Updates on the Fight for Quality Public Education in Brevard County, FL
0:00 It. Sa. Sa. Sa.
4:36 It. Good evening. March 11, 2025.
5:56 Board meeting is now in order. I would like to welcome my fellow board members and. And the public.
5:57 I would like to take this opportunity to remind the public that the appropriate place for public participation in the meeting is during your individual public comment opportunity as identified on the agenda. Outside of your individual public comment opportunity, your role in this meeting is as an observer. Roll call, please.
6:19 Mr. Trent. Here. Mr. Susan.
6:21 Here. Mr. Thomas. Here.
6:22 Ms. Campbell. Here. Ms. Wright.
6:24 Here. @ this time, the board would like to hold a moment of silence. I invite you to join audience.
7:02 Thank you. I would like to invite Arianna Alex to the podium. And please rise for the Pledge of allegiance.
7:18 I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Right, tonight we have a big treat. We have Edgewood Junior senior dance team.
8:17 Wow. Hey, I want to hear about what they. I found a love on my own.
8:52 You’re looking good, Riz. Eat your heart out. What? It could be grease lightning.
9:05 Systematic. Hydromatic. Ultramatic.
10:24 It could be grease my finger. Good job, you guys. All right, so I believe we’re going to have Ms. Veronica and Kimber answer some of our questions.
10:33 Board, who would like to start? I’ll go first. I think it’s kind of cruel to ask questions right after you guys get done doing that because it’s going to be a little hard to talk right now. Thank you so much.
10:44 So let me ask, how long have you been practicing together as a team? Well, most of us this year are actually seniors. All of us that are here right now, except for one. Okay.
11:00 We’ve all been practicing together for at least two years, and most of us have been together for the last four. That’s amazing. So what’s the plan once you leave? I mean, you’re gonna graduate, so are you gonna continue on with dance when you leave the school? Not me personally.
11:08 I think, like, my time on dancing will probably be over, but had a really great time. Awesome. Well, thank you so much for coming and performing and what great energy.
11:11 I love the music. I love the dance. I love the outfits.
11:15 You guys did an amazing job. Thank you. Thank you.
11:19 Sure. Well, first of all, you guys were awesome. Your timing was phenomenal.
11:28 Obviously, because you’ve danced so long together. That’s probably why you guys are really, really good. My daughter was a dancer, so I can appreciate how good you guys were.
11:44 I’m just curious. You guys have been doing it For a long time. How do you think this program or your dance program has helped you as a person or as a student? I know it’s given me some of my closest friends, and I’m, like, eternally grateful for this program that we’ve had.
11:57 And I’m really glad that, especially since a lot of us, it is our last year, that we’ve really gotten to enrich all of our experiences this year. So it’s been a really great experience. Do you guys dance together on any other teams? No.
12:03 That’s pretty impressive. Some of us go to the same studio, though. Very good.
12:07 Awesome job, ladies. Lots of energy. So talk to me about competitions.
12:18 How does. What is. How does that work? And what kind of things have you guys done this year? We actually just had a competition this last weekend at Seminole High School in Orlando.
12:27 So that was really great. We did a really great job. We actually did the best we’ve done since so far this year at that competition in all of our dances, so that’s really great.
12:42 And then we’ve had two or just one. We’ve had two other competitions this year so far, and then we did really great at those as well. And then we’re coming up on nationals here in a couple months, so we’re really training hard for that to make sure we’re ready.
12:47 That’s exciting. Is this the full team? This is our varsity team. One member? Yes.
12:49 Okay. Awesome. Awesome, awesome.
12:51 So how many. How many. Oops.
13:01 How many total people are on the teams, do you think? Or maybe that’s a good question for coach. I think about 20. About 29 on each? Yeah.
13:09 Awesome. Well, I wish you the best of luck when you go to nationals. Thank you, Mr. Susan.
13:18 So one of you alluded to a place that you guys go dance besides your competition. Where is that? It’s just a studio in Merritt Island. It’s called Doosage Dance Studio.
13:38 I know I go there, and then another girl on the team goes there, and you guys compete in another area when you go there. Is that just a way for you guys to improve your skills? Okay. Because there was a dance team out of Melbourne that I ran into that has a whole studio down there, and they go, like, international, and they go all over the world and compete, So I didn’t know if that was the same one.
13:48 So it’s not the same, but we know them, too. They’re amazing. What schools did you guys beat when you guys were over there in the Seminole competition? I want to call some other school board members.
13:54 We were. We were Against. We were against Colonial High School.
14:12 Did you beat those guys? That’s bad for us to know, but yeah. And then we were also against Milhi at that one as well. Did you guys get them, too? Did you guys beat them? For sure.
14:17 Look at that. All right. All right.
14:22 Guys are such nice people. They don’t come tough at all, do they? No. I really appreciate you guys.
14:30 Anytime you guys are in those competitions now, you’re going to national, I heard. Yes. Where is that at? That is in Orlando.
14:40 Oh, it is at, like, Disney or something. It’s at the Hilton. How many other schools from Brevard have teams that will be there? Maybe Melbourne, if they qualify, because they’re not as good as you guys.
14:50 I’m actually not sure if any from Bovard are going to be there. There’s usually a lot of out of state there, like at the national. Well, we’ll have to have you guys come back if you place or do something really cool over there.
14:53 Yeah, for sure. And actually bring, like, the trophy that you guys win. Yeah.
14:57 And if it’s not big, let me know. We’ll produce a bigger one. You know what I mean? No.
14:59 Thank you so much. I appreciate it. I appreciate.
15:04 I appreciate all the parents who came here tonight. You guys are awesome. You have some beautiful daughters.
15:10 I have four daughters, so I’m like one of the. What do they call it? A dad girl, A girl dad, or whatever it is. And I understand the.
15:17 All of the great things that they bring in your life, and I appreciate you guys being here tonight. So thank you, and thank you for being a big part of our BPs. We appreciate you.
15:26 Thank you. Thank you. I’m just surprised Ms. Ingrata wasn’t up there dancing with you guys again.
15:33 You guys were awesome. If you. If you hadn’t said that you were all seniors and had danced together, we would have assumed it.
15:37 You guys were. The timing was impeccable. It was very nice.
15:58 When we do things like this at the beginning of our board meetings, it’s really nice to see the extra activities that our students have. I mean, you need something other than your studies, and especially, you know, seniors, you’ve got plenty to do at school, but it’s nice to have these outside activities. I mean, it’s really good you talked about meeting some of your friends.
16:12 Those are the relationships that you’re going to keep forever. So just another example of BPS students excelling outside the classroom. And another way we could just show the talent that we have here in Brevard, and you guys make Our job, so much easier.
16:27 Parents, thank you so much for encouraging the activities to take a break in the studies. I know this time of year, it’s very, very, very stressful for seniors. So great job there.
16:36 Principal Ingrata, thank you so much for all the support you give these young ladies. And then, coach, it couldn’t be possible without you. So thank you so much.
16:41 And ladies, again, thank you for being here. Thank you. Thank you.
16:53 Mr. Chair, I just want to make an announcement. Everybody in here got to see this performance live. And normally we broadcast live, but we’ve been having a little bit of trouble with our cable connection.
17:01 So it was recorded. So if any of your friends were trying to watch. It’s still an old board meeting being broadcast right now.
17:11 So don’t worry. Once we’re done with the show today, we’ll broadcast it live. So we’ll make sure you know when it’s airing so you guys can get on there and watch it.
17:17 But if anybody was texting somebody, wait, they’re not on. They’re not on. Yeah, because apparently we’ve had a disconnect with our cable outlet.
17:23 So we recorded it though. It was awesome. And we’ll broadcast it so you can see it.
17:32 Of course. I thought there were a few fans recording it anyway, but yeah, you’re not live, but you will be broadcast eventually. All right, thank you.
17:44 Thank you, thank you, thank you and good luck. Take you a picture? Picture, yes. If you wouldn’t mind, like to take a picture with the.
19:23 With the whole team. Next, I would like to invite Apollo elementary principal Amy Delago to the podium to recognize her staff members for their heroic actions on February 12, 2025. We’re referencing the bus fire on i95.
19:34 Good evening. I’m actually gonna have my staff come up here with me. I want to thank you for giving us the opportunity to come out here this evening to recognize our outstanding staff members at Apollo.
20:10 On Wednesday, February 12, returning from a field trip, the fifth grade students at our school experienced an emergency on a chartered bus that resulted in a fire. Thanks to the heroic actions of our dedicated staff, Ms. Marshall, Ms. Powers, Ms. Harper and Ms. Myers who are here tonight, and Mr. S and Ms. Thompson who could not join us, the situation was swiftly handled, ensuring that our student safety was our number one priority. Their level headedness and commitment to student safety turned what this could have been a disaster into a very successful story.
20:37 I want to thank my staff members from the bottom of my heart for bringing home our staff, all of our students. Saf, If you didn’t see it on any of the social media sites. When they first called me and said, oh, there, you know, there’s a fire.
20:51 Well, then I’m on the phone with Ms. Marshall and she’s very calmly speaking to me and suddenly someone comes into my office because it was actually being broadcasted on social media live. And I realized it wasn’t a fire. That bus was in.
21:11 Engulfed in flames, the entire bus. So for their action getting them off of the bus on the site of 95, it was absolutely heroic. Later that night, I actually on my way home, I thought if it was just a few more seconds, this would have been a completely different story.
21:27 But then I remembered my staff members and how much they take priority of our students and that’s why they came home safely. So again, thank you. Thank you so much.
21:36 Say something. Yeah, please do. I’d just like to say, you know, because of your quick thinking and decisive action, you saved a lot of lives.
22:00 And that’s first and foremost. Secondly, I’m glad that you pointed out it was a charter bus. So within, so quickly I called Central bus and within no time they had a bus there, you know, meeting them on the side of the road.
22:21 You guys are awesome. Microphone, please. So I. You mentioned it, but the part of this story when I first heard it that scared me the most was, oh my gosh, that means they’re standing on the side of the interstate.
22:30 So I as a. My, my mom heart jumped straight to the dangers it could be. But you guys just did an amazing job.
22:50 And I don’t know how you did it because, I mean, at least those fifth graders and not like first or second graders, but second still fifth graders can be squirrely. So thank you so much for what you did. All of us are parents and have that probably had the same little stress level that rises just thinking about what would it be like if our kids were there.
23:03 But I have to tell you, what I saw on social media and media was parent after parent saying, my kid was on that bus. And everybody did such a great job. So much positive feedback on a story where usually people get on and are so nasty and negative.
23:16 But all the people who were a part of it and the parents were like the staff, they couldn’t have handled it better. And so kudos to all of you. We are so appreciative for the work that you do every day, but especially that day.
23:21 Yeah. Honestly, this is a testimony to being at the right place at the right time. And you guys honestly were where you needed to be.
23:28 And thank God the results turned out the way that they did, because if you weren’t there, it could have looked very, very different. So thank you. Thank you.
23:33 Thank you. I have to ask the question. When the bus caught on fire, were one of you the.
23:41 Who noticed that first and how did that happen? So I smelled the smoke and asked the bus driver to stop. Okay. She stopped the bus and got off.
23:54 I kind of already knew we were on fire. I waited for her to tell us, you know, so then we were able to get off quickly after that. Well, thank you so, so much for honestly stepping in the gap there and really doing something that’s tremendous and saving those children’s lives and your lives as well.
23:58 So there’s no greater gift than being willing to sacrifice that. So thank you. Thank you.
24:12 We really have to say that it was the kids that really. They listened, they got off the bus quickly, and the training that we’ve given them throughout their years of, you know, school at Apollo, they were able to listen and get off quickly. Did you have any children that were upset or can.
24:17 Like. I mean, obviously emotions are peaking, so you’re having to tend to that as well. So you.
24:23 We had a medical team there quickly, the police, everybody was there, volunteers helping out. We were pointing. You.
24:26 You take that child. That one needs an extra hug. Thank you.
24:26 Thank you. Thank you so much. Those words don’t seem big enough for a situation like this, but we really, truly do apprec you all well.
24:35 Thank you. Thank you so much. When we were.
24:42 When my wife and I saw the story, I was sitting down and I was talking to her, and I said. I said, that’s amazing. Those teachers, you know, they get.
24:48 They were able to get all those kids off the bus if I was there. She said, no, listen to me. She goes, our children barely listen to you, Matt.
24:57 So they would be the last thing you’d be able to do is move all those kids off that bus. And I agree, because I taught high school, right, and that’s easy for you just to yell at them, get them off the bus. Bus.
25:00 But those little kids need a lot more. They need reassurance. They need that.
25:19 And following that light off that bus is you guys. And that was huge, because if it hadn’t happened that way and one kid would have froze and gotten, you know, wanted to look back, we would have been looking at numbers that weren’t so good. So I just want to take, from the bottom of my heart, thank you so much for being there, and I appreciate you.
25:44 So, again, you’ve heard it from all of us here. But what better group of people would you want in that situation than elementary school teachers, right? You put out fires for a living every single day. So if I were to pick any profession to be on that bus with my children or any of our children, it would be you.
25:44 So thank you for being there. Thank you for choosing the career path that you did. You’re in the right place and we’re proud to have you.
26:04 So thank you so much, Dr. Rendell. So I just talked to a few of them before the meeting started today, and I just. How did you remain so calm and, you know, do what you did? And they said, well, that’s what we do.
26:15 We’re just teachers. We take care of kids. So I really think since they have the microphone, it would be a really good idea for each of them to say their name and what role they have.
26:22 A second grade teacher or whatever. Because we didn’t mention their names yet. And I feel like they need to be called out like.
26:33 And anybody who isn’t here, Amy, if you can, make sure they get recognized. Jessica Meyer, instructional assistant. I’m Laura Powers.
26:42 I’m a fifth grade teacher. I’m Kathy Marshall and I’m a fifth grade teacher. I’m San Harper and I’m a fifth grade teacher.
26:47 Amy Delaga. Very proud principal. Two of our teachers are not here.
27:18 An instructional assistant, Ms. Thompson, Shay Thompson and Mr. Slobanak, a fifth grade teacher are not here this evening. Thank you guys again. You can do a picture now or they can wait.
28:53 When we do a picture, don’t go anywhere. Okay, let’s go. Yeah, let’s do it now.
29:06 All right. Now I would like to invite Cindy Lysinski to the podium for the bookkeeper audit recognition. Yay, Cindy.
29:18 Yay, bookkeepers. Yay, bookkeepers. Good evening.
29:34 Tonight we are pleased to honor and celebrate the outstanding achievements of our district schools in financial management and accountability. As you may know, every year our schools are required by state law to undergo an internal audit. Accounts audit.
30:10 This audit examines how our schools handle the funds that are raised, collected, and spent for student activities such as field trips, club clubs, teams and events. These funds are vital for enriching the educational experience of our students, but they also pose a high risk of fraud, misuse or error. That is why we need to ensure that our schools follow the best practices of internal controls and comply with state statutes and board policy.
30:37 Our accounting firm, rsm, audited the financial records and procedures at each of our schools. They checked for accuracy, timeliness, completeness authorization, documentation and compliance in various areas such as receipts, deposits, expenditures, fundraising, sales tax and petty cash. They also issued a final report for each school which indicated whether they were any audit findings or not.
31:00 A report of no audit findings means that the auditors did not find any errors or issues in the areas mentioned. This is actually a very remarkable achievement and it reflects the high level of professionalism, integrity and excellence that our school leaders and staff demonstrate every day. The research is clear.
31:30 Leaders of schools who demonstrate the highest level of financial stewardship and spend money wisely have a significant impact on positive student outcomes. It is also extremely important that we provide confidence to the board and our community that our schools maintain rigorous internal controls and make every dollar count. We wish to express our sincere appreciation to the Brevard Schools foundation for donating the frame certification certificates.
32:10 I would also like to acknowledge district accounting staff Ashley Smith, Jennifer how and Cheryl Crawley for supporting all of our schools and thank you for your continued hard work. So I’m pleased to announce the following schools, bookkeepers and principals. Okay.
32:44 Apollo elementary School being accepted by principal Amy Delacco and the bookkeeper is Deborah Bryant. Columbia elementary School. Elena Owens is the bookkeeper and Jennifer Julian is the principal.
32:55 Discovery elementary School. Arianna Viger is the bookkeeper and Christine Rosa Rosado. I am so sorry, she doesn’t like a.
33:19 Is the principal. Ed. Edgewood Junior Senior High School being accepted by the principal, Jacqueline Ang.
33:47 Enterprise elementary School. The bookkeeper is Patty Freeman and the principal, Kelly Dufresne. Harbor City Elementary School bookkeeper is Lisa Marie Kelly and the principal, Christine Boyd.
34:06 Holland elementary School. The bookkeeper is Melanie Thompson and principal Samantha Allison. Indian Atlantic Elementary School.
34:32 Being accepted by the principal, Colleen Lord. Johnson Middle School bookkeeper is Tracy Bird and the principal is Marina Middleton. Longleaf elementary School.
35:12 The bookkeeper is Denise McCammon and principal Jason Sherburne. Ocean Breeze Elementary School bookkeeper is Linda Nolan and principal Shelly Ann Michelle. Pinewood elementary School bookkeeper, Alicia Hickman and principal Amber Smith.
35:36 Riviera elementary School. The bookkeeper is Lori Voyer and principal Mary Elizabeth Myers. Rockledge High School bookkeeper is Betsy Dillatree and the principal is Peter Papcinski.
35:49 They’re all book teachers. Theodore Roosevelt Elementary School. The bookkeeper is Kathy Goff.
36:08 Prisgoda. Did I say that right? Pisgota. And the principal is Jennifer Clark.
36:36 Sable elementary School bookkeeper is Genesis Butler and principal Lauren Trossett. Saturn elementary School bookkeeper is Christine Brainham and principal Corey Story. C. Park elementary School.
37:03 Janelle Crook is the bookkeeper and the principal is Stephanie Hall. Sunrise elementary School. Aria Fransworth is the bookkeeper and principal Danielle Cross.
37:28 And Tropical Elementary School. Lindsay Kaysor is the bookkeeper and principal, Dr. Nelefra Marshall. Okay, so oak park elementary school.
37:58 The bookkeeper is susie mitchell and principal kelly ross. Okay, the schools that we’re not able to attend tonight are Astronaut High School. No, we’re not doing good on her.
38:07 Okay, so they are here. Astronaut High School. Robin Burris and Krista K.
38:30 Miller is the principal. Is Hoover Middle School here. Okay, the bookkeeper is Christina Gilbert and the principal is Palomal Ferreira.
38:49 Did I say that right? And then Lockmore Elementary School. Amber Ryan is the bookkeeper and Kathleen Campion is the principal. The additional schools that were not able to make it.
39:02 Krista McLough Elementary School. The bookkeeper is Jeanette Bender and principal Victoria Finston. Freedom 7 elementary School.
39:18 Patricia Colgan is the bookkeeper and principal Kathleen Lott. Hans Christian Anderson Elementary School. The bookkeeper is Stacy Ginsburg and principal Kimberly Harris.
39:28 Imperial Estates Elementary School. The principal is Cynthia Adams. The bookkeeper right now is a vacant position.
39:35 But they did amazing last year. They did wonderful. James Madison Middle School.
39:46 The bookkeeper is Kelly DiVincenzo and principal Travis Diesel. Jupiter elementary School. Ashley Hannam was the bookkeeper.
39:54 Is the bookkeeper and Melanie Nelson is the principal. Palm Bay elementary. Again, perfect audit this last year.
40:12 Bookkeeper wants to keep a record, so she must have retired. She’s not there, but the principal is going to keep it going. Sarah Brimmer, Stone Magnet Middle School bookkeeper Denise Olson and principal Lauren Williams.
40:19 Vera elementary School. Lindsey Cunningham is the bookkeeper. Adrian Schwab is the principal.
40:33 And West Melbourne Elementary School for Science is Janice Gray as the bookkeeper and Teresa Benson is the principal. Again, thank you. Oh, my gosh.
40:38 I really can’t. There is no words for the work that bookkeepers do. There’s just.
40:52 It’s just an incredible, incredible job that there’s so many. So many things that you guys do. And then to do it perfectly is just absolutely amazing.
41:23 Thank you. So as a high school principal four times over and the spouse of a former elementary bookkeeper, I know how hard it is to have a perfect audit, especially at the secondary level when you have all those coaches and sponsors that don’t follow the rules. So congratulations to all of you.
41:40 Elementary and secondary bookkeeper. This is fantastic. Congratulations.
45:58 All right, turn your shoulders in, ladies. All right, that brings us to the adoption of the agenda, Dr. Rendell. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
46:22 On this evening agenda, we have one proclamation. 35 consent items, 13 public hearing items, four action items and two information items. Changes that have been made to the agenda since it was released to the public include the following removed was F19 Termination of Instructional Employee, revised for B9 Bleeding Disorder Awareness Month, and C10 administrative recommendations.
46:30 Do I hear a motion move to approve? Second any discussion? Paul? Roll call, please. Mr. Thomas? Aye. Ms. Campbell? Aye.
46:35 Mr. Trent? Aye. Mr. Susan? Aye. Ms. Wright? Aye.
47:10 Okay, that leaves us our puts us into here that March is the Bleeding Disorders Awareness Month. I would like to welcome our own Yvette Cruz to the podium to read our proclamation for tonight. Whereas considered rare bleeding disorders that include hemophilia, von Willebrand disease and rare bleeding disorders are characterized by the blood not clotting normally due to the lack of clotting proteins, also known as clotting factors.
48:26 And whereas in the United states, more than 20,000 individuals live with hemophilia and rare bleeding disorders, with 6,000 of them living in the state of Florida and 1 to 2% of the American population who have von Willebrand disease. And while treatment can help, the conditions are not yet curable. And whereas symptoms of a bleeding disorder include unexplained and excessive bleeding, bleeding, large or deep bruising, nosebleeds and bleeding into joints, muscles and soft tissues and if someone has a bleeding disorder, they may have extended bleeding with incidences such as an injury or trauma, menstruation surgery or dental procedures and Whereas the Bleeding Disorders foundation of Florida, founded in 1996, supports the bleeding disorder community throughout the state and its mission to improve the quality of life for people with the condition and their families through education, information and referral services, advocacy, support and research and annually, the organization hosts five case fun walks and other events throughout Florida to bring awareness to the community and needed funding for research and support services.
49:06 Be it resolved on March 11, 2025, that the Brevard Public School Board does hereby proclaim the month of March 2025 as bleeding disorders Awareness Month, a time to encourage all citizens to increase their understanding and awareness of these serious bleeding disorders. And thank the efforts of healthcare professionals and the Bleeding Disorders foundation of Florida and the National Bleeding Disorders foundation organizations for their dedication and for their commitment to improve, approved treatments and ultimately a cure. So tonight we have the Bleeding Disorders foundation of Florida here to accept this proclamation.
49:18 So I’d like to invite them up to the podium. Thank you. It is a pleasure to be here at bps.
49:38 This is our fourth year in a row, continuing to make history throughout the country, not just Here in Brevard, we are the only school board in the nation to actually declare Bleeding Disorder Awareness month, which is something that should be done. You know, we’ll leave that to everybody else because we’ve already done it. My name is Samantha Nazario and I am the proud mother of a Milhi Bulldog.
49:50 Go Bulldogs. My son Tyler was diagnosed at age 6 with von Willebrand’s disease. It’s how we decided to take our my time of loss, which I don’t really do loss.
50:01 Most of you know me in here. I don’t really do lost or confused very well. But I was at one point and I had to educate myself in order to learn not only to survive with a bleeding disorder but for him to thrive.
50:10 And I always brag about my Tyler because He is a BPS product through and through. He is now 25 years old. He is on his bachelor’s of science and game art.
50:38 Yes, it’s a real degree at Full Sail University. After achieving two degrees at Eastern Florida State College, all while putting aside his own journey to want to help his community, Tyler created Team Tyler, which I’m wearing today, which is now a 10 year project and has raised over a hundred thousand dollars all on his own to provide to our chapter in donations. From that donations, kids get scholarships, they get sent to Camp Boggy Creek which is a Paul Newman’s fun so serious fun camp.
50:57 If you don’t know, Google, it’s an amazing education. I want to take the time to tell Brevard this is something that you may not know, you may have never heard of it, but I’m going to tell you because when I, when you leave here today or you watch this meeting, you’re going to say wow, I do want to google that. I’m sure that everyone in this room remembers the height of the AIDS crisis.
51:14 Thanks to the people that lost their lives in the bleeding disorder community. Due to what we call in the bleeding disorder community, the blood Holocaust, we lost 20,000 patients in a matter of five years. The bleeding disorder community then decided to take on the blood industry for the entire world.
51:29 World. 20,000 remaining bleeding disorder patients fought against congress and everywhere and world Health Organization to come to terms with the testing of all blood products. Anyone in here could be, could be susceptible to needing a blood product.
51:51 Surgery, motor vehicle accident, a simple bump on the head, anything can happen and you may need a blood product. Guess what? Thanks to the Ricky Ray law passed in 1998, you will not receive a tainted blood product because of someone that died from Healing hemophilia due to AIDS related he due to AIDS related hiv. As a mom with a son with a rare bleeding disorder, I can tell you that our medication is exorbitantly expensive.
52:01 One dose is $16,000. It’s the size of a syringe for a diabetes medication. It takes 16 donations of plasma to create that one life saving medication for my son.
52:08 We need three to four of those a month. The co pay that is $2,100. I advocate throughout the country.
52:14 We’re even going to Puerto Rico for a Latin conference. But the most important advocating I do is right here at home. It’s for the employees that work for you.
52:28 It’s for the students. It’s for the ignorance of parents sometimes that don’t want to tell you at school my kid has a bleeding disorder. Guess what? You better tell those teachers that kid has a bleeding disorder because you’re putting that kid’s life in jeopardy every day.
52:39 You may have an employee that doesn’t want someone at the job to know, but maybe seeing this today, they’ll have a courage to let their coworker know. You know what? When I’m having a cycle, I have a little bit harder than you. Thank you for your understanding.
52:51 So what I do, I do a lot in the community, but this is, this is my baby. This is my pet project. It’s been my passion for the last 19 years and it’s led to so many other avenues I would have never expected.
53:13 I do want to take this time to wholeheartedly thank the board because thanks to the efforts of so many of you up there, we’ve done a lot in this community. With the partnership of Matt and the school board, we were able to host the first ever multicultural festival in downtown Melbourne. And it cost me $6,000 to close the street, but it was worth every penny just to be able to have something in the town where I live.
53:18 I live in Melbourne. I don’t want to have to go to Palm Bay for cultural stuff. Don’t get mad at me, Rob.
53:26 But you know, I live in Melbourne and it was nice to bring that to the community. And I look forward to doing that again. And I thank you guys again for this amazing partnership.
53:40 And the tears that came to my eyes the day that Mr. Susan sent me that awning outside saying Bleeding Disorder Awareness Month. That means so much to us for an illness that so far from a cure. So thank you so much for everything you guys do every day.
53:49 Thank you. Hey, get a picture with her. We got a vote.
53:51 Let’s vote first. Yes. Oh, yeah, okay.
53:54 I’m sorry. Yes, we do. Do I hear Moshe move to approve second.
53:59 Is there any discussion? Paul? Roll call, Mr. Thomas? Aye. Ms. Campbell. Aye.
54:01 Mr. Trent? Aye. Mr. Susan. Aye.
55:38 Ms. Wright? Aye. All right, now let’s take that photo. All right.
55:50 Two. All right. Which leads us to, am I correct that we have no administrative staff recommendations? That is correct.
55:57 Okay. All right, so that leads us to our public comment portion of the meeting. Mr. Chair.
56:04 First. First. Mr. Bryan, you are the only individual signed up for a non agenda public comment.
56:20 But your comment is about the public comment policy, correct? That’s a public hearing. You don’t have to sign up for non agenda. Is that your only non agenda comment? All right, yeah.
56:23 That’s a separate issue. But you don’t have any non agenda outside of the public. All right.
56:27 We don’t have any non agenda comments. Speakers in. So we don’t need a motion.
56:37 Okay, so now we’re at the public comment portion of the meeting. We have how many, Paul? One. We have one speaker and you’ll receive three minutes.
56:44 Our attorney will call that speaker up. Bernard Bryan. Mr. Gibbs.
56:51 Right. Just if we can ask you, just turn off the lights when you’re done. Thank you, board.
57:02 Thank you, Mr. Trent, and the entire board. Thank you for allowing me to speak today. I’m a member of full SAC teams.
57:20 I mentor a lot of children and I love Brevard public schools. So, you know, to be able to stand before you, I believe this is a calling of mine and I believe God has called me in this role right now. And so out of the last four years, I think I’ve only missed one public.
57:31 One public meeting. So I just want to tell you that I really love Brevard public school children. And my wife always encouraged me behind the scenes as well.
57:44 I want to talk basically on a workshop that I saw online in regards to closing ALC schools. I just have a couple of questions around that. I know you just had that workshop.
58:38 One of the things that the NAACP as well as the concerned citizen is concerned about is when these students are moved back to their zone schools, we are concerned about the resource that will be available to support those students. One of the things that we’re concerned about is that will there be enough social workers, will there be enough counselors to support the schools that have a very tight bandwidth right now? So when that extra load is added to them, I’m just hoping that this board will consider adding the resources that are needed. They’re going to need because if that is not addressed, I believe with the marginalized population, around 40% of the LC students are from marginalized communities.
58:59 So I’m concerned about whether that’s going to increase the dropout rate. If they don’t have enough social support, they don’t have enough counselors to support them through that. You know, I haven’t mastered the presentation, but this is just a big concern of mine, as well as these people that I represent.
59:12 So we’re very concerned about that, because if the support is not there, the ability to go that route in terms of dropout will be escalated. And I don’t have that dropout data in front of me. So that’s.
59:18 That’s one of the items I wanted to. That I want to share with you today. I’m also concerned.
59:28 I’ve read your policy on public comments, and one of the things I’m concerned about when I look at. Oh, I’m sorry. The public comment policy.
59:32 The public hearing later in the meeting. We’ll recall you for that part. Okay.
59:39 You can just talk about the ALCs for now. Okay, thank you. Thank you.
59:42 All right. And that’s it. Right.
59:46 Good job, Gibbs. Good job. Yeah.
59:49 That concludes our agenda items. Public only. Public comments.
1:00:05 Thank you for taking the time out to schedule to address the board with your concerns and suggestions. I would like to remind the public that the board is accessible for future conversations outside of our business meetings through scheduling a meeting. Okay.
1:00:09 We are now at the consent agenda portion of our meeting. Dr. Rendell. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
1:00:20 There are 35 items on the list under this category. Does any board member wish to pull any of these items? I’ll retain a motion to accept the consent items on tonight’s agenda. Move to approve.
1:00:25 Second, any discussion? Roll call, please. Mr. Thomas? Aye. Ms. Campbell? Aye.
1:00:30 Mr. Trent? Aye. Mr. Susan? Aye. Ms. Wright? Aye.
1:00:44 All right, takes us to the public hearing portion. We will now hold a final public hearing for the following policies. G48PO01691.
1:01:09 Is there anyone present that wishes to address this item? Thank you for that exercise. Yeah, I’d like to talk about your public comment policy. I’ve had a chance to read most of it.
1:01:17 You know, when I think about public comments, I’m thinking about Brevard Public. You know, when you think about public. All right.
1:01:33 Not this for wall public. You know, we represent a lot of people, a lot of different organizations. And what I’m thinking is when since you have made that change where non.
1:01:54 Non. Agenda item is spoken at the end and off camera, what I’VE noticed what I think will happen, you may lose a lot of valuable input. And I know it may not be aligned with what you want, but you have a lot of people that deals with a lot of communities that represent Brevard Public Schools.
1:02:09 And I believe you’re going to lose that type of input. Also think you may lose the participation rate. If you look here now, you don’t see a lot of participation.
1:02:22 I’m also concerned about you may lose community partners. If they are able to stand and represent their public. Not this four wall public, but the community provide public arena.
1:02:37 I believe you’re going to lose a lot of partnership in that area as well. I mean, if this is what you want in terms of public participation. And I know sometimes these public comments are painful, but leadership is not easy.
1:02:49 Sometimes you got to hear things that you may not want to hear. You know, I’ve been a manager, you know, for like 25 times, 25 years of my life. And there were a lot of things I didn’t want to hear, but I had to hear because I’m a leader.
1:02:57 So I just want you to reconsider that. I’d like to add a proposal though. If you decide to stick with your policy.
1:03:21 Maybe you want to consider adding to your agenda an opportunity for the first floor to add in what they want to talk about. That’s not on the agenda and obviously you can approve that from this dais. But I’m just concerned because you have a lot of people who are passionate about Brevard Public Schools that may not have the time to call each and every one of you to try to set up what they are concerned about.
1:03:34 This may be the only opportunity. So I just want to express that, you know, Mr. Bryant loved Brevard Public School. He loved to to work with the different schools and be a part of the plan.
1:03:52 But I see a shifting here. And so just consider that because, you know, I would like to see you standing in front of a crowd getting the input that would add value to our students and to our school system. So that’s what I wanted to share with you, if you will consider that.
1:04:03 Maybe tweak it a little bit. But I just like to see our voice being heard not in these four walls, but across Brevard Public. Thank you very much.
1:04:21 Thank you. Is there anyone else present who wishes to address this item? All right. Do you hear a motion move to approve? Second, any discussion? Yep, but don’t go so fast.
1:04:34 I first of all bored. I went back because someone asked a question and I went back to listen to the workshop where we talked, long talk. And I have to apologize because I realized, man, I talked a long time that day in particular.
1:04:42 I know I did it frequently, but I did want to address a couple things that not just Mr. Bryan mentioned, but some other people who have emailed. And I’ve gotten very little feedback. I don’t know about you guys.
1:04:51 We’ve gotten very little pushback on this this time around because they understand. I just want to be clear about something. We as a board are still valuing and taking that feedback.
1:05:04 And certainly over the six years that I’ve been on the board, six and a half almost, I have heard my share of things that I really didn’t want to hear. And I know that’s what I get paid to do, to sit up here and was elected to do. And so that I welcome it.
1:05:30 What we’re not allowing, without going back into the full explanation from the couple workshops ago, what we have decided to not do is to allow over our airwaves things that we think would be inappropriate to air, which could be student names, staff names, racial slurs, things like that. We don’t have to broadcast that. So the input is still here.
1:05:44 When people push back about turning off the cameras, but they say it’s about us hearing people’s voices. I’m going to hear your voice because I’m sitting right here. And I was part of when we made that decision, making sure that we did not adjourn the meeting so that we made sure that we were all here.
1:06:01 That was the expectation that meeting would continue to go on. So I value that public opinion, but I stand strongly on our decision to cut the cameras off because of the limitations that we now have with the lawsuit and with the 11th Circuit decision. So I think this is the right thing for us to do.
1:06:13 And, you know, we’ve revised this policy so many times since I’ve been on the board. If something happens and we feel like we needed to go back and redo it again, we certainly have that ability. So for that, I continue my support.
1:06:20 Mr. Chair. Great. Any other discussion? Mr. Chair? I’d just like to say that was very eloquent.
1:06:25 I couldn’t have said it better myself, and I support it. But I think that it was very well said. Ms. Cameron.
1:06:37 Right? Yeah, exactly. I would say the exact same thing that, you know, if you hear anything out there, please don’t let someone say that we’re not allowing public comment. It’s here, it’s just not broadcast.
1:06:46 And we value that opinion of the people, they can still come. I look at it as. Now they can speak twice and double the amount of time.
1:07:00 So we’re not limiting that whatsoever, but because of some of the 11th Circuit decision on what we can and cannot stop someone from saying, I think it’s just protection of. For our. For our citizens to have it this way.
1:07:09 So it’s unfortunate, but I think it’s. Overall, we’ve had support this time around, so. But thank you for your concern on that.
1:07:11 All right. So I do. I did.
1:07:18 I’m sorry. I didn’t. I wanted to say, as I normally do, I concur with Ms. Campbell, and I think.
1:07:22 I think. Ms. Campbell, we’re going with this. Okay.
1:07:35 I think you did it. And Mr. Thomas, I just wanted to say thank you for. For eloquently laying that out, and I look forward to passing this, because I agree and thank you, Mr. Thomas, for giving her the credit that she deserves.
1:07:39 That’s it. I. Roll call, please. Mr. Thomas? Aye.
1:07:42 Ms. Campbell? Aye. Mr. Trent. Mr. Susan.
1:07:46 Aye. Ms. Wright? Aye. All right, next.
1:08:01 Policy G49, policy 2421. Is there anyone present that wishes to address this item? Is there anyone present that wishes to address this item? Do I hear a motion move to approve? Second. Any discussion? Follow roll call, please.
1:08:04 Mr. Thomas? Aye. Ms. Campbell? Aye. Mr. Trent? Aye.
1:08:10 Mr. Susan? Aye. Mr. Rent. Aye.
1:08:21 Next. Policy G50, policy 3120. Is there any one present wishes to address this item? Anyone present that wishes to address this item? Do I hear a motion move for approval? Second.
1:08:25 Any discussion? Paul? Roll call, please. Mr. Thomas? Aye. Ms. Campbell? Aye.
1:08:28 Mr. Trent? Aye. Mr. Susan? Aye. Ms. Wright? Aye.
1:08:42 G51, policy 3124. Is there anyone present that wishes to address this item? Is there anyone present that wishes to address this item? Do I hear a motion move to approve? Second. Any discussion? Follow roll call, please.
1:08:45 Mr. Thomas? Aye. Ms. Campbell? Aye. Mr. Trent? Aye.
1:08:50 Mr. Susan? Aye. Ms. Wright? Aye. G52, policy 3430.
1:09:00 Is there anyone present that wishes to address this item? Is there anyone present that wishes to address this item? Do I hear a motion move to approve? Second. Any discussion? Yeah, real quick. Yeah.
1:09:07 Anybody else? I just wanted to say there was. Got some calls on this. Two different areas.
1:09:20 If you guys remember. This was some of the stuff that occurred in here we moved forward with years ago, where we just. You may not have been on the board yet, but my wife was on leave, and she was just called and said, you know what? We no longer want you to be a part of the school district.
1:09:40 And there was an ongoing thing that we had allowed teachers to be on leave. Now, that caused some issues and everything else. But I did want to say in that regard, this looks good because it allows the superintendent to approve and to continue approval in the event that there’s somebody that they want to allow to be on leave from various reasons and stuff like that.
1:10:01 And I also, just for a point of clarification, we got some calls also about the bargaining units being part of this. And it clearly says that the employees in a bargaining unit should refer to negotiated agreements. We’ve set that over the years as far as an agreement between us and them over their involvement to be on leave without having to come back and get it every year and everything else.
1:10:07 So I just wanted to kind of. If you guys hadn’t gotten those calls. It’s inside of the end of the agreement and everything else.
1:10:11 Right, Paul? The union part. Yeah. It’s in the bargaining agreement.
1:10:13 Yeah. And it’s. It’s.
1:10:17 I just didn’t want anybody to feel like there was anything in there. So this is a good policy. We’re good to go.
1:10:20 Okay. No more discussion. Roll call, please.
1:10:22 Mr. Thomas. Hi. Ms. Campbell? Aye.
1:10:26 Mr. Trent? Aye. Mr. Season? Aye. Ms. Wright? Aye.
1:10:40 G53 Policy 5000, 112. Is there anyone President wishes to address this item? Is there anyone present who wishes address this item? Do I hear a motion move to approve? Second. Any discussion? Paul? Roll call, please.
1:10:42 Mr. Thomas. Aye. Ms. Campbell.
1:10:43 Aye. Mr. Trent? Aye. Mr. Susan.
1:10:48 Aye. Ms. Wright? Aye. G54 policy 5121.
1:10:58 Is there anyone President wishes addresses this item? Is there anyone present at which has addressed this item? Do I hear a motion move for approval? Second. Any discussion? Paul? Roll call, please. Mr. Thomas.
1:11:01 Aye. Ms. Campbell? Aye. Mr. Trent? Aye.
1:11:07 Mr. Susan? Aye. Ms. Wright? Aye. G55 policy 5225.
1:11:13 Anyone present that wishes to address this item? Is there anyone present who wishes to address this item? They’re here. A motion move to approve. Second.
1:11:17 Any discussion, follow? Roll call. Mr. Thomas? Aye. Ms. Campbell? Aye.
1:11:21 Mr. Trent? Aye. Mr. Susan? Aye. Ms. Wright? Aye.
1:11:34 G56 policy 5500. Is there anyone present that wishes to address this item? Is there anyone present who wishes to address this item? Do I hear a motion move for approval? Second. Any discussion? Roll call, please.
1:11:36 Mr. Thomas? Aye. Ms. Campbell? Aye. Mr. Trent? Aye.
1:11:42 Mr. Susan? Aye. Ms. Wright? Aye. G57 policy.
1:11:51 Is there anyone present that wishes to address this item? Is there anyone present that wishes to address this item? Do I hear a Motion move to approve. Second. Any discussion? Roll call, please.
1:11:53 Mr. Thomas? Aye. Ms. Campbell? Aye. Mr. Trent? Aye.
1:11:58 Mr. Susan? Aye. Ms. Wright? Aye. G58 policy 5771.
1:12:08 Is there anyone present who wishes to address this item? Is there anyone present who wishes to address this item? Do I hear a motion move to approve? Second. Any discussion? Paul. Roll call, please.
1:12:11 Mr. Thomas? Aye. Ms. Campbell? Aye. Mr. Trent.
1:12:14 Mr. Susan. Aye. Ms. Wright? Aye.
1:12:22 G59 policy 7217. Is there anyone present who wishes to address this item? Is there anyone present who wishes to address this item? Do I hear a motion? I do. Approve.
1:12:26 Second. Any discussion? Roll call, please. Mr. Thomas? Aye.
1:12:29 Ms. Campbell? Aye. Mr. Trent? Aye. Mr. Susan? Aye.
1:12:38 Ms. Wright? Aye. G60 policy 9271. Is there anyone present who wishes to address this item? Is there anyone present who wishes to address this item? There.
1:12:40 Here. A motion move to approve. Second.
1:12:43 Any discussion? Follow. Roll call, please. Mr. Thomas? Aye.
1:12:46 Ms. Campbell? Aye. Mr. Trent? Aye. Mr. Susan? Aye.
1:12:53 Ms. Wright? Aye. I think we did every policy different fall just to make it more complicated for you. I tried.
1:12:56 All right. Keeps you on your toes. Yes.
1:13:00 He’s doing good tonight. I mean, I gotta hand. Paul, congratulations tonight.
1:13:19 You’re doing a great job. Dr. N, will you please let us know about the items under the action portion of tonight’s agenda? Thank you, Mr. Chair. The first action item is H61 refunding of the district’s 2015 C certificates of participation and release and or substitution of the Central Area Adult Education Alternative education facility.
1:13:24 I hear a motion move to approve. Second. Any discussion? Paul, roll call, please, for the vote.
1:13:26 Mr. Thomas. Aye. Ms. Campbell.
1:13:28 Mr. Trent? Aye. Mr. Susan. Aye.
1:13:41 Ms. Wright? Aye. I will now call a recess of the regular board meeting to convene the leasing corporation meeting. The leasing corporation is now called to order.
1:13:54 Dr. Rendell. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Tonight’s agenda item is the refunding of the district’s 2015 certificates of participation and release and or substitution of Central Area Adult Alternative education facility.
1:14:37 The recommendation is to approve the delegation of the chief financial officer to move forward with the current refunding of series 2015 C certificates at the optimum time that allows the district to achieve at least a 3% net present value savings and the release and or substitution of the Central Area Adult Education Alternative education facility, approve the attached resolutions and other legal documents and approve members of the financing team to include the financial advisor, special counsel and disclosure counsel, and the underwriting team as delineated above. Do I hear a motion move to approve? Second any discussion? Paul, roll call, please. Mr. Thomas? Aye.
1:14:40 Ms. Campbell? Aye. Mr. Trent? Aye. Mr. Susan? Aye.
1:14:50 Ms. Ryan? Aye. Leasing corporation meeting is now adjourned. Now we will reconvene our regular school board meeting.
1:14:57 Thank you. Can I. Can I take a second? Yes, you can. Mr. Trent, Mr. Ford and Associates and all the individuals from there, I just want to say thank you.
1:15:06 You guys have been good stewards of our finances for a long time. I’ve had the honor to work with you guys, and I want to say thank you for giving us this opportunity to reduce our debt and everything else. So thank you so much.
1:15:15 We appreciate you. Thank you. Thank you.
1:15:18 All right. Looking forward to it. Thank you.
1:15:24 Mr. Susan? Yeah. I just want to say. All right, Dr. Dell, the next action item is.
1:15:30 Thank you, Mr. Chair. The next action item is H62 department and school initiated agreements. I hear a motion move to approve.
1:15:41 Second. Any discussion? Just briefly. This is a benefit that staff brought to to our employees a couple years ago, and it has been very beneficial.
1:15:55 It’s a free service to our employees, allowing them to get top notch care at no cost to them, which, you know, cheaper than even going through the regular insurance plan. So thank you, team, for keeping this going. HR Finance, all of everybody who had a hand in this.
1:16:06 I think this is something that continues to be a great thing for all of our staff. Any other discussion? Paul, Roll call, please. Mr. Thomas? Aye.
1:16:08 Ms. Campbell. Aye. Mr. Trent? Aye.
1:16:12 Mr. Susan? Aye. Ms. Ryan? Aye. Dr. Lindell.
1:16:18 The next action item is H63 Procurement Solicitations. I hear a motion move to approve. Second.
1:16:22 Any discussion? Roll call, please. Mr. Thomas. Aye.
1:16:25 Ms. Campbell? Aye. Mr. Trent? Aye. Mr. Susan? Aye.
1:16:34 Ms. Wright? Aye. Dr. Undell. The last action item is Age 64, closing the alternative learning centers beginning with the 2526 school year.
1:16:44 Do I hear a motion move to approve? Second. Any discussion? Paul, roll call, please. Just real fast and like before we.
1:16:53 I don’t want to just like hop over it real fast because I want to have a discussion about this. There’s been a lot of misconception in the community about this, the concern of what’s going to happen. And I’ve.
1:17:07 I’ve spent some time last week and some this week. I’ll continue on the rest this week. But just taking the time to talk to the principals and really having one on ones because really in our secondary world, there’s a lot of fear and concern of what does this look like? So I just.
1:17:15 I would encourage you. Those conversations have been extremely beneficial. And you know what? I have heard from every single one of the principals I’ve talked to is that things are better now.
1:17:27 So they’re like, I will say this, there’s been some changes that you guys have made that I was like, not sure how that’s going to work, but it’s actually panned out to be better. So, you know, I’ve asked our principals in the North End, just hang on with us through this one. Let’s.
1:17:46 I know there’s an unknown factor here, but ultimately the goal here really is to get that student code of conduct which we’ve been working on today, and I’m sure we will be working on more back in line and to make sure that the principals have the autonomy to run their school, make sure everything in there is smooth. It’s not, you know, for the kids that are disrupting the campus to come back and continue to disrupt the campus. That’s the.
1:17:57 Not what’s going to happen here. So just encourage your principals as much as possible. I know there’s an unknown factor of how this is going to work, but I truly believe it will, in the long run be better for our students and better for our staff overall.
1:18:00 So. Right. I did want to address something, too.
1:18:07 Oh, sorry, you jumped first. I do want to address the public comment. There was a question about resources being available to serve students.
1:18:19 And Mr. Bryant’s not here anymore, but I. I’m sure he’ll go back and watch. So if we know we’ve. The board has been presented with the numbers of students that are at the ALCS now.
1:18:54 And so if you divide that over the student, the schools that they’ll be going back to, it’s my understanding from what was presented to us at our last workshop a couple weeks ago, Dr. Rendell, that those schools that have, or maybe you and I had a conversation with somebody about it, the schools that have a high percentage of students that are coming back, we’re going to provide that extra support for them and also for the ones who are going to be. Who are eligible, first of all, to come to do the diversion program. And we’re not just going to leave schools hanging who need that extra support.
1:19:10 And plus, we’re also talking about, generally at a time, one or two, a very small handful of students coming back in, and then also that it’s not all of those. I mean, as we were working through our. Ms. Wright said, as we’re working through our student code of conduct, not all of those students will be eligible to come back in and participate in the diversion program.
1:19:31 Some of them will be doing the new. I forgot what it was called, but success online platform. Ultimately, I believe, as we were having these conversations a couple weeks ago, I believe this will allow more students the opportunity, if they’re serious about making it right, the opportunity to stay on target with their graduation path.
1:19:46 It will help. It has a potential to help improve our grad rates because when they go to the ALCs, they aren’t able to take all the classes that they would have normally taken if they’d been in their school. They’d just taken those core subjects to keep kids on track to graduate on time, even the online version.
1:20:08 And with the goal of having more students be able to cross that finish line and fewer students being completely without services. So I think when I think about support, I think we have the opportunity to provide even more support now than we do. But with this vote, there are a lot of things that couldn’t take place until we vote on this tonight.
1:20:35 So even though it seems fast, this vote tonight enables us, for example, board. The transfer window opens the Monday after spring break. And so for those teachers at the ALCs who are trying to figure out, am I going to be one of the four, and if I’m not, where do I want to go? They for them to be the first in line because it’s a kind of a force transfer situation, we have to take this action so that then the staff can start officially putting all these dominoes.
1:20:44 You know, the dominoes start falling to get all ready for 25, 26. So even though it seemed fast, we’ve been talking about it for a while. I know some of the board members have been asking for us to do something with ALCS for a really long time.
1:20:57 So I think this is going to be a good idea. And we’ve got some more, again, more pieces to put in place, but this is the first step. That’s it.
1:20:59 Mr. Thomas, did you have. Mr. Thomas? No, ma’. Am.
1:21:11 I would like to say something I did. Once again, I would say you did an amazing job and I concur with everything that you said. I think you, you eloquently laid it out and I just wanted to say thank you.
1:21:17 You did such a great job today. I’m not kissing up. I’m trying to tell you guys together.
1:21:20 I just wanted to say thank you. That’s it. And I appreciate that time.
1:21:33 And yes, I agree with everything both of you have said. So thank you. I would like to just add on that, Ms. Wright, what you were talking about when you were talking to your principals out there, it’s very important to have those conversations.
1:22:05 And this is a chance for this board in this district to put our money where our mouth is. You know, if we say to serve every student with excellence as a standard, that means every student and students that even run into some troubles, and the more we can keep that student connected to their campus, to their teachers, to their community, it’s a better chance for that student to walk across that stage and get their diploma and get their graduation taken care of. And that’s, you know, that’s our goal here.
1:22:22 Here is for not to see how quickly we can get certain students out of our schools, but how to keep certain students in our schools so we can be that example to those students. And I believe this is the first step in doing that. So I’m very proud that we’re making this move.
1:22:32 This is where we can actually help those students more, we can help those families more. And I just couldn’t be more prouder of this board. Make that bold step.
1:22:51 Dr. Rendell and the staff, the staff had every right to say, not so fast and maybe not this year and maybe not next year, and we need more data and kick the can down the road. But the staff said, absolutely, we’ll look into it. And that’s how it started.
1:23:27 And it might have been a few years on my radar, but bringing it to the board and to board members that maybe never step inside of an ALC before they got on this board or had the luxury to teach in an alc, it’s a proud moment that we’re going to be able to capture more of those students. And again, Mr. Bryant had left there about, you know, his concern was about more of a dropout rate. It’s going to have the absolute opposite effect, and we’re going to grab those students and keep them as part of BPS longer because of the decisions we’ve made.
1:24:02 So that’s all. Dr. Rendell, did you have something? I just wanted to follow up on Mrs. Campbell’s eloquent discussion, but to address Mr. Bryant’s concern, I think those students will receive more support and services at their home school than they would at the Alternative Learning Center. They would receive support at the Alternative Learning center, but at many of those schools, there are so many levels of support in place, and they will have all that level of support as well as, again, like Mrs. Campbell mentioned, access to all of their seven standard courses and staying on track and that kind of thing.
1:24:12 And that is the. The ultimate goal is to keep them on pace academically, and I think there’s something to be said about that. You were a former employee of those alternative learning centers.
1:24:20 So it’s not that this is just an idea. This is something that you lived, and that’s a big deal. So Roll call, please.
1:24:23 Mr. Thomas? Aye. Ms. Campbell? Aye. Mr. Trent? Aye.
1:24:28 Mr. Susan? Aye. Ms. Ryan? Aye. All right.
1:24:42 Great job, board. We will now move on the information agenda, which includes two items for the board review and may be brought back for action at a subsequent meeting. No action will be taken on these items tonight.
1:24:58 Does anyone, any board member, wish to discuss this item? All right. At this time, I would offer my fellow board members and Dr. Rendell an opportunity to recognize students, staff, or members of the community. Mr. Chair.
1:25:20 Yes. I would first and foremost like to congratulate Palm Bay High School girls basketball team for winning the state championship. And if I’m not mistaken, as Coach Murray’s second year being the head coach, and he’s a Florida Tech alum, so our paths crossed slightly when he was at Florida Tech and I was there at the same time.
1:25:28 But congratulations to them, and beating American Heritage is no small feat. That’s a great school. So I’d also like to.
1:25:52 I will save the most of the comments for Mr. Susan, but for this next subject, but I would like to just give him kudos and Mr. Ramer and Mr. Robinson for the elementary flag football. I went by Jupiter and Medal Intermediate on Saturday, and I was amazed at how many kids and parents were out there. And it just shows that there’s a huge need, a huge interest.
1:26:26 So congratulations. I know that idea brewed before I ever got here, but very great idea and great job implementing it for getting that many kids all moving in the same direction. Last, I’d like to make you guys aware, I was asked by the Space coast association of Realtors to make you all aware of the that they’re hosting the Project Prom 2025, and that’s on Saturday, March 15, from 10am to 2pm at their location on Pineda Plaza and Palm Shores.
1:26:35 And what that is is basically they’re giving gently used formal attire and accessories free of charge to students. They don’t. Students don’t have to qualify.
1:26:44 Any student can receive it. But it’s a way to get some gently used prom attire for prom is this Saturday. Yep.
1:26:46 Saturday, March 15th. Yep. 10 to 2.
1:26:51 Thank you. That’s it. Yes.
1:27:20 I had the opportunity to be one of the judges for Destination Moon, which replaced Destination Mars that we used to have. And I just wanted to thank our big title sponsor for that event, Boeing, and all of the many volunteer judges from the community, but also the people who work in this building who stop what they’re doing multiple days during this month to come and spend four hours listening to some really fantastic presentations. Our elementary school teams did a fantastic job and I had a lot of fun for the two days.
1:27:33 It’s ongoing. They’re not done yet, but just a great job team and Amanda for coordinating it and ET and all the work that they did. It was really well done.
1:28:01 Two of the Fridays in February, I was able to participate in the African American read ins at Columbia elementary and Suntree elementary and just such a great event because so many people from the community come in and it is fantastic. And we read books either by an African American author or about an African American character in history or fiction, whatever it may be. But they also get to introduce themselves.
1:28:21 What do you do for a living? How’d you get there? And the kids ask the most interesting questions. So I got to do fourth grade one day, but my first week I was in there with the pre K kids and it was very fun and very interesting. So thank you to Nicole Parks and also Kathy Hamilton Brown, who are the assistant principals.
1:28:30 I know Saturn also did this event and Ms. Parks from Columbia told me that next year she’s got like 12 and John was. Mr. Thomas was at the Columbia event. She’s got like 12 more elementary schools.
1:28:41 I said just don’t put them all on the same day because love to participate as as much as possible. But they did a fantastic job organizing those. Those are the assistant principals at Columbia and at Suntree.
1:28:57 The leadership training Roundtable happened last week. It’s something that our professional development staff does to train future teacher leaders. So it’s people who are teachers right now from across the district and all different levels and types of schools.
1:29:08 And maybe they’re thinking about becoming administrator one day. This is kind of the first step. Or maybe they’re thinking about just stepping up to leadership, you know, in their own school in different capacities.
1:29:20 And so it used to be that Teacher Leader Academy. And so they’re doing something different. Linda Buffum has had me teach kind of how the board policy process works for the last several years.
1:29:30 So she. Since they changed the format, I got to do this roundtable discussion with them last week, but mainly I wanted to highlight. I just wanted to recognize Linda Buffum and Lisa Hyam.
1:29:41 They did a fantastic job. The feedback they sent us, the feedback that the teachers had written anonymously about the session and they absolutely loved it. And that’s just one of a few days that the training is going to go.
1:29:51 But I want to especially recognize Linda Buffum because she’s retiring at the end of this school year. And I just appreciate her so much, her positive attitude. You can’t see her in the building without huge smiles.
1:30:10 And she does a great job job even just a few minutes that I got to sit in there and listen to some of the things that she was teaching, the way she makes them reflect. A lot of the success of that kind of program had to do with her leadership. And we will miss her dearly, even though she told me last week that she’s coming back as soon as her 6 months FRS will allow her to.
1:30:26 So we’ll be happy to have her back doing something and oh, not done yet. Sorry as far as reports go. Just wanted to make you aware if I don’t know, Ms. Wright, if you got this, but for all of us who are FSBA members, they’re sending legislative updates, sent the first legislative update on Monday.
1:30:37 I’m happy to forward that to you with a tracker. Wanted to highlight a couple of things that are moving across the finish line. I didn’t see any too much that directly relate to our platform.
1:30:54 I will be up in Tallahassee next week. But I did want to highlight a couple of things. One is Senate Bill 1150 by Senator oh, sorry, Khalada youd, who is the Education Committee chair specifically talking about school social workers.
1:31:10 And one of the things that we’ve talked about not making school social workers have to pass teacher certification, she’s got that down as one of the things that she would like to move forward. And so they’re just getting started. Concession officially just started last year.
1:31:27 Tuesday also, there’s a couple other things there was there’s a couple of people that have been talking about attendance. We know they talked about it last year. They’ll be talking about this year mainly to have a uniform definition, which there is not currently, of what attendance is in the state of Florida.
1:31:43 Every district counts it differently. Every school in some districts can count it differently. And what is chronic absenteeism? And all those so try to put a singular definition so that they can, we can, they can start supporting us and making legislation that makes sense.
1:32:07 But we have to start with a similar definition because if you ask every district what’s your chronic absenteeism rate, it’s going to look a little bit different. Senator Simon is also putting forward his administrative efficiency bill, which is basically deregulation but they’re not calling it that anymore. Looking at some other things, I think we’re probably going to see some improvements in teacher certification issues.
1:32:20 You know, we asked for them to allow right now and I don’t really understand exactly how this works but when you. Your certification is tied to your district. So if we pull in people from other districts, there’s some extra hoops they have to jump through.
1:32:36 There’s some work on VPK and asking the state to support additional funding for full day vpk. And I’m not sure if that’ll get across the finish line, but that is definitely part of that. Thankfully we don’t have to deal with the school start times.
1:32:42 That’s such a headache for, for a lot of school districts right now. We’ve already are doing. We’ve been doing that for a long time.
1:32:52 So we’d have to make that adjustment. But I’m certainly support our other districts who are struggling to try to make that happen with that being rescinded or adjusted. You can look at the rest.
1:32:56 Ms. Wright. I’ll send you that if you, if you didn’t get a copy. It came out on Monday.
1:33:10 And then finally last weekend I had my board of directors meeting for the Florida School Music Association. I represent brevard. I represent fsba.
1:33:19 This is the organization that governs. It’s kind of like FHSAA board for Music. If they govern the MPA performances and the solo ensemble performances make up the rules.
1:33:31 And so there’s two school board members from across the state a north and a south on that. But I want one of the things that they the music. All the music education associations advocated for last year was the Seal of Fine Arts.
1:33:42 So starting this year, students can earn a seal that will go on their diploma. And there are some pretty significant things they have to do to earn that seal of Fine Arts. They have to participate in a top group.
1:33:47 They have to go to the MPAs. They can. There’s a list.
1:33:53 They can even do like volunteer hours in a music based or arts based. Not just music. It’s an arts thing.
1:34:00 But it’s not just like be in art for four years. You actually have to go with some competitions. There’s some rigor to it.
1:34:34 And so the goal was not just for districts to have to track a whole bunch of data, but the goal is ultimately if a student does that, they put that kind of time and effort into earnings to seal that it could potentially be an opportunity for that student to earn. What’s the word I’m looking for acceleration acceleration points which help school grades. So now those of you who don’t know if you get, you get acceleration point by taking AP classes, IB classes, things like that, CTE courses, any dual enrollment, any kind of thing that’s an advanced program.
1:34:58 A lot of our students who would be earning the seal of Fine Arts might get it another way. And you can only earn one acceleration point. So it’s not a matter of getting students to have extra points, but there are for the small handful of students who aren’t going to get an acceleration point another way, but they are just really excelling in the arts and they do all the things in that way for them to have that opportunity.
1:35:16 They’re actually, they were thinking that was going to be a far off goal, but they actually were able to start having those kinds of conversations with legislators this year. Not that they think it’s going to happen this year, but sooner rather than later. I say all that to say it is worth it for us as a district to start tracking that opportunity for students to earn that seal of Fine arts.
1:35:23 Because one, we want to recognize the work that the students have done. And like I said, it’s not just we’re in band for four years. Okay, you get it.
1:35:38 You have to put significant work and time behind it. But if it’s the potential for some more students to earn a handful of students across the district to earn another acceleration point, it’s worth it. So some schools are putting, some districts are putting that out on their website.
1:35:53 This, like I said, this would be the first year Dr. Rendell told me he already talked a student from Cocoa beach, he was like super excited about getting that seal. But we want to make sure that we’re recognizing those students across the district who do that work. They have to do an application.
1:36:16 But if this moves in the next couple years, years into an acceleration point situation, that will help our school grade, help our district grade, we want to be all behind it. And so I just wanted to give that information to you and I shared it with Dr. Rendell in our one on one the other day just to see what are we doing to track it. Because one of the things that the legislators are going to want to know is how many students are we talking about.
1:36:30 So if we’re not already tracking it in different districts across the state, that’ll be a hard number to give them. So I imagine starting next year, they’re probably going to be asking us that, you know, how many students didn’t earn an acceleration point another way, but they would have earned it this way, so. And that was all I have.
1:36:34 Thank you. That’s right. All right, I will go too.
1:36:46 So I had the opportunity as well to judge the destination moon. And I have to tell you, I’m always so blown away because these are elementary students. And so when they come in and they’re doing coding on the spot, I’m like, oh, my gosh, I am so blown away by this.
1:36:55 And then some of them will get stuck. I cannot help them at all. So I’m like, oh, you know, you’re watching them, but just watching them problem solve and really the resiliency there and like, getting back up and doing it.
1:36:59 So shout out to University Park. University Park. Clean house.
1:37:07 On the awards when they. When I was there, the day that I was there. So their coach did an exceptional job getting those students ready, because they really.
1:37:14 I mean, they won, I think almost every single category they got first place in. It was unbelievable. District.
1:37:15 Oh, okay. Okay. It’s not.
1:37:23 Yeah, I was gonna say it’s not a competition, but it is the same thing the week before, but it was the same coach. Okay. Oh, was it? Okay, so the coach.
1:37:29 So shout out to that coach being exceptional on getting those students ready. So, yeah, that was a fun event. I love it.
1:37:33 It’s. If you got the chance to judge, you should judge. You’re missing out if you don’t do it.
1:37:42 Also, I want to give a shout out to Ms. Coachman at THS. She had a best buddies event, which she’s done a couple years in a row now. And it’s kind of like a big old party that happens out in the courtyard.
1:37:48 She brings in basically anybody that will come, come on out. And then we play sports. They have food.
1:37:59 Different things that are happening. Tyesville PD is out there, the fire department’s out there, city council, mayor, everybody that comes, you know, the district came. Mr. Poole came over from Viera, you know, came down there.
1:38:12 So it was just a good event all the way around of including kids that have different disabilities that maybe sometimes don’t necessarily get to always be participating in a traditional kind of setting there. So also want to give a shout out to Eastern Florida. I had the opportunity.
1:38:26 I’ve gone now two years in a row to Mr. Humphrey’s political science class and spoke to his students, which is always so much fun. I absolutely love going there and hearing what college students think. He’s an Eastern Florida teacher.
1:38:45 Sorry, I went to Coco, but I’m always the questions that you get asked or what they think about the role that you’re in. I will tell you, it’s interesting. I think it also probably warrants the fact that we need to do a better job at teaching at a younger age what local government does, right? And I hate to say that, but that’s the God’s honest truth.
1:38:56 Because a lot of times it’s like, what do you think they make? I laugh when I ask that question. What do you think a school member makes or a city council member makes? And it’s always so, so unbelievably off. It’s not even funny.
1:39:10 So, you know, good questions there and good talking about governance and what our role is, because the public doesn’t sometimes there’s a misconception there. Board, I’m gonna. I mentioned this to Dr. Rendell and I’m gonna mention it to you because I’m gonna need some support on something that’s a little outside of the box.
1:39:21 So I have a elementary school in the North End. It is the most northern end elementary school that we have, currently runs a VPK program, has two classes. They are at capacity every single year.
1:39:29 Year. They are on a wait list every single year for VPK. They are losing Title 1 funding this year, which is what funds their VPK.
1:39:41 There are no VPK options for families that run that North End up there. I mean, all the way to Volusia, down into Titusville. There’s no VPK options that really exist in this market.
1:39:51 We changed the way that we qualified our Title 1 school several years back. I don’t know if you’ll remember, we used to hound parents. We’d call them, email them, text them, send people to knock on the door, fill out this form, fill out this form.
1:40:07 We need it back from you. And I agree with the method in which we’re collecting that data now. So now we’ve taken the approach of if these families are actually receiving government assistance, such as Medicaid, food stamps, things like that, then they’re going to be part of the families that qualify.
1:40:20 Well, the particular community in the North End, it’s just a different community. They will go work, they will go do different things. They don’t necessarily always go for the government assistance, if that makes sense.
1:40:33 Whether that be a lack of don’t trust your government. It could be that or it could be a, I’m going to go and work and figure out how to put groceries on my table. So with that being said, they’re on the chopping block to lose their two VPK classes.
1:40:40 And that’s going to devastate that school in a huge way. And so Dr. Rendell, I spoke to him about this. I know we’re working through a solution.
1:40:53 There just may become. There may come a time when I need some support there on making sure that this stays a program that exists in the North End because it will hurt that community and it’ll hurt. That’ll move down, unfortunately, into a lot of the other schools.
1:41:02 So just want to make you aware of it, put it on your radar. It may come back as something that’s outside of the box of what we normally do. But I know we’ve been very vocal about trying to expand vpk.
1:41:18 And so this one is like, man, we can’t lose a vpk. Two VPK units in a school that are at capacity with a wait list. They could actually take on probably three or four VPK units if we were able to fund it because there’s such a need in the North End.
1:41:39 So just making you aware of that because it’s a little different outside of the box and it may come back before us at some point. So that’s all that I have that would be a good thing to communicate to our legislators who are taking a look at funding BPK full day. Because if we had the reason why does for the public to understand the reason why is because Title 1 schools use their Title 1 funding to pay for the rest of the day.
1:41:46 And so if. If we were funded for full day vpk, then that would take care of that problem. All right.
1:41:58 I think I do know that area that you’re talking about on the north end. I’ve heard individuals that work up there who, you know, Ms. Harris used to work up there as a principal. She knows that area very well.
1:42:11 And I mean geographically. I think that it’s our responsibility to make sure that we’re providing certain services for our students. Especially because those students in that specific area, if they’re not given that vpk, they may end up in a larger.
1:42:17 They may need those extra couple of years to transition into that classroom. So I agree with you. Let’s take a look at it.
1:42:38 What I would say is if we can tail in that before that comes back, if we can also do an analysis, Dr. Ando, of the before and after. This was an idea that we would move to this new way of pulling in our revenue based upon anybody who was filling out for government assistance. We have numbers from per student before.
1:42:50 Now we have numbers for this one that are consistent for a couple years. Let’s look and see which one’s bringing in more revenue as far as a target? Because we might find that we’re not making as much by not having them fill out the forms, if that’s the option we want. Want to go to.
1:42:55 You know what I mean? That’s all. If we can get something like that before we make those decisions. And then I’m good.
1:42:58 I just wanted to say that on the tail. So I didn’t mean to cut you. No, no, you’re fine.
1:43:00 That’s. That’s all they had. That was my last.
1:43:04 Was my. I might need your help. Please help if it comes up here.
1:43:09 Thank you. So I just got a cup. Is that okay? I saw you going.
1:43:20 So it went to the Cattlemen’s association meeting that went really well. They are over the moon, excited about all the agricultural things that we’re doing. They’re excited over how we’ve taken that.
1:43:29 I mean, we had the Farm Bureau, we had all those guys there, and they’re like, no other district is doing what you guys are doing. No other district. And I was sitting there and I was like, that’s because we’re Brevard.
1:43:36 We’re the best at everything. But you guys are just finding that out. So I just wanted to tell you guys, great job on the agricultural stuff that we’re doing.
1:43:44 Astronauts getting some huge support through them. MIMS elementary is hatching chickens in their school. It is the coolest thing you’ve ever seen.
1:43:50 They have incubators and I mean, this is like a whole thing up there. So. Well, I got so many of those chicken stories.
1:44:01 My daughter did some stuff. So anyways, with that, one of the initiatives that we have that Health first was able to start a little bit of the sponsoring. But we’re going to be putting in an outdoor classroom at Ralph Williams.
1:44:13 That’s a farm to table. And what that is is 4, 10 raised beds that go to four different seasons for where the kids grow something and then they bring it in and they actually eat it. So it’s a really interesting thing.
1:44:32 We’re going to try to get it in before sometime in April and then be able to have a Cinco de Mayo chips with salsa because you have the peppers and the tomatoes. But that outdoor classroom is a long table where families, communities, church groups can come and they can have meetings outdoors. And it’s a beautiful little area.
1:44:42 So something to be coming. I just wanted to say thank you to Ms. Schroeder for doing that. I also wanted to say our girl Brooke, the most persistent woman that we have out in the world for water safety.
1:44:48 I don’t know if you’ve ever. Oh, yes, she’s been here, worked with her. She has now gotten 10,000 people in.
1:44:52 So she is incredible. Like she’s. I’ve seen some of the emails I’m on.
1:45:04 I’ve never seen somebody drive a program like that before. And she’s now moving to do now that she’s gone through and she’s educated all of our kids in the first phase. She’s now actually doing water how to swim.
1:45:12 So she’s at Sherwood and she’s doing that. So it’s incredible. Sherwood pool, she’s taking the kids from Sherwood, walking them down there and she’s going to teach them to swim.
1:45:30 And that’s phenomenal. So I just want to say a big shout out to Brooke and the water safety did want to let you guys know the ecac, that group of generals and everybody that is incredible. It’s again, Ms. Yvette Cruz running, pretty much running it.
1:45:35 But we have the opportunity if you guys can save your. Dr. Rindeller working through some. Some items.
1:45:59 But May 15th at Viera High School, it looks like we’re going to have the first graduation members who are serving in the military to have a big graduation and they’re bringing over military generals from Tampa, Miami. I mean, it’s going to be a big deal. So it’s all the kids, homeschool, private school and school board that are graduating will be graduating that night or not graduating.
1:46:07 But they will be doing a. It’s called like a. They do it at Daytona Speedway where they raise their hand and they actually swear in right there.
1:46:12 And it’s going to be a big deal. Can you send us an invite? Calendar invite? Yeah. So Dr. Rendell has to check.
1:46:26 I just said tentatively we’re going to get a date somewhere in there. It has to be from like the 13th, somewhere in there, somewhere in there 13th to like the 16th because the way that they get all of the numbers on the 12th and they have to get before our graduation. So it’s going to be in there.
1:46:32 Dr. Rendell’s looking at how it conflicts with other schedules. Okay. But I would put it down on the 15th right now because that’s where it’s.
1:46:35 We’re kind of trying to make it work. It’s huge. It’ll be massive.
1:46:46 I call it. I don’t think it’s done anywhere else in the state. I’m also on April 2nd, we have something called the Brevard Athletic association that we’re officially going to pull together.
1:46:50 What it is is just. It’s not an official association. It’s not official anything.
1:47:09 All we’re doing is we’re forming the to be able to work out an agreement between all the cities and county and school board over what facilities for sports that we have currently and how can we improve, collaborate and increase that to increase the participation of sports in general for both our colleges and everybody else. It’s great. It meets on April 2nd.
1:47:29 We have a member from each city parks and Rec elected official and then many of our rec leagues and stuff like that. And on the second, we’re just going to lay out, hey, here’s the vision. Now everybody’s going to go back and figure out how many facilities they have of each sport, which ones need to be repaired and fixed and then we’re going to be able to start hosting like Palm Bay and Melbourne.
1:47:37 They’ll be able to start hosting huge flag football tournaments for like NFL flag and stuff like that. Some stuff to that we’ve never been able to do before. And it’s at the TDC office.
1:47:48 It’s going to be incredible. The Central Florida School Boards Association, I’ve been on two of their meetings. Now I want to tell you guys that if you don’t have an opportunity, we all get the links.
1:47:53 I think it would help if you guys were the stuff that they’re bringing up now. It’s. It.
1:48:00 It’s not what. It’s not what we had before. When I was on the Central Florida School Board association years ago, I couldn’t care to be be on it.
1:48:03 I’ll be honest with you. The things they were bringing up were just. It was meeting after meeting of them.
1:48:11 Just good. But there’s a lady named Allison Campbell out of Marion county, she’s chairing it and she’s doing a phenomenal job. So some of the things that she’s brought up.
1:48:31 The last thing that they did was they brought up transportation and they had like Volusia County, Marion county and a couple of the other counties transportation directors on. And they brought up a bunch of different ideas and they said, how are you incentivizing people in your transportation center? And a couple of the great ideas. One of them that they mentioned was, is that they have a bonus.
1:48:47 So if the bus drivers are present for an entire nine weeks, they get a bonus and an entire year they get a bonus, which is really cool because that’s what we want. Right? But there was just some innovative stuff. So I’ll make sure that you Guys are on the link to invite, but it’s cool to listen to it because she’s actually running it and doing a good job.
1:48:51 So just wanted to say that. Yes, the elementary school sports. Sports.
1:48:59 Holy cow. Like, I. I didn’t even think that it could be as big as it was. I don’t know how many people you had at your location.
1:49:02 It was pretty good. Pretty good turnout. I was.
1:49:05 I was floored. I went to that Longleaf. There was about.
1:49:10 Probably about 250 to 300 parents. And then I went to Viera, and it was like 500. It was crazy.
1:49:13 It was. It was out of control. And the kids.
1:49:25 The kids at Longleaf were maybe 1, 12 team per school. We got over there to Viera. Each school had at least two teams that were like younger and older teams and stuff like that.
1:49:39 Ralph Williams coach didn’t show up, got sick. So I was forced to get back into my coaching mode. Ms. Campbell, I know you might think that that’s something that I like to do, but elementary school students scare me.
1:49:44 I’m just not gonna lie to you, because I have. Yeah, I know, but I can yell at. At them.
1:49:51 I can’t yell at these kids. And they. So I get in there and I was coaching in the first two games, we lost by a touchdown each.
1:50:01 And then there’s this happen to have your whistle with you. My cleats on. But there was this one girl named Kimberly, and she was.
1:50:07 She was an animal. And by the third game, she was starting to run things, and the quarterback and everybody. So they won out the rest of the game.
1:50:11 They started doing well. But I just. The energy, I walked off.
1:50:18 And this is what. This is two things that happened, and I wanted to make sure we understood this. There was a very family that was sitting there, and they were all there.
1:50:35 And I walked off and they said, hey, whoever’s done this did an amazing job, because we can’t afford nor can we have the time to take our kid to play sports. And they’ve been able to play a sport. And then I can’t tell you how many other families that were there that were on the outside that had kids that.
1:50:42 That were like, I didn’t know you guys are doing sports inside the schools. I didn’t know that. So they were talking about taking their kid from.
1:50:57 There was. There was kid parents that were in charter schools that were talking about bringing their kids to our schools because now we have elementary school sports. And then they also were talking about some of the homeschool families were like, wow, can we do this? And I said, yeah, but I think you got to be part of the school for this one, so it’s really cool what that did.
1:51:03 Really good stuff. Thank you, Dr. Rendell and Mr. Ramer, for initiating that. You guys did an amazing job with it.
1:51:17 I did want to let you guys know that the. We talked before, and I wanted to make sure it was okay before we do this again. But we talked before about the logos that each one of our high schools have should be trademarked.
1:51:22 So I talked to the. We brought this up before. Mr. Gibbs said there was an attorney that was going to reach out to me.
1:51:27 He was on vacation, so I finally got a hold of him. He works in this area. He agreed today to move forward.
1:51:35 Forward with it, as long as you guys are okay with it. I’d like to have him just work with Gibbs on crafting some stuff for us to pot do and. And move forward so we can.
1:51:37 We can do it. It pisses me off. What was the cost? Was there.
1:51:45 Is there a cost for him to look at this and trademark each? No, he’s doing it for free. He’s doing it. He’s just going to help us understand what the laws are and then let Gibbs get where he needs to go.
1:52:01 So if he needs to go back out and get somebody, he can. But it’s kind of a formal informational session that we can basically, by law, because we’ve been. Because it’s known that it is our trademarks and they are knowingly putting our names on it.
1:52:08 We have rights right now to slam it down. Okay. But we want to move to a more official position.
1:52:22 I think it’s actually wrong that there’s actual companies that are out there that go and produce our shirts and then go to Walgreens, go to Target, and say, hey, we can sell these shirts for you. There’s a third party making money off. It’s ridiculous in our.
1:52:31 And. And if you watch. If you’ve been to any of our sports, years ago, you actually had, like, a booster club trailer that was there that sold everything.
1:52:44 And everybody went up there, and they stopped doing that at all the schools, most of them, because there’s no way for them to make money because they can go down to Walmart and get it. Well, if Walmart wants to do it at $5, then pay us a portion of that, and that can go to the school. You know what I mean? But we got to make sure.
1:52:48 Yeah. No, I think this. I love the idea when you brought it up before, so I think it’s something we should pursue.
1:52:58 Okay. Next thing is, is that the state championship girls, awesome basketball team, want to go to nationals, but the FHSA blocked them. Why they blocked them.
1:53:21 They said that they cannot do it outside of. Because FHSA has rules that say that as a team and this is to protect our athletes so that, you know, cannot form a team and then start playing. So, like, when I was coaching and John, I’m sure and you understand this, too, you can’t just grab your, you know, Cocoa beach golf team and go start playing Volusia county golf team in the middle of the year.
1:53:30 That’s outside of season because coaches will drive that into the ground. But what happened is we. And I haven’t gotten into it, but we applied for them.
1:53:43 They said no because it’s the national championship is actually not a FHSA sanctioned event because it’s outside the state of Florida. But these girls, they. They deserve to go play the darn national championship.
1:54:06 So what I’d like you guys to do is for us to get involved. Paul, were you in on those negotiations originally with fhsa? I would love our attorney to send them some sort of a we’re going to go do this and you know what I mean, kind of thing. I would love to get direction to give Paul, to be able to send a letter to try to get our girls to be able to play.
1:54:13 I don’t know where that is. The board of directors for the fhsaa, I know half of them, we. They said that they already have petitioned them.
1:54:20 I have a feeling that if I reached out to them, I could get it across. But there are standing laws against this, and this is wrong. You know what I mean? Go ahead.
1:54:28 Do other states play? Other high schools from other states? Obviously, yeah, play. So does Florida never, say, sends a team to this? No. That’s crazy.
1:54:32 It is. And it’s. And it’s in New Jersey and it’s a national championship.
1:54:44 We very rarely will we ever have a team that we know probably could win the national tournament. And that, that. And not only that, but the exposure for our athletes at that level for scholarships, that’s what gets me.
1:54:55 I was just like, screw this. Like, definitely just my question to Mr. Gibbs would be, if we’re not playing an FHSA sanction, that then we should be able. Our team should be able play wherever they want.
1:54:56 Right. There it is. So.
1:55:00 And it’s. Is Palm Bay High your school? Yes. Okay.
1:55:00 So I think we just want to stay championship. Yeah. He’s trying to get you a national.
1:55:11 So I think it might be good. You might want to take the lead on it. Mr. Thomas, you know this very well.
1:55:24 I’ll be honest with you. The FHSAA does a lot of things that border, like, there’s a lot of upside. We had a team go down to Rockledge, took their track team down to Miami.
1:55:38 We won the event. And then their stadium, they allowed parents on the field, attacked our students and knocked one of them out. And that person was never held accountable, never arrested, nor was the school ever held accountable or anything.
1:55:50 And FHSAA then had the event there the next year. The other thing is, is that we had a baseball team go down there. There’s been instances where FHSA has been completely wrong, and I think they’re wrong on this one.
1:56:02 Can we ask Mr. Dr. Randall, as far as whether it be Mr. Robinson or whether we have. That’s an attorney issue or whether it would just be a athletic director issue that he could address? He already had petitioned it, and they said no. Oh, he already did? Yeah.
1:56:09 That’s why I said we got to get to the attorney. Yeah. I haven’t talked to Mr. Robinson about it, but I can check with him tomorrow.
1:56:20 You can turn that timer off. Did you turn the timer off? He’s turned my timer on me. All right, so just to follow up on that, Mr. Gibbs, would you mind checking into that then, as far as.
1:56:33 Yeah, I’ll look into it. I don’t know much about it, but I’ll see what I can find out. Basketball, right? I know what sport we’re talking about, but I don’t know anything about the FHSA blocking participation in national.
1:56:45 So if it’s okay, stop blocking from doing something outside there, right? Yeah, I think if. If it’s okay, I think we should do this, so I concur. That’s all I got.
1:56:48 That’s it. I mean, I got. Look, I got three more of them now.
1:57:07 Anybody else has anything further to report on Dr. Rindell? Yes, I do actually have a couple things. So the first thing I want to share is we actually had a state competition going on last week in another state sport as well. I mean, I was fortunate enough to be in Lakeland for the girls basketball state championship game and see them win that game.
1:57:18 That was great. But earlier that day, I was in Kissimmee at the Silver Spur arena for the opening rounds of the state wrestling tournament, and we had quite a successful run. Our students.
1:57:27 Our student athletes from all of our high schools had quite A successful run. We had 25 individual medalists. That means you placed in the top six, six in the state to earn a medal.
1:57:43 It’s not just first, second and third, but top six. And so it’s one thing to qualify for state, it’s another thing to win a medal or medal at state and then an even greater thing to win the state championship. So we had three individual state champions.
1:57:56 Timmy Boda from Merritt Island, Emma Hoppe from Viera, we do have girls wrestling, and Leonard Christian, the heavyweight from Palm Bay. So those three were individual champions. We had a slew of second, third, fourth and fifth and sixth medals.
1:58:03 So that’s a three day tournament. Well, if you can survive to the third round, you have to keep. You have to win a little bit.
1:58:17 But it’s quite an a feat. It’s quite an accomplishment, Quite a feat for these student athletes. And probably the people we don’t thank enough are the coaches that put these programs together and get these kids ready for these, this level of competition.
1:58:28 And it’s quite a feat. If you’ve never seen a state wrestling tournament, I encourage you to check it out, especially the first day, because you’ve got, I think it’s 16 mats going on at the same time. And it’s crazy.
1:58:39 It’s really cool. And then the last thing I want to share is last Friday we actually culminated our Coffee Bean experience. So for those of you that don’t know, the Coffee Bean is a very short motivational book.
1:58:49 It talks about overcoming adversity. And for two years now we’ve had all of our sixth graders read the book. So every sixth grader gets a copy of the book.
1:59:16 And then last year, and this year we had one of the co authors of the book, John Gordon, come and speak about overcoming adversity and how you have the power within you to basically overcome any challenge that you face. And there’s a simple allegory of the Coffee Bean, but I’ll make you read the book to find that out or Google it. But we have about 5,000 sixth graders and there is no facility in Brevard big enough to house 5,000 people.
1:59:33 So what we’ve done the last couple years is take half of them to a facility and they hear John address them in live and in person. And the other half of the students remain at their campuses and we live stream the address back to them. So last year when we did it, we were at FIT at the Clemente Center.
2:00:05 This year we were back at the King Center. And so half of our sixth graders were there live in person, and the other half were watching on livestream and really need to thank the teachers, administrators, and other staff at the schools who helped organize this experience, and then definitely the curriculum and instruction department who helped organize the experience. So you had people at the school organizing all the kids and getting everything ready, and then people at the King center receiving them and getting them all seated and organizing all this.
2:00:11 And of course, we had transportation that had to get the kids from A to B. We used yellow buses for. For the mall.
2:00:22 No charters, yellow buses for them all. And so transportation had this huge undertaking. And then food services usually had to adjust the lunch time for those students when they get back.
2:00:45 So it’s a huge team effort to have these kids not only learn the message in the coffee bean by reading the book, but then also seeing the author live is quite an event. And we’re also repeating this type of event, the same scenario with our ninth graders. In a few weeks, all of our ninth graders received a book called no Barriers by Eric Weinmayer.
2:00:53 And he’s an inspirational person. So he’s the author. So he’s going to come and speak to some of our 9th graders live and in person, and we’ll live stream it back to the others.
2:01:04 So we did this event, these events, last year, and they’re a great success. And the first one this week, this year was last week. And I just want to thank all of the different staff members involved for pulling that off.
2:01:16 It was a lot of people behind the scenes making stuff happen. And so I don’t know if anybody really watches this portion of the board meeting, but at least it’s on record that I thank them for all their efforts. And then we’ll do it again in three weeks with the ninth graders.
2:01:21 That’s it. Mr. Chair, can I. Yeah, absolutely. Add just something to that.
2:01:41 First of all, congratulations to you or thank you to you, because not everybody would see a value in bringing motivational speakers, especially at that age, to schools. And your vision, I think, is awesome. I went to it, and I can tell you to see 2,500 sixth graders not only there, but they were super engaged.
2:01:46 You could tell that they read the book. You could tell they were super excited about the speaker being there. It was amazing.
2:01:59 I mean, I was truly impressed that they were that involved in the presentation. And just to compound or echo what Dr. Randell said, from the moment I pulled into the parking lot, it was like being at Disney World. I mean, it was like flawless.
2:02:05 And the kids were all lined up perfectly the buses were all parked perfectly. I mean, it was a total team effort. Very impressive.
2:02:13 I don’t mean it was crazy to have that many kids and have it be that flawless. It was amazing. So great job, Dr. Rendell.
2:02:20 Thanks. Great. Yeah. Those are things that are. We’re going to see the benefits down the road, right? Absolutely. So we appreciate for that, that vision. So anybody have anything else? If there is no further business, the meeting is now adjourned. Sam, It.