Updates on the Fight for Quality Public Education in Brevard County, FL
0:00 music
3:40 Thank you.
4:40 Good evening.
4:46 The March 19th, 2024 board meeting is now in order.
4:49 I’d like to welcome my fellow board members and the public.
4:51 It is so encouraging to see so many faces in the audience this
4:54 evening.
4:55 I’ll politely ask the public to help our board meeting flow a
4:57 little more smoothly by following a few housekeeping rules.
5:00 The public’s opportunity to address the board is during the
5:02 public comment portion of the meeting.
5:04 I ask that the public refrain from speaking, loud disruptions,
5:07 distractions, and other forms of communication that will hinder
5:10 the business of the board.
5:11 Paul, roll call, please.
5:12 Ms. Wright?
5:13 Present.
5:13 Mr. Trent?
5:14 Here.
5:14 Ms. Campbell?
5:15 Here.
5:16 Mr. Susan?
5:17 Here.
5:17 Ms. Jenkins?
5:18 Here.
5:19 At this time, the board would like to hold a moment of silence,
5:21 and I invite the audience to join.
5:44 Thank you.
5:44 We are going to rise.
5:45 We have a student here from Vire High, Max Madel, who will lead
5:48 us in the Pledge of Allegiance today.
5:50 I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America,
5:58 and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God,
6:03 indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
6:11 Well, you guys are in store for a treat, because we have so many
6:13 wonderful things that are happening in Rivard County.
6:16 Tonight, we’re going to honor several different individuals and
6:19 students.
6:19 I think our first demonstration that we have, though, is from
6:22 the Vire High’s Exercise, Science, and Dental Aid Center, or,
6:25 sorry, Career and Technical Education Program.
6:28 You guys are going to come forward, correct?
6:30 And you have a, you’re going to show us something, right?
6:33 Go ahead and come on forward.
6:41 Good evening, Chairman Wright, members of the board, Dr. Rendell.
6:47 I’d like to introduce you to Carrie Garrison.
6:50 She is our Dental Aid Instructor at Vire High School, and Jackie
6:52 Elinswitz, our Exercise Science, did I get it right?
6:55 You did.
6:55 Our Exercise Science Instructor at Vire.
6:57 We are so pleased to have these students here under their
6:59 leadership, and they’re going to be describing what you’re
7:02 seeing as we’re having a demonstration this evening.
7:04 All right, so, good evening, board and everyone.
7:09 So, thank you so much for the opportunity for us to demonstrate
7:12 both of our programs.
7:13 We have a combination of our Exercise Science Level 3 students
7:16 and Dental Aid students here, and we’re going to demonstrate CPR
7:20 and a rescue situation.
7:22 So, just as a caveat, normally when the situation is happening,
7:25 the victim would not be on a table.
7:27 But for demonstration purposes, it does make it significantly
7:31 easier, but we would have the victim on a hard, flat surface
7:34 like the floor.
7:36 So, just, you know, putting that out there.
7:38 But we’re going to have our two students act out the scene and
7:41 whatnot, and I will narrate as they go to give some context.
7:45 And then we’ll have our other two students ready to field or
7:48 answer any other questions that you may have.
7:51 So, you’re all ready?
7:53 All right.
7:54 Go ahead.
7:57 So, when there are two people there available for, uh, at a
8:09 rescue situation, um, it is most, uh, evident that you would, uh,
8:17 send someone away in order to call 911 and go retrieve the AED.
8:20 Um, if this individual were alone, uh, he would then have taken
8:24 the time to call 911 himself so that he was not reliant on just
8:28 himself in order to maintain the compressions.
8:30 Uh, as you will notice, he will only be doing compressions for
8:35 the CPR, uh, from, as of 2012, the American Heart Association
8:39 has actually recommended, uh, compression-only CPR in situations
8:43 that are not for infants, children,
8:45 uh, or in respiratory distress situations, um, and if the rescuer
8:50 is either uncomfortable with providing, uh, breaths or maybe is
8:54 unsure of their ability to provide said breaths.
8:56 So, since we do not have a pocket mask device here, uh, he is
8:59 only going to engage in compression-only CPR.
9:02 Uh, but as you can see, the second rescuer has now returned with
9:05 the AED, so, uh, she will be able to help analyze for rhythm if
9:09 a shock is, uh, needed and necessary.
9:12 Uh, so, with that, now, as the compressor has continued with the
9:17 AED pads on, it can, uh, begin to analyze for rhythm, uh, once
9:20 the compressor, uh, ceases his compressions.
9:23 So, the AED will now analyze for rhythm, and so, it is
9:27 recommending a shock, and so, the second rescuer will indicate-
9:31 indicate that all people should clear out of the way because,
9:34 one, we don’t want the AED to accidentally analyze an incorrect
9:37 rhythm, uh, with both the compressor and the victim.
9:40 We also don’t want, uh, it to accidentally defibrillate when it
9:44 needs to or when it doesn’t need to, uh, so, the AED indicates
9:47 that a shock should be delivered, so, the, uh, second rescuer
9:51 will indicate that it should clear again, um, and then the shock
9:55 is delivered, and now that the patient is, um, uh, stable and
10:00 ready for transport, second rescuer can begin putting the EKG
10:03 electrodes on, uh, so, it can be monitored during transport
10:06 there.
10:07 So, this demonstration here, uh, highlights, uh, several of the
10:10 skills that these students learn in our programs, uh, CPR first
10:14 aid, uh, is something that they learn in their second year, and
10:16 they get certified in, um, and the EKG is what they are
10:20 currently learning now, um, and so, they are learning how to, uh,
10:23 take recordings of heart activity.
10:25 EKGs do not defibrillate, um, but these, uh, students are able
10:30 to analyze these heart rhythms and interpret them as such, and
10:34 be able to identify whether someone is in cardiac distress or
10:37 not.
10:38 And so, what you’re watching is really only just a couple weeks
10:42 worth of practice, um, and they are already, uh, more than proficient
10:46 at the skill here.
10:47 So, now that the victim is prepped for transport, you can
10:50 transport them.
10:51 That’s great.
10:52 That’s great to do.
10:53 Yeah.
10:54 It’s a perfect sized journey.
10:55 Yeah.
10:56 Very nice, guys.
10:57 That’s awesome.
10:58 All right.
10:59 Thank you so much.
11:00 Um, this is funny that this is being presented because I think
11:03 our board, did we not have a discussion about this on getting
11:06 trained?
11:06 And so, I wanted to ask you a quick question since I have the
11:18 opportunity.
11:21 The last time I used an AED machine, it prompted us verbally and
11:25 says, so that AED machine does the same?
11:27 It would as well.
11:28 Okay.
11:29 So, because it would be on, um, a dummy as well as because we
11:32 wanted to transport them, that’s why we elected not to turn it
11:34 on.
11:34 Okay.
11:35 But that is the wonderful thing about an AED is that it
11:37 essentially is, ironically, dummy proof.
11:39 Yeah.
11:40 Um, because, uh, anyone can operate it and because it tells you
11:43 exactly what to do.
11:44 As long as you remember to turn it on, you have something there
11:47 to assist you during whatever crisis you have.
11:49 Yeah.
11:50 Wonderful.
11:50 Thank you.
11:51 Well, I’ll give my, my fellow board members a time, um, if you
11:53 would like to ask any additional questions or make any
11:56 statements, uh, in regards to the display that you just saw.
11:59 So, thank you so much, guys, for, um, this presentation.
12:03 It’s great to see what our students are learning.
12:05 I know now, um, it is state law, correct, that all of our high
12:10 school students will learn CPR.
12:13 So, not just in the CTE courses, but how are our students
12:17 learning that outside of these specific courses?
12:20 And maybe I’m, that’s out of the scope of.
12:23 She’s like, that, that, that, that might be.
12:26 Um, go for it.
12:27 I can answer that.
12:28 Um, so we actually certify them in BLS in our classes.
12:32 Okay.
12:33 Um, last year on, at the Viera High School campus, we actually
12:38 took students from every grade level.
12:42 Um, they came down like during lunchtime.
12:45 Um, we taught them, um, compression only.
12:48 Um, and that’s as, as much as they learned.
12:52 So, they’re not actually certified, but if they need to do it,
12:55 then they can do it.
12:56 Right.
12:57 It’s amazing all these programs.
12:58 So, you, your, your dental students are learning this.
13:01 Yes.
13:02 And your sports science, um, students are learning this.
13:05 And I know our, at our other programs, our CNA students are
13:08 learning this.
13:09 Yes.
13:10 We have so many CTE programs that are learning this.
13:11 And I just have to testify.
13:12 I’ve been in classrooms where we had students who saved people’s
13:16 lives because of the training they receive in these class.
13:17 Even as a high school student who are already saving lives.
13:20 So, thank you for what you do.
13:21 Um, and providing such practical skills for our students.
13:24 Thank you.
13:28 Ms. Jenkins.
13:29 Yeah, I, um, I don’t have any questions.
13:30 Actually, I’m, I’m glad Ms. Wright brought that up.
13:32 Cause that’s exactly what I was thinking when they said that you
13:34 guys were coming and presenting this tonight.
13:36 I thought, Oh my God, are we doing a live training?
13:39 Oh, but, uh, you know, when we were having that conversation, I
13:44 admitted it then and I’m going to admit it still now.
13:46 It hasn’t changed.
13:47 I’ve said, uh, ever since my daughter was born, I kept saying
13:50 that I was going to get CPR certified and, and, uh, learn the Heimlich
13:54 and all of that.
13:54 And she’s seven and a half and I still haven’t done that.
13:56 So, um, it’s just, yeah, this just reminds me, you know, I need
14:00 to, I need to get it over with and I need to do it.
14:02 Um, it’s an impressive skill set.
14:04 And like Ms. Campbell said, you know, we’ve had students here
14:06 that we’ve honored for, for using these skills in the real world
14:09 and saving people’s lives.
14:11 So thank you.
14:12 Thank you for all you do and for training all of our kids.
14:14 Thank you.
14:16 Mr. Susan.
14:17 I wanted to say, thank you.
14:18 I think it’s ironic that Viera high school was able to give this
14:21 presentation.
14:22 Um, I’m not sure if you guys are aware, but Colin Seeley was one
14:25 of the students years ago.
14:26 Um, many people don’t know this, but there was a hero, uh, Tim
14:30 Thomas, who’s a ROTC instructor who, when Colin went down at Viera
14:36 high school, they were calling for the AED, but they were
14:40 hearing AD.
14:40 So they thought they were talking about the athletic director.
14:42 So Tim Thomas pushed on that kid’s chest for like eight, nine
14:46 minutes until they could bring that there to save them because
14:49 of the confusion.
14:50 And then on top of that, our ambulance that was supposed to come
14:53 there to save them also took forever because they didn’t know
14:56 how to get to the back.
14:57 So literally all of that was the reason that we then went with
15:01 Sean Seema and who we play for and everybody else to the state
15:05 Capitol to fight, to have CPR required for the whole state.
15:08 So the three of us went up there.
15:10 We ran around hotel rooms and everything else.
15:12 And it, it’s just ironic that you guys came here to do this
15:14 today.
15:15 And I’m so proud that you’re doing it because just like my
15:18 fellow board members said, there is a definite need for this
15:21 across the county and lives are saved just because somebody
15:25 keeps those chest compressions going.
15:26 And that is just something, um, it’s something that everybody
15:29 needs.
15:29 And I really appreciate you guys coming.
15:31 I really appreciate you guys taking the time to show us because
15:34 it right now, everybody in this room that is not certified is
15:37 saying I better go get certified.
15:39 So there’s a big deal right now that you guys are here.
15:41 So from the bottom of my heart, thank you.
15:43 And if you haven’t been certified, please go do it.
15:46 Yeah.
15:47 Um, you’re going to have that moment where you wish you did and
15:50 you may not want that.
15:51 So thank you.
15:52 That’s it.
15:53 Thank you.
15:54 Mr. Trent.
15:55 Well, not a lot to add after all of, all of you guys, but
15:58 exactly the same.
15:59 Uh, thank you so much to, for shining a light on, on what’s
16:03 needed.
16:04 Uh, young people, thank you for taking the initiative to, uh,
16:07 you know, to get this talent.
16:09 Uh, like you said, you know, there’s still some of us that are
16:13 no longer the youth of you that are saying we should probably
16:17 get CPR certified.
16:18 Uh, as some of us were because we were coaches before, but there’s
16:21 a lot of people out there that, uh, uh, need the talent that you
16:23 already have.
16:24 So thank you and thank you for being that example.
16:28 Yeah.
16:29 I’m going to echo the sentiments of my fellow board members.
16:31 Uh, it is such an important skill and really an easy one to, to
16:33 master.
16:34 Honestly, once you learn it, you’re going, oh my gosh, this is
16:36 like riding a bike.
16:37 And honestly, you will know it for the rest of your life and it
16:39 will save a life.
16:40 It could potentially save many lives.
16:41 Um, so thank you to the instructors for all the hard work that
16:43 you’re doing there on teaching these students.
16:45 I still want to challenge our board.
16:46 I, we made this comment before that we all need to be CPR
16:49 certified.
16:50 I, mine is expired.
16:51 I will admit.
16:52 Um, but I think it would be a good lesson for us to all walk
16:54 through.
16:54 So we might reach out to you and see if we can come over there
16:56 and schedule something.
16:57 We would love it.
16:58 Okay, wonderful.
16:59 Well, thank you guys so much.
17:00 Dr. Rendell, do you have anything else to add?
17:02 I don’t have anything else to add.
17:04 I don’t know if you wanted to do a picture before we do the next
17:06 thing.
17:07 Okay.
17:08 We’ll take a, we will take a short recess real fast and take a
17:12 picture if that’s okay.
17:13 Sure.
17:14 All right.
17:32 We’ll see you next time.
17:33 Bye.
20:02 I don’t think he officially recessed us. Okay. Mike, are you
20:08 good back there? Okay. I’m good.
20:11 I’m back on. All right. All right. Thank you. I am going to
20:18 offer my fellow board members and Dr.
20:21 Rendell an opportunity to recognize students, staff, and members
20:24 of the community. Board,
20:25 I will remind you we have several different recognitions we’re
20:27 doing tonight, so hopefully
20:28 they’ll overlap, but if anybody would like to jump out first and
20:32 go. So our Brevard
20:37 Achievement Center hosted the annual art festival at the zoo for
20:41 our ESE students
20:42 across the district, all age groups. It was a fantastic event as
20:46 always and very much
20:47 appreciate the work that they do and all the sponsors, the
20:50 students from EFSC and a
20:52 lot of other people. They even had an instrument petting zoo
20:55 where kids could
20:56 come and get their hands on violins and banjos and guitars. It
21:00 was so much fun. So
21:01 thank you Brevard Achievement Center for your support of our
21:05 students and for all
21:06 the people at the district, especially in student services who
21:10 volunteered and helped
21:11 put on and organize that event. It was a huge event from the
21:15 beginning to end. And if
21:16 you got, if you were in the zoo that week, our students’ artwork
21:19 was hanging all over the
21:20 place. And then I wanted to thank, we thanked them on social
21:24 media, but I just want to publicly
21:25 thank in our board meeting, the Boeing Corporation for their $250,000
21:31 check that they presented
21:33 to the Brevard Schools Foundation in support of Destination Mars,
21:36 the event that’s been
21:37 going on all month long and will finish up this week. It’s a
21:42 huge gift and it really is supporting
21:44 STEM in our schools and our elementary schools as they’re
21:48 looking at what it’s like to live
21:50 on Mars, what it would be like, what are we going to need once
21:54 we get there. And so very much
21:56 appreciate the Boeing Corporation and the Brevard Schools
21:58 Foundation for help facilitating that.
22:00 Thank you, Ms. Campbell. Ms. Jenkins? Yeah. So I’m going to jump
22:09 off of that Destination Mars. I just want to give a huge shout
22:12 out to Amanda Howell for orchestrating all of that and taking
22:16 that on. It is no easy feat. It was so fun joining them again
22:18 this year. I didn’t get to do every day like I wanted to, but I
22:18 always have a blast.
22:19 The day that I got to go there was particularly special just
22:20 because of the particular schools that we had that were winning.
22:21 So hats off to the kiddos at Challenger 7 who did a fantastic
22:22 job that day. And I hear there’s a rumor that next year they’re
22:22 not going to Mars, they’re going somewhere else.
22:24 So it’s pretty exciting. So it’s pretty exciting. I also had an
22:28 opportunity to participate as a teacher at the University.
22:31 And I’m joining them again this year. I’m joining them again
22:34 this year. I didn’t get to do every day like I wanted to, but I
22:36 always have a blast.
22:36 schools that we had that were winning so hats off to the kiddos
22:39 at challenger seven who did a
22:42 fantastic job that day and i hear there’s a rumor that next year
22:46 they’re not going to mars they’re
22:48 going somewhere else so it’s pretty exciting i also had an
22:52 opportunity to participate as a judge
22:54 with the junior achievement social innovation challenge which is
22:58 also super fun thank you to
23:00 ja not only for coming into our classrooms but the volunteers
23:03 who sponsor those students and those
23:05 teachers uh to offer this unique and amazing opportunity to our
23:09 kids this is the coolest
23:11 thing in the world um it’s kind of like a shark shark tank
23:15 challenge for our kids to come up with
23:17 products have to stand in front of a group of professionals and
23:20 present those products to us
23:22 it was pretty incredible and uh one of the winners from the room
23:26 that i was in created a home device
23:29 to guard a um your security networks with their own vpn so i
23:33 mean these things are like
23:35 light years ahead of what you’re happening right now and um
23:38 pretty impressive kiddos um thank you to
23:42 the space coast association of realtors again for hosting
23:45 project prom it was my first time ever being
23:47 there i know miss wright was there for i think the entire day um
23:50 it was so fun it was so wonderful to
23:52 see families come in and get their attire for free for prom but
23:57 there was one family that came in that
23:59 the dad um had shared a tragic story um someone had sent him the
24:03 information they showed up that day
24:05 and he had no idea that it was even going to be free and he kind
24:07 of broke down to the staff there so
24:09 incredible opportunity for our students and our family so thank
24:12 you for everyone who’s involved in
24:13 that um just want to say a reminder that your annual re-enrollment
24:19 has started yesterday and it’s online
24:24 yay no more paper packets um so make sure you get on there and
24:27 do that that helps our administrators
24:29 plan for the next year so try to do it as soon as you can we
24:32 appreciate that um destination kindergarten
24:35 events they are starting april 6 from 9 a.m to 1 will be held at
24:40 max rhodes park and there will be
24:42 one i believe two weeks after that in titusville i don’t think
24:45 the destination is uh officially
24:49 announced yet though so keep your eye out for that and then last
24:52 but not least um i did get get to go
24:55 on a couple of school tours with dr rindell and i just want to
24:58 give a special shout out to one teacher
25:00 at port malabar elementary in her veb classroom miss rambi um i
25:05 had the opportunity of meeting her
25:07 last year actually not meeting her being in her classroom and
25:11 subbing um but going back there and
25:12 meeting her was incredible that is a teacher who lives breeze
25:16 dies for her kiddos it’s the most
25:18 beautiful classroom it is so fun and she pours every single
25:21 ounce of her heart into those kids so
25:23 thank you miss rambi for letting us come join you thank you miss
25:27 jenkins mr susan i want to say thank
25:29 you to everybody here i see a lot of familiar faces all the way
25:31 from the wrestling and the uh
25:33 satellite um you know what i mean automotive and some of the
25:36 other stuff here i want to say thank you
25:38 also to those of you guys that have done some great audits i see
25:40 some great principals and
25:41 great people in the audience i want to say thank you to roy
25:44 allen ralph williams and harbor city
25:46 elementary schools for having me visit um over the past couple
25:50 of weeks um it’s been a very good meeting
25:53 discussing all the things all the way from health care to
25:56 permission slips to mtss and all the other
25:57 issues that we have going on inside the district to make sure
26:00 that we’re in line and fixing the problems
26:02 we have i also wanted to say thank you to boeing space florida
26:06 microsoft lockheed martin spacex
26:08 miami-dade schools citrus county schools and others that were a
26:11 part of the career and technical
26:12 workforce program out at kennedy space center last week many of
26:16 you may not have known but we called
26:18 a large workforce we are falling behind texas alabama and california
26:23 in competition for jobs for the space
26:25 force and the problem we have is is that our we don’t have
26:28 enough workers to fill the positions for
26:31 the companies that are coming so we created a workforce summit
26:34 we’re calling it space force workforce
26:36 and what it is is to draw all of the kids from across the state
26:39 of florida to challenge those
26:41 other states to say that we can lead because whoever starts
26:44 really launching as they start ramping up
26:46 will be the teams that when we talk about doing mars rovers and
26:49 everything else we will be the center
26:51 of the entire universe for space exploration we want to continue
26:55 to do that and we can only do that if
26:57 we have enough workers i wanted to also say thank you to miss
27:00 rutledge for her hard work with our 4-h
27:03 many of you don’t know but we’re bringing agriculture back into
27:06 the classrooms and right now romalia farms
27:09 and miss torlak have stepped up to create systems where students
27:13 who want to be involved in 4-h style
27:15 agricultural programs would be able to go to those farms i’ve
27:18 talked to them today on the phone they’re
27:20 excited to facilitate for next year so bringing all that ag back
27:24 in miss rutledge and spending the time
27:26 on the phone with me today and some of those other partners is a
27:28 great opportunity i wanted to say
27:30 thank you and that’s all i have thank you thank you mr susan mr
27:33 trent all right i’ll make this uh quick
27:36 just like mr susan i can’t wait to get through these recognitions
27:39 uh for everyone sitting out there
27:41 it’s going to be a wonderful evening you guys are well deserved
27:44 of all the recognition you’re going
27:46 to get uh i too had a pleasure of visiting a few schools with dr
27:50 rendell um and even with mr susan
27:52 here but williams williams elementary and uh mcnair magnet dr
27:56 richardson over there at mcnair’s
27:59 is uh he’s on top of things we went and witnessed um classroom
28:03 after classroom uh it was ran well uh
28:07 well managed uh we saw music and math and i mean making pizzas
28:12 and reading all within an hour and a
28:15 half and the kids were engaged that’s what we’re looking for is
28:18 engaged students and even in the
28:20 past you know the hallways the the respect that the students
28:23 gave uh the staff and and dr richardson
28:25 so he’s doing a great job over there mr trent just to clarify we
28:28 didn’t see pizza making in the
28:30 yes you were upset about that i could tell we saw pizza making
28:32 in the culinary class correct not in
28:34 the math class no we saw math we saw music we saw pizza making i
28:38 just wanted to make sure everybody
28:40 knew we didn’t see pizza making in the math class however
28:44 however we did drink tea in the we did
28:47 tea in the social studies we did drink tea but there was a lot
28:50 of math in that uh in it that dough is
28:52 resting mr dr rendell wanted that pizza right away we had to
28:56 teach them that it was had to rest for a
28:58 day before you can use the dough so we got that straightened out
29:02 uh but again we’ve encouraged uh
29:04 each board member to go outside your district and visit a school
29:08 so i i joined um and we went down
29:10 and looked at williams elementary and uh ms schroeder it is a uh
29:14 it’s it’s a pleasure to see uh an
29:17 administrator that has you know such a grasp of her school and
29:20 she this is her first year there isn’t
29:22 it not i think it is so uh she’s a wonderful fit and a lot of
29:26 good things happening uh there miss
29:29 hon if you’re if you’re here if you’re not here you’re you’re
29:32 you’re back working uh your work is
29:34 is uh well accepted at that elementary school the new flooring
29:38 that’s going in there and the new uh
29:40 carpet and the laminate the place is looking great and the kids
29:44 uh are loving it so um excited to get
29:47 going tonight thank you mr trent all right i’m gonna try to wrap
29:50 mine up really quickly one of the
29:52 disadvantages to going to last is that you have attended a lot
29:55 of these same events that my fellow
29:56 board members have so destination mars was obviously a very a
30:00 big highlight for me it was so much fun uh
30:02 watching these students just on the spot problem solve and code
30:06 and chain i’m going oh my gosh i
30:08 cannot believe that these elementary age students are doing this
30:11 uh so thank you so much to miss howell
30:13 for putting that on and um and inviting us to come be a part of
30:16 it i also had the opportunity to attend mpa
30:20 and that was an absolute uh just a blessing it really was so
30:23 watching these students get there and make
30:26 joyful noise and sing and and then also hearing from other
30:29 people in other counties that come to judge
30:31 our students and and really recognizing the fact that our
30:34 district has put so much emphasis and focus
30:36 and attention towards the arts and so that was a really really
30:39 neat thing for me to see and hear from
30:40 other counties on what they’re doing or what they may not be
30:43 doing and what they love that we’re doing
30:44 so thank you so much to all those teachers uh mr av at space
30:47 coast you were running around i think you
30:49 probably worked 16 hours that day if i were guessing um i also
30:52 got the opportunity to attend the parent
30:54 leadership meeting which was another really fun thing that
30:57 happens on a monthly basis so there’s parent
30:59 liaisons at each one of our schools that have the opportunity to
31:01 come here at the district
31:02 and really hear what’s going on and then they get to talk to us
31:04 and tell us some of the things that
31:06 that maybe they could they could provide some insight into ways
31:09 we could help their school site so
31:11 uh this particular parent leadership meeting had the sheriff uh
31:14 present in juni and so thank you to the
31:16 sheriff coming here and and talking about school safety and how
31:18 we’re keeping our school safe uh there’s no
31:20 greater job i think than than making sure our kiddos are safe
31:23 every single day i too
31:24 attended project prom miss jenkins i didn’t get to meet the
31:27 parent that you met but uh you and i
31:28 were i think you were standing there with the the young lady
31:31 that tried on a dress and she came out
31:32 and she this dress was made for her and it was just absolutely
31:34 magical and it’s that moment of ah the
31:36 dress but then she finds the pockets in the dress and she’s like
31:40 jumping up and down and we’re like oh my
31:42 gosh we’re laughing but what a huge success that event is and so
31:45 i want to find out a way that we can
31:46 partner with them next year because that event is just
31:49 tremendous and what the space coast association of realtors does
31:51 is
31:51 um it’s nothing short of really a miracle so and then also today’s
31:55 election day and so one of those fun
31:57 things that happens is that we have polling sites at some of our
32:01 schools and i want to to commend those
32:02 schools because that’s a lot of shuffling that happens whenever
32:05 you have to take an entire area of
32:07 your school and shut it off now and open it up for the
32:09 supervisor of elections to come in and set up a
32:11 polling location so thank you to our supervisor of elections to
32:13 our school sites that are hosting some of
32:15 those uh and to all the the poll workers and watchers we
32:17 appreciate you we see you we recognize your
32:19 importance so um we will i’ll wrap up my my recognition so um at
32:23 this time we have several
32:25 staff members and students who we’re going to recognize tonight
32:28 for their dedication and their
32:29 accomplishments first we have two instructional assistants who’ve
32:32 been praised by their colleagues
32:35 miss maggie potter are you here okay all right uh so miss maggie
32:40 is a ia from central middle school she’s
32:43 going to come forward with one of our transportation specialists
32:46 our driver david eli who wrote a
32:49 magnificent letter okay all right come on did you bring the
32:51 letter do you have the letter that you’re
32:53 going to read you do okay all right go ahead so you wanted to
32:55 open them up so i’ll turn it over
32:57 yeah i just want to introduce david dr and dale thank you guys
33:00 for letting me speak i know dr miller
33:03 was a little concerned but anyway first of all thank you guys
33:06 for what you have done for transportation
33:09 i speak for at least 100 drivers that are so thankful for the
33:14 commitment you’ve made to us
33:16 and i know chris reed somewhere here in the building and the
33:20 disciplinary program is fantastic
33:24 thank you thank you thank you no thank you we appreciate you
33:28 guys thank you i i want to introduce
33:30 david david ellie i’ve known david since i’ve came to work here
33:35 and i’ve always wanted this moment to
33:39 be able to speak about what this gentleman is he’s the epitome
33:45 of a bus driver he’s a pleasure to get up
33:48 and work with every morning he’s just a ray of sunshine and this
33:53 letter he’s about to read to
33:55 all you guys is david he brought it to me to talk about miss potter
34:01 and how awesome and how much of an
34:04 influence she is well this gentleman is also an influence and i’m
34:07 not trying to take from miss potter
34:09 she’s fantastic but anything you ever want done david is yes sir
34:15 yes sir and when you thank him he says
34:19 it’s my pleasure and all i want to say it’s my pleasure to
34:27 introduce david ellie
34:38 madam chair esteemed members of the board superintendent ladies
34:46 and gentlemen please allow being in the first
34:52 place to extend my sincerest gratitude for the opportunity to
34:57 address this esteemed guardian
35:02 my name is david ellie and i proudly serve as a bus driver for
35:08 the south area district
35:12 i recognize that my speech may bear the distinctive accents of
35:18 both ghanaian and british english
35:24 but i assure you that i will endeavor to communicate clearly and
35:30 effectively i’m truly humble to find
35:37 myself in front of this i guess assembly today i owe a debt of
35:42 gratitude to my supervisor mr john davis
35:47 whose support and encouragement have made this moment possible i
35:53 stand my heartfelt appreciation to him and to
35:58 all of you for affording me this opportunity today however it’s
36:04 not about me it is about henry miss potter
36:11 her contributions are enormous with your current permission
36:17 madam chairperson i will proceed to read
36:22 the letter
36:24 i’m writing to express my appreciation and recognition for the
36:31 astounding contributions of mrs margar
36:35 maggie potter who is an assistant on my bus mrs potter has
36:41 consistently gone above and beyond
36:45 in ensuring the well-being and positive development of the
36:50 students of on our bus mrs potter does
36:56 not only fulfill her responsibilities with diligence but has
37:01 also taken it upon herself to instill
37:05 important moral values in the students instead of being bossy
37:11 and pervasive she has taken the initiative to teach
37:16 the morals and lead by example as i drive the school bus this
37:22 approach is undoubtedly having positive impact
37:29 on the students on the students behavior and character
37:31 development on the bus and beyond moreover mrs potter has
37:38 consistently treated the students with the utmost respect and
37:44 kindness she has created a safe and supportive
37:49 environment on the school bus where students feel valued and
37:55 respected
37:58 it’s evident that this approach has fostered a sense of
38:01 community and contributed to a healthy
38:05 atmosphere during their commute to and from school i believe
38:11 that recognizing and appreciating mrs potter
38:15 exceptional efforts is important to encourage and motivate
38:22 such positive behavior
38:27 margie as amplifies the values and qualities
38:31 that we aim to instill in our students
38:36 and her dedication is truly commendable
38:43 i kindly re request that mrs potter be formally
38:49 acknowledge for her exemplary
38:53 service and contributions to our school community
38:57 whether through a public announcement happening already
39:01 so i do not have to go over that
39:06 thank you so much for considering my request thank you thank you
39:14 thank you so much for those kind words uh mrs potter would you
39:25 like to come up for just a moment and
39:27 and i know you’re like oh i’m gonna have to say something so uh
39:32 no i i think it’s exceptional
39:33 whenever we receive a letter of recommendation from someone else
39:36 within the district who’s seen
39:37 the special things that you’re doing that really make a
39:39 difference um it’s very important for us to honor
39:42 you and say thank you and that you’re seen and we appreciate you
39:45 i want to ask you though how long have you been with the
39:47 district for
39:48 six months six months all right many more years of working with
39:53 us hopefully so thank you so so much fellow board members do you
39:56 have anything that you want to add
39:57 yeah just super quick i just want to say there’s there’s no
40:01 greater honor than being recognized and acknowledged by the
40:04 people who work with you and to hear that you’ve only been here
40:06 six months and you’ve already made such an impact on on the
40:09 person you’re sharing a space with
40:10 is really incredible thank you to both of you for everything
40:13 that you do and and thank you for supporting
40:16 one another yeah can i say thank you to my principal for hiring
40:19 me
40:19 thank you so much all right we actually have more though so don’t
40:25 go too far because we’re going to
40:27 take a picture with you guys but we have one more recognition i
40:28 think that we’re going to make today
40:30 um is amy cedar are you here all right wonderful and you are an
40:33 instructional assistant at meadow primary
40:36 uh and bus driver jenny jenright are you you’re with her perfect
40:40 all right well i think we got another
40:42 wonderful recognition that uh hopefully you’ll be willing to
40:45 share good evening to the board and dr
40:48 randell i’m deanna smith i’m the proud principal at meadow lane
40:51 primary and we are here this evening to
40:54 recognize miss amy cedar one of our pre-k instructional
40:58 assistants who serves in a blended classroom so she serves
41:02 students um in the gen ed setting and also students with
41:05 exceptionalities but not only does she use all
41:07 of her energy in the classroom she also is a bus um ia so she
41:12 rides a bus in the morning in the afternoon
41:14 and the reason why we’re here is because one of our incredible
41:18 bus drivers um is wanting to honor miss
41:21 amy as her bus ia so i’m going to let miss jenny jenright read
41:24 the letter that she sent in thank you
41:29 i first just wanted to say um when john introduced david
41:33 wherever he went um i i just wanted to agree
41:36 with him mr david is just the sweetest thing he’s so good to all
41:41 of us and he really anytime you tell
41:44 him thank you or you ask him to do something you’re just
41:46 wonderful david thank you thank you for just
41:50 being wonderful and always helpful um my i’ll read you my letter
41:55 um thank you so much for honoring amy
41:58 tonight for recognizing her for working so hard my name is jenny
42:02 jenright and i’ve been a school bus
42:04 driver for brevard public schools for 10 years i was recognized
42:09 in the fall which is why i knew it was
42:11 okay to do this so i hope a lot of other people will know that
42:14 it’s okay to let people know that
42:16 let let people know that it’s okay to recognize people for doing
42:22 a great job i thought that that
42:23 was really neat that you guys do that um so i was recognized at
42:27 a school board meeting in the fall
42:29 because of a letter sent to you by a parent of one of the school
42:32 students that i drive i wanted to write
42:34 to you about my meadowlane primary instructional assistant her
42:38 name is amy cedar i pick her up
42:40 every morning at 6 20. i just thought you guys should know that
42:44 it’s really that early when i pick her up
42:46 amy’s amazing she goes above and beyond every single day she and
42:51 i are responsible for 62 students on
42:54 our bus among whom are quite a few pre-k kindergarten and ese
42:58 students we would both tell you that we work
43:00 as a team that makes our bus a good place to be and i am so
43:04 grateful to have her there are truly not
43:08 enough words to say thank you for all the things she does but i
43:10 thought everyone should know what an
43:12 incredible person she is and i really do think you are i’ll
43:17 start by just saying amy is dependable
43:20 always there waiting and ready to go when i arrive to pick her
43:23 up though it’s still dark and she has two
43:25 school-aged students of her own to take care of before she can
43:28 begin her adventure with me
43:30 i’ll attempt to list as many of the things as that amy does
43:34 during our routes in the morning and
43:36 afternoon as i can she buckles and unbuckles pre-k students she
43:41 buckles and unbuckles ese
43:43 students which there are quite a few she gets out communication
43:47 tablets for ese students and listens
43:50 to their needs if you don’t know what that is they have tablets
43:53 they they can’t speak many are autistic
43:57 non-verbal and so they have tablets that they push a button on
44:01 to say what they need to communicate
44:04 so she goes to see what it is that they’re trying to communicate
44:07 with us
44:08 she wipes the noses of a lot of students so that seems like not
44:12 a big deal unless you’re doing it a lot
44:18 she goes to or answers the needs of students with their hands up
44:21 for any number of reasons and there
44:23 are a lot of students on this bus y’all she she mediates disagreements
44:29 if you drive even two or
44:31 three kids you know that that’s a thing she helps get pre-k and
44:35 kindergarten tags ready to be checked
44:37 when we get to a bus stop as we’re making sure each student gets
44:40 safely to their listed authorized pickup
44:42 person in the afternoons she reminds the students to get their
44:46 things so that they don’t leave all their
44:48 things on the bus that’s also a big deal that’s in the morning
44:51 and the afternoon after the students
44:53 are off the bus she picks up anything they’ve left behind and
44:56 buckles any unbuckled seat belts that’s
44:58 just a blessing to me that’s something she doesn’t have to do
45:01 that’s something she does just because
45:03 she’s a blessing to me being a bus driver is not an easy job amy
45:06 would be the first one to tell you
45:08 that being an ia is definitely not an easy job either we have
45:12 mutual respect because what we do is
45:14 tough but doing it together as a team makes both of our jobs
45:18 much easier i hope you recognize her and
45:20 join me in telling her how much you appreciate her hard work and
45:23 dedication she definitely deserves it
45:25 thank you so much thank you so much amy let me ask you how long
45:35 have you been with the district six
45:37 years six years awesome awesome thank you so much for all the
45:41 hard work you do there’s no greater honor
45:43 like my board member said than being recognized and acknowledged
45:46 by your by your teammates that
45:47 you’re working alongside we’re going to take a quick photo if
45:49 that’s okay if we can have the other
45:51 group come back up i don’t think we need to go into a formal
45:52 recess we’ll just go ahead and snap a photo
45:54 real quick all right thank you guys
46:21 go ahead and snap a photo and snap a photo and snap a photo and
46:25 snap a photo and snap a photo and snap a photo
46:25 so
47:33 okay
47:38 okay okay so we have again back to all the fun exciting things
47:44 we have so many fun exciting things
47:45 happening tonight so several of our high school students took
47:48 part in the top tech challenge which
47:49 is a statewide automotive competition uh and yes our teams here
47:53 in brevard county did very very well i
47:55 think miss rutledge are you gonna come up and and show us just
47:59 how well these teams did
48:03 absolutely and I’d actually like to bring up our amazing
48:06 instructors this
48:07 evening we have Ed Sabatka from from Rockledge I have Chris
48:11 Wilson and Randy
48:13 Pitts from satellite if you don’t mind joining me up here mm-hmm
48:16 it’ll be great
48:19 so yes we have some amazing automotive students I would put our
48:27 students up
48:29 against any auto kids throughout the state and the nation they
48:33 are super
48:33 competitive and skilled at the work that they do so we had three
48:39 different four
48:41 different teams that placed at the state level in the Universal
48:44 Technical
48:45 Institute statewide competition and I had their instructors here
48:49 to talk just a
48:50 little bit about that have some questions for them also want you
48:53 to hear
48:53 from a student a parent about this but it’s not just the UTI
48:57 competition that
48:59 they excelled in they also excelled in our skills USA
49:02 competition which is
49:04 another career tech student organization that students can
49:07 compete in a variety
49:08 of a variety of activities so instructors please come up here
49:13 real quick I’d like to
49:14 ask you first since we have so many of your students here to
49:17 highlight their
49:18 families what characteristics do you see in your students that
49:21 performed well in
49:22 these competitions
49:22 um when I when I kids starts coming in actually I when they come
49:34 in as a freshman I start looking at their
49:37 potential my number one star student for the past three years I
49:42 pulled him out and put
49:43 him in a competition as a freshman I saw some I saw a spark in
49:47 him and this was
49:49 during COVID and I only had him for six weeks at the time that I
49:53 put him in his
49:53 first competition and he actually pulled out fifth place
49:56 I you know we worked really hard with all our students and
50:01 something I’m very proud of and we’re up for any kind of
50:04 challenge one thing
50:06 that a lot of people don’t really recognize is that when we go
50:09 play other schools that whole school represents a county it’s
50:14 county wide and we got six automotive programs so imagine if we
50:19 all just had one school and we had the best students of all
50:22 nobody that ever touches but we do an amazing job
50:25 to add to what Randy said is you know as the automotive program
50:43 with Brevard County each year that we go to this competition it’s
50:47 always Brevard schools that are finishing up top I remember
50:51 taking a group of students and there’s twenty some schools that
50:54 are finishing up top I remember taking a group of students and
50:54 there’s twenty some schools that are finishing up top I remember
50:54 taking a group of students I remember taking a group of students
50:54 and there’s twenty
50:54 some schools there and they start at I think like tenth place
50:58 and they start going down the list and they’re like oh my god we’re
51:02 at fifth and we’re still not called we must have done terrible
51:05 and the next thing they know they their names are called and
51:09 they’re they’re obviously proud of their accomplishments it’s
51:12 always exciting to go to competitions and see the kids
51:16 I’ve had parents write me letters saying that was their
51:20 highlight of their high school career so it’s always pretty
51:23 rewarding for the students as well as the instructors
51:26 Can I ask a question just because I don’t know what these
51:30 competitions look like I’ve never been to one so can you tell me
51:33 what are they doing when they compete?
51:35 Well this year UTI threatened and says we’re changing the whole
51:40 competition you better be ready and I said I am ready bring it
51:43 on we’re not scared of nobody and we actually pulled out first
51:49 this year we’re actually the first school with a back to back
51:52 first place win ever in the 12 year history
51:56 yeah commendable
52:03 and UTI to me is the most fair competition out there
52:06 um you know nobody really has they don’t have a anybody to root
52:12 for they don’t put you know it’s totally different from the
52:15 other competitions we do uh they don’t have a dog in the fight
52:19 so to speak because when we go to the other at skills USA we
52:23 play against the other school the hosting school has their
52:25 competitors in that competition so they already have a leg up on
52:29 us and when we can still win against the other schools that are
52:33 hosting the competition that’s a big accomplishment I feel
52:35 uh but UTI again they’re fair to everybody and they had rumors
52:42 that some schools had some insight to it so they threatened and
52:46 they changed everything this year
52:48 that’s in serious competition
52:50 can you tell them specifically what types of competitions the
52:54 kids compete in
52:54 okay we did they had to do electrical stations they had to do a
52:59 brake station they had to do an AC station
53:02 um
53:05 written test
53:06 a written test
53:08 and uh there was five different stations
53:10 identification
53:11 and the parks identification with the five different tests that
53:14 they did
53:14 and um
53:15 two of my
53:17 my
53:18 um
53:19 they also had individual trophies this year for the highest
53:23 scores
53:23 my number one guy got a 96
53:25 my number two guy got a 95
53:27 wow
53:28 total of scores
53:29 that’s amazing
53:30 and uh which we were very proud up to
53:32 yeah thank you
53:34 anything else to add on this one
53:37 okay so what I’m hearing is that our automotive students we can
53:42 stack them up against anybody and they’re going to take the win
53:44 right that’s what we want yeah and I told these gentlemen before
53:47 I came up here I have a shirt from all of these schools and
53:50 heritage I also have a shirt from heritage Mr. Brown wasn’t able
53:52 to be here this evening but um I told him I couldn’t pick which
53:55 one so I didn’t wear any
53:56 there you go
54:00 I didn’t want to represent
54:01 keep it the wrong way here
54:02 gotta keep it fair
54:03 okay
54:04 so what are you most proud of with your students
54:06 I think what I’m most proud of with our students is the passion
54:09 uh for the trade um how they excel in school not just in our
54:16 program which obviously they make as much time as possible in
54:21 their day um but uh just uh it carries
54:24 uh it carries over into the rest of their school day as well uh
54:29 we get a lot of um teachers that we share students with that
54:33 will contact us and and ask us about our students and and they’re
54:38 just blown away that they’re as involved and and uh that they
54:44 are you know not just in our program but in in the school is
54:48 general in general um and kind of brag on our school a little
54:52 bit we have a pretty good
54:52 um sense of community in our school and uh we’re very very proud
54:59 of that um so
54:59 what was the question
55:07 what are you most proud of with your students
55:09 um yeah uh they’re passionate about their their uh studies they
55:15 you know they’re obviously in the automotive class because that’s
55:18 what they’re passionate about and most of the the guys that go
55:22 to these competitions uh they’re working in the local dealerships
55:26 here in town i have students working at the lincoln dealerships
55:27 here in town
55:27 i have students working at the lincoln dealer right up the
55:30 street um toyota you name it all the dealerships in this county
55:36 are employing our students so that’s at the end of the day that’s
55:39 our job to get them employed and that’s what we’re trying to
55:42 achieve
55:42 so the students are passionate about you know what they’re doing
55:46 and it shows in the in their future
55:49 all right well thank you so much um and just to kind of feed
55:58 into that i know we were talking about pizza
55:59 in the math classroom well there’s kind of some correlation with
56:05 our mesh classes and our career tech ed
56:07 they’re learning about measurement and math in their automotive
56:10 and we’re not making any pizzas there but
56:12 you know um they’re learning they’re reinforcing those skills
56:14 okay so i’d like to um call up really quickly
56:18 um miss stephanie white she is a parent of one of our automotive
56:22 students she just wanted to um say
56:23 what this program has done for her job
56:30 hi good evening i’ve been a um educator and currently an
56:36 assistant principal with brevard for over 20 years
56:38 um and i’ve been fortunate to see the impact that teachers have
56:43 on students a lot um but tonight i’m wearing my parent hat
56:44 and because i wanted to take the opportunity to recognize mr wilson
56:50 and mr pitts for the program that they run at satellite
56:54 and the influence it has had on my son um their dedication and
56:59 their commitment to their students is unwavering
57:01 they um open their shop up early every morning of the week and
57:06 they have a room full of kids that are there to practice
57:08 they give up their evenings and their weekends to go to
57:12 competitions um that are long and very boring sometimes
57:17 sorry guys um they um bring guest speakers in to talk to the
57:22 kids about different careers
57:24 they have helped them write applications to um scholarship um
57:29 programs um the list goes on and on and on and on
57:32 and i just can’t say enough about what they do um for the
57:35 students at satellite
57:36 and i also just wanted to take a moment to thank mr pruitt and
57:40 miss lundy for supporting the automotive program at satellite
57:43 and i know there’s a time commitment that comes with that so as
57:47 you sit here in your position
57:49 i wanted to just take a moment to say to you as you think about
57:53 cte education continue to support it
57:56 because it is impacting kids on a level you can only begin to
58:01 understand thank you
58:03 jason you want to come up here and say something really quickly
58:10 jason is one of our rock stars that we’re recognizing tonight
58:15 he’s a winner on many many competitions with our from satellite
58:18 thank you for this opportunity tonight to let me speak is this
58:25 on
58:25 the satellite auto tech plays an important role for kids like me
58:32 who are looking for opportunities outside the traditional path
58:35 being in this program the last four years has allowed me to
58:38 become better through competition
58:39 for example i am the back-to-back winner of the universal top
58:43 tech challenge
58:44 this program ran by mr wilson and mr pitts has produced a lot of
58:48 other winners as shown as everybody sitting next to me
58:51 this speaks volumes about our program at satellite
58:56 i chose this program because i am fascinated by cars through my
59:01 competition winnings i have secured a full ride to universal
59:05 technical institute to their nascar school to study cnc machine
59:11 the satellite program has helped many kids like me find a career
59:18 path that we enjoy
59:19 thank you for letting me speak tonight and thank you dr rendell
59:24 and everybody on the board
59:25 thank you jason
59:26 and to wrap it up this evening randy pitts would like to say
59:33 something
59:33 i i have been teaching at satellite high school for 18 years
59:41 and unfortunately i’m going to retire this year
59:45 i’ve had a wonderful career at satellite high school
59:47 it’s i’ve done things that i didn’t know was out there
59:52 i have taken students and one things that
59:55 our backs were against the wall
59:57 and we came out on top
59:59 i’ve had several principals say or a couple principals say
1:00:02 you sure you can do this
1:00:03 sure we can do this
1:00:05 and still come out on top
1:00:06 everything that we have done
1:00:08 we have been in the top percentage of every every competition
1:00:12 that we have ever entered
1:00:13 we’ve done skills usa for triple a
1:00:17 the quaker state best in class challenge
1:00:20 uti
1:00:23 and dealers association dealers uh central florida dealers
1:00:26 competition which we also went to new york city in
1:00:30 uh so i like again thank y’all for supporting the cte program
1:00:35 we have students that come up and saying that i had a couple of
1:00:38 them come today and say
1:00:39 you know if it wasn’t this program i wouldn’t be here at
1:00:42 satellite today
1:00:42 uh it’s the this these type programs keep these kids in school
1:00:47 thank you very much
1:00:49 thank you mr pitts
1:00:52 and randy you’ve made such an impact for our kids over the years
1:00:56 and we are really going to miss you
1:00:57 um but are glad you’re going to get to take that rv
1:01:00 rv and hit the road but i’m very grateful for your for your
1:01:05 service to our kids
1:01:05 so thank you i think we wanted to take a great photo with you
1:01:08 guys
1:01:08 yeah i want to ask something real quick
1:01:10 who wants to speak okay go ahead
1:01:11 so mr pitts if you guys can come up to the podium and i want to
1:01:14 hear from the kids just a yay or nay
1:01:15 one of the things is we have the best career and technical
1:01:18 automotive programs in the state
1:01:20 there’s no doubt you guys win every competition
1:01:22 but the thing is is that when i go to other states north carolina
1:01:25 texas other places like that
1:01:27 schools actually have race car teams
1:01:29 you guys go to gator nationals right didn’t we just do a big
1:01:32 field trip
1:01:32 why isn’t we don’t just have a team a high school team that goes
1:01:36 and competes
1:01:36 would you guys be interested in doing something like that if i
1:01:39 was able to pull it together with them
1:01:40 we take on any kind of talent
1:01:42 it sounds like mr pitts sounds like i might be able to i might
1:01:45 be able to talk you into coming back
1:01:46 that’s what i’m saying
1:01:48 hey from the back the kids would you guys be interested in
1:01:51 something like that
1:01:51 that’s what i’m talking about
1:01:53 he put off his retirement if you do that
1:01:55 i’m serious mr pitts
1:01:56 i’m actually a former drag car racer
1:01:59 i know that and that’s one of the reasons i was talking about it
1:02:02 is because
1:02:03 to be honest with you i’ve seen it and i’ve seen the inspiration
1:02:05 that it gives to the children
1:02:06 when you have a team like that
1:02:08 and they go and they beat a lot of teams that are sponsored by
1:02:11 other programs
1:02:11 and i had a conversation with a couple of people that are very
1:02:14 high influential people in the in the race car industry
1:02:15 and they would be very interested in trying to do something like
1:02:18 that
1:02:18 and now dr rendell is going to fall out of his seat because i’m
1:02:21 talking about putting together race games
1:02:21 but don’t do it
1:02:22 thank you
1:02:23 i i want to jump in there really quick
1:02:25 first of all mr pitts you can’t leave until you find your own
1:02:28 replacement
1:02:28 um so you work on that and then we’ll let you then we’ll let you
1:02:33 retire right
1:02:34 um you said something really important when you talked about the
1:02:38 way other districts do it
1:02:39 because they have a technical center and everybody who’s going
1:02:42 to be a part of the automotive program has to go to that
1:02:44 technical center
1:02:45 i am a huge advocate to continue to do it the way we do it in
1:02:49 brevard because that allows such greater access for students who
1:02:53 going to a technical center that’s 20 30 miles away or farther
1:02:58 is just not going to work for everybody
1:02:59 so we have excellent programs from north to south we have
1:03:02 excellent programs all the way down from heritage up to titusville
1:03:05 teaching students these skills we don’t have it at every high
1:03:08 school but we have it somewhere close so students are passionate
1:03:11 about cars about mechanics about um auto body whatever it is we’ve
1:03:17 got somewhere close by that has a program that they where they
1:03:20 can get this training
1:03:20 and be ready to go out into the workforce so i appreciate the
1:03:24 leadership that was in place before i ever got here to make sure
1:03:27 that we have programs from north to south but
1:03:29 it has to be staffed with people who are passionate and clearly
1:03:33 our our automotive teachers in brevard are passionate and
1:03:37 passing that on to their students so thank you for what you do
1:03:39 and i’m really proud of the work that you guys do from all
1:03:43 across the district
1:03:44 thank you one thing let me some of the teams that we go up
1:03:50 against are actually their vote tech centers and sponsored by
1:03:53 port chrysler general motors are all three of them
1:03:55 so they are multi-million dollar schools uh and we’re still
1:04:01 right in the fighting ring with them we still can hold our own
1:04:05 against them
1:04:05 testimony to your good leadership uh miss jinkins did you want
1:04:08 to say something yeah um i have an exciting announcement for a
1:04:11 new automotive competition it’s a rusted old 2009 hyundai elantra
1:04:15 that’s in my driveway
1:04:17 about 180 000 miles we can see what you guys can do with it um
1:04:21 no i just i didn’t want to i didn’t want to see you walk away
1:04:24 without acknowledging you publicly
1:04:25 mr pitts you are a landmark in the satellite beach community and
1:04:29 um i’m happy for you that you are retiring
1:04:31 but i know that you are going to break a lot of hearts because
1:04:34 there’s some generational families there that
1:04:35 that are going to be a little sad that you’re gone but thank you
1:04:39 for all that you do i hear nothing but wonderful things about
1:04:41 you um
1:04:41 um even for my husband on the soccer field
1:04:45 oh thank you thank you mr trent do you have anything i just want
1:04:50 to say uh job well done guys
1:04:51 and congratulations on your 18 years here and i’m sure you’re
1:04:56 going to continue with that enthusiasm in
1:04:57 your next chapter race car race car thank you again no we truly
1:05:02 appreciate you and this is one of those
1:05:04 life skills that you teach that these these kids will go on to
1:05:06 be men and they’ll teach these lessons to
1:05:08 their sons uh and it really really changes the world for the
1:05:11 better so thank you so so much and i would
1:05:14 vouch to say what do you think your job placement rate is i mean
1:05:16 if you were going to say out of the
1:05:18 students we have where what do you think that is um it’s getting
1:05:22 better and better every year we have
1:05:25 dealers that are calling calling us right now you got any
1:05:28 seniors that we can put to work uh the bigger
1:05:30 problem was the age factor because everybody wants to be 18 but
1:05:34 some of the dealers are starting to hire
1:05:36 people at 17. we got independent shops that are calling us now
1:05:41 for students it took us a long time to
1:05:44 get there but everybody in bevard county knows all about the all
1:05:48 all our programs here in bevard and
1:05:52 you know we got percentage wise it’s hard to really say but we
1:05:56 got several students each program’s got
1:05:59 several students out there in the field right now working and i
1:06:03 try to encourage my students go on to
1:06:05 uti post-secondary because they should be going to post-secondary
1:06:09 before they hit the work world and
1:06:12 out of there they’re just about all getting a job and i would
1:06:16 vouch to say i would vouch that that that
1:06:18 emerged probably significantly high if not close to 100 percent
1:06:22 and our young men and young ladies are
1:06:24 finding opportunities in automotive which is really exciting
1:06:26 even through the internship program their
1:06:28 senior year absolutely dr rendell do you have something you
1:06:31 would like to add i just want to make
1:06:33 sure we have the students here and i believe all the students
1:06:36 here they placed right at the competition so
1:06:39 i want to have a big picture with them up here but i want each
1:06:42 of them to come to the microphone say their name
1:06:44 what school they’re at and where where they placed in the
1:06:46 competition all right so they need they need
1:06:48 some time in the spotlight so let’s get them all up here i know
1:06:51 we got the first place team but we’ve
1:06:52 we’ve got others too and they’ve all placed they’ve all done
1:06:55 really well so we need to get them up here
1:07:06 it’s a hell of a story so name school and what what you guys
1:07:11 placed uh i’m koa kelly
1:07:14 and uh at satellite and i uh we got first place at uh uti talk
1:07:19 tech challenge awesome
1:07:21 jason white i was co his partner and we got first place all
1:07:27 right so you guys line up over here
1:07:33 my name is owen erickson uh my partner is that’s that his name’s
1:07:38 shaffer cook we placed second place
1:07:42 in the automotive competition and got 7 500 scholarships all
1:07:46 right what what school
1:07:48 what school are you guys at what school there we go see all
1:07:54 right my name is bryce gene antonio at
1:07:58 silia high school my partner here is gage underwood and we won
1:08:01 10th place with a thousand dollar
1:08:03 scholarship outstanding
1:08:05 my name is jonathan smith and my friend here is keegan blunt we
1:08:12 both placed fifth place
1:08:13 and got a 1 000 scholarship to uti
1:08:21 from heritage from heritage okay yeah that’s heritage awesome
1:08:24 all right we’re gonna all right big
1:08:25 picture photo with you guys
1:08:26 the the scholarship money was first place was 10 000 per student
1:08:34 second place was 7 500 per student
1:08:36 third place was 5 000 per student and then uh fourth through
1:08:41 tenth all got a thousand per student so
1:08:44 they did really well
1:09:14 so
1:10:14 things we’re celebrating tonight i know you guys are like okay
1:10:16 when is it gonna be our turn
1:10:18 all right we have a student student champions to honor tonight
1:10:22 so during the uh recent florida wrestling
1:10:25 state championship we had a total of 26 wrestlers from nine
1:10:30 schools that medaled
1:10:32 the director for the district athletics kevin robinson are you
1:10:35 here
1:10:35 where is he okay i’m like you back there all right so you’re
1:10:38 going to come to the podium
1:10:39 and showcase some of these young men and women and the
1:10:42 achievements that they have accomplished
1:10:44 good evening was right school board and dr rendell gives me
1:10:51 great pleasure to recognize
1:10:53 the 26 wrestlers who medaled at the state championships earlier
1:10:56 this month including the
1:10:57 two the two wrestlers who won individual state championships so
1:11:01 brevard qualified 52 wrestlers
1:11:04 from 12 schools all together for the state tournament and
1:11:07 exactly half of those wrestlers earned medals for
1:11:11 placing in the top eight in their respective weight classes um
1:11:15 miss wright and dr rendell i invite
1:11:18 you guys down to come to the front and center don’t be nervous
1:11:27 this is not a demonstration so
1:11:42 that’s why you’re not begging okay students when i call your
1:11:47 name come to the front shake hands with
1:11:49 miss wright and dr rendell and then move to the far side of the
1:11:52 days we will go alphabetically by
1:11:55 school uh first up from astronaut high school preston pinero was
1:11:59 seventh place in the state
1:12:02 i don’t think preston could make it tonight but still wanted to
1:12:05 recognize him um from coco high school
1:12:09 we have cole webb seventh place in the state also
1:12:24 and from coco beach high school adrian day fifth in the state
1:12:35 billy day seventh place in the state
1:12:39 and madden fredenberg third place in the state as a freshman
1:12:49 and next up from heritage high school the first state champion
1:13:12 in school history at heritage high
1:13:15 high school solomon peterson
1:13:25 and seventh place in the state is gustavo ferrera
1:13:37 keith cole was fifth in the state
1:13:50 and finally harper noel was fifth place in his weight class
1:14:05 next up is merritt island high school
1:14:09 and first up we have state champion caleb ivy
1:14:19 trey drigget placed eighth in the state
1:14:32 and landon quiroga finished up sixth place in his weight class
1:14:39 since we’re on merritt island high school i also want to kind of
1:14:43 take a minute to uh to give a shout
1:14:45 out to former merritt island high school state champ elijah lusk
1:14:49 who is now wrestling for lander
1:14:50 university uh the reason i’m saying is because elijah last
1:14:54 weekend placed sixth in the ncaa division two
1:14:57 national tournament helping his team to a second place finish
1:15:00 overall so with that finish elijah is now a two-time
1:15:04 all-american as a junior so it’s just good to see uh brevard
1:15:08 wrestlers having success at the college level also
1:15:11 and from palm bay high school we have chris brunson fourth place
1:15:19 in the state
1:15:20 leonard christian also fourth place in the state
1:15:31 and octavian osby third in the state
1:15:42 also placing for palm bay high school at eighth place in the
1:15:46 state raymond jackson
1:15:48 raymond couldn’t be here tonight
1:15:52 next up from satellite high school ryan burn third in the state
1:15:58 ryan will be wrestling at duke university next year
1:16:09 anthony dix fourth place in the state
1:16:19 and jake giovino second place in the state
1:16:30 next up from titusville high school parker bryant seventh in the
1:16:40 state
1:16:42 and from viera high school alex giletti fifth place in the state
1:16:58 and emma hoppy second place in the state
1:17:09 catalina kenny fifth place in the state
1:17:12 brian mitchell sixth in state
1:17:28 and edwin torres eighth in state
1:17:32 congrats to all of our wrestlers who are in state medals this
1:17:45 season i am super proud of all these
1:17:47 wrestlers and coaches for their accomplishments and for all the
1:17:50 hard work that they put in to get
1:17:51 there in fact we have some of the coaches here today i want to
1:17:54 ask you guys to go ahead and stand and be
1:17:56 recognized for all your hard work
1:17:58 board members and dr indell would you guys like to say anything
1:18:19 absolutely coaches come on down
1:18:41 so
1:19:52 we’re going to be here we’re going to be here we’re going to be
1:20:01 here we’re going to be
1:20:04 we’re going to be here we’re going to be here we’re going to be
1:20:06 here we’re going to be here
1:20:16 life but we just want to say hey we’re proud of you guys we
1:20:18 recognize you guys and way to go
1:20:21 represent our county very well can i i want to just say before
1:20:29 the coaches leave when you all
1:20:34 were asked to stand up you all were very humble and of course
1:20:36 didn’t want to take recognition but
1:20:38 i i just want to give another hats off to you guys because
1:20:42 anyone who’s working in our athletics
1:20:44 department is not getting paid enough for the job that they do
1:20:46 in the first place you do this
1:20:48 because you love it and you love those kids and you support them
1:20:50 so thank you and congratulations
1:20:51 so many people don’t know this but our female wrestling is the
1:20:59 highest and fastest growing
1:21:02 portion of our female athletes and what we have is is the um
1:21:07 situation where a couple of years ago one
1:21:10 of the coaches advocated for us to put in stipends for female
1:21:14 coaches and that’s truly what really
1:21:16 blew up the uh female coaching for wrestling and as a former
1:21:19 coach that coached wrestling it was the
1:21:22 most demanding sport i’ve ever coached in my life i’ve coached
1:21:25 almost every one of them at the high
1:21:27 school level but that was incredible and what those kids did at
1:21:30 a state championship is unheard of so
1:21:32 i just wanted to say very impressive that’s a growing sport yes
1:21:36 all right so all right we have one more group i think that we
1:21:39 are we are recognizing tonight so i know you guys are patiently
1:21:39 waiting and and we appreciate the patience there so we are going
1:21:39 to invite is miss cindy lisinski available or is she she’s
1:21:39 coming up to the podium all right good we are going to honor our
1:21:39 school bookkeepers uh this will be the second round that we’re
1:21:39 honoring we did honor a group uh in february 6th but we want to
1:21:39 remain we want to honor the remaining school bookkeepers that we
1:21:39 did not get in that batch so miss lisinski
1:21:39 can you come up and i think you have prepared i think you have
1:21:46 prepared for the list
1:21:46 thank you thank you so much for recognizing tonight so i know
1:21:51 you guys are patiently waiting and and we appreciate the
1:21:52 patience there so we are going to invite is miss cindy lisinski
1:21:53 available or is she she’s coming up to the podium all right good
1:21:54 we are going to honor our school bookkeepers
1:21:54 uh this will be the second round that we’re honoring we did
1:21:56 honor a group uh in february 6th but we want to remain we want
1:22:00 to honor the remaining school bookkeepers that we did not get in
1:22:01 that batch so miss lisinski can you come up and i think you have
1:22:08 prepared
1:22:08 all right okay tonight we are pleased to honor and celebrate the
1:22:14 outstanding achievements of our district schools in the area of
1:22:18 financial management and accountability as you may know every
1:22:22 year our schools are required by state law to undergo an
1:22:25 internal accounts audit this audit examines how our schools
1:22:29 handle the funds that are raised collected and spent for student
1:22:33 activities such as field trips clubs teams and events these
1:22:38 funds are
1:22:38 are vital for enriching the educational experience for our
1:22:43 students but they also pose a high risk of fraud misuse or error
1:22:47 that is why we need to ensure our schools follow the best
1:22:50 practices of internal controls and comply with state statutes
1:22:55 and board policy
1:22:56 are accounting firm rsm audited the financial records and
1:23:01 procedures at each of our schools they checked for accuracy timeliness
1:23:05 completeness authorization documentation and compliance in
1:23:10 various areas such as receipts deposit expenditures fundraising
1:23:16 sales tax and petty cash they also issued a final report for
1:23:20 each school which indicated whether there were any audit
1:23:24 findings or not a report of no
1:23:26 any audit findings means that the auditors did not find any
1:23:33 issues or errors in the area
1:23:33 in the area
1:23:33 and it reflects the high level of professionalism integrity and
1:23:42 excellent that our school leaders and staff demonstrate every
1:23:47 day the research is clear leaders of schools who demonstrate the
1:23:51 highest level of financial stewardship and spend money wisely
1:23:55 have a significant impact on
1:23:56 significant impact on positive student outcomes it is also
1:24:03 extremely important that we provide confidence to the board and
1:24:03 our community that our schools maintain rigorous internal
1:24:03 controls and make every dollar count
1:24:03 so i would like to invite each bookkeeper and their principal so
1:24:10 apollo elementary bookkeepers deborah bryant principal amy delago
1:24:10 so apollo elementary bookkeepers deborah bryant principal amy
1:24:17 delago
1:24:17 so apollo elementary bookkeepers deborah bryant principal amy
1:24:24 delago
1:24:24 atlantis elementary rebecca emick and erica back is the
1:24:28 principal
1:24:29 atlantis elementary rebecca emick and erica back is the
1:24:36 principal
1:24:36 atlantis elementary rebecca emick and erica back is the
1:24:43 principal
1:24:43 atlantis elementary rebecca emick and erica back is the
1:24:51 principal
1:24:51 uh… shinawa long shinawa long shinawa sorry long and the
1:24:58 principal’s
1:24:58 nicole uh… gaiman
1:24:58 jemini elementary uh… bookkeeper dd rich and principal christina
1:25:05 carver
1:25:05 uh… harbor city elementary uh… bookkeeper is lisa marie kelly
1:25:15 and the principal is christine boyd
1:25:22 uh… harbor city elementary
1:25:24 uh… bookkeeper is lisa marie kelly
1:25:28 and the principal is christine boyd
1:25:31 india atlantis elementary uh… uh… lynette torres is not
1:25:48 attending
1:25:48 but the principal is accepting for her uh… colleen lord
1:25:53 longleaf elementary the bookkeeper is carlene uh… caesar and
1:26:03 principal jason sherburne
1:26:10 um… metal lake intermediate the bookkeeper is sarah blake
1:26:17 yay and the principal’s uh… sarah barnett
1:26:24 ralph williams elementary the bookkeeper is lisa moore
1:26:35 and principal susan schroeder
1:26:38 applause
1:26:47 south lake elementary bookkeeper is uh… jackie sellers and
1:26:53 principal jennifer brockwell
1:26:55 applause
1:27:01 uh… stone middle uh… bookkeeper is denise olsen
1:27:09 and the principal’s courtney lundy
1:27:12 applause
1:27:15 sundry elementary the bookkeeper is kelly mogford
1:27:22 applause
1:27:23 and principal sherry tressler
1:27:26 applause
1:27:29 university park elementary the bookkeeper is tanya hales
1:27:44 and principal anna diaz
1:27:50 applause
1:27:52 and our last school is vera hi uh… bookkeeper renee ambrose
1:27:56 with principal heather legate
1:27:58 applause
1:27:59 thank you all
1:28:08 all right
1:28:09 more do you want to come down to the studio?
1:28:10 yeah
1:28:11 perfect all of it is a very awesome thing to happen
1:28:13 but all of the book
1:28:14 we’re going to talk about it
1:28:37 and we’re going to talk about it
1:28:38 Thank you.
1:29:30 um let’s go ahead and
1:29:36 i’ll give them just a minute yeah i just met at some time we
1:29:42 will yes we have the proclamation
1:29:46 yeah that’s after the agenda adoption of the agenda and then i
1:29:50 say let’s do the proclamation
1:29:52 so that those guys can go and then we’ll break before before we
1:29:54 go into public comment is that
1:29:55 fair do we have do we have administrators do we have what oh the
1:29:59 administrators are after yep yeah
1:30:02 yeah all right we’re back okay wonderful so i thought we were
1:30:08 not going to get here guys but
1:30:11 we’re here we’re here all right this brings us to the adoption
1:30:14 of the agenda dr rendell thank you
1:30:17 madam chair on this evening’s agenda we have a resolution
1:30:20 administrative staff recommendations
1:30:22 26 consent items two action items and one information item
1:30:26 the additional items are i-44 code of conduct and the revised
1:30:33 items are b10 bookkeeper audit
1:30:35 recognition and c12 kindness all around symbol resolution
1:30:40 all right all right on tonight’s agenda we have something very
1:30:56 very special we have the resolution
1:30:58 for the kindness all around symbol this is a national symbol
1:31:01 that was created by our students
1:31:02 and our staff right here in tropical elementary we invite these
1:31:05 students tonight i think we have a couple
1:31:07 that are kind of come up i believe and read the proclamation is
1:31:11 that
1:31:12 it’s miss bar are you coming up as well okay
1:31:15 is this is the step school still there for the
1:31:27 okay perfect
1:31:29 thank you for having us today dr rendell ladies and gentlemen of
1:31:53 the school board i wish all the
1:31:54 razzlers were still here they really filled up the auditorium
1:31:59 um we’re um celebrating the fifth anniversary of the kindness um
1:32:04 symbol and we appreciate the adoption of it five years ago the
1:32:08 kindness symbol started with my tk class in 2018 we were
1:32:13 studying patriots day and the ten days of peace and the children
1:32:17 told me that people should be kind and that they believe that if
1:32:21 people saw a symbol of kindness it would remind them of the
1:32:24 to be kind so we developed a kindness symbol and we gave it to
1:32:29 the world the world the students proceeded to follow their own
1:32:29 advice they were kind to each other in our classroom and out
1:32:29 they were role models to each other they stood up for each other
1:32:29 they helped each other they didn’t just act kind they also paid
1:32:29 it forward literally they read thousands of books to earn more
1:32:29 than a thousand dollars to donate to their chosen charities such
1:32:29 as
1:32:29 the children’s hunger project aging matters and lessons with
1:32:34 love they gave it to the world the people who gave it to the
1:32:35 world they gave it to the world the students proceeded to follow
1:32:36 their own advice they were kind to each other in our classroom
1:32:36 and out they were role models to each other they stood up for
1:32:39 each other they helped each other they didn’t just act kind they
1:32:44 also paid it forward literally
1:32:47 they read thousands of books to earn more than a thousand
1:32:51 dollars to donate to their children’s charity such as the
1:32:54 children’s hunger project aging matters and lessons with love
1:32:58 feed the kids help the grandparents and help people across the
1:33:02 world and through it all they had a high level of learning when
1:33:07 you read thousands of books you become a great reader
1:33:10 i’d like to share a few quotes um some of my favorite quotes
1:33:20 that my students wrote throughout the years i want you to know
1:33:24 that when they wrote these quotes they were six years old six
1:33:28 you’re going to be impressed
1:33:31 kindness is important because it is like peace rosalie kindness
1:33:42 is important because it shows a caring personality julia said
1:33:48 that all these students are not here right now these are just
1:33:53 some of my other ones but rosie’s here and so it’s tommy we’re
1:33:57 going to get to his
1:33:58 kind people will ask if you’re feeling left out kind people will
1:34:02 stick up for other people katalaya
1:34:05 kindness is important because it will make people happy and then
1:34:09 people will spread it
1:34:11 noah kindness is important because it will help people feel
1:34:16 loved
1:34:17 tommy
1:34:22 kindness is important because it will make the world a better
1:34:26 place
1:34:27 kindness
1:34:32 lyra
1:34:33 six years old
1:34:34 that is a good one
1:34:35 from the mouths and hearts of our early childhood learners they
1:34:37 have been telling us what kind of world they want to live in
1:34:40 if we only choose to listen and act
1:34:42 let’s help them reach their dream of a kinder world
1:34:45 be kind act kind and spread the kindness symbol
1:34:48 i’d like to introduce our readers for tonight
1:34:53 uh they include i’m going to include the year they were in my tk
1:34:57 classroom also so you can see that it did span throughout the
1:35:00 years
1:35:00 uh rosalie will be our first reader she’s 2019-20 class
1:35:07 uh denver i did not have the honor of being denver’s teacher but
1:35:12 denver wanted to join our kindness project and so he’s here with
1:35:16 his siblings uh shoal our 2020 through 2022 class uh tommy 2019-2020
1:35:23 class august 2018-2019-2019 class
1:35:27 august 2018-2019 class
1:35:34 august and malachi were here five years ago reading the kindness
1:35:39 proclamation before the board at that time
1:35:42 um i have to tell you i’m so proud of these students
1:35:45 not for what they’ve done but also for their patience and
1:35:48 sitting in the audience
1:35:49 for an hour and a half
1:35:55 and i’m also proud of our other students who just couldn’t make
1:35:59 it today for conflicting uh uh experiences they had
1:36:03 thank you again for having us and i’m gonna leave it to the kids
1:36:06 all right
1:36:07 i put paper right here too if you need it
1:36:09 there we go
1:36:13 you’re gonna do great rosalie
1:36:19 great rosalie
1:36:22 hey quiet tommy
1:36:26 it’s okay you’ve done this before
1:36:34 i know we’re good
1:36:37 a resolution of the school board
1:36:40 of the school board
1:36:42 of
1:36:45 barbara county
1:36:47 we
1:36:48 and i can i sing the five-year anniversary of the kindness all
1:37:14 around symbol whereas this kindness
1:37:17 symbol
1:37:18 and
1:37:19 you’re doing great
1:37:24 you’re doing so good
1:37:25 initiative started in the tk1 transitional kindergarten
1:37:32 classroom at tropical elementary and merritt island and
1:37:35 whereas wait where are the tropical class determined having to
1:37:44 have a family
1:37:45 symbol for kindness would help make people more aware of
1:37:53 kindness in their everyday lives and
1:37:57 since then the kindness symbol has received many recognitions
1:38:05 including a resolution from the preferred school board on february
1:38:11 26 2019
1:38:12 on february 19th 2020 the florida house of representatives and
1:38:23 the florida senate both signed resolutions recognizing the
1:38:27 creation of and proclamation of the kindness symbol and
1:38:27 of the kindness symbol and
1:38:42 i don’t need this
1:38:49 i think
1:38:59 Whereas on March 5th, 2020, U.S. House Resolution 887 was
1:39:07 referred to the Committee on Education and Labor.
1:39:11 On March 6th, 2020, Representative Posey submitted remarks to
1:39:17 the Congressional Record recognizing the kindness symbol, and on
1:39:22 June 29th, 2021, U.S. House Resolution 509, submitted by
1:39:29 Representative Posey and co-sponsored by Representative Darren Soto,
1:39:36 Representative Brian Mast, and Representative Maria Elvira Salivar,
1:39:43 making it a bipartisan resolution, was also referred to the
1:39:52 Committee on Education and Labor.
1:40:03 Now, therefore, be it resolved by the School Board of Brevard
1:40:07 County, Florida, that the fifth anniversary of the kindness all
1:40:12 around the symbol is hereby recognized with all parents,
1:40:16 students, community members, residents, and visitors of Brevard
1:40:20 County, Florida, encouraged to use and promote this official
1:40:25 symbol of kindness.
1:40:28 Adopted in regular session of the School Board of Brevard County
1:40:32 on this 19th day of March 2024.
1:40:35 Okay, we’re going to go ahead.
1:40:44 Do I have a motion?
1:40:45 And then we’ll open this up for discussion.
1:40:47 Move to approve.
1:40:48 Second.
1:40:48 All right.
1:40:49 Any discussion?
1:40:50 I, yeah, I, I am going to say this as fast as I possibly can,
1:40:54 but, uh, because this is going to be my last year where this is
1:40:58 happening, I have to take a moment to say this to you, Ms. Volcox.
1:41:01 And I think I’ve said this previously in the past super fast,
1:41:04 but I, I don’t care, I’m going to get into it.
1:41:07 You are the most incredible teacher and you are the reason I am
1:41:10 an educator today.
1:41:12 And I’ve been able to share this story this past year.
1:41:15 I’ve been going out and speaking at events and I, I always feel
1:41:18 the need to share my why and I’ve never really had the
1:41:20 opportunity to do it.
1:41:21 And I just need to acknowledge that.
1:41:23 My mom, when she was really ill, my parents made a last minute
1:41:26 decision to move to Florida.
1:41:27 And so I made a last minute decision to join them and I wasn’t
1:41:31 happy and I failed out of college and they told me, come to Brevard
1:41:35 County, get your AA, we’ll send you back to New York.
1:41:38 And so I did.
1:41:38 And I took like 24 credits in one semester because I wanted to
1:41:41 get out of here.
1:41:42 And I took random classes that I could care less about.
1:41:46 I wanted to be a business major and go work on wall street, but
1:41:49 I took an elementary education course that forced me to come to
1:41:52 you at Endeavor Elementary.
1:41:55 And I spent that day with you and I have never met a person who
1:41:58 had loved their passion, their profession and their children so
1:42:02 much.
1:42:03 You forever changed my life and you changed my trajectory from
1:42:06 that day forward.
1:42:07 And I need you to know that.
1:42:09 And I thank you for that.
1:42:10 And my husband thanks you for that because I met him in that
1:42:13 class too.
1:42:13 So thank you.
1:42:16 And I just want to say, you guys are so brave to stand up here
1:42:20 in front of all of us funny looking adults standing behind a
1:42:25 wooden platform.
1:42:26 You were amazing.
1:42:28 Great job.
1:42:33 Well, it is my honor to have been on the board, you know, twice
1:42:39 for you guys to come around.
1:42:41 And I’m so glad, Ms. Wilcox, that you brought some of the
1:42:44 original TK-1ers.
1:42:45 Are you guys in fifth grade or sixth grade?
1:42:47 Fourth.
1:42:48 No, the oldest ones.
1:42:50 You’re in fifth.
1:42:52 Wow.
1:42:53 What, you know what, when this initiative, when those kids hit
1:42:56 middle school, it’s just going to change middle school, right?
1:42:59 I just want to share, do a little advertising, a little promo
1:43:02 for you.
1:43:03 You can go to togetherkind.com and get all the history and all
1:43:07 the places that should have listed, all the places that have
1:43:11 adopted this symbol, right?
1:43:13 Which is not just the school board and the state, but also the
1:43:15 county commissioners did it, some of the cities did it.
1:43:18 You can get a history of what this symbol has done, and it also
1:43:21 will link you, if you want to get your very own shirt, to the
1:43:23 Etsy shop.
1:43:24 I’m going to stand up so you can see my shirt.
1:43:27 But it’s, you know what, you guys, this isn’t just for
1:43:32 kindergarten, first grade, second grade, third grade.
1:43:37 Every single one of us in this room needs to remember the
1:43:40 importance of kindness and how we treat one another.
1:43:43 Because in this room, there’s people who don’t agree with each
1:43:46 other.
1:43:46 But we have a choice.
1:43:48 We can say what we need to say with kindness, or we can say it
1:43:51 unkindly.
1:43:52 And which one do you think everybody else wants to hear?
1:43:56 With kindness.
1:43:58 Right, exactly.
1:43:59 And you know what?
1:44:00 I’m a big believer that regardless of what you have to say, you
1:44:03 can always say it and do it kindly.
1:44:05 So thank you for reminding us of that tonight.
1:44:07 You guys are amazing.
1:44:08 And I’ll be very proud to vote in favor of this in just a few
1:44:11 seconds.
1:44:11 Thank you, Ms. Campbell.
1:44:14 Mr. Susan?
1:44:14 I just wanted to say thank you for you guys coming out.
1:44:16 Thank you so much for what you guys are persevering to do.
1:44:20 I appreciate you and all your dedication as an educator.
1:44:22 Thank you.
1:44:23 Mr. Trent?
1:44:24 Same.
1:44:25 Guys, reading in public is not the easiest, right?
1:44:30 And you guys, it’ll be, hey, you broke the ice.
1:44:33 You finished it.
1:44:34 So, you know, you faced that fear and overcame it.
1:44:38 So from now on, it’s going to be, nobody’s going to be able to
1:44:41 shut you up now.
1:44:43 You’re going to be able to read in front of anyone and as many
1:44:45 people as possible.
1:44:45 So that’s great.
1:44:48 Thank you so much for putting this forward.
1:44:50 Yes.
1:44:51 Thank you guys so much.
1:44:53 I want to share little, Rosalie, I see you back there.
1:44:55 You came up and you were so kind to give us a sticker to remind
1:44:59 us, which I have put on my laptop.
1:45:01 I think some of my fellow board members have stuck there some
1:45:03 different places.
1:45:04 But you gave me a post-it note, too, and it says, you have the
1:45:07 power to change the world simply by being an example of kindness.
1:45:10 And so I’m going to keep this.
1:45:12 I’m going to keep it up here at all times.
1:45:13 So I’ll never forget that that is why we should always, always,
1:45:16 always display our behavior.
1:45:18 So thank you guys so much.
1:45:19 I am so happy to proudly vote yes for this.
1:45:22 The world needs more kindness, and I appreciate you guys taking
1:45:24 the initiative to spread it.
1:45:26 So, all right.
1:45:27 Any other further discussions?
1:45:28 No.
1:45:30 Paul, roll call, please.
1:45:31 Ms. Jenkins?
1:45:31 Aye.
1:45:32 Ms. Campbell?
1:45:33 Aye.
1:45:33 Ms. Wright?
1:45:34 Aye.
1:45:34 Mr. Trent?
1:45:35 Aye.
1:45:35 Mr. Susan?
1:45:36 Aye.
1:45:36 It passes 5-0.
1:45:38 The kindness resolution stays.
1:45:40 Thank you guys so much.
1:45:41 Yep.
1:45:44 Can we take a picture with you guys?
1:45:46 Is that okay down front?
1:46:04 Thank you.
1:47:04 All right.
1:47:20 Are you guys okay if we take a short recess?
1:47:23 I need to go to the restroom.
1:47:24 So can we take a 10-minute recess and resume back at 722?
1:47:30 All right.
1:47:31 Thank you.
1:53:26 all right thank you my mic runs off right for the short break
1:53:38 all right we are now at the
1:53:41 administrative staff recommendations do I hear a motion any
1:53:46 discussion no Paul roll call please
1:53:50 Ms. Jenkins Ms. Campbell Ms. Wright Mr. Trent Mr. Susan all
1:53:55 right we don’t have any of these
1:53:57 individuals I believe that are present is that correct no ma’am
1:53:59 okay so we are now moving on
1:54:01 to the public comments portion of the meeting how many public
1:54:04 comments do we have tonight all right
1:54:06 we have 18 speakers this evening you will each receive three
1:54:10 minutes in an effort to remain
1:54:11 unbiased the speakers at the podium I will ask the parliamentarian
1:54:14 who is our board attorney to
1:54:16 announce the speakers and manage the time clock I’d like to take
1:54:19 this opportunity to remind the
1:54:20 public of the rules written out in board policy 0169.1 all
1:54:24 comments should be directed at the board
1:54:26 or individual board members staff members or other individuals
1:54:29 shall not be addressed by name
1:54:31 abusive obscene or irrelevant comments will not be permitted
1:54:34 orderly conduct is expected from all
1:54:36 public comment participants and the presiding officer may
1:54:39 interrupt warn or terminate a participants
1:54:41 public comment opportunity Mr. Gibbs can you please call the
1:54:44 first three speakers
1:54:45 Thanks Brooke Bothan Albert Underwood and Kathleen Ruega
1:54:50 According to the CDC the second leading cause of death for
1:55:07 children ages 5 to 14 is drowning
1:55:09 these unfortunate deaths however can be prevented through
1:55:12 structured water safety programming my company
1:55:15 aquatics and education would like to spearhead such a program in
1:55:17 Brevard County starting with a $10,000 grant
1:55:20 I’ve already secured to implement such needed programming the
1:55:23 key to prevention is education given ongoing concern of drowning
1:55:28 especially among children and those in lower income areas
1:55:30 emphasizing water safety on par with academic education can save
1:55:35 a life without ensuring the safety of our students the chance to
1:55:39 impact academic success is compromised in pursuit of my goal to
1:55:42 lead drought and prevention efforts I forged part of the
1:55:45 partnership with institutions like palm bay fire department and
1:55:50 actively serve national state and
1:55:50 local drowning prevention and community coach and community
1:55:53 coach in addition to classroom water safety and community coach
1:55:55 in addition to classroom water safety and formal swim lessons
1:55:55 are also needed as they decrease the risk of drowning by 88%
1:55:55 unfortunately Brevard County struggles with restricted pool
1:55:55 access
1:55:55 swim instructor, and community coach.
1:55:58 In addition to classroom water safety,
1:56:00 formal swim lessons are also needed
1:56:02 as they decrease the risk of drowning by 88%.
1:56:05 Unfortunately, Brevard County struggles
1:56:07 with restricted pool access.
1:56:09 Additionally, inclement weather and limited access
1:56:11 to heated pools during colder months
1:56:13 lead to numerous cancellations of swim lessons,
1:56:16 which impacts our ability to effectively save lives
1:56:19 through experiential learning.
1:56:21 For these reasons, I urge the school board
1:56:23 to protect the last remaining indoor pool,
1:56:26 elementary school pool at Dr. W.J. Creel Elementary.
1:56:30 I’m aware of all countermeasures
1:56:32 given to destroy this pool.
1:56:34 However, I believe we can work together
1:56:35 through a collective commitment from the district.
1:56:38 We can bring this life-saving instruction to our community.
1:56:41 Along with the $10,000 grant I’ve already secured,
1:56:44 the 2024 legislation introduced a program
1:56:46 allocating $500,000 for swim lessons to low-income families.
1:56:50 It is necessary for us as the leaders in Brevard County
1:56:53 to embrace this new legislation.
1:56:56 This initiative could not only revive Creel Elementary’s
1:56:59 adaptive swim program, but also cater to the entire campus
1:57:03 where 100% of the students are eligible for free reduced lunch
1:57:06 as reported from the childcare food program.
1:57:09 Once Creel students are served,
1:57:11 I would love to extend this program
1:57:12 to other Title I elementary schools,
1:57:14 providing after-school access to those in need.
1:57:17 This program adhere to the same guidelines as high school pools
1:57:20 where this asset can be granted similar privileges.
1:57:24 Creel pool could offer summer enrichment programs to the
1:57:27 students
1:57:28 as well as certification coordinates for older students.
1:57:30 Myla Elementary previously supported similar initiatives.
1:57:33 However, regrettably, that pool was closed down along with
1:57:36 others.
1:57:36 Again, Creel has the last remaining elementary school pool.
1:57:40 Drowning has a ripple effect on the community.
1:57:42 The first responders cannot erase the memory of going to those
1:57:50 scenes.
1:57:51 Friends, families shaken from the tragedy.
1:57:53 The teachers can’t comprehend the sudden loss
1:57:56 of a promising life we have.
1:57:58 I urge the board to prioritize water safety education.
1:58:02 My name is Brooke Bothan.
1:58:03 It would be an honor to join forces and work together
1:58:06 as a collective commitment.
1:58:07 Thank you.
1:58:08 Thank you, Brooke.
1:58:12 Albert Underwood, followed by Kathleen Ruega and Gina Derring.
1:58:18 Madam Chair, distinguished board, my name is Albert Underwood,
1:58:22 Satellite High School, class of ‘72.
1:58:24 I am the CEO of Aqua Blue Pools in Melbourne, Florida, started
1:58:30 by my mom and dad in 1969.
1:58:33 We are the builders of the Creel Elementary School back in the
1:58:36 day when we put the pool in.
1:58:39 I have served in a lot of capacities in the swimming pool
1:58:42 industry.
1:58:43 I currently serve as the local president of the Florida Swimming
1:58:46 Pool Association’s chapter
1:58:48 here in Bavard County.
1:58:51 I want you to know that the FSPA has always been the
1:58:54 spokesperson for the swimming pool industry.
1:58:57 They are the leading voice.
1:58:59 We have over 750 members and an economic impact last year of
1:59:04 over $12 billion.
1:59:06 The swimming pool industry is a valuable asset to the state of
1:59:10 Florida.
1:59:11 There’s always been a concern about child safety.
1:59:14 The FSPA has always, in its 60 years, had water safety and child
1:59:20 drowning issues on the forefront.
1:59:24 Very concerned about it.
1:59:25 I want you to know that the industry supports this endeavor.
1:59:29 We established a foundation a number of years ago, the Florida
1:59:35 Swimming Foundation.
1:59:36 It has an ongoing fund source to help financially support the
1:59:44 effort.
1:59:46 We also have a giant body of expertise that’s willing and able
1:59:51 to help support any kind of
1:59:54 endeavor to help save children’s lives.
1:59:57 Because ultimately that’s what we want.
1:59:58 We want every child as a swimmer and whatever we can do to help
2:00:02 achieve that goal is what
2:00:04 we want to do.
2:00:06 The industry a number of years ago embraced doing pool alarms,
2:00:10 safety fence, automatic door
2:00:13 closures.
2:00:14 None of that stuff does near as good as water safety education,
2:00:19 adult supervision, and training.
2:00:22 We can save lives that way.
2:00:24 We had one device that was supposed to automatically close a
2:00:28 sliding glass door around a pool.
2:00:30 As everyone knows in Florida we have sliding glass doors
2:00:33 everywhere.
2:00:34 We actually were designing a guillotine is what that thing was.
2:00:38 That wasn’t going to save anyone’s life.
2:00:40 We currently put an alarm on a pool that’s made overseas
2:00:44 somewhere at an expense of $185 per
2:00:47 alarm.
2:00:48 That’s not going to save a child’s life.
2:00:52 It’s all smoke and mirrors.
2:00:53 What’s going to save a child’s life is education, training.
2:00:57 And Brooke, when she joined our group a few years ago, it has
2:01:02 been a whirlwind.
2:01:03 We think we can bring this to reality.
2:01:05 We asked the school board to consider supporting this endeavor.
2:01:09 I think we can do it.
2:01:10 We’re willing and able to help them do it.
2:01:12 We want to save children.
2:01:13 We want every child to be a swimmer.
2:01:15 Thank you very much.
2:01:16 Thank you.
2:01:19 Kathleen Ruega, Gina Derring, and Bernard Bryan.
2:01:23 Hi, my name is Kathleen Ruesca.
2:01:26 I’m actually here on behalf of Carrie McGovern.
2:01:30 She’s the Every Child a Swimmer Program Manager for the state of
2:01:34 Florida.
2:01:34 And I don’t know if you’re all familiar with the Every Child a
2:01:38 Swimmer Law.
2:01:39 It went into effect in 2022-23 school year.
2:01:43 Each public school shall provide a parent who initially enrolls
2:01:46 his or her child in the school information on the important role,
2:01:50 water safety, education, and courses in swimming, lessons play,
2:01:54 and saving lives.
2:01:55 The number one cause of death for kids from one to four years
2:01:58 old is drowning.
2:02:00 The second cause of death for kids from four years to 15 is
2:02:03 drowning.
2:02:04 This is a letter from Carrie, she couldn’t be here, from Casey,
2:02:08 I’m sorry.
2:02:09 To the esteemed members of the school board, my name is Casey McGovern.
2:02:14 I am the mother of a drowning victim.
2:02:15 My daughter passed away from a drowning in our backyard pool in
2:02:19 2009.
2:02:20 Upon saying goodbye to her, I made a promise to commit my life
2:02:25 to educating others on the risk factors associated to drowning.
2:02:29 I have dedicated my life to the topic of water safety and
2:02:33 drowning prevention, holding the position of the Drowning
2:02:36 Prevention Program Manager for the Department of Health of Broward
2:02:40 County, as well as sitting on many statewide committees, I am
2:02:44 now leading the efforts for Every Child a Swimmer Program, a
2:02:48 program that passed legislation in our state mandating all
2:02:51 schools to share water safety information and where to go for
2:02:56 local swim lessons.
2:02:58 The program also provides learn to swim scholarships for quality
2:03:02 lessons up to three months for children from low income families.
2:03:06 I come before you today with a heartfelt plea to endorse Brooke
2:03:10 Bothan as the implementer of a water safety program at Dr. W.J.
2:03:15 Cleel in elementary.
2:03:16 As we deliberate on the crucial issues of water safety, it is
2:03:21 imperative that we entrust this responsibility to a dedicated
2:03:25 and qualified individual
2:03:26 who possesses both the passion and expertise necessary to make a
2:03:30 meaningful impact on the lives of youth.
2:03:34 Brooke’s passion and expertise, I’m sorry, books on wavering
2:03:37 commitment to the safety and well-being of children is evidence
2:03:41 in her extensive experience and proven track record in the field
2:03:44 of aquatic education.
2:03:46 With a background in swimming instruction and lifeguarding,
2:03:49 Brooke brings a wealth of knowledge and practical skills to the
2:03:52 table, making her eminently qualified to lead a water safety
2:03:57 program at our school.
2:03:58 The proposed closure of the school only jeopardizes recreational
2:04:01 opportunities, but also undermines our commitment to fostering a
2:04:07 culture of water safety among the residents of Brevard County.
2:04:08 In a region committed in a region surrounded by waterways,
2:04:13 beaches, the ability to swim is not merely a leisure activity,
2:04:18 but a crucial life skill that can prevent tragedies and save
2:04:22 lives.
2:04:23 However, I come bearing a beacon of hope in the form of every
2:04:25 child a swimmer program.
2:04:27 This initiative not only provides.
2:04:29 Thank you, Kathleen.
2:04:30 Can you do me a favor?
2:04:31 Is it possible for you to email the board the remainder of that
2:04:34 speech so that we have that?
2:04:35 No, sorry.
2:04:35 The three minute time frame is up though.
2:04:37 No worries.
2:04:37 But yes.
2:04:38 Thank you.
2:04:39 Gina, Darren, Bernard, Brian, Diana, Haynes.
2:04:44 Good evening, board.
2:04:45 I just want to share a delightful Thursday we spent last week.
2:04:51 The League of Women Voters attended the science fair at Central
2:04:55 Middle School last Thursday where we awarded our Indian River
2:05:00 Lagoon Dolphin that Fran Bear, those of you who know Fran,
2:05:05 herself put the sand in the dolphin.
2:05:09 It focuses on the health and survival of the Indian River Lagoon.
2:05:13 I want to thank the staff at Central Middle School, Heather, who
2:05:20 I worked with at Vieira, for getting the gym ready, providing
2:05:25 lunch, but also for the staff at the district who worked so hard,
2:05:29 all the teachers and principals that were behind the scenes,
2:05:34 making sure that we knew where to go for the different exhibits
2:05:37 and where if we had any questions at all to go to them, they
2:05:40 worked so, so well.
2:05:43 The young man that we awarded the award to, I can’t say his name,
2:05:48 was from Holland and his project was on the effects of nitrogen
2:05:52 poop on the Indian River red mangroves.
2:05:58 And he was just adorable.
2:06:00 He owned that project.
2:06:02 He told us all about it.
2:06:04 And an added addition to that is that a friend of mine was at
2:06:07 the last school board meeting when I mentioned the other
2:06:11 competition we looked at in the north, who is a dean at Bayside.
2:06:18 And she texted me that night and said, hey, you know, you need
2:06:21 judges for this?
2:06:22 And I said, yeah.
2:06:23 And she said, can you hook me up with the judges?
2:06:25 Because our National Honor Society students need to do something
2:06:30 like this for volunteer hours and our AP physics class would
2:06:35 like to do it.
2:06:36 So they showed on the scene, 10 of them, kind of alleviated the
2:06:40 pressure of the judges in certain areas.
2:06:42 And they came in and they were outstanding.
2:06:45 How they interacted with the kids and asked questions and looked
2:06:48 at their log books.
2:06:49 It was, it was just amazing.
2:06:51 So, uh, great job by the district.
2:06:54 Great job by the kids and the teachers.
2:06:57 Um, I also want to acknowledge the passing of John Fields, who
2:07:01 was a teacher at Sherwood Elementary for 27 years.
2:07:06 We lost John March the 10th.
2:07:09 He was just an outstanding guy.
2:07:13 Uh, love the kids, love the community.
2:07:16 I worked with him as a member of the PTO at Sherwood, uh, where
2:07:20 my daughter attended and also as a substitute teacher.
2:07:24 And it was a pleasure to work with him and please keep his wife,
2:07:27 Janine, in your thoughts.
2:07:29 Thank you.
2:07:31 Bernard Bryan, Diana Haynes, Crystal Casey.
2:07:36 Good evening.
2:07:41 Uh, thank you board.
2:07:43 Uh, my name is Bernard Bryan and I represent the South Brevard
2:07:47 branch in WACP as well as the concerned citizens of South Brevard.
2:07:51 Uh, I spent over the last five years, uh, trying to understand
2:07:56 Brevard public school system.
2:07:57 And I’m still lost today as I was five years ago.
2:08:00 But there’s just a couple of things I want to share and bring to
2:08:03 light.
2:08:04 And I would like to thank this board for listening to us and
2:08:08 being supportive of us and really trying to help our children.
2:08:13 Uh, just a couple of things that I would like to share with you
2:08:16 today.
2:08:16 I spent a lot of time looking at data, trying to understand why
2:08:21 this child is not doing well.
2:08:23 And what can we do to help that child?
2:08:25 Uh, as you’re aware, I, I’m at five different school as SAC
2:08:29 members.
2:08:30 I mentor 16 kids so that I can do everything I can to help that
2:08:34 child.
2:08:35 But just a couple of things.
2:08:37 I’ve looked at your PM2 data.
2:08:39 I still see some opportunities there with reading and math.
2:08:43 So, as I heard from the dais today, that there’s a lot of
2:08:47 opportunities, jobs that are in these communities.
2:08:50 And if our children do not have the reading and math skills,
2:08:53 they aren’t going to fulfill those jobs.
2:08:56 And just, I would like to bring to light.
2:08:59 Um, when I look at Brevard public schools, there are 35 C
2:09:03 schools, based on your last FAST analysis.
2:09:07 And then there are four D schools.
2:09:10 So, out of the population of around 87.
2:09:13 So, we have a lot of opportunity there.
2:09:16 And I would like to challenge this board.
2:09:19 Um, what can we do in your district to help every school within
2:09:24 the next two years to become a B school?
2:09:28 Um, so, so what can everybody on this diocese do so that that
2:09:34 can happen?
2:09:36 And I truly believe if we look at those data, look at that
2:09:40 opportunity, um, there’s, there’s nothing this district cannot
2:09:46 do.
2:09:46 And to be honest with you, I’ve, I’ve visited with many
2:09:49 principals.
2:09:50 I see the hard working of your staff.
2:09:53 I see the hard working of your teachers.
2:09:55 But in order for them to get to that B level, um, it’s going to
2:09:59 take this board’s support.
2:10:01 It’s going to take this team’s support.
2:10:03 Look at what those principal needs.
2:10:05 Because they’re going to get burned out.
2:10:07 Um, you know, when you look at being a D school and a, and a C
2:10:10 school, and they look at the other competitive schools, they’re
2:10:14 going to want to compete to that level.
2:10:16 And so I’m just asking if you will consider, you know, provide
2:10:21 the resources that the principal needs.
2:10:24 Some schools may need more than others in order to get to that B
2:10:27 level.
2:10:28 So I just challenge you at least over the next two years in your
2:10:32 district.
2:10:33 Uh, what can you do to make that school a B school?
2:10:37 And last thing I want to say, please cadence that with the
2:10:40 community.
2:10:41 Uh, what are you doing to make your school a B school?
2:10:45 Okay.
2:10:46 Thank you, Bernard.
2:10:47 Diana Haynes.
2:10:48 Crystal Casey.
2:10:49 Gregory Ross.
2:10:50 Good evening.
2:10:51 Well, I’m back a month later, and I still have no answer to the
2:11:00 questions that I have asked over and over this board.
2:11:05 And I’d like to start from the beginning.
2:11:07 I’d like to start about a public, about a form that we all fill
2:11:10 out to speak.
2:11:11 Um, during these meetings, which I had a parent fill out for me
2:11:15 one day when I was late in traffic.
2:11:17 And somehow from the table outside to the dais, the form
2:11:21 disappeared.
2:11:22 There was never any video shown to me, even though I asked
2:11:26 repeatedly of her filling out the form and handing it in.
2:11:29 And that’s rather shoddy public records, if you ask me.
2:11:33 And then I came before this board multiple times regarding, um,
2:11:37 an incident that we’re all aware of.
2:11:40 The alleged sexual assault at Johnson Junior High School.
2:11:44 It’s almost two and a half years now.
2:11:47 And there still have been no answers definitively.
2:11:50 I have a police report where two parent, a parent, um, and an in-law
2:11:56 and a teacher have a conversation.
2:11:58 They say this event occurred at Johnson Junior.
2:12:01 Uh, I’ve got text messages from the party that had the direct
2:12:05 conversation with the alleged teacher about the incident.
2:12:09 Uh, confirming that it’s being worked upon and it’s being looked
2:12:14 at, but yet no one ever came forward with the names.
2:12:17 I’ve got information that Mr. Diaz was involved and he gave, um,
2:12:23 exoneration to this individual, this, this employee of yours.
2:12:28 So that they wouldn’t be fired because I guess they were getting
2:12:31 close to, uh, retirement and didn’t want to divulge who the
2:12:33 victim was.
2:12:34 So if this is all true, I would like an explanation from this
2:12:39 board and from this community as to how we can allow.
2:12:42 Not only a victim student to still be out there, but if this is
2:12:48 all true and not some hoax or some made up political scheme.
2:12:51 How we can allow a perpetrator, a sexual assaulter to roam free
2:12:57 amongst our students because we have gotten no answers to this
2:13:04 incident.
2:13:05 Uh, I’ve asked questions about an incident that occurred at McNair
2:13:09 back when we were discussing and dealing with kids who like to
2:13:13 think they were, um, alternative animals.
2:13:16 And when I put in my public records requests asking if there
2:13:20 were OSHA reports, incidents reports of this feces that a
2:13:23 student saw not once but twice in the hallways at McNair, I was
2:13:28 told nothing existed.
2:13:30 So are you calling me a liar because in my 66 years of being an
2:13:35 educated adult, I don’t usually, you know, go down those roads
2:13:42 with such tall tales.
2:13:44 What I want to know is if this student who I have complete
2:13:47 confidence in, in telling the truth, told the truth, why isn’t
2:13:53 there any documentation?
2:13:55 Thank you.
2:13:58 Crystal Casey.
2:13:59 Gregory Ross.
2:14:00 Rebecca McAllenon.
2:14:01 Good evening, Board.
2:14:02 Dr. Rendell.
2:14:03 I’m here to request respectfully that Brevard Public Schools
2:14:15 adhere to Florida Statute 119 and adhere to Florida Statute 1002.22.
2:14:26 There are a couple of people sitting up here on this board that
2:14:30 I’m not going to specifically name right now that are involved
2:14:39 in non-compliance with Florida Statutes.
2:14:43 Just waiting for the non-verbal so that we can catch that on the
2:14:57 camera.
2:15:00 So as everybody knows, there is an ongoing lawsuit with public
2:15:06 records and we don’t need to name the names because I think
2:15:10 everybody here knows who we’re talking about.
2:15:15 And I’m hoping that we’ll get an update tonight on the status of
2:15:20 that lawsuit because it deals directly with violations pursuant
2:15:25 to Florida Sunshine or Statute 119.
2:15:32 I would like to implore this board to follow the law.
2:15:37 I’m just an average citizen asking for Brevard Public Schools
2:15:44 and their employees to follow Florida Statute 119 and follow
2:15:52 Florida Statute 1002.22.
2:15:54 From here into the near future, as long as you hold your
2:16:03 position, you still have to follow the law.
2:16:07 No one is above the law.
2:16:11 Thank you.
2:16:13 Thank you, Ms. Kazi.
2:16:16 Who is our next speaker?
2:16:17 Gregory Ross, Rebecca McAllenan, and Julie Mantione.
2:16:21 Good evening, board.
2:16:24 Thank you for this opportunity for public comment.
2:16:26 Don’t worry, Ms. Kazi.
2:16:27 I’ll name names.
2:16:28 Mr. Trent, let’s start with your lack of ethics.
2:16:31 Can you tell us all what was in the handwritten note you passed
2:16:34 to Ms. Wright at approximately 10:10 a.m. at the March 12th
2:16:37 school board meeting?
2:16:39 Before you claim ignorance on the note, I filed a public records
2:16:42 request for a copy of that note and copied you and Ms. Wright on
2:16:46 it.
2:16:46 On that very day.
2:16:47 So I know you are aware of the request.
2:16:49 It has now been more than a week and I have not received a copy
2:16:52 of that note as required by law.
2:16:54 Can you clarify what the delay is in providing that note?
2:16:59 Does it contain a Sunshine Law violation?
2:17:01 Does it contain more of your name calling of the public and
2:17:04 taxpayers?
2:17:05 Perhaps Mr. Gibbs can give you some training that all written
2:17:10 communications during a school board meeting between school
2:17:13 board members are public records.
2:17:15 Speaking of violations of law, Mr. Susan, what is your delay in
2:17:19 producing the public records requested by Ms. Jenkins?
2:17:22 The phone call records she has had to sue you to produce at a
2:17:25 cost of $100,000 to Brevard taxpayers.
2:17:28 $100,000 that could have been avoided if you would just produce
2:17:32 those records as required by law.
2:17:34 You admitted in court documents that you used your personal cell
2:17:37 phone to discuss board related business with County Commissioner
2:17:41 Tobiah, the Sheriff’s Office, the Florida Department of
2:17:45 Education, and Randy Fine.
2:17:47 He legally spent $10,000 of patent money to avoid the summons
2:17:49 for a lawsuit.
2:17:50 Mr. Ross, can you please refrain from using people’s names?
2:17:52 Thank you.
2:17:53 Maybe he was looking under his desk for loose change to pay as a
2:17:56 lawyer.
2:17:57 Anyway, I’m not sure why you do not want to disclose those phone
2:18:00 records, Mr. Susan.
2:18:01 Perhaps you were discussing ways to remove Ms. Jenkins from her
2:18:04 District 3 seat and for Mr. John Thomas to be relocated into
2:18:07 District 3.
2:18:08 Just a little good old boy political corruption, right?
2:18:13 Ms. Campbell.
2:18:14 Can you please refrain from using names, Mr. Ross?
2:18:16 Yes.
2:18:17 Ms. Campbell, this is the type of corruption that we have been
2:18:19 pointing out to you for more than a year.
2:18:21 We had hoped you would show courage and speak out publicly on
2:18:23 the corruption of your fellow board members.
2:18:25 At the very least, please stop enabling their corruption and unethical
2:18:29 behavior.
2:18:30 For example, you don’t need to present a motion to ban age-appropriate
2:18:34 books.
2:18:35 You can rest assured that Mr. Trent will pass a motion to ban
2:18:37 every book that doesn’t meet his small world view.
2:18:40 A small world view held by the majority of this board.
2:18:43 A view that is costing the Brevard taxpayers $1.2 million a year
2:18:47 to implement your book banning policies.
2:18:52 Or we could just use a free and low maintenance opt-out form as
2:18:56 we did for decades.
2:18:57 But you just have to win them their culture wars, don’t you, Mr.
2:19:00 Trent?
2:19:01 Speaking of culture wars, Mr. Susan and Ms. Wright, I listened
2:19:04 with interest at the March 12th school board meeting
2:19:06 as you desperately tried to paint the public commenters at the
2:19:09 school board meeting as being the victims of misinformation.
2:19:12 The only misinformation is that you guys are somehow qualified
2:19:15 to be school board members.
2:19:17 That’s the misinformation that’s out there.
2:19:19 Brevard Public Schools deserves better.
2:19:22 Thank you, Mr. Ross.
2:19:24 Who’s our next speaker?
2:19:25 Rebecca McAllenan, Julie Mantillon, and Sarah Mirsky.
2:19:29 Hello.
2:19:30 As was said earlier, thank you for the opportunity to share
2:19:40 public comments tonight.
2:19:45 As usual, I want to talk about books.
2:19:49 I realize there are no decisions that are being made tonight.
2:19:52 But as a reminder, I’ve attended almost all the book review
2:19:55 committees meetings and/or watched them,
2:19:57 as well as these board meetings and work sessions.
2:20:01 And all the decisions that are made about books from the dais,
2:20:04 the common excuse for removal is always the statutes, the statutes.
2:20:07 So my question to you is how much flexibility do you have as a
2:20:11 local board?
2:20:12 Your policy states that families can opt out, yet you never
2:20:17 offer that or personally support that.
2:20:19 Tonight I’ve actually brought some copies of the opt-out form
2:20:22 for you guys when I’ll show them to you
2:20:25 because I have questions about them.
2:20:27 It was really, really hard to watch the discussion about the
2:20:30 nowhere girls.
2:20:31 The statute was worn like some kind of cloak, religious cloak,
2:20:37 where other books were deemed age appropriate
2:20:40 that also had sexual content.
2:20:42 I think the most disturbing part for me was all the inclusion in
2:20:44 your comments of me and my,
2:20:47 as if your parental needs are more valuable because you’re
2:20:51 sitting up there, and that’s incorrect.
2:20:55 As a board member, your job is to follow the statute, not your
2:20:59 personal needs.
2:21:00 It’s not a PTA.
2:21:01 The rules and policies exist based on your votes and your
2:21:04 responsibility to the statutes and how you interpret them.
2:21:07 And those votes should be based on those policies and the best
2:21:10 outcome for all the students.
2:21:12 To that end, I would further suggest that this form be revisited
2:21:16 because it is performative at best and useless at worst.
2:21:20 It does not, it’s an all or nothing.
2:21:22 It doesn’t allow a parent to decide by book, genre, subject
2:21:25 matter.
2:21:26 It doesn’t have dates on it.
2:21:28 It’s really just performative.
2:21:31 So I don’t understand it and maybe someone can explain that to
2:21:35 me.
2:21:35 And last thing I would like to say about that is when you say,
2:21:39 I would never want my child to read this with such magnanimous
2:21:44 emotion,
2:21:45 that’s really insulting to the people who are okay with their
2:21:48 kids reading it.
2:21:49 And that’s your parental right as a parent to opt out.
2:21:53 But it’s not fair for you to put your personal beliefs about
2:21:57 what you feel is important and what they should be reading.
2:22:00 A book like The Nowhere Girls is such an important book.
2:22:03 And the last thing that’s, and it’s too late.
2:22:05 The last thing that might be, it might be too late.
2:22:07 At the last meeting there were 100 and some policies.
2:22:10 Would it be possible to name what those policies are as you’re
2:22:12 spouting them off instead of a race to move to approve and yell
2:22:18 I when it’s something that’s really great that you want that’s
2:22:20 offensive to other people.
2:22:22 When the discussion is going on and the numbers of the policies,
2:22:25 it’s impossible.
2:22:26 It’s impossible, the transparency is impossible to follow 100
2:22:29 policies in one meeting when it’s only by numbers.
2:22:32 Would it be possible to say the Tylenol amendment or whatever
2:22:35 and kind of tone down the, you know, the rushing and the, it’s
2:22:40 really, it’s not, it’s not.
2:22:41 Thank you.
2:22:42 Julie Montiong, Sarah Mirski, Amy Raub.
2:22:55 Hi, good evening.
2:22:57 Thank you for public comments.
2:23:00 Much of what I have to say today is after having viewed the
2:23:05 discussion on Nowhere Girls.
2:23:07 And I want to address some of those.
2:23:09 And I guess I want to start by acknowledging that we are indeed
2:23:12 in a very tumultuous time of these culture wars.
2:23:16 And I am sympathetic in how you want, you see your role as
2:23:22 balancing or hopefully balancing your personal values with the
2:23:28 mission of Brevard Public Schools.
2:23:30 I actually spent a little time on the internet today trying to
2:23:32 find the mission that I couldn’t so I’m very happy to see it
2:23:34 right there.
2:23:35 To serve every student with excellence as the standard.
2:23:41 As I mentioned in these meetings before, libraries have kind of
2:23:45 been the way of education for thousands of years.
2:23:49 And I would like to think we all want an excellent library.
2:23:54 And I guess I just want to emphasize the point that an excellent
2:24:00 library has a diversity of viewpoints.
2:24:05 I agree with my friends.
2:24:08 A library is not to say this is the one book that’s going to say
2:24:12 what we feel about these issues.
2:24:15 A library is about providing as many voices as possible so that
2:24:22 we can have our students be educated.
2:24:27 I also realized, I want to thank you Matt, Susan, when you
2:24:30 brought up space.
2:24:31 I am a very proud Brevard County resident with NASA.
2:24:36 And I’m also a person who deeply loves mythology and classicism.
2:24:42 And when I think about Apollo and Artemis, I think you guys,
2:24:48 many of us really kind of are too protective of children and don’t
2:24:56 realize like the stories.
2:24:58 Apollo tried to rape Daphne.
2:25:00 Artemis killed someone who saw her naked.
2:25:03 These are stories that little children have, and I’m not saying
2:25:07 we should, but this idea that children have never had stories
2:25:13 with adult content.
2:25:15 The very names of the rockets that we proudly with tax dollars
2:25:20 send into space are named after these stories.
2:25:25 I just want to end too by thinking of legacy and I’m sympathetic
2:25:29 of what y’all’s legacy is going to be.
2:25:31 I mean, there will one day be a museum that will talk about book
2:25:36 banning in 2024.
2:25:38 And I just, I don’t, I want you guys to think that next time you
2:25:43 vote to remove a voice, to remove a book from a library, how you’re
2:25:49 going to be represented in that museum.
2:25:52 Because I know there’s people during segregation that don’t feel
2:25:56 good about how they’re in museums.
2:25:58 Thank you, Julie.
2:25:59 Thank you.
2:26:00 Can we go next speaker?
2:26:01 Sarah Mirsky, Amy Raub, Aiden McBadden.
2:26:06 Good evening, Madam Chair and Board.
2:26:20 My name is Sarah Mirsky.
2:26:21 I’m a wife, mother of two children in BPS, UCF BSW Student of
2:26:25 the Year nominee, taxpayer voter.
2:26:29 I live in District 2 for school board and I have a holistic
2:26:32 interest in this school district being successful.
2:26:35 Tonight, I would like to address the board about the discipline
2:26:39 committee meeting in light of National Social Workers Day and
2:26:42 the policymaking skills and the peer-reviewed research and
2:26:47 evidence-based practice that I and other social workers bring to
2:26:50 the table.
2:26:50 I was disappointed when the committee chose not to use the
2:26:54 information for better behavioral health outcomes.
2:26:59 In celebrating National Read Aloud Day, here are things that
2:27:02 parents asked me to read aloud to the school board tonight.
2:27:05 The definition of the phrase to get the boot in Collins Dictionary
2:27:09 means to lose your job.
2:27:11 This idiom could also mean someone is dismissed or fired.
2:27:17 To get the boot could also mean to be voted out, evicted, or
2:27:21 made to leave.
2:27:22 I propose the latter definition is appropriate for Matt Susan.
2:27:26 Parents’ opinion is that Matt Susan should be voted out by Brevard
2:27:32 citizens in District 4.
2:27:35 You may be wondering why Matt Susan should not be re-elected.
2:27:41 As parents, we have more questions than answers.
2:27:45 Does District 4 deserve a school board member that attempts to
2:27:48 resolve school issues by actually communicating with parents by
2:27:51 email?
2:27:52 Does District 4 deserve to receive accurate public records
2:27:55 requests even if those PRRs include an official school board
2:28:00 member’s email address?
2:28:01 Does District 4 deserve to be informed by other school board
2:28:04 members or by their school board member when lockdowns occur and
2:28:08 families are concerned about their children’s safety?
2:28:11 Does District 4 deserve to receive factual information about
2:28:15 school board members’ business affiliations if those affiliations
2:28:19 may pose a significant conflict of interest?
2:28:22 The answer to all these questions is a resounding yes.
2:28:26 District 4 deserves better instead of Brevard County.
2:28:29 Thank you for your time of consideration.
2:28:31 Thank you.
2:28:33 Amy Raub, Aiden McFadden, and Debbie Parker.
2:28:38 Hello.
2:28:40 First of all, Katie, your little speech there about kindness.
2:28:56 It’s not kind to speak in a little voice that doesn’t make you
2:29:01 kind, okay?
2:29:03 But I can do that for you.
2:29:05 It’s not kind to waste the book review committee’s time.
2:29:10 It’s not kind to push your superstitions and religions onto our
2:29:15 students.
2:29:16 That’s not kind.
2:29:17 It’s not kind to sex shame or to make kids, especially girls,
2:29:21 feel dirty about their own bodies.
2:29:24 And it’s really not kind to empower sexual predators, which is
2:29:29 what you guys are doing.
2:29:31 When you ban books like that.
2:29:34 Okay, so I wanted to talk about when you banned, at the end of
2:29:43 February, you banned, I missed this meeting, you banned the Nowhere
2:29:49 Girls.
2:29:49 And that was a glimpse into some really poor parenting styles of
2:29:55 Matt, Jean, Megan, Katie.
2:29:58 When you banned that book.
2:29:59 I saw how you guys parent and the way you think.
2:30:02 And we, not good, okay?
2:30:05 Jean, when you said, I don’t want to plant those ideas in your
2:30:11 17-year-old boy’s head, what I hear is, you have no dialogue
2:30:18 with him.
2:30:18 And I’m glad.
2:30:22 You’d be a terrible person to come to for advice, especially
2:30:25 about sex.
2:30:26 He sounds wise, and I’m glad he’s wiser than you.
2:30:29 17 years old.
2:30:31 Do you think that you’d be planting any of those ideas?
2:30:35 Like, you’re so out of touch.
2:30:38 The committee.
2:30:39 The committee that you guys totally made up on your own.
2:30:50 You removed all of the experts, all of the teachers, the media
2:30:54 specialists.
2:30:55 You had a handpicked committee there for yourself.
2:31:01 And you stripped them of their power.
2:31:05 You lied about it.
2:31:07 But it was to take away public comment.
2:31:09 You had your beautiful little committee.
2:31:11 And you still didn’t listen to them.
2:31:13 You have zero respect for parents.
2:31:15 You have zero respect for any of the citizens.
2:31:17 They do not agree with you.
2:31:19 They do not want the books banned.
2:31:21 Stop your little crusade.
2:31:23 Stop banning books.
2:31:27 That’s not what the public wants.
2:31:29 Jean, do you have any animal noises you wanted to make?
2:31:33 You got eight seconds, buddy.
2:31:35 No?
2:31:37 All right.
2:31:39 Thank you.
2:31:40 Want to hear the next speaker?
2:31:41 Aidan McFadden, Debbie Parker, and Paul Raub.
2:31:46 Sorry, I didn’t want to lean over the whole time.
2:32:07 I’m Aidan McFadden.
2:32:11 And I went to Brevard Public Schools.
2:32:15 My whole public school life, which was my whole school life.
2:32:20 And I would just like to say how when someone –
2:32:25 well, when you guys ban a book, go against a decision of a
2:32:31 committee,
2:32:32 do something stupid that makes me question something,
2:32:36 just question what you guys are thinking up there.
2:32:41 It just makes me feel really disrespected that we have these
2:32:48 kind of people representing our students
2:32:53 and making these decisions for our students in this county.
2:32:58 And when you – like when you say things like how my mom said,
2:33:05 like planting ideas in a 17-year-olds’ head,
2:33:08 a 17-year-old is one year away from 18-years-old, which is an
2:33:12 adult.
2:33:13 So I just don’t – it’s disrespectful.
2:33:18 You know, it’s a human that – when you’re a 17-year-old person,
2:33:23 you have your own thoughts.
2:33:25 You’ve taken in a lot of stuff your whole life.
2:33:27 I mean, 17 – you’re not old, but, you know, you’re not five
2:33:30 years old.
2:33:31 I just really wanted to get across that it just really feels
2:33:38 disrespectful to – it just feels wrong.
2:33:46 Thank you.
2:33:49 Who’s our next speaker?
2:33:50 Debbie Parker, Paul Raub, Liz Mkhitaryan.
2:33:54 Good evening, and thank you for this opportunity to speak, and I
2:34:09 speak for myself.
2:34:11 Every student, school staff person, and family in Brevard County
2:34:16 of every color, every sector of the economy,
2:34:19 every religion and ethnicity, every gender identity, every
2:34:22 ability and disability,
2:34:24 every mentally healthy and unhealthy person, and any and every
2:34:28 other difference you can describe
2:34:30 is affected by the decisions and actions of others.
2:34:33 The actions of Brevard schools and this school board will truly
2:34:38 make a difference for years and years to come,
2:34:40 for everyone.
2:34:41 A couple of weeks ago, March 11th, there was a settlement
2:34:46 reached, and it provides critical protections
2:34:49 and clarifications to previously vague laws and rules that
2:34:52 developed following the Don’t Say Gay Law.
2:34:55 Now, free expression has been restored.
2:34:58 Students and teachers can again speak and write freely about
2:35:02 sexual orientation and gender identity
2:35:04 and classroom participation and assignments.
2:35:07 Also, targeting LGBTQ+ individuals or topics under the guise of
2:35:13 this law is explicitly forbidden.
2:35:17 Now, this is big.
2:35:19 As long as the books aren’t being used for classroom instruction,
2:35:23 the law does not apply to library books.
2:35:27 Other topics should be available for reading in school libraries,
2:35:33 too.
2:35:34 A few local facts.
2:35:36 Did you know that on Christmas Day, 1951, the Moors, who are
2:35:41 leaders in the Civil Rights Movement,
2:35:43 and he was the founder of the first NWACP branch in Brevard
2:35:47 County, they were asleep in their bed,
2:35:50 in their home, and were bombed.
2:35:52 Both died, one on the way to the hospital and one in the nearest
2:35:58 black hospital in Sanford.
2:36:00 At that time, the hospital at Titusville would not accept or
2:36:04 treat black people.
2:36:06 Also, did you know that in January, just a couple months ago,
2:36:10 the Harry T. and Harriet V. Moore Voting Rights Act was
2:36:14 introduced.
2:36:15 It aims to protect voters from the discriminatory voting
2:36:18 practices and policies
2:36:20 that have been put into place in the past couple of years in
2:36:24 Florida.
2:36:25 students must have books available to them in their school
2:36:30 libraries that will teach them about their history.
2:36:33 All of it.
2:36:35 And they can learn from the past.
2:36:37 The actual past.
2:36:39 And students need to be able to read about reality.
2:36:42 Not your reality, but theirs.
2:36:45 Life in the U.S. has changed and will continue to move on.
2:36:49 It’s time to embrace our actual future.
2:36:52 Every one of us are experiencing changes that are for real.
2:36:57 It’s time to make a conscious decision and no longer resist and
2:37:02 learn to accept.
2:37:03 Most importantly, all students, all parents and families must be
2:37:08 respected and treated with kindness.
2:37:11 Thank you.
2:37:12 Paul Raub.
2:37:13 Liz Mkhitaryan.
2:37:14 Kelly Curvin.
2:37:15 Paul Raub.
2:37:16 Liz Mkhitaryan.
2:37:17 Kelly Curvin.
2:37:18 So, I was going to say thank you for allowing us to speak.
2:37:30 Heard so much.
2:37:34 Well, we were out of town, but watch the video later.
2:37:38 Last week is about statutes.
2:37:39 We’re bound by statutes.
2:37:40 We can only.
2:37:41 It’s not us.
2:37:42 It’s the statutes.
2:37:43 We love the, you know, books are good, but statutes.
2:37:45 And I believe it’s statutory that this public comment period has
2:37:49 to exist.
2:37:50 And I wonder if that ceased to be true, how quickly it would go
2:37:54 away.
2:37:55 So, thanks statutes.
2:37:59 And I say that not completely randomly because that’s part of
2:38:05 the fascinating arc of the, what are we called now?
2:38:10 The book recommend, I don’t know, what are the book review
2:38:14 committee, whatever we’re called these days.
2:38:17 Where, you know, this sort of zone of demoralization that I’ve
2:38:21 been caught up in as part of that.
2:38:24 Like, if you wanted people to lose interest in being part of
2:38:28 this process and quit, I’m not sure how much you would do
2:38:34 differently than what’s happened.
2:38:35 Maybe some of it quicker.
2:38:37 You might, you know, pull the bait and switch of there’s going
2:38:40 to be experts on the committee and they’re going to be listened
2:38:42 to and they’re going to have a vote.
2:38:43 And then, oops, well, we didn’t like those results.
2:38:45 Let’s remove the experts.
2:38:46 Wait, oh, wait, let’s remove their vote.
2:38:47 But no, let’s just remove them entirely.
2:38:49 Oh, let’s replace some of the members, but let’s take five
2:38:52 months to do it while y’all sit around.
2:38:54 And then, oh, I know.
2:38:57 Let’s bring in the person who challenged most of the books that
2:39:01 we’re, that we’re reviewing.
2:39:03 That’ll be hilarious.
2:39:07 And then, if they get criticized, let’s take another couple
2:39:10 months off and, oh, remove public comment.
2:39:13 I’m sorry, restructure the committee so that it is merely making
2:39:17 recommendations and therefore, oh, no longer required by statute
2:39:23 to receive public comment.
2:39:25 It would still be an option.
2:39:27 It could still be allowed, but it’s not required.
2:39:29 So, oh, there it went.
2:39:30 Interesting.
2:39:31 And then, the last full meeting that we had, this committee
2:39:39 agreed unanimously to recommend that the Nowhere Girls be kept.
2:39:43 And this is not a committee, historically, that is unanimous on
2:39:48 anything.
2:39:49 Really.
2:39:50 There’s some huge disagreements in there that we’ve been very
2:39:54 vocal about and unanimously.
2:39:56 But this book that is about, you know, authority trying to sweep
2:40:01 things under the rug and keep everything sweet and keep the
2:40:06 uncomfortable things out of the public eye.
2:40:08 So, that got voted down four to one over the, again, I think
2:40:13 unprecedented, unanimous recommendation of the committee.
2:40:18 So, I’m going to keep going.
2:40:21 I’ve been to every meeting so far.
2:40:23 I’ll continue to come to every meeting.
2:40:25 But, it’s getting harder.
2:40:28 Thank you.
2:40:30 Liz Mkhitaryan, Kelly Curvin, and Ava Wolpenkohler.
2:40:36 Good evening.
2:40:41 Liz Mkhitaryan, Titusville.
2:40:43 I’m the founder of the national organization Stop Moms for
2:40:46 Liberty.
2:40:47 I am here to make a suggestion to you board members.
2:40:50 I was very pleased to see you approve a proclamation on kindness.
2:40:54 Kudos.
2:40:55 Weren’t those children great and so well-behaved?
2:40:58 Oh, my goodness.
2:40:59 Just a little tip.
2:41:01 You can move an agenda item when you see children sitting out
2:41:05 here.
2:41:06 You could have made a motion.
2:41:08 Do better.
2:41:09 So, how about if you start modeling kindness,
2:41:16 modeling kindness as a body?
2:41:19 Board behavior has declined dramatically over the last couple of
2:41:23 years.
2:41:23 And I mind you that I’ve been involved in Brevard schools longer
2:41:28 than all of you.
2:41:31 Of course, I have seen some attacking type comments at this
2:41:34 podium.
2:41:35 But you know what?
2:41:36 People are angry.
2:41:38 You’re being paid with taxpayer dollars to sit there and pay
2:41:42 attention.
2:41:43 It’s what you need to do.
2:41:45 So, let’s talk about that behavior.
2:41:47 Some examples.
2:41:49 Unkind.
2:41:50 Refusing to look at community members like Mr. Trent is doing
2:42:02 right now when community members come to this microphone.
2:42:04 Unkind.
2:42:07 Leaving the dais when your community members are speaking.
2:42:12 Unkind.
2:42:13 Making facial expressions that are dismissive even to BPS
2:42:19 students.
2:42:21 Unkind folks.
2:42:22 Grabbing and eating snacks and having your whatever beverages
2:42:28 and whatever cups you choose to use in front of a group that
2:42:33 sits here just as long with no chance for them having snacks.
2:42:38 I used to tell my kids, if you don’t have enough for everyone,
2:42:41 don’t eat in front of other people.
2:42:43 So, making rude comments.
2:42:45 Let’s talk about that.
2:42:47 Oh, boy.
2:42:49 Here we go.
2:42:51 Get ready, Megan.
2:42:54 Or meowing at your constituents.
2:42:58 All unkind.
2:43:01 I would never have allowed my five-year-olds at BPS to talk
2:43:05 under their breath negatively about others the way that a couple
2:43:09 of you have done.
2:43:10 If five-year-olds can act that respectfully, so can you.
2:43:15 So, for all of our sakes, please turn off those hot mics because
2:43:19 you’re really embarrassing yourselves and this community.
2:43:24 The chair needs to start controlling the meetings, please.
2:43:28 Displayed behavior by these board members is not acceptable and
2:43:33 the community is watching.
2:43:35 So, hot mics off.
2:43:37 Start looking at the people that are speaking.
2:43:40 Mr. Trent, I’m here.
2:43:42 So, in my opinion.
2:43:43 Thank you, Mr. McIterian.
2:43:45 All right.
2:43:47 Next speaker.
2:43:48 Kelly Curvin, followed by Ava Wolfenculler.
2:43:56 Yeah.
2:43:57 One more.
2:43:58 Two more.
2:43:59 When speaking with a crisis PR consultant, you all use words
2:44:06 like a joke, chaotic, and self-serving to describe how you
2:44:09 thought the public felt about the Brevard School Board.
2:44:12 After the last meeting, I think those words are too kind.
2:44:15 Eyewitness Matt uttered the words, quote, “Get ready, Megan,”
2:44:19 under his breath when a friend of mine came to speak, and then
2:44:21 Gene Trent responded by catcalling her.
2:44:23 Just so we are clear, what Gene Trent did is called sexual
2:44:27 harassment.
2:44:28 Last year, Gene Trent made a bold statement when discussing the
2:44:31 funding for loving guidance.
2:44:33 He said, quote, “We didn’t have safe spaces growing up and we
2:44:36 turned out fine,” unquote.
2:44:38 “But did you?”
2:44:39 Good men.
2:44:40 Men with emotional maturity and empathy don’t sexually harass
2:44:43 women.
2:44:44 They aren’t intimidated by strong women.
2:44:46 They don’t belittle female students, and they certainly don’t
2:44:49 get barred from teaching in their own school district for lying
2:44:52 about being arrested because they got into a drunken bar fight.
2:44:56 Of course not to be outdone, Matt, Susan replied under his
2:44:59 breath with, quote, “Actually it hasn’t when a public speaker
2:45:02 said that religion has been handled well in our school system.”
2:45:05 Would you care to expand on that, Matt?
2:45:07 Or explain why you are pandering to an extremist minority that
2:45:10 would like to bring America back to the days of the Mayflower?
2:45:13 Whose co-founder of the local chapter openly admitted that she
2:45:17 doesn’t believe teenage girls should bother attending high
2:45:20 school because their only future is becoming a traditional housewife.
2:45:24 I can only speak for me and my daughters, but I’m raising them
2:45:27 in a house where they understand they have a voice and a choice
2:45:29 in their future.
2:45:30 Pandering to religious extremists who are actively working to
2:45:33 indoctrinate our students into harmful ideologies and false
2:45:36 Christian teachings are dangerous.
2:45:38 Next, I am calling for the end of the Book Reconsideration
2:45:41 Committee.
2:45:42 The public is tired of being lied to about the good governance
2:45:44 Megan claims this board is doing.
2:45:46 It’s time for this board to own up to your own bias, read the
2:45:48 books yourselves, discuss them, and cast your vote.
2:45:51 This recommendation will save BPS time, resources, and money.
2:45:54 We have wasted millions of dollars in the pursuit of book banning
2:45:57 that frankly could be used in a multitude of other places,
2:46:00 like teacher and staff pay, trainings, and intervention tools to
2:46:03 close achievement gaps.
2:46:04 And I know both Megan and Katie will hit back with statements
2:46:07 like, and I quote, “The statute says the school board can blah,
2:46:09 blah, blah.”
2:46:10 And I’m not arguing that you can’t control the policy.
2:46:14 I’m saying that you are neither qualified nor intelligent enough
2:46:17 to do it.
2:46:17 The policy has been rewritten time and time again, and it
2:46:20 continues to get worse with each rewrite, so just end it.
2:46:23 And Megan, I’ve got to ask, is your committee member still even
2:46:25 talking to you about the hateful things you said about the
2:46:28 nowhere girls?
2:46:29 She bravely shared her story about her experience with sexual
2:46:33 harassment and grooming at the hands of a teacher as a BPS
2:46:35 student.
2:46:36 You respond by calling the book trash and stating you wouldn’t
2:46:39 give it to anybody to read.
2:46:41 Using hateful and unprofessional rhetoric to me is one thing,
2:46:44 but that was your friend.
2:46:45 Did you even think about that before you openly disrespected her
2:46:48 voice and her choice?
2:46:49 And then you went on to claim that you were going to find a
2:46:52 replacement book?
2:46:53 Once again, please stop.
2:46:54 You can’t even effectively run a meeting.
2:46:56 The last thing you need to be in charge of is picking my
2:46:58 children’s library books.
2:47:00 Thank you, Ms. Carvin.
2:47:03 Ava Wolpenkohler.
2:47:08 Hi, I’m Ava.
2:47:11 I just wanted to come up here and say that, well, I started a
2:47:14 new book last night, but I wanted to say that if I read you
2:47:19 parts of it, you would ban it.
2:47:21 And maybe it’s not something you would be interested in, but
2:47:25 shouldn’t you be proud of me for reading?
2:47:28 Isn’t that the important part?
2:47:30 My education?
2:47:32 And I’m so grateful that I’m lucky enough to have access to this
2:47:36 kind of literature, unlike so many of your students.
2:47:39 So it would be kind of you to keep them in mind.
2:47:42 Thanks.
2:47:43 All right.
2:47:45 Thank you.
2:47:46 Board, you good to keep going?
2:47:50 I’m good.
2:47:51 Everyone’s okay?
2:47:52 No one needs a restroom break?
2:47:53 All right.
2:47:54 We are not the consent agenda.
2:47:56 Dr. Rendell.
2:47:57 Thank you, Madam Chair.
2:47:58 There are 26 agenda items under this category.
2:48:02 Thank you, Dr. Rendell.
2:48:03 Does any board member wish to pull any of the items?
2:48:09 I wish to pull F-22 for discussion.
2:48:15 Any others?
2:48:16 All right.
2:48:16 Do I hear a motion?
2:48:17 Move to approve.
2:48:18 Second.
2:48:20 All right.
2:48:21 Any discussion?
2:48:22 Just mine that I’m pulled.
2:48:23 I’m not discussing this one now.
2:48:24 We’re voting on these and then going back to that one.
2:48:25 Okay.
2:48:26 Paul, roll call, please.
2:48:27 Ms. Jenkins?
2:48:28 Aye.
2:48:29 Ms. Campbell?
2:48:30 Aye.
2:48:31 Ms. Wright?
2:48:32 Aye.
2:48:33 Mr. Trent?
2:48:34 Aye.
2:48:35 Mr. Susan?
2:48:36 Aye.
2:48:38 All right.
2:48:39 The item that I pulled for discussion, F-22 has to do with
2:48:46 supplements to the separate day
2:48:52 school and board, I pull in this one just to ask a quick
2:48:55 question because there’s a dollar
2:48:56 amount tied to this and I don’t know that that was what we
2:48:59 agreed upon.
2:49:00 And so I would just like the board to weigh in on this
2:49:03 discussion and decision.
2:49:05 Motion and a second.
2:49:06 Sorry.
2:49:07 Move to approve.
2:49:08 Second.
2:49:09 Okay.
2:49:10 All right.
2:49:11 Discussion.
2:49:12 There it is.
2:49:13 I apologize.
2:49:14 So if you pull this item up and you look at it, it’s based on a
2:49:16 supplement to Gardendale,
2:49:18 separate day school, which is our most difficult school by all
2:49:21 means.
2:49:22 And I don’t, I want to hear from the board on what their
2:49:24 consensus is in regards to the dollar
2:49:27 amount for the supplement.
2:49:28 I know this is what we had done last year, but I thought that
2:49:30 the board had a discussion
2:49:31 about increasing it and I could be totally off here.
2:49:33 So I just want to have a conversation.
2:49:35 Yeah.
2:49:36 From my memory, this is the dollar amount that was agreed upon.
2:49:39 Cause I, I had said, I wish this would be higher.
2:49:43 I don’t think it’s high enough, but this is what the majority of
2:49:45 the board supported
2:49:46 in that meeting.
2:49:47 Okay.
2:49:48 I, I do remember this being the dollar amount.
2:49:50 I think the, the priority that we said to staff was we need to
2:49:53 go ahead and get it handled
2:49:55 before the transfer window opens, which is about to happen.
2:49:58 Um, so this is perfect timing.
2:50:00 Um, so that the people who are there, um, would know they’re
2:50:04 going to continue to have that stipend
2:50:06 or supplement rather.
2:50:07 And then the people who are interested in transferring and we’ll
2:50:09 know what they’re coming into.
2:50:10 So, um, I, I, to me, this is exactly, we, you know, we want to
2:50:14 make sure we continue on with what we’re having
2:50:17 and, and making sure that it’s done in a way so that I think the
2:50:20 way it was written out in this agenda item
2:50:23 so that it’s a prorated.
2:50:24 So if they, even if they teach a part of the year, that
2:50:27 everybody is going to get a part based on how long they, they
2:50:30 serve at that school.
2:50:31 Okay.
2:50:32 Thank you.
2:50:33 Ms. Campbell.
2:50:34 Um, I, Mr. Susan, do you have anything to weigh in on this or Mr.
2:50:38 Trent?
2:50:38 No, I’ll wait for you to lay out what it is that you were.
2:50:41 All right.
2:50:42 I know this one’s, I, I, this could be a starting point.
2:50:44 I know we’re trying to get this and get this in place before we
2:50:46 open the window up.
2:50:47 Um, I just, again, I feel like this supplement needs to be
2:50:50 increased based on the work that they are doing at this school.
2:50:53 And anybody that goes to that school cannot argue with that.
2:50:56 I don’t think.
2:50:57 Um, so if this is the rule of the board to start here, uh, that’s
2:51:00 fine.
2:51:00 But I think when it comes time that we have the discussion again
2:51:02 about maybe additional supplements, we need to look at
2:51:05 increasing this one.
2:51:06 Go ahead, Mr. Trent.
2:51:11 You, sorry.
2:51:12 Uh, I can’t argue with the point that the amount of work that
2:51:15 they’re doing at Gardendale.
2:51:17 Um, I, I know that was the numbers we talked about.
2:51:19 I remember Ms. Jenkinson.
2:51:20 I wish it was more, my thought at the time was if we’re going to
2:51:23 give Gardendale teachers more, we need to talk maybe about the
2:51:27 ALC teachers, um, and try to get them into the picture.
2:51:32 But I do remember the five here and that, and that’s.
2:51:35 Okay.
2:51:36 I’m fine with that.
2:51:37 All right.
2:51:38 Um, so then we’ll go ahead and vote on it.
2:51:40 Can I, I just want to follow up with that too.
2:51:42 Um, thank you for sparking my memory about Mr. Trent.
2:51:45 Um, because then the conversation went down to, you know, we
2:51:50 have got VE classrooms, VEP classrooms, pre-K ESE classrooms.
2:51:54 And I’m not saying they don’t deserve it.
2:51:55 I mean, you know me, I advocated for it, but that’s a way bigger
2:51:58 conversation.
2:51:59 Um, and so the reason that this was kept at the five was like Ms.
2:52:04 Campbell said, get it through so that these people know that
2:52:06 they’re going to get it again.
2:52:07 Um, but if we’re going to talk about increasing supplements for
2:52:11 all of our ESE, um, classrooms, that’s a way larger conversation
2:52:16 and ticket number that we need to talk about.
2:52:18 Okay.
2:52:19 Fair enough.
2:52:20 Do you have anything else?
2:52:21 Are you turn yours off?
2:52:22 Okay.
2:52:23 All right.
2:52:24 Paul roll call, please.
2:52:25 Can I just say something real quick?
2:52:26 I think in general, um, we ran into a situation across the board
2:52:31 where we are now in a position.
2:52:33 I think we have three board members that were pretty solid on
2:52:36 this being the number.
2:52:37 Right.
2:52:38 Um, agree with, and everybody up here, I don’t think it’s just
2:52:41 one or two agrees that we need to have these higher.
2:52:43 There’s no doubt about that.
2:52:44 Absolutely.
2:52:45 I think the issue that we have is, is, um, you know, identifying
2:52:49 where in the budget we get it and stuff like that, but prioritizing
2:52:52 because we’re in a situation where we’re competing, even CTE,
2:52:55 you know what I mean?
2:52:56 Even all of it, it’s, it’s just, we’re in a bad spot when it
2:52:58 comes to, and we even just got all the millage money.
2:53:01 Right.
2:53:02 So, um, I feel like I agree with you a hundred percent that it
2:53:04 needs to be more.
2:53:05 I think also Dr. Rendell has looked at, um, possibly doing some
2:53:09 innovative things at Gardendale so that there may not be the,
2:53:12 the need like it is right now.
2:53:14 So there’s probably during budget time, we can make those
2:53:16 decisions, but I agree with you guys.
2:53:18 Thank you.
2:53:19 All right.
2:53:20 Fair enough.
2:53:21 Any other discussion in regards to this?
2:53:22 Nope.
2:53:23 All right.
2:53:24 Paul roll call, please.
2:53:25 Ms. Jenkins.
2:53:26 Aye.
2:53:27 Ms. Campbell.
2:53:28 Aye.
2:53:29 Ms. Wright.
2:53:30 Aye.
2:53:31 Mr. Trent.
2:53:32 Aye.
2:53:32 Mr. Susan.
2:53:33 Aye.
2:53:33 Dr. Rendell.
2:53:37 The first item is H42 procurement solicitations.
2:53:40 Do I hear a motion?
2:53:41 Move to approve.
2:53:42 Second.
2:53:43 Any discussion?
2:53:44 Nope.
2:53:45 Paul roll call, please.
2:53:46 Ms. Jenkins.
2:53:47 Aye.
2:53:48 Ms. Campbell.
2:53:49 Aye.
2:53:50 Ms. Wright.
2:53:51 Aye.
2:53:52 Mr. Trent.
2:53:53 Aye.
2:53:54 Mr. Susan.
2:53:55 Aye.
2:53:56 Dr. Rendell.
2:53:57 Aye.
2:53:58 Mr. Trent.
2:53:59 Aye.
2:54:00 Mr. Susan.
2:54:01 Aye.
2:54:03 All right.
2:54:03 We will move on to the information agenda, which includes one
2:54:03 item for the board to review.
2:54:03 may be brought back for action at a subsequent meeting.
2:54:04 No action will be taken on this item today.
2:54:05 Does anybody have to approve the denial of this application?
2:54:06 The recommendation is to deny the application for Orion Charter
2:54:10 School to open next year.
2:54:11 Okay.
2:54:12 Second.
2:54:13 Any discussion?
2:54:14 Hearing none.
2:54:15 Paul roll call, please.
2:54:16 Ms. Jenkins.
2:54:17 Aye.
2:54:18 Ms. Campbell.
2:54:19 Aye.
2:54:20 Ms. Wright.
2:54:21 Aye.
2:54:22 Mr. Trent.
2:54:23 Aye.
2:54:24 Mr. Susan.
2:54:25 Aye.
2:54:26 All right.
2:54:27 We will move on to the information agenda, which includes one
2:54:28 item for the board to review,
2:54:28 may be brought back for action at a subsequent meeting.
2:54:30 No action will be taken on this item today.
2:54:32 Does any board member wish to discuss this item?
2:54:34 I do.
2:54:35 We, we mentioned it last week when we were going through all of
2:54:39 the, um, line items of
2:54:41 the code of conduct, but I wanted to thank again, uh, Ms. Dampier,
2:54:44 Mr. Reed, all of the
2:54:46 staff, um, all the community members who came out, um, and
2:54:50 stakeholders, other stakeholders,
2:54:52 our representatives, BFT representatives, 10, 10, we had, we
2:54:55 just had really good group.
2:54:56 And I, Ms. Dampier, that was her leadership to do it this way
2:54:59 this year.
2:55:00 And so this, this revised code of conduct really is a good
2:55:03 reflection of a diverse group of
2:55:05 people who came together to have those conversations.
2:55:08 And really they got in everything they could cram in of the, uh,
2:55:12 of the decisions that were
2:55:13 fit within the state, uh, definitions and board policy.
2:55:16 So, um, and even, you know, challenges to change some policies.
2:55:20 So thank you for getting that done in such a timely fashion.
2:55:22 And I think once we have gone through this process, then from
2:55:26 this point on every year,
2:55:27 it should get easier and easier, right?
2:55:29 That’s the goal.
2:55:31 So thank you guys.
2:55:32 All right.
2:55:33 Any other further discussion on this topic?
2:55:35 No.
2:55:36 All right.
2:55:37 We are now, uh, Oh, Ms. Jenkins, are you, no, you’re not
2:55:40 touching.
2:55:40 Okay.
2:55:41 Sorry.
2:55:42 I saw you grab.
2:55:43 Okay.
2:55:44 Um, we’re now at the board member reports.
2:55:45 Does any board member have any further things to report or
2:55:47 discuss?
2:55:48 I know.
2:55:49 Mr. Susan, you do?
2:55:50 Okay.
2:55:51 Go ahead.
2:55:52 Yeah.
2:55:53 So in the three schools that I went to, we’re seeing a lot of,
2:55:55 um, uh,
2:55:56 Roy Allen, uh, in regards to permission slips, right?
2:55:59 Um, so at Roy Allen, they have a Bob book.
2:56:04 It’s about this tall and it says bring a big old binder.
2:56:08 And inside of it, it has all of the permission slips that they’ve
2:56:11 requested.
2:56:12 Um, they’ve got, um, like if they want to have a field day, they
2:56:16 have to send home permission
2:56:20 slips, stuff that’s been going on for 20, 30 years.
2:56:23 And one of the issues we have is, is that we have some schools
2:56:26 that are very affluent,
2:56:27 that have a career, a base of volunteers that chase after the
2:56:31 kids on days like that.
2:56:32 They call them and say, Hey, want to let you know Johnny didn’t
2:56:34 turn in his permission slip
2:56:36 and stuff like that.
2:56:37 And then you have another, you have, but in the title one
2:56:39 schools, it’s very difficult
2:56:41 because they don’t have the support to chase down some of that
2:56:44 stuff.
2:56:44 I’m going to just, as an FYI, I’m going to work with Paul to see
2:56:47 if there’s an opportunity
2:56:49 to allow certain ones of those to be allowed by the principal or
2:56:53 the superintendent to allow
2:56:55 that, Hey, if you’re going to have a field day, you’re going to
2:56:58 do something that’s during
2:56:58 the school hours that has, that is based on, um, you know what I
2:57:02 mean?
2:57:03 Part of the school that it’s been doing forever that having kids
2:57:06 sit in a room
2:57:07 because their parents weren’t able to fill out the form.
2:57:09 I just, it’s difficult.
2:57:10 So I’m going to look at that permission slip framework and see
2:57:13 if there’s some of those
2:57:14 that we’re able to allow kids, you know, classroom teachers who
2:57:18 are having, um, you know what I mean?
2:57:20 Uh, something inside their classroom have to have permission
2:57:23 forms for it.
2:57:24 Right.
2:57:25 And there is a reason for that.
2:57:26 And I do know what that is.
2:57:27 Um, but I don’t think the intent of what they were trying to do
2:57:29 is applying to that.
2:57:31 So I’m just going to look at it just an FYI and then I might
2:57:33 bring it back.
2:57:34 So if you guys want to, when you guys are inside your schools,
2:57:36 kind of mention to them,
2:57:37 say, Hey, how’s the permission form thing going?
2:57:39 What’s going on there?
2:57:40 And then, um, maybe bring that back when we come back in two
2:57:42 weeks.
2:57:43 That’s all.
2:57:44 All right.
2:57:45 Thank you.
2:57:46 Mr. Susan, any other further discussion or reports?
2:57:50 Nope.
2:57:51 Hearing none, this meeting is adjourned.
2:58:01 Thank you.