001[Music] Hearts color hold un States indice so cut right turn h oh HK HK turn thank you may be seated so a special thanks to our presentation of national of national colors and Pledge of Allegiance we want to thank our Color Guard unit from Mountain View High School Marine Corps jrtc program Christopher cam Cody Johnson Malachi Simeon Ty gray and Andrew saaya the instructors of the program are Lieutenant Colonel Ray mienda and Sergeant ma major Allan Tanner all right we will move on to 1.03 roll call Madame clerk please call the role yes sir Dr Chase here miss e Miss guy here miss holstead here miss hey here miss Irish Miss Randall here miss Sigman here and Dr Warner here we have a quum okay thank you we will look at 1.04 we don't have
002anyone uh participating electronically this evening moving on to 2.01 approval of the agenda motion to approve have a motion by Dr Chase can I uh make an a change in the agenda real quick sure okay I would like to um move 3.07 uh to action item 10.01 okay so we have a motion by Miss Randall to move item 3.07 to item 10.01 is action item in a second by Dr Warner um any well there's any discussion nope all right if we could set up the electronic vote to move item 3.07 to item 10.01 please cast your vote please display the vote and that passes with a vote of 70 with all in favor all right do we have an motion to approve the agenda I'll give that change motion to approve motion by Dr Chase
003do we have a second second second is that Miss guy thank you all right there's no discussion on the on oh we have any discussion on the approval of the agenda all right if we could show the vote please cast your vote please display the vote and that passes unanimously all right we will move on to 3.01 election of the school board chair per policy 8 118p the division superintendent acting as chair will request nominations for chair no second for nominations is required the floor will remain open for nominations until there are no more nominations the superintendent will take then take a vote starting with the first nomination and proceeding through each one as needed until one nominee receives a majority vote additional rounds of nominations may be required in order for one nominee to
004secure major majority of the vo to be appointed once a chair has been elected I'll turn the meeting over to the newly elected chair who will continue with the process of filling the remaining positions using the same process through which a chair was chosen so at this time I'll open the floor for nominations for chair I take I nominate Moren Sigman for chair okay we have a a nomination for Moren Sigman other nominations okay see none I'll close the floor for nominations we'll take a vote uh on our one nominee uh the nominee is maren Sigman board members please cast your vote that passes unanimously congratulations chair Sigman I'll now turn the meeting over to you thank you very much and thank you everyone I appreciate that and I look forward to working with you
005again for another year um oh my Apple blazes okay we will move on to item 3.02 election of a school board Vice chair are there any nominations I nominate Miss Maya guy for vice chair are there any other nominations seeing none we will close the nominations and cast our votes for Maya guy for vice chair that motion passes 7 congratulations Miss Sky uh item 3.03 adoption of the 2025 Schoolboard meeting schedule there a motion to approve or change motion to approve second is there any discussion did you want to I actually did have some discussion on the May 27th meeting I noticed that that is the Tuesday after Memorial day and just two days before graduation for three days before graduation and I wondered if for community and staff it might be better to reschedule
006postpone or cancel that meeting I would say that we could ca cancel it um I mean unless we also said we were putting these on and if we didn't need them we wouldn't use them and maybe because this would be a really big stretch for everybody that week it would be a good one to cancel Dr Smith did you have thoughts on that date I have no concern with canceling I think it would provide staff some needed time with everything going on that week okay I agree I think that canceling it makes most sense so do we have an amended motion somebody want to make motion to approve the Schoolboard meeting schedule with the exception of May 2 7 which will be cancelled the work session will be canell second yeah okay any further discussion
007okay please cast your votes that motion passes 7 to zero item 3.04 adoption of 2025 administrative authorizations motion to approve second is there any discussion hearing none please cast your votes motion passes 7 to zero item 3.05 appointment of the school board Clerk and Deputy clerk motion to approve second second okay is there any discussion on this item no can I just say how much I really appreciate them I just wanted to tell you miss and Angie it's it's not doing nothing's happening without you girls so thank you so much for everything ditto and I feel like now is the time to say that because I might fall out of favor soon no I'm just kidding any further discussion okay please cast your votes motion passes 7 to zero item 3.06 appointment of citizens to
008Schoolboard advisory committees motion to approve second he is there any discussion once again I do want to thank everybody who is volunteering to be on an advisory committee and uh find your friends if there are vacancies on your committee or on any of the Committees uh we would love I think I speak for all of us to say we would love to fill them and um we do our best work when we're working together so thank you very much um please cast your votes motion carries 7 to zero item 3.07 appointment of oh that's right that got moved to 10.01 okay Awards and recognitions item 4.01 recognition of a school board member Patricia Healey for 25 years of service if we could if you want to invite people down key would you like to join
009us in front of the DI please tonight we are pleased to honor our remarkable individual whose dedication passion and steadfast leadership have left an indelible mark on Stafford County Public Schools Mrs Patricia Healey began her tenure on the school board on January 1st 2000 this month marks an extraordinary M Milestone 25 years of unwavering service to our school division making her the longest serving School Board member in Stafford County history for a quarter of a century Miss Healey has Mrs hey has been a champion for Education an advocate for students and a steadfast voice for our families her tenure tenure is nothing short of extraordinary by the time she completes her current term she will have devoted 28 years on our school board a legacy few can match Mrs Healey has served alongside 33 other
010board members during this time seeing six from a five from Falmouth seven from Garrisonville four from George Washington six from Griffith Widewater and five Harwood Representatives these Partnerships brought diverse personalities and priorities to the table yet Mrs Healey navigated them with Grace diplomacy and an unwavering focus on what matters most our students her wisdom and dedication have ensured that our decisions remain student centered and focused on our future over the years her leadership has chased the foundation of our school she has served seven years as the school board chair and eight and an eighth as the vice chair guiding the board through times of growth challenges and change in this time she has seen the opening of one-third of our schools Rocky Run Rodney Thompson Kate Waller Barrett T Benton Gale Margaret Brent Conway Mountain
011View Anthony Burns Dixon Smith and Shirley Heim she has overseen the rebuild and Renovations and additions to Stafford High mure Falmouth Grafton Village Stafford L AG Wright North Stafford Stafford Middle Brook Point Colonial Forge Mountain View and Ferry Farm before her current tenure expires she will see the opening of high school 6 Elementary 18 and 19 as well as the rebuild of Drew Middle School Mrs Healey your service has been a gift to this community your commitment to the families of Stafford County your tireless advocacy for high quality education and your Steady Hand during times of change has made a difference in countless lives on behalfs of the students families Educators and community members whose lives you have touched we thank you you leave a legacy of leadership compassion and dedication that will continue to
012inspire us all congratulations on this extraordinary Milestone thank you Mrs Hy for 25 years of service and an unwavering commitment to staff aord schools h right here of course I just want to thank my daughter Sarah and her fiance Rob who came here tonight and if it hadn't been for my daughter I would not be on the school board well my daughter and all the wonderful people in Rock Hill that have allowed me to return every four years but I said when uh when my daughter Sarah got to school that if she was going to go to public school I was going to get involved and unfortunately the PTO president role was taken and I got talked into running for the school board and never left but anyway um she's she's really endured a lot
013from having her mother on the school board fortunately her her she has her father's name instead of my name so when she was in school a lot of people didn't know her mother was in the school board which is a good thing when when you're in school but um thank you for coming Sarah and and all everyone who's come out and and and talk to me and those who I haven't gotten a chance to talk to um Mrs Brown who came up from South Carolina and former Schoolboard members and and staff and former staff thank you so so much for coming out it it really means a lot um I don't know where the time has gone and it's it's just goes fast it's it's everybody says it goes fast but it it really does
014so thank you and particularly the people of Rock Hill who've allowed me and I see a number of them here um who've allowed me to to to to continue with my night job because it really is a it is a calling and a public service so thank you thank you Mrs Healey for the impact you've had and will continue to have on the Stafford schools Community will Monir elementary school counselor Shannon Kelly the 2024 Stafford schools counselor of the year please join us at the podium National School counseling week February 3rd through 7th celebrates the incredible contributions of school counselors and the profound impact they have on students families and schools celebrated across the United States during the first school week of February this special week focuses public attention on the unique role of school
015counselors within America school system this year's theme School counseling helping students Thrive highlights how school counselors Empower students to achieve academic success and prepare for future careers school counselors dedicate themselves to helping students students discover their strengths abilities interests and guide them toward academic achievement and career exploration they support families by fostering the personal and social growth of children collaborate with Educators to help students set and Achieve realistic goals and connect with the Community Resources to enhance comprehensive counseling programs sponsored by the American High the American School Counselors Association this week honors all they do to create opport unities for students to thrive and succeed making a lasting difference in the lives of others thank you and do we have any other counselors with us this evening thank you for all that you do okay
016item five on our agenda our consent items motion to approve second thank you we have a motion and second for our consent items please is there any discussion cast your votes consent motion passes 7 to Z Dr Smith do we have any announcements for administra administrative Personnel appointments we do thank you tonight you have appointed three new administrators I'd like to introduce you to this evening first I'd like to invite Nicole Clemente and her family to the podium as Nicole is coming down I'll share that Miss Nicole Clemente will join the team at Garrisonville elementary school as the new principal Miss Clemente has been part of Team Stafford as an assistant principal for 10 years first at Widewater Elementary School and most recently at Moncure Elementary School in this role Miss Clemente implemented a buddy
017Bears program to address chronic absenteeism and led the high Bear Nation celebration uh Miss clementy earned her bachelor's degree in early childhood education from Youngstown State University and her masters from an education of leadership from George Mason University she has currently participated in the Statewide communities of practice for excellence scope to EXP expand her instructional skill set through collaboration with Community leaders from across the state of Virginia congratulations Miss Clemente thank you thank you good evening Dr Smith Madame chair and members of the school board I just want to thank you for this exciting opportunity and entrusting me with the position of principal of Garrisonville Elementary I am certainly joining a very dedicated passionate and extremely spirited Gator staff here in the next few days so I'm excited for that and I'm honored to just
018serve the Garrisonville Community moving forward we know this job isn't done alone so I am have my husband here with me Michael who has been with me every step of the way and super supportive for all the fun things that you get to do as a husband of an educator and my two children McKenzie and Tyler so thank you again next I'd like to invite jelita Johnson and her family to the podium Miss Johnson is currently serving as the Dina students at Parkridge Elementary School and will now join the administrative team of Parkridge as their assistant principal she's been a part of Team Stafford for the past three years first as a reading specialist and most recently as the dean of students at parkbridge Elementary in her position she was dedicated to inspiring students interests
019in math and literacy along with instilling a self sense of selfworth among all students Miss Johnson earned her Bachelor of Science degree in elementary education k6 mathematics from fville State University and a master's of Arts degree in Reading Elementary education from Grand Canyon University she just completed her postgraduate program in educational Le leadership from George Mason University congratulations Miss Johnson thanks Dr Smith um Madam chair and the board members I am so grateful for this opportunity um I also like to thank um my principal and assistant principal who've joined me um and I think it goes without saying that my wonderful husband McKinley um has allowed me to pursue my education career while he is still active to the Army so I thank you um and my wonderful kids jalani Janice mckenley I F and
020Michael so thank you guys so much for this opportunity all right and I'd like to invite Sarah Stenson to the podium Miss Stenson will join team Stafford as the new assistant principal for Grafton Village Elementary she joins us from Spotsylvania schools where she served as an elementary educator for 21 years and most recently as an instructional specialist during her tenure she was recognized as a finalist for teacher of the year for the for the division she earned her bachelor's degree in exercise science from the University of Richmond a master's of Education from the University of Mary Washington and her Masters Administration and supervision from the College of William and Mary congratulations Miss Stinson and welcome to team Stafford thank you Dr Smith Madame chair board members I'm so excited for this opportunity to join Grafton
021Village's family um I come with a lot of teaching experience and instructional coaching and I'm very excited to get started with them my husband is at home with my three teenagers doing all the things that he's going to be taking over now that I step into this new role so it's just me tonight so thank you very much okay thank you to all of our new appointments for choosing Stafford we are very grateful to have you here next on our agenda we will have a presentation of findings from the trans from Transportation advisory Services regarding Transportation root cause analysis and Associated recommendations uh thank you everyone for letting me uh speak with you tonight um uh t uh submitted a proposal for um the root cause analysis that you were looking for uh due to
022some Transportation issues and we're going to have a presentation tonight um I love when this is interactive so if you have questions throughout feel free to just shout at me uh raise your hand whatever you feel comfortable with um just to give everyone here a brief um understanding of who Transportation advisory Services is um my name is Christopher walowski um t as was founded in 1987 no I I've not been here since 1987 um but the um organization has had some uh a lot of experience and is well respected in um with school districts uh we are the largest uh dedicated School transportation consulting firm we don't do anything else we don't recommend or we don't uh sell software or anything like that um we have seen over 550 clients we're closing in on 600
023um and we are in about half the states throughout the country um so we do have a decent footprint mostly on the East Coast um and the most important thing that I want to point out on this slide is we are a thirdparty independent consulting firm um we only work with school districts um and anything uh anytime we make a recommendation to a district it's really in your best interest we don't make any additional profit or uh any additional Revenue by making any of our recommendations um I did provide my contact information on this if there's any questions after the presentation um down line a week month even a year from now I love uh jumping on the phone and talking with people and seeing how we can help you guys um so initially the
024problem that occurred is at the start of this school year um there's some Transportation issues uh it left 3,000 students uh without School transportation and so that's kind of what we were tasked with figuring out kind of what went wrong um some quick background on what went wrong and we'll dive into it a little bit more um there were significant challenges throughout the entire department um that kind of led to this um the big the big things that we want to point out is there was a restructuring of the department um and there was a new bring software the software had a lot of led to a lot of confusions and efficiencies in communication um we did break down the different causes um that we found uh during our study into a several categories um
025so that's that big bold change in Department structure that's going to be our first subject that we talk about and on each of the next few slides we're going to talk about the issue the cause and kind of the impact of that um so one of the uh and there's not a specific um it's not in ranked order so it's just these are the things that we noticed um the department changed quite significantly um there's a lot of reshuffling people were in different roles um the structure and how students were being transported and scheduled and routed changed dramatically um this caused confusion and a lot of misinformation among the staff um some of the staff didn't know um what their roles and responsibilities were um and this really led to a lot of uh operational
026inefficiencies um and lot of uh communication breakdown as well ask a question so in you when you're speaking of staff you're talking about our transportation staff that's at the building at our our building not the bus drivers did we talk to them at all that's correct um what in our time here we spent um talking to staff um the the next thing was the the routing softare software that was implemented for the beginning of this school year um there are a lot of kind of bugs and uh different aspects that our routers didn't really understand about the software due to the late uh implementation of the software um we don't we think the software that was chosen and moved forward with uh does have really great capabilities but there were several hurdles that and obstacles
027that weren't really met um mostly being testing and training um were not thoroughly done um and there was significantly significant difficulties in implementing that software um you did have a lot of new routers um to the team that didn't have experience with the old routing software so and bringing on a completely new routing software did definitely make some challenges in making sure all these students were scheduled and got to school um for the beginning of school year may I ask a question absolutely was this new software or was this a software upgrade a little bit of both uh it's it was from the same uh company um it's a different kind of platform um very different feel um the new software has a lot of capabilities um but it is kind of it's not it's
028not upgrading like a Microsoft from one version to the next it is a quite significant change um so there a lot of training is really needed and did we have an option to stay with the old software or were they no longer supporting that that software there there was an option to stay with the existing sof or the older software um we we can definitely get into more of that yeah um so to me this has been this was a significant issue for me just in looking at it and so hearing that we could have stayed with the old software was there a sense of why we felt like it was so urgent to push to the new software since we had the option for sure yeah there was a kind of a drop dead
029time from the technology team there's a lot of um things that need to be moved on the back end to make this work um I think there was a lot of pressure to implement and get this software up and running since there was kind of a a commitment both from uh we can make this happen and also a commitment financially um to moving towards this software um there was a kind of a drop dead date that the department did have um where we have to go with this new software or we have to kind of revert back there was uh server opt different things on the server level that needed to be upgraded to maintain the existing software um so that there was a time when that decision had to be made and the decision
030was to move forward um I believe it was towards the end of April when that decision needed to be made um so so it was an either yeah so it was an either or situation we needed to either upgrade correct on our end or we needed to change software systems correct running them in parallel was not really feasible from an operational or financial perspective if that makes sense um yeah and the routing software like again it does both of them have their their pros and their cons um upgrading the software definitely made sense but the implementation I think was what really needed to be um a little bit more time focused and a little bit more Direction need to be focused on that um leading to this um whenever you implement a new software um
031in any aspect you need to get all your key stakeholders to kind of Buy in um especially when it comes to technology or any kind of software implementation your technology team really needs to be heavily involved they need to drive the project they need to be there every step of the way um the technology team was not really seen as an asset um it was they were not involved um with the implementation and that led to a lot of if they were involved earlier in the process um a lot of the issues May been have uh may have been averted um there were a lot of unrealistic timel lines um in implementing the software and I think the technology team if they were more involved in the process could have thrown up some more red
032flags or prevented a lot of the issues that uh occurred um so the technology team wasn't invited to the table to discuss the implementation of the actual new software understand the Dynamics of the new software yeah they so they were involved to a point um it it did feel like they were kept at arms length for the beginning most of the beginning portions um and they they were definitely involved but not as much as they really needed to in earlier in the process um and Technology you mean art technology or technology you mean the company's technology the district's technology team okay and so what and then ended up with it being implemented or being decided upon in April there was no training from technology or theirs actually on for our staff to make sure they
033were updated and prepared for the change so the technology team is more kind of pro on your end is more the project management making sure everything on the back end is going to work the transition is see seamless the training aspect is more from the the the company needs to come in and do trainings and one of the things we had a meeting with all of your dispatcher or all of your routers and immediately following that and um the routing company came in and did some training and I think that there there's been significant Improvement since we came initially um but yeah that that's the kind of thing that needed to happen before implementation there needed to be a good understanding of the software before it was implemented um and there was some uh some
034poor uh training and that's not only pertaining to the um the software but um the restructuring caused a lot of different roles and responsibilities there's a lot of confusion throughout um throughout the staff um there's a lot of new processes and procedures that really needed to be implemented and thought through um and there wasn't a lot of preparation and I say here that it was in inadequate um and the staff was not really set up for the new system or for their new roles and responsibilities um there was a lot of sorry I'm going to be a pain but no please again I I need to understand if the training that we're talking about is just for the staff that's in the building were the bus drivers not trained at all on the new application
035or the processes that that they were supposed to be enacting from the bus route itself in in this app um what I'm speaking about here is more um training from the restructuring um the new software impacts the drivers for sure um the amount of training that they are required is not we don't believe it was a root cause failure um and lack of training in the drivers um from looking at the training that the drivers receive just on a holistic standpoint we um I thought that was very excellent it was something that I will probably recommend to other districts on how the training is done with your current drivers um another thing that we saw that was a uh a failure was um some of the transfer stations that were implemented um we don't think
036that transfer stations are necessarily bad um but the PO planning and execution really led to complicate some of the issues um again the there wasn't really the preparation that we would really like to see on something of this scale um and handoffs of students and we would really like a um little bit more Streamlight process can I just clarify we're calling these transfer stations are these the Hub stops we were had been using for special okay lots of different uh language and that's exactly it I was trying to translate from your language to what we are calling things locally so that we're on page yeah and these transvers stations or hubs can could work but it's maybe not something that you want to Implement when you're trying to implement many other aspects as well um
037and we we typically like to see implementation of things on a smaller scale and then okay what works what doesn't work um and then Implement further from there um and and the big thing I want to give it to everyone today is um a learning and and growing and making sure that the um Stafford can grow from this and be better in the future um now I'm going to move on to some of the recommendations we have um again these are not in any specific order these are just things that I've noticed and things that can help the district um um uh improve um and one of the things you'll hear me say a lot um if I haven't said it already is communication and Leadership um the communication excellent communication is needed on any
038level anywhere um and accountability is great um but you really need that accountability from the top down um and you really need your leaders to um the the buck should stop with the leaders in any Department if if something goes wrong in my department I'm responsible um and if if we can see that and that can trickle down um that's really what we would like to see um we definitely want clear and consistent leadership um and the culture we'd like like to see the um a cohesive culture where people are wanting to be come to work and wanting to collaborate with one another um and we think that's that's that th these first three bullet points are really something that um can be the first implementations uh from our recommendations um this NE next recommendation
039you already have gone through some of the implementation of the software but whenever you do any kind of software there are other applications that your Transportation uh Team could get into um but really um comprehensive testing um pilot programs when necessary um and really having your staff understand all of the trainings and how the the software Works um and making sure that there's ongoing uh support for when things go wrong because the expectation is okay we have this great uh software we're implementing it it did well in the pilot something is still going to go wrong but let's make sure we have contingency plans built in so that when there is a failure we can be nimble and move on our feet and and correct any uh any issues um we definitely want to see
040some improved uh training programs um for the staff in the office um we believe that the uh this the bus drivers are receiving excellent training um like I said I I'll probably steal some of the processes that you guys have and um provide that to other districts because it's it's I thought it was an excellent uh training um but the staff really need better ongoing training they need to understand what their roles and responsibilities are they need to understand how they can work cohesively together um and those trainings and those processes and how you train people um is really important um again making sure we're involving stakeholders uh especially the technology team um your technology team is very robust and should not be seen as it to come fix my computer because it won't start
041they they should be seen more as a an asset for project management implementation uh troubleshooting um and really helping you develop timelines because people in transportation should not be uh necessarily project managers and you have a lot of really great project management team uh leaders um in your technology team that can really assist and drive forward some initiatives that uh Transportation may have can I a question it seems like um it would from what you're describing as a recommendation that it would be helpful to have a technology person at the transportation office or just available to like do they need their own person or is the team that's not operating in that building acceptable as well it's hard to answer that question mostly because you do have a techn technology team and that technology team
042was not being utilized to its fullest within Transportation I I I personally would try to make the current system work because it the current system wasn't being utilized the the staff was was available but maybe not being utilized I don't think an additional person over there from a technology perspective necessarily is needed at this moment but that could be something that in a few years okay this they do need more support um and implementing a new routing software is a very big technology lift um but it's not going to be as big of a lift indefinitely so um I would probably recommend at least for the time being keeping it the way it is and just utilizing the resources within the district can I ask a question as well the life cycle of the technology
043these apps or whatever that we're using is three minutes because technology changes so fast so how like how soon are we looking at having to now address some things that are going on because I know these Technologies change pretty quickly so any understanding of that would be good as well so in the from the Transportation World um there a are a lot of districts that are using software that is from the 90s and earlier um so the routing software and implementation of technology has been very slow moving um the change that you guys made has been a very significant one because of the um where the software was to where it the new software is was a big gap um I don't believe you'll face this in the next five years um will there be
044an option to upgrade in five years probably will you need it I I would think that would be doubtful um again if we if we're going to implement transfer stations or hubs um making sure we have a detailed plan making sure we have fail safes when things go wrong we understand how to Pivot and uh and and work together with the uh department and the community um and adjustments and being Nimble are very key when it comes to Transportation if you are too rigid um in your approach it's really hard to solve problems um again we want to make sure that our uh the leadership both in transportation but in the district as a whole is very supportive um we want to make sure staff has support and people leading departments also have support so
045um when someone has an initiative hold them accountable to making sure that they're executing on that initiative but giving them the the resources that they need to make sure that initiative can go through and be positive um and we really want the environment over there in transportation and obviously the rest of the district to be positive um work environment and that really starts with leadership um and feedback and open open communication um that can always be improved but there's definitely some improvements um significant improvements that could be made um one of the things that we want to point out is there's not currently an opt-in model um for the district for students to opt into Transportation so this is not going to be an opt-in mod we don't recommend an opt-in model for all students
046um our special education students we have to provide transportation we don't want to put additional barriers on families that have special education students that's not something we're recommending um but there are options that can um minimize the amount of um implementation that Transportation needs to do um utilizing an opdate model um and this is not sending one email or one communication to parents saying would you like transportation and then come the beginning of the school year you have 3,000 students needing Transportation or not have have transportation again this needs to be a constant bombardment of communication um really um communicating what you need and when families do not respond you need to be proactive as as a district as a whole to get responses from all of these students um and one of the things
047that we want to point out is transportation can be strategic on this opt-in model um and really focus on students if they do not respond um or families that don't respond focus on students that would have the largest impact to a route if you have a student that doesn't respond um that's in an apartment complex with 15 other students maybe that's not where transportations should really dedicate their time but if you have a student that is five miles out of the way that's a student that you really want to make sure you're getting in contact with because that poses a lot more um strain on the department so making sure that you're getting answers that they really need that that transportation and that can really make some very uh beneficial improvements um next we want
048we'd like the district to consider uh combining Fleet Services and transportation departments um there were we did notice that there was um not as much cohesion between those two departments um and we would love to see the maintenance and anything that goes onto a bus is kind of there is some accountability because right now there are there are two departments that are hand that are handling either uh the buses or some of the equipment that are going on the buses and if you can integrate those two departments we think that there can be some efficiencies more cohesion better teamwork especially if you're um having a really positive leader over there and um really good communication and culture over there um it positive communication and and good culture is contagious um so if you can have
049that in both departments kind of coming together we think that could be very successful um there is some real tracking in in some of your in uh a lot of your vehicles but all of your vehicles do not come back to the same place so making sure that your real-time tracking system your GPS things like that are on every single bus so you know exactly where all all of your buses are um that's not NE necessarily the case right now um and we want to make sure that from a safety perspective from an efficiency standpoint we want to make sure that we know where all of our buses are at any given time God forbid if there's any ever an accident um you want to know exactly where that bus is you don't want to
050have to rely on a driver communicating on their location over um over a radio where there may be a lot of um uh traffic I ask a question there too uh we have reports you know even myself about uh cell phone reception within Stafford County um and we have had concerns that the lack of signal in some areas makes this whole part of real-time tracking difficult for our staff is that yeah I mean obviously that's beyond this board's control but I want to recognize that that is a challenge in Stafford County that is beyond our capabilities right now I definitely think that that's a great point I definitely think GPS tracking as much as possible possible is beneficial because what to complicate um the issue is if there is ever an issue where there isn't
051S service um knowing more information um maybe it's off by a couple hundred feet regarding the GPS I like I would want more information in a time of Crisis than less um with understanding that there is um there there is an added cost to this so you're you're you're making a distinction between GPS global position systems and self cellular service is that right and so you're noting that we may not have cell service but we should have GPS information yes and and and and knowing and knowing where you're knowing where your vehicles are at when they're parked in a lot at night is important too um and and and that's just something we think that there's improvements that can be made in every uh department so we want that's that was one of the aspects
052that we noticed um this is something we uh recommend every District transportation doesn't necessarily handle a lot of the maintenance aspects but we definitely want to make sure that all the vehicles um are getting regular maintenance um and safety checks um from our understanding we didn't have a lot of interaction but that that seems to be going on um and compliance with all safety regulations we like to put that on all of our recommendations because it's something that's critically important we want to make sure all of our kids are getting to school and getting home in the way that they arrived um we definitely want to see uh Foster some Community engagement and feedback this kind of goes into the opt-in method but also understanding how parents are feeling about the transportation Department's um success
053or things that they may be able to improve upon um and really implementing uh based on that feedback I think could be fairly important as well um and developing uh contingency plans for emergencies this is not only if a bus breaks down or gets in an accident but what happens if my routers don't have the full capability to get all of the students to school on time what if I um need to make sure that um a new special education student gets to school um there's a lot of different contingency plans that are not implemented right now and contingency plans may be uh an area of focus over the next uh few months here um just to make sure that and thinking brainstorming and thinking up um any uh potential uh issue that could arise
054what are we going to do in being proactive and understanding um how we can really make that happen that does conclude um our slides I definitely want to open it up to any further questions um does any anyone else have comments or questions Miss hey I have a question about the timing of our learning of the um the problems and deficiencies I am at first I want to say that I know how hard the transportation staff Works um and this just sounds like it was a um Perfect Storm you know if we had not implemented the the new software if we had not you know done certain things then maybe we wouldn't have been here um but the result was a incredible burden on our community um parents you know who we literally contacted the
055day before their students were due to come to school and said uh we don't have a way to get your child to school can you drive them and you know these are parents that you know have you know work other family responsibil a lot going on but I I just don't understand and I didn't didn't see it here how we didn't learn about this until the night before and and that I think for me is important to understand so I can try to share that with our community you know and and again I I I want to back up and say you know I know how hard the transportation staff worked in fact once this came uh to light I don't think there is anyone more hardworking in this entire School District than Transportation I
056mean and I don't see that in here either how they came together and worked you know incredible hours um you know coming up with a solution so so that I I think we need to recognize that you know in this whole um this whole review but I I I just I want to know and I I don't expect you to you know be able to tell me at this minute but I would I would like to have that as part of this you know root cause report is you know why we didn't know until so late in the game um so that we could get started and and and and getting it worked because literally I mean the email came 9:00 vog the night before that's to us and then maybe a few minutes later
057it went out to the the family so so how did that happen that we didn't know so that we could start addressing it earlier there was definitely a lot of pressure to make the new software work because there was not a um there was no turning back once they made the decision to kind of go live um and I think to your point that the the staff over there worked tirelessly they were coming in on they were staying very late they were coming in on weekends um I think one of the dispat one of the router said that they had worked like 14 15 days straight um and and not eight hours either each day it was very long hours um so I do want to commend them for their their hard work and getting
058the routing to where it needs to be um I think it m wanting to make the software work was kind of the largest factor with that being said if some of the other changes didn't occur like the restructuring of the department the transfer stations um re reassigning uh roles and responsibilities the there may have been larger success um than what you saw um and I think there there was a there was a want to make it work until they knew okay that it's impossible we can't make it work so I think that they waited a little bit too long to notify people that it didn't work um because they wanted to make the software work they wanted um to kick off the school year as smoothly as as possible so well can can that be
059addressed in the report I mean that to me that's part of the root calls here I mean that's it's significant that this was not recognized that it could be reported and you know it's reaching out for help because that's you know our community was incredibly burdened with this I mean there and and this the the parents the families the students the teachers you know whose students weren't there the students who had to try to catch up you know with all this I mean this was it was it was amazing that's why we we came to the outside you know this board wanted an independent review and and I know that's that's what we're getting here and and I think you have very much addressed the causes of it but you know part of the the
060issue in my view is the the late Discovery and announcement and only then having to start scrambling around and and this is not again this is not the staff because independently I know the staff were all doing you know what they you know were um tasked to do but but somehow this this this ball I mean it wasn't just dropped it was slammed down the night before 10% of our students don't have rides at school including students you know with IEP pce which which is you know as all it's significant so I I I would like to to get some more information on that so that that does not happen again I mean you've given us you know ways to to address you know the the the software the training you know the the the
061direction but how do we make sure that doesn't happen and not just in transportation but anywhere I mean this this happened in transportation but it could very well happen you know in another area you know in some type of of support um and we just don't want to have anything like this happen again so for me it's um I think it's I think it's addressed in the um culture of transparency because I think that's where we're that's what was missing here was just an open conversation about what was actually happening and if we had had that sooner in the game right like if if the board had known that this software was causing so much trouble if technology had been invited to the building like I mean I feel like those variables are covered per
062se I think now it rests on us to pick this information up off the paper and put feet on it and make it and fix it because now we've been told and now I need to look and I understand we were told a few years ago as well a lot of this comes down to resources so that's my question for you on this one is how how far behind in our resources are we in terms of I mean we have a capability capacity issue and so I'm very curious as to as you were looking at this how far behind the able are we because some of these are budgetary concerns we just can't afford to fix the broken systems in terms of buses and bus drivers and so I just need to understand a little
063bit more about your reflection on our resources yeah so as far I when you say resources you're mostly speaking to staff correct um I think that the staff that you have is capable of making of of working I don't necessarily think um adding headcount will solve a lot of these problems um I think having U like like you said a good culture over there would have probably prevented a lot of these issues or been able to bring up some of the issues ahead of time instead of like you said the night before school started um the culture really needs to improve dramatically and I think that's something that can be done with the staff that's on hand um as well as communication and understanding roles and responsibilities um I think making massive departmental changes um
064makes it really really hard for people to understand where they sit um and I think that that prevented a lot of collaboration um and it diminished some of the communication that happened which I think in turn led to the lack of communication up to District leaders to make the call like okay we have to make sure that we're uh notifying all of our parents that we're we can't make this work and there could have been a little bit more proactivity um from the Transportation and communication to the parents instead of the night before so I just have just to follow up really quick it's not really a question it's more of a statement for us and and Dr Smith to to for the record like really I think it's our responsibility now to get more
065proactively involved with the bus drivers as well and have some more conversations with them those are our boots on the ground and I'd like to see that we talked to them a little bit more because there are some that have 30 and 40 years 30 years experience with us and have seen these system sys operate different ways and I just don't want to walk away from this feeling like they didn't have a say or a voice either and I I recognize what the limitations were of this and I appreciate what came out of it but I do think moving forward we need to really actively engage our bus drivers um I think to to Echo that point I think your bus drivers have been doing an excellent job based on the information I've heard from
066the staff um it I think this staff really need is is where the communication and and support really needs to be Li uh lay right right now um I do think the bus drivers um are heard um at least from a departmental standpoint um and I think that's where probably your your strength of your department is on the the bus driver side that kind of um I I do believe that they have a a decent amount of say but yes involving bus drivers is excellent excellent um approach well can I ask can I try and understand why if we're doing this investigation where the bus driver's not engaged by you because for me and and maybe this is just not how it's done I don't know but it's kind of like going and trying to
067do women's healthare without a woman in the room like it just kind of doesn't make sense they're so important to this um you know to Transportation right for sure yeah the bus drivers are very integral within that um there were some constraints U preventing us from speaking to the bus drivers um and we fairly quickly found out that the cultural issues that the transportation department um were driving many of the issues um as well as a lot of the other things that we spoke to um we did speak to staff that oversee bus drivers that interact with bus drivers on a continuous basis um and the conversations we had within staff is is was glowing of the bus drivers not that we didn't want their feedback but just with time constraints that's that's the main
068reason we did not involve so my follow-up statement to that is not necessarily to you it's to Dr Smith and to my fellow board members is that um you know bus drivers did know that something was wrong um many of us have friends who are bus drivers because we've all been living in this community for years and we heard Rumblings and were on chat chains and saw things on social media they knew okay they absolutely did um what I think and uh Dr Smith and I talked about this about a different subject but was you were considering doing some type of anonymous reporting um so that staff never have to worry about feeling um like a retaliation not that I think anyone would retaliate but you know sometimes people just feel that way um and
069I I think maybe something like that might have helped us in the past and hopefully moving forward you can figure out a way to do that where staff always feels comfortable to come to whoever they're supposed to go to um to to let us or not necessarily us not miss guy but to let Dr Smith know what's going on so that we can get them the support or the training or whatever so that issues like this don't occur not just in transportation but throughout the county Miss Randall um when you said that you talked with staff in transportation um and we've been asking you know had did you talk talk to drivers what levels of the transportation office um staff did you speak to or if it's easier which office staff did you not speak
070to like there's routers and area coordinators and so we we spoke to all of the the routers the area coordinators um the executive um director the assistant executive directors um we spoke to and it's in the report and I feel like I am forgetting several people um but every Department within Transportation was spoken to by you or by your team in in some in some regard I believe yes okay and the other question I have is when you have on your um on your slide you wrote involving technology team early and you said that a decision was made April to engage the new technology when was the technology you said technology engage the technology team from the beginning and collaborate on realistic timelines techn technical challenges when was the technology team brought in so the
071initial um uh start of the project bringing in the new routing software was in the fall of 20 three right that's when technology should have been brought in okay and they were they had monthly meetings with them and it was brought up in those meetings but there was never a there was an offer from technology at that point or very close to that point to get more heavily involved and there was a um definite we'll let you know if we need you kind of thing um and the April timeline was when there would be that was the the kind of the drop dead like are we going to move forward um because technology needed to do their part yeah not to get into more uh into the weeds they there was a lot of things
072that they needed to do if they weren't going to move forward right um so technology was not really part of the process hardly at all okay um they did try to be part of the process um but it was more we'll let you know if we you instead of yes please take the spirit um spear had this project okay that's what I was just like wondering about when you were talking about timelines I'm I was just trying to figure out for sure yes what that timeline even looked like thank you does anyone else have any comments or questions um when you're done okay so um I also wanted to agree with Miss hey that part of the issue was that we had students not properly routed but also the communication side of things how to
073to get that notice out to our families uh more quickly and efficiently um or a delay that you know is the secondary effect of of the transportation so that is something I think that we all agree could use some improvement I do want to thank everybody who helped get us through that I want to thank Mr Mackey for stepping in and helping us in transportation over the past few months I want to thank the mure community for sharing him um I I also wanted to Circle back to what you said about the tech on the buses as far as the real-time tracking and that some of our buses have it and some of our buses don't um Dr Smith I would I think I would really appreciate knowing like what what is the size of
074that Gap and what is the fiscal impact of that Gap maybe that's something fabc could hear and then bring back to us um and what it would take as far as one time but two resources to correct that Gap and if we have a plan for that already and that kind of thing um with that I don't think anyone else has any Dr oh M Dr Warner and one one quick comment um it sounds like there was a breakdown in communication within the department and then that breakdown in communication led to a breakdown in communication with everybody else um it also sounds like everybody was kind of working in their own Silo but those silos changed and they didn't really understand completely what their role was and how to integrate it is that correct absolutely
075Ely yes Dr Smith thank you for that and so I just wanted to share we'll absolutely look into that in terms of that Gap and the fiscal Gap happy to share that out uh we you know talking with with Transportation staff and uh senior leadership we've been really waiting for this uh report um anxiously waiting to understand the root cause analysis what are really did take place um from this external review along with those recommendations so that we can get moving and so um I know being down in transportation seeing how hard folks are working you're exactly right um everyone wants to make sure we get this right and they want to fix it now yesterday um months ago and so um I just wanted to point out that I know I along with our
076staff are ready to jump in and take these recommendations get them moving forward um because we've got you know what seven eight months before we've got a we got to start next school year and so the time's ticking already and I know we're feeling it but we're we're happy to have this tonight and uh we're ready to get moved thank you very much um Madam chair I would also just like to say and I've talked with Dr Smith about this too is that as we start um getting information getting ready for the fall I would like to know that we get updated on the timeline and not be waiting until the 1 of August when we start school days after I would like to know even where we are before we go for July July
077break and making sure that it whatever system we're using communication technology training all of it is at least practiced in summer school so that we can make sure that we know of problems before the 1 of August we'd be happy to do that we've talked inform I've talked informally with staff that regardless of the recommendations that come back that we need to have a timeline that we're going to have check-ins and kind of speed bumps along the way so that they are not surprised that we have those those routine check-ins we know how things are going we're catching things early we're making adjustments as needed to make sure we're ready so happy to keep you updated informed on on that along the way thank you very much uh item 7.02 presentation of a donation check
078by the rotary clubs of Stafford and North Stafford from the 2024 Stafford in action week to help reduce student meal debt interesting change of topic so this is a good one we're very grateful thank you my name is Sherry Maya and I am was the chair of viic Glory Stafford this year and it is an event that's put on by the two rotary clubs of Stafford County and each year we pick a beneficiary for that Event Stafford County Public Schools due to our connection with Nikki was picked as that beneficiary and we also benefited from having Marine serve as an honorary co-chair so we have a check to present this evening from on behalf of the rotary clubs and it is to support the meal Deb program to to bring that down so we'll start
079with that and then if you wouldn't mind join me I have a little plaque for you as well so through our on-site donations that day and this is not the end of the donation to Stafford County public schools because we actually have a a little bit more signicant ific donation and we are utilizing our district Grant this year between the two clubs so we really will be donating somewhere in the neighborhood of $10,000 but the uh check for this this is for the lunch program is actually $1,065 51 and that was uh all gathered on that day through Roberta's hard work with the raffle thank you and then as I said we were so blessed to have your chair be our honorary co-chair this year uh we got her a nice yellow vest that she
080got to wear around the event and uh she joined us and the idea is that um in my other in my day job I work for Germanic Community College and the idea is that we're going to try to integrate all of education and the community and community service kind of all together in in this signature event and I will also plug that next year's event is scheduled for the last weekend of September and we do hope to partner with Stafford County Public Schools again so I have a beautiful plaque for you thank you very much we are moving forward with our student Representatives comments uh we are very very glad to welcome our two new student Representatives we're actually going to start with our student rep alternate today Lillian if you'd like to come and
081share your first comments with us good evening school board members Dr Smith and Stafford Community my name is Lillian e and I am honored to serve as your new alternate student representative I am a junior at brookpoint high school my journey has been unique my freshman year was in Missouri and my sophomore year is in Idaho my experiences in other regions along with frequent moves have taught me how to adapt to new environments connect with a diverse range of people and help bring a fresh perspective to my role as alternate representative first I will serve as a bridge between students and the school board ensuring that every voice is valued and heard and second I will collaborate with Gabby the superintendent and school leaders to implement ideas and policies that enhance our school experiments I
082will Implement academic support along with peer tutoring and finally I will work with Gabby to find the best way to involve more Civic engagement within our community our main priorities is helping students not just pass but Thrive academically across our schools students are facing challenges in key areas like writing and history with only 51% of students passing their writing SOS and 64% passing history while Math and Science scores are slightly better at 68 there is still significant room for growth to address these issues we must advocate for more accessible and effective tutoring programs that extend beyond just Math and Science to include subjects like writing and history by targeting these areas we can ensure every student has the support they need to succeed academically and feel confident confident in their education another key priority for
083our schools is fostering Civic involvement among students encouraging students to engage with their communities not only helps them develop leadership skills but also strengthens their sense of responsibility and belonging whether through volunteering participating in community Improvement projects or working with local organizations Civic involvement helps students make meaningful contributions while learning the value of service schools can play an essential role by creating opportunities for students students to engage civically both in and outside the classroom this kind of involvement is an investment in both their personal growth and the well-being of our community one of my other top priorities in this role is ensuring clear and timely communication with everyone I'm committed to staying on top of emails and meeting updates and I will coordinate closely with Gabby to address all matters effectively together we'll work to
084ensure that everyone's voice is heard and no concerns are overlooked I am particularly passionate about increasing student involvement in schools policy and activities a significant goal that I would hope to achieve to Foster this engagement I will prioritize connecting with students and Gathering their insights my participation on the softball team in model un and in the choir enables me to interact with many students and hear their thoughts about our community additionally I will I will use opportunities like sports events fundraisers and student Le activities such as prom to network with other students and help understand what we believe matters most these insights will help Gabby and I advocate effectively on our behalf of our fellow students thank you for placing your trust in me I look forward to working with all of you to make
085a positive impact on our school Community thank you very much Lillian Gabby as our student rep hello everyone and good evening members of the board Mr Smith and K I am honored to my name is Gabby Irish and I am honored to have been chosen as the student representative to the school board and stand here before you tonight this role offers an incredible opportunity to amplify the voices of my peers and work collaboratively to enhance the educational experience across our district building on the focuses that Lilian has mentioned we aim to ensure every student has the support they need to succeed academically and feel confident in their education one of our key goals is to create opportunities where students can support each other academically by encouraging peer-to-peer tutoring through between high school students and lower
086grade levels not only will this initiative provide additional academic support but it will also Foster leadership teamwork and collaboration across grade levels helping students Thrive another priority of ours is increasing Civic engagement among students in Stafford County we aim to encourage students to attend and participate in Schoolboard meetings providing them with a platform to voice their opinions and contribute to important decisions additionally we want to create avenues for students to share their perspectives directly with us through in-person communication fostering a sense of connection and collaboration by empowering students to engage actively in these ways we can help students in our schools develop as informed citizens and strengthen the relationship between our schools and broader Community Lily and I are committed to representing the voices of all students and working to ensure that their needs are
087reflected in our decisions together I believe we can create an Comm environment where every student feels connected with the decisions that affect their everyday lives finally I would like to thank the previous student Representatives Jenny and Jolan for setting up so many great resources and methods of communication for us to utilize going into our terms thank you for this opportunity and I look forward to a great year thank you Gabby we will move forward with citizen comments three minutes are allotted to each speaker or group speakers shall identify themselves by name and organizational affiliation speaker shall also announce the purpose or topic of their comments citizen comment which is profane abusive or threatens imminent physical harm shall be ruled out of order Miss Hall Madam chair we have two citizens signed up the first is
088bonica gierz and the second is Shemar Connors okay oh there he is hey guys I'm Shamar Connor I've been here before Harwood Hartwood district and you may recall I gave a speech previously about the signup process for Stafford and how there was no notice or option given to parents to state of their rights will be respected if they chose not to vaccinate their children I've never heard a response about this from anyone nor has anyone changed anything to my knowledge you still state that it's mandatory that you get vaccinated 10 school when I showed the law that says that's false it's not mandatory parent can submit a notorized form to be exempt from the vaccine and I have it if you need it hit me up I'll get it to you now why am I
089bringing this back up well a parent reached out to me and showed me a form passed out to all the students in the schools and it's this form right here and it says uh 2025 adolescent vaccin consent form once again there's no mention that the parents have a legal ability to claim themselves exempt and the kids exempt from these vaccines furthermore your form makes it look as if the these um the HPV and others are mandatory and they must consent to this to having their children vaxed in the schools at school this is false and needs to be corrected immediately who's putting this stuff out for children and how much are people getting paid to push this stuff I already proved previously and I gave you the data that pediatricians get a $40,000 a bonus
090per per person or more if they have a certain threshold of fully vaccinated patients has anyone even done any research on the vaccines if you look up the HPV Vex it's probably the worst one out of all of them with the worst side effects and then parents do you want your parent your kid to be potentially sterilized because that's one of the side effects of this vacine why not look up the court case where amer's Gish OFA killed a 10-year-old daughter in North Carolina and a 14-year-old daughter in Pennsylvania and there's another 150 similar cases pending even more by now they only report about 1% by the way in the court documents they show that there's no studies ever that have ever proved that gter cell prevents cancer ever it doesn't prevent cancer so what
091are you getting it for anyone trying to persuade children getting this should be held accountable okay I doubt there's anyone actually doing any research on this and they're just repeating the cult chant of trust a science well here's something else that came out having having been called a liar by Anthony fouchy for saying not one of the 72 vaccines mandated for children's Urban safety tested RFK junr sued fouchy after a year stonewalling Fouch lawyers admitted that RFK Jr had been right all along there's no Downstream liability there's no front- end saf safety tesing there's no marketing no advertising Tas because the federal government is ordering 78 million school year kids a year to take the vaccine every year so what better product could you have you can't make any more money you know there's it's
092billions dollars a year and so you get all these new vaccines 72 shots 16 vaccines and they saw an explosion and chronic disease all these different diseases autism went from 1 in 10,000 to 124 and another thing is RFK Jr did a foyer request from the CDC where the CDC did a study un axed Kids versus unvaxxed kids in 1999 you can look it up they deliberately hid this and unvaxxed kids were by far more healthier in every single category and if you want the data I can give it to anyone that wants it so parents please do the research and schools you need to respect the rights of parents and notify them that these things aren't mandatory thanks thank you very much do we know if was it Miss Gutierrez has is Miss Gutierrez
093in the room I don't think so okay so we will close public comment for the evening moving forward with action items item 10.01 appointment of board members to serve on committees boards and commissions Madam chair I'd like to make two different motions because we're talking about two different things the first is um as I understand Dr Chase if I'm incorrect there needed to be a change of Dr Chase as secondary or alter and Miss guy as primary for the diversity equity and inclusion so that would be my first motion is to make that distinction second okay is there any discussion on this I assume can you say that again yes so currently it's written um in our Dr Chase's the primary and Miss guy is the alternate right and apparently it is the reverse okay
094I gotta I just want to make sure miss guy doesn't have too many committee appointments I mean does everyone have two because now I'm at two I wanted to be at one who's at one so you two get the one CGS that's like for three what about you miss H you too you how you only have one committee plus governance all right fine I'll do it I'm just saying just saying gosh darn it all right I'll vote Yes all right all right please cast your votes motion passes 7 to zero okay Madam chair um we need a an exception vote to move um Miss guy to fabc from governance and then you to governance but the exception is for Miss guy so motion to approve that exception second thank you it's because I'm accep it's
095because for discussion um the bylaws state that after spending two years on a commission you should be off for a year um Miss guy has only been off for a semester so about six months um but due to scheduling of these committees um and I like to count and she likes to count um we would like to ask for an accept to switch back if there's no other discussion we can cast our votes that motion also carries 7 to zero item 10.02 wait wait I would like to make a motion that we approve all other committee appointments as presented good catch thank Chase second any discussion on anything else okay please cast your votes also passes 7 to zero uh now moving forward with the adoption of a high school redistricting plan would anyone like
096to start with a motion oh Madam chair I should I make a motion for for a specific plan I'm I I make the motion that we accept proposal F1 as the redistricting plan for high school six second okay discussion please um Madam chair I I want to bring up uh two two sort of questions before we adopt this plan that maybe this is the right place um I noted in the digital comments somebody had brought about the issue of students with disabilities being able to stay at their school um rather than having to transfer I know we made that exception for um Elementary School when we did the elementary school redistricting for children but I don't know I don't know where staff is with that uh is that something we could uh maybe I don't
097know if we need to address that today but if we need to address that before um at some point and is that indifference to the back to base that we currently have in place I don't know I don't know so question yeah yeah relates do we have a policy in place to address this if on an individual basis when parents bring it as a concern bring it and as a concern do we have a policy I'm happy to ask Miss Bush to speak to this in just a moment I I will share um I I don't know that we've had conversations around that internally uh wasn't prepared really tonight to speak no you're okay I understand um but I don't know if Miss Bush might want to approach the podium and just offer any insights
098there I know we need to we might need to look into policy further around that I'm not sure policy-wise that we have anything in place back to base was different that was not due to redistricting that was due to decisions that we were making to move students back to their base and we went through an IEP process for that so what we are doing for all of our students with redistricting for general education students we would follow suit with our special education students as well so that is different than the back tobas process that we went through so I if if there is a student who uh you know because of their disability has really worked on relationships at a particular school um is there a mechanism for that family to request to stay at
099the school right I mean some children have a lot more difficulty making these kinds of changes as a result of their disability we could potentially review um through an IEP process the only programs we have in place right now are multiple disability students um so we would just need to look at those schools for redistricting to ensure um if it was multiple well it's a program so they would still continue at the program they would not be um impacted by the redistricting them so could we could we know how many could we get some information about I mean we can look at that we don't have that that specific information we just have a percentage of students with disabilities that would be part of the redistricting but we can do a deeper dive and look
100at that can I clarify something for families now um as a parent of a of a student with an IP in 504 when she had to change schools from say middle school or Elementary to middle school there was essentially an IEP transfer meeting because she was transferring schools in general um for families that might have a student who has an IEP and or a 504 who do and uh are moving schools do to a redistricting is this is a similar process for those students on the receiving end yes that is something that when we went through back to base that we did and we can certainly look at that with the redistricting we're actually in the process of starting that now with our designes where we talk about students um who are transitioning from one
101school up to the next school so that can be part of the discussion so I just want to make sure I understand what you're saying in particular for the parents with IEPs so if they're a parent who's worried about being redistricted once once we make the vote and they understand that their child is going to move the process for them would be through the IEP to appeal this is that what we're is that what we're saying because that's the bottom line that I want to get at if I'm a parent and I'm sitting at home and I'm going to watch us change where my my child is going to school and my child is one of the students that you said What specifically do I do I I want the steps that that parent is
102supposed to take tomorrow or next week once they made their decision um what tell us what they should do they can they can contact the school and call an IEP meeting okay and they'll do it through the IEP and the I team can hear the concerns make consider what the concerns are make and then make a determination from there okay thank you Dr Bush just just please CL correct me if I'm wrong I do think that once you make a decision on redistricting those students will be scheduled to go to their the school in that zone I think the IEP team will can and will consider least restrictive environment in terms of what's best for that student given the scenario they're also going to look at where the student is zoned to go to do
103to go and just because the student has a disability in a document doesn't mean that they're going to have a separate appeal mechanism okay um for that um the IEP team can consider um you know where where they need to be based on leas restrictive environment is my understanding that right if a parent has a concern about that then the IP team would convene and discuss what the concern is make the consideration and the determination from there but we would not automatically do that for every student that has an IP that's redistricting and and then I wanted to clarify one other thing um which is just that um anybody who is a rising senior in 2026 when the school opens uh will stay at the school that they've been at they will not get redistricted
104to a different school is that correct is that all of our understanding I believe that's our understanding it is that's my understanding I I do want to ask um Mr Fulmer so that he can make sure that we're we have the right motion and how we've done that in the past we can make sure that we get it right whether it needs to be a part of the motion and we're all on the same page about what we're doing with that yeah thank you for bringing that up I would advise that you vote on um uh the scenario and then a second motion following that um allowing the rising seniors to grandfather in at their existing school or you can make it as part of we're not going to have a senior class at the
105new high school correct no so they would stay at their existing school that they're all seniors so all seniors would all seniors yes okay that's what I thought yeah so I don't know if I misspoke sorry is that so no Rising seniors will be redistricted is that correct need to actually make a formal vote that that is the case because that's not an assumption that's made cor I mean we've made that assumption correct per but what you're saying is that we need a formal vote right now so that we put that on the record is what I'm hearing yes ma'am and I do want to clarify so you could have I'm just going to give two schools as an example we could have a student um from brookpoint going to Colonial Forge that's a senior
106we can allow them that option of going to Colonial Forge um if they want to or they can grandfather and stay at Brook point and that's why I say we allow them that opportunity obviously um if they're redistricted to high school six we won't have a senior class there so they will have to stay at their existing school but we're kind of we would give the seniors the option of staying or moving if they're going to one of our existing schools and will we provide transportation um yes so that's also a great question so um typically seniors drive themselves but we would work with um some of our other mechanisms since we're already shuttling some of our students now for our travel programs um we would pick up our students so um part of that
107opt-in process that uh we talked about already we would make sure we contact all of those families if they are um electing to stay at their existing school so just trying to make this clear for parents at home listening so if my child wants to stay at brookpoint instead of going to forge um and they're a senior and they're probably going or they're going to use hubs potentially for these kids I'm just wondering if their bus ride is going to be longer than a typical bus ride yes um I just want them to know that when they're making that decision like you may have you know an extra 15 minutes on the bus in order to stay at your high school correct to stay at your old high school because they don't want to go
108to the new one yes because you're yeah I just see so I'm going to kind of walk through this because I can see some confused faces so um so so it may impact your transportation but you will be allowed to choose to stay at your high school if you are a rising senior and you may have Longs Miss Hy I hope you're paying attention to our Maze musts and shs and keep us in line no I I just have a question about the um the motion is there a reason for this um considering that it was number three on the trans ation um your recommendations transportation is definitely one consideration but um this does balance this in my humble opinion um I think this maximizes the use of Mountain View which would have been at
109like 87% with several other plans for years to come um I think it it takes our oldest smallest school and puts the lowest student population at it but that's also a school that has no Fine Arts Center as our other high schools have and it it it's there is one group of students that will impact Transportation but those students are already assigned to Shirley Heim so they will still be attending school with their peer group at book point so I I I just think that it's the most um effective plan to try to balance all the Divergent needs that we're trying to to meet with our redistricting it's the way I see these there's not that much difference between e and um this F is it F1 or F2 which one did you f F1
110if you if you look at them together I mean North is the same you know it's Brook brooken um Forge may flipflop you know with the 100 the 105 and E was a higher U recommendation from the transportation we do we are fortunate to have Greg Mackey here with us uh that was a part of putting together those those recommendations around the transportation so I do want to make sure you have all the information making the decision today um so Mr Macky is here and can answer questions about those specific Transportation recommendations or thoughts if you'd like so I just want to make sure that's well I'm just trying to um understand the rationale for the for one when when they look fairly so so but I think that it's it's balancing the needs that
111we have not just from the geography itself but the building so the big difference here is that North Stafford is 93% from 97 and that's a huge deal in terms of what that building can handle and what's going on there the other part of that is that there was also consideration for brookpoint high school and some of these like these higher numbers 105 for Brook Point High School is really high so is I mean they're all a little bit high at the 2032 mark But at the end of the day filling Mountain View and the compressing North Stafford had sort of and to Dr Warner's point in my opinion they had they were weighted very equally in terms of what needed to be done but most of these scenarios have mountain mountain view is an
112impossible school to fill because the growth is not there anymore and so Colonial 4 is much easier to move students around should we need to in 2032 if High School 7 doesn't come um it's much easier as a central location I don't have that same grasp or grab for Mountain View High School because of its geography I don't have that for brookpoint specifically I want to keep that low because there'll be a third school on that premise on those premises now and so so consideration for those particular things has to be made we've talked a lot about the North Stafford building and its capacity functionality being not relative to the other schools right so like a full North Stafford is not the same as a full Colonial Forge at all just because of the building
113makeup and the things that have to go on there so if you if you pick yourself up off the scenarios and look at all of the differential variables that were presented to us and the things we need to consider for me that's where this makes the turn to the most sense I would also like to point out these schools one of the challenges we have when we build schools is they aren't necessarily where we need them to be they're where we can get a piece of land to put them if you measure the distance between Mountain View and North Stafford and um Colonial Forge there's less than five miles between any of those schools those attendance zones are always parents people are always going to crisscross and there's just no other way you can do
114it and they're five miles apart but Colonial Forge being kind of located to the center of Stafford it gives us more flexibility when we do have to redistrict or do any spot redistricting and I would rather maximize our redistricting now at the beginning then continually go in and tweak things because I think that's way more disruptive for families Miss Sigman M Randall I would like to as we're part of our discussion here I would like to thank Lionel white for putting together some really amazing scenarios and then when we shifted after public comments and started meeting with him to discuss how did how to do these shifts and then make sure that we're being fair and looking at the free and reduced and then we added on um Esau and or L and then we
115added on um special education you know as factors to consider and every time he came forward with these numbers for us and I understand there might have been some changes that we had to look at and see and you know Corrections and you know let's give Grace because we're a lot and we ask for a lot and these are a lot and and um to try to make it the best we can for the students that we are asking and in reality by the time we open this we're also going to be moving 2,000 more than 2,000 students into specialty centers around the county so even where we're putting them isn't necessarily going to be where they go but like I said I would loudly like to thank um Lionel for just it's a lot
116of work a lot of work to talk to us and he enjoys his job and I'm so glad he does because you can't ever ever talk to him where he is not just beaming with a smile and in often saying I love my job what else what else and he's just got the coolest tools um but I do want to really really thank you for I like I said we're a lot and you dealing with the public and their emails their concerns you know and it's a layer upon layer effect to get through these but I just want to say what an exceptional job and so very much appreciated is there anyone else who'd like to weigh in um I would actually like to take a minute to hear from Mr Maki about uh E
117versus F1 in terms of Transportation good evening Dr Smith and board um so the biggest uh challenge is and believe me I've gone through a learning curve over the last two months right um so uh big caveat there uh biggest thing that uh was uh Weighing on the group of us that worked on this proposal was what would impact trans uh transportation and delays across the county and really that's what really impacted a lot of it so uh when you're looking at traveling across 95 um in uh scenario F1 for example you're taking a whole cluster of Safford burough sunale Meadows uh Foxwood Woodstream you're taking them all across 95 through that Fair section on Route One um over to Brook um Point um which is a definite pinch point when we have accidents which
118you know occasionally happen on 95 um so it was definitely one of the major factors that we looked at as a hey it could cause an issue um like the same factor um if I looked at F1 um that same Wayside area um it's taking multiple different neighborhoods CR Point tamber landstone Ridge Green Ridge Quail Run Cobblestone it's taking all of them again south on rout one again over 95 um and so if you happen to hit uh an accident that would take place on 95 at any time of the day the bottleneck on how that could really cause massive delays across the county that was a perspective that we were looking at um and that's why this proposal of F1 fell from further down the list trying to keep people as far away from
119that cross um as possible so first of all I really love your tie very cool um and I do I do appreciate that but currently if you will the folks that are in those particular things from Brook Point are still having to come out Route One travel North go around to come South to get to Brook point is that correct um for some of the uh age groups yes currently for the high school there's only one way to go no So currently for the high schools they're not um they're much more separ currently like for example that whole section of the Foxwood Woodstream they're heading to North Stafford um the uh other group that is currently in that W area they're heading over to Brook point so they both of those groups are currently during
120the high school runs are not heading over 95 um so it's that crossover um which is the biggest difference right so I hear that but I'm saying like still they still have to come out in that split there come out go north because those are one-way roads so you have to come out of those areas out of those developments come up north uh one North make the turnaround I see what you're saying for especially the Wayfair side um the the difference is though you also have U multiple neighborhoods that are on Route one that you have brookpoint buses heading north on so now you're having a brook Point heading north to get their own students you're having kids coming down down south um and heading back and forth from different um to the elementaries and
121so forth as you're going back and forth and you're also having the Colonial Forge side where they're heading out you just have multiple different directions and more buses that we're putting onto that area which if there is a a Slowdown it will add to delays again that was our biggest thing was trying to cut back on some delays can I ask a qualifying a I guess a question to clarify some information and this might be a Mr White question um I'm struggling looking at the maps between e and F1 to figure out basically what the headcount reduction would be in students traveling from um the aqua District over to uh Colonial Forge because they look I mean so I'm like for me the difference between andf and because I am looking mostly at the Garrisonville
122District that's where the differ is the impact on North Stafford and the center part of the county that's where I see the changes to be so I don't necessarily see the the transportation impact for East of 95 coming West that's correct like you said sort of the center of the county well uh North Stafford that segment uh at the southern part of the North Stafford Bounty going to Colonial Forge also the um the community on uh the Western most part of the Colonial Forge boundary is assigned to Mountain View in F whereas in E they that Community remains at Colonial Forge so those are the two uh two big changes um Madam chair can we call the question I'm not finished well I guess if you have to call it but I didn't think we
123were finished the discussion go ahead sorry no I mean if you I'll have comments at the end but if you're not quite finished then go right no I just wasn't ready to call the question I mean technically when you say call the question you got to call it so maybe there you go I don't think we have a choice well I I can't support e because it puts too many students at brookpoint um not to beat a dead horse but I I like to beat Dead Horses I was not happy with the location of Elementary 19 I do not think we served the acquired District fairly At All by putting the school there but I will go along with it and make the best decisions for our community that being said I'm going to be
124very loud about protecting um the Aquia families from you know having all like having to go to Brook point and having three schools on that campus um there are people who live behind Brook point I I just I I know we're doing our best I know we're going to plan appropriately I know we are building out parking lots I trust all of those things but I'm going to vote for the lesson a number that's going to put bodies at Brook point less cars in their parking lots and less um intrusion for the families that live live close to there so that's why I can't support e no I my understanding is once the questions called there is no further discuss can iend my can iian sure okay I'll resing that Miss hey may get a
125chance to speak no I'm I'm I I thought we were still having the discussion I didn't Mr Mackey was talking you know Miss Sigman was asking questions Miss guy had some I I just didn't feel that we were ready but once it's called then you're the special 25th year person go ahead no if everyone's finished I just was going to um um you know and when asked the question why F1 over e it is essentially the things that Dr Warner and Miss HED said uh for me I felt really really strongly about keeping um the pressure off of North we've seen what happened with Drew and with Hartwood um we don't want something like that at the high school level I think we can learn from from our experiences there to kind of prolong the
126life at North Stafford I also would like to try to keep Rook Point lower than it it is in Prior and I do feel like Dr Warner that if we're going to have to put pressure on a school because we are a growing Community um that it is the one in the center of our essentially of all of our high schools um because it does allow us to pull in four different directions based on where space is based on development um but the most important thing here is to build the relationship and to keep the conversation going knowing what these numbers look like in 2032 that's only six years after these High School 6 opens so we almost immediately need to begin conversations about high school 7 knowing these numbers and knowing uh where these
127pressure points are going to be and therefore moving forward with high school 7 um in response to this um so that is where I am on between those two is there any further discussion does anyone else have anything sorry I I just want to say I'm not going to be supporting this I don't think there's much difference between the two um you know 93 versus 97% at North is not the same as 100 105 um and and I would respectfully say that if we are measuring the capacity in our schools then that capacity should reflect the the actual physical uh footprint there that if we are going to say a school is 95% capacity it should should be the same no matter what school they're in perhaps our capacity should be measured differently in an
128older school but a percent is a percent it shouldn't be a different percent um weight just because the school you know is is older um I I pre much prefer um not moving students that don't have to be moved um you know in one of these Brook is at 101 another one it's 105 you know versus Forge at 100 versus 106 I'm not saying one should be 100 versus 106 one is going to be no matter what and you know we specifically asked transportation to weigh in I could not um support transportations number one because it does put North at 114% which is unacceptable under any circumstances so I am I'm not going to support um F1 I would prefer e but I hear the the um the echo in the room and it does
129not sound that e has any support other than here so thank you anyone else okay please cast your votes the motion is for scenario F1 the motion carries six to one with Miss hey dissenting Madame chair I'd like to make a motion that we Grant any the seniors the option of how do we want to say opting of staying at staying at their uh current high school if they choose second any discussion on this I have question yes do we know what the impact of that would be on these potential um percentages I mean hypothetically you know how many seniors you know it would um make a difference or do we not care we're happy and that's a hypothetical question is that okay I think that for me this is the lowest population our high
130schools will be is the year after we do this um redistricting so I think we can it's probably the only year we can be sure that we will have space unlike prior redistricting where we are redistricting to kind of balance space um I don't know maybe Mr Fulmer might know but do you have any sort of idea of how many like is it a 90% of our seniors take us up on this offer or is it it is I I I don't know um I think it's a mix me we even saw that when we did the little bit of a redistricting emry Mill um this past year and and trying to relieve some of the pressure at North Stafford not everybody took us up on that offer um including from honestly 9th to 12th
131grade uh and we open it up to everybody uh that opportunity I will say you um what I was going to point out is this is a onee thing so um technically all the scenarios will kind of by year two the numbers that you see in the charts will actually be pretty close to accurate because the seniors will be gone so um it is just a one-year um fix but it is our year where we have the most capacity available in the schools so I um think it's something we've done with every whether it's a fifth grader or an eighth grader at our elementary and middle school respectively it's something we've typically allowed at all of our redistricting so I have another question um what about siblings of these Rising seniors that I don't believe
132they're ined in thetion stay but they wouldn't yeah I think that's opening opening it up a little bit farther okay with a no further discussion we can cast our votes that motion carries 7 to zero Dr Smith if you would uh provide your report and comments for us this evening absolutely so uh thank you for the opportunity this evening I've got several good news to share from around the division and I'd also like to take a few moments at the end to talk about uh my first six months here in Stafford and and my plans in terms of an entry plan make sure we got our slides up okay there we go okay I'd like to take a moment first to acknowledge the passing of Mr R Lyle Ray Smith half of the Dixon Smith
133Middle School namesake Mr Smith was the first principal of Grafton Village Elementary School which opened in 1967 he served in this capacity for more than 20 years after beginning his career as an educator in Caroline County he was a teacher administrator and Coach who demonstrated unwavering support for the students and Community he served Mr Smith was also a member of Germanic community college's board and Stafford County Board of Supervisors after his retirement from the school division his unwavering dedication to Stafford County's children impacted thousands of lives our thoughts and sympathies are with his family I'd also like to take a moment to express my deep appreciation for the hard work and dedication of our staff over the winter break while schools were closed for two weeks our facilities team led by John Kramer acted swiftly
134to address a safety concern when we discovered that the canopy structures at our Rising Star campus were unsafe and needed immediate removal not only did they tackle this challenge but they also managed to ensure that the necessary asbest remediation was handled properly without risk to anyone I'm grateful for their quick action their professionalism and dedication to maintaining a safe learning environment we're now working on replacing the canopies and we have worked to secure an inclement weather plan in place for arrival and dismissal I'd also like to acknowledge the maintenance team for their efforts during the week long snow and ice removal process it was a difficult one and their dedication to ensuring that our parking lots and sidewalks were safe and accessible during the recent winter weather exceeded our expectations they work tirelessly in challenging
135conditions to clear the way for our students staff and families to return to learning their hard work and commitment to safety are deeply appreciated and I'm grateful for their efforts to an ensuring that our students have a safe return despite the winter challenges I'm EXC excited to announce that Stafford High School senior Drew Eagleton design has been selected for the construction of the bringing occupational opportunities to schools also known as boots house 29 another outstanding design by Stafford High School senior Kayla hamburger will be added to the boots Bank of Reserve plans for potential future use reflecting the exceptional Talent of our students construction on boots house 29 will soon begin on Braxton Lane in the Ferry Farm area offering students the chance to see their hard work realize programs such as boots exemplify the
136value of real world learning helping students to gain the critical Workforce skills while making meaningful contributions to our community Community Partnerships play a vital role in enriching student learning and we're grateful for the strong relationship that we have with the Sheriff's Office the Stafford County Sheriff's office has generously donated a decommission police cruiser to the Mountain View High School's criminal justice program providing with Hands-On real W experiences like traffic stops transports and crime scene preservation the vehicle will feature branding from Mountain views leadership education and public service or leaps Center to distinguish it from active law enforcement Vehicles while highlighting the valuable collaboration this follows the Life Care Ambulance donation to The Champ Center last ail April which also supports student preparedness these Partnerships reflect the incredible support of our community and their dedication to
137Student Success Partnerships are also equally important and I'd like to highlight the dragons helping dragons program started by seniors Adrien farer of brookpoint high school and Nolan Parker of Colonial Forge High School after feeling a strong sense of community at Anthony Burns Elementary School Adrian wanted to give back so he and Nolan organized a program where high school students volunteer a tutor younger students in math and in Reading twice a week the program has grown to include about 30 students and recently this group raised over ,000 doar to provide gifts for 22 students through the angel tree program the program has been a huge success with high school students not only helping with academics but also acting as positive role models for the younger students Adrian and Nolan are working hard to ensure that help
138dragons helping dragons continues to thrive even after they graduate this is just a wonderful example of our students supporting students and building a lasting sense of community next I'd like to recognize two two generous contributions that will enhance our learning environment for our students first the Stafford Education Foundation awarded a 20 20500 Mary Washington Healthcare micr Grant to support stat biomedical students this funding will provide white coat mentorships in a Capstone night a visit to the national museum of military medicine and project we me the way medallions for graduation enhancing both student learning and recognition additionally we'd like to thank Kevin and Michael for from the Community Financial Group who Don donated $5,000 to support the Shirley Heim Middle School band and Orchestra program their generosity will provide these much needed resources and opportunities for
139our student musicians over the last few weeks I've had the privilege of visiting our schools and presenting the finalists of our of the- year categories where certificates and tokens of appr appreciation it's been incredibly rewarding to see the joy and emotion in our Educators and though uh I won't say who I'll never forget one of the one of our finalists being moved to tears during one of our visits it's movements like these that are such a powerful reminder of the dedication and passion our staff has for Student Success a true reflection of the amazing educator quality we have here in Stafford we're excited to continue to celebrate these incredible individuals and look forward to announcing and honoring our award winners this may I'd also like to take an opportunity at this time to to recognize
140the impact effort and commit of our dedicated School principles that is principal Appreciation Week all of our principles lead with dedication guiding our schools through both challenges and successes fostering a positive and support environment for everyone their commitment to Excellence from ensuring a high standard of Education to providing support for their team is truly remarkable and I hope you'll join me in in showing appreciation for their hard work and Leadership this week feel free to drop them an email send them a note or just let them know how much you appreciate their work as a former principal I know they will appreciate your messages and now I'd like to take a few moments to sh share not only with you but with our students parents staff and community members about my entry plan which will
141guide my work during the first six months in Stafford today today is the beginning as I shared of uh week four and I've been enjoying it so much that it seems like I've been here for so much longer this entry plan entry plan consists of three three distinct phases it's a pre-entry entry and post entry during the pre-entry phase my goal was to learn about the culture and values of Stafford schools this phase took place between my appointment and my start in Stafford schools and consisted of a thorough review of guiding documents and meetings with key District leaders during the entry phase which will be taking place over the next few months I'll hold stakeholder listening sessions throughout the district to hear from our students staff parents and community members it's also during this phase
142that I'll generate themes about what I'm hearing and learning in order to create concrete action steps that will ensure we continue to move our work forward the Final Phase postentry will focus on implementation during this phase I'll present my findings to the community and the board and provide recommendations for ongoing actions that will support our students staff and Community this initial presentation is scheduled for a April of this year the six-month plan outlines five key goals that will guide my work in the coming months the these goals reflect my commitment to enhancing student achievement fostering inclusive environments strengthening Community Partnerships supporting our dedicated staff and ensuring long-term sustainability the first goal focuses on building strong and transparent relationships with the school board staff students and parents to ensure I'm meeting this goal I'll focus on
143establishing regular and transparent communication with board members also conduct connections listening sessions with for parents staff and community community members to hear more about what we're doing well where we can improve and what's most important to do well I'll also be meeting with parent groups to ensure that all including underrepresented voices are heard and establish and reinforce the board's legislative advocacy efforts my second goal is around to assess the progress of our strategic plan the the goals the implementation of metrics post-secondary outcomes academic performance climate and culture and staff support while ensuring that each Stafford school's graduate is prepared to be CH successful in their chosen path to do this I'll take a look at our curricula and programs examine our student achievements discipline and attendance data for each of our student reporting groups assess
144student opportunities and Pathways including new plans for new Pathways and I'll also review the instructional resources to ensure teachers and staff have the tools and resources they need goal three will evaluate organizational Effectiveness and efficiency including the degree to which Clarity coherence and competence exists across our School Division notably I'll take a look at our professional learning leadership development career advancement pipelines um I'll also review our budget to ensure that we have Clarity in terms of our prioritization of our critical needs and effective resource allocation finally I'll review our central office staffing and organizational structures and review transportation and bell times for efficiency goal four will ensure that we have effective and impactful structures and systems in place to regularly monitor intervene and support the academic progress and growth for each student as a part
145of this goal I plan to engage with our advisory committees review our academic calendar examine multi-tiered systems of supports and positive behavior interventions and supports as well as review our full School improvement process and finally goal five places a focus on develop strong and meaningful Partnerships with advisory groups parent teacher organizations our Stafford Education Foundation legislators and elected officials local and State Education Association as well as Community leaders my pledge to the community is to schedule and attend meetings with each group and devel strong and meaningful Partnerships that support each Student Success as we continue to work through the entry plan I want to just share I want to hear from you and our community one of my top priorities is is listening and beginning tomorrow I'll host the first of 18 connections shared voice
146shared future conversations this will be a time for us to come together and discuss our strengths challenges and priorities for the future staff only sessions will take place from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. and they'll be followed by Community sessions from 6:00 to 7: p.m. for those unable to attend in person we'll also host two virtual options and you'll find all the dates and locations as well as an unlik feed online feedback form at any time by visiting our website staffordschools.net connections during my first two weeks in Stafford way back in December I had the privilege of visiting every school and building in our district and I'd like to end this uh presentation and comments by sharing some initial thoughts uh really regarding what we saw there um I was very impressed by our students and
147our staff many times being led by students walking me around the building showing me all of great the great things taking place talking about the teachers that they like the most um and just the support they got from each and every one of our staff it was a true Testament to some of the outstanding work we have taking place across Stafford schools and I'm truly honored and privileged to be a part of such a great school system in the coming months I look forward to updating you on my progress along the way with the entry plan and keeping you updated on the work taking place I look forward to partnering with our school board our parents our students and our community on our journey ahead thank you chair that concludes my report thank you very
148much we will start with our board member comments and committee reports Miss Healey in honor of your 25th year we'd like to start with you gosh I wonder how many minutes I've talked over the past 25 years not as many as me just it's a it's a it's something to think about um I just I'm going to spend my time thanking you all for the lovely event tonight um I told Mrs Sigman I found out about it reading the emails and if she had asked I would have said please don't do that but I'm glad you did this is a testament to our transparency citizens we do not that's right everything hi everything's everything's in the emails but anyway thank thank you board members uh when it's thank board members I've served with in the
149past um particularly those that that came by tonight um sort of a blast from the past but it doesn't seem all that you know long ago and um gosh um Dr Chase how many years do you have left about 15 no to catch up with me you're the next senior uh sen senior here also want to thank the staff that um that came out and particularly the the students that was very um very touching the um you the the presence um that I have um and and I I just of course I love all our schools I'm reminded all the time they're all all our schools but my Rock Hill schools are my you know special near and dear to my heart um and they have multiplied and grown during the time I've been on
150the board um really proud of that jrc the the Marines we finally got the Marines and we got them in Mountain View but um I I remember you know how hard we worked as a board to to get the jrc into our schools and I I think um it's just been an amazing asset to our schools the leadership uh skills and that our our students are are are getting out of those programs um looking at our student reps you know that you know I'm so happy to have them on the board now there there have been so many changes you know over the 25 years but the bottom line is we're still here for the kids and that's that's what we have to remember we may not um agree with each other sometimes we may
151not like each other but we just have to remember that we're here for the the the the students and and also to support our staff because we could not provide the high quality of Education that we do without our dedicated staff um you know my friends and that who came out thank you um particular my daughter came this is her second Schoolboard meeting that she's been to in 25 years I reminded Miss Egan of the first some of you Dr Jace will will remember the first one she came to but she's always been you know very supportive my husband had a meeting at an an another County tonight or he would have he would have been here but but most of all I think I owe my my my thanks to the um the residents
152and the voters in Rock Hill who have allowed me to come back for seven terms uh you know on this board and it's um it's it's something that I am grateful for I've always said it's a privilege yes it's a challenge always a challenge um it's not always fun even though it may look like we have lots of fun here um maybe once in a while we do but it's it's it's a lot of work and sometimes it's almost like that Survivor show you know who's who's who's going to survive um I've certainly survived a number of superintendents and hopefully this one will out survive me he's going to he's going to be here a long long time I'm I'm I'm very happy we have we have Dr Smith so thank you to everyone for
153a um a lovely night um and I look forward to three more years of serving on the school board in the Rock Hill district oh I forgot all that amazing food from the Stafford Culinary Arts students and Chef thank you thank you all our culinary arts programs I don't remember them when I came on the board and now we've got them throughout the the county and they they continue to do an amazing job I wish we could have some kind of competition because I knew we would be bringing home the uh the gold ribbons well I mean with the other the other districts Well we I'm sure we win or if if not we we should but thank you thank you to everyone and and I'm I'm I'm sure I missed people as well but
154um this is all inclusive thank you Miss Randall thank you Miss Igman I would first of all I'd like to say happy New Year and I hope everyone enjoyed their extra week of respit um to our staff and students I know when it comes to snow I am so happy um I even went down to the lake and this past weekend and they had snow like snow on the beach snow oh just so Heavenly for me and I know the rest of you are telling me yeah go ahead jump in the lake um and don't let it happen again no let it happen again I love the big dumps but anyways I would also like to say um to miss Healey I remember when I first started coming to speak to the Board of Supervisors
155or Board of school board you were up here and I and it's funny because Miss and I went to a training at vsba and they told us when the public comes up to talk don't nod your head because they think that you're agreeing with them I always think that nodding my head is like first of all I'm into what they're saying so I'm feeling like I'm hearing you yes I'm hearing you but apparently that's not what we're supposed to do but as an example I always thought Miss Healey was irritated that I would speak because she doesn't nod her head she sits perfectly still and I need to follow that example and sit perfectly still but it's even funny when I go back through some of the things that I keep track of things that
156I committees I've worked on and things that I've done and I have Letters From Miss Healey because the chair used to write letters to the speakers if you ask them I want a response they would give you a written response so I have my letters from Miss Healey from when I was um coming and speaking I've served on committees I worked with redistricting so I've had a I had a lot of run-ins and experience with her but then getting to serve with her has also been quite an honor I've learned so much um and you know even leaning on her when I was chair working with her and learning under her as Vice chair um and even sitting next to her and our little corner back here is it's just been such a pleasure so
157I really really appreciate it um but I would also like to thank Miss Sigman and Miss guy for your careful guidance um through 2024 because it was full of plot twists twists and turns but still I think it was a very strong year for our board uh in working together um but if you you do resolutions Solutions goals theme words action agendas and you made it to today here in the new year you have made it past quitters day quitters day was Friday January 10th um so congratulations um but being that the sun is down today on the 14th day of 2025 I want you to be encouraged that you still have 350 more days of a blank slate to write your story with all your ups and downs celebrations or just your resolutions Solutions
158goals theme words or action agendas for 2025 and whatever you choose I hope you just choose what is best for you thank you thank you very much Dr Chase yes I would say Happy New Year to everybody as well um and uh hope that it's going to be um a good one um I also want to extend my condolences to the Smith family um Mr Smith's grandson was in school with my eldest child and often heard um what a wonderful person he was and and how dedicated he was to Stafford County Public Schools um and uh another um comment I just wanted to make was um my uh stepfather had polio um and it was a really really hard go having polio um and uh I know he was very grateful when there was a
159vaccine developed for for polio and I think we are very spoiled these days in that we don't really see the ramifications of not having vaccinations so um I also though very much appreciate that in Virginia parents have have certain rights um and responsibilities that go with those rights um I know that there are things in the school system that I would be told was mandatory and I would do my homework and find out indeed it was not mandatory so Stafford County Public Schools never got my children's social security number um and so I I absolutely understand uh a parents right but I also understand the school systems role and I am very grateful for vaccines and that's my comment thank you um Dr Warner good evening um first of all I would like to send
160my thoughts out to the people of California that have faced these horrific fires as we struggle with our own capacity issues and redistrict our students it's good to remember that there are families in California that have not only lost their homes but their students their children have lost their schools and there so this whole sense of community has been disrupted um the fires are devastating you can often retrieve things from a flood but it's difficult when if the fire and I have friends that live out there and my foster sister was in on CDF the California Department of Forestry which managed some of the fires and those fires are very fast moving and sometimes it's very challenging to get out of the way so I just would like to send my thoughts to those to
161the people of California I would like to welcome back all of our students and faculty from their extended break I'm sure that they enjoyed that extra week and I just would like to remind our families that this not all the roads in Stafford County are the best and we have buses that actually have to do three-point turns in some places so it's not always feasible for us to to just open the the schools just because it's clear where your your neighborhood is um there will be a fabc meeting on January 21st at 1:00 so if any board members or anybody has anything they would like to see on the agenda please let me know and um because we are in the most dreaded of Seasons budget season and I will be attending the capital conference
162and hopefully meeting with some of our state legislators and you know telling them that they they need to to fund schools better we need to pay our teachers better and we need to put the resources where we need them to educate students thank you Miss holstead um yeah I can't believe we're in 2025 this is a little bit insane for me because you know growing up this was post-apocalyptic America like in all the crazy Hollywood movies like almost yeah well that's true um but you know I'm looking forward to a year filled of good things hopefully um I want to go on record is saying I'm sorry I annoyed Miss Healy on her 205th anniversary that was not my my intention no well I'm sorry that I messed up um um that was not my
163intention but I do appreciate your um oh God your dedication really dedication is what it takes but um I'm glad that we went the extra mile and gave you the celebration because I think we all knew that you wouldn't have accepted it and that just was not not going to happen um because this is a difficult place to be a lot of the time um it there's many untenable decisions that are made up here and you have signed on to do it over and over and over again so thank you for that I also only have two comments really tonight the first one is about snow stop ruining snow for me it's the only I only get like one snow storm a year and it gets ruined every time um you know the decisions that
164are made by this school system are not made or taken lightly I don't know about any of you but I live in a very you know I live in a forward front part of this County and our roadways were awful there was 4 inches of ice on my roadway which is an incredible slope like this um and that would have been a possibility and that was till Thursday um afternoon so when they make the call of the decision to close the schools it is not done lightly it is not done to affect anyone's um life it truly is about the safety like there were plenty of roadways around me that weren't very clear and once I got out of my neighborhood which by the way was in a four-wheel drive almost you know horizontal down
165my roadway um I maybe could have successfully navigated to did successfully navigate the places but we don't have that luxury with your children or our buses so I I get that everyone gets frust I particularly get frustrated after multiple days of school closures because I feel The Angst that our parents have on that end but I think it's fair to say that um the decision has to be made for the better for the best benefit of not just our students but our faculty and our staff and anyone that we put on the roadway um and there is a very much debate about um and I've been I've spoke to Dr Smith about this you know we're sort of damned if we do and damned if we don't because the accountability Factor then falls on the
166school system right and what's going to happen if we put one bus on that road that bus slides on black ice something happens that's an additional expense that we can't afford right now number one um I don't think our drivers want to be in that position either to have that responsibility of that bus itself and so sometimes it's just easier I will say it is very important to to stay on top of when the weather happens to remind the Board of Supervisors that we will we need to work together on clearing roadways on understanding and I know we do I'm not saying that we don't at all that's not my my intention but it's really important to understand that there is a relationship between us and them and we have to remember to work together
167so if you have I emailed I emailed my board of supervisor member about my road and said hey what's up like nobody's coming to clear it and he you know got back to me and said hey let's let's let's handle this and he did so if you find that you're having an issue reach out to the Board of Supervisors they're not going to know every roadway that's not plowed or not cleared or not handled immediately or maybe you don't want to wait until that meeting comes I will say uh thank you Mr English he was very responsive very quickly it I mean honestly if anything happened to anybody in my neighborhood no ambulance was getting down that street in a medical emergency to get those to get to a family so so those issues those
168things are always on the table for us to consider and I just I want to just remind everybody that we don't take those decisions lightly we're not trying to get in the way of anybody's you know um sport or after school activity or fun um but we are always going to not put your child in a position of harm if we can um that is the same situation for me when we talk about um anything on our roadways and our new Drive drivers and so I would always ask parents in general just to remember that if you do have a new driver on the roadway um to remember that the people around them are not always patient not always willing to follow the little new driver signs on the back of their cars and so
169work with them to be really patient on the roadways as well and to understand and and get a little bit um more experience because you know I dve these roads and and after 150 years of driving I can say there are times where I don't I don't know how we do it every day um the last thing I want to say just to our student Representatives is is I really do hope this year is successful for you guys in terms of bringing the kids to the the the podium here if if not here although I do hope we can get some some faces and voices here it's really powerful and impactful for this board to not just hear from the student from you guys even though it's still is but it's really impactful for us
170to hear from the actual student body to know that they're empowered to contact us with their issues and their concerns and to speak directly to us and so for that to be an initiative I think is really it's really powerful and it's really important and I I wish you all the luck in the world and I do hope that more frequently we see the kids come into these meetings and and talking to us or emailing us or something so I wish you the best of luck and I just want to thank you for what you're putting forth Miss gu okay thank you um I'm going through it you guys so this is going to be quick because it's very hot in here we're I'm going through something um I turned 50 this year so that's
171probably what's wrong with me uh I'm would like to thank Miss Healey for her dedication in 25 years and I know we don't always see eye to eye and you did tell me that you're going to lose the H coup that I wrote you which I don't even understand like how do you know you're going to lose it before I even gave it to you it might be your of telling me you don't want it but I'm still going to give it to you but I just want to thank you for um your guidance when I got on the board you were incredibly helpful to me um you've answered all of my questions and I I very much appreciate it um and I do want to welcome the new student reps I am excited I
172do love your initiative um as um what's your name again sorry almost what's your name what the hell is Alissa Miss holet Lord Jesus as Miss holstead was saying it is so important to hear from the students and if they don't want to come here and speak they can come out to our um our town halls that we have sometimes for the budget or or whatever um I also say that I want to say I'm excited for 2025 um I'm trying to do it differently this year you know and um I'm excited about the what's going to happen we've got some some things coming up that are going to be exciting and um I also get to see what our new superintend attendent going to bring so I just hope that we can all continue
173to get along and you know it's budget season if you guys believe in a higher power please pray for us like seriously um and that's it thank you I also wanted to uh express my just gratitude for Miss hey when I moved to North Stafford you know there's there's people who explain things in a way that you just understand sometimes you just get a teacher better because of their instructional style and she is that for me she speaks a language I understand and um made being um a parent to public school students easier for me to understand and watching the meetings as a citizen uh and certainly has helped me learn a lot uh in my last three years on the board and I look forward to many many many more I love when she
174scoffs at that um I also am really excited about our new student reps and also about your initiative uh I think you hit the nail on the head with you know citing our achievement our um test scores and uh are looking you know from a student perspective on how to reach students um and to get them the resources they need having a student at the table to help us with that I think is super important thank you to the rotary clubs of Stafford and North Stafford for supporting our initiative and uh helping us to reduce the meal debt we have in this County um as she said and as we continue to say we are always accepting donations to help our students uh and our families in the community who are struggling because we will
175always make sure our students get a lunch um and a breakfast if they need it uh so that they are ready to learn um I wanted to extend congratulations to supervisor Diggs and supervisor Allen uh in their roles of chair and vice chair On The Board of Supervisors I look forward to working with them this year moving forward um I want wanted to highlight some upcoming events in the community not just Dr Smith's Community conversations uh we will be having our budget and CIP Town Halls coming up pretty soon and the CIP advisory committee has a number of scheduled meetings with school PTO um I will put up a list of scheduled meetings so you can see if your PTO is on there uh and if you would like them to come and meet with
176your PTO I'm sure if they haven't already they will reach out to you or you can reach out to them uh I also want to thank our committee volunteers and I did you know not to end on a down a but we talked about you know staying on top of growth in this County um particularly as it pertains to high school 6 and knowing when our schools will reach uh 100% capacity again I'm sure we'll have the similar conversation when we were talking about um capacity a future capacity of our elementary schools um earlier this week the governor uh delivered the state of the Commonwealth uh address to the general assembly which I watched um the recording is available online um the text transcript is also available if you prefer to read it um there
177were two things I took out of that that I think are significant for Stafford County as a whole first of all he has tasked the general assembly to um tackle the funding formula um he wants he doesn't want Band-Aids he wants a solution he wants a first draft by summer that's all great but summer doesn't help us with this budget cycle we will have to work locally to make sure that we can get what we what we need for our students and our community based on the old funding formula or the current funding formula I'm going to call it old because I expect it to go away I'm going to have hope um the other thing they did and I find this interesting is that they were celebrating the growth that has happened in Virginia
178um what was said was three years ago when the governor started and honestly when the three of us here started on this board Virginia was 41st in net growth in population and now just um three years later we are ninth in the nation um in net population movement um that means we are getting more students here from other states than we were three years ago um this explains a lot when we consider three years ago we I think we were the fourth growest fourth fastest growing uh School Division in the in the Commonwealth and now we are number one um so I guess we should be happy about this if you listen to the state of the Commonwealth but um it brings me a lot of stress because you know we are looking at uh
17910year redistricting numbers that are really only six years after the school opens um so that means we need we are already I feel already behind the eightball when it comes to this and I would like to make make sure we have these numbers in our Forefront I know it's January I know it's like the beginning of the beginning but um these are the realities and uh I look forward to having more conversations on these but these are the numbers I wanted out in front of things um as we start uh would you like to relisten to clo oh let me uh talk about our we do have closed session after this but I would like to share that our next board meeting uh we have a special called meeting on January 28th at 7 pm
180and on February 11th we have a work session and our monthly business meeting Miss guy no sorry I move that the board convene a Clos meeting pursuant to Virginia code section 2.2 3711 A1 to discuss the performance of specific Support Services Personnel operations and two pursuant to Virginia code section 2.2 3711 A3 to discuss or consider the acquisition of real property for a public Warehouse oops sorry for a public P purpose warehouse space where a discussion in an open meeting would adversely affect the bargaining position or negotiating strategy of the public body second okay casting oh we're voting do we have to vote no we gave away our clickers okay well they told they told me to give away my clickers all in favor I any opposed we are enclosed okay oh it's finally cool
181in here oh my gosh fre okay pursuant to section 2.2 D 3712 of the code of Virginia I move that the closed meeting held by the school board during its work session on January 14th 2025 be certified by adopting the following resolution now therefore be it resolved that the school board of Stafford County Virginia hereby certifies that to the best of each member's knowledge only public business matters lawfully Exempted from open meeting requirements were discussed in the closed meeting to which this certification resolution applies and only such public business matters as were ident ified in the motion convening the closed meeting were heard discussed or considered by the board second Dr Chase agree Miss guy agree Miss Hallstead agree Miss Healey agree Miss Randall agree Miss Sigman agree and Dr Warner agree Madame chair motion
182passes is there any action coming out of closed yes I move that the school board authorize staff to execute a contract for the acquisition of real property located at tax map number of 38 C-5 with the street address of 42 Blackjack Road Fredericksburg Virginia 22405 on the terms and conditions as discussed during the closed meeting the school board also authorizes the school board chair or vice chair in the absence of the board chair to sign all documents associated with the aforementioned acquisition the contract terms shall include the appropriation of funds by the Board of Supervisors second can can we say shall include a contingency uh the contract term shall include a contingency on the appropriation of funds by the Board of Supervisors second any discussion all in favor I any opposed motion carries 7 to
183zero we are adjourned