Updates on the Fight for Quality Public Education in Brevard County, FL
0:00 Thank you.
1:15:57 into my ears because I’ve wanted that we’ve we’re gradually
1:15:53 getting to more of
1:15:54 that PD where we’re videotaping so yes that is on our agenda so
1:16:04 here are as our
1:16:05 results from our partners and BFT they did a survey in the same
1:16:10 time frame that
1:16:11 we did so here are their results approximately 438 teachers
1:16:16 responded out
1:16:17 of a union members 3100 there’s 3100 technically union members
1:16:25 yeah I did not have that written down but yes so when we look
1:16:31 their policies
1:16:32 procedures clearly defined for teachers we do see there’s a
1:16:35 split of the members
1:16:36 that didn’t respond at a 50 50 percent second question I am able
1:16:42 to understand
1:16:43 the disciplinary rules and corrective strategies and my school
1:16:45 was written in
1:16:46 the code of student conduct again there is a majority however we
1:16:50 would love to
1:16:50 see that increase to a overwhelming majority instead of just
1:16:54 approximately
1:16:55 just below 60 percent and the final one here is addressing the
1:17:00 follow-up of
1:17:00 administrators administrator follows up with me to discuss
1:17:03 referrals and
1:17:04 corrective strategies we see that there is some room for growth
1:17:09 there we see that
1:17:10 there is an all all-time is roughly just under 22 percent with
1:17:13 some time being around 50 percent
1:17:16 and then 28 percent not following up at all so we would
1:17:19 definitely like to see some improvement
1:17:21 growth in that area and we have I did share this data with the
1:17:25 chief of schools since the principal
1:17:27 supervisor so they can really work with the principals and
1:17:31 looking at this data as well share this with him on Friday when
1:17:34 we received it so
1:17:35 I had a couple more questions than we did on their survey so I’m
1:17:40 just going to go over those real
1:17:41 quick I can easily get a hold of an administrator during a
1:17:44 crisis situation so
1:17:46 again we do see a majority of positive there with just under 60
1:17:49 percent however we would love to see
1:17:51 that continue to grow my administrator supports me with student
1:17:56 discipline issues again we are just
1:17:59 over that 69 percent which is a good number but there is room
1:18:02 for growth there as well
1:18:03 finally they did ask them what additional trainings they would
1:18:08 need in order to support them in the
1:18:10 classroom and they have a plethora of different answers so if
1:18:13 you could see that pie chart there’s a
1:18:15 lot of whole bunch of little ones in there however there’s a
1:18:18 good amount of stuff with de-escalation
1:18:20 um policies and procedures is something we can definitely
1:18:24 address for them classroom management etc
1:18:26 so next steps we’re looking to do um and this is kind of
1:18:35 inclusive of both areas is continue to
1:18:39 provide support and problem solving to schools this is something
1:18:42 that my team does on a daily basis
1:18:45 uh we did our own version of triage uh where we have schools
1:18:48 that will call us email us um and be
1:18:51 seeking advice so um we are trying to train them to make sure
1:18:54 that they’re utilizing our uh documents
1:18:57 we have our existing documents that are manual and student code
1:19:00 of conduct but my team is there to
1:19:02 make sure that we’re able to answer a phone call or an email in
1:19:05 order to make sure they’re getting their
1:19:07 problems addressed accordingly uh continuing offering that
1:19:10 professional development for school
1:19:11 administrators again this is something we do on a monthly basis
1:19:15 we are always trying to provide
1:19:16 them the most up-to-date information in order for them to
1:19:19 effectively do their jobs adding scenarios to
1:19:23 the monthly assistant principal trainings this was something
1:19:26 that came up as a as an ask because a lot
1:19:28 of times even though every situation is different sometimes uh
1:19:31 if you’re brand new to it you might not be well
1:19:34 versed um and have a lot of experience so we want to add some
1:19:38 scenario based examples in order to give
1:19:40 them a little bit of uh more understanding of some time to more
1:19:43 common occurrences they may be seeing
1:19:45 continuing to collaborate with our partners in bft and
1:19:48 transportation we find this to be very uh positive
1:19:52 and we would love to continue that and make sure that we’re both
1:19:55 uh growing positively for bps
1:19:57 ensuring schools are effectively tracking and monitoring their
1:20:01 data uh we do do a tracking and
1:20:02 monitoring data here however we want to help and partner with
1:20:05 schools to make sure that they are also
1:20:08 owning their data and know their data as well when it comes to
1:20:11 things uh discipline related as well
1:20:13 offer trainings on bullying harassment investigation process and
1:20:17 forms during the second semester via teams
1:20:20 that is something i believe miss cash and smith had already
1:20:23 alluded to more trainings that would be
1:20:25 occurring in the second semester and finally again uh holding
1:20:29 optional q a sessions and office hours for
1:20:32 bullying and harassment investigations um question about um
1:20:36 trainings that you guys offer do you offer
1:20:40 trainings for what in a secondary school would be a dean’s clerk
1:20:44 elementary whichever secretary or
1:20:46 whatever is or assistant is in charge of following with
1:20:49 paperwork because i know ultimately it’s the dean or
1:20:52 the assistant principal the principal who’s who is responsible
1:20:54 for what’s on the paperwork but i know
1:20:56 sometimes things get tossed back down from the districts of
1:20:59 school because somebody didn’t fill out
1:21:01 something correctly or whatever but do we do any trainings for
1:21:04 them to kind of help catch those things
1:21:06 no we haven’t but we can continue we could start doing if it’s
1:21:09 necessary i mean nobody’s come to me and
1:21:11 said i want to have this training but i thought it might be
1:21:13 helpful i know we’ve done it with our
1:21:16 some of our paperwork that comes in for um what is it for
1:21:20 enrollment but we really haven’t um for
1:21:23 pre-enrollment but we really haven’t offered any dean’s um clerks
1:21:26 training or anything like that
1:21:28 i know during our 10-month principal trainings our dean
1:21:32 trainings there are some schools that do invite
1:21:35 their clerks and they do attend however it’s not consistent
1:21:38 across the board right because some schools
1:21:40 obviously utilize them more than others while some might not
1:21:43 have that advantage of having one so yeah
1:21:46 no no it’s good i just thought if there’s so much you know if if
1:21:48 something didn’t get signed and you
1:21:50 know there was something i know dr fontan you know i have saw a
1:21:53 note on something recently i think it was
1:21:55 an expulsion packet hey we missed something and it’s it’s such a
1:22:00 like maybe not quite as clear step by
1:22:02 step by step as the bullying harassment title nine process but
1:22:06 it there’s a one two three and sometimes if
1:22:09 that causes a delay the whole process you know just could be
1:22:12 more frustrating so if if it’s necessary
1:22:14 or if it would be helpful i i would like i think it would be
1:22:18 good i think to reduce the errors with
1:22:20 the paperwork we can add that to our trainings and offer that
1:22:24 virtually like we’ve done in the past for
1:22:26 other trainings that we offer for our behavior techs we actually
1:22:30 provide that training monthly for them
1:22:33 maybe we can do something for our dean’s clerks as well yeah
1:22:36 awesome thank you so um and just
1:22:39 to add so my team is um working on a handbook for our clerks
1:22:43 right now because we noticed that
1:22:46 they’re not really owned by any one particular um group and so
1:22:51 they’ve got they’re asked by a lot of
1:22:54 different you know offices to do different things and so um we’re
1:22:59 working with we we surveyed them
1:23:02 and we asked them like who do you reach out to you know for your
1:23:06 role and so we made sure that we got
1:23:09 all of those people around the table and we’re trying to just
1:23:13 you know like i would say they probably work
1:23:16 the most with um et and so they already have documents that they’ve
1:23:20 made but we want to try to put it all in
1:23:23 one place and so right that we’re working on trying to just get
1:23:26 them a little bit of support oh that’s
1:23:28 a that’s a great resource thank you for doing that and i want to
1:23:31 say thank you to the board for i really
1:23:34 do think the behavior tax in our elementary schools having that
1:23:38 foundation um really has contributed to
1:23:41 some of this um data the decreases in that you know i’m
1:23:45 constantly out to schools we were just out to
1:23:48 a school on friday and the principal’s like please don’t take my
1:23:51 behavior tape please don’t take my
1:23:53 esc support specialist please it’s been a life changer and
1:23:56 changing just as last year when i would go to
1:23:58 their schools and i knew that they needed something especially
1:24:01 at the elementary level not saying
1:24:03 secondary doesn’t need it but elementary they were saying we
1:24:06 want to be a principal we can’t be a
1:24:08 principal and friday i was at a school and oh my god that
1:24:11 discipline the principal says that their
1:24:13 behaviors have decreased by 54 percent and they said thank you i
1:24:17 can be a principal because i have a
1:24:18 full-time behavior tech full-time esc support specialist so i’m
1:24:21 saying those resources that we’re providing
1:24:24 in the schools have been monumental uh to some of i i think some
1:24:28 of telling the story today of some of the
1:24:30 decreases so i want to really advocate for you know providing
1:24:34 more of those positions for next year
1:24:38 can you can you i know because everybody started jumping can you
1:24:41 just advance that one more so that
1:24:43 because it says questions on the next one i think all right so
1:24:46 we’re in the proper spot all right so
1:24:48 so mr uh miss campbell i didn’t want to pass up are you have you
1:24:53 completed all your questions for
1:24:54 mr dampier okay all right mr thomas go ahead thank you first of
1:24:58 all i think it’s awesome um i think from
1:25:01 what the uh what the board did um with the superintendent’s uh
1:25:06 implementation to your team to the
1:25:09 principal the dean i think the discipline policy overall is
1:25:11 working i think the training that you guys
1:25:13 have done is awesome um and the fact that you followed up your
1:25:17 training the survey the feedback
1:25:19 has improved is something that a lot of people miss i think and
1:25:23 i think it’s a huge dividend moving
1:25:26 forward for the next couple years so kudos to you guys i just um
1:25:32 had a question about microphone please
1:25:34 and i was just curious if you had uh had an answer for this but
1:25:39 one of the slides was listing um listed
1:25:43 am i on must be child resistance i could hear you instead of the
1:25:49 uh 198 students you said one of the
1:25:52 slides said 198 students opted for alc um during the discipline
1:25:57 portion of it and i was just curious
1:26:01 is there do you have you have to know off the cuff out of those
1:26:04 198 students that opted for the alc
1:26:06 how many of those had no further discipline um action taken to
1:26:10 the rest of the year we don’t but
1:26:13 that’s something that we can look at we can try to disaggregate
1:26:16 that and get you an answer okay
1:26:17 and other than that i think you guys uh were very comprehensive
1:26:22 and i think you are doing an awesome job
1:26:24 mr wright all right i’m up next okay um thank you for all this
1:26:30 information honestly we we need to continually keep on looking
1:26:33 at this one of the things that
1:26:35 um i look at i think that’s very important is really the
1:26:38 recommended recommendations for alternative
1:26:41 placement by school that that chart i think it’s on page 12 on
1:26:44 your slide here uh it’s pretty easy to see
1:26:48 where the hot pockets are right of the majority of the children
1:26:52 that are going into alcs and i think that
1:26:55 that warrants probably the district taking a look at what can we
1:26:58 do to help those certain schools
1:27:00 in a different way as the board has talked to the last workshop
1:27:02 about looking at something different
1:27:04 than the alc the possibly looking at like maybe an iss model
1:27:08 which not every school has that
1:27:10 but if there’s a way that the district can focus supports there
1:27:14 on on trying to really hone in on
1:27:16 those schools and figure out there’s a few here that are a
1:27:18 little more concerning than others i think
1:27:20 that really needs some specific focus but overall we’re turning
1:27:23 the right way so we knew when we
1:27:25 originally came in and we started to say hey we’re going to look
1:27:27 at discipline discipline really is to try to modify the
1:27:30 behavior right we want to make sure the students are are well
1:27:32 behaved in the classroom everyone is
1:27:34 learning it’s a productive environment our teachers feel state
1:27:37 or feel safe and are happy with their jobs and
1:27:39 discipline was one of those messages we were hearing loud and
1:27:42 clear like this is a problem these kids are
1:27:44 running the classroom so we’re trending in the right direction
1:27:47 for the most part um getting some of these
1:27:49 things under control that being said we have kids so we
1:27:52 understand kids are going to push the lines
1:27:54 they’re going to push the boundaries we’re going to always have
1:27:56 to correct them and make sure that we get them back on track but
1:28:00 again overall goal is just to maintain a peaceful classroom that’s
1:28:03 productive so these kids can
1:28:04 learn because unfortunately you know we look at we we see the
1:28:07 other side of it the expulsion side of it
1:28:09 and so when you read some of those packets and you see that
1:28:12 steps are having to be taken to remove
1:28:14 students from classrooms and you know you start to read all the
1:28:17 story there you’re going oh my gosh we
1:28:18 still have work to do so um thank you and if there’s a way that
1:28:21 we can focus on those schools that have the majority of
1:28:25 these alc placements and see if there’s a way to bring some
1:28:28 support into those schools i think that
1:28:30 would be tremendous there’s one that’s really a hot spot i think
1:28:32 more so than any of the other ones
1:28:34 if there’s a way we can support that school in any way i think
1:28:36 we should look at trying to do that as
1:28:38 well so thank you okay thank you miss damp here i just i was
1:28:43 really excited when i saw these numbers
1:28:45 we were talking about them the other day um and i just wanted to
1:28:48 say thank you to you and your staff
1:28:49 you guys are amazing i was i leaned over to miss wright and i
1:28:52 said you know there’s things that you do
1:28:55 as a school board member that you get kind of remembered for
1:28:57 right and if you ever would have
1:28:59 said that our group that came in there in 22 would have known
1:29:02 that discipline would be one of the
1:29:04 things that we’re remembered for that would be not something i
1:29:07 saw coming and it kind of hit us we’re
1:29:09 ready to go and because of your support and in the work that you’ve
1:29:13 done it it is something that we can
1:29:15 shine on this district and people can feel safe about the them
1:29:18 sending their children to our schools i uh i did
1:29:21 want to point out a couple of things that i saw that are really
1:29:24 good um on your page 411 it’s just with
1:29:26 all the alternative placement by discipline code uh weapon
1:29:29 possession down 100 percent possession of
1:29:33 uh potentially dangerous objection major down 100 percent i
1:29:37 think part of that may be the fact that we
1:29:39 moved in with our um metal detectors uh we always do have some
1:29:43 that might make their way in or out but the
1:29:45 fact that you have to have the single point access and now i
1:29:48 think that that’s gotten under control
1:29:50 something for everybody to kind of take a look at um and then i
1:29:53 was going to say something because it’s
1:29:55 the drug sales and distribution is down 80 percent and the drug
1:29:59 possession is down 16 percent um is
1:30:02 that you feel in part because of the system that we put in place
1:30:05 for taking children away from going
1:30:08 to the alternative learning center and actually working with
1:30:11 them in to where we don’t have repeat
1:30:14 numbers and we don’t have all that stuff have you guys seen any
1:30:16 of that or no um yes i believe that would be a
1:30:19 say um definitely when you’re looking at this mr seuss and this
1:30:22 is students that opted for
1:30:24 alternative placements so this wouldn’t be encompassed of those
1:30:26 drug diversions so the drug diversion
1:30:29 every student that selects drug diversion is one less that is
1:30:32 being placed in an alternative setting so
1:30:34 that is a positive no it’s it’s awesome um i did talk to the bus
1:30:38 drivers right before or yeah it was right
1:30:41 before we took off on break and um what you’ll find is is the 17
1:30:46 that were there i know a couple of them
1:30:49 um that had said like that they don’t feel that their referral
1:30:52 processes were up to speed on that
1:30:54 thing what you’ll find is is that they will tell you that they
1:30:57 have principles that actually do it very
1:31:00 well and some that don’t so those bus drivers that i was a part
1:31:03 of and spoke to both at the viera compound
1:31:06 the manatee compound and over in ogali had mentioned to me that
1:31:09 it’s specific to school and that we may
1:31:11 be able to talk to them about okay if you don’t feel strongly
1:31:15 about it where is it that you don’t feel
1:31:17 strongly about it because they’ll tell you and it’s not like it’s
1:31:20 it’s not like it’s one out of ten
1:31:22 there’s all of them you know what i mean so it’s it’s pretty
1:31:25 inclusive on that can i chime in on
1:31:27 something just just a simple suggestion i’m gonna i’m gonna brag
1:31:30 on my north end bus compound so
1:31:31 cleveland up in the north end what he does at the beginning of
1:31:34 the school year and i think it’s
1:31:35 imperative as really building that relationship is he takes his
1:31:39 bus drivers to each one of the schools
1:31:41 and meets with the principal and the deans brings donuts and
1:31:44 really just establishes that relationship
1:31:46 because it’s all about relationships and and i think that he has
1:31:48 said that has paid dividends that are
1:31:50 tremendous as far as his processes of referrals uh you know
1:31:53 being done in a timely manner so just maybe
1:31:56 a suggestion a challenge hey take them over there let’s meet
1:31:58 with the admin team build that
1:32:00 relationship and see if that helps to some degree donuts yeah
1:32:03 and he always brings good donuts
1:32:04 that is something we can share especially when we meet with our
1:32:08 bus um supervisors we meet with
1:32:10 them monthly along with dr miller and we problem solve and we
1:32:13 really if they have issues we try to
1:32:16 you know intervene ahead of time because we want to be you know
1:32:19 proactive instead of reactive and um that’s a great idea
1:32:22 i just didn’t want you guys i think that the number is is great
1:32:28 to look at but i wanted you to understand
1:32:31 that sometimes it’s not 100 of those 17 the other thing is is
1:32:34 that one of the things that the bus
1:32:36 drivers had mentioned is is the follow-up to them right so we
1:32:40 know that the process is they come home
1:32:42 they write they’ll they write the referral it goes to their kind
1:32:45 of area supervisor who formulates it and
1:32:47 sends it in that area supervisor and sometimes may not be
1:32:49 receiving it from the principal back and then
1:32:52 back to the bus driver i didn’t know if along with some of the
1:32:55 things that we normally do if there was
1:32:56 like a check box list like a process and flow like okay you know
1:33:00 what i mean was processed was sent to
1:33:03 the bus driver check check you know what i mean because that
1:33:06 that kind of area kind of breaks down
1:33:07 a little bit sometimes and that’s an area that i thought we
1:33:10 could improve that’s an area i’ll get
1:33:12 feedback on because we did add that from this summer i met with
1:33:15 the bus drivers and that was one of the
1:33:17 requests that you know they find out you know when it was
1:33:20 processed and so we thought we addressed that it
1:33:23 was a part of our training so we will look and make sure that it
1:33:27 is working uh with that and if you can
1:33:30 if you if you did address it if you could put a time stamp on it
1:33:33 when it did so that you can see
1:33:34 where those are happening because i think that they would be
1:33:37 indicative of schools um and then
1:33:41 i got all these this is good i talked about that and then mr ampere
1:33:48 have you had a chance um you spoke
1:33:50 there at the end about the very high importance of each one of
1:33:54 the behavioral texts and those
1:33:56 individuals have you had a chance to kind of go through that
1:33:59 with each board member and explain to
1:34:00 them the process because there were some concerns from our board
1:34:03 about um taking from instructional
1:34:06 assistance and all that other stuff and i don’t know if you ever
1:34:09 had that opportunity to talk to them
1:34:11 i didn’t know if you wanted that now or if you want to meet with
1:34:13 them individually and talk to them
1:34:15 well we were very thankful this past year again because we were
1:34:18 able to add behavior texts and i was
1:34:20 afraid that we were not going to be able to hire the behavior
1:34:24 tests because we had so many ias
1:34:27 but what it did was it opened an opportunity for those ias who
1:34:31 were having to ride the bus or were only
1:34:33 working six hours the behavior tech pays a little bit more and
1:34:37 you know as far as the hourly rate but it also
1:34:40 gives them eight hours so it did you know we did have some ias
1:34:44 moved to that position but
1:34:46 it didn’t hurt us as far as the ias you know us not being able
1:34:50 to hire for either or
1:34:52 so it was a win-win situation because we had more people wanting
1:34:55 to stay with
1:34:56 of our public schools those that did not want to ride the bus
1:35:00 all the time that kind of thing and
1:35:01 really work in the school so it really just opened the door
1:35:04 where we were able to keep some people who
1:35:06 probably would have gone back to you know the you know target or
1:35:10 some other area but we still need
1:35:13 to compete be able to compete for those particular you know
1:35:17 employees that really they get skill they
1:35:20 have a skill set that we’re really training on every month to
1:35:23 make sure that they have the skill to work
1:35:25 with our most severe kids and so we do we we do want to expand
1:35:30 that because we have heard and we’ve seen
1:35:33 that there is this really has helped in our elementary schools
1:35:37 so we want to expand it for next year and
1:35:39 we were also looking for an increase in that particular area as
1:35:43 far as salary are you able to see the
1:35:46 reduction in discipline based upon having behavioral techs in
1:35:49 schools and places that don’t have them
1:35:52 can you see that yet um yes because in elementary we were able
1:35:56 to i can i can tell you when i was on
1:35:59 the campus on friday was like night and day that same campus i
1:36:03 was on last year and i just commended
1:36:05 the principal there are she told me that they have reduced
1:36:09 behaviors by 54 percent i can tell you there’s
1:36:12 structure in the schools there’s learning going on in the
1:36:15 classroom she’s not like she was it was just
1:36:18 it was like night and day and i had to commend her and i
1:36:22 actually commended um i told mr he’s not in
1:36:26 here i told mr ramer that i went to the school and he even said
1:36:30 he’s seen an uh a difference and i’ve
1:36:32 been to several schools that were asking for help last year
1:36:35 begging pleading i actually was a part of
1:36:38 trying to uh you know work with uh several uh schools and we’re
1:36:42 not seeing it when i go to the schools the
1:36:45 principals are not saying that they can’t be an administrator
1:36:48 what they’re saying is thank you for
1:36:49 this support that we’re actually able to do our job at the
1:36:53 elementary level and that was why it was
1:36:55 imperative that we provided that support for them and some of
1:36:58 our schools are still sharing we have a
1:37:00 0.5 we have like a couple of our schools that’s sharing i think
1:37:04 about 23 of our schools are sharing a
1:37:07 0.5 part-time um and we’re hoping to expand some of those if we
1:37:11 get funding for full-time because some
1:37:14 of them are needed yeah and so um i i say ask the principals i
1:37:19 mean but they’ve all said to me please
1:37:22 do not take those two positions away from us can you say will
1:37:26 you talk about sharing are you talking about
1:37:29 the esc support specialist or the behavior text both okay we
1:37:32 have sharing of the behavior text yes okay
1:37:35 because we only had enough funding um that i you know within my
1:37:38 budget last year to do a point you
1:37:41 know full-time and then to make sure everybody had some access
1:37:44 right right and i’ve already spoken to
1:37:45 dr rendell about possibly expanding that as well as esc support
1:37:49 specialist because i’ve heard that as well
1:37:52 and we know that there’s a need we just need additional funding
1:37:55 to make that happen those are just that are
1:37:57 small like our smallest schools right or our um like choice
1:38:01 schools and things like that not necessarily
1:38:03 we went as far as we could with the you know right the funding
1:38:08 that we had and so i’ve already spoken
1:38:11 to dr rendell about possibly expanding that there is a need to
1:38:15 spend several of those to full-time
1:38:17 you’re i’m sorry miss campbell no that’s it your work in hiring
1:38:23 has been phenomenal with the vacancies
1:38:25 that you had when you took over um even the the teachers union
1:38:28 and others have given you such great
1:38:30 praise over the percentage and i know you have some vacancies
1:38:33 that people are sharing but you’ve done
1:38:35 a great job in that regard i wanted to give you and your staff
1:38:37 the opportunity for a second because
1:38:39 you’ve been doing great i know you don’t ever want me to give it
1:38:41 to you it’s the staff i mean we really
1:38:42 are they work they we work together and we want what’s best for
1:38:47 our kids and we know
1:38:49 that uh when i hear stories like what i heard on friday it
1:38:52 warmed my heart this is why i do what i do
1:38:54 to see it actually see it because i i would not have believed it
1:38:59 i’m just telling you uh and to see
1:39:01 the principal and the esc support specialist walk with us to
1:39:05 classrooms as well learning what’s going
1:39:07 on in the classroom we were in the halls there was stuff all in
1:39:10 the halls last year would probably been
1:39:12 taken down and so it was just so nice to see and hear the
1:39:15 principal show us what what is happening
1:39:18 in their school so thank you thank you mr ampere thank you for
1:39:22 everybody anybody else have any
1:39:24 questions for mr ampere we’re good i have some stuff oh sorry dr
1:39:27 rindal i was getting i was good
1:39:29 dr rindell i was i was getting ready to say dr rindell that’s
1:39:32 what i always it’s on here on the notes
1:39:34 i can do it no i appreciate some of the points that the board
1:39:37 members have made and some of the
1:39:38 the slides they’ve highlighted i’d actually like to highlight a
1:39:42 few others so jason if you can go to
1:39:44 slide five so slide five i think is is one of the best slides to
1:39:49 share so whoever can get us back up
1:39:51 there all right it’s going to be much easier going this way
1:40:01 so this is the ticket slide so remember last year when we were
1:40:06 trying to address misbehavior and we
1:40:07 said to correct the misbehavior we have to write a lot of
1:40:10 tickets it’s like you’ve got a certain road
1:40:13 where there’s a lot drivers are speeding or driving recklessly
1:40:15 and so the police pay attention to that
1:40:17 road they set up patrols they write a lot of tickets until
1:40:20 driver behavior changes so last year we were
1:40:24 writing a lot of tickets referrals and at this point this year
1:40:28 the number of referrals are down almost 2 000.
1:40:31 that’s amazing and then the number of students receiving
1:40:35 referrals is down almost a thousand
1:40:37 so i mean or over a little over a thousand so you know we’re
1:40:41 still enforcing the rules so to speak
1:40:43 but we’re actually writing fewer tickets and fewer students are
1:40:46 receiving tickets so to speak writing
1:40:48 fewer referrals so that’s really really good news it means that
1:40:53 some of the changes that we’ve made over
1:40:55 the last year and a half or so are taking taking effect and then
1:40:59 the other slide number eight if
1:41:02 we can just advance to eight so we when we finished the year
1:41:05 last year one of the things we talked about
1:41:08 was fewer days of missed instruction now at the first part of
1:41:12 the year last year our numbers were higher
1:41:15 we were suspending kids more out of school and assigning in
1:41:18 school suspension at a higher rate than
1:41:21 the previous year then it kind of leveled off and we ended the
1:41:24 year with fewer days of out of school
1:41:27 suspension and fewer days of in school suspension we’re already
1:41:30 ahead of the curve overall with those this
1:41:33 year as you can see iss has decreased almost 1300 days now the
1:41:39 oss has increased by 365 that’s only two percent
1:41:43 three percent so combined it’s 932 fewer days of missed
1:41:47 instruction at this point and last year again
1:41:50 this was the higher point so if our pattern continues through
1:41:54 the end of the year we should actually
1:41:56 be able to beat but you know last year’s toll is in both those
1:41:59 areas so fewer days of missed instruction
1:42:01 should mean you know better academic performance and you know
1:42:04 that’s we want the kids in the classroom
1:42:07 i really feel like we’ve been able to do this with consistent
1:42:11 enforcement of the policy
1:42:12 and part of that’s education you know mrs dampier talked at the
1:42:16 beginning about educating everybody
1:42:18 about what the expectations are not just the staff that’s
1:42:20 administering the discipline but also the
1:42:22 students did a good job of trying to you know explain what the
1:42:25 desired behaviors were what the
1:42:27 consequences were and that leads me to slide number 17 so we can
1:42:37 jump down to 17
1:42:40 so 17 and you can go ahead and get your red highlight on there
1:42:46 is not
1:42:47 it’s this isn’t just paperwork this is real cases so 30 percent
1:42:52 fewer cases of unsubstantiated bullying
1:42:56 we might think well there’s a 30 percent reduction in unsubstantiated
1:42:59 bullying there must be like a 70
1:43:00 increase in substantiated bullying and no there’s actually a
1:43:03 decrease
1:43:05 so again it’s education not just for the people handling these
1:43:08 cases but also to the students you
1:43:11 know we’re doing a better job and then you know mrs cash and smith
1:43:15 talked about well if it wasn’t
1:43:18 substantiated or it wasn’t deemed bullying at all in the past
1:43:23 maybe we didn’t even consider harassment
1:43:25 so i kind of left the door open well then maybe there’s going to
1:43:28 be an increase in harassment cases
1:43:29 because you’re not classifying all these as bullying and you
1:43:33 look and nope decrease in unsubstantiated
1:43:37 harassment and substantiated i mean unsubstantiated increased by
1:43:40 an increase by two but still
1:43:42 combined a decrease so again really really good work by the
1:43:46 staff at the schools that are handling these
1:43:49 cases you know not just you know up here at the district office
1:43:53 or even the administrators at the
1:43:56 schools but even the teachers in the classroom and in the last
1:43:59 couple slides we talked about 2021
1:44:03 those are the survey results you don’t have to go to them but
1:44:06 the fact like mr thomas pointed out that
1:44:08 we’re not only making these changes but we’re asking for
1:44:10 feedback you know we’re not just looking at the
1:44:12 results at the data we’re asking for feedback from the people
1:44:16 involved and you know the results from the
1:44:18 administrators seemed pretty strong results from the bus driver
1:44:21 seemed pretty strong the results from the bft
1:44:23 survey looks like we still have some work to do you know so but
1:44:26 we have that feedback and we’re going
1:44:27 to you know act on it so kudos to the student services
1:44:30 department but really kudos to all the
1:44:33 staff at all the schools you know because this is you know the
1:44:36 phrase that we use a lot is discipline is
1:44:38 everybody’s responsibility just like safety is everybody’s
1:44:42 responsibility so it’s not just the
1:44:44 student services department and kudos to them you’re right mr
1:44:47 susan definitely but um all the people at the
1:44:50 buildings that are making this happen you know that’s that’s why
1:44:53 these numbers are so so good
1:44:55 right now so we just hope it continues for the rest of the
1:44:58 semester this you know rest of the year
1:45:02 one thing too just because i think it’s important to highlight
1:45:08 the fact that the
1:45:10 you mentioned it that the teacher participation in the survey
1:45:13 was pretty low so even though these numbers
1:45:14 don’t look maybe as favorable as we would like to see it only
1:45:17 represents about what 15 percent of the
1:45:19 teachers that they have in the union so ideally if we could have
1:45:22 more participation that might look a
1:45:23 little different if we if we got that number up to over 75
1:45:26 percent of the teachers responded
1:45:28 we might see a little bit different there um and if we don’t see
1:45:30 different that’s okay that just
1:45:31 lets us know we need to work on a few things right so that’s all
1:45:34 thank you thank you for everything
1:45:35 we appreciate you guys you guys have been doing amazing work so
1:45:38 mr susan we have one more um
1:45:41 topic to cover but i’d love to take a break if we could yeah i
1:45:43 was just gonna literally i felt
1:45:45 miss campbell breathing down my neck here i agree with you a
1:45:48 hundred percent she she went and grabbed
1:45:50 it i was like okay i know what i did want it i did want to jump
1:45:53 in this just really quick before we
1:45:55 take our break um i don’t know if you guys saw an email just 30
1:45:57 minutes before the meeting started
1:45:59 but our the delegation meeting has been canceled for next week
1:46:01 because of the weather and the
1:46:02 potential special session but also i got an email from tom sarah
1:46:06 from the consortium and we are the
1:46:08 only district that hasn’t voted on the consortium platform so i
1:46:11 don’t think it’s too late because it’s been
1:46:13 topics we’ve discussed in the public for us to take that vote
1:46:16 tonight um we can talk about it this
1:46:18 afternoon but we need to we need to give a yay or nay or if
1:46:20 there’s anything we want to pull off
1:46:22 of the consortium platform while we’re thinking about this this
1:46:25 afternoon um and then let’s vote on it
1:46:27 we’re going to talk about it in in five minutes yeah right right
1:46:30 yeah yeah so but tonight we need to we
1:46:32 can uh vote we can’t vote in a workshop um but we need to vote
1:46:51 in it
1:46:54 so
1:47:29 and
1:47:38 so
1:47:42 you
1:47:51 so
1:47:53 you
1:47:55 so
1:47:55 you
1:48:51 You
1:49:03 you
1:56:47 three
1:56:48 two
1:56:49 last on the agenda is the legislative platform does any board
1:56:54 member have would anybody any board
1:56:57 member wish to lead the conversation I have I can walk through
1:57:01 it I think the first you want to do
1:57:04 it okay sorry I’ll get started yeah so each of you have a packet
1:57:07 in front of you it’s information
1:57:09 I had given you before we’re a part of different groups and so
1:57:13 some of our different groups have
1:57:15 put together legislative platforms for example we’re part of FSBA
1:57:18 there’s legislative platform
1:57:20 from FSBA we’ve looked at I’m a member of the State
1:57:23 Superintendent’s Association there’s a platform
1:57:28 for that we’re also a member of another group of school boards
1:57:31 the greater consortium of Florida
1:57:33 school boards they have a legislative platform mrs. Campbell had
1:57:37 done some work earlier and had put
1:57:40 together what she thought were the bullet points that we all
1:57:42 kind of agreed on as our own things
1:57:44 we wanted to carry forward so you have all that packet also you
1:57:48 have a sample draft letter from
1:57:51 me to the Brevard delegation as mr. Campbell pointed out before
1:57:55 we took a break we were going to be
1:57:58 presenting to the Brevard delegation later this month and so
1:58:03 what I’ve seen as somewhat effective in the
1:58:06 past is that different groups send all their information to
1:58:10 those delegate members ahead of time say you know
1:58:13 they send it out a week to them we send it to them a week or so
1:58:16 ahead of time and then just follow up at
1:58:18 that open public meeting hitting some of the high points so I
1:58:22 drafted a letter based on what we had
1:58:24 kind of talked about would be our points and you know put that
1:58:28 together so I thought we could have a
1:58:30 discussion today about do we want to adopt anything different as
1:58:36 ours do we want to change anything reorder it or that kind of
1:58:39 thing
1:58:40 also as mr. Campbell mentioned we are being asked by the consortium
1:58:47 whether we agree with all of the things on their platform or not
1:58:51 and if there’s anything on their platform that we don’t want
1:58:55 them to pursue that we need to let them know
1:58:57 so you know that’s kind of two different discussions one are we
1:59:01 good with the bulleted points that mrs. Campbell put together
1:59:05 and then I translate it into a letter and that’s going to be our
1:59:07 so that’s going to be our asks to the local delegation and then
1:59:11 b are there other things from the other platforms that we want
1:59:15 to bring in
1:59:17 so that’s awesome do you want to start with the greater florida
1:59:21 consortium and just say does anybody wish to veto anything on
1:59:24 here if you guys take a look at this it’s kind of the if you we
1:59:27 have the authority this is kind of like everybody that’s in the
1:59:30 consortium has an idea they throw it on here and then if we want
1:59:33 to eliminate some of it we’re good um i’ll take any
1:59:36 recommendations
1:59:36 i had one small ask on on the first page so they allow school
1:59:41 districts flexibility regarding school start times and dates can
1:59:45 we add and date yep so we can’t add um so the the way the
1:59:51 consortium’s platform works is we can’t add we can only take
1:59:55 away um so they built this the the adding time was when they
1:59:59 they built when they had their meeting and right we were invited
2:00:03 to yeah um but they build it and they we they we can um
2:00:05 we can um anything that we as a board say we can’t get behind
2:00:10 that they will take it out of platform altogether but we they
2:00:13 won’t add uh they won’t add okay so with with that in mind then
2:00:16 i i mean to me i i don’t support i this i don’t know we’ve
2:00:21 already changed everything and maybe that’s being selfish from
2:00:23 rivard standpoint but as far as complying with the the um state
2:00:28 mandate on school start times i’m guessing that’s what they’re
2:00:30 trying to get out right here they don’t like that correct right
2:00:32 so it this doesn’t apply to rivard
2:00:34 it’s not too far because our our middle school and high school
2:00:37 times are already right after the times but i will tell you this
2:00:39 is causing significant consternation in many counties across the
2:00:44 state because of their bussing uh their three tiered bussing
2:00:49 systems and because of students like their practice times and
2:00:53 being able to have after school jobs and all this kind of stuff
2:00:55 so they’re they’re having community outcry in their communities
2:00:58 and so the what the stance i’ll just tell you that fsba took on
2:01:03 that was at least allowed to
2:01:03 at least allowed districts to put out a community survey and if
2:01:09 they could show that their community really doesn’t want that
2:01:11 they’ll leave it but i will tell you there’s already been bills
2:01:13 filed um bipartisan way i don’t remember if in both houses to
2:01:18 actually either repeal this or pull it back
2:01:20 it’s quite so i think this is i mean i don’t i wouldn’t want to
2:01:23 take it off just because we don’t do it right you know i mean
2:01:27 there’s a lot of counties that are really um
2:01:30 we’re having a hard time we’re going to have a significant hard
2:01:33 time especially with transportation if this continues
2:01:36 thank you for the clarification
2:01:38 okay i had one uh item um and i’m gonna have to find it but
2:01:46 there is a and it’s the one that i talked to
2:01:48 the front page yeah where yeah thank you which paragraph is it
2:01:52 we’re on the consortium still yeah we’re on the consortium
2:01:54 third one after priority issues yes sorry governance so the
2:01:58 third the third paragraph uh require all schools that receive
2:02:01 taxpayer dollars to have the same financial and academic
2:02:03 accountability measures um that sounds great but what it says is
2:02:09 that every every um private school will have to have the same
2:02:12 financial act and account and account and academic
2:02:15 accountability measures as our public schools and while there’s
2:02:19 some people would say yes and amen i’m not sure that you know it
2:02:23 comes to choice i’m not sure that that um
2:02:26 is a good idea i mean private schools have their own ways that
2:02:31 they are we going to require uh private schools to take the fast
2:02:36 test you know our because when it says academic accountability
2:02:40 that’s the way we have academic
2:02:40 accountability is through our school grades and through our fast
2:02:43 testing and all the other things i am not um i’m not of the
2:02:44 opinion that our private schools that are the state government
2:02:44 should come and tell a private school what to do when it comes
2:02:44 to that even if they’re receiving funding that’s the parents’
2:02:44 choice
2:02:44 to do that funding and i don’t think that um that that that if i
2:03:00 follow that rabbit trail ultimately i think that’s what it means
2:03:04 is that we would require our private schools to have the same
2:03:06 kind of testing and academic um standards as our public schools
2:03:10 and um that’s not a very conservative position
2:03:12 yeah i tend to agree with you on that stance honestly um what if
2:03:18 we vetoed just and academic
2:03:20 and you put in require all schools that receive taxpayer dollars
2:03:24 to have the same financial accountability measures
2:03:26 well if you do the financial well i want i want the
2:03:29 accountability for these scholarships i absolutely do
2:03:32 when you talk about financial accountability then whatever
2:03:35 requirements we have as far as audits and things like that then
2:03:40 we’re also saying
2:03:40 we want the same that way too if they’re going to take taxpayer
2:03:46 dollars i have no problem using financial accountability
2:03:48 measures on them
2:03:48 um that’s it that’s only if they do so private schools don’t
2:03:52 want to um it’s the same word the same because like again if i
2:03:56 chase that rabbit if i chase that all the way down the rabbit
2:04:00 trail um it’s basically turning public private schools into
2:04:03 public schools
2:04:04 if they receive public dollars right you should be able to be
2:04:08 financially oh i’m sorry i’m not allowing you to go
2:04:10 it’s the same word i mean i i if honestly if you could take out
2:04:14 the same i would be in support of it to require all schools that
2:04:18 receive taxpayer dollars to have
2:04:18 financial and accountability you know and academic accounting
2:04:22 measures um that i could probably get behind that
2:04:26 but um i don’t think well it does very much you know so they’re
2:04:31 going to target private schools with this and
2:04:32 what will end up ultimately happening is you’ll have your
2:04:34 private schools not taking the scholarships and the whole point
2:04:38 of
2:04:38 them having the freedom of choice is to be able to move their
2:04:41 child where they feel they’re getting the best education
2:04:42 so i i kind of tend to agree that that’s a slippery slope does
2:04:48 anybody know or can anybody share with me why some of these are
2:04:50 underlined and why some of them are not is there any does
2:04:53 anybody know that new dot um i think they knew or they
2:04:56 no it’s it’s um if you look at the difference i was looking at
2:05:00 these some of them are underlined
2:05:02 and maybe because they’re like amendments to existing
2:05:05 legislation and others are kind of new ones i know i just
2:05:08 that threw me for a loop and i’m like is this otherwise just to
2:05:11 focus on these more so they didn’t send a key
2:05:12 they just copy and pasted stuff yeah usually it’s when you make
2:05:15 a change it’s underlined or something
2:05:17 like that we asked and they we didn’t get a good answer okay mr
2:05:19 chairman if you don’t feel comfortable
2:05:21 you guys about moving forward on this one i did want to just say
2:05:23 my piece and then be done with it
2:05:25 um you’re right about that miss wright that they will start not
2:05:28 wanting to take the scholarships which is
2:05:30 a negative the only problem that i run into is that a lot of
2:05:33 these um charter and private financial
2:05:36 institutions um will they are started and they are run by like a
2:05:42 organization that not only
2:05:45 is the real estate company is the company that sells all the
2:05:47 food like they’re just they’re just
2:05:49 set up as a profiteering situation and i think that that’s fine
2:05:53 i’m not saying that that’s a negative
2:05:55 at all but it just needs to be financially known and i don’t
2:05:58 think that they’re able to do that
2:05:59 under the certain uh financial requirements that they have i’m
2:06:02 not saying that it’s illegal i’m not
2:06:04 saying that it’s wrong i just think that the people that go
2:06:06 there should know the board that sits there
2:06:08 should know that the person that is also their realtor is also
2:06:11 their person that they buy their
2:06:13 management from and their everything else you know what i mean
2:06:15 that’s all and that that would help
2:06:17 there but i hear where your concerns are so i’m willing to mr
2:06:21 chair yeah so i um of the opinion that if
2:06:24 they’re going to receive taxpayer money that they should be
2:06:27 accountable to the taxpayer
2:06:29 if they’re not there it’s their choice if they don’t want to
2:06:32 take the funds and that’s fine remain
2:06:34 private but as soon as you take taxpayer money you should be
2:06:36 accountable to the taxpayers and i think
2:06:38 i think what we should do since this one’s got a little bit of
2:06:41 dance to it maybe what we do
2:06:42 mr thomas is is rework this one and bring it back next year
2:06:47 strongly and just make it as part of
2:06:49 recommendation so we’re not being negative on the piece that
2:06:52 goes to the scholarship we address some
2:06:54 of the issues with her but the only reason i say this is there’s
2:06:57 a couple charter schools in our
2:06:58 district that were doing this that are no longer doing it but
2:07:01 they were doing this and it was really
2:07:02 upsetting to me that they were being kind of sly behind the
2:07:06 behind it right and so i would like to
2:07:08 move if that’s okay with you to do something like that to where
2:07:11 we’re we’re not kind of throwing it out
2:07:12 there um we can veto this one and then well and we’re not
2:07:15 talking about adding this to our agenda
2:07:18 but we’re just saying do we right you know do we want to and i
2:07:21 honestly don’t know the answer to the
2:07:23 question of i know we can’t add anything but can we remove just
2:07:28 two words or can we say all or nothing
2:07:31 i mean i you know there’s um yeah their direction at uh the last
2:07:35 time we met with them was they just
2:07:37 if any board has any issue with any of these we’ll pull it off
2:07:41 okay so if we have an issue with that
2:07:44 you know before all schools receive taxpayer dollars period
2:07:47 after that they’re going to just
2:07:49 take it off i feel strongly about it i just i want to be able to
2:07:53 work it better if that’s okay
2:07:54 with you guys because i do feel strongly about that and i i’m
2:07:57 all for accountability i’m not opposing
2:07:59 accountability but i think again in the the nature of what the
2:08:02 voucher program really was created for
2:08:04 was to make sure that all children had equal access to to
2:08:07 potentially private schools or different
2:08:09 education option rather than the one that they’re zoned for
2:08:11 right there in their neighborhood and
2:08:13 i’m afraid if we say that then we might it might end up
2:08:17 ultimately saying okay well then we’re just not
2:08:19 going to take it and it’s going to hurt kids in the long run and
2:08:22 again i’m i’m you know i like the idea
2:08:24 of have the best product if you have the best product then the
2:08:27 customer comes to you and so the competition
2:08:30 keeps us all better right um not just not to knock private
2:08:33 schools or charter schools or any of that
2:08:35 but we want to be the best and continue to be the best and if we
2:08:37 are then then there’s enough for
2:08:39 everyone so to speak so so i think we pull that one um since
2:08:44 miss would you if you want to run through
2:08:47 miss campbell and then i’ll go to mr thomas if there’s any that
2:08:49 he wants to pull if you want all
2:08:50 right that was that was the only item i had this on on the
2:08:54 consortium’s agenda okay i the only other
2:08:58 one i i had was adding and i didn’t realize you couldn’t add to
2:09:01 it so the the as far as start times and
2:09:03 dates because i felt like that that provided some flexibility if
2:09:05 we were going to look at the modified calendar
2:09:07 but that would give us that ability um to do so if we could get
2:09:11 that across mr chair yes sir i know we
2:09:14 can’t add if i was going to add one it would be to the uh the
2:09:19 consortium’s um initiative to increase
2:09:21 uh pay for mid-level teachers i think it should be for all
2:09:25 experienced teachers because i think that
2:09:28 could create compression for our most experienced teachers where
2:09:32 was that one it’s on the it’s on page two
2:09:35 about i don’t know like a fourth of the way up and it’s bold
2:09:38 letters mid-career teachers and support
2:09:40 that’s the ones you’re talking about right i wouldn’t want to
2:09:42 take it away because i wouldn’t want to take
2:09:44 away the chance to get some additional funding but i i would
2:09:46 think it should be for everybody all experienced
2:09:49 teachers yeah i see yeah just reading that okay is there
2:09:53 something you want to try to pull out of there
2:09:56 or do you want to no i was going to actually bring it back that
2:09:59 back up when we do our own
2:10:00 recommendations for for our district okay all right so we’ll
2:10:06 keep it anything else mr thomas no
2:10:09 good point mrs wright do you have anything else um nope i love
2:10:16 the uh renewal of the voter approved
2:10:18 millage for a period of up to eight years i think that would be
2:10:20 a really good beneficial thing for
2:10:21 school districts but which one that’s under capital outline what
2:10:25 was that where the permit school
2:10:27 districts to renew voter approved millage for a period of up to
2:10:30 eight years oh yeah
2:10:32 i’d be shocked if they did that but i understand why everybody
2:10:37 else is good so as we’re getting back
2:10:41 to mr sarah do we want to ask if we can remove just those words
2:10:45 of the same or if we can or if
2:10:46 not just strike the whole item you’re talking about i would just
2:10:49 say strike that whole sentence right
2:10:51 the taxpayer dollars piece yeah i have a call with them this
2:10:53 afternoon if you guys want me to just
2:10:55 make the phone call and tell them we’re good to go yep i have a
2:10:58 standing call with them or something
2:11:01 are we good with that miss campbell yep okay all right dr rindell
2:11:05 you okay if i move to the florida
2:11:07 school board association platform real quick yeah and so you
2:11:10 guys in inside of the notes you have
2:11:12 the florida school board association platform there’s uh five
2:11:16 items um i think we went at length with
2:11:17 this miss campbell thank you so much for giving us an update
2:11:20 previously is there anybody that wishes
2:11:21 to have any communication on this or conversation on this i didn’t
2:11:25 have any issues with those okay i was
2:11:28 trying to see if what you had said about the dates because when
2:11:31 we did our submissions to this i think
2:11:34 we added that and i um i can’t remember i don’t think it made it
2:11:43 on here
2:11:43 um no but i’ll say this i mean we we technically we have the
2:11:55 ability i mean like we we talk about the
2:11:58 pilot program we’re a part of but if a school district wants to
2:12:01 start a year round school we don’t we don’t
2:12:03 have to be part of the program we already have the ability to do
2:12:05 it just like royal palm charters run
2:12:07 uh you’re on schools and charlotte had the year on school so we
2:12:10 we have the ability to do that without
2:12:12 a special um i mean if we’re not doing a year-round model we can’t
2:12:16 start for august 10th right that’s
2:12:18 that’s the law but if we’re doing year-round model i i don’t
2:12:21 believe we have to have special permission
2:12:23 is that correct i thought we did because the state statute is
2:12:25 pretty clear on not being able to start
2:12:26 before the august 10th date so well but we have these schools
2:12:30 across the state that have already
2:12:31 done it i know and i wondered that question i i yeah i don’t
2:12:35 know we need to look into that a little
2:12:37 bit more since that’s probably coming up on the horizon yeah
2:12:39 there are different provisions you can
2:12:40 start earlier if you’re a high performing district for example
2:12:44 you can start earlier the charter probably
2:12:46 wrote that into their model when they applied so when that was
2:12:49 approved by us and then approved by the
2:12:51 state that was there those schools over in charlotte were doing
2:12:55 it before that statute was enacted so
2:12:57 they were maybe they were grandfathered maybe okay but i can
2:13:00 check and see you know can we just do it
2:13:03 without saying we’re going to be a pilot you know right because
2:13:06 that that came up with us when we were
2:13:08 when we were initiating the pilot project because do we really
2:13:10 have to be a part of the project
2:13:12 yeah to do it the pilot in case there’s limitations one of only
2:13:15 five right right and did we did they even
2:13:17 get the five i i think a couple of the school districts punted
2:13:21 it a year out i actually only
2:13:22 think two of us did it oh okay okay all right so we’re all good
2:13:25 with the florida school board association
2:13:28 legislative platform well i don’t think that was on there for
2:13:30 our approval it was just if we had
2:13:32 something we wanted to pull off to put on our own correct
2:13:34 because that one’s done right it’s voted on
2:13:38 all right um and then the florida superintendents association fads
2:13:44 is there anything that you guys
2:13:46 wish to pull from here to put on to ours or tell him that we don’t
2:13:50 like any of this yeah did you have
2:13:53 any favorites on here dr rendell no i think um again you know
2:13:58 they i’ve signed off in support of the
2:14:01 platform so when they talk to the legislators they’ll say you
2:14:04 know the reward superintendent signed off on
2:14:07 this so yeah i mean most of the statements in the fads platform
2:14:11 are general statements provide more
2:14:13 funding provide more flexibility you know reduce regulations so
2:14:18 they can take many forms that that
2:14:21 way they don’t get pigeonholed so it’s like these are the types
2:14:24 of things we want done yep all right and
2:14:27 then so if nobody else has anything on the fads do you have
2:14:30 anything sir no sir okay then we can move
2:14:33 to our platform um and this might be an opportunity mr thomas if
2:14:37 you have something that you want to try
2:14:39 to add at the last minute we can but this is the if anybody has
2:14:43 anything i i wanted to just say i’m so
2:14:46 excited about the certified pre-k because i’ve been driving
2:14:49 people crazy up there about this for long enough
2:14:52 and i appreciate this being put together and everybody’s work
2:14:55 behind it but mr thomas you
2:14:57 got something to say yes first of all thanks to mrs kim for
2:15:00 putting this together that’s very
2:15:02 comprehensive and appreciated um i have just noticed i’m sure i’m
2:15:06 not telling you guys anything you don’t
2:15:09 already know but um i think teacher pay is a huge thing and we
2:15:13 have limited ability a lot more limits than
2:15:16 i thought we did as far as being able to do things with it
2:15:19 moving forward so i think that um first of
2:15:24 all for it should always be a priority of ours to try to get
2:15:26 more money from the state for that
2:15:28 and i think right now my statistics are accurate um we are 47th
2:15:36 out of 50 states in average teacher salary
2:15:40 and but we’re in the top 10 for the highest starting salary so
2:15:44 that says we can get them in we pay them
2:15:47 decent but once they’re here they’re not rewarded for staying
2:15:50 here and i can tell you i was here last
2:15:52 week or what to do a new teacher welcome and half the room were
2:15:55 new teachers that i never taught before
2:15:58 and the room was packed with more than 100 teachers so to me
2:16:01 that says we’re losing um we’re not just us but
2:16:04 i think it’s a problem across the board that experienced
2:16:07 teachers are leaving the profession
2:16:08 and i think if we’re going to be competitive with other states
2:16:12 we need to be not we don’t not just
2:16:14 need to be worried about being competitive with osceola or
2:16:17 orange or indian river we need to be
2:16:19 as a state worried about how we’re competitive with the rest of
2:16:21 the country and so i think we need
2:16:23 to lobby as a collective group um i know this is just talking
2:16:26 about just our district but i’m saying for
2:16:28 next year i think we need to have a concerted effort but among
2:16:31 all these associations all these
2:16:32 organizations to have that be something that’s on their list
2:16:36 every year um because i didn’t see it
2:16:39 even listed other than the one i mentioned for the greater florida
2:16:42 consortium it’s not even on anybody
2:16:43 else’s radar and there’s no way we’re going to be able to be
2:16:46 able to be competitive unless we get that
2:16:49 increased so anyways that being said i’d like to make it one of
2:16:52 our priorities that we move to increase
2:16:55 funding for experienced teachers mid and and however however
2:16:59 that should be worded but our most experienced
2:17:01 teachers from the you know mid-career on um because obviously
2:17:05 teacher salaries at the at the beginning
2:17:08 are fine and there’s been adjustments and that’s all good but we
2:17:11 need to get additional funding for our
2:17:13 experienced teachers so i have a question as to how how we um
2:17:19 how we want to go about this so there’s a
2:17:22 couple ways um that have been gone gone back and forth so the
2:17:27 the way that we got the teacher minimum
2:17:30 salary increase right was the state mandate get up to 47 5 and
2:17:33 then here’s this funding and keep going but
2:17:35 there were all these strings that made it really complicated in
2:17:38 those years and then we had this
2:17:39 compression that happened which i think you’re trying to solve
2:17:43 um but when we when the state continues
2:17:45 to increase that funding which the governor has proposed and the
2:17:48 legislature has passed it’s in a
2:17:51 special category and it’s fewer rules over the last few years
2:17:55 but it’s all a lot of times tied to rules
2:17:57 rather than and doing an increase to the base student allocation
2:18:01 which is increased funding for school
2:18:03 districts like just broadly which gives us the flexibility to
2:18:06 actually hammer it out with our own
2:18:08 uh bargaining units and so we can come up with the best
2:18:12 solutions that are right for the teachers in
2:18:14 brevard and as as that flexibility has increased we have been
2:18:17 able to take care we’ve had some
2:18:19 initiatives with negotiations with negotiations with bft to be
2:18:23 able to fix some of those in our own
2:18:26 county those mid-level teachers um with different initiatives um
2:18:30 but the reason why i i would kind of lean
2:18:33 towards doing like just a general we want to see this percentage
2:18:35 increase because that doesn’t just give us funding
2:18:38 for teacher salary initiatives but also for our other critical
2:18:42 support staff um and if we get it
2:18:45 specifically in a in the tsia which is a teacher salary increase
2:18:49 allocation then then it goes back to this
2:18:53 all the rules that are tied to that so um we can we can do one
2:18:56 one way or the other but we it would
2:18:58 probably be good for us to decide how do we want to ask for that
2:19:01 increase in funding do we want to say hey
2:19:03 i know that notice that um the consortium has asked for at least
2:19:08 a five percent increase in the base
2:19:10 student allocation i can’t remember if fsba yeah fsba has at
2:19:13 least a five percent increase in the state
2:19:16 in the base student allocation i’m my apologies i didn’t see
2:19:19 that part yeah yeah no no no that wasn’t
2:19:21 on ours that was on the fsba it was on page two when we added
2:19:24 the hurricane stuff because of storms this
2:19:26 year it bumped it we have a two page platform instead of one
2:19:29 page platform but um so we might
2:19:31 we want to you know do one way or the other my my recommendation
2:19:35 would be to make it as part of the
2:19:37 base student allocation because that gives us the most
2:19:39 flexibility to address um salaries and pay for
2:19:43 a bride a broad variety of employees um where we have needs i
2:19:49 wouldn’t oppose to that i defer to you guys
2:19:51 because you are more experienced in that area than i am i just
2:19:54 know the overall objective i think we need
2:19:56 to have more ability to increase pay first for our experienced
2:19:59 teachers and our staff so can i just
2:20:02 weigh in on just this conversation a little bit on on one train
2:20:05 of thought versus the other um the tsia
2:20:09 when we increase that that that says we are giving this money to
2:20:13 our teachers right so there’s some
2:20:15 security from the legislation standpoint of this is actually
2:20:18 going to go into our teachers hands when we
2:20:21 increase the base student allocation that gives the district as
2:20:24 you said the flexibility and i think
2:20:26 one of the things and this is no disrespect to to anybody here
2:20:29 or anybody in any school district
2:20:31 the increase in administration the increase in some of the
2:20:34 things that that the legislation i think
2:20:35 feels frustrated with on hey we’re giving you guys funding or we’re
2:20:38 giving you plenty of money but
2:20:40 you guys are spending it on other things um so i i think they
2:20:43 would be more inclined to say yes to
2:20:47 the other that’s just my personal opinion and it also sends a
2:20:49 message that this is where we are
2:20:51 putting these dollars we are not saying we want more money and
2:20:53 then we’re going to do something else
2:20:55 with it we’re saying yes we would like more funding and we want
2:20:57 to go here because this is what we’re
2:20:59 doing with it yeah well i’ve heard that argument in a legislator’s
2:21:02 office before um i think that
2:21:05 particular legislator i think sometimes misses the point that it’s
2:21:09 not just salaries that go up
2:21:11 everything goes up just like our gas and electric bills and
2:21:14 groceries have gone up so our grass and
2:21:16 electric bills and groceries go up too so i hear you um i mean
2:21:19 we can do both and hey increase
2:21:21 space student allocation and we support an increase to the tsia
2:21:25 um so that with the with maximum
2:21:28 flexibility that’s the key to that the maximum flexibility to
2:21:32 the increase in tsia because
2:21:33 otherwise those first rules especially were super restrictive
2:21:37 and that’s what caused the terrible
2:21:39 compression well and then and maybe even say something to that
2:21:41 effect to address wage compression
2:21:43 because then that we can clearly show hey we’ve given xyz
2:21:45 dollars to our teachers that have been
2:21:47 here for this many years versus that many years and and you know
2:21:50 if we ever were to be audited on it
2:21:51 we could show hey we’ve done that so i’m curious what legislator
2:21:54 said that to you because that’s i’ve
2:21:55 not heard that from anybody but that’s just my thoughts of it so
2:21:58 i’ll tell you later okay mr chair yes
2:22:02 sir i just this is a sidebar to that this discussion i’m just
2:22:05 curious do we currently pay for experienced
2:22:08 teachers to come from out of state do we give them years of
2:22:10 credit as far not be not years in retirement but
2:22:12 do we give them years of experience we do not we do not except
2:22:16 for with the millage so if you come in
2:22:19 because of we of us having to address the terrible compression
2:22:23 if you’re coming in as a brand new
2:22:25 teacher with i think up to 20 years of experience you’re getting
2:22:29 that right am i nod your head ryan if
2:22:31 i’m correct you’re you’re starting at our base pay which is
2:22:35 fifty thousand four hundred um however we do
2:22:39 with the millage recognized teaching experience we wrote that
2:22:42 into the mou before we passed the millage
2:22:45 that all of your teaching experience from charter private out of
2:22:49 state whatever as long as you
2:22:51 document it um you can come in and you will get if you’ve you’ve
2:22:54 been teaching for 20 years you will get
2:22:56 the biggest millage supplement to go with your to try to address
2:23:00 that issue does it address it enough
2:23:02 um if if you’re i don’t know what the amount is for this year
2:23:06 but it’s like seven that the millage
2:23:07 supplement for our highest teachers is like seven thousand
2:23:10 dollars is that a local is that our
2:23:12 district alone or is that are we yeah so the millage is our
2:23:15 district alone but also not bringing in
2:23:18 your years or experiences our district alone that’s a
2:23:21 negotiation with the bft yeah that’s that would
2:23:24 have to change and i’m preaching to the choir but to me that’s i
2:23:28 mean we’re trying to bring in experienced
2:23:30 teachers we’re the fastest growing state in the nation and we
2:23:34 cannot keep up with uh just we can’t just keep on
2:23:37 bringing in and experience teachers and we need a combination of
2:23:39 both right and being able to recruit
2:23:42 some of the some of the best and brightest from other states
2:23:44 would be huge especially if we can get
2:23:45 the pay up so that’s to me that should be a priority as well so
2:23:50 that’s how we negotiated we can negotiate
2:23:52 that i think part of the conversation that’s always been a stickler
2:23:56 of mine is that we have to if you
2:23:58 come in you don’t get those years of experience until you’re 20
2:24:01 and the millage does offset it but it is
2:24:03 something i think we can do a better job when we come together
2:24:06 um during the next uh budgetary system
2:24:09 i wanted to tell you a quick story you know during covid there
2:24:12 was a bunch of upset canadian teachers
2:24:14 that wanted to come here so i’ve somehow found 400 teachers um
2:24:18 in canada that were part of this group
2:24:21 that had just said that they would come to united states because
2:24:23 they had shut down all the schools
2:24:25 people had gotten upset with the way it was and the one thing
2:24:28 that they got held back on was is they
2:24:30 couldn’t figure out how to come here and make enough and
2:24:33 basically these were masters in their craft and
2:24:36 everything else and it was incredible i remember that there’s
2:24:38 some of them were still willing to
2:24:40 come but the majority of them held back because of that so you’re
2:24:42 100 right when you make that argument
2:24:44 mr thomas um i agree with you on the base talent student
2:24:47 allocation but i wanted to say this what what
2:24:50 miss wright says is resonates up in tallahassee because i’ve
2:24:54 talked to a lot of legislators that come from
2:24:57 that are ex-legislators and they say we give all this money we
2:25:00 know we give this money to the school
2:25:02 districts but it never gets to the hands of the teachers right
2:25:05 and in some cases not like brevard
2:25:08 that does happen unfortunately so we need to educate them about
2:25:12 how we do it and how we show things so
2:25:14 that they can see the differences so like there’s opportunity to
2:25:18 say well we heard about this audit or
2:25:21 this thing or this waste over here and that’s what they point
2:25:24 out that’s not us and that’s why we
2:25:26 should be a stronger at it so if you wanted to add something
2:25:29 along that lines if you want to meet with
2:25:30 dr rendell dr indell i would i would mention to the certified
2:25:34 pre-k thing is a really good explanation of
2:25:37 what even i presented four or four years ago inside the
2:25:40 legislature but it was copied and pasted just just
2:25:43 i mean john gave me credit mr thomas gave me credit but this
2:25:46 remember this is a conversation that we all
2:25:48 had in august i just recorded it and then i added certified
2:25:51 because that makes you might be able to
2:25:53 just say cut half that off and add something about the base
2:25:56 student allocation funding directly well we
2:25:58 might we might make it two page and make it more of like a uh
2:26:01 flyer so that way either way and if we
2:26:04 can put it on our radar just for discussion when it comes time
2:26:07 to make recommendations next year for
2:26:09 these consortiums that would be i’d love to be able to get them
2:26:14 on board i just don’t think anything’s
2:26:16 going to happen unless it’s an overwhelming mandate from all the
2:26:19 school districts i asked when i was
2:26:21 chair to have all the consortium heads meet and kind of hone out
2:26:25 so that when the legislators get
2:26:28 the greater florida consortium and all that just three tops like
2:26:32 three top issues that each one of them
2:26:33 have like i understand the greater florida consortium if you
2:26:36 look at the way it is it’s all the coastal
2:26:38 counties it’s amazing for us to be a part of that but the guys
2:26:41 up in the panhandle aren’t going to
2:26:42 be the same so what my argument was is we’re all feeling the
2:26:45 same thing let’s get three tops and i
2:26:47 couldn’t get there so you’re a hundred percent having a five
2:26:50 page uh right yeah it’s probably not helpful
2:26:54 either good luck for mr that’s what i’m saying like when fsba
2:26:56 drafts there’s they’re like we got
2:26:58 to get it down to one page we had it down to one page and then
2:27:00 there were the hurricanes and they’re like
2:27:01 well we can’t have a hurricane year and not ask for the
2:27:04 hurricane flexibility even though it didn’t
2:27:06 i got this one down pretty small so clarifying so if we can
2:27:14 clarify for dr vendell
2:27:16 we’re gonna are we asking saying we as a board we’re in support
2:27:21 of an increase to the base student
2:27:22 allocation but also to an increase in tsia with maximum
2:27:27 flexibility for so i wrote down two bullet
2:27:30 points one to cut cut and paste copy whatever the five percent bsa
2:27:34 asked that is in several of the
2:27:36 platforms but the other one was to increase the tsia and allow
2:27:39 flexibility to use the funds to address
2:27:41 wage compression so i’ll work on the perfect okay making that
2:27:46 look smarter but um but i want to put them
2:27:48 both in there separately that way because you know most of the
2:27:51 other ones have the increase the five
2:27:53 percent in the bsa which i agree is kind of a bigger lift than
2:27:56 when you say targeted money towards
2:27:59 teacher salaries or you know that might get through easier and
2:28:02 when you guys when we’re talking in
2:28:04 tallahassie or we might be mentioning anything about the pre-k
2:28:07 the education committees are well aware of
2:28:09 each one of them they’ve actually looked at it they’re the ones
2:28:12 that asked for the opaga report
2:28:13 because they know that the 90 of it but they’re afraid there are
2:28:16 other things that they’re going to miss
2:28:17 so just so you know staff’s behind this also so that’s all dr
2:28:21 rendell do you have anything else
2:28:24 i’m good i’ve got direction any other board members need
2:28:26 anything else oh i do um and i apologize
2:28:29 board for not catching this earlier but as i was we’re getting
2:28:33 ready for the annual um children’s hunger
2:28:36 project love a kid luncheon and it is on the day of our next
2:28:39 meeting and i didn’t catch it when we moved
2:28:41 our meetings our workshops to start at one oh yeah so you know
2:28:45 it’s it’s down the street and it starts
2:28:47 at noon but like it ends at one and i i have big
2:28:49 responsibilities that day so i was wondering if
2:28:52 on the 11th we could start our workshop just a little bit later
2:28:55 just to give me at for because i
2:28:56 would obviously i’m going to invite all of you and i want you to
2:28:59 be there with your pocketbooks
2:29:01 um along with you please um but uh but just want to make sure
2:29:05 that i have time to get from that we all
2:29:08 have time to get from there to here and have a little
2:29:10 flexibility you think i don’t know what
2:29:11 you have on the agenda for the next workshop but do you think we
2:29:13 could move it back and
2:29:14 not hurt our time we can definitely do it and we just then the
2:29:17 board will have to be conscious of
2:29:19 the time as we go through but you know like i mentioned earlier
2:29:23 we’re gonna have you know food
2:29:25 in between so we can push all the way to like 4 30. so yeah okay
2:29:29 so can we start like 1 30 or 2
2:29:31 either one i think if you said two o’clock you’re safer that’s
2:29:34 that’s good you know i wouldn’t
2:29:35 want to say 1 30 and have us all get in car accidents trying to
2:29:38 get here from where is it
2:29:39 i hope not it’s it’s right around the corner right it’s the
2:29:42 church right around the corner right yeah
2:29:44 okay yeah yeah it’s not very far miss campbell are you going to
2:29:46 sing this year again i am not but i
2:29:49 we are going to have some really special entertainment from a
2:29:51 couple of our elementary schools so um i’ll be
2:29:54 you’ll be getting your invitations well that’s a bummer i i am i
2:29:56 advocate for you singing
2:29:57 anytime because you have a beautiful voice what about dr vendela
2:30:00 no i haven’t heard either of you
2:30:03 actually so so maybe 1 30 that because i mean we can’t start
2:30:06 without us so if it’s 1 30 if we show
2:30:08 up 135 it’s okay so 1 30 we’re good do you think that’s enough
2:30:13 yeah i mean i that is i will tell him
2:30:16 i can’t stay and help tear down so they we’ve got lots of
2:30:19 volunteers so i think we’re good but definitely
2:30:21 it will be over by one well and in good nature of just
2:30:23 respecting because obviously our chair is not
2:30:25 here right now he’s had another obligation he had to be at uh
2:30:28 for the board but to run it by him make
2:30:30 sure he’s okay with that i don’t think he has and i don’t know
2:30:31 if he has anything that he’s planning
2:30:33 for that day or if you guys have discussed that but i know what
2:30:35 he should be doing from 11 31.
2:30:37 1 30 pm on the 11. okay all right thank you thank you all right
2:30:43 nobody else this meeting is adjourned
2:30:47 all right you
2:30:52 all right
2:31:17 all right you