5/5/2026 - FCPS School Board Work Session

001is called to order at 11:55 a.m. I call on Dr. Reed for a discussion on the Sky View High School and Western Pyramid boundaries. >> Thank you, Miss Dixit. Uh we're running just a scooch late, so I'm not going to go into much of an introduction other than to say Mr. Gordon and Mr. Smith will be um sharing the work. Mr. Smith has been uh if you will guiding uh this work on the opening of the new high school and our pyramid work. We also have other staff on board who have been part of those conversations. So, Mr. Gordon, I'm going to go ahead and uh turn it over to you and then I'll probably make a couple comments uh following the presentation. So, thank you, Miss Dixon. >> Hey, good morning all. Uh today's

002session provides a comprehensive update on the Sky View High School boundary process. We will walk through key mile milestones, provide some uh background, give an update on the 2232 process, and we'll talk about A&E architectural engineering procurement services, uh some community feedback that we've received, and we'll run through three draft scenarios. The goal is to inform the board and frame a discussion ahead of future community engagement and decision points. The school boundary was initially paused from a divisionwide boundary review to allow for thoughtful planning. um after property acquisition. This approach assures decisions on school type, timing and boundaries are aligned and informed by community input. Earlier concepts were preliminary. This is the first structured opportunity to develop boundary uh collaborative with the community. A formal kickoff boundary development u was held at Sky View High

003School in the western pyramids was held um on the 25th of March 2026. This process is governed by schoolboard policy 8130 and follows an expedited adjustment framework. This is appropriate given the capacity pressures and the uh and the opening of a new high school. We are applying the same priorities and criteria used in the comprehensive reviews including proximity, capacity and program uh continuity. Community engagement remains central and is structured per regulation 8130. In parallel, the 2232 land use uh process is underway and will enable uh the site uh use as a public facility. This proc process is structured in four phases. Data collection, scenario development, refinement and final recommendation. We have transitioned into initial community input and draft scenarios into refinement. The community engagement is on uh occurring in two waves and the entire and

004is and to ensure iterative feedback. The goal is to bring forward a well-vetted recommendation for schoolboard action in potentially June or the July time frame that we'll talk about later. Um this slide depicts uh capacity pressure across the western uh school pyramids particularly at Centerville and Chantilli. Several schools are operating above program capacity even higher when excluding modular units. Sky View High School is is uh is a critical strategy to relieve overcrowding and rebalance utilization across the region. Boundary decisions will focus on aligning uh enrollment with available capacity while uh minimizing disruption where possible. Again, I'd like to reinforce the need for the western high school because of the high school capacity utilization across the western pyramids. Now looking at the 22 uh 32 land use process update. Uh this process is progressing through required

005county reviews and public engagement. Multiple meetings have uh been conducted with a land use and transportation committee and includes a neighboring HOA called Creekide. A uh planning commission hearing is scheduled for May 13th. This process is essential to secure the approval for the site's public use. This process is on track. We executed a not now talking about the engineering and um architectural sol uh solicitations. We executed a competitive procurement with A&E services for A&E services in the in accordance with policy 8220.5 and the Virginia public procurement act. The RFP was issued on March 5th. Eight proposals were received and evaluated through a structured criteria based process. A top rank firm has been identified and fee negotiations are currently underway. The goal is to bring forward a contract award recommendation to the board in June. This

006keeps design uh activities aligned with the project schedule and opening timeline. Now getting into uh some some other details for the request for proposal or the RFP. It's basically broke into three components. There's a main building uh renovation piece. There is a shell building uh tenant fitout piece and then there's a site improvement supporting a full high school experience. So looking at the main building, this project will repurpose and modernize existing interior spaces to meet high school instructional needs. Underutilized and open areas will be converted into functional classroom space to maximize capacity with where feasible. Staff work rooms and el ele elementary uh prek prek spaces will be reconfigured to support high school reprogramming uh programming standards. The design will ensure full alignment with high school instructional requirements, including appropriate classroom sizes, layouts, and support

007spaces. Necessary upgrades to the building systems, accessibility, and life safety will be incorporated into uh to support the increased capacity and revised use. The existing swimming pool will remain unchanged, allowing us to focus resources on instructional and core support spaces. Looking at the shell buildings, the two shell buildings will undergo a corporate or I'm sorry will undergo a complete interior buildout to support high school operations. This includes delivery of both general education and specialized instructional spaces. Each building will be equipped with appropriate support areas including uh collaboration and operational spaces. Full building systems and code compliant infrastructure including plumbing, restrooms will be installed to meet occupancy requirements. These buildings will provide critical additional capacity and program flexibility as uh as a school grows. Looking at site improvements, supporting the full high school experience. Uh site

008upgrades will ensure the campus supports at comprehensiary high school program. Athletic facilities will be enhanced including stadium improvements, track and field, and tennis courts. Supporting elements such as concessions, press boxes, ticketing, and storage will be incorporated into um will be incorporated to enable full event operations. Asphalt play areas and outdoor activity spaces will be improved to support student use throughout the day. Lighting systems for fields and site areas will be upgraded to improve uh safety, usability, and community spaces or community access. These site investments will ensure the campus function as a complete modern uh high school environment for students in the community. Looking at key dates, community engagement on initial scenarios occurred last week, April 28th and 30th. Today's work session provides direction ahead of next uh engagement round planned for May 28th and 30th.

009Um the super superintendent's recommendation to the board. It was originally planned for June. Again, we'll talk about later that how that pushes to July possibly. Uh these milestones are tightly aligned to maintain schedule for a school opening. When looking at community feedback overview, as of last Tuesday, we had received over 1400 responses reflecting strong community engagement. Feedback has been submitted across multiple language reinforcing broad uh participation. This input is actively informing scenario refinement and decision- making. Continued engagement remains a priority as we move into the next phase. Looking at community feedback from the two engagements we had last week on May uh April 28th and 30th. Uh currently we we've received over 5,000 map comments and we're still counting. We've had over 20,000 address searches and featured clicks where some you know someone's clicking on

010uh school is almost 90,000 clicks. We've had over 12,000 unique visitor IDs. And then when you incorporate the questions that we received in person and online last week with the mount uh we've had over 400 questions that were submitted in person and online. And then I've personally seen at least 150 emails or so that have come in uh to the leadership within the uh the district. When looking at uh respondents profile, the majority of respondents are parents of current students with strong representation at from elementary families. This indicates a high level of interest for families who will be directly impacted by future boundary changes. When looking at uh geographic uh distribution, uh participation is geographic geographically diverse with the highest concentration from H. Hearnden. This aligns with areas expected to experience the most significant boundary

011considerations. When looking at school uh representation, strong participation from Carson Middle School and Crossfield elementary school communities. This reflects engagement from key feeder patterns likely to be impacted by boundary adjustments. When looking at uh community priorities, families are priorities prioritizing factors such as uh proximity, stability, and program alignment. These priorities will be balanced alongside capacity and operational considerations in this narrow refinement. When looking at slides 16 and 17 will cover community concerns. Uh feedback highlights concerns focused on specific high schools, particularly Westfield, Oakton, South Lakes, and Chantilli. themes included overcrowding, feeder pattern, continuity and distance, and potential disruption. These concerns are being incorporated into um additional scenario adjustments. So now we'll go through uh slides 18 through 21 where we'll talk about scenario options. Uh these scenarios represent initial options developed using capacity data, feeder

012patterns, and community input. Each scenario uh balances trade-offs between utilization, proximity, and stability. These are not the final recommendations rather they are tools to gather feedback and refine options. The next phase will focus on narrowing and improving these scenarios based on stakeholder input. Uh WXY is our consultant looked at current state. The existing bounding structure reflects modern balance but growing strain. While 22 schools are currently at target utilization, only 15 can accommodate future growth with seven supporting capacity deficits. The average student travel distance currently sits at 2.42 miles and the system includes 11 split feeders contributing to uh continuity and community concerns. So what you see in front of you is the first scenario scenario one which titled balanced improvement approach improves utilization while maintaining a moderate level of stability. It reduces schools nearing capacity

013deficit to one and improves travel distance to 2.27 miles. However, it requires reszoning approximately 12.8% 8% of students split feeders are reduced to eight representing a net improvement in alignment while maintaining a balanced trade-off between change and operational benefit. Looking at scenario two which is titled stability focus approach minimizes disruption with the least amount of student reassignment at 9.9% while achieving the strongest utilization out where 25 schools at target at the highest capacity to absorb growth. Travel distance improves to 2.29 miles. However, this option increases split feeder patterns to 13 uh negatively impacting feeder alignment along long-term uh continuity. When looking at scenario three, alignment and efficiency approach uh max maximizes uh feeder pattern alignment and operational efficiency. It produces the fewest uh split feeders at six and the shortest average travel time at 2.26

014miles while maintaining strong utilization improvements. This scenario requires the greatest level with 13.8 8 students being reszoned representing the most significant community impact among the uh options. Overall, each scenario represents a uh distinct uh trade-off. Scenario one balances uh and disruption. Scenario two priorizes uh stability and capacity, but at the expense of feeder alignment, and scenario three delivers the strongest long-term structural alignment and efficiency, but requires the most change. These scenarios provide a structured uh framework for decision-making allowing leadership to weigh in to weigh capacity needs, community impact, transportation considerations, and feeder pattern integrity in determining a preferred path forward. So, in closing, uh I thank the board and community for continued engagement, feedback, and direction from this session will directly inform the next iteration of scenarios, and we remain on track for a June

015July recommendation to the board decision. So, thank you. Standing by for your questions. Uh Dr. Reid uh wants to make some comments. >> Yeah, as I mentioned intro, I have a couple comments to make. One, thank you. This is a large body of work. Recall uh board and the community watching while the western boundary process is working. Ourilities team is also um meeting in four other hotspot areas across the county doing boundary work right now. um that will be brought forward to the board by January of 27 uh for the fall of 27. So as we are looking at this timeline right now and looking at the feedback as we want to be responsive to um community feedback, we really believe uh at this point that we should have a third cycle as part of

016this review. Um, initially the consultants were planning to come back with two scenarios in May and then that would go from there to a recommendation. I um, in reviewing that with staff, we feel like we really need to come back with three scenarios in May, not two because we're not ready to narrow it yet. Uh, given given the breadth of uh, feedback. So I think we would like the consultant to come back with three scenarios in May and we have those meetings set and then we'd like to add a cycle of review after that that's public again. We want to make sure we get this right and we want to make sure we're thoughtful about um hearing our community's feedback. So um I would propose that while we had discussed June as being a board

017vote that uh minimally we move uh the board vote to the second meeting in July which would give us an opportunity to take a uh third cycle publicly to the community before it comes back for a final review and recommendation to the board. So, I did want to make that um comment and in large part when we posted this Tuesday, we've had other um interactions and we've reviewed more feedback and just feel like we need to take a very measured approach at this time. So, um I would certainly be advocating um to extend this a bit and have one more cycle. Another way that we've discussed to take this one more uh look is to really be more focused about this being a feeder pattern and high school boundary look at this point. I know

018that there were several um elementaryaries that were in play originally in the original divisionwide work and I think Mr. Gordon, as we reviewed that, that was Virginia Run, I believe, and Bull Run that were part of the elementaryaries, which we paused when we said we were going to pause the western boundary work. Um, and I know there have been several other elementaryaries that have come into play with the um several of the early consultant maps. Uh, one of those um Fox Mill and then another I don't know if Crossfield actual boundaries, what was it? Lee's Corner. So really as we look at that I think if we want to get the um high school boundaries thoughtfully reviewed I think it would also be my recommendation that we don't address elementary boundaries of the individual elementarymentaries

019with particular recommend rather that can be part of our next five-year look. However, we do need to address the elementary feeder placement because it's critical that we understand where our elementaryaries as they currently are boundaried, what feeder pattern they'll go to. So, I think if we can more laserike focus on the task in front of us and do another round, which would be a measured um approach to review, I think that um those are adjustments that I would like to recommend at this point based on our staff review. Okay, with that we will go ahead and start our discussion. Dr. Anderson, thank you. Um, just in response to what you offered, um, I'm kind of looking at the Sky View work a little bit removed because I don't understand all the nuances of the neighborhoods.

020So, I I do defer quite a bit to those who do, but it seems but I've seen the emails that much is true. I I've I've I've I've heard or I'd rather read the concerns and I think slowing down sometimes you have to go slow to go fast I think would is a good thing. We could use that in more than one place. So I appreciate that you're um exercising that discretion here. So I have no concerns unless people who are closer to the action do regarding the um July date. And just to make sure that I fully understand because I really need to build my knowledge based on this and this conversation, the high school boundaries will continue and that's what we'll be voting on in July and the elementary work will be at

021a future date. Is that what I should take away from your comments? >> I think that we have to decide. Yes, I would take that away from my comments. Yes, I I know we're Yes. Yes, ma'am. >> Okay. Thank you for keeping it simple. Um my other question is for Mr. Gordon as you went through some of these scenarios of which there are three. So you're asking the um consultant to bring more than these three scenarios. So Dr. Anderson and again for those also listening the process we've previously gone through is the consultant provides scenarios then those based on feedback those scenarios are revised or adjusted. We're not going to create sort of brand new scenarios, but they're going to revise the three that are there. What my um request is, and I've talked with

022the team, is that the consultant was going to pair those down to two with the next round. I don't think we're ready for that yet. I think we need to revise and bring three and then the third round we would go back go down to two to really hear feedback from the community. So each time these revisions should get tighter and tighter because they really I mean we value our community input and we did in the divisionwide work and we want to make sure we integrate that feedback into subsequent uh drafts that the consultant will bring forward. >> Okay. Thank you. That is helpful in helping me understand what you have in here in front of us. Uh Mr. Gordon, as you were presenting, you kind of um shared some data regarding uh the number

023of students that would be impacted and also bus timelines and some other pieces that I don't see here. Where can I find that information? Is there they seem to only be in your notes? I didn't see them in the PowerPoint. >> There was a handout. Um >> there was a handout that the consultant provide at at the at the uh two engagements. It's here. We have it electronically. I think we could probably >> Can that be posted with today? I have >> it's online, but yes, >> I have whatever this is, but I I don't think I have that be added to today's conver um today's um conversation since he did make reference to that handout. I'm asking Miss Setllo. >> Thank you. >> I'm I would need a copy of the handout. Yes, we

024can add it. Super. So then I'll ask my questions about that once I've reviewed it. Um, couple of things. Um, slide six. >> I thought, and again, please correct me if I'm wrong. Our aim for Sky View was 2500. It's two thou has that changed 2,00 or maybe it's me who's okay. I I see the body. I I read the language. I got it. That was fairly unanimous. So I'm going to skip to the next piece. Um the what's that? I I I I I've read the room. Yes. Um regarding the 2232, I I hate to bring this into the room, but I I have found them to be a little bit unpredictable because that's what history has shown me, at least in fair in um my area. Do we have a plan B in

025case that the May 13th day does in case that there's a delay to their vote on May 13th because we've been here before. >> So, at this point in time, as we're working through the process, we're working handinhand with uh our counterparts at the county and we're not tracking an issue for for there to be a plan B. Uh we will go for uh presentation on the 13th. All the preliminary meetings that we've been required to do are in line and we're not anticipating any issues at this time. >> Okay, I'm gonna leave that there. Um then moving on to slide eight. Um the fee proposal, can you help me understand that a little bit better? This is a little bit outside of my baywick. >> So what particularly on slide eight this >> So

026what's the purpose of the RFP or what's >> the fee proposal? So I don't know if so we're through the RFP process we're looking to hire an architecture engineering firm to start the design process to do the the three the three components of the buildout which would be the main building. >> So is that a different charge outside of their just regular plan scope of work and cost? >> So you hire an A&E service. So this is this the fee is to do the design work >> and so we're in negotiation piece that we're not really not in can't discuss amounts or or the um the vendor that we're working with for discussion. So >> sure you'll see that when we come forward with the for approval. You'll see that then. >> Okay. I think

027I'll ask you my question separately. Um but the question that I do want to ask here is where's the funding coming from for this work? Because I know we had moved some things around for the purchase of the building. I don't know if I'm clear on where the funds are coming from for the rest of the work. >> It's through the capital funds. >> Capital bonding funds. >> I'll take a go back, please. >> Hey, and I just wanted to share some um guiding questions to uh to help us further um you know, preliminary thoughts about the boundaries feedback we've received from constituents. how will the renovations construction impact students and educators next year and the concerns especially of board members whose constituents are affected. So just want to put those out there. So Mr.

028McDaniel then Mr. Lady and then Mr. >> Mine. >> Thank you. >> Mr. Miss Lady. >> So I'll I'll take a I have been eyeball deep in this in the last week. Um and I a real quick housekeeping item on slide six. where we talk about the capacity and I've said this before and I'll say it again and again so I'm blew in the face that does not include future development that is not yet under active construction so those numbers even though under our calculations they say what they say it does not include things that the board of supervisors has approved that is yet dirt turned on those projects that's a very important thing to keep saying because those numbers are going to change um on that based on the community feedback that I and

029I've gotten a lot more than 150 emails. Um probably not as much as the magisterials have, but I've gotten a lot of emails. Um I appreciate the desire to narrow this into a middle school, high school adjustment and leave the elementaryaries off the table um for the time being. I mean, there there was a couple of different elementary changes that I think were already in the works and were were vetted and and requested, so to speak, by the community to make some changes during the countywide review. So, those are fine, but the ones that have been proposed as part of this um that have led to consternation, I do agree those need to be pulled back. Um, and as far as the push, I don't have an issue adding a third round of review to

030it. Um, that July 16th date makes sense to me. I would I would not want this to go beyond recess. um because we need to give the community an answer. I mean, I was an advocate for this to be done during the divisionwide review. Um it is what it is at this point, but we don't need to continue to kick this can any more than we absolutely have to. So, adding that third review, having the final vote on July 16th, um I don't have an issue with that. regarding the 2232. I was actually at the PC at I was at the meeting um a week or so ago at at Carson Middle School where we did the meeting for the planning commissioner uh Evelyn and uh it was a meeting of one one member of

031the public showed up for that meeting which in land use that's not a bad sign necessarily. It means that the project and the and the proposal isn't controversial. Um, and I'm also going, as the PC liaison, um, I'm also going to be testifying before the planning commission with some comments at their public hearing on the 13th at 7:30 p.m. If any of my colleagues would like to join, I will circulate my comments to the full board prior to to hopefully have that be an official board statement. Um, but I I based on my knowledge of of how this land use process has been tracking, I I I don't have particular heartburn about a 2232. Um my final question before my time runs out. Um can someone speak to when we're going to actually come back

032with a phasing and transportation plan? We have to have the boundaries in place obviously to run those calculations. Um but I do believe the board needs to to codify that and solidify because this is outside the normal boundary review process. >> So Mr. McDaniel, as you mentioned, we do need the boundaries to come back with that. So, if we do the vote on the boundaries in July, I think we could either talk about transportation and phasing at that meeting or the first meeting in August when we return. And I I think staff um would probably prefer a little more time, but if we wanted to, you know, make those simultaneous, we can certainly, you know, run those scenarios and numbers and have that for you at that meeting as well. >> Thank you, >> Miss

033Lady. And then Mr. Mackin. >> Uh thank you. And I want to thank staff. Um I was at the um Thursday in person at the Thursday Sky View uh boundary meeting. Um and as I told the constituents at the end, uh we do listen. These meetings do matter. And I think that it's been uh heard loud and clear um the concerns. I also want to up fact that I did have several people ask state make a statement to me which is the loudest people get heard. And I also said that actually we listen to all people um so encourage people to use uh their resources, their B committee members um if they think they're in a vocal minority that we still value that input as we move forward. Um and and grateful that uh in

034in agreement uh in regards to I believe it's mostly Lease Corner and Fox Mill or any that were added in this particular round that were not in previously rounds. Um, I also am grateful um to listening to the community wanting this a little more time um and offering a third review. I think that's fantastic. I do have a question based on uh my colleagueu's question. When you're talking about transportation and phasing in perhaps early August, are we talking about for fiscal year 2728? >> Yes, ma'am. Because we already have the decision in place for the fall of 26. So, we're a full year out and honestly, even if we did it in August, it's going to be earlier, you know, well ahead of schedule. So, >> thank you. Yeah, >> I just wanted to verify

035for folks listening that that that's we're talking about a year away because the board only voted on next year. So, no, most importantly, I just want to thank staff um and thank the community members who have come out and shared their concerns. Um, I'm very excited uh about Sky View uh opening. Um, and I'm very excited about uh what I believe enrollment numbers to be. So, it's an exciting time. Thanks. >> Hey, Mr. Moldy and then Mr. Moon. >> Uh, thank you so much. Um, so I have some questions about the physical plant since you touched on that um in your initial slides. Uh so the first question is can you walk us through a little bit more about what you're envisioning for the two external buildings um that that design. >> So yeah. So

036yes sir. So it's there are two shell buildings and this is as I described we're looking to build those out to support a traditional pathway traditional high school setting. So there you've been in the shells they have um uh some bathrooms already but we need to based on student load. And if I remember correctly, it's about uh 10 classrooms per building that we'll be building out. So potentially 20 additional classrooms. >> Okay. >> Designed to our current specs. >> So this is an opportunity for us to look at single stall bathrooms instead of group bathrooms. Um is that something that's being considered? What are the current bathrooms in the building? >> Thanks. I don't remember the current configuration. It's been a while since I've been there, but um I'll take that note back to see

037how that might affect the future design. So, single single stall bathrooms you're asking, >> right? Yeah. I mean, just given given the policy issues we're dealing with. Um and I think preferences in general. Um that would be my preference. Um and so, um can we also talk a little bit more about the sports fields? Um you talk just very broadly in the slides about kind of refiguring fig reconfigurations to the lighting um and building out the track. Um, are we going to be adding additional fields at this point? >> So, there are some spaces for additional fields. So, if if you've been to the site, there's the main field and on the other side of the build and down below that there's an area for a field and on the other side of the building,

038there's an area for kind of a temp field as there is right now. So, um, fitting in a tennis court, will it be, you know, as large as some other schools? Probably not, but we'll have to deal with the the site footprint that we have. Are we going to be encroaching onto that um what I would call like liinal space between Carson and this facility? Is there any plan to um use >> um haven't seen you know haven't you don't know where the path goes but right now I don't have a plan to do that but okay >> we'll have to see where the what what is needed that's really to fit out the school. >> Got it. Um uh separately can you tell us a little bit about uh Centerville High School renovation? Is

039there any update on that front? So nothing has changed from where we previously were. We're still in a FAR discussion with the county. >> Great. Um that's it for now. >> Full floor area ratio discussion. >> Thank you. >> Uh Mr. Moon, >> I'm not going to ask you more question about Senator Bureau, but I'm going to ask you questions about uh next iteration of options for the board to consider for the boundary wise. Would you at that time would you bring back the next iteration? Would you bring some more specific numbers number of students will that will be affected at each of the schools that's going to be impacted by the scenarios? I appreciate the fact that you gave us a percentage 10% 14% etc. Those are good but I also want to see

040numbers. >> Yes sir. I can provide numbers now if you would like >> for the next one. >> Next one. Yes sir. We can >> Yes sir. >> Okay. We have Miss Dix and then I will go. >> So thank you uh Mr. Gordon for the presentation. Uh actually um being this in my district, I did receive more than a thousand emails and uh messages from the community and it is uh really uh something everybody um is thinking about right now in the district. So um having said that u it's lovely to get the community engaged. I really enjoyed the community meetings. Uh Mr. Smith, you did a great job with uh listening to all the parents and there was uh we had 300 uh more than 300 online and more than 100 in-person um

041committee members and the word is going around. Yesterday I had a meeting with I was expecting one person there were 50 people in the zoom meeting. So you know because the PTAs and uh PTO's are getting together and and coming. So my um qu I guess one of the question has with the maps some of the under enrolls rocky run um they is showing students are moving from Rocky Run to Liberty and we really don't want to lose any more students at Rocky Run because it's already under enrolled school and that is one of the things my community is really me emailing me about other than the elementary school um distance is um a big issue like they want students to um all the parents want students to go to their close by nearest school

042and and I see that on the chart 17 that that's one of the uh concern that schools too far uh from where where they're being uh you know boundaries suggesting them to go. So um I'll just you know maybe uh answer this question for Dr. read is um you know we talked about elementary school so are we considering bull run Virginia run still as a part of that boundary discussion or all elementary school we are kind of pausing right now so I believe we're pausing the elementary discussion at this time so I don't believe the other schools were part of the we ended up not taking action on them in the full division review um so um I would also say that with regard to the um the distance and the time on the phone

043last evening with a parent and there's a difference, right? The consultant did a geographic boundary adjustment without necessarily understanding the roads and the traffic at certain hours of the day and time in our county. So that's where the on the ground feedback is so important from our families because when the consultants put their sort of best geographic or GIS and sort of technical recommendations then I think real people in real lives and real time have to say while that may make sense it doesn't for us based on traffic and time and congestion and people's work hours in different parts of the county. So that feedback is going to come back and obviously is part of our calculus. Um I also want to clarify that the B similar to the divisionwide work the consultants put out

044the first their first uh drawings and then the B reviewed the feedback about those drawings and not reviewed these initial drawings but they will be reviewing the feedback from the drawings before the next iteration. So just wanted to clarify that as well. That's uh good information to know. Um so other than uh that I think Sky View overall has been such a welcoming uh you know school in our community and uh people are excited to go and definitely all the tracks we have in the school. I I want to just uh maybe uh check on the enrollment status if you want to share that. >> Sure. And good afternoon everyone. Uh, and I do want to thank the schoolboard members who showed up at the uh, community engagements events. It was uh, very comforting to

045be able to talk to the community and have schoolboard members there to also hear those concerns. As it relates to uh, enrollment at Sky View, uh, right now we're bumping up against 800 students who are enrolled at Sky View for the fall. Uh we're also very excited about uh a water safety uh academy uh that we've been working very closely with ISD and transportation to ensure that we can provide uh certifications in CPR, lifeguarding, water safety uh for students in 11th and 12th grade. So an academy program uh bringing students into the school and that would be for up to 100 students. >> That's great news actually. uh once we saw the swimming pool, we were like this is uh you know Dr. Reed mentioned this is going to be a great addition to have

046our students certified and you know get employment after they're certified uh as as uh lifeguards. Um when we when we talk about the prek and and maybe some other thing are we also including the enrollment or the program is not done yet the prek program. So we are we are not including prek in terms of enrollment at this time. Uh we know that the prek program we haven't done anything with that space. We have the furniture. There are some programming discussions that are happening with prek and there were some issues where we wanted to hold the school for the 2232 process to ensure that it's a high school and then work on some of the prek programming once that process continues or it comes to an end. >> I think that's great. Thank you so

047much. those by questions. I will go ahead and take a turn and then we have it back to Dr. Anderson. So I want to summarize my understanding of this sky view boundary work to date. So the board approved to hire the consultants WXY to conduct the work. The consultants conducted outreach survey went to the community. We have that survey data presented in the slides today. The superintendent sent scenarios to the board in the Friday letter on April 24th I think it was or 23rd and then April 26th the or the the boundaries were published and that night we had a community meeting. The B committee did not review the scenarios. The school board did not have ample opportunity to provide input on the scenarios. I am finding the updates today far too cavalier for my

048liking and imprecise. Um, I think it's dismissive of the amount of real emotional heartache that thousands of students and families have experienced. And I think that it's evidence of the failure of this to be rolled out in a positive way. When we did the comprehensive boundary review, one of the failed motions was that the superintendent conduct an evaluation and lessons learned that was voted down by the board. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like lessons were learned because if last week we could have avoided putting out elementary school boundaries that today the superintendent said, "It seems we're not and I will seek confirmation." All of this strife could have been avoided and now all of the extra money we're apparently going to spend on a third review which has yet to be identified in dollars. We don't

049know that number and Mr. Meline asked a budget question on how much the comprehensive boundary review was and we did not get a wholesome response. We got the number of the contract and then we were told something like 400 overtime hours were worked with no dollar price on that. So this is evidence of repeated, imprecise and cavalier approaches to one of the most sacrosan things that people decide on in this county. Where to buy their homes, where to send their kids to school, where to invest in school. I want my colleagues to please understand. So last two map came out and drew a line through Fox Mill estates. And not only was that a whammy, the double whammy was the community had no idea that elementary schools would be discussed. They had in good faith

050participated for months in these discussions. That Friday night they had their amazing annual Matsuri event, their huge Japanese cultural program. And for me, it had a damper on it. Were so fraught. If we do not hold the superintendent accountable for how these processes roll out, we are not doing our jobs. It is our right to know how much money is being spent. It is our right to know what she is proposing to the public more than 30 seconds in advance. Tremendous pain has been done in this community. I have further questions, but I will wait for now because I'm still recovering from the emotion of it all. Dr. Anderson and then Mr. Mine. Thank you. I have a number of things, but I want to be way late a little bit regarding the bathrooms that

051Mr. Mavine has mentioned. We've had multiple conversations and they've all been kind of conversations um about moving to single stall bathrooms and this has been happening since our first term on the board. So my question to Dr. Rita is what do we need to do as a board in order to move that from a conversation to an actualation? Do you want me to bring a forum topic, a a motion so that when we are looking at renovations, we are looking at any physical work that single stall bathrooms be the default rather than the gang bathrooms that we currently have? >> So that's a that's a great question. I think in the design and construction phase, there's also a community permitting piece. So, I guess I would defer to you in terms of what would be

052required to ensure that maybe that's part of the RFP and the design piece. I'm just wanting to make sure that um it matches up with whatever permitting moves forward. I ma'am I just would say you know in my 10 months here it's a new topic for me and I think I need a little time to talk with staff to make sure I fully understand and what the second and third order effects are and would be willing to provide that information but I need to talk with staff and not create something that you know not fully understanding. >> Sure happy to do that. I just want to make sure that we are communicating to you that this is something that needs to happen and so how you get that working I'll circle back with you because

053I want to move beyond conversation on this because it's been ongoing since literally 2020. Um second thing is the enrollment. Um, I know we've said this at, well, I haven't said this, but I know it has been said over and over and over again that we were going to be beating people off and that we were going to have at least a thousand this year. We are at 800. I think I'm surprised by that and I remember the conversations that we would be u opening with up to a thousand students for the for the fall. And I know that the school has been working very uh closely with community members uh the school staff at at Sky View. They have uh gone to our middle schools uh to do presentations. They're providing uh we've had

054uh events every week uh since the beginning of the year for families to attend. Uh there's actually for those who are watching the work session at 4:00 today on Tuesdays, they are available for tours at the building for those families. uh who are interested in attending. >> So, we're still trying to recruit. >> I say that we're still engaging with families and are still uh helping families understand that Sky View could be an option for them. >> Oh, okay. Um the water safety, is that a life guard course or is it what you had discussed earlier, which is to teach water safety to third grade students from the schools around the division? >> So, we're those are two different projects. Um, I'm still committed and we're still committed um to working on a partnership with

055our park authority to provide bless you to provide water safety courses for our third graders here in Fairfax County. But that's not what this is. This is an academy course uh that is being developed to support really a WSI certification or equivalent. Uh we recognize that Fairfax County has a number of pools and uh it's an opportunity for our young people to earn a certification that would enable them to be employed as a lifeguard uh during the summers or during the times that uh even an indoor pools, right? That could be a year- round extra work. So that's my understanding that what we're talking about here uh Mr. Smith and you you've been directly involved with this. >> Yeah. Yes. We're looking at a variety of certifications. Advanced lifeguarding, American Heart Association CPR, American Red

056Cross water safety instruction, uh American Red Cross first aid. Those would be the some of the certifications that students could receive. And then, uh quite possibly a pool operator's license for those students who may already have some of these certifications where they could learn more about the management of of uh a pool itself. >> Thank you. And that would be just for the surrounding schools or available to more than just the schools that are listed here. I don't know how far you've gone in that planning. >> So right now we're looking at working with trans to see how far go based on student schedules as we think aboutmies across the the county. Uh wanting to ensure that we could provide transportation to those 11th and 12th grade students uh so that they could get back

057to their base school uh to take advantage of other course work. So, we're still looking at the the catchment area on that for the academy, but we are offering it for 11th and 12th graders uh because we don't have 11th and 12th graders at Sky View yet. >> Sure. So, I should deduce that the academy is going to be what our currentmies are. If you're geographically located in too remote of an area, you cannot have access, which is the very thing we've been trying to combat >> at this point. And again without having information about the transportation piece uh it would look like more of an a traditional academy geographically >> which is unfortunate. >> Well and do you think that I mean we have to seed if you will incubate pilot programs somewhere and

058having a pool enables us to do that here. That doesn't mean that once we can get this academy program up and running that we couldn't look at other pools in the county, once the program is situated to expand programming to it just would have a different budget consideration if we need to rent pool time. >> Sure, I hear you. But it just doesn't happen. You know, sixth grade in the middle school only in Mason district is a very very clear example of that. Um I I do want to say one last thing because I see that my time is going down. Can I finish this one statement, Miss Marin? Um I I I think there's been a huge opportunity that has been missed with all of this work. Um I'm glad to hear you say,

059Dr. Reed, that the technical piece from the consultants, whether it be WYZ through consulting, it happens and it's fine and it's good on its face, but it it it misses the opportunity to really understand what's happening in the neighborhoods. what is the lived experiences in the neighborhoods and what the community will or will not tolerate. We did not do this in this process. I don't think this board was properly leveraged to help support that. We were on the side. We watched the bus go past us. We were not on the bus to help this be less difficult for the public. That's a huge miss. And I would be remissed if I didn't share this because we have to do better on that point. >> Thank you Dr. Anderson. Mr. Maline. >> Uh thank you and

060thank you Dr. Anderson for that. The one one thing I would correct you on I don't think they're called gang bathrooms. I think they're group bathrooms. So it's not >> I'm sorry. I was a principal when I open up a new school and they say we have gang bathrooms. I'm like what? Construction told me there were gang bathrooms. Um, so, um, uh, one question kind of following on, um, Dr. Anderson's points. I know there's been some countywide communication that's gone out about potentially recruiting students from other parts of the county. Do you want to speak to that at all? >> I think, you know, originally we talked about having um the priority being to the five pyramids on the western part of the county, but if there were spaces available that they would be available

061outside those five pyramids. So, um there has been communication out about that and opportunities to see the facility um for other students in the county. >> Got it. Okay. So, I think to to u Mr. Smith's point, we are still um if the word isn't recruiting, we're still welcoming people to >> we're still welcoming people to look at the site and see if that's a choice for their child. >> Um so, when we think about this, uh the academy program here, you know, is built as an aviation academy. It sounds like it's moving to more of a air and water academy. Would you agree with that statement? >> Well, I don't know if it I remember we did say it was going to be a comprehensive high school with some strategic pathways. Um I do

062think that the pool presents a unique opportunity for us and as we think about um I maybe we could talk about air and water. I don't know. But Mr. Smith, I'll defer. I don't want to put words in Mr. Jagel's mouth. >> No, no. I I I do think that it's air and water, air force, navy, I don't know. I don't want to go down that road. Uh but it is an opportunity where because we do have a pool, I think that to take full advantage of uh the opportunities uh with the pool. Uh we also know that uh the the pool is uh already set to support uh individuals with disabilities and we've had those discussions with our department of special services of what future programming might look like for students as it relates

063to the pool as it relates to therapy. So I think that there are many opportunities for an aviation school that has a pool where there are opportunities where we utilize the pool to its fullest potential. >> Well, I I appreciated hearing about all those opportunities today. So, thanks for presenting that. The the uh pool facility management, pool management certification is interesting to me. I was actually a snack bar manager at a pool. Um I would love to see I would love to see a snack bar certification. >> We can create a snack bar academy and we will ask you to be an instructor at the snack bar academy. >> Thanks. I'm sure it comes to no is no surprise to my colleagues that I was in charge of snack bar. Okay. Thanks everyone. Okay, Miss

064Lady, >> thank you. Um, and uh I I believe that I heard we're close to 800. >> Yes, that's correct. >> I I think that's fantastic. I I do remember the conversation at the dis quite vividly and I think there were some folks who didn't think that from an opt-in perspective that we would get those numbers. Uh, I also say that being there on on on the open house this past Saturday, um, I was ecstatic to talk to people from around the county, um, who work in that area, which is why it's a possibility for their children. Um, but also saw, you know, I I don't know if it's been shared, but Mr. Jaggels has talked about the P working with the PTSA to create a ride app um where depending on where parents are

065coming from like we can't share addresses or emails but they can choose to share them that they can create their own hubs or their own car pools and I think that that's uh important to note because um it does make it more accessible um than just the default of thinking that there is no transportation. I the other thing I'll say is as someone who has spent you know the you know I I mean I worked at at TJ for four years but working at Marshall Academy I mean Marshall High School which has an academy and at Chantilly High School which has an academy I I did that by choice because I love the opportunities that are there but you know by design we didn't choose I mean someone at some point chose to put HVAC

066at Edison um and that's a long way for our folks to travel our kids can't access Right. I mean, I I don't want to sit here at the dis and complain about my side of the county and how far it is. There are areas where some opportunities are more amenable or more um you know, sort of um they can get there um easier. And I I don't want um you know, I I'm excited about Sky View. anything we do in this system, any decisions we make, um, you know, they're they're they're tough at times, but I I just, you know, I think that what we're going to be doing with the academy, making part of it an academy for certain pathways is fantastic, and I do think the water safety, we'll figure it out for

067the whole county when it comes to the third graders. Um, and I think it's a great resource. So, I just, you know, I understand the consternation some folks went through with the drafts that came out. Um, and and hopefully now that's that they're, you know, celebrating what they were hearing today. Um, because I just I I want to uplift staff for listening and and pivoting pretty quickly um to incorporate that feedback. Um, so I remain optimistic about what's going to happen at Sky View and just thank everyone for all the hard work. >> Thank you, Mr. McDaniel and Mr. Moon. >> Thank you. And I appreciate the update on the enrollment um situation. I mean I I I don't think there's anything particularly magic about the 1000 number. Um you know, but it seems to

068certainly be trending in that direction and I have no I have absolutely no doubt that we'll open and everything will be fine with a cohort of students that are going to enjoy this building and the amenities and the opportunities it has to offer. um you know when consultants come to the table they typically do a very rigid data analytics process and that's clearly been done here. I would like to say that this presentation that the and I was at both of the meetings at Sky View, one virtual one in person and the document that the consultants generated that was shared with the community um is very professional. It has a lot of data and it is a very good work product. uh I was very impressed with the work that they've done in in generating

069um the these scenarios. That being said, what our job is to do is to take that hard data and to marry it up with that community input. And that's us at this table. That's having town halls. That's engaging with constituents. I've done which I have done extensively over the last week. And that's a process that takes time. Um so we'll get to the right decision and we will open the high school this fall and it will continue and this is going to be a great um asset and a great opportunity for our students. Thank you. >> Thank you. I just want to address the time. I had asked the chair and vice chair about adjusting the time allowed on this agenda and I didn't get confirmation that we would be but clearly we need more

070time. >> That's that's incorrect. I I gave you an email back that said that we would add the time on to the end of the day. >> Well, I must have missed that. >> Yeah, she must have. But yes, you received a response that said that we would add time on to the end of the day, which is what I'm hoping we can do. >> Okay. Yeah, that I guess that was unclear to me that we would if if you want to do it again, this agenda and there's people here in the public, you know, we've got to be clear about what our agenda are and things change. There was a very big change that happened last week with this topic that impacts tens of thousands of people. So adjusting our agenda makes sense. So

071given that it's now 10 to 12 and our clerks just informed me that, you know, we need to keep going on the um on our agenda, we will go ahead and pause here for sky view. We do have two and a half hours for the calendar discussion, which as I also said, I do not think that is necessary given the hard work governance has done. So, I'm hardressed to say to the public when they can expect for this board to reconvene about Sky View in that 3 to 5:30 time frame. >> Well, I was I only saw two more placards. Could we not get through those questions and then move forward? >> We have a we have a we have a panel of people coming at 1:00 and so I want to give the board

072enough time to go ahead and break for lunch. Um, but we're going to do a faster lunch and then we're going to reconvene as quickly as possible. So, we can absolutely make sure that we pick up the rest of the discussion at the end of the day. So, I guess to members of the public, I would guess no earlier than 400 p.m. the board will reconvene a discussion about Sky View, but that seems to be it. So, Mr. Moon, I know you were next. I also had further comments. So with this, the board will go into a recess and shall we say reconvene at 1:15 to give us a reasonable amount of time to just Yes. Okay. So we will reconvene at 1:15. If you can please take your seats. Okay. So at 121 I'll

073call this work session on artificial intelligence panel discussion to order. I'll turn it over for Dr. Reid. >> Thank you Miss Lady. So good afternoon and um as we begin today's panel and it's so good to see all of you here um I want to suggest that we frame the discussion around a really core idea that we've uh been contemplating and that is how do we create a roadmap as a school division for implementing AI which improves human skills and not reduces or replaces them and I really want to thank uh Richard Colada for sort of framing that because we had a conversation in preparation for today's conversation and I think that's really an important way to think about framing it. How do we create a roadmap for implementing AI that improves our human skills,

074our human capacity to problem solve uh to collaborate um and to generate solutions for many of the challenges facing us and not about reducing or replacing them. To have AI to be an assistant which maybe helps free up time administratively uh so we can spend more time with one another I think is really exciting. So here in Fairfax, I know that that's where the premise we want to start with is how to enable AI as a tool to strengthen our human capabilities, not reduce them. And so um I want to make sure that as we look listen to the uh panel this afternoon, I'm going to cut my remarks short because we're running a little short on time and I really want the board and our community to hear from our four uh experts in

075the field. Uh first of all, Dr. Richard Kablada, the CEO of ISTY and ASCD. And for those of you watching online, uh the bio slides have been posted. I also want to introduce Dr. Amarda Shahoo. I may have not pronounced that correctly. Shi who um who is the chief AI officer for George Mason University our higher education partner and Ysef Ahmed uh the co-founder of Play Lab and our partner in our meeting the moment competition that we had earlier this year. Also online we have Dr. Allison Mishkin the youth policy lead for OpenAI who has joined us remotely um this afternoon. We believe that the really diverse perspectives will provide some valuable insights and we're looking forward to the conversation. So at this time I would like to turn it over to uh Mr. Sethi

076and Dr. Prescidio as they are collaboratively leading this work here in the school division. So Mr. Sethi. >> Thank you. Thank you Dr. Reed and thank you to the panelist. Uh we're going to start with a quick slide deck uh which Mr. Kera is going to lead us through to ground the conversation and then go on and ask some questions to the panel um from there on out. >> Well, thank you and thank you for the opportunity to uh spend some time here. I am thrilled to be uh here. I spend most of my life traveling around having meetings like this in districts all around the country. I uh am a parent of four FCPS uh students, two recently graduated, two that are in the Hearnen pyramid right now. So, I'm honored to be able

077to have a minute to be here uh uh with you all. Um, I think the first, if we can go back to the slide before real quick, I just wanted to set up and these are just three slides. This will not be long. Uh, but but I wanted to tee up the conversation in a way that I think could be helpful. And I found having had lots of these conversations before, some areas where we can kind of get caught up and and I and I wanted to do that. So my first uh uh point, my first ask is uh before we dive too far into anything related to AI, uh it's useful to ask this question. What is your why for AI? What's why for it? Right? I think Dr. Reed just said something really

078really powerful. This idea of thinking about AI, using AI to help uh students become better at doing uniquely human skills, right? That's a great that's a great why. And I think you could have versions of that that uh that align with what you want to do as a as a division. Uh, for example, a why could be, you know, I, uh, our why in Fairfax County is that we believe AI should be used to help students be more curious, more creative, and more collaborative, right? That's a good why. Uh, a good why is focusing on using AI to help uh, students do their uniquely human skills better, as we talked about. Those are those are good wise. Just learning about AI because it's here is not a good why. Uh, and and and I see

079uh, school districts around the country falling into that. we better do this. It's here. We better do this. And so trying to shift uh to that really thoughtful why and and again for me it would be about helping support human skills. So um if if we can and I just want to go to the next slide here. What I want to share is there are four distinct use cases for AI in education. And this is where we get wrapped up a little bit. I've been in lots of conversations where people are are you know passionately arguing for one view and passionately for another. And then when you stop and say well what are you talking about when you say doing AI? you find out, you know, if you could see their thought bubbles pop up,

080they're actually thinking about very different things. And so I just want to lay this out here. There are four use cases and I think um my friend uh Bobc uh Mushagani was here uh recently and he he and I were very aligned on this. He's also trying to help. So this will this will line up with what you heard from him. The first is uh using AI for school efficiency, right? doing things like helping to analyze data data sets, doing things like helping to optimize hiring processes or uh identify more efficient bus routes or or you know th those important things but it's for the efficiency of the school. That's that's one. Number two is for teacher efficiency. Teacher this is creating lesson materials, creating a a rubric, drafting an email to a parent, maybe

081making some materials differentiated instruction. That's the use case number two. Number three is learning about AI, right? Sometimes we call that, right? Learning about AI. What is AI? How does it work? What's an LLM? How does the data get process? That's all falls into into in bucket three. And then bucket four is learning with AI. It's using AI uh to help identify where there might be gaps in learning and suggesting opportunities to move forward. It's getting feedback. It's practicing a conversation with AI before a student maybe has to present that in front of a class. It's getting personalized uh tutoring and support. It's also using AI as a brainstorming partner to help think more broadly about a topic than one might do on their own. I set this up because I would invite you as

082you're having this conversation long after we all leave, as you're having this conversation to be very thoughtful about which one of these you're talking about in the moment because the the policies, the goals, the uh examples that you use all shift based on which one of these you mean. And the last thing I'll say on this uh is I would strongly encourage you to not lose focus on that fourth bucket. I feel like we get a lot of attention on number two, a lot of attention around number three, and often that fourth bucket of how do we learn with AI? How do we use AI to support learning uh kind of gets left off and and actually I believe that's probably the most important. They're all important. I think that one's the most important as

083the as the the role of a school. And so the last slide that I'll share and then and then I'll wrap up is uh we have a number of schools around the country and states that have reached out to us and said, "Great, we're in. We want to do that. How do we do it? What are the skills? What does that look like? And so if you go to the next slide, uh we've created something called the profile of an AI ready graduate. And these are six human skills. These are human skills being a learner, a researcher, a synthesizer, a problem solver, a connector, and a storyteller. Six human skills that we believe all students by the time they graduate will need to know how to use AI to do better. And that's what the

084profile of an AI graduate is. And we have a a more fleshed out version that has subs skills under all these and and can really get into details of what you should do. But these are the things that we want to see when students graduate and go to uh their, you know, place of work or future learning. They're going to be expected to know how to use AI to help get unstuck, right? They're going to be expected to know how to use AI to tell stories. And I don't just mean that in an entertaining way. I mean to capture hearts and minds about something they care about. they're going to be expected to use AI to generate far more possibilities for problem solutions that they will then choose which is the right way to move

085forward. And so these are the idea that we want to be thinking about is how do we help model using AI to help them be stronger in skills like being a good researcher, a good learner, a good problem solver, a good connector with other people. AI is very powerful tool to help understand viewpoints and connect with other people. uh if used in this way, right, in this bucket four way. So, let me wrap there. Thank you for letting me uh sort of get that state that out. But I I think this will keeping this idea of these four use cases can be helpful as we have this conversation and certainly look forward to uh however we can help do that. Thanks. >> All right. Well, thank you, Richard, for kicking us off. That's the best

086PowerPoint presentation I've seen in terms of length in a long time. >> So, I'm going to need to take a page out of your book and start to cut my PowerPoints down. Um, but we're just we're going to try to be as informal as possible with the with the discussion. And I think those four use cases that you just laid out um is a really good framework for us in our community and the FCPS community to think about AI. And I do think you're right. It's kind of that fourth uh use case of learning with AI that we're probably struggling with the most. We need to learn more about all four use cases, but it's probably that last one that we're struggling with the most. And I think for the first question we would just

087ask any of our panelists, you know, what are some of the promising practices that we might be seeing around the country or around the world um in a little bit more detail where we see actually some promising practices with learning with AI in the classroom and anybody can just jump in whenever whenever you feel moved. >> There have plenty but I already talked a lot. Does somebody else want to jump in and Okay. >> Right. I can give a few examples but they are not primarily from K12. they're from higher ed just because of the position they occupy. But some of them may be general and transferable. Uh very low hanging fruit that I have seen instructors at George Mason University has been gamification. uh so using uh very simple tools and sort of these

088technologies out there I'm not going to name specific providers uh in this meeting to create um quick games um in order to reinforce certain concepts. So for instance uh like the card matching game that usually tests memory. I think we've all played it like you open strawberry and then it disappears and you know then you try to match strawberry strawberry. Um so some instructors are using these in order to u allow students to connect concepts uh and to be able to practice this at home. So outside office hours outside the um usual you know 9 to5 when the instructor is available either in class or in their office. Um I've also seen instructors using allowing students to use these tools but more as critics. So in a socratic uh fashion uh to challenge their ideas

089or to challenge their project in order to iterate and to consider the multiple other solutions or approaches um as we just heard. Uh again uh not to replace the work of the student but to be there as a critic and and to push the student to think a little bit deeper um and to advance more in their both their understanding and the in the maturity and sophistication of the types of projects um that that they're pulling together and I and this falls under teaching with AI right so utilizing these tools these AI um platforms out there that have very specific capabilities in order to enhance enhance the teaching to enhance pedagogy uh to make themselves in some fashion available to students. But there are also many other cases that our instructors are including in the

090classroom that fall more under the category of teaching about AI. Um no matter the the discipline uh where students are providing them some basic uh AI literacy understanding of what these tools can and what more importantly what they cannot do. And the most powerful example is not the one where instructors are telling students but are having them experiment themselves um in very structured sort of studio-like fashions um um exit ticket like fashion where the students themselves are carrying out very specific experiments and figuring out in real time uh the quality of the answers what it is that they can and cannot rely on. And then the third category is a funny one. Uh teaching with AI about AI. Um so I've done this myself. For instance, I had students experiment with consumer chat bots. And

091here I can mention a couple um OpenAI, uh Gemini, uh Anthropic, and uh even Grock. Um they would pull uh problems uh prompts uh that were reasoning tasks. So for instance, I'm giving you a a a series 2 46. What's the next one? Uh that's called the reasoning task, right? Many students um uh in K12 are supposed to be able to figure out these patterns. Um and so the students would design somewhat more advanced reasoning tasks and provide them to these consumer chatbots, the free version. Um and they would record not just the accuracy of the answer but they would also record the reasoning whether the reasoning was correct because they found out in real time that the answer could be correct but the reasoning would have no connection to the answer or the other

092way around. They also learned for instance how brutal these uh AI technologies can be because um they went through structured a structured process where they would push uh the chatbot and say hm I'm not sure you got this right and see the response and then would have a more than polite uh push and aggressive challenge you really failed at this and see the response of of these tools and so in real action they learned about reliability of these tools how often did they change their mind are they really reasoning being is the answer connected to the reasoning at all. The instructor did not, in this case myself, I did not have to teach them or preach to them. They could see it in action. They could gather and analyze. They did all their data analytics

093with AI. Um, no spreadsheets involved, no Python coding involved. So, it was a bit of an interesting exercise, but they learned in action basically um probably four weeks of material that I could have spent to teach them about AI literacy. So, there are lots of examples Let me add one real quick. I'll just be very brief. This is a teacher that I was uh talking to in in Maryland just just up the road. Um and she was sharing with me uh a student that she had who was just struggling to write. It was one of those students that had I don't know if you you've experienced this yourself, maybe that blank page fear, right? There was that blank page sitting in front of them and they just got stuck and felt like they couldn't move.

094And this was something that they was working on for a while. And so finally she said, "Let's try something. We're going to use AI and we're going to say AI is going to give you a first sentence and she prompted it to say here's the topic, right? First sentence. Your job is just to come up with the next sentence and then AI will give you the next sentence and then you'll do the next one. And so they started doing this sort of paired writing. And what was amazing is over time this kid just got over this fear of just getting started, right? And so then they were able to pair it back and said, "Hey, this time we're do it again. This time a is just going to give you the first sentence and you

095need to write the paragraph and then they're going to help tea up the next paragraph that you can write." and and and to the point where this kid then became confident on his own in in being able to write. That's a really interesting example of this that fourth bucket that I shared of using AI to help strengthen a human skill. This kid needed to become a good writer. He wanted to the teacher wanted to he was stuck because this here's a blank piece of paper was was was holding him up, but a was able to help move him over and through that through structured practice. >> Can y'all hear me? Okay. Um I'll keep it simple. There are many many examples like uh we have a database with over 100,000 teacher projects. So like wide

096ranges of use cases. If we just focus on writing feedback, one thing that we've learned about teacher use and like good use that's actually impactful, a lot of it has more to do with culture, context and how the tool is introduced and used than the technology itself. And so even if we take something like writing feedback having like uh you know so one example we work with a community of uh science teachers in Massachusetts all teaching the same curriculum open sed it's a researchbacked rigorous curriculum and the they have the same AI tool that gives students writing feedback where they can get formative practice at bats to improve their claims evidence and reasoning. um this AI tool. There's a researcher that independently studied its impact in one classroom where they saw significant gains in their

097reasoning skills through using this formative feedback tool. But and here's a rub. Um the results vary dramatically by how a teacher introduced it. There are certain teachers that had conversations about what is this? Where does this fit? What are our norms and values as uh as a class as we use the technology? And uh when that was done well, it was used as something that really like a bicycle for the mind. It augmented uh kids who were struggling, who weren't able to ask for help were really seeing gains. Kids who were already doing well were being accelerated. So it was both raising the floor and raising the ceiling. But in classes where the conditions when it was not introduced effectively, um you had a lot of kids thinking that wait my teacher is not giving

098me feedback. This bot is what does that mean? What does that mean about me? Right? Right. And so I think that the emphasis or the lesson that I take from that is like there there's a whole conversation about technology, but I think as important if not more important is a conversation around how do we set teachers and our systems up to introduce these things well in ways that actually create the kind of learning cultures that we want to see. >> All right. Thank you very much. I I think um well Dr. Mishkin had her hand up a minute ago. Did you want to jump in on this one or or >> I'm happy to jump in but also cognizant of the time if we want to move to the next question. >> Okay. Well, maybe

099maybe actually we will move to the next question then because I think a lot of those comments were great in terms of getting a little bit more specific about what some of those instructional use cases look like. And I think one of the things that I probably should clarify just for folks in the community that might be watching right now in Fairfax, we are not using AI chat generative AI chat uh features with our students right now. our teachers have access to those. But we have been very intentional and deliberate to really try to think about, you know, before we roll tools out, what are some of the foundational AI literacy practices, ethical practices, academic integrity practices, and things that we would need to have in place and some of the examples that you just

100gave. I think we're getting some questions from our community about if students are interacting with these generative AI tools um and they're getting coaching, feedback, support, brainstorming help. some of the examples that you gave, what does that mean for academic integrity and how do we ensure that we're not offloading student thinking, right? That we're actually providing supports uh to deepen student curiosity, to deepen inquiry, to deepen student thinking. Um, and I'm just wondering like what are some of the best practices that you might be seeing um in schools uh whether they're K12 uh or higher education to really kind of balance some of these concerns around academic integrity? I can I can uh start on that. This is something we spend a lot of time on. And I think I think part of the the

101key with this is understanding the difference between productive and non-productive struggle. And so, uh, one of the things that we think about is, you know, should learning should it be should there be struggle? Should there be should it be a, you know, should it be hard? Yes, the answer is we do want kids. We want kids to struggle with with concepts and we want them to learn. We know that we learn through that. The challenge is that there's also a lot of nonproductive struggle in school and that doesn't help with learning. In fact, it does the opposite. It removes the opportunity to learn. And so I think what we need to be really thoughtful about is what is productive struggle and what is not productive struggle. Let me let me give you an example. Taking

102a concept from science and understanding how that might apply in the real world. Uh trying to understand how that might apply in uh a particular scenario or situation that's set up. Knowing how those chemical compounds, you can tell I don't I'm I'm a I'm a Spanish teacher, right? I probably should have used a Spanish example. Understanding where and how to use past subjunctive correctively in Spanish that I'm better. I'm now in my territory, right? That is productive struggle. That is good. Here's what is not productive struggle. Not understanding the instructions and waiting because there's nobody at 10 o'clock at night that can help figure that out. Uh not understanding a cultural reference that doesn't make sense in an assignment, and there's lots of those. And not having any way to get around that. uh having

103to uh take information that is not at the right level for a student who can't get at it because it's written at a level that's either too too high or too too low for them. That's non-productive struggle. None of that leads to helping learning. And so those are cases where it's actually really helpful to be able to use AI. What you don't want to do is replace that productive struggle. And so I saw an example of this. Let me just give a a non-example here at a school district and there was a teacher who said, "Look, I I don't have time to make this assessment. I'm gonna go into AI just here's the standard make the make the assessment and and and then she took it and then posted it in in her online you

104know schoolyage or whatever it was and the students then logged in and said I don't have time to write this do this assessment this is homework I have time to do that they took the the assessment questions put into AI and generated an answer right they then posted that back in you know their online tool and the teacher said I don't to grade this so she took the answers put it in AI and gave feedback and then posted it to the students right so we've just had this back and forth and back and forth Earth. Who got smarter in that? >> Well, AI did. AI got smarter. The people the people didn't get smarter. Right? So, that's an example of of you that productive struggle that that actual product struggle just got handed off to

105a machine. That is what we don't want to do. And I think that's the key here. And and I think the goal at the end of the day is to say, and we need to have this conversation. When would it be inappropriate to hand a task off to AI? And and you have to this one when would it in be inappropriate not to right I had a kid who just spent this was number of years ago to be clear uh going through school three days formatting uh references in MLA format right that is not a good use of student time three days formatting nobody in his life when he graduates he will never format anything in MLA manually ever right so that's an example of non-productive struggle that would have been should have been handed

106off to a tool to do that the writing process, the creating process, finding his voice, that's a that's a skill that would be totally inappropriate to hand off to AI. >> Well, that's a great example. Um, and it's given me flashbacks to my dissertation and all of the citations and it took me more than two or three days to do those. I can assure you. So, um, I think we're going to bring Dr. Yes. Yes. I was going to bring Dr. Michigan in, and I'm getting a lot of facilitation help from my colleagues, which is great. I need all the help I can get. So, Dr. Mishkin, >> thanks everyone. Um, and apologies I'm unable to be there in person today. Um, but I really want to underscore everything that was just said and emphasize

107both um, the importance of AI literacy and that's real concrete structures to ensure that young people are taught to be critical consumers of when are these tools going to encourage their learning, when is it really going to be more about cognitive offloading. And that's where I really think the FCPS approach of focusing on let's make sure that the teachers and the adults and the community around a child is really wellprepared and understands those nuances themselves before we put it into the hands of young people. Um and so I think that's a really critical approach. Um secondly, I think it's also important to recognize that the tools themselves be best suited for learning. Um, we actually don't have a consumer-facing education product at the moment because we're doing research to ensure uh with academic partners including

108Stanford University around a special model tuned to promote concepts like metacognition with the concept being before we put these powerful hands into an educational environment, it's really important to ensure that we do so thoughtfully. as still we do have consumer tools that users may choose to engage with um teenagers only um including a study mode that all consumers can opt into to make sure that they're getting the scaffolding necessary to encourage um deeper thinking and academic involvement. And so I really think that the solution to solving a lot of these problems is not around um a one-sizefits-all approach, but it's about making sure um that everyone in a student's ecosystem knows how to have and can grapple with these questions. um making sure that students themselves are trained on okay what are some great places

109where we can maybe increase efficiency so we can focus classroom time on the actual act of learning. Um and then also what are the best tools out there to support those learning goals and that only by really think collaborative we be able to ensure that young people are best prepared to be critical users of these tools when they grow up. >> Thank you. That that's super helpful. And I think just to kind of paraphrase, one of the things that I heard in there is not just turning students loose in unstructured ways in unsupervised ways with AI tools, but being very deliberate and intentional and even fine-tuning what the tools are capable of doing to make sure that uh we're providing students with the appropriate supervision and scaffolds to use those tools correctly. So, that's very

110helpful. Thank you, Gotham. I'll jump in and maybe follow up with the question which lines up right as you look at uh the adult and teacher training models that are emerging and these are being developed on the fly because this is so new there's no teacher training school working at this as yet. What may be some of the approaches that the division should take in preparing our our adults, the teachers and maybe even our community in engaging on this >> um sort of an important um perspective on this one. Uh teacher preparation to me is a main uh main objective if you want equity. So when people say equity and access they typically think about AI infrastructure, right? Or AI tools. So they're thinking, hey, we want to make sure that it's not just the

111kid who can afford whose parents can afford the the latest premier model in the after hours, but we want to make sure that all our students have access to some highly capable model. So we typically tend to think infrastructure or technology, but having teachers who know when and how to integrate these tools in the classroom, that is a competitive advantage, right? So and and I would even advocate that is more of a competitive advantage than having access to the latest Jed GPT model because as as you mentioned earlier it's really about how you are thoughtful how you're integrating them in the right context for the right student population at the right level of development right for the right reasons. Um but training has has been a real challenge because the the tools change they evolve

112so quickly and it's very often the case that uh at least in education we don't by design we we are we're not built to move fast right we're built to be thoughtful and and careful. Um so there's always a little bit of a a mismatch. we train for the tools of yesterday when the tool already changed in in front of us. Um, a model that is emerging in higher ed has been the peer-to-peer uh training model and primarily that's driven by lack of resources and lack of money to hire people that can coral the community and and train. All right. So, it's just it's a it's a recognition that we will never have uh maybe what industry will have but we do have inside we have champions. We have folks that are innovators and we

113want those folks to come out of the woodworks and tell us what it is that they're doing, right? What are the cool things that they're possibly thinking about and implementing but hiding? We want them to come out, share, pilot, and then create a community of practice. So, at Mason, for instance, we have communities of practice among instructors. We have communities of practice among staff and um they exchange problems, questions, and solutions over teams. They say, "Hey, I was trying to do this and I couldn't. Can somebody help me?" And somebody comes and has an answer. Or somebody comes and says, "Well, that's kind of interesting. Let's think about that together." Um, and and that community grows really fast in their understanding. And it's I I have become a firm believer that that's the only way

114to attempt to catch up. Anything highly structured uh requires a lot of prep time ahead, requires a lot of resources, right? But when you distribute it to a peer community, that's probably the distributed model is probably emerging at least across higher ed as something that's practical and reasonable enough. >> Richard has a lot more expertise here. Um, so I see you're writing notes. I'm going to let you go. Uh, just what I'd add is I think there are three, if I were to think about it, there are like three core things that we all need to develop right now. Um, I think to to your point, the tech is changing. We're trying to learn about a moving target. That's really hard. Um, it's a moving target that has real world implications. You're seeing the data

115centers go up. You're seeing like conversations about energy prices. Um, there's real conversations about safety. Like a lot of the chat about companionship, chat bots, right? And chat bots are the tip of the iceberg. They're like cassette tapes from my point of view. The like AI agents and agentic systems that are coming will like be more powerful. Um, but with risks also come real possibilities for connection, for uh raising the floor for more young people and for adults. And so I think with with I think for adult literacy and teacher literacy, we think three things are important. It's like actually getting hands-on, playing with the technology regularly in places where it's safe to play, where you as a teacher can be around peers, ask questions. Um uh be vulnerable. You don't need to be the

116expert all the time. Um uh but then two, as you play, really start to think about for my context, what can I do today to help my young stu my my students? What can I do to actually like help myself in my work? We all know that teachers like it's it's a really tough profession. Um uh and then and then three um because this tech is so new as an organization like Fairfax, how do you create the space for thinking not just about direct implications but unintended implications? The example I'll share is um we work with every community college in California and what I've been hearing from faculty there is anecdotally they're noticing that some of these really effective AI tools that they have for their students are helping immediately. They're helping first generation students

117navigate courses that they otherwise would have difficulty navigating. But they're seeing less peer-to-peer collaboration outside of class. Kids are turning to chatbots instead of to peer groups. And so the question then becomes, how might we design the technology is really beneficial. How do we design it in a way that's pro-social? And we're seeing some colleges there that have been piloting use of the tech in ways that is actually still augmenting and actually helping more young people find peer collaborators and groups. And so it's I don't think it's either or, but again it's a question of how do we roll it out in a way that both helps us helps us helps us use it in ways that create the kind of learning communities that we actually want to be a part of. >> Just just

118to add just to I agree with that and I won't add much more to that, but just to say if you focus training on tools, you will always be behind. >> If you focus training on principles, you will be ready regardless of what tools come along. And good learning is good learning. And so if we talk about what are the principles of good learning then as new features and new it becomes very clear we're not always playing catch-up. We know this makes sense because it supports effective learning. This doesn't regardless of what's in the tool. And and actually I want to if I can just give a quick shout out to uh Fairfax County and Sloan in particular uh has made a a a shift where uh all of the um school-based technology specialists the

119ESVs are in process of getting certified an industry recognized certification on effective learning. Right? So so to be clear these are technology specialists. their certification is on what is effective in engaging learning because the best way to be a a school-based technology specialist is to understand what good learning looks like and what it doesn't. And I think where where we got wrapped around the axle a little bit and there's certainly a broader conversation, not the topic I guess for today, but a broader conversation around tech in schools in general is from a whole lot of not effective technology use that largely came in after COVID and and so so just kudos to to the team here for being ahead of that and saying we're going to make sure our instructional coaches really understand what does

120good learning look like and how to use technology to support good learning regardless of what tool happens to show up. just a strong uh I really want to emphasize that um couldn't have been said better myself. Um the principles behind how we should thoughtfully engage with and be critical consumers of technology doesn't change that much depending on the tool, right? like concepts like digital literacy which emphasize um checking validity of information be critical consumers ask yourself when is it appropriate to use technology and when is it not apply regardless of the medium regardless of um if it's generative AI or sending a message um and so I think anchoring an approach in what is the science of learning what do I need to get across um and also recognizing that the principles and the concepts

121and the values that you are trying to communicate shouldn't be shifting based on the latest technology ological release um can help ensure that teachers, educators, parents, community members are best prepared to help students navigate the technological shift ahead. >> Can I disagree a little bit? Um I I I agree with like the the emphasis on digital literacy. Technology and tools do matter. Um has anyone here heard of right to repair? >> A few do you mind explaining like real quick? Yeah. >> Uh companies that produce certain things don't allow other people to fix them if they're broken. So it creates a lot of cost on the >> like John Deere is a great example like farmers across country can't fix their tractors and it's not because of tech it's like there a lot of business

122decisions that were made to make it that way and I think the push I'd make is as a district um there choices around like technology that you can't fix that you can't understand a world where like we just we're living with black boxes um or there's a push you can make towards procuring technology that you can understand that's interrogable where young people and educators can get behind the scenes to see how the thing is working um and so I think that's uh agree on the digital literacy and I think there's a push on like you know that the transparency does matter. Yeah, >> fully agree. But I think that the question like the the goal is not just how do you use once you pick a a tool not just how do I use this

123particular tool but how do I use all tools and this may be like there might be specific features of a given tool that you need to use but the questions that you need to be asking and interrogating are not just purely like how do I turn it this particular one on and off. >> Maybe a followup to that. Um, as we think about universal literacy, we want parents in our community to be on the journey with us in that because we know while access at school is certainly blocked, students or young adults may still have access outside. How do we help build or shape the thinking and support structures for families? Any best practices emerging in this realm or anything any advice for us as a division? We spend a lot of work working with

124families on this and I think what the what we found in schools that have done this well I think of districts like Miami date has done a very good job of this it is helping uh parents have more meaningful conversations with their kids and a lot of times uh that is doesn't happen the school you know rolls out a new technology or another program and you know maybe inform forms parents but doesn't necessarily help help them have meaningful conversations. And so some of the things that we recommend and you know not to uh sound like a self-promotion here, but I did I did write a book specifically on this how to help parents and families have more meaningful conversations about technology use. And so some of the questions that we recommend are, you know, when

125in our family, right, when is it appropriate to use technology and when isn't? How can we use technology to help us be better members of the community? One of the examples that I often give is, you know, I was walking down the street the other day uh and picked up a there's just a little piece of trash on the ground. We were at a park and I just threw it away. I didn't really think anything of it. The next time I went out, my son saw a water bottle sitting there and just picked it up and threw it away. That modeling is really powerful, right? But in a digital world, it's very hard to model if you're not explicit about it, right? If it's if it's me just sitting in front of my computer, uh

126I could be playing a game or I could be helping support the blood drive that's happening at our at our uh you know local local community. But to my kid, it's just dad sitting at his computer again. And so being explicit about saying how do we use technology? What is the equivalent of throwing away a piece of trash in the virtual world? What is the equivalent of using technology to help us uh connect and engage more as a family? Right? And so asking those questions I think are really important. We recommend that all schools have a acceptable use guide or or a sort of a norm set of norms for how technology is used. And we see these a lot in in uh in districts around the country, but they usually start with don't, right?

127Don't use technology to do this and don't use it for this and don't share your password and don't uh be a jerk online and don't do it's just all the don'ts, right? Um the problem is uh you can't practice not doing something. >> Thou shalt not. You can't practice not doing something. And so we actually need to articulate what are the doses. What are the doses that we want to see? I want to see I expect you in my classroom when I was teaching I would say I expect you to use technology to fact check. I expect you to use it to bring new viewpoints to class that we didn't have before. I expect you to use it to be able to present ideas in more creative ways. I expect you to use it to

128keep track of when your assignments are due. Whatever it is, but being able to articulate the vision of what we want to see, right? That's where we need to go. Oh, and so if we can help parents tee up some of those questions at home as well, it can make it a much more uh engaging conversation. And and that is a decision of families, right? Families decide where and how they want technology to to engage. But if they understand what are some of the questions uh that they should be asking and how those align with some of the expectations for how technology is used in learning, it creates a much uh much better environment. And I can tell you from districts that have done this that the sort of anger and animosity, you know, that

129that some parents have just sort of go away because they're they're part of that conversation and it's an important one to have. >> Oh, you good? >> Apologies. I think that was an earlier hand. >> No, no problem at all. And and Richard, some of your last comments just made me think a little bit as you're talking about acceptable use policies and being able to articulate the vision for how we would want students to use the tools. Um, our community and our board is in the process of developing a policy right now around instructional technology and artificial intelligence is a big component of that. So, do you have any advice for us in terms of like what we should put into a policy, what we should perhaps, you know, stray away from a little bit

130more? Just any thoughts or ideas? uh really for the entire panel as we think about the type of policy that would promote the types of use that we would want to see with technology tools and protect against the risk that we're all concerned about. Any advice that the panel might have for us? >> I'll start quickly, but I'm sure other people have thoughts and I'll I'll be brief because I I don't mean to take too much time here, but um but I do think it's really critical again back to what I said focus on the learning. Um when I see technology policies that start with lots of tools and don't and when and count the minutes for how you can use technology that is not an effective technology vision right if I have technology that

131is not effective for learning two minutes is too long right if I have technology that's helping create creative engaging curious learners then longer makes sense and so I think it's really important that we talk about those uh th those principles and make sure that in the policies that the learning is really clear I just was on a meeting with another large school district from the other side of the country that is struggling with this right now. And I and they they were saying, you know, we're we're we're we're having, you know, trouble and we're trying to figure out how to how do we create this? And lots of disagreement. I said, can I see can I see the uh the the pol, you know, the every year at the beginning of the year they send

132around this the policy that you sign and opt in or opt out, however, however you think of it. I said, can I just see it? Can I see what it is? And I looked at this thing and it was written by a lawyer clearly and it just had all this, you know, your data will be used in all these different ways and all these systems. And I said, "I wouldn't I wouldn't sign that. Are you kidding me? I would opt out right there when I saw." They said, "Wait, but but that's that's a tool that they're using to do these creative, you know, virtual science projects." I was like, "That doesn't say that on here." And so, it's really important if you have a policy anywhere that is going out the door. And it's a

133technology policy, but it's not focused on learning. Time to redo the policy. Every policy, every technology policy has to focus on learning if it's going to be effective. Even if the end of the day is to talk about how you're going to use technology. Sorry, >> I wanted to give a perspective because we gave through this exercise about 18 months ago trying to craft a policy. We did not call it policy because the moment we would do that all the lawyers would get up and we wouldn't move anywhere. >> Uh so we called it guidelines for safe and responsible use of AI. And um I'm just going to make two points. One is what are you trying to protect? The tools will evolve. Their capabilities will evolve. What is permissible now? Maybe we'll figure out

134that that was not such a good idea three years from now or what we think now is not possible, two years from now we'll think that's okay that we have moved beyond that. Uh but what are you willing to protect? What do you want to protect? And so it's very important to outline those principles. Even though people might scoff at them, but the principles tell the community what is precious and what your identity is. So if you want to protect critical thinking, you should put it in there because the teachers will see that and whenever they want to integrate something, they're going to ask what what am I am I protecting critical thinking? Right? So at least those principles become questions of what it is that you want to protect. The answer may look different

135from classroom to classroom, from district to district, but you got to have those um really clear, front and center, transparent. The second one is guidelines, policies, they tend to be dry, right? They tend to be we want to protect this, this is important, right? They're they're kind of virtue signaling at some point. So you want to take those and you want to translate them for what does this mean for you as a teacher? What does this mean for you as a student? What does this mean for you as staff? So you also want to take those guidelines and you want to translate them into something more practical that is very specific and and useoriented or or or use userbased. And then the third thing I guess I I said too I lied. The third thing

136is we should put somewhere that we reserve the right to change our mind because things are moving so fast, right? And that will make it okay for people to understand that they can move around the margins, right? They can come to you with a question. They can be comfortable to surface something that the policy said but that they're actually not finding possible to implement in the classroom, right? They should feel safe. So, um, that's why we call them guidelines because they're squishy and fuzzy and you can go and you can modify them. >> Dr. Mishk, >> lower my hand this time. Um, I love this analogy also of needing to emphasize the shoulds, right? Like we don't teach piano by saying this is all the notes you don't play. We say here's how to play

137it. Um, and I think what's really interesting about all the examples that I'm hearing with regards to acceptable use policies is that emphasizing what are the shoulds, what are the visions, but also I think separately it's really important that it's done in a transparent way so that young people and educators and everyone in the community knows what those values are. Part of my community my concern with like the this is what the data says and these are what etc. is what what does that mean? What's the so what? And I think it's really critical that any policy not just has the substance of what our goals are and what our articulations are, but that it's articulated in a way so that young people, educators, comm community members really understand what it is they are agreeing

138to um and can really buy in and feel a part of and excited about that vision. Well, all of those comments were were fabulous and give us a lot of, I think, uh, food for thought in terms of how we're crafting our policies and our acceptable use policies as well. Um, I really like the focus on our values, the practices that we want to see and in clear language to articulate that, not just to our community and teachers, but also to our students in terms of how we would want them to use the tools and devices. Um it does raise a little bit of a question um in terms of once we've got that dialed in really well and we think that we're ready perhaps to enter more into the AI for learning space. One

139of the things that we know that we have to be aware of from the very beginning is how would we measure the effectiveness of learning with AI tools. Um, so we're kind of curious what suggestions, recommendations you might have, things that you're seeing in the field, either evidence of um, how AI is uh, being used in the classroom to impact learning or things that we should be thinking about in terms of how we would want to go about measuring that uh, here in FCPS. >> I think Allison, you should totally share some of the research that OpenAI's produced. I think it's really good. ISTY obviously has produced a lot of really good work on this. Um, the quick thing I'll say while they tee up, um, because they they have tons of research that they

140could they could pull from, um, is it's connected to what you just asked about earlier. The districts we've seen have the most impact on outcomes are the ones that are coming at this with learning questions and it's often the ones where the boards are holding their teams accountable to what are we learning about AI implementation in our district? Where is it improving teacher outcomes like teacher satisfaction, efficiency, etc. Capability I actually think is a big one. um uh where is it improving student outcomes and where are things that we tried not working why and how can we course so I think just that learning orientation is really important at the systems level a lot of examples I could share I think the favorite one that I have especially thinking about how entry level just the

141discourse around entry- level jobs and when from cousins and like you know friends that are like recent graduates from college um uh there's some powerful use cases around making learning more relevant and more real so I think who here Just a tangent really quickly. Who here thinks of themselves as a math person? Come on, Dr. Reid. I mean, not many people. Uh, but what's beautiful about AI from my point of view, we've been we work with illustrative mathematics. It's uh really strong evidence-based math curriculum. They're open source. Um, and what we've seen with AI is districts as large as New York City to small rural districts are using AI tools to one build the capabilities of teachers to teach with this really rich but hard curriculum. Um, but then two creating really strong uh AI

142tools with guardrails that their students can then use to make learning more meaningful. For example, in New York City, these international schools that serve mainly newcomers to the country are using AI tools to help teachers personalize projects uh to the context of these kids. They can think about the Mets. Um I know we're in DC. Um uh but you know in Queens they care about the Metsu or the Knicks if it's right now. Um uh but they can connect it to things that kids actually care about. Um and then they can offer kids support so that they can actually and and that's changing and it's leading to more kids seeing themselves as math kids. And I think that matters and that's important. But it started with the district team that's leading this, Superintendent Alan Chen,

143um, uh, asking the question of what can we try right now and what are the cycles of data that we can collect so that we can learn what's working and what's not. Um, and when it's not working, instead of coming down with a stick, it's like, hey, we tried it. Let's we we obviously tried it within a container, right? Um, what do we shift? What do we pause? What do we do differently, right? So, I think creating those conditions feels really important. Alison, you got a you got a shout out to go in there. I'll I'll share something, but you should you should uh do you want to jump in or >> um happy to jump in. Um as they mentioned, um at OpenAI, we've externalized our uh learning outcomes measurement suite, which is just

144this concept of um both. How do we use model behavior and change how the model responds to ensure that it's really also just being fine-tuned for all of those learning science principles that I think have come up repeatedly um as key needs throughout this panel. Um the second is then okay we need to actually like measure like both like how the individual use of the product changes um and also um how broader skills like metacognition etc evolve and so through this toolkit which I'm happy to share um we've externalized a system and way of thinking through both what are the shifts and what are the ways in which AI might be able to help learning um as well as here's the tangible like technologies you can deploy to measure how learning happens happens through chachi

145bt. I think this also gets to a broader point about when selecting technology providers which is um ensuring that there is evidence even from the from day one not just before it enters your classroom of this is the theory of change as to how we believe we can better design and implement learning sciences through this tool and here's the evidence that it can already achieve that goals and then measure it within your classroom setting. Um but just really making sure that research aligned learning pedagogical uh approaches are what are prioritized. >> So just to be clear there's no special measure of AI learning, right? We know what good learning is. We know what good learning looks like. If we are using AI effectively, we are using it to get at effective learning principles that we've

146known for a very long time. We've known, you know, since I was teaching back in, you know, many many many years ago, right? We know that if learning has meaning for students, they're going to learn better, right? That's really hard to do. When I had five classes, I was in a state that had a lot higher student uh uh ratio. I had five classes of 30 students each every day. Making individual meaning for every student is very hard to do, right? We know that having meaning leads to better learning. If AI can help do that, we're doing it right. We know that uh we need way more feedback, right? There's lots and lots of research that shows if we want to improve learning, it's not the amount of content that we need to increase, it's

147the amount of feedback that we need to increase. Students need far more feedback than they get. If AI can help give more feedback, great. We know that authentic practice is incredibly important. Authentic practice, that's hard to do. Again, as a previous high school teacher, that's hard to do when you have uh over over a hundred students. If AI can help with more authentic practice and it's leading to improved learning, great. if it's not supporting those things, time to stop and think about how we're using it and maybe reevaluate the decisions. >> Well, I want to thank all of you for that response. And again, it's very consistent with the themes you've touched on from the very beginning that we should only be using AI in ways that are already aligned to evidence-based instructional practices. And

148if we do that, we can continue to use the research base to measure the impact of how we're using those tools. So that's excellent. Gotham. Yeah, just from a workforce perspective and you just touched on it as we prepare the next generation and they're going through the pipeline. Um, what may you be seeing right now in the workforce as a founder and a CEO at tech companies and what are the expectations of the the employees that are coming in to the workforce? >> Happy to jump in, but I know all of you probably have ideas. I have a lot of friends that like AI labs in San Francisco and so we we hear a lot um but I think from our end like work is starting to change like uh um I don't know if

149you guys have tracked but did anyone hear about like the improvements in a lot of the models back in December so some so I mean uh particular on coding right uh and so like our team um you know we use uh some folks use codex uh which is from open AI most of us use cloud code um we work very closely with both the anthropic and the deep design teams. Um, and I think the kind of what's shifted here, whether you're using Codex or Cloud Code or one of Google's tools, um, or the many other coding assistants is software engineering has fundamentally changed. Um, not like it's not magic, right? There's a lot of real engineering work that's happening. Um, but it's clear if you peak around the corner what it means to be an

150engineer. Um, what it means to be an AI researcher. If we look at some of the kind of things that are happening, uh, on some of the kind of different model training teams, um, it's changing. Uh and I think that for us it actually relates to what I was sharing earlier. We think a lot about how are we learning as an organization. What like how are we creating the space among all the other things we're trying to do to like try new ways of looking learning and collaborating. Um and so I think that's that's been something that we've we've been thinking a lot about. I think the the second maybe thing I'd share back is like as humans like especially when you think about education and young people many of us are parents. I have

151a three-year-old and a one-year-old. Um, so the stakes maybe are a little bit different than than your high school or middle schooler. Um, but uh it's it's it's clear the current education system from my point of view, the what what I went through um uh is not going to be the education system that my children need, right? Taking, you know, learning fixed subjects, standardized exams, doing math worksheets doesn't feel like the thing that's actually going to equip my kids for the role that we're entering into. And the reality is that discovering what education should look like for this new world isn't something it's not a known. We don't know what the solution is. We have ideas. There are tons of wonderful examples. Richard can probably expound on many of the wonderful school systems that they've

152worked with around the world. But we need to create space for learning and trying new things. How do we teach math? How do we teach science? How do we build critical thinking for this world that we're entering into? And the the the if I if I leave you with one I think one powerful idea, it's this powerful idea that we need to create containers for safe and responsible experimentation. Experimentation is a really loaded word. It's something we don't want to talk about when we talk about our kids, we talk about our families. But what what if you really break down what experiment means? It means you have a real hypothesis that's grounded in something, usually science, learning science, pedagogy, ideas about what competences should be. And then you scope out a way to validate whether

153what you're trying is working or is not working. And I think we're at a moment where we need really thoughtful, responsible experimentation with safeguards for to help discover what teaching and learning should look like for the school world that we're entering into. Because if we don't, we're just going to keep doing the same old same old. And we know that's not going to be what sets up my kids for success. that's not going to be what sets up kids here in Fairfax County. And so I think that's that's the kind of as I think about our experience of the changing of like how work is changing. I think that's that's the idea I'd leave you with. >> Any other thoughts from >> Yeah, I get asked a lot by parents um what discipline, what major

154should I send in my kid? What is safe from AI? Um I don't charge them for my answers. Uh but I I I do want to echo Yousef that whatever answer you get is probably not the right one. Um at most I think we're guessing because things are evolving so fast. So even folks that say things such as well a mechanical engineer will be safe because it's a very tactile, right? It's like you're dealing with things a civil probably safe. Um I I I don't think that's the right way to think about it. The right way to think about it is for these kids and I have kids. I have a a high schooler and a middle schooler here in the county for these kids that will go in a very in a radically different

155workplace, right? Well, they will be expected to uh seamlessly integrate these in their daily job. What are we doing in order to prepare them cognitively for what they will need? We might not be able to teach them the latest and the greatest about the technologies but we should be able to position them so that whenever the technology changes they still have the formation right so in a way the answer is the very old one what are you in the business of right whether it's higher ed or K12 you're in the business of formation right the students encounter through their middle school through their high school through you know community college through the four if they go to to a a typical four-year college, what they encounter every day are are problems. So, what they really

156need to develop are those the ways to come up with answers, the ways to come up with solutions, right? The ways to think about things. Um, so in a way things will change a lot and they will not change because those core skills I argue and I tell parents those are even more important now, right? the ones that are is so easy to forget about if you focus on the moving target those become even more important those are the ones that you need to protect because those are I don't like the word durable but those are the things that will stand um I do have uh trepidations myself about my own kids so I am very cognizant about what they use at home uh so I I agree here that I put very very um

157sharp uh boundaries at home and and one thing that I did want I get a little bit earlier which is in line is um not all AI use is good right good AI use is good but your your challenge is to define those boundaries and to be able to feel comfortable to say nope not at this age okay but restricted right and and we're looking at you we're looking at you because you understand cognitive development right uh just keep AI high um to the same standard as just any other technology. Even though it is so easy to be wowed by it, keep it to the same no as I say. >> Thank you. Um Dr. Michigan, >> you're on mute. >> You may be on mute. >> Apologies. I think that must happen at least

158once a meeting. Um, I just want to um emphasize everything that's been said before and I going deep on that it's really easy to be wowed by like oh wow look at what it's done. I think in some ways that's a lot of the power of AI and where I see the opportunities for young people. So with tools like codeex or claude code or really any of these, it becomes a lot easier to be a creator and we know how impactful and important it is for kids to be creators rather than just consumers of content. And what that means that the tools to solve the problems that they care about are ever closer to young people um regardless of uh what age they are or when they're graduating. And I think there's incredible opportunity um

159because no matter what happens problems aren't going to go away in society. Um, but kids are innate problem solvers and what AI does is give folks the tools to solve that which they care about, which I think is incredibly important and powerful. And so I think education and preparing young people to tackle problems, to understand how to solve or design an experiment or um really those uniquely human skills um are going to be really impactful and help them succeed. >> Thank you. And we certainly saw that in the competition we held for our high school students who opted into it. They all came with their passions, used the technology and the tool to kind of build the outcomes that they were really passionate about. everything from finding food for families to rentals and supporting all

160sorts of things in that and that is a powerful example when when you start using these tools you start synthesizing and actually orchestration is one of those words which comes in as an IT person now working with these tools and even building apps you're orchestrating the experiences and you have very quick for experimentation to see I build something I can have somebody use it I can get a feedback I can correct that loop and be able to deploy deploy something which is useful and that's the end and if it's not useful it's likely not going to get used and that feedback loop is so tight you don't have to wait years or months anymore it's like overnight you can get that feedback to say this is working or it's not working maybe one final question

161I know some of us some of you have to leave at 2:30 as we um look at AI and education where may you see AI and education's impact in five years right how do Do you think of that framing? And we're all predicting here. Nobody has the answer. Um, but what would you see? >> Allison, tell us what you're seeing inside. >> Oh gosh. I don't want to predict the future because can I'm I'm currently at a conference and candidly, if you'd asked me even three years ago what the technology would look like, I would not have believed you. Um, instead I have a wish list which is that I hope that this technology and really all technologies become tools to help young people realize why learning is so fun and why the craft of

162knowledge is this like uniquely amazing adventure and recognize that they have the power in their communities and in their schools um to really be impactful, well-rounded individuals, passionate and excited about something. Um and so my hope is that these tools better enable to that four-part framework that we led with at all levels of the ecosystem. It's all about ensuring that classroom time and young people's time is devoted to the act of learning and the goals that we have for them as humans. And so I think as long as we keep that north star, um I'm really optimistic. >> Well, I can give you my hope. Um my hope is that uh we will have better clarity uh after five years on um what is good, what is beneficial, what should we keep, right? what should

163we experiment, what should we try out and what I expect uh in five years is that we will have hopefully delineated sharper boundaries of and as more specific evidence accumulates and by specific evidence I mean very specific experiments run you know very specific group ages around very specific uses so that there's no sense of we're having to try to figure it out in real time uh but we have good evidence to point to and we can then make the right decisions for our kids. >> I think there are two very distinct different futures five years out. Uh one is where we have offloaded important human skills to AI. uh we've stopped being able to be good writers, good thinkers, good problem solvers because it's gotten so easy to just hand it off uh to AI

164and uh uh one where we're no longer using it in a way that can uh really reinforce human skills. And that world scares me. There's another future world that looks very different and it's one where we have decided to use AI to help us do human better to help us be better collaborators, more curious, better problem solvers, uh more able to connect and engage with important problems with different viewpoints. And I don't think there's going to be much of a middle. I think it's going to be pretty much one or the other. And to be completely frank, that will largely come down to how we prepare students for the world that they're going to be living in. And if we are able to model these important key skills, model the use of this tool as

165one that can help us be curious, be creative, be better learners, get feedback better, get more viewpoints better, engage with each other, know how to learn and synthesize from materials better. If we can model those skills, we're setting ourselves up for a very uh very effective, very positive second option. But if we don't, um if we just sort of stand back and let it happen, AI will happen. There is no question about that. AI will happen. There's no putting it away. There's no putting it back in the it's here. Uh our choice is what what one of those future worlds do we want? And I and I and I hope my hope and and I will do everything that I can as a Fairfax County parent and a leader of an international education organization that's

166based right down the road here. I will do everything that I can to help make sure that we are modeling and preparing kids for that second future where they are really using this tool to become uh much better at the human skills than we've been able to get to in the past. >> Anything leave it at that? I think that the two questions I'd ask like that yes to everything Richard just said and the two questions I'd ask is what are we learning about all this like and regularly asking it and the second question I think to your point is to what extent do people in the district students adults feel a greater sense of agency those to to me feel like the canaries in the coal mine that give us a sense of which

167direction are we going in are we moving towards a brave new world Aldos Huxley's kind of like cognitive offloaded world or are we moving to a world of like real like robust agency and see Allison's point about more creators, not just consumers. So, I think that's those are the two questions I'd ask. >> Well, that was uh thank you all so much for sharing your ideas and thoughts with us today. I think uh that was that was a great uh a great feedback loop. I'm still considering some of the responses. I think that's our agenda for today. Okay. So, I think we had you scheduled to till 2:30. So, at this point, we appreciate you. Thank you so much for taking the time to being with us. Um, and I think we're going to take

168a quick break to do a technology turnaround so we can then engage in our AI conversation uh based on a lot of what we learned today. So, I I feel your excitement. It's palpable. Um, and I think as as many of you said, we're sort of at a crossroads here. Um, and we've got to put the guardrails in place to leverage in the appropriate way. And I think that's what we're trying to do. So once again, appreciate all your time and um, thanks for being here. >> So we'll take a deep break at 2:29, 5 minute break. um on AI and I'll turn it over to Dr. Reid. >> Thank you, Miss Lady. Um I really want to thank uh Mr. Sethy and Dr. Presidio for uh facilitating um our panel of industry uh leads

169and thought uh leads on this topic of AI. and um appreciate the time in preparing and I want to also thank our our four panelists for uh providing time to be here and to support a conversation I think that we need to continue to have and appreciate the board's willingness to engage in this topic uh with um our uh panel as well as the uh the community watching. So, um I think really this is an opportunity, Miss Lady, for the board to interact with one another about what they've heard. Uh because, you know, as Miss Marin has indicated, our AI policy is very shortly going to be finalized. Um and we want to make sure that we have a chance to dialogue about that. I think that was one of the things we heard that

170was important from the panelists is to continue to have a conversation because context matters. Um, so I look forward to the conversation and uh the feedback this afternoon. >> Thank you. Um, I did recognize placards that went up as our guests were speaking, so I'm going to go in the order that I saw them rise at that time. Uh, to that end, we'll start with Dr. Anderson. >> Thank you. Firstly, I wanted to thank our guests. Um, that was very informative. I have multiple pages of notes here, so I appreciated hearing their thinking. Um, similarly, uh, Mr. Dr. Prescidio and Mrs. Sethi. Um, a lot of the questions that you raised in the conversation were things that I jotted down because I wanted to hear what their thinking was about that. So, thank you for

171that facilitation. Um, just jumping into my comments, I I want to be sure that I kind of ground this because um, we had an educator from GMU, Dr. Shahoo, but for the most part um, the bulk of the panel were vendors. So, that is that brings in a bias to it. So, I want to be sure that we put that in the room. We're seeing one perspective. Um, very helpful. Again, lots of good nuggets, but it is a very different perspective to be presenting from the position of a vendor. And I want to start by um what Mr. Kleta shared, which is what is your why? I thought that was a very good place to start because I don't necessarily think we've had that conversation wholesome with this full board. Um, one of the things

172he said is we um, it shouldn't be that we better do this and it's here. And I guarantee if we're to replay any board conversation we've had, that's been what's been said. It's here. So, we've got to do it. That shouldn't be our sense of urgency. And it was glad to I was glad to hear um that be shared here with them. Couple of things. There are some and I appreciated hearing all the four components and there seems to be some lowerhanging fruit in terms of what is palatable, acceptable, even expected in some ways and some of the other things that are a little bit more touchy. Um palatable, acceptable I think for me falls into the area of operations. I think everybody wants more efficiency. um when he talked about efficiency of schools and

173efficiency of instruction, efficiency of operations is what came to my mind because he talked about bus routes. I'm like, yes, we want that. We want more efficient bus routes that we don't have to hand um create um we want I want I've said this before and I'll continue to say it now. I want for teachers to have more efficient operations as well um in terms of creating resources. But the outstanding question which I was really hoping to hear is how do we ensure that those are good resources so that we're not passing on bad information because this does happen. We've had what two lawyers in New York that use AI and were wrong and you would think it would stop but after the first one which is a big public splash second one still went

174in that's that just happened very recently. So that's the ongoing question as well as um what did she write here? She said what are we trying to protect? That is definitely something that I'm going to be sitting and reflecting on as we are continuing the work on the AI policy because if we are not clear about that in the policy it doesn't seem to protect it. And that's what Dr. Shahoo said. Um I'll stop here and wait for go back if there's time. >> Thank you Miss Mayor and followed by Mr. Dannon. >> Yeah, this this didn't present new knowledge to me or considerations. Um I found it underwhelming. I was really excited, especially to hear from Mr. Kulada, but I just found like it was all over the place and it was a straight

175up hour of talking at us. Um I'm concerned that this board and this school division have a pattern of having employees of large tech companies come in and sit at our table um and yet not stay long enough to hear what our challenges are and what they could learn from a school division like us. Um, I I would have loved to have asked them what they plan to suggest we train our educators on. There was a quote about that. Um, I wanted to hear more about other school divisions. There was a comment about how New York City is using AI to help teachers personalize projects like in Queens. Well, what were the outcomes for those kids? Was it a pilot or was it to scale? What data are they collecting to show that it's been

176positive? Anecdote is not evidence. And I heard our panelists talk about schools in Maryland, a group of teachers they talked to, some people in Massachusetts. That is not good enough for the children of this county. Um, I would have loved to spend time talking about the decision this board needs to make about curriculum, liability and safety, purchases, device use, monitoring and measuring outcomes. I really would have liked to have said to them that creating systems in a school division of this size cannot be done with grassroots efforts by employees who are doing pilot projects that it requires intentional investment of time and money and it's public money and we can't just have quote fuzzy guidelines as the GMU professor said. It's like they're divorced from understanding our reality. We do have standardized testing. I love

177the I look for the day when we don't have to have that. But we are dependent on public money and we can't just make fuzzy decisions. This was not helpful for me. What I want to know is what is FCPS doing to roll out AI literacy instruction like we already do for family life education. What is happening? Is it the same thing? Is it part of digital litership digital literacy global curriculum? What digital literacy curriculum? Um, we heard earlier the website on AI isn't even up to date. Our CTO said it's still in progress. That is not good enough. Um, how much are we spending? I will say I have numbers from members of the public, a whole spreadsheet of numbers that they've put together on what we're spending. I don't have those numbers. I

178don't need more cheerleading about AI. I need us to focus on the decisions we need to grapple with and be realistic about it. And once we can put that stuff in place, then I'm all for getting creative. But again, when Arlington public schools has their principles with the authority to give opt out on devices, we can talk about AI all day, but our parents want to know where we are with devices and what they're doing and what the applications are. Thank you, uh, Mr. Dannon and Mr. Moon. >> Uh, thank you very much. Um, so I have to say I I I I really appreciate the discussion and I know it jumped around a bit, but um, like I shared earlier, this is unfortunately not to bring up bad memories. Um, a lot like CO

179where there isn't really a road map or kind of thing our way around that that narrow path as I've heard described. And I appreciate ending with the two different scenarios and I think we're already seeing elements of at least the first um and and yeah I do my only regret is yeah I do wish we had more time. Um uh will there be more opportunities or I guess Dr. Reed or Dr. Pio um Mr. Sethia what other opportunities will we have to engage with some of these experts as we think through and formulate policy is scheduled? So I think that really we can our staff is very well connected to a number of um leading thought partners in this field. So I think as topics perhaps are brought forward that we want more engagement, we'll

180certainly provide uh or do outreach and provide um thought partners to be at the table to visit with you. >> That's great. I appreciate it. And I um you know, especially now we're putting pen to paper. I appreciate you sharing resources from other school divisions um you know, sample policies and so forth. I think the the New York City policy was was helpful in that it it specifically instructed the division of what not to do. So that was that was helpful. Um I'll be honest too, I think I was at the meeting the moment event um back in December, maybe January, so forth. Um it it it was not as student- centered as I've imagined. And I've been to events that um we've put on and they were very I I loved how we literally

181centered the students and asked them a lot of questions and that to me it honestly it felt a little more like a pep rally for these tools which which I get and I I work in tax understanding people get excited about the tools. So, I really appreciate that this was a little bit more robust and it it talked about, you know, our why statement and so forth and putting the data and the research first and and outlining. I put in my notes, you know, what do we envision um for our our students and so um is the clock going, by the way? I don't want I've never gone over my time, so I just want to make sure it threw me off. Yes. All right. Um so uh you know what are the what are

182so that answers that question but um you know I guess my I appreciate the comments too about productive struggle centering that um you know my concern and I've shared this before is that as technology becomes more ubiquitous it's having the effect of um separating our kids and isolating our kids and so even the example that was shared about using AI to as like a to help with writing prompts um you know that could be good and me and as an adult I would use AI for that kind of My concern is that as a student that that took away the student's possibility and this is not to knock the presenter. This is again I think to hopefully display how complex this is but but using AI for a prompt took away the opportunity for that

183child to push themselves a little bit further and make a mistake and and screw up and figure it out and and struggle. Um it also took away an opportunity for them to maybe collaborate with another human on that kind of stuff. Right? So that's you know as we kind of think through our philosophy on this um those are the kind of things that that come out to me and and you know my personal view is that our or my hope at least is that AI can take over those boring repetitive tasks as they mentioned there there are certain things that you know the MLA formatting example I've I remember that from policy studies 101 having to do that and I've never had to do it since. um you know and my my you know rudimentary

184vision is that we have a school system that pushes kids to do that deep thinking and that that really difficult cognitive um load and challenging themselves and you know I think I maybe it's worth just saying you know as a a lot of us are at least 40 and above um you know we we had the benefit of having this rigorous mostly tech-free education and we learned a lot we grew a lot and you know we struggled um and I think you know as a parent and now as a board member we have that same concern that we want to take that from our kids. And I think there's a lot of shared agreement on that. Um, like I said, I think we're trying to walk that narrow path of how do we, you know,

185be realistic about what the future is to come and how do we emphasize those unique human skills. And the last thing I'll say is I think we already have a great resource um with Portrait of a Graduate. And I guess my question for you all is, you know, do we need to double down on that or there maybe changes to Portrait for Graduate to make sure that we're, you know, taking consideration what the the sprayed new world looks like. So, I'll stop there. >> Thank you, Mr. Moon. Uh thank you. Uh I have a slightly different take from my schoolboard representative from Hunter district or Mason district on today's discussion earlier with experts. I appreciate their being here answering they're making their own presentations and also answering our question as a benefit. There may be

186some some bias being vendors but hey we get biases from all our presenters. So with that said with that said as far as a AI being here I approach that from from this anger AI is here can we can we prevent all the families all students from using II don't think that will be possible ever because there are certain things beyond our control students will use that at home with or without parental permissions or with the encouragement of parents. Sometimes a lot of times that can happen. So what do we do right now? Do nothing because of uncertainty out there. Do we just wait for five years doing nothing? Is that is that the choice we have? Yes, that is choice we have. Is that the decision we want to make? Is that the way

187do we want to go for me? No. Absolutely not. Absolutely not. The question about question about a what's your why for AI that's for the board to decide individual board members perhaps have a different why but we will have to have a collective wisdom collective wisdom display and deciding why for our school division that's a policy decision we going to have to make use of digital digital devices opting out it's the same thing those are decisions are for us you Ask people about what do you think? What do you think? We'll probably hear hundreds, thousands of different opinions on this. At the bottom of a day, it's going to come to 12 of us working with superintendent and other senior st to make decisions rather than kicking things down the road. >> That's where I

188am. And I was going to ask if I still have 50 seconds. So, if uh Dr. Reed or Dr. if you don't mind going to their presentation slide where they had the four AI use cases in education with four columns one two three four whether do you generally agree with that Mr. Smith you can participate as well. M Mr. Gothan uh do you generally agree with those four big categories with sub you know sub items you see underneath and if so can you share with us generally where our system may be on each one of those. I mean I'm not sure who wants to >> jump in first but go ahead. >> I can talk about at least one and two. I think with the availability of the tools that we have enabled right now

189we are seeing the acceptance and the enthusiasm by staff being able to learn from it because these tools you still have to learn how to use them and use them meaningfully. They'll produce an output which may be worth something or maybe worth nothing but we have to judge the output as adults who are using the tools. So when it comes to sort of school efficiency and teacher efficiencies at least in technology because we can use these tools to write programs right the tools we make systems internally we make parent digital consent is a system that engineers in our team currently wrote to support parent consent to different choices in the school division. Those kind of tools we can evaluate push faster we're using them to evaluate the security challenges cyber security challenges those things. So

190on the efficiency side from an operational perspective we are seeing initial value and it is only accelerating where we feel as we get towards next school year you will see real examples of value that is generated from it but it still requires an adoption curve right people are still a little hesitant waiting to see where we land with that I think we are seeing our teachers being able to use some of these technologies especially when they're curating their coursework and working through those but they are in early stages we did a PD recently we at 2,000 has joined an online training session with an AI tool to just learn what it is all about. So those are the early stages or at least on those two fronts. >> Yeah, I I definitely agree with Gotham

191and I would say I mean across the continuum. First of all, I would say we're just at the early stages in any four any of these four different use cases. um to maybe speak about three and four that got them covered one and two. The AI literacy work is the work that we've been developing those lessons and piloting those lessons with students now and teachers now to get feedback to optimize those so that we can scale them up because we think it's incredibly important that students one understand the risks of using AIN into independently outside of the school system and we've discussed those here publicly before but also understand how AI works so that they don't you know get manipulated by the technology which is another key risk And the learning with AI is where

192we've got the most work to do though. I mean, we are just trying to understand some of the use cases where AI would add value. In the last work session that we did last week, we tried to present a couple different use cases to show some of our thinking. I think the feedback from the board at that point was good. Um, and it's pushing our thinking. So, we're just, if this was a continuum, we are just barely getting started in AI uh with instruction. And the other three, I think we're much farther along. Okay, with the nine seconds left, Dr. Reed, I as a one board member would love to hear from you or get from you list of questions that I should be answering in making decisions on AI policy or giving you as

193a CEO of a school system about feedback about what I think as one board member or us 12 of us as collective body. >> Mr. I'm sorry. You would like a list of questions. >> List of questions that I should be thinking about >> answering. Okay. >> Thank you. Uh Miss Dix following Miss Anderson. >> I just wanted to to share a little bit. I I understand that it can seem like we are bringing in experts to talk to us um as some sort of cheerleading event related to AI, but I don't think that's what's happening. Um we don't have to cheer they don't have to cheerlead for us. AI is happening outside of our walls regardless of whether or not we engage with it or not. What I do see happening is that no

194one wants us to be left behind and we have highlevel folks from all over the country that are coming in to talk to us about what our opportunities are because they see us as a leader within the country related to education. Um so I heard some very important things. Don't start with the don'ts. You can't just give restrictions related to any of these things. And anybody who's parenting a teenager right now can tell you that starting with the don'ts doesn't work. Um, I love the idea of focusing on the learning. If we make our policies and make our decisions focused on what the learning outcomes are because there's a lot out there about edtech, but they are very clear that all screen time is not equal and they are talking clearly about the fact that

195good edtech is far more beneficial than than no edte at all. So, um, what are we trying to pro protect I think is an extremely important question. For me, I love the focus on critical thinking because I think that's the core of this. I also 100% want student safety protected because we need to make sure that these are tools that our kids are already using and we've watched that happen with social media and we ignored it as a division. We ignored it. And so I want to make sure that we don't do that again. And so I would love to talk about how we can protect student safety and what and that is something um and I love the concept of reserving our the right to change our minds because we that's the that's my

196whole point as to why I want us to stop conflating the conversation between edtech and screen time and AI. AI is innovative technology. That is a different approach for the division than talking about how much screen time our kids are getting. That is those are two separate conversations and they feed each other but it is two separate conversations and I would like to keep them as two separate conversations so that we have we don't lose the innovative part of our education because I think that that is a real risk in our division if we we can all be nostalgic for something that happened when we were kids but we didn't have technology like like they did when we were kids like we were on dialup at the best like I was a freshman in college

197before I was able to really really get online and that was with my father like doing something in FCPS when I was in fourth grade talking to schools in Alaska like we were not we were he was very much an early adopter. So I'm just going to say that I want us to continue to see the curiosity in our own work so that we can move forward and make sure that we're attacking this from th those positions of curiosity because I think that's where we will be successful. >> Thank you. Perfect timing. Miss Dixit. >> So I would say I was really appreciative of all the speakers who had come today and taken time of their busy schedule and I know how busy uh they are as leaders in their own organization. Um I uh

198spoke with Yu after uh the conversation and and just to learn his his p his passion and I think everybody's passion was coming through while while they were speaking about it. Um I I'll say as a global s you know uh learner I should say that I'm seeing other countries uh taking adopting AI much more than us in U US even though AI came out of US. So in in fact um other education system are embracing it and they're they want their kids to be future ready. Um now it's up to the parents choice that they want their kid to go into the AI field or maybe kids can decide for themselves but exposure is important because um 80% of the jobs in the future will have some AI element to it um except I

199think the hard blue collar jobs where you actually have to do plumbing and and and other kind of work. So but anything with the office desk environment, medical field and correct me if I'm wrong but everything will have some sort of AI uh piece we teach this kids um from our perspective like in a protective environment otherwise they're going to do it themselves on their own free time. They're going to go to any un like uh computer they can get their hands on and and learn for themselves. So for me um and I think we didn't go to this slide there was another slide was portrait of the graduates after this one in uh online and FCPS portrait of graduate it talks about communicator ethical global citizen collaborator right so creative thinker critical thinker I

200think if we can use our AI tools to enhance these skills for our students that is the goal I the way I want to go they don't have to be experts but just know enough so that they and when they grow up they can take their path and it will help them in some ways. Um I used EI AI for productivity and I feel like any teachers who are um taking too much time to develop course material and it helps them to get it get it done it helps their productivity um it's it's there for their use. So I do not um think this is going away. This is happening and uh we have to be on the right side of it rather rather than fighting it. Uh because it's not going to work. U

201if we don't adopt AI it policy it's going to be unregulated AI it's going to be difficult to manage and that's fiveyear example which he was sharing what I I I know this is happening in this real world. Um there going to be lot of jobs in five years which are going in a very different direction. So I I hope um we can collaborate and work on this together. Thank you. >> Thank you. Um Mr. McDaniel followed by uh Mr. Mle. >> To go back to the question that Mr. Moon asked, you know, why um I mean I I have two wise. One, what Miss Sema was alluding to, you know, skills and opportunities. There's no question that the use of AI is a skill that will go with a graduate for the rest of

202their lives and exposing them to opportunities in that field, whether it's strictly within that field or if it's if it's exposing them to other fields that would require that skill. Um, that's what we're in the business of across a whole host of other topics that we that we teach and we have courses on. So, I don't know, you know, we need to explore that here. But what Miss Anderson said, this is the conversation that I have with with parents when I talk to them about this. you know, when social media came up, um, it was largely ignored by by K12 education, um, public and private and colleges and it led to epidemics of problems that, you know, to a certain extent we're still grappling with today because it was just ignored and people were out

203there, students were out there on their own doing their own thing with social media and it led to safety problems and we're we're already seeing that with AI. um you know kids are going out and and having inappropriate interactions with AI and it's leading to um very tragic situations that that are in the newspaper. So I I you know I would hate to see something like that happen um here in fair anywhere much less here in Fairfax County. So those are kind of my two wise. Um, one of the things I'm very interested is the operational efficiencies that AI can provide. And I go back to the data that was presented at the meeting of the moment symposium about how much teacher time is used on things that are not actually like straight one-on-one teaching

204with kids and the opportunities that AI can provide to cut down on some of those tasks and through efficiency. Um, we've got to really look in that because as budgets get tying it all back to budget, as budgets get tighter and tighter and tighter and we're asked to do more with less and we ask our teachers to do more with less, um, you know, technology has a place to provide capacity to do that more with less without necessarily sacrificing the time that they need to be one-on-one with the student or with the group of students. Um, on that note, I to an elementary school yesterday and I was at the fifth grade language arts um class and outside of the class on the wall there was a row of instead of art it was handwritten

205essays. The teacher asked the student to write make come up with their own legend and write their own legend and they were all written with pencil and and note paper regular old you know old school if you will note paper. Um, and he made an interesting comment to me that I've heard before. He said when they do that they also gave him feedback that they have to think more about how they write, how they structure, how they flow, more of that analytical, creative part of their brain is more engaged because when you type it out on a computer, it's so easy to just backspace or cut and paste and restructure. So writing that out by hand, develop these skills, I think we all want to protect and nurture and foster. So all that being said,

206there is a balance here and I'm looking forward to us being on the forefront of striking that balance. Okay, seeing as though Mr. Mlean is away from the table, um I'll take a turn. Um I was grateful uh for the comments today from our from our panel. Um and again, you know, I think the four AI use cases in education. I think those buckets are need to be at the forefront of what we're thinking about because it really does break it down. Um and I think that we have to focus on learning. And I feel like what I heard was when it comes to policy that we really can't put everything in the kitchen sink in one, but we probably need to leverage the committee we talked about in the earlier forum for more more

207or less teched review because that's the curriculum, if you will. It would be accessing teched to help curriculum. Um, and perhaps what I'm at least what I feel like I'm digesting about what I heard is maybe separating that from um the policy about utilizing um technology to learn but not getting specific about certain tools because they made it very clear that we need to focus on the learning and not the tools. Um I think that what we need to talk about too is is training. Um I think that um the AI literacy obviously is of paramount importance um but also the AI uh literacy of our teachers um and this is where the peer-to-peer which was talked about is happening organically in in our schools. I came to the inclusion um pilot showcase last Friday

208at Willow Oaks and you know visited the different locations and and sort of the intersectionality of inclusion and lighthouse schools or innovative technology use and learning was evident. Um, and you know that excites me because you know everyone who was standing next to a board and talking was just beaming with pride about what they've done in their school because they had a targeted team focused on inclusion. Um, and how they were sharing stories about, you know, leveraging technology um, to help kids with disabilities, kids that are multil- language learners. um access learning in ways that they hadn't previously. And they talked also about the fact that some of them their team started with four people who agreed to participate and is now like at 25 strong because they went one team member may have gotten

209back to their CLT shared the work and it sort of churned. Um and then they all leaned in and they are teaching each other because I'm not an early adopter of technology. I never have been. um maybe pickle ball or a new sport, but not technology. And um and I think it's great because I I lean on those people. I did throughout my entire career. I mean, when I was building master schedules, I I had to lean on the people who were really good at pulling the data, running the reports that were allowed for us to to learn and and focus as we built. So, I'll stop there. I see that Mr. Mavine has returned. Mr. Meline. >> Um thank you. So, um, first of all, I, um, really appreciated, um, Richard Kulada's, uh, presentation.

210Um, the two slides were very helpful. Um, I wish we could have had that a year ago instead of the runhide fight presentation. Um, but, uh, that that being said, um, I will say that, um, today's presentation probably could have been the homework. Uh, the benefit of bringing people to us is having us have the opportunity to engage with them and ask them questions. Um so I was disappointed with that. Um and to some other comments that have been made, it is very hard to move the battleship and I think we have to be very deliberate uh when we um make decisions on how to proceed with technology. I'm going to refer back to my comments last month. It took us you know six to eight years to begin any onetoone work on on computers,

211right? And over in in the blink of an eye that that changed because of the pandemic. But we don't have a pandemic situation here. we have the the benefit of being able to um think deliberatively about these things uh and work iteratively to to get them right. So um grateful for the staff support. Um do hope if we um have the opportunity to see these people again that it can be a conversation instead of a a lecture. Thanks >> Miss St. John Cunning. Um I too am very grateful for all the work that the staff has done and for this panel um because they raised a lot of really interesting uh questions and they gave us a lot of insight. Um I think the most important thing that we talked about is that we have

212to define our why and what was grounded in that why was education and that we're in the business of uh formation of students and I think if we keep those as our guiding lights then we can do the why and what really resonated with us with with me was um focusing on effective learning and maintaining the core competencies that we want which I think are very well outlined in portrait of a graduate uh and to using this AI and again I want to separate AI because that's what this discussion was as opposed to technology which is a whole different aspect that we're discussing but what I heard was this is a way that can enhance our humanity and our human experience and I think if that becomes our why and we have those this will

213address focusing not on the moving target as was said but as it changes is knowing that we have a philosophy that will be applied to any new tool that comes up and I think that that's really critical and that also prevents us from getting down into the no no this shouldn't be done if we have some really strict boundaries of this is our why these are our core competencies then this is what we're everything that comes through us whatever new tool whatever new technology and how AI looks if we stick to that framework and that philosophy then I think we can come up with something that will be successful that will allow us to have that nimleness and this flexibility because yes it's not co but this is moving so fast that it's move we

214have to be I've been using this word a lot today because it just seems to have applied to everything we have to be nimble we have to be nimble because this is all occurring in very quickly again if we have our core why then anything that comes to us has got to fit under those parameters. >> Thank you, uh, Dr. Anderson for Goback. >> Thank you. Um, you know, I I understand the opportunity that we need to have staff explore and to get to know the tool. Um, you know, that's how we're going to learn. Conversely, there's just the concern from I think the parents that this staff is learning on my kids's dime, so to speak. They only have a fourth grade year, a fifth grade year, a sixth grade year. Can't get it

215undone. So, how do we ensure that whatever it is that the staff is learning, whatever it is that they're doing as they are potentially going to impact students through an indirect use of AI, that that's a good product. I think that's the crux. So, Dr. Reed, one of the questions that I want to ask is how are we evaluating that effectiveness as teachers are learning and trying to find resources because nothing scares me more than a teacher who wants to do the right thing, who is using AI to develop resources for um her students and then not having the right tools to evaluate the veracity of that resource and then passing along that bad information to kids. That's the tension where it's so scary because we know there's no doover. >> I'll uh have Dr.

216Prescidio answer that because we do have a division curriculum um that is expected to be taught. Um and I to your point um I think that uh you know the partnership with um open AAI to uh learn about AI tools is a way in which I think the division and Mr. Sethy and Dr. Presidio can speak to this. I think Dr. or Mr. Seth talked about 2,000 staff on a particular professional development where there's an effort to uh provide uh thoughtful professional development on what tools to uh how to work with the tools, how to optimize the tools. So I think there's you know an opportunity to have more of a group conversation around that topic with staff. But I'll um to the point I think you're making about rogue materials. Is that sort of

217I would want >> I wouldn't that that was not my term. >> Well, I mean you said finding their own material. So I think >> because that because that's one of the things we talked about to increase teacher efficiency to differentiate better. You're going to create materials that are going to be very specific to the children in front of you. They're not going to be developed by central office per se. >> Well, I think that's what I want to ask Dr. Presidio to speak to because I there is an expectation that um the information that is presented in the classroom does have um is vetted by the school division. So um in terms of the pacing guides, I think Dr. Prescidio, you've spoken to, so I'll let you uh >> Yeah. No, I'm happy to.

218I think there's maybe a couple questions here, but let me try to address the curriculum materials issue first. So we have a core curriculum. Um, if we don't have a basil curriculum, meaning we purchase something from a vendor like our language arts benchmark curriculum, we have a centrally created and curated curriculum through our planning and pacing guides that all teachers are expected to use. Um, that doesn't mean that teachers don't add or differentiate that curriculum at certain times, right? But that's why our collaborative learning team process is so important because we don't want people working in isolation to make those individual decisions as much as possible. We want people really leaning in and taking advantage of the collective knowledge of their instructional teams, their collaborative learning teams. So what ends up happening though oftent times

219is when the materials that we provide um need some additional differentiation or scaffolding then individual teachers and teams are left to try to do some of that work based on the needs of the students that they have in their particular class. It's not possible for a vendor or for central office to create every single lesson and every single you know instructional material um that a teacher might need in the classroom. So where we believe when we get back to this use case of AI for teacher efficiency is that we do believe and that was well first of all we do believe that AI can provide some of the scaffolding and differentiation for multilingual learners for example um that often teachers might need uh to customize some of the off-the-shelf ready materials that we provide. Those

220were some of the examples that we were trying to provide in last week's work session of what that might look like and what that process might look like for a teacher to go through that process. um your question about evaluation uh of the work that we're doing in pilots. I just want to clarify we're not piloting work with generative chat AI tools with students right now. We're waiting to figure out where do we end up as a school division and community with our policy and what are the use cases that we really want to promote in that fourth bucket. Right? So when we talk about things like inquiry and curiosity and deep thinking and the portrait of a graduate skills, we are working right now to try to think about what some of those use

221cases would look like. And those are the things that we would pilot with a very intentional evaluation process to determine if they're actually having the intended effect and enhancing learning outcomes. And our research office is uh here with us today in the audience and we appreciate the partnership with them. So that's the type of research that we would do on pilots when we would initiate them, but we haven't done that at this point right now. We've really leaned into those first three buckets um in the AI literacy curriculum, which was one of the other questions um that I think was part of this um that is yet to be brought to scale. Those are just pilots and again that is teaching students about what AI is, how it works, um how to avoid bias, look

222for bias, manipulation, some of the safety concerns that many of you have expressed in your comments here um today. >> I I appreciate that. I'm not sure if that answers my question, but I also realize how loaded that question is because teachers will always create materials. I did it as a teacher whether I came up with it on my own. It's just that now we have this tool that everyone has agreed that is very powerful and is moving at a speed at which people can't keep up that could potentially create harmful things. Just how do how are we teaching our teachers from getting into that um into the cycle that I think Mr. Colada explained where the teacher created the tool, didn't have a chance to write it, just send it to kids. The kids

223use AI to do it, the teachers use AI to grade it, and then that really removes the learning for the children. >> Just just one last point on this. I mean, that's about the AI literacy for our educators, right? So, that is making sure and we've issued guidelines about the things that we wouldn't want teachers to use AI to do, right? We don't want teachers to use AI to grade, right? the human judgment and the evaluation is really important in the grading process. We don't want to outsource that um to AI. So, so those are the things that we're working on when we talk about AI literacy for students and AI literacy for staff. >> Teachers cannot use AI to to grade and to give feedback. >> Under our guidelines, the final grade that a

224teacher assigns a student needs to be based on their professional judgments. >> Thank you. I'm not seeing other placards. So, we have another healthy robust conversation ahead of us. So, uh 3:28 we'll close the conversation around AI and transition to calendar in about 3 minutes. Thanks. 42. We're going to kick off our conversation on school calendar. Um, and I'll start. Uh, we are going to do a couple things. Recap the progress we instituted from the regular vote on April 9. Um, and the status of the work and look ahead. We're going to recap the April 21 governance meeting and walk through the draft policy which is from the April 21 meeting uh with also um some suggested edit edits based on the vote. So uh if you all had a chance to look at the

225uh draft policy, you will see that we um have offered some redlinining to the language related to early release days. Um okay. Yeah, let's maybe start. Okay. >> Well, I guess we'll get to that point when we go through the policy. So, let's just go through the policy um and recap the governance meeting from April 21. And also, I know we have some questions about emergency weather. Uh and Betris is here to help us with that because it's a very complicated thing. It changes every year in terms of the math behind it. But when we get to that, we're grateful that she's here to help explain that to us. Um, so I'm going to turn over to my colleague, Miss Mary, to talk about governance and policy. >> Great. Thanks, Miss Lady. It was good

226for us to get together and try to take stock of where we're at because we know we want to move forward on this. So, um, so again, just to get my mind in it, too. So, since our vote on April 9th, we have made it clear that uh the early release days will be published on the calendar in advance. The Veterans Day is instructional day that we're going to have updated calendars by July 9th, 2026 for three years. So, that's this upcoming school year, which is already done, plus the two that we'll vote on that night. That was Mr. McDaniel's motion. um and that there was um alignment among members that five days and a consistent calendar is among the top priorities for the calendar. So those were things that came out April 9th. So

227again, the hope is that we could even put this on new business for this Thursday for action May 9th, excuse me, for May 7th for action at the regular May 21st meeting, which gives our superintendent maximum amount of time to get those calendars out published. we get input and we vote on July 9th. So to recap the April 21st governance committee meeting. So at that meeting there were the five committee members plus our board chair. So six members and among we six there was um alignment that five days be among the top priority. It wasn't listed as the top priority. Um and there was no appetite for putting a number or percentage of weeks of full five day weeks in the policy. So I just want to say that again the six board members there

228were not interested in putting in the policy a number or percentage of weeks per quarter or the year in the policy. So just want to share that. So if we could just walk through the draft which is posted. Um, so again, this is taking the best of what was published back in November 23, what we've heard as input and um, let me just grab my copy. Hold one second. So, it combines the six existing policies, which um, is a good thing. It includes clarity on such things as community engagement, emergency closures, including snow days. So that we'll hear more from more on that and especially it identifies and publishes religious and cultural observances and federal and state recognized student holidays. And it was Robin and I thought it was important to underscore the state recognized

229holidays because we have Junth. We also have those state elections which impact us in ways that federal holidays don't. >> Friday >> and the Friday before Labor Day which is required. Um thank you. So, also note that from the 2023 guidance, things that carried into this policy that previously were not codified is that spring break is not tied to the Easter holiday, which is also, I believe, in alignment with area jurisdictions. Again, those federal and state holidays and Veterans Day becoming an observance day. So, an instructional day, but an O or observance day. So, those three things had been practices, but not codified. So that's even more that we're getting clarity to that our public wanted us to be clear about. Okay. The spring break not going to Easter, the federal and state designated holidays

230and Veterans Day becoming an observance day. Then there were three questions we had asked of the superintendent. One was about any implications with collective bargaining. One was about weather related closures and a third one which I will think of while perhaps you want to speak to those two. Thank you. >> Thank you, Miss Marin. Um, I think I'll the collective bargaining. Um, I'm going to ask Mr. Smith to comment on I did provide you a memo this morning related to that. Uh, but Mr. Smith, if you could um comment on the collective bargaining CBA piece. Um, I believe you have that in front of you. >> I do. And good afternoon everyone. Uh so as it relates to collective bargaining uh currently we have uh three CBAs uh two with uh FEU and one with

231FCF PSA and uh all three uh the governance for uh work days uh is governed by regulation 4421. So, uh, as it relates to work days, what happens is that the school board shall establish the student calendar and then the superintendent shall establish the employee calendar and we use regulation uh to develop that calendar. The only other carveout that we have in the CBA for our operational employees is that when developing the work calendar uh we shall ensure that we have uh 12 holidays uh for our transportation and food nutrition uh service employees. And so that's the carveout that that is stated and stipulated in the CBA. >> Great. So, we're good that this policy complies with our collective bargaining. >> I believe that's correct. >> That is correct. >> Great. So, thank you. >>

232Yes. And then we want to talk about we were trying to get some clarity to that um always asked question. How many cenies do we have? Are we going to make up the cities that and then also Dr. Reed the community engagement piece that you were um eager to follow up with us on? Those were the other two remaining pieces. Thank you. >> Thank you, Miss Marin. So, Miss Huffman, if you would uh please uh share sort of the the history and how we established the number of weather days in the contract. Um, and as uh Betrris gathers herself, I do want to say that the last two years especially, we've used almost all the days we did put in the calendar. Um, so I think we're probably at a nice sweet spot at the

233moment. So, Betris, do you want to describe that please? >> Certainly. it it is an annual process that we go through using a um layered approach that applies each of the set of regulations from the state code. Um so there's a requirement for the overall instructional time and a requirement specific to the instructional hours the the core academic hours at elementary middle school and seat hours at high school for credits. Um so each of those are taken into account based on the instructional guidance um and the bell schedules that we have. Recess goes into play. Um so essentially we ensure that looking at the calendar days that we have our bell schedules that have been set the instructional guidance in place that we are complying with all of those um state regulations at each layer.

234And then calculating our total, we see what wiggle room we have and essentially find the level that has the least. That's what we then use to determine where we would have our our buffer for weather. So which if it's elementary school, middle school, or high school that is closest to the state requirement. In other words, has the least give. um that's what we go by when we say for the division that we have for example 10 built-in snow days. Um so it will vary a little bit yearbyear um based on all those parameters. Um but for the last couple of years it's been around 10 and as Dr. Reid said we've come close to using that for the last couple of years. >> And if I could add to that so the 10 days that

235we're talking about that's the equivalent those are the equivalent minutes above the 990. So, it's important to note that our six-hour day is is 30 minutes longer than the state requires. That provides more instructional time as part of the day. So, we do not have additional days that we have built into the calendar, but we have the equivalent of those days which provides that buffer. And so uh in in doing the calculations, you may have a variety of calculations that provide the equivalent of 15 additional uh days, 11 additional days or 10 and whatever is lowest. We then uh truncate that at the decimal point to provide that number of buffer days. >> Thank you for that. And just for folks, you know, it does make sense having worked in the system that bell schedules

236are different and we talk about instructional hours. I believe our elementary students have the most instructional hours. Um but then with some of the way we've done flex schedules um and teaching cell lessons and things like that, all of those things don't always qualify as instructional minutes. And so I do understand that however that falls with the 990 hours, whatever level it's either middle or high is typically where we're going to see the excess that might equate to to up to 10 additional days. Um, so I don't think we given that that it moves it's a moving target a bit. I think that if we wanted to put something in policy, my suggestion would be a no less, no fewer than five days, six days um built in with via the extra hours versus we

237build in this exact number because I think it fluctuates. Would that work for you, Dr. Reid? I do think it would be best to say a minimum because it does fluctuate year-toear and we want to make sure that we provide a thoughtful year-to-year um number which is what the team's been calculating. So I think a minimum number and then allowing us to work with that makes the most sense >> and I think that meets with a lot of the conversations at governance because there was with nothing codified in here many of our communities and our families have no idea we have buffer built in and so that's the reason we want to put something in policy so they understand there is a buffer and it would be no less than perhaps five days we can

238work on that um to at least codify it. >> Right. So if I can add and thank you for reminding that was the impetus and that's why that line which says on the screen now FCPS has blank number of snow days available for use each school year right so we've just heard that that's not how it's calculated but if we can say um how did you word it miss lady you had >> no less than the equivalent of five >> so no um fewer than than the equivalent of five emergency weather >> not snow because we've had there's other reasons we've had weather we had tornadoes so I would say emergency uh closures >> emergency closures right so um just with the sentence starting as you know there will be no less than the equivalent

239of five would that suffice >> I don't know if we need to qualify it with weather >> yeah agree >> um I only bring that up because within that nine was the ele the the days for the election this year too correct >> yeah so we we used nine, I guess, but they weren't all for Snow Creek. They were also because of elections that had to take place over and over and over and over again in the Bradock district. >> And no, wasn't just Bradic. So maybe no less than seven is being recommended by Dr. Reid. Um, >> less than >> seven gives us election flexibility. >> Gives us election flexibility. Okay. So there will be no less than seven than the equivalent of seven emergency closure days. Now do note that and we can

240walk through the so we wanted to take this portion allow Dr. Reed to respond to the three things the governance committee asked her to come back with but we will go through the whole policy now and you'll see that in another place in the policy we do now talk about special elections. So again just trying to make it clear and concise. So, shall we put a pause on that? And maybe before we get to community engagement, actually, let's walk through the policy. What do you think? >> Yeah. And and I just I I want to thank both uh Miss Merritt and Chair Anderson um who worked hard on versions of this um and the one that we're viewing um Chair Anderson organized for us. Um, so I just want to put that out and just

241I appreciate the work of of different board members and their input uh that's gotten us this far. >> Less for rock and roll. So if uh members if you want to look online or pull out your policy. So again just to walk through it um the purpose um having that unified policy doing away with having six and having them all together. So it would um be this one policy 1344 and then sunsets the other ones that have been brought in. The summary of changes is that it's been updated in its entirety. We have definitions there. And then we have a philosophy uh that again encapsulates that we want it to be reliable. We want it to be clear that it prioritizes rigorous learning, respects the diversity of our community. Okay. Um and the use of

242our facilities as public assets and also to align with practices of neighboring school divisions. Okay. So that's the top of page two. So section five is policy and um what's good is that the I was reminded this Thursday we have on action or consent rather the governance committee put forth uh structure to help get all of our policies in alignment because there's different formats from different years. So we are going to vote on consent. Uh the governor's committee thought it was great and passed it through to consent to the board. And so what I'm so pleased about is that this uh fits that structure, this section policy or responsibilities. So that's great. We could leave that title. And then um we have calendar and instructional time that includes the standard calendar structure, calendar adoption, how

243we're going to adopt it, a community engagement portion, which again we will have time for Dr. Reid to come back and talk about um the survey that's been in draft. emergency closures, which we just talked about, and a modified school year calendar, which isn't as um prevalent in our use as um as other pieces. So, then the calendar development guidelines, these are all the things that pull in from all those other policies. The start of school, making sure people know that if we're starting before Labor Day, we've got to have that 4-day weekend. And then the last day of school, the length of the school day, um you know, school start and end times, and then any adjustments. Again, we have a few edits coming forth to this. Then in section in the fourth place,

244we have student holidays and observances, which that list comes from the 2023 guidance document that the superintendent has used to develop calendars. So this would be the first time codifying that list al together here in this policy. Then we have recognition of cultural observance days, commemoration. So um an extension of you know observances. then the summer holiday and countywide elections. So that's all the stuff in one place. And then Miss Lady and I went through and from governance also suggested just a few things and that's on the printed red line you have and also it's on board docs. It was sent by email as well. Do you want to speak to that? >> Yeah, that was to incorporate what we voted on the board meeting. Um so if we want to uh officially do that

245in this document we can um >> yeah under the early release days um which is on page page three I think yeah under length of the Yeah, under adjustments I believe it says so as mandated by the code of Virginia the first day of student attendance shall be no earlier I think that paragraph is fine um >> oh I was going to Labor Day okay >> all right so let's go to the earlier D sorry yeah the edits I suggested were there should be no more than uh four divisionwide early release days. Um, >> point of clarification. Yeah. >> Um, we did not vote on four division or eight divisionwide early release. >> I know that's what we're correcting. >> Well, but that's what's being corrected. We did not vote on that. We voted on

246eight early early release days for elementary only. >> That's right. >> So, >> Oh, I I see what you're saying. So, >> red line is incorrect. We We are only ever have given four divisionwide early release days. >> Right. So, we're trying to codify that four early release days for end of course, end of end of quarter, right? And four additional for elementary only. >> Miss Anderson, I gave you a copy earlier in the day and I've since then updated that to cross out that eight. It's for if the clerks could put up the version that I shared by email, please. Um that's not what I shared by email but it just point of clarification it is for end of quarter early release divisionwide all levels and then four additional for elementary early release is

247what we voted on. >> I I understand that that's what we voted on for the 26 27 calendar. I would like I'll I'll speak more >> I got you. Okay. That is correct. That is what we voted on just for the 26 27 calendar and not necessarily in perpetuity. So that's open for conversation. Thank you. One minute. I'm just getting the right version, please. Um okay. Yes, please. I think additional and again just to reiterate that this is up for debate. You're correct. This is something we vote on for next school year. And I guess my apologies if I made the assumption that that was perhaps going to be in perpetuity, but it certainly was not voted on in perpetuity uh yet. >> Right. So, thank you clerk team for getting that up there. And

248again, we're just presenting this to you for then discussion because it's a lot of pieces we're trying to weave together in the interest of time. So that from what Miss Lady understand would reflect the vote that happened at our last board meeting. Um and then the other additional changes were um Miss Lady had a good description up under the start of school and that's on your the shared document that just explains why we we always get asked why do we start before later today? Why can't we end later? So, Miss Lady wrote that up and said, "Well, we start school before Labor Day so that students have two additional weeks of instruction um and um have time at the end for testing." So, that's for your consideration. And then the last thing under um student

249holidays and observances was just to put for the spring holiday that there not be an FCPS scheduled student holiday on the Monday after spring break. So, that was a suggestion for board consideration. Okay. So, all right, we've got I did not see the order of placards. I do believe I saw Miss Anderson's first, so I'm start there. >> Um, I have I have just a few things that I'm probably going to need to go back. I just wanted to I don't have any concern with the extra information added at the start of school. I am ex I am extremely concerned about the language related to early releases for the same reason I was concerned when we voted in voted on it is that it doesn't acknowledge the fact that we have lots of early release

250days at the high school level that are are beneficial to our students related to and I hear nothing from parents related to concern about those days. So I would like to be extremely careful about how we're wording things. Um, the other thing is we unless each school is is publishing an individual student calendar, this is going to be impossible to make sure that every early release day is codified for every school on the same calendar. We have 199 schools. There's just no world that we're going to be able to do that effectively. Um, and I don't think that our intention is to allow the early release days in per into perpetuity. We had talked to Dr. to read about the ways to phase them out eventually. And that was that was the um negotiation to

251get to eight for elementary. Um in addition, I would like to make sure that we're consistent with our language. If we're not calling it spring break as the as the overarching, then we should make sure that if we're going to say that there's no FCPS scheduled student holiday, it should say after the spring holiday, not spring break. Um, in addition to the fact that I want to make sure what happens if we end a quarter the with the last day before spring break which often happens. Does that mean that we are not going to give teachers a teacher work day after the spring break or after after the spring holiday? >> I think based on the discussion that we wouldn't do that we would end it on Thursday to ensure that that happened up front.

252that the teacher work day would be then the next day to prevent it from being the following Monday because it's already an early release. Therefore, it's only disrupting one fiveday week and not two fiveday weeks was the discussion. Okay. Um the other thing is I'm um I spent a fair amount of time merging the two documents together that we had been working from and so I have a lot of familiarity with like the reason. Um so I'm not wholeheartedly against the reorganization of it. I don't understand fully why um this was only given to us right before the meeting. um because again that is and it would have been extremely helpful for this to be actually redlined to indicate where things were within the document rather than proposed in the way that it is because

253it's it's a pretty significant departure from the way that it was presented. Um and so I'm I'm okay with talking about that, but I would need to be able to actually see the document put together with with the whole thing. Um, so I I'll leave it there, but I may have a few more comments. >> Thank you. Uh, Mr. McDaniel, >> I was a little confused as well. Um, so thinking on my feet here, um, this on this document, um, I have parent I mean I have constituents wanting us to go back to starting after Labor Day. So, I don't know that we need a redline paragraph talking up starting before Labor Day. I mean, the policy is a policy. Um, it just seems editorial in nature. I don't I think we should just stick

254to what the code says and be done with it. Um, so comment there. I still continue to have the elementary plan. Um, I think the motion that was brought last time that I abstained on was obviously from the comments and the conversation that ran three hours on the dis um was a mess quite frankly. Um, and I still have heartburn about that, but the board voted and it is what it is. Um, but I guess so there shall not be an FCPS scheduled student holiday on the Monday after spring break. That kind of implies that there could be after winter break or Thanksgiving break. So that was a question there. Um, there was also a comment made about Easter and I guess trying to decouple potent there was a comment made about Easter, but the

255word Easter isn't anywhere in the draft or the redline draft. So, I didn't really know where that came from. Um, and regarding Veterans Day as an O day, no other O days are in policy or regulation. So, I don't know why we were necessarily calling out Veterans Day as an O day. The policy the policy does refer back to policy 1460 religion under the recognition of cultural observance days which I pulled up a copy of here. Again, there's no actual observance days listed out. So, and then regulation 1460, which obviously aligns with policy 1460, also doesn't write out anything regards to specific O days. So, I don't think it's necessary to specifically call out Veterans Day as an O. I'm fine with it being an O day. Um, but uh, yeah, again, just thinking quick

256on my feet here. That's those are some of the the comments that I have. >> Can I I'd love to be able to just answer some questions, not speak to your opinion and thoughts, but so this combines the policy that said Veterans Day will be a student holiday. I mean, a student day of instruction. So that's why Veterans Day is is an O day because it codifies what was in the policy and then codifies what we voted on last time which said that Veterans Day will be an O day. So that's where that comes from. Um regarding Easter, you're right, it doesn't mention it. We do hear though, the reason it was put in is because we do hear is it going to be coupled to Easter or not? So that's up for debate. The

257policy does say that the winter break will be a certain number of days and will end on a Monday or Friday. Like it doesn't say it the way the spring holiday and we I'm happy to make that change to holiday from break. So those are some of the answers to your questions and certainly it's debatable still how we put in early release days. Right. So that's another person who we want to make sure saying we want to make sure we get that right. Okay. And then I also just want to confirm I'm hearing that there might be different opinions on saying no break, no Monday after spring holiday, student holiday. Have I captured your >> Have I answered your question? >> I think I mean the only follow perhaps it's worth actually listing out the

258Odays. If if we're going to list out one, I think it would probably be beneficial to list out all of them just so it's very clear on the O days, but I'm not going to die on that hill. Anyway, that's all. >> Dr. Anderson, >> thank you. I'm just going to start with what's first, and that was the comment regarding the start of school, the before Labor Day, after Labor Day. Um, is this still accurate given the Den Helmer bill regarding when SOS are to be administered? Because that was pushed back. So, I think there's some space there for some discrepancy. Maybe that's worth looking into if we choose to stay married to this language because I know that was moved back by a year or two. >> Yeah, I think it's it's not this

259year, not next year, but the next year, >> right? So then you couldn't say we are afforded that because of the time because they'll have to do it so close to the end of the school year it becomes a >> that's correct for SOS it's not it's not correct for APS IBS and DE okay >> okay those are hard inter of course before when we didn't start before Labor Day um we put our kids at a huge disadvantage this is Robin Lady's opinion because in the south they start the first week of August uh so it's not only preparation for standardized testing at the APIB level it's also the college process the deadlines continue to back up. Um the earliest hard deadline is October 15, but rolling admissions for some schools starts August 1. Um

260we don't have transcript secretaries, transcript AAs in the office over the summer. Um and for kids to >> Right. And I and I appreciate all of that, but I could also counter that in the south they start early, but they also end early. We just have a very long period. But again, my point of saying in my edit was for spring testing. Um, I don't want to outline so versus AP or D. >> Well, so is identified here. That just may no longer be applicable. That's why I raised it. >> I would say for spring testing, >> I I'm just going to move on to my next thing. Um, my next thing is regarding early release days. >> I I do agree with Miss Anderson. We can't necessarily identify on the date that these seven

261schools are going to be off on the 7th and then these nine schools are going to be off on the 15th. However, I see a space for us at the bottom of the calendar of the student calendar for there to be some sort of asterisk that says elementary will have four early release days to be determined. Similarly, high school will have x number of early release days to be determined because we don't talk about that at all. And I think we need to make sure that there's clarity that elementary will have the four divisionwide which is on the calendar which we can definitely live by. But elementary will have four extras, four more. High schools will have whatever that number is because frankly I don't even think I know. I just know that kid is

262always in my house. So, if we could just let people know how many days they should expect to see their kids in their homes, even if it's at the bottom of the document, I think that gives us the communication rather than no information at all. So, that's one piece. Um, I wanted to better understand uh and I'd love feedback to that point when I pause here. I better I wanted to better understand the emergency days. I understand we used nine and then the initial conversation was five and then we landed at seven. I I'm trying to figure out why this feels arbitrary to me. Help me better grasp my head around this. >> I think the last several years, even pre my getting to the division, we've used the approximate the equivalent of 10. And

263I don't see a reason to adjust that given we've been very close to that the last couple years. So that's where I would likely continue to build it. Um, so I think having no less than seven, the reason it's arbitrary is likely we're going to go with 10, the equivalent of so whether it's less no less than five or no less than seven, 10 still fits there. Um I think this year with the elections, the special elections and the weather, um it has been more challenging perhaps than other years, but as we looked back at the data, I think we had nine that we used a year ago and um nine that we've used this year. So, you know, it's very close. >> Does the policy clearly state 10 the the old policy? So, it

264had no number >> believe there was any number. I think that was a calculation that staff because of historical purposes, Marty, you've been here obviously longer than I have. There was a historical pattern that has been utilized. >> Yes. When we developed the calendar, we were looking at those those uh instructional uh hours above the 990 and then landed on that lowest number. So 10 is where it's been, but it has been as low as eight depending on the time that we've had built for instruction. uh and it's been as high as 11 and maybe a little bit higher. So that number does fluctuate and and the board members of the board may remember in years past when uh we didn't use all of the the buffer days that we had. And I think that

265I've answered many questions both with the community and with our own uh teachers and staff wanting those days back. Uh and they're not additional days that are built in. It's >> the hours that lead into days. I was trying to have that conversation back there with Emily. So, how helpful is it to say it's no fewer than 579 if we're going to use what we use? Because how helpful is that? That's the piece I don't think I understand. >> I think that the and again it I think that the architects of the draft you're looking at wanted a greater sense of transparency for the community that there are actual extra days built in. I don't know that we would always pick 10. I think that's what we've traditionally picked over the last recent past. Um,

266but a policy, you know, doesn't get reviewed as regularly. Um, so I think having a minimum and then leaving that latitude signals that there are extra days without limiting what staff believe the extra days need to be based on the calculation for that given year and VDOE's possible adjustments to calculations. So I I think the minimum signals there is something beyond without limiting what staff needs to do to address VDOE requirements and possible emergencies based on our context >> because right now we still have 180 days of instruction on our calendar. >> We build the calendar based on 180 days of instruction. 180 days with additional hours sprinkled in to come up to what comes across at least to me as a fairly arbitrary number because we're going to use what we use. >> Well,

267and again, the state's guidance is built on 185.5 hour days. We build our calendar on 186 hour days for students. >> That's the piece where I I'm not sure I see the utility of this piece um where we're adding the numbers. Um, I do want to say with this cardboard piece that we have here, the letter B, um, the suggested student holidays and observances language about no holiday of the Monday after spring break. I I think that's spot on because that just was insult to injury in a lot of ways. I I'll take a go back to finish the rest of my thoughts. >> All right. Thank you, Miss Dixit. uh so I was not on the governance uh meetings I guess when you guys discuss this so uh I think some of the information

268is a bit new to me I don't know the the memo and some of the info I'm still kind of going through that um but I've had a question about u the uh the top of the policy it says sunset's policy 13503415380 can somebody pull up the policy 3840 This is the only thing I found under uh 3840. It's about community participation or or student performances, community events. Um so I think this needs to be removed from that this calendar policy and the rest are fine. Um can I continue? Okay. I also uh wanted to ask on definition section. I know we have very very nicely put all the definitions uh which we didn't have in in the prior policies. Um I didn't see about anything about virtual instruction days or anything to say the

269school is in session but the classes are done virtually in case there is a um you know emergency or I know we we move yeah like extended uh should we address that here as well? >> Is that a question for me? >> Yes Dr. >> Superintendent I think that's Dr. >> Superintendent Dr. Reed. Yeah. >> It's my understanding that we weren't gonna link both of those in this policy. Okay. >> Um I know VDOE has rules about how many days you could go virtual and that would um so we could certainly follow statute but um I don't uh it hasn't been traditionally a part of our calendar policy. >> Yeah. The reason I asked is when we keep saying five consecutive days of student instruction. So for for example there had something had happened and

270we had to go virtual maybe twice or thrice in the year it would still count as a fiveday instruction maybe even one or two days are virtual. How how do we quantify that? >> I don't know that it would if it doesn't if we're not able to effectively instruct all children. So, I think that then we end up potentially making up time um if if we're not able to do that. But I I certainly could go back to staff and talk about that, but I um that has not been a part of our calendar policy. I think at one point there was guidance that if we missed a certain number of days, we would consider that. Uh but we took that off the books a couple years ago because again, it's very difficult. I think

271co also taught us it's very difficult to effectively um educate and engage with every child um in a virtual format. >> Okay. Um um because our calendar policy kind of is starting with the man you know five days um school days that's like the kind of the philosophy and the philosophy section. So my mind went into what when kids are virtual. Um I also wanted to share about Labor's day and starting closing the school starting the school early or closing the school early. Um I think we are going into way late in in summer and and starting the school way late again. Um, it's this is my opinion, one board member, but I I just uh feel like maybe there's a way we could school end a school a little bit earlier or start either

272way, start the school earlier or end the school earlier like >> Yeah, >> I know. I know. So this this is the issue with some of our rules is like I think I'm I don't know. Okay. So the reason I said it in many parts of the world and then I'll I'll say the schools end early and they start next year's instruction before they split end the school for summer break. That's very interesting to me. It doesn't happen here in the United States. And I don't know the logic behind it. Maybe it's you get to the next grade. So you finish your fourth grade your class and then you have like a one or two day break uh after exam and then you are right back to fifth grade starting the school and then go

273for your summer break. I have yeah exactly so it doesn't have billions of students are doing that across the world but I think US uh is not but I I don't the benefit of that or the you know u is good or bad educational wise but this is a practice and when I heard about you know closing school early I was like um maybe you know we could give them extra uh additional courses for next year to study over the summer. I I believe in homework. >> Can I share a comment? So um so you know again these are the things that have over months of review bubbled up as areas that we can take action on. Now I think you know virtual days when school starts and ends I think a lot of us

274want to talk about it and so I'm writing this down. I just doesn't seem like we're going to get to that in time for the superintendent to make the decisions. But this could be the next steps you know after we just get this policy cleaned up. Um, and again, the thing about Labor Day, that language, Robin and I thought it would be helpful to put that in there and present it to you all for consideration because we all received questions about it. It does not have to be in there. It was meant to be helpful. If it's not, let's just take that out. So, thank you. >> And similarly, the addition of no less than this number of emergency days. Both of those are editorial, but we we keep hearing from people that they're not

275aware of the reasoning, which is the only reason that we made it editorial and put it in there. Okay. All right. So, Miss St. John Cunning, you're up next. >> Um, so, first of all, again, got this right now. I'm having a difficult time crosswalking it because it's not following the same pattern. So, I want to ask what was the reasoning for the reorg? Um, and I I I I know that I'm going to need more time to dive into this and look at this because the way it's it's not redlined the way I I'm used to normally seeing red lines. >> So, I'm having to skip all over. >> Yeah. Sure. You know, I um you know, answer to your question. Why wasn't this sooner? I was just really busy. Uh a lot of

276stuff I was meeting manager at two of the events today, two of the sections today. So when I really went back and reread for I don't know maybe my third time last night to prepare for today the draft policy that was posted I said huh you know I think some of these things could be better categorized. So um like things talking about the standard calendar makeup. We're going to have standard the instructional times going be 180 days or 990 hours the structure and that's direct content from what's in there. Let's put the start of school the length of the school day the last day of school the summer. Those are all standard things. And then I said, "Okay, well then there's development guidelines." So let's put in there about the holidays and observances, how to

277do community engagement, how it's going to be adopted. And then finally putting the two closure pieces together. So emergency closures and countywide elections were about community about closures. And then that last piece about a modified year calendar, which is really just on a school by school basis. These are my personal suggestions. If it's too much to do at this time, that's fine. I thought that this would be a more organized way to present it than what the policy currently has it as. But it's if it will imp if it impedes getting this to uh the new business on Thursday, I am happy to have you all reject it. Hope that helps it. Just the way my brain works, it's it's really hard for me to crosswalk. So um that was my only thing. I do

278appreciate the language you want to add in terms of clarification about why this is being done. Although I don't know that it needs to be in polic. I think that's something that we as school board members put out. I appreciate the reason that it's there because I think that again going back to our communication and how we get the information out um because this to me is more explanatory and do we do that in all of our policies? So I mean I can go either way. I appreciate it. I understand the reasoning. I'm just trying to, you know, since I'm being in government, since I've started being in government, it's looking at how we have consistency in all our policy. So, again, that's that's just my two cents for for what that's worth. Um, the

279other thing about the Monday after um spring break. I I don't know why that was originally done. I do know that there is a large celebration at the zoo for our African-American community historically in this area because before uh the African-American community could not go to the White House Easter egg roll. So what traditionally has happened is that a lot of our African-American community goes to the National Zoo. I don't know if that was the initial reasoning for that being that Monday off. I I'm just putting it out there as a fact that I happen to know. >> Okay. Thank you. Uh Mr. Dannon, >> good afternoon. Um first I I I appreciate uh the one effort um to consolidate a lot of policies into one. I thought that was really great when I saw

280that at the top. So um and I appreciate Miss Dix Miss Dixit's outside the box thinking because I'm going to ask a couple questions. One is people have brought to me and about how much they throughout this whole discussion but boy those early release monies weren't so bad. So for the record given what um you shared Mr. Smith that um that is that ship is s that is not a possibility of carving out language in this policy to make that an option again. Correct. Or Dr. the earlier Mondays the people like the consistency of it. They eventually could plan around it. They knew that it was you know every Monday they would get out a couple hours early. That is not a poss. We're not going back to that. Is that correct? if we if

281that's my question is that you know the sense of that >> I think that's really a board decision and I think most recently it was >> okay all right thank you so I need to discuss inside the house that'll be maybe next meeting that was a joke um >> well and I also I also wanted to I apologize to mystics about the virtual learning too that also requires devices right so I think all of those are conversations we're still having at the moment. And I just think that, you know, at this point, that's probably another reason not to conflate the the two. So, >> cool. Thanks. Um, under definitions, I didn't see a definition for student holiday, but it was referenced. Is it worth clarifying or did I miss it somewhere? >> I'm fine with

282that. I think it's a good point because people understand a student holiday is when students are home but faculty is working. >> Yep. Okay, >> it's fine. >> Um and then section 5 A1 um this the second the third paragraph I think is just duplicative of the other. So a page two under calendar instruction time standard calendar structure. Um it it says the board prioritizes full school weeks during each quarter. That was It's just duplicative above. >> We've crossed it out on the version up here. >> Oh, thank you. Okay. Sorry. Um the language under section two calendar adoption in the third paragraph seemed a little fuzzy where it talks about with the third year adopted at the first regular board meeting. I think it makes sense like it's every year we're approving the calendar

283three years out. Correct. I if maybe it's not fuzzy to anybody else but um so it is a little fuzzy. I don't know if we need to and I apologize. I did not come up with a suggested language for it, but um uh you maybe had an on an annual basis or something like that to to clarify again just a suggestion. Um section three right below that community engagement um and apologies again if this was already discussed but where it says feedback may be gathered um I don't know if we want to strengthen this language just to you know document clearly that we will be gathering public input um that it's instrumental to this um maybe that requires like a new sentence about forming a group or something like that but um and I know

284again I know and trust you will get community input but it's always better to have it in policy Um, this is a little pet peeve of mine. Going down to um, calendar development guidelines part B, start of school. Is there a reason why that we clarified that we list here that school should start on a Monday? I feel like I remember a couple years ago school starting on like a Wednesday and it made things a little bit easier maybe for school staff, but I could be. Just remember that. I'm getting looks from folks who work tonight to school. No, is Monday. Is that the preferred start date over? Okay. In a different district. Does it need to be? I'm trying to What's the benefit of that I guess is my question of having it or

285is there a benefit to starting midweek? >> Well, it gives us one more five day week. >> Yeah, exactly. No, it makes sense. I was thinking in terms of like support staff that I know. >> I mean, I do agree with you that that it's a marathon for staff that first week to be five days and when we were after Labor Day, it was always a four- day week, >> but then you'd have three four day weeks in a row. >> Got it. Okay. because you'd have the first week before days. You have to have off the Friday before Labor Day and the Monday of Labor Day. So, you'd have three four day weeks. So, that's probably why it was codified as starting on a Monday. >> Okay. I didn't Yeah, I didn't uh I

286won't I won't uh I don't know what the term you used earlier is, but I won't uh >> Are you proposing to change that? >> No, no, I just more of a of a question. Um the last thing is, and you know, I I go back and forth. I know I've said this before, but going back up to philosophy, um my recommendation would be to strike the language where it says full school weeks, five days instruction to uphold and just state committed to an academic calendar that prioritizes instructional continuity and stability. So, it's basically the same thing, but I think that language just gets at the heart of the issue is that people want that consistency and stability. Um, you know, the we have five day weeks and presuming those are Monday through Friday weeks,

287but >> I mean, basically striking on page two under philosophy and I'll >> sorry my my not making a motion or anything but my suggestion would be striking the language where it says full school weeks five all the way through to uphold so that it states committed to an academic calendar that prioritizes instructional continuity and stability because I'm not aware of any research that states that a fiveday week per se is better for instructional outcomes or educational outcomes, but I do know that having instructional continuity and stability does. And so that's just the thinking behind that is that being very specific about what we mean there. So um I saw Miss Dixit like that idea. I don't know if anybody else any other thoughts on that, but >> I like it. I do not like

288that idea. >> What's the thought behind it? Can I ask it? Yeah. >> Yeah. I guess just kind of loop back what we were talking about the process. So as governance people, you know, we provided our own standalone suggestions for discussion. So I think awesome that you're providing your suggestion. I think it's pretty clear that we can't put this on new business for this Thursday so it can come back to governance. We can have that discussion, get it the final back out to the full board and get it finished. um you know whether that's getting feedback, you know, there's always that kind of weird space when it's like, well, we put something out to the board and then if we change it, do we need to republish it or but we'll figure it out. Um

289but I'm writing a list of things that I'm hearing agreement on or questions on. I'm sure the clerks are and so we could bring that to governance for discussion. So I'm glad I'm glad it's captured, but I don't agree with it yet personally. >> Sounds good. That's it. Okay. Thank you all. >> Uh Mr. Moon, >> thank you. Uh on on the philosophy since you know several board members mentioned about the particular paragraph I was going to suggest flipping I mean there is basically there are two sentence three sentences one first and second could go after the third. So starting with the philosophy section could start with the bold seeks to provide a clear and reliable framework starts with that and first two sentences could come later as a commitment because the next paragraph also

290f is about commitment that's me uh and I have a question regarding a early release secondary course especially for high schools on the final exam. um period. How many days do they normally get? Four days. Four days just at the year or at the end of each semester or >> that was confirmed by um M or Dr. Prescidio. So yeah, it's four days. >> It's four. It's two It's four. The very last day of school is early release and the three prior to that are exam days where there's two exams per day. But we have seven blocks. Your first exam is the last period of whatever that A or B day is and then the others are built in so you don't have more than two. >> Is that is that at the end of

291the school year only or Okay. >> High school only >> and then there's the SAT PSAT early release. Um >> and then for the elementary so it's fine high school >> end of a quarter early release stage divisionwide. How many hours they get up earlier? Two hours. Is that three hours, two hours? I just want to make sure that I am understanding this correctly. >> I not sure if it's two or three. >> Last day is three. Are all the grading days three? >> There three of the four divisionwide are two and the fourth of four is three. >> Okay. What about all the early release days for the elementary? >> Those are three. What about exam period? How many early release hours? I'm trying to count back from 1,080 hours we have. >> Yeah.

292>> Out of 180 instructional days. If we set aside 10 days as emergency days, that's a 60 hours out of that. Right? We need 990 minimum. You set aside the 60,50 right there. If we have 180 hours, that leaves us with only 30 hours for all the early releases whatever SAT PSAT high school exam or end of a quarter or those four additional. So just keep that in mind that we have what 1,080 hours built in and then we have to have a 990 minimum or including all those snow days. Each snow day is six hours off and then we also have a many late start, two hour delays, all those things come up. So count count that down because I remember you know many years ago we had to make that up at the

293end of the school year for for for for and also for the certain period of time we had to make up we had to make up certain number of minutes every day. So uh okay so with that said I also have a question regarding generally all these number of holidays the length of a spring break length of winter break all that if you >> could I finish that go ahead yes >> okay if you I did my arithmetic it's not calculus you add all those and the summer will never exceed more than eight weeks And for the teachers who have to come about a week earlier for teachers summer will never go more than seven weeks. >> We've >> so that and also I have a problem with the definition of winter break being 10

294business days. >> Okay. >> Because business days do not include holidays >> over your time Mr. M. Could I otherwise I'm just okay. >> So our intention was to keep this as high level as possible and we've gone like way down deep in the weeds and haven't even talked about the biggest thing we thought would be the discussion which would be the cultural observance days and all that. So you know again we're going to take all this feedback back to governance. We'll bring a red line back. You are welcome to give input at any time. I have given copious updates over the last few months. So, we have until 5:30, but we were going to try and do sky view again um since that is such a big deal. >> But we also I think

295what we need to do is pivot to exactly where Mr. Moon was going if we can focus on um section 4A student holidays just so we can get a sense before we go back to governments where people live with this. This is certainly what's in draft form. um and and and then also if we can get to any consensus uh on which of the three surveys that Dr. Reed put out. But let's start first with uh any comments um on the designated student holidays which are in alphabetical order >> and again those are from the November 2023 guidance document that was not voted by the board but that is used now. So, are we going to look for as much agreement as possible that people want to do a show of hands? Who is in

296line with it? Who is not? >> Yeah. >> Are we all over the map? Okay. >> Well, I just want to pivot to that page because I don't want us not to be able to have that part of the conversation. And any other, you know, edits to the policy, we welcome. So, I'm just going to go in the order of what I saw as gobacks. And if someone doesn't, you know, want to speak to this, that's fine. Um or if you feel radically like you need to talk about something else and you still want your go back, that's fine, too. Uh Dr. Anderson, >> that was actually the first thing that I had on my list of things to talk about. Um as I mentioned in governance, I do not want for this list to

297be part of the policy. Um one of the things that I know was clear from Mr. foster when we talked about holidays before and again I pulled up the information is that there has to be some operational impact. Um this leaves it open to I think interpretation that we could add without having that secular reason which he had outlined previously during a public meeting. I'm just referring to the public meeting conversations that you had. >> Did you read his update that was shared with us yesterday? I'm not sure that I >> he addressed this very thoroughly. >> Okay. So, I will take a look at that in a little bit >> and he and in it well >> I will take a look at that in a little bit. I have other things that I

298want to speak about. Um the community engagement piece on page three where it says feedback may it should say shall because the feedback has to happen. How is how it happens is the flexibility because the may onto the feedback means it could not happen. So that would be my very strong ask. Um again I talked about adding all the early release days as an asterisk on it. Um starting midweek I have to say from somebody who worked in schools for many many many years over two decades. It was really nice to start on a Wednesday because there was only so much bandwidth for students and so that would be one of the spaces if there was some flexibility I would appreciate that just because it makes it a little easier in life. Um 5day weeks

299I am also vehemently opposed to removing that from the language because it's part of the advocacy that we've been hearing a lot about and not being responsive to that. I think uh misses the mark. Um again, maybe in one place and not the other, but um I just wanted to raise that. Um I do think this needs to go back to governance with a reiteration of all of what's been provided today in a nice redline version so we can just have one document instead of multiple documents to review. and I will go take a look at Mr. Fosters's um email right now. Thank you. >> Okay, I'm just going to stay in the order. Well, actually I'll go with placers and then with time we'll come back. So, Mr. Moon. >> Yeah. One thing that

300I was not able to finish is with a winter break as written as written right now here as a draft is 10 business days. me as business days do not include holidays. So Christmas day and New Year's Day those are holidays. So if they are not included 10 business days they will they could extend to two and a half weeks. You need to add another two days. So make it 12 sort of. So that's that's way too long. That's way too long. We could say just 10 calendar day. No, 10 10 weekdays. Are you is that are you done? >> Yeah, I have some additional comment on the winter break being >> somehat much longer than it used to be, but I will reserve that for some other time. Miss >> Dixit. Um, so I'm

301going to just say that u I'm good with the number of holidays mentioned here. U the the um I did not support uh Veterans Day to be a school day um during the last voting and it shows it shows here as a O day. I may be okay with that but I really wanted that to be holiday too. Um that's my opinion uh on that and uh like um Mr. Dannon said right the idea is consistency that's what the community is saying I don't want to put very specific language in the policy document and get you know um you know just make it more um like generic in nature. I think I like that approach uh is uh to put it as a as the this calendar policy is to make our school system uh

302give um you know consistent educ instruction. Um so I I would like to hold on to that thought and I would appreciate if our government's team um can you know consider our non non-governance people also our thoughts into action when you redo the word work >> that's why we're here um and we welcome >> I know but I'm not there right so I I just want to make sure sometime people are there they don't get hurt >> well >> and I I I feel like uh um also like some people hold on to their thoughts um and believe in that what is right but it that just because they believe in it is doesn't make it right so the board has to decide that right so I not uh particularly saying miss uh lady that

303you you're you are specifically doing that but overall I have I've seen that when you're not in the room things can happen which you don't want to happen >> well this will come to a board vote and I think that the since the These are outlined in the policy that governance brought to you that that was the feeling in the room of governance and it sounds like you're in agreement with what's in front of you. Um, so I think you you were represented in the room when it comes to these days. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm just saying the five days, the language. Oh, yeah. I changed my mind on that. >> Okay. Okay. >> Thanks. >> Okay. Um, thank you, Miss St. John Cunning. No, I'm sorry. Yes, Miss St. John. Mr. Mr. Dannon,

304>> I promise to stay on section four here. Um, so just to clarify, when we say student holidays here, uh, would these also be teacher work days or that's just TBD? Um, because I see like, you know, Labor Day and Fourth of July, and I'm presuming people we wouldn't be asking teachers to work those days or or would we? Okay. I I wasn't sure just from the way those it was listed here. And I guess when we have the definition of student holidays, it'll that'll help. Um, has there been any more I understand some folks have we've tried to reach out to the um minority faith coalition. And I will say I met with them a while back and it was shared with me that that was one of those great examples where people different

305views come came together and and collaborated and worked things out um and gave input. It's you know again maybe not perfect. We're not going to there is not a perfect calendar and so it's probably worth saying that out loud. Um but have we heard more from them or had more engagement with those kind of groups to get a sense of where they're at with this and and so forth? I'll put that out to the board or to Dr. read if you've heard from that group. Okay. Um and again this is Tom Dan and Middlechilds trying trying to strike a balance here but has there been any thought given to some of these um I recognize election day is always on a Tuesday for example but to treating some of these as a as a holiday

306day off if it falls on a Monday or a Friday and then an observed day if it's Tuesday Wednesday Thursday. And again I recognize this is an imperfect solution. This is a difficult um problem. We're trying to balance competing interests here. But I I did want to put that out there again if if I don't know if other school divisions do this where you know if if like I said if a holiday one of these religious holidays falls on a Monday or Friday gets recognized. Um and if not it becomes an O day. So that's my last comment I think. >> Thank you. Uh I think we're capturing that note Miss St. John Cunning and then Mr. McDaniel. So, I I appreciate all the work that has gone into this and the thing about this

307is that we're trying to balance competing priorities. Not saying that one is more important than the other and and that's what's difficult and that's those are the decisions we have to make. So, I do appreciate the work that has gone into this and yes, there's been advocacy for the five days. I've gotten letters saying we should just go to a 4-day week. So again, it's always some of the loudest voices that we hear and I've gotten like absolutely no holidays. Let's not do any holidays. So there are competing priorities and we're trying to balance what is impossible and there are some people that are not going to be happy and we need to recognize this. We're trying to do the best for our students, for our staff, for our community. Um I appreciate this work

308session. I appreciate the engagement and I would just offer to the rest of the people that are here that are normally not in governance, whatever your suggestions are, please email them in because that doesn't mean that just because you're not at the committee doesn't mean that you don't have a seat at the table. I heard some great uh suggestions here today, but this is the first time we've had to discuss it and that's what a work session is for. So, I appreciate the feedback and the engagement that we received. Um, and I just want to put on the record that these are all competing priorities. Any faith day is holy to that person and we have to respect that. Uh, and I'm glad that our community does that. So, just my two cents, if you

309really feel strongly about that, email the chair, email the people on governance and every we will take everything into consideration. >> Thank you, Mr. McDaniel. So to the topic at hand that was requested to be discussed the the holiday I'm fine with the section as is. I think with the technical edits around business day versus work day that's fine. Um and Mr. Moon uh you know the math exercise it convinced me that uh calendar math is harder than boundary math. >> Yeah. Um so anyway but I agree with Dr. Anderson's comments about May versus Sha and community engagement. I think that takes care of that. Um, you know, I agree there's no research necessarily showing that five day weeks produce different outcomes, but I would suppose that that means that conversely there's no research saying

310it doesn't. Um, I I and if it's a neutral factor and if the community is generally wanting five day weeks, if it's a neutral factor and if the community is generally wanting five day weeks, I don't have a problem saying in the policy that that's a goal. Um, I worked with Mr. done on language on a motion that I agreed to second uh which put specific numbers in there and I was very clear with him. I don't know if I'm going to support the motion or not because I don't know where I am on specific numbers but I'm happy with the language as is that says we are striving to attain fiveday complete weeks. Um I did have a technical question though that I forgot to ask and Miss Mirren reminded it when she said

311elections. Um we have in there that it will be canceled for a substantial number of the word substantial is in there. What what is substantial? I actually added that and it was because it was actually the special election for the Bradock district was the perfect example is that we probably can manage it if it's one district that is has a special election or one smaller congressional you know like not congressional but one smaller um legislative >> district but we can't necessarily do it when it the reason that we did it um for the congressional seat was because it was over a percentage of our schools and so it That was up to the superintendent, but it was over 50% of our schools. >> Well, that's my should we just say over 50%. >> I guess

312that's my what is the definition of I agree with your comments, but I guess my my question was what was the definition of substantial. Um anyway, governance can figure that out. Um it's whatever you want to do on there needs to be a number in there. I guess my point a a numerical number. Um, and lastly, this is a I I have never seen a school division outside and I was in public schools in Mississippi, so take that for what it's worth. Um, but the month the Friday before Labor Day, you know, having a holiday and I know it was the compromise of the King's Dominion law and I I I get all that. So maybe I'll bring a motion to put in our legislative package to roll it back because that's just goofy to

313me. And Mr. Mr. Moon and I will have a conversation offline about one week of of winter break versus two because that was a historical change that I think has contributed to the mess that things have have become. I'm done. Okay. Um so I just I I do have one question. I 100% support and and believe in community strong community engagement. And I guess my question is if we change that from a May to a shall but the policy also dictates the dates then I guess the community input is simply around more or less the length of things like winter break, spring break or Thanksgiving. If we're going to name the days in the policy, then we're not but O days are not named. And I I and I I well I agree with Veterans

314Day being an O day, but suns setting the policy that existed around Veterans Day, which by the way, I did vote um to make Veterans Day a school day because that's what the policy stated and I followed policy. I agree with my one of my colleagues that I would prefer that that be a holiday. Um I understand the appetite for it not to be and I voted that direction for next year. Um but just because it had its own standalone policy doesn't mean it has to be named as an O day in this policy because I don't really want to name all the Odays, but I'm fine with it being named. Um but I kind of just like those being operate like on the calendar. Um, so we also need to talk about the survey

315speaking of community input. So I'll just put it out there that I personally um, and I'm going to get back to other people. But I think we need to focus a little energy on here because if we're going to get the input that needs to happen sooner than later. Um, and I would just say that I don't really have an appetite for A, but I'm but I have an appetite for B, B, or C. Um it may be, you know, I'm anxious to hear other people people's thoughts. I do believe that um so I think with that sort of in mind I'm going to go back to Dr. Anderson. >> I'm so sorry. Can you just come back to me? >> Okay. Miss St. John Cunning, Mr. Dannon. uh just around the um uh feedback

316and so forth. My sense from the conversation a couple weeks ago was around one making good use of that feedback. So not asking for feedback every year. Um and again this is doesn't have to be decided today but just for the input. Um maybe working in some language around reviewing every conducting a comprehensive review every three years where the committee looks at the data. But I agree with the sentiment shared a couple weeks ago that reviewing you know putting out a survey every year you know having volunteers and so forth look at that could be a little um lend itself to overcorrecting versus um meaningful feedback. So pause there. Miss Anderson. >> Um I am the one that's strongly advocating for it to be an ODAY because or for Veterans Day to be an O

317day for two reasons. First, it's the only federal holiday that we don't give off in just the list of holidays. Um the other one the reason is is that our community is widely um unagree like they're not in agreement as to how this should be laid out. And I believe that the ode in my opinion is the happy medium between so that if you have someone that really wants to take their child to their unit and go celebrate um Veterans Day with their with their units, they can do that. But otherwise then they we we would still have something at the school related to to honoring that tradition. Um so I am I also believe that it's the only cultural um observance day that's a little bit different than the rest of them. many of

318the other cultural observance days are really focused on religious holidays um and not necessarily this is really it's a different it's a different um reason and so that is the reason that I'm advocating for it to clearly be outlined um and also if we don't do that then we need to identify clearly that Veterans Day will be a day at school. So >> thank you Dr. Anderson. Thank you. I do want to share um two quick things um regarding the survey. That was something that I advocated for and I do not want it to be a yearly survey. I think you need a little bit of time. That's what I shared in my comments um to Dr. Reid when I spoke to that motion. Uh I think every other year is fine. Every year is

319not that helpful. And it it is going to be in it is it should be informative in order to give some way for us to perhaps review policy. Um, speaking of the survey that is in front of us, I do want to lean into the one that ranks um, the different options because this is a zero sum game. We can't do it all. So, it will be very helpful and instructive to understand where does the community fall in terms of what is the most important. If it's a fiveday winter break, so be it. Um, so I would like to have the one that ranks um the um different options there. Were you looking for something more specific, Dr. Reid, whether it's B or C? >> Because I think both of those accomplish that. If if

320we go back to page three of the draft policy that's posted, >> page three of >> the top where it says community engagement, >> it it says feedback may address start and end dates, timing of breaks, and alignment with regional school divisions. So, in a sense, it's outlining what the survey really should encompass. And so, that was why a was originally developed, which did not include feedback on religious or cultural holidays. So B and C do include um a ranked choice that includes um religious holidays and cultural observance days. So I just would want to make sure I mean draft A meets the expectation of that paragraph number three. Um, and if the board is going to list the holidays in the policy, then I don't know if you want to survey about the list.

321Again, it's a question. >> No, it's a fair question. And the way that I see it is the feedback shall happen, >> but the questions that are asked, what's listed here may be asked. It doesn't have to be all of those things, but I think realistically speaking, there are going to be some areas that are a little bit more defined than others. But I also think it could be pretty informative to the school board to inform our um decisions when it comes to these policies because next school board that gets seated in 2028 may decide this is all moot and they want to do something differently. At least having this kind of feedback from the community gives some anchor to decision-m even at the policy level. So, I don't know if I'm as that's my

322long way of saying I don't know if I'm as worried in terms of what it says here because it's a may. You could add to it. You could subtract from it. It doesn't have to just be those. >> Well, I'm and I appreciate that and I'm looking for some consensus on whether the board feels that A, B, or C are going to better meet their needs. Miss Anderson, >> I I think that I would advocate for B because I feel like it still gets to the rank order um and it gives us a little bit more detail than the than the A option did, but it doesn't go too far into um other concerns. So, I think that for me the B would be a happy medium. >> And I I do have a question

323for staff. um when we get to a consensus on this, how long is much time should be allotted to get this out and then be able to evaluate data to inform a board vote on future calendars. >> So, thank you, Miss Lady. believe the we wanted to provide this for a board vote at the July meeting um and because it'll connect to the calendar and we'll have to have new business which will back it up a bit. So I'll ask uh Miss Neil to have either you or someone from your department be responsive to from the time of putting the survey out to when we can have um data in such a way to inform that what we realistically think that is. >> So Dr. I think we if we can um kind of backward

324mapping from the date that you need and I think what I want to kind of flag that it's not so much about how long it takes for us because we can expedite there are certain piece that we really can't such as a translation but I think it's the timing of when you are sending this survey would be really important because toward the end of school year but I also want to share that historically we have very low response rate whenever we do family survey so it's It's a long it may not be the question I mean answer you are looking for but I'm saying we can actually try to bag map it from the date but I also want to be very mindful when we send it given all the end of school and and

325other priorities the families may have provide a suggested timeline in the Friday letter. >> Okay Dr. Miss Dixit, I'm >> just uh little bit surprised with one question about the survey. Um why would we want to ask our community whether they want schools on federal holidays? Like that question or reduce the number of federal holidays because that's some where parents are are home. They they want to you know keep their kids with them and like it's a no-brainer. Hopefully they are they want to keep their kids. >> But that question is there thing on all options. I I just wanted to um have a look on that. I fair question. I think we're just looking at ways um all the possible variables. If five day weeks are a priority, then what are the things that

326are involved in five day weeks and there's not for whatever reason there has not been a requirement that federal holidays be federal holidays. So I think that that was a question I think that uh the team felt was related to the goal statement the board had around five day weeks. Um I mean there could be anything else than this question like I I will be like do you want to work go to school on Sunday like something like that right then that's federal holidays I mean it's u it's like a that question I would really take off from the list if I was the surveyor but u anyways if you're trying to get uh everybody's input my only question is Dr. left is what if there only few people who are pushing this one agenda

327or that agenda answering the survey is there's going to be a unique ID for each uh person that they can't like thousand response from same person >> we've sure had that question so somewhere in the past that must have happened so um Miss Kim do you want to um respond to that please >> yes we actually use Qualri's platform and we actually have the directory of the parents that we have. So we actively filter those who are a little bit more eager than others to express their opinions. >> Dr. did you have additional questions? >> No, I just wanted to say that I think given that especially the statement that Dr. just made about um you know, we want to know where to go since five full since five day weeks are important in response

328to the federal holiday. I I think I want to lean into um survey C. Thank you. All right. So, I think ideally we could wrap this up if we could get consensus on one of these options. Oh, we can't because they're not posted. Okay, so we'll pause on that. So, not seeing any more placards. Um, we do have a little bit of time to revisit the Sky View boundary conversation. I know there were a couple folks that still had questions, so I'm going to turn it back over to um, Miss Marin and Miss Dixit to continue that conversation. Thank you. >> Mr. moon your sky view or boundary or >> sky view >> mystics would you like to begin >> yes thank you so much um I just wanted to just uh continue this conversation

329which was kind of left off earlier um I don't have any questions in in at this moment but I I'll make some comments after my colleagues have um got a chance to speak right so Mr. Moon would do you like to go ahead and then Dr. Anderson. >> Yes. Thank you. I think I heard something. I'm sorry. I said Mr. Moon and then Dr. Anderson. >> Oh, thank you. >> I'm okay if you want to go first. >> I'm an old man, so >> uh Go ahead. >> I I I got a little bit confused with some of the conversations and versus what's on the slide. Slide nine. This is bullet three. It talks about the conversion of the existing elementary and prek classrooms. Are we keeping those or converting them? Because that's a little

330different from the comments that you made, Mr. Gordon. >> So, it's a part of the uh total process to bring the school within our standards. So, we'll convert as needed to make sure we have uh enough space to eventually house, you know, 2,000 students. >> Right. So, I've only been at the school twice and so the space that I think I visited that was the the um prek space. Are you thinking we would take part of that if we needed to up to all of it if we needed to? That's what I'm hearing. >> Primarily elementary primarily elementary space. Go ahead. >> So, there is a prek space in the building that is separate from the elementary wing. And so the wings in question that are the elementary wing, those would be converted to support

331uh high school students. >> But you see the statement that I'm referring to, you see the third bullet, it doesn't really say what you just talked what you it doesn't reflect what you just said. >> We we can clear that clear that up, but the prek spaces the prek spaces uh are will remain in the building. They are not being converted. >> Thank you. And my last thing is just I tal I asked this earlier in terms of where the funds are coming from because please help me better understand. We had the 150 for the purchase which were taken from other projects. Where are the dollars for the construction coming out of more specifically what is not going to be done so we can achieve this? Because we don't have any new dollars existing capital

332funds that we get every year. We'll have to get back to you with more specifics. I think we've had several times we've provided a spreadsheet, but we can get back get back to you on that. I didn't bring that for this afternoon's conversation. >> Thank you. That would be very helpful. >> Mr. Moon. >> Okay. One quick question regarding transportation. uh uh that I do understand that the invitations been extended beyond those five scores and I have also heard over the weekend that uh some of those parents have been apparently informed that for the transportation they could go to depot drop up is that >> yes just as all the other high schools that we're phasing at this point there are depots or hubs that are running that are able to be used and those

333have been shared. >> Okay. There will be no limitations, right? They're not going to cut up a certain point. >> No, sir. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Mr. McDaniel. >> Thank you. Thank you. The only the only real question I have is there there's there was some commentary in in the previous round on on this and you know I kind of agree with it to a certain extent but for those impacted magisterial district board and I think there's I know Miss Dixon, Miss Mirren and Miss do you have do you have impact with Sky View Miss Lee? I can't remember technically yes on paper. >> Okay. All right. Well, for the for the magisterials and the three atlarges um who whose constituents are going to be impacted by this, you know, for the second and

334the third round, is there a particular I mean, can we be given a preview of these maps prior to >> just to maybe potentially get ahead of any Okay, >> we did get you the we did give a preview um in the Friday letter of the prior maps on a Friday prior to a Tuesday release. Having said that, I think it would be helpful um I mean for sure depending on how quickly there there's going to be some pretty quick turnaround adding a third cycle in only two weeks. So um but as soon as the I mean essentially I got them to you as soon as we got them from the consultant. So happy to do that. >> Thank you. That was all. >> Miss Marin, do you want to go? >> Sure. Um, I

335I do think I would like to see the expanded budget for doing the third round. Um, I think well, when we get the design, well, I'm I'm pretty tired at this point of the day. This was not the end of the daytime I was hoping for. Um, I will share a few things. I have to follow up to get actual commitment from the superintendent, but some a constituent asked at the April 28th meeting. What was the criteria for considering the feedback that people are giving? And this was the same question that I heard at the very first boundary meeting I attended in the fall. You know, is it the people in the room who are the loudest who are going to be heard? And the answer given was very vague and just said the boundary

336review committee will review the feedback. it's people are seeing that there's not the detail coming forth that they're seeking. Um also I would like the slides from today to reflect um some things. You know these slides are our public records and not including the update on the comments received the thousands and thousands of comments received in one week is not being authentic to this work for now and for the future. So, I did send an email around asking that either the slide um here be updated to say that those 1400 comments were before the the maps were published and or showing that what has ended up as a result. My colleague said earlier the slide about future capacity due to construction. This becomes a historical reference document. The consultants documents show the potential growth from

337household residential construction. but our slides do not. That is insurance for us when we want to go and advocate and look at what's been done. I'll also say finally when we voted on the comprehensive boundary and the last minute changes earlier this year, I made a point to say please don't wait until January Dr. read to finalize the other boundary adjustments that forthcoming because we know this year that people were waiting, you know, with baited breath for their schools were going to change and if you present to us in January the boundary changes for those four other areas. We're put people we just discussed this. So again, I just don't understand why we wouldn't try and make it easier for families and give it to the board in November or December. So that is all.

338Thank you, Miss Marin. Um I'll just go um at the at the last unless some someone else wants to speak. Um no no one. Okay. So um this was a sudden change for our community. I understand uh especially the elementary school school parents were very uh surprised and there were many of them like I said earlier thousands uh plus emails and u messages to me. Uh I just found the response from superintendent and and the m Miss Smith uh that we're taking the elementary off the table pretty quick just to and we already am sharing that information to the community because I I want to make sure that they also understand not everybody's watching the work session. So I'm I'm going to use my tools to um send messaging out. Um but the support and

339the engagement we got from the community was overwhelming. This is how FCPS works. It's like our parents are equal partners. Their voice matters and when they came in the room and they spoke and we we heard them. That is the part of this board is to hear from our community and then take action accordingly. So in fact u I had really supportive conversations, understanding conversation. All the meetings were very respectful. We didn't have anybody coming in and and you know throwing stones at us. Thank God. But I I was uh I was pleasantly surprised uh with the um support system we have. Uh sorry I I will say thank you to all the parents who got who engaged with us and now they are basically together in this and this group of parents who met

340me last week last yesterday told me is there anything they can do for our school system and when I said yes we mean need money there are advocates now to get our money from state local wherever they can. So I just meant to say I mean um I I tend to be uh very thankful for uh the support we got from both school system and from our parents for this. So Sky View is going to be great. Thank you. You want to close? Okay. So I think with nobody else want to speak anymore. This work session is adjourned as of 5:17 p.m.