001board member uh oh board chair Coleman present. You have eight in the affirmative. We have board member Williams also. Board where board member Williams present. We have eight in the affirmative. Seven. Seven and affirmative. Thank you. We do have a quorum. Tonight's posting of the colors is presented by White Haven High School. Please stand for the pledge of allegiance. Please remain standing for a moment of silence. Tonight's moment of silence is for the two students from Book Washington High School, BTW, who tragically lost their lives on Thursday, April 24th, 2025 following an off off-campus shooting. We extend our deepest condolences to their families, loved ones, and the entire BTW community. We'd also And we'd also like to include Carl Johnson, Jr. Thank you. You may be seated. We are now on to the approval of
002the agenda. Are there any amendments? In Superintendent Richmond? Yes. Uh I think there are what items general counsel are we still removing those items from earlier. Uh thank you interimm superintendent. Items 11 uh.7 needs to be removed from the agenda and item well [Music] 24 needs to be removed from the agenda and added or from the consent agenda and added to the request for action. Please are we leaving 11.25 25. Yes. Thank you. Board member Kenny. No, I just wanted to remove 11.24 from the consent agenda. So 11.7 and 11.24. Yes. No, they said no. No. It's not just move to the discussion agenda. Is there a motion for the approval of the agenda and second? Motion. Second. Motion by board member Otay, second by board member Murphy. Roll call vote, please. Board member McKisik.
003I. Board member Garcia. I. Board member Murphy. I. Board member Love. I. Board member McKenna. I. Board member Otay. I. Board member Williams. I. Board Chair Coleman. I. You have aid in the affirmative. Board member Porter. Present. Are you voting? We're voting on the agenda. Yes, we have nine in the affirmative. Thank you. The agenda is approved. We are now on to public comment. In accordance with state statute, the board shall reserve a period for public comment during business and special call meetings. Only those members of the public who submit public comment cards to the board chairman prior to the commencement of this meeting shall be permitted to address the board. Public comments shall be taken in the order in which the public comment cards are received. A signup sheet for public comment will be
004will become available 30 minutes prior to each applica meeting and will will be closed at the start of the meeting. This sign up is located at the entryway table just past the security checkpoint. Speakers must state their name, organization he or she is representing, if any, and subject of their comment before they are permitted to proceed. Speakers may offer an objective comment about school operations and programs that concern them. Speakers are acts to refrain from using names of personnel or names of persons connected with the school system, particularly when lodging a complaint. Speakers will not be permitted to engage in gossip, make defamatory comments, or use abusive or vulgar language. The chairman shall have the authority to terminate the remarks of any any individual who is disruptive and does not adhere to board rules. Dr.
005Schultz will announce the number of speakers and time allotted per speaker. This evening we have 20 speakers, one and one half minutes each. Your time is projected on the screen to your right and directly behind the board. When you hear a bell, your time has expired. Our first three speakers, Latasha Griggs, Bishop Charles Lampin, John Nichols. Good afternoon. My name is Tasha Greavves. My address is still change 31 Southern. I want to speak today about accountability. That's what I want to speak about. Dr. Richmond, I understand that you're the captain of this ship. And by you being the captain of this ship, I expect you to run your ship as so. Now, what I have a hard time understanding is why do we as the taxpayers pay for the Carter Malone group to do the
006public speaking when we have a commissioner that seems to think that every time she just got to say something. She just got to say something, not realizing she making a situation worseer by saying anything. First of all, second of all, we wouldn't be at this point where we are dealing with the state versus the board had it not been for six of them. So now, six of those members up there who divided the community, but they never came back to try to fix the fix it. They divided us, but they didn't try to fix us. What they did was they went out and found somebody else to make them comfortable where they at. That's not what it's about. It's not. And on a side note, you live you you come from Detroit. You live in
007South Memphis. I'm from South Mississippi. Bishop Lamin, 1637 Britain Street, Memphis 38108. I've been silent for a minute and I've spoken to several of the leaders up there. one whom I hold a great high regard. Uh he's my brother and he's my friend and I believe that he's going to make things happen in due season. What I'm concerned with is that yeah, this community has been divided by ugly personal whatever. But you have to deal with God with that. I just want to put you on notice. House Bill 662 is not dead. Senate Bill 714 is not dead. And guess what? It's a whole lot of us that went up to Nashville that don't just look like me, one of my partners standing right next to me and a whole bunch of other people. Please,
008please use this time wisely and try and unite the community. Please don't go out and represent us at the Kuanas Club and all these other places and read from a prepared statement and make us look worse than what we already look. Have a dignified approach to what we're trying to do and what we're trying to represent. There's a lot of you up there that I hold with a lot of respect. One that trained me and I respect her and I respect you all. Let's come together and let's bring this team and this community together. This is the opportunity. Don't miss it. My name is John Nichols, 6367 Shadowwood Lane, Memphis, Tennessee 38119. Good evening board members. My name is John Nichols. to serve as the interim CEO of Literacy Midsouth. I want to begin by
009expressing my gratitude to Dr. Richmond, Dr. Whitelaw, Mr. Langston, and their respective teams. Over the past several months, we've had thoughtful and collaborative discussions about the future of the Tutor 91 program in MSCS. Now completing its third year, Tutor 91 has provided high dosage inschool tutoring to MS students, making a measurable impact on student achievement. Many of you have seen this in action, and I thank you for your time in doing that. Tutor 911 works not only by accelerating learning outcomes, but by reinforcing and supporting the instruction that takes place in every MSCS classroom. It honors the expertise of classroom teachers and administrators, actively engages family and community members, and creates a joyful learning experience for everyone involved. As our city navigates economic uncertainty, Tutor 91 represents a strategic research-based investment in our most important
010resource, our children. LMS is prepared to contribute $6 million over the next four years, the entirety of our newly awarded EIR grant to sustain this vital work. However, in order to continue reaching 1500 students each semester, we are requesting an annual investment of $ 1.9 million from MCS, approximately 0.10% of the proposed district budget. While we understand this is a significant ask, it's an investment worth making and we thank you for your consideration. Our next three speakers are Nina Addison, Trudy Roston, and Hannah Mieran. And I apologize for the last name. Hello everyone. Nina Addison, 6215 Hatterson Drive, Memphis, Tennessee 3119. I've had the wonderful opportunity to tutor in our grade schools of Memphis. I'm not here to reiterate stats or data of how useful our program is to the district, but I'm here to
011make an appeal on the importance of a tutoring program to any educational institution. A timelmited instructional classroom approach is not going to do it alone. As technology is becoming more advanced and academic achievement more challenging, tutoring provides reinforcement of both fundamental and supplemental skills in a calming atmosphere. What's so amazing and different about our program is that our reinforcement takes place during the school days, providing optimal results. I love to hear our students say, "My teacher just told us that, but I didn't quite get it." Here, we through the art of repetition and cultivation begin working on the skill desired until it is mastered. We are able to catch students at their initial point of difficulty rather than after school or once a week. We work with teachers in the same setting and on the
012same skill. It is my silent wish that every child could be served by our program. Thank you for listening. Good evening. I'm Trudy Royston at 5316 Coner View Lane. My zip code is 38002. I am the tutor support manager at Alcy Elementary as well as the tutor 901 team lead and I do work for Literacy Midsouth. I'm excited to talk with you this evening about the importance of the tutor 901 program. The work that we do for our Shelby County students is intentional. Much time and effort is placed into preparing and annotating lessons, addressing student needs, and communicating with our schools. Our school tutors receive intensive and ongoing training and observations to address strengths and areas to improve. We use evaluation results to tailor our tutoring tutor training to enhance their performance. We stress daily
013with our students that we are there to help them. Once we identify the needs, we may share information with administration and teachers as needed. Our tutor support manager team continuously works to identify areas of improvement as well as research and share strategies to get us there. We want to make a difference with the students that we tutor. Our students know that we are about the business when working with them, and we have high expectations for their growth. We stress bell-to-bell instruction and good time management and pacing to maximize instructional time with our students. As a part of our community engagement efforts, we have attended additional activities to dispense books to our students and families to use while at home, such as recently the MSCS lock in and level up TECAP prep event. We hope that
014you will join us and support our program by prioritizing tutor 901 in the budget. Thank you. My name is Hannah McTinan, uh, 4049 Graham Oaks Court 38122. Um, I work as a tutor support manager for Literacy Midsouth's Tutor 901 program. And prior to my time with Tutor 901, I spent seven years as a educator in Memphis Shelby County Schools. Anyone who has ever taught will tell you that when it comes to supporting students, it truly takes a village. And Tutor 901 provides that. A village of tutors who can provide small groupoup instruction that one teacher alone physically cannot. Our tutoring groups are ratioed one tutor to three students for 45 minutes at a time. something even the most seasoned and skilled teachers physically cannot do. What makes our program extra special is our village of
015tutors, many of whom are here this evening. We currently employ a diverse core of nearly 200 folks um ranging from those who are retired educators to those as young as 18 years old who are trying to figure out next steps. We've had many folks who decide to go on to become educators after participating in as tutors in the tutor 901 program. But what makes these people so special is their hardworking attitudes and hunger to learn. Tutor 901 tutors are held to really high standards. They are trained on the science of reading. They receive ongoing coaching and attend monthly literacy training by former educators like myself. As many of you know, you can we cannot do this alone. We need your support. I'm asking you to please prioritize tutor 901 in the budget and help us
016to continue to be the village that our students deserve. Thank you. Sandra Ford, Carrie Catrell, Olivia Mack. Good evening. My name is Sandra Bryant Ford and I am a tutor at 901. I'm a room tutor at um 901 tutor. Excuse me. I am a tutor 901 room monitor and tutor. My address is 3555 Acacia Drive. I'm here to speak about why Tutor 901 works. I am a former uh educator. I'm retired now and I can tell you exactly why it works. It works because, as you've already heard, a small group support. We have just three students at a table, 45 minute sessions, and three times a week we work with these students. As a matter of fact, you've already heard it. Our mantra is we we tutor bellto bell. During the school day, tutors follow
017pre-prepared foundational skills and annotated I already lessons that are tied to grade level skills and expectations. Tutors are provided ongoing training throughout the year. Tutors also take part in what we refer to as tutor learning communities. Not PLC's, professional learning communities, but tutor learning communities. How does that work? Well, in between classes, we discuss and model strategies on how to roll out new lessons. That's a part of our ongoing uh professional development. Above all, we take the work with our students seriously and tutors are caring and consistent. That matters. In addition, Literacy Med gives away book books quarterly. We give monthly attendance participation certi certificates. I thank you. I encourage you. Please continue to support Tutor 901. Thank you. Good evening. Um, my name is Carrie Cutrell and my address is 756 North Evergreen 38107.
018Miss Catrell, can you lift the mic up a little bit? Is that better? Yes, ma'am. Thank you. Okay. I'm a tutor at Literacy Midsouth in the Tutor 901 program. Tutor 901 is built on a researchbacked model designed to reach the students who need us most. We work in schools in small groups three times a week providing focused personal support tied directly to what students are learning in class. But it's not just about reading levels and scores. It's about connection. It's about believing in students who sometimes don't even believe in themselves yet. My first year tutoring, I worked at an elementary school where there was a lot of anger. One of my students was known for throwing chairs when she got upset. But during during our tutoring time, she usually found a little peace. One day,
019she came to me in a terrible mood. I knelt down to ask her what was wrong, and she rubbed her arms and told me that she didn't want to have dark skin anymore, that her mother told her that she couldn't be her child because her skin was too dark. She cried, and I almost cried, too. That moment broke something open in me. From then on, every time I saw her, I made a point to tell her that she mattered, that I was happy to see her and that she is important. Within a week, her teacher told me that she had stopped throwing chairs and wasn't getting physical with kids anymore. I like to think that I had an impact on her, but honestly, she had just much of an impact on me. She's one of
020the reasons I went back to school to get my teach masters in teaching because I want to be part of the solution. Tutor 901 is part of the solution. It's not just literacy. It's healing. It's hope. And it's a bridge to a better future. But now with state funding ending, we need MSCS to invest $2 million annually to keep this work alive. Thank you for listening to me. Olivia Mack, 2000 North Parkway 38112. I'm here representing Literacy Midsouth. I'm a third-year student at Roads College, double majoring in English and history. And for the past two years, I've had the privilege of serving as a tutor with Literacy Midsouth, an experience that's been both foundational and formative in my journey as an educator. Working with these third graders, I help support their literacy development during a
021critical time in their academic growth. This work allows me to bridge theory and practice, bringing to life the concepts I learn in the classroom through real life hands-on experience. Tutor 901 works because it meets students where they're at and gives them what they need. Small group instruction, uh, held during the school day and aligned with classroom con content and delivered by trained, compassionate, and consistent tutors. Literacy Midsouth doesn't just support students, it supports tutors like me. The training we receive aligns closely with my coursework at Roads, reinforcing key concepts from multiple perspectives. And even more valuable are the people. Many of my fellow tutors are retired MSES educators, administrators, and literacy specialists. Their guidance and insights have been some of my greatest learning tools, helping me grow, not just as a tutor, but a future
022teacher. To keep this vital program running, MSES must commit $2 million annually. It's a modest investment for a program that is delivering real, measurable, measurable results. I see this difference in this program every day. At the beginning of the year, my students are often discouraged and unsure of themselves and are frustrated with simple writing tasks, but within weeks, they are ready to engage, eager to write, ready to revise, and proud of their progress. Thank you. Our next three speakers, first name Karnita, last name Farmer Justina Wright Paulina Avalos. Hi, it's Kenthia like Cynthia with a K. It's uh I'm Ken. No, you're fine. I'm Kenthia Farmer, tutor with Literacy Mids South um at Robert R. Church and my address is 3100 Stone Street, Memphis, Tennessee. So, um you guys heard great things about Tutor 901
023and we all know when it comes to sports, if you look at sports, that there are intangibles that make things valuable. So if you ever watch sports, do you know that one person that's like that locker room leader that is that energy driver, that hustler, that grit and grinder? So not only do we provide the data that you've heard and that you'll continue to hear, we provide those intangibles in those schools. We are a lot of these kids locker room leaders. We provide that confidence for a lot of these kids. We are that 101, that direct connection that some of these kids are longing to look for to the point that kids that aren't even in our classrooms, they'll come up to us, they'll hug us, they'll be able to get this experience of there
024are extra hands around on top of the net positive tutor 901 provides. We provide these aspects. We provide the additional energy for our students. We provide the deeper connection with trauma-informed care. We provide additional outlets for the buildings for our students and other students who see us weekly. We build confidence. There are students who just took the teac, but because they're familiar with us when they're breaking down, they look to us and we're able to kind of be that that rich auntie in the school that's given them that pep talk, those extra hands. They're able to kind of get them across that line of success. So, we are the invaluable to a lot of these kids. We are their MVP. Good evening. My name is Justina Knight. I am a 901 tutor. Home address, 3589
025Coington Pike, Unit 207, Memphis 38128. I'm reading the statement on behalf of one of our tutor room monitors who is unable to be here today. Her name is Sherah Canrell and she states, "Since joining as a tutor in 2023, I have witnessed significant progress in reading fluency among the students. I've worked with at two distinctly different school sites. While academics is the primary focus, I have seen firsthand how building connections with students is crucial. This connection fosters acceptance of support leading to increased confidence as they navigate through the program. Tutor 911 is truly effective. The small group support we provide during the day three times a week, 45 minutes per session, offers a reinforcement that students desperately need. Unfortunately, we have recently learned that funding for the tutor 901 program is coming to an end.
026To sustain this invaluable program, MCS we would would need to invest $2 million a year. This investment is vital as we have proven results that positivity impact students across the district. I kindly ask you to prioritize the tutor 901 program in the budget for the upcoming school year. We have made notable achievements and cannot afford to take steps backwards at this crucial time. Thank you for considering this important request. Thank you. Hi, good evening. My name is Paulina Avalos and my address is 4047 Allison Avenue 3A122. I am a former student and a former educator of SCES as well as a parent of a SCES student. I am here because I wanted to discuss the possible ways we could help a vital part of our student population, undocumented students. First of all, I'd like to
027say that we need to invest in anti-racist curriculum for the schoolboard members. It is embarrassing that we have schoolboard members threatening to deport former students. This is not how a school board member should feel about undocumented students or any students. Actually, our schools are supposed to be warm and welcoming environments for all students, and our board members need to exemplify this as well. With that being said, I know that we have all heard about the laws that Tennessee has been trying to pass blocking undocumented students from having a free education. We as a community are asking you all to pass regulations supporting our undocumented students. You must show that this is actually a safe space for all students by taking action and by actually paying attention when I'm speaking. That would be that would be
028marvelous. Um, not by standing by while our undocumented students suffer. Not by calling to deport former students. Thank you. Elliot Lee Charlie Nelson. Last name Emmy J I A. Good evening. My name is Elliot Lee. My address is 4047 Allison Avenue. I want to thank the board members that paid attention to my wife while she was sharing that important message. It is critical right now that we pay attention to those who need to be listened to. As an educator for nearly 10 years, I've been blessed to work closely with our Hispanic population. Both as an ESL teacher and an e English teacher, excuse me. Some of these students were recent arrivals. Others were in SCES their whole lives. They knew what it was. But no matter their background, I knew it was my job to
029make these students feel safe, feel welcome and feel as if they had a chance to learn and grow and prosper. That is our job as educators and also our job as adults. We chose this career to better future generations. So what happened that made some of us go back on that good? What happened that made some of us decide the size of our wallets were more important than the fostering of our youth's education? Should we not make the education of every child in Shelby County, regardless of their status, our number one priority? I ask these questions because we are on borrowed time. Given the current state of both the country and of Memphis itself, there is no moment for caution or hesitance or whatever benol excuse we can bring up in order to ignore this
030problem. We have a duty, a sworn one, to educate our students. We have a duty to nurture our students, but most importantly, we have a duty to protect our students, not to threaten them. Thank you for your [Applause] time. How y'all doing today? My name is Charlie Nelson, 1212 Stra Cordova, Tennessee. Uh, nice to see y'all again. But I'm here to talk about um, you know, I'm about my fight about uh, equality. Um, still ain't hearing nothing back. I've been applying for plenty job. No interview, no no feedback. Uh, Tito, you did call me. I appreciate that, but it's just not, you know, good enough. I need to know what's going on. It's none of my background. I've been going there for two years. That's why I filed a federal lawsuit, but it's been dismissed.
031Can't keep making excuses. HR Leon Brook, I talked to you. You real sweet. Um, my fight is not by no contract. I want to know why. Who blackball me? Stop me from getting a job. What I hustle the street, you know what I'm saying? The hustle flow. Ain't got nothing to do with me. I ain't never been convicted. I never been caught with a crime. I'm I'm clean record. You can't hold my my street capability. What I do, what my what kind of car I drive, how I dress. So, what I'm saying is, u Mr. Rob Rich in the state trying to take over. So y'all need to get it right because I'm going to start holling defund. I'm going to call Mar White. I'm going call Bren Taylor to defund cuz y'all ain't going
032to help people get jobs. Any defund. I'm going to call Donald Trump defund. So I'm giving you a chance. I came down here last time I told you I don't play games. I told fake one she wrong. I don't play game. You know I don't play. So if y'all ain't going to do right, let the feds come on in TV. I investigate everybody. I ain't going to play no game cuz I'm tired of my name being slandered. I call every now one of you board members up here to help me. Y'all keep saying y'all don't want to help, but I'mma put put nine more new board members. Y'all want to help? What do I got you in my district? If you ain't gonna help me, get somebody out of here gonna do their job. I'm
033through talking. You need to do what y'all supposed to do. My record clean. I want to be exonerated. Have a good day. God bless you. Hello, my name is Elizabeth Vernon. Um, I live at 2016 King's Cross Lane in Cordova, 38016. Um, as many of you are aware, our special needs population is growing with no signs of stopping. Our rooms are filled to capacity, at times over capacity, with kids who require individual attention, intense monitoring, and differentiated instruction. I've been both a teacher assistant and a teacher for the past five years in a pre-case bedroom. I've seen what works best for our students and that is consistency. Consistent teachers, consistent rules, consistent expectations, and consistent smiling, friendly faces. Teacher assistants in the special education room are very important part of that consistency. And without our
034TA, special education rooms would be chaotic, unmanageable, resemble more of a daycare than a classroom. I could talk about everything they do, but a TA wears all kinds of hats. They do everything and have the expectations of a teacher most of the times as well. Some of our days are dangerous. Uh some days are long. Every day is incredibly busy. TAs have the expectation of a teacher but the compensation of a retail worker. They are paid a maximum of 35 hours a week but expected to arrive early and occasionally stay late. They're only paid for half of the school holidays. And since they're a 10-month employee, they receive no compensation during the summer. It has become increasingly rare to find good special education assistants, and it's hard to find people who have the right heart.
035Almost every year during the summer, I have to worry about having to find a new person to fill a TA's role and hope that they didn't find a summer job that will pay them more money with less expectations. Um, teachers are underpaid, but TAs are grossly underpaid and they do not make a livable wage. A step in the right direction would be to make them a 12-month employee. Thank you guys very much. Our last two speakers are Sharon Montgomery and Robbie Williams. Hello, my name is Renee Jose. I'm going to be helping on behalf of the Office of Multilingual Learners to translate into English. Kingsbury. Hello, my name is Karen Mahia and I live in 3969 South Kingsbury. I am a mother of three children, two of them by which um are students of the
036district of Memphis Shelby. [Music] My oldest daughter um can be affected by the proposal. a law um that indicates that students that are immigrants um will be denied education. Um the law HB793 right now is on pause but can potentially return next year. Um that is why I am here with other mothers and members of the community. I'm asking for the the board of education today to approve a statement in contra in in against the law HB793. I hope to count with your support for all of the students of the immigrant community as well as all students as a whole. Thank you. Good evening everyone. My name is Sharon Montgomery. I I'm with Micah. I live at 1048 Crosswood Lane, Cordova, Tennessee 38018. We uh we are requesting resolution resolution uh a resolution to protect
037our students regardless of their immigrant immigration status. As a retired teacher, I can't imagine putting children through such a traumatic experience. We say that students are lifelong learners. So what is this teaching our students? This will not only affect our students with immigrant status, but it can also affect a child who wonders what happened to their friend or neighbor who was subjected to arrest by ICE. Our schools must protect the innocent that are caught up in a political situation. Again, we request a resolution protecting education for all. Thank you to our speakers. Board member Otay, I just wanted to thank you, board chair. I just wanted to uh thank all of all of you guys that came out and spoke today. I just wanted to say from the very first person to the last, we
038hear you and I thank you for the work that you're doing in the community. I see a lot of you boots on the ground and I appreciate that. We all appreciate that. But I just wanted to make sure you know that we hear you and we're thankful for you coming out to speak today. Thank you. We are now on to the approval of the minutes from the following meetings. The I beg your pardon. Am I not disposed? Should I proceed? Go ahead, sir. I'm sorry. Greetings and thank you. I'm Roby Williams. I reside at 160 Island Place. I S L A N D Place P L Ace C Memphis, Tennessee. I'm a registered voting taxpayer and I stand today as a representative of the Castellia Magnolia Community Development Corporation. I have one mission. Mr. W,
039can you pick the mic up just a little bit so we can hear you clearly? Thank you. Should I begin? Should I begin with my name and address? Okay. Thank you. I'm here for one mission, one purpose to have the board convey the Magnolia school property to the Castasteria Magnolia CDC. We want to use that property as a community anchor. We are a CDC who've been involved with the community for some time now and we've had a number of activities over there. We come to you not asking for something that where we haven't made any investment in the community. We had a number of cleanups in the community where over 100 people participated. What we're trying to do is make this this former Magnolia School anchor in the community where we'll have where we'll have
040programs for senior services and for youth. When we did have our cleanup, we had persons from baby boomers to 15 year olds. All strat all strata of the age groups are represented in this effort. Did someone say thank you? You're very welcome. And we I'm just here to carefully convey strongly recommend and repeatedly suggest that we do this convey that property to the to the Castereia Magnolia CDC. Thank you very much. Thank you. And I do apologize. Thank you. Now we're on to the approval of the minutes from the March 18th work session and the March 25th business meeting. Are there any corrections? There being no corrections, do we have a motion to approve these minutes and a second? Motion to approve. Second. Motion by board member Huitt Garcia, second by board member Porter. Roll
041call vote, please. Board member McKisik. I. Board member Garcia. I. Board member Porter. I. Board member Murphy. Board member Love. Hi. Board member McKenna. I. Board member Otay. Hi. Board member Williams. I. Board chair Coleman. I. You have eight in the affirmative. Thank you. That motion passes. We are now on to committee reports. We're now on to the board chair's report. Please join me in wishing a very, very special young lady a very happy birthday. She celebrated her birthday this past Friday, this past Saturday, this past Sunday. She She celebrated. Now we'll turn to the screen, please. Board member Stephanie Love. Wishing you all the best this year and all the many years to come. Board member love, happy birthday. Continue to show all your love and all your support and I really truly appreciate
042everything you do for our students. Again, happy birthday and may all your pain be champagne. Hello. I would like to send a very very special happy birthday to my friend and my colleague Stephanie Love, Commissioner Stephanie Love. And I want you to know that I love you. I appreciate you. And thank you for everything that you do. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday, dear Stephanie. Happy birthday to you. Love you, Ladybug. Have a great birthday. Hi, Vice Chair Love. Happy birthday. I hope you are celebrated and you take some time to rest and have a little fun, too. Happy birthday, Stephanie Love. I hope you have a wonderful day and thank you for all of your dedication and commitment to Memphis Shelby County Schools, the students, parents, and the community. Have
043a wonderful day. Hey, Stephanie. I heard you're turning 35 again. I hope your day is as wonderful as you are. Happy birthday. It's your birthday. It's your birthday. It's my friend's birthday. Happy birthday, Stephanie. 35 and holding looks mighty good on you. Enjoy your special lunch. Love you, [Music] girl. Ladies and gentlemen, please join me. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday, dear Stephanie. Happy birthday to you and many more. Thank you all so very much. I'm still [Laughter] celebrating. Now we're on to our recognitions. We're going to start with board member McKisik from District 1. We ask that the ID well IDA wild elementary chess team come in at this time. Board member board members you all can go down to the front if you want to stand as we recognize
044them and sup interim superintendent please go down. Super exciting as they make their way. I just want to say congratulations to Idle Elementary. Not only just outstanding the preK or not the preK, the primary and the elementary groups both won the state championship in two divisions for chess. Congratulations. Boy milk. Boy, go down. You see those big trophies we have. [Applause] I'm read. I got read all. Yeah, I got all this. Just give it to [Applause] Yeah. Board member McKisik is going to announce these students names. I'm going to I'm going to have chair uh hand out the certificates for me as I call the names. I did a whole tutorial on how to pronounce the names of these outstanding students. So, where's your sheet? Can I see your sheet? Okay. So, we have 12
045students. And in recognition of the Idwell Elementary Chess team's participation in the 2025 Harry Saving Tennessee State Scholastic Team Chess Tournament for primary, that means K through three and elementary, K through five levels. We celebrate a historic achievement competing against some of the finest schools in the entire state of Tennessee. They secured this victory. So just congratulations to principal Kirsten Schnacki, vice principal William, Dr. William Schuman, program sponsor, Mrs. Rebecca Taylor, and where is coach? Coach, where are you? There you are. I So we don't I don't have your name right here, but I know that I've got Just call me Coach Mark. Coach Mark. Coach Mark has been holding it down, and they brought home the big win. Y'all, this is super huge. These little kids are blowing it out the water with chess.
046So, I'm going to call as best I can. Please uh apologize for any pronunciations. Pardon? Would you please come up here and do it? And so, I'm I put them in alphabetical order. Great. So, great. All right. Okay. Well, the primary team Calvin Tyler, Julian Tyler, Sota Yoshida, Gen Siglin, Levi Fitzpatrick, and kindergarter Satcha Yoshida on the elementary team. Yasine Judine, Rosson Ganis, Kay Siglin, Kyus Krenshaw, Oscar Brasic, and James Ganis. And we will be traveling to nationals next week taking on the top teams in the country. Congratulations. And we would also like to offer. We would also like to recognize from the from Idaw Keith Shinglin K. K. Kay won third place in this year's Tennessee Civics essay contest by the Tennessee Secretary of State. Kay received a $100 Tennessee Star scholarship and a
047trip to the state capital. During the award ceremony, students are assigned to serve as pages for either a state senator or representative during the House session. Kay will will serve as senator as a senator page with leader Romesh Abear. [Applause] up. How's up [Music] There you go. [Applause] ulations. Next, we will recognize board member McKenna, District 2. Thank you all. We're so proud of you. District two board member McKenna, Santia Ryan. Okay, I'm sorry. We're going to rec we're going to recognize Santia Ryan. Hopefully at our next board meeting, Kenneth Parsons Jr. from Douglas High School. The the Douglas High School. Let's give it up for Kenneth Parson Jr. as he comes forth in recognition of outstanding academic performances. Mom, come on. Come on, Mom. In recognition of outstanding academic performances throughout his time at
048Douglas High Optional School, his dedication to his studies is matched by his commitment to leadership and service. Kenneth holds several leadership roles, including serving as a member of the student council, band president, and battalion commander of the Red Devil Battalion. Let's give it up for Kenneth Parsons Jr. [Applause] We have the assistant principal, Miss Audrey Jones, with us on this evening. Congratulations, Mr. Parson. Next from board member McKenna, we have Olivia Mitchell from Kingsbury High School. In recognition of Olivia's exceptional dedication and accomplishment, especially during project graduation and summer school, she exhibited an impressive level of effort and commitment to her academic aspirations. Her relentless hard work and determinations have facilitated her early graduation and we take great pride in celebrating her achievement. Congratulations. Thank you, chair. I just wanted to say um that I
049recognized four students really. The other one um is going to be recognized tomorrow at the college signing. But I wanted to say for Kenneth Parsons, I want you to stand up again. Kenneth Kenneth person p he shared his personal statement with me. He has persevered um through many trials with his family and he has done that and still he rises. He is going to University of Memphis and Kenneth Kenneth is very clear about his direction. He will be our state senator one day. Okay, Olivia. And I want to say thank you to Kenneth's parents, mother. Thank you. Thank you, Olivia. Is she still here? Okay, Olivia. I You're just amazing. You're amazing. You You need to know that. You need to hear that. You graduated early. You persevered. And Olivia is going to Southern University.
050that brings a special place in my heart because I'm a H.B.CU grad. So, go Southern. All right. All right. So, I just want I and I wanted to do this because we we um we honored all of the val Victorians and saludiatorans um just this past week. But we need to know, all of you need to know that we have more than just valad Victorians and saludiatorans who are doing the work and are going places. Santia couldn't make it today. Santia is going to roads college. She will be going to Roads College. She is a graduate of Craigmont High School. I also have Jaylen Williams. Jaylen Williams got the Gates Scholarship. She and that's a full ride. Full ride. She's going to University of Memphis. She got the Yale Book Award last year. So that's
051and and these are the students that we're graduating from our our high school. So I want everyone to give all of these students a big round of applause. I appreciate it. We're going to keep moving. Uh board vice chair Love District Three in honor of autism awareness. She has Kayn Crump from Raleigh Egypt High School. Kayn, here he comes. Come on, [Applause] Kayla. Yes. Come on, parents. In recognition of his outstanding progress and dedication to autism, Kalin is demonstrating remarkable growth and progress, communication, social skills, academic performance, his hard work and dedication and his positive impact on Raleigh Egyp High, the Riley Egypt High School in the classroom. We celebrate him tonight. [Applause] Oh my god. Thank you. [Applause] Wait. Okay. Um, so Kayn was not supposed to live. He spent the first year of
052his life in the hospital and when he came out of surgery, they basically told me that he was going to die and here we are 18 years later. So, [Applause] [Music] Our next young person is Carson Comb from Kate Bun PreK. recognition from vice chair love. Caleb is a in recognition of his outstanding progress and dedication. Carson is demonstrating remarkable growth and progress. Carson's hard work, dedication, and positive impact at Kate Bond PreK in the classroom. This recognition is a testament of the hard work and positive impact he has on those around him. Thank you. Thank you for sharing Carson with us. I'd like to thank Kia Shine who's partnering with us uh to promote autism awareness. Thank you. We got the back. Our next will be board member from board member Ford uh district
0534, I'm sorry, board member Porter. and he's recognizing tonight the men of valor from New Sardis Baptist Church in recognition of the men of valor for their unwaving dedication and commitment to the mentorship program at Highland Oaks Elementary. Your positive presence has made a meaningful impact on the lives of our students on from greeting students each morning to assisting doing TCAP testing. Your service exemplifies true leadership, compassion, and community spirit. We have with us this evening Mr. Johnny Brand, Mr. Floyd Moore, Mr. Stanley Walker, Mr. Clyde Kingston, Mr. Rick Downey, the coach, Mr. Leroy Mlan, Mr. Don Gray, Dan Gray, I apologize. Reverend Brian Robert, Brian Robertson, and Reverend Dr. Daryl Harington. Thank you. Thank you, Jim. Thank you. Uh, Nousad's men of Valley are under the leadership of Dr. Darl Harrington and we are
054so glad to be here this afternoon. Uh, we are absolutely trying to do an outstanding job in the community and on a scale of 1 to 10. We probably at a nine and a half right now because we are mentoring as they said at Holland Oaks Elementary and uh I know for sure it's a task but we definitely enjoy building relationships with our students. So that is so important and we want to present Commissioner Marcus Tomarcus Porter with the gift uh men of valor shirt and a coffee cup. So, uh, Tom Marcus, thank you so much for supporting us and everything that we do. And his name is actually on the roster for the men of valor. So, he's along with us. If one is doing something, we all are doing something in the community.
055So, thank you so much. Thank you, young man. I remember when. Thank you. Appreciate you. Yes. Been a long time. Been a long time. Thank you so much. Thank you for district five board member Otay. The first one is for Oak Grove Baptist Church. The host pastor is Pastor Donald Johnson. Is anyone here from Oakrove? Hope in Him morning Chapel Baptist Church. Well, we thank both of these churches for supporting our students and our buildings, our teachers. The third one is from Memphis and May, Tequila Rucker. Memphis for All. I'm sorry, Mr. Kila Rucker. In recognition of Memphis for All for their unwaving dedication to the advocating for positive changes in our community with a powerful blend of political fire and soulful tenderness, she has led with purpose, mobilizing voters, building movements, nurturing wounded hearts,
056and championing the rights and well-being of our children. Tequila has made invaluable efforts to strengthen our community and inspiring hope and actions across generations. We thank you. [Applause] Mommy. Congratulations, Miss Rucker. Now for district nine, we have John Griffin Jr. John was recognized as youth of the year by the Melrose Boys and Girls Club. by the Boys and Girls Club from the Merose High School. John Griffin Jr. in recognition of your outstanding achievement and dedication, embodying the qualities of a true leader and role model and proudly designated as MEO's Boys and Girls Club Youth of the Year Award. John's leadership, perseverance, and commitment to making a difference has truly set him apart. He from the Melrose High School, Mr. Langston. And the principal of the Merose High School is Mr. Christopher Davis. Next we have
057Miss Unique Monroe. Is Unique here? Let me tell you all about Unique. Unique Supra Superintendent. She is recognized for designing the Memphis in May t-shirt for 2025. [Applause] The t-shirts that will be sold for the Memphis and May Festival was the was designed by Miss Unique Monroe. Congratulations, Unique. Congratulations. Unique is a seventh grader, a middle school at Haven View Middle School. Next, we will recognize Nia Kia Shine and Alicia Coleman in recognition of autism advocacy for their outstanding advocacy efforts and unwaving commitment to supporting the autism community and improving the lives of individuals. I had a chance to go to a couple of schools with him and the love that he shows for our special young people is just hands down we appreciate you. He was just giving out toys to the kids. Just
058making them feel like they are somebody and he was showing them how important and how special. We thank you. I want to thank each and every one of you uh up here. um the care the teachers, the educators, caregivers, the parents, you know, um my autism community appreciates what you guys do every day for our community and especially my son who's nonverbal and with profound autism. I really appreciate the teachers because a teacher made the difference in his life. So that's why we do purpose work. Um I want to say that the special needs community are is different, not less and they blessed by the best and I thank y'all so much. Thank you. Thank you. Now, I'mma turn it around. Board members, you can go back up there for a minute. We're in for
059a treat. Um, I have four young people. Board member Toana Murphy called me late one night and said, "Madame Chair, Madame Chair, you got to see these kids." And I'm like, "Miss Murphy, it's late. I don't even want to see my own kids this late." But when I sat up and watched them, I was in absolute awe of what you are about to see. I want you to meet Dian Maurice Brown. Is that you? Turn around so they can see you. Dia Marie Brown, is that you? They attend Soulsville Charter School. Deanna McKenzie Brown. Deanna and Davian Malik Brown. They attend Home Ro Homes [Applause] Road. These are the Brown Four and they were featured last week on American Idol as guest artist. So give it up for Memphis own the Brown [Applause] four. Oh,
060how [Applause] I how I love you. Oh, how I how I love to. [Music] Oh. How I love you. Because because because because because he [Music] Me loves me. Loves me. Loves me. Oo. [Applause] You are wonderful. You are wonderful. You are one. Oh my god. Oh my god. Men are in love. Wow. I saw church man. Excellent. Oh my god. Beautiful. Excellent. Excellent. Give yours a minute, y'all. She crying. Give her a minute. Excellent. Wow. Y'all, these my babies here. These my babies and they represent Memphis well with over 14 million views. Miss Okay. Come on. Come on. This is their mom. Give their mom. [Applause] Bless you. Bless you. We're going to keep moving as they're giving out their certificates. Uh this is also from board member Murphy Hamilton High School validictorian Denia
061Welton. Is Denia here? Class of 2025 saludiatoran Danisha Britam Hamilton High class of 2025. Jeremy Livingston. Okay. I have two more quickly. All of these will be given to them next week. We would like to do a special special honor. I have two young ladies that I get great pleasure out of going on the second floor. Uh, the first young lady I want to introduce you to is somebody that's been with the district for 25 years. She's worked directly with our interim superintendent for 20 years. Come on, Miss Tammy Edwards. Give Miss Tammy a standing ovation. She been putting up with me for 20 years. [Applause] She's a graduate of Southwest Comm Community College and the University of Memphis. A few of her responsibilities because you heard Dr. Richmond, those that didn't hear you say
062she's been putting up with him for over 20 years and she does it. I don't care when you go in that office, she has a smile on her face. Some some very very limited of her responsibilities. This is what she does. Some of it, okay? She schedules meetings. She enters contracts. She does board docs. And she mid minty including putting up with intram superintendent Richmond for over 25 years. We honor you on tonight. Hold on one sec. And I also would like to honor all of our administrative assistants from last week. Happy administrative assistance day which was last Wednesday. Again, I want to thank Tammy. I love her and I appreciate her. Uh I don't know I couldn't do this job without her. I couldn't have made it to the point that I am without
063her. And so Tammy, today we honor you. I appreciate you. And we have she has someone that works with Miss June Nicholls. She's been with the district for 25 years. She started out as a classroom teacher. She's a graduate. Come on, Miss Nichols. Yes, sir. Come on, Miss June. We love Miss June, too. We couldn't make it without Miss June. She's a graduate of the University of Memphis. Here we go, sister. Some of her end her duties include preparing appeals for the superintendent submitted by parents, compiling appeals for the discipline hearing discipline hearing authority for the network hearing officials and scheduling hearings. She also advises on top of doing all that, she also advises and trains school administrators on entering discipline data in power school. We salute both of you beautiful young ladies. Thank you.
064[Applause] Are any of our students from Invictus here tonight? Anybody from Invictus? Okay. We're not going to apologize for the length that it takes, but as our interim superintendent says so often, greatness grows here. And in order for it to grow, it has to be watered sometimes. So, we're watering some of the greatness that grows in our district, letting them know we appreciate their efforts. Appreciate them helping support. This is just the beginning. We'll have more next month. Thank you. We're now on to the academic performance committee report. No reports. Everything will be forwarded to committee next week of the following meeting. We're now on to budget audit and finance committee report. Thank you. Uh the board held a board budget retreat a long meeting a retreat a long meeting on March 26 right after
065our last business meeting. Uh we held a community budget meeting on April 16th. So thank you to everyone who came out. I did want to share that um there was an opportunity for uh community feedback through surveys. We had 643 community members respond to that and at least one family from 143 of our schools. So that is outstanding to hear uh what you want to see prioritized in the budget. Uh we did come up with the board shared a lot of questions during the retreat and asked for some additional data. Board members, it looks like everybody has picked up their draft budget book, but there are in the front of the binder. Um, we will in May uh use our budget audit and finance committee meeting to have a further budget discussion. Um, I know
066there are still some outstanding questions and I want us to all have an opportunity to follow up on the data that we did receive from the budget uh retreat. One update I wanted to share is that the uh in our previous timeline we had uh April 30th as a presentation for our initial draft to the county commission. That is now going to be May 14th. Um and then we'll the final towards the end of that month. Um so any any questions that you have on that draft budget, please bring those to our committee meetings in May. And that is it for budget autom. Thank you board member Her Garcia. 8.4 Charter School Committee report. No report. Community Outreach and Engagement Committee report. No report. evaluation committee. No report. We are now on to policy, governance,
067and legislation committee report. Thank you, Chair Coleman. We had the meeting last earlier this month. Um and we came up with um a list of policies that we are going to prioritize and calendar to create a budget I'm sorry a um policy calendar for the year where we will review and um determine if we need revisions um to policies and or develop new policies. We also um wanted to give an update on the board governance training RFQ that was scheduled to be posted on yesterday was it was posted on yesterday and that date it closes on May 19th. Again, this is an RFQ which is different from an RFP. RFQ is just asking for qualifications, asking who it's consultants. Um, and we're asking them to let us know whether they can meet the requirements that
068we have put in our scope of work for our board governance training. 8.8 Procurement Committee report. All items are on the agenda. No report. We're now on to general counsel's report. Thank you, Madam Chair. report this month. We're now on to superintendent report. Yes, ma'am. Thank you, Madam Chair. Good evening, board chair Coleman, Vice Chair Love, and all members of the board and the listening audience. Uh, I want to begin by sincerely thanking you for trusting your trust and confidence in my leadership. Uh when I stepped into the role in January, it was during a period of significant transition for our district. A moment that called for stability, clarity, and immediate action. Uh I understood then, as I do now, that leadership is not simply about maintaining course during easy times. True leadership is forged
069during moments of challenge when the stakes are high and the future demands both courage and vision. I accepted this responsibility with full awareness of what the moment required, a firm commitment to students, families, and educators of Memphis Shelby County Schools. Today, I formally present my 100-day plan, a strategic framework that both reflects the work already underway and charts the path forward with intentional focus. This plan is rooted in disciplined inquiry, datadriven decisionmaking, and an uncompromising commitment to excellence. It is designed not simply to respond to challenges, but to build a foundation for lasting systemic improvement. You will see that we're prioritizing the critical areas that define our mission. Addressing disparities in literacy, numeracy, and college and career readiness, strengthening community trust and engagement, and creating strong, transparent systems of accountability at every level. Some initiatives
070have already been launched, others are in active development. But across every area of this plan, one thing remains constant urgency with a clear focus on student outcomes. I stand before you not only to outline next steps, but to reaffirm my commitment to lead this district with integrity, purpose, and a relentless belief in the potential of every child. Thank you again for entrusting me with this important work. Together, we will move Memphis Shelby County Schools forward. Next slide. My 100 day plan will start with guided questions. Uh we're going to start with governance and board relations. Key considerations will be transparency, alignment, and collaboration between the superintendent and you all as board members. Some of those key questions guided questions are what structures and processes are in place to ensure strong governance? How effective is my
071engagement with you all? and how is it aligned with district priorities? What are the main concerns and expectations of you all regarding district leadership? What strategies are being used to enhance communication and trust between us? How do you all perceive the effectiveness of retreats and one-on ones as we have those? What policies, governance, and accountability measures need to be updated or reinforced? And lastly, how will board priorities be integrated into long-term strategic planning? As far as student achievement, key considerations will be transparency, alignment, and collaboration between the superintendent and you all. What key academic gaps and strengths have been identified? How is the district addressing disparities? What strategies are being implemented to improve instructional quality? How effective do current curriculum alignment with workforce demands and high education expectations? What roles do stakeholder focus groups play
072in shaping academic improvement? High student performance being measured and monitored over the over the 100 day period and what interventions are in place to support multilingual learners, students with disabilities and at risk populations. Next, staff relations. Key considerations would be recruitment, retention, professional growth and collaboration. Some of the questions are what are the key concerns and needs of teachers and staff. How effectively is the district filling critical vacancies and reducing time to hire? How professional development is aligned with student achievement? How is the academic organizational chart being realigned to better address achievement goals? operations and finance. Key considerations would be budget efficiency, resource allocation, and financial sustainability. How are financial resources being allocated to maximize student success? What are the district's short-term and long-term financial priorities? What opportunities exist for cost savings, cost avoidance, and
073revenue generation? What improvements have been made in procurement, payroll, and grant management processes? and what steps have been taken to optimize school closures, capital planning, and facilities management, just to name a few. Next slide. Next, community relations. Key considerations will be how effectively is the district engaging parents, community members, and local leaders. How are stakeholder concerns and feedback being incorporated into our decision making? How are community engagement events contributing to stronger relationships and district goals? And how does the district ensure equity and inclusion in all community engagement efforts? And lastly, evaluation and accountability. Key considerations will be measuring impact, ensuring accountability, and defining next steps. How is progress being tracked for each strategic priority? What key performance indicators have been identified? How often are updates shared with you all? and what adjustments have been made
074based on early findings from the 100 day assessment, just to name a few. Next slide. The 100 day plan overview, evaluation, and and performance measures. The plan outlines actionable steps to address five strategic priorities. They are governance and board relations, student achievement, staff relations and capacity, operations and finance, and community relations. Next slide. Actions and performance measures, governance and board relations. Action steps to establish a transition team to oversee the initial priorities. What I'm doing is working closely with our senior leadership team. We'll also bring in content experts uh to assist as needed. Uh I'd like to start scheduling uh campus visits with you all over the next c two weeks uh to build relationships and to gather more insight. Uh we've already hosted one retreat which was February 28th and March 1st. We'll have
075our second to share findings and recommendations from the 100 day assessment. Also, I want to continue to schedule regular meetings with you all to discuss agendas and district matters. schedule our one-on- ons and check-ins with you all as we've begun to do and to review policies, governance documents, and accountability protocols. Student achievement action steps. We'll be hosting stakeholder focus groups to identify academic gaps and strengths, analyzing K12 data on achievement, attendance, and behavioral trends to inform strategies, reviewing course offerings and curricula to align student interests and workforce demands. And lastly, developing and implementing extended learning opportunities and summer bridge pro programs. Much of this again is already in the works. We will be working closely again with partners as we have been. Next slide. Staff relation action steps. Conduct regular check-in and comstat style meetings.
076We'll collect briefing summaries on district-led initiatives to evaluate effectiveness, strengthen recruitment efforts to close vacancy gaps with highquality candidates. Realign the academic organizational chart to better address achievement goals. Uh we're also in the process of doing this to make sure our org chart has form and function. Improving internal communication loops to foster collaboration. We've also been doing this via our Monday memo that's sent out every week along with a recap of what happens with me every day of the week to staff uh as well as other stakeholders. Next, operations and finance action steps. Review protocols for school closures and facility capital planning. Uh assess grant applications, budget proposal proposals and essending plans. conduct five-year forensic audits to evaluate financial practices. Uh, as I've heard the state wanting to do a a forensic audit, I'm all
077for that. Uh, most administrators will tell you when administrators transition into roles, the first thing I tell them is to get an audit. Next, to evaluate customer service and safety feedback for surveys and to address crisis management protocols, walking routes for safety and improvement. And next, community relations, hosting community engagement events, using virtual platform, social media surveys to gather stakeholder feedback, actively participating in local and state events to strengthen relationships with partners, and lastly, establishing consistent communication with key stakeholders, including parents, media, and elected officials. Next slide. You've heard me talk a lot about the five Aas. I want to give you a snapshot of the five A's and the steps. First, academics, attendance, attitude, arts, and athletics. Next slide. Academics will focus on curriculum development, professional development, personalized learning plans for our students, extracurricular
078activities, and parental involvement. You can see the timeline beginning with year 1, quarter 1 and quarter two, July through October. initiate curriculum reviews, identify students for personalized learning plans, and begin PD sessions. Also review mid-year data for student progress, curriculum efficiency, and extracurricular participation. We've been flagging students in um in uh Power School uh to look at how that is increasing it each year. We've also added extracurricular offerings throughout uh our portfolio. Next, adjusting curriculum and PD and PLPS based on year one outcomes, aiming for a 10% improvement in proficiency by year two. Next, performance outcomes. We'll look for 5 to 10% increase each year in student proficiency in math and literacy by the end of the year. Uh, when we look at Tissa, there are milestones that have already been set. One of those
079milestones is for the end of this year, our outcome should at least be at 30%. So we've set uh a 5% gain from last year which was 27.5% in ELA. So we're looking to hit 32.5% this year. Uh in numerousy uh we were at I want to say 29% and so we're looking to increase that by 5 to 10% as well. 85% of our teachers will participate in professional development focused on datadriven instruction. We'd like for it to be 100% but we want to set a smart goal which is specific, measurable, attainable and resultsoriented and time bound. So we've set a baseline of 85%. 100% implementation of PLPS for students identified as needing intervention with 70% showing a significant academic uh progress and these students would be bottom 25, third grade, fourth grade, fifth grade
080and students uh ELLL students and sped students. We also want to increase participation again in extracurricular activities by 10%. And 25% teacher conference attendance as correlating uh rise in student performance uh for those students whose parents engage. I know 25% may look low. We'd like for that to be a baseline and to increase that by 25% each year. Next, attendance. We want to start off again incentive programs, professional development, early intervention, and school climate. Quarter one of year one, we want to launch our attendance incentive programs and identify our atrisisk students like we did earlier this year. We also want to hold early intervention meetings, assess communication effectiveness, and to conduct our first climate survey in october using insight. Uh this year we didn't start off with insight because that particular uh contract was held
081up. So we're hoping this year we'll be able to start off in in October using that survey. Next, monitor attendance improvements and adjust strategies. Aim for a 10% reduction in chronic absenteeism by year two. Next slide. Performance outcomes. Again, we want to reduce chronic absenteeism by 5 to 10% every year. 50% of our students at risk of absenteeism engaging in early intervention programs to show 10% improvement in attendance. We want to increase our parent involvement in attendance, improving strategies with 50% of our parents. And we want positive school climate ratings improved by 20% correlating with a 5% increase in overall student attendance. Again, using insight data. Next slide. Attitude. And attitude. Uh this is where we're going to incorporate our social emotional learning. Look at our looking at our character education programs. As you all
082saw earlier today, men of valor, we want to increase our mentorship programs and using positive behavior intervention and recognition. This will be part of our response to intervention squared B around behavior. We want to implement character education and mentorship programs as part of our social emotional learning. We want to review our mentorship participation and introduce positive behavior uh recognition and the aim for 10% reduction in behavior incidents as well as a 10% decrease in exclusionary uh suspensions by year two. Exclusionary practices, excuse me. Next slide. Athletics, we want to have inclusive sports programs. Uh this week, Thursday and Friday, we'll be participating with Greater Memphis around Special Olympics, but we also want to include many of our students who are special needs in some of our inclusive sports programs, physical education, facilities improvement, and community
083partnerships. During quarter one, we want to launch inclusive sports programs and to set fit fitness assessment benchmarks. We want to secure new community partnerships and improve our facilities. I see the Y that's sitting out uh in the audience this year. We started uh sports in our elementary uh grade bands and the Y partnered with us uh to spearhead that. So I want to thank them. Let's give them a round of applause. I see Mr. McGlin in the audience. Thank you. And community partnerships. We want to achieve a 10% increase in sports participation and 10% improvement in fitness scores by year two. Next slide. performance outcomes, 10% increase in student participation in sports with balance, gender, and special needs representation, 10% improvement in student fitness assessment scores by the end of the year. Some may not
084know it, but we have a school health report card. And we want to start using that school health report card that our health promotion team does each and every year that is measured by our EPSDT screenings, vision, hearing, BMIs, and the like. We want to have a reduction in that fitness report card by 10% of some of those uh illnesses andor uh issues that we know many of our students underlining conditions that many of our students come to school with. Facilities improvement surveys to show a 90% satisfaction rate among students and staff and three new community partnerships secured to support athletic programs resulting in increased student access to resources and facilities. Next slide. Arts. We know athletics and arts are competitive advantage. We just saw it today. Let's give those young people a round of
085applause. As I've gone around and seen, uh, we had our Snowden who did a side by side with Memphis, uh, Symphony Orchestra. We had our ORF, uh, all city ORF performance. This year, our students are extremely talented uh, performance opportunities, funding, and resource community engagement. Year one, we want to begin arts integration and core subjects, and secure initial funding. This year, we secured $7 million. And I've gone around when we've issued some of those instruments to see students in the ninth grade picking up an instrument for the first time. Let you know that if those students were able to start arts integration in the sixth grade, we have some students who could be some outstanding musicians. And so, uh, I want to thank Derek Mars, who's in the audience, for securing that $7 million along
086with, uh, Dr. Maples and her team, Sonia Porter, for spearheading that. Let's give them a a round of applause for that. We want to continue to host go back to host student performances and exhibitions. We want to secure community arts uh partnerships. And we want to aim for a 10% increase per year in students participating in arts programs. Next, performance outcomes. 100% integration of the arts and core curriculum in at least one subject per grade or what you would call thematic integrated units. 20% increase in student participation in performances and exhibitions by year two. Increase in external funding for arts program by the end of year 1 and the establishment of at least five new community arts partnerships leading to expanded opportunities for our students. Next slide. Effective teachers action step. We want to recruit
087and retain our teachers. We want to collaborate with recruitment partners like Teach for America and Memphis Teacher Residency. We want to offer retention bonuses for highly effective teachers and professional development. We want to provide monthly professional development on instructional improvement, student engagement, and datadriven teaching. You can see the timeline for that. Next slide. Evaluation strategy. Each each of these will have an evaluation and a performance outcome. We want to track teacher effectiveness through evaluations, classroom observations, and student achievement. Measure recruitment and retention rates of high performing teachers. Monitor the impact of professional development on teacher effectiveness and student outcomes. Outcome performance outcomes will be increased and the percentage of effective teachers. Retention rates of effective teachers. We cannot do this without retaining effective teachers in our schools and stabilizing those schools. 50% of teachers demonstrating
088improved effectiveness scores after participating in pre in professional development. We have to know that the professional development we're providing for our teachers is making an impact on student outcomes. Next, effective leadership leadership training offering leadership development programs focused on instructional leadership and datadriven decision making. distributed leadership, encouraging distributed leadership by forming instructional leadership teams in every school and making sure all of those schools have the professional development needed for them to also be effective. We want to launch our leadership development programs and identify participants for pipeline roles. I see Dr. Jack and Miss Addison out in the audience. I want to give them a round of applause. They've kicked off some of that work this year along with doc under Dr. Tankson's leadership and we want to ensure 20% of our leadership roles are filled
089by pipeline participants by year two. Next here are evaluation strategies monitoring leadership development programs tracking improvement and uses surveys to gather feedback performance outcomes. 20% of leadership positions and priority schools are filled by these participants. 85% of participants report satisfaction with the program and feel prepared. We must prepare our school leaders to be able to do this work. And schools led by program participants demonstrating a 15% improvement in student outcomes and school climate. Next slide. Feeder patterns. Feeder patterns. This is going to be some of the most important work that we're going to embark upon. Next slide. Feeder patterns. Vertical curriculum alignment. Developing vertical alignment curriculum to create coherence across elementary, middle, and high schools. As I've said, uh, just thinking about the arts, all of our elementary schools should be exposing students to, let's
090say, or music. When students move into middle school, they should be exposed to, if they want to take uh, band or choir, students are being exposed to that so that when they go on to high school, that's not their first time being introduced to those things. We may have a high school that has a band teacher, and that band teacher may only have three periods. Well, what's keeping us from allowing that band teacher to be itinerate where he or she can also support our middle schools and can grow programs our middle schools can grow into and feed into those high schools so that we're exposing students earlier and we're uh taking advantage of being more efficient being more efficient. And part of that is going to be through uh our feeder pattern vertical curriculum alignment.
091Feeder pattern collaboration hosts bimonthly feeder pattern meetings to encourage crossgrade collaboration among teachers and administrators. And I'm just using music, but this will also apply to curriculum. Next, next slide. Evaluation strategies tracking vertical alignment and curriculum. student outcomes, teacher collaboration, measuring progress in key academic behavior indicators across feeder patterns, conducting regular feed uh feeder pattern meetings to assess collaboration and improvement. This is going to allow us to plan both vertically and horizontally. Performance outcomes increase the number of students progressing from elementary, middle, and from middle to high school within those feeder patterns. We want students to buy into their communities. that comes with building strong feeder patterns like white station shouldn't be the only strong feeder pattern that everyone is trying to migrate to. We ought to have strong feeder patterns in all of our
092communities so that parents aren't wanting to transfer out of their neighborhoods where they should be demanding effectiveness and high quality schools within their communities. [Applause] 10% improvement in graduation rates and targeted feeder patterns, five to 10% increase in student proficiency in key academic uh subjects across feeder patterns. By following this timeline and structured action plan, the district will be able to address the key areas of academics, attendance, attitude, athletics, and the arts while developing strong leadership and improving feeder patterns. Other thing about these five these five competencies and five focus areas each student in every school should have an opportunity to be successful. If you're a straight A or honor role or principal's list students we going to recognize you for academics. If you come to school every day we're going to recognize you for
093coming to school every day and doing the right thing by being at school every day. If your attitude, if you're a good citizen, you have all E's and S's, if you're a great athlete, if you're great in the arts, we want to celebrate all of our students talents and genius. Next slide. This is what we'll be breaking up into four regions. Uh this is a representation of how the four regions will look. We'll have a northwest region, a southwest region, a a northeast region, and a southeast region. We'll be coming back during our committee meetings. We'll come and we'll explain more in detail the regional structure. But you can see we have our elementary, middle, high, CTE, our alternative schools, our schools that may have a special uh sped focus around our students with disabilities.
094Our charter schools will also be captured in these regional maps. Next slide. Here's a feeder pattern. So this is the Levi uh the Mitchell Heights feeder pattern where you have Levi, Ford Road, Chickasaw, but you also see Southwest Career and Technical Center. And then you see far over to the left XAI. When we start talking about vertical alignment and feeder pattern planning, let's just use XAI and use that feeder pattern for example. What if we start teaching coding, start teaching STEM in that particular feeder pattern? When you look at our CTE center, students can go to that CTE center and they can start to look at uh some of the careers around STEM focus. We could look at workbased learning for people that are in that southwest corridor. We could also uh have opportunities for
095our parents to come in and to have job training at our Southwest Career and Technical Center in working in partnership hypothetically again with XAI, we can turn that whole community around. we can help those individuals within their community to have jobs within their community so they're not having to travel across our entire county when we know there are companies and industry within that area that have uh opportunities for those particular parents and students and the entire uh community. And so when we start talking about feeder patterns, we know that we can tailor what we're doing to those communities. We can also help with workforce development for the individuals residing in those communities by taking a feeder pattern approach. Next slide. Also, we start talking about rightsizing our district. What this is is looking at all
096of the schools that feed into Mitchell High School. And you can see Mitchell High School has a TAS of five. It's a success rate of 11.3. You see the letter grade. You see principal tenure. You see 20-day enrollment. You see uh total enrollment. You see 10ear FCI. That stands for facility condition index. And you also can see utilization. As we start thinking about how we're going to rightsize our district. These are the type metrics that we want to start to look at that are both academic but they're also looking at the facility. So looking at these metrics we're going to be able to make decisions about our various facilities if and where we should merge rightsize and or uh update and revitalize certain facilities within feeder patterns. This is the approach we'll be taking. I
097want to thank uh Michelle Stewart, Miss Stewart and her team along with Mr. White and his team. We've done this type of analysis for all of our schools in all of our feeder patterns and we've started early work through our curriculum department and looking at what curriculum uh offerings are in all of our elementary through uh high school feeder patterns as well as our CTE offerings and what we'll be doing around dual enrollment and dual credit. Next slide. Here's a quick video and overview of uh feeder patterns juncture of Memphis Shelby County Schools. One of our most powerful levers for long-term success is the thoughtful design and alignment of our feeder patterns. The structured pathways that guide students from elementary to middle to high school. Feeder patterns are more than school assignments. They're strategic frameworks.
098When done right, they offer students a coherent and connected educational journey. Students grow through familiar environments guided by consistent expectations and supported by educators who understand their trajectory, not just academically, but emotionally, socially, and personally. Strong feeder patterns drive equity, academic continuity, and community pride. They allow us to align curriculum, school culture, and support services with precision from the first day of kindergarten to the day a student walks across the graduation stage. But beyond tradition, this is about transformation. We're bringing innovation and empathy into how we think about alignment, ensuring feeder patterns connect not only classrooms, but also career pathways, early college access, mentorship programs, and wraparound supports that reflect the reality of today's students. As part of our 100-day plan, we are prioritizing key communities like the Mitchell High School feeder pattern and schools
099like Ford Road Elementary to ensure they're no longer overlooked, but elevated. These are not just neighborhoods we serve. They're ecosystems where greatness grows here when alignment, access, and belief in our students intersect. We're doing this work with a wider lens, evaluating how feeder patterns intersect with facilities, transportation, and community access. We're analyzing buildings like Chickasaw, asking hard but necessary questions. Are they safe? Are they modernized? Do they reflect the future our students deserve? In some cases, the answer may be repurposing, not closure, but transformations. We are exploring how older campuses can become career and technical education hubs, workforce training sites, or community- based learning centers align with industry demands. We're mapping how far students travel, identifying access barriers and infrastructure gaps to ensure safety and proximity. We're partnering with institutions like Southwest Tennessee Community College
100to align CTE programs with real career opportunities in healthcare, skill trades, logistics, and technology, especially in communities where opportunity has often been an afterthought. And through it all, we lead with empathy. We listen to families, honoring community roots, and ensuring every facility we invest in reflects dignity, readiness, and hope. Because when feeder patterns are aligned with innovation and compassion, when our buildings match our vision, and when every student, regardless of zip code, has access to excellence, that is when greatness grows here. Next slide. Also, what I want you to see here is this is our pathway to greatness. So in the gray what you see is elements of the work that will impact all of our students. Teacher and leader effectiveness, community solution projects, which is like service learning, uh master scheduling, we know it's
101important master scheduling for us to uh be able to afford our students to take advantage of CTE uh dual enrollment and other course offerings. We're looking at accelerated reader. Uh we want to take advantage of our health clinics, days of peace, another term for it is fight free schools. Uh we want to make sure that we are starting to curb violence in our schools, virtual learning, curriculum maps, innovation labs, which is part of our innovative school uh models, grant, multi-ter system of support. You're going to hear us talk a lot about that. RTI squared A and B uh parental engagement radio reading readalongs we're going to start doing those uh as as a part of our literacy uh dyslexia intervention extended learning and discover Memphis also you see earlier we had tutor 901 that was
102here you can see on our uh birth to second grade where we have our strategic partners for literacy uh we'll be coming and talking more about that prek kindergarten readiness what we've tried tried to do is to track uh what are those milestones, what are also those initiatives and programs along the way along our prek again prek16 really continuum of how we will be supporting our students. Um this is a draft because some of these programs as we look at them as we become more and more fiscally responsible we want to ensure that these particular programs uh are yielding uh the results and the ROI that we want. So we'll continue to put measures in place to evaluate the programs that we're using. Uh but again, as we go out and speak uh to the
103broader public, we wanted to have just kind of a roadmap, which is our pathway to greatness that we can just kind of show people this is what we're doing and Memphis Shelby County Schools to change the trajectory and outcomes uh for our students. And again, this is a draft. We'll continue to fine-tune it and to ensure that it aligns with our academic plan, our CTE plan, and our facilities plan uh that we're continuing to work on. Next slide. Next steps and ongoing monitoring. We'll continue to flesh out our district academic plan. We'll update and improve our pathway to greatness framework utilizing board meetings to discuss and provide progress up updates for the 100 day plan. I have update but again we'll continue to flesh out even our comprehensive facilities plan determine and implement accountability metrics
104develop uh and build out our data dashboard and last but not least ongoing evaluations of initiatives milestones and programs within uh pathway to greatness. Thank you. This concludes the superintendent report. Thank you in thank you inter superintendent Richmond. I have to go back. Board member Love had a question. This is pertaining to the budgets uh committee meeting. I had a constituent call me over two weeks ago and she was hired in as a behavior specialist and um the I'm looking at um she was hired in as a behavior specialist and her job was modified meaning she doesn't have the credentials to continue on in the behavior specialist role. Thank you for that uh question, Vice Chair Love. So, going back to last year, this time last year, uh we know that uh there were some
105positions that were due to be uh abolished or excessed. Those positions were abolished in excess, resulting in I want to say uh Mr. Langston about a thousand positions or so and then there was an effort to uh reonboard some of those individuals and positions during that time. We have what we have job descriptions and those job descriptions have uh qualifications outlined essential functions uh along with what are the basic qualifications minimum and maximum qualifications. Uh what we found out is some of those individuals uh in several roles when there was a rush to reonboard people because so many people were excessed. We had individuals who were hired in some of these roles who didn't meet the minimum requirements. Once we found out those individuals didn't meet the minimum requirements, what the team and I have
106done is we wanted those individuals now that we're in the transfer period. We wanted those individuals to be able to secure employment. But for you to be in some of these roles there uh there are certain minimum require requirements as well as certain expertise that you must have. When we start talking about behavior specialists, the terminology implies that you know how to modify behavior. We had some individuals in these roles who did not have a college degree andor the prerequisite supports and skills to be able to modify behavior. So, we have started a review process to ensure we have the best candidates in these roles because we know climate and culture in our schools is incredibly important. When individuals are providing pushin support to schools, principles and teachers want qualified individuals in these roles delivering
107these supports and services. my team and I and as long as I'm in this role, I want the most effective people in these roles because it is our responsibility to be able to carry out these roles and responsibilities in an effective manner. The other thing that also we've seen through some of these reviews of roles and individuals are salary inequities which gets me to compensation again. Last year when many of these individuals were let go and their roles were excessed and we had to hurry to hire them back. a lot of uh uh mistakes were made. This is not the only role where mistakes were made. There were other roles where mistakes were made and my team and I along with the support of HR. We're trying to clean these things up. As you know,
108I forward you all emails all the time. You all receive emails all the time about uh employees who are saying that their compensation is not correct, their compensation is not what it should be. And much of that is attributed to again what occurred last year during some of the uh employee layoffs and bringing those employees back at a hurried pace and rate. uh it caused a lot of problems that again I'm trying to clean up in a way that causes as very little disruption. But I'm also trying to do it in a timely fashion where every employee who may be impacted can secure employment before school starts and before there are no other positions available. There are a lot of positions available for people who may not be degreed. But again, this is an educational
109institution and in some of these roles, it is required that you have a degree. And in this educational institution, having education counts and matters particularly in some of the roles that we have people in that we know are extremely important to supporting our students. Thank you. Um, I would like to shout out Terrence Brittnam for feeder pattern work in my district. We just had a meeting yesterday. Raleigh Egypt Middle and High School and Elementary School. We've got that ball covered. I ironically uh Raleigh Egypt I was going to do two feeder patterns and Raleigh Egypt was the other example uh that we were going to look at uh using as an example because you have the entire feeder pattern those three buildings on the same campus which we know is uh extremely uh effective and
110if we can leverage that uh it can be dynamic in changing uh student outcomes uh and ensuring student success. Shout out to Mr. Brennham. Thank you, Vice Chair Love. I was um board member Kiss had to leave and she asked me to announce that the charter partnership council will meet on May 15th and all the info will be on board docs. Now, we'll get back. Lights went off. Board member Huitt Garcia, then board member McKenna. Thank you. Uh just for the listening public who heard the document read uh is this what is this what you have done? Is the creation of this plan been your first 100 days or is there been some level of execution or is this a roadmap to the next 100 days? It's a both end. Uh and the reason it's
111a both end, I'm going to treat it like u May one. May one will be starting the first 30 days of the 100 day plan. However, there are uh significant milestones and things that uh my team and I have done that we needed to do. Uh one example would be uh contracts. Uh we knew we had a lot of contracts that were uh bottlenecking. Uh and so when we knew they were bottlenecking, one of the first things I did the first week was to have Mr. Langston and the team uh to look at uh the process that we had employed under the prior administration and to put a new process in place for both schoolbased staff and central office staff. Once we put that in place, we had uh a a virtual uh professional development
112delivery model as well as a face-to-face delivery model. Uh and so we delivered uh professional development to all of the endusers so that we could become more efficient in bringing forth uh contracts. Uh particularly I'll use I see my Richland. Let's give Richland a round of applause. I see my friends from Richland back there. Uh and what I was trying to tell them is really our new uh streamline uh process around contracts helped us uh to get that contract in place uh for us to do that much needed work that needs to take place uh at Richland Elementary. So some of these things are taking place or chart for example uh the prow org chart we've take a hard we've taken a hard look at. We're looking at modifying that because we want an org
113chart that has form and function. I'll be bringing our new org chart soon. I'm meeting with uh district leaders to again make sure that we're aligning the work uh in a purposeful way. I'll also kind of be bringing you all the pros and cons to the former org chart versus the new org chart uh and why the way we've organized the work uh is more streamlined and more effective as we move into the 2526 school year. I think uh I appreciate getting a plan. I think some of the context of the decisions I'm balancing um there was something about that conversation in terms of um we want the right qualifications, the right job. And I also don't want to it felt a little disrespectful to employees. Just that I'm saying that out loud because I'm
114sitting with that. But I want to I want the context for it hasn't been for lack of a plan is what the feeling is. So what is what does it feel like and operate like what are the I think I wanted a more or what I'm hoping to get um is there what are the the key things that will be different because we see lots of plans and I think you have a vision for this. I like the feeder pattern. I loved the facilities assessment and the way you're thinking about it, but like what are the core things you have to get right because we're not going to do all of this at once and I don't need it all tonight, but I think that's just how I'm thinking about it is literacy has always
115been important. We've always we've talked about those key the key foundations of a 0 to8 right those are those are those have been beliefs of any superintendent that we've had. So, what are the what's the sharpness that you need to get in there? That's that's what I want to hear moving forward of we've got these five A's. We have key milestones on it, but these four things we've got to get right. These are the next 30 days. Like giving it to us as um your biggest bets. Yeah. Well, I think what's incredibly important that I think the team and I have been focused on is truly aligning the work. Uh the what's what's also aligned with this is our academic plan. So, uh I beg to say that the district probably hadn't had an academic
116plan at least in the past seven seven years. if someone can show me one uh then I'll I'll apologize but I don't know if the district has had an academic plan. I know there hasn't been a comprehensive one in at least the last five years. So one thing I would say is that first of all we have feedback from a reputable person who has audited our academic plan which is the council great city schools. What I would say is what we've done here has been to align some of that work along with having an academic plan where it's a very inclusive and participatory academic plan that's been led by uh Miss Ker uh and Dr. white law where we're bringing in stakeholders and we're getting feedback from those stakeholders in regards to how to better
117align our academic plan so that we can move student achievement. The other thing I would say is that we're being very uh careful about having a whole lot of initiatives and programs which in research is called confounding variables. when you have a lot of different initiatives and programs, it's difficult for you to really uh figure out what worked and what didn't work. That's actually exactly what I'm saying is that we could do a lot of we could work all work 24 hours a day and not get anything done and not move the needle for kids. So, I'm saying what are the the what's the what's the headline? So, I think the everything that you're saying makes sense to me, but We were read a lot of information tonight. That was my point. Gotcha. And the
118other thing I want to point out is I think it's more about people and less about programs. And so that's why we're also reviewing the effectiveness of every person in every one of these roles to ensure that the most effective person is in the role. they meet the minimum and maximum qualifications along with making sure I've spent countless hours talking to principles about implementing job descriptions and essent essential functions with fidelity because when you don't you create gaps in the work and those gaps in the work lead to certain things around student achievement or student success not being addressed. Thank you Dr. Richmond. Um, chair, Dr. Richmond, thank you for this. It's very comprehensive and it's very easy to follow. So, I appreciate that. So, one of the things I do want, and I think
119this might piggyback a little bit off of what um, board member Huitt Garcia said. I think because we are in the budget process right now, it is important that we align any of the things that we are going to spend funds on with any um any of the proposals you may have around strategic investments and that sort of thing. I understand and I want to make sure everybody else understands that you have provided us with very clear um um I guess outcomes. you've given us what your your your things you want to do and a timeline for that and then the performance outcomes. I think what would be helpful is that we employ our our policy data the data dashboard that provides all of that data that will show where there here's what we're doing
120here. Here's what we said we would meet and here's where we are and if we can do that in real time. I think also what you're doing here is setting a foundation. And I know that nothing happens all at once. We don't have enough money to do that. But I appreciate you thinking about it from a foundational standpoint and saying, "These are the things. Maybe these three things are what I need to do to build up to the next five things and then the next 10 things." So, we're setting a foundation. And so, if you can um I'm going to ask our academics committee um chair if you could bring this to our academic committee on Tuesday. And I think it's an ongoing conversation. um and we can sort of see what you're doing with
121as it relates to the budget ask and then what you're um putting here in terms of your strategic initiatives and your performance outcomes and I appreciate that that is very clear um here's the baseline here's how we're going to move it and here's when we're going to move it. So I appreciate that. Um if you want to answer that I have a couple of more questions. Oh, I I'll take your Well, for for starters, if you look at it, first of all, it's a 90-day plan in regards to things that guiding questions and things that I'm going to start to look at in regards to gathering feedback to more ensure that our academic plan is aligned to stakeholder feedback. As it relates to the 5A, for the most part, when we did our budget, we
122outlined all of uh the request and the budget to the 5A. Outside of that, I'm really not even asking for uh an investment because for the most part, it's in kind. When you start talking about teachers and leaders, that's the most important part of the work. That's part of your instructional core. You're looking at teachers, students, and content. So those things are already baked and embedded in the budget. Feeder pattern just deals with how we're organizing the district to be more efficient and to be more effective and to leverage the expertise of the collective along with better planning. So really, most of these are not asking for anything because again, I'm presenting my 100 day plan and things that I'm going to be asking as well as asking you all to see if maybe there
123are things that we may need to additionally invest in. But pretty much this doesn't come with a price tag. It's re most 100 day plans. If id have had a contract on February 1, I would have done my 90-day plan in February and we it wouldn't have been for an investment. I may have started asking for an investment now. But I'm presenting the 90-day plan just in terms of letting you all know the thought process of the team and I and what we're going to be doing for the next 100 days to better prepare to support our students. I appreciate that. And maybe I misspoke when I said strategic investments. I'm I think budget alignment. So when we we if we spent money over here and you're saying no that money needs to be moved
124over here because this setting the foundation of your the 100 day plan to get us where we need to do in those four those five um A's. The next thing I wanted to ask you about um I'm very excited about um the feeder pattern and um the I call them campuses. I actually did had um asked um Miss Stewart to let me know what um how many of our schools were actually on the same campuses. We have 39 schools across the each of our districts that go across all nine districts and they um it represents 17 campuses including the ones you just talked to. The idea that we can leverage and maximize what's happening um those buildings andor what is already in the community is um wonderful. I hope we and that's going to require
125us to have some partnerships not only strategic partnerships with some of organizations but also with our local government and maybe even the state. So, I'm happy to hear that you're you're you're thinking about that. And as it it pertains to the facilities, if we're going to make these investments, one of the things I want us to pay close attention to as we um and I'm going to say it every time because we can't hide behind it. We're going to have to close and consolidate schools. We just we can't we've got to do that and we've been talking about it for years. I know they were talking about it when I was at the district 10 15 years ago. Um and now we we have to do it. the rubber has hit the road. As we
126think about that, however, I want to make sure that we're thinking about how do we put our students in state-of-the-art buildings as we consolidate and close because I know that's what we did with is it also closed and and then we we took those those children and put them all we closed two schools or and then we to put those children in a brand new building. So, I'm speaking now for district two. I've got several campuses. I got tread well that's busting at the um at the seams elementary that sits on the campus. It's almost 100 years old. Um so I will be very interested I'm very interested in this this um feeder pattern and campus process that you're doing. I think this is the smart way to go and thinking innovatively how we how
127we incorporate all of the things in our community including school buildings. So I appreciate that. Thank you. Board member Williams and then board member Murphy. Thank you and thank you Dr. Richmond for such a splendid report. If anyone knows the depths and this of this district, it would be you. And if I had my way, I would make you the superintendent tonight and we wouldn't have to wait on all of this stuff. But what you're saying is just the truth and it has all to do with what goes on inside of a school. and you've laid it very plain and very clear laid it on the line and to ask these kinds of questions about who's going it has to be it has to be in the curriculum that the children are exposed to and
128if you have to have teachers standing in front of them who can deliver it now my question to you I don't know how many principles we have or might have that may be wavering on the line but it is important that the leader of a school is very instrumental and they set the tone and the pace case in the building and I'm wondering if we're having any issues with administration in the schools because the teachers are there, the students are there and there's a disconnect someplace with the administrative staff I think in some of these buildings and I I do know that you are well equipped. I do know that you had a very successful school district with the zone and I do know that you are what's best for the Memphis and Shelby County
129schools. And the sooner we understand that and the sooner we take advantage of that, the better off all of us will be. It is not up to us to sit here and try to nitpick anything because you are a proven record of success in this school district. And it just has to fall that way. And anybody who don't know, they need to ask somebody who did the work, who's done the work. And we're talking about the people who've done the work. We're not talking about bringing in anybody from Timbuktu to do anything. because we've been there, done that. I stayed in this district a long time and I know what I'm talking about. I've been through it. I was here under EC Steim who was the superintendent of schools who was a white man. I
130was here under segregation. I taught under segregation and integration. So I I sometimes it is just heartening for folk to ask certain some kind of questions about your your focus. You know what you're talking about. You've been there, done that. you've been there and you've done that and you have proven your work in this school system. So, you know, whatever what what you're bringing, I understand it. I get it. It it works. But the the problem is this board understanding that the work belongs to the superintendent and his staff and the teachers and that's how it gets done. We are just here to make sure the money is there and it's it's it's spend fairly. But uh to have all of these castigated questions about you going to do this now, you don't know what
131he going to do, but he knows what he's going to do because he's done it. And all these other folks who getting on a couple don't start it. Don't even try it. But it's not going to happen. And I I appreciate all that you've done, all that you will do, and all that I as long as there is breath in my body that you shall do. [Applause] Board member board member Murphy. I forgot what I was going to say cuz Williams done took me somewhere else. But I I do want to say thank you Dr. Richmond. This was very effective. It was informative and it was precise and this is the first time that we have had this and it's presented very well. So, thank you and thank your team for all the hard work
132that you have done to give us a solid 100 plan uh 100 day plan to move forward and move the district forward. So, I am excited about our next steps and I am excited about the next 100 days and I agree with everything Williams just said. I want you to know I agree with you, but you I forgot the rest of what I was going to say cuz you I lost my train of thought. But I want to say thank you and thank you to the team. Don't laugh at me. Don't do me that way. Thank you to the team. Thank you Dr. Richmond for everything that you have done and in our next things that we got boots on the ground and with boots on the ground we just need to move forward. We
133need to move the district forward and we need to show them in the next year that we got this. Yes. Cuz greatness grows here. That's right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Board member McKenna, board member Porter, Vice Chair Love. Thank Thank you. Um, one observation and again, um, thank you board member Williams and Murphy. Um, I saw the community sol I'm looking at pathway to greatness, your five A's and I guess these are the inputs at the top. Okay. Community solutions project one. Thank you parent engagement. And then thank you for um recognizing that dyslexia intervention is can be a big game changer for us when it comes to our literacy. One thing that I would like to recommend for your consideration is to add student engagement as student engagement as part of your
134inputs. Yes ma'am. Okay. Thank you board member Porter. Yeah. Um thank you chair. I now ask a more in depth question when at committee meeting but uh but it seems like the feeder pattern limits um parents choice for school. It limits school choice. So would that kind of come into the effect on how we articulate to the public? And also um will each district will there be a school in each district in each district have like a CCT school where they can feed into um those particular schools or particular programs? Excellent question. Uh the regionalization does not limit feeder pattern does not limit parent choice. Parents can still uh go through our open enrollment or go through our uh optional schools. Uh what it is doing is just breaking the district down into small smaller
135districts where we can tailor the work. We can tailor the curriculum. We can tailor support around those different communities throughout this city. All of our communities uh are different. Uh they have different different needs. And so uh to answer that question, it would not limit parent choice. Your second question is when we really look at our CTE centers, they already are somewhat geographically uh located. You have Kingsberry CTE that would be in the norththeast region. You have Tresin that would be in the northwest region. You have Southwest which would be in the southwest region. And you have Sheffield which would be in the Southeast region along with schools already having CTE program within them. Yeah. Yeah, that that's right. That's my question. I think that's why I was trying to get at as well because
136we I often times forget about the some of the programs that our children go off campus and what's happening within the dual enrollment in the early college as well in the schools. So, thanks for the clarification. Yes, sir. Vice Chair Love, um I want to see a plan on crime in our communities. Natalie made a a good point. We are going to have to consult with the city and the county and the state. Our children come from the communities and there is a lot of crime in our communities. Thank you uh Vice Chair Love. Again, this is just a 100 day plan. This is not our comprehensive uh academic plan andor our overall district uh what you would call response to intervention B or behavioral plan. We will be coming with those individual uh plans
137as well. And this is not the board's strategic goals. You all still have the opportunity to outline your strategic goals. All this is saying is what I'm going to be doing the next 100 days or that I've been doing since January 22nd. Uh it doesn't take the place of the academic plan, the facilities plan, the CTE plan, the strategic plan, or the districtwide uh behavior intervention plan. And one final question, the employee said she was hired in in March of 2000 and this year, not last year. Thank you. Even if the employee was hired then, whoever hired the employee without having a degree made it in error. And so again, we're having to clean up some of these things. Uh we're having again to stress to leadership. We're stressing the central lead central office leader,
138senior leaders, any and everyone who's a hiring manager. When we start talking about cronyism, when we start talking about nepotism, when we start talking about all the isms, they go away if people apply the criteria for hiring the most qualified and effective person in the role. Thank you. And I want to come in on board member Porter's question. I would like to see all of our schools be optional schools, have some type of an optional program in all of our schools. I know it's going to take us a while to get there, but there's no reason why a child, if there's an optional program that's available, if we could work on seeing that we can get those in our schools for our children. Seeing no further lights, we're now on to the consent agenda. Are
139there any items to be removed from the consent agenda now 11.1 approval of the YMCA of Memphis and the Midsouth in the dollar amount of $1,399,000 11.2 Two, approve a Department of Exceptional Education Technology refresh lab laptops in the amount of 609,371.75. Approval Insignia Software Corp in the amount of $338,100. 11.4 for approval K12 science textbooks adoption. No cost 11.5 approval Sheffield High School desktop computers and laptops in the amount of $109,88645 11.7 approval Tennessee Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services. Nonrecurring infrastructure grant contract amendment 2024 through 2025 school year in the amount of $236,98. 11.7 has been removed. 11 point 11.8 Eight approval tread wheel laptops, desktop, teacher tablets, computer carts in the amount of 128,56820. 11.9 Approval Vantage Learning LLC in amount of $138,695. 11.10 10 approval memorandum of understanding with
140Christian Brothers University for economics local dual enrollment in amount of $80,050. 11.11 Charter authorization initial round no cost. 11.12 approval nutrition services cafeteria computer workstations replacement in the amount of $184,680.75 11.13 purchase approval Diligence Corp in the amount of $210,96 11.14 purchase approval nutrition services warehouse Wi-Fi infrastructure in the amount of8 8,994757 11.15 approval Andrews Technology 1,159,400 11.16 approval ICMS applicant tracking system 220,795 $79.95 11.17 approve Approval Classic Collisions Bartlett in the amount of 175,000 11.18 approval devices Raptor $120,745.72 11.19 approval Holland and Knight LLP in the amount of $18,000 11.20 20 approval Richland Elementary School ABS Engineering Incorporation in the amount of 165,300 11.21 Donation acceptance John Roberts Estate to Central High School $26,59582 donation 11.22 22 donation acceptance Craigmont High School marching band booster club to Craigmont High School 27,000 I'm sorry 27,783
14111.23 grant acceptance Shriners International to shrine school woohoo $17,433 1124 was moved 11.24 24 is moved. 11.25 approval property sale reversion clause former Hollywood Elementary $250,000. 11.26 Resolution approval teacher bonus provisions. 11.27 Resolution approval implementation of a comprehensive facilities plan. Do I have a motion and a second to for the consent agenda? To approve the consent agenda. I move to approve the consent agenda. Motion by board member Murphy, second by board member Williams. Roll call vote, please. Board member Garcia. I. Board member Porter. I. Board member Murphy. Hi. Board member Love. Hi. Board member McKenna. I. Board member Otay. I. Board member Williams. Hi. Board chair Coleman. I. You have eight in the affirmative. Thank you. That motion passes. Now we're on to request for action. Um, 11.24. The Goodwill Excel expansion. Goodwill Excel expansion.
142Thank you, chair. Um, I pulled that because I want to get some clarity about that particular contract. Um, the request is that we expand them to two zip codes 38108 and I can't remember the and 38 38134. So the question and then the question becomes that if we do that we have to pay we have to pay $1.5 million for the first 150 students that might um come into the um correctional facility. I recall at our board work session and with and and and talking to um staff that Mr. Skyler who's with Goodwill is willing to go with us to the county when we go present. We thought it was tomorrow, but it is now been pushed to May 14th to ask for an investment, a strategic investment of that $1.5 million. So, I'd like
143to suggest that we hold on that. And I think if there are there any other um issues around that particular zip code doing this as well, I'd like to hold on that um until we can figure out um what we can do in terms of that 1.5 I am concerned about the 1.5 because of all the other things that we have to that come into play. I'm also concerned about um us having collaborative partnerships and the willingness of the county to take on investment for the adults that are under their supervision in the correctional facility. I'm concerned that we have to put pull that from our K12 program in order to facilitate that. And I don't want us to get into into that habit because we may be creating to solve one problem which of
144course I want to make sure that our our adults come out and they're productive citizens and have the opportunity but to solve for one we end up making another problem. So I am more than willing to work with and I think we all are. I think that's what we discussed at the board work session. I think too at the board committee meeting is that we would ask um for a strategic investment from the county commission considering this law that just passed in what effective May May 2024 just came about because we prior to that we were passed through so it didn't take any money from um the K12 um programming. So, I want to be clear that I want the I I want this to be successful. I just think we need to take some
145time to figure out how to um strategically go to um um the um county commission and also think about other um ways to get this accomplished. So, that is why I'm asking to pull it for right now with the um is is there a time and I don't know who I need to ask this. Is this Justin or is this Tito? Is there a time constraint? Mr. Skylar, could you come up please? Yes, ma'am. Board member McKenna had a question. She wanted to know was this a timesensitive matter? It is very timesensitive if we want to open in August. So I but I did I talked to uh Mr. Langston earlier today about uh going with you guys on May 14th and so I'm more than willing to do that. I've already talked to a
146couple of uh them already earlier this week. So I think we're I've set the path for us to go there. But uh but it does get more difficult the more we push it back. I have to admit. Will it will it be able to wait one month? Well, actually, I'd have to talk to Mr. White, too. That'd be part of it, too, because we might push our start date back instead of August to September. So, there'd have to be some things I'd have to talk I know I can see his eyes moving right now doing some of that. And along with Tito also, I mean, I'm sorry, Mr. Langston also. So, we could have that discussion possibly. So we don't we still have the pay coming but but move the start date back and then
147ends later in June per se or July. Actually we're going to go year round with these students. So um yeah. So I think we can make it work still. It just depends. I uh meet May 14th but then can we have a decision quickly after that if if they say okay because as opposed to June, you know how that goes. That's what I was I think I was kind of asking chair and other board members. Is there when is our board meeting in May? We go May 14th. We'll schedule a special call. Okay. Just as soon as we can after that once all the board members can meet, we'll schedule a special call. Sounds good. Please understand, Mr. Skyler, that I definitely you and I had a we I definitely want this to go. We
148just have to figure out how we do it in a collaborative and collective way that we are not taken from one to feed the other. Yeah, I get you. Okay. I appreciate you. I I appreciate all of you. Yeah. Board member Huitt Garcia. I think we could go on the 14th and we got not get any traction and then we end up making the same decision that we would make tonight. I understand the we have to protect our our fiscal position. I do get that. I do I think there has to be advocacy at the state level to get adult education funded upfront. So we are not taking from K through 12. I think that that should be a legislative agenda item that has bipartisan support. So I know within the contract there is a
149plan to open a school every year. I would be amendable to making sure that this happens with future openings contingent on an upfront or additional investment. So I I don't know if there is a my worry is that even if you had the full county commission say yeah we'll give you the 1.5 million the paperwork alone right and then we're trying to get we just when we all agree in any body it takes six months to get anything done and I f like this to me is something I want to I want to see happen and I I think we all do too. I'm just worried about the practicality even when we all agree. And it so but I do understand the door that we're opening up by saying we're going to do this every
150year, right? For me, if we did it this year, I think future expansion would be contingent on that legislative approval or that upfront sort of if or stronger fiscal positioning where we're not worried about federal flow. So, I think I'm I'm just inclined to not push it off because I think it may not happen then. That's my worry and I appreciate the flexibility. Um, but is is there something that I'm missing here beyond the just the general funding concern that for me the general funding concern that I'm just speaking personally. This is this is how we fund this is the state well the adult education is funded through the LEA or upfront through the LEA. So my if I may may I make a suggestion? Yes ma'am. That we take this back to committee and
151start the conversation. So I want to make sure taking it back to make sure to committee is not starting it all over. It's just expand the conversation. But we are committed to the 14th and then coming to a special calling a special call meeting after that. Okay. I can agree with that. Thank you. Because there it's like when you ask one question another one the questions are mounting. So if we could take it back to committee without any objection or does anybody object that okay is there the motion to postpone no the motion is to send it back to committee that's the motion I want to make is to send this the the this back to committee and we have a conversation before May before we go to county commission in May. That can be
152done as long as there's no objection. If there's an objection, then you'll have to vote as to whether you wish to do that. So question um Madam Chair, point of order. So nothing would change if we take it back to committee. It we'll just keep it where we have it right now. We just for more discussion and then on the 14th whatever happens on the 14th then we'll call a special call. Okay. Thank you for the clarity. That's fine. That's okay. Okay. That's fine. Okay. Anybody object without objection is sent to committee. We don't have to vote if everybody's support. We are now on to the strategic allocations. The strategic allocations this year we have $102,044. There is there a motion to approve this agenda item and a second? Motion. Second. Motion by board member
153Otay, second by board member Murphy. Roll call vote, please. Board member Garcia. I. Board member Porter. Hi. Board member Murphy. Hi. Board member Love. Hi. Board member McKini. I. Board member Otay. I. Board member Williams. I. Board Chair Coleman. I. You have eight in the affirmative. Thank you. That motion passes. There being no further business before this body, this meeting is adjourned. Thank you. Have a good night. Be safe.