it down all right welcome everyone we are privileged to be joined tonight by swimming Pen Creek Elementary and their singing otter chorus under the direction of their talented teacher Miss Courtney [Applause] Hulk [Applause] [Music] [Music] DRS echoing tonight but she is only wh of some quiet conversation she's coming in 1230 flight refle stars that guide toward Sal I an old man the way findot words ancient turn to me as if to say hurry boy she's waiting there for you take a to dve me away from you 100 could ever do I just down INRI the time to do the things we never have [Music] C out in the night [Music] rest I know that I must do what's right and sure the [Music] deep [Music] that could take a lot to drive me away from you there's 100 men or more could ever do I bu the Rains Down and Out but it takes time to do the things we never [Music] have [Music] hurry boy she's waiting there for you going to take a l to drag me away from you there's could ever do I the Rain Down in Africa I the rain Down in Africa I the Rains Down [Music] inria I the RS down in I the RS down in time to do the we [Music] never [Music] [Applause] w [Applause] w what a great way to start our meeting thank you guys so much for being here with us tonight um we'll give everybody everybody a minute to transition and then we'll move on with the rest of our agenda for oh no problem yeah all right so at this time we will have uh Pastor Russell Franklin uh join us to lead us in our uh invocation and our Pledge of Allegiance so if you would all stand with us let's pray together dear father we do thank you so much for the opportunity to come and to gather for the purpose of discussing our children we thank you so much for our County the way that so many people work so hard to educate to come alongside our children and also parents we thank you for our school board our superintendent all the teachers support staff so so many people bus drivers cafeteria workers on and on and on it take such hard work to to care for children we thank you for that uh hard work that is paying off we thank you for our boys and girls our young men and young women in our County that are growing that are becoming that are thriving we pray that that continues as a school board and superintendent make very crucial decisions we do pray for your calm peace we pray for a United spirit that uh the best things will be done for the quality of Education and Care for the boys and girls that enter every classroom all around this District we thank you so much God for uh just myself my own two children have come through this County and public school we thank you I was able to teach in this public school system and got to see so many great things and experience so many great things we just pray tonight that you'll bless everyone here and that above all that you'll be honored by what is happening in this place and all the classrooms around this County we pray all of this in Jesus name amen amen please Jo me the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you so much Pastor Franklin it's always good to see you um if you guys will take a moment to notice the artwork in the back of the room um we have a beautiful new display um in the Showcase you will see the talented students of swimming pin Creek Elementary under the dire direction of their art teacher Stephanie Pikman a variety of mediums were used for the art that you can enjoy at the back of the room including papier-mâché acrylic paint tempura paint watercolor wash watercolor color pencil metallic glaze actual and implied textures chalk pastels geometric shapes and sequential drawing and marbling there's quite a bit of talent at swimming pin Creek Elementary um so at this time I will call to order the regular school board meeting for February 1st 2024 I want to welcome each of you uh thank you for joining us tonight um this is this meeting is our opportunity as your elected representatives to collaborate openly and to make decision that will decide the future direction of our public schools and the education of our children here in Clay County if you wish to address the board on an agenda item there will be an opportunity to speak for 3 minutes please fill out a card located at the back of the room or the side entry door indicating the specific item number or topic you wish to speak about and turn it in promptly to one of our officers if you have items that you would like to present to the school board or to the superintendent please hand them to an officer who will distribute them accordingly no additional cards will be accepted once the board moves to the public comment section under presentations from the audience your participation is always welcomed and appreciated so at this time we will move to the recognitions and awards um section of our agenda and first up is the recognition of our academic team champions and Miss treasure picket our chief of secondary education will be making this presentation all right good evening everyone m Martin come on up um I would just like to um let everybody know we're here tonight to honor the Klay County academic team District Champions at the high school the JV and the junior high division um I would first like to thank the school board and Mr brosi obviously for their continued support of these uh extracurricular activities um I would like to thank parents because we know especially the JV and junior high students um don't travel to m matches by themselves so they have to have transportation so we appreciate that um we appreciate the coaches at each school they do a great job um with their students and supporting the program we we appreciate admin in each School many of them are Judges sometimes so we we thank them um but most of all um we thank the students for Having the courage to join the academic team if you have never been to an academic team match um it's tough okay um for most of us you don't feel very smart either it's very difficult so um just how difficult is it you ask well what I'm going to do is uh give a couple of questions and you're going to have you're going to have more time to ponder than the students do okay they have the buzzer and they've got to hit it quick I'm going to give you all time to ponder and think no Googling no Googling I think Miss gilhousen got got one right last year didn't you miss gilhousen way to go so I'll give you a couple questions and then we'll move on so here we go question number one students I know you know the answer don't don't don't give it to anybody let them figure it out let the adults try to figure it out the Treaty of Paris which officially ended the American Revolution was signed on September 3rd 1783 since then six C ities have served as the official capital of the United States one of them of course is Washington DC our current capital can you name the other five Mr brosi I believe you uh have a history background so just saying I didn't mean to say that out loud but might have all right that was many years ago oh probably when that Capital existed for you math folks if a certain book must be in the middle in how many ways can seven books be arranged on a shelf all right so at this time what I'm going to do is uh turn it over to our our leader our district leader Mr Martin does a great job I he's been doing it since I've been in this position and I'm so thankful for that but he organizes the matches he pulls questions he organizes is who brings snacks and schedules and things like that the varsity and JV have their matches here at the TTC and then the junior highs will have it at one of the host schools so he organizes all of this fall schedule for us and does such a great job so at this time I'm going to turn it over to Mr Martin and the first thing we're going to do is recognize our division team winners thank you Miss p it um the first group I'd like to recognize is the champions for the junior high schools um we've um on the side here we've got all the champions from previous years and this one floats around um we've had Lake Asbury win it Lakes sides won it uh Oakleaf Junior highers won it but taking it back for this year is Lakeside junior high so coach uh Maui if you'll come on up and introduce your team sure of course okay we weren't able to get everybody to come this this evening uh due to conflicts but I'm going to read everyone's name if I read your name you could W wave to the crowd they'll know you're who you are uh we have Caleb Connor Isabella Castilla Sophia Gia Kylie Manning Franchesca pumo Natalie Stewart William Summers our captain Eli Swan Brody Tois Aiden Watt and Blake Wiggins this is Lakeside junior highs academic team yes thank you next we're going to recognize our High School Division and here we have a junior varsity and a varsity uh level of competition um the uh junior varsity is made up primarily ninth and 10th graders but every now and then um uh one of the schools I think it's Keystone is a junior senior high so they actually have eighth graders on their uh junior varsity team um it's been a tough competition but running away with it this year uh was um Fleming Island height school so with Mr Gartner if you would come on up here and bring your JV [Applause] team J there's so many of them your JV if you want to go ahead and read off your names yep all right this is fluming Island High School JV team on the far left we have Sophia Shayla Lincoln Evan and [Applause] Ethan and next is our Varsity Champions pulling the Daily Double was Fleming Island High School this year so they won both the JV and the varsity level so once again coach Gartner and his varsity team all right from left we have Sam in the back Derek Michael Kylie Kevin David Victor and Zena The Varsity Fleming Allen [Applause] team all right we have one more team to recognize and this is the um team that will be representing us at the state competition so each district can then select an all district team and we'll go and compete and Mr Martin takes them down there and they compete in that so I'll let him call them out now I be before I do that once again I'd like to to reiterate what Miss picket had said a little bit earlier um all of this is possible because of you guys supporting um the Academic Teams uh the trip down to Orlando that we do in April cost a little bit of money and we couldn't do it without your support so uh we've always made it to almost the final day uh but this year I'd like to kind of make it to that final day and bring that trophy back home for state championship for you guys so once again thank you very much for what you guys do to support us the All County team is made up of six players plus an alternate um we do a lot of stat tracking during our matches um trying to get the best uh the B the brightest and the and the best if you will um and I think we've got a really really good team this year so I'm super super excited about this one so I'd like to call them up a couple of them are dual enrollment students they're actually in school tonight so they could couldn't quite make it uh but I'm going to call out the names and if you're here if you'll come on up I think I've seen most of you um I'm going to start with our alternate um that is uh Abigail DS so Abby if you'd come on up you'll take Center Stage there for a second Abigail is a senior from Oakleaf High School also representing Oakleaf High School is Amara leam a senior also yeah she's uh actually miss OHS and I think is involved in the um getting ready for that for this year coming from Fleming Island High School is Victor agular Victor if you'll come on up Victor is a junior always like to have a like nice mixture of Juniors and seniors so uh Abby was on the team last year so it shows that having those Juniors on there kind of pays off so hopefully that experience will help us uh also from Oakleaf uh at a dual enrollment class is pan Patel coming in from fluming island is another Junior David rafalski and a repeat from last year uh uh our star player really if if you want to kind of put it that way uh is Derek bamer from Fleming Island High School a senior we're counting on Derek to pull us a lot of points at the state so thank you Derek so this is our all count team that will be representing Clay County in April down in Orlando oh I'm sorry you know what I'm sorry I forgot one I thought I had all of them also representing Oakleaf High School shame on me um is CLA Sheffer a senior so Claire if you'll come up how could I forget Claire she's our literature Guru so we got to have that one so I apologize Claire once again now our all count [Applause] team all right thank you and the answer to the questions remember I'm looking for um the six cities that have served as the official capital of the United States B the five beside Washington DC are Princeton New Jersey Annapolis Maryland I hear I'm say yes Trenton New Jersey New York New York and Philadelphia Pennsylvania I got you m all right we got a couple all right if a certain book must be in the middle and how many ways can seven books be arranged on the Shelf 720 different ways thank you we hope you enjoyed it and have a good evening there's a student in the back who got the answer and I it's like I want you afterwards if you're still around would you explain it to me please thank you okay got it thank you all right at this time we'll move to the recognition of the 2023 2024 School related employee of the year and teacher of the year finalists and we have Miss Carolyn crawl from the clay Education Foundation here to make that presentation well good evening superintendent brosi and school board members I'm here to in tonight to introduce by video our top five School related employees of the year and teachers of the year uh the selection committee has spent the past several months um dwindling down we went from 10 semifinalists to five finalists of where we are now um and we'll they'll all represent their their schools at the Apple Awards um we'll also celebrate uh several nominees who have made a difference in their school community with a special Spotlight Apple award you can see how special this is to them um I one of the things I just loved to watch is the current teacher of the year and school related employee of the year just really want to make this so special for the for the ones this year it's been sweet to see so if we cue the video [Music] [Music] go [Music] thank you and that's exactly the kind of cheering that we want we want it to be a loud celebratory event um well thank you so much we can't wait to celebrate with all of you next week all right at this time we'll move to the recognition and ribbon cutting of the Student Art Gallery we have miss Karen McMillan our coordinator of school choice and Chris Google our Fine Arts curriculum specialist here to make this presentation good evening board good evening superintendent um last April superintendent braski spoke to the awesome work that our Fine Arts teachers do in this County he spoke to the hours they put in before school and after school he spoke to the value ad that our Fine Arts teachers have in our our school and our community and he spoke to the talent that they build in our students um shortly after that the board approved a new allocation for our first Clay County district schools Fine Arts specialist and and I just wanted to speak to some of the work that he has put in place in just the short time that he has had this role so first of all do do I have a clicker to show Miss watt do I have a thank you all right so first of all I want to speak to how he supported our teachers so so he has helped vet curriculum resources for our Elementary music teachers they now have an online curriculum resource to support instruction and learning strategies our K12 art teachers have a curriculum as well for the first time and and it also has PD in devel developed it within that system he has worked with all of our Fine Arts teachers through professional development this year we had our first ever all all Fine Arts teachers come together for a day of professional learning um he coaches our teachers he works side by side with te with beginning teachers and he also supports growth-minded teachers and sits with them and discusses with ways that discusses with them ways that they can be better in their craft he he h something that fine arts teachers have that not all teachers have is they have to work with contracts and budgets and he supports that work with them he does a Weekly Newsletter with them that has all kinds of information for them and he highlights teachers so they all get to know each other he also supports our programs I he's our Fine Arts teachers have put Clay County out there and he is really he's pushing it even more pushing that limit he is our he's the point of contact for the community for the district for the teachers for the state which has been pivotal for us because it's enabled us to get grants that we may not have been able to Garner had we not had a fine arts specialist to manage that work I don't know if you know we just were able to get a $1.2 million grant that the state had released and he he he completed that application and we were able to get it so uh Esser funds there is an Esser supplemental Grant he was able to put like for the first time ever they're getting funds that they have never seen before so it it's been an amazing journey um he's put a tiles in the portals so that there are available resources for all of our Fine Arts teachers he has supported the our all count events which highlight the best of the best which several of you were able to make it to and see our kids shine he is supporting our growing programs our new teachers and helping them be better he is helping our administrators fill their Fine Arts positions he is putting available positions on the state site so that kids graduating from college can see where they're opening so that we can bring in new Talent he he has put our social media out there we have a representation now we now have a fine arts web page on the district site and he's able to showcase our students even more so than our Fine Arts teachers already do that's why we're here tonight is he he will be showcasing our kids who performed in the All State and our ribbon cutting for to highlight our students artwork I would like to thank SNJ printing for putting our signage up our vinyl signage up they put a rush on it and they got it done today so we greatly appreciate it they have business cards by the door is a thank you for the rush job that they did um I would like to invite the board and the superintendent and all of our art teachers who were able to come here tonight to support this auspicious event to come back here for the ribbon [Applause] cutting look TR [Applause] w you [Applause] doesn't it thank you so much we sure appreciate all that you guys contribute to the enrichment of our students here in Klay County all right so at this time we have the fine Arts recognition of all County events and Mr Chris goall will be making that presentation good evening school board members superintendent teachers principls and all those who are supporting our Fine Arts programs I'm excited to share a review of the recent all count performances and recognize All State student performers that showcase the extraordinary talents within Clay County schools first let's review our All County performances which included presentations by Band secondary choir Elementary chire and for the first time ever a theater showcase all of these events involved several Clay County students who went through a rigorous audition proog uh process showcasing their M their skills and musical knowledge students were chosen then dedicated um themselves to rehearsals meeting multiple times with teachers and clinicians including a full day of rehearsal right before their respective concerts the culmination of these efforts resulted in spectac spacular performances all under the guidance of our exceptional clinicians tonight I want to extend a heartfelt congratulations to all of the students who participated in these allc count events your hard work and dedication have truly paid off and we are proud you had the opportunity to showcase your hard work and talents at these events can we please give our all count student performers a round of applause this evening we also have a number of outstanding Allstate student performers to recognize from Clay County Schools through a tough audition um audition or nomination process that took place last fall these students earned their spots in Allstate honor ensembles by competing against others from across the state these Allstate ensembles are made up of the top students from across the state and acceptance into these groups is highly coveted and and a distinct honor this year we are proud to announce that Klay County schools had an impressive 15 students selected to participate in an Allstate honor ensemble in early January those students traveled to Tampa immersing themselves in lengthy rehearsals that culminated in breathtaking performances students as I call your name please come forward to receive your recognition please remain standing up front for a picture at the conclusion of these recognitions [Music] thank Emily garganus from Lake Asbury Jor High Brett lisy from Lake Asbury jior [Applause] High Abigail norell from Lake Asbury Jor High Rebecca robu from Lake Asbury Junior High and Aiden schaer from Lake Asbury Junior High Joseph Summers from Oakleaf Junior High and Joseph is actually on a um an ace trip right now so so his award will be accepted by um Miss Paula Summers our next student Haley Bolam from Fleming Island high [Applause] school and Nathan Reed from Fleming Island High [Applause] School William Ross from Keystone Heights senior high Ethan donaho from middleberg high Michael Drina from middleberg high and khis Wheeler from middleberg high Cameron powers from Oakleaf High Samuel Ellsbury from Ridge View High and Alex RoR from Ridge View High let's give these students a well-deserved Round of Applause for their remarkable achievements at this time we will take a picture with all students and then after that we'll take a picture inviting teachers and admin up taking a picture and teachers and admin if you would like to join the students for a picture on either side of the students now would be a great time teachers and admin students will do one more picture with your teachers or admin here thank you can we hear it one more time for our [Applause] students and before I conclude I want to express our gratitude thank you to the school board the superintendent the music teachers principls and the families and supporters of these talented students your continuous support and encouragement Have Been instrumental in fostering a thriving Fine Arts Community within our schools and together we're creating an environment where creativity dedication and Excellence are celebrated thank you for being an integral part of your students artistic Journey all right our last recognition is for uh career and Tech education and we have Miss Alice pul the supervisor of career and tech ed here to make this uh presentation tonight good evening uh my name is Alice pul and I'm one of the CTE supervisors for the district and it is February which means we get to talk about Career and Technical Education Month uh February is noted as carean technical Education Month across uh the United States and so we've taken this um presentation and done it a number of ways over the years we've highlighted students we've highlighted business partners um we've done some myth busting um in this year we're going to kind of do a year in review and let me say now I'm sure I will leave some event out some student out some school out so let me just apologize ahead of a time because to try to capture everything that's gone on in our um year in a presentation um is almost impossible but we're going to try try to hit some of the highlights for you here so first we just want to go by the numbers as kind of a kind of a baseline of where we're at so if you're not aware we have approximately 120 crew and Technical educ education teachers across the district uh we of all Junior highs and high schools along with Florida Youth Challenge Bannerman Learning Center and then of course clay virtual as well uh we have seven College and Career coaches each um high school has one that's on their campus full-time uh we have over 11,000 students who sit in a CTE course through our Synergy program we over we offer over 30 different programs across the district and so when we talk about programs we're talking like early childhood we have five programs but when we're talking about numbers we would count that as one program so that's why the 120 and the 30 don't quite match up um another thing that people might not realize is we have 14 different advisory boards that meet three times a year and those advisory boards have taken on some different um kind of makeups over the last couple years we finally got into where we talk about content so we have like a viar Advisory Board we have an A Advisory Board we have an early childhood education Advisory Board and those advisory boards are made up of not only business partners postsecondary um participants um we have parents we have students we have teachers we have um administrators and guidance counselors as well and in those advisory boards their purpose is to assist advise and advocate for our students in our programs and they serve as kind of our sounding board of are what we doing is what are we teaching and doing and using in our classrooms appropriate for what we need to be putting out for the workforce that's coming out so they they really do help advise and make sure that we're on the right path with what we're doing so when you add all that up that's about 42 Advisory board meetings a year which is a lot but it's sprouted over the year but those are some great conversations with our business partners uh last year we were able to report 1,415 industry certifications to the Department of Education and that includes some of the junior high but mostly at the high school level so that's kind of a baseline of what we've been up to this past year so again we're going to look at the month by month and again I will leave somebody out and something out so we'll apologize now but I want to kind of highlight a couple of things that have gone on in the past year as kind of a year on review one of our favorite events probably every spring is construction career days which we'll give you the date Miss bolo loves coming to that along with some of you others who've made it out there Construction Construction career days is an event put on actually by the Florida Department of Transportation and it highlights all of the industries and available jobs in the construction Transportation industry that's everything from those who are working straight out of high school to those who have an engineering degree and so we offer that opportunity up to every student every Junior High and high school on their campus they do not have to be part of CTE we have a great partnership with the Department of Transportation that puts us on they will bust the students there they feed them lunch and it's a fabulous opportunity so we'll um we'll highlight that date here in just a minute it's actually going to be on leap year February 29th so if you'll put that on your calendar if you'd like to come out it's held at the equestrian center and it's just a great opportunity to see students um connect the dots between a math class or something they enjoy doing and what kind of career they could possibly go into again we won't go through all of the things but these are just some of the highlights for the month of March we stay busy with mock job interviews most of our Career and Technical student organizations have their State leadership conference where they get to go showcase their skills um and compete with others across the state we start to have um in some of our mock job interviews which is where our business partners step in and do some interviewing skills with our Juniors and seniors in high school to get them ready for the world of work in April our big event which we don't actually have a p picture up there because I didn't know where we would start would be our Clay County Agricultural Fair which spans uh 10 11 days where our students participate in all kinds of levels whether it's with um Act activities in the barn or even helping volunteer at the fairs so that's a great partnership we have with the Agricultural Fair this past year we did our Middle middleberg High School Community tour which we'll talk about those that are coming up for the rest of the year we've also had some great events with our um nail driving competitions that are done by nefba which is northeast Florida Builders Association and then we have our Ace mentoring event which is always a highlight for our engineering student Ace mentoring is architecture construction and engineering and those students work with a team of professionals after school once a week with those professionals come in and teach them about their trade so one week it might be a mechanical engineer the next week week it might be somebody in design the next week it might be somebody that deals with architecture and the students present an RFA to a panel of judges on something very specific and real in the community a couple years ago they designed a new layout for Clark Park which actually was part of what they used when they redesigned Clark Park and took in and put the new playground in so it's a very practical event um it's a great culmination for those engineering students and drafting students to see those skills come to life in may we call uh May in our office May Madness instead of March Madness it's good Madness but it's a lot of Madness a lot of good things going on uh we get to recognize all of those students especially those seniors who have been program completers which means they've been in a program three for three years and they've earned their industry certification and that comes in a number of things whether it's through an award ceremony through senior Awards um but we try to celebrate those students in all their accomplishments we have a great U partnership we've had for years with hasell and they put on a great construction trades breakfast where they get to highlight um a number of students in our trades program uh the coveted Gold Hammer award is given out to the outstanding carpentry student of each program along with some other Awards and high school takes them through the process of all the different uh jobs and opportunities they have for their students and in the field of construction um again and then in may we spent we were busy uh plugging in all those industry certifications into Synergy so they can make them to the state uh you think June would be slowing down because school is closed but it's not of course uh we're busy with our teachers doing some curriculum mapping and making sure our Frameworks and our activities are up to date with what's going on in the world of work these days our vice students head off to visce Star um and spend the summer downtown in their summer Branch um side by side with the business uh those who are hired to work at viscar going through the same training that they're going to if they're going to go work out in a branch and they're being paid by V visar for that opportunity uh this past summer uh ridu High School a laier received a Rachel Ray culinary Grant um for Ru high school for some programs there and then we have all of our um usually our national leadership conferences start to take place for our Career and Technical student organizations and those students are competing Across the Nation at this point um and representing Klay County very well one of my favorite stories is the young man in the lower right hand corner that's him at the national skills USA conference he was a student actually from Orange Park High School in carpentry and he won at the district level and the state level and he was ready to go to Nationals and has school could really see that he was going to be a a great student and not only that possibly be a great employer uh he came off the floor literally of the big Georgia um Convention Center and they offered him a job right there to put him to work because they could see the the the skills that he had so one of my favorite um stories about the Career and Technical student organizations and why they're so important to our students after school in July we still have some more uh student organizations heading off to National competitions and our very Maria binkin which we recognized a couple of Schoolboard uh meetings ago was recognized as the national TSA which is technology students of America National Middle School adviser of the year and that's for the whole nation and she is a fabulous gym that we have out at Lake Asbury Jr uh then it's time to start back to school and here they come and so in August we're busy with some more curriculum mapping with our teachers we hosted our districtwide inservice day of course we have our new teachers that were trying to get on board and Oakleaf High School was able to bring um a Whole Foods Garden Grant to oaklea High School this year through our a program and so we're um excited about the things they're getting to do out there as well in September we had our great College and Career night if any of you were there you probably saw me out parking cars in the parking lot at the fairgrounds Kelly and I were um it was an overwhelming success that is the student um that is the State University system program that rotates throughout the state and we get assigned a date to host it uh we decided to move it out to the fairgrounds this year and it was quite the event with hundreds and hundreds of families juniors seniors anybody that really wanted to come learn about their college opportunities in a One-Stop shop um so that'll be again this next year in September we don't have the date quite yet uh we're busy starting our Advisory board meetings we have our great Partnerships with the forign bureau company for foreign Bureau which hosts our um speech contest which our students can get involved with and then our culinary teachers are always expanding their skills through our great partnership with the Florida restaurant and Lodging Association in October um we uh participated in the one clay Parent Academy at Keystone Heights High School schol with a table and we've participated we will be participating in all those parent nights that are kind of moving across um across the district we had our visar reality favor at middleberg high school if you're not familiar with those we have a couple of banks that do this but viistar um put students through a simulation of they get assigned a job they get assigned a family situation where they're married or single and how many kids they have and then they basically draw their their salary for the month and then have to work out between rent and food and insurance and all those fun things uh when my child was at middleberg high school he was not pleased he was uh drew a single father I think with three kids and so he uh he wasn't too pleased with that I was like that's life we got to learn how to B to manage it so it's a great opportunity through our business partners uh we have our um we have our we participated with our comprehensive local needs assessment and this is something the state has asked us to do and it really it's a good idea we get together as a region Northeast Florida through the jaxusa uh partnership which they're a great partnership fars because we look at what our region needs Northeast Florida not only Clay County as you know our our most people live in Clay County and they sometimes drive to the northeast Florida area so we look at those things of what's needed in our area and our programs aligning to that and if not what do we need to do to get them aligned to that and then we sent our FFA students off to their National Convention in October as well uh November we participate had students participating in the Jacksonville fair um all students not just Career and Technical education students were invited especially seniors to go spend the day at St John's Riv State College where they got to learn about admission they got to learn about some programs that are available and learn a little bit about navigating the school we know if we can get kids on campus to just simply figure out where do I go for ad where do I go for admissions where do I go I have questions about financial aid where do I go to get my books we're taking some barriers away from them so we um provide that to any student um in our schools not just crew and Technical education students um our big event in November one of our big events was we were um contacted by n National gimson which is a company based out of Green Coast Springs Junior High School the gentleman said we'd like to support trades programs we said okay that' be great thinking a couple hundred dollars they'd give some stuff for using the programs and they showed up with a $30,000 check to be used in trades programs so we are very thankful of course for not only the financial support but the interest they have in supporting our students and investing in what they're doing um so that was a big November uh for us as well in December we had our Junior High Orange Park Junior High provided our rotary lunch and for the club which I I think some of you probably participated in um we we see these grants that come out usually about July and August from the Department of Education and I my eyes get really big and Kelly goes Alice what are you doing I said this will be great it'll be great for kids it'll be great for students it'll be great so we apply for all these grants in July and August right as teachers are coming back and we sit there and we wait and we wait and we wait and then usually about December sometimes January maybe earlier or later we finally start to get those letters in from the state so in December we were awarded a Pathways to career opportunities Grant which spefic specifically focuses on pre-apprenticeship programs that would be like our carpentry electrical um some of those kind of areas and so we have money to invest in those programs with new equipment and trainers um which we are looking at some more of those for them as well we have some exciting news for some of our culinary programs Universal Studios hosted a handheld competition like a handheld item to eat and two of the top three schools are from Clay County and so they will go next Tuesday to compete in the final that's key Heights High School and richu High School and they will compete I don't know where the other district is doesn't matter one of those two will bring it home for us and so their item that they're creating will be put on the Universal Studios park menu and will be served in the park and so they can go and see their item being served at Universal Studios so we're very excited for those students as well um and then we have our ctso activities and when I C say ctso that was our career in technical student organizations things like FFA and fbaa we also have our national student Honor Society our national Tech technical Honor Society which is very similar to National Honor Society where those students have to have a certain GPA and participate for so many years in career in technical education it's a great opportunity for students to get that recognition um and also they do some great scholarships for students as well and then January hit we thought January was going to be nice and quiet and it turned out to be just the opposite we hit the ground running um if you weren't aware uh we invited um Aaron Bean to come out to visit Clay High School back in the fall he had been to the fair and we said you've got to come see some of our programs in in action his wife happened to be from uh attend Clay High School so they had interest in coming there he was very impressed and said uh we'd love to have y'all to DC and I jokingly said I don't think you want to give us a mic because that could be dangerous and lo and behold he called right before Christmas and asked Kelly to come testify at Congress in a subcommittee hearing and so we were able to talk about the great things going on here in Cay County with Career and Technical education and it was a great opportunity um to talk to him and some other um Congressional folks we also found out in January we had applied for a cap which is has to do with capital outlay for Career and Technical education programs uh we received that Grant and then of course the state kept on notifying and we received an entrepreneurship grant for some of our students were with entrepreneurial um activities so we've been busy with um helping with the literacy night with some of our a programs and then we have our very own Edwin Oro who's one of the top five for Teacher of the Year from a TV production program at Oakleaf High School so January is usually not quite so busy but it was a great busy um and then we roll into February and so this is kind of what February looks for like looks for us as well a couple of things I want to highlight for you all is on February 15th we will have our career fair and at this program um we invite all seniors again they don't have to be incur in technical education programs we we invite all seniors from all high schools to participate we tell them to look to either be enrolling enlisting or getting employed so if they're a senior who's not real sure what they're going to do come May or even a little sooner than that then then we'll have all the branches of military there to help them find out information about unlisting we'll have local colleges there to help them find out about enrolling and then we have lots of businesses they ready to talk to them about um full-time or parttime part-time jobs as soon as they graduate or possibly even sooner so that'll be held out at the fairgrounds on February 15th and then on February 29th is our construction career days which is out at the equestrian center um so if you'd like to come to either of any of those but either of those we'd love to have you as our guests to participate in those I left with you earlier tonight hot off the press is our new course selection guide for the 2425 school year um this highlights all of our programs that we have going on in our high schools um and in the middle I kind of like it it's a little One-Stop shop where it shows um the programs and the schools and then the industry certifications that students could possibly earn by the time that they're done with those programs if they're with us for those three years and last but certainly not least another item hot off the press is our new Career and Technical education video that we'll be showing at our Junior high and high school program so I'll leave you with us tonight as you prepare to embark on your high school Journey the Clay County school district has something extraordinary in store for you and we have over 30 Career Technical education programs for you to choose from the CTE programs were created with you in mind so you can explore your passions and interests while gaining practical skills that set you apart After High School our goal for you is to cultivate opportuni through hands-on experience that builds practical knowledge all while earning certifications for the real world from industry standard state-of-the-art facilities to Gardens that feed the community your high school years could include a wide range of [Music] activities [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] as you prepare for high school remember your journey does not have to be average you can start today by exploring the diverse CTE programs within the Klay County School District your future awaits so thank you so much for letting us talk about curent technical education this February and probably every month we like to come and talk about our programs but we do truly appreciate your support we know we un able to do those things without the support of our board and our superintendent and staff so thank you very much so many opportunities as a mom of an upcoming freshmen the opportunities are endless and it's a little overwhelming so thank you so much for putting it in a nice neat little pamphlet that we can review together I know that's helpful for a lot of families all right so we are going to move towards our school our School showcase and tonight we have uh swimming pin Creek Elementary with um Miss Sherry Larson the principal there to um tell us all about the things happening at her school good evening superintendent school board um thank you guys for staying um I am so grateful to share the learning and growing that is occurring every day at swimming pin Creek Elementary the otter family so we are a small um community school with around 475 students um the our zone is just within a mile and a half uh we have three schools in one we have a a traditional K through six we have an ESC self-contained um unit that serves students um with needs with behavioral needs uh K through six and then we have a monory program is school choice and we serves uh children ages three through sixth grade I had the privilege of uh joining this community in October 2021 and I serve um alongside my work partner Laura Smith um we are likeminded in our pursuit to provide a safe nurturing learning environment with educational experiences that are motivating challenging and rewarding so we have adopted the conscious discipline approach that integrates resiliency skills School culture and um discipline by fostering emotional intelligence of adults first and children second so we are better equipped to create a positive healthy climate that allows for optimal learning states by providing that safe place and a sense of belonging people are able to develop those executive skills for problem solving so we see the school as an extension of the family and use this as the foundational model for our initiatives which are connection consistency collaboration um these initiatives uh unify um our diverse learning community at PC so interesting fact about our campus is that we have six staff members that are actually mother son and mother daughter we have 18 staff members who have students who are currently um attending SPC but all of our children on our campus are part of the SPC family the adults or the safekeepers um the beauty of our small campus is that we know our students by name um we invest time in Energy building those relationships and these strong ties provide us with that happiness security support and that sense of purpose we have lots of clubs we have our um our teachers volunteer um our assistants um volunteer and even our parents um volunteer to sponsor all of these um different extracurricular activities we have chorus robotics muggins math team chess book club ASL art manga yearbook track Battle of the books anger for life and I probably forgot some um these activities afford children an opportunity to pursue their interest and connect with um other adults and students on the campus our students have opportunities to demonstrate ownership at school for example uh last year we tasked our fifth grade um students with um presenting us with ideas ideas for the school theme for this year and one of our six uh well we got amazing submissions but um Emma was um the person chosen for the theme she did the Space theme and had a whole presentation um that she submitted um learning is Limitless in otter space um so we have our t-shirts and everything and it and just gives that sense of ownership and she was very excited when she was chosen so we also have an anger for life um leaders that um they're like the ambassadors for our school and when we have new students they take them on tours um when we have guests they will um greet our guests and bring them in and it just um empowers our students and promotes um that sense of school pride so in preparing for um the Showcase we wanted to hear um our from our stakeholders and and how they felt about our school so that we could kind of share that we value our families and counted a privilege to partner with them in their children's educational Journey these are a few and I'll just read um another it's that kind of ties everything up it says we love our small tight-knit community the opportunity to choose monor in the public school setting we absolutely love our teachers and staff that help our children day in and day out to continue to grow into their best selves we have enjoyed the after school extracurricular opportunities the family oriented events and celebrations the and the community outreach #o ERS so that connection provides that sense of um identity belonging which has impacted um our attendance which was one of our goals so we love our children but we have an important obligation um to our families and that's education so consistency helps build build momentum develop good habits and stay focused on our goals the otter team it's our otter values team was established to create consist um consistent expectations and a Common Language across the campus to bring Unity to our school uh we've been building on that work for the past two years so that it's embedded in the culture of our school we absolutely enjoy um the positive phone calls home when the students have demonstrated our otter values of being peaceful responsible and safe and um we've made over hundred calls and they're just um it's it brings joy to our day to to make those calls home um we also provide consistency academically um small group interventions have um evolved into a success block this year for our third through sixth grade students this is a time um held sacred when we have all hands on deck for 40 minutes every day um to provide Ela instruction that's tailored for each student uh so we have seen really positive um impact in our midyear data um so that that was exciting as a result of this work and we're closing learning gaps as well as providing those um enrichment opportunities for our students so children um whoops okay children strive um through like rituals and routines and traditions maintain that continuity between home and school um and give us something to look forward to each year um our flag pole ceremonies are held on the early release days and led by our patrols and it's a time where we bring all of our school together and we celebrate accomplishments and and events um we also have packed house for our spaghetti dinner um and concerts as you can see um earlier our concerts are great um and then we began our year this year with our first annual um tailgating breakfast for uh celebrating dad's bring your child to school it was a great success so that's going to be something that we're going to do annually and then we end the year with a family picnic so those are just some of the things that you know we've put in place that um we look forward to each year every child deserves to have Educators who are consistently for them and seeking to support their growth and every educator deserves to be part of a school community that supports and inspires them to be their AB absolute best which leads us into our third initiative which is collaboration so for the last two years we've collaborated with the Florida inclusion Network um to create student centered schedules in order to provide services and supports for our students with with disabilities in the least restrictive environment uh we conducted walkthroughs and provided personal feedback um to our our inclusion teachers and our general education teachers to really strengthen our our practice um through this training we became more focused on instructional P practices for collaborative teaching um our teach teachers um attend the teacher lead leaders Academy each summer and they develop plans for Meaningful and relevant uh professional learning communities during this planning session um over the summer this recently the teachers voiced the need for more intentional planning with their inclusion teachers um so with the help of our amazing resource um team we were actually able to carve out 40 extra minutes um bi-weekly for our teachers to intentionally plan um for our collaborative classrooms our um inclusion classrooms it takes a village we need um we need the community involved to help us um you know in our schools so we revitalized our parent volunteer organization um our church-based partners um they've fed our staff and and assisted in beautification projects um we've partnered with athletes from Fleming Island High School um they come every month and our kids uh look forward to having them in the classroom um or out at recess it's it's great um community building and then we offer diverse learning opportunities at SPC through our monor school choice program um monory education is backed by More Than A Century of practice in schools all over the world yet it aligns with today's emphasises emphasis on deeply engaging individualized personalized and self-paced learning um this approach supports executive functions and academic achievement while fostering the child's Natural Curiosity and um just desire to learn uh we're proud to bring that option to Clay County families and we're currently accepting applications um through February for the next school year um I just want to thank you for allowing our students to share um their their beautiful art and the music tonight um we couldn't do any of this without you and we're very appreciative of your support thank you so much Miss Larson uh at this time we will move to presentations from the audience uh that's public comment so this will be the last call for comment cards if anybody has one that you haven't turned in yet please wave it so our officers can see that you need to turn it in otherwise once we move forward to this portion of the agenda we will not accept any more comment cards all right seeing none our first Speaker tonight will be Justin Coker and as a reminder when you come to the uh Podium just state your name and record for the address unless you are a minor good evening folks my name is Justin H Coker I'm the director of bands at Keystone Heights Junior Senior High School I'm here tonight to speak about the many positives of having a fine arts curriculum specialist um so I'm I'm more of a bullet points kind of guy so I'll just get straight to the point uh my personal experience is that uh just there's been a lot of positives like I haven't been able to expect a consistent trip or visit every week and that's exactly what Mr Google's actually provided to me so it's offered a lot of helpful feedback for me and a lot of potential for a growth for my program at Keystone Heights Junior Senior High so uh I feel more confident in where to direct any questions for the Fine Arts as well and there are once again being redundant from earlier there are weekly spotlights for the different programs in Clay County which helps me feel makes it more of a shared experience with other Fine Arts teachers in the county rather than just isolated experiences at our own school so it helps provide that sense of community having a fine arts curriculum specialist it is great to be able to ask someone with the experience in my subject area to come observe my classes and offer constructive feedback and Guidance with a process on how to achieve the goals and I recognize a stronger advocation for all things Fine Arts now that there is a position that is able to dedicate the time required for that and hearing earlier there's a $1.2 million Grant award that is amazing as well as the many other things Mr ghog has has done to help advocate for the provocation of the f two funds for the Fine Arts teachers so and then uh just to end uh I also saw him at the FMEA convention and that told me that he is still continuing his lifelong journey to receive more education on how to be a better anything so his journey has not ended yet and that's that's what I love seeing most is just not only a fine arts Specialist or or a teacher or anyone just um just teaching but someone who's actually willing to for their own education so I see this as a huge positive to our County and there are so many things he's done just in this year and I am truly excited to see what is coming forth in the futur thank you for your time next is Tina [Applause] Larson hello good evening I'm Tina Larsson I'm from Green Co Springs Junior High I'm the one of the few music teachers that I teach band and choir at a secondary level and as this is my 11th year at Green Co Junior highend teaching period it has been a completely different year on many levels one of them because of this position that has been offered to us has been a oneperson point of contact we don't get a handbook on how to do our job as a teacher period but especially as a music educator and one that does multiple facets of it um every day we have something that's changing whether it be a procedure something a paperwork change something with our bookkeeper something with Transportation there's there's nothing one thing that helps us with that so having a person to do that for us has been just so beneficial we don't have a lot of extra time um I'm a new mom um I just had a baby the day the day before school started so Mr Google made sure that if I needed something he was there to handle it he was somebody that my admin can contact he was the person that helped find my long-term substitutes and he filled those things the needs that I couldn't be there to do um other than like being in front of my kids teaching them he did whatever he could to make sure there was somebody there for us um talking about how busy we are you guys already know um all teachers are really busy but there are things that paperwork wise like these Esser funds other people in different parts of the state have been able to get all of that but for us to sit down and do the lengthy process of all this applications and writing papers and advocating for our district or our school it's none of us really had any of that because we didn't have time for it so him being able to stop and advocate for us at the state level and get those funds for us it is it's been a really big asset for us um instruments I have one of the older schools in the county Green Cove Junior High that was Clay High at one point literally have instruments that they don't even make parts for anymore because they're falling apart and stuff so to have funds to buy new instruments and to fix repair ones that are able to be fixed because it's like a car that breaks like so some cars there's no parts for anymore same thing with our instruments um I just have a huge thank you for being able to fulfill that spot for us and giving us all that support that's it next is Sandra Wiggins good evening my name is Sandra Wiggins I'm the art teacher at Lakeside Junior High um two weeks ago one of our fellow art teachers rang the bell and is recovering from cancer these are her words and she speaks for many if not all of the art teachers she um she wrote I have been super grateful to have the Fine Arts coordinator position added to the district this school year Chris Google has hit the ground running since ear early summer and is doing a wonderful job of ensuring that each Arts area within our district um are both heard and helped Chris is a go-getter and strives to have the Arts be visible respected and seeks to have collaboration and camaraderie within our County a little glimmer into what he has done so far he has held summer meet and greets for all Arts people to introduce himself and get to know our Fine Arts teachers he has met with us over the summer to go over a newly adopted art of Education Program um to ensure that we have access to information needed um for her leave on FMLA is held successful in service for the very first time where all the Fine Arts teachers were together in the same room he has helped um have art of Education Program reintroduced into our County as a platform that enhances the art Educators to expand professional development opportunities as well as a resource for lesson planning always checks in to see how things are going and what he can do to help this goes a long way to help isolated teachers at their schools feel appreciated seen and heard sends out weekly Fine Art emails to ensure everyone has access to all the Fine Arts information as well as introduce the teachers at each School so we know who they are we often feel secluded in the Fine Arts and do not get together very often he attends events and he wants to be there he has put out opportunities for Fine Arts to engage in social media events and photos to ensure we all feel highlighted but also connected he attends State conferences to ensure that he is most up to- dat with information created a holid gathering for the Fine Arts teachers to engage with one another in a fun environment seeks out opport unities to have donations and help teachers um in various forms has helped several new Arts teachers come into their classrooms and be successful actively plans the Clay County student art show the allc count band and chorus events and seeks input on these events attends and advertises and this is only half of the school year we can't wait for the opportunities advancements and plans he has in store for all of us in the Fine Arts we are typically overbooked booked in our events classes and sometimes feel out of breath and Chris has come in to fill that Gap and be of utmost support and help in our overwhelming worlds we have only heard positive feedback from all other art teachers thank you next is Katherine Wright good evening everyone my name is Katherine Wright I'm the music teacher at Wilkinson Elementary for the past 27 years I've been teaching Elementary music and have been extremely fortunate to teach in a multiple States across our country due to my husband's military service unfortunately in every District a fine artch coordinator or curriculum specialist was not a designated position when I joined Klay County 8 years ago I could see that our County was different in the essense that the appreciation of the Fine Arts was highly Reg regarded within the community last year you supported the establishment of a fine arts curriculum specialist position and is made a positive impact on the fine arts department to say that I am grateful for this addition is an understatement Mr Google has done an outstanding job in his new role he's always accessible engaged driven and most importantly an advocate for the Fine Arts the weekly newsletters he shares are a valuable resource that are informative and Link all areas of the Fine Arts together the extra support that he has provided such as classroom visits professional development opportunities the allocation of grant money has far exceeded our expectations this position has created a connection between the Arts and a multitude of departments within the school district as we look into the future I challenge you to consider the Fine Arts as a fifth core subject specifically in music no other subject can take a song and teach figurative language through lyric analysis Ela integrate addition subtraction multiplication and division within arhythmic notation and a song math make connections with sound production and vibration using instruments and hearing what is played in the accompaniment science and make a historical and geographical connections between composers where they are from and the facts about the time period social studies all within a 30 minute lesson which is just one example in closing I leave you with this question how will you continue to grow the fine arts department I guarantee that we are worth your investment which is evident by so many Fine Arts Fine Arts people here tonight and the all count performances these past few weeks and the students that were with here with us tonight just to name a few I thank you for your continued support of the fine arts department and all of the programs and for believing that together the possibilities are endless thank you next is Chad Robbins good evening uh I'm Chad Robbins I'm the director of bands at Oakleaf High School the Oakleaf High School band has quickly become one of the top programs in the State of Florida after a complete rebuild and Rebrand that took place in the fall of 2018 where the program lost both both directors all additional staff the entire Color Guard a third of the total membership and were and what was one of the roughest transitions a band could go through thank you Mr Google and I were hired by Mrs picket which we are grateful for to take on this Challenge and since then we've been able to grow our our membership back reestablish an award-winning Color Guard a robust instructional staff represent our program school and community and finalist performances both in state championships and bands of America events as well as well as earn Superior ratings in the area of concert Jazz and marching band over the years though the most turbulent time is behind us we continue to face challenges in securing essential resources for our bam program fundraising remains a crucial aspect of efforts aiming to provide quality Furniture such as band chairs music stands music folio cabinets the financial burden of acquiring sheet music which cost thousands annually poses a significant hurdle additionally we need funds to cover travel expenses requir for required assessments and purchase new instruments which create additional expenses for our students and our program our collaborative efforts with neighboring schools inspired by successful models like Fleming Island have allowed us to share valuable insights fostering growth among band programs in Klay County thanks to our new Fine Art specialist Mr Google similar to our peers Oakleaf High School faces challenges with space from band rooms designed for junior highs inadequate stage cafetorium which necessitates performing on the floor and hindering our ability to showcase our students to their full potential looking ahead our long-term goals include advocating for oncampus auditoriums ensuring a steady flow of resources for instrument repair and purchase expanding storage options and seeking support for additional supplemental staff for summer fall and spring these initiatives will not only enhance our student students musical education but also contribute to the overall growth of the success for Oakleaf High School and all other band programs I'm grateful for the support received thus far and look forward to continued collaboration and growth in Personnel Resources facilities for Oakleaf and all other band programs thank you for enriching and transforming our students experiences good evening next is Kristen [Applause] Richard good evening my name is Kristen reard I am the music director at Wilkinson Junior High go Eagles so I just want to start out by saying I feel so lucky to be a part of this great community of music and art Educators here in Clay County County I work most closely with the music directors around here and let me tell you we have a wealth of smart and talented directors here and that's not the case everywhere um and so we we're really lucky in this County to have such smart and talented directors um I just wanted to start out by saying that I also feel lucky that I have a very supportive administration at Wilkinson and recently in this County we have added the Fine Arts facilitator at the district level Mr Google Mr Google has really made a difference for me in the classroom I transitioned to Wilkinson Junior High this year um really like in the middle of the first quarter it was a really tough transition and he was there every step of the way to help me kind of navigate that transition navigate fit into that Community um I'm I'm trying to revive kind of a struggling music program there and he's helping me to um address the administration advocate for my program even though the administration is very supportive sometimes they don't really understand every all of the needs of the program and he's always there to help me know how to advocate for my program with the Administration there he's been in my classroom every week um just with observations giving feedback helping with pullout lessons sectionals um just anything that's needed he's always there that's been a a real help to me he's been there to help me connect with the community um in middleberg connect with the high school directors as well as the elementary directors to try and make it a continuous program add some continuity to that program there in middleberg he's been a a good help with that and just the funding I know you've heard every single director here say the funding the funding the funding but this is the first time in my 12 years in this County it's my first year at Wilkinson but my 12th in this County that I have received any District funding purchased brand new instruments and um gotten repairs paid for by the district and things that were needed it it has been a necessity probably not that you guys didn't want to provide that money to us but you didn't know that we needed it and we didn't know how to advocate for it and Mr Google has really helped us in that aspect and I'm just really grateful for his position next is Brett [Applause] PTZ good evening superintendent brosi and Schoolboard and everybody that's still here you are brave souls this is important work uh my name is Brett pitz I'm the band director at Orange Park High School and also the Florida band Masters Association district chairman for northeast Florida the counties of Clay St John's and Flagler uh I'm here today to just reiterate what everybody has already said uh but I I think it is still important I'm first appreciative of my colleagues and the school board's decision to allocate this position to Mr Google and entrust the Fine Art specialist to him Chris has provided amazing support to our band programs in my nine years uh since coming over from leyon high school in Tallahassee my nine years here uh this is the most support that I have seen financially um Hands-On in the schools and I'm very appreciative he is visible he is present in the schools he'll just drop by to say hi and smile at the kids and tell them great job keep working uh he's an advocate at professional development uh conferences such as Florida music educators conference in Tampa he's approachable he's always responsive and quick to take action he's resourceful as you've heard he has secured Esser funding which is very difficult for music educators that might be working 14 15 16 hour days to keep their programs alive and a marching band on the field and you know and not to mention all the funding for student experiences such as all count band which we're very appreciative that several of you were there at that concert it meant a lot uh and most importantly he is kind you can only work with people that are kind and approachable and and receptive and he is that he is positive and up uplifting the support that you and Chris Google have provided to our band students they help to build life skills have an outlet for their talents to continue to develop their leadership skills not to mention also providing a safe nurturing environment for them to thrive and grow musically intellectually and socially having somebody like Chris Google at the county level Pro provides the necessary support for art students to continue to be shining ambassadors for their school and their Community these students are some of the very best as you know because of his amazing support they will be even more equipped to be productive members of society so thank you again to you the school board to superintendent brosi and to Chris for entrusting uh this responsibility and for your continued support of the music education in Klay County Schools next is Paula [Applause] Summers good evening I'm Paula Summers I'm the music teacher at Oakley Village Elementary School um in my 22 years in Clay County Schools I have seen the support for the Fine Arts only grow uh my very first year in the county I was very nearly cut with a budget cut as a first year music teacher and unfortunately that was not the last time that it was in danger um I've been here before speaking to the board and it hasn't been from a position of saying thank you for your support but rather it's been begging for support from music program to see the value and I'm so glad that that has not been the case now for several years we have felt very secure and knowing that I don't have to hold my breath when the allocations come out that we are supported there is music in every school that's truly a wonderful feeling and our Elementary music teachers absolutely appreciate that it is um wonderful to know that that regardless of the size of the school that we feel that every child should have a highly qualified music and art teacher teaching them and that's a great feeling so that's wonderful news and this position the creation of this position is another step up that ladder it's not the last step um we are a big and growing County and ultimately this is a big job that may eventually require more than one person doing it because we have a lot of needs for the music and the art and there're two different fields in a way um we also continue as Mr Robbins mentioned to advocate for appropriate Performing Arts facilities any secondary school that is undergoing construction should include a Performing Arts facility because that puts us on par with other districts similar to us in size and support of the Arts and it shows our students and families that we value a place for them to perform um with regards to Chris in this position there's two words that I kind of think of as for how what the job that he's been doing and the two words are communication and advocacy um he is very great at communication has been mentioned by several people but he's very responsive to email very eager to help connect things as someone who has served for as the logistics coordinator for All County course for several years it's often been hard for me to know who I should should connect to in the county to get certain things done and he has been able to do that much better from Green Cove than I can do from my classroom in Oakleaf and that has been such a relief and has been a big timesaver for us um we have started this year an elementary music instrument lending library for Stu for schools that don't have as many instruments available to them we have some instruments that we loan out and they travel around and he helped secure us a home base for those so that they are secure and stored appropriately climate controlled when they're not out at a school that has been huge hugely successful with Elementary music I did ask um some other music teachers their thoughts and this is one quote I got Chris is worked hard to keep us informed of information and opportunities pertaining to the Arts he's very supportive and truly wants to see our programs flourish and succeed I agree with that and I will add that I'm sure all of us want to see our program succeed but Chris knows what it takes to see music programs succeed and that's an important difference um it takes not only teaching ability subject matter but also advocacy you have to be able to advocate and we are thankful to have an advocate in the county office we appreciate your continued support of the Arts thank you next is Lindsay [Applause] McDade good evening everyone um just wanted to introduce myself um I'm Lindsay McDade I am the director at Ridgeview High School their theater program alongside my co-director um Khloe Wilson who is also with me at riew high school um I just want to thank the school board um for allowing this position for the Fine Art specialist it has definitely impacted theater um greatly I know chorus and band um just from the start of the school year going to the Fine Arts um Workshop that we had all together I couldn't believe the amount of band and chorus and even theater we know we know where we are and we know who we are but we as a group of teachers in theater haven't had the opportunity to get together I don't think as much as chorus and band and really come together and work together um we haven't had that environment and Mr Google has made this happen for Fine Arts um it's the first for him I think we were kind of fumbling around trying to figure out how to do it and we slowly are but it's really wonderful to have the opportunity to work with the theer teachers in Clay County um he's been super supportive he's come to our classrooms it's been a wonderful experience for the first time this year we had an all count for theater um which was amazing um our students can see that and that is important to them our students are important um that they're recognized for Theater which hasn't happened um they're recognized through our district and through our state festivals um Mr Google was present at our our district Festival that was an amazing experience to to walk in and see him there and him look at all these wonderful kids in the Arts um that are within theater because it's not just the acting obviously there's Tech there's the Productions there's all the elements within theater and as one of the teachers mentioned you through theater you learned so much besides just performance there's so many elements there's the technical elements there's working together as a team to put on a production with which is outside of school and these kids a lot of times were missing things and having the funds to be able to replace things is a wonderful opportunity I've been doing this for 18 years and I don't think I've ever felt as connected with the theater teachers in the county as I have this year um through Mr Google and Miss McMillan and their hard work and trying to get us all connected it's been a wonderful experience we've always had supports from the school um and I've had wonderful principles who have supported supported us but that extra support and especially with lighting that has happening sound that we have problems with um we never really had that voice to help us fumble through it and have the money so it's been a wonderful experience and he's been truly amazing and we're very very grateful and thank you to everyone that attended Mr brosi um and those that attended the first it was smaller we're hoping to get it bigger but the first theater um All County it was amazing so we appreciate it and Miss Bola thank you for always coming to our Productions we really yeah gree is coming so thank you so much and thank you so much for everything next is Katie [Applause] pulk good evening my name is Katie pulk and I am the coral and musical theater director at middleberg high school I have been the coral director for 5 years and as the secondary County Chorus coordinator for the past 3 years as I reflect on my years of teaching I have never been more thrilled to have a fine arts curriculum specialist to support direct and guide the Fine Arts programs in Klay County we have some uh someone to push and Champion our programs to their full potential and come alongside us to help our programs flourish The Specialist position has provided a new level of support to our classrooms by having a direct contact within the district office this clear line of communication has fostered many improvements in the lives of teachers and their students we now receive a weekly newsletters which we mentioned before with scholarship opportunities resource materials event information and a spotlight section of fellow Fine Arts teachers through this newsletter and the accessible nature of our Fine Arts curriculum specialist we can communicate the needs and desires of our programs and our students our programs have a strong advocate in our curriculum specialist we have also seen an increase in support from our school board and superintendent through attend at our all count events I cannot tell you how wonderful it is to have you in attendance and support our programs thank you this is largely in part due to our specialist creating a unified Fine Arts calendar and communicating with District officials on our behalf since my first meeting with our new specialist over the summer I have heard the vision of this position and the vision of our Fine Arts programs in Clay County the vision has come to life through our specialist attendance at the Florida music Education Association conference in Tampa where courses on music administ and how to bridge gaps were provided I've also seen this Vision come to life through grant writing process for All County cor chorus clinicians and accompanists to lessen the fees for students and families we have received various classroom material such as microphones for recording and stage makeup for theatrical performances as well as assistance in clarifying and editing governing documents for our programs our specialist has created a benchmark standards Master reference guide designed our first ever Fine Arts professional development in service day and formed a tile in the portal for our reference materials the Fine Arts curriculum specialist position has and can provide more than I've just listed we would love to see the position grow and continue through curriculum and funding support additional allocations for district level support for area specific Fine Arts destinations for example having a coral curriculum specialist the development of an all count program more so for musical theater and support in acquiring an audit orium for Clay County students our students families schools and all stakeholders are deserving of thriving Fine Arts programs together with our Fine Arts curriculum Specialists we can move towards a more engaging inspiring educational and entertaining future thank you next is Alex [Applause] buck good evening Mr braski and hang on don't start my time yet who is it okay all right I'm prepared to go all right um good evening school board and superintendent braski my name is Alex buck and I'm here representing me and Miss Rose in the back um to talk about more of the same um so first I want to tell you about FL the Fleming Island band overall our Band program encompasses AP music theory keyboard beginning band symphonic band Wind Ensemble marching band two jazz bands winter guards and indoor percussion this is a lot for two people to manage and having extra help especially navigating everchanging laws and policies has been incredible this year the Fleming Island band is consistently among the top three marching bands in the state and last year was one of three public high schools to receive the highest rating possible with two concert bands at the state level I'm excited to express the remarkable positive changes that have transpired within the Fleming Island High School band particularly this year since Mr Google has been put in place the support for band in the broader spectrum of Fine Arts has become extremely evident this year from the district level this year with newly released grants there has been a substantial Financial boost enabling us to procure new and essential equipment while this is a milestone as in my six years at Fleming Island such financial support from Grants has not existed I think we have a long way to go Fleming Island has always been lucky to have the support of Mr Pitman to help when instrument costs are higher than our fundraising efforts but we are still using instruments that are 20 years old imagine using a textbook that is 20 years old it would never happen it's something that would be replaced likely within 5 years our students along with their counterparts throughout the county now benefit from some updated functional equipment what was once distant requiring years of fundraising efforts has become a reality the band has been granted access to resources that would have otherwise taken considerable time and effort to attain thanks to Mr Google and his team effort team's efforts I have to read faster additionally Mr Google was of great assistance with the All County honor band for which I am the coordinator he was able to be someone that helped secure funding location and music along with being a help uh to planning preparing and executing the event moving forward I'm excited to see what to to come for Fine Arts most importantly I would love to see a Performing Arts Center that would allow our students to have a venue in which to perform and express their talents especially with the success that Klay County Schools brings with concert and other performing ensembles at each of our high schools we are faced with challenges while performing in cafetorium acoustically and with available space for ensembles and Spectators I speak for all performing arts teachers in saying that one large Auditorium shared by the Performing Arts would be incredible I would be glad to load up anything and travel to give my students an opportunity to perform in a great hall although right out here there's a great empty lot that we could put a great Auditorium it would be great for me um so I appreciate your time and look forward to seeing the continued growth in Personnel Resources in facilities me and my counterparts are so Overjoyed by the support increase this year and are excited to see what next year brings if there's anything that me or any of us could help with we are more than happy to sit down and talk please just reach out to us thank you I think it's safe to say that the Mr Google fan club showed up tonight it's Mr Google's Opus it is it is there we go it is were they afraid Hall were they afraid we were going to get rid of his position or something no way um all right our next speaker is Bruce fredman good evening everybody that was a lot of fun uh one of your early speakers asked a trivia question I'm stickler for details there was question was regarding how many ways there are to arrange seven books the answer is seven factorial that's 5,40 not 720 moving right along another one of your speakers used the word safekeeper which is how I'd like to think of each of you when we send our children to you as you know over the last year and a half I've been revealing porography found in the school libraries nobody's doubting there's pornography in the school libraries anymore last month submitted 34 challenges eight of them were determined by your committees to be inappropriate for all schools they were pulled they're porn six of them were determined to be established set in the wrong School environment maybe move from elementary treated Junior High and so forth I've appealed the rest of them I've already submitted that to Chief Wagner this month I've submitted an additional 33 challenges some of them are impressively horrible I thought I had a thick skin I lived in New York a half a century I've been reading this garbage for a year and a half a friend called me early this morning said look what I just found he said nah there's probably no way that's in our County I was wrong it's in one of our Junior highs it's in two of our high schools it's included in the package I they did without sleep so I could make it happen I hope that your future policy revisions don't limit my ability to fix the problem his expression which is uh you can't fix crazy all you can do is documented it's documented fix it have a great night next is Tara Richardson yes my name is Tara Richardson and I uh have an address on file I won't be reading from this tonight but it's a beloved just a little audio visual ad and I'm really embarrassed to say that that one of the first years I was an administrator I actually lost a tuba and had to write it down on the lost inventory property terrible I'm still looking for that tuba um when Librarians and classroom instructors this last summer looked at each other and said we're not in Kansas anymore Toto uh they were CH cataloging all of their books uh in their schools Kansas by the way ranks third in the nation in band books with the latest figures that I could find 7,669 Texas was second with 10,000 285 and Florida is number one with 22325 on an interesting side note the only place that bans more books are prisons uh so for those of us who don't think discussing ban books is a big deal I'm offering these statistics the reason we challenge students with so many spicy books is uh because we want them to develop some skills on their own you know they pick up the book my 10-year-old granddaughter daughter told me this uh that she picks up a book she looks at the jacket looks at the author looks at the themes what's the write up on the on the jacket and if she isn't interested she puts the book down that's what it's called thinking for yourself of course parents should be involved in what their child is reading and that would happen in a perfect world but thinking for yourself that's a life skill Ray Brad said we need to be teased questioned and disrupted our minds need to be stirred up that's Ray Bradbery from Fahrenheit 451 Banning books is just another form of bullying it's all about the fear and the Assumption of power the key is to address the fear and deny the power that's a quote from James how he's written 79 Juvenile and young adult books and the final thing that I want to say tonight as you're a retired person it's very easy to spend a lot of time looking at quotes on the internet regarding Banning books the thought that leads me to contemplate with Dread the Eraser of other voices of Unwritten novels poems whispered or swallowed for fear of being overheard by the wrong people outlawed languages flourishing underground essay questions challenging authority never being posed unstage played cancelled films that thought is a nightmare as though the whole universe is being described with invisible ink That's Tony Morrison she's a Nobel prizewinning author of beloved and many other books but she was a challenged author here in Clay County thank you for this evening next is Adam morren Mr Warren I see the note on your card so I'm just going to let you know uh one of our rules is we don't name employees if we have a concern you can use their title but not their personal name thank you good evening my name is Adam Warren I know my address and everything's on file from the argal area um he has some pictures that um are going to go along with a lot of what I'm talking about here I wish I had more than 3 minutes to talk but um here goes um most of the pictures that you're going to be seeing here in a few minutes are from the last four four or five days at Aral uh cleanliness and hygiene at this school are well below Health Department standards um I've repeatedly brought up these issues with both members of this board and one-on-one members meetings with the argal administration repeatedly I was told sorry we have a new head custodian and we are working through those issues one would think if the custodians aren't able to do the task that lead leadership would fill in to ensure our kids are able to do simple things like get a drink of water wash their hands with soap and paper towels no this is just forgotten like so many other things at this school teachers are being told to instruct their kids to bring in water bottles from the home and teachers are even going on their own and bringing in their own toilet paper this isn't a solution the time is up and the things that I've just discussed are atrocious and I expect them to be resolved immediately you have had seven months I've been bringing this up since August moving on I attended All County School course concert last Friday night and someone from this board spoke and he said and I'm paraphrasing there is more to school than just math science and social studies I couldn't agree more that is why I'm also bringing up a lot of issues with the principal at this school she has canceled our mascot we're officially the Pioneers but we're never allowed to talk about it anymore and has even went as far as painting of over all the paintings of pioneers in the school we technically have no identity teacher helpers and safety patrol kids work hard all year to assist the school in various jobs that said for years they have gone on Bush Gardens or SeaWorld as a reward for their extra work and efforts for the year keep in mind this is a reward these kids maintain good grades attendance and good behavior to be able to stay in this program and go on this trip the principal told us last year that this type of trip would no longer be approved after last year she has went as far as this year removing all fundraising Associated for these trips that allow the students to go at no cost this is ridiculous remember there's more to school than just math science and social studies field trips she has absolutely will not approved these in a timely manner for us to go get buses scheduled with the county some of my memories from my school days were fi trips I will let you dive into how long it's been since most of our kids at this school have been on a field trip time's running out sorry she won't even prove us getting free picnic tables to be donated so far this year we've lost 15 to 20 teachers if this principal is still at our school at the end of the year we're going to lose 20 more there's a big neighborhood moving in that's going to have another 150 school kids coming in next year there's no plan at all we will lose another 50 teachers all for one reason did you know that we were without a certified nurse for weeks at the school and that was not even communicated to any of this to the parents today the fourth grade had 35 Plus students in each portable because no leadership or a sub was ever given or brought in how about the ESC kids that don't have the appropriate Staffing or support we still don't have a librarian obviously we have no leadership here cleaniness is awful Staffing and student morale is way down and we don't have a plan for upcoming influx of students coming our way most are afraid to speak up to this principal I am not I just want things to be better and it's not fair to these kids please help me save Argy and please remember Argy used to be so much like swimming Peak swimming pin Creek Elementary that was so highly talked about earlier thank you for your time next is Constance higen bam Miss Skipper I know we don't normally make comments but I just want to thank you for coming up and being courageous cuz a lot of times we don't hear about these sides of the story their day-to-day operations so thank you very much much I appreciate that Miss hien bam good evening my name is constant hi both my address is on file I'm the president of the Clay County Education retired I'm here almost every month and I continue to hear what's wrong with Clay County Schools tonight has been a remarkable recognition event thank you for highlighting all the students and teachers at this tonight and at previous Schoolboard meetings I'd like to spend my three minutes telling you some of the good things that we're doing in Klay County Schools Klay County Education retired his membership is comprised of Educators administrators and support professionals all of us have retired from the school system we are always looking for a new adventure our dedication to the students in Clay County schools has not dism diminished since we retired we currently tutor students at Lakeside Elementary tin Elementary and Thunderbolt Elementary we are tweaking the process at Ridge Elementary and should begin this month in addition we tutor students from Ami and three days a week are members working with the city of Green Cove Springs tutor at the Augusta Savage mentoring Center in Green Cove members of the Clay County Education retired serve on several committees for the school board and attend many workshops as many workshops as possible we assist in the scoring of grants for the clay Education Foundation last year we as an organization gave out two grants for innovative ideas in the classroom one at Thunderbolt and one at Orange Park High in January this year we had communication with the Education Foundation and this fall they will be matching our grants thank you our members are assisting Klay County schools with scoring at the Clay County science fair and conducting esol interviews for the school system this month today with the assistance of the superintendent thank you Mr brosy and your staff we have begun our black History Month poster competition for all elementary students grade K through 6 with winners being announced in March our next meeting is Tuesday February 6th at the Village Improvement Association on palmeta Street in Green Cove Springs and our speaker will be Carrie puit retired physical education extraordinaire from middleberg high school she will be speaking on women in sports and in March we will be conducting a countywide essay comp competition for all secondary students in titled women in sports and again we will announce winners and distribute prizes to Junior High and Senior High students the following month we also reach out to new teachers quarterly and we in mass will be attending the Apple Awards February the 8th we are just a small group of retired education professionals there are over 2,200 teachers and approximately 39,000 students in Klay County public schools who are doing amazing things every day and we don't hear about them I encourage parents and members of the community to extend Schoolboard meetings and talk about those things the public news to needs to hear more of the positive things that are happening in Clay County Schools thank you next is Claire sheffler Claire I think I saw you up here earlier as a student so please don't share your address okay okay um hi my name is Claire Sheffer uh my address is on file um I'm a high school senior and I have never spoken at a school board meeting um uh but I never thought I would need to um my then my high school librarian stopped being able to purchase any new books for our book club um and I want to know now wind did books become the enemy how wind did ink on paper become the greatest threat to the minds of children I don't mean to suggest that books don't have power they do they're incredible vehicles through which to see the world they let you see with someone else's eyes and to understand other people so as to better understand yourself so why uh so why this is why it worries me uh when I see that the people who strip our library shelves haven't read the books which they claim such staunch moral objection they take a single line out of context and present it as though it reflects all that a book could mean to a person as if all literature was nothing more than pornography or senseless violence and it only this is only in mentioning the more explicit cases never mind the hundreds of other uh books that whose only objectionable content is in their mere recognition of other ways of existing in the world we also can't forget that the list of uh band books is only the surface of the damage in the midst of all this controversy what are Librarians to do do they risk buying books that deal with race violence sexual orientation or mental health or do they play it safe and avoid these important subjects entirely so members of the school board I implore you to protect books and to protect Librarians to establish a system for reviewing challenges that is conscientious of the community's concerns but also respects the value of a book stop this constant hunt for anything at all controversial that keeps hundreds of books away from the hands of kids like me and please put books back on the shelves and make the world that much bigger thank you next is Tanya [Applause] Kon good evening Tanya cassen my address is on file I'm the chapter chair of mom celebrity Clay County um I wanted to start by Miss Hansen and Miss skipper for holding the community Forum to give parents a voice um in the new policy and how it's being drafted it's so refreshing to see people that serve our community actually seek out our input that's just so refreshing so I thank you for that and I hope you guys continue to do that with other topics um it does take some courage um to to maybe tackle some of these things that we don't all agree on and I I really admire you for that and I hope you continue to do it um I also would like to say that um I deeply appreciate your commit to keep our library shells free of pornography there are laws that govern this to protect children and I appreciate your commitment to making sure that the law is followed in this case um I I do want to add that removing something that has pornography in it is not Banning a book at all it is following the law that protects children the same as you would from a Hustler magazine so can we stop using that for porn um we do have to consider though in this form was targeted at considering books that don't violate the law but might have some very mature content um we're talking things like suicide explicit drug use self harm parents might have a problem with that or it might be very very mature for some students um I've heard the argument that we'll just put it in high school and it'll be fine but we know that high school students can be 13 to adult all right and a freshman is not the same as a a senior in high school so we have to be considera of that um I do want to uh believe that we need to really be committed to an opt-in form with inform informed parental consent informed parental consent means that a parent would receive some type of notification that they signed off on that tells them exactly what it is that they're consenting to so yes you check this box say my child can read something that has explicit drug use and it has self harm and people chopped up like in dmer it is within a parent's right to do that but they need to understand what it is that they're consenting to the form that we sent out this year did not explain what people were consenting to so I implore you to please make sure that parents are given informed consent um I do want to also add that um another thing is parents didn't know this stuff was here I taught in Klay County for a long time I'm a mom I was absolutely astonished and very sad to find out about some of the books like push and gender queer that was on our shelves nobody's blaming anybody nobody's pointing in their fingers but if we didn't know that then most parents probably maybe don't know what other options are in there so we have to be very clear in what we're giving parents to consent to so I'm going to ask you guys to do that um I've heard a lot about the opt let's do a opt in where everybody opts in and then the parents don't want it can opt out in my opinion that's nothing more than a PR Ploy for an appearance of consent and it isn't in true informed consent so while I expect respect every single parent right to make any decision they want for their child and I will fight beside parents to do that I want to make sure that when a parent consents they fully understand what they're consenting to thank you for your time have a good night next is Adriana jarquin good evening team um I haven't met Mr Google I hope that he is a contender for a future board he seems like he's advocating a lot um for our schools I wish our board did a little more of that seems like they're advocating for privatizing of schools instead of advocating for our public education uh I would like to have the school board consider unfreezing Library funds for elementary I'm sure it's going to be a lot easier to confirm that porn isn't an elementary book I'm sure those books are easier to read front to back to confirm we all know that literacy skills are improved the earlier by the time they're in middle school high school which by the way thanks to the book bands I think those books have now been more popular so more children are actually reading so I'm thankful for that that's the silver lining of this whole um ordeal but yeah it's more uh more than anything if we could open up those funds for elementary schools there's a lot of new books that deal with a lot of issues that our kids are dealing with and they're not available because our libraries are very outdated I also want to ask uh for the prevention of the double dipping we are aware that private schools and Charter School parents are taxpayers they are getting their money back in those uh voucher scams that you guys have advocated for so they have more than enough funds already taken away already from our public education so I would um with the police ordeal that really brought that up to light that $3 million had been reallocated so that they can now have uh security which they're private schools charger Schools they're already getting funds with the vouchers if they have problems with budgeting maybe you guys could help them with that and I guess that's it um I think I got it all oh and if you could review the new bill the HB 7025 that Florida's trying to pass uh charging people who do not have children in the school board and are it submitting a lot of submissions after five material submissions a year they're up advocating for charging them $100 per new submission and maybe that will allow the school board to actually work with the true problems that our kids are facing I have yet to hear of a child hurt by a book thank you all right at this time we will move to the discussion agenda uh the first item is uh Human Resources special action a I'll give everybody a second to get back on their computers they might have gone to sleep all right do we have a motion I move approval and do we have a second a second I have a motion from Miss Bola and a second from Miss Hansen is there any discussion all in favor please signify by saying I I I any oppos osed motion carries 5 all right next on our discussion agenda is a bid renewal do we have a presentation on that Mr brosy or okay do I have a motion I'll move approval and a second I'll second a mo from Miss baa excuse me Madam chair did you want to recuse yourself on this that's right thank you yes I do um so I will be recusing myself from this vote um it involves a family member so I can still call for the vote though correct okay uh so all those in favor please signify by saying I I any opposed say no motion carries 4- Z all right moving on to our consent agenda do we have a motion sorry did you get the vote for that we haven't gotten the vote for the bid R yet M got it okay all right everybody ready okay do I have a motion on the consent agenda I'll move in a second I'll second okay I have a motion from Miss Hansen and a second from Miss Clark any discussion all in favor please signify by saying I I any opposed motion carries 5 Z all right our CCE up CCE a update you're not miss Kidwell no I'm here for Miss Kidwell today my name is Heather Castell and I am one of our CE ccea District directors and I'm the chair of our mini Grant so I am here today to award 10 $200 mini grants to teachers here in Clay County um so here they are a few of them already had to leave I know this meeting went a little bit longer than normal so I appreciate everyone who did stay um but our first one is going to Kimberly dupi uh her Grant is for PBIS classroom incentives come on up Sarah Pritchard she she and her third grade team um are going to be getting class sets of the best books and they're best books so they're allowed Blair Leo she had to leave but she is going to be starting and building up a sensory room room for her students with sensory needs I've got Christina Smith she's going to be getting microscopes for her class we have Terry Collins who will be getting a flexible seating for her classes Justin Daniels who is a government teacher and um will be getting materials to help with their voter registrations there did I explain is that right that'll work okay Barbara McKenzie she's going to be getting a grant to help fund lunches to be able to support the students who are improving in their learning and help as an in incentive I have Karen Whitten she is going to be doing a science mural okay William weeks is going to be providing his students with drama production and supplies material and Melissa Patterson will be doing Al pellet activities with her classes so all of these people have put together amazing amazing projects to help our students here in Clay County and we are really excited to be able to give out $2,000 in [Applause] Grant thank you so much for supporting our teachers thank you for letting us present today after the meeting catch us after the meeting she does want you to know that the answer given by our staff was correct and she can prove it gotcha thank you thank you so much next is our sespa update do we have a representative from sespa here tonight okay uh superintendent update Mr braski all right awesome just a couple quick things I just wanted to say thank you to all the Fine Arts teachers that were here that they clearly travel in packs and um they're certainly very very dedicated I you know I think you know when I whenever I listen to a bunch of people come at one time makes me think like what's going on and and I looked at that and I thought okay what's going on here and I think that uh they're they just felt starved for some direction and finally have it and they're so joyous about it you know they're so passionate about it it was fantastic to see that and as I was thinking about that I thought okay what I learned from that is the importance of providing support to people uh and that support that you saw was through Chris Google who might be the most popular person at the meeting today for sure right but then I started to think about other groups of people right so you see the same sort of setup when you when you think about District Athletics and Jay stillo right you can't just have programs without people working the program in the case of Miss Mr Google not sure how much that guy's getting paid but he brought in 1.2 Millions that's that's a real good return on investment in my book right so so sometimes you have to put those people into those positions in order to get those um those returns I I couldn't help but I also thought of ginda Po in the presentation the math and the academic piece and how you have to support the work you just can't do the work or throw the work out to people and pray that it all works out people have to manage those things that's what I took away from that and by the way I'll just go on the record I'm in support of a Performing Art Center in Clay County I think it's overdue I I you know Miss Skipper and I had this conversation a week ago or whenever that was I advocated for Fleming Island sorry guys so so at at a location to be determined later how about we just say that I I think that the the board's commitment is so commendable in the area of fine fine arts because what you heard from one of the teachers and I forget which one said it that in many districts it's like the first thing to go right and so instead of going we we've invested in it every student should have a connection to their school that goes beyond English math science and social studies as Mr Warren pointed out and that connection could be through Athletics it could be through ART it could be through drama it could be through you have to offer all of those things because all children are different right so everybody needs an opportunity so how about about this right you know I know sometimes people uh you know say we put too much value on Athletics and Athletics is is important I'm not denying that but take a look at tonight was a total celebration of the Fine Arts right and so I'm very proud of of everyone and in that regard so tonight got a couple of qu I'm going to go quick because I think everybody's heard enough presentations uh today so I'll move quickly so you don't glaze over schools of the month Lakeside Junior High middleb Elementary two grade schools the theme was awesome academics Community First great partners by the way it takes a whole Villages correct it takes Our Community Partners too this month is we love our campus I don't know who will get the the giant pencil award but we wrote for your favorite school by going to the website as you see there super students of the month let me just tell you this this may be the best thing I ever do you know and and uh this young lady I says to me wow is this all you do you just come out and give certificates and I thought sweetie you if you only knew what it's like in in my moccasins uh you know and just a great kid and you know I always say that uh superintend like 4% of your time is stuff of this nature but every time I go out there it really fills my bucket and makes me feel energized again because you get to see kids uh you know in their natural environment and great kids her two sisters by the way showed up for this event and went out in the room and just the pride on their face to see their little sister getting the award totally Priceless and totally worth every bit of it Savannah um from Oakleaf Jr another great example and Maddie from from uh Clay High great great students you know we got so many great students to celebrate CTE month I'm not going to go into this but I was going to give uh Kelly Mosley a hard time and I I said next time I see you I'm going to bring a Sharpie so I can get your autograph uh I happen to turn on to C-SPAN to see Kelly Mosley's performance and that's kind of intense going to testify in front of Congress uh Alice and Kelly they do they do a great job 11,000 students involved in that program less than 50% of students go on to college school systems have to provide an option for everyone and uh whether it's through our CTE programs or other programs that we have uh they're just so important to our students this is Black History Month I I made sure that I included this in the slides because if you remember uh from uh Hispanic um Heritage Month uh we did have a speaker come and say hey what are you doing like for that and I thought okay yeah there's a whole program of stuff that we're doing to celebrate um uh black history you can see some of those things up there there's a whole curriculum that's rolled out there's a whole thing and I guess we just don't talk about that sort of stuff enough uh but you can see all of the resources on the website too and and so important that we do that literacy week fantastic I saw so many board members out there reading the kids uh I think it was OV that had like a large crowd if someone would have told me I was reading to the hund 20 kindergarteners all at once I might have backed out well you you should have saw me I was trying to like hold the book up so I'm I'm going back and forth like Vanna White trying to be animated as I'm reading a page and then walking back and forth because there were so many kids but it's so fantastic to have everybody out out in the school seeing the good work that's going on uh the science of reading and the eight parts of of reading so important you know our mtss process helps us diagnose which part part of the reading strand is not where it should be for a student and then direct instruction towards that strand so that that student's reading ability goes up uh we do this not only through our our reading her state approved reading plan that's out there but the resources that we provide So reading so important it's the basis of most learning in school very proud of that literacy matters you can see the pictures I'm going to kind of flip through this quick it's just a celebration of literacy we should celebrate that every day quite frankly but we we we throw a separate week together for people uh you could see all the all the fun activities that were going on what's so funny to me is that Elementary it's kind of like in high school how many people remember homecoming week right you dressed up and you did all these things in homecoming week right elementary school that is their homecoming week it's literacy week that's when everybody does those creative things gets kids excited about being there all that kind of stuff you see some of I see I see Miss Hansen there I see I see Aaron Bean I can't really see that far I see Miss Bola I see Sheriff Cook Miss Clark in the bottom there so we're all out there I appreciate the support of of our schools out there lots of great fun things high schoolers going down to read at the elementary students you know you know younger kids when they see the high school students come down that's like a big they're like all stars like when the when the high school kids come now it's a big deal uh there you can see some of the days that they had there such as Dress for Success day all of that celebrating literacy here's a topic that we didn't talk much about accreditation so accreditation we just took our our sort of like final exam I had like a two-hour uh like interview with Coga uh I think the 25th I believe was the day that we did this but I also I thought you know by golly they they probably don't realize this is like a two-year process and all of this has been going on behind the scenes to earn District accreditation why is this important well it matters to all of our stakeholders it matters to students our parents our teachers our community the accreditation process validates what we do as an organization so it's a very important process let me tell you it was uh it was long it was long uh type of process you could see we started back in the fall of 22 and you can kind of weave your way through those timelines to the final the final exam if you will on January 25th now the the accrediting agency meets four times a year their next meeting is in June and that's when they issue the the report card at the end of that uh I believe it'll be very good based on the on the U on the final exam and and everything that we've turned in it was kind of a funny story I guess I can admit this I I sent a miss onora an email those of you that know I prefer paper over computers so like if there's like an email or a link so I made the mistake of sending something to to Bonnie and it was literally I said hey can you take this report and copy everything for me so that I can take it home and and read it you know rather than on the computer I walked into my office and how it was literally like 14 Ines of paper and I was like I didn't mean like everything she said I thought you meant everything right so by the time you finish with that report if if you actually printed it out and that now of course everything's digital but it was probably that much work and that's that's from School leaders at the school level and then that's brought to the district level and then there's an overall uh standards for the district itself but you know I wanted to take a couple minutes uh tonight to talk about it because it's one of those things that just kind of happened behind the scenes that people aren't realizing that all of this is going on at the same time many leaders involved the work was led by uh Laura ferty who did an amazing job in organizing this yeah thank you Laura and uh you know I thought the board should should hear that uh there's really four key areas 30 different standards if you will that they come in and they evaluate you on uh you can see the the four main building blocks there for upcoming events one of the things I I wanted to do is one of the things I have the pleasure of doing is giving out scholarship to a senior and to a kindergartener through Florida Prepaid for those of you that don't know they're in the open enrollment uh period now want to kind of promote this uh you know have two children and we had for Florida Prepaid for both of those children and the reason why is because I was trying to inflation proof the cost of college education because if you start to pay for it when the child's young then it's that's your cost when the child gets to college age so I I like to promote that it's a wise investment if you start early and it'll inflation proof the cost of college enough with that commercial you can see all the events coming up uh here this week and and I thank you so much for your time all right uh School Board attorney remarks Mr blocker thank you mad thank you madam shair and board so I want to just notify the board kind of where we are as far as negotiations with negotiations with the sheriff's department so we had a great meeting with the sheriff's department and the county staff as well so what we're going to need to do Madam chair if if possible we're going to see about having a special meeting on February the 27th which is normally our Workshop day the purpose for that is there are number there about six agreements that we're going to have to put together between the county and the sheriff's department which is which is normal some funding agreements property transfer agreements some agreements to Charter Schools as well so one of the first agreements is really a transition funding agreement so we're going to need board approval for that that February 27th meeting that way you can go to the County Commission that way they can approve it so this would be an agreement between us and the County Commission that way you the funding um you know we can get that squared away and go from there so um again for our board rules majority of the board can call for it Madam chair you can call for the superintendent but just want to make the board aware so probably what we'll do is at the beginning handle that uh business that that agenda item then go right into our Workshop have that special meeting so are there any questions about that or that we need to discuss I think we're good will it be like the workshop first and then like we did before you call a speci we have the special meeting first and then the workshop as well then you do the workshop okay that's correct yes ma'am Mrs we need to vote on that or just a verbal agreement uh so so the Madam chair uh can call the meeting or or the superintendent if they're not willing to which I think they are then in the majority of the board would just vote so I believe believe we're uh so chair I just need for you now if that's something you're willing to set we just go ahead and work on the notice and yeah is that agreeable for everyone all right then we will move forward with advertising for that meeting yes ma'am thank you that's all I have ma'am thank you all right School Board member remarks would anybody like to start I'll be happy to okay um it's when I think back I've been on the board now for eight years and in my eth in this is my eth year when I think back to some of the um um election whatever promises that I made to people that I would do it's one of the key ones that I was very very cognizant of throughout these eight years is that when I spoke with my 25 students in my classroom because I ran for election in August I won and wasn't sworn in until November and I remember telling my students I'm going to be leaving you and they knew it they were very aware of it um but I'm leaving the 25 of you and at that time I want to say because I'm going to be working with 30,000 other kids and I took that to heart and frequently when I come to board meetings I talk about you know the things that I've done over the past month and I just it's not necess necessarily to say oh these are all the wonderful things I've done it is to follow up on those campaign promises to those students and so shoutouts definitely um W Cherry spelling be what a hoot and boy it was good it lasted a long time usually they're pretty quick sometimes at the school that one lasted a long time attending all of the all county music was wonderful I mean talk about a bucket filler along with the early literacy night which was awesome here once again this place was full of kids playing on the floor and talking and reading and parents leading them around um great reading at Do's Inlet Wilkinson Elementary Spring Park Elementary from which I got a number of thank you cards once again cherished and oaklea Village judging for the FCCLA um competition at ridg viw high I was hoping to get the pastry judging job unfortunately I did not I ended up judging um job interviews and things um last night right here in the room Florida um Fleming Island high school's poetry out loud competition talk about exceptional students and reciting poetry and the seven students who made it to the final round had to recite yet another poem it was tremendous um going through all of the interviews for the Apple Awards coming up the teacher of the year interviews but then the final videos very interesting we have some remarkable teachers in we have a lot of remarkable teachers in this County and just a reminder the Apple awards are week from tonight definitely looking forward to that um and of course I always mention Dolly Parton imagination life Library um continuing to do fundraisers so that we can expand that program I would be remiss in not saying a little bit about Argyle Elementary since that school is near and dear to my heart and thank you Mr Warren for coming tonight yes you have been pointing out things for the entire year and I'm hoping that I know that Mr um our superintendent Mr Brasi was up here taking notes and hopefully we'll be following up on that in the very near future I'm not certain why programs were cancelled I was one of the teachers to open Argy elementary and in fact started the Pioneer helper program um and we used to do a lot of fun events and definitely that end of the year trip was awesome because we didn't use parent chaperons the teachers volunteered to be chaperon for that so I'm not certain why certain choices were made and with the with the the change in leadership some changes do get made um but I know that the superintendent will be following up with you as well and definitely on the cleanliness of the school um it is important to have a clean school it's important to have water fountains that you can drink from and be able to and I realize hey we're in Florida those water fountains are a number of years old now I want to say Argy is coming up to its 20th maybe coming up soon um and I know that they get sitting in the sun is difficult um but I'm sure something more can be done with that and I would encourage the superintendent to follow up on that um thank you Miss Fogerty for all of the work that you did on the accreditation I know it wasn't an easy job and that's it thank you who would like to go next Miss Hansen well I'm going to talk about three things that are not where I've been visiting but I do love visiting places so um I want to tell you that office hours are enjoyable you would be amazed at the kind of people that show up and the great ideas they have for you as long as you listen um Miss Skipper and I decided that we will from this day forth be co-sponsoring once a month forums um the next forum will be on February 13th in the same location at Orange Park High School p.m. this will be part one of a disciplinary task force that will include dress codes and cell phones what can we do to make sure that our students while at school have uninterrupted quality learning at all times in addition Mr brosi as we Hammer our way through this media policy something I read in the media policy was that we were creating a a library procedures manual and I am asking that during the creation of this Library procedures manual I'm requesting that the district and all the Librarians and possibly myself since I've met with them one other time meet to create the procedures manual because they are the experts and have great ideas that I support they need to have a voice they are the best ones to talk to about what procedures should be in our manual they have shortcuts for things that the district has made hard and they have ways to save time so enables them to be more efficient at their work and so I would like maybe in two meetings or one media specialist to be part of the library procedures manual processing and developing I have a whole list of Notes too on ideas they've sent me lastly I'm going to ask the board to keep an open mind I know that the top priority of mine when I ran for office was policy it is true sound policy that everything great happens it is sound policy that drives academics someone said to me when you create a policy the first question out of your mouth should be how does it approve how does it improve student achievement we have um I talked to Mr Broski about this week we have some very old policies and a lot of work ahead of us and I am going to suggest and I'm going to ask Mr blocker Miss gilhousen brought up the idea of Neola so I had to do some research and Neola would allow us to drive through these policies put it in proper format and create what we want using those guidelines and get us to where we want to be with our updated policies in a very efficient manner and I asked Mr blocker what is my concerns is the inability for us to make many changes as we would like as a board so is what happens with that I know that you've worked with different districts with Neola yes ma'am through through the chair that's correct neol is a a tool it's it provides different policy updates you know based on the legislative changes and in my experience most school districts will still put their own flavor to it and modify you know they'll stay within the Florida statute um so that that is an option if the board decided to utilize that tool and and develop some policies from that it certainly could benefit from that so Clay County is one of the districts that has not used uh Neola um some of your neighboring counties do use that but in my experience again they they customize it based on the needs of the district because I know I handed you guys a a sheet last week from think Hillsboro County had like the 5,000 student section had every single policy separate and it was hyperlink so parents could find it that's how they're doing it and it's if it takes a year to hammer through a policy we'll never get through our policies and so um thank you U Madam chair for making me think about something I thought I might not um want to agree with you but after some research I believe that you were probably on to something about that so is that something that everyone feels like you want to consider because it would be a purchase so it would be something we would need to vote on I believe correct um can we please ask doc legutko if we would have the finances to well that's what I mean it's a that's something we need to get I mean that would be I'm assuming that we would would have the money to so if I if I can if I can suggest that if the board chooses to move forward we can do some research cost and all that stuff bring it to the workshop on the uh next time we meet 2027 um for discussion then there'll be a vote theoretically at the March Workshop because it is a contract that would have to be voted on by the board because I feel like when I read from the sheet at the workshop the first policy we need to probably start with and I have been talking with Mr blocker about this is a policy on policym our direction is lacking when it comes to the how- toos who's to do what what is our responsibility what's the district's responsibility I feel like if we have Neola it is the the Neola program could be the direction and then we would have the input we need for the district to look at what we're we're thinking about and support us on the direction we want to go and that's the reason I um bring this up so and I really didn't have anything else to say at all okay any any volunteers Miss CL I'll jump in there okay um I did speak with Mr blocker before the meeting and I'm happy to hear that hopefully at our next Workshop we'll be discussing the book policy again and that we might actually get somewhere so uh I think we're pretty pretty close but we're tired of the media putting out there that we're Banning books because that is not our intent we're simply following the guidelines of the State of Florida um the next topic I want to talk about is our insurance it's really exciting so I just thought I'd bring that up uh but now I'm happy that we took the plunge a couple of years ago a field that I had been in in the late 80s and early 90s of self funding and uh I knew what it did for us then and I'm just you know it's hard to know how much money we've saved going this route because we don't know what if we'd been with the insurance carrier what those premiums would be up to but we're we're building OB serve we're getting somewhere I think we're meeting the needs of our of our teachers so that's always very important uh see Fine Arts it's nice to know that we're on the beginning of this stage and and to see where we're going to go with it in this County it's going to be very exciting I think back to I know it doesn't sound like I was in music but I was um I think back to a friend of mine that he got the lead rooll and Fiddler on the Roof and it changed his Direction Forever in fact he taught at Orange Park High School he was the chorus director so it was changed his life and and you know we do we talk about teamwork with sports but you've got it in chorus and in band as well you know there's no hot dogs everybody's got to listen to one another and work together it's amazing and literacy week I don't talk about things that I go visit or or do but literacy week is fun because my muppet bobby gets to go with me yeah Miss Clark's following me around in literacy day reading to kids and she's got this little bag and she has to one up you all the time she's got like a muppet in it she reads through a muppet Turn the Page yeah well the nice part was the children were so well behaved and you must do something right because they invite you to come back so and I think the the children at Grove Park were I mean a a pen could drop and you'd hear it it was amazing so anyway that's it for me Miss Skipper I'm gonna shock all of you okay I used to win Awards for uh writing okay I'm a better writer than I am a speaker shocker I know uh but I also won an award for play writing so I just want to put that out there it was actually in junior high but it still counts but anyways that was just a side note because um I was a little worried tonight hearing everyone come forward I kept looking around just like everybody else is he in scared of his job like what's what's happening why why like why is every freaking out um so I too was highly confused about that and um I still stand that flemon island has still some vacant properties that we can uh get this performing art studio built um but side note CTE um they will forever have a special place in my heart um my husband and I would not be where we are today without CTE uh middleberg High School my husband I went through um aut body and paint with the I call them the good old boys because they the the three three or four that uh stayed there for several years that um my parents knew um so because of skill sets that he learned then it has not only financially provided for our family in times where um we had an in between or a pause was getting out of the military um he was able to utilize those skills that he he was taught um to provide for us but um not only that I was also in HOSA and the CNA program through middleberg high school and um continued on to be a emergency room nurse at um my goal was to end at a prestigious hospital here in Jacks um by 10 years and I beat it um within the fourth year so I do hold a very special place in my heart for our CTE departments because like I said if it wasn't for the path that that it sets you up on or it also will quickly make you realize this is not what I want to do um so I do appreciate that and um we'll we'll always have a special place I'll just say um Miss Hansen touched on the town hall that um we will be doing every month so I I won't hit that again um but uh you didn't see me pictured up here during literacy week uh because I allowed Congressman Bean to do all the reading for myself I uh I allowed him to do that uh I I want to thank Congressman being in his team for um accepting an invite for for district one um and choosing literacy week to do it so um it's very exciting since he is on the education committee up in Washington um and also I don't care what side of the aisle that you're on he's a funny guy um and he he interacts with kids very well and brought them treats um so it was it was to see you know going into these kids classes and just seeing them read I'm actually living early literacy in my home and teaching my well I shouldn't say I'm teaching I'm being patient while she reads because others are teaching her how to read um so I know just how important that is in um and getting to experience it as a mom for the first time is is also um something I look forward to um and thank you to our amazing lawyer and our team I I know we are moving forward in the right direction it is been yet another challenging aspect um to say the least securing you guys down so thank you for sticking it out and know that we are here for you um advocating for you every way we can and then I wanted to just bring up again because I think that this is a policy that needs to be addressed sooner rather than later and that's the visitor policy um I would like to discuss that um either at our next Workshop um I I don't know how much I don't know if we'll have the book sorry book policy done by then or or hopefully okay okay so I don't want it to interfere with if that's going to take extensive time uh maybe do the next month but I feel as though this is something that needs to be addressed sooner rather than later um and I think that's it um yeah thank you I'm not sure if niola has a policy for that they do well they do and I also submitted some to I know yeah I remember you said that that which I think were based off a Neola some of them were yes ma'am that's correct but they were not all Neola all the [Music] way okay I gave him a couple so I'm just saying um but I think that that's something that we need to visit well Mr bler I'm going to let you steer that ship as far as um both of these policies that we're considering are coming through your office so yes ma'am uh depending on when you're able to bring them for consideration yes I think we're willing to take them up as soon as they're ready is that correct I think that's what I'm hearing from everybody because I think the district had it in their hands last I heard and so we were kind of waiting on them or I don't know um you yes absolutely we can I I I can work with uh superintendent we can look at those um we did look at we did look at a couple I I think uh there were there were a couple you each one was tailored for each specific District but um there are some some room for improvement in our our current districts I appreciate Mrs Skipper and the board collectively for highlighting that and I think we can uh you know make sure we revisit that and make sure we get that that back I I don't know if you had the thoughts Mr BR I do you know some of the some of the we can certainly do that in the current format that's there and just add it in and then when we go if the board decided to do Neola it'll come up again in the cycle because I would Envision that there would be an organized way to to start from the beginning to the end over months in order to update all of our policy so it might be something if if the board wanted to do it right now to have something different in place in the current format which we don't like the current format we want to change the whole format and I get that but that might be a stop Gap till when it cuz I won't know where it will be my understanding is it's kind of done in chunks right and that might not be a chunk until might be the second or third chunk kind of thing yeah I think you're right okay so if we could prioritize those two policies as soon as they you're finished with them in your office if you'll bring them to the board preferably at a workshop so absolutely I'll give with the superintendent this came up again this week we had a you know um this this was this has been Revisited this week for a number of there's certainly a need there so I'll get with the superintendent we we'll come up with initial policy for y'all's approval then as we go through the cycle as we identify some additional room for improvement the idea is as you go through a policy cycle every two to three years you're going to have as the Law changes we're going to have new updates we're going to have new you know procedures as the district grows so we'll continue to modify this but we'll identify that yes may I ask a question regarding the the book policy so it was my understanding that the you two and whomever else in the district office were going to review it and then we were going to Workshop it again if I'm not mistaken right that's what I'm saying bring it to a workshop okay but a workshop or are we going to do a a a special workshop for the book policy because I've had a lot of community members come to me or call me or send me emails saying wait you know do we still have input opportunity do we still have the opportunity to question what's being what's going to be done and I assumed that yes we did so I just want clarification on that when you say bring it right now we're looking at the 27th as a special board meeting and possibly talking about this policy are we talking about the book policy on the 27th as well as well as having well I I don't think we have a clear agenda Workshop clear Direction on that if if if I could just answer this so as youall know you'll have a lot going on right now so we're we want to make sure that we we address this but you know the the the the media specialist policy is is a big overhaul I appreciate Mrs Hansen outlin that you also have the the sheriff's department um that that is that is a major overhaul as well so we want to prioritize this based on the board because ultimately the board you the policy deciders my recommendation would be um because there are some things that time sensitive and pressing that we want to get through my recommendation would be I do think it would be helpful if the board feels so to to have a a workshop on the the media relations policy I think I think Mrs Hansen you know rolled out a great policy the superintendent and I had a great meeting this week where we're working on finding I believe uh the superintendent Mrs Hansen has spoken further I think yall as the board felt that that was you know there were some positives that came from that but it might be helpful if if if uh Madam chair you and the superintendent agree um to call maybe a special Workshop to continue that discussion hopefully that point you know we'll have some additional work that we've put into it I think at this point you know the overall ideas make sense now it's just putting that into some type of implementation you know getting additional feedback from y'all as board members um as far as the visor policy I think that's a fairly easy fix you have some other districts that have very straightforward and again I appreciate um each of you'all bringing this especially Mrs Skipper has has brought a couple things to the superintendent's attention and my attention where we really could work on that and improve that and just make sure that we're leaning forward in the Foxhole I don't think that's going to be a major you know I don't know that would require a special board you know meeting I think that the real the special kind of Workshop was really directed towards you know just the media specialist policy since it encompasses such a large you know Viewpoint well and in addition to the Sheriff's um agreements and stuff I don't know if those two items might warrant a separate Workshop I don't together I'm thinking together yes ma'am if if if if I can just clarify you know dumping everything on the no absolutely and I I appreciate that and just just to clarify um you we kind of touched on this earlier there is there is a Time sensitivity to the transition so I think we're going to have to handle that there um that could be a very long uh workshop and we want to handle this thing based on what you know y'all's what y'all's priorities are I would recommend not doing the the media specialist policy at that time just because I think that's going to be a lot to to cover in one day um and also we have another government body that's waiting on you know a final decision from yall as a policy uh makers so you know we could work on scheduling a a separate Workshop you know later at a different time you know we can do that you know based on yall's desire we could you look at the calendar now or at that Workshop we could place that as as a you know at that time come get the calendars out identify a time and go from there so we can do whatever youall want to do based on should should I just want to ask this just because I know it's time sensitive the police department do we need to have a a meeting sooner and maybe do that separate I I don't want to mess you up I know that you have like a ton of paperwork that that goes with that and a lot of you know other in between leg works and stuff like that so if it's not going to be ready by then I I totally get that too but I'm just trying to think in my head if we need to meet sooner than the 27th because it's the first um can you let us know that absolutely Mr gii I appreciate your sensitivity that I think we're I think we're that timeline seemed to work with both agencies both the sheriff's department in um you obviously because you have different parts of the of Clay County that are that are government involved in this and each is approaching this with you know different perspective and a different stakeholder in the process this this agreement really hinges on the sheriff's department schedule they they have a schedule they have to mean which requires this approval to go into place um by March so our current board schedule does not meet with that timeline and also does not meet with the County Commission having to to to again uh review some do review some documents that that would come out of that meeting so I think that timing of this because again we have to kind of work through what some of those documents are going to be to bring to youall so as as we work through this there there'll probably about five or six different documents and different agreements we'll have to bring to youall for approval we'll try to frontload those some will come later some will go sooner um one of the unique things is Klay county is in a position where we're one of the first to to have started out with one part of the Margy stowman Douglas act now we're transitioning to a different phase of that so that involves you know the Property Transfers involves you know funding involves you know you all have a a special millage so they're just some of those unique legal issues that we need to navigate through and and again I think everyone's on board and and working well together is just kind of getting the timing is is important on some of this just because we're relying on other boards to approve and and again not approve the concept but approve the funding that's really you know who's paying for what at what time really so does that make sense for for the board well also Mr Broski keep in mind we talked about how to get to an April vote on this media policy because we have that 30-day notice so advertisement so it' be my intention to to do both okay which I think we can do that I traditionally like to under promise and overd deliver but I think we can realistically have the funding uh piece of that which is the most critical in the Sheriff's Office thing uh related to timing I also would would like to when you take a look at that media policy really the part that's really in question is the book challenge it's four pages yeah piece of it right so we can truncate that out and focus on those that because that's really the meat and potatoes of it so to speak so I feel like we can do that and have something and and some um sort of agreement prior to the workshop so that it can be discussed by the board at the workshop and then you guys decide what to do from there because literally we you take out the procedures part there's not a lot of pages left for us right that's what I that's why I'm thinking that we can just separate that piece out yeah I agree so we'll schedule I guess do you guys want to schedule a workshop for that policy at our February Workshop or would you like to schedule that I I think Mr brow is right it's a it's for about maybe four to six depending on the font when they take all the strikeouts out of it if you guys had it just just even days before the workshop it's just a couple of pages um I I mean we're bright I'm pretty sure we can read through a couple of pages and then discuss it it might go quicker than you think because I know that Mr blocker and Mr brosy have been tweaking things um I haven't seen it but I have to lay faith in them that they're doing that and so it it should be about four to six pages only as long as we notify that it will be discussed at that Workshop because as I said people were listening to us at the last Workshop saying it's going to be made open to the public so that we make certain that it's it doesn't have to be time sensitive per se but knowing that it's going to be the morning of the 27th and that's when questions can be brought to the workshop regarding that policy so that was my question do you guys want a separate workshop for this or do you want to add it to the 27th agenda in the 27th agenda I'm I'm sure because I'm not underestimating but it's not that compc then I yes ma'am the policy is fair Fairly straightforward um it's I think that there's some procedural part of it as well um that's it's going to hinge on so I think that's what myself and the superintendent have been talking with staff you know I think we want to make sure that the policy that that the board comes up with is one that you know we're not running into issues right away again not issues with the policy but just how it's carried out and I think the example I use as y all with military background you know you have your your orders and then it's carried out right so we want to make sure that we're crafting something that one that y'all approve that meets y'all's policy because y are the policy holders but also an Airness of the superintendent that his staff can carry out that we don't run into compliance issues so um you know we're going to do whatever youall want well well we can get we can prioritize things I'm just I'm just reminding you all we have a number of priorities that that y'all have come up with that are important that we need to to make sure that we're focusing our energy on so if a Ball's dropped and and you know we want to make sure that we and we do have a timeline of April and in addition I have been Fielding dozens and dozens and dozens of emails and almost everybody's clear once I answer them and so miss baa I would say to you if you have people that have not been one of the people that have been feeling me questions or emails sometimes they go to all of you but I am answering in great detail every single email and it just seems to be an you know so you can send them my way if you want it would be well it I guess I'm I'll play ignorant I'm still somewhat confused I am too what I'm trying to nail down is will will we have a policy to consider at point we have Miss Hans but do we I believe they we'll have a draft of a potential policy for the board to discuss and you know if you wanted to change what's there you do whatever you want it perfect all right so we'll have a draft policy by be a discussion at that point I mean how you're answering I mean I answer all of the emails as well as to what I'm assuming is happening and so right now we've got two different people answering emails and so well I actually know what's in it though so I'm answer but I don't I I mean I don't necessarily agree with everything that's in it let's say I mean I'm just throwing that out as a what if um so with that in mind i' I'd like to have the policy beforehand and have it part of the workshop agenda so that everyone can see it and be able to comment on that right ask questions about it because at the workshop we only allow the community to ask questions just clarifying that thank you yes yes and so Madam Madam cheer if I I'm sorry if I can just just highlight y'all so again youall have a policy that's in compliance with 847 so this is really the community standards portion of that so so again this is this is modifying the current right policy based on a community standard which which you know the law allows which is which is part of it so that's that's really where we're at right now so it's not so much a complete overhaul of your current existing policy it's adding that component to the community standards and doing some other modifications I mean your your current policy um involves a lot of procedure again so the superintendent his staff went through it I went through it and you we had board member put as well a lot of that is following by the wayside so a lot of that was condensed I think we started out it was about a 40-page document that we're down to a couple of pages so but really it's a community standard so so again I think you know based on y'all's wishes we absolutely can get there so and if I could just touch on the dates for a minute I hear Mrs Hansen saying you want it finally approved public hearing at the April meeting he he could answer that I'm not real good with the dates and times so one of the one of the challenges will be by Statute we need a 28 day time frame between there and I think between March and April there's not 28 days correct in there so we'll have to adjust the time frame to be in compliance I thought it was February to March it wasn't 28 days so we pushed it to April no we would we would the theoretically everything goes well in the 27th and the board has a a a policy that they want to bring forward you would advertise it in March whatever day I think it's the 7th but if you take March 7th to the April board meeting it's not 28 which is the required notification to finally pass the policy correct and and that's something we we can verify by the 27th we'll we'll make sure we've looked at the calendar and the statute and gone from there so we we we'll have an answer Mrs Hansen by then and I know you brought that up and we've talked about talked about that just been a long time just trying to trying to nail that down a little for sure understood that's it okay everything on the 27th got it okay um all right so was there anything further Miss Skipper that you had okay um I wanted to talk about the uh committee assignments do you guys want to do that now or would you rather have this conversation after the meeting it's not something we vote on um I have the little notes that we've collected over the week of who wants to do what um did anybody have anything they wanted to add or change I just didn't know um take stock and children okay after the meeting okay all right then this meeting is adjourned