001hello hey hey hey come on hello hey hey hey nat kathleen Brown chair of the Virginia Beach School Board i hereby call this informal administrative workshop session at 4:30 p.m on this Tuesday June 24th 2025 at this time Madame Clerk would you please announce the role thank you Madam Chair present in the schoolboard chamber are Chair Brown Vice Chair Williams Mr bowensteel Mr kalen Mr cummings Miss Felton Dr green Miss Melnik and presently on Zoom is Miss Rogers and Miss Rogers for the record can you uh explain why you're on Zoom and your location um I'm in Savannah Georgia on a family vacation thank you thank you at this time we are in schoolboard administrative matters and reports do any schoolboard members have anything to report okay um also um I forgot to announce um
002for the record that Mr co Pepper is on a flight that's landing at 510 so he will be joining us later and um Miss Dwire is on her way um and that brings us now to the Harbor Hope Center Progress Region 2 Recovery School update and we welcome Robert Jameson executive director Office of Student Support Services all right well good afternoon Chairwoman Brown Vice Chair Williams board members and Dr robertson my name is Robert Jameson executive director for the Office of Student Support Services and the presentation this afternoon will be brief my goal is to share key milestones achieved by the Harbor Hope Center Regional Steering Committee over the past couple of months recall my last progress report included actions through April 11th so we will pick up uh there where we left off and
003share our progress to date at the conclusion I'll touch on the next steps the regional steering committee will take to open our region 2 recovery school and then I will take your questions we remain optimistic the Harbor Hope Center will open its doors on September 2nd aligned with Chesapeake student calendar so allow me to get started on the list of recent accomplishments as a reminder the Virginia Opio Abatement Authority grants I'm sorry the Virginia Opio Abatement Authority grants are awarded to cities and as such significant collaboration occurred with Virginia Beach City Leadership confirming VBCPS as a grant subreient of the Virginia Opioment Authority Cooperative Partnership Grant this highly competitive grant will result in $1.5 million distributed over five years combined with grant matching and non-matching direct settlement funds from the cities of Norfol Portsmouth Suffach
004and Virginia Beach total grant funds secured exceed $2.4 million these funds combined with the general assembly funds ensure all operating costs for the 2526 school year will be fully covered by the grant and future schoolboard contributions will be minimized through the 5-year renewal period of the grant a fully executed with the school boards of Chesapeake Norfick Portsouth Suffach and Virginia Beach was secured given this was no easy task I'd be remiss if I did not acknowledge Mrs lenetti's skill and assistance with brokering this agreement concurrently anou was brokered with the city of Chesapeake whose partner organization Chesapeake Integrated Behavioral Health will provide clinical services thisou defines the relationship between the two entities and the expectations and limitations of the partnership theou is supported by the partner agency and awaits approval by Ches excuse me Chesapeake
005City Council once approved Chesapeake Integrated Behavioral Health will post and staff the two clinical positions as a reminder that is one clinician and one peer recovery specialist like our schools where staff engage in professional learning communities or PLC's we sought opportunities to learn from the experiences of the state's first recovery school Chesterfield Recovery and from the Association of Recovery Schools which represents the fewer than 50 recovery schools in the United States we are learning side by side with three other regional recovery schools in our state who will open their doors for the first time at 2526 the success of the state's recovery schools are a priority for the Virginia Department of Education and as a result the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services organized these learning communities for school divisions across the state participation
006in these opportunities will extend throughout next school year and beyond the first step to a marketing campaign is a website and Harbor Hope Center has secured the web domain HHC tidewater.com a mock site has been developed and is ready to go live in early July the drop-own menu includes admissions purpose and vision the academic and clinical framework and contact information excuse me contact information to mention a few items we will let you know when the site officially launches a regional CVY school must operate with bylaws and VBCPS as a fiscal agent took the lead on the development of said bylaws these bylaws define the governing board composition and operational procedures and responsibilities from a field of 43 applicants the regional steering committee interviewed a handful of the top candidates and representatives from the committee of
007superintendent conducted a second round of interviews with those top candidates the committee of superintendent supports the selection of a candidate and Dr robertson will bring forward to you an administrative recommendation once approved and able to begin the program coordinator will focus on staffing collaborating with Chesapeake Integrated Behavioral Health developing a marketing campaign recruiting along with enrolling students and finalizing logistical details oh sorry I was off by a click there so then the regional steering committee also continued work on the operational aspects of the Harbor Hope Center to include developing the referral and intake process creating the student success plan template and ordering Chromebooks as well as furniture we are working effectively and remain optimistic the Harbor Hope Center doors will open to students on September 2nd so I appreciate the time this afternoon and with
008these updates I'm ready to answer your questions dr green thank you mr jameson how are we looking right now with student recruitment um with not only in Virginia Beach but with the other districts as well so each of us have had some several phone calls have been fielded uh we are confident that when we open doors on September 2nd we'll have up to five students somewhere in that ballpark which we were hopeful to have one um but at this point it's looking like we may have around five as we open uh at some point how will you and the other divisions be doing recruitment so that our communities will know that you're ready to receive students so we have a flyer in the works with the support of our comm's team in here in Virginia
009Beach we've been speaking with the different communications teams and the other school divisions to be posting information on social media as well as outreach through our principles and counselors uh throughout this summer and then of course when counselors return uh for any of those referrals in addition uh we have some different connects on the recovery side of our community where information has already been shared and we've been able to field some phone calls from that great look forward to you having a lot of enrollments yes ma'am and and Dr green if I could add one more piece today um um two of our military liaison attended the meeting uh because they wanted to be able to u have that information for any military families that would come in if their children are struggling with this
010and um Debbie Patch mentioned that um she's in contact with Chesapeake and Norphick and would get in contact with Portsmouth and SUFFK through their liaison that to so that we have that information as well miss Melnik the five students the potential um not just from Virginia Beach correct not just from Virginia Beach okay all right perfect thank you yeah Miss Melik um I I shared today in our governing board meeting that um unbeknownst to me because I never got these reports until I was a superintendent I probably have received somewhere in in the 8 to 12 range this year of record requests from families whose children uh from middle school to high school have been removed and their parents have sent them to a couple of programs up in the Richmond area because we don't
011have any programs here so I think there is a need um we're a little concerned that we're probably about four weeks farther past than where we wanted to be but there is a need and so although we may project opening our doors with five September 2nd unfortunately I think that number could grow as the word gets out yeah and I'm sure it will my question is each division has a set number we knew that going forward right but let's just say we're you know months in you haven't heard anything and now we have six people from Virginia Beach that need this score are they able to take up seats from somebody else and is there a cost differential um I as a reminder we have 12 allotted for us just to give an example and
012so if we were to go over our 12 and there was a 13th student in need if one of the other participating school divisions had less than their aotment that's part of the discussion that we would be having that you could buy a seat correct well not even not even necessarily buy being that it's already covered there no additional cost that we'd have to incur we would just be taking up the seat that they've already essentially have secured for that moment okay i just worried about you know a division having one student in and they're paying a specific amount of money that's why I said could we buy a seat okay okay thank you yeah so additionally the the the beauty about the this first year is it's fully the the program is fully funded
013so the only thing a division would have to pay is for the transportation costs of any students that attend because to your point when we get into the second year where we've got a a shared funding formula where it is um allocated by division size like Mr jameson said we have 12 slots i think Portsouth might have four slots um that's what we're responsible for um if we needed to get more than 12 then there would be a share we would pick up that cost from Portsmouth if Isa White all of a sudden wanted to join in or some other region two school division wanted to join in then we would work with them on what that cost would be perfect uh because we had five willing to start but I think what will happen
014is particularly those on the south side Southampton County southside too right might want to get involved and there you know you could conceivably because in Ches Peak you could probably see somebody want maybe from Hampton or News it's not too far a drive for them but Great thank you Miss Felton thank you Chip Brown um it was reported public notice that um the Harvard uh hope center had a public hearing school board hearing today governor's hearing today being that we are the physical authority of the uh Harbor Hope Center region 2 will we have access to the meeting minutes and things that took place today and and I guess maybe the administration we're going to hold off on that Dr robinson and telling us what was taking place today yes so Miss Felton we did
015have our first uh committee of superintendent uh and governing board meeting today um that was necessary because we need to get a program coordinator recommendation through so and and we also needed to have the governing board review the bylaws and review theus and those things and so that occurred today the bylaws were accepted i was named the executive officer uh Miss Williams was named the chair of the governing board and the vice chair is uh Miss Thomas from Norfick public schools um so those minutes will circulate through Miss Williams as the chair and then Miss Williams as a leazison will share that information with the board but certainly since this is such such a new venture at any point in time we can come in and do a presentation like we're doing right now to
016make sure this board is aware and this felt in the way we wrote theou we're treating this as a foyer uh organizations the governing board so the meetings are open and and the medium meetings are open i was uh I was uh really aware of that being it was made public that the public know that we was having those uh meeting as well that they were invited but wanted to make sure that since we are the physical entity of this new beginning and new building new program that we would have privy to the minutes and everything else that goes on in these meetings as well will these will these meetings be televised as our meetings or tell I was asked by one of the constituents will they televise these i think our goal is to
017move the actual meetings down to the center once it's open and I'm not sure the center has the capacity the Harbor Center has capacity for video transmission so that would be something we'd have to talk about in the future okay but that that is something that we might look at look into in the future being that it is a part of uh J City Public Schools and the constituents knowing having information where we meet the parents and meet the constituents where they are to make sure they get this information as well either way I'm sure that's a good thing for the governing board to talk about it just I think the next meeting will happen at the location in Chesapeake and I don't know enough about the location whether it has that capability and what
018we would have to do that's certainly something that Governor B can look at okay so I the reason why I'm bringing these things up because it can be confusing being that we are the physical authority but everything is taking place in Chesapeake and our constituents our parents whoever they need to understand how this is going to be laid out the format how they will have um access to all that's being said and done because I really want that to be one of the things that we do be transparent parent as we move forward because we that can get lost in the process and I want to make sure that we have the entity out there the information out there thank you Attorney Lenny Venetti Dr robinson Vice Chair Williams um yes thank you and one
019of the other things that we did today was previewed the handbook which explains everything in great detail for the students and parents and that'll be all on the website once um once we get that going and it'll be um the marketing campaign will hopefully be very robust and that will be brought to us um once I get started we had to of course wait till we approved a coordinator which um Dr robertson will bring forth later on this evening so that was super exciting but I do want to thank um Dr stner he's not here but for all the work and for you um Mr jameson and Miss Lenetti and Dr robertson and all the superintendents because it has been you know a lot of work to to get everything and and again we voted
020on the bylaws today looked at the handbook um looked at some o some other um quarterly meetings which hopefully we will meet at the center um the reason why it's in Chesapeake is because they donating the space and that was huge i mean just huge and it's the old Great Brbridge High School or middle school yeah it's the Old Great Brbridge High School so they already have custodians there they already have a nurse they have and they're and they're donating the maintenance the custodial fees the paying the nurse and the building so that that's just huge huge right there so selfishly I would have liked it down the street from my house but you know when someone gives you a building in Chesapeake you you know you take it so we're very grateful for um
021Chesapeake School Board and and um the Chesapeake Peak folks for don donating that to us but um I'm super excited about it and I will um invite you all to come and visit of course when we get running i think our coordinator is going to start in early July and then we're ready to go um September 2nd and I really liked I really appreciated Dr stner's um comment about you know we're a school first harbor Hope is a school first and then recovery because so often our students like Dr robertson just said there's a dozen that that have had to move out of Virginia Beach public schools to live elsewhere um they had to pick recovery over education and I know that's I I know that road because it happened to us too and so
022this way they can be with their family and the wraparound services their family gets help they get help but they very importantly they get to go to school they don't have to choose between education and recovery so I thought that was a great comment today and again I thank all my colleagues for your support in this and um we will report back thank you Madam Chair i just want to let you know that uh Miss Rogers has her hand raised to get into the queue okay Miss Rogers thanks so much um I'm just wondering it was stated that theus and the bylaws have been executed when will we be getting copies of those so um we'll send those to you again i I sent those as part of a package uh and this is a
023good question for me to get direction from the board because I'm planning on doing it again at the end of June where I'm going to package three memos together with my June update so I think with my May update I sent theou and bylaw so Miss Rogers we'll we'll send it again to everybody um but it is probably a good discussion for the board when I send my June update which is g be Monday it'll be accompanied by three other documents that are critical documents for your review is that helpful to bundle those things together or is it more helpful to send you separate emails i appreciate you asking and I just want to make sure because I didn't see the uh executed and bylaws in the May bundle for me i think it's easier
024for it to be separated but I mean obviously my colleagues can weigh in as well madam Chair just a a point of contact context um theou and bylaws were uploaded to the schoolboard SharePoint site as directed so okay I'll um make my comments once everybody else has had the chance to speak miss Malik um not a question but so there are a lot of leader leaders in this little corner of of the Commonwealth but I just want to publicly thank the leaders in our division that have stepped up to to do this work uh Mr jameson Dr saltner um particularly proud of our superintendent um and anyone who had a hand in this um and and and you said it in the beginning but really a huge a huge uh debt of gratitude to our
025uh our attorney um I do know thatou was daunting cumbersome any any any other language I could use to to express that um with everything else we have going on um in this division the work you did it does not go unnoticed and um I I appreciate you okay I'm going to go to Mr cummings and then Vice Chair Williams and Miss Felton uh just to answer Dr robertson's question um I think whenever actions required just putting in subject line action required is always a good good practice um along with folks being diligent in their email is also good but just for clarification I think Miss Rogers asked about executed documents i'm not seeing I'm seeing docs that aren't signed not that to me it's a huge thing but I think she is asking for
026I don't think there's too much delineation between those documents and what was signed vice chams um yes Dr robertson I think either like highlighting or something or separate because yeah last schoolboard meeting when it was stated that theUS weren't set out sent out I went and looked cuz I thought for sure I had read it and and they were sent out but sometimes it gets very overwhelming about the amount of information and we don't want anything to accidentally be missed so if you could somehow highlight or send separately I would appreciate that thank you Miss Felton thank you i I find it very um convenient when it's placed in SharePoint and I was having a problem with my SharePoint getting to it uh now it has been rectified by uh technical center the only way
027I was getting to certain things was I would had to go into Miss into Regina's mission uh u email and click on the link so I would prefer it's a lot of information it's a new project is coming at full throttle i would prefer me personally my information going to the SharePoint and I can click on it it's easier to read sharepoint is more is user friendly to me emails when you click on the emails you're looking all over the all over the place and my email has a tendency it's no no um reflection on our technical department because they're always there they fix me up and get me going but I just have a problem with my emails when I'm outside of the building but SharePoint work me work really well for me so
028I would love to have my information come from Dr robinson in my SharePoint thank you thank you um so I personally don't feel like I want a separate email for every single item because that could really um get complicated and um I also like the idea of um sort of meeting multiple needs here so maybe if there's something in there hey just so you know this is in here um that way board members know to keep an eye out for that specific item and then maybe also we can have that uploaded to SharePoint i think that would help a lot of folks and then um of course board members if they don't know where something is um they can most certainly reach out and you can tell them it was in your update so um
029those are my thoughts and I don't see any other discussion and there's no other hands raised okay so I will do I will do both i'll have it placed in SharePoint including the upcoming memos that we're going to send and uh an email uh noting whether to Mr company's point is it to read and review or is there action required just to give you greater uh clarification on what what the purpose is and I just have a question for the chair and obviously open up to the board would it be even more helpful to have a separate tab like we do for other items like FOYA the to have a separate tab on the side for just Harbor Center would that be even more access to have everything in one spot I I I think
030a separate tab is is fine here yeah thank you i think that's what the board's nodding so um All righty thank you very much i appreciate all of your work on this um this is very important i'm excited about it i would just ask that um as a flyer becomes available that maybe you could provide it to the board so that we can um give it to the community members that we think could get it into the right hands to generate some in additional interest so thank you thank you okay we are now on to the forecast of regular schoolboard meeting agenda topics for the first quarter 2526 um in your packet here so that you can review it and I'm going to turn it over to Dr robertson yes uh thank you Madam Chair
031so as you know we have one meeting in July and it's the retreat and uh that agenda uh for topics was already discussed and approved and so uh you have the topics here listed on the forecast and you also have a schedule for that day it includes the start time the lunchtime the end time uh moving to uh our one meeting at this point in August uh we've got two workshop items summer programming review where we're going to some of the feedback I received and in my evaluation was the the board really wanted to see achievement data so part of that summer program review is going to be sharing all the achievement data that we have available to us to include um participation in our various programs then there'll be a summer staffing update i
032just want to say that uh the work of Dr tropman and her team um is I I don't even have the right adjective uh because this is the time of year where people are weighing their options and uh as they're coming in they're heading out so we're uh we're we're we're in pretty good shape considering um where we've been in the past so but I want to make sure the board is aware August 12th where we are in terms of opening up schools with fully staffed um and then there's a couple of information items a program evaluation schedule and then two uh evaluation readiness reports we move into September um there's going to be a school opening update you know one of the things that happens every summer is summer projects renovations maintenance all those
033type of things and uh although we will have been in school a couple of weeks we want to let you know what the status of those projects are and that'll be on the 9th also on the 9th as you know I've put together a a CIP committee workg group where we're looking at uh CIP projects and the CIP itself as well as Princean High School we'll provide the board with a workshop update of at the conclusion of that work which would be September 9th then you go into information and it's we got the 403b oversight committee membership and budget calendar the second meeting in September um again we're going to come back to you staffing up for success and open of school update to give you a real clear picture of where we are with
034staffing in all of our schools and then their interim financial statements so it's uh not a whole lot of meetings not a whole lot of meetings in that first quarter but that's what we have right now and this is a planning document as things emerge we can certainly make adjustments but this is where we're going kind of as a preview at this point happy to take any questions any questions okay and no hands raised okay dr green uh Dr robertson when will we and this may be information you may already be planning for can get an update on the transition of Bayside Middle School um the closing of of Jericho Road and then how it's looking um with our students who are will be transitioning to the middle school to make that a comprehensive middle
035school yeah so Mr freeman oh yeah we'll we'll look at what the best date for that is i can tell you that there's there already plans in place like my wife is working at Bayside 6 and and her room is closed up and her stuff's being rotated this week over to the middle school and um so Mr freeman put together a work plan probably five months ago with very various departments that are involved with the move from Dr smith was staffing um the the schools as we talked about we wanted to make sure we didn't um eliminate positions at Bayside 6 we just moved them to Bayside 78 so we can give you an update on that process but best thing might be let's take a visit the first week of school because that'll be
036really the proof in the pudding what's it look like at that point yeah yeah and uh just to answer that um I will I will also work with Dr robertson um and vice chair Williams to look at maybe August 12th or September 9th in conjunction with Mr freeman so that we can make sure that the board has everything that they need on that all right um Miss Lenetti do we have time to do anything enclosed right now i have one brief matter yes I do have one brief matter I need to go over and on a real estate matter and an update on litigation and then if you wanted to start something else we might have some time but that probably those two matters probably don't take more than 5 10 minutes so we'll do
037those two matters and then we'll save the others for later vice Chair Williams will you please read the motion to go into closed i move that the school board recess into closed session in accordance with exceptions to open meetings law set forth in code of Virginia 2.2-3711 2-3711 part A paragraphs 1 137 and 8 as amended to deliberate on the following matters one discussion consideration or interviews of prospective candidates for employment assignment appointment promotion performance demotion salaries disciplining or resignation of specific public officers appointees or employees of any public body and evaluation of performance of departments of schools of public institutions of higher education where such evaluation will necessarily involve discussion of the performance of specific individuals any teacher shall be permitted to be present during a closed meeting in which there is a discussion
038or consideration of a disciplinary matter that involves the teacher and some student and the student involved in the matter is present providing that the teacher makes a written request to be present to the presiding officer of the appropriate board nothing in this subdivision however shall be construed to authorize a closed meeting by a local governing body or an elected school board to discuss compensation matters that affect the membership of such body or board collectively three discussion or consideration of acquisition of real property for a public purpose or of the disposition of publicly held real property where discussion in an open meeting would adversely affect the bargaining position of negotiating strategy of the public body seven consultation with legal counsel and briefings by staff members or consultants pertaining to actual or probable litigation where such consultation
039or briefing an open meeting would adversely affect the negotiating or litigating posture of this public body for the purposes of this subdivision probable litigation means litigation that has been specifically threatened or on which the public body or its 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 is
040consulted on any matter namely to discuss A superintendent's contract B discussion on property at Jericho Road C schoolboard attorney evaluation d status of pending litigation or administrative cases e consultation with legal counsel regarding probable litigation and pending litigation matters motion made by Vice Chair Re seconded by Miss Dwire any discussion seeing none I call for the vote to go into close session so Madam Chair we have nine eyes the motion did pass to go into close thank you heat heat i see you hello whereas the school board of the city of Virginia Beach has convened a closed meeting on this day pursuant to an affirmative recorded vote and in accordance with the provisions of the Virginia Freedom of Information Act and whereas section 2.2-3712 2-3712 of the code of Virginia requires a certification by the
041school board that such closed meeting was conducted in conformity with Virginia law now therefore be resolved that the school board of the city of Virginia Beach hereby certifies that to the best of each member's knowledge only public business matters lawfully exempted from open meeting requirements by Virginia law were discussed in the closed meeting to which the certification applies and only such public business matters as were identified in the motion by which the closed meeting was convened were heard discussed or considered is there a motion for the certification of closed moved by Miss Dwire seconded by Mr cummings any discussion seeing none I call for the votes to certify close session so madam chair we have nine eyes the motion to pass for certification of close session all right and this informal session is adjourned and
042we will reconvene at 6 p.m for a formal meeting