FCPS School Board Meeting 2-18-2021

001good evening all it is now seven o'clock we are ready to begin our meeting this february 18 2021 regular meeting of the fairfax county school board will now come to order i will take roll miss cohen here miss corbett sanders good evening everybody is there not colfax hello good evening mr fish hello hello miss keys gamara good evening miss mclaughlin here miss marin good evening miss obeish hello miss makarsky good evening everyone ms tolen good evening thank you mr anubudo i'm here good evening good evening everyone please rise as our student representative nathan anabudo leads us in the reciting of the pledge of allegiance followed by a moment of silence mr anubuda i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under

002god indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you thank you all in order to comply with section 2.2-3712-d of the code of virginia it is necessary for the board to certify that since the fairfax county school board convened a closed meeting on february 18 2020 and to the best of each member's knowledge only public business matters lawfully exempted from open meeting requirements and only such public business matters as were identified in the motion convening the closed session were heard discussed or considered by the board during the closed meeting i see that's been moved by ms corbin sanders and seconded by ms omash all in favor miss corbett sanders miss omaesh miss marin mr frisch ms seisma heiser miss cohen darren kofax miss tolin miss bakarski gotta move my screen here um i'm so sorry

003i lost my place here miss cohen miss stolen ms darren colfax miss tolin miss mclaughlin mesquiz gemara and myself i don't think i've recorded a vote for everyone was there anyone who abstained or voted a no i'm so sorry miss seismo heiser i did not call your name that is unanimous thank you and i'll call him mr anubuda for an announcement mr anubudo thank you dr anderson march marks march 2nd marks this time read across america day education associations um at the nea red cross america now in its 21st year is an annual reading motivation and awareness program that calls for every child in every community to celebrate reading on and around dr seuss's birthday this year's celebration is based on the theme celebrating a nation of diverse readers since a clear message that our

004public schools are places where every child is welcome and encourages students to delve into diverse books from diverse authors that will appeal to an increasingly diverse student population in cities and towns across the nation teachers teenagers librarians politicians actors athletes parents grandparents and others develop nea's read across america activities to bring reading excitement to children of all ages thank you dr anderson doctor and you're on view thank you mr anibuto i believe you have a second announcement as well for national foreign language week yes ma'am i do thank you national forest language week is march 7th through the 13th the week of march 7th through the 13th in 2021 has been designated as national foreign language week the alpha mu gamma foreign language honor society has sponsored national foreign language wing since 1957 and the

005theme for 2021 is open your mind to language schools are encouraged to use this opportunity to highlight the value of learning world languages and to celebrate the successes of world language students and teachers learning a foreign language also promotes cultural sharing and understanding in today's global community thank you thank you i understand we have a sound issue that there's no audio for our audience at home that we have either music playing or no audio uh ms smallberg can we have this be checked on by it and a confirmation working on it and we hope to have it fixed in a moment okay until it is um repaired we will recess until that point so please stand by okay the i team has fixed the problem thank you very much for fixing that issue being that

006the first part of our meeting was not heard by our public we will need to revisit um the certification of close we will not do roll call because i believe we have everybody on board so let's start again in order to comply with session 2.2-3712-d of the code of virginia it is necessary for the board to certify that since the fairfax county school board convened a closed meeting on february 18 and to the best of each member's knowledge only public business matters lawfully exempted from open meeting requirements and only such public business matters as were identified in the motion convening the closed meeting were heard discussed or considered by the board during the closed session that is moved by ms sanders and seconded by miss cohen all in favor miss sanders i'm sorry miss corbin

007sanders miss cohen is there not colfax miso maesh seisma heiser mr frisch miss picarski miss marin miss tolin miss mclaughlin and myself thank you please lower your hands that is 11. we don't have a vote registered for ms keys gemara at this time oh and miss keys gamara just voted so that is unanimous thank you uh mr anubudo i will ask you to go ahead and represent your announcements um in just a little while but before i ask you to do that i will share the general announcement that if you would like to review a copy of the agenda and any agenda item that is being discussed tonight that information is going to be provided to you online and tonight's meeting is being broadcast on channel 99 and live streamed on the website at fcps.edu

008dot tv i'm sorry slash tv slash ch999 again all of the documents can be found on board docs i call him mr anubudo for an announcement thank you dr andrew um read across america day is on march 2nd education associations nea read across america now in its 21st year is an annual reading motivation and awareness program that calls for every child in every community to celebrate reading on and around dr seuss's birthday this year's celebration is based on the theme celebrating a nation of diverse readers sends a clear message that our public schools are places where every child is welcome and encourages students to delve into diverse books from diverse authors that will appeal to increasingly diverse student populations in cities and towns across the nation teachers teenagers librarians politicians actors athletes parents grandparents and

009others developed the nea's read across america activities to bring reading excitement to children of all ages thank you dr anderson thank you i also call on mr anibuto for the national foreign language week announcement thank you national foreign language week is march 7th through the 13th the week of march 7th through the 13th in 2021 has been designated as national foreign language week the alpha mu gamma foreign language honor society has sponsored national foreign language week since 1957 and the theme for 2021 is open your mind to language schools are encouraged to use this opportunity to highlight the value of learning world languages and to celebrate the successes of world language students and teachers learning a foreign language also promotes cultural sharing and understanding in today's global community thank you dr anderson thank you mr

010anibuto now we will have a recognition of an award that was provided to uh posthumously by one of um to one of our former teachers by the providence chapter of the dar i will ask for the clerk to please pull up the slide and for dr brabrand to join us as he was present to receive this award on behalf of fairfax county public schools this award was provided by minnie beckwith who was born in fairfax county on december 8 1871 to alfred and fanny beckwith who were freed slaves she attended local public schools until she was 15 years old when the teacher told her father she had maxed out for public school education there was no secondary school option for african-american students like many so she began working in a hotel in clifton in 1890

011the beckwith family opened their home to board a new teacher in the area and this teacher encouraged many to continue her education at hampton institute now known as hampton university many started hampton in the fall of 1891 and returned to fairfax to the hughesville school for for the required one year of unsupervised teaching she returned to hampton in the fall of 1895 and graduated the following may she passed the state's qualifying teaching exams and returned again to fairfax county to begin a career that would span 43 years dr bray brandt i'll ask you to pick up and speak to her career at fairfax county at this time thank you chairman anderson uh during this time horton town station clifton cub run hughesville the uh fairfax african-american school and the fairfax rosenwald school where she was

012both an upper school uh teacher and principal in 1902 she married phillip hughes another early african-american teacher in fairfax county and for whose family his bill received its name there were two more generations of hughes that would go on to pursue careers in education in fact her daughter became a public school teacher and principal in fairfax county one grandson became a public school teacher and principal in rappahannock county and one granddaughter is a recently retired professor of law from howard university law school she worked many did in teaching from 1894 until her retirement in 1937 only leaving the classroom for a brief period when she had children at the time of her death at 103 she was the oldest pensioner in the history of fairfax county public schools miss manny beckwith hughes through her own

013career and those of her posterity has left a tremendous legacy on the african-american community of fairfax county and of fairfax county public schools this past saturday the providence chapter of the national society of the daughters of the american revolution awarded misused the woman in history american history award which i and chairman anderson gratefully accepted on her behalf the award pays tribute to the role of women past and present in american history and we're honored and privileged to be able to lift up and share the story of miss minnie beckwith hughes who worked tirelessly to improve the lives of countless children in fairfax county and in fairfax county public schools and it was an honor to be there and we hope that we can do an even better job lifting up many more names of folks

014who have served in the fairfax county uh schools community and to tell their stories thank you thank you dr brabrand at this time i call him miss mclaughlin for recognition of social work appreciation month great thank you chairman anderson um as the only social worker on the fairfax county school board i always look forward to every year being able to read this monthly recognition and just want to express um my tremendous respect and appreciation for our social workers here in fairfax county schools no year like this one has ever shown how important you are to helping our children and also our employees in um grappling with the demands and the challenges of this pandemic so in honor of all of you for march is the national social social work month and school social worker week

015which is march 7th to the 13th this year's national association social workers theme is social workers are essential school social workers are master's degree professionals who are trained to examine and address life's challenges in a holistic way they have expertise in many areas including mental health human development and behavior trauma and family systems school social workers are needed now more than ever as we support students and families during the covid pandemic they increase student and family engagement by fostering positive relationships and creating hope and opportunity for youth and families in need school social workers facilitate skill building and strengthen support systems to help students cope problem solve overcome barriers and access resources to support distance learning and the return to school buildings social workers tackle some of the toughest challenges facing our society in every

016city in every community they develop solutions to increase access to both mental health and physical health care reduce poverty eliminate injustices and protect vulnerable children from harm school social workers are essential members of the school multi-disciplinary team working with school faculty and families to provide coordinated interventions and consultation designed to help students in school and help families access the supports and resources needed to ensure student success they promote a positive school climate and culture through a trauma-sensitive lens to maximize student learning school social workers in fairfax county public schools use their training experience and skills to provide services to children families and school staff in an effort to remove personal and environmental obstacles for supporting student academic performance they are committed to helping every child achieve ensuring equitable access and opportunity building relationships to strengthen

017student and family engagement and supporting mental health wellness to help students succeed in school and in life thank you chairman anderson thank you miss mclaughlin um typically these recognitions will be done in person with some of our social workers to um take some photos with the school board but since we're not able to do that in this setting the social work office does have a video a short video that they would like to share so miss mulberry we are ready for you to play that can change the world my name is anne-marie colligan and i'm the school social worker at west springfield high school i did a home visit yesterday with the mtss and we arrived at the exact moment that the father and son were discussing his failing grades the son felt hopeless and

018designed to attend summer school the father said we were like angels sent the exact moment to provide hope and guidance to his son [Music] hi i'm karen and i support little run elementary school him pima early childhood and the preschool resource teachers and i've enjoyed using my kamochi characters octopus cat cloud and bug to teach my friends how to understand and articulate their feelings particularly during this time opportunity hi my name is jenny alvarez i'm the school social worker at lenovo elementary school early in the school year i made a connection with the organization's store they have since donated food during holiday assistance um over a hundred reusable cemetery napkins continue to offer us with resources for our families and needs and i'm glad to have made this connection thank you uh i'm amy young

019and i work with students who are deaf or hard of hearing at woodson high school the deaf community has faced unique challenges related to accessibility for both technology and communication during systems learning many of our students live in homes where communication is not accessible for them they may have limited available support for their school work and their emotional health in addition to meeting with students during distance learning i've worked to connect families to deaf-centered resources to support their child thank you that was really inspiring um thank you so much to the social work office for providing us with that wonderful opportunity to hear more about the work of our social workers and now we'll call on miss picarski for a resolution recognizing national athletic training month thank you march is national athletic training month and

020this year's theme is essential to health care an appropriate slogan reflecting the important role certified athletic trainers employed by fairfax county public schools play in keeping our students safe the slogan perhaps carries a bit more weight this year given all that has happened since last march and the important role our certified athletic trainers have played in our efforts to resume athletic opportunities within fcps nationally certified and state licensed medical professionals fcps athletic trainers dedicate themselves to promoting the health and safety of our student athletes before during and after practices and competitions while the last year has forced our athletic trainers to adapt to a changing environment fcps athletic trainers remain committed to providing the full complement of athletic health care services that has defined this group of professionals over the nearly 40 years that fcps

021has employed athletic trainers in our high schools in fact even with the interruptions in our spring athletic season over 8 700 students received care from an fcps athletic trainer during the 2019-20 school year accounting for 67 000 visits to our 25 athletic training facilities our ability to re resume out of season workouts last august and competitive athletics in december has required required all involved with our athletic programs to navigate a host of challenges to support our student athletes fcps athletic trainers in partnership with directors of student activities assistant directors of student activities and athletic coaches have been the forefront of these efforts developing and implementing a host of new policies and protocols designed to keep students safe fcps athletic trainers consistently go above and beyond to support our athletic programs and without question are essential

022members of each school's activities program even when faced with unprecedented circumstances fcps athletic trainers play a vital role in our overall efforts to support athletic opportunities for fcps students thank you thank you miss picarski i will now call again on ms mclaughlin for our women's history month resolution ms mclaughlin you're you don't have your sound on just quite there we go thank you um i'm very excited to read this year's resolution uh because as it turns out i just discovered that my hometown of santa rosa california was the first to begin this type of recognition and uh it will be captured in the resolution so for women's history month march 2021 whereas march is women's history's women's history month and this year's theme valiant women of the vote marks the 101st anniversary of women achieving

023this right to vote whereas we honor these those who gathered at seneca falls in for the first women's right convention organized by elizabeth katie stanton and lucretia mott launching the women's suffrage movement the convention's manifesto the declaration of sentiments drew its inspiration from thomas jefferson's declaration of independence but added the words women and women throughout to call upon women to fight for the constitutional guaranteed right to equality as u.s citizens whereas susan b anthony an abolitionist gave many passionate speeches against slavery at a time when most thought it was improper for women to give speeches in public she later joined staunton and became one of the most visible leaders of the women's suffrage movement traveling the country and giving speeches in favor of a women's right to vote in 1872 anthony was arrested for voting

024and fined a hundred dollars which helped bring national attention to this issue anthony and staunton then spent 50 years together fighting for women's rights whereas elizabeth glasgow is a native virginian a pulitzer prize-winning author and the namesake of glasgow middle school she writes wrote some 20 novels many with strong women characters like women who were seeking the right to vote in the early 1900s she spoke at the first women's suffrage meeting in virginia and helped establish the equal suffrage league of virginia whereas the silent sentinels organized by alice paul and lucy burns picketed outside the white house six days a week from dawn until dusk in the bitter cold starting in january 1917. they called upon president wilson to support a women's suffrage amendment to the constitution once the u.s entered world war one public

025opinion regrettably turned against these demonstrations because they were seen as unpatriotic on november 10th of 1917 33 women including lucy burns were arrested and sentenced to jail at the occaquon workhouse in lorton virginia the night of november 14th became known as the night of terror when word leaked out about the inhumane treatment it became the turning point in winning the right to vote whereas women's history month began as women's history week in santa rosa california in 1978 it coincided with the international women's day on march 8. the goal of this event was to bring attention to women's historical achievements many communities across the country adopted this special recognition and this movement became so widespread that in 1987 congress ultimately designated the month of march as women's history month whereas the newly created national turning point

026suffragist memorial is located in lorton virginia and pays tribute to the millions of women who fought more than seven decades to win women's right to vote and whereas kamala harris made history this year when she was sworn in as vice president of the united states she became the first woman first african-american first asian american to hold this office her election coincided with the 100th anniversary of women achieving the right to vote now therefore be it resolved that the fairfax county school board on behalf of the fairfax county commission for women and all of its residents hereby proclaim march 2021 as women's history month and a time to remember and honor the countless women who fought relentlessly for the rights of all women in our great nation i so move is there a second [Music] is

027there not cold facts will you be said thank you thank you miss corbett's thank you miss um dana colfax uh miss mclaughlin would you like to speak to your resolution very briefly because as you noted it was a very comprehensive resolution um but i do want to just simply say that again what i find so inspiring uh not just about the history of the women's suffrage movement uh but again all of the millions of women who knew that um there needed to be change and that they they stood up against so much uh difficulty um across this country and across the world and uh we are better off for it uh especially obviously the 11 of us women sitting here on the school board who just a hundred and one years ago were told we

028were not allowed to vote so i just always find it an exciting resolution and again it was an honor to read it tonight thank you miss mclaughlin is there not cofax would you like to speak to your second yes just very briefly i appreciate miss mclaughlin and her words and um i have told this story several times just briefly the first time i i was in my first year after i was elected and i was at a dance studio with my daughter and it was in lorton and it was the first time i came upon the women's museum the suffragette museum was a small space but i was so moved by the fact about what these women did what they accomplished the tortures that they endured and as i stood there in that moment it

029was as miss mclaughlin said not even having the right to participate in government and there i was my first time as an elected official so i was very moved the first time i saw that and every time i hear this resolution i believe i read it one of the first times but um i um you know we as miss mclaughlin said um the women sitting on this board have have many years of history um to be thankful for these women and the hard work that they've done have done in order to allow us to sit at this table tonight so thank you and thank you for letting us read this thank you are there any other speakers to this resolution seeing none i will now call for the vote all those in favor we have

030ms darnoch colfax miss corbett sanders mississippi heiser miss picarski miss cullen miss mclaughlin miss keys gamara miss omesh ms tolin miss marin mr frisch and myself that is unanimous thank you miss mclaughlin and miss narnac cofax the next order of business is citizen participation speakers are requested to limit their remarks to not more than three minutes the school board will not hear statements involving issues that have been scheduled for public hearings such as capital improvement program budget and boundaries complaints regarding individual students or school-based employees should be directed to the appropriate school principal or other official speakers should refrain from using personally identifiable information and connection with an individual student with in connection with an individual student speakers are expected to deliver their comments with the decorum and respect appropriate to the conduct of the

031public's business thank you for your cooperation and thanks for those of you who have elected to speak to us today we do have 10 citizens who have signed up to address the board and we will also have two video testimonies just a reminder to our speakers that once you have finished your remarks you will be removed from the board's blackboard site that hosts this meeting speakers can continue to watch the live stream meeting on the fcps website i will now invite ms mulberg to call our speakers ms mulberry our first speaker is thomas goudreau thomas goudreau okay i will go to the second speaker profane char street sri skanda forgive me for the pronunciation speaker number two okay um speaker number three joanna sears hello can you hear me yes gladly before my time starts

032dr anderson could i please respectfully ask all school board members to please turn on their cameras so they i know that they're listening to me please direct your comments read your testimony and don't direct comments directly to specific board members thank you [Music] good evening my name is joanne sears and i am a member of open fcps as a reminder open fcps is a volunteer-led non-partisan ad hoc grassroots coalition of over 2 300 parents and growing who came together last summer because we want to advocate for a choice to return to in-person education five days a week tonight i'm going to address women's history month let's take a look at present day history and how women are faring during the pandemic a new academic study which will appear in the journal of gender and society

033this spring shows moms have left the workforce in droves and areas like fairfax where remote instruction was the only offering because of this inequity what the school board has done and others like it will have negative consequences on future wages and occupational mobility for decades to come we know women have suffered the majority in the majority of this pandemic related job losses especially women of color as they've been forced to leave their jobs to take care of their children according to the center for american progress they found that nearly 68 percent of black mothers and just over 41 percent of latina mothers were the primary or soul breadwinners for their families compared with 37 percent of white mothers what does this mean during a global pandemic when school board this this school board has ignored

034science and shuttered schools it means black and latino families and children have been put at significant risk because schools remain closed and mothers have no have had to reduce their hours or leave the workforce because they need to take care of their children who are not in school and in some cases they have unwittingly put their kids in hands of dangerous daycare providers because they've had no choice because they have to go to work and a cross-section of economists have all noted that a full economic recovery depends on getting parents back to work it also means that when the history books are written the fairfax county school board will be directly complicit in disrupting the ability for women and women of color to be able to feed their families and educate their children in a

035safe environment it means our children have been abandoned and in many cases may never catch up to to their peers academically and what have women learn during this pandemic we have learned that pandemics only work for the privileged and this board abandoned mothers who are in the brink of extreme poverty while telling us and our children to be resilient and have some grace it also means mothers will never forget what the school board has done to our children we are women of all political persuasions and we're angry and we're going to get rid of this school board in 2023 or beforehand women earned the right to vote a century ago and we will leverage this right to fire this school board what can you do now listen to science and put schools fps is not

036yours it's for the children our next speaker is mary mac tolar hello go ahead please mary put on your camera i am misloading can you see me yep you're right go ahead thank you thank you for having me my name is mary mack i'm in third grade at chesterbrook i'm the most joyful person you will ever meet i might be young but i can make a difference in this county that would be some real-life women's history i found out right before covet that i was dyslexic it makes me awesome at solving problems but typing takes a lot longer online school makes it worse because even though i'm trying really hard i have to stop and think about things that make absolutely no sense like is this key on a board a little l or a

037big i because on being online all day makes my brain and eyes tired it helps when someone reads me emails or directions i have a helper who comes every day during school when she is not here and my parents are busy with work i suffer i know a lot of kids who have been going to school safely for months it is not fair that some kids get to go to school every day and some kids have to stay at home my twin brother is my twin brother is very good with computers and helps me but he thinks online school is boring and my sister in sixth grade says she is suffering and cannot handle it anymore she used to like school now she hates it and she says that it is pushing her over her

038limits she wants to move away where she can get her normal school life back your job is to do the right thing and our job as kids and to go to school and i don't think we're going to school the right way so please let us go back to school five days a week with our teachers i wish somebody could give me five reasons why they should keep kids out of school and on a computer from nine a.m to three pm but i don't think anyone can thank you thank you our next speaker is christy hudson go ahead please hi can you hear me yes please go ahead okay i propose strategic goal number okay i'm here to propose strategical number five which is five days of the in-person school with a teacher in the

039same room fcps has failed to provide this for a year during which time you've consistently asked us for grace parents afforded you a lot of grace last spring with the unmitigated disaster known as distance learning we gave grace when kids effectively began summer break in march we gave grace covid was new and scary we had little science or data nor vaccines one year later staffer vaccinate we have data proving schools are we know transmission is lower inside of schools than out we know mitigation works we know the risk to vaccinated people is nil and those individuals need not quarantine after exposure we know six feet of distance is not necessary with masks we shouldn't use march 2020 fear to deal with february 2021 reality and the reality is we've sacrificed kids five days a week

040is not a want it's a need school is life for kids it's not just academia but socialization clubs sports mentorship depriving kids of this need for a year has damaged them far worse than the threat of any virus kovid isn't killing kids shuttered schools are students in fairfax county are hurting they're engaging in horrifying self-harm swallowing pills cutting themselves they're suffering life-threatening eating disorders many are failing school kindergarteners who should be establishing a lifelong love of learning are rebelling and acting out figured out strategic goal five five days with the teacher in the same room stop hoarding and repurposing your cares funds use them as intended buy trailers tents lease buildings rec centers libraries whatever for additional space partner with metro or the national guard for buses use your resources fcps is not only wealthy

041it's full of really smart people so stop asking us for grace and start inviting us to the table instead of limiting citizen participation at these meetings take advantage of the parents who are willing to do anything for the children of fairfax county we're doctors lawyers strategists military members and tradespeople and if you're too proud to ask us for help ask the archdiocese of arlington to borrow their playbook on opening schools five days a week in person students are your most important stakeholders unfortunately they don't have union reps i'm sorry miss hudson your time is up thank you they only have us next speaker is emily wells bellow emily wells bell idol i'm here go ahead please just a moment yeah i understand that they couldn't hear me on the uh the conference thank you we'll

042come back to you at the end sir thank you all right me to mute and silence the audio yes thank you yes thank you good evening my name is emily my husband an active duty air force officer and i have three kids i'm here to speak for my kids as well as the other 17 000 fairfax county military kids school board members and staff when you are making strategic plans do you carefully consider military families like mine and their unique circumstances and challenges do you realize that your school closure policies this year have been devastating for military kids especially for those who are new here or who have a deployed parent to help illuminate this i'd like to read some anecdotes from some of my active duty military friends from one if schools don't open

043full-time in the fall i'm going to push for a hardship reassignment out of this area my husband and i both air force members and our three boys we cannot continue on like this another dad writes i'm active duty military my wife has a very demanding job and we're barely holding our heads above water with virtual school for our special needs first grader this is much more than we can handle another i want to know how many military kids have moved here this summer like mine it's one thing to go through covid in an established community with known classmates friends learning pods etc but for the military child who moved here this summer the isolation is heartbreaking and suffocating they don't even know what the underside of their schools look like both of my children have

044been in a holding pattern since july please keep these children close at heart their needs are great and have been completely overlooked here's another if one more person tries to tell me that my kids are resilient they'll make it up all kids are going through this i say no not all kids are going through this all over the country children are not being treated like fcps treats my children all children are not missing in-person schools sports activities we will move again next summer what will military families do to be able to catch their children up will they be thrown in remedial classes asked to repeat a year i am sick with worry another mom friend all of our children's friends back in the state of rhode island have been in school five days a week

045we will be returning there in a year my children will be so behind and that's just the academics the emotional toll this takes on my resilient military kids is almost more than we can bear and the last one is from my son luke we are new to fairfax as well this summer and he still has no consistent friendships his sixth grade class was supposed to make three goals for the new year he only wrote one it reads my goal for 2021 is to not be so lonely please school board members and staff provide a system that honors the sacrifices these families make to serve our country to serve you give us the peace of mind our kids will receive top-notch education inside a school facility next speaker is teddy geiss speaker number seven teddy guys

046yes hi miss mulberry okay thank you good evening school board members thank you for the snow day i'm here tonight to address one problem a problem that has been ignored for months i'm talking about the reluctance to provide more mental health resources to students and teachers in their most dire time of need this pandemic has brought many issues but this problem seems to be overlooked because it carries a certain stigma a terrible stigma that many feel they don't need to touch at tuesday's meeting i was disappointed to see little to no support from mr mesh's amendment to the budget her amendment to provide more mental health support staff would be a game changer in how fcps addresses the needs of students because it's sad to hear that many school psychologists are shared between schools and

047the estimated ratio per student is more than double what it should be recently i joined the group of high school students working with missalmeish to address the student's mental health concerns what i heard was embarrassing counselors aren't checking in students aren't engaged and when someone misses a class no teacher or principal bothers to ask what's wrong fortunately enough i don't have this issue at my school but thousands of other students aren't as fortunate and have bore the brunt of this pandemic without any help from the schools as i've suggested there needs to be a student mental health public hearing within the next month because we need to hear all the problems students have been facing and what we can do to fix it it could be as simple as providing more grading safety nets or

048contracting with tele mental health service to provide something but something needs to be done lastly citizen participation needs to be changed as you've seen most of the speakers here tonight are with open fcps and surprisingly i don't see that lady from the union here but all of you need to stop taking up these slots you know what it's like to wake up at 5 45 a.m do you this monday the 10 slots were gone in 46 seconds 46 seconds while it's admirable that they advocate for others their issues are no longer of concern anymore since we began in-person instruction this week and are phasing in more over the next few weeks and thousands of teachers have been vaccinated but as the cdc director noted it's not a must it's nice to be vaccinated but it's

049not a must students number almost 200 000 in this district and yet we can barely get any slots to speak at these board meetings so please open fcpsfea stop quoting these slots from students because we are the ones whose voices have been overlooked and ignored by everyone i'm letting i'm finishing by letting the school board open fcps and the fba know that the students most in need of the school board's help don't write and they can't stand to speak because there are no thoughts available something needs to change because the student's voice really matters thank you our next speaker is vanessa hall excuse me will i be able to go after uh you will both be called at the end thank you thank you uh hi i first wanted to say thank you to teddy

050that was awesome my son's in your pyramid um so return to school has been a huge undertaking with unexpected consequences for so many for hybrid students the classroom experience will not be the return to normal they hope for and for virtual students many have had their schedules upended despite expectations of a stable learning experience that would keep their families safe the schedule changes seem simple but the impact is far-reaching my own family chose virtual to protect vulnerable family members but also to maintain stability our daughter is in an all virtual class so we were surprised by the level of change that began this week my daughter especially for her the return to school changes were the last straw she broke and she broke hard when i heard the hopeless words life isn't worth living things

051aren't ever going to get better from my daughter i immediately returned to my amazing elementary to ask for help because clearly my daughter was in crisis the front desk and her teachers quickly had her counselor set up time to talk with her only hours later the change in my child was instantaneous although she's still struggling to handle the constant change and disappointment of a pandemic she's working hard to be hopeful i'm speaking now to beg that you ensure that all students have similar access to swift action for crisis and ongoing support for student struggles please fully staff mental health care professionals at each school and ensure that they are available to take care of these kids i know that counselors are regularly relied upon as subs even in the best of times and that these

052counselors may be used to fill the return to school staffing gaps this is unacceptable instead empower these counselors to do their jobs and support the students also please support nathan onobundo's proposal for student wellness advisory committee because it will help students now and far into the future empowering students to voice their needs and problems is a huge step towards enabling all of us to address those needs and support student health something that helped my daughter is hope the idea that we're all working together to limit covet spread so that we can return to a new normalcy that hopefully involves in-person school in the fall please don't give in to forces who push for five days right now instead work to make sure that we can come back in the fall to safe schools for full

053in-person learning we need masks and mitigation to ensure that students can learn and adults can teach without the stress and fear of contracting or transmitting covid please focus on making safe schools not just open schools return to school is a huge change for all fully support the counselors teachers and staff so that they can support the students and their families during this time because it is not just business as usual thank you so much thank you our next speaker is olivia root olivia root see you hi i'm here okay hi my name is olivia root and i'm in the german immersion program at orangetown elementary school i'm really excited to go back to school in person virtual school is not as good as going to school in person because it is hard to talk to

054my classmates and hard to make new friends i feel like i've not made any new friends this year there's someone new in my class and i feel like we'd be good friends but i have no way to get to know her it's also hard for teachers to help me when i have any questions in person it's easy for the teachers to notice when you need help and are struggling and they can walk you through whatever you need help with they can come to your desk and just see that you need help with something for example in school we're working on a tiny house project and i've had a lot of questions that i don't think i would have had if we were in person my teachers are really great but i just really don't feel

055like i've learned anything this year and it's not just in one of my classes it's in all my classes my mom goes to the pentagon every day to work and my dad has been deployed almost all the time that i've been in school and so they're not around if i need extra help or have any questions school is really boring and i really have to force myself to get up in the morning and go downstairs to turn on my computer my little brother who's right behind me asks me every day when we're going to go back to school and he is learning german and math and it's really hard for him to learn that as a first grader a lot of kids in my neighborhood have switched to private schools so they can at least

056go to school in person a few days a week my cousins in kansas and connecticut go in person and they have been going in person for a long time now my best friend her brother live in germany and even they go to school in person and where my grandparents live the kids have been going to school since august and have plexiglass in between their desks it's really hard to understand why fcps kids can't go to school and can't go in person to school my parents switch my older brothers to private schools so they could at least go to school two times a week in person they are glad to have that opportunity but they miss their west springfield high school grants my parents are considering sending me to a private school or even to florida

057so my brother and i can go to school five days a week i don't want to move because i really want to go to irving to continue german and to start acting and i don't want to move away from my friends i have already moved a lot because my parents are in the military and i went to german school before i knew how to speak german that was really hard but not as hard as learning virtual school please figure out a way to get it back to school in person five days a week like so many other kids are doing thank you thank you speaker number 10 mary alice matt mac d armith hi there we're here can you hear and see us yes thank you okay great um i mean the entirety of my

058time to my son who's a sixth grader here in fairfax county dr brabrand and members of the board i am 12 years old and i moved to northern virginia the day all the schools shut down sooner will be a year since i have seen the inside of a classroom meanwhile my peers and friends across the nation have been in person and thriving i hear the schools here are closed to keep everyone safe but i came to speak for all the thousands of kids like me across this district whose voices have been silenced all in the name of that safety we are the kids who sit defeated behind a screen for hours every day because we are desperate for human educational interaction while i have an absolutely amazing teacher who i can't wait to see no

059amount of virtual time can substitute for being actually seen and heard and known for decades we've known the negative effects of too much screen time for children we know that kids can become overweight and depressed from too many screens and yet here we are demanding the children some as young as five be forced to sit behind a screen for hours per day i am one of those kids and you are not keeping us safe you are actively harming us test scores and mental health are down for many students so why are you locking down schools for all the two days when in-school transmission rates among mass teachers and students are and always have been lower than transmission by people out in fact there's a recent mayo clinic study that shows that mask wearing even space

060is closer than six feet is almost flawless in stopping kova transmission the fact is that each of these school board members is safer walking into a class of mass students and teachers than you are out in the community going to a restaurant or to a grocery store so the truth is none of this adds up masks and schools work they protect our teachers staff and students and on top of that our teachers have been vaccinated and many teachers want to be 100 in person with us not doing concurrent learning so that's where you come in we need you to show up by being the voice for all of us who have been voiceless we aren't asking you to make everyone go in person but what we are asking is that you give kids like me

061who are desperate to be in class the chance to be in class five days a week you can make this happen and here's one way the most recent surveys in our county indicate that 50 percent of students and teachers want to be in person while 50 of teachers and students want to be virtual so an easy solution is to let the 50 teachers and student and students who want to be in person do that first five days a week and that the other fifty percent of students and teachers who want to be virtual do so five days a week then you substitute teachers for any classes where there is not an even split this plan removes the stress of concurrent learning on teachers and gives both groups what they really want honestly there are million

062ways to make it work we kids have trusted you and by not finding solutions you are losing our trust unprecedented times call for unprecedented creativity so let's do this thank you thank you mr thomas goudreau good evening i recommend the school board not approved the strategic plan reports goals one through four is written and attached to today's agenda details the strategic plan reports presented to the school board are completely disconnected from fcps's strategic reality the fiscal year 2020 school board strategic concerns summarized in the caring culture resource stewardship premier workforce and student success plan reports is out of touch with current strategic imperatives in all there are over 20 school board strategic concerns listed yet none of them state that the school board should be students to in-person learning five days a week as soon

063as possible only one of the concerns speaks to coveted safety concerns instead i would urge the school board to prioritize the following three strategic concerns over everything else one fcps return students five days a week to in-person learning as soon as possible two return fcps performance to pre-covered levels academically and culturally and three repair damage to relationships among fcps students families and the community repairing damaged relationships will take serious work fcps should not unilaterally change iep services to suit the needs of fcps at the expense of special education students fcps should not predetermine services to fit a desired virtual format virtual education does not meet the needs of all students and is not a free appropriate public education for everyone and lastly fcps should re-establish the family engagement survey and address the impact of hearing

064and rejecting families feedback this past year most importantly fcps should make it a strategic priority to overcome all obstacles that prevent fcps from returning students five days a week to in-person learning teachers teaching in the classroom deserve the full support of the school board fcps leadership and the community and they deserve a resilient plan that has contingencies other than just sending everybody home or hiring more classroom monitors strategies that prioritize everything prioritize nothing the written strategy works so hard to be inclusive that it fails to communicate priorities it ignores the most important issues facing scps today and the years to come fcps return students to a classroom five days a week fcps must return educational quality to its previous nationwide leadership levels and fcps must address tensions between fcps the students and fcps families any

065other strategy fails in the face of these compelling needs please reject the strategy thank you thank you our final speaker is pratha meshavar shrikanda yeah yeah hi my name is prothom and i'm a senior attending fairfax high school this year throughout the virtual learning period i'd like to remind everyone that openfcps is a group with various student members like me many of whom have spoken here today i'd like to start off by stating that this past year hasn't been an easy year for anyone not the school administrators or their or the the school's students or their parents last march we didn't know how to handle the pandemic and on the swing of a pendulum fcps shifted into full shutdown but now a year has passed and it's high time that that pendulum swing back in

066the other direction fatality rates for all age groups are fairly minimal and they're i'd like everyone here to look at the current case death ratio it is high time that we reopen and fcps's fourth strategic goal states that it is to ensure student success but virtual learning is an inefficient way to accomplish it here are my following concerns first i feel that grades right now are being intentionally inflated an ex an example this would be the standard that unturned in assignments have a minimum grade of 50 a standard which is continuously demotivating students efforts to learn second students actual learning of the required content is diminishing as with the increase of an opportunity for them to cheat on assignments and tests in addition many students aren't even able to effectively pay attention in class due

067to distractions like pets siblings and their parents and other ongoing daily occurrences in the household finally and perhaps the most alarming concern is the rise in obesity mental health issues and uh and all the other health issues which are occurring the various negative effects of long-term isolation in humans is well documented and even my friends and i personally have all felt like we're stuck in this continuous cycle of online assignments and staring at a screen day in and day out and we've just lost our motivation to learn and care about what is happening in schools right now but those are just a few criticisms criticisms of virtual learning and i think i speak for everyone when i say it's for many people when i say it is clearly an ineffective way for us to learn

068and hinder students abilities to understand what's going on and we can't stand idly by while that happens students education is highly foundational and we it's best depicted by a building that we build upon each year and is supported by the core subjects which we are taught and we can continue to build upon that uh building like each year with more and more knowledge but if even one layer of that foundation is weak the whole structure is going to inevitably collapse in other words if the goal of our educational system is to truly ensure student success we have to in and that might be in college uh their future careers or some position external to the labor force we need to switch back to our model that try to fly maintain mental and physical health and

069academic we have two videos one from robert rigby and one from tina williams good evening school board members dr brabrand and senior staff my name is robert rigby i am co-president of fcps pride which is an organization for lgbtq staff and parents um i want to talk about the strategic goals of of uh preserving resources and fostering a caring culture um you may have seen as i did the screenshot this week um of the folks aiming to find teachers who were virtual because of an ada request uh and to scour their social media to find evidence of them living their best life um i know a lot of teachers i don't know any who have cloned an ada so that they can live a life of rivalry in secret um i know a lot of

070teachers who are terrified for this health for their health there is this whole myth uh a hateful myth that there are droves of teachers who have claimed ada accommodations uh so that they don't have to teach in person and that they're going to stay home and monitors will watch their class it's really a very small number of people 800 out of 25 000 full-time positions and the people on ada really need to be on ada folks have been targeting teachers since the beginning of the year for things they say on social media scouring their social media and targeting them they've targeted lgbtq teachers many of my members um they've targeted minority teachers that targeted teachers with disabilities they've targeted teachers for simply not keeping their political opinions secret during the election um we really you

071as educational leaders really need to preserve the resources of your staff and and to defend your staff uh because the environment has become really really hateful i know it's been hateful for many of you but many individual teachers who haven't done much of anything are being inv are being targeted uh their administrators are being emailed uh people are trying to get them fired or disciplined it's it's gotten really bad um and my organization can do something to defend teachers and to support them but jews educational leaders i think really need to speak up and speak out and defend your staff we need you in this time thank you good evening i want to wish you all a happy social worker appreciation week as you all have noted in this week's work session fcps staff are

072taking home less money in their paycheck today than they were this time last year fcps staff are working around the clock to provide high quality education for students in our community it would be inexcusable to require our school staff to go above and beyond and then turn around and deny these very same workers their much deserved step increases and cost of living adjustments we appreciate the school board's decision in recent weeks to improve on its initial employee compensation proposal and we urge this board to provide all fcps employees with step increases and market scale adjustments in this budget just last week governor northam announced that the state revenue reforecast is far better than expected the senate has proposed giving all school employees a 3 percent raise and the house has proposed a 5 percent raise

073at the same time all neighboring school districts around are providing employees with a step increase and many are providing a market scale adjustment as well frankly we are losing our competitive edge when the cost of living in fairfax is higher and the compensation is lower than neighboring districts our members are starting to question if fcps is the right place for them to work we appreciate that fcps has discussed giving all fcps employees a market scale adjustment but employees deserve their step increases too if fcps moves forward with the proposed budget this would be the second year in a row that employees go without their expected step increases to ensure that all fcps staff at every level of the pay scale are compensated fairly we urge this board to adopt a budget that honors staff expected

074step increase and a market scale adjustment it's simple fcps staff are professionals and we need to be treated as professionals valuing and respecting staff means compensating them fairly by ensuring that they receive step increases they expect to make when they accept employment with fcps we will not be able to attract and retain a premier workforce if we don't take these steps fcps educators have been here for students throughout the pandemic and before that well before that and we want to continue to be here we ask you to demonstrate that you respect and appreciate fcps employees by treating them as professionals and by adopting a budget that provides steps and market scale increases they deserve thank you miss moberg i do believe that was the end of our citizens citizen participation correct yes thank you we

075are now up to our student representative matters and i'll call on mr anubudo hi dr anderson i'm going to see if my if i can get my camera to work my wi-fi has been good so give me a sec of course can you see me there we go yes sir good to see you nice to see you too dr anderson um and same with the entire community um dr bray brand leadership staff in the school board i have a couple of different things that i hope to speak about um during my student matters at this particular portion i'll try to keep brief but there's a couple different things i want to touch on um the first thing i want to speak to though is the calendar discussion i think from what i've heard so far

076from where i sit there has to be a better way to compromise i'm of the mindset that recovering student learning loss is the single most important priority the school system faces as we talk about returning to in-person schooling and outlining the upcoming school year if the leadership team believes the extra week of summer programming that option c provides is a tool to help begin recovering some of that learning loss then i believe that extra week is absolutely vital however we have done so much work to ensure that the community feels heard and seen throughout this calendar process it seems particularly detrimental to fall back on that messaging at this stage in the game to me it seems impossible that we can't find a way to end school a week earlier and honor the extra holidays

077laid out in options a and b i don't know maybe we can remove seven or so of our snow days or something we rarely use them anyway the current situation is being billed as an either or either we prioritize the recovery of learning loss or we honor the work of the calendar committee something tells me it doesn't have to be in either or and it would be really amazing if the leadership leadership was able to come back with a more robust compromise as a student i see through my friends the near impossible choices that students are sometimes forced to make as a result of our previous practice of holiday recognition so i know the importance of the inclusion that options a and b offers however i also recognize that in a community as diverse as

078ours we will likely never reach the goal of being as inclusive as is actually necessary in situations like these i don't believe that it doesn't mean we don't try to try by taking steps like moving towards calendars resemble options a and b but rather that means that our ultimate goal as a school system a system is large and diverse is ours a system that serves countless diverse populations our ultimate goal must be to reach a place where grace understanding and flexibility is commonplace within each of our classrooms a place where it isn't such a horrifying thought for at least some of our students to miss a day or two especially for religious observances moving back into buildings doesn't have to mean moving back into the pressure cooker environment that fcps all to happen all too

079often mr colton those are my thoughts regarding the calendar conversation switching gears a bit i am super excited to announce that the in a word tool bookstore is now live i want to give a super duper special thank you to the bookworms to bookworm central a local company for helping me realize my goal of helping our school system find creative ways to get um books into the hands of our young learners and our most disadvantaged learners especially to the company's leader miss radical josh um thank you for all your help throughout the process as well as have cps leadership for making this possible specifically mr jay garan um and our comms office if you would like to know if you would like to donate a book or two um speaking to the fcps community now

080um i will be posting the link to my twitter account sometime shortly so you can go check it out there the the account is njo nathan156 live there sometime shortly i was switching gears again a bit i want to talk about very briefly i just want to take a brief moment to publicize and across our school system we're doing is to bring the class senior classes at our high school high schools and fcps together um this particular issue is close to me as i'm a senior myself so i want to give a special thanks to the students i'm working with on the senior planning committee as well as principals assistant principals parents and leave pouring into our seniors as we move towards graduation and everyone starts to see the things our system is doing to

081celebrate seniors i just want the community to recognize the amazing people students staff members and leadership lastly um very briefly i want to touch on something that i touched on in my last two representative matters because i think it's extremely important we all need to continue working together as a community to bring the temperature down as i said in the last meeting it is so so very evident to me that students are deriving behavioral cues from all of the adults in their lives in a time full of so much natural change and stress anxiety last thing young people need is for the adults in the room to pile onto that it's not one person or just not coming from one place but it's collective angst that is built from all of the the natural that

082this change is brought on all of us i see exhibiting exhibiting it everywhere i go and i know that students are deriving some of their stress from those from those places and i just i i urge to continue to find ways to work to bring the temperature down because it hasn't been easy on students students are suffering and the last thing these caring adults need um is to pile onto that stress so i encourage all of us to continue to find ways to help our students our young people cope with the amount of change that's going on because change is natural part of life and we're getting real life experience people having to deal with this kind of change so i think that that's so important to me and i'll say it because i see

083it every single day i think we lost your feed if you are able to log back on then we'll allow you to go ahead and finish but i'm going to move on to the next agenda item at this point um oh yes you're back go ahead please i was done go ahead and complete your statement nathan that was it dr anderson i think my feet cut off right on time the wife okay well that actually worked out that was everything thank you of course and thank you nathan at this point i would like to call on mr frish for a recommendation for mosby woods elementary school renaming mr fresh uh thank you uh dr anderson i move that the name of movie woods elementary school be changed to mosaic elementary school i further move that

084the superintendent be directed to change the name by the beginning of the 2021-2022 school year [Music] is there a second thank you miss eisenhower heister mr frisch would you like to speak to your motion yes thank you um when we first set out to rename mosby woods elementary school i was cautioned that school name changes even those that seem like no-brainers are never easy um things get complicated very quickly i was told in my view the one thing that has never been in question during this process is the fact that confederate john singleton mosby's name should not remain in a place of honor within fairfax county public schools in a letter last year many of mosby's descendants his great great and great great great grandchildren endorsed the board's effort to change the school's name writing

085quote in the interest of furthering the mission you are already engaging in of maintaining an inclusive environment for all students we hope that your institution will follow the precedent set by justice high and change the name of your school to something that does not include the name of our ancestor in the fcps strategic plan we commit to fostering a responsive caring and inclusive culture and we cannot live up to that standard when students attend schools named in honor of the confederacy and so this board voted to change the name of mosby woods elementary school as part of that process we offered names for consideration and commenced with community meetings and public hearings when engaging the community it is never easy to tell whether the fraction of the community that shows up for a meeting or

086any on any given day is representative of the views of the broader community as school board members we struggle with this reality every day in our work we work hard to do our best to reach out and to listen during the initial community engagement process those participating largely coalesced around the name mosaic arguing that the name was a repudiation of the school's current namesake and encapsulated the diverse student body the school serves none of the other names offered in that initial round received traction as the board prepared to make a final decision on a name for mosby woods in december i pumped the brakes after hearing concerns the name mosaic might be geographically confusing to some because of the shopping district because no other name had consensus i opted to delay renaming mosby woods in

087favor of offering additional names for consideration holding a third community meeting with the hope that this would encourage more community engagement we had our final community meeting on tuesday evening and twice as many people participated while there was more interest in these new options than there had been at our previous meeting it was clear that the only name considered thus far that attracted significant support was mosaic and few members of the school community shared the geographic concern as one parent told me mosaic is not perfect but no option is why should it be rejected out of hand for its few shortcomings when other names are not i spent the last two days on the phone almost all day talking with constituents and my colleagues to try and build some sort of consensus on this topic

088i know that mosaic does not represent the direction that everyone would like us to take i am disappointing some with this motion i know that this process has not been perfect but i also know that mosaics as a symbol can send a powerful message during one of our public hearings we heard the words of some mosby woods 6th graders who said quote we are all different cultures and then when we are put together we are beautiful picture where we all belong they also said a mosaic is a metaphor for their school because they quote are people who come in different shapes and sizes and we embrace and celebrate our difference in a mosaic every tile is different but we celebrate unity it is in the spirit of that unity that i have sought to build

089uh i've sought to build unity during these deliberations and with this motion i am if i'm being honest i have not always succeeded but i have worked hard to listen to our community and my colleagues so that i could encourage agreement and find commonality if possible what we choose to name a school matters names command power that is why so many schools were named after the confederacy when racists pursued a policy of massive resistance to keep virginia schools segregated whether we name a school after a symbol of unity and diversity or after an inspirational figure from a marginalized community who fought oppression or succeeded against all odds we are doing the right thing when we work with the community to rename schools that once honored the confederacy mosaic is not perfect mosaics are not perfect

090but the irregular pieces of stone glass and ceramic that make mosaics result in something special that is my hope for mosby woods community that is the name change results in something special not only for them but for future generations of children who walk the halls of this very special school thank you thank you mr fresh massage my heiser would you like to speak to your second yes sorry um i would very much like to speak my second so thank you and i just wanted to start by saying that i'm really honored to second the motion to change the name of mosey woods elementary school to mosaic elementary school and first i would like to thank my colleague providence district school board member carl frisch for bringing forward this change i'm grateful for his efforts to

091promote an inclusive and welcoming culture in our schools and ensure that inclusion walking culture is reflected in the names of our schools i'm also incredibly appreciative of the hard work that he has done to engage the community including the descendants of the mosley family and to ensure that all voices are heard and consensus is built i know it has not been easy for him to try to build consensus around this name to try to listen to all stakeholders and to really try to center all the voices and i appreciate his efforts because as he said no matter what happens somebody will be disappointed but i very much appreciate the hard work that he has done this school like others was named in the height of massive resistance to integration and it is a very worthy

092goal to replace its name with one of a groundbreaking person of color that's the reason why when we this board renamed lewis high school i was thrilled with the name john r lewis for that school what a more sitting name for a school once named for confederate general than one of the leaders of the civil rights movement in the 1960s but there are limited schools to be renamed and it is clear while the past of fairfax county was massive resistance to integration our future is one that celebrates and embraces our many cultures in short our future is one of multiculturalism where many diverse cultures come together and many diverse people come together to make a beautiful whole it is a difficult task to balance those many voices and nearly an impossible solution to find that

093pleases everyone i think the name mosaic is a good compromise between those who would like to very understandably again overtly reject the massive resistance to immigration by picking an african-american and those who would like to see value in recognizing all of our diverse communities it is a difficult balance and i appreciate mr fish's desire to try to find that balance as a minority student overs that advisory oversight achievement committee stated in their letter to this board yesterday it is important that our school renaming process is inclusive open and transparent with an effort to develop a broader and deeper understanding of our shared community history reflect community values and beliefs and have community consensus indeed this letter fits with the school board policy 8170.7 which describes the policy around school renaming that the school board may

094consider a change in the name of the existing school of facility to ensure an inclusive and respectful learning environment the word inclusive comes up quite a bit and i know mr frisch takes these words and values to heart and it is clear that inclusivity and the community values are one and the same inclusivity is clear in what i saw in the community consensus and reviewing the community feedback the community the words inclusive community and unity appeared many times there also seemed to be a community coalitions around the name mosaic although as mr fisch said it is difficult to get as broad of community to engage as school members would like but again community inclusive unity that is the name mosaic itself a beautiful multifaceted pattern consisting of many materials and colors and shapes unified to

095make a beautiful hole what could be a better reflection of the multicultural future of sarasacks county a future that is already in existence at mosby wood school a school where students come from 40 countries and speak 28 different languages where students from asian backgrounds are nearly 30 percent of the school population hispanic students just over 17 caucasian students 38 and african-american students nearly seven percent in short this school is already a beautiful mosaic of cultures and backgrounds which is exactly what fairfax county has become while we all firmly reject fairfax county's past of massive resistance to integration and it is very important to acknowledge the harm that that has done it is also important to send to all our voices and communities and we should celebrate that mosaic is representative of the future of our

096county we are in the midst of writing a new history of fairfax county a history of a beautifully multicultural society it's a history that we get to write what a better name than mosaic than to start a new history but we are all seen as different and multifaceted where each piece is created and shines differently but all the pieces come together to create a togetherness a unity full of unique discovery that is the future of america and that is the present and future of fairfax county it is not a perfect name like mr sharp said there is no perfect mosaic but it is a name that is looking forward and so i'm honored a second notion to rename lucy which goal to mosaic thank you thank you i see that we have a few board

097members wanting to speak to this motion and we will start with miss cohen thank you so much and i also want to echo very much um my appreciation for sir fresh in being able to share the struggle of trying to get this right um and it's been awe inspiring to watch i i know how much effort he's put into it and i'm i'm really appreciate it appreciative of it um i just want to say when we started this process mosaic was maybe my least favorite of the names that had been circulated i'll confess that especially on a day when perseverance just landed on mars i was pretty partial to a certain nasa mathematician we had some incredible choices for the new name of the school and we also had some incredible advocacy that incredible advocacy

098came from some of our very youngest voices from their parents and their teachers the emails calls and breakout groups that i was in all had one common theme mosaic the most moving advocacy came from our students who very proud of the diversity of their school referenced that their school was like a patchwork quilt that together they made a beautiful mosaic the truth is that the mosaic that is the former mosby woods elementary school is made up of future mathematicians and astronauts who will chart a course to destinations unknown doctors who will help cure diseases politicians who will make laws to right the wrongs of today activists who will fight for true equity and teachers who will grow our future leaders our students at mosaic elementary school will break barriers they will make this world a

099better place and they're starting that journey by learning a valuable lesson that their voices matter that they can affect change so thank you for students who reminded me once again that there is catherine johnson a rebecca crumpler a may jemison a patsy link a sylvia mendez a barbara rose johns and mary mcbride in every single school in fcps thanks thank you miss cohen ms mclaughlin thank you i i really just wanted to take a moment to express my appreciation to my neighboring magisterial district colleague crawfish not only do i deeply appreciate the great care and consideration you've given to this process from start to finish um but your words tonight were eloquent inspiring and i know they touched the hearts of so many who are listening tonight um i am excited and hopeful for your

100community and uh the excitement they will feel in a name that captures how beautiful it is to bring people from so many different backgrounds and cultures and experiences and and create what we know the beauty that mosaics are so i just wanted to really give those those extra words of support and appreciation and they do know having gone through these name changes um previously um they do invoke a lot of emotion and uh as elected officials um it's our best efforts to try and um bring unity and um and healing to this and so again mr frisch uh well done and uh look forward to supporting your request thank you very much ms mclaughlin um miss marin hi yes um i think mosaic is really quite a fitting name i think it inspires inclusivity in

101coming together i think that it's um you know it is near the shopping center nearby but many of our schools have geographical references like that and i think it actually helps people to locate the school in our minds about our vast county you know we have over 100 elementary schools and relating it to where it is geographically can really help with the presence um of a school so i think that that is actually a bit of an asset uh i i think that you know not all of our schools need to be named after people um it sounds like the community wants this particular name and so the will of the community should really shine through and i also you know do applaud mr frisch for his due diligence once again uh the ongoing you

102know work and council he's tried to get and the input i know this is personal for him and you know i think that integrity is doing what's right even um no matter who or how many people are looking and this is the right thing to do to change this name we want we don't want to have racist names on our schools our children's deserve way better than that so thank you very much and i look forward to supporting the name change to mosaic elementary thank you very much miss merritt miss corbin sanders yes thank you chairman anderson i want to first thank the maker of the motion for initiating the process of renaming mosby woods elementary school the work that mr frisch and miss keysgamara have done to change the name of a school named

103after a leader of the confederacy is greatly appreciated and was a much needed change mr frisch has repeatedly reminded us that the renovation of the school provides an excellent opportunity to rebrand the school to reflect the values of one fairfax and i appreciate this initiative and his motivation to do so i know that mr fresh and miss keys gamara have met with community members on numerous occasions and certainly appreciate that although we've made progress in how we approach renaming buildings more work needs to be done on how we approach initiatives such as as this we need to develop guidelines on what our objective what our objectives are in school naming at each level elementary middle and high school is it to associate a school with a location or is it to evoke an emotion or

104provide an inspirational role model to further understanding of our one fairfax equity policy we need to have a clear process of informing the public about the names being considered and how they an individual board members can provide input engage and engage in the process in principle i do not have a problem with naming a school to reflect a geographic location most of the schools in my community are just that and frankly the first school renamed in fairfax county was named after a geography after the community and the board struggled to agree to a name and when south county was built a similar situation occurred my predecessor wanted to name the building after a suffragette who had been incarcerated at lorton which we heard about that tonight in our women's history recognition unfortunately the community didn't

105coalesce around that name but my concern about the proposed name of mosaic is that the name is associated with a different geographic region than that where the current school is located so i appreciate that mosaic evokes strong sentiments and emotions and it's a great name but i cannot uh support the name tonight so um i but i do want to recognize the excellent hard work that all of the board members have put into this thank you thank you miss corbett sanders our next speaker is mr carski thank you dr anderson i just wanted to take the opportunity um to thank my colleague for bringing this name forth i know he has worked extremely hard with the community to listen to them to do the outreach to really find and put his pulse on what the

106the desires are of the neighborhoods and the community which this school serves and he has been extremely committed to that um and having a a transparent process and and also working with all of us so i want to thank you i am happy to support you in in this new name thank you thank you miss mccarskey miss downrap go fast i think you're unmute no you do not have any sound um why don't you log in again and we'll be sure to capture your comments are there any other speakers while we'll wait for miss edward kofax to log in again seeing none i will quickly take a turn and then turn it over to her once she reappears um i appreciate the comments that have been shared by many of my colleagues and my sentiments

107are the same um i do understand and i've seen the work that mr frisch has put towards ensuring that he gathered community input that he spoke to school board members and i know the last two days have been very very busy for him having said that i i appreciate his effort i know that it was hard to come into this place where he was listening to the community but i would have to be honest to say that i i feel like we miss an opportunity here to really make a statement um it is one thing to be responsive to our community and i love that he did that but i also want to be sure that we are making statements particularly when we are renaming schools that were signals and symbols of oppression um having

108said that i will be supportive of mr frisch because i want to be supportive of the community and the feedback he they provided to him but i i feel like we miss an opportunity to really make a statement in our community here regarding our values um so that's it for me and i see that miss dana colfax has come back in let's check your mic and then we will go to ms tolen after you can you hear me yes ma'am you are on all right i will keep my camera off and i will be brief i just do want to thank mr frisch and miss keisgamara for their hard work in renaming um one of the last remaining schools that has confederate ties directly to the to that person to the name of a person

109um i know how very difficult um the renaming process is and um there is rarely a perfect solution but i do want to say that i do appreciate um the the idea of a mosaic because is what moved me when i did hear the speakers from the elementary school and they talked about what an inclusive and welcoming culture they have and a mosaic is a combination of diverse elements so i will be um supporting mr frisch's advocacy and miseismar heiser and um continue in in allowing them to change the name of mosby woods to mosaic elementary school thank you miss tolen yes thank you um i don't really have any new con coming at the end of a long list of very eloquent speakers um you know we've heard about um you know very eloquently

110the the picture of what a mosaic really represents and what the community was thinking when they chose this name and um so i just wanted to you know log in my support for my colleague mr frisch he and i have had many conversations um over our months on the school board about public engagement and the importance of you know listening to the public and i'm gathering that input and and how to gather that input and um so i applaud his i'm moving forward with this name change this evening and look forward to supporting this motion thank you very much seeing that there are no other speakers i will now call for the vote we have on our screen i believe was it posted ms oh madame taylor oh i'm so sorry miss keith gamara i

111did not see your hand there please go ahead and take your turn thank you i'm going to begin my comments by saying thank you to my colleague mr fritz for allowing me to work with him through this up until today and i will apologize to my colleagues because there has been some language that i have heard through this process that does not allow me to support this recommendation so i will go through that history i know that my colleagues have already talked about what mosby raiders meant and how he was indeed a confederate general that intentionally terrorized black children to try to keep them from getting an education we began this process knowing that we wanted to remove that name and initially there were some recommendations particularly supported by staff that included this name i

112had some discussions with mr fritz and he wanted to consider women of color in particular because a number of our schools don't have the benefit of that history those names were may jemison sylvia mendes patsy mink and rebecca lee crumpler this represents an array of people from our community great americans who have taken significant steps to improve the lives of all americans hispanic a a hispanic woman asian woman african-american women as i attended all the meetings i heard not only the push for mosaic which i know was a staff favorite but at the language i continued to hear which is hard for me to repeat basically said and we received it in a letter just this past day these people don't represent us i heard it more than once these people don't represent us and

113i heard it from staff that was hurtful to me because there is no denial that these are great americans in their explanations and i've spoken to community members who had at least one that had that view until our conversation and they said we have asians and hispanics and we have so many people that's why these people don't represent us and mosaic is so much better but i have to question whether we have truly been impacted by the intentional steps of the daughters of the confederacy who made sure that people of color particularly african-americans in our history books i'd like to be allowed to finish because that statement has been repeated by staff and unfortunately leadership and the reason that i can't support this is because when we have that view it implicitly impacts how children

114see themselves i have spent my life fighting to remove barriers to education and any type of barrier for children and when we have staff coming forward saying they don't represent us we need some very serious professional development to make sure that when we look at americans we see ourselves and we permit our children to see themselves no matter where that person comes from and so unfortunately because of this repeated thing i cannot support this but i ask our superintendent to please work with whomever we need to to make sure that these attitudes that could easily be transferred to our students do not cause harm and limit the way our children see themselves thank you thank you mr maesh thank you um and and you know i i will echo um gratitude for mr frisch who

115um has worked hard to bring forward the community's input um and elevate voices that uh throughout this process you know were not included in the beginning and and and repeated efforts to make this happen um i think he mentioned a point in the beginning about what community outreach looks like that's going to be a continued conversation on our board we have this every time we bring any issue where we think about what does it mean when we say we have heard from the community and mr frisch led with that and that's an ongoing conversation we need to think about as a board and it to acknowledge some of what ms keith gamara mentioned um there have been conversations that have been very difficult uh loaded with implicit biases and challenges with that understanding i would

116urge my colleagues that the first step be for us to take our own equity training and i look forward to that opportunity now that we have an equity uh member and on the leadership team to guide us through that but today was an opportunity to say we live in a community we live in a county that speaks over 200 languages that has people from all walks of life uh and that mosaic is a way to bring everyone together under that name and it's a way to bring a name that as as some colleagues mentioned brings healing to the community brings some unity and allows us to reflect on the process of how we do this on what conversations need to be had and frankly on what we need to teach our kids through the curriculum

117and beyond uh to to grow from this together so i'm grateful to mr frisch for bringing this it's been a long road and uh you know full of challenges but i i think he did the right thing and um i think we you know we move forward from today having learned many lessons and and and hopefully with the excitement that we have a school now where we can celebrate the identities of all kids coming in um and hopefully we'll honor that moving forward that that name be used uh to cherish that peace of that school community and what it represents for uh all faces of fairfax so thank you again mr fresh um and uh i'm pleased to support this name thank you very much miss omega at this time ms mulberg will you please

118place the motion on the screen and i will call for the vote all in favor of the motion on the screen at this time please raise your hands miss keys gamara thank you miss marin miss bakarski miss mclaughlin mr frisch miss cohen miss seisma heiser miss tolin missile mage is there not cofax and myself that will be 10 please lower your hands at this point all against miss corbett sanders and miss keys gamara the motion will pass i'll now call in miss picarsky for the motion to award the contract um to the university of wisconsin ms mccarski thank you i'm just sorry i'm pulling that up here we go i move that the school board approved the contract as detailed in the agenda item thank you is there a second miss corporate sanders thank you

119miss picarski would you like to speak to your motion no thank you thank you miss uh sanders would you like to speak to your mom to your second i would just like to briefly uh inform the public that this is the award of the contract for the wida assessments for english language learners and i think this is especially appropriate tonight when we recognize foreign language week so i'm happy to say thank you any other speakers to this motion seeing none i will now call for the vote all in favor we have miss krabit sanders miss picarski miss marin ms darnoch koufax miss tollen miss mclaughlin mr fresh miss cohen massaisma heiser and myself that is 10. um please lower your hands all of those opposed none in opposition all of those abstaining miss omega i'm

120so sorry madam clerk i believe i missed one vote because i shared i think i called ten names in favor and one abstaining whose life did i miss you i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry who is speaking at this point let's give this keys tomorrow could you please provide us with a voice vote i am in favor thank you that will be 11 in favor and one abstention the motion carries we will now call him miss colin for a motion to award a contract to george mason university ms tollin i move that the school board approved contract is detailed in the agenda item do we have a second thank you miss cohen ms tolen would you like to speak to your motion yes just briefly please um this contract is for participation in the early

121identification program with george mason university it's a multi-year program for students who will be the first in their family to attend college the early identification program is sponsored as i mentioned in partnership with george mason university students from grades 7 through 12 are welcomed into the program and to date the early identification program is located in the following fairfax county public schools glasgow homes luther jackson lanier poe sandberg and whitman middle schools annandale fairfax falls church justice mount vernon and west potomac high schools the program includes supports such as financial aid information and guidance scholarship assistance college application assistance college entrance exam preparation access to academic resources such as the khan academy career and job resources and i would like to recommend that we continue this contract with george mason university to offer these students

122offer these services to our students thank you mrs miss cohen would you like to speak to the to your second that needed ms tolland did a lovely job thank you any other speakers of this motion seeing none i will now call for the vote all in favor of this motion to award the contract as detailed by ms we have miss carpenter sanders miss marin miss cohen miss seismo heiser miss omaesh misterana koufax mr fresh miss tellin ms keith gamara and myself all of please lower your hands all of those opposed those abstaining we have miss mclaughlin abstaining i do not believe i've recorded a vote for you can you give us a voice vote please oh i voted in favor earlier thank you so much so that will be here i'm so sorry i didn't

123recognize the voice if i may complete the vote and then i will wreck the speaker or miss mclaughlin did you want to record a vote because i did not have one for you as well is that why is that you yeah my hand's been up for the extension i i had it up the whole time okay so then we we are unanimous and not vote thank you no no no i'm staying oh i'm so sorry thank you miss mclaughlin and it is 11 then it is 11 in favor zero opposed and one abstention which is miss mclaughlin thank you thank you both for that clarification i now call him a seismo heiser for a motion to approve the strategic plan reports goes one through four thank you um i move that the school board approved

124the school year 2019 2020 strategic plan goal one through four is there a second thank you miss tolin miss eisenhower heiser would you like to speak the emotion uh this person i'm going to say that i know that um there was some concern on the board about our usual work sessions around hearing these two goal reports and um you know given the pandemic and the work that our staff has been doing i appreciate the work that they've been doing and look forward to hearing these reports again next year that's all so thank you thank you miss tolin would you like to speak to your second um actually i think miss mccarsey post a second this one but um she has no objection i'm happy to second i'm so sorry i saw your hand up there

125and so i called on you are you are you fine to second the motion i'm fine to second the motion um if that's okay with miss picarsky mr carson do you have any objections miss picarsky's been kicked out again just fyi so we need to just move on the secondary um i really don't have any additional comments beyond what my colleague miss seismer heiser said um you know we do realize we are in a very special time now with kobit and so um you know not all of our priorities that we're working on right now are necessarily reflected in these reports but um you know overall um they certainly you know are very useful and you know will be a tool to help us move forward so i would second this motion thank you and

126the other speakers of this motion miss mclaughlin please go ahead guess thank you as i shared with colleagues and uh dr brabrand uh i very much appreciate uh how the the great um degree of changes and improvements that have continued to be made with these goal reports i really feel our superintendent and his team have been listening to board input uh and continuing to make them stronger unfortunately i know with time on the board's agenda and all the things we have we really weren't able to dedicate um the amount of deliberation with one another that we normally do and i had expressed concern that i thought there's some additional analysis i'd like to see um and and really some more deliberations so uh as a result i i will be choosing to abstain tonight on

127the reports um just because i'm just not quite there not quite ready yet to uh give my my full approval for them but do very much appreciate um all the hard work that went into them and and the progress that's being made thank you miss mclaughlin ms darina kofax can you hear me yes we can okay this has been a journey again um i am appreciate following my colleague miss mclaughlin i have um been as um some of my colleagues noted they've been understanding of the need for efficiency um in during these coveted times and we have been working very hard but i too feel at this point there are many questions that i have not been able to delve into or or suggestions to make for improvements so i wanted to say that and

128state that i wish we had more time and more opportunity to to do this so tonight my vote will also be an abstention i'm not um negating the work or saying i am not supportive of it but i am not at the point where i can completely support this going forward at this time thank you miss corbett sanders i too will be abstaining tonight um for the reasons that my colleagues have already stated but i do want to express my sincere appreciation of the staff and the leadership team in the refinements they have made to these reports but the subjects that are contained in those reports directly relate to our return our ability to be fully successful in returning to school in bridging opportunity gaps achievement gaps and addressing concerns of some of our employees

129there's a lot to unpack and i welcome um next year's report being able to delve into a deeper as a board but uh because we weren't able to delve into it to the same degree and it's no fault of anybody um in this room virtual room but really because of the pressing times that we uh we have before us and the top priority being making sure that we had a successful opening of schools this week and that we have all those students who want to be back in our schools back in our schools in a hybrid model by the middle of march we know that the time was not available for us to do the unpacking that we needed to do so i appreciate everybody's great work but i too am not ready to fully

130adopt something that we haven't had those discussions with thank you thank you seeing that there are no other speakers i will now call for the vote ms smallberg would you please display the motion all those in favor we have messiasmi heiser miss marin mrs karsky miss cohen mr fritch and myself i'm sorry miss tolin and myself that is and miss lamesh thank you that is eight all of those um against we have none all of those abstaining we have ms keys gemara miss corbin sanders miss mclaughlin and mr not kofas the motion carries at this time i'd like to call miss marin for a motion regarding the fy 2022 advertised budget thank you dr anderson so this has been quite the year due to the pandemic but as the budget committee chair i can attest

131that the board and staff have conducted a thoughtful thorough approach to developing the fiscal year 22 budget 2022. with our fiscal year beginning in july work soon kicked off last summer to work with budget priority meetings for members to voice our priorities and in the months that followed we had regular updates where the committee shared to the board in writing and at meetings we simultaneously conducted a budget program review of staffing formulas and program budgets to help inform the current future um current and future budget development and then we also closely monitored the current fiscal year 21 budget as this also informed the development of this fiscal 22 uh development and planning work so the superintendent's fiscal year 22 proposed budget reflects a modest request that focuses on the basic strategic needs of the system

132that is almost level with the previous year's budget despite the overall modest increase the budget is proposed in january does require nearly 43 million dollars in new funds from the fairfax county board of supervisors primarily due to reductions in state federal and other revenue sources but that is not enough evidenced by the compensation discussion among board members at this past tuesday's work session as well as virginia's house and senate deliberations about compensation and our own neighboring communities proposals for additional school system employee compensation as well as a few targeted amendments are believed to have school board majority support this evening therefore an omnibus motion has been developed that is a motion that addresses all amendments proposed as of last night members may speak to the omnibus motion in the aggregate or address individual components it

133should be noted that the purpose of the omnibus motion is to streamline discussion and vote to avoid lengthy discussions about the specific amendments since this was already addressed on tuesday and again we believe that there is majority support for all included items now for the motion i move to adopt the fiscal year 22 advertised budget as detailed in the fiscal year 22 superintendent's proposed budget with the following amendments a increasing the county transfer request by a total of 60.3 million and increasing state revenue by 13.4 million based on the senate's proposal for a total of 73.7 million to find a three percent compensation increase for all employees and b increasing the county transfer by by 0.7 million or seven hundred thousand dollars to fund six positions to supplement select title 1 schools and c increasing

134the county transfer by 0.7 million to fund and address elementary school principal and assistant principal pay parity d directing the superintendent to identify funds for a neurodiversity specialist position in a trauma-informed social emotional learning or sel specialist position and further that the superintendent be directed to review staffing standards for counselors psychologists social workers nurses esol teachers reading and math specialists and classroom teacher positions including a multi-year plan to achieve the best practices ratios prioritize with an equity focus and to be completed in the fall prior to the preparation for the next year's fiscal year 23 proposed budget thank you uh miss merritt is there a second i second it thank you ms dernak kofax miss martin would you like to speak to your motion i do realize you've given us a little bit of background

135i do yes as budget chair i did provide that background just individually i'd like to add a few more things that um work this week was as up to the minute as we could get it as our general assembly members work to determine what support can be provided to our school systems i really urge our partners down in richmond that are there working to be sure to support our public schools as we continue to provide necessary services to our children and families i also do want to point out that the cost of private health insurance is a major driver of the need to ask for more revenue the cost of health insurance is projected to increase 4.9 percent it's 13.2 million dollars over fy 21 as a result of rate increases this is completely out

136of the hands of the school division this is private insurance companies that are squeezing our local services that are offered by our county governments in even our state governments so i believe that we have done all we can to propose a modest request and i look forward to approving this and sending it over to the county board of supervisors for their um for their determination thank you thank you smarron is there not conflicts would you like to speak to your second yes dr anderson i do want to thank my colleagues and our budget chair miss marin for your all of your hard work and the time and the many meetings and conversations we have had to get to this point today i thank lee burden and alex whittington and your entire budget team for their

137positive attitude amazing work at managing our many meetings and answering budget questions in tuesday's work session and i'm sure tonight my colleagues will share their thoughts and rationale for how we came and agreed upon to this omnibus so i will be brief and speak primarily to item a um and i spoke to this a bit during the work session but prior to fy 19 and 20 when fcp fcps received full funding from the county fcps had not received full funding for its budget request since 1995 that was 25 years ago since 2008 we have cut our budget over 70 million dollars including cutting to nearly 2700 positions while we were working to restore those cuts we have not yet done so as a board we must be committed to making certain we are hiring and

138retaining the best and the brightest employees to teach our children to counsel our children to transport our children to feed our children and to ensure that their social and emotional needs are being met and in order to do so we must be competitive with our surrounding jurisdictions previous sports began in fy 17 and our board last year made a commitment that fcps employees including our teachers would reach 95 to 105 percent of our market share it took four years of investments adding nearly 175 million dollars to our teacher scale to reach that goal several of our neighboring jurisdictions have passed salary and proposed salary increases we have invested too much to lose ground now so i appreciate my colleagues thoughtful additions to the compensation element in this omnibus and i look forward to hearing um

139from you and i look forward to passing this unanimously tonight thank you very much kofax um i see that we have several speakers to this motion and we will begin with mrs mclaughlin thank you dr anderson uh first i want to express appreciation to our budget chair melanie maron and vice chair ms tammy darren at cofax having done this work before i know it takes a tremendous amount of time and coordination with senior staff more than the public ever sees so thank you both for your extensive amount of time and effort in that um and i certainly also appreciate dr brabrand our cfo lee burton and the other team members who worked really hard to get us here tonight um as as we talked about at the the final uh budget work session this past

140tuesday i i really want to again emphasize what ms dearnett kofax said while we're very appreciative of our partnership with the county um we're supervisors the county executive and we're very mindful that we are just one of the many services that our taxpayers support every given year it is extremely important that we pass a needs-based budget and part of our needs um irrespective right now of where all of the funding um levels are we need to at least communicate to the board of supervisors and to the public and to our employees um what those needs are and one of those needs is to ensure competitive pay uh the fact that the state through the general assembly and the governor's office are communicating that they do want to see employee raises for state employees and also

141for our educators uh this board deliberated um very carefully on tuesday about how we could best honor our employees and ensure competitiveness here in the northern virginia region and so we'll be supporting on this budget even though it does uh supersede uh what superintendent brabrand initially presented to us and we are mindful of what the county executive has said the um revenue project projections will be but i do think that it's really important that again we communicate our needs um the board of supervisors will then have to take all of this into account and as i shared with um ms kofax and others um i think it'll be extremely important that this board empower dr anderson as chairman of the board um continue in those dialogues with uh for supervisors chairman jeff mckay to make

142sure he understands that we are trying to be good partners we are trying to be mindful of fiscal efficiency and and effectiveness but we really need to have this conversation between the two boards about what do we do for employee raises and most importantly for all employees listening tonight i want to also emphasize something our board has said we realize you've worked extremely hard throughout the pandemic um the last thing we want to see i i think we have i will let you finish that statement but i believe we have some other microphones that are on if we can turn them off so that we don't have that feedback um very quickly miss miss mclaughlin if you can wrap up absolutely i just wanted to let everybody know that we're mindful that with health care

143uh premiums increasing for the school system and therefore on employees as well um that alone is is a concern that we want to make sure people are not working for less come july than they certainly have been this year already so thank you dr anderson thank you miss mclaughlin the clock miss corbin sanders please go ahead followed by ms omesh thank you dr anderson and i want to first thank miss maron and miss daranak kofax miss whittington and ms burden for yeoman's work for uh this is the third budget that miss burton and miss whittington have worked with this board in less than um less just about a year and as uh miss mclaughlin mentioned we need to present a needs-based budget but we also need to be cognizant that our budgets reflect the values

144of this board and this board signaled last spring that we were concerned about compensation because of the adjustments we had to make last year and so this omnibus budget our budget amendment actually reflects many of the priorities that this board has espoused not only in the adoption of last year's budget but in the subsequent months as we have worked to get our students back in schools and that includes employee compensation uh support for social emotional supports for our students and our staff as well as uh looking for additional funding sources to be able to address the critical needs of opportunity gaps and uh remediation caused by the kobit 19 pandemic so those funds are actually for the people watching from home the funds for the summer school programming and the remediation and interventions are coming

145from esser funds which were appropriated by the congress at the end of december the rest of this budget which is what we are asking for from the board of supervisors addresses the strategic priorities that this board has coalesced and through a very robust discussion on tuesday came to agree upon as well as an additional piece which picks up on a very important conversation which is how do we most effectively address the real social emotional needs of our students to include staffing ratios that uh will come back in the form of a plan uh so i am very supportive of this on the bus budget uh omnibus motion and i thank the makers of it both ms darin at kofax and miss maron thank you thank you sanders i'll now call a missile maish all right

146uh there we go okay thank you um really starting off echoing immense gratitude for the budget team um darren echofax and miss burden and co um this has been a smooth process i've really appreciated the amount of effort that's gone into making this in omnibus and gathering consensus and doing a lot of the legwork in advance so that we can bring this forward in a clean and smooth way so i want that to be recognized um i wanted to just point out a couple of things uh you know i think this process showed us you know as we go to the board of supervisors every year and having to ask for what we want that it's never truly reflective of the needs of our system and that in fact if we were to add up

147all the the needs whether that's finding staff at the best practice ratios we'd expect whether that's you know providing robust mental health supports for kids or academic supports that are so essential now especially uh within the gaps that were created that we would end up finding ourselves with a billion dollars or more over uh our budget is the reality and that's a problem i mean across you know as a country we don't value education we're number 66 in the world of funding in the country as a state you know we're number 24 way in the bottom um you know of of states that that show through money that they care about this so this is part of the challenge we find ourselves in what i do want to say though highlighting particular elements i you

148know obviously am pleased to see some development on the esau front i think colleagues this is one of those areas where you know every every chunk of work has a is a priority but this is one of those that's been neglected for so long seeing a ratio of 1 to 44 that even this incremental amount is going to con we're going to continue to need to think about this just from an equity perspective um and then of course as i mentioned the mental health and academic needs of our students but i hope the really the main takeaway is that moving into the next year we can look at the budget in a needs-based way we can do a zero-based assessment hopefully when coveted you know is no longer as significant of a consideration um and

149then also that we look at phased-in plans let's look at plans over several years so that we can anticipate these challenges uh rather than you know every year look at it and kind of have a narrow focus that doesn't allow us to solve these big problems that we continue to see year after year um so i would that that would kind of be my advocacy i'm you know i know that we were in a tight position and offering salaries this year no doubt for staff who've been working really hard is a no-brainer especially given what our neighboring counties are doing and uh the reality of our economy um but i hope that moving moving forward we keep those things in mind that we have an opportunity and that we start those conversations now with the

150board of supervisors so that we put it out there you know i want us to be honest about what the needs of our system is because that's what we owe our kids and it is massive but that's what it is so um i hope we can reflect on that in advance of next year's process thank you mrs our next speaker is miss seismohizer sorry i'm just getting my everything turned on thank you um i will try to be brief but i really never am so i just get started um i first want to you know my colleagues thanks for our budget chair and vice chair and our entire budget team um thank you miss um maron ms jonathan miss burton misslington and everybody for all your hard work especially in adding the program budget reviews

151this year on top of the pandemic and everything else and so i i want to thank you for your work i also just wanted to thank my colleagues um and dr boyd mike bloom um dr williams in my conversations with staff about supporting a neurodiversity specialist um and from the bottom of my heart from someone who has a special needs child and has been a long time advocating for our needs special needs child i just wanted to thank you neurodiversity you know for those who aren't as familiar is really an emerging trend in special education that helps that emphasizes helping students learn to maximize their strengths rather than focus on their weaknesses and the emerging research shows that creating a neurodiversity oriented approach can improve educational academic outcomes and reduce bullying and so you know

152adding a neurodiversity specialist one um one position that has without asking for extra county transfer really the negative budget will really allow fcps to continue to be a leader in the education of students with disabilities and i i really just want to thank my colleagues for supporting this um so many advocates wrote into us you know the the beauty of the neurodiversity model is that it normalizes a variety of human learning styles and seeks to maximize the strengths of each learner rather than molding lars into the so-called normal standard it also helps to describe the unique behaviors of coping strategies that spring from different wired brains and it's really a philosophy that our students with disabilities are definitely wired they're not they're part of diversity and we should focus on their strengths like we do

153with all of our students so i just wanted to thank you all for listening to me and hearing my advocacy and thank our staff and for embracing my my advocacy for our neurodiverse students and our twice exceptional students so thank you thank you so much miss seismohizer seeing that there are no other speakers i will take a quick turn please turn off your microphones thank you we have had an evening here with open mics and audio issues i will um speak very quickly before i turn it over to the vote i do want to say thank you to miss marin and miss dana koufax miss burden and the entire budget team from having done this work as miss mclaughlin's vice chair last year i'm very appreciative of all the work that you have put in

154to ensure that we have a very very smooth process so thank you i'm also very appreciative of ms mclaughlin's statement while we want to be good partners with our board of supervisor colleagues we also want to be sure that we are advocating for what this division requires in order to move forward in a successful way for all of our students we do need to present a needs-based budget this is not a fully uh this is not fully representative of that but we are definitely heading in that direction so i really look forward to continuing those discussions with um chairman mckay as mclaughlin has shared um i'm happy to support the efforts of our team here and i will be glad to support this omnibus motion so finally prior to the vote for adoption of the

155fy 22 advertised budget just a gentle reminder that it is our obligation to approve a budget that conveys to the board of supervisors a budget that meets the needs of our fc of fcps in the upcoming year um we have much work to do but we are heading in the right direction thank you so much to dr brabrand and his team as we continue to invest in every fcps child by naming by need at this time the motion before us is on the screen i will call for the vote those in favor please raise your hands at this point miss corbett sanders miss darren colfax miss omega miss seismo heiser miss picarski miss marin miss tolin miss mclaughlin miss keys gemara mr frisch and myself that is 11. please lower your hands all of those

156opposed i'm sorry miss cohen was that vote in favor i think i caught you at the tail end there yes ma'am then that makes it unanimous the motion carries thank you miss marin and miss der nachofax for all of your work on this at this time i will call on mr mesh for a follow-on motion all right um i moved to direct the superintendent to hold a work session in the fall of 2021 on the board's strategic priorities in an effort to provide early guidance to the superintendent prior to the preparation of the proposed budget presented in january twenty twenty two is there a second thank you miss club at sanders miss omish would you like to speak to your motion yes um in the prior uh budget conversation we had a number of follow-on

157motions related to the alignment of the strategic plan and the budget um this will give us the opportunity to do this in advance i know as a full uh board of us 12 we haven't had the chance to define the strategic plan yet um and that would be an opportunity to uh right after doing that have a discussion on how the budget is going to look in advance of it coming with the superintendent's uh proposal so that we have that chance to to shape it according to that perspective to me as well it matters a lot that we have the equity piece involved in the preliminary conversation so that we're looking at it in a way that prioritizes systematically rather than kind of coming at it at what we've heard or what we think is

158important um so this is an opportunity to allow us to do that in advance and i certainly let miss uh corporate sanders elaborate further on on the history of the importance of this since 2016. thank you very much uh miss lamesh miss corbett sanders yes thank you dr anderson this board and the previous board has long advocated for increased transparency and accountability in our budgeting process the approach built this approach builds on the very helpful pre-meetings between budget staff the budget committee chair and or vice chair and individual board members conducted this fall and the ongoing unpacking of the program budgets that we've done this year a public work session allows for the community to hear these discussions amongst board members about the priorities of the board and complements the work that our budget chair

159has initiated this year this follow-on motion incorporates an approach which is similar to the approach used in neighboring jurisdictions including alexandria arlington and loudon where the board offers guidance to the superintendent in advance of the preparation of the budget proposal ensuring that we as a board collectively agree on priorities for budget guidance to the superintendent prior to the development of the superintendent's proposed budget it also allows for the board to have discussions and develop a consensus on the board's strategic priorities prior to the annual november meeting with the board of supervisors and addresses concerns and comments made about how we collectively signal our priorities to the board of supervisors expressed this past work session i've been asked why this budget why this motion is needed now in late may when we adopt the final budget

160for the year and i want to address this the board is committed to continuous process improvements the follow-on motion today addresses the process associated with the adoption of the proposed budget and addresses how future proposed budgets should be developed it is based on a best practice which is used in our neighboring districts and leads to increased transparency in our processes and it is directly related to the action we're taking today which is on how we go about the budget proposal and how that gets adopted versus the final budget adoption which reflects actions taken by the board of supervisors and our state legislators so i hope that i can have the support of all of our colleagues uh for both miss omash and i in this follow-on motion i think it's a great process improvement thank

161you very much miss robert sanders i see that we have speakers for this motion i will now call on ms mclaughlin thank you um very happy to support this following motion and i just want to tag in here that as dr brabrand knows and my colleagues know i've been a tireless champion for us i'm improving our school clinics and increasing school nurses and nothing more than the pandemic has shown um how important is to have school nurses um in our schools and so um i'm gonna just give a little plug to dr braverman and his team uh he knows there's two prior follow-on motions from november 2018 and from february of 2019 uh that i had asked for information from staff that we look at best practices i know the superintendent has assured me that

162um with a new team in place they're very committed to helping us get that coordinated information from the county who are partners in running our school clinics but i did want to just spotlight here that these follow-on motions are important they are directions from the board and i do really look forward to ensuring that uh my outstanding um motion follow-on motions that are still in need of of information will uh actually accompany uh some of this budget work that we're going to get by the motion that i certainly encourage my colleagues to support this evening so thank you thank you ms mclaughlin miss tolin yes um i just wanted to make a couple comments i'm very happy to support this motion um you know i've had numbers of conversations with um you know karen corbin

163sanders and other colleagues on the importance for a strategic view to all of our work and particularly in your tying our uh strategies to our um you know our important strategies to our budget and how we're spending our money because that's you know where we spend our money certainly uh tells um you know what our priorities are um i also i really like the uh the timing that this um motion is asking for for us to really you know start in the fall um before we really dive into the budget process to set some of these um you know priorities and i also think that um it's a good time because it can feed into other things as well for example tonight we had our you know goal reports you know goals one through four

164um you know that we you know all expressed a little bit that we didn't feel like we necessarily could dive into them the way we wanted to but um by setting you know priorities in a strategic view in the fall that could also feed into um you know those goal reports one through four um that you know are certainly a big part of our um you know strategic plan so anyway um thank you very much to uh mr mish and karen corporate sanders for putting um for this motion i'm happy to support it thank you miss tullin um seeing that there are no other speakers i will speak to this motion i am happy to support it um and i also want to just put a plug into even taking a different uh and another

165look at our strategic um scorecard i think that conversation should also be one that we take that we take up as a board in the fall i know we began this work last february prior to the pandemic but i think that will really help to inform um what our budget priorities are aligning all of these documents would really help to focus our work and i'm looking very much to um doing that in the fall and hopefully we can have these things be aligned with each other we look at our scorecard we look at our budget and we have these collective conversations that are aligned um to the mission of fcps um i see that there are two additional hands to speak so i will call on those two members and then if there are no

166others after that i will call for the vote uh miss darren colfax and then miss marin just very briefly i appreciate my colleagues um ms omesh and miss corbett sanders bringing this forward um i have spoken to both of them about the you know my thoughts and their support my thoughts and support of their amendment here i'm talking about i know i can't speak it's getting too late but they had the same struggle but basically um i think it's extremely important um that we as a board not only have the two by twos but we have that once we have that done we have that strategic conversation as a board what are our priorities what do we need to invest in we cannot invest in everything all the time we have limited resources so i

167think it's a fine time to put this out right now i think um you know we will again revisit it as um as once the final budget is posted it will be a follow-on motion to that too and um i think it's important that we as a collective do come together and talk about what our strategic initiatives are we have a good understanding of it and we fund them so thank you for bringing this forward thank you mr nakofax miss marin you are the last speaker i think okay then i'll wrap it all up then um i you know i think of course the idea of melding together our strategic planning with our budget this is something that's been raised in various meetings um most recently with the goal reports and so you know i

168can i can support it i just want to caution us that that's really planning for the fiscal year 23 budget and i know i like that we're being ambitious but we also need to be realistic we just are approving the proposed budget and we still have to adopt that budget in may we still have other program budget reviews happening in quarterly reviews and so it would be unwise to expect staff to be able to dig in and start working on this um you know thoughtfully so i think that this ties to much larger conversations that we've been having about our work getting our work throughout the year and having a um a planful and expected timeline of work um i also think that this could you know be re-envisioning how some of the budget committee

169works um use ad hoc committees or task force in some way so i just want to again tie this this work that's very tactical and thoughtful and think about how we as a board can do it in a way that us um in all other aspects of the you know the goals that we're trying to to do in other work and and other legally required work so i just wanted to share that thank you thank you um miss mclaughlin did you want to go back or did you just trick me here oh i'm sure you wish i was tricking you i just thought i could go back okay um go ahead please thank you um i just wanted to get dr brabrand's thoughts because part of the challenge of his follow-on is whether or not

170our our language is clear enough that he sort of understands uh what this directive is to the board um i really appreciate what ms marin said um but i i know for many many years we as a board have talked at a very high level about tying our budget to the strategic plan and i think at times there's been maybe not a sense because it seems esoteric and to me i i think this board is trying to be um much more tangible about what this means but it's simply saying rather than dr brabrand and the team trying to get a sense of where we want to um strategically target our positions our school-based positions and the um the central office supports what we get um that this would whether it's meaning some summer conversations the

171task force work that ms marin said but i do hope that dr brabrand knows we are open to talking with him on how to operationalize the follow-on motion afterwards so that uh we really can hopefully move the needle and do this in a really effective way for staff timing on ours no thank you mr mclaughlin i'll just simply briefly say out of this pandemic we need a new strategic plan and we need to continue to refine our budget process to meet that strategic plan so i totally support this follow on and i want to thank this board this is in less than three weeks on a major issue a united board a unanimous vote first returned to school and now a uh an advertised budget that i think is sending a strong statement to our

172community and all of our stakeholders so kudos to this board this evening on this vote on the budget um tonight um i really really do appreciate it very much thank you thank you very much certainly smoother than others right dr bray brand yes and hopefully it doesn't have to happen twice that would be important as well um at this point i would like to call for the vote on the following motion which will be posted on the screen by ms mulberg all of those in favor of the motion as posted please raise your hands at this time miss carpet sanders miss mclaughlin miss omeg ms there not colfax miss cohen miss marin mr frisch miss picarsky miss tolin miss eisenhower heiser ms keis gamara and myself that is unanimous please lower your hands at this

173time at this time i will invite our vice chair to continue with our next two agenda items while i take a much appreciated sip of water miss pomkarsky i am happy to do our concept agenda our adopted rules of parliamentary procedure robert's rules provide for a consent agenda listing several items for approval of the board by a single motion many items listed have gone through board review and documentation has been provided to all board members and the public in advance items may be removed from the consent agenda at the request of any board member prior to the meeting these consent agenda items are on the screen is there any objection to approving the consent agenda hearing and seeing no objection the consent agenda is approved new business the following are you business agenda items there

174will not be a vote on these items tonight but action is scheduled at a future meeting new business items are on the screen thank you very much miss picarski at this time i will call on dr bray brand for superintendent matters thank you chairman anderson just a couple of quick things to share first i want to share with you we know we need to continue to reach out to all of our stakeholders uh those that we've communicated well with but many that we've not connected well with and that we can do better and continuous improvement remains our mindset this month we have launched in pocos palabras which means in spanish in a few words it's an fcps podcast in spanish and english to share timely important school news with families the goal the podcast is

175to help families access key resources to help their kids education there are three podcasts currently available on the website and we'll continue to add to the library and i want to thank our office for esau services in the office of ople for their work on this important project and i look forward to providing future updates as the scope of this work expands beyond just our span with the spanish language community i also want to share with you virtual instructional job fair february 20th we'll have another virtual instructional job fair for uh this year um here on february 20th and participants can learn about professional development benefits and of course all the jobs that we have available um virtual interviews will be held from february 22nd through march 5th and we're looking for teachers counselors librarians

176occupational therapists physical therapist speech language pathologist any of those folks who want to join the fcps team should visit our instructional job fair page to learn more and apply online and then finally i know many of you may have seen in the national news that um perseverance uh nasa's uh robot landed on mars and guess what like many things not just locally regionally nationally worldwide but in the universe there's always a fairfax connection and several board members i think miss mclaughlin and miss cohen were with me what seems like years ago but a little over a year ago we're at lake braddock to watch alex uh mather be recognized out of 28 000 entries it was alex who came up with the name of this rover perseverance and it was uh exciting to see him

177be honored by nasa he got to go watch um perseverance lift off and uh it was great to see him uh sharing uh his love of science um with uh folks in the media as the rover landed on mars and so what a great fairfax connection and a reminder that we are here to serve students and to help them hope and dream one day he wants to be a nasa engineer and i think he's well on his way and uh it was great to see that in the news so thank you all again for uh uh uh um uh your vote on the budget i think again a united vote on a very strong statement to our stakeholders in our community so thank you all very much and have a nice evening thank you very

178much dr brabrand at this point i will invite our board committee chairs to report on their committee's activities and we will begin with mr frisch thank you dr anderson i'll keep this brief the governance committee met on february 9th during our meeting we finalized finally uh suggested changes to strengthen our conflicts of interest policy for senior level staff and it has been sent to the full board for consideration additionally we adjusted the policy review docket to streamline processes and make the committee's work more efficient so looking forward to operating under that regime uh starting at our next meeting in just a couple weeks that's it thank you oh fantastic thank you and i believe we have a committee report from the budget committee that was a joke dr anderson do you have any uh i'm

179sorry miss um seismo heiser did you have a report i know ma'am we met i reported the last meeting and so i'll report on the next one thank you then we are going to proceed to board matters and i will begin with miss cohen followed by miss marin thanks so much i just wanted to say thank you to hunt valley elementary school who was so kind to welcome me to their bridge decay program last week we have some really excited kindergarteners who are counting that they only have five sleeps left until they're back in the building um and it was just awesome to get to to be with them and thank you to all of our staff and students who have gone above and beyond to make all this work in our buildings um i

180got the opportunity this past week to speak to custodians bus drivers teachers food service workers our ias assistant principals and principals and i know how hard you all are working and i know everybody is beyond maximum capacity excited but tired and so thank you so much for all that you're doing and your service to our students and our families and our whole community we're excited to be back together so thank you great thank you so um i i was neglecting i neglected to thank our assistant superintendent for financial services the fearlessly burdened thank you to you and your team as alice wiggington um dorian and marty smith of course and dr brabrand on the budget work thank you very much for working all the time throughout the holiday weekend most recently um i've also been

181the second biggest project in my life lately has been preparing my own child to return to the classroom my second grader will be going back and uh that's been um he's having a hard time accepting that and we're trying to figure that out so like a lot of parents i i know um that it's hard to make these decisions and you're trying to do the best that you can for your kid the other thing i've been focused on is the calendar the school year calendar and i'm glad to hear more of my colleagues are interested in trying to find some kind of a compromise that honors the work of the calendar committee to um include more religious and cultural observances that also balances the need for instruction rest athletics performances you know all of the

182things that our calendar does need to balance and so i'm eager for solutions there and then finally the general assembly just continuing to try and monitor what's happening and thank you to michael malloy and our staff and to ms darinath kovacs for being our legislative liaison at the state um wow things just move really fast there so i've been trying to you know let people know when they can advocate but it's it's just very fast moving um last week i was also happy to join the vienna baptist church's legislative update um conversation which i thought was really meaningful talked about a lot of different issues their community not only is from the vienna area but all over fairfax and even beyond um i also was glad to join the thorough pta over at the vienna

183community center virtually to talk about some return to school items with the parents there and lastly something to look forward to on february 27th the south lakes pyramid is going to be having its broadway night so there'll be over 100 students from the high school and all the feeder schools in the pyramid there's going to be broadway actors and film actors introducing acts and it's in partnership with the preston community center so check it out um online it's february 27th thank you very much miss marin and now i will call our next three speakers so please follow each other um without any additional introduction ms corbett sanders and miss dernak kofax that's miss corbett sanders mrs omega and mr kofax so i want to start with thanking the staff at bucknell elementary i loved being

184there as our youngest learners got off of the school bus and came into our school on tuesday the joy on the children's faces above the mask was just riveting and the enthusiasm of the kids being back in the building but also the staff being back in the building was was something that was just so heartwarming and i look forward to visiting some of our other schools coming up i also want to congratulate the lady wolverines at west potomac they um although they lost yesterday to madison they had a fantastic run for the first time they were regional champs and in the state semifinals uh it ended the season but it was the first time in the history of west potomac that the lady wolverines went that far so congratulations lady wolverines and with that have

185a great evening everybody [Music] all right um so tonight was uh was a tough night uh on equity and i think moving forward i'm looking forward to seeing how we can develop structures and systems in place uh amongst ourselves and review some of our policies um in how we do things to make sure that our outcomes match our values um i do want to say uh it was really exciting of course to have some students begin to return safely over the past week um i have heard some uh great stories of kids reuniting with teachers um and that's gonna be something we continue to monitor and of course have to continue to mitigate to make sure that that continues to be successful um and that we don't you know kind of sabotage the opportunity to

186continue moving in that direction um i have heard a number of student concerns about grading and potential uh flexibility there so i look forward to seeing dr rayburn what may come out of that i know the student advisory council has been very vocal in advocating for particular proposals and obviously nathan has been reinforcing that so i'd love to see how we can support not only student mental health but in general what's going on on that front i am looking forward to some round tables with community leaders this weekend uh to get the pulse of how folks are doing and what they're hearing on the ground i had the chance to gather a brilliant group in a student environmental task force which i know ms tolland had been supporting on as well as as a student

187mental health task force to see what we can come up with to be of benefit to these students um and finally uh i had uh we had our stream with the student environmental task force and we'll have another one in uh two weeks as a town hall so folks can ask their live questions and answers um at that time uh the last comment to my colleagues i think you know today was uh another opportunity for us to think about long-term solutions um thinking ahead for our budget we just put in our ask you know i hope that maybe in the coming time in addition to what i said earlier you begin to even think about prioritizing the conversation on savings like we did before given the time that we're in and then also alternate sources

188of funding that we might want to be creative about to to make sure that we're sustainable in the long run but that's all from me and i want to thank our principals teachers and staff for all of the hard work that you are continuing to do as you make this transition into the hybrid learning model we continue to appreciate you very much and i know students who are choosing to go back into the classrooms are looking very much forward to being reunited with you in person i as miss marin um noted the legislative issues continue to move along in our in richmond and mr malloy does do weekly updates he'll be doing one tomorrow or over the weekend again if colleagues have questions or comments about what is happening because it does happen so fast

189um please reach out to me directly or mr and i can connect you with mr malloy or if i can't if i can't answer the question and finally i do want to thank my colleagues for all of your hard work tonight on the budget um during this week um there were lots of twists and turns and um getting having a lot of those conversations and spending extra time on tuesday i think really made a difference for all of us so um thank you again we are not done we're just at the midpoint we're at halftime and we still have lots of hard work to do so we need to continue this kind of good work and again appreciate um all that we're able to do together on this in this front to uh compensate our

190our staff and our teachers and all of the other um well well well thought out um additions to um our funding that are needed so thank you and good night thank you ms darren at kofax our next three speakers miss picarsky mr frisch and miss seismo heiser miss picarski we will begin with you followed by mr frisch and miss seisma heiser thank you i wanted to take the opportunity um in my comments to thank dr brabrand our very hard working staff and our budget chair and co-chair as others have noted they have put in um endless hours and effort into getting us to the point uh where we um are tonight and i i too was thankful that we were able to work closely together as a board and listen to each other and have

191the extra time this week to really um work on our um best path forward and ask from the board of supervisors with this budget i was um i had the opportunity last week to have a pta leader town hall and thoroughly enjoyed the discussion and the comments they are very helpful and i appreciate the fact people took the time to come out um i have uh i'm visiting westfield ptsa next week my own daughter's school so i'm excited about that of course i also had the opportunity to meet with a few students from chantilly high school who wanted to share their experiences in our schools and uh areas for improvement with our equity work uh and it was a very fruitful and insightful conversation and i i appreciate the fact that they took the time

192uh to reach out and and do that advocacy and be so open and willing to talk to me um i will also be hosting a a joint budget town hall as i did last year with uh supervisor kathy smith we are working on uh final details and plans and i will have that out uh soon so that should be about mid-march thank you thank you miss picarski i guess i'm next um so since our last meeting i've had the pleasure of meeting with the mosby woods community in the stenwood elementary school pta and with students returning to in-person instruction i'm in the process of scheduling school visits in the weeks ahead at different schools throughout providence district so i'm very much forward looking forward to that and those visits and i am incredibly appreciative of

193all of the hard-working principals teachers bus drivers custodians and other hard-working staff members who are making this return to in-person instruction possible i've heard my partner in the other room all week telling his students that they will no longer be learning in our living room with him so i'm looking forward to seeing our students back in action on campus thank you um and i'm happy to follow mr frisch i you know also want to thank dr bray brand our staff our teachers our principals our school building staff you know custodians bus drivers our families and most importantly to me our students um for all that they're doing to be flexible and and all the hard work that everybody's putting into this year and um whether it's the students who are returning in person or the

194students are staying virtual um i'm i'm looking forward to supporting all of them and i also really grateful to go to key center on their first day to welcome their special education students back into the building um the students were thrilled to be back and and i know the staff was told to have the background buildings as well and so i look forward to mr frisch for the school visits that i'll be doing as well and setting those up i just want to also say that i'm really excited um my own son is also going back in person learning and he's already circled the date on the calendar with a big old smiley face so i might tell you where his mental health is in terms of returning to in-person learning but i also know

195that those who stay virtual we need to make sure that we um intentionally include and ensure that they continue to have a good experience i will say that i want to thank mrs holland for inviting me to meet with many members of her constituents as we talked about the mclean language boundary changes and i i'm grateful to billy here from the community as we move forward on that and i'm excited actually tomorrow with uh mr onobudo to attend a meeting with several students at lakewood secondary school who took it upon themselves to do a student survey around student wellness and received over 2 000 responses from their school and put together an incredible presentation for their pta regarding student stressors and student wellness and so i'm excited to meet with them to hear more about

196what they found and how we can help support them moving forward so kudos to the students of lake braddock and moving forward i'm looking forward to hosting my first pta roundtable as an at-large member it's it's a little trickier because i have 200 schools that i'm trying to meet with so i am going to be starting region-wide pta roundtables in addition to my regular town halls and so i'm looking forward to my first region one round table next week um and i'll have more information about my next town hall um soon as well and i just wanted to say i i really want to thank my colleagues on the board for all the work that we've done on some very difficult topics and how we call us together as a board and i'm looking forward

197to um more great work really really listen to each other and work together and work with staff to come to some really great places um even if they're difficult decisions and um so i want to thank my colleagues and with that i'm going to say good night and i'll look forward to hearing what the rest of my colleagues have to say thank you miss seismo heiser our next three speakers are miss keys gamara miss tola and ms mclaughlin just to repeat miss keys tomorrow ms tolin and miss mclaughlin thank you i will be uh quick i have been in the process of planning a mental health discussion taking into account many of the events that our students have experienced it has been scheduled for wednesday i am hoping to be able to go forward with

198that but i would like to say to the community that i am dealing with a family medical matter so if i have to cancel that would be the reason uh and we will reschedule along with office hours um i also wanted to uh thank everyone uh for being being able to participate with the vienna baptist legislative discussion i really enjoyed that and thank you and good night yes good evening um i'm of course very happy that we're moving forward to offer um an in-person option for our families um but families can also opt to stay virtual and interestingly it's if you really look across the entire uh durango district it's almost a 50 split with our families i'm glad that fcps is planning a measured approach to moving our students into our buildings so that

199we can continually monitor our safety and mitigation measures and assess their effectiveness and we can also ensure that our instructional technology and teaching practices are working well for those in school and at home with almost 50 percent of our students still electing to remain virtual i plan to man monitor their experience as well among the excitement of people showing up into our schools don't want our virtual students to be overlooked um even with our constraints you know our goal continues to be i want to maximize our students education prioritize the emotional well-being and continue to strengthen the connections in our school communities and speaking of connections i want to really give a special thanks to our school staff and administrators for working so hard to give information to all of our students and families as

200to you know what they should be expecting over the next um several weeks um we've had some fun things happen um the chesterburg elementary school chipmunks put out a great welcome back to their students a little fun video um and so we're seeing lots of fun things like that happening across the schools in drainsville um i also wanted to just remind people that uh tj admissions are due next um weeks february 26th and excited to um understand that at this point we're seeing a good number of applications coming in from across all of our middle schools um the langley pyramid um ptas is doing a diversity equity and inclusion committee that that committee is celebrating black history month with a special project um this month 28 days of podcast video short readings and a book

201club uh we are all reading the the book blind spot uh please join us for this activity you can see the langley high school um the cooper or the um churchill road on pta websites to get more information i was also happy to attend the vienna baptist church legislative event um and enjoyed that immensely and also attended the mclean pts mclean high school ptsa meeting last week as well despite working virtually fcps has 55 scholars selected from millions of high school students across the country that will be have been honored as presidential um scholars and we have 19 of those 55 candidates in the dreamsville district um five at langley high school one at mclean of 13 and tj keep up the great work congratulations i will be meeting with janesville high school students next

202week from all three of our high schools to start joint conversations across the schools about issues with schools returning to in-person learning um you know student wellness etc um it was a great follow-up to our comments from our student this evening teddy geiss uh i'm very much looking forward to hearing these student voices and working with them um over the next several months as we um you know transition um you know the way we're teaching and working with students so thank you very much have a have a wonderful evening oh goodness looks like my turns up my turn's on sorry dr anderson um so anyway i know it's late but i do want to say it this is my 10th budget that i have been a part of on the board and i've never seen

203this finish this early in the evening so i do want to compliment my fellow colleagues and uh let staff know that sometimes these extra work sessions mean we can have a really smooth process when we get to the end on something like tonight's um just a couple of things first i wanted to say that i really appreciated last night that the braddock district council which represents our civic associations in the braddock district had invited me to come and present on the fairfax county school budget and i really took a lot of uh care to help explain why the board was adding um the additional dollars uh for employee raises and that the the data and the merits for why we felt that was important to send over to the board of supervisors um and then

204i just uh want to uh also convey how much i appreciated what our student um nathan abudo said this evening about bringing the temperature down uh as we know uh president biden has also talked about how we can bring our communities together our country together and um this board uh the 12 of us i i know um absolute to my core um every single one of the twelve of us is as dedicated as possible for our employees our students and our families while we are all trying to come at the best solutions for how to return to in-person learning to address the mental health impacts of covid i just want to reassure the public that while we so value um your passion and we value um hearing your deep deep concerns um i do want

205to re-emphasize again every single one of us cares deeply this is really grinding work we do on the board the public doesn't see a lot of the time we put into it this isn't to say that we deserve applause we don't we're public servants but i do want to reassure people that we don't want to have division among the 12 of us and i hope that you will also recognize how much we are all together collectively trying to find the best solutions to open our schools and i hope we can try and and speak in in that vein um knowing that the criticisms that we expend toward any of us and i've been on the receiving end as my colleagues um i don't think that it's reflective um or accurate about our dedication and our

206commitment so um in any case i i really look forward to uh everything that we can do to help dr bray brand and this school system successfully uh begin to reopen our schools and i absolutely encourage our employees and our families and students let us know how it's going we want to be a bridge of communication to the school system and so yes your voices are always again encouraged and welcomed but i hope we will continue to be thoughtful in in how we communicate so thank you thank you miss mclaughlin uh again i find myself between adjournment and everybody going to have an earlier evening than normal but i do have a few things that i'd like to share but i will try very much to keep them brief i do want to say thank

207you to very much to our school staff because as a parent of an elementary student and a middle schooler i see firsthand all of the preparations that are happening at our schools to receive our students as they we enter into the school buildings i have a son who was slated to be virtual but we have made that change to have him return in person and i want to say thank you to dr brabrand and the staff at glasgow for while we were on that wait list we got off of that wait list and he's going to be able to return in person i'm very appreciative of the um flexibility that has been provided to parents to toggle back and forth and to make decisions that best fit their families in this moment rather than decisions

208that we made back in july so i'm very appreciative of that and as always i have to send a special shout out to the folks at mason crest elementary because they continue to go above and beyond for our students and i just want to make sure that principal shin and assistant principal aiello and pratt that they know that we see their work and we're very appreciative of all of their efforts similarly visiting glasgow and homes in this past week just seeing all of the preparations that are in place to receive our students we're very grateful for all of your thoughtfulness i want to quickly say thank you to the justice pta for having me at their meeting last week um your work and focus on equity it's really unparalleled i'm very grateful for the voices

209that were in the room to ensure that our parents are all included in the decisions that are made at our schools i do want to offer a reminder to the mason district pta and ptos my round table will be on the 23rd and i hope to see all of our pta and pto leadership there um lastly i do want to say a special thank you to uh mr smith um when the vaccinations that he is i think has been spearheading on our behalf kind of went awry um with scheduling and having to go back it was painstaking to hear and see how he and his team were literally going through hundreds of names thousands of names to ensure that our teachers had timely rescheduling of their vaccinations so thank you for doing that job with

210your team it's definitely not something that i think anyone had the opportunity to know was happening um my last two comments are going to be again brief i want to say happy birthday to miss lee burton who i know she spent her birthday yesterday working on all matters budget so i wanted to take a moment to at least publicly wish you a happy birthday and also to our very own seismic heiser who will not make her birthday with us because it is tomorrow and we are going to adjourn much earlier than midnight so i'd like to invite all of my colleagues to please say a happy birthday to both of these um wonderful folks before we adjourn happy birthday happy birthday ladies happy birthday happy birthday goodnight everybody so we have not yet adjourned it's

211not official so i'll say good night i don't have more to say um not cool no i don't it is um 10 18 our meeting is adjourned good night everyone you