001foreign good evening it is Tuesday October 18th 2022 at 5 37 p.m and we are calling this regular meeting of the Wake County Board of Education to order I'd like to welcome those of you that are watching at home and those that are here in person to observe as the Board of Education conducts its official business I want to take a moment to highlight board policy 2310 which states Wake County Board of Education meetings are conducted for the purpose of carrying on the official business of the school system the public is cordially invited to attend board meetings to 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 leave by the presiding officer members of the audience should show respect
002for speakers by refraining from loud comments or other disruptions disruptions by any person or persons of a public meeting will be subject to action in accordance with General statute 143.31-318.17 we do have a quorum Miss Scott has a family matter that she is attending to and if you would all please join me in reciting the Pledge of Allegiance please stand [Music] s for all thank you before we begin our meeting with comments I'd first like to take a moment to acknowledge that we are all still a community in mourning following the tragic shooting last Tuesday that claimed the lives of five people including one of our own students it was a horrifying and heartbreaking event and we are still grappling with shock and profound sense of loss as school leaders foremost concern remains with the
003well-beating being of our students families and our staff members of student Support Services teams have been helping students and staff process their feelings of grief fear and we have shared resources and tips with families on the best ways to help students cope with this trauma sadly acts of random senseless violence are all too common occurrences in our nation and through the though the pain of one this close to home is much more acute it's my hope that our leaders and citizens can find common ground on solutions to reduce the likelihood of such tragedies in the future and my hope that all of Wake County and particular our school communities will emerge from this tragedy stronger wiser and more compassionate and for now we must both engage in self-care and continue to take care of each
004other I'd like to ask board member Waters who represents the district where this tragedy occurred to lead us in a moment of silence headingham is a District 4 neighborhood it is very close to my neighborhood and I drive by each day Wars fail me as I think of the tragic loss of life and I share in the sorrow of family friends and loved ones with that will you please join me in a moment of silence to remember the lives of Nicole Connors Susan karnatz Mary Marshall Gabriel Torres and James Thompson thank you and may we continue to lift up our community and our thoughts and prayers thank you Miss Waters certainly keep the folks of headingham and those along the greenway in our hearts and especially our First Responders who um were a part of
005that incident um at this time we turned to our information items which begin with the superintendent's comments superintendent Moore good evening chairman half team board members October 6th I had the honor of announcing the 22-23 principal and assistant principal of the Year winners at our annual banquet congratulations to principal of the Year Dr Anis Williams of bug Magnet Elementary and to assistant principal of the Year Mary Taylor of Brooks Magnet Elementary Dr Williams who holds bachelor's Masters and Doctorate Degrees all from UNC Chapel Hill has led bug Magna Elementary since 2020. before that she spent eight years leading Poe Magnet Elementary she has served as an assistant principal or principal in our district since 1998. in her candidate portfolio she wrote that she encourages and empowers her staff to engage students by building on their
006experiences interests and strengths my goal is to support a culture of shared responsibility and ensure we can leverage staff diversity for the greatest opportunity to reach every student She Wrote Mary Taylor who has a bachelor's degree from East Carolina University and a master's degree from NC State University has been the assistant principal at Brooks for 16 years prior to that she served Brooks for many years as an instructional resource teacher and a classroom teacher this is the second time Miss Taylor has been named assistant principal of the year she also received the award in 2016. she earned her in her candidate portfolio she wrote transparency authentic collaboration and celebration are the foundation of our school leadership given their many years of exemplary service to our district these two outstanding School leaders are certainly deserving of
007this honor congratulations to them and to all this year's finalists two of our teachers were recently recognized with Statewide honors First Mount Vernon Middle School librarian Julie Stivers was named librarian of the Year by the North Carolina School library media Association Miss divers a graduate of the UNC Chapel Hill School of information and Library science has served at the Mount Vernon librarian for eight years in 2017 she won the Francis hen award from the American Association of school librarians in 2018 she was named an American Library Association emerging leader one of two school librarians in this National Group there are many Librarians in our district doing amazing work Miss diver said this Ward is an endorsement and an amplification of inclusive student-centered librarianship second Bethany drew a Spanish teacher at Broughton magnet high was recently
008named the 2022 Teacher of the Year by the foreign language association of North Carolina flank the award is presented annually to one K-12 teacher of a world language in North Carolina she will now go on to compete for the teacher of the year titled at the Southern Conference of language teaching scold which includes Educators from 14 States and territories this is Miss Drew's 30th year of teaching and her 24th in our district one of our strategic core beliefs states that dedicated and highly effective teachers and staff members are essential for Student Success these two outstanding Educators embody that belief with their tireless commitment to their students congratulations on these well-earned honors finally I recently had the privilege of joining nearly 300 others to honor volunteers from our business Community who support our school to Career
009program the Wake County school to Career program connects students with businesses Civic organizations and higher education institutions to provide relevant experiences and to help them see the connection between academic success today and Career Success tomorrow the awards breakfast was a time for us to show appreciation to business volunteers for the many hours they put in to support and strengthen our schools Career and Technical education coordinators nominated volunteers who have worked with and impacted students through Career Development and work based learning activities each of the selected nominees was presented an award during the event at the mckimmon center we rely on strong Partnerships in our community to prepare our students for college career and productive citizenship my many thanks to the members of our business Community who give of their time and talent to help students
010find their path to success that concludes my comments thank you superintendent Moore and thank you as well for representing the school district at the state of the county making sure folks know what's going on and it had a lovely setting at the art museum I want to congratulate the Holly Springs High School Optimus Prime and Fuquay Varina High School orange slice robotics for participating in the Thor competition Thundering Herd of robots um this past weekend at Chapel Hill High School Wake Forest University hosted bands of America and many of our marching bands and their color guard participated including green level high school Panther Creek High School Cary High School Green Hope and Apex Friendship High School we're all participants and several of them placed in the top ten I want to lift up our Apex
011friendship Middle School Community today and just share that during school hours that it is very important that you pay attention when driving in school zones [Music] and look out drive the speed limit and just be on high alert and I want to um end my comments with the ribbon cutting today that was at Apex friendship Elementary School the shooting stars held their ribbon cutting and I'd like to thank Dr Gamble and his team the shooting stars students and the PTA for hosting and leave you with some of the words from their school song that debuted this morning and I'm not going to sing it because I will not do it as good of justice as they did but set your goals try your best ask questions about the rest remember you're a star I thought
012that was a great way to set a tone in elementary school for the rest of their time in our school system and beyond so thank you Mr hegarty thank you chair Mahaffey so as we've heard about already you know this is a tough time for our community and I appreciate everyone coming together to try to heal as we move forward from this uh I can share I've I've been in contact with Governor's crime commission and there are local authorities that will be putting together interagency task force of all sorts of experts and wcpss will be included in this effort to look at problems and and come up with Solutions going forward um so I do want to share some positive news the governor Cooper has named this month as Hindu heritage month and as many
013of you know we have a large population of Hindu citizens and residents in Wake County particularly in the Northwestern area that I'm I'm fairly familiar with this is the season of many holidays many festivals and there's a lot going on in the community right now a lot of bright colors a lot of Celebration and attending one of the festivals we've engaged in a lot of conversations about just in the Hindu tradition and culture the respect that they have for education and the respect that they have for teachers and you know a lot of interest and Outreach in what they can do to better support our schools and our community one of the conversations that I had with one of the gentlemen actually was very interesting he explained his belief that as he described it education
014of the heart is the heart of Education and as we talked about it you know we we can look at that a number of different ways it can talk about love of learning but I think it also he was talking about something a little bit deeper and that goes into you know kindness respect and just you know citizenship how we treat each other as individuals you know we talk about it different ways depending you know where you're from what your upbringing is is it how we treat others is it concerned for our fellow man is it the Golden Rule treat others how you would want to be treated I think student well-being can take many many forms but at its very basic as we look to the the the physical the mental the social emotional
015well-being of our students just even helping to Foster this basic culture and this basic belief could do so much it's it's very important work it's not reading it's not writing but I think it's important that we model that behavior that we work with our children we recognize it and celebrate it when we see it and and we just try to bring everyone together to support the importance of of the support for each other and I think this is a good time to do that so thank you and I wanted to announce first that the um First District Six board advisory council meeting will be held tomorrow at noon at Sanderson we have a full agenda um the student safety will be presented by um Russ Smith and his team student enrollment plan updates as well
016as some information on the weight Capital Bond and I appreciate the comments from our board chair on the recent tragedy in our community and reflecting on this there's been a massive increase in gun purchases in the last two to three years not just in our community but in our nation and I think we have to be cognizant as a community that we need to put gun safety first and foremost as a priority for our children for our Public Safety officers for our entire community so I would encourage any family any parents who have firearms in their home please go to be smart for kids.org every town for gun safety has wonderful resources outlining how you can keep your Firearms safe and out of the hands of children and to keep our um First Responders and
017Public Safety officers also safe from weapons getting into the wrong hands as we reflect on this tragedy I hope we will all take action to keep our community safe thank you thank you Miss Kushner Dr Martin thank you I share my colleagues deep sadness thank you Miss waters for leading the moment of silence we have several friends who lived in the headingham who live in the headingham area and uh yeah it's close to home yeah uh and I I share Miss kushner's statement uh that we need to pay attention to gun safety I I grew up a hunter I enjoyed hunting there are safe ways to use Firearms to store Firearms um it's not an either or we must work together for safety yeah because there's no way to completely protect a community other than
018the community working together we know that we just need to live it there is a lot to celebrate various things have been mentioned the school took uh career breakfast was outstanding thank you to all the Community Partners it's always inspiring to recognize that the students who have participated in the CTE programming particularly those developing any kind of certification have effectively 100 graduation rate that community of Engagement that goes with that those Co those CTE cohorts really makes a difference when it comes to graduation and a big thank you to all of our business partners it was great to celebrate a Hispanic awareness dinner as well several of my colleagues were there it was uh you know the the dancing of some of the students we got to enjoy a taste of that in the board
019meeting a couple weeks ago fantastic the students were clearly the best dancers of of everybody who was at the program but it was also very rewarding to to celebrate our Hispanic Educators uh including our superintendent uh educator in Chief of the district congratulations always uh superintendent Moore the principal vice principal of the year uh celebration was again uh fantastic uh congratulations to Miss Taylor and Dr Williams and I've particularly known Dr Williams for several years and I can't think of a more deserving principle for that award I think it is appropriate to highlight one of the things that she raised in her remarks that evening and that issues to the best of the knowledge she was able to dig it up and I I believe it's it's confirmed she's the first African-American female principle of
020the year yeah in the Wake County school system and I raised that because well there's been a lot more outstanding African-American principles than just one we do a lot of work trying to yeah address Equity across the school system the work that I have done over the last several years looking at the the integration process that you know we were part of and many good things have come of that but a lot of that integration happened by reinforcing the historically white schools over the historically African-American schools in part because more resources had been poured into the historically white schools and so you know on the merger the the the more resource schools are the ones that that tended to continue um but what that meant was that we had a lot of absolutely outstanding black
021Educators both male and female on who lost their positions of leadership we we lost the respect for a great legacy of amazing Educators in our historically segregated and in this area that meant historically black schools uh and and so uh thank you Dr Williams for calling that out a well-deserved award both for you but thank you for also calling out the legacy of very strong female black Educators on a cohort that has been overlooked and you know this is one step in the very much the right direction also had the opportunity to work with a group of counselors who are going through the ramp process the recognition of our school counseling we've got a lot of our schools that that are recognized by their professional Society and I call it out because every time I
022go through one of these engagements I'm sobered at the um recognition of the amount of work that our school counselors do in the particular school I was working with they had a ratio at a high school of one counselor with a cohort of 400 students if you think about that if you have a 20-minute meeting and 10 minutes in between to sort of go to the next student a half hour a piece that'd be five weeks of 40 hours a day to meet with each student now counselors have a lot more to do than just meet with students and many students need more than just one 20-minute meeting but those are just the hard statistics if you did nothing other than meet with students it would be five weeks to get through your one cohort
023of 400 students there's a reason we say we need more counselors in our schools it makes a difference um I'd also like to highlight I think from the board table we need to be careful what we you know promote from outside organizations but there's an opportunity coming up this weekend The Graduate students at from NC State chemistry department and Department of textiles are hosting the national chemistry week celebration down at Moore Square Park it's going to be a great event running from 10 to 2 P.M family event I would say a lot of the demonstrations the Hands-On things are really geared to about fourth graders to ninth graders so come on out and support The Graduate students they've got a lot of great demonstrations be a great chance to get your hands uh on Discovery
024the theme is looking at the chemistry of fabrics yeah you don't always think about what all chemistry goes into it from dying to fabrication there's a lot of neat stuff that will be going on so it's a free event four families from ten to two at Moore Square in downtown Raleigh this weekend or this weekend this this coming Saturday uh October the 22nd finally I think it's important for us to continue to pay attention to covet numbers they're down-ish and somewhat stabilizing the week of 10-2 Wake County schools had 103 cases the week of 10-9 there were 91 cases the good news is the student cases are dropping a lot faster the less less good news is Staff cases are not dropping as fast and in fact about half of the Wake County cases are
025staff cases so students you're doing a better job than staff staff we need to pay a little bit more attention staff cases are about twice what they were a year ago student cases are about a third of what they were a year ago so uh you know we're in this lull time it's important that we pay attention because what we do now is going to impact the magnitude of the surge that is likely to happen late December and January yeah thank you thank you Miss Johnson hosler thank you um again I certainly Echo the comments that have been made in appreciation and gratitude for both chair Mahaffey and Miss waters for your thoughtful and reflective words that hopefully will speak volumes to everyone who's listening as we all will be reflected on last week's tragedies
026for a significant time to come a follow-up to Vice chair Hagerty um we I want to say for people who are listening there is an organization who with Governor's crime commission support on Saturday held a vigil and still continuously will offer grief support their website is ncvan.org and they will continue to provide support until we get up and running a rapid response Center here in Wake County so grateful for my colleagues of that organization who immediately jumped into action to be responsive to our community certainly we know that our schools lifted up ways to support our students but we also know family and our community oftentimes also would prefer outside support so I'm grateful that we have both offerings to our school Community both our internal wcpss but also our external Partners who truly are
027coming to the table to be supportive of our community I I certainly know everyone in this room knows this but as a parent I think it is important to uplift that while students May not have personally known engaged or had any close proximity to what happened they all were still impacted by the trauma that happened in our community last week I've said it before I will continue to say it people are not well and I mean collectively and it is our responsibility to not only lift it up but to continue to be responsive and I know that people are doing everything with that in their power but it is also I actually had an adult say thank you for acknowledging that we're not well that is that helps us remove the stigma that it is
028okay for us to not be okay and it is even more so okay for us to seek the supports that are out there and so hopefully we will continue to encourage each other and to be supportive of each other regardless of our relationship or no relationship at all we always say that a smile could truly change somebody's life and that is really true in this moment so thank you all especially for our folks here at Crossroads who really stepped up to be responsive to provide our schools with some way to respond in that moment but certainly there's never a good way to respond when we're talking about grief and Trauma but I think it's important to acknowledge that it's not just what we needed to do last week that we're going to need these supports
029long term and when we talk about the work of our school counselors or our social workers or our school psychologists um their plates are full their plates are full and there are expectations job expectations that supersede what we require at Wake County but their jobs still go on just like everyone else and so those additional supports are certainly necessary and I ask people to be patient as people figure out how to implement those resources because they are stretched and strained but we still need them so to everyone in our community who were immediately responsive and still responsive because I don't think this is short-term and hopefully we will not treat this as something that just happened last week and we'll all move on because there are a lot of people who can't just pick up
030and move on so um that is all my comments for this evening thank you thank you Miss Johnson Hassler Miss cash um yeah thank you I I also thank Mr Happy and Miss waters for delivering those remarks and um it's Jonathan hossler you're right we're not well and I I'm I'm devastated what I see in the emergency room on a regular basis and I'm saddened by The Adolescents that we see that are not well and I hope that what we can do at least in our world that we can support them in every which way we can and I hope that we recognize that and we do we need more bodies in our schools but um it's a big worry to me it's a big worry to the world so having said that um Miss
031Johnson Hoffer and I were at football game and she's always at the football game at Millbrook last I get to watch her daughter who's an amazing cheerleader dancer at the football game at Millbrook High School last Friday and it was Millbrook against Wakefield so I had on two different t-shirts and I'd switch them as I go from one side to the other but it was a good game it was a nice night and I did the best I can but it was funny um I I have I want to say a little bit I said over the last several months or longer I have heard comments about the school systems fiscal accountability or our budget transparency and I would like to take a moment during my comment time to address this as Finance chair for
032several years I feel that this finance committee has put much effort into reporting our budget steps it may be that some have only recently been paying attention or that some have missed the most important presentations that we have had a very informative and important presentation was made at the board's finance committee in September September 2nd the presentation was on fiscal accountability and transparency within the district if you look at that the presentation included a review of fiscal accountability and transparency including and not limited to reporting of the financial information to the state of North Carolina the federal government the Wake County Board of Education and the public the presentation also included information about the annual independent external Financial audit of a district financial reporting and the controls and the board of education's independent audit committee
033if you were not able to see this presentation I encourage you to go to the district's YouTube website and please watch it it will give you a solid understanding of the district's comprehensive work and disclosing detailed fiscal information to the board and to the public you can also you can also go to the district's website and see the annual budgets and independently audited comprehensive Financial reports for the past 15 years I encourage you to do that if you will speak about our budget I want to be sure that you've seen all this information and so also in an effort to be fiscally responsible I'm always impressed with the audit reviews at Wake County Public School System conducts finally I will share that we are targeting to bring to the November finance committee meeting the representation
034of the board's independent audit committee's report on the external Financial audit of the district for the fiscal year ending June 30th 2022. November is a targeted date and will be dependent upon the work of forvis which was formerly known as Dixon Hughes and Goodman the external audit firm and the Local Government commission's review of the final audit comprehensive financial report I understand that a large institution such as Wake County Public School System with funding sources that come from so many places can also be hard to understand at first glance however reviewing it with some time spent in doing so will sometimes give you a much better understandable it is an understandable form and it is transparent I have worked with the people in our financial department for so many years in the recent last term
035on the board and in my terms in the 90s I know that we are so fortunate to have this type of expertise in our system so I just wanted to challenge what I believe to be an inaccuracy about our transparency we have always made it a priority to share in every Finance meeting and many work sessions our revenue and our expenditures I appreciate you letting me comment about this at this time it's very important to me as Finance chair but these things are are actually discussed I also want to mention that I did go to the state of the county address and superintendent Moore you did an excellent job of speaking about that I wanna I I do want to end and give um some praise to superintendent or I mean County Commissioner Chris or
036county commissioner chair Hutchinson I think he did a really good job of doing this final state of the county but I think what he did really well if you if you were there there was a film that he did and he let every one of his County Commissioners stand up and do a presentation on what their purpose was of being a county commissioner for their term so you learned a lot about what every county commissioner mat and what they've done what they've accomplished and what their heart was really in for thanks thank you Miss cash Miss Carter thank you and I appreciate everyone's comments about the community in Raleigh so far and I just wanted also to take a moment to address the incident at Kerry high school last week and I just want to
037first off thank all the school staff that were there the SRO for quickly acting and I also would like to address some information that Phil has been shared a lot not just in relation to Kerry high school but our schools in general that this board does not care about the safety of our schools and that we never discuss it and that you know you need to discuss it and take action I encourage folks you can reach out to me many of you have and I try to share information and links and presentations in the meetings that I've been involved with just in the little less than two years that I've been on the board it is definitely something that has taken very seriously by this board I can say by the entire board and to
038say so is just simple that it that's not true that that's untrue I'm speaking kind of confusingly because it is confusing to even hear people say that and specifically one incident that comes to mind is there was a lot of backlash about a visitor system and money being sent spent on that and to clarify because I know as someone who has worked in our school system and also been to many of our schools that is a key component because if you have seen how some schools mayor may not have different visitor Management systems and how having a system that has actually been recommended by an assessment to have a district-wide system and one that we can put in information such as restraining orders child custody that that type of things are trespassing and be able
039to have something flag immediately versus being unaware because they might be listed as a parent or what have you or a grandparent and not knowing the other important detail that could be missing so there is an important work that has been done and will continue to be done working closely with law enforcement and also the um safety school safety and advocacy Council if you have not heard of them and the word that they have already done for our district um you can reach out to me or you can look that up there are lots of links lots of presentations lots of videos that you can go and see the conversations and sometimes it is in closed session and that is by design it has to be that way to help protect our staff our students
040and our schools and I know it's hard because it would be nice to be able to have all the information but if the public has the information that means everyone has it and so it sounds like that would be great but not really when you're trying to prevent and hope that there are less tragedies that can occur so again I encourage you again if you need help finding that information I'll do my best to help but I just want to I just want to take a moment to point that out and I do thank all the work that has been done and will continue to be done um and piggybacking a little bit um on because you all know I love my um Athletics and extracurriculars and I speak on often but I want to
041tie it in because I think it goes right into mental health and why I strongly supported those continuing even when high school students were not in person however I would have preferred them but I digress because for some of our students that is where they get their Outlet not only Athletics it's up on that stage it's and the dances and the cheering what what have you so I encourage folks I think a great way if you're interested in looking to support all of our schools and students and showing how important that they are and recognizing what outstanding things are happening in this District go to those events show those students that you support them and our staff and the referees that are there because without them because they need them so if you're interested and
042yes please sign up because without them our Sports will not continue but I do want to help so I'll get off of that but you all know I like to say that a lot and I did enjoy I've actually had um was blessed to be able to attend all the homecoming the Carrie carito and Apex I made all their football homecoming games which was great and they're carry high in particular I was like oh homecoming but now they're not having the band during halftime but no worries we got to stay after the football game and see the entire not just a snippet but the entire performance by the carry high band it was just I I just love it so you know I could go on and on and then for the Apex football game
043I okay so I love dogs okay so they had um at this past Friday is Ripken right and so I just wanted to highlight him because he is awesome and if you don't know he would run out and he would get the football team okay first I was like is he getting the ball and they're like oh no the T I'm like oh it apparently helps out the golf uh team as well uh the ladies golf team at Apex so um you know stay tuned there that's that's exciting if you haven't been thinking you know perhaps he'll be there um but um also I had the opportunity to go to green hopes Orchestra fall orchestra concert and just wanted to give a special shout out to their concert Orchestra chamber Ensemble and the symphony symphony
044orchestra and their director Mrs Lewis it was a wonderful night and just being able to see the students and again it's just a great Outlet you can just see and and just fill it if you're there it was awesome and then it was a great transition because I pulled up Twitter just to see because I knew there was a volleyball game going on just a couple doors down and it was still going on and it was like down to the wire so I was very grateful that I was able to hop in and see the ending the last several points for Green Hope to win over green level um Ed yes and so um I just want to congrat congratulate the team for that and the coaches um and um last night I was at
045East Cary Middle School and um if you're close by you still have time they're performing tonight at seven and then again Wednesday night and Thursday night I encourage you all to go as an interactive event you get to vote for whodunit is what they call it at intermission and then they what was interesting to me the students had to learn different lines because they didn't know what what they were going to be performing exactly for the last act until they tallied up the votes um during intermission um so it was yeah it was it was pretty awesome and it was the person I chose I was pretty psyched about that um but you never know because you got to go because it could be a different person every night I'm just saying so uh please
046head that way and I know Green Hope is performing uh their uh fall uh show as well and Apex high school and uh Carey High chorus is Thursday night at 7 pm so lots of opportunities to support our students just a few in District 9 there but um and I'll end with the reminder that the board advisory council meeting for district nine will be on this coming up Monday at Apex HIgh at 6 pm and we will be having a pre presentation about the draft two of the enrollment plan which we was just released earlier today thank you thank you Miss Carter Miss Waters thank you and thank you Ms Johnson hostler for speaking about mental wellness and I want to continue to give voice to the need for mental health support in our schools
047and in our communities I know what it feels like to struggle with mental health I remember a number of years ago having a real battle with postpartum depression and at times feeling really hopeless and so I was fortunate that my family intervened and helped me get the help I needed to recover and so reaching out for help is not a sign of failure or defeat it's a sign of your Humanity so if you are struggling and need support please reach out or if you know someone who is struggling please intervene it's very important that we care for each other at this time and in our next district for board advisory council meeting which will be held on November 3rd at River Oaks Middle we will focus on Behavioral Health at that meeting as well as
048uh one of the as we transition to talk about some of the joys of the work in the district I am so proud of Dr anise Williams in being named principal of the year she is just such a force of greatness and it was just really humbling to see how spirited she was in in having been nominated previously and how graciously she came forward and gave voice to black female Educators and thank you Dr Martin for your remarks there so I'm so proud of her and the work that she's doing at Bug Elementary it is the sweetest school I I am very glad that she is leading the school Community there and speaking of another sweet School Hunter Elementary had their walk bike and rolled to school last week at Chavis and when I initially
049got there I only saw two family groups and then I run at the corner and they're like 200 family groups and so they took over Tavis Park and it was a great turnout and so I wasn't able to walk with him I was a little disappointed I had another obligation but I really appreciated seeing all the school community and the family there is Hunter continues to be such an amazing school and district for and then several weeks ago while I was at Southeast Raleigh Elementary either meet the teacher I had a chance to meet Miss Wanda McCargo she leads the southeast Raleigh Elementary she leaves the southeast Raleigh Community Learning Center which supports many schools in district four and on Saturday they had a great event at Marbles Museum to celebrate a group of African-American
050female doctors who were very active in increasing the number of covet vaccinations in southeast Raleigh and so they were celebrated there so it was great to see kind of that connection between health and education at celebrated at that moment and to see their impact I know that they undoubtedly saved lives with their work around the covet vaccination and I know Dr Martin is always giving boys to coven really value what you report to us on a regular basis and as I was thinking about covet I remember about this time last year my own child ended up in the ICU with a severe asthma attack and I started to think if he had had covet as well because that would have been a really really bad experience for him and so as we continue to see
051covid in our communities please continue to be safe and take care of yourself and if you're not feeling well please please stay at home so that we can all stay safe and um I am just very grateful for the opportunity to represent District Four and all the great work and always so much great things going on in our school district so so thank you thank you Miss Waters and as you mentioned Chavis it popped into my head that just a reminder to everyone that it is coming upon election season if the signs littering the road weren't a clue [Music] um early in-person early voting begins this Thursday and goes until November 5th for sites and information please visit wake boats early.com with that will now entertain a motion to approve our meeting agenda for tonight
052motion perversioned we have a motion in a second to approve the meeting agenda any questions or comments seeing none all those in favor please say aye any opposed nay thank you we now move on to our information item for tonight and that is being presented by Ms Jill McKenna our assistant superintendent of special ed services regarding disability history and awareness month Miss McKenna thank you board chairman happy superintendent Moore and members of the board thank you for allowing me to address the Wake County public school system's 10th Annual recognition of disability history and awareness month we are delighted to continue this annual celebration and are grateful that the board provides us the time and space to Spotlight for us what is a very special month in 2007 the general assembly of North Carolina designated October
053is disability history and awareness month in order to expand the Public's knowledge awareness and respect for persons with disabilities later that year the Wake County Public School System School Board issued a resolution outlining that during the month of October our schools will provide intensive instruction on disability history people with disabilities and the disability rights movement the link to the full document is at the bottom of your page since 2012 our district has engaged in an annual celebration of our students with disabilities led by their teachers oftentimes this is a celebration that includes the entire School community this memo for disability history and awareness month was provided to staff district-wide on October 5th 2022. this year the district is continuing to embrace the language from here Anything is Possible for our students who embody unique abilities
054anything is possible looks and speaks to our future District core value number one States every child is uniquely capable and deserves to be challenged and engaged in relevant rigorous and meaningful learning each day for the month of October we have the opportunity to celebrate All uniquely capable students in our district schools and classrooms similar to last year special education services is providing access to focused activities and opportunities these activities share the unique abilities of public celebrities provide lessons for students of all abilities and promote the use of social media to Spotlight the achievements of individual students classrooms and schools this link leads to information and additional activities that include quotes book lists and school projects provided directly to teachers in early October one of the things special education services looks forward to every year is
055receiving all of the pictures and the tweets and the messages about the things that are going on in our schools related to disability history and awareness in celebration of disability history and awareness month our principals recently engaged in an activity in which they reflected on the three prompts that you see on the slide this provided an opportunity to hear about a special education teacher who visits general education classrooms during her trackout to read a book that brings awareness and acceptance to those with disabilities to hear about the importance of inclusion is one principle shared inclusion really matters and it makes the ultimate impact on the lives of all students overwhelmingly the theme shared by principles was around celebrating valuing and appreciating the uniqueness of all students this year we also want to take a moment
056to highlight one of our programs project search project search is a collaboration between Wake County Public Schools and the community agencies that you see on this slide the vision of project search truly embodies the four principles of the Ada which are also outlined in the board's resolution inclusion full participation economic self-sufficiency and equality of opportunity for people with disabilities so we have a video for you our speaker was unable to be here tonight but we have a brief video highlighting project search and you will hear from the teacher Brandy Pittman in one of our recent graduates summer project search is a school to work transition program that provides total immersion in a business setting our program here is at the Embassy Suites Raleigh Durham RTP and we started in 2019. we work in partnership with
057Vocational Rehabilitation Community Workforce Solutions and Alliance Health the interns will come for one for one school year to have the opportunity to work in different departments throughout the Embassy Suites they work alongside the staff and they learn not only how to do the different jobs in the Departments but many other skills as well such as when and at and how to ask for time off of work what to talk about in the break room how to double check their work for accuracy taking responsibility through the program it is amazing to see the self-confidence you just see it literally Blossom throughout the year in our interns for many this is their first opportunity to really work independently and to be truly integrated into a business setting on their own it can be a time of huge
058emotions we run the gamut from Fear anxiety joy and also Pride you can see that they have pride for for themselves knowing that they did something that was hard that they were able to do it and they did it well nationally over 70 percent of the students who graduate from the project search program will go on to find employment the 21 graduates that we have had at the embassy over the past few years have gone on to work at the Embassy Suites Walmart the Hilton the Renaissance Texas Roadhouse Publix as well as various other places I'm working the lobby tennis and Embassy Fleet I do the trash the the windows and all that and mopping I'm glad about this job because I've learned about me being respectful to the friends [Music] in the hotel I
059had to learn how about the helping the people here because I love my job my dude and Embassy free thank you for allowing me a few minutes to focus on the distinctive abilities of all of our students and to specifically celebrate the successes of our district students and become more aware and celebrate the uniqueness of the students that we in special education are honored to serve every day thank you Miss McKenna many of us had the honor of being at the last project search graduation and hearing the stories of our students and their work with staff members and his name is escaping me now the incredible manager of that Embassy Suites bill I believe it was Bill was yes um was was incredible and I I quickly went to their website and they highlight project
060search as part of their mission and values working closely with project search we're helping young adults with disabilities to gain this skills knowledge and opportunities to allow them to lead fulfilling careers so thank you for highlighting disability history and awareness month and lifting up project search in your comments thank you we now move on to public comment public comment is accepted in video written and in-person formats members of the public are welcome to offer comments or criticism directed at substantive ideas actions or procedures of the board and and individual board members the laws and policies of North Carolina provide that issues or concerns involving individual Personnel matters are confidential and therefore not appropriate for public comment settings concerns related to Personnel issues may be addressed through applicable wcpss personnel the grievance policy or other applicable
061policies those offering comments to the board including students may discuss issues and matters of General concern but should refrain from discussing confidential student information concerns related to confidential student matters may be addressed through applicable wcpss Personnel the grievance policy or other applicable policies we have four written comments as part of our public comment portion of this evening's agenda these comments are linked on the same online agenda we are using for tonight's meeting that agenda as well as guidelines for those wishing to submit comments for future meetings can be found at the district website wcpss.net under the tab labeled School Board we have four written comments from the public the topics are as follows Eastern wake school safety feedback on public comment mass shooting Equity policy and school safety for those of you here in per
062person during public comment you may speak for up to three minutes a green light will illuminate at the podium when our speaker begins a yellow light will light up along with an audio signal when there are 30 seconds remaining in your time and then a red light along with an audible tone will be your signal that your time is up and the next speaker will be called upon up to the podium in the interest of maintaining Civility and decorum however speakers are encouraged to address their comments to the Board of Education and to refrain from personal attacks and insults directed at the board individual board members staff or other members of the General Public please remain at the podium during your speaking time and any materials you wish to share with the board should be
063handed over to Mr blumberg our board attorney either before or after your comments we have 11 people signed up for public comment today our first speaker is Mike Nutt good evening I'd like to thank the board for its consideration of the new educational Equity policy 1150. I appreciate that it is focused on both Equity as an outcome for which we should strive but also a set of actions we can carry out to help students reach their unbounded potential last week I talked to an educator about what life is like for queer and trans students in the district I can't get it out of my head because I'd never heard it described in quite this way before what they described is that queer students are forced into a state of hyper vigilance and constant defensiveness or
064all day long they're scanning their environment and listening to what people say for any crumb of evidence any tiny tiny signal from Educators that they are in a safe space that they don't have to hide who they are that they can relax they can let their guard down and just be a student most of the time that does not happen a recent survey of the campaign for southern equality found that 24 percent only 24 percent of Southern queer respondents reported receiving support or resources related to their lgbtq identity at school the educational Equity policy draft seeks to erase these kinds of disparities but as of now it is going to fall short in a really critical and specific area every student down to our preschoolers has the right to see themselves reflected in our instructional
065materials and this policy should say so existing policy 3200 on the selection of instruction materials allowed to individual principles to dictate what kinds of supplemental materials are allowed in their High School diversity and instructional materials shouldn't depend on whether or not a principal is a Republican it also doesn't require any kind of maturity level as suggested in the current draft of 1150. diversity and representation and instructional material is not just optional it can actually be veto by principle I implore you to stand up for what's right what you know is right our teachers already feel like they have Targets on their backs and this is especially true for those who do value equity and inclusion in their classrooms they need you on this issue our students need you on this issue families need you on
066this so please take another look at proposed policy 1150 Section 3 commitment three thank you sincerely for your time our next speaker is Daniel Grant King to Grant King following Mr Grant King on the list is John Aman chikuwu the last name is Aman chukwu thank you very much for correcting me Mr Aman chukwu yes no problem it means I know God um Luke chapter 17 and 2. says it is better for a person to have a millstone tied around their neck and to be thrown into the sea then for anyone to harm or damage a child and so the question today to the school board is only you know whether or not your role the policies the curriculum and the things that you allow in this school system in Wake County only you know
067whether or not a millstone is tied around your neck the reality is this God is going to judge every last one of you for decisions that are made on behalf of children you know this past year we spent one million dollars on a diversity office and how did that benefit black children how did it benefit children in general well 78 of third through eighth grade black students are not proficient in math in Wake County we're wasting taxpayer dollars putting money towards this diversity office that's not benefiting those who need it the most 66 percent third through eighth grade students are not proficient in Reading black students and our reading on grade level they're not performing mathematically and they're not going to be able to get jobs in the fields like stem but we're wasting money
068on a diversity equity and inclusion office while we are failing black students in the name of diversity you know in the Jim Crow era black students were locked out of the public school system but today they are trapped in and many of these students need options they need school choice they need the opportunity to take their tax payer dollars and take it to school systems that will benefit them and support them and educate them and as we talk about inclusion and making sure that the trans student feels comfortable and the queer student feels comfortable what does that have to do with Reading Writing and arithmetic as we are in oh as we as we are teaching cultural Marxism and grooming children to be the next pervert we are damaging our kids in this public school
069system and it needs to stop our next speaker is Melanie Motors head huh officer Gabriel Torres Mary Marshall Nicole Connors Sue carnets and James Thompson brother of the shooter last Thursday a 15 year old gained possession of two firearms and then murdered these five people my name is Melanie Motors head and I'm a parent substitute and be smart volunteer fact in incidences of gunfire on school grounds up to 80 percent of minor age Shooters obtain the guns from their home or from a friend or relative's home 91 percent of mass shooters were current or former students I recently attended a board advisory council meeting Russ Smith the senior director of security for Wake County Public Schools reported that after a thorough audit our campuses were found to be safe I raised my hand and asked
070if there were any plans to educate the community on safe Firearms storage in a word no plan to remind thousands of adults of simple steps we can all take on a daily basis to keep our kids safer in the U.S about 13 million households with kids contain at least one gun and one study found that the majority of kids in gun owning households knew where the gun was stored shockingly 4.6 million kids live in a household with at least one loaded and unsecured gun at this point someone enters our campus and we're ready to react but we basically wait for danger to enter our space why not be proactive and address this at the source our school system isn't shy about outreaching to parents safely securing your Firearms needs to be added to the list
071major school systems in Ohio Illinois Arkansas Texas Minnesota and Georgia have already passed resolutions to provide parents and caregivers information about secure firearm storage let me not forget about an incident that occurred just last week at Cary High School in which a student fired a gun into a toilet thankfully no one was hurt but this is the second incident just last week in Wake County of minors having access to unsecured guns and then making horrendous decisions we don't have time to wait for another tragedy before we reach out to our families it is time for the school board to pass a resolution to distribute be smart secure firearm storage materials to parents and caregivers of Wake County Public Schools thank you our next speaker is Chad Stahl hello everybody uh Twitter's such a dark place
072I'm just gonna read a little bit from the I believe this is the Grant application for uh project Nexus from 2020 I believe I just want to point out a couple of things here number one uh I guess there's a you have to have a voluntary plan or a plan either required or voluntary a plan to reduce eliminate or prevent minority group isolation that is being implemented or would be implemented if assistance under the magnet schools assistance program is made available the funding on either a voluntary basis or as required under title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. so when you go to your desegregation plan a part of that Grant one of the greatest predictors of future success is past performance wcpss has a long history and National reputation for combining its
073magnet schools program with its Student Assignment plan to achieve voluntary desegregation socioeconomic integration and promote student achievement that proven track record consists of number one an extensive history of positive desegregation over time number two Innovative program reforms number three local funding augmented by federal funding number four positive reception of magnet Choice by the public number five one of the largest student achievement records in the state number six highly qualified personnel number seven strong Student Assignment policy guiding implementation of magnet programs I think I read that twice sorry at number seven strong Bella number eight a history of factoring socioeconomic status into Assignment decision making I'm not sure if you're the the game plan of why you assign students is really transparent to your parents and to your public I think there's a lot of misconception
074of what the purpose is but it says here and this grant that you applied for that you won that you are committing yourself to move people around the plan was designed this is a good one the plan was designed to implement the board of education's commitment to a racial balance of 15 to 45 percent minority enrollment in each school that range reflected an acceptable variance of what was at the time a 30 percent minority population as Community needs and conditions change the Boe made modifications to the desegregation plan to accomplish two goals avoid minority group isolation and fill under enrolled schools I just don't think you're really transparent about why you take a kid from one school and put them in another school or the fact that your funding is dependent on how you move
075students from school to school I don't think people know that I don't think they recognize it I don't think they realize it I think it's all assignment we just got to do the school thing help put kids in schools but really you're making decisions based on race based on socioeconomic status and I guess it's wrong for minorities to have be grouped together is that the messaging is that what our federal government requires our County School System to do is to prevent minority grouping thank you our next speaker is Kim Maney first thanks um to the board for its thoughtful response um to the violence we've faced in our community in and outside of this meeting which we're focused on the mental health and support for our students staff and Community I personally appreciated the avoidance
076of calling for more guns to solve what is a gun access problem um also thank you I wanted to provide some Kudos in disability awareness month for Wake staff in support of my family mywig County student has some Vision issues you wouldn't know it but but they're there from the discovery of these issues the staff of her Elementary School rallied around her to support her a plan was put together and her teachers and and the administrative staff helped to make sure her plan was followed with the transition to Middle School where I understood everyone had to grow up I didn't know what was going to happen I've been really um excited about the outstanding response that we've received from our first meeting it was clear that all of her teachers had read her plan and
077were ready to comply one teacher spent her own money on a support tool for my student and refused to be reimbursed my child has received the highest grades to date with these Educators supporting her I want to I wanted to highlight this as part of disability awareness month and I wanted to encourage all parents to make sure to support decision makers who support Educators like this with both financial and other needed support thanks to the board members who also are providing much needed support to these key Educators thank you our next speaker is Diane Chandler okay I wash the left for me along I listened to a Litany of awareness months disability history and awareness month National bullying prevention month Hispanic Heritage Month LGBT History Month International Walker School month yag Kippur but cancer awareness
078month now heading to heavy Christmas Miss Johnson Hustler's dating last week is appointed us all the groups and community and make it effort to show that you see and hear them so you're very caring I'll go back to this board that one very important one for it left out October it respect life month in honor of that month I weak out to all of you asking about the court program and support giving to pregnant and parenting students both mothers and fathers only miss Corey referred me to policy 4023 which states School administrators shall provide efficiency support to correspondent and parent Insurance to remain enrolled in school and graduate including referred for critically current Community indicate where appropriate support can include allowing a huge offices for pregnancy related regions and for care of a sick child
079and allowing homework and makeup work to be available privately we can do more according to the kikihi in 2019 a teenage birth rate was 17 hour 1000 girls affecting the 19th this great women at Wake County schools has around 3 000 private schools every year there could be programs that physically immediate plenty and parents Insurance these needs are more than just days off and make up work in 2019 only 50 or so a key mother to acquire a traditional high school diploma motherhood did not mean communication cannot successfully finish school and become successful adults in searching for model for program can accurately support leaking I found several programs in Texas they included support like prenatal care parenting Collective job and life skill trains one-on-one case management and even Child Care at the school online program
080get offer self-paced curriculum economic option I actually Wake County Schools continue to implementing a program aimed I should physically helping these students women including teenagers are continues abortion agriculture unplanned pregnancy because they feel like they have no other choice the pregnancy annual guitar will impede their future tickets with support the kids not have to be vacated my own biological mother was so Keen when she had me back in 1978 my mother would pull out her school and sent to a special school she was shown by her community despite that she became a nurse and a mother could two more children I just think in 2022 we can do better our next speaker is Becky Lou Hobbs hello my name is Becky Lou Hobbs I'm a long time resident in Wake County I graduated from Wake
081County Schools I'm now a mother with children in the system so when contacting the board led to no response I began coming to these board meetings in person that was a year ago now I'm a candidate for school board oh boy has it been a year in this time I've addressed the board more than a dozen times bringing many issues to the board's attention such as the toolkit that this board followed like it was a religion the physical and emotional damage that Force masking caused our children principals who overrode mask exemptions by medical professionals and the board's approval of this practice kids forced to eat lunch on the floor parents kept out of schools as the board's policies called parents non-essential then there is the board's decision to appoint a non-resident to the vacated seat
082by Keith Sutton and of course many times about the plummeting test scores and proficiency rates that was also addressed earlier this meeting all these issues brought to the attention of the board but never have received feedback or comment from the board but there are multiple trimes addressing parental rights the fundamental rights of parents to direct the education Medical Care and the moral upbringing of their children you know the rights of parents want to know what their kids are being taught be involved in their education although no informal response several board members publicly berated criticized parents for asserting their rights because parents want to be part of their kids education doesn't make any sense and then of course tonight multiple times I've addressed the budget and the inadequacies regarding that and yes I know exactly where
083all those files are on the board Miss cash looked at them for many many hours many many days and so is many other people that have commented publicly I know I'm not the only one we do have a lot of questions there's still a lot of things that have not been answered so why does this board refuse to respond when people bring forth issues do you think that by Waiting by not responding that parents will grow tired that will just go away when will you finally understand that when it comes to our kids we will not stop we'll never stop defending them we will not go away [Music] I've talked to many parents over the past few weeks as I've gone out door-to-door they're frustrated that their kids are not getting the quality education that
084they deserve they want to get back to the basics Reading Writing Math Science History it's not just us coming to the board it's parents polls open for early voting in just a couple days election day is November 8th I encourage people listening to this to vote for our kids vote for their future I'm Becky Lou Hobbs thank you our next speaker is Julie page before I begin I just want to tell people watching that you might want to put a take your minor children out of the area while I talk today um hello again friendly reminder just a mom not a terrorist on the agenda tonight is discussion about low performing schools there were 38 from last year representing 26 000 students many schools with low proficiency ratings are left out why overall proficiency is
085a meager 55 percent you cannot just throw money at a problem and expect it to go away your problem is time money cannot buy time the classroom time that you took away when you pandered to the ncae you all want Leandro like it's a magic pill to make all of your terrible decisions disappear what a joke speaking of the ncae fake teachers union and a left extremist woke mob who pushed to keep school buildings closed who wanted to keep kids in Mass indefinitely for the sake of health and safety who was sexualizing our children with obscenity and lewd literature in schools grooving our kids for underage illicit sex and pornographic Tendencies who is confusing our children's gender identity using books pronouns bathrooms locker rooms Sports and pride celebrations who is using Dei and SEL as
086a way to declare oppressed versus oppressors or good versus evil who has denied the need for school safety using metal detectors and sros in the name of student trust and emotional issues who has exacerbated mental health problems among our kids to the point of suicide do you understand yet these things are detrimental to academics there are obstacles to Student Success and achievement current wcpss core beliefs State the board will be 100 focused on student achievement can you say you're doing that instead you focus on Equity gender affirmation and sex books you break up communities by moving kids from school to school you double down and congratulate yourself yourselves on a job well done such nonsense now I want to read some passages from a couple of books his tongue brushed against her he thrust a
087finger inside her he closed his mouth over her and sucked at the same time he pushed deep inside of her curving his finger and stroking the very center of her body she came with an explosion that made her gasp the next book he leans down his fingers still moving inside me his thumb circling and pressing his tongue mirrors the actions of his fingers claiming me my legs begin to stiffen I come constantly again and again falling apart beneath him the first book Is Almost Perfect by Brian catcher available in your school system the second book is Fifty Shades of Gray by E.L James what is worse where is the literary value here there is none yet you call this smut inspiring it's disgusting voting begins in two days we want better and we deserve better
088our next speaker is Michelle Morrow [Applause] I appreciate the words that were shared earlier talking about character Maslow's hierarchy of human needs places Safety and Security second only to food and shelter the need for love and belonging esteem and self-actual actualization can only be achieved when the first three have been met and that has not happened in our school system and I appreciate that you guys talk about security but it's not a reality talk is not we can't just hope that our kids are going to be safe the reality is if we do not bring safety to our classrooms as well as to the entire school then teachers cannot teach and students cannot learn when there is not discipline in order when there is not character development in the classroom when everything is going to
089be different I've talked to so many teachers present and past from Wake County in the last six months and again and again people that have left they're not leaving because of the pay although I absolutely believe that we need an incredible increase in pay but they're leaving because they do not feel supported by the administration they say again and again the time in the classroom is being spent on behavioral issues dealing with two or three students that keep acting out and the others cannot get the education that they need this is wrong when you're talking about this needs to be if you deal with it it can't be dealt with you go to the administration as a board you guys hire and you are responsible for making sure that the administration is making the best
090work environment possible for those teachers teacher after teacher tells me the parents are even worse I go to the administrator they say we're going to have our hands off talk to the teacher or the parents they call the parents and the parents are saying well is it because my my child is a different race is it because my child is this is it what are you doing to them that should never be the case our teachers should not be put in the middle of this and so as a board it's time for us to deal with what's happening in our classroom this should be the place that if a teacher is not getting supported by the administration they should be able to call whichever one of you is their District representative and say can you
091please sit down and can we have a meeting can we discuss this because no one is succeeding we're looking at we have a an influ or an exodus of teachers and of students out of Wake County Public Schools it's because education isn't happening safety is not happening and I have been here multiple times over the last four years talking about the security from the outside that was on the inside we also need to deal with what's happening from the outside there is no reason why we cannot have a comprehensive security system with sros we have heard time and time again sitting here from the very same ncie claiming that every law enforcement officer has a embedded against anybody that is a minor a minority and that is simply not true I will tell you everyone
092felt safer when there was somebody that had a pistol that was shooting at a toilet everyone felt safer when those police officers arrived with their guns on their hips it's time for us to put our money in put our mouth and do our actions our Amanda Cohen is our next speaker is Miss Cohen here okay thank you this concludes public comment we continue with our information items with the superintendent update superintendent more foreign again the item that we covered in our work session today was draft two of the enrollment plan there were several components in today's update first being the Highlight an overview of the public engagement activities that have occurred since draft one was released that included information around the submissions The Impressions and the comments left in the thought Exchange program that was
093put out for public to present comments and questions an FAQ that has come out of those questions as to inform the public on the themes that we reoccurred in the thought Exchange prompts there was also there were also public info sessions that were held on September 28th September 29th October 5th and October 6th and that was a recap of the information as well as the things that were highlighted another part of the presentation this afternoon included reviewing the recommendations for the stability rules there have been a number of questions about those and some clarifications that occurred in in that Arena as well the last part of the presentation this evening went over four recommendations for changes to Dr in draft two from draft one two that were auditions two that were deletions from previously recommended
094changes all of that information is available on simply for anyone who would like to take a look at either the video or the presentation there's an addendum also that is a part of the presentation that contains more detailed maps and information that folks can take a look at uh next steps include um a public info session specific to draft two on October 26th there will be a board public hearing on November 10th that is a Thursday it is an off date it's a special called board meeting specifically for public comment on the enrollment plan the final plan to be adopted by the board will be brought to work session on November 16th for final review with a vote requested from the board that evening in your regular agenda for as an action item in your
095meeting that was the item from work session today thank you thank you superintendent Moore um for anyone who'd like to go back and see that work session it is available archived on our uh YouTube play page um at this time we are on the consent agenda is there a motion to approve the consent items here I'm happy I'm approval of the consent items is listed thank you thank you Miss Johnson Hassler any discussion seeing none all those in favor of approving the consent items please say aye any opposed name we move on to our action items first coming from academic advancement with Drew cook assistant superintendent of academics talking about the North Carolina Symphony yes ma'am good evening everyone chairman hathy Vice chair Hagerty superintendent more and board members as you know but for the
096benefit of the public in September of 2022 the Wake County Board of Education approved a line item in the budget to fund the cost of sending every fourth grade student in the district to the educational concert which is part of our ongoing and long-standing association with the North Carolina Symphony in years past you may note and may recall this had been a line item in the county commissioner's budget and is now part of the Wake County Public School System budget beginning with the 22-23 school year you may be interested to know this is information from Freddie Lee Heath for some context that the first North Carolina Symphony education concert was held in 1945. since that time thousands of students from Wake County and across the state have had the opportunity to see hear and experience
097a live professional Symphony often for the first time that tradition continues this year for over 11 000 Wake County fourth grade students who will attend one of 10 education concerts being held at May Mandy Concert Hall in Raleigh with the first event for the year scheduled for next Tuesday October the 25th as part of this experience teachers are provided with professional learning prior to the workshop to align with North Carolina DPI standards and also the Wake County Public School System pacing guides the increase in the Arts budget this year to support this opportunity is reflective We Believe with the continuing commitment of our district to provide exposure to and experiences with the Arts that align with ncdpi's vision for Arts education in the state of North Carolina it is our hope and our intent that
098this experience will provide yet another important opportunity to ignite an appreciation and even a passion for music in specifically orchestral music that our young students will carry forward with them throughout their educational journey and even Beyond throughout their lives we appreciate again the board's commitment to this effort and other similar to similar initiatives within the Arts and it's in that Spirit tonight that staff is requesting board approval of the contract with the North Carolina Symphony for our fourth grade students to participate again in the education concert series for the 22-23 school year happy to hear comments or share additional information as needed thank you Mr cook and again this is something that the Commissioners would provide to the symphony directly instead they are asking us to um be the check writer so it comes from
099the local amount is there a motion to approve before we move on to discussion second all right did you miss Allen take your pick like I say just one quick note um we did have a budget item budget case in our board proposed budget and and that was went to the Commissioners to just really asked for the dollars to come to the district so that the Commissioners wouldn't be paying it themselves but rather it would be part of our budget Dr Mark well I just think it's appropriate for us to note in the Scott's absence as a former music teacher she's been an absolute passionate supporter of this and other arts and I know she would want to vote very much in favor of this as well but I think it's just appropriate to to
100highlight her advocacy as well as all of the advocacy on the board because we know the extent to which Arts education is part of Education you know we hear sometimes people bemoaning it's not just reading and Math and Science and whatnot um I can tell you I just got done grading a chemistry exam and I think a lot of students would have done better had they had a little bit more Arts education because what you really need to do in chemistry is to be able to explain what's going on and arts requires a little bit more of that richness of explanation it's not just mechanical uh it uses all parts of the brain so it's absolutely part of Education I'm very proud to support it thank you thank you Dr Martin and you'll be happy
101to know that Miss Scott was with us in our executive meeting where we made the decision to highlight this on the action agenda further comments enthusiastically Miss Carter and then miss cash I just want to Echo and thank you for bringing this up and highlighting this for the community to hear because for some this might just light a whole passion and change their whole trajectory you just never know um and then I for one fully support this in any opportunities for the Arts in our system I know I when I think of this I think of the I know the United Way of the Arts coming to our school and I thought back to when I went to Adams Elementary and they had the number drummer number drummer there and seeing some of those students
102and some that might have struggled in other aspects of academics and really connect and then they're learning math at the same time and it goes right into this because it's all connected and I just appreciate I could go on and on so thank you Miss cash I appreciate it too I when if you've been to these when all these kids go and you see a lot of these kids that will never have that experience and they get it and it's just really fun to see the smiles on their face so I highly support this this is a good event Kushner thank you and thank you to my colleagues for supporting this so robustly because I think the magic of it is that every fourth grader goes and as Ms cash said they dress up this
103is their time out and it's and when the Arts are like the United arts and these programs where it's an inclusive program for all students it it ignites something sometimes in our students who didn't think they liked the Arts who didn't think they were artistic and so programs like this are just so critical so um thank you for highlighting Mr cook and it's also an opportunity for our music teachers to get involved because many of them work with the sympathy over the summer to create this program and curriculum that is aligned with our standards and so it's a wonderful professional development opportunity and keeping it relevant um I don't know about you all but when we did our trip to the symphony where I came from it was going to the Music Hall and hearing
104Peter and the Wolf and my mother went to the Music Hall and listened to Peter and the Wolf was it Peter in the wolf it was not so we change it up here in North Carolina I know yes and so we have Harry Belafonte when I was in fourth grade stop it's true and it is wow that's pretty cool I think we need to end on that now all right let's we have a jump in the line and uh all in favor please say aye aye any opposed nay all right thank you Mr cook and please send our regards to Mr Freddie Lee will do and up next is policy and that is policy 3420 student promotion and accountability first reading and Mr cook you're staying with us for this I'll stay right here um
105not quite as much fun as the North Carolina Symphony but important nonetheless so board policy 3420 student promotion and accountability is a revised policy we're bringing to you for first reading tonight as you may recall this policy was reviewed at the September 27th policy committee meeting and the revised policy reflects your feedback and input and the discussion from that day when given final board approval it will replace the current policy 3420. just a couple of notes worth mentioning policy 3420 was recently revised back in May of 2022 this year when several technical adjustments were made to update and incorporate our policy language with new legislation that's been passed within the past year I also make note that in our discussion on the 20 seventh in that policy committee meeting we spent some time reviewing draft
106revisions to the associated rnp which primarily involved updates that were more comprehensive and also better reflect current practices related to promotion retention and intervention as opposed to incorporating a wholesale list of new initiatives or strategies so just to be clear a lot of what we were sharing and we were discussing in that policy committee meeting around the rnp was not new practice per se but more an effort on our part to align current and ongoing practice with what's in our policy manual that needed to be updated after several years since that discussion a couple of weeks ago the draft rnp you'll note that we reviewed has been migrated over from the old policy manual over to the new manual so what was 5530 rnp is now updated as 3420 rnp so we can check off
107the list another policy and rnp and the long-standing migration process with that migration and move over so with that context in mind I'll quickly draw your attention to the key draft revisions in policy 3420 before you this evening starting in section A in the first sentence the recommended revision is to amend the language to say quote the superintendent shall develop one proposed promotion standards and two a process to be used in determining a student's Readiness to progress to the next level of study and shall submit the standards and process to the board for information as updates and revisions occur you'll note striking the word approval from the previous policy and then a related revision is recommended to the last sentence of section A uh which would read principles quote or quote principles have the authority
108to promote or retain students based upon the standards developed by the superintendent and any applicable laws or standards set by the State Board of Education again noting that we strike the phrase approved by the board and as discussed in the policy committee meeting both of these revisions of course will serve the purpose of adjusting the standard from board approval to board information and also notification when changes are revisions to the district processes occur which from a practical standpoint is the associated r p that we reviewed in our policy committee discussion a couple of weeks ago that is now part of the new policy manual we do believe this is a more practical and feasible standard especially in the absence of any specific time frame for how often or even in what circumstances approval might be
109required and it also provides greater flexibility in updating and revising detailed promotion and retention processes and procedures it may occur really on a rolling and certainly annual basis I'll note another relatively minor Revision in section c we're in the third sentence it states quote principles shall not make promotion decisions based solely on standardized test scores we've added to that sentence the phrase except as may be required by law based on feedback from Mr Bloomberg this language will be more consistent with applicable legislation so other than a couple places where we've capitalized the word board there are no other recommended changes to the policy again we're requesting board approval on first reading tonight and as always happy to answer any questions or share additional information on the policy thank you Mr cook Dr Martin on behalf
110of the policy committee that I chaired a woman well miss Kushner was away I'd like to move approval of the policy 3400 revisions on first reading is there all right thank you Miss Kushner and Dr Martin any discussion questions yes sir yeah just brief comment um I do appreciate the staff bringing the rnp to the board for discussion that was the major part of the discussion at policy committee meeting uh just so the public is aware rnp does not need to be approved by the board that is a staff decision the board makes policy and the staff implements the policy but I really think it was it was great to have that discussion to go through the rnp yeah making sure it's consistent with policy as you noted I I still caution whenever a board
111approval is struck and just to board information obviously I'll be rotating off the board I think it's something the board wants to be careful about though I do understand that this is reasonably in keeping with State Statute in terms of what Authority is given to the superintendent what Authority is given to principals particularly with respect to student promotion that said I think it's just important to to be careful uh you know if the in terms of where is the governing Authority and where it where is not for the board that said I think it is worth approving these modifications thank you further comments or questions okay seeing none all those in favor of approving board policy 3420 student promotion and accountability for first reading meaning it will come back to the board for a second
112rating um please say aye any opposed nay all right thank you during the closed session that we had over after the work session we worked on some Human Resources items I will now accept a motion to approve the recommendations the HR recommendations for administrative appointments and recommendations for employment yes sir at this point I would move board approval for the administrative appointments and offers of employment approved during closed session all right do we have a second second all right we have a motion and the second all those in favor please say aye aye any opposed nay all right and now if we could get a motion to return to closed session which does not require reading the previous statement as long as we reference them so moved here all right yes sir thank you thank
113you thank you Jonathan and Miss Johnson hosler with the motion and vice chair hegarty with the second all those in favor of returning to closed session for the reasons previously stated please say aye aye any opposed nay we now return to closed session thank you all