2023-05-02 - School Board Meeting

12:23 Good morning. On the May 2, 2023 special board meeting is now in order. I would like to take this opportunity to remind the public that the appropriate place for public participation in the meeting is during your individual public comment opportunity as identified in the agenda outside your individual public comment opportunity. Your role in the meeting is as an observer.

12:40 Paul, roll call, please. Mister Susan? Here. Miss Wright? Here.

12:44 Miss Campbell? Here. Mister Trent. Here.

12:46 Miss Jenkins. Here. Just so everybody understands, Miss Jenkins is calling in.

12:51 We have her on speaker. She can hear clearly and she can speak clearly. So if you hear that voice, it is her calling in.

12:58 And I’ve done it a couple of times, so we’re looking forward to having her participate. Please stand for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

13:25 That brings us to the adoption of the agenda. Do I hear a motion? Move to approve. Second.

13:30 Any discussion? All in favor, signify by saying aye. Aye. Any opposed? We’re good.

13:39 We are now on to the public comments portion of the morning’s special agenda. Special meeting comments will be limited to the agenda items only. Change that.

13:48 We have six number of speakers that will receive three minutes each. I will call up three speakers at a time. Pursuant to board policy, you are allowed to address board members by name, but not staff or the public.

14:00 You are allowed to speak to the individuals that are on the agenda. So, in this case, because there’s some confusion, if there’s somebody that’s an applicant, you can speak to their name. And the first three speakers are Jennifer Parrish, Kerry Takis, and Kathy Ebersberger.

14:18 You have the floor over there, Miss Parrish. Hang on, I gotta reposition this thing. Hang on just a second.

14:30 Hang on. I gotta get this thing right here. There we go.

14:33 All right. Good morning. I’m Jennifer Parrish, and thank you for the opportunity to speak.

14:38 I won’t take the full three minutes. I just wanted to. At this time, I would ask each of you to remember why you ran during your campaigns.

14:48 You know, you talked to each and every one of your constituents, your volunteers and members within the community, and reminded them that why you were running. To be a strong member in the community and bring true leadership back to the school board. And let us believe that that mission statement, to serve every student with excellence as a standard is true.

15:10 So picking someone with the qualifications, that is game day. Ready and ready to dive into this district and serve every student with excellence, is exactly what we’re asking you to do, which is to pick doctor Randell. Thank you.

15:29 Thank you, Miss Parrish. Miss Kerry Takis, please. On deck.

15:33 Kathy Ebersberger. Kelly Kervin. Rachel Jolly.

15:39 Rochelle. I apologize. Rochelle.

15:41 Okay, the clock. I gotcha. Just hang on.

15:46 All right, here we go. Kerry Takis. I have a unique situation because one of the applicants is my child’s principal.

15:55 Two years ago, I was pulling my kids out of BPS, but my daughter begged to go to Cocoa beach, where she became a top student. And she’s flourishing, and that’s because of Doctor Rendell and his leadership. So I believe it was just voted the top high school in Brevard county as well.

16:13 And that’s due to his leadership. So I would love for you to take that into consideration, that the only reason my children are in BPS is because of that school. Thank you.

16:24 Thank you, Miss Takas. Miss Kathy Ebersberger, you’re on the deck. Hi, my name is Kathy Ebersberger.

16:32 I’m a concerned citizen and a taxpayer. I would like to add my support to doctor. To Mister Schneider.

16:39 As a new superintendent, he has addressed his lawsuit with black lives matter openly and honestly. He received great marks in the meet and greet for his familiarity with dyslexia and respect for students. He’s knowledgeable about EsE.

16:55 He will concentrate on the achievement gap, and it is my understanding that he has the support of several black community leaders. I believe that, unlike the other candidates, he is best prepared to meet the substantial challenges BPS faces today. The achievement gap, finances and discipline.

17:15 BPS is just now regaining the trust of the taxpayers after a financial misstep a decade ago. This resulted in the approval of the millage. Many voters told me that they wouldn’t support the millage due to the decades old mistake.

17:34 Doctor Rendell has left Indian River county, and I understand that the investigation revealed no impropriety on his part. However, he was the one responsible, and the budget was a mess. So he didn’t have the supervisory eye on the ball for the budget.

17:54 And I believe the taxpayers would not look kindly on the fact that you hire someone who’s taken the eye off the ball on the budget in another county. The other concern I have is Doctor Rendell was not familiar with dyslexia. To have someone who’s an experienced educator not be familiar with dyslexia is troubling to me.

18:17 And finally, I have concerns about Doctor Rendell’s emphasis on the high income rate in Brevard county as a reason that we should be high achievers. I think that he should know that over 50 of our students are low income students, and that is what affects the achievement gap. And I think the only way the achievement gap can be addressed with the high income of brevard taxpayers is by relying on them to give more taxpayer support to the schools.

18:54 And I don’t think that they will have the trust in you to appoint Doctor Rendell when he had these other issues in Indian River county. Finally, I’d also like to say that in an earlier decision, you had discussed the point that we can’t afford to take teachers out of the classroom. Doctor Rendell is a principal here.

19:18 Can we really afford to take him out of the principalship? Thank you. Thank you, Miss Ebersberger. Miss Kelly.

19:27 Kervin. Rochelle Jolly. Katie Delaney.

19:31 Good morning. Cocoa Beach Junior Senior High School, I’m sure is an amazing school, but it’s not the top rated Brevard county school that goes to West Shore. They’re ranked 711th in the state, 1005.

19:44 West Shore is the fourth highest public school or fourth highest school in Florida, behind three private schools. They’re number one for public, and they’re 55th in the nation. I’m not going to tell you who I would vote for, because, to be frankly honest, when I stood up here before the vote for the interim superintendent, exactly what has happened that I said would happen is exactly what’s going to happen.

20:08 I firmly believe that Doctor Mark Rendell is going to be our new superintendent, even though he is the lesser candidate. Samantha wanted to be here. She had testing.

20:18 Otherwise I would have pulled her out. So I’m going to talk a little bit about her experience at the community meeting. Great.

20:23 She went to every single finalist and asked the same question. Her question was, do you know what dyslexia is? And how have you helped dyslexic students in your educational career? Of the three candidates, only one actually had a firm understanding of dyslexia. And I don’t hold that against any of them, because, being 100% honest, I’ve been schooling people on dyslexia for seven years.

20:42 I have no problem sitting down with them, superintendent, and being like, hey, did you know this exists? However, what made her responses unique is that Samantha asked permission to record them so that she could use that in the feedback later, and they all agreed. So I didn’t listen for what they said about dyslexia. I listened to how they spoke to her.

21:01 Did they speak with respect? Were they dismissive? Were they evasive? Did they answer her questions? Did they treat her like a human being. Two did, one didn’t. And I’ll be 100% biased.

21:16 Honest, I am 100% biased against Doctor Mark Rendell. He is a failed superintendent of Indian river county. And by failed, I mean, did he leave Indian river county better than when he got there? And the answer to that is no.

21:27 However, I had the privilege of traveling to Orlando twice for two very different things this weekend. And I sat down with people who aren’t from Brevard, who don’t have a vested interest in and who wins this vote. And I said, hey, listen to these three short clips.

21:41 I played them in different orders for various different people and said, rank them. Who would you want to work for? Ten out of ten put Rendell last. He was evasive, he was dismissive.

21:51 He was outright rude to her. The other two were not. So whether you go with Mister Snyder, Doctor Wysong, or Doctor Rendell, there’s clearly better options.

22:07 Manatee county saw it that Friday that we all got to meet them. I looked at their finalist list. Two of their three are two of ours.

22:16 So I hope that you pick the better option. I don’t believe that’s going to happen. Whether it’s Schneider, whether it’s Weissong, I don’t particularly care.

22:27 Just not Rendell. He’s not what is best for brevard or students. Thanks.

22:32 Thank you, Miss Kirvin. Next up, Rochelle Jolly. And then Katie Delaney.

22:41 Good morning. Thank you so much for allowing me the opportunity to speak. I wanted to share with you my experience I’ve had through the process as we’ve all been going through it together.

22:50 And I do appreciate the fact that the community has had a say so little bit in being able to meet the candidates. And even before that, I was able to attend one of the workshops that was held at Rockledge High School. And I felt really fortunate because at one of the tables was a group of students.

23:11 They were junior high students, and they got to have an input in the qualities and values that they were looking for in a superintendent. And I thought that those opinions matter more than any of ours. And some of the things that they put down were they wanted a superintendent who was kind and honest and approachable.

23:33 And all of these qualities that I felt like students look for in leadership. And as we were able to come and do the meet and greet and interview all of the candidates, I will say that Doctor Rendell is not very approachable and doesn’t seem to be very kind. I didn’t know him at all.

23:56 I don’t know any information I had to do some research on all of the candidates. And so, just through my research, I am concerned that Doctor Rendell did leave his previous superintendent job as what I would view as a failure. Leaving that district not better than he found it, as someone previous said, is a concern for me.

24:20 I did find that both Doctor Wiesong and Mister Schneider seem to be very student and teacher focused. And I feel like that might be what’s best for our students, since that’s who we’re serving. So as you move through this process and.

24:37 And go through the pros and cons, I think if you just make a list, you’re going to be able to make an easy decision and choose. Mister Schneider. I was there to witness your daughter ask about dyslexia for Mister Schneider.

24:52 I was not present, but he was very open and honest with her. My question that I asked to each of the candidates, which was the same question, I am concerned about discipline. I think a lot of time has been wasted on discipline that doesn’t really affect our students or help our teachers.

25:11 I don’t think a dress code is going to improve behavior. I don’t. I think a dress code is only going to cause teachers and administrators to get yelled at by parents who have to take time off work to bring clothes to their students who don’t need dress code.

25:24 I’ve had a lot of kids in burfire public schools because I’m an old mom. And so as a mother of a teenage daughter who previously attended BPS, I got to serve on the sack. And that came up and the administrator said I would spend every minute of my day dress coding kids and would get nothing else accomplished if we’re going to enforce strict dress code laws, or dress code rules.

25:55 So as we move forward, I asked them each, I will say this. I’m concerned with sros being involved in our school’s discipline. I think that’s a very bad idea.

26:07 And Mister Schneider was the only one who agreed with me. Thank you, Miss Jolly, Miss Katie Delaney, you’re up next. Good morning.

26:23 Today I could speak on the statistics and all of the experience that one of the candidates has, but the thing that struck me about Doctor Endel when he was speaking in his interview with you all was his focus on the culture of his school. The positivity, the kindness, the morale that he brings to his school. And what an amazing thing would it be for our whole district to feel that way? That is just going to explode our teacher retention and make our people feel valued and make our students feel excited to go to school.

27:07 And after all the testimony that I’ve heard from parents who have had their kids at Cocoa beach, it’s just an incredible experience. If I didn’t live an hour away from that school, that’s where my kids would be going to school. And that’s because of Doctor Rendell.

27:28 So I hope that he’s your choice today. Thank you. Thank you, Miss Delaney.

27:32 That concludes our public comments. We thank you for your willingness to address us in this public manner. We are not at today’s action item we are now at today’s action items for superintendent selection.

27:43 As we address this election of our superintendent, the school board will make a decision of great magnitude. Our decision today will have a great direct impact on the continued success of brevard public schools. We have an elected duty to represent the public.

27:54 More importantly, our decision will impact the lives and education of over 74,000 young people and roughly 9000 employees. With that in mind, our discussion should be open, candid and guided by what is best for students and community that we all serve. We will do this in three steps.

28:09 We will review the superintendent search process. The school board will discuss and vote, and we will provide an overview of the next steps after our selection made today. Now I will provide an overview of the search process.

28:22 In early January, the school board met during a workshop with the Florida School boards Association with their search consultants to discuss the timeline and associated activities. The school board held another four work sessions over the time period of January to April to discuss the superintendent search activities. An online community survey was conducted January 30 to February 17 and resulted in over 5000 responses.

28:46 We held five in person and virtual input sessions from the community and staff and had a student input survey between February 9 and 16th. Advertisements for the superintendent position ran from February 24 until March 3133 applicants were received. I wanted to take a second and say that we are the school district that had the most applicants across the county.

29:10 Charlotte had 22, Manatee had 27, Osceola had 32, Broward had 26. So Brevard had the most applicants of any one of the counties. When we went out to bid, there was some sort of miscommunication about as far as the number of applicants not being enough.

29:28 And then I would also say that we positioned ourselves, if everybody sits here and watches, to be the first to make the decision. And it was correctly stated that two of our applicants are the finalists in many of the other districts. So we have positioned brevard for success and we have had the most applicants and I just wanted that to be known.

29:45 Eleven semi finalists were named on April 4. Each subsequently provided answers to written and video questions which were posted on our website. Four finalists were interviewed April 27 and 28th 1st by the full school board than in one on one interviews.

30:00 We had three finalists. A community meet and greet with the finalists was held on April 27 and feedback from those interactions was shared with the school board. Subsequently, additional input was received throughout the weekend, leading to today’s meeting.

30:13 Now we will begin our discussion of the process and finalists. So here’s what we’re going to do. We’re just going to go around, discuss it, and then if in the event that a certain person seems to come to the top, then we can make a motion.

30:24 I would ask that everybody keeps their comments down to five minutes or less as we move through this, we can keep going multiple rounds if needed, but I think that that’s going to be kind of the thing. So we have discussion then, if one person seems to come to the top. I would remind school board that we try to be as positive about our applicants as possible.

30:45 That we don’t go into a negative on different stuff, try to point out those things, be positive, because many of these individuals, if they don’t be selected here, they deserve the credit to move on to another district. I would say that the three candidates that we have here could run any school district in the state of Florida. And I feel confident saying that.

31:03 We start with one round. Each board member is speaking, then we’ll follow with two and three rounds of comments. Please limit the comments to five minutes.

31:10 So with that, does anybody want to go first? I can go over this side. Mister Trent, Miss Campbell, do you want to go first? Wait, wait, wait. Miss Jenkins.

31:20 Yeah, I was going to say if for the posterity speak. I’ve been online when I was able to vote, when we had the who we play for thing. And I was actually, my wife was in the birthing room and I had the headset on.

31:35 So I do know the. Well, I think Miss Jenkins. I would like to let Miss Jenkins go, if that’s okay, because she asked.

31:41 But I do want to say that there’s no problem with somebody being online and voting and discussing. So that should be our policy. It’s been that way for a while.

31:48 So, Miss Jenkins, go ahead. Thank you. Yeah, I appreciate going first, if you don’t mind, in case there’s some kind of slow delay of some sort.

31:57 So I just want to start off by acknowledging someone. I want to acknowledge Miss Han. I appreciate her stepping up to.

32:07 To a task literally seconds before midnight one night. She has been absolutely incredible. She put on another hat on top of the 40 different hats she already wears, and has played that role like an absolute champion.

32:26 I was so impressed with her. I believe we had a workshop either the next day or the following day. It felt seamless.

32:37 It felt like she was sitting in that role for months already. So I just want to do a special acknowledgement to miss hand, to thank her for her leadership, for her camaraderie with her peers and her colleagues, for expertise. And quite frankly, I’ve kind of said it from the beginning.

32:59 I was hoping through this process that somebody in our cabinet would. Would step up and take on this role for continuity, for our school system, for our teachers, for our staff members, for our students, for our cabinet, and quite frankly, for our community. And I appreciate her so much for doing it in that moment.

33:21 And I don’t know what’s going to happen going forward today, but I would hope that we come to some kind of consensus for positivity to move forward for this district. And if we don’t, man, I hope we would consider somebody like Miss Hand, you know, as an alternative, if this doesn’t end with cohesiveness and positivity. But I. So are we going to say a little bit about each candidate? Yeah.

33:54 Miss Jenkins, I think. I think I would say each candidate, what your positives are, and if there’s any indication of which one of those you may feel pretty strongly about, that might. Might be part of the conversation, too.

34:05 Sure. So this was kind of difficult for me, which is. Which is a positive.

34:12 It says that we had really great candidates. It wasn’t an easy decision. There were positives for me personally from two people that I enjoyed their group interview the most, but as well as their one on one.

34:26 So I’m just going to speak to my experience as my one on one. Because everyone obviously was present for the group. I kind of carried them exactly the same way with one another.

34:33 Just the direction that they went in were different. And so I would start off by speaking about who I am, why I felt I was here. That would lead into a natural conversation of who they were and why they were here.

34:44 And they were all very positive meetings, all three of them, in that sense. And then I move forward onto what I care about, what my priorities are going forward, and what I hope to see this district do and achieve. And again, every conversation was a little bit different.

35:03 Mister Schneider really appreciate his diverse experience working with all different populations of students. Our conversation, when I would talk about my priorities, he offered his own examples of things that he had done in his district or things that his district had done and that he was able to participate in. He had offered even some, you know, differences of opinions or suggestions, but was able to carry that conversation with respect.

35:32 And I appreciated that very much. He gave me a sense that he would be able to work with a board with all different opinions as well as community members. Mister Wythong, I genuinely believe he has the best interest of students at the core of his heart.

35:51 I really enjoyed our conversation. Again, very different perspective. This was difficult for me, quite frankly.

36:01 I see positives in both of them. The only concern that I might have is I might. I might question whether or not Doctor Wyson would be able to navigate through this board as easily or as.

36:23 As well as Mister Schneider. I felt like he. Just.

36:28 The way he talked and the way we carried our conversation, he might have a better experience navigating with multiple perspectives that could be very, very different from one another. It’s hard for me. And I’ll end here.

36:42 I’m sorry. I don’t know how long I’ve been going. I apologize.

36:45 Miss Jenkins, you still have plenty of time. You go ahead. Okay.

36:48 Thank you. I will say this. I still don’t feel comfortable picking one over the other, if I’m being very honest.

36:56 I said this last time we went through this process. It’s tough for me. I’m still deeply concerned for our school system.

37:03 I’ve said that from day one. I’m concerned about consistency and stability. I’m concerned for our staff.

37:07 I’m concerned for the instability that the community is feeling. I am worried that there is one candidate that regardless of your opinions, it still brings up this divisiveness in the community. So, yeah, I don’t know.

37:24 I’m kind of in this weird limbo place again. But I appreciate going first because I just wanted to speak about my experience with everyone one on one. Thank you.

37:33 Thank you, Miss Jenkins. Miss Campbell, you had indicated that you’d like to go first. I’m sorry about that.

37:39 I just wanted to give her the opportunity because it is difficult being. No, that’s right. I totally.

37:42 I get it. All right. I’m going to set my own timer, too, so I can keep track.

37:46 Actually, I’ll do it on my watch so it buzzes to tell me, like, electric shock. Stop talking. All right, here we go.

37:53 So let me just address elephant in the room. And thank you, FSBA, for guiding us. This is an awkward moment because we have to make these decisions out in the public and televised and everything, but this is the most important that any school board ever makes.

38:06 Choosing the superintendent is the most important decision we’ll ever make. And some school boards don’t have to do that because they don’t do that during their term, but this is the most important decision and because it’s so important, I just want you to know, board, that I have people across the country that have been praying for us, and especially in the last 48 hours. So if you felt a little, if that’s what it was, you know, I remember going through some school board training and they said, you know, when you come prepared to a meeting, you probably are going to have your mind about 90% made up, but you need to leave that little wiggle room because this is why we’re aboard.

38:37 And not one person making the decisions. And what we’re going to hear from each other will and from our public comment. Even though this, whoever came, we heard certainly from different sides, whoever came, this is not our whole constituency.

38:48 Right. Even though I thank you guys for coming out, but I know there’s a lot of people who couldn’t be here, including employees who are working right now. But, you know, I hope everybody’s come just with that honest sense of, I got it.

39:00 90% made up, kind of decided. But I want to wait and hear what my fellow board members say, what the community has said. And so with that in mind, I want to give a couple shots of thanks.

39:09 Thank you, FSBA, for guiding us through this process. I wish we had had you in the interim process. It might have helped us a little bit out, but we, we were struggling through on our own, but really going through this, realized, wow, this is, this is great to have you guys to guide and assist us.

39:23 Thank you, board, for taking this process seriously. Thank you to all the candidates from the first 30. How many do we have? 33.

39:30 33. All the way down to these final three for the work and just putting yourself out there. It is not easy, especially facing the very public possibility of rejection.

39:40 And thank you to our community. You know, we actually got some criticism. It’s your job.

39:44 You got voted and just make the decision. But it’s important to hear from our community and feedback. And I thank you for all those hundreds of people who left feedback after the meeting the other night on the virtual, the online survey and then all the way back from the very first surveys that were mentioned earlier.

39:59 You know, all of our candidates had such great. And, you know, if we could make the perfect superintendent, maybe we could pull from each one and combine them and mash them into one great superintendent. But they all had great strengths.

40:13 They all. Because some people, some people mentioned, oh, one candidate brought the plan, the opening day plan. I just want everybody to know that all three candidates actually presented to us, some in their one on ones, a very well developed plan, which were all very similar.

40:27 They all started with listening, which is so important, and then analyzing and then moving forward, and so very deliberate, very thoughtful. And I appreciate all those plans that I reviewed again last night. I will be honest and tell you, I don’t believe any of our candidates are completely ready at this point.

40:42 It has been said, you know, we’ve got someone who I think the first term I saw several times was shovel ready. But none of our candidates have led a district this size. None of them.

40:51 And they all are going to have a learning curve. There are two who got kind of close because of their position in their district, but they’re all going to have a learning curve, whether they’re from Brevard or not or, you know, they’ve all, they all have things to grow. And so it’s very important to me, one of the things we’ve read, heard from our public, from our staff is that, and that we’ve sensed ourselves is that sense of trust.

41:19 You know, Miss Wright, you mentioned in November when we had our first fateful meeting, that the community was looking for a strong leader. And I believe that we have some strong leaders. I will just, you know, just briefly, I’ve got more.

41:34 I think this is kind of the first round, second round, you know, can go into more detail. But I will tell you about Doctor Wyson, what I appreciate most. I think I’m just going to quote what some of the commenters was.

41:43 His depth of knowledge. I couldn’t have said it better. Depth of knowledge just so honestly flowing out.

41:49 He is clearly leading so many departments in his own county and just. I appreciate that so much. Mister Schneider is an energetic leader.

42:01 I will tell you right now that that is where I’m leaning, because he is a strong leader. What I really appreciate about him is his ese background. If you guys noticed his role before, the role he’s.

42:12 He was over all high schools and alternative sites and we had some conversation about alternative schools. And that is one of the areas that we are really needing to focus on. And he has that experience of working with students who are struggling.

42:25 And I just very much appreciate his breadth of responsibilities that he has had, especially in the last few years. And I think that our community, when I look at their community response, you know, I see not everybody was a fan, but just someone who was a uniter. And so that’s.

42:47 There goes my timer. All right, so that’s where I’m leaning right now. Okay, I guess.

42:54 Mister Trent, you ready to go? Sure. And I’ll start out by a few things as well. FSBA.

43:05 Thank you. Job well done. You checked all the boxes.

43:10 You did all the work that we certainly didn’t want to do, you know. So it was very good having your experience to fall back on. You’re always accessible.

43:19 So that was good. The amount of candidates, 33 of them. That was great.

43:27 I like the diversity of that group. I mean, all over the country we did say we wanted a nationwide search and we certainly got that from all different types of experiences, some that had never even been in leadership, but they just thought it was such an opportunity for them. So I was excited to see all that and I felt the board did a good job going from 33 down to eleven.

43:51 What I like most about it is I thought we kept our individuality. We didn’t all have the same group going from 33 to eleven and I appreciated that. I think it’s how you get down to the qualified candidate that the board’s going to pick.

44:10 So where do we go from here? The candidates? I truly believe we had the three best candidates that’s going to be applying for a superintendent’s position in the entire state. Two we see that have applied at multiple positions and they’re being rewarded for that, for their experience and their knowledge and their vision, their passion. And we had one that displayed their passion and vision from where they’re at and did not explore other avenues which should be appreciated as well.

44:10 So where do we start with the candidates again? I’ll start with Mister Wysong. What a, what a, what a lot of information. He’s an absolute professional.

44:54 I enjoyed, I think I, where, where he flourished was in the one on ones. They actually sit down and say wow, you really, you carried that. I mean he sounded like a the PhD that he is sitting here.

45:09 But then when you, when you sat with him on one on one, you saw a little bit of the other side. And as much as I said, are you sure you wanted to be a superintendent? Because it just seems like you enjoy what you’re doing and you’re very good at it. That’s he’s ready for it.

45:24 But as, from what I understand, he’s proctoring an AP test today so he’s willing to do whatever the district asked him to do so. I thoroughly enjoyed that. Some of the conversation I had with them was when they, in his county, when a position came available.

45:42 I enjoyed that conversation where they did not just automatically post that position, but they had. That’s when the conversation started was the effectiveness of that position. Do we need to rehire? Let’s look at things.

45:57 Can we take on those responsibilities? Can we use that money somewhere else in our plan? And we talked a lot about that. I hope going forward we can take that model here in Brevard. So he’s going to be fine wherever he goes.

46:13 He’s excited about the county that he’s in and I respect that Mister Schneider Ball of energy there. He really enjoys what he does. I can pick that up quickly in his video response.

46:29 It was a perfect setting that he, his backdrop was in a classroom because he did answer many of his questions as coming from his teacher side of things. And again, as a former teacher or a current educator, I respect that his vast knowledge across the entire spectrum of what a superintendent needs to do is there again, he’s going to be a wonderful superintendent at some point. And we had a great one on one as well.

47:05 So that leads me to the third one with Doctor Endell. And what I appreciated there was he didn’t need to do this. And we ran into him back when, the interim when he just said, hey, the district needs me, I’m stepping up.

47:24 He’s completely content. When I met him, as you all know, full transparency. I live in Cocoa beach.

47:30 I’ve known the man since he’s come to Cocoa beach. And I had the pleasure of working with him as his testing coordinator the last few years. And I’ve had one graduate of Cocoa beach and I’ll have another one here in the next couple years and another one another five years later.

47:45 As you guys know, I have five kids, so graduations are common in my house. So us as a board, we had talked about some of the things that we had looked for even in the interim, and they didn’t go away. We talked about, that was five minutes already.

48:02 Sorry, man. Sorry. All right, well, I’ll be quick.

48:09 We were hoping to find somebody with some experience in Brevard. I think that’s important knowledge. I mean, we talked now about hiring principals in our district that we would love to look at our AP pool and not go outside of the district.

48:24 So we have a candidate that has that and the others do not. And I don’t want to keep saying that, but out of state leadership, that’s good. Bringing that out of state perspective.

48:35 It can’t just be in a bubble. A couple of our candidates, wonderful candidates, but they’ve stayed in their district, which was a concern of mine outside of their current district, Florida experience, but not always in this district. So we had Doctor Rendell, who was a deputy superintendent and then changed to another county and was the superintendent.

48:55 And some of the information out there, if you would just read the resume, would answer a lot of your questions, and not just read the comments on social media, but look at the resume. I’ve had endless conversations from the public’s supermarkets to, you know, walking down the street of. With students, hey, I hear Mister Rendell, we might be losing him.

49:19 And I’m like, you know, I can. Yeah, he’s applying for it. And they got a smile on their face, but they’re like, he’s an awesome principal, and I hate to lose him, but he’s.

49:29 We need him somewhere else, then we’re good. Countless teachers, the same as that. I can tell you that the culture that he fosters is second to none.

49:42 And I’ve been in a few districts, so it’s not often that you say, I enjoy going to work, and you really, truly mean it all the time. But they do make things exciting, fun, and fair, but you’ve got to do your work. What I liked about Doctor Rendell was everything revolved around student achievement, and that runs everything.

50:06 We sat down his one on one. He didn’t share it here, and I wish he had. He.

50:10 I mean, his plan of literally going around to every single employee here at district, you know, thank them for their job. What do you do for student achievement? How do you help students in Brevard and have that conversation? If I can have 30 seconds more, maybe a minute, because as much as some would not like to say, I like data, I like data. Grad rates, that’s very important.

50:33 We had a. We had. We had a presentation here a couple weeks ago.

50:37 We’re not where we need to be. We’re good, but we need somebody to help us get to grade. So graduate grad rates.

50:42 Let’s go back to Indian River county. All students graduation rate went from 81% to 92%. Black students, 65% to 82%.

50:53 Hispanic, 79% to 88%. We need that here. And I know superintendent’s not all of that, but he’s witnessed it.

51:02 I mean, if I’m hiring a head coach, I want somebody with some success, and that’s what we need here in brevard, AP enrollment for black students, it was 8%. He rose. It to 21%.

51:14 That’s amazing. That’s leadership. Okay.

51:18 Hispanic AP participation went from 15% to 25%. White, 27% to 34%. He increased retention for all employees.

51:29 I repeat that. Retention increased for all employees. I think that’s one of the things staring us right in the face.

51:35 We’ve talked about it at every single meeting. 87% of his new employees stated that their employer treats them like family. If anything is needed here in Brevard, I think it’s that.

51:47 And that’s somebody that has shown that we don’t have to guess and hope because they’re nice in an interview that we can get that we have some. We have it here. Instrumental in opening the treasure coast technical College, which is a district sponsored vocational school.

52:01 Again, a top priority here in Brevard on the space coast. So we have somebody that has that experience, probably most important here, attention to the third grade reading. We need that.

52:14 We need it across the country, but we need it here. Rose from 53% to 60%. I believe it was a seven point increase in third grade reading.

52:22 And we know what third grade reading directly impacts graduation rate. So I think you kind of know where I’m leaning. All right, I apologize, but please read.

52:41 Go back, read resumes. We have somebody here that can. Is.

52:45 I believe we can. We can hand the keys over and feel confident. My last statement is, Miss Hahn was absolutely unbelievable.

52:54 That’s exactly how a superintendent should conduct himself. She is the most prepared person I think I’ve run into. Not that here in Brevard we don’t have prepared people.

53:03 Nobody is going to out prepare Miss Hahn. So thank you so much for what you’ve done. Thank you, Mister Trent.

53:10 All I know is I better not have lost my time to Mister Trent’s ten minute long. Yeah. No.

53:16 So I want to echo Miss Jenkins sentiments on the fact that Miss Han stepped in at a time where there was a lot of controversy, there was a lot of uneasiness. And I tremendously appreciate her because she is just a wealth of knowledge and she brought a level of security to everyone in our district that we really needed. So thank you, Miss Hahn, from the bottom of my heart.

53:34 You are my hero. So we appreciate you tremendously. This process was a very interesting process.

53:39 So I’ve been part of hiring hundreds of people over my. My career history, and I’ve never been part of hiring someone and only representing 20% of being able to hire that person, so to speak. So it’s an interesting different mindset when you’re looking at interviewing people.

53:54 We had some phenomenal applicants, we really did. And honestly, in a perfect world, I’d take all three of these. I’d put them all three in our district because I wouldn’t want to lose any of them.

54:02 Because they all offer something very unique and different than the others. So I’m going to speak a little bit about each one of them. So Mister Wise song, again, a depth of knowledge.

54:14 This gentleman really understands his district inside and out. And his willingness to listen and learn was very refreshing. He didn’t have an answer for a question I didn’t ask, which he listened, which was nice.

54:26 Sometimes you’ll have people that will spit an answer at you real quick. And I’m going, you’re not listening to what I’m asking you. So that was very refreshing to hear that from him.

54:33 And the history that he has with his district. I think that says a lot about someone who’s stayed in their district for as many years as he has. That that, to me, signifies that he represents stability and someone that is, you know, willing to stick it out through multiple different leadership changes.

54:49 And he’s done that. So he brings a level of comfort and stability that is very, very good. Mister Schneider.

54:57 I’m gonna do my best not to take my full five minutes, maybe Mister Schneider. Mister Schneider was honestly one of those people that you just immediately clicked with. Because he’s kind of a people person.

55:06 You could just tell right away. So his story is very familiar. And he was.

55:11 He was phenomenal. So he went to one of my schools and I got the opportunity to speak to that principal. And she absolutely loved him.

55:16 Raved about how great he was and how much he would be a perfect fit for Brevard county. And I really appreciate that, honestly. He has, you know, a wife that’s a teacher, he’s got children that are in the school system.

55:28 Those are all benefits, I believe, because he sees all different angles of what this role really looks like. And then he also comes from a district that is larger than Brevard county, which is tremendous as well. So I think he’s a great asset as well.

55:42 So that’s why this is like, so, so hard to really narrow this down. And then when I. When I look at Mister Rendell. Let me talk about this for a minute, because I think this is a really unique thing that he did, and I really appreciate this.

55:53 He. After our interim, when we were hiring, our interim, he was obviously one of the applicants and he did not get the interim position. And he did something that was very unique and original.

56:06 He asked for a somewhat of an exit interview or a debrief on why it was that I didn’t feel that he was the right applicant. And so I’ve never had someone do that, honestly. So I took him up on the offer of, hey, let’s sit down and have coffee and have that conversation.

56:20 And so I gave him my feedback on what it was that I was looking for and some things that, you know, maybe to do differently or think about differently. And I was very candid and honest with him. And then when I saw him come in and interview for our permanent position, he blew me out of the water.

56:36 He really did. I thought, oh my gosh, he came with everything that I had recommended. I was so impressed by him.

56:42 So I really, you know, I was grateful for him to listen and then take that feedback and then to humble yourself enough to say, hey, what is it that I’m doing wrong or that you didn’t like and what should I do differently? I think that that speaks tremendous amounts of volume to me as a person on somebody who’s willing to take feedback. The other thing is, you know, we’ve gotten several, several, and I’m sure my board members could probably say the same, have, have received several emails, some in favor, some not in favor of each of the applicants. Believe it or not, so majority of them kind of center around one of the applicants.

57:16 But an overwhelming amount of support has come for one particular applicant in the form of email, in the form of, I mean, I was at a bill signing yesterday and somebody said something. I mean, everywhere I go, this one applicant is constantly brought up to me and that’s who we want. That’s who we want.

57:31 That’s who we want. And then we also did take a survey for the community as well. And the survey from the community came back with one applicant obviously over the other one.

57:40 So, you know, I think all three of these gentlemen are amazing in their own way. They’re all significantly different, which is very unique when you’re looking at who you’re going to pick to be your next leader. But I think right now with the condition that our district is in and the need for some changes to happen so that we can move in the right direction and start to focus on student achievement, graduation rates, these things that are very, very important, that should be the center of what our discussion involves is what is best for children.

58:11 I, you know, I’m tending to lean towards one applicant that I prefer, but I would like to hear Mister Susan before I go ahead and say the applicant that I’m referring. And I think, just so everybody understands, Miss Campbell’s indicating that she wants to continue the conversation. So we’ll go through another round and discussion.

58:31 So, yeah, so I think, first off, thank you to sue Han for her work that she had. You want me to. Oh, yes.

58:41 Not that it mattered. Thank you to sue Han for her stepping in. If you guys noticed how quiet it got as soon as sue took over, like it was just all of a sudden and everything just really got on the rails and we were moving and we had meetings and everything else.

58:58 So big shout out to miss hand. I think just to be completely transparent, prior to the interim applications, when the deputy superintendent resigned, I went to miss Hamm and I asked her to step up and to do it. And she had said that she had to focus on all of her facilities so far.

59:18 For her to take it when she did was awesome, and I really appreciated her doing that. I also want to say thank you to FSBA. Top notch, great opportunity.

59:28 Anybody who says that it wasn’t, was completely wrong. We ended up with the most applicants. We ended up with the future within 60 days.

59:36 These applicants, these two of the three, because they’re the only ones that I think have applied to the other districts, will definitely become superintendents no matter what they’re going to be. And you put us in a great position for that. And I think that a lot of clout goes out to you and for your processes, and we really appreciate you.

59:53 I wanted to say thank you to this board. One of the things that people may not know is both Wysong and Schneider both went through difficult boards, and Wysong told me something that was very interesting, and I wanted to say thank you to Miss Campbell and Miss Jenkins, because throughout this process, we have been moving and we’ve put in all of our efforts. And I appreciate that our board comes from different perspectives.

1:00:16 But one thing Weisunk said is that he said two things. He said, because I hit him with it, I said, I don’t know if you have the experience to deal with our board. And he said, well, let me tell you something.

1:00:26 I went through one of these two years ago, and he explained how in Seminole county, they had a situation where they had, this is how crazy it was. They selected a superintendent, and then at the next meeting, when they were going to do their thing, they flipped it and chose another person. So, like, he went through all of that as an administrator for twelve years.

1:00:43 So. And then he said one thing to me that was very interesting. He said, you know what he said? I know you guys all work together.

1:00:49 And I said, what? What are you talking about? And he said, because you guys voted 50 and it meant something. And I will tell you that Wysong did his homework and I was very impressed with him. But I did want to say that, and I wanted to thank, it comes back to this board for your work in this process.

1:01:06 It’s been, you know what I mean, a ride. And I think we’re at a good place. I want to thank the candidates.

1:01:11 Yes, diversity was the key from the beginning, and I struggled through this process also. I mean, like, we named the names and we started coming down great presentations. The whole process through.

1:01:23 These candidates are so well qualified, and in the event that we don’t select one of them, I feel like they will be chosen in another place. I want to thank the community for all of their hard work getting to these places, to speak, to come out. I mean, we had people coming the day they were here, the community.

1:01:41 I mean, as far as the meet and greets, I mean, we are a community here in Brevard. And I wanted to thank them for their. And then I wanted to say thank you to staff, websites, surveys, all the stuff that they’ve been doing to support us has been incredible.

1:01:53 So thank you all the way around. To all actors inside of it. I wanted to say that, you know, I struggled through this process, narrowing names, narrowing of the three, the interviews in open public, the one on one interviews.

1:02:07 I asked. I actually asked and traveled to their districts. So we’re friends with school board members.

1:02:12 We’re friends with business leaders inside the community. There were allegations on multiple school board members that were, or, I’m sorry, superintendent applicants that I had to go clear up. And I just felt very confident that if I went to the places where they’re at, then I would actually get the truth and then be able to talk to the leaders that were there.

1:02:29 And I wanted to thank all the individuals that met with me in those, those areas. I also, you know, asked some local leaders to reach out to them and give me their feedback. So from a perspective of everybody that was involved, all of the components, I think it was a great opportunity for all of us to give our voices, I’ll tell you right now, Wysong.

1:02:50 Absolutely. One of the leaders said that he had looked them up before he even called. Like that man was ready.

1:02:56 And when, I’ll be honest with you, when we did the one on ones, I didn’t have him in my top, right. And then he gets into the one or, no, I’m sorry. When he did the community one, I was like he didn’t interview as strong as the others but in the one on one he did really well prepared himself and he was ready.

1:03:10 And his depth of knowledge is there. He’s steady at seminal. Great comment I think that you had made and maybe Miss Campbell had made that being a part of an organization for a long time is tough to move up and then make that chance.

1:03:22 So that really goes. And he’s very responsible in listening and speaking which was great. Mister Schneider, I said device experience.

1:03:29 Miss Jenkins was 100% right. The ESC and everything else is 100% where a lot of, a lot of his experiences and man he’s got some energy and to be honest with you, he’s got kids in the schools and he’s like, yeah, I mean I felt like I was talking to a brother, I’m not kidding you. Like I really did.

1:03:46 Like I thought when I was looking at him and talking to him, he had his wife, it was like same as dynamic as what I have. So it was just incredible. And I told him that and I thanked his wife for being here like she was, you know they all came with their wives and they did a great job.

1:04:00 And he has that experience also of a large district. And then you come to Mister Rendell, I think combination of being ready. He has experience as far as a superintendent, multiple district experience which is in indicators.

1:04:14 So you have St. Lucie, Indian River, Brevard and a couple others that give you a perspective of how other people do things. I’ll tell you, the local support for this guy was like out of control. Like I had mayors, right, I had church leaders, church leader from a mile and a half from my house was saying, hey, this is the guy you need to support.

1:04:36 Community, friends, staff. A lot of our staff are coming to me and saying that Rendell is a good choice. So I wanted to say that there was a lot of those pieces and when he presented, he presented on numbers of achievement from his district, which I went back and verified a lot of that.

1:04:53 What he was doing saying was completely true. There’s some things that I wasn’t able to identify just because of the time, but like everything that was coming up was, was, was there. And then you know, Mister Trent, when you talked about his presentation and some of the other things and the achievement, you nailed it.

1:05:08 And I don’t need to go through those, but a lot of those are identifiable towards he did that presentation identifiable towards our needs as a district and he knew them inherently. So when I looked at it. I looked at it in three different areas.

1:05:22 I talked to the leaders in the community. I talk about experience of leadership and getting ready to go and then the challenges that we have. One of the things that we haven’t been speaking to is that we are going to be thrown into the most competitive moment in Brevard public schools history with HB one, we’re going to be.

1:05:39 And you have to ask yourself, who is going to be shovel ready, I think the term was, or ready to go. Who understands the the district to be able to turn that ship quickly, to be competitive. Right.

1:05:51 And I feel that’s Mister Rendell. I think that the experience of dealing with boards, even though Mister Schneider and Wysong both had great examples of having it, it’s different when you’re not the person that’s in charge of that board, when you’re actually number two or number three. I think that that’s there.

1:06:09 I also think that the leaders in the community for building that bridge, one of the things that I had asked many of the candidates was that, what do you plan on to build this thing together? And Mister Rendell said, I will reach out to all the groups immediately and host meetings and the others did too. But I think when you reach out from somebody that is known in the community that has the support of many of the people here, it comes at a different level than the people who are first. There’s kind of a introduction that doesn’t need to happen as much.

1:06:40 So with that and a bunch of the others, I will tell you this is one of the hardest decisions I made. And that with all of those components favoring Rendell, that would be who I would like to choose. But I wanted to give Misses Campbell and others the opportunity to speak.

1:06:59 Miss Jenkins, if you’re okay, I would like to give her the opportunity ahead of you. Miss Jenkins, I know there’s a delay, but would you like to speak? I don’t mind. Miss Campbell going first.

1:07:13 She head outs first. Okay, Miss Campbell. Okay.

1:07:16 Thank you. Thank you for the second chance. Because I think it’ll be good to kind of address some of the things, you know, what I didn’t address Doctor Wendell specifically in my first round and what I have heard is that he is.

1:07:28 What I am feeling, sensing from all the feedback, is that he is an amazing principal. That is what I’m hearing. He’s an amazing principal.

1:07:35 He’s done great work at Coco beach. Just let me back up for a second and talk about what we’ve done through the process. Because as mentioned, look at the resumes.

1:07:41 Look at that throughout the process. Look through the resumes top to bottom, the letters of recommendation, their experiences, watched the videos, read the essays, these interviews, looked through the plans that they’re presenting, their entry plan as well as reached out to school board members. Mister Susan probably has more connections than I do, but school board members from across the state to say how is this working in your district? And I will tell you, yes, we have had an abundance of feedback on one candidate.

1:08:13 Yes, but he’s the local guy and I would think that’s clear. We’ve also had abundance of both kinds of feedback. And you know, one of our community members did mention actually on the news if there’s any controversy then they shouldn’t be on the list and they were talking about a particular one.

1:08:31 But I will tell you, we do have one. We do have two candidates that come really without controversy and at a time when our district is divided, I. My question and I thank you Miss Messina for helping guide us on how to state things. I have a question.

1:08:47 I have questions that Doctor Wendell could unite us because I. We are, you know, you mentioned, Miss Wright, that the survey did show one over another, that it only showed that one candidate got a lot more feedback than the other. If you read through the comments, the feedback on that one candidate was very divided. It was some, it’s kind of like cilantro.

1:09:09 You know, some people really love it and some people absolutely don’t. There was, it was very, it was polarized. And I’ll be quite honest you guys, I don’t want to make another decision that will polarize this community.

1:09:31 You know, I want to address the. Someone’s, talk about someone being a finalist in multiple districts, that is not a negative for me. I mean these guys are fantastic.

1:09:38 They’ve got great experience. Experience. The two that are finalists also in Manatee and maybe on some other lists.

1:09:44 I don’t know because some of the districts haven’t gotten to that far in their process. You know, we obviously Doctor Rendell, he told us I’m only applying here because this is where I’m happy to stay where I am regardless. But the other two, that is not a negative for me.

1:09:59 They are fantastic. And you’re not going to set your hopes on just one opportunity knowing that you’re one of three, three or one of four or whatever. So.

1:10:07 But I agree with you mister Susan, that when I look at someone who stayed in the same district and has been able to move up, to me that shows trust moving around a lot. And this is something that I shared in the debrief that we were asked to give back in January. That is a problem for me.

1:10:27 And it may be just go back to me being married to a sports guy. I like to see the Dirk Nowitzkis who stayed with the Mavericks their entire career, their Kobe Bryants who stay with Lakers their entire career. Because it just shows that the trust and leadership in your own organization is what causes people to move up.

1:10:44 And the moving around is actually kind of a negative for me. You know, we talked about who is ready to lead us for the competitive into this competition. I will continue to say, I think Mister Schneider is the one.

1:11:01 I think he is the one with the energy, the one who has the buy in. You know, they were only limited because the process we went through, they were only limited to three letters of recommendation. But when I had my one on one with him, he talked about the other letters of recommendation that he had and included people on all sides of political spectrums, community spectrum.

1:11:21 And so, you know, I just. I’m going to continue to support Doctor Schneider. I think he is the one that can, will come in without baggage, will come in with that strong leadership, a strong energy, will be here for the long haul.

1:11:37 You know, he shared with us in his, you know, in the entry plan and letters and one on ones and in our. I can’t remember if we did it in our public interview or not. Their family is ready to, to relocate and to lead us and to be that energizing, united.

1:11:53 Now, you can’t be a superintendent for very long and continue to be a united leader. You’re going to make some decision that some portion of the community doesn’t like. And that’s going to happen with anybody.

1:12:05 It happens with us. But I feel a strong community support, community wide support for him. And it will continue to.

1:12:17 I continue to think that he is the one that we need to come in and lead us. Thank you, Miss Campbell, for being under five minutes, which I didn’t follow, and she did a great job. Miss Jenkins, would you like to speak? Yeah, I’ll keep it brief because I feel like I kind of said some of this before, but I echo the sentiment of making a decision to heal brevard public schools and to avoid controversy, to avoid divisiveness, to avoid polarization.

1:12:55 We have a community that has questioned the integrity of this process since November and the decisions that were made by this board since November. And I think today there is a decision that will be made that will continue the chaos and divisiveness and I don’t think that’s in the best interest of our public schools or this community. There were statements made about receiving recommendations, and that’s wonderful.

1:13:27 But quite frankly, I would hope that my friends, family, and faith leaders that I see on a weekly basis would support me as well. It’s wonderful that they felt compelled to reach out. But, you know, it’s not unique to have received letters of support from people who support you daily.

1:13:52 I think it’s important to recognize the survey results. There was one person who had more responses than anyone else. However, they were mixed and again, divisive.

1:14:10 Typically, on a survey response, if you have a candidate who is from within the county, you would assume that they would have the most responses. Right. It’s easier for people to feel invested in a local candidate, but we did have a candidate who received almost the same amount of responses who isn’t local, and 99% of those were positive.

1:14:30 And so to me, that is reflective of what the community was seeing and hearing. And I commend FSBA because this process was transparent, it was diverse, and it gave the community different opportunities to participate in this process. And I think we did get a pretty good picture how they felt.

1:14:57 To me, there were two candidates that absolutely stood out. There are two candidates who have an insane depth of knowledge and experience in large districts. It would be wildly, wildly unfortunate to not give those candidates an opportunity.

1:15:19 And I’m going to circle back to what I said before right in the beginning of my conversation of hats off to miss hand. If we were intending on tapping on somebody from within this district, quite frankly, I’d be tapping on a cabinet member and somebody who had a greater depth of experience or who has already sat in the seat here in Brevard and done an impeccable job. It’s hard for me to replace a person in that position with somebody else from within our county that, quite frankly, had that opportunity somewhere else.

1:15:54 And, yeah, I’m concerned about the performance in that role previously. I’m concerned about the communication style and leadership style that’s documented on the reviews of that candidate. And quite frankly, that is one of my major primary concerns going forward is the comfort and stability of our staff in the district.

1:16:24 I’m going to be honest, walking the hall with ESF and the buildings of our schools. Yeah, I’ve had staff members stop me, too. And clearly they’re saying different things.

1:16:34 I just don’t believe that it is in the best interest of brevard public school to make a choice that is not uniting. And that just continues this divisive culture that we have. Again, I’m comfortable with either of the other two candidates.

1:16:55 I’m leaning. Quite frankly, I was pushed to lean closer towards Mister Schneider because of community organizations and leaders that felt that way as well. But I felt strongly about both candidates, again, for different reasons.

1:17:12 But again, this is the moment in which this board is going to be making a decision whether or not we’re going to continue to divide or if we’re going to unite. Thank you, Miss Jenkins. If we go in the proper order, Mister Trump.

1:17:27 All right. So I do promise I will not take ten minutes. I don’t want to reach hash the qualifications that we have in front of us.

1:17:36 The data that proves one is much more ready for Brevard. I think staying with the district means something at a leadership position. I agree.

1:17:50 And that’s what we have in one candidate. I believe a calm, confident demeanor like we saw in this on. But Doctor Riddell showed that.

1:18:03 And I’m telling you, it’s not. It’s not an act if we get a little personal right here is, you know, knowing a person isn’t someone different in an interview is invaluable. As a previous business owner like yourself, Miss Wright, hiring is something I’ve done many, many times over my career.

1:18:32 And being 20% of a hire is very difficult. Even us being married, as being a 50 50 decision is sometimes difficult. But I’m telling you, this is the person we need.

1:18:47 We’re excited as a community. That’s as overwhelming what I’m getting. And I mean, I guess we could sit here, you know, all day and do this.

1:18:57 So I would like to put forth a motion that we select Doctor Rendell as our next superintendent in Brevard county. So I’ll second it. But I want to still hear from Miss Wright and give her the opportunity, if that makes sense.

1:19:13 Yeah, because it’s the motion, the second. Now it’s discussion, but you can finish out your discussion because, you know, if that’s okay. Yeah.

1:19:22 Again, I appreciate what you’re saying. As far as Miss Jenkins had mentioned, the fact that there are several decisions that we make that we’re not a. We’re not a 50 vote, this board’s not a 50 vote.

1:19:32 Government really shouldn’t be a 100% unified when it comes to decisions that they make. Because quite frankly, we represent different people, different populations. And that’s just what it looks like.

1:19:43 I will tell you, one of the candidates specifically said to me, and I understand this statement, I do, that they would not come here without a 50 vote. And I’m like, have you watched our board meetings? That was my first question, because we’re not a 50 board. But I understand it, because when you’re considering relocating, you obviously want that security that you have a board that’s going to support you.

1:20:04 And I think that, you know, I understand that statement. I do. But I just also, to me, I have paused with that statement because of the nature of what our board is and the fact that we do have a lot of things.

1:20:16 Education is changing right now. I mean, it is all over the place. And so we are going to have controversial topics that are going to come up before this board, and we are going to have many of them that are not 50 votes.

1:20:25 And it’s not going to be another conception in the public’s eye that it’s this side of the board versus that side of the board board. That’s not how our votes come down. Many of our votes have been different.

1:20:35 If you’ll. I’ll remind you, for the interim superintendent, it was the three females that selected the interim superintendent. They were the ones that drove that vote, not the other way around.

1:20:44 So that idea that three of us align and the other two do not, that’s not true. And that’s. That is false narrative that is being put out in the community.

1:20:53 But what I will say to you again, and I go back to the experience that I’ve had with Doctor Rendell, is that I am impressed with the fact that he was willing to take the feedback that he was asking for criticism. In a world where there’s no shortage of criticism, we get it all the time from everyone. But he asked for it so that he could use it constructively to improve himself and then to come back before us again and display that and show that, hey, you took in everything I said to you, and you nailed it.

1:21:21 And you came with some outside of the box ideas, which I love. Outside of the box. Cause right now, we’re gonna have to get outside of the box with a lot of different ideas coming forward.

1:21:28 So with that being said, I think all three candidates are exceptional. They are all going to be a superintendent in the state of Florida. I have no doubt about that whatsoever.

1:21:38 If I could take all three of them, I would today. But we have to pick one. That is the job that we have.

1:21:43 So for that, my support’s gonna go with Doctor Rendell. All right. Thank you.

1:21:49 And I think many of the points that were made today are very, very good. But I did want to speak to one, we always have a tradition of a 50 vote after we do our vote, and we will be. So everybody understands, I will be moving towards asking for that.

1:22:08 Many people don’t remember, but when Doctor Mullins was chosen, I was asking. There was a motion ahead of. Right in the middle of the three finalists, there was a motion ahead of just having him hired immediately.

1:22:20 And so I voted against having Doctor Mullins come on board, but not because I didn’t think he was my choice, but I thought that we should have heard out the process. Right. So I did want to say that after that, they made a motion to vote 50 in the interim superintendent.

1:22:34 We had a three two vote, and we came back and we voted 50. So I do. I do think that this board will come to a 50 vote eventually.

1:22:43 I would hope that. But I did want to say that just for the people out there, this is the process that we go by. And then, just like governance, even though you may not get an original vote, that we come back together as a group, I did want to talk about.

1:22:56 I heard a lot about baggage, divisiveness, and all this other stuff. These are all just so everybody understands many of the accusations that have been made. Both.

1:23:06 And there is accusations against another candidate. That was one of the three finalists that I hunted down and made sure that was untrue. The other indications of one of the other candidates, all of them, have been found untrue.

1:23:21 Some of the indicators was that Doctor Rendell had some false appropriations of funds or something like that. There is an attorney general report that during the interim superintendent search, I provided a copy for everybody here on the board so that they could see it, that exonerated Doctor Rendell from any misbehaving. And there was a couple other things that were out there that just didn’t have anything to do with governance that were not true.

1:23:44 But I’ll say that it is up to us to do due diligence to find out if they’re true or not, to expel the false narrative that occurs, that creates the divisiveness. And we have that out there. So I would say that if there’s an opportunity for us to get down to the bottom, and I feel that everybody on this board would do so, that if there’s an opportunity for you to do that, to start calling those people out, because a lot of what’s happening is that we’re creating a divisiveness between our school district based upon feelings, and most of it’s being driven from a narrative that’s just not true.

1:24:19 And I’ll just be honest with you, I’m tired of it. Like, I’m tired of them saying that, oh, there’s this stuff and everything else. So the issue is that we, as a board, can come together because it’s time to get to work.

1:24:31 We have retention and recruitment, we have all of the other components. Student achievement, we have so much to do. That sitting back on a divisiveness and fighting each other over claims that online, social media, Facebook, they’re all false.

1:24:45 And the fake and the untrue thing is that we don’t do our kids a service if we don’t get down to the bottom of it and then vote appropriately. But when we facilitate those fake and false narratives, it creates a situation where it hurts our kids. So I’ve seen some stuff where we’re starting to see staff is starting to pop on and fight these things back.

1:25:08 I don’t know if that’s appropriate, but I will tell you that this is the way we need to be, is go down. Get down to the bottom of it, go to the place of origin, and make your decision based on that. And I think we do that.

1:25:17 Miss Campbell does a great job, and so do other members of the board. So, with that, I’ll call the question for Doctor Rendell to be the superintendent. No, we are in discussion.

1:25:28 Not everyone got a chance to speak. We all spoke to it. But if you want to speak to that component, that’s fine.

1:25:35 Miss Jenkins. I’m not going to stop. This is a very important decision.

1:25:38 If you would like to speak to the motion, then you have every right to. Miss Jenkins, you go ahead. Right.

1:25:45 The question was or the motion was seconded. And we had a discussion. So not everyone spoke with you? Absolutely, Miss Jenkins.

1:25:52 Great. Quite frankly, I believe that members of this board owe the constituents of Bevar county an apology for spending time and money on a process that clearly lacked integrity. And I, quite frankly, think you owe the candidates an apology as well.

1:26:18 This is another embarrassing moment for Brevard public schools. It’s shameful. It’s shameful.

1:26:26 And I think we have counties across the state that are breathing a sigh of relief as they watch us pass on two extremely qualified candidates that we had the first opportunity to make them an offer. It’s shameful. Okay.

1:26:45 Thank you, Miss Jenkins. Miss Campbell, would you have anything to say? Yeah, I appreciate what you said, mister Susan. And certainly, I think I have seen the social media, all that.

1:26:53 I will tell you, my issue with baggage is not about social media or even printed stories. I have looked, and I have talked to people from the county who were left behind. And really, when it comes to me, it comes down to leadership.

1:27:08 And I have questions about leadership. And, you know, whatever may have been, you know, whatever the things that were true or untrue, to me, it comes down to leadership. And I, you know, it looks like we’re already going there.

1:27:23 But I just wanted to confirm with you that that is where my issue lies. Lies. And that’s why he’s back here.

1:27:33 And so I’m ready to vote. Okay. Thank you, miss Campbell.

1:27:38 Is everybody okay? Are we still discussion? We can discuss if you want, or we can go to vote. I just want to bring up one thing real fast, just really quickly, because Miss Jenkins mentioned this. You know, there was this comment of, oh, this has already been decided.

1:27:51 It wasn’t decided. And honestly, I think the fact that we’re went to a national search and still come to back to that candidate, for me being the strongest candidate that we saw going to me, it says, hey, we searched high and low. We searched the country.

1:28:04 And I feel confident now in saying, hey, this is who I want to move forward with. So I don’t think that we did a disservice to our taxpayers in any way whatsoever. I think we searched wide and far, and we still came back, and I feel far more confident about this decision moving forward than I did when we initially came through with the interim superintendent position.

1:28:31 Same here. I probably was the one that didn’t have to make up my mind as much. But I’m very thankful, very thankful, FSBA, that we went through this search.

1:28:47 There’s always going to be haters, right? You’re not going to believe what I’m saying, but out of the 33 candidates, we went through the process, reading every single resume, doing Google searches on every single candidate, getting it down to the eleven, getting it down to the four, then the three, and then my choice stayed my choice, but through a critical eye, and it made it it even more that we have it right here in our backyard and we need to take advantage of it. I believe this is going to be the step forward that’s going to bring Brevard back from good to great. We’re going to promote from within, if possible.

1:29:23 We’re going to look inside. And I even had one of the other candidates say, when we don’t hire from within, we have to question why not? And then maybe fix something. So I feel stronger today than I did going through the interim.

1:29:41 Things happen for a reason, and I feel very confident moving forward on this decision. Thank you. I think that brings us to the vote.

1:29:51 All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. All opposed? Nay.

1:29:56 So it passes with a three two vote. What we’re going to do is, I’m going to ask that question, but I wanted to let you guys know we’re going to give the superintendent a call here in a second and then make sure everything is lined up. I had spoken to Paul and didn’t know what the outcome would be, but we’re going to go travel to the individual that we select today to try to negotiate ahead of time so that we have plenty of time prior to the meeting to collaborate on what the contract looks like and what the terms are for you guys to have plenty of input prior to the next meeting so that we can bring that forward.

1:30:32 So I’m going to ask. Yes, ma’am. Yeah, I don’t want us to rush this process.

1:30:39 I know we had originally talked about trying to, you know, we’d have a week and get it done so we could vote on, on the night. We don’t need to rush this process. I think we’ve learned a lesson over the last several months that we, I want, I want Doctor Rendell to have the time to look through the, you know, and not feel like, oh, we got to get it done.

1:30:56 So we vote on the 9th. Paula’s already mentioned that we have, you know, we can, we’ve got further board meetings, you know, and when I, one of the questions that I asked all of the candidates was when can you be here? And not that it’s a rush or it’s going to make my decision, but all of them kind of chose that June 1 day, even including Doctor Rendell, because, you know, we’ve got a school year to finish out and everything. And certainly he’d be willing, he might be willing to start a little sooner, but I don’t want to speak to put an artificial deadline of May 9.

1:31:24 I’d like us to make sure that he has all the time that he needs and that if, when you and Paul, you know, lead through the negotiation process, if you need to bring something back to the board to see if anything’s out of the ordinary, different from what Doctor Mullen’s contract was, that, you know, you have the chance to bring it back to us next Tuesday in a workshop if necessary. But I certainly don’t want us to rush through that process. Yeah, it’s not a rush in the process, us just to start it.

1:31:49 So just wanted to. Everybody okay with that? No, I it’s not that we’re going to force him to sign something today. It’s just, let’s start the negotiations to correct.

1:32:01 Start the process. Yeah, I just wanted to get my input in there on that process. Hold them to the fire and say, figure it out.

1:32:08 I mean, like, no, I’m excited that you’re getting started on the process. I’m not quite sure what lessons this board has learned. So, mister Susan, if you think that’s appropriate.

1:32:20 Yeah, I’m the one that negotiates it. We can get the process started. He’s not going to be held accountable and we’ll go absolutely sure.

1:32:27 If it’s easier, then absolutely. Miss Campbell, you are right. There is no indication that he will start anywhere earlier than June 1.

1:32:34 That negotiation could be in there. But if there’s an opportunity to get something done a little bit quicker, we can accept first. Yeah, that’s true.

1:32:41 So what we’re going to do is I’m going to ask the board and then we’re going to break. I’m going to go talk to them, and then I’m going to come back and say, okay, and then we’ll break again. Okay.

1:32:48 Is that okay? So I’m going to ask, I’m going to call a question that if everybody here wants to, I’m going to have another vote on Rendell to see if everybody will support him on a five at zero vote. Do I have a second? 2nd. Okay.

1:33:03 And the motion on the floor is to vote again, Rendell for a ceremonious 50 vote. All in favor, signify. I’m sorry.

1:33:11 Go ahead. Go ahead. I know you’re trying to get it done, but slow.

1:33:15 I didn’t know that we needed more discussion, so I’m sorry. I will tell you that I had a frank conversation with all the candidates, including doctor Rendell. And I did tell him, you know, that whatever happens, if this board chooses him to be superintendent, I will support him because that’s.

1:33:37 We can’t, you know, the way we happened, we were divided. You guys didn’t choose the one that I wanted you to choose. And.

1:33:44 But you know what? Like I said, we can’t always all be there. And so I will support him as our superintendent, and I’m absolutely going to work with him. I’m going to hold him accountable.

1:33:57 I see the improvements, too. I didn’t mention it, Miss Wright, but I, you know, from the debrief that we had, he also came back and very clearly added some things in that I had talked about to him. But I will.

1:34:13 I just want to be clear, if the decision is made, and for the good of our community, I absolutely will support him. Because that is what needs to happen in order for us to move forward. And all of us have influence.

1:34:26 And I believe I have influence, and I’m hoping that my influence in not reversing course, I still think we didn’t choose the best candidate, you know, but, I mean, this is the candidate we have. And so I absolutely will support him because that is what it’s going to take, is people deciding regardless of whether things go the way I want or not, I’m on the team, and I’m a team player. And I’m going to take my leadership role and lead the people that I have influence over into also supporting and working hard to continue to make this district better and to not give up.

1:34:58 And that would be my message. It’s been my message from the very beginning, from our very first meeting together in November. Don’t give up.

1:35:04 Don’t give in. We still have great work to do, and we can do it. Thank you, Miss Campbell.

1:35:09 Miss, may I? Jenkins. Yep. Yeah.

1:35:14 I said the same exact thing to all of the candidates. Quite frankly, I don’t think anybody on the board would not support moving forward and progress. I am not going to go forward with a ceremonial vote, though I have significant concerns about this decision.

1:35:33 And again, I spoke to the integrity of this process. I don’t believe that that is indicative of working with a person going forward and having the best interest of a district at heart going forward. I don’t think that I need to change my vote for the public when they’re well aware of how I feel in order to do that.

1:35:55 I just don’t. I think that I am speaking for the majority of my constituents with my vote and my voice up here on the dais, and I’m not willing to throw that aside. With that being said, I absolutely will support.

1:36:08 Support. Doctor Rendell, we had an open, honest conversation during the interim process. We had an open, honest conversation during this process here.

1:36:16 He has always been very kind to me and an eye to him, and I want nothing more than the progress of this school district. But I’m not comfortable stating something on record that’s opposite of actually how I feel. Okay, call a vote.

1:36:35 All in favor, signify by saying aye. All opposed? Nay. Okay, there we have it.

1:36:41 I’m going to break the meeting. If you guys want to take a five minute break, make a phone call, and we’ll come right back. Sure.

1:36:46 Okay. We’re coming back to do what? Yep. Explained it.

1:39:49 Welcome back, everybody. Just went ahead and had a conversation with Mister Rendell, or should I say superintendent Rendell. And for the first time, I also.

1:39:59 He’s gonna actually, I asked him what he would like to do. He says, hey, I’m coming up there for a meeting already at 230, so he’s going to be up here. I’m going to have him work with Russell Brune on a press release and also we’ll start the conversation.

1:40:12 I told him, I said, look, man, like, this isn’t pushing you into something, but if there’s some pre qualifiers, we can start getting out of the way. He said, great. So he’s going to come up here.

1:40:21 So he’s accepted and, you know, he’s ready to go. So does anybody else have anything? If not, we can get more moving. Good, he’s listening.

1:40:30 Congratulations, Doctor Rendell. We’re excited. He said he was having testing, right? He is.

1:40:37 We’re good. Good. All right.

1:40:40 For the good of the order, thank you very much. We don’t need that little hammer.