001e e e e e e good evening everyone and welcome to the Tuesday February 4th meeting of the Wake County Board of Education our board previously convened and came to order at 5:00 pm for a special ceremony where we welcomed our newest Board member Miss Christina Abe Gordon to the board representing District 2 having already established that we had a quorum and having already recited the pledge we'll move into our regular meeting agenda uh first as always I remind you that Wake County Board of Education meetings are held for the purpose of conducting the business of the Board of Education the public is cordially invited to attend board meetings and observe the board as it conducts its official business persons who willfully interrupt disrupt or cause disturbances at an official meeting may be directed to
002leave by the presiding officer members of the audience should show respect for the speakers at the PO who come up to speak to us um by refraining from loud comments noises or other disruptions disruptions by any person or persons of a public meeting will be subject to action in accordance with General statute 143 31817 and with that we need to entertain a motion for uh to consider our meeting agenda chair Swanson so moved we have a motion from Vice chair Swanson to adopt the meeting agenda and we have a second from Miss rice all in favor of the meeting agenda signify by saying I I any opposed it's not the most dramatic First voal cast but it is the first so I wanted to recognize that so turn turning to our newly approved meeting agenda
003the first item we have is a special uh special item we have a recognition event tonight and I'd like to recognize Dr will Chavis to provide an introduction for us is Dr Chavis here okay so in that case we will skip straight to the esteemed principal of Lian Magnet Middle School Mr Gary Duval welcome Mr Duvall good Swanson disting members of the board and superintendent Taylor as we come together to celebrate Black History Month it's important to reflect not only the made also Legacy for one such Legacy is found in the rich history of John W Lian high school now Lian Magnet Middle School located in downtown Raleigh opened in September 1953 Lian high was the only High School in the city for black students standing as a Beacon of Hope and opportunity during a
004time of segregation named after John W Lian a distinguished local educator and Community leader the school was the largest school construction project in North Carolina at the time despite the challenges of segregation Lian became a model for black education attracting talented teachers and preparing students for Success throughout its history Lian has also had to adapt to change in 1971 following the desegregation of schools in Raleigh John W Lian high school was converted into a junior high school then in 1982 the school transitioned again this time becoming part of the Wake County Public School System as a magnet school ultimately earning the name of gifted and talented Magnet middle school today lean continues to stand as a symbol of Excellence through R through rigorous academic course offerings Dynamic electives and specialized Arts programs that enrich the
005educational experience of our students as we reflect on this Legacy we are reminded of the powerful words of James Baldwin who said not everything that is faced can be changed but nothing can be changed until it is faced the history of ligan is a testament to the courage and resilience of those who have faced adversity headon it this also serves as a call to action for us all to continue the work of ensuring the quality and excellence and education for every student today we not only celebrate the past but also honor the voices of the future our students who continue to carry the torch of change creativity and hope it is my pleasure to introduce one such student a talented young scholar and artist salana Mack a seventh grader at the Lian Magnet Middle School
006who will be performing a beautiful rendition of lift every voice and sing this Anthem often referred to as the black national anthem has long been a symbol of resilience pride and unity in the face of adversity I ask that we all rise if able as we listen to this moving performance thank you [Music] lift every voice and sing of Liberty let I rejoice as LIF SK s out as a rolling SE sing a song full of the F and the [Applause] dark facing the son of a new day be G as much to victory [Music] has Stony the road we TR fether the chain in the days when hope and yet with our St [Music] live not out we in the days for when I fall we are over [Music] as we have come out
007from The Bling still now we stand the white K of the bright St is God of our we ear God of our s tears thou goest us for on the way th who by thy that into the light keep us forever in our we PR BL [Music] St Shadow beneath [Music] th May wa forever and true to our god true to our na [Music] [Applause] all right please be seated so that was I think I speak for all of us when I say simply amazing and I I hope as as we took time to appreciate that you also took a few moments to listen to principal Duvall and really hear the importance in the significance of the institution of Lian both as one of our most prominent and history making high schools and the work
008it does today as a magnet middle I I'm proud I know that one day I'm going to be sitting there watching the Grammys with my kids and I can say I remember when I saw salana Ma and they're just Gonna Roll their eyes but I'll remember so thank you so much for joining us um what we're going to do is because the next part of the meeting agenda is our public comment period uh we're going to take a brief recess just to uh break down some of the sound equipment I'd encourage you unless you're leaving to please stay seated so we can then continue on with the meeting as soon as possible but again I just if I could just one more round of applause for Miss Solana M and we'll sit in recess for
009no more than five minutes again I encourage you to please stay where you are I all right we should be good to go okay again um we really appreciate any opportunity we can get for our students to come in share their gifts share their talents and was was so glad that Miss Matt could join us with principal Duval this evening the next item on our agenda is our public comment period so speakers speak speaking on items on the night's agenda will be heard before speakers commenting on other topics we do give priority to the students that have come out to speak with us tonight all other speakers will be heard in order of sign up only the person speaking at the podium will be able to stand and again all attendees that are not speaking
010we ask to remain seated uh concerns related to Personnel issues or student matters that can be addressed through applicable wcpss Personnel the grievance policy and other policies please know that we do have staff here tonight if you do have a pressing matter that's come before you we might be able to direct you to the staff person to try to get you some assistance before you leave tonight in the interest of maintaining Civility and de Quorum speakers are encouraged to address their comments to the Board of Education those of up here and and must refrain from personal attacks and insults directed at individual staff members of the general public it takes a lot of courage to get up and speak before a body like this whether you disagree or agree with the person please show respect
011and do not interrupt their comments with any comments or noises of your own during public comment for those of you who are speaking tonight you may speak up to three minutes please note that the microphones are adjustable depending on your height You may wish to raise them or lower them when your your time begins when you begin to speak that's when you'll see the green light come on uh you can continue with your speaking don't be surprised or shocked you'll hear an audible tone that first tone and when the light goes from green to Yellow that's just a signal to you that you have 30 seconds remaining in your time again you can finish your remarks when the light goes from yellow to red and you hear the second tone we will need you to
012conclude your remarks and then you know vacate the podium so that the next speaker has an opportunity to speak uh we do have a lot of speakers tonight we're going to do our best to cycle through everybody uh efficiently so the more that you can respect the time limits the more we'll get a chance to make sure everyone has heard um speakers are asked to let's see uh respect the time limit as I just said speak no more than 3 minutes and with that we'll go to our first speakers tonight we have two speakers um who have signed up uh we'll start with Bailey Owens who'll be followed by Phoenix Belo is Bailey here welcome Bailey good evening members of the board my name is Bailey and I'm a junior at Apex Friendship High School
013every child deserves the chance to learn an environment free from Fear unfortunately immigration enforcement near and in schools has created a climate of anxiety and instability for immigrant families in our community parents are afraid to drop their children off at school students are distracted and distressed unable to focus on their education these are not hypothetical situations they are Happening Here and Now an attack on one of us is an attack on us all imagine you are a second grader and your best friend gets called to the office and never comes back this is terrifying and confusing school should be a safe space for all students to learn this creates an environment that is filled with fear and anxiety students have already been through so much the fear of ice entering schools is just too much
014people talk about the anxious generation this is why we are so anxious we have lived through multiple school shootings continued lockdown drills and now we aren't sure that our friends are safe at school adults worry about what cell phones and social media are doing to us this is merely a distraction trust me cell phones are the least of our worries we worry about the daily threat of violence we worry about our friends getting taken out of our classrooms we worry that our friends will return home to empty homes I know you are working on a policy and I urge you to be thorough and unrelenting in the protection of our staff and students please stand for my friends thank you for taking for your time and your commitment to our community thank you our next
015speaker is Phoenix Bido good evening board members um today I just want to read you 14 little scenarios um okay so number one just a couple of weeks ago one of my classmates at school was wearing a make America great again t-shirt and it had the silhouette of an AR-15 um and imagery like that violates dress codes and some schools even don't allow political shirts at all but it happens all the time and if we penalize nationalism we're deemed unpatriotic number two people across the nation and even in our state are having their homes raided by ice in in order to circumvent their constitutional protections 30,000 immigrants are be are to be imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay it's like there's a disdain for human rights number three transgender people have been targeted all the way from
016the municipal level to the federal level we are the alienated and we are the common enemy and we are the scapegoat government or number four government officials claim that they will use our military power to take over Greenland many are embodied due to their belief in military Supremacy number five I found out that my school has been violating Title 9 for at least 2 years and of course that title 9 protections are being Stripped Away sexism is everywhere and it's becoming acceptable number six individuals or groups can get removed flagged and banned from social media just for speaking out individual children can have the Secret Service sent to their school just for speaking out we're losing Free Speech because the media is controlled by those in power number seven I've overheard several of my peers
017talking about how our nation won't be safe until we get rid of the illegal immigrants it's true that our nation is unsafe but they're pointing at the wrong people number eight there are schools that are having to teach the Bible or recite the Ten Commandments public schools number nine have you noticed that one of the most powerful businessmen in the world is currently controlling things in our government even though nobody elected him number 10 North Carolina among others does not allow teachers unions and we are among the lowest in workers rights number 11 musicians like Billy Joe Armstrong have voiced their concerns through their art all to be criticized and looked down on by authority figures now number 12 officers will detain students for emotional outbursts even putting them in handcuffs we seem to want
018to put a lot of people in jail number 13 we are governed by a group of people with aligning views who don't care about those who descent number 14 did I mention the guy we didn't elect who is controlling government spending these 14 scenarios are all representative the of the 14 identified rights number three using scapegoats as a unifying cause number four supremacy of mil military number five rampant sexism number six controlled mass media number seven obsession with National Security number eight religion and government are intertwined number nine protection of corporate power number 10 suppression of laborers 11 disdain for academics in the Arts 12 obsession with Crime and Punishment 13 rampant corruption and 14 fraudulent elections now I know that this is an issue for other places and I understand that but um we
019are at school to learn and school shouldn't be subjected to any of this when we're there um I think that schools should be off limits and uh I ask of you to please not let fascism into our schools all right so we're two speakers in and we have about 20 more to go and so I do want to ask people in the audience to please whether it's the most wonderful speech in the world or whether it just bothers you to the core please refrain from making comments or noises during the other speakers I know that you know it's it's it's nice to affirm someone that you believe in but if someone else is speaking and they get other comments that maybe are not as nice it's hard to have an orderly meeting if people are
020who are not speaking are making noise during the presentation so I do want to go back to the rules and just stress for everyone that we are in a government meeting we do want everyone to be able to speak and be heard and I just ask for your cooperation so our next speaker tonight we now move to our two speakers who are speaking about on agenda topics the first is Margaret Belo who will be followed by Becky lops good evening Miss Belo good evening hello board members superintendent welcome to school board I'm in your District um I'm here to address the 2025 legislative priorities I commend the board for recognizing the urgent need to fund public education and protect the rights of all students especially our most vulnerable including transgender and undocumented students these priorities
021are critical as we Face unprecedented attacks on public education with private unelected entities increasingly influencing education policy and federal proposals to eliminate the Department of Education our state must uphold its constitutional duty to provide every child access to a free and appropriate public education lack of funding is already making this difficult and further Cuts will only deepen the crisis the way we overcome these challenges is by supporting one another and standing as unit Community however division is being intentionally manufactured by targeting marginalized groups when these groups are scapegoated it distracts from the larger goals one of which is dismantling public education altogether make no mistake what starts as targeting one group will not end there we must see this for what it is and respond by protecting all public school students every child in Wake
022County has a right to a safe welcoming School environment where their identity is affirmed their history is honored and their families are respected no one can claim moral superiority while simultaneously advocating for the exclusion or Erasure of any child we should be removing barriers to education not creating new ones our schools belong to all of our children and discrimination and intimidation have no place in them it is essential that we continue providing an accurate and inclusive education that allows bra black brown and Indigenous children to see their histories woven into the fabric to see their stories woven into the fabric of history history cannot be hacked apart just because some find parts of it uncomfortable if we think those parts are ugly then we must ensure that we never repeat them I urge the board
023to maintain this legislative priority and strengthen protections for marginalized students continue to rely on Expert datadriven guidance when formulating policies do not give in inflammatory rhetoric based on fear and misinformation continue to protect the private information of students and families and please do not allow entities on school campuses who seek only to terrorize children and disrupt their education board members community members this is our time to come together divided we're weak together we're strong we will not let fear divide us we will not stand by while anyone terrorizes our community because they look love or sound different we will not allow our children to be erased or dehumanized we're a community and we're stronger together and I'm going to finish R speech uh he'd like to point out that according to britannica.com a concentration camp
024is defined as an internment Center for political prisoners and members of national or minority groups who are confined for reasons of security explo or executive decree almost like the one sending 30,000 presumed immigrants to Guantanamo Bay thank you Miss Belo our next speaker is Becky L Hobs after Miss L Hobs we'll go to our off agenda speakers and our first speaker will be Mark Dixon good evening Miss lops hello good to see you guys again I'm Becky L hops I'm a mom to three amazing kids who either are currently attending White County Schools or have attended them in the past and I'm also Chapter Chair of moms for Liberty in Wake County thank you so much for your time first I want to talk a little bit about the legislative agenda and I am highly
025concerned because what I see is a continued discrimination and continued focus on anything but academics now I've SP been speaking here for a few years you know 10th Amendment of the Constitution says anything not stated in the constitution is a power of the state education is a power granted to the state there's nothing in the Constitution giving it a power to the federal government it needs to be the state but that being said part of this uh Federal invasion was involved with title N9 and I've been very happy with what's been going on for the past few weeks starting with January 9th when federal courts vacated Biden's overreaching title N9 changes that last year in July that this School Board rushed to implement it included language that redefined sex redefined what sexual discrimination was and
026left the um free speech of people in question further executive orders addressing Dei biological sex CRT and I know that there are more coming that will have to be looked at are you afraid of losing your federal funding like you claimed last year here's last year's budget almost 10% comes from the federal government what's that 300 odd million dollars um why aren't you afraid of losing it now why are you still letting these policies that the courts have have have ruled and vacated they are not to be enacted you've got policy 1710 and 1720 just to name a few that have implemented this language that need to be changed Ed it's been three three and a half weeks since the Court ruling it hasn't appeared in the it wasn't on the policy committee I haven't
027seen it on the agenda and of course you don't post things in advance enough I don't even know if it's coming on the policy committee meeting but we need to revert these policies back to the pre- July 16th versions and remove that language and protect our kids so with that being said that goes through pretty much everything but I want to point out that the Mandate of the school system is to provide an academic education that's it not to provide morality or anything like that that is a job of the family and of the parent need to stop interfering thank you Miss Lou Hobbs our next speaker is Mark Dixon and Mark will be followed by Fernando Martinez good evening Mark good evening yeah I got to go off script here for the first part
028um I'm here to talk about boys volleyball again um you all uh received a package for me back in December um but maybe it's proper I demonstrate to you what this is done for my son Thomas he's a junior now at Panther Creek very proudly um about a year ago he's playing for his club team first tournament all right so I used to play and I was a coach so the moment my son went from being a boy to becoming a young man I saw it happening right in front of me here's what it looks like team lines up he got put in the middle so hands up and I watched him right I'm just sitting there as a casual parent I see him and his eyes he looks over to his left he finds
029the setter sorry I'm not pointing at you finds the setter finds some middle blocker and that was the moment where my son never looked so confident he loved playing he found his thing and so now he asks like many many other students to play and they are handed on a silver platter the offering fully funded season everything included not just a check from some entity to engage so what happened to my student in the last year well his grades got better time management everything is going well he found his thing and went to the DECA Regional event he joined Deca that was didn't I didn't see that one coming now he's going to Greensboro at the end of the month as a re registered Wake County business owner to compete at the state level that
030is it's because of the sport and I'm not standing here in front of you without the sport being a big part of my life so what I'm really concerned about though is the students are told hey County's not going to support but it's it up to the individual schools but I am very upset and it looks like there's something going on behind the scene where I go to the individual schools I hear reports they will not engage how how is this possible and I never got a message back from any one of you how how is this possible unless there's something going on I'm following the rules I am I am going through every channel that that is afforded to me and I don't think I'm getting something back but what's most concerning is what
031I read in the um in the email which was that volleyball has to align with um The Districts broad broader uh strategy what is that that's how I'm going to end please tell me what that is thank you Mr Dixon I appreciate it uh next speaker is Fernando Martinez he'll be followed by Joseph Deon good evening Mr Martinez good evening um Dr Taylor uh Miss hery board members congratulations Miss Christina Gordon uh it's hard for me to be here again in this position what I am um along with the thean Justice Alliance and many other community based organizations that work with parents and students and way County we have been coming here for more than 10 years uh to advocate for uh Improvement for advocate for uh the Improvement of schools and quite honest we
032identify ourselves as public school Defenders cuz we not only come here but we also go to the general assembly and we advocate for more funding we advocate for more teacher and we are uh families parents students and public school Defenders but it saddens me to be here again because uh we've been here in 2018 2019 uh when uh the people in the uh office was going after uh my community the ameran community we are thankful uh for Dr Taylor and uh some of the board in this uh infir me right now for thinking about guidance for schools uh in case of immigration and law and custom enforcement coming to the schools and at the same time I'm here to invite you to be bolder if there's any time where we could be stronger way county
033is one of the largest school districts not only in North Carolina but in the country and people will follow your leadership our families are confused our families are afraid the very same idea of having immigration in the schools sacred places we're talking about churches we're talking about hospitals we're talking about schools learning environment if there is any people who impact our life you can attest to this are teachers you always have a teacher that you remember uh that it was a person that you would love to look up to and some of the that you had in the schools but now the community is afraid to go to schools we need a stronger guidance we need trainings for the area superintendent we need training for school bus drivers we been training for um some of
034the leadership at the school level about what are the difference between a court order and an order signed by another agent because they are those practices have been proven in my community that they lie they cheat I in my own family we have experience to the part Tans and they always try to trick people so that has been proven and we need a stronger protections we need a stronger guidance from this board for you to be a leader in protecting and being on the S right of History years from now people are going to look up back to you and you have a choice now to stay quiet to stay silent or to be of history and take the right side thank you very much our next speaker is Joseph ton who'll be followed by
035Martha Hernandez good evening last fall I unsuccessfully petitioned the board not to include gender identity in its title 9ine policies because that requires schools and teachers the socially transitioned students this active intervention conditions the majority to go on medically uh transition whereas studies show that the majority will outgrow gender confusion without intervention medical transition is detailed in s so8 from wpath s Soca claims it was developed by following the process of the national Academy of Medicine this was blatant let's not and say we did as revealed by Discovery during lawsuits against state laws Banning medical transition on miners first practically all 119 authors have significant conflict of interest contradicting Academy guidelines second associate states that John's Hopkins was contracted to perform systematic evidence reviews but W paath suppressed publishing most of them because little to
036no evidence supporting various treatments was found this this is serious scientific misconduct third s so8 States the authors use the deli process to achieve consensus a few treatments were Rec were rated as we recommend which means they think it's strongly supported by evidence but many more were rated as we suggest which means it's their opinion but not supported by evidence under pressure from Rachel LaVine in the Biden HHS W paath leadership changed many of the we suggest to we recommend violating the deli process of their own members the chapter on adolesence most relevant for us tonight even says that sister atic review was not possible for lack of quality evidence most outrageous after ocate was published W paath issued a correction in which minimum age for all treatments except one were simply deleted again at
037the insistence of Rachel LaVine so that s so8 could be cited to bolster the lawsuit suits Wake County Schools must not cooperate with sending vulnerable young people into this medical fraud thank thank you thank you our next speaker tonight is uh Martha Hernandez excuse me our next speaker tonight is Martha Hernandez who will be followed by Carmen Flores for gracias gracias one moment here and we'll get the translation one moment are you that was Carmen right okay yeah U okay um here is our interpreter so she says hello my name is Carmen Flores a community server from the Grassroots groupa just one second please okay okay so but I I thought it was this so I didn't okay okay all right so I'm going to try to summarize what I because I thought I was
038going to read this one you know so basically what she was saying is that she her family is afraid I mean all the kids are so afraid to come to school the kids are do not want to come they are afraid to go to take the bus uh they're suffering from bullying because of this thing being an immigrant and she's basically asking and begging you to enforce something to have Clarity on this and uh basically to defend the families and the wellbeing of those students and I'm sorry for summarizing but I thought it was going to read this one thank you senor fres Roman B gracias cles now we have the translation this is the one okay say hello uh my name is Carmen Flores a community server from the grass root Roots group justian
039esperansa Justice and hope arresting of w County and a mother of three children who attended Public Schools as a member of the Immigrant Community I am living through one of the most difficult times witnessing so many attacks against our community as a mother I live every day with the fear of what could happen to my children Roman my youngest son just 7 years old listens daily to my advice on what he should do if uh something happens today I am here alongside other parents and students to ask the super superintendent of the way County School System to support the families of their students we demand a Firm Stance against collaborating with immigration authorities ensuring that our children are safe in their their schools and that no school police officer will interrogate them without their parents
040present enough Injustice enough living in fear of what could happen if what if in what should be our children's second home schools must be the safest place for them after home one day I walked into a school full of Hope to enroll my children today I stand here full of fear trembling knowing that just like me there are thousands of mothers and fathers we demand immigration enfor enforcement enforcement out of our schools thank you all right thank you all right our next speaker is actually uh Sarah Wilder um will'll be followed by Laura H not to jump to conclusions or anything good evening Miss Wilder good evening so I'm kind of going off script for this whole thing but I got my trusted post a note I'm probably one of the least suspecting people that
041needs to be talking in front of the school board but I am a clinical social worker and a licensed clinical therapist and addiction specialist that's worked in my field for the last 10 years and I've been watching kind of behind closed doors all the different changes over the years but definitely since covid and now currently with the political atmosphere stress is the issue and I've also that on the board for the career Advisory board for Southeast rally High School to try to get people to understand what mental health looks like not only in our individual lives but then the family systems that we go home to the school systems that we all participate in and even the work environment so I'm a privately owned business so I'm doing a lot of that impact work from
042corporate level as well as to local government level but for me personally why I'm here is I set out to be what I needed when I was younger and to be that person that you could hold space for the things that you go through at a teenage developmental level some of the things that you can't control hormones whatever the case may be but also what do you do when your child starts using or experimenting with drugs as a parent how do you handle that but as also as a child of a parent how do you handle those conversations what can you do about it um so I'm coming here tonight to offer you myself as consultation whether it be from the Schoolboard level or whether it be from whoever gets to see this um there
043are resources out there to deal with the emotions that you're feeling right now but unfortunately they never go away that's the tricky part of them and it's going to be a longterm change that we have to do from every single level of our society in order to be able to see all the changes that clearly everyone has been trying to advocate for for a very long time and I'm just here to provide my contribution to that since mental health has been a very closed conversation and still very much is considering that my reach is really only one to one sometimes with billing people's insurance and I'd like to make that make sense at a larger level so thank you for your time and consideration but I would really hope that you guys choose to empower
044the students and and equip teachers and every level of administration to how to deal with all of this change and a motion going on right now so thank you thank you Miss Wilder and before you leave we do have someone on staff that we can connect you with oh okay okay where would I need to go to um if you want to just step over here okay all right thank you our next speaker is Laura hog who'll be followed by Nicole Baldridge is Laura here okay we'll next go to uh Nicole Baldridge will'll be followed by Dr Edith neevis good evening good evening board thank you for being here my name is Nicole Baldridge and I am a parent of three students in Wake County um and a former teacher I come to you tonight
045as a mother and a Community member first of all before I get into this the pain that a mother feels is universal and it was very clear even if you don't speak Spanish how painful and scary this is and I urge you to listen take that to into account and do something to protect these families they're clearly in a lot of pain um so what am I here for I'm here to talk about Dei um and tell you what it is and what it isn't some of what Dei is despite what people may tell you ramps and sidewalk curb cutouts that's Dei subtitles and Clos captions on your TV and phone that's Dei family restant rooms at the airport and other places that is Dei parental Leave paid time off Dei non-smoking areas end of
046indoor smoking areas that is Dei being able to have medical professionals and your co-workers use your preferred name not just queer people your nickname that is Dei rooms to pray and meditate in at work and other public places Dei what Dei is not again despite what you may have heard and people will tell you hiring an underqualified person for a job that's not Dei that doesn't happen hiring based on race just to meet diversity goals no such thing that is illegal a new fad or buzzword Dei has been going on for decades it is not new it has just been called many different things this is just the name we're using now Dei is the broad term used to make schools and workplaces accessible for all people it is the term that is applied to
047all accommodations necessary for non-typical students staff and parents to attend our Public Schools is what makes schools more inclusive and more reflective the of the community in which they sit I have personally attended many Dei training sessions these range from how to make curriculum more accessible to students on the Spectrum to how to scaffold instruction for students that have learning differences scaffolding means to build in instruction so that everybody has access it is Dei that gives us the helps to give us the ability to have empathy and give access to those in need all of our students come to us with different things and different needs and is our job as teachers to ensure that they can all learn good teaching means scaffolding instruction we needed and it means adding depth and breath when needed
048Dei gives access to the gifted Learners and the non- gift and Learners it is your job and I urge you to continue to control School curriculum and allow teachers to teach what we they need to thank thank you our next speaker is Dr Edith neeves who'll be followed by Tammy Fitzgerald good evening good evening everyone um my name is Dr Edith Nas I Am a board certified pediatrician with 15 years of experience and my number one priority is uh taking care of the children children and that include um including immigrant childrens recently the Secretary of Homeland Security wrote back a policy that limited immigration Customs Enforcement from making arrests at hospitals doctor's offices places of worship and schools this action brings fear and hardship to Immigrant children and their families they are known to increase
049toxic stress levels in children the American Academy of Pediatrics opposes any policies that are detrimental to the Children's Health and well-being we have robust evidence that toxic stress disrupts brain development and impacts mental health though every child is different children who experience toxic stress May display the following signs at school acting withdrawn crying spells hyperarousal difficulties focusing on school work fear of being separated from caregivers of family which may lead to school absences poor appetite in plain terms these children are operating in a brain survival mode how can school support students and families set a tone of safety and respect make your school a safe space through public statements of support reaffirming every child's right to education these statements are most effective when grounded in vision mission and stated in the Strategic plan of the
050school district be aware of the peer Dynamics in your school environment deal directly with any derogatory language or behaviors from peers that are rooted in Prejudice use these moments at teaching moment assure caregivers that any information that the school has about the student immigration status it is only available through an order from a federal judge be proactive and hold meetings with families who may have a lot of questions consider bringing legal experts other social services programs to present about relevant topics our leaders must remember that immigrant children are children it is our duty as a society to safeguard the well-being of children thank you thank you our next speaker is Tammy Fitzgerald who be SP who will be followed by Renee seele good evening M Mr cheral good evening good evening members of the board
051chairman Hagerty thank you for allowing me to speak um in December the Biden Administration withdrew a title 9 rule they had pending and decided not to pursue it January 9th a federal judge in Kentucky vacated Nationwide the title 9 rule that the Biden administration had just passed in August last year then on January 29th this year president Trump issued an executive order ending radical indoctrination in K through 12 schools and just today the civil rights office in the department of federal education has issued a letter of guidance a dear colleague letter and they cite all of these things that have happened in the recent past and state that the Biden Administration the office of civil rights is now enforcing the 2020 version of Title 9 not the 2022 version and your rule that was adopted
052last fall is based on the 2022 version so um I didn't see on your agenda tonight an item suggesting that you repeal this but what is going to happen because it's been very clearly stated by the president and the Department of Education is they are going to withhold Federal funding from this school system if you continue on this Folly um so I know that you have transgender students going into girls bathrooms in high schools in southern White County and all over this County and if that continues the president is going to cut off your federal funding so my suggestion is that you close the office of equity Affairs right around the hall from you because that's going to be that funding will be cut off and um that you revise what you're doing revise your
053policies to the 2020 version of Title Nine thank you very much thank you our next speaker will be Renee seele excuse me Renee SEO who will be followed by ogga Lilia Romero Hernandez hi good evening I came tonight to deliver a civics lesson but first I want to say to the parents in this room my heart goes out to you I can't really say much more than that because I got yep yep yep sorry um so civics lesson so there's been a lot of talk about executive orders and Donald Trump said this and Donald Trump said that and they're shoving papers in front of him and he's just signing stuff willy-nilly and we're all supposed to believe I saw this on Miss caulfield's Facebook page you know that oh we have to rush right now
054to roll back protect oo excuse me start discriminating against kids make our schools less safe because the money's going away so a civics lesson you might not know but we have three branches of government Donald Trump is the head of the executive branch of the government Miss Coffield and his role those executive orders he can tell executive branch agencies how to enforce the laws he does not have the power of the purse he cannot make laws himself the agencies themselves cannot make laws they can interpret the laws they can issue rules but those rules must go through a comment period and a notice well notice and comment as called so this oh my gosh it's been five whole days since this executive order came out and why aren't we discriminating against kids again it's a
055little bit silly those executive orders do not have the force of law until they're properly vetted until the agencies go through the r making process and let me just tell you we've already seen the lawsuits these lawsuits have to go through the courts so president Trump can issue an executive order saying that he's an eagle but I'm not going to watch him fly so just a little bit of information there and also for the folks in district one who might be interested Miss Coffield you've been saying some really crazy stuff on your Anonymous Twitter account for years now and now it's leaking out into the public so I urge the members of district one to take a look at the kinds of things that Miss Coffield says and ask yourselves is this who we want
056representing are children is this the person who's champing it the bit to make our schools less safe for children to make our children less safe because she's antix too take a look decide for yourselves our next speaker is oga Lilia Romero Hernandez who will be followed by Alicia deos Fernandez one moment I have asked men to please speak two sentences at a time and make a pause for the interpret to proceed after that she can continue thank you so much okay welcome okay good evening my name is today I want to use my voice as a mother of an American girl that attends a public school in the way County public school system and she's she's been impacted Me by by the attacks I mean towards immigrants so even her Mental Health is being affected
057and today I am asking for respect tolerance and inclusion in the uh schools of the way County public schools for all the kids who daily attend our schools regardless of their uh uh immigration status today we advocate for counselors that are experts in uh mental health thank you very much gracias next speaker is alici um Alicia deos Fernandez she's not here okay next speaker ailia Romero not here okay next speaker Martha perusa perusa uh next speaker Jessica guandi welcome hello guys my name is Jessica I'm a United States citizen and my husband is a DCA recipient we have a son who was born in the country and attends um the Wake County Public Schools we both work daily to be able to Pro provide a better future for our son therefore my mother-in-law who is
058undocumented is the one who takes him to school every day since my son did not qualify for public transportation in school not only am I worried about my mother-in-law putting herself at risk by dropping my son off at school given the political changes that are emerging I am worried about my son's mental health because even though he is a citizen of this country there are phys there are psychological damages that can be caused to him by him seeing how a child or himself be a victim of racial profiling with the bullet with the bullying that occurs at schools when teachers don't pay attention that is why I would like to see more preventive measures to take taken to ensure that not not only that schools are safe but also how they are treated and that
059school counselors and teachers are attentive to what is happening to our children thank you thank you our final speaker is giselda Al Griselda Alonzo roas okay okay good evening my my name Isa Alonso and I am a community organizer first of all I will I will start me with some data approximately I mean 350,000 residents you know undocumented residents I mean make a a a huge contribution a key contribution uh by uh paying their taxes through our economy in North Carolina it says um according to the Taxation and and Eon and economic policy the undocumented people have contributed I mean with uh 6 92.2 Millions uh paying I mean the taxes to the state um just I mean last year these contributions are essential you know to uh keep and maintain I mean the infrastructure
060you know and um our institutions and public services in the reg okay as a as a Community organizer and grandmother of a child who currently attends I me a school in the in W County it's been very devastating I me to see how uh our community is being uh pushed I mean to um totally uh dispear and is being affected and uh especially in uh their mental health and that I mean includes all our children okay here I'm asking you to please I mean uh provide I mean uh experts in mental health to all these undocumented uh people who contribute I mean to our economy and to making Ure that uh our schools are a safe place and uh please do not be in complicity with this systematic I mean harm okay and um finally
061I would like to add something else and I'm going to repeat it maybe you didn't pay attention at the beginning of what I said okay so the undocumented immigrants contributed 6922 Millions you know in taxes to our state if you somebody's in doubt that we don't have rights we have rights because we pay taxes all right thank you all um and again when I say thank you all I I really do mean that thank you for coming out and sharing your views tonight thank you for respecting our process and for respecting the other speakers it takes a lot to get up and speak in front of of a public meeting like this so thank you all right we have concluded our public comment period and so now we'll turn to the next item which are
062our board and superintendent comments and so I'll turn it to our superintendent Dr Robert Taylor thank you Mr chair and good evening to you all uh my comments will be a little longer tonight because I want to include comments that I didn't have at the last board meeting uh February's black history month and the time for our students and staff to deepen their understanding and appreciation of the many contributions of black Americans to the fabric of our nation this year's theme is African-Americans and labor which encourages a focus on the various profound ways that work uh uh ways that work of all kinds free and unfree skilled and unskilled uh inct with the collective experience of black people I know all of our schools will be imparting knowledge and insights on this and other aspects
063of black history throughout the month of February Black History Month is also a time of Celebration so I would like to invite you to Lan Magnet Middle School on February 28th at 6:30 uh for the second annual Dare To Dream black history month program so we do uh thank all of our staff that are putting those progr that program together uh our magnet schools have uh once again demonstrated that they serve as National models for everything magnet program should be uh 51 of our magnet schools were honored last month with National Merit Awards of our 51 winners 18 were named top Schools of Excellence the highest merit award given by magnet schools of America to put that in perspective there were uh there were only 24 schools in the entire nation to receive that designation
064uh so if you do your math 18 out of 24 you know where we stand uh in addition 20 Wake County Public Schools Magnus schools were named Schools of Excellence and 13 were named schools of Distinction to receive a National Merit award schools must demonstrate commitment to high academic standards curriculum and Innovation successful desegregation and diversity efforts and consistent delivery of high quality educational services so you can find a full list of our winners on our web page uh wcpss.net 2025 magnet Awards uh for more than 40 years for more than 40 years our magnet programs have been at the Vanguard of the magnet school movement promoting diversity while creating unique learning opportunities for countless thousands of students the 51 schools recognized for meeting our exceeding lofty national standards demonstrate that we are consciously continuously
065working to build on our success to level up for the benefit of our students in our communities I'm tremendously proud of the students and the staff at all of our magnet schools as well as the hardworking folk in our magnet office who provide invaluable support so thank you Dr Lane uh again congratulations to this year's winners I'd also like to congratulate our latest group of teachers to attain uh to attain our renew the national board certification 128 Educators learned in December that they are our newest national board certified teachers uh an additional 171 staff members have renewed their national board certification absolutely all to there are 3,250 teachers that have achieved the national board certification while employed with our district that is just outstanding so we remain committed to supporting teachers at every step of
066the certification process from initial candidacy through renewal the certification proc process requires teachers to analyze their teaching practices and the impact of the instructional decisions on student learning to take on leadership roles and to collaborate effectively with their peers so we encourage and support teachers to pursue national board certification because we believe that establishing high standards for teachers leads to increased student achievement and again you can find more information on our website uh this week we are celebrating our outstanding school counselors as part of National School counseling week and we have much to celebrate there are about 550 school counselors currently serving students in our district and they as We Know know are second to none 16 of our schools have earned recognized ASCA model program of ramp status the highest National Honor a School
067counseling program can receive that gives us the most ramp certified schools in the state I'm going to read that one more time that gives us the most ramp certified schools in the state uh the data is clear about the impact of effective school counselors their work improves academic performance reduces disciplinary problems and promotes Mental Health our councils Have Been instrumental in helping our district reach a record high graduation rate this past year and reducing chronic absenteeism over the past two years and just in case you forgot there's 91.3% graduation rate we will continue to do all we can as District leaders to give our school counselors the resources and support they need to continue and expand their important work I hope everyone will take time uh this week to let school counselors at their school
068know just how valued they are uh next week we will have the opportunity to celebrate another valued group of employees our hardworking Transportation staff love the bus week is an annual opportunity for students staff and families to show their appreciation to bus drivers Safety assistance mechanics and other Transportation Personnel our transportation staff are going above and beyond to make sure tens of thousands of students get to and from school safely each and every day so it is only fitting that we take this time to make sure they are recognized for performing this critical role I know our schools will be providing breakfast treats handmade banners cards and other goodies throughout the week I'll look for pictures of these celebrations on social media under the hash wcpss loves the bus uh it goes without saying that
069our transportation team performs an absolutely vital function for our district uh so I'd like to personally express my gratitude for all they do to support the success of students at and I hope you will all find a way to do likewise uh I do want to end my comments today uh and address our public uh concerning the recent issues that have come out of the executive orders out of the federal government and the president's office uh I want to reaffirm that as your superintendent our number one priority is to make sure that students are safe when they come to school uh we know that executive orders have been issued uh but we are happy to report that the president uh still designated schools as safe zones and he has uh no intention at this point
070of sending anyone to our schools um to enforce uh immigration law we have shared Guidance with our schools with our principles to know and understand uh what they should look for uh if indeed an agent were to come to school and so we want to reaffirm uh that our job is to make sure that our students are safe uh more importantly as executive orders come down we want to make sure that we are compant with the law um whatever that compliance may be it will make some happy it will make some unhappy and when the Law changes that opinion also flip-flops and we understand that uh last and more importantly uh we want to reaffirm to everyone that as executive orders come down our number one responsibility is to interpret those and understand what is
071required of the school district uh and that will always be our priority um uh to making sure that we follow the law but more importantly making sure that students are safe when they come to our Public Schools I will reaffirm uh that we do not ask for immigration information that is not a part of the duty or the job of public schools the law is clear across this country that any student that enrolls and and comes to a school has a right to attend and that is what we do every single day and so with that Mr chair I'll turn it back to you thank thank you Dr Taylor you know um if I look a little rattled if I look a little tired I'd confess it has been a difficult couple of weeks now
072for me as we try to get our orientation and our bearing with the flood of different executive orders and developments we're hearing about in Washington DC and to hear the language that's used about you know shock and awe military terms right this was this was Mr Hershey I apologize you you've heard me talk about this already but you know uh shock and all was a military campaign from the first Gulf War that was intentionally designed and friends of mine that that served tell me it was to basically indiscriminately just bomb the heck out of everything to create Panic destroy morale so confusion and it was very effective it crippled the enemy but at the same time it destroyed hospitals schools museums and the the justification was that well sacrifices had to be made and so
073to hear that kind of terminology words like shock and awe being used to describe how our own government will issue rules and regulations and governance for our country really disturbs me because the sacrifices we're making here are our kids in our communities right we've we've all gone to school we've taken our Civics classes we can agree to disagree about how much power we think one branch should have or the extent of states rights versus Federal rights these are debates we've had throughout the history of our country but when you're willing to sacrifice the well-being of some of our most vulnerable citizens for the purpose of sewing confusion and panic I mean I can't tell you how much that disheartens me whether it was the first executive order that came out to threaten Federal funding which
074was immediately challenged and then there was a federal stay and then it was rescinded and rolled back and there's still questions about what exactly it meant and what it would apply to to all of these orders that are direct threats about funding you know the federal funding that we get supports some of our most vulnerable students over 20,000 special education students in Wake County and you you've heard me say Wake County has so many special education students that if you took them out of the county they would form the 14th largest school district in North Carolina that's the direct impact to families right here in Wake County when you talk about our Title One programs and the number of educational services that are being provided in schools to assist families that have the lowest economic
075resources of their own programs like prek to help all kids get ready for that first day of kindergarten to have the educational and social skills to interact with other kids and to be good students to be able to receive that instruction these are essential services and we know they're effective and why would you threaten those Services you know even programs that don't necessarily affect our most vulnerable kids like our magnet school programs that we know have incredible academic benefits to kids across this County in our work session we just listed off some of our most recent Magnet School Grant recipients East Wake Magnet High Wendell Magnet Elementary Wendell Magnet Middle Zebulon Magnet Elementary Zebulon Magnet Middle Centennial Camp Centennial Campus Magnet School East milbrook Magnet School Magnet Middle School Wake Forest Magnet Elementary Wildwood Forest
076just down the road Dillard Drive Magnet Elementary and Dillard Drive Magnet Middle East Cary Magnet Middle Smith Magnet Elementary Schools the loss of those funds will directly impact kids they fund teachers and instructors that we cannot afford without those grants over 42.5 million just in the magnet program that doesn't count the money we would lose for special education students that doesn't count the money we would lose for counselors and for programs for you know our mckenny vento students our students who are homeless for students they're victims of abuse for students that are here as refugees maybe from a war torn country who for whom English is not their first language but they're trying to get an education I don't know what the future holds I really don't and I'm really shocked every day shock and
077a about just the level that people are willing to go to make political points I wish I could give you more comfort more reassurance but I really am unsettled about where we are right now and the future going forward we know there are people that are standing up for these students that are standing up for these programs that are going to fight them in courts fight them in the legislature in congress with all the powers that are available to us and if you support these programs I hope you'll advocate for them as well but I've been trying these last several weeks to concentrate locally what can I do locally on what I can and can't control but they're bringing these issues to us and so you know I hope all of you will join me
078in advocating for our Public Schools our public school children and the families that benefit from all of these programs these are not numbers these are not dollars these are real people these are real children right here in Wake County and I hope I can count on you thank you I guess I ended too soon I needed to turn it over to Vice chair Swanson you did I was waiting for the the segue um but I I wanted start off by thanking um Dr Perkins um at Connections Academy for hosting our BAC meeting last night and we had a very robust conversation around our updates on our strategic plan um that was led by Dr Robinson and Dr Alfred Keith and a deep dive into the um potential well the upcoming cell phone policy that was
079led by Dr Crane and we had such great conversation and I was sharing with Dr seon earlier that that was the most engaging I've seen um from our BAC so thank you all for lifting that up and um bringing us into thank you thank you um and I also want to just thank the student for who kind of set the tone for us this morning or this afternoon or earlier this afternoon excuse me it feels like it's been on such a long day um who reminded us and I I hope you're able to sit there and listen to the words of of uh lift every voice and sing um which was written in a time that was much darker than the moments that we're currently sitting in where Hope's unborn was dying folks literally dying
080and so to see what folks were able to pin to paper to give us hope I hope that resonates you and you can sit and marinate with that as you look to a place for Hope and for change and you know the part that I particularly love in this this song is stoning the road we tried better the chesting rod felt in the days when UNH hope had died yet with the stated beat have not our weary feet come to the place where our forefathers side we have come over a way that with the tears that have been watered we have come I'm trying not to sing it because I don't want to mess it up uh we have come we have come trending the path through the blood of the slaughter out from the
081gloomy pth till now we stand at last where the white gleam of the bright star is cast God of our weary years God of our silent te thou who has brought us this far on the way thou who has by thy might led us into the light keep us forever in the path we pray let our feet stray from the place of our God where we met thee our heart shrunk of the wine of the world we forget thee Shadow beneath thy land may we forever stand true to our god true to our native land and I think that is very reminding as we kick off Black History Month which is American history and American history is Black History month and I think it's also important that we uh take a moment and really just
082to to look to our history for our hope uh today we celebrate the 112th birthday of Rosa Parks who was known as the Godmother of the Civil Rights Movement who did not just sit down and sit back and was portrayed as this fagal older woman who was just tired of giving up and giving in but who strategically organized to spark change in a moment where yet again hope Unborn had died so let us continue to celebrate not just black history month during this this month but for the next 365 days as we really chime in and lean into those places because I also want to encourage you to lift up figures and history figures that you that we may not know such as Ella Baker who was a a a key organizer in a strategic
083organizer who gave um light to Young students I'm Ling to the the students in this room because she she is one who dared folks to dream um who played a key rooll in the stins that happened at my beloved Alma norcent uh where we celebrated the 65th anniversary of the sit in that spark changes were Four entt Freshmen set down to challenge Injustice to challenge Jim Crow to demand equality that sparked a movement throughout the South and those four young men were e Blair David Richmond uh uh uh David Richmond um eel Blair lord they're going to kill me they're going to take my anent card I should know this um I've been out of college for 10 years so we GNA blame that uh but the ent4 not the greensb 4 um is what
084we know them as who again uh changed the world so um that little black history fact will come back next week because I don't want to take up much more time but thank you all and but continue to lift up your voice and to and to aggravate agitate aggravate and do something to shift the moral compass of this country thank you thank you Vice chair Swanson Miss edmans are you ready sure yes I am thank you uh so welcome Miss Gordon we're excited you're here glad you're here uh congratulations to former Schoolboard member Susan Evans on her election as chair of the Wake County Commissioners last night and to Sophia Jackson who was sworn in yesterday these are two public education Champions that we are very lucky to partner with February is National magnet schools
085month which I just learned like an hour before our meeting so thank you to Dr Kimberly Lane and her department and all of those who came before you um to give Wake County the excellent robust magnet program that we have here in our school system and um a system that is a system of magnet schools that is the Envy of and the model for the nation congratulations to Vernon Malone College and Career Academy Middle Creek High School and Westlake Elementary School for receiving their ramp certification I know it's a tremendous amount of work thank you Dr Taylor Senior leadership and our legal partners for the guidance issued last week on how to respond if and when Ice shows up at a school I'm grateful for our community Partners um ncae and the education Justice Alliance
086who are working with families and teachers and thank you all for coming tonight it really is very impactful and we appreciate you very much um and want to hear more from you so come back next meeting um I also want to shout out cumra andc they've got some excellent resources on their social media Pages that's cembra and c and I know there's many others in um eja will help us learn about all of those resources on Saturday I participated in an event called voter girl project this is a national program offered by the League of Women Voters that's aimed at teaching young girls about Civic engagement and the importance of voting and it um encourages girls to see themselves as leaders and even running for office and I participated in a panel with mayor well
087several panels with mayor Vivian Jones of um Wake Forest and town coun Carrie Town councilwoman Lori Bush um you know spoke to the girls and answered their questions about what it's what we do in our jobs and our roles and what it's like to run for office to honor Black History Month I have two things first a shout out to Queen be Beyonce on her Grammy win she is the first black woman to win country album of the year and as many of you as many of you know I hope you know she announced a cowboy Carter tour which I think is exactly what we need in 2025 I'm planning to go with my son um second our Wake County public libraries have a month worth of programming called celebrate Black Brilliance these programs honor
088black creativity history and culture you can find a full list of those events by ageg group at wake.gov libl Brilliance and then lastly I do want to thank all of our Educators for your commitment to teaching and learning and doing what's best for students in these extremely challenging times I left it to chair Hagerty and my colleague Mr Hershey to um say things that I just couldn't find the words for so thank you chair for your remarks but um the leadership that our Educators um the leadership at this table and those of you across the room um I'm prepared to do all that I can do to support you and to do what's best for every single child every day um who comes to us in Wake County Public Schools that's the focus their safety
089their well-being their their education and their care and recent days have been extremely hard and we know that we are going to um unfortunately have more hard days and hard weeks but we are Wake County and I'm honored to work with you all and to meet those challenges with you all and to respond to any attacks on public education um our children are worth it thank you thank you Miss Edmond well next turn to Dr Ing thank you and uh welcome Miss Gordon um you do know that you have the best seat in the house um good evening and um on January 14th I was honored to be a part of the 50th anniversary of East milbrook Magnet Middle School um I want to thank principal Marson for including me in the celebration I was
090very impressed with all the talent on display that evening the orchestra the choir the the art on display but the Highlight for me was seeing the time capsules from 1975 and 2000 um inside the 1975 capsule was a copy of Newsweek magazine with a cover story on the Concord um so students I would suggest that you ask your parents or grandparents what the Concord is or was um the magazine also had ads for the latest fashion and cars from 197 5 and also there were ads in there for cigarettes which thankfully you don't see that anymore and as for the time camp for 2000 there was a list of the top songs from that year including byebye by um can't believe that it's 25 years old I feel kind of old now um I want
091to congratulate all the early graduates that walked across the stage this uh uh last few weeks I was uh on honored to be at the Ceremonies for milbrook high school and Heritage High School um these are always special for me because uh they're more intimate and I get a chance to hear the students aspirations and um and then also messages from the parents um so it was a very special time and I wish them the best in their future uh Endeavors um District 3 will have the next BAC meeting on February the 24th and we will also be focusing on uh getting feedback about the uh possible cell phone policy for our schools um so I've invited uh Dr Robinson and Dr crane um to be on hand to lead the discussion and to record
092all the feedback um I invite everyone in the community to attend um it will be at um baileywick elementary school and I want to thank um the staff there in advance and also the PTSA there um dinner for the staff will be served at 5:30 and the community can join the meeting starting at 6:00 um We are continuing to collect feedback and welcome we welcome um emails uh to help us understand your concerns about this issue um in the meantime I encourage everyone to pick up a copy of the anxious Generation by Jonathan height uh I'm continuing reading reading that and um it looks at the state of mental health in our youth today and how technology may be contributing to the issues that we are facing and finally I know that the community has
093a wide range of feelings and no doubt a lot of questions about the executive orders uh that were uh signed by President Trump last week and I'm sure that we on the board will have disagreements on what that means um the latest one the last one the ending radical indoctrination and K12 schooling order um is giving a 90-day period for the Departments of Education defense and the Health and Human Service services along with the attorney general to gather information and formulate a strategy and it may affect Federal funding for many uh elas including ours um but it also includes in there um a um uh reestablishment of the 1776 commission to help promote patriotic education in our schools and to help all of us get ready to celebrate this country's 20 250th birthday next year
094um it will also call for a more robust and pervasive educational program to celebrate Constitution Day on September 17th what all this actually will look like we really don't know yet um it's true that no direct action is needed by us right now and a lot can still happen in the next 90 days however we have to remember that our primary mission is education and that parents are our partners in that mission um I believe the American people want kids to learn the things that will help them succeed in life while it is important to understand other people's viewpoints the school is not the place for spreading social agendas our schools need to be a place of learning and not a place for social experiments and activism we want our children to learn the value
095of hard work and Merit and to judge others based on the content of their characters the American people are desperate for truth and the much needed injection of Common Sense and to return to a time when American except exceptionalism is valued and taught in our classrooms and to my fellow board members I know that there is a lot of fear of the unknown I I urge all of us to take actions to be compliant with whatever regulations that may come from DC because above all we need to be a model to our children of what it means to be law-abiding citizens for example uh when it comes to the uh policies um we do need to look at make sure that our Pol policies follow the reversal of the title 9 regulations and I hope
096that we can do that transparently and without delay I trust that we will be able to weather the changes together and keep our focus on the education of children not because of the fear of losing Federal funding but because it is the right thing to do thank you thank you Dr in our next speaker is Mr Hersh thank you so much um couple things uh appreciate the words of all my colleagues um I will say that uh if we are searching for truth we're going to have to wait about four more years for that um because man I've never seen someone lie so much as that person uh a couple things that were referenced in our in um public comment that I just wanted to bring to light a couple people brought up the the
097federal legislative agenda and I'm really really appreciative of the chair and the vice chair and Dr Taylor for for going down this path I I advocated for it in the past and it's so incredibly important now with everything going on couple of key points to hit on um so for people who didn't see the work session uh one the first point that we're talking about is as a board calls on Congress to preserve and strengthen the Department of Education we list a number of reasons why they support special educ ation funding they support a lot of funding and a lot of programs that we have um and if you are interested in improving the education of our children this is something you should be in favor of keeping because if we lose that sort of
098funding um it makes it a lot more challenging to educate our children if that is truly your uh priority um the other parts in here talk about student mental health and well-being we hear about it from students who come to speak speak to us about how mentally I'll just say exhausting it is with everything that they have to go through with code Reds um now with immigration uh gun violence that this country continues to do nothing about um so that's part of our ask to to Congress infrastructure uh funding which um I'm going to ask our facilities uh had at the facilities committee next week to kind of talk about in general um the if there are potential tariffs how we go about buying stuff for our schools what the process that we have to
099go through if that stuff is even readily available in this country which a lot of it is not and kind of the general impact fortunately those were paused for 30 days but it's important for people to understand um the impact of those actions on a school system uh another part of our federal agenda ask is um for the school lunch program you know we want our kids to be able to eat uh breakfast and lunch for free that's you know having having a full belly allows them to be a better student and again if we're interested in their education that's that's a big priority and um so that I just wanted to touch on that another point that was brought up a couple times during the public um common period was Title 9 and I
100just just want to point out going back to the old rules makes it tougher to find someone in violation of sexual harassment so I if that's your if that's where you're at and you want us to go back to the old rules and make it tougher to find someone in violation of sexual harassment okay um I get it it's really about trans kids um last I want to touch oh two things one I just want to thank everybody who who came out to talk about the immigration issue and the challenges if they are here still or not um they have my support and really I think a large percentage of the community truly wants schools to be safe places um for our students to come and learn people understand that um like my son doesn't
101get to decide where he lives he lives in Raleigh with with us uh he doesn't have that choice and so um we need to maintain safety at our schools for our students and for our staff because it's not just our students that are going to feel that it's going to be our staff because all of a sudden how do they react and what do they have to worry about and they already have to go through code Reds we had one not that long ago in North Hills and it affected about seven schools and I mean that's it those are not um enjoyable experiences for staff students or families uh and I want to also lift up just making sure we're really emphasizing at schools any bullying around the immigration issue um we it's got to
102be we can't have it period And I don't know if if that's message uh best flows from our superintendent to our principals to our teachers and really the parents to to let their kids know like Hey we're not having this in our schools I I would appreciate that very much um lastly because it's black history month month I think it's a good time to talk about diversity equity and inclusion and I really want to highlight as uh Dr n mentioned we're celebrating 250 next year um that for 250 years I think it's really important to talk about people being hired uh based on their skin color and for 250 years um it has been um mediocre white men who have been hired based on their skin color and those are facts uh I mean that's
103that's you know I've heard people say Dei is racist if that's what you believe you know nothing about diversity Equity inclusion and you know nothing about racism and that speaks to you as a human being um you know within Wake County how does that how does that impact a school system it's ensuring diversity Equity inclusion ensures that our kids who need more help get more help it ensures that kids are black and brown kids who have not had the same educational opportunities over the course of the 249 years of this country get those opportunities um and it's without lowering standards that's the thing that drives me nuts the most that's being real and I've said this before people who throw around Dei hire is they're just replacing the n-word with Dei higher um that's what
104they want to say we get it you guys are all losers um sorry not no no not anybody in here I'm not talking about anybody in here I it's What I Hear on TV when when we had the plane crash and it and and you had people on TV questioning should I be should I see a black pilot do I think they're a Dei hire no that's racism you know to to think that way and I have to edit my language real quick I was about to get in trouble with the chair um but uh so let me just close you know so why is so in our school system too and if you look at our our staff and and you for one second think that um any of them are hired uh with
105a lower standard oh man you are could not be more wrong um whether it's uh anyone of any race of any gender sitting over there they are supremely qualified uh in what they do that's how Wake County hires um they they look for the best and the brightest and we are not lowering standards it's insulting to to um put that on any public education I mean we got vacancies so uh we're not turning away people because they're white that's one of the dumbest things I've ever heard um sorry I feel like it's my job as a slightly better than mediocre white guy to say this um and and let me say why lastly why it's important there was a person hired in this Administration he's the under secretary for public diplomacy and public affairs his
106name is Darren Bey he wrote this is on this is him saying competent white man must be in charge if you want things to work and he goes on to say I don't have the quote in front of me I'm not going to get in trouble and pull my phone out but he said no not he said the problem with this country is that we uh you know play too much to women he included women and minorities and we should not do that so for those of you that think Dei excludes white women uh it does not um you know white those mediocre white men don't want anything to do with you either so just putting that out there uh and that welcome to board comments Mr Hershey don't encourage no no I was going
107to say welcome to board comments it's your turn thank you thank you Miss Gordon the mic is yours thank you well am I on okay I will keep my my comments short tonight um but I just want to say it is an honor and a PIV okay am I not speaking okay maybe I'm not close enough it is an honor and a privilege to be on this board um I do not take it lightly um and you I'm sure you have seen my passion come out and and I appreciate you all lifting that up um and I just want to say to to our community members I am so excited um to be here and I look forward to being in the community and I cannot wait to visit my schools I know I keep
108saying it so next week I will have more to say thank you thank you Miss Gordon we'll come around the table to miss rice good afternoon everybody well I'm going to try to keep this as very brief as possible and um try not to switch hats this time around the table with everything that's going on um almost feel like I need to put on my pastor hat uh but I'm going to keep it in the professional realm of Board of Education uh and in my professional world and dive right into uh Wellness but I'm going to come from two perspectives this time where I usually do one but I'm going to do spiritual and social but before I do that I do want to say uh the proud um principal Deval and me being the
109proud board representative of District 4 um hats off tonight for representing lignet Magnet Middle School with salana Mack and a student that brought us in so very well with her singing um so I'm excited to represent um that particular school and magnet schools are primarily within my district right so there's a passion so I'm going I'm going go to keep this on Pace I I've got something written but there's a flood of emotions but I'm going to keep those emotions together um and so I do want to say um I would like to honor um black school board members that have served on the W County Board of Education that was formed in 1976 almost 50 years ago um and so I heard Dr in and I heard Mr Hershey talk about 250 or we're
110in our 249th year so I want us to be mindful that we are years as a country and of those 249 years only 49 of those years Wake County Public Schools was integrated only 49 years of the 249 years of this country was W County Public Schools integrated that integration came with force that integration came with mandates that would have only happened had our federal government stepped in so I need people to please take heed to the behaviors that we have and the mindsets that we have thinking that we're going to do right or that people think differently just because a mandate came down when people show you who they are believe them the first time and every time of my 50 years I have seen people on my board I have seen people in
111community I have seen people in my faith community and I believe you the first time you showed me and so with that I want to lift up in Wake County of 49 years this is what you have cforia wimbley bernon Malone Harriet Webster Keith Sutton Monica John Hustler Tara Waters Tyler Swanson tashiba rice and the Christina Gordon nine board members in 49 years that look like us and you wonder do we need appropriate practices I leave you with this analogy and I may not do my whole thing and that is everyone understands a child who rides rides a bike everybody wants their child to ride a bike right and when children ride their bikes and parents get ready to go out and teach them how to ride their bike not one parent can identify to
112say they told their child get on the bike and ride and walk away you held the bottom of the seat you instructed them on how it's going to wobble you instructed them on how to keep their balance I want to use that analogy to help you understand when you say that this school education is just to teach and just to share academics no one just tells a child to come in the last classroom and just learn no the teacher is showing them through different programs and structures how to balance the education how this is needed you can do it supporting them with confidence and what that looks like is what you want to dismantle and call parts of what we call Dei so no one just goes into something and just say do it you
113don't train your child how to ride a bike in that way so why do you come in a classroom and think that a child is just supposed to learn because someone says do it there are parts and structures to come in that are building blocks to these children so that their brains can actually comprehend the information and learn so now let me switch over to my spiritual hat for you for Spiritual Wellness I stay within the professional right it's eight Dimensions of Wellness and one of those Dimensions of Wellness is spiritual as well as social so I want to remind us and I heard a lot of talk about fear and for those who have whatever spiritual practice they have mine just happens to be of a faith um that practice and calls my God
114God okay for God has not given me the spirit of fear but a power of love and a sound mind when I am afraid I put my trust in you in God whose words I Praise In God I trust I will not be afraid what can man do to me and the last thing I want to say when anxiety was great within me your consolation brought me to my soul but now this is what the Lord says fear not for I have redeemed you and for this it is fitting and culturally for black history month because my culture of the 249 years have suffered and it has been in those spirituals and those thought processes of faith that has carried us here into 19 to 2025 right and so the last thing that I'm going
115to do with you is social Wellness around the constructs of un honoring Black History Month this is what you can do you can sell celebrate Black Culture highlight black contributions highlight the accomplishments and contributions of black people and communities you can read books by black authors read more books by black authors you can organize a book club you can volunteer and support black Le organizations you can donate to them you can support employee resource groups that promote employee res resources around black employees advocate for black community get involved in activism contact government representatives and amplifi amplify black voices and most importantly educate yourself America unless you were born here or unless you were here before everybody came over as we like to say our Native Americans were already here history tells us who we are
116believe us for what they've shown us and I ask everyone to please operate in love because hate is not a place where we need to be but if we operate in love everybody will have what a positive and productive day thank you Miss rice next we'll go to miss Coffield thank you so I'd like to welcome uh the new District Two Board member Miss Gordon um I like what um she had said about not filling someone else's shoes but filling your own so I look forward to working with you and seeing what we can do for our children February 24th is District 1 um next board advisory meeting and we'll post details as soon as they are available we're still looking for a school to host and we'll get you those details I wanted to
117congratulate East Wake high school Roseville High School and Wake Forest High School who held their first midyear graduation uh that was Wake Forest uh High School who held their first midyear graduation it was a great ceremony and I do agree that um it's really great to see them in that intimate more intimate service I wish them all much success in what the new chapter brings last Saturday I attended count Institute Training which was uh great to hear from all of the speakers from all over um if you have not heard of their organization through the John lock please check it out there's a lot of resourceful information there I made a statement about title 9 and since we move so swiftly to alter the policy to accommodate Biden's changes due to the law interpretation and
118the threat of federal funding I feel expect that we should do the same to address this policy now I feel strongly about it because women fought for their safety and opportunities and they still deserve that right trans students also deserve protections and we have the power to work on a solution for that as well a solution that does not infringe on rights of the girls in their private spaces we need to either revert or speak about the policy as quickly as we change it as we changed it back in July when the rest of North Carolina and 22 other states waited for the Court's decisions to make any policy changes if we put half of the attention that we put on sexual content gender and racial point of views towards life skills and solutions imagine
119the mountains that we could move for our children what we do to solve our bullying problems or our drug problems like fentanyl or lace pills and overdosing I brought attention to the issue of the vape stores being so close in proximity to the schools working with other elected officials while we still have made some progress there is still so much more to do the problem of vaping was one of our number one issues that we discussed at our Retreat we can make movement on this it's time to view the problems and solutions through the lens of what is best for all children no matter their race or gender we owe it to all of our children to do that we have a tremendous bullying issue and it needs to be addressed students and parents come
120to speak to us often about bullying and it breaks my heart each and every time we have a huge discipline problem CH children need order teachers need the order children do better with boundaries and high expectations there are many things that we can spend this much attention on that help all of our children imagine what student achievement and mental health would look like if our children would FOC were focused on learning life skills and reaching their dreams if every one of them knew how to read at grade level if we put this much time and energy into their math if we focused on life skills so they felt repar prepared and empowered to do great things when our children suffer and they do because they struggle to read then they look at their peers and
121they feel their brains hurt trying to Pro progress in math they feel like something is wrong with them our gifted students also struggle for the same reasons they flounder these pressures lead to anxiety depression and drugs and worse and if you think our children do not know this then you need to read the room enough is enough people's lives are torn fam's children are hurting so stop with all the politics and and get back to the basics so we can focus on education and getting our children back on track to success get them excited about their future and their dreams I feel we've completely lost our way and it's not just Wake County but wake is our responsibility it's past time to get back to the basics and for the record I do not have
122some secret tw Twitter account I barely use it and more save things on it and read through the personal read through it it's more a a nickname I've had it long before the school board and it is not a secret it's just not a board page anyone is free to see and read I'm not anti anything I Am pro transparency and I am Pro not having our children's welfare being sacrificed for profit or agenda parents deserve transparency and account accountability and even more so do our children thank you and we'll conclude our board comments tonight with Miss mafy welcome Miss Gordon you've only taken one vote and already it's been quite a night um first I would like to thank Dr Crane and Dr Robinson for coming to my board advisory council meeting um and
123talking about personal devices in schools and leading that focus group for our families and administrators that were present when I was teaching and even here at this board table there are two things that I go back to because at our core we have to do what's best for students and in teaching there's two fundamental things that you need to know the first is maso's hierarchy of needs the second is Bloom's taxonomy masa's hierarchy of needs talks about the things that we need in order to thrive in this world psychological needs not being hungry not being cold not being sick or in pain safety needs knowing that you can feel safe in the present in the future and moving forward societ needs for love and belonging self-esteem and then finally self-actualization those are the things when
124we talk about social emot learning that are important for our kids we need our kids to feel safe in school whether it's from bullying whether it's from uh an outside force coming into the school and threatening their physical safety you can't learn if you don't feel safe you can't learn if you're hungry our job is to teach children but as part of this school system and this school district our job is to make sure our children are in a place where they can learn we need children to feel accepted for who they are when they enter our schools if students don't feel accepted they can't learn if we have children who are hungry who are afraid who don't feel accepted we can't do our job which is to teach children and that's what it comes
125down to and if we can't agree on what makes students feel safe and loved when they enter our schools we have a big problem in our society because I don't care what your kid looks like or who they love or who they are and what they want to be they need to learn but we need to accept your children for who they are in order for them to feel that love and to feel safe and to learn and it makes me very sad to see things not always that way in this country I grew up in a very small community that is 97% white I think when I was there maybe it was higher I had no experience with many people from many different backgrounds in my community I made a a lot of mistakes
126as an adult because I just didn't understand I read a lot of books I thought I understood but when you meet people you have different experiences people just want to feel safe people want to feel loved and accepted and know that they're cared for and our job is to do that for students and waiting for that and it has been seconded by Miss mafy All In favor of adoption of the consent agenda please signify by saying I I any opposed all right all of the wonderful items on the consent agenda including the item for Apex High School has been approved thank you so we have one action item tonight this is a review of the wcpss Board of Education State Legislative priorities this is the document that we discussed on our work session we went
127we had um I thought a very good discussion we have made amendments to the document based upon your input and we present the FI the document to you in its final form now I say final form I know that we had at least two other specific ideas that uh people were going to draft some language on so before we take a motion um well I guess we should we should probably take a motion on the agenda first for discussion and then we'll will consider any amendments Mr oh go ahead Vice chair Swanson no go for it so moved second so we do have a motion from Vice chair Swanson to adopt the uh 2025 wcpss legislative advocacy priorities and we have a second for Miss mafy now that the motion is on the table is
128there any discussion or any debate Miss rice chair um I just want to get clarity in reference to the work session comments and information that we shared earlier will this be added into what we're what was originally sent to us and then come back again or allow me to provide some clarity so we have two different documents um at least two this one is specifically for uh the state and so it's we referred to it on our agenda as State Legislative priorities the document you see might only say legislative advoca of priorities no it's a good catch that we should in the title make sure that we do that it does State State Legislative advocacy and State Legislative priorities and I believe that's something we can just direct staff to address without a formal Amendment
129but the the timetable just to keep talking on uh the bigger question is we were also discussing Federal priorities and Federal polic policy and so we had our first discussion of that at today's work session it did sound like there were um a lot of ideas beyond the original ideas that were brought to us and we didn't get a chance to talk about all of the items in that document so we will bring that back to our next work session to continue that discussion this document is only our State Legislative Advocate advocacy priorities based on the conversations we had at our treat and at our previous work sessions thank you I I apologize I didn't I was my brain was still in work session mode versus looking at assmbly to tell me Miss rice we
130have other folks ask that same question you are in good company um so do we have any other questions or any debate I you know I'm prepared to speak on agenda items but um before we let me let me ask first before we go to amendments any questions or what you'll see here is we did go through we've talked about raising teacher compensation um modernizing special the special education funding formula that we get from the state addressing student hunger to support academics funding you our schools based on the actual enrollment so that we are funding each child attending public school we talk about local flexibility over operational issues things like being able to modify our school calendar either to align with the community colleges or to respond to whether an eer Mercy related situations we
131talk about K3 class siiz flexibility exploring local funding options to support the capital needs in our schools things like our hvac's and our our transportation system and we talk about fair and transparent access to school performance data you know the importance that you know we need to prioritize the needs of our public schools and our public school students and to improve school performance evaluation and make sure that all families can get a fair and accurate uh compar comp Arison of what their choices are as they navigate the world of school choice so you should see um some changes based on your comments to strengthen the agenda or to clarify areas that were that were brought up um and so I would recommend it to you so at this point we do have a motion to
132um adopt it that has been seconded but I understand there may be amendments and or even other questions questions first um I'll start with um all right with Miss Edmonds and then go to Dr ring so uh I do have an amendment so I need to wait okay so we'll next go to Dr Ring um just to clarify so is this the final uh version like the the appearance of it will be the U how it is or because because previous years it was in that kind of info like a bunch of graphics and and all that yeah we'll give staff you know some discretion of flexibility to format it right now it fits on you know one sheet of paper front and back if it's expanded and it goes to three pages we'll have
133more space to fill so the idea that we could have Bolder um titles more Graphics things like that could be added but things about formatting I was just going to defer to staff yeah I mean I I appreciate more of the explanation of our positions rather than a nice picture just my opinion I app I appreciate that Dr uh Mr Hershey um I I think it I'll be making an amendment but I emailed everybody um Dr Mao's language on reducing barriers to te teacher licensure um I think that's what we had talked about um and so that I do I need to why I need to make an amendment then to I'm actually asking the vice chair parliamentarian over there I will defer to our parliamentarian just do I make it now or I I
134thought Miss Edmonds had a was waiting on one too I I would say that Miss Edmonds announced her intent to make an amendment but did not actually offer the amendment I I would like uh to make a motion that we add this language to our legislative agenda all right if you'll indulge me Mr hershy I'll read it for the fol folks in the audience this would be to add a new section that says reducing barriers to teacher lure and I'll just ask for clarification of the three sections that are in there now where do you think it fits the best under funding under flexibility in operations or in uh evaluation and data perhaps staring I'm open to suggestions makes no difference to me okay well let's see how we end up in the final document
135and if we need to create a new category potentially we'll have that as well all right the amendment is to add a section that says reducing barriers to teacher lure and it reads as follows to support teacher Recruitment and Retention the North Carolina General Assembly should adjust North Carolina teacher teacher lure requirements to accept outof state lure tests eliminate costly additional testing and reduce other testing and lure fees DPI should accept outof state tests for candidates who have completed An approved educator preparation program for elementary defined as k36 or exceptional children General curriculum regardless of a candidate's years of experience the additional edtpa ppat test requirement should be removed other high CO other high testing costs and state liers fees should also be removed or reduced and all board members did you include Miss Gordon
136on that she's yes okay all board members should have a copy of the specific text of the amendment so before we begin any discussion is there a second for the amendment I'll second we have a second for Miss mafy so the amendment to the legislative agenda is on the table Mr Hershey would you like to speak to the amendment I'll defer to miss mafy well I I'm in favor of the amendment because I do think um having been teacher and had to move my license from out of state there are a lot of barriers especially when we have um a lot of vacancies for teachers um not just in Wake but really throughout the state um I don't know that this would necessarily be favorable to the um legislature but I think we shoot for
137the moon um it may be adopted and as we talk it may just be limited to states that require a practice exam rather than states that have their own exam but I feel like that gets really into the weeds um and having had done the edtpa oh God that would be great to get rid of um that's just a huge barrier and while you know important um you know if we're trying to get teachers in our schools that are qualified I think that this is a great way to um put this out there so I am in favor of this as is and we'll support it thank you Miss mafy I have a comment or two but before we get that does anyone else have any other questions either for other board members about this
138one in particular yeah the amendment yes okay um I'll say I know sometimes you know if you're seeing it for the first time it takes a minute to sort of digest it and really think about it and sometimes I'm reluctant to just accept something if I don't know everything about it because I look for are there unanticipated problems are there barriers or obstacles but one of the reasons we're only seeing this tonight is that it did go through staff and it was vetted and so I know that like our staff has looked at it already potentially have identified any potential conflicts or problems and you know giving it to our HR folks to review and this language coming back I'm comfortable with it and I'll I'll support the motion are there any other thoughts or
139thoughts or uh questions about the amendment if not I'll entertain a motion to call the question on the amendment this is not a motion on the actual agenda this is just simply to amend the agenda with Mr Hershey's amendments Mo to call the question all right we have motion to call the question is there a second all right all in favor of um calling the question there just ending debate please signify by saying I I any opposed all right we'll move into immediate vote on the motion uh to adopt the amendment all in favor of the amendment I any opposed all right the amendment has been adopted it will be incorporated into the document just with the uh discretion that once we get all amendments we'll figure out the best placement for it in the
140document okay all right are there further amendments Miss edmans thank you so I would like to move that we add language back in um in opposition of private school vouchers we had it in our and I do have language we had it in our 2024 legislative agenda since that agenda was passed hb10 expanded private school vouches in our state exponentially so um we are on track to spend almost $1 billion in less than 10 years um on private school vouchers this year alone we have spent more than $616 million on private school vouchers in 2425 and um the expansion is not just about public schools or the voucher funds are not just about public schools public education where this has been done Universal vouchers in other states it has blown massive holes in state budgets
141that impact other state services and state um projects such as Ohio um and Arizona are two examples so the fact that we had it in our 2024 legislative agenda and we don't have it in this one I think is quite frankly insane and makes no sense so um I mentioned it at our board retreat I mentioned it in the work session when we talked about this um the last time we talked about this so the motion specifically is to add in that very top paragraph funding public education to add another sentence that comes directly from the 20124 language where it would say the Wake County Board of Education calls upon the North Carolina General Assembly to prioritize Public School dollars to fully fund Public Schools not private school vouchers period And this is under the
142funding public education category correct or is this under the the very top yep fun public education yeah that's I just wanted to make sure M okay has everyone heard the amendment does anyone need to see it in writing if somebody needs to see the language if you um go to the homepage of wcpss and pull up our legislative agenda I just did a search but I can send it to you or if you just even want to read it out again yeah I can read it again but it literally I'm reading that language except for the formal intro which would be copying from from what's in front of us for this 2025 agenda the Wake County Board of Education calls upon the North Carolina General Assembly to to and then prioritize Public School dollars to
143fully fund Public Schools not private school vouchers okay so if I can if I can ask you a question before before we get the second so right now the current language I have has more after that sentence are you deleting that or are you rephrasing that what do you mean more after that sentence so the the sentence that I have in assembly says the Wake County Board of Education calls upon the North Carolina General Assembly to make important systematic reforms regarding the funding of public education to ensure that public schools which are mandated to serve all enrs children regardless of income health or ability receive the Educational Funding they need to provide a sound basic education my motion is to add a second sentence okay that reads the wake you want to say also the
144Wake County Board of Education also calls upon or you know but I'm just saying copy that language the Wake County Board of Education calls upon the North Carolina General Assembly to prioritize Public School dollars to fully fund Public Schools not private school vouchers so in other words I was I was refraining from doing another comma with another item but just having a second sentence related I appreciate that I misunderstood I thought you were having that as a replacement I understand it's a second sentence now no problem okay you heard the amendment is there a second for the amendment I second it we have a second for Mr rice all right so the motion is on the table I know miss evman you gave some explanation while making the motion but is there anything else you'd
145like to say in support of the amendment or we'll hear from other board members okay are there any other questions any debate or discussion of the amendment I do um discussion I just want to say the reason why I know it wasn't in there before we've kind of talked about it and I think to see now why it's important based upon our earlier work session um the data that was shared and presented to us around what our dollars look like how we've decrease and how we are seeing the huge privatization um of the schools a chunk of where the money is going and I think that uh we have got to support our schools where we can and at least having a sentence in it and referencing um the trend that we're seeing based upon
146um being spoken to today from data experts right about the opportunity gaps and what it's going to look like in our funding we need to at least say something thank you Miss rice and we do have the language in there as well that Miss edmans had suggested at the work session that 616 million she referenced just to try to provide some more data just for folks that can't we don't have it up on the screen so if you don't it's online but if you you know were following from the last meeting I want to let you all know that was in there Mr Hershey thank you I'm of two minds of this one I 100% agree with the um with Miss Edmonds on this issue my other the other part of my brain is saying
147if we're just it's if we're going to start adding things like that that say what our values are then there's a lot more things we can add and I've been thinking about this legislative agenda they're never going to revisit vouchers at least not this year and so I don't know that they'll listen to us anyway but I don't want to give them something to just throw the document away if it's right at the top I don't know what making that statement gets us for this particular thing and again in complete agreement it's vouchers are drive me nuts but what do we get out of adding it would be my question all right thank you Mr Hershey I'll go to Vice chair Swanson and then Dr in and then back to missm Mr Hershey you and
148I are on the same page that was my original thoughts as well and I am comfortable with the language that's under the fear and transparency access of school performance um that says PRI prioritize the needs of public school students the board believes that funding the public school need should be prioritized and met before funding before funds are allocated to private schools if the state continues to provide public dollars for private schools vouchers with 660 million in state tax money appropriated last year loone than than all schools public private and uh Charter well public private or Charter excuse me accepting public dollars for K12 education should be required to provide the same student achievement and budget accountability information this information will Empower families to make information to make informed decisions that ensure responsible use of taxpayer
149dollars so that's the language that I'm comfortable with um I think it speaks to to the root of what Miss edman is motion is um and I I think it's very it's there um I also do want to be very intentional and being mindful that this is what the legislative body will be this is you know Dr in reminded us this last year this is not a wish list this is what we will be instructing our lawmakers to to push the district forward and so I just get a little weary of you know the buyin that we could potentially lose from lawmakers that we need to really do what is best for our Public Schools so although I am with you on that issue I just can't support that language at this moment does not
150mean I am I I'm elected to a public board I'm going to continue to Advocate but I also think um there's other key things on this legislative agenda that we need to push and I'm afraid that one particular issue could derail all of that thank you oh sorry coming back around we'll go uh Dr ining Miss Edmonds and then I saw Miss Coffield Miss mafy did you have your hand up too or okay then we'll come back around this side of the table Dr in then miss edmans um yeah so uh in terms of the the principle of it um I think prioritizing public school before um you know other options is what I would be comfortable with um in the in the gist of the the document now we are you know presenting this
151in in the hands of legislators who you know will be um you know mix of um from both parties and I want to make sure that you know like Mr Hershey said we don't want a document that will be kind of dismissed right off hand by something that is already um that they have already um um decided on for the time being that you know it's and and we don't want to um risk losing their attention on reading the rest of the document which has have a lot of important points thank you we'll go to miss edmans thank you um so I I I won't vote it down because there's too much in here that you know is important but with a couple things with regard I I feel like if if we don't State
152our values in a document like this and be very bold about our values and what we believe in I don't know what we're doing this notion of being timid and afraid to put forth our values in in bold very plain language because we're afraid that they won't look at any of the rest of it I just think is um shortsighted and not very uh creative um with regard to Dr in's point about you know both sides both parties looking at this there are rural counties in North Carolina that have zero private voucher receiving schools in them and those lawmakers are largely Republican lawmakers and what has happened with this voucher funding should appall them because their counties their citizens their school children get absolutely no benefit from it whatsoever and those dollars primarily are funneled
153to the large Urban District private schools so I don't see it as a partisan thing at all I see it as a fiscally irresponsible um thing that the the majority has done with the vou with the explosive voucher funding that actually hurts some of the very Republican right-leaning constituents and families and lawmakers in this state um so I urge us to be bolder and um I I my motion stands thank you thank you Miss Edmond coming back around the table we hear from Miss Coffield and then miss mafy thank you um I just I I appreciate the language um that is there that is that is written um it speaks to transparency and accountability and I think that's really what the main issue is um when it comes to the funding I know we've hashed
154this out before um but this is not being withdrawn from public funds it's it's another fund that is being used yes could they use other money I would rather see some of the money that they have going towards things that would help our schools like for our meals nutritional in in our meals stuff like that but um I think it does what's written here is speaking about transparency and accountability I think adding the other language actually tells the families that cannot make it in this same box that we are working in that their tax dollars don't matter so I would like to keep it the same that's what I vote for thank you Miss Coffield Miss mafy um thank you chair um I mean these funds are coming from our our Public Schools we heard
155from Mr Neer um how that that funding is coming from DPI and how DPI is not able to have funding for our schools that being said I'm opposed to vouchers I don't agree with I was grateful that we were able to have that opposition in our last um board session um knowing that vouchers were going to be a big part of the legislative agenda with education um going into this bium looking at the body on Jon Street um you know I'm I'm with Mr hershy and Mr Swanson that you know yes we need to State our values and we need to be realistic with what the current uh tender tenor of of the legislative body is and and I agree they're not helpful to our districts throughout North Carolina and [Music] um you know if
156we had a small statement under prioritize needs of public schools you know what we would prefer no voucher money go out sure um but do I think that it needs its own sentence at the beginning no thank you M rice that's all your hand um thank you uh chair hary I just want to um add to our discussion one I want to caution us as a board with thinking that if we Tip Tow around certain things it's going to make it better our current state of our country shows that that is not the play that needs to happen we need to learn how to stick to a value and speak it boldly and proudly in season and out of season when a major because at the end of the day our legislators know who Wake
157County Public School Board is made of and whether we put something in the beginning or whether we put it down at the bottom it's not going to sway what they want to do or not want to do for us and I think we are fooling ourselves when we keep living in this bubble of thinking that if we don't um poke the bear we're going to be okay no they're going to do what they want to do when they want to do it and how they want to do it and they have constantly shown us who they are so believe them the first time they told us we didn't believe it eight years ago cuz you're right back in the same situation you in again and they told you who they were on a federal level
158it doesn't matter it's time to transition the way we've been doing things and not be in a space to think oh if I just be a little bit more quiet about it maybe they might not we won't poke their ego their ego is already there and so I just really want to encourage us to be mindful to can be bold and be courageous in the spaces that we're in because if we continuing that mindset we're going to continue to lose and I'm not saying it out of a thought I'm saying it through a reality that we're currently living and if we assess that mindset we're going to see if we do things a little bit different we might get some better results considering after the list I just read after after 49 years you only
159see nine people that's been on this board that looks like me because we've done things the same way all the time so I just want to encourage us that while in some instances it's true you may not want to antagonize people but these people are going to do what they want to do anyway and they're going to encourage us or they pat helped us with other school a law that we needed but you got to realize they did that because it benefited them to do it for Wake County so realize that they know who wake County's board is consisted of and who leads wake County's board so please don't think what language you put in a document is going to cause them to either do right by us or not do right by us they're
160still who they say they are all right um I wasn't going to speak on this one because I think there are valid opinions on both sides but I I I I do have to respond um you respecting your point of view on that but if the belief is that leg lers are going to do what they want to do anyway then why do we even have an agenda why even make the attempt isn't it just an exercise in futility and I understand a lot of people right now think we could be living in a very futile situation I fully get that and I don't know what the impact of putting this particular language will be you know I agree with the statement I do I know that in my work in the past with the
161legislature legislators are people they have egos they like to be stroked they if you come in and criticize and and protest they're less likely to do what you're asking to do but you know if you come out with something that's a principled position and you they disagree but they can see the value of other things that you're willing to stand up for in many cases they can accept that they disagree with you on one issue and it's not necessarily going to be a poison pill so you know we passed legislation last year with with Republican majorities in the House and Senate that allowed us to continue our leadership and continue them at an HBCU the mother of all HBCU and I think that part of that success was that I thought we had at least
162a fair relationship with legislators that wasn't hostile do I think including this language makes that relationship hos hostile I I don't know that it does and if this is if this is really you know where we are and you believe we need to say this then we should put it in the agenda but you know I would just you know I I can't tell you what will be more effective but I can tell you that how you ask the question sometimes does make a difference and I think this is you know a a a a reasonable and modest especially you know on on the arguments that could be made you know a modest suggestion so you know I just encourage each of you to vote your conscience on it and we'll proceed and we'll advocate
163for the agenda whether it's in here or whether it's not in here and if it makes it a little more difficult we'll just have to work a little bit harder that's all I'll say thank you all right are there any more any more debate or any questions Miss mafy I have a friendly amendment to miss Edmund's Amendment and if she's opposed to it then I will withdraw it um under Fair and transparent access to school performance where it says prioritize the needs of public school students changing that first sentence to where it says the board believes that public dollars belong to public schools in light of vouchers being in North Carolina the board ask that public school needs be prioritized so just changing that adding a sentence the board believes that public dollars belong in
164public schools period and then continuing with the paragraph does anyone need that repeated all right so miss mafy put it forward as a friendly Amendment so before we ask for a second because she also said she would withdraw it if Miss Edmonds wasn't in favor of it what I'd like to do is defer to miss Edmonds so that if it does need to be withdrawn it can be done so without having the second thank you um Miss mavy I appreciate the spirit in which you offer that but I do reject it it's to me it is critical that what I am trying to get passed my motion go under funding public education out of the gate top priority intro to the whole thing I think that that matters so thank you all right any other
165debate on the amendment Mr Hershey um what about using that language that Miss mafy suggested at the in place of unless you're just intent on using your language I'm just suggesting that and people assumed they knew how I was going to vote on this I really was of two minds on this I was not sure until listening to comments so just putting that out there all right is that was that a question to miss Edmonds or okay Miss Emmons please thank you um I just I think it's stated really well in our 2024 legislative agenda so I don't see a need to get creative with different language it's we agreed to it a year ago um so I'm a little perplexed at at how we're trying to have some kind of other Nuance or something
166so no all right any other questions before we vote on the amendment any other discussion or debate I'm still I'm still in favor of um miss Edmund for for those two points um previously mentioned um as well whether it falls under the very beginning of descendants or we're still saying the same thing uh at the bottom if that's what we believe we believe and and and Li you to your point chair um Hagerty you said you don't know we don't know what it's going to be I think that if we were bold last year to put it in there you haven't changed anything you're bold this year but again I want to continue to caution us to continue using the same Playbook so to speak for a better lack of word than we've always used
167because what result is it really getting us all right thank you m rice all right are we ready for a vote seeing no other um no other hands we'll move to an immediate vote this is not a vote on the agenda this is a vote on Miss Edmund's amendment to amend the agenda all in favor of the amendment please say I I any opposed all right can I get a show of hands well we'll do the eyes and NS so miss Gordon with this means as we'll just go around the table and have each forward member vote I or nay and uh typically we do start with you so I'll just I'll just call out the names uh voting uh this is for Miss Edmund's Amendment uh Miss Gordon Mr Hershey I Dr in N
168Miss Edmonds I uh chair will vote I Mr uh Vice chair Swanson May Miss mafy Miss Edmonds I'm sorry I I apologize to both of you miss Coffield n and Miss rice yay all right um so by my count the amendment fails all right U but I thought that was a good oh oh it did pass okay so it does pass 5 to four all right I it's been a long night I don't have my glasses all right I apologize all right so the the language will be incorporated all right miss edmans this is not an amendment just a technical correction please um under that section we talked a lot about the prioritize the needs of public schools um it is more than 616 million okay um Dr Taylor did you want to address that
169yeah so I wanted to know exactly uh what those numbers represent the 616 M the information that we got from um Mr Neer um shows that it was so that's what was allocated okay but I mean if it's sorry not to um this came from the state budget from hb10 from the language and the bill but if it's not correct I mean so Mr chair what I what I would propose is that we um uh verify the numbers because the numbers that I have from Mr neita were verified by the department I know this is um from public school first but there may be some misinterpretation of what the exact numbers are so if everybody is okay with us verifying those final numbers and and I can email that to the board and that's what
170we would reflect uh but it is somewhere between what was verified as 594 million uh in the 616 million so it's basically in the bowel Park okay thank you Dr Taylor is everyone comfortable with that all right thank you all right further discussion further amendments Miss Coffield did you have a comment on the agenda as a whole yes well I had a question in reference to um the hunger and support for uh academics addressing the lunches um and we have on there no cost breakfast so we're asking for basically all families to receive free breakfast is that correct I believe I believe that's correct yes okay so I guess I was going to propose an amendment to actually or a motion to um I'll do I make the motion first and then explain why later
171is that how you want me to do it yeah typically you'd make the motion that'd see if there's a second if there is then you could debate okay so I was going to make a motion to remove that last paragraph and add language in there to um ask for more funding and Quality Foods I could say it better but that was my motion okay so just because we're hearing it for the first time can you point us again we see the addressing student hunger to sport academics it says North Carolina and I wrote over it so I can't read it but basically the remaining gap for no cost breakfast so basically I'm I'm trying to put verbiage that do not want to address taking any free and reduce or breakfast away from children who need
172it but rather than everybody getting it that seems like it's money that could be spent elsewhere but to make sure that it's provided but to also ask for additional funding towards better quality food because we we do hear about the costs that it takes to do that so we clearly don't have adequate funding for that okay so just to be clear on what it will read now after you've amended it and I wrote all over it so after the proposed amendment um be with me for a second here I wrote in all different directions so rather than closing the remaining gap for no breakfast to provide so it say North Carolina can provide will provide um or to provide adequate funding for improved uh sorry I'm trying to write it out straight because I wrote
173it all sloppy all over so provide adequate funding for improved nutrition okay so that to provide starts after what word so North Carolina I guess I mean we could keep it simple and just say North Carolina or ask the St or state will provide North Carolina will provide and then the rest of the language as you have it yes okay and that replaces the rest of the sentence mhm okay you can leave the estimate investment but I mean where the foundation uh learning future learning is established with an estimated of investment of approximately 140 million yeah but is that 140 million coming from the no cost breakfast is that how they came up with that number that's what it would cost to provide that yeah Statewide Statewide not even not even just Wake County I
174mean we could just ask for the funding to be put towards that or do you want to just ask for use that same number with an estimated investment of approximately 140 million yes okay all right so we'll just change that can close the remaining gap for no cost breakfast in grades K through five with um will or can provide adequate funding for improved nutrition okay all right so Mr CH if I could could I make one comment and I just realized this that it says breakfast but that should be meals not just breakfast so that is not just breakfast okay yeah yeah that's an okay all right um so that's an important clarification we need to change if it is not amended if it is amendment that language just comes out to be replaced with
175the new language all right you've heard Miss caulfield's Amendment uh before we can discuss it is there a second second we have a second for Mr Swanson all right uh questions and discussion question missed again yeah I just I don't have the I don't have the language I just need it repeated that's all okay Miss Coffield I type it out better North Carolina can you bear with me one second Miss Coffield would you be able to email us your language too so we can read it so you can move on thank you okay so if you don't mind we'll take just a a very brief recess to get that typed out and shared and then we'll read it out to everyone in the audience so that you can hear it too all right we'll be
176in a short recess sorry I'm trying to I wrote all over it and then I can't could make e e e have e e e all right if we can come back together I believe we have the language uh Miss Coffield will email that to everyone for their consideration I'll give you a minute just to return to your seats all right all right we're back and so miss Coffield do you have the language that you can email to the board members oh there it goes right there all right so we have an amendment for Miss Coffield it has been amended or sorry it has been seconded by Mr Swanson North Carolina should provide adequate funding for improved nutrition for grades K through five where the foundation for future learning is established with an estimated investment
177of approximately 140 million so it's asking the state for an appreciation of 140 million um and it just changes the wording there to provide adequate adequate nutrition for Gates Gres K through five um it has been moved it has been seconded miss Coffield do you want to speak to the amendment so I know in some of the um prior meetings that we had about nutrition um Miss Luc was able to really Express how how hard it is to provide nutrition proper nutrition and that we were giving vegetables basically to some of the students that didn't have uh you know funds on what the meals cost per chicken per vegetable and this is really going more towards putting the money towards quality food for our children because even if they go in and they get the
178breakfast it's got to be something other than donuts and and you know sweet tea um but they have to have some healthy proteins in there so this is really more to make sure they have an adequate meal and improve the nutrition since it is more cost costly to do so all right is there are there questions or discussion Miss Edmonds so can we put the universal meals piece back in like I'm fine with this language but can we say NC should should because that's what it is right 140 million would be Universal meals for K12 is that correct excuse me K5 that's right here I'm sorry NC should provide adequate funding for um for Universal meals for K5 Universal meals and improved nutrition where the foundation of future learning I don't know how to word
179Smith it but it just to me I think we want to convey that that is what we're talking about not just improve nutrition but to to say that 140 million would cover it I I don't know you know what I mean like um so basically I was I was asking to remove the universal piece and the reason I say that is because that costs a lot of money with 160,000 students and there are plenty of people whether it be allergies sensory um eaters picky eaters whatever it is that will never have the meal so rather than provide that and have waste you know CU I've been to some of these programs where it just kind of goes in the garbage to Prov provide it for the families in need but also to make sure that
180we put take the extra money that's needed and put it towards nutritionist meals for them not necessarily Universal where we spend the money on everybody when people aren't going to use it so we could use that savings to make sure they have better food all right thank you Miss Coffield we have some other comments other questions I'll start with Miss rice and then miss mafy um so I thank Miss Cofield for her amend um however I will have to share um that that I I can support uh improved nutrition part for K through five um however I'm not sure how we would actually word a space of saying we're only going to pay for this or that and then that money is going to go it does I don't think it necessarily works like that
181that we either we ask for a certain lot of of money and it happens that money can be and then the controlling of the nutrition part of our food if we have to be reminded is a federal situation and we're dealing with our state legislators and they don't fund that part so we can't change the nutritional values of our food um because it's a federally funded situation of what the requirements are um if I'm wrong please someone from our staff that works in the area to help us so I know that um we can ask for funding to fund our food K through 12 I'm sorry K through 5 which is going back to our Universal piece but we can't change we can't we can't change the menu or we can't make um certain stances
182be what's already federally mandated of what's considered nutritions unless we change an entire menu within our wet County schools that says we'll take this money but that's only for I think uh superintendent Taylor says that we were changing from breakfast to meals period That's K through five students only even though I still have a problem with the fact that we have other family children um the whole gamut K through 12 who still going to school hungry and if going to school and getting up at 5: in the morning and not returning home until sometimes 600 and 7:00 at night at after Sports and don't have any food to eat so I don't even we're not even I'm concerned about we're not even considering that as well but I'll make this short again I hope if
183I'm making sense we can't take say we're going to only take a certain amount of money then we can take the rest of the money and put it towards something nutritional we have Federal mandates that we must adhere to to so Dr Taylor please fix that yes so to add the clarity to that um it is about supplementing uh the the federal school lunch program and so what we know is that that 140 million is what would help close that remaining Gap uh knowing that we already have a reimbursement program that feeds a certain number of students uh the other Clarity I want to add to the board is that uh remember that when we say uh no cost meals that doesn't necessarily mean that every student in the school is going to eat and
184so what what a school will do is is predict the number of students that eat School meals and that's what they prepare so I could go to a school and it's 600 Elementary students enroll but they may only prepare 400 meals uh and there are students that will still continue to bring um their own meals in uh so the 140 million is to adjust for all of those that currently are not able to take advantage of free or reduced meals knowing that others will still bring their own meals thank you Dr Taylor um additional thoughts and comments um would you like to respond to that or come back I saw Mr Hershey has a question m m has a question all right if if you if you don't if you don't have a response just
185for clarity I just wanted to ask um Dr Taylor when you um and I understand like you know how it comes down from federal and the statutes and we have to but that's like the minimum I'm going asking like we could still go above and beyond I don't think Federal is going to say no you can't have like high quality chicken like I'm confused by that so I need Clarity and the other question was um when you say no cost meal so then this is not a Universal program because I know that was a discussion beforehand I thought that's what was being said here in a different way yeah so it would be Universal meals for all the kids that are K5 meaning that any student that came to school and wanted to eat it
186would be at no cost and it would be covered uh but with that we recognize that all students will not participate and so that means that if every kid participated then the funding would be there to do that uh but we know that's not the case uh the other part with the um the school lunch program is that uh because it is an Enterprise program um we still have to make sure that it is a profitable program and so if the district or any District wanted to go above and beyond to provide more nutritious meals uh then the district just simply have to take on that cost and so we will submit a reimbursement uh for a meal the federal government will give that to us and if uh that reimbursement is $4 or child
187that's what we get but to provide a nutritious meal that goes above and beyond if that is a $6 cost uh then we as a district will have to pay that additional $2 and that's where the profitability piece comes in but it's just a commitment that we'd have to make as a district and as a state thank you Dr Taylor and I mean I have I have a question on it too but I see other questions I'll go to those first um Miss mafy and then Mr Hershey thank you um um so I I hesitate to remove the piece talking about no cost meals for for students in K5 um I think that that is something that we have talked about this is something that we are in alignment with with our County Commissioners looking
188to you know this being a step to expand 2k2 um looking at that first paragraph that first paragraph doesn't have an ask with it and as as MCA when she was here noted that our costs for our goods and and things that we purchase are not keeping up with inflation and so I'm curious if this is really two asks one in the first paragraph because it does address inflation and supplementing funding for student meal programs and Rising food costs insufficient Federal support um if there's a way to include a dollar amount to cover that Gap that we're seeing so that we're able to pay our school nutrition workers so that we're not increasing lunch prices because I think there's there's two issues number one the cost of oal is going up and Rising because the
189cost of food has gone up and we want to be able to provide no meal meals for all students so I I guess I'm curious as to why they're you know and again I know I was a part of the conversation saw this earlier but you know do we need to add some kind of both and dollar amount am I making sense okay I got you I'm just making sure that because it is almost 9:00 at night so um so for me it's it's um it's I I do not want to eliminate that second paragraph I think it's vital for our students I also recognize that at the rate we're going our school meals for our other children that are not covered by this or if this Universal meals part for K5 does not pass
190will continue to rise and so I don't know what the dollar amount is or if we need to ascribe it dollar amount but an ask in that piece talking about how to I'm I'm not able to word Smith and I'm not asking for a recess I just yeah Dr Taylor do you want to yeah so I I understand exactly what you're talking about what we can do is go back and determine what that number would look like uh to make the programs uh profitable so I know that's what you're talking about it's it is different from the second ask uh so we will identify a number uh and I will share that with the um the chair and the vice year if if you all okay with us um identifying the number and putting it
191in we'd be able to do that uh if you know what the language will be we could do that would be I mean at at some point I think if it's adding statistics unless we dispute the statistics that's more editorial and I'm willing to grant that to staff is that sort of where everyone is okay Mr Hershey uh no I was I agree with Miss mafy I appreciate Miss caulfield's bringing bringing this up I think you put it into that first paragraph keep the second line the way it is and I think that covers both and I trust the superintendent to do that language and then our chair and vice chair to verify make sure we're good to go all right thank you um Miss mafy parlamentar since Miss coffields uh suggested removing that second
192paragraph do we have to do an amendment to our amendment to keep the second second paragraph or are we good yeah or do we it down let let me ask Mr Mone what he thinks so first of all you haven't voted to approve her correct Amendment so that could you could vote on that and it could die you could get another cleaner amendment that does exactly what you're trying to do would be one way to do it prob that one would we ra would we rather do that than trying to like amend an amendment and then have to vote again okay all right make it clean all right so in that case are we ready to take a vote on the on this amendment that went around to everybody that's not what we just talked
193about with the reordering but rather just what you see in your email okay all right all right all in favor of the amendment in email please signify by saying I and any opposed no all right that Amendment fails and so now miss Coffield I will recognize you for a for a new Amendment do you have a new Amendment so now the challenge of the language again so um I'm okay with u what Miss mafy suggested um and then adding in um the language hold on I'm dealing with two different ones [Music] here um if we can just remove [Music] so you're saying Dr tayor that you could come up with a number that that would require um so if we were to remove that second part of the language and just um add in either
194before the without the last sentence or at the last sentence that NC should provide adequate funding for improved nutrition for grades K to 5 okay so the amendment is to add language North Carolina should provide adequate funding for improved nutrition for grades K5 can we say K12 because if it's two separate issues I don't know why we need to leave them out sure I think the K5 was only looking at what the cost would have been for that one specific program so if it's just improved nutrition let's say K12 right okay North Carolina should provide adequate funding for improved nut ition for G grades K12 mhm and then the dollar amount the dollar amount to be provided by staff okay all right so uh we have a motion from Miss Coffield seconded by Mr Swanson
195does everyone understand the amendment no okay so miss Coffield do you want to clarify where that falls on the agenda um after Rising food costs coupled with insufficient Federal support create significant challenges for for meal programs without adequate nutrition students face various challenges that impact their well-being and ability to focus on learning North Carolina should provide adequate funding for improved nutrition for grades K to 12 okay okay does has everyone heard and understands the amendment okay it has been met seconded by Vice chair Swanson is there any questions are there for are there any questions is there any debate any discussion Dr R so that statement is really more aspirational than actual ask correct I think it's more like a policy goal yeah I I think the actual ask will come when the dollar amount
196that staff will will put in there in order to cover those pieces because that's a really long paragraph with the inclusion of the additional sentence from Miss Coffield to make sure that we're better able to cover the cost of food in North Carolina all right are you ready for a vote all in favor of the amend oh M rice sorry just for clarification very quickly so we're going to keep the second paragraph we're going to take out no cost breakfast and we're going to talk about meals no cost meals for grades K through 12 just clarifying no no when he cleans up not that part honey no I I understand what we're doing in the top paragraph I'm asking about the second paragraph when he puts when superintendent Taylor puts in the adequate numbers that
197we're doing I'm simply asking are we keeping the no cost meals in grade skate through five so we're keeping the second paragraph the same right except for changing it from breakfast to meals the I know superintendent said that it changes from breakfast to meals okay that's it but then the only other amendment is what Miss Cofield no I'm I'm I'm understand and aware of her amendment that makes sense it doesn't delete right I'm just trying to clarify point of clarify thanks understood all right now are we ready for a vote on the amendment I hope so all in favor of the amendment please say I I any opposed all right the amendment passes now I know there was one other amendment that was suggested at the at the work session um Miss Coffield had sent
198some language I tried to condense it uh for her I've sent that to her yeah is that anything that you want to offer at this time okay and thank you for helping me word Smith that um I just sent it to the board so everybody will have it in front of them um and it's basically about our flexibility in spending that is similar to Charter like spending and uh restart schools so this is what we talked about in the work session I'll read it for anyone listening research has shown conclusively that restart schools B benefiting from these schools authorization to use Charter likee flexibility to address specific needs and barriers to school Improvement have resulted in improved academic growth and achievement the general assembly should expand the use of flexibility to more Public Schools strengthening
199the systems and structure of the schools leading to more positive student outcomes oh and thank you chair hagged for helping me wordss Smit that and I just making sure that Dr Taylor got a copy of that as well okay all right is there a for the amendment second second from Miss Edmonds all right uh would anyone like to speak to the amendment I'll I'll go with Mr Swanson thank you um Vice chair Swanson I'm sorry thank you chair her I just had a question which I'm in favor for it I just want to kind of tighten up the language I think the charter likee flexibility um can be a little confusing because we just passed a motion that said you are against charter school and now you want the reference that was your motion no
200it was private school private school private school vouch it's still the same it's still in the same no no sir no they're not hold on hold on hold on one I I I I do understand and agree with the point that there is a distinction but I do want to recognize the speakers and respect that they have the floor question Swanson thank you I was just saying let's just tighten up the language a little bit just so it's a little bit more conducive without yeah thank you Vice chair Swanson I appreciate that and I will I will will tell you that I'm I was the actually the Genesis of that because Miss Coffield had origin originally did not have that Charter likee flexibility and what I was trying to do in the drafting was use
201the specific language we've seen some education Advocates use so it doesn't so the general assembly couldn't misconstrue it to mean that we were just asking for more local control without their Authority but it's I I I understand your point so I if I can follow up I think having more local control would be a a language or a word that I would feel more comfortable than certain on does all right thank you so let's go let's go around um Miss Coffield since it was your Amendment and then we'll go to miss maafi and miss rice and then we'll come back around to this side so uh Mr Swanson I appreciate what you're saying and I understand what you're saying I think the reason that we mentioned both restart and Charter like was to express how
202that flexibility allows the school in both situations allows the schools to do what they need which is kind of the point of of of the ask and um Mr Mone in reference to your question it would go under local flexibility over operation issues okay thank you all right um I Believe Miss rice did you have I saw Miss mafy I just want to make sure I haven't missed anyone no okay miss mafy my my question was where is it going so that's been answered I I believe that local operations in the flexibility is really what we're talking about here coming back around to this side Miss Edmonds just where we landed with the tightening it's been it's been discussed but no formal change has been suggested yet and you know if someone has one I
203you know I don't know about you I would welcome welcome it I I don't have any pride of authorship here anyone on this side if not we'll come back over here Dr in and then miss Rise um I'm fine with the language of that um uh proposal I I was just wondering whether we are keeping that first sentence after local flexibility over operational issues uh you're going to have to be more specific I'm sorry oh under the window second page um the you know the local flexibility over operational issues title yes it says the Wake County Board of Education also calls on the North Carolina General to Grant greater local flexibility over operational issues allowing the district to address local needs more effectively and efficiently so we're keeping that sentence that was not part of
204the amendment okay so it would fit under that sentence well it would fit under that category see the local flexibility of operational issues is more of a category and then you have three issues the school calendar flexibility K3 class size flexibility uh the expanding exploring local funding options and here it would be like restart L flexibility I think could be oh okay so so it's in that subsection yes sir okay okay Mr rice yeah that was the question are we creating another subsection or title up under the amendment that Miss Coffield is requesting okay Miss mafy thank you I'm curious because this is a pretty open-ended statement um um saying that the general assembly should expand the use of flexibility to more Public Schools strengthening the systems and structures of the school leading to more
205positive student outcomes um is it the intent to leave it open so that the general assembly can decide what that looks like um because I know restart schools have a certain formula or do we have a formula that we'd like to propose in order to and again I know it's late but I wasn't aware that these amendments were coming until five minutes ago understood and and I appreciate everyone kind of like bearing with us as we get some of these you maybe haven't had time to look through and really think through um again you know I know that the intent that Miss Coffield expressed was looking at our restart schools being able to provide that same sort of flexibility at our other Public Schools but beyond that I'll defer to her for however she'd like
206it to read yeah I guess my question is are we proposing that they propose a new funding formula or a new set of criteria in order to have that flexibility or are we asking that all public schools be given that flexibility yeah it was basically for all to have um I mean in in explaining it I can't put all of it in a paragraph but we actually have to fail for a certain amount of years in order to receive that advantage of flexibility spending to put it where we are where we need it and with having 200 schools and so many different needs when the state is controlling what and where we're spending it you may not have you may have more ESL in one school you may have more special needs in another school
207so just asking in general for us to have this restart flexibility it is kind of reversing that that whole situation where we have the flexibility I mean obviously if something is not going well then we will put in some kind of you know Improvement plan or something for that school but this is basically flip-flopping the situation we have right now so in hearing that um believe it would be Amendment another amendment correct me if I'm wrong to change more in that last sentence to all so expand the use of flexibility to all public schools yeah and and I'll admit when I I use the term more just you as a qualifier so for example if they were not willing to Grant it to all public schools but they would Grant it to you know like
208all Title One schools right or as a pilot or you know all schools of a certain performance level I didn't know what their tolerance would be so that's that's why it was that but if Miss caulfield's intent is all then let's change it to all yeah I'm fine with changing it to all all right Dr R uh I just got a friendly proposal um that language I feel like um it is more like a um I thought it would fit under that first sentence um the way County Board of Education also calls upon the North Carolina General Assembly to Grant greater local flexibility I feel like after that sentence it will justify what we're asking in the subsequent points M um you know do you understand what I'm saying I I I see what you're
209saying I think the difference is that and it's a minor difference but the restart flexibility is much broader than those three categories so it's an expansion beyond that although those restart schools do have some of those other flexibilities okay yeah all right all right so I heard a friendly Amendment suggested I heard another amendment suggested before that in terms of questions about the language so um where are we do we want to look at um a set like we did before with a second amendment or do we want to try to just fix this one I think can I'll say Vice chair Swanson I think Mr chair I would just propose for the sake of time um that we just give staff that Authority or you know we combine a wor smth and and and
210let staff figure out how to condense the language or whatnot so let me ask you this would you all be we we are on a a we were being very deliberate about the timing because of Bill deadlines and things like that coming up but at the same time I don't want you to have an agenda that you don't feel comfortable with so we could try to push through we could say well we can't get it quite perfect or we could bring this back at our next meeting and you know the benefits pros and cons what we're doing is we're we could spend more time and perfect the language and get a little bit better um give staff a chance to again do some of this editing tighten it up make sure it says what we
211want it to say um we do potentially sacrifice some opportunity in terms of some Bill deadlines I don't know how big a con that really is in the grand scheme of things because I think a lot of these issues will emerge from the legislature on their own and we're stating our position as opposed to it won't happen but for Wake County asking for it so I'm I'm very comfortable if we want to defer and let staff tighten that up but I I'll put it to you all Mr rice uh thank you chair um I just want to encourage us as a board that we have access to this information in assembly on Friday I think that since we're talking about the essence of time um I think that our constituents deserve for us to work
212on what we need to work on if it's on our action item to complete the action item um on the day that we're supposed to take the action uh considering the fact that we've had this information since Friday um I think that in the full transparency and responsibility as board members um we should make these amendments over the course of of our weekend before Tuesday gets here um to to share or share at least have something so that we won't talk about it's it's getting late it's time I'm just being honest it's getting late it's time and so therefore we feel like we have to rush this is one day out of the week that we actually have to stay a little bit later and start I just want us to be a little bit
213mindful sometimes when we're talking about moving forward versus taking our time to do the job that people have asked us to do and that maybe it's a possibility that we might take a little bit more of our time uh between Friday to Monday to kind of hash out a few things that we might need to see or look at that we may possibly want to make changes um in for the sake of time if we're actually um if time is something that we're concerned with so just a suggestion um but not not trying to spank anybody but just a suggestion and if I can respond to that I mean I think all of us would benefit had we seen amendments ahead of time to really digest them and fully understand them at the same time
214we can't really put them in assembly and we can't decide them ahead of time because that requires board action but what I do think if I understand you miss rice is that you I don't think you do understand me of course we can't put an amendment in assembly before time but you can write your Amendment down as a board member of your thoughts from the legislative agenda that we've looked at we knew that it was going to come if you had any changes or thoughts I'm simply saying as a way of being efficient we may need to and we know that we make amendments if we don't like what we see if we could possibly digest that in our time between Friday to Monday of thoughts we might have and possible language because we're looking
215at something not that we put I mean no of course we can't put our what I was going to suggest is what she said there but I heard assembly and that just threw me off I apologize no no no go no we no protocol all right so at the same time like I said we do have legislative deadlines um and so I just want to see where everyone is Mr Hershey uh friendly amendment to miss call I I word Smith it real quick just a couple and I'm getting thumbs UPS I think okay has this been sent by email yes all right and I will defer to the parliamentarian experts on what I should do chair Swanson do you have a comment yes just make sure that you're including Miss Allan Miss Allen in these
216emails for the minut um amendments that you're sending make sure she gets them oh is she not in the board group yet oh I apologize I put board and it's usually a group okay I apologize didn't mean to leave you all of these things that we we sharing by email are part of the official meeting and should be included in the minutes and so that's why it's very important for Miss Allen to get that and vice chair Swanson I want to thank you for lifting that up all right so the language for Mr Hershey if everyone sees it would say research has shown conclusively that restart schools benefiting from these schools authorization to use flexibility to address specific needs and barriers to school improvements have resulted in improved academic growth and achievement the general assembly
217should expand the use of restart School flexibility to all public schools strengthening the systems and structures of the school leading to more positive student outcomes I believe that captures what Miss callfield was saying and some of the comments on the table I will second Mr Hershey's friendly Amendment well for parliamentary procedure oh okay we would need to vote on the the first wording vote it down and then take this one if Miss Coffield would accept it yes all right all in favor of the original Amendment which was under consideration with the original language you saw an email please say I all opposed nay nay all right that Amendment fails Miss Coffield do you have a new Amendment the one that looks exactly like what Mr is so I make a motion to amend the original
218Amendment um to say r research has shown conclusive conclusively that restart schools benefiting from these schools authorization to use flexibility to address specific needs and barriers to school Improvement have resulted in in Improvement and I'm sorry an improved academic growth and achievement the general assembly shall expand the use of restart School flexibility to all public schools strengthening the systems and structures of the school leading to more positive student outcomes all right is there a second second all right is there any discussion are we ready to vote all right all in favor of um I'm seeing no other anyone ready to speak so all in favor of the new Amendment please say I I any opposed all right the new amendment has been Incorporated Vice chair Swanson Mr chair I'm I'd like to call the question
219to if there's no more amendments um I move that we I want to go back to the original of approving the uh legislative agenda for the 25 uh school year Swanson has the has the prerogative to call to call the previous question this cuts off all debate it takes a two-thirds motion all in favor of the call for previous questions say I hi any opposed all right the motion passes we'll now move into an immediate vote on the 2025 legislative agenda as Amendment all board members voting in favor please vote I I any opposed all right the amend the legislative agenda has been adopted unanimously thank you all for your hard work for your patience um I make a motion we go into close session for reason stated on the agenda second we have a
220motion to go into close session for the reasons so stated on the uh agenda second that by Miss mafy seconded by Miss rice all in favor of moving to close session please say I I any opposed all right thank you well now we'll now uh move to close session I did many times so for