001Happy. Hey, buddy. Heat. Heat. Hey, hey, hey. Hey. Good evening. My name is Kathleen Brown, chair of the Virginia Beach School Board, and I call this formal meeting to order on January 27th, 2026 at 6:01 p.m. Madame Clerk, would you please announce the role? Thank you, Madam Chair, present in the schoolboard chamber or chair Brown, Mr. Bowensteel, Mr. Kalen, Mr. Co Pepper, Mr. Cummings, Miss Dwire, Miss Felton, Dr. Green, Miss Melnik, and Miss Rogers. Thank you. And Vice Chair Williams is absent today for medical reasons. Please join me in a moment of silence followed by the pledge of allegiance as you are able. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Our first
002recognition this evening is for the Virginia Society for Technology and Education's Outstanding Coach of 2025. I was going to ask you to please welcome Chad Huff, but I understand Chad Huff is under the weather. So pinch hitting for Chad Huff tonight is his principal Angie Morani or Manari, excuse me. But on behalf, it's all about Chad. Chad Huff is the instructional technology specialist at Corporate Landing. He's been honored as the Virginia Beach City Public Schools Instructional Technology Specialist of the Year and also by the Virginia Society for Technology and Education as the outstanding coach of 2025. Mr. Huff is the model of resultsdriven collaborator, skillfully partnering with teachers to turn data into powerful, effective instruction. As a leader, he improves instruction through coaching, modeling, and lesson design. He excels at creating engaging learning experiences that
003foster critical thinking and problem solving. Beyond his direct work with students, Mr. Huff is an outstanding mentor who empowers his colleagues through hands-on professional learning opportunities and one-on-one coaching. In every aspect of his role, Chad Huff's collaborative spirit, innovative mindset, and strong focus on student growth make him an exceptional leader. He is a reflective coach and a forward-thinking educator who consistently inspires excellence in everyone around him. On your behalf, Mr. Huff, congratulations. We're proud of you. Our next recognition this evening, it's not for citywide. It's not for districtwide. It is for statewide school librarian of the year. No need to be quiet. Please welcome Mary Sutterluti from Kimpsville Middle School. It is an honor to recognize Mary Sutter Luty as both the Virginia Beach Librarian of the Year and the Virginia Association of School Librarian
004State Librarian of the Year. Since becoming the librarian at Kimville Middle School in 2016, Miss Sar Luti has transformed her library into a vibrant, welcoming hub of learning and creativity. She is an exceptional instructional partner creating amazing projects that strengthen media and information literacy across our division. She engages students through programs like Battle of the Books, sensory friendly brain breaks, and clubs that support STEM and sustainability. She's also an innovator, securing grants for projects and helping teachers and students stay current with emerging tools. But what truly sets her apart is her heart. She builds an inclusive environment where every student feels seen, supported, and empowered. A huge congratulations to Miss Sutter Luty. We are very, very proud of you. Our next recognition this evening is for the BBCS BBCPS citywide teacher of the year. Please
005welcome Mary Nazarino. Yes. At the age of six, Mary Nazarina moved with her family from the Philippines to Virginia Beach. She graduated from the Math and Science Academy at Ocean Lakes High School and earned her undergraduate and graduate degrees from the University of Virginia. She began her career in 2019 at Indian Lakes Elementary, where she still teaches today. This past year, Miss Nazarino helped create a science lab, transforming an empty classroom into a functional space for enhanced instruction. Her students become immersed in real world learning on market day when they create a product or service, assume the roles of both producers, and consumers. She has taught a variety of second and third grade students, including inclusion, gifted cluster, and English language learners. From an initial pool of 87 teachers of the year, the division selected
006the division's selection committee visited the classroom of selectees and interviewed finalist to determine the winner. Miss Nazarino embodies the heart of BBCPS. Her dedication to relationships, real world learning, and cultural awareness truly lifts every student she serves. Her work reflects the collaboration, resiliency, and critical thinking we value as a division. Congratulations, Pasino. We're very proud of you. Just before winter break, several fires destroyed our damage or damaged the home of multiple Virginia Beach families. We are here to commend the schools, charitable organizations, and PTAs that made our students could still celebrate the holidays with presents, housing, and essential items. The following BVCPS organization showed remarkable community support. Malibu Elementary, Birdneck Elementary, CEK Elementary, and Attriable Dream Academy, and Achievable Dream Middle and High School at Linhaven, and the Office of Family and Community Engagement, famously
007known as Faith. After hearing about one of the fires before winter break, Malibu Elementary principal and school counselor worked with the PTA to organized an impromptu event that collected donations for the affected families. In addition, students Shane and Jack Lascowitz raised $600 by selling lemonade at their neighborhood. Come on, give them a hand. Though though generous donations from staff and the community about 6,000 was collected for each family. Yes. The division's office of family and community engagement, face, connected families with two community partners, the River Ellis Foundation and we are VB that provided housing assistance and gift cards for food and clothing. Also, in response to the fires, VBCPS and a Trial Dream staff collaborated providing clothes, gift cards, and meals to the family. At Berneck Elementary, staff and community partners quickly multip, food, personal
008hygiene items, transportation, and other support to one of their families. Additionally, community partners included charity trackers, faith and action, Union Baptist, Project Hope, and the Birdneck PTA. Students at all these schools saw that their communities stand together in times of need. Congratulations schools and community partners. We are proud of you. Yes. Give it up. Give it up. Give it up. Yes. Congratulations everyone. Okay, we are now on to the adoption of the agenda. Um, we will return to the workshop, but that's covered under 17. So, we don't need to modify the agenda for that. Are there any other modifications to the agenda as presented? Seeing none, I call for the motion to approve the agenda as presented. Moved by Dr. Green, seconded by Miss Melnik. Any discussion? Seeing none, I call for the vote to
009approve the agenda. So, Madam Chair, we have 10 eyes. The motion to pass for the approval of the agenda as presented. Thank you. Dr. Robertson, do you have any reports or recognitions this evening? Yes, Madame Chair, woman, and members of the board. I do have both. Here are a few items of interest for you and our families. We celebrated Virginia School Principal Appreciation uh week earlier this month with activities showing how much we love our school leaders. And here are some examples. At Woodstock Elementary, students colored an illustration of their principal dressed as the school's woodchuck mascot. S Elementary principal received a small statue of herself that a talented staff member created on a 3D printer. Lancetown Middles SCA created a poster with thank you notes for their principal. Old donation third graders surprised their
010principal with a hands-ed banner full of appreciation. The students and staff wrote thank you notes to First Colonial's principal who was also treated to his favorite donuts from the office staff. The Office of Family and Community Engagement, the Department of School Leadership distributed gift bags that included free food and beverages, movie and symphony tickets, mini golf, and more. And I'd like to thank our community partners for donating these gifts. We're proud to celebrate our principles. They play a critical role in bringing our strategic plan to life by leading strong school communities, ensuring teaching and learning remain focused on student success. Next up, the coat for kids event on January 10th was a big success at the Plaza Annex. The Office of Family and Community Engagement distributed coats and books to 132 children. In addition, 57
011adults received coats, something you'll need tonight. Our school's community engagement liaison shopped for coats to help students at their schools. And I'd like to thank the student and staff language ambassadors and other volunteers who helped with the event as well as wavy TV10 our title one program for donating codes. Finally, we appreciate the division the distribution services staff who help with deliveries. This work reflects our compa 2030 strategic plan by strengthening partnerships and supporting the whole child ensuring every student has what they need to learn, grow, and succeed. Next, Virginia Beach will be hosting a family information webinar about social media with our parent organization, Pound Win at Social. I invite families to join us for a practical presentation on parenting in the digital age, where we will discuss ways to encourage children and teens
012to navigate technology in positive ways. The webinar is at 6 PM tomorrow night, January 28th. Families and staff received an email with a Zoom link earlier this month. And that link is also found on this slide. We'll have another webinar digging even deeper into this topic at 6 pm on m March 25th. And you can expect other webinars on vaping and mental health and resources at a later date. Finally, I have a two-minute video to share about our Renaissance Academy students who recently delivered special treats to third graders at Newcastle Elementary School. Let's take a look. Three, two, one. Open it up. We're doing the monster project again this year. This is the fourth year I've done this project with my students here at Renaissance with Newcastle Elementary, a third grade class. They basically created
013their own monster. They drew it. They talked about where it lives, its fears, what it likes to eat, and they sent their project to Renaissance where we could make them come to life. The kids really like seeing their monsters come to life. Um, they really like seeing how we've mocked them up and we have to go with the fabrics that we have here, which aren't always exactly what what the kids color, but we try to get the same colors that they've been using. And ever since we've come back from winter break, it's been boom. We've just been producing monsters. And the English 11 team actually had our students take the stories that the the kids wrote and craft a story about their monster to really bring them to life to add that extra bit of
014story to their creation. The creation of the story came from the heart. Um it took a lot of connection reminiscing about when I was that age and what brought me joy. It's pretty cool and I really like wanted it to come to life. I didn't know what it was. And then I was like so surprised when I saw it like this. This project started last spring when Miss Lombardi reached out with this idea. Her requests fit in really well with our objectives in the first quarter with third grade where they our students are using a creative process and expressing imaginative and expressive qualities with their drawings. But I've get a lot of support here at the school. We do a lot of really good things here at Renaissance that people don't know about. So, I
015appreciate the opportunity to talk about how wonderful my students are here and what good work they do. Yeah, it's it's definitely wonderful to see our younger and older students working together to build their skills in imaginative ways. So, kudos to the staff at Renaissance and Newcastle for making this collaboration possible. Thank you, Madam Chair. This concludes my report. Okay. Do you have some recognitions? Yes. So, we're pleased tonight to recognize a couple of recent appointees. We'll start with uh Tara Urick. We're pleased that you've accepted our recommendation for Tara to be the next assistant principal at Corporate Landing Middle School. And I see you have some guests. Thank you. This is my father and my two children. And I also have Congratulations. Next up, we have Brian Lon, formerly coordinator of security emergency management, who
016is now the director of transportation in the office of transportation and fleet management services. I see you have some guests. Yes, I do. I have my wife and I have my daughter. I have my JT. Congratulations. And then finally, we have Kristen Schuman, who formerly was assistant principal at Indian Lakes Elementary School, who's now the principal. She's in approval. Okay. Well, there you go. Wrong form. Okay. All right. Yeah. Well, can't do that. That's it. Congratulations. Okay. We are now on to the approval of meeting minutes. Are there any modifications to the January 13, 2026 meeting minutes as presented? Seeing none, the motion is made by Mr. Cummings, seconded by Miss Rogers. Any discussion? Seeing none, I call for the vote to approve the January 13, 2026 meeting minutes. So, Madam Chair, we have 10
017eyes. The motion did pass for the approval of the January 13th meeting minutes. Thank you. The school board will now hear public comments on matters relevant to preK through 12 public education in Virginia Beach and the business of the school board and the school division from citizens and delegations who signed up with the schoolboard clerk prior to noon today. The purpose for the public comment section is for the school board to offer an orderly forum to receive public comments during the schoolboard meeting. I call upon all speakers and all persons in chambers to be civil in discussion and decorum. Whatever views you wish to express, the schoolboard wants to hear from you and to ensure that all viewpoints and perspectives are heard. The best way to do this is for all of us to strive
018for civility and respect. Madame clerk, would you please introduce the first speaker? Thank you, Madam Chair. Our first speaker will be James Fry, then Cody Connor, then Heather Cyp. You're welcome. You know, every time I go to a meeting, there's always some news. I'm talking about the IH definition of anti-semitism. today. I just saw on this uh Jewish news agency that now apparently Saudi Arabia is becoming anti-semitic. I wonder if that's because they won't allow Israel to use its airspace to bomb Iran. The IH, International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, let's sit and remember the Holocaust as we genocide an entire population. How many IHEA members believe the people of Gaza deserve what they got because they're anti-semitic? The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance has a working definition of anti-semitism. It's a working definition because it changes and
019it's subject to the whims and of their objectives. It's really long too and exhaustive. I'm going to go over it, a few of the points of it, and make some comments on it. And I'm doing this because Jason Mar has sent a letter to all superintendents in the Commonwealth of Virginia warning them that you can't criticize Israel or any of that stuff. So, I'm going to do that right here. Uh, here's a The first one is calling for and justifying the killing or harming of Jews in the name of extremism. Well, I have a quote from an Israeli comedian who's touring the US right now. And this is a quote from him. You know what the picture of victory will be? The victory will be when Gaza is on fire. God will look up and
020say, "What is this?" I tried to use his voice, but I find it interesting that according to this Israeli God looks up. Don't know what that's all about. saying Jews control the media and economy and government. Well, Wavy 10 uh has a lot of support for the Zionists perspective and it's been like that for decades. Maybe they're worried about the CBN viewers or a pro-Israel mob, but uh we know I know that the Hannes owner is an ardent supporter of uh Israel and he uh when his kids were at Cape Henry. Uh he used he threatened the teachers not to criticize Israel for the global affairs class. Well, I had a lot more and I guess I missed out, but uh you get the point. Have a nice day. Our next speaker is Cody Connor,
021then Heather Cip, then Betty Spencer. Good evening. You know, I I almost didn't show up tonight. I didn't have the time that I usually do to to write out something eloquent and and moving. Um, there's been a lot of times that I've almost given up. You know how much work this takes to write a speech for y'all every two weeks? How nerve-wracking it is to time and time again come and speak to you. But every time I end up visiting my child's school or something and and a teacher will come down the hallway and pull me aside and thank me for for what I do, ask me not to stop. A parent will run into me at the grocery store and thank me for finding words they couldn't, for standing up when they couldn't. Every
022time I'm reminded that I'd rather come up here and fail over and over again than do nothing than not try. You know, a few meetings ago, I spoke to you about making a statement about what's going on with immigration enforcement in our communities, about providing policy and instruction to teachers and staff about how to protect students. Since then, well, we've had two American citizens murdered, shot down in the street. We've seen preschools teargassed. We've seen children come out of schools to protest what's going on. I'm asking you again. You know, the the best time to have stood up against what's going on in our country, to have taken a stand against tyranny was when people were here warning you over and over again that the politics and the philosophies and the regime that you were
023supporting would lead to tyranny, that the small policies you were doing were just small steps towards what we're seeing now. The best time would have been then. The second best time would be now. Make good decisions, please. Our next speaker is Heather Tip, then Betty Spencer, then Melissa Lukeston. Good evening, Chairwoman Brown, members of the school board, Dr. Robertson. My name is Heather Sun and I'm the president of the Virginia Beach Education Association. I read this quote somewhere online. Your company culture is not words on your website or posters on the wall. It's how your people feel. There we go. The Sunday scaries. That's a phrase many Virginia Beach educators use. Scary. This past Sunday, BBCPS staff felt disregarded. care about staff safety. With the majority of our area being under a freeze warning and
024neighboring divisions being on a delay, the notice sent out to BBCPS staff that they needed to report on time for normal operating hours on a staff day was downright obtuse. With many staff living in neighboring cities and some down in North Carolina, I personally had to navigate my neighborhood on the on-ramp to the interstate, the flyover from 64 to 264 and at the bottom of the off-ramp at Rosemont Road. That was my personal commute. But stay safe. Last Sunday, any staff who had previewed the agenda packet and looked at the slides for the workshop compensation presentation probably felt even more stress and dread as they thought about how little BBCPS seems to value them with the proposed raises. If you could even consider the half% and 1% options a raise, those proposals were downright insulting.
025This is not how you show staff they are valued. This is not how you retain staff and this is definitely not how you recruit staff. I'm looking forward to seeing the revised options that will be presented given the good news Dr. Robertson referred to at the beginning of workshop regarding federal funding and VRS updates. The disparity on the unified scale for steps 0 to 14 only having 1% and steps 15 plus having 1 and a.5% needs to be fixed. BBCPS needs to ensure that we are no longer seventh in the seven cities for starting salaries. Enough lip service. Words on a website and poster don't matter if you don't back it up with action. Show that you value staff. Invest in staff and stay safe. Our next speaker is Betty Spencer. Then Melissa Lucen. Um,
026good evening school board members, falcony staff, students, parents. Um, and congratulations to all those that were recognized tonight. Um, I'm here this evening to, uh, talk about an issue that's central to the success of our schools and the well-being of our community, competitive pay for our falcony and staff. We must do more than talk about recruitment and retention. We must act to ensure Virginia Beach schools can attract and retain highly qualified and diverse teachers, support staff, and administrators who reflect and serve our students well. Despite salary salary increases of over 26.6% over the past four years, Virginia Beach's entry level teacher salaries remain the lowest among the seven local school district divisions. Entry level salaries and surrounding divisions are currently 2% to 8% higher than ours. Even with recent increases, our ranking has fallen from
027the top to the of the region to the bottom tier. Entry- level teachers in Virginia Beach earn around 56,000 annually, while several neighboring divisions offer more. Proposed increases of 2% to 3.5% would still leave Virginia Beach at or near the bottom in regional comparisons. This affects everyone. New teachers entering the profession face rising housing, transportation, student loan, and health care cost. Many leave within the first few years, not because they lack dedication, but because they cannot afford to stay. Veteran educators, the mentors, the leaders, and the culture builders in our school also feel the strain. When experienced teachers and staff feel undervalued or financially stretched, we risk losing the people who stabilize our schools% or even a 3.5% cap is not enough to remain competitive. We need increases greater than 3.5% and a compensation strategy
028that responds to the regional market, especially at the entry level. We also must address rising health care premiums. Pay increases are often offset by higher health health care costs, reducing take-home pay. We must find ways to supplement increasing health care expenses without cutting into salary growth so that raises are meaningful. Teachers and staff need a living wage so that they can live in the community where they work. Avoid taking second jobs. adequately provide for their families. When educators are constantly worried about finances, the community pays the price through turnover, vacancies, burnout, and loss continuity for students. Competitive pay is not just an employee benefit. It is an investment in student outcome. Student stability and community strength. When we invest properly, we create schools where experienced educators stay, new teachers begin their careers with confidence, and
029students benefit from stability and excellence. We believe education if if we believe education is a priority then the people who and that is time. Thank you. Our next speaker is Melissa Lucen. I want to ask you to do something for me with in the next three minutes. Close your eyes or at least picture this clearly. It's 6:30 in the morning in Virginia Beach. A school bus is pulled over, not by local police, but by masked federal agents and tactical gear. Children are inside on their way to school. Now, imagine you're in the drop off line at Kingston Elementary. Suddenly, agents surround a car. They open the door and pull out a mother in front of students, parents, and staff. A 10-year-old fourth grader screams as her mother is taken away. This is not hypothetical. This
030is happening right now in Minnesota. Picture an 8-year-old student getting home from school in Virginia Beach and walking into a silent house. No parents, no note, just gone. Picture a special education student logging into class from their closet because immigration agents are banging on the front door and they're hiding for ventilate. He collapses into a panic attack. His father was arrested that morning. The teacher has to call another adult to watch the class, take him outside, and hold him for 30 minutes until he can breathe again. Now, imagine a code yellow is called, not for an intruder, but because immigration agents have been spotted nearby. Recess is canceled. Doors are locked. No one has to say ICE. The kids already know. Children are falling asleep in class, bursting into tears without warning. This is trauma,
031not misbehavior. And these are real stories that have happened in the last week. A 42-year-old US citizen, an autistic and disabled woman. She was of our special education students in Virginia Beach, especially those who cannot advocate for themselves. teachers are no longer Can I get you to pause and we'll add your time, but I want the microphone to catch everything that you're saying and it seems to be glitching here. Test test test. Okay. Oh, yeah. You're here. Test. I think it's a boost wire. Maybe I turn it off and on again. Test test test. Okay. And Madame Clerk, so it's going to be adding an additional 30 seconds here. I appreciate that. Thank you, Chairra. Um, I'm just going to go back to the 42-year-old US citizen. Uh, an autistic and disabled woman was forcefully
032dragged from her car screaming that she was disabled. If that can happen to her, it can happen to any of our special education students in Virginia Beach, especially those who cannot advocate for themselves. Teachers are no longer just educators. They are arranging food drop offs, emergency rides to hospitals at 2 a.m. because parents are afraid to drive. They're car pooling to avoid being followed. They are a being asked to sign designation of parental authority forms in case parents are detained and someone else needs legal permission to care for their children. When this comes to Virginia Beach, and it will, what is our plan? Because hoping it won't happen isn't a plan. Tonight, I'm asking the board to take three immediate actions. First, direct the superintendent to issue clear guidance to every school on how staff
033should respond if immigration agents appear on or near school grounds. Guidance that prioritizes student safety, privacy, and trauma-informed response, not fear or confusion. Second, affirm publicly and in writing that our schools are safe spaces for children. I believe in my heart that Virginia Beach schools are safe places for children. And that special. Oh, thanks. Okay. All right. Uh, it's okay. Third, ensure every school has access to mental health crisis support for students experiencing immigration related trauma and that teachers are not left alone to manage panic attacks, grief, or fear in classrooms full of other children. This is not about politics. This is about preparedness. You cannot control federal policy, but you can decide whether this school system is ready or reactive. Our children are watching. Thank you. And madam chair, that was our last speaker
034for this evening. Okay. Thank you everyone that came to speak and Miss Lucen, I appreciate your patience with the microphone and technical difficulties. Okay, we are now on to interim financial statements and we welcome No, I think we're going to move on. We don't respond to the public comment section. We welcome Daniel Hopkins. Good evening, Chair Brown, Vice Chair Williams, schoolboard members, Dr. Robertson. Um, in your schoolboard packets this evening are the November and December 2025 interim financial statements. My presentation is going to concentrate on December since it's the most current month. The first graph will show that the overall revenue trend remains acceptable at this point in the fiscal year. We received the governor's proposed amendments to the fiscical year 26 direct aid budget on December 17th. Key recommend key recommendations proposed in this
035budget include state basic aid is going to decrease by $3.2 million. At risk funds will decrease $2.1 million. English learner teacher payments will decrease 500,000 and state income or state sales tax will decrease by 260,000. Now, this is a little over $5 million and this decline is mainly due to student decline, but there is another increase of $5.3 million for an um SOQ bonus. So, the net decrease is going to be 360,000 that is proposed in the governor's budget. Uh the ADM decreased from 62,54 students to 61,799. That's a 705 student decrease. The general assembly can amend this proposal and we'll update you with any changes. Federal revenues are showing an acceptable trend at this point in the fiscal year. We have received federal impact aid payments of $9.8 million year to date. Local revenues
036are acceptable at this point in the fiscal year. We have received 50% of our transfers from the city so far. Other sources of revenue are acceptable at this point in the fiscal year. Um we are down about 225,000 in the same time period last year. This is mainly due to the jewels settlement money and propane rebate we received last year. Although it's important to note we're supposed to receive another jewel settlement this year of just under $200,000 and the stop arm enforcement is up $110,000 year to date from last year. Now the next graph shows that the sales tax receipts are an acceptable level. We are up about $2 million from the same time period last year, but it's important to note that the state has put in their budget early on that they expect
037a $5 million increase. So, we still have $3 million to go. And the last graph shows that our expenditures incumbrance trends remains acceptable at this point in the fiscal year. At this point, I'll take any questions. Miss Milnik. Okay. Mr. Hopkins, can we go back to the beginning of your presentation where you um I think I misunderstood. I heard you talking about was it sales tax revenues or down? Uh the you are you talking about where the governor's proposed budget? I don't know. They're proposing a $260,000 decrease in what the what the state originally budgeted. Okay. At the beginning of the year, but whatever you said you followed it with. Um that's because student membership was down. Yes. Okay. So So that's all that all correlates. But then later in your presentation, you talked about
038ADM Yes. Again. Well, okay. So, ADM, the state basic aid, at risk funds, and English learner, they went down because our student count went down. Okay. Then I mentioned that the student count went down by 705 students. Okay. 700. Oh, okay. All right. I'm square now. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Seeing no further questions at this time, um I welcome you back um for the annual comprehensive finance report. Good evening, Chair Brown, Vice Chair Williams, school board members, Dr. Robertson. Uh we have Cherry Beckard, our external auditors here tonight to present about our annual comprehensive financial report, aka the Afford. Um you should have all got a nice little packet in your thing. So, I'll introduce Laura Harden, our audit partner with Sher Beckard. Uh, good evening. Thank you all for having me here this
039evening to present the results of the audit of the school board of the city of Virginia Beach for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2025. First, I'll go over the results of our audit. So, we did perform our audit for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2025. We issued what is called an unmodified opinion on the financial statements and dated our report on December 12th, 2025. A unmodified unmodified opinion is the best opinion that you can receive as a result of your audit. It is what many people will call a clean audit opinion. In addition to the audit of the financial statements, we are also required to perform audits under both government auditing standards as well as the Commonwealth of Virginia's auditor of public accounts specifications for audits of county, cities, and towns. Um, we
040identify no instances of non-compliance required to be reported under those um standards or specifications. We also do gain an understanding of the internal control environment of the school board when we're performing our audit. that helps us to plan and perform our audit. We do not issue opinion on uh internal controls. However, if we did identify any deficiencies, we'd be required to report those to you. We identified no instances of material weakness in internal control over financial reporting during our audit process. Um just a couple of changes from year-over-year. In note one of the financial statements, you'll note that the school board adopted Gazsby statement number 101 for compensated absences. This was a new standard applicable to all governmental entities for fiscal years June 30, 2025 um and was is required to be applied retroactively which
041resulted in a restatement of beginning that position and which reduced that position by 72.5. policy no inappropriate accounting policies or practices. Just a couple of final required communications. We had no difficulties um in performing our audit, nor did we have any disagreements with management. We're not aware of any consultations that management had with other accountants for any type of second opinion. Are there findings or issues that are required to be reported audit? I'm happy to answer any questions. Thank you, Miss Melnik. So, I offer this to my colleagues. Um, when when I first got on the board, I remember Dan Edwards when when this information was presented. Dan Edwards said, "You really should take this home and read this." And I tried to picture myself reading this like a really good Kristen Hannah book, and
042I just couldn't. Although I flipped through it, but I will tell you in years past I have taken this home and I have really looked at it and it's really worth the look and it reminds you when you hear Cherry Beckard say again this year another clean audit just how important it is for board members to read this and to remind yourself that this is a nearly a$1.2 2 billion budget and this is again another clean audit and that's testament to the people um in this division um that do this fantastic work. So kudos to you all um and um makes my job easy and I will try to read this like a good Chris and Hannah novel. Miss Rogers, I just have a quick question for you. I know that we have ongoing audits
043usually every year. Um, from year to year, do you guys do like um specialized like look at specialized things here and there or do you stick with the main plan that you do year to year? It looks like it's on. The red the red light will tell you it's on, but it might not be. Is it not working? Yeah, it's not now it went off. Okay, went out. If you could push the button again on the right. There we go. Um, so we perform what's called a risk based audit. So, every year we do our risk uh assessment procedures, meeting with the school board employees to determine whether there's any things that might elevate or change our risks and then we perform our test based on those identified risks. In addition to that, we are
044required to incorporate an element of unpredictability into our audit under go under under auditing standards. So we do a we every year will select a new procedure to perform to make the audit unpredictable and then um based on any conversations we have with individuals throughout the audit process. If somebody raises something up to us um as an identified risk, we will address that as part of our audit process. And just out of curiosity, you do a risk assessment based on um your conversations with board members. How many board members do you usually have conversations with? We typically have I'd uh talk with one member of those charged with governance. Okay. So, it would just be someone on the audit committee. You don't have conversations with other board members? Not unless we would be I mean,
045if we were asked to, we'd be happy to have conversations with others on the board. Okay. Thanks so much. Welcome. Okay. Are we allowed to disclose who that conversation was with or Yes, the board member. Um, so I received the call just for full transparency this year. Um, I actually had to ask, is this something that I'm even going to answer? Um, so, um, I did ask legal, is this something that we usually get a call for? And so that was a conversation that was had. Um, and I I want to actually echo Miss Melnik's uh comments about this this document. This is available on our website also. And you know, the public has often had a lot of questions that are available in in this very comprehensive book. In fact, um you know, how
046many teachers we have in our schools in the last 10 fiscal years, um information about student meals, cafeterias, buildings, square footage of buildings, student enrollment. Um so this is really a wealth of information. I actually do go to this very frequently for data points uh during this duty on the school board. So this document really is is great. So, make sure that you're tucking it away and have it available for your reference when you need it. So, I don't see any further discussion. Oh, the only thing I want to say it'll be online. We'll work on it tomorrow. We don't do that until we present. Okay. So, it's not online yet, but it will be online very shortly. Okay. Thank you. I appreciate that. Thank you. We are now to college coursework and readiness assessments
047and we welcome Robert Vagel, research specialist, office of planning, innovation and accountability and I hope I said your name right. All right. Good evening chairwoman Brown, members of the board, Dr. Robertson. I'm Robert Vital, research specialist for the office of research and evaluation. This evening, I will be sharing information about coursework for college credit, including advanced placement and dual enrollment participation and performance. as well as participation and performance on college readiness assessments to include the PSAT and SAT. As a preview of the results compared to the prior year, AP course participation, exam participation, and performance on AP exams increased. Dual enrollment course participation has increased and overall performance on the PSAT and SAT evidence-based reading and writing sections and math sections also increased. We'll begin our review with coursework for college credit. The AP program
048provides high school students opportunities to take rigorous courses. Students interested in enrolling in an AP course are encouraged to do so. Students who might struggle due to the increased demands can meet with their AP teacher and arrange supports for the course. Yeah. M Mr. Dan, can you um I don't know. Is that a little tap or something? Chair, can we maybe switch mics with or switch location presenting? I don't think there's a way to switch microphones. Can that that would be fine with me if that's okay with you for the presentation here. It's the final presentation we have. Oh, we have a workshop presentation too. None of them are working. Okay. Madame Cleric and um Attorney Lanetti, with the board's approval, can we vote on the consent agenda and the personnel appointments and then come
049back to this presentation? as long as the public can hear you. Oh, they're not going to be able to hear us. Okay. Can All right. Um, we're going to do a five minute recess while we reset the microphones. So, we will be back here at 6:58 p.m. Tap this me. Hey, hey, hey. Heat. Heat. Maybe. Hey. Hey. Yep. Okay, we're going to hold for another minute here. Okay, I call this meeting back to order. 7 pm and you can go ahead with your presentation. Mr. Right there, Mr. Vagel. Okay. The AP program provides high school students opportunities to take rigorous courses. Students interested in enrolling in an AP course are encouraged to do so. Students who might struggle due to the increased demands can meet with their AP teacher and arrange supports for the course,
050such as tutoring. If for any reason there is not a Virginia Beach staff member available to provide instruction for an AP course or not enough students to fill a particular course, students may take advantage of AP course offerings through virtual Virginia. During the 2425 school year, students in VBCPS were enrolled in 38 of the College Board's AP courses and there was a total of 13,675 AP course enrollments during the year. Students who take the optional AP exam and earn a qualifying score of three or higher may receive college credit depending on the policies of the institution where the student eventually enrolls. Students can take an AP exam without taking the course, although this is rare. While the exams have a fee associated with them, VBCPS pays for the fee for students who are eligible for
051free and reduced lunch to increase access for students who are underrepresented in advanced coursework. The division has also partnered with two organizations, the National Math and Science Initiative and Equal Opportunity Schools that provide students funding for AP exams and work to increase student representation in advanced coursework. The chart on the top of the slide displays the number of students enrolled and at least one AP course. AP course participation has increased each year since 2122. During 2425, 7,04 high school students were enrolled in an AP course. The chart at the bottom of the slide displays the percent of students enrolled in at least one AP class by grade level in year for the last 5 years. In 2425, 11th graders had the highest percentage of enrolles at 42% followed by 12th grade at 40%. The largest
052increase in participation was for 10th graders. Overall, 35% of Virginia Beach High School students were enrolled in at least one AP course during the 2425 school year. After decreases in overall AP course participation from 2021 to 2122, the percentage of students participating in AP courses has increased for all student groups. When the percentage of students enrolled in an AP courses during 2425 was examined by student group compared to the prior year, participation for all student groups increased between two and three percentage points. This chart displays the percentage of AP course enrolles who took at least one AP exam over the last five years. The percentage of students taking at least one AP exam was lowest in 2021 and was impacted by the pandemic, but has increased 17 percentage points since then to 73% for 2425.
053When examining data regarding AP exam participation, results showed that course enrolles who were less likely to take an AP exam compared to the overall group or students who are black, Hispanic, economically disadvantaged, receiving special education services, or English learners. The chart at the bottom of the slide displays the percentage of AP course enrolles by student group who took at least one AP exam over the last three years. The percentage of students taking at least one AP exam have increased for all student groups since 2223, ranging from increases of three to 9 percentage points. This slide shows the percent of AP exams with a score of three or higher for VBCPS and public schools in Virginia and across the nation over the last five years. VBCPS has had somewhat lower percentages of AP exams with scores
054of three or higher compared to the state, but was higher than the nation the last two years. However, an important note is that VBCPS historically has had somewhat higher percentages of high school students taking AP exams than across Virginia or the nation. It should also be noted that College Board has recalibrated the scores of nine AP exams since 2022. These recalibrations are standard practice by the College Board and reflect the alignment between rigorous scoring of AP exams and current grading practices of equivalent college level coursework. The chart on this slide displays the percentage of students scoring three or higher by student group for the last five years. The percentage of students earning a three or higher in 2425 has increased for each student group between 3 and 10 percentage points compared to the prior year.
055This slide displays the relationship between AP course grades and AP exam scores. Students who earned grades of A or B in their AP course were more likely to score a three or higher on the corresponding AP exam. 85% of students who earned an A in the course and took the exam scored three or higher and 60% of students who earned a B in the course and took the exam scored a three or higher. Grades in the course were also related to whether students attempted the exam with those earning a D or E less likely to take the exam. This section of the presentation provides data for dual enrollment course participation and and course performance. In the dual enrollment program, high school students may take courses that meet requirements for high school graduation while simultaneously earning
056college credit. Grades are awarded according to the policies of the college, and credit earned for the courses taken may be transferred to other public colleges in Virginia and the nation. Students are responsible for verifying granting of college credit for successful completion of any course with the colleges or universities they choose to attend. There are several requirements for dual enrollment course enrollment listed on the slide. Students should be prepared for college level coursework and complete any required college application materials, placement tests, or course prerequisites during the 2425 school year. And currently, classes taken at Tidewater Community College are $25 per credit hour, which VBCPS covers for all students. For classes taught at a VBCPS high school by VBCPS staff, tuition was free. Please note, these fees can change each year. In 2425, VBCPS students were enrolled
057in 69 different dual enrollment courses and there was a total of 6,150 enrollments in these courses. The chart on this slide display dual enrollment course participation data. The number of students enrolled in at least one dual enrollment course has increased each year since 2122. During 2425, 2,158 high school students were enrolled in a dual enrollment course. Of those students, 270 were 11th or 12th graders. When compared to overall enrollment of 11th and 12th graders in 2425, approximately 13% of 11th graders and 30% of 12th graders were enrolled in a dual enrollment course, which was an increase from the prior years. The chart on this slide displays the percent of students enrolling in a dual enrollment course during their 12th grade year by school year and student group. Overall in 2425, 30% of students enrolled in
058a DE course during their 12th grade year. Dual enrollment participation in the 12th grade has increased for all student groups since 2021. Compared to the prior year, all groups had an increase in dual enrollment participation with the exception of Asian students. Students performance in dual enrollment courses are shown on this slide. Overall, at least 61% of students in a dual enrollment course earned a grade of A in the course each year, and at least 21% earned a grade of B. When grades were examined by student group, at least 93% of students from each student group analyzed earned a grade of C or higher. Additionally, when graduates diploma types were analyzed for 2425, at least 88% of 12th grade students who took at least one dual enrollment course and graduated earned an advanced or IB diploma.
059The next portion of our presentation will focus on participation and performance on college readiness assessments, including the PSAT and the SAT. The first college readiness assessment we will examine is the PSAT NMSQT or the National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test. The PSAT is created and administered by the College Board. The PSAT is offered to all grade 11 students each fall and paid for by the division. There are three tests, reading, writing, and math. Grade level college and career readiness benchmarks are provided for two sections. evidence-based reading and writing or ERW, which is a combination of the reading and writing sections and mathematics. Students may opt in to having their information and score shared with colleges and scholarship organizations. The chart on this slide displays the percentage of Virginia Beach students participating in the PSAT over the
060last five years. Participation in 2021 was low due to the pandemic. In 2425, participation increased by 1 percentage point from 2324. When we examine the most recently available participation data for the state and the nation in 2425, higher percentages of VBCPS grade 11 students continued to participate in the PSAT than students across the state and nation. The PSAT data on this slide is from fall 2024. 63% of VBCPS 11th graders who took the PSAT met the ERW benchmark and 35% met the math benchmark. These percentages were lower than public schools in the state and all test takers in the nation. This pattern is likely related to VBCPS having a higher percentage of students taking the PSAT than the state or the nation. This slide displays the percentage of 11th grade students meeting or exceeding the
061benchmarks on the PSAT by student group. For evidence-based reading and writing benchmark, Asian and white student groups had the highest percentages of students meeting the benchmarks at 78 and 74% respectively. In 11th grade, less than half of all student groups met the math benchmark, except for Asian students with 61% meeting the math benchmark. Prior data analysis in VBCPS have shown that higher percentages of students who took algebra 2 and advanced courses met the PSAT benchmarks than those who did not. This slide displays the percentage of students meeting the PSAT ERW benchmark by student group for VBCPS students over the last three years. Overall, there was an increase in the percentage of students meeting the ERW benchmark compared to last year. When examined by student group, increases ranged from 4 to 9 percentage points compared to
062the 23 24 school year with black students having the largest increase of 9 percentage points. Hispanic students maintain their percentage at 50%. This slide displays the percentage of students meeting the PSAT math benchmark by student group for VBCPS students over the last three years. Overall, there was an increase in the percentage of students meeting the math benchmark compared to the prior year. increases ranged from two to 5 percentage points compared to the 23 24 school year with Asian and white students having the largest increases at five percentage points. As an overview of the next college readiness assessment, the SAT is a test created and administered by the college board. It is typically taken in the spring of a student's 11th grade year or the fall of the senior year. The SAT is administered on Saturdays
063at various Virginia Beach high schools. Students are responsible for paying all fees for the test and providing their own transportation to and from the testing location. Financial assistance for the SAT is available through fee wavers provided by the College Board. Individual schools and students can also uh request additional financial assistance through the Access College Foundation. The SAT contains three tests, reading, writing, and math, with an optional fourth essay section. As of November 2025, the National Center for Fair and Open Testing reports that 289 accredited bachelor degree granting institutions no longer require the SAT for admissions purposes. However, schools may use test scores for scholarships, honors colleges, and specific academic programs. As a result, Virginia Beach staff recommends that students take these assessments and supports them throughout the process to maximize post-secary opportunities. The chart on
064this slide displays the estimated SAT participation rate based on the College Board reports and the VBCPS report of graduates. Since 2122, the percentage of students taking the SAT has decreased from 41% to 35% for the class of 2025. As a reminder, this may be due to the fact that many colleges and universities have discontinued the use of the SAT as an entrance requirement. Historically, when compared to the state and nation, VBCPS has had a lower percentage of students participating in the SAT. The table at the bottom of the slide displays characteristics of SAT test takers for the class of 2025 for Virginia Beach schools, public schools in Virginia, and the national group of SAT test takers. The numbers in the table represent the demographic characteristics for only those students who took the SAT. For example,
0651,791 Virginia Beach students in the class of 2025 took the SAT. Of these students, 197 or 11% were Asian. Compared to the total group across the nation, Virginia Beach had a higher percentage of black, multi-racial, and white students who took the SAT. Overall, data for Virginia Beach test takers were more similar to Virginia public school test takers. Because of this, comparisons on the next few slides will focus on Virginia Beach and Virginia public school data. However, data for the total group is included for reference. The chart on this slide displays the percentage of students by student group meeting the evidence-based reading and writing benchmark on the SAT for Virginia Beach public schools in Virginia and all SAT test takers. 88% of all VBCPS takers, test takers, met the ERW benchmark with percentages by student group
066ranging from 72 to 79 72, sorry, to 92%. When compared to the state, Virginia Beach had a higher percentage of students across all student groups meeting the ERW benchmark. This slide displays the percentage of students meeting the SAT ERW benchmark by student group for VBCPS students over the last three years. Overall, there was a two percentage point increase in the percent of students meeting the ERW benchmark in 2425. Compared to the prior year, all student groups had increases in the percentages meeting the benchmark except for Hispanic students, which was maintained at 87%. This chart displays the percentage of students by student group meeting the math benchmark on the SAT. 60% of all VBCPS test takers met the math benchmark with percentages by student group ranging from 38 to 78%. Compared to the state, Virginia Beach
067had higher percentages of each student group meeting the BA math benchmark with the exception of a Asian students who were equal to the state. This slide displays the percentage of students meeting the SAT math benchmark by student group for VBCPS students over the last three years. Overall, the percentage of students meeting the math benchmark in 2425 increased four percentage points compared to the prior year. All student groups had an increase in the percentage meeting the math benchmark. Black students had the largest increase at 11 percentage points. The next slide provides a brief summary of the results for each area. In the 2425 academic year, the advanced placement or AP program experienced growth, seeing an increase in enrollment for all student groups. Overall, 35% of high school students were enrolled in an AP course. Of the
068students enrolled in an AP course, 73% took at least one corresponding exam. Participation in AP exams also increased for all student groups. 74% of AP exam takers scored a three or higher. This percentage was slightly lower when compared to the state at 76%. Although VBCPS has a higher percent higher percentage of students taking AP exams. Participation in dual enrollment courses increased in 2425 for 11th and 12th graders. Enrollment in these courses is highest for 12th graders. Academic success within DE is strong with at least 93% of various student groups earning a grade of C or higher. Furthermore, among 12th grade students in 24 25 who enrolled in at least one DE course during high school, 88% earned an advanced or IB diploma. PSAT participation increased compare compared to the prior year which is accompanied by
069an overall increase in performance. 63% met the evidence-based reading and writing benchmark and 35% met the math benchmark. These percentages were lower compared to the state although Virginia Beach PSAT participation was higher than the state. SAT participation continued to decrease although performance increased overall. 88% of students met the ERW benchmark and 60% met the math benchmark. The percentage of students meeting these benchmarks was higher compared to the state. Notably, the percentage of black students meeting the ERW and math benchmarks increased and was also higher when compared to the state. This concludes the presentation. We along with the Department of Teaching Learning staff are available for any questions you may have at this time. Melnik. So this was fascinating to me. So I have a few questions for you. The first is what is the advantage
070of taking an AP course over a dual enrollment course because I other than and I I wrote down my own answers uh like a weighted grade for a GPA for an advanced an AP course. Let's see if microphones. Okay, it's working. I think your answer to that question is depends on the student need. Uh from a you're correct in a weighted score for the AP course. If I'm going to a four-year institution, they may take that credit on the exam score, but that's also the benefit of the dual enrollment course is I'm automatically earning the college credit. That's what I mean. TCC or the transferable nature of that credit if I am going to a community college. So, why would you take the chance and take the AP exam when you could take a dual
071enrollment class and pass it and get the credit? I think again it comes down to the course selection as well. What am I what am I taking? Where am I looking to go? What what's what's my career pathway that I'm looking to get? And so, all right. If I'm trying to go to UVA or an Ivy League institution, I'm probably looking more closely at my AP. I I didn't even think about the course selection. That's true. Okay. Just right off the cuff, though, I had to ask myself, but if I can, if you don't mind, I think it it's really interesting when you look at that data. In both instances, we're seeing an increase, right? So, we're we're doing a really solid job across the board through our school counselors and our building leaders to
072really ensure kids are aware of those opportunities and letting them kind of make decisions on what works, right? Some would say we're going to lose one in one area and gain in another and that has not been the case. So, we're really certain proud of that data. That shows this too that how how many high schoolers do we have? Lord, uh roughly 20,000. So basically, I would say it's it's it's realistic to say half of high school students are taking an AP or dual enrollment course. Well, yeah. Well, I mean, students enrolled in 38 AP courses offered by College Board in 20 242, a total of 13,675 students. That's that's highly impressive that that that rigor exists out there. And we see the numbers growing in all categories, too. So, well, I think and I'm
073going to take up some air time if you don't mind since you're asking the questions. I think it's been a really uh big result of the future ready profile, the 3E framework, right, of our conversations around enrollment, listen, or employment and really has driven that beyond the conversations we used to have specifically around the graduate profile. The conversations aren't so much more around you're ready to gra you have everything you need to graduate as no, what is needed beyond graduation that you need to be prepared for. So that's been the trend over the past couple of years in conversations with students. We still got work to do, but it's really that that future ready profile and threes E has helped change that conversation. Clearly that that is happening. And I'll add one thing. We have
074the board received a presentation on our changes to our mass sequence um last year and we are leaning in the parents hard. In my last uh death chat, I made a comment to parents. We need kids taking math in their senior year. Uh so we are identifying those kids earlier because as uh Robert said those kids take have taken algebra 2 when they take the SAT and the PSAT they score much higher. That's a gateway course. And we want those students to take a course in their senior year, a math course in their senior year. So board members, you can help me with parents when parents are trying to determine what's best for their own child. their child is not going to say, you know, it's best for me if I take prop stats. Yeah.
075But it's best for them if they take prop stats, for example. Clearly. So, um, I just have two other quick ones. One of the things that you mentioned was that students do not have to take the class to sit for the exam, the AP exam. You said it's rare, but my question is, how often has that happened that they've passed like and gotten credit for a class that they never sat for? Well, so I'll share. We had a student at Salem who took five AP classes that he never sat in, studied for him by himself, and he made fours and fives on every one of them. Okay. I mean, the kid was a savant. Okay. Well, there you go. All right. So my other question is it's when you have data but then there's a
076comma but and that happened with the total number of PSA takers we and we pride ourselves on testing everybody and I really like that. But when the data gets out there to the public if they don't hear the comma but to explain why our numbers are lower. It also happens with the Virginia and US history so when they when students have satisfied that requirement by the state with another course only a certain number of kids are taking Virginia and US history so it looks like it's so much lower but the difference between the total number of PSA takers versus just the class of 2025's ERW benchmark like that was significant and I just hope that when people look at this or they hear about this that they're also hearing the comma but to explain the
077PSAT um right okay all right well I think that goes back to Dr. Robertson's comment though, there is a yes, but but we we also look at saying there's work we need to do and that algebra 2 is the one that really drove us a lot on that core sequence. So, uh back to his comment on conversations with parents around the math sequence and really challenge our students for that preparation because if they have not had algebra 2 and by the time they take that PSAT, they have not been exposed to some of the standards. So, you're included in there. And since it's been a long time, I guess I would get the same SAT score if I took it again today because I have not had any math. So, that's like that tells you
078that I'm probably not any better off than I was as a senior. Um, but it's still a butt though. I know we're always working in Virginia Beach, but thank you for that. Mr. Ken. Okay, Mr. Delaney, let me run through the same question Miss Melnik just did to make sure I heard it correctly. I'm a student and I've taken an AP course and the school that I'm interested in getting into requires that the AB course be taken. That would be one of the reasons why I'm taking that course. In contrast to I've taken a dual enrollment course. A school can accept that. college environment can accept that if I passed the class, but it sounds like not every college would be accepting that dual enrollment credit. Am I following the theme correct? I think I
079would have to turn to Mr. Jameson if he's here to be accurate on the dual enrollment. I do want to clarif clarify something around the AP class. That's not required for college enrollment to be accepted to a college. The rationale around our statement was if they take the AP exam and score a certain level, that university may accept that score for college credit. So, I do not need to take an AP course across the board to get into every college. Certainly, schools would like to see that you've taken that rigorous coursework and an AP course does that for most of our institutions, but uh to get the score to get the credit in college requires a certain level of a score on that AP exam. Okay? So, in that situation, it sounds like the AP
080class that I've taken and scored a certain level in is the equivalent of a dual enrollment. I'm getting college credit for it as well. The AP course or the AP course, if you score on that AP exam, if I do not take the AP exam, if I take an AP Virginia US history course, for example, and I do not take that AP exam, I'm not going to get college credit for that. Now, universities look at it favorably because they know I'm taking a college level course and feel like I'm being exposed to college level material that makes me makes them more comfortable on how I'm going to achieve at the college level. But I would not receive the credit without taking the AP exam and showing a score that they will accept for that. And
081that can be on a range based on the assessment you're taking. Say AP calculus versus an AP psychology for example. And then back to the dual enrollment course. If I take it and pass it, am I accepted? Is that class accepted in any college environment or Typically, it is. Again, it it depends on the dual enrollment course you're taking, but it it typically it does. I'm looking at my school counselor next to me who's shaking her head, but um that's what I was going to bring up. So, for for an AP exam, a three, four, or five is a passing score, and we count that. But some universities, UVA has a different threshold than like VCU. So I believe UVA will accept a four or a five score for credit, not for a three though
082is is what I was looking at earlier today. That's correct. Anticipating this question. And then also for dual enrollment, the way it's structured in Virginia, um all the state institutions, it's supposed to be applicable to going up to them. There are some specific programs though where it could possibly not, but for the most part overall you get your dual enrollment, you're getting your college credit and it's going to transfer to any state school in Virginia. So on the surface beyond Virginia, you have to check with your institutions whether they will accept those or not. So it's on the surface it might seem like taking a dual enrollment course would be the better way to go, but it really boils down to an it depends. It's all about the students plan and and how they've looked
083at it um going forward from the conversations I've had with you know all of our staff. So stay in touch with your counselor is the bottom line here. Thank you Miss Rogers. So first of all thank you so much for the presentation. Um having a high schooler and a high schooler well just graduated. I've been through this. And first of all, I want to do a big shout out to the um lead guidance counselor over at Kellum. She did an amazing presentation for parents for rising juniors about this whole thing and explaining it to parents exactly all of this information that the board is asking. So, if you're interested at the beginning of next year, go to um one of your high school's um presentations. They ask parents, if you have a rising junior and
084senior, come on down. We will lay it out for you. So, it really did give me a huge um understanding. I think I would need to take a course before I go see her possibly. But um I think that it's really important that we highlight the fact that these these classes are giving students a lot of um really great we have so many offerings with our AP and our dual enrollment. and specifically dual enrollment. One of the things that my own children have are my daughter's doing next year, my son already did it was dual enrollment English course because it actually helps the students prepare for their college application. those essays that are due are all um written and reviewed by the dual enrollment teacher which is a huge advantage for our students especially those
085who don't have parents who have gone to college who don't understand how to do um these this college application it's a an amazing advantage for our students and I um and also while it does transfer dual enrollment for instate if you're going out of state you do have to think about that but your APs are also So, um, my son took a whole he took five APs his senior year. I was like, I don't know what you're doing. But some of the co, um, some of his APs, he did not score, even though he got three, fours, and fives on all of them. One of his exams he scored a four. They wanted a five, so he couldn't use it. So, it really does depend on the college and what your plan is and where
086you're going. And a lot of these kids that are seniors, they're applying to many colleges, so they don't know. So, they just take this, take the exam, and hope for the best. But it's it is worth it because um there were several um classes that he got credit for with dual enrollment. You get the college credit with dual enrollment. Some of your APs you don't. But he did then not have to take some classes. So that saves money for mom and dad. So all of this is I think really important and I I think it's a credit to our staff um who are encouraging our students to do this and and it's a credit to our division who prioritize um beyond graduation to give our students this success. So um I just think it's a
087really positive and it's a great win for um the people sitting up here, the people in our schools and for all of our students. Dr. Green. Thank you. And thank you, Mr. Fel. Um, I'm going to use this as an opportunity to do a commercial for academic planning as a former school counselor with Dr. Trotman. So this time of year for our viewing public um we are doing course selection and I cannot stress the importance of sitting down with your school counselor and mapping out that academic plan because the things that you have just viewed such as information about dual enrollment versus do you want to do a AP course and your school counselor can even uh make you aware aware of what schools will accept what as well. And what was already stated in
088terms of state universities through the state council of higher, we we do have that articulation agreement where that we do take dual enrollment at any public institution, any Virginia public institution. Let me clarify. But again, parents, I cannot stress the importance of you sitting down with your school counselor while you're doing those course selections to make a plan. You can save a lot of money, whether you do dual enrollment or advanced placement courses. And next week is National School Counselors Week. So, use that as a time to go by, wish your school counselor a happy school counseling week and then do your academic and career plan. Okay, so a lot of great questions. I appreciate all this data. Um, I am going to go on a little bit of a soap box here. Um, but
089I am curious to see how those dual enrollment numbers may change next year. Uh well, it's not next year, it's this year's data, but I'm and I don't know if you kind of have any feelers about whether or not those numbers have increased this academic year. Do you have any idea about this one? Oh, go ahead. Sorry. So, in in my midyear update, I presented um advanced coursework at the at the high school level. It has gone up. I didn't differentiate between AP and dual enrollment, but it continues to go up. Well, I I I look forward to that information. Um, the soap box that I'm going to get on is, you know, when I was on the policy review committee, I want to say we spent with staff maybe four, five months working on
090changes. Um, AP courses were getting weighted bonuses. Dual enrollment courses that corresponded were not. Um, at the time there was actually three courses that were now there are 30. Um, so your regular Englishes, um, stuff like that. There's a whole list of them for the public. That list is in the reference section of policy 6-71 as you're you're working through that. This is important to me. Um, I do have two high school students, too, but people in my community sometimes felt like AP was not really the right fit for them, but they felt like they had to do it because of that weighted bonus. And now students uh, here in Virginia Beach are able to kind of pick what they need. and you know those students that don't exactly know what college they're going to
091but that they want to go to college can get some of those general education dual enrollment coursework out of the way and it's not riding on one exam. So um anyway I appreciate that presentation. I just wanted to make sure people know that there's more than one option. So thank you. Okay we are now on to the consent agenda. We are going to be voting on 3-95 public charter schools 5-49 intercolastic competition 6-26 evaluation of new and existing programs 6-44 school counseling 6-77 literacy and response to intervention screening services. Are there any objections to the school board voting on the consent agenda items as presented? Okay, seeing none, I call for a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented. Moved by Miss Dwire, seconded by Mr. Kellen. I call for the vote to approve
092the consent agenda. Mr. Co Pepper, how do you vote on the consent agenda? Thank you. So, Madam Chair, we have 10 eyes. The motion to pass for the approval of the consent agenda. Thank you. We are now on to the personnel and administrative appointments. I call for a motion to approve the personnel report and administrative appointments. Moved by Miss Dwire, seconded by Miss Melnik. Any discussion? Seeing none, I call for the vote to approve those appointments. And so, Madam Chair, we have 10 eyes. the motion to pass for the approval of the personnel report and administrative appointments. Thank you, Dr. Robertson. Yes. Uh thank you. Um I was a little premature earlier and we're pleased that you've accepted our recommendation for Kristen Schuman, currently an assistant principal at Indian Lakes Elementary School, to be the
093next principal at Christopher Farms Elementary School. Thank you. All right, we are now on to committee organization and board reports. Do any board members have anything to report? You can raise your hand. Uh Dr. Green, the Miss Rogers. Thank you. Um we in the uh alignment of our agenda. Uh I had an opportunity to attend the quarterly meeting of the assets foundation board last week. Um, as always, a lot of information uh that will benefit our students. Also, as a reminder, uh, each school does have an assess coordinator that can help you with that FASA form. And in the last presentation, um, you heard a reference to fee waiverss, um, for taking the SAT. uh so your assess counselor uh along with your school counselor can help you with those fee waivers as well. But
094it was a good meeting with the assess foundation. Miss Rogers and Mr. C. Um first I wanted to say that um the staff did an amazing job at the African-American male summit that I also attended. Um the students were incredible. I was there for two and a half hours making connections with so many community members, people interested in supporting our students and um it was just really really amazing. Um also working with the mental health task force, we are continuing to work on um accessibility of mental health supports which I think is incredibly important for our staff, our students, and our community. Making sure families have um good access to all of the supports available. Um, can I make a quick apology? Okay. I wanted to apologize to the community for the rhetoric heard during
095our speakers this evening. We do have rules for decorum and it's expected the participants follows those rules. Thank you, Mr. Cummings. I have a just also wanted to share my sentiments for this for the uh success of the African-American Male Summit. It was a great event and I definitely applaud the office of opportunity and achievement for all their work hosting at Green Run School for hosting us. Um, our family and community engagement office as well for great sessions with the parents. And so I applaud all those folks who showed up and were present, our students, our counselors who led sessions. Marching band was there. They got me hyped up. And I feel like we should probably make a motion sometime to have marching band play before every school board meeting. Um and then the other
096piece I wanted to talk about was also uh with uh Ms. Rogers and I had the opportunity to attend the stu one of the student groups with Dr. Robertson and it was a very delightful conversation and I appreciate Dr. Robertson you extending that invite to me um this last week. Some of the conversations our students the one conversation that dominated a lot of the time was the cell phone policy. So they had lots of thoughts and feedback on that. Um but we also heard uh from students about vaping. Um the last group we met with spent I think about 15 20 minutes on on that topic and so it opened some of my thoughts and eyes to some of the issues that they're seeing within their schools and I feel like that we're probably going
097to have a schoolboard discussion at in the coming future or ask for it. Um just about vaping, what's going on uh and is something that I appreciate. They also had questions about ICE and our schools and asked about, you know, what it means to be on school board as a member. So, it's great discussion. I appreciate how curious our students are, how great our hosts were at Som High and you know, it's a good time. And then finally, I just I think a good portion of us were at teacher of the year and I just wanted to, you know, finally follow up and just say how what an amazing event to see the boots on the ground be celebrated for their achievements. Um, and I absolutely love that we picked somebody from every single school
098um to be there. I think that's such a great thing and it's a good reminder I think of the heart of our mission is that every single 80 some of those folks up there is serving our students with compassion, care, integrity um and delivering great work. So I thought that was an amazing event. So wanted to extend my thanks uh to that as well. Thank you. And like he said, there were a lot of us at that teacher of the year event and it was a wonderful event and it's great to recognize our great um staff and teachers in our school system here that help educate our students every day. Um I serve on the special education advisory committee as the liaison and we had our recent meeting but we also have an upcoming meeting
099March 9th at 9:30 a.m. at the Plaza Annex. I was asked to share that there are three vacancies in that committee and they're reviewing those on a rolling basis even though as a school board we review them once a year. So if there's anybody that's interested you can email the board or me and I will get you the link so that you are able to apply for that position and um they also accept public comment uh on issues important to students with disabilities at those meetings. So with that we are going to return to workshop and we are going to do budget workshop number three and we're going to have Dr. Robertson kick that off. Yes, Madam Chair. Thank you. So um I think you're going to be excited to see uh in just a
100moment Miss Pate's going to share where our projected revenues sit right now. Um just a reminder the we do not have a state budget right now. We have um a draft from Governor Yncan that the the state legislators are in Richmond right now grappling with um reviewing that budget to make any adjustments. Um, I feel very confident that whatever adjustments they make will not reduce the money that Governor Yncan has earmarked for Virginia Beach, but also but but may actually give us a little bit more. Um, so my team has done a lot of work over the last several years trying to become more efficient and lean without impacting schools. And I'm really proud of that work of the team and and so I think you're going to be excited about the number you're going
101to see which is going to give you a lot of opportunity to determine what's the best decision to spend this new money. Okay. Good evening, Chairwoman Brown, Vice Chairwoman Williams, I'm sorry she's not here. School board members, Dr. Robertson. As mentioned, this evening marks our third budget workshop presentation. The agenda for tonight is displayed on this slide. We will begin by addressing schoolboard members questions and providing our responses. We will then share any updates related to actions or direction from Governor Spanberger and the general assembly. Following that, we will provide an overall budget update and then open the floor for questions or discussion before transitioning to the next set of departmental presentations. The first question requested a list of positions for all departments, including a salary analysis with a distinction between central office positions and
102school-based positions where applicable. In response, a file containing this information was posted to the schoolboard secure site for their review. The next question related to the presentation from the department of communications and community engagement. Specifically, the board asked about the cost of the Let's Talk platform, now known as OnFlow, as well as data on its usage. In response, we successfully negotiated reduced pricing with OnFlow. The platform cost for the current school year is $160,749. For fiscal year 2027, the cost will decrease to $156,731, resulting in a savings of $4,18. While the overall cost has decreased, usage of the platform has expanded and we continue to explore additional automation opportunities available through the platform. Regarding utilization, the chart at the bottom of the slide shows the top five topics for the 2526 school year. These include
103bus routes, McKin Vento applications, general transportation questions, registration, and general questions. With the relaunch of the Onflow platform in September of 2025 and increased efforts to raise community awareness, we project that the number of tickets will more than double. For the general assembly update, under the new governor and the current general assembly, at this time there really been no real specific actions directly impacting K through2 education. However, in Governor Spamberger's first address to the Virginia General Assembly, she emphasized education as a top priority. She expressed a commitment to making Virginia schools the best in the nation with a focus on increasing teacher pay, strengthening reading and math instruction, and supporting partnerships between parents and educators. She also cited responding to federal disruptions as a key priority. Additionally, one of the governor's recent executive orders directs
104the Virginia Department of Education to reinforce public education by strengthening literacy and math instruction, reviewing accountability measures and expanding access to advanced math coursework. Lawmakers are considering the governor's education priorities, particularly proposals related to teacher compensation and academic support. While Governor Spamberger has not explicitly referenced the 2023 JARK study regarding Virginia K through2 funding, her stated priorities of strengthening K through2 schools, improving teacher recruitment and retention, and supporting equitable funding and quality outcomes are closely aligned with issues raised in the JARK funding formula and teacher pipeline reports. The policy challenges identified by JARK, including underfunding, outdated funding formulas, and teacher shortages, continue to shape the broader context for budget and legislative discussions in Richmond. There's also some positive news at the federal level. The House and Senate Appropriations Committees have released a four bill fiscal
105year 2026 minibus appropriations package sending setting funding levels for the Department of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education along with three additional appropriation bills for other departments. The labor HHS education bill provides a $5 million increase for impact A compared to fiscal year 2025 as well as $20 million increase for title one part A and $20 million increase for IDEIDA part B as well as an additional 5 million for rural education. Most other K through2 programs remain flatfunded. Overall funding for the US Department of Education remains essentially flat compared to fiscal year 2025, which represents a significant improvement the deeper cuts initially proposed. This package still requires approval from both chambers of Congress, but is expected to be enacted before January 30th when the current continuing resolution expires. And finally, one additional item not
106reflected on this slide. On February 4th, Dr. Robertson, Miss Woodhouse, and I will be meeting with city manager Patrick Dehaney, deputy city manager Monica Kroski, and Kevin Shadalier, director of budget and management services. The purpose of this meeting is to strengthen collaboration between the city and schools during the budget process. Our goal is to establish a shared understanding of assumptions, priorities, and expectations early in the process so we are better aligned moving forward. So, you may recognize the top portion of this slide from the January 13th presentation. It represents the starting point of the budget balancing process, showing revenues by source and comparing approved and amended fiscal year 2026 revenues with the proposed fiscal year 2027 fiscal year 2027 revenues under the governor Yncan's proposed budget. These figures excluded budget debt budgeted debt service and
107payo amounts as those are required off-the-top expenditures. Based on the governor's Yncan's proposed fiscal year 2027 budget, we were currently projecting a $33.4 million increase in revenues compared to the current year's budget. These figures are preliminary and remain subject to change as the state budget process continues. The bottom portion of this slide highlights items where outcomes are either known at this time or still require decisions. Under items that are known, total departmental reductions previously shared with you on the January 13th 13th presentation result in a savings of $5.2 million. We are also projecting significant savings of $18.1 million due to changes in the VRS benefit fringe benefit rates. While these rates still require general assembly approval, there is a high level of certainty that this approval will occur. And just to reiterate what we spoke
108about early on in the budget workshop, um BRS sets these rates, BRS board sets these rates every two years on the bienium. They use very conservative actuarial assumptions. Um it's a complex process, but they try to do that to ensure full funding over time. Um, in this case, VRS felt that they could lower those rates because the fund in the system is in a stronger funded position, but rates remain again subject to the bienial review to protect long-term um solveny. So, additionally, we are seeing small net increases in state grant matches of $330,000 as well as $180,000 increase related to city landscape services, which is driven by proposed increases in city employee compensation. There are however several areas where decisions remain outstanding. At the top of that list is employee compensation which was presented earlier
109in the workshop by Seagull. We are continuing our work with Mercer on analysis and planning related to the health fund and will present updated information and a proposed plan at the February 10th meeting. There's also uncertainty regarding Lexia literacy tools which are currently funded by the state through the all-in grant. This grant expires at the end of this fiscal year and it is not clear whether the state will continue funding these tools. And finally, there are potential impacts from any new budget requests that have been made that are being considered outside the base request that may be approved. This next slide essentially provides you with the same information as on the previous slide, but more in the format of a preliminary budget balancing perspective. All the known items just mentioned are included under the proposal
110section showing you remaining balance of funds at this time without factoring in compensation any plan for the health fund the Lexia which is currently grant funded and new outside the base budget request. As you can see from the slide the remaining balance is approximately $56.3 million. However, several significant items are still under review and will require further discussion and decision-making before an accurate estimate can be reflected in the C on budget balancing. And that concludes the presentation. I'll be happy to answer any questions you have. Miss Rogers, thank you so much, Miss Pate. Um, I'm happy that you are going to be working with the city um manager um to be in alignment, but I am concerned. Um, I was watching some of the city's um, workshop and I feel like there's a lot of
111misunderstanding as to our budget and what we have to spend our money on. And it seems to me there's not as much understanding with some of our city council members like our budget. So, and like what you know, all of our SOQs and all of the things that we're doing and and and so while they've stated they don't want to have a meeting with us, I feel like as long as they're the city council's getting the information, it doesn't have to come from us. it as long as it's coming from somewhere. Um that what questions that they have as to where we're spending our money and hearing things like we give the schools enough money is where my concern comes from because we definitely can't afford to be cutting our budget if we're going to
112remain competitive with our teacher salaries. So, that's something that's concerning to me and I don't know if that's going to be you communicating or whomever, but I think that there is definitely some misunderstanding and confusion as to where our budget money is spent. Okay, thank you. Um, since there's no one in line, I I wanted to talk about the uh the VRS French benefits savings here. um compensation is very very important to me. However, um I'm looking here at the VRS rates and I know that we got a 3.06 reduction. Is that correct? Was that the percentage points? Yeah, it went from um it's down to 12.2 is up to like 14. Okay. Um, and in 2022, I have it listed as it went up 1.96% 2024.73% and so um I don't mind using some
113of it for compensation. I would love to, but um I also don't want us to be in a pickle when the rates do inevitably go back up two years from now. Um, I just want to make sure we're being sustainable. And so I would really, really highly suggest to my colleagues um, superintendent for consideration that um, half of this go to the health fund balance to address those challenges. Um, because that would that would be about that that increase um, so that we're being conservative in our approach. Um, just a thought. um of course just one board member but you know we do have some challenges there with that health fund balance and I think that that would really help alleviate that and make sure that we aren't putting ourselves in a position where we
114can't fund our positions and we're cutting a bunch of people in a couple years here. So those are just my thoughts. Um so I appreciate that. Is there any other presentations related to this? My There are department presentations. I just want to make sure because there's a couple here. Good evening again. I will provide an overview of the operating budget for the department of human resources. Human resources is responsible for ensuring that our division is staffed with qualified, properly credentialed employees while maintaining essential services fiscal responsibility and alignment with compass to 2030. This presentation highlights our department structure, core responsibilities, legal obligations, and how our proposed budget continues to support students, schools, and staff. Each department aligns with compass to 2030 and its work is guided by four key principles. preserving functions and supports closest
115to students by maintaining roles and services that directly support instruction, student and staff needs and school operations. Protecting all legal compliance and safety requirements, ensuring that every decision continues to meet federal, state, and local obligations. maintaining essential services to schools so that operations remain consistent and reliable throughout implementation. Finally, pursuing restructuring and realignment to improve efficiency by pro efficiency so that our organization is well positioned to support division priorities. The department of human resources approaches financial stewardship by prioritizing these guiding principles. We seek opportunities to ensure that resources are used responsibly and aligned with the division's long-term goals. The Department of Human Resources supports the division by managing the full employee life cycle from recruitment and hiring to employee support and retention. Our work ensures that Virginia Beach City Public School attracts and maintains a
116workforce that is qualified, properly credentialed, and supported throughout their employment. To effectively carry out these responsibilities, the department is organized into two offices, employment services and employee relations. The structure allows us to balance the operational demands of hiring and staffing with the ongoing needs of employee support and accountability. Employment services focuses on attracting and hiring talent for the division. Key functions include recruitment, applicant screening, employment processing, contract issuance, lensure and endorsement verification, and reporting staff and data to the Virginia Department of Education. Employee relations focuses on workforce retention and employee engagement. This office manages employee performance concerns, investigations, accommodations, leave administration, and provides guidance to division leaders on a variety of employment related topics. Employee relations also oversees employment recognition programs, including the division's annual retirement event, which honors years of service and contributions to
117students and schools. Both offices share responsibility for training managers, ensuring consistent practices and informed decision making across the division. Together, these offices strengthen the workforce and positions employees for success. Adherence to federal and state regulations is a critical responsibility of the Department of Human Resources. The department administers and adheres to key employment requirements including the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, and employment verification obligations, which support fair, lawful, and consistent employment practices. Virginia Code 22.1-302 requires that a written contract be issued for each teacher employed by the school board with human resources responsible for ensuring all contracts are properly executed and maintained through the instructional personnel and lensure system IPAL. The Virginia Department of Education collects annual data to verify that instructional staff are properly licensed or endorsed for their assignments. For
118the 2024 2025 school year, BBCPS earned a 99.42% score on the IPAL report. The Department of Human Resources aligns its work with goals three and five of Compass to 2030, focusing on a highquality workforce and operational excellence. As a part of our commitment to financial responsibility and stewardship, the department conducted a thorough review of its operating budget. There we go. through targeted line item reductions. The proposed 2026 2027 operating budget includes 115,997 in savings representing a 1.77% decrease from the current approved operating budget while preserving essential services, protecting legal requirements, and maintaining supports for schools and departments. To continue meeting federal and state requirements and advancing the goals of Compass to 2030, the Department of Human Resources remains focused on supporting recruitment and retention incentives. These incentives are crucial not only for attracting and retaining
119highly qualified teachers, but also for other staff in hard to fill positions due to the competitiveness of the market. In addition, the department continues to manage rising contractual costs and inflationary impacts on essential services and materials required to support daily operations. Looking ahead, remaining engaged within our community and across the state is essential. As a result, expanding marketing and advertising efforts remains a focus for future consideration as we strengthen and sustain our workforce. In closing, today's presentation outlined the department's key budget considerations informed by careful budget management, a review of responsibilities, and planning needs moving forward. The proposed budget reflects support for all staff, which ultimately impacts students. Thank you for your time, and I'm happy to address any questions that you may have. Miss Melnik. So, Dr. Trotman, I first of all, I want
120to thank you for careful budget management. I really do. But and I appreciate the cuts where they're coming in all of the in in every department that we're hearing tonight that you're being really careful and you're making these cuts. But I also want to be mindful of the fact that this is a really busy place and there's a lot of work that happens every single day in this place. And it's not like we can cut our workforce in half. That that cannot happen. I I have never come into this building and seen people standing at the water cooler. And I really mean that like it's this is a busy place. Um, so I commend you for the work that you do every day. Um, uh, just like inside of our school buildings every day. I
121mean, it's busy and it takes a lot of people to run this organization. Um, and clearly, you know, we're a great school division with great results, but I I just want to make that that point because people really need to know that, too, that we just cannot cut our workforce in half and expect that we're going to be able to get all of this stuff done. It's a lot of work. And I I appreciate it. Thanks, Dr. Green. Thank you. And Dr. Trottman just ditto to what uh Mrs. Melnik said and there was one statistic you gave that I want to uplift because I think many especially our VM uh public may not understand the significance the I think it was in slide four under uh responsibilities of the different areas employee relations I may
122have the wrong number for the IPAL report and and would you let people know why that is such uh a a big deal that that statistic I think it was what 992% 99 42% yes so annually and we've um had audits conducted by BDOE and have consistently um been praised for the work of having teachers properly credentialed in their teaching assignments and in today's environment with what we're facing that is huge Um, so our teachers are in their correct assignments and license for those positions. So, thank you. And of course, it does take a village, everyone. So, thank you. Right. And it does. And and that means we have staff that are fully certified and and I know some of our neighboring divisions cannot tout that statistic. So, um, thank you and and thank you
123to your team for that. We'll pass it on. Thank you. Hey, thank you. Thank you very much for all of your work. Um, can you tell me the reductions? Um, what exactly does that entail? Because I see we have the same amount of FTE. So, where exactly are you reducing? So, um, I was able to those line items and one of those when I mentioned incentives. So incentives that we would like to continue particularly with student teachers because student teachers come from teacher preparation programs and we know historically um that the research shows the trends that teachers are not going into teacher preparation programs at the rates in which they used to. So, one of those um deductions or line item reductions was in that area of trying to offer an incentive to those student
124teachers who were with us and student taught to try to retain them and keep them here in Virginia Beach. Okay. Do you think that's going to present challenges for us? I do. Okay. Possibly. All right. Thank you. I guess we'll have more conversations about that. Thank you. All right. And there's another department presentation. Two more. Two more. Yes, ma'am. It's listed as one on the agenda. So, once my paper papers start getting a little shuffled, we'll keep it rolling. Uh, good evening, school board chair, uh, Brown, school board members, Dr. Robertson. My name is Matt Delaney. I'm the chief schools op uh, officer, and I'll be presenting uh, the Department of School Leadership's operating budget. Uh the department of school leadership, I'll probably refer to it as dil during the presentation, is really committed to
125providing multiple levels of ongoing support to schools to meet the unique challenge which impacts students, families, and staff. We do this by playing a prominent role in ensuring the success of our strategic plan compass to 2030 and the division strategic action agenda through the successful implementation of each school's plan for continuous improvement. Secondly, doil takes the lead on facilitating interdep departmental partnerships with school leaders so we can maximize the impact of our central support departments on the success of our schools. Another major component of our work in dosel is the strategic focus on building leadership capacity through ongoing professional learning to administrators, departmental leads, sitebased leaders and staff. The leadership capacity really focuses on three primary areas of skill development, instruction, organization, and people. All of this is done with the goal of providing a
126top-notch educational experience for all of our students. As Dr. Tropman shared in her presentation, we've been operating from the guiding principles for financial stewardship as outlined on the slide. I'll touch on several of these items as I go through the varying responsibilities of each office. This slide shows the Department of School Leadership's total FTEES at 4,851.10. Uh 4,81.6 of these are directly allocated to schools. The school-based positions include both instructional and classified positions. For example, teachers and general assistants, assistant principles, principles, administrative assistants, student activities coordinators, and office associates are included in that number. 49.5 of the FTEES are allocated to the docsel offices that are strictly designed not only to support the 4,800 FTEEs, but other uh community and students as well. DOS is composed of five offices. Elementary DOS is led by Dr.
127Dr. Melanie Hamlin along with two directors Dr. Terry Bro and Mrs. Kamani Vaughn. They oversee our 55 elementary schools. Middle schools dol is led by Dr. James Smith who oversees our 13 middle schools and the old donation school. High school docsel is led by Dr. Walter Brower who oversees our level comprehensive high schools as well as Green Run Collegiate, the adult learning center, technical career and education center and the advanced technology center. Dr. Smith and Dr. Brower also worked collaboratively to support the Renaissance Academy and achievable dream academy as well as providing organizational support for the environmental studies program. Professional growth and innovation is led by Dr. Janine Gorum and the office of student leadership is led by Miss Leanne Turble. It also also includes the office of parent stakeholder services and Mr. Robert Nowski
128provides the ultimate levels of support in this area. The total amended fiscal year 2526 budget is $488,237 and899. I'm going to provide a snapshot of the work of the DOS officers perform daily to ensure all of our schools are successful. The first group to review is the elementary, middle, and high school DOS team along with the parent stakeholder support that I shared on the previous slide. This office is also supported by four office associates who associate assist with managing the budget, respon respond to community concerns, and support school needs. Just going to give you a moment to review the bullets and I'm going to highlight a couple of items. I'd like to draw your attention to the first bullet. I've talked about this in previous presentations regarding DOSIEL. Uh I shared that our work with
129principles is really to ensure that there's alignment for the big picture area of the strategic plan all the way down to the feedback that teachers are receiving with regard to classroom instruction. Our school leaders play a role in the achievement of our five strategic goals and the DOS teams works closely with schools to implement and monitor alignment. You can see evidence of this in some of the other bullets as it pertains to the role we play in selecting our building leaders, ensuring that schools have the necessary resources support student achievement and with creating collaborative communication structures between central support staff and school administrators. The office of professional growth and innovation is led by Dr. Gorum. It also includes three coordinators, four specialist, one office associate, one data management analyst, and two data processing specialist. And
130I'll just give you a moment to review the chart highlighting a few areas on this slide. The PGI data team, which includes the one data management analyst and two data processing specialists, oversee the infrastructure that allows all staff to search and register for professional learning and maintain an accurate transcript of their professional learning activities. in Frontline, which is our online application. Just this year, beginning in July, o nearly 11,000 employees have used Frontline to register for over 1,800 professional learning activities, representing over 47,000 enrollments. PGI PGI staff provides direct customer sort as well as maintaining records for attendance and reporting. PGI also oversees the process for providing orientation to our teachers. We had 406 teachers attend orientation this summer. 272 teachers are currently being mentored and two PL specialists providing coaching to secondary and elementary
131teachers. The two specialists also provide quarterly professional learning for teachers in their first five years. PGI offer also provides interdep departmental support as well. Two examples are included on the final two of the final three bullets. PGI partnered with the department of teaching and learning to support professional learning communities in schools. They collaboratively created resources and offer professional learning attended by 256 school administrators and teacher leaders. Something we've seen great growth in the last several years that we're very proud of is that PGI design and implements custom professional learning based on the needs of departments, offices, and schools. Over the last two years, PGI's led 16 retreats and workshops impacting over 500 staff members from a variety of departments such as Department of School Division Services. A great example was in effect today with our
132plaid sessions. I don't know if you're aware of the professional learning we did for our teacher assistance today was led by the PGI department. We had over estimated over 650 TAs participate in that professional learning today. The final bullet is one that our PGI team is extremely proud to highlight. They're extremely committed to supporting teachers that are moving through the rigorous national board certification process. This support includes several Saturday sessions with teachers. The office of student leadership staff consists of director Miss Leanne Turble who oversees all the offices in that area. three coordinators who res whose responsibilities are split to support elementary, middle, and high school programs as well as title nine. There are two residency verifiers, one office manager, and 3.5 off associates who will each work with a coordinator andor the director. Again,
133if you take a moment to review the bullets on the slide, I'm going to highlight several of the primary responsibilities of this office. They assist school administrators with enforcing the student code of conduct to include allegations related relating to title nine bullying and harassment. They enter and monitor discipline data through year through the year to correct errors and entry and ensure compliance to local policy and state regulations. They provide training and ongoing support for students, schools, and family who may be going through a title n process. They provide assistance with registration and verifying residency when in question. This often includes exploring alternative means to help families navigate the registration process when they cannot provide the required documentation. They provide guidance for homeschooling, foster care, and exchange students to family schools and organizations seeking these avenues.
134The office of student activities con consists of three coordinators and two office associates. Some of the primary responsibilities and goals of the Office of Student Activities include ensuring compliance with VHSL policies and regulations, providing outreach opportunities for students, as well as leadership and character development. They work with schools to help plan, supervise, and support studentled activities, assemblies, service projects, and schoolwide events that enhance school culture and engagement. They provide scheduling for athletic events at both the middle and high school as well as ensure these events have appropriate security to keep the school and community safe. This requires ongoing communication, collaboration with city officials as well as collaboration within our division departments such as the office of security and emergency management. They plan and fund and organize all high school graduation ceremonies which also includes the
135summer graduation celebrations. The office of health services consists of one health coordinator, a specialist, a resource nurse, and an office associate to support the coordinator and specialist. This office directly supports schools by providing leadership and supervision for school nurses and health staff, ensuring consistent delivery of student health services across all schools. Some of the primary responsibilities of the health services office include staffing and supervision of all school nurses and clinic assistants, monitoring compliance with state and federal health laws, immunization requirements, medication administration policies, and communic communicable disease protocols. They collaborate with school nurses and staff on developing and monitoring indivi individualized health plans, emergency care plans, and supports for students with chronic or complex medical needs. They collaborate with emergency responders, public health agencies, and school administrators on medical emergency response, outbreak management, and crisis
136planning. This slide outlines the initial proposed line item and staff reduction of over a million dollars or 22%. Key changes include a reduction of one FTE which is currently a vacant position. Docsel has also significantly reduced the amount in line items across all offices. This was done by reducing several resources across multiple cost centers in a strategic manner to minimize negative student support implications. We will also continue review with attrition any futable future possible reductions with the goal of the highest level of school support in mind. In terms of future considerations and anticipated adjustments, DAS must always be prepared to respond to federal and state regulations and required services as well as the impact of legislation. Student enrollment trends and budgetary trends are always an area of focus. And finally, we will always continue to
137monitor our programs and services to look at potential modifications. At this time, I'm prepared to answer any questions you may have. Miss Rogers, thank you, Mr. Delaney, for your presentation. Um, well, I so appreciate um your thoroughess. I was wondering if we could kind of get like an org chart like Dr. Tropman presented because you were talking about who was where and it's really hard to follow with all of these people that you have. So, if you can like make a little chart to kind of say like this is the title, this is how many we have, it'd be so much easier to follow for me. I appreciate it. I'm visual. Sorry. No problem. And then the other question that I have is I know that we talked at the beginning of the school year
138about our new principles and assistant principles. Um is their mentorship under DOS or um the um professional growth and innovation PGI. So PGI is a compon in totality PGI is with DSLE. So I just to give you that total package like right next to each other. Yeah, I did that because I wanted to separate them out but they are part of the the docel group. Uh it's two portions of that. Yes, they support uh PGI does a lot of work with the mentoring process of our APS and principles as well as our DOS team at Dr. Smith and others where we'll assign a principal to mentor another principal and an AP to mentor another AP. So, did you find that this year that that work increased and perhaps monetarily increased because I know we talked
139about having a lot of new um assigned principles and APS that hadn't done this before. They were going to need a lot of support. So, I'm just wondering like not from a monetary standpoint. Um we did not have any issue there. But work increase, yes, I'm assuming. I'm sorry. the the but the work increase though with like for our people that are in PGI would did the work increase for those people that had to do the mentorship since there was more that were needed I I'm and I'm asking because we talked about it but I this is kind of like a followup yeah I don't I don't think it's significantly increased to where we have a concern over their workload in that area of mentorship for principles and assistant principles much of that is done
140in a very organic fashion uh during citywide sessions and informal means to do that. Um so I I don't see an excessive workload from the mentoring of principles and assistant principles. Yeah. Just to be clear, Miss Rogers, um principles mentor principles. Got it. Assistant principles mentor assistant principles. Got it. Okay. And we also have the benefit of some superstar retired principles who will work for us on the temporary employment agreement like Sharan Lewis who works with a number of our new principles as an example. Okay. And again, I'm just trying to like get it straight because an org chart would be better for me visually. Thank you, Dr. Green. Thank you. And thank you, Mr. Delaney, for that great presentation. Um, does DOS still control teacher allocations? Um, I know you there was a time
141you helped the school staff because all the allocations are correct. We we still handle the majority of teacher allocations. When I come back next week or two weeks for the DETL presentation, you'll see where some allocations are done there as well. And as you know, Dr. agreeing that starts with the SOQs and we we go through that proc process with our budget team. Right. And and I wanted the reason why I asked that question Mr. Delaney when I I wanted our viewing public understand why you have so many allocations uh that first on that first page that high number that you have and also I thank you for how in alignment if if um our viewing public is not aware that each department works to feed into the next one starting with our elementary program
142uh with our middle school and then culminating you know with our high school and that you truly do have a team that work in sync. So, thank you. Thank you, Miss Melnik. So, this is my 14th budget and in all the years I've been doing this, no, my 12th budget, not my 14th, I'm sorry, my 12th. I I have never had things explained like this. This is so remarkable. to whoever thought of this or whoever's participated in any little way, I'd go back and make sure you scribbled that on your talent ed form because this was a great goal and it was a great this is a great goal and what I'm learning and I'm sure everyone else is too. Um it's really unbelievable and it helps the overall interpretation of a very complex budget.
143Um so thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Okay. And I'm I'm sure as you know people roll the information around that questions are going to come forward um from the board. So I'm sure there will be more questions, but I don't see any more right now. It looks like we have the Department of School Division Services next. All right. Good evening. I'm Jack Freeman, chief operations officer, and I'll be presenting the operating budget for the Department of School Division services. You see this slide at every presentation. These principles have guided our work for many years now. Related to the last bullet, although past years aren't the focus of tonight's presentation, it may be helpful to know that every office within school division services has gone through a thorough uh organizational review and realignment to ensure we're
144structured to deliver our services effectively, cost-effectively, efficiently, and focused on current processes and needs. You receive briefs several times a year on topics related to school division services. Notably, every year the school board receives a brief uh shortly after school begins. During that brief, you hear from each director from our offices, and all those directors are here tonight. We're going to leverage that background and information to keep this brief focus at a high level, and we can drill down as you have questions at the end of the brief. Along the top is data from the operating budget. You can see the total full-time equivalent allocations for the year. That's across seven offices funded by the operating budget with a budget of almost $172 million. Below that you can see the table for food services. Food
145services operates on an internal services fund structure. What that means is food services does not receive funds from the operating budget. They run more like a business. They receive revenues for serving meals and those revenues are used to pay expenses including paying the roughly 590 FTE allocations. In the table at the bottom you can see each office listed under the heading office name. Next to that on the right heading is uh central office staff then boots on the ground and then school-based. We separated these three columns to give a more accurate highle picture of the roles employees play to serve the division. The school-based column shows the number of employees that work in schools like custodians, security assistants, and food service employees who work in our school cafeterias. The boots on the ground column is
146our attempt to show employees who are not assigned to schools but perform essential functions required for basic operations. These include bus drivers, bus assistants, vehicle technicians, maintenance craftsmen serving HVAC, roofing, plumbing, carpentry, painting, etc. It also includes custodians who work at our support buildings and our 247 roving security officers. And that leaves the central office staff column, which more accurately aligns with what is commonly considered central office functions. Starting with transportation, you can see the vast majority of employee allocations perform boots on the ground functions like driving or maintaining our vehicle fleet. Next, you can see facility services. There are only three positions in facility services funded by the operating budget. For transparency, we've included the positions and facility services that are funded by the capital improvement program. Those are in parentheses with a single
147aster. In maintenance services, there are 31 allocations for central office and 160 allocations for positions like craftsmen and others who directly support the maintenance of our buildings. Next to the custodial and distribution, there are 17 central office FTEEs, 36.5 custodial and distribution allocations supporting our buildings and 598 assigned directly to schools. Security and Emergency Management, six central, 12 security officers performing 247 coverage and 244 security assistant allocations assigned to schools. The division service office has two employees, the COO position and an office associate. Park and landscape services is funded through what is essentially a contract. We pay the city for services provided. Those funds are included in the budget number, but there are no Virginia Beach City Public School employee allocations uh in that office. And finally, food services does not receive funds from the
148operating budget. Employee allocations are funded by revenues. They have 22 employees who work in central office staff positions and the rest work in or directly support school cafeterias. Before we talk about the responsibilities of each of these offices, we wanted to provide some perspective and numbers associated with our focus related to financial stewardship. We live in a culture of continuous improvement and it is our goal to operate a lean organization and capture opportunities to support Virginia Beach City Public Schools in the most efficient and cost-effective ways possible. This is not an all-inclusive list. It's just intended to give a high level perspective. Under grants, facilities has captured about 26.5 million in grants over the last six years. Much of that is to support HVAC systems. Security and emergency management captured about 2.6 million in grants
149over the last seven years. After more than a decade of energy efficiency improvements, Virginia Beach City Public Schools has avoided cost increases in utilities, which is estimated to amount to about $10 million annually. Further, in recent years, we've been participating in the demand response program. In short, this program is designed to help stabilize the electrical grid when local energy demand exceeds the capacity of the grid. Our participation in that program has captured about 1.4 4 million in energy credits. Virginia Beach City Public Schools has disposed of approximately 319 portables since 1998. There are two ways to view this. The first is we avoided having to build additional schools during our peak enrollment years and 319 portables supports the equivalent of 7 to eight elementary schools in size. The second way to look at this, when
150en enrollment declined, we were able to easily reduce those spaces when not needed, saving utility costs, maintenance, and other expenses associated with those spaces. Next, we continue to refine our calculations for the number of custodians needed to maintain our buildings, and more on that in a later slide. Finally, transportation has continued to improve routing and analytics to reduce the number of routes from 610 in FY19 to 560 in FY26. This will be the first year uh first almost full year uh with our most recent stop arm camera program which has a number of benefits. In previous years, we had 150 buses with that capability. Now essentially all buses have stop arm camera systems. This is a safety program. I won't go into the details of the program, but here's some things that might be helpful
151to know. This program receives revenue from Virginia Beach Police Department verified violations. The revenue is expected to increase from previous years due to the increase in buses with the hardware. These revenues go to the operating budget and you received that as part of one of the earlier briefs. The hardware supporting the new stop arm caner program also improved internal and external cameras and provided the capability to remotely access video. Previously, every time we needed to review bus video, someone had to travel to the bus, pull the hard drive from the bus, and return to transportation office to download the video. Remote access is expected to save time moving forward. and transportation has received over $500,000 in school bus reimbursements or rebates like when we bought propane buses to receive uh to replace older diesel models.
152Again, you heard about that in a brief earlier tonight. So again, it's not intended to be a comprehensive list uh but it should give you some perspective on our financial stewardship for the responsibilities of the offices within school division service. In the interest of time, we'll leverage the past presentations you received. So I will be brief. Facilities is responsible for the capital program that includes new construction and large maintenance projects like HVAC, re-roofing and foundation repairs. They also manage the building utilization and attendant zone processes. The office of maintenance services is part of the facility organizational structure. In addition to traditional maintenance functions, they also perform energy management, oversee our security platform, manage the lead and drinking water and Legionella prevention programs, and pest management. Custodial and distribution services is also part of the facility's
153organizational structure. In addition to traditional custodial support, they screen and recode gym floors and conduct bloodborne, pathogen, and biohazard cleanup when needed. And the distribution team is essentially our internal Amazon team that receives supplies at our distribution center and delivers them to our schools. Transportation transports over 40,000 students to and from school on a daily basis and performs vehicle maintenance. Security and emergency management manages or supports all the traditional security functions and training for not only our security professionals but also for our administrators. Improved training was a high priority from the blue ribbon panel for school safety and security. Park and landscape services does far more than mowing the grass. You received details about their broad range of support at the fall school opening update. Uh you can read the details, but note the last
154item there, snow removal. It's really more than that. Uh they provide incredible support leading up to and following weather events that impact our properties. And finally, food services. You can see the programs that they support. And here are the numbers for the proposed budget. It shows a reduction of 20 vacant positions, 18 of which are vacant custodial positions. Again, we're in the process of re-evaluating again the number of custodial allocations needed, and we will continue to refine those numbers. Notably, part of the proposed line item reductions is not funding replacements for our students with disability school buses. This is the first year that line item has been proposed to be left unfunded. Regular school bus replacements are also not included in the proposal. This would be the third straight year of not replacing regular education
155school buses. Proposed reductions include reduced maintenance project funding and the proposal includes the school board adopted AADA expansion. In total, the proposed reduction for this year's school budget is a little over $2.7 million. So, here are some future considerations. In total, including what is proposed in this brief, the dis the deferred school bus replacement cost is now $13.4 million. School buses cost about $100,000 in FY2020. They now cost $160,000 a piece. Inflation is real. To get back on track, when funding improves in future cycles, this total cost would need to be added to the annual cost per normal replacement cycle, which is now estimated to be about $4 to5 million. We want you to be aware that we're evaluating options for how to mitigate this. One option being considered is end of the year bus
156purchases. If the budget team is confident that end of the year money is available, that doesn't put the division at risk from a fiscal responsibility perspective. Deferred maintenance projects total 1.3 million. Again, this cost would be over and above the $600,000 of annual baseline funding. When financial conditions permit, it would be advisable for the board to consider spreading that deferred cost over multiple years. And we're currently evaluating shifting McKenna Vento transportation from our current practice, which is through a contract, to the office of transportation and fleet management services. This may not be a wholesale change in the way that we do business, but we're evaluating what can be done to maintain similar or better levels of service in the most efficient and cost-effective way possible. And finally, although not part of this operating budget focus
157brief, there are elements of the operating budget that support the capital program. First is debt service. We project the debt service annual funding will need to sub be substantially higher when it's time to execute Prince High School. You will receive more information about that over time as part of the CIP briefs. Just know that debt service is operating budget dollars that come straight off the top from the operating budget and in the future years uh consideration should be given to increasing that amount incrementally over several years rather than trying to solve it in one or two years. PIGO funds are operating budget dollars that go straight to the capital vote program. The vast majority of the CIP is currently funded through the issuance of bonds, which is debt that the school division needs to repay.
158This debt heavy model of the current CIP isn't just challenging for Virginia Beach City Public School. This debt is also part of the combined debt with the city, and there are metrics the city needs to stay below to retain their AAA bond rating. Our work with the consulting firm Davenport, the same consulting firm that supports the city, identified the need to increase cash funding to the capital program over time again when the financial cycle uh permits that to occur. So with that, uh the division services team answer any of your questions and uh I will get support from the directors as needed to be able to answer. If madam chair, if I could just uh make a comment first. Um, if you could go back to that last slide, I think that's going to be
159important. So, a couple things. Um, part of the meeting that we'll have with U. Patrick Duhane and his team and my team on February 4th is going to be related to ensuring we're all on the same page with projecting debt service as we go through building Princeton High School. Um, and so we're we're we want to be confident that when we come to you and it's time, we're well aware of what the debt service obligations are. Secondly, you know, one might wonder why I didn't direct my team to adjust their presentations um knowing that, you know, a week ago we found out about these additional dollars because clearly we've pushed bus replacements off now three years. Clearly we we are now pushing off some more maintenance projects. Um, and we don't have special education buses
160on there. My team was tasked in July to operate based upon a projected revenues that were at best going to be flat. All the trends were saying that. And so what I would like the board to know is when I present to you a dollar, I'm going to give you a Cheesecake Factory menu to say here are all the things that you could spend this on. Um because I think it's going to be a collective decision. You're going to have some opportunities to give a really nice Christmas, right? But you want to make the right decision for not only now, but also down the road. And so the reason I haven't asked my team to change anything is I'm gonna need input from the board to say, "Hey, you know what? We're gonna need to
161buy some buses and we want you to make a priority to buy some buses or we're we're going to make sure that uh that that those maintenance projects, we got to keep those things on track because eventually we're going to have debt service. We're going to give you that information and you're going to grapple with that and then tell us tell me how you want to spend those funds." So again, you'll see one more presentation from Department of Teaching and Learning on February 10th where you'll see some reductions. Um, and we still have some unknowns. We don't know if Canvas is going to be funded. We've got to have Canvas, our learning management system, right? So, we'll give you all that information. You will have the month of February to figure it out. Uh, about
162three weeks in February, but uh, it's a good problem to have. Dr. Green. Thank you uh Mr. Freeman. Thank you for um your presentation. My first question was related to slide eight where you um indicate that we have 20 um vac reduction or 20 u custodial vacancies. Um can you say where they are? Are they schoolbased, central office or some of it through attrition? So the number is 18. So there's 20 total reductions, 18 custodians. Um uh I think your question is and this relates to the recalculation that we're doing related to schools. So these cuts aren't going to be made in a way that um is a school is doing without, but there will be recalculation uh of what schools need. Okay? And that's that that's an ongoing process and we continue to update
163those numbers. Um, and I'll tell you, Mr. Nexi and I were talking a little bit earlier. He has some really good uh things that he's working on uh to be able to update uh maintaining an uh uh an an appropriate standard uh while finding those efficiencies. Okay, great. Because I just I know the valuable service that they provide throughout the school division and and many of you have heard me say this before. um if you don't have clean classrooms and clean buildings, there will be no learning. Uh and so I just want to make sure those cuts um are not going to impact schools uh at all. 100%. That is the goal. Okay. Thank you. And then I have one more question. I know a little bit about this thing called McKenna Vento Transportation. That
164was my question. Uh, as many of you know, I used to have oversight of that area and and that in late spring, as you know, Mr. Freeman, we would be knocking on the superintendent's door. We need money to pay the cab bills. Um so my my it's not really a question that per se that you can answer but my my thought question is given that there's so many unknown variables with um uh the transportation um of our homeless students. So the viewing public if you're not what McKenna Vento does that's transporting our homeless students and we've had instances where we have transported across the river to Hampton and all the way to Suffuk. So I just I'm sure you are you look working with Mr. Wilson in uh schoolwork social services where he can share
165data with you so you can see how broad and vast uh those we don't know where they are and then I'm thinking in terms of uh how we have all the academy programs last year uh achievable dream was extended to my district for so that's a herculean task I know that but I know you will do it so I guess you're not retiring now But uh so so uh you are absolutely right and that's why we have an incredible group and Bobby Jameson will be a huge part of that and we'll get all the right people at the table and and that's the challenge is to work through all of those uh all those challenges that currently exist and what can we do more efficiently and cost- effectively keeping the same or better level of
166service while also saving the school division money. That's going to be the goal, right? and and I ask my colleagues to to remember what what we Mr. Freeman just highlighted with regards to transportation and all the responsibilities that we're taking on because taking on that McKenna Vento that is I mean you would almost need a whole fleet just for that in itself. Um last uh be one of our duties now. Yeah, it it it is a big task and with the price of gas and and those type of things. So, thank you. Yes. And if I could just make one last comment. So, uh again, just to re-emphasize, we're on the early stage of this. We're not saying it's going to be a wholesale uh change, but we are confident that there are going to
167be some things that we're going to be able to do. And again, like we talked about before, we work continuous improvement. So go in, implement a change, see what the effect of that change is, evaluate to see if there's another uh step that you can implement. So we're going to work with all the right people and work through the steps and see what we can get to. Right. Thank you. Thank you, Miss Melnick. I'm just going to throw out an old name and say Frell Hanser never liked us to get behind in the bus replacement. Do you remember? Yeah, that was his big thing. Um, that's a little scary to me that we're up to 13 million. Well, so let me say this. Um, and I know that this wasn't the way they Crystal and
168her team have done an amazing job. It's incredible. We've gone through some challenging years and had to make hard decisions and you guys made the hard decisions based on recommendations were presented. It it is what they it is what it is. They were good decisions. Now, it's just a matter of understanding where we are and how to move forward and where the opportunities might present themselves, which is kind of what Dr. Robertson was setting up a little bit earlier. But I'm not saying we did anything wrong or or budgeted anything wrong. I'm just saying in general, you think about that kind of the same way you think about compression, right? Like, oh no, now we've got to dig out of this hole. And so, um, I'm sure you've looked carefully. Um, but that was just
169a scary that was a scary number at $100,000 a pop. That's not two or three buses. That's a lot of buses. So, it's not 160, right? Right. I know. That's what I'm saying. It's It's a lot. Um, how many good you got a good grasp on it. I know you do. Those are just scary numbers. And again, that's what the public needs to see and they need to understand the constraints we're under when we when we're working through this budget. So, yeah, Mr. Cummings. Yeah, thanks so much for sharing and I appreciate slide number four, uh, specifically with, you know, our estimated annual utility savings of $10 million annually. Um, it's exciting large number to look at. And so I guess my question to you is do you feel like we're at the ceiling of
170what we can be doing uh from a utilities savings perspective or do you feel that we can continue to scale some of our operations to increase that number in you know annual savings as well like and just maybe just at a high level as well just so a couple ideas of what all goes into that $10 million in savings. Short answer is yes. There's there's more that can be done. Um the the broader answer and it's fair that whenever you start doing something opportunities are high and you can capture a lot over time. um the opportunities moving forward and quite honestly I've lost track of the briefs that were provided to the board and and elsewhere um the work related to solar um and how that solar process is set up that we get a
171fixed rate for 20 years when we go into that contract the rate never goes up. it does go up when you're working with uh with outside providers and at the end of those 20 years and you get to keep the panels uh and you just have to maintain the panels and be able to uh capture that money. So there is uh continuing opportunities that we continue to explore and try and capture in order to have that cost savings and and again what goes without saving if if you don't have to pay money for utilities then your budget leaves opportunities to be able to capture other priorities. Miss Rogers, thanks so much. I appreciate everything that you're putting in to this um presentation. I have just a couple of questions with regard to our custodians and
172the reduction in custodians. Are we ensuring I just want to make sure that we are ensuring um that the expectation of workload is um it's able to be done within the hours that they have available. That's my concern because if there's not enough time and it gets left for the next day because they just didn't have the time to do all of the things on their list based on all of their responsibilities. You know, schools are unpredictable, children are unpredictable. So, you know, you have these tasks that have to be done, but then somebody throws up here and there's somebody who missed the toilet there and and then suddenly the things that you need to get done can't get done. So, I just want to make sure that we are not overt taxing our custodians
173that they really can't get the stuff done that they need to get done because we have less of them. Does that make sense? It does. And what I would say is when these topics come up, it's not in in isolation that school division services says, "Hey, let's cut 20%." Right. Sam Nicks worked very closely with the DOS team, with human resources, and anybody else that we need to have at the table to ensure that we're uh if we have a plan for implementing a change that the conditions that you describe are being met, that we have uh that we're not basically putting on the the burden on the current uh custodians. That's too much. Okay. We found the right balance. Okay. And then I have another question and this is just a spitballing question but
174it is still something that now that I'm seeing this I I I in one of the slides you talked about um well you just talked about you know efficiencies in not needing some of our energy efficiencies. So let me ask you this. When we is it I'm going to assume but you can tell me if I'm wrong. Is it more efficient when our students and like does it cost us less when students and staff are not in the buildings versus when they are? Uh yes, from a HVAC perspective uh when students and staff are not in the buildings, we tend to uh set back the temperature uh so it's not on we're not heating or cooling the building during those times. That is a substantial sav. So, the reason I ask is because perhaps we
175could think as a school division to allow our staff when they have a staff day of of, you know, they're doing online um trainings or whatever that they don't have to be in the buildings to save ourselves some money. Just an idea, putting it out there. But I mean, we trust our staff to be professional, to do the work that they're intended to do, so that if they do have a staff day, it may cost us less to not require them to be in the buildings when children aren't there. Just an idea. Thanks, Miss Dwire. So, Miss Rogers addressed one of my concerns is how you compensate for 18 vacancies of custo, you know, custodians. That's a lot. Um, and of course you can't do overtime, right? Or do you? Well, so what we're describing
176here, so remember there were, I believe the numbers 598 custodians that are assigned to our schools. So 18 of that is it's not a huge percentage. And also realize that we're continuing to do the calculation for uh the number of uh custodians that are required in the building. Yeah. And what we're learning is is that we have um uh by using the calculations we have, we have probably more custodians than comparable divisions. And that's some of the work that Mr. Nicks is doing uh to be able to get some comparisons of of how we other divisions work and a little bit interrelated of well, how do they use their custodians and uh timing tasks and functions and how does it work for them? works, what doesn't, and then we capture the best lessons we can
177out of that. And then like Dr. Green said, you have to restructure once you hire these custodians as well back into the budget what that's going to cost. And good for you on your um on your utility credits. I I will tell you great team and we have some very smart people and uh we have people that are managing on a regular basis um the setbacks in the schools and things that we do with our energy. Really good team that does that in maintenance services. Yeah. Very good. Very good. Thank you. And Dr. Troutman, forgive me, but I have a question for you. And um because your score was near perfect, um was that before or after the line item reduction? That was for the 2425 school year. Okay. Um preliminary data for this school
178year, we've already submitted it. It we're projected to be higher. So fingers crossed we still have a little work to do on another submission, but that last school year. Very impressive. Okay. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. Thanks for your hard work. So I have a couple of questions. Um and then we'll go to Mr. Cummings. Um I hope I'm not asking for too much, but I'm sure that you guys already have this. So, um I think that the board could potentially find it useful to have a list of our bus inventory and and the age as we're having that conversation. Um and then also I would be interested to know exactly which uh projects for this $1.3 million are being deferred. I I think it's great you guys are evaluating the McKini Vento um to see
179if there's any way to cost savings. So, I wanted to make a a compliment there. Um and I think you kind of already answered this, but I just want to verify. Um there's been some conversation about utility prices increasing. Are you saying that our rates are sort of locked in for certain places or do we anticipate that our school division's utility rates will also increase? So that the comment of locked in is when you uh enter a solar uh purchase agreement. Um those rates are fixed uh when you enter the contract. um our divisions and uh uh we so roughly there's a period of time and I can picture the chart that it's gone from about uh 7 and a half cents up to about 12 point uh something cents uh over a number of
180years it's been a substant I think everybody's experienced that their utility costs going up energy rates go up so the vast majority of our electrical use is subject to those rate increases from the energy provider it's the solar it stays fixed uh for the cost of the utilities that or the cost of the energy that that produces. Okay. Um so then how many of our buildings have the solar uh would be another question I have. Um, and then right now in our approved budget for this year, we have one custodian allocated per 1700 uh 17,500 square ft. Um, do we anticipate that that's going to change the square footage allocation with these vacancies? Okay. Well, we're and we're evaluating what that uh final number that we should um settle on after we've done a little
181bit more research. Okay. Um and then I I just wanted to, you know, make a a quick comment, you know, for the public and the board, you know, as we're talking about potentially doing buses at the end of the year and potentially doing health fund balance at the end of the year budget. um if we're cutting through vacancies and attrition, our reversion is going to be lower um almost certainly. So, um I just want to make sure we're not biting off more than we can chew with that, Mr. Cummings. Yeah, thank you. I just needed a couple minutes to think through just some of the things you mentioned about solar and I I would be curious to explore the avenue more of, you know, util potential savings with utility. um you know development with like
182solar and some of those other opportunities. you know, it's extremely impressive to see, you know, the 10 million dollars that we're saving. And so, if there's opportunities for growth, you know, what does that investment look like from the board? What are the long-term estimates of savings? Um, you know, especially as I hear things about bus costs, you know, deferred maintenance, you know, if there's opportunity to free up cash from utility savings, you know, what does that investment look like from us up front? what is our projected savings over time? And so, yeah, it's I think it's a a great avenue to explore and to to see if that's a place that we'd want to go as a division or I don't know if you're looking for direction from the board on on this if there
183something else as well with that. But those are just some of my thoughts, but we can provide whatever the school board needs to be able to help out perspective and uh make decisions. I can tell you that the the work continues to move forward. Um um so you guys see on a regular basis the work that comes through and approve it through the uh your school board action or consent process. Uh but we can provide you whatever you need. Miss Falton. Thank you. Chair Brown, Mr. Freeman, thank you for that detailed uh uh presentation that you've done. Just a quick two questions. The uh McKini Vento that is a federal program, isn't it? Is it mandated federal? So I am not the McKenna Vento expert. I'll turn over to others that are Yeah, it it
184is a federal program and we receive reimbursements, but they don't even come close to covering the costs. And that's why I asked it because I know a lot of federal mandates, statewide mandate with no funding or a half of a funding. That's why I talk about u the ideal uh act. away. We've never got full coverage for that. So, I just want to make that make the public aware of that. And I've seen the fleets of cars that go around. And of course, it is important that we make sure that all of our students are compensating to get into to the schools and be there. And I've seen them pick them pick them up in the morning and they're there picking them up in the evening and they have to carry them to other areas
185and we do go far out. But that uh McKini Vento uh act is very important. It has uh helped a lot of our students to get where they are. I just want the public to know what that is. Also, um I did not know the square footage like uh Chair Brown has about the custodians, but I do have con well as we're moving and want to comp compensate them as well. And I just like to say I don't know how it's built in, but I've seen our custodians at the job fairs. I've seen them at the graduation like the nurses graduations. I've seen at the open houses and different things that we do. I saw them on Saturday working great work and they keep our building looking good. And when you use the word essential
186for our custodians and what they do, I wonder how much that that is put into consideration those things that they do outside of is that compensation or is that overtime? Are we going to compensate for them as well? because they do work outside of the regular. So, I just want that to be I want that be known by how we move forward, what our custodians are doing as well. Yes. I I think part of that was a question of if they're working uh outside events, are they getting uh compensation over and above what their normal job is? The answer is yes. Okay. Um and to your point, our custodians are wonderful. They do great work for us. It's not just their during their normal job. They volunteer for opportunities to make sure that every program
187that we have is uh is up to standard. Right. And I just want to be made known that I do appreciate them when we walk into our buildings, floors are shining and everything is well put into place and they are just as important to our division as everything else. It's great when you hear that from our leadership. They are there. They they are essential. And when when the snow is coming down and the roads and the sidewalls have to be cleaned up, our our custodials are out there doing that work. And I wanted to be made known how much we appreciate their work and how we're going to consider these things as we move along in our budget. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. I see no further discussion. So, thank you for
188all your work in this presentation. All right. We are going to go back into close. But before we do that, I just want to mention um a few months back, Miss Rogers got an email from me and it wasn't me asking if I could help with something and Miss Melnik mentioned something similar. So colleagues, if you get an email that doesn't look like it's from me, um there's somebody posing as me sending emails to our school division. So, uh, with that, Miss Mel, and in addition though, um, that email that you sent actually disappeared. And so I checked with Mr. Den who said that's exactly what the system is supposed to do. Like you see it and then it's gone. That means that that our system is working to click that junk right on out
189of our out of our system. So that's that was good information I learned tonight. Okay. All right. Thank you, Miss Melnick. Will, will you please read us into closed? I move that the school board recess into close session in accordance with the exceptions to open meetings law set forth in code of Virginia section 2.2-3711 part A paragraphs 78 12 and 29 as amended to deliberate on the following matters. Seven consultation with legal counsel and briefing. Can everybody please be quiet as you're exiting by staff members or consultants pertaining to actual or probable litigation where such consultation or briefing. An open meeting would adversely affect the negotiating or litigating posture of the public body. For the purposes of this subdivision, probable litigation means litigation that has been specifically threatened or on which the public body or
190its legal council has a reasonable basis to believe will be commenced by or against a known party. Nothing in this subdivision shall be construed to permit the closure of a meeting merely because an attorney representing the public body is in attendance or is consulted on a matter. Eight, consultation with legal counsel employed or retained by a public body regarding specific legal matters requiring the provision of legal advice by such counsel. Nothing in this subdivision shall be construed to permit the closure of a meeting merely because an attorney representing the public body is in attendance or consulted on a matter. 12. information relating to the negotiation and award of a specific contract where competition or bargaining is involved and where the release of such information would adversely affect the bargaining position or negotiating strategy of the
191public body. Such information shall not be withheld after the public body has made a decision to award or not to award the contract. and 29, discussion of the award of a public contract involving the expenditure of public funds, including interviews of biders or offerers and discussion of the terms or scope of such content where discussion in an open session would adversely affect the bargaining position or negotiating strategy of the public body, namely to discuss a review of draft RFQ for CIP Print High School replacement project, B status of pending litigation or administrative cases, and C consultation with legal counsel regarding ing probable litigation and pending litigation matters. Okay. Moved by Miss Melnik, seconded by Miss Dwire. Any discussion? Seeing none, I call for the vote to go into close session. So, Madam Chair, we have
192eight eyes. The motion to pass to go into close session. Thank you. Hey, hey, hey. Noo. Nah. Hey. Hey. Hey. Heat. Heat. Noodle. Hey. Heat. Heat. Why are you Heat. Heat. N. Hallelujah. Heat. Whereas the school board of the city of Virginia Beach has convened a closed meeting on this date pursuant to an affirmative recorded vote in accordance with the provisions of the V Virginia Freedom of Information Act. And whereas section 2.2-3712D 2-3712D of the code of Virginia requires a certification by this school board that such closed meeting was conducted in conformity with Virginia law. Now therefore, it be resolved that the school board of the city of Virginia Beach hereby certifies that to the best of each member's knowledge, one only public business matters lawfully exempted from open meeting requirements by Virginia law were
193discussed in the closed meeting to which this certification applies. and two, only such public business matters as identified in the motion by which the closed meeting was convened were heard, discussed, or considered. The motion was made by Dr. Green, seconded by Miss Dwire. Any discussion? Seeing none, I call for the votes to certify close session. So, Madam Chair, we have eight eyes. The motion to pass for certification of close session. Thank you. So, it is 10:36 p.m. and we are journed.