##VIDEO ID:zpL1-0K7DXk## [Music] [Music] [Music] our words we our heart [Music] [Music] I was by my to me he me [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] time time [Music] [Music] thank you and thank you so much to the team at Royal pal Elementary for the pledge and that very wonderful um pres performance performance yes um we will now uh board member Al alhad has requested a moment of silence for a staff member from marjerie stowman Douglas Mrs Al thank you I would like to request a moment of silence for Britney Chapman Britney worked at Marjorie stowman Douglas High School as a campus monitor Miss Chapman is survived by her mother and two sister two sisters she leaves behind a plethora of kindness and compassion she will truly be missed please join me in recognizing a moment of silence in her honor at this time thank you thank you board member wholeness has also requested a moment of silence for a staff member from Boyd Anderson High School he would like to request a moment of silence in honor of Miss Kai bford a dedicated and compassionate teacher at Boyd Anderson High School Miss bford treated every student with kindness and fairness bless you ensuring they received the care and attention to to thrive her infectious smile and uplifting spirit will be dearly missed by the Boyd Anderson Community but her Legacy of kindness dedication and love will endure please join me in a moment of silence thank you fellow board members each year the school board of Broward County recognizes school counselor week during the first full week in February today I I am thrilled to celebrate our school C counselors and Brace advisers to recognize these individuals for their dedication to enriching our school community and serving as guiding lights for students as they navigate their academic achievement College and Career Readiness and personal growth the school counselor of the year and Brace advisor of the Year Awards honor the contributions of those who go above and beyond to create an environment of learning resilience and compassion they represent the highest standard ERS of what it means to be an outstanding school counselor and Brace advisor today we honor the school counselors and Brace advisor of the Year whose efforts have profoundly impacted the success and well-being of countless students please join me in congratulating our school counselors of the Year Miss Jen Viv Stevenson for elementary [Applause] schools sand Thomas for middle schools and Ronald zardi for high schools in addition congratulations to Christina Taylor the brace advisor of the [Applause] year we thank you all for the great work you do with students every day and appreciate your contributions to Student Success at br County public schools in addition please accept this bag of goodies now I am happy to introduce Belinda Daisy School counseling supervisor for some closing comments commitment and advocacy on behalf of school counselors Mrs Hixon before we wrap up I want to acknowledge that the Florida school counselor Association recently honored you as the school community and family advocate of the Year award at their annual conference congratulations on this prestigious honor and thank you again for being a staunch advocate for the work our school counselors do at Brower County Public Schools me e Rec [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] a [Music] [Music] oh as we prepare to begin this Schoolboard Workshop we are reminded that our vision is 100% proficiency for all our students as an a-rated School District We Begin the vital task of of sustaining this achievement we will continue educating all students to reach their Highest Potential our theme this year is believe and power achieve one Broward today's Workshop will operate in accordance with the Schoolboard policy 1020 and the board will review the items as advertised and presented by the superintendent our first item for discussion is the the annual superintendent report of the CCC settlement a agement I now turn it over to staff for a brief presentation good morning Madam chair board members um and members of the public turn this over to miss hollinsworth and Dr Washington good morning everybody Simone Hollings Earth Chief academic officer and thank you for allowing us this time and Dr Jody Washington is going to take it from here Dr Washington good morning everyone Jody Washington task assigned executive director student services initiatives do we have the presentation all right so it is the time of year that we bring forward the annual superintendence report as it relates to the status of the conditions outlined in the CCC settlement agreement um it is in policy 1240 the diversity committee policy that outlines the superintendent will bring an annual report in January this will be followed by a report in April by the diversity committee just some background information um I know this is the third year that I've brought this report forward so I I'm sure we're all well aware of what we're doing but just um as a quick reminder uh in August of 2000 the school board of brard County settled with a group called citizens concerned about our children to ensure equity and diversity are promoted across all schools within the district uh The District School Board appointed members of the diversity committee were named in the lawsuit as the body of stakeholders that were charged with monitoring the district's uh implementation of those nine conditions and you can see those here on the slide just some updates since the last report in January of 2024 the diversity committee brought their report in April of 2024 and within their report they made 39 recommendations as it as it related to those nine conditions so one thing that you will find new in this this year's report is a current status of each of the indicators as has been in the previous reports but you'll also find the status of where we are as it relates to the 39 recommendations that the diversity committee brought forward in April of 2024 and with that I'm going to turn it over to the board for discussion okay thank you very much we'll go to public comments and we have Mrs Pier Grant the uh committee chair of the diversity committee oh good morning everyone sorry about that was reviewing the report thank you so much the staff and the superintendent for a um a robust report it was like 517 pages and I've been reading all of them um and appreciate that you've taken the recommendations of the dis uh the diversity committee um uh I think the report looks great I'm hoping to align our report with um the super intendent report um my only uh slight criticism is like a couple of the uh conditions and um indicators doesn't give us a why and a how and so I will uh hopefully have an opportunity to address that with the superintendent he should be coming to our meeting next month um but other than that I'm super excited about um the direction with the uh with the district and um the work we've done in the com the committee so I'm through there a lot of stuff to look through and I'm working on the report now but um so far I'm pleased to see some some changes and I hope that this is a a continued trajectory to getting the district um where all of the conditions and all the indicators are met so thank you so much thank you and I will say thank you also to staff um I know there was a long period of time that this wasn't getting done and it's the second year in a row that we've done it so I appreciate that and now we'll move to board discussion so do I have any board members that have any questions okay um Mrs fam did you have your hand up yeah I just wanted to pose one question I'm going to go item one at a time and so going to address one I know here it talks about every student have access to a hard copy textbook I thought I had reviewed a a statute or something coming forward where it says um the governor wants everything to go digital am I mistaken in that if someone could clarify thank you Dr Miss holl World good after or good morning still um so yes we are looking at both hard copy and digital materials so that that's how the vendors are then sending them and uh purchasing them we want to give we never want to take away a hard copy we have students that need that um copy that they have to have whether they have an accommodation or not as well as looking to be more fiscally responsible knowing that a lot of materials are online so we're doing the um a package of both and we'll be doing that with all of our instruction materials thank you Dr Z thanks so much chair um couple comments this is uh such a big step from previous report so thank you uh for doing that on behalf of my constituents and I mentioned this earlier a summary that might even help the chair of our diversity committee you know absorb this quicker uh but certainly will help the community absorb this quicker um because this is important to the Comm Community you know this was a settlement that we entered into 23 years ago uh due to uh a mountain of data that suggested there were some real concerns about the way that we treated uh people um in in the schools and where they lived um the conditions are good the metrics are good the data that we've gathered is good I love that there's more explanation and more analysis this year that kind of gives a reader context and if we had a summary uh I think they could absorb that quicker I want to say one real big positive thing though which is you know things like a onetoone laptop uh policy is not just good for learning it's good for beating back any kind of disparity impact that there is in communities that cannot afford uh access to technology uh at home and so I'm looking forward to us moving in that direction uh as soon as possible I still think though that there is an opportunity with this report to answer the underlying question uh of are are we um at a point where we have diversity and we have equity in Brower County schools and to Me Maybe it's kind of a line to the executive summary recommendation for next year's report is that we might want to answer that question upfront and if we're not there you know not only how close are we you know how much progress did we make um but what is the priority that this board is giving to the underlying causes that caused this lawsuit at the begin with and caused us to enter into a a settlement with them in order to uh make sure that the future is better than it was in 2000 the last point is that last I checked 2000 was 25 years ago that's a long time um I think the community wants to know why there's still some not Mets in here and some of the not Mets aren't equal to other not Mets like one of the nmet is are you achieving 100% uh um at grade level I'm paraphrasing what the what the condition is and we're not doing that in majority white schools universally we're not doing it majority uh black uh or ethnic or schools with ESC clusters and the like um so that's that's a hard one to get to but when you look at the kind of overwhelming evidence that's comes through in this report there's been tremendous progress of the past 25 years and uh that progress ought to be celebrated uh and we ought to still recognize that there's a few things left over uh that we can do that I would love that that message was like presented in the report itself that there was a little bit more editorial rather than just the data and the analysis which is really great huge jump from last year but I think there's an opportunity for us to uh kind of note the Improvement and kind of satisfy the community's interest and whether or not we're continuing to work on these uh issues that came out of this uh this lawsuit in 2000 thank you thank you uh Mrs rert thank you my um my first question well first of all thank you so much for um this presentation and the information that's in it you know I remember not too long ago as the board member and another board board board board maybe four back that um I was really digging in Deep by myself so I appreciate the fact that it is very transparent we're holding people accountable and every one of my colleagues is going looking at this with a fine tooth comb so I I appreciate that uh tremendous amount um my questions on condition six how many actual certified media Specialists do we have in all our schools ratio of them broken down by Elementary Middle High School and 6 through 12 and obviously there's follow-up needed I don't expect you to answer that today Dr hiter um thank you for the question Mr rert um definitely that's a followup that's something we're looking at um right now because we do fund every school for a media specialist um but we've provided autonomy in the past of how schools can actually utilize that position or the funding for that position so it's something we're looking at just to make sure moving forward we're meeting that condition since we're already funding for it but we'll provide a followup of current state right now to the board thank you I appreciate that and I think that was it Dr Zan touched on the two not met areas um and then I guess the last one for me is condition five athletic facilities um it's not meant for the building part this is something that I've I've struggled through um and our I'm sure our our parents students and our employees are struggling through them too we are making progress there because we're closing that Gap with with the um with the smart problem lag smart program lag and I appreciate that and I appreciate the forward motion that we're doing and um we've already talked about maintenance before and oh I guess are we still at the point where we have publication dates that are 50% older than 15 years Dr heurn uh miss holl's work is found on that I there as Dr heer mentioned due to the fact that we've had some autonomy with media Specialists and that that is really truly the function of one of their functions of their job is that um weeding shall we say so the um Innovative team has and going out and helping but we do have some schools that are still behind there so we're working with them and really addressing that with the schools and with the Innovative learning team well I look forward to that um continuation and I I get it and sadly um and the public knows this as well as we do which is you have lower enrolled schools the money for student for the schools go down and uh you have to make these very tough choices but uh when it comes to um parody it it's important for us to continue continue putting it um under a microscope which we're doing and um going to the next update thank you so much thank you um Mrs alad yes I'm going to speak on page 37 condition s my question is on 7.5 can you explain what the big five is and why this condition hasn't been met yet Dr H Dr Washington yes thank you for that question so this is a situational um not met due to the transition from um the using the discipline management system to focus where our data is coming so in previous years all of the discipline has been entered into basis um and there was a behavior dashboard within basis that broke down time of day that referrals were happening primary locations referrals happening um it did break down referrals by demographics to see if there is a a subgroup that is being disproportionately disciplined in relation to their percent of the population of the school so that um data analysis report isn't available this year as we transition from using DMS into focus our data is housed in Focus now we're still processing referrals in DMS but the behavior dashboard that was used to create those reports on a quarterly basis is unavailable right now but we're working working with the focus team to get those back online to be able to continue with those reports but that's not to say the data is not being analyzed we do have PBIS specialist assigned to each one of the schools they do go and they meet with the schools and and review their data particularly for students who have a high number of referrals to make sure that we have services in place for those students uh and that we're getting them the help they need or an environment that is most supportive of their needs and the big five the big five is the report that looks at the time of day that referrals are happening uh where on the campus location referrals are happening who on the campus has the most referrals the disparity data and I'm trying to think of what that the fifth one is but it it it's a report that breaks down the that data for the schools to be able to make decisions about do I need to shift um a lunchtime or a class change or is there something happening at this particular class change are we seeing more in the afternoon than we are in the morning and and what is our master schedule looking like it helps them to engage in those conversations okay great and 7.4 with the resources to promote positive student Behavior changes are these different that you gave examples like spbp I Champs District family counseling programs are these or one of these at least available at every one of our schools Dr heer Dr Washington yes each one of those is available at every school the spbp is a schoolwide positive behavior plan it's a plan that schools collaboratively with teachers administrators um their school advisory Council work on on an annual basis to uh create a positive we're looking for students doing the right thing instead of trying to find kids doing the wrong thing so they every school has an spbp every teacher has access to I Champs training it's available online we also come out and do it in person they can come to a training um on a Saturday or after school whatever works best for their schedule and then there are family District family counselors available in every Innovation Zone in some Innovation zones there's more than one District family counselor but we also have other um every school has their own positive behavior intervention system that weren't listed there um but each one of them has what works in their environment is there something uh better focused for at the high school level Dr hipman Dr Wast a program specifically for the high school level each one of the high schools has um a program that's part of their schoolwide positive behavior plan they have they may have something nested or embedded within that um I can't remember the name of the there was I can't remember the name of the system but at high schools that they use for example to uh track students getting to class on time and they'll reward those I think it's hero hero that that's one of them that's a positive incentive program that several of our high schools use um to not only to track those that are doing the right thing but also uh encourage them when they're not through some minor consequences okay yeah so I think that this that's wonderful I think obviously kids thrive on positivity and those positive reinforcements I think we need to do a better job at the high school level and I'd love to get Landon's perspective on that um and so if there is other programs out there if you could follow up let us know what they are but not more importantly make sure our high schools know what they are thank you thank you Dr holess thank you madam chair so um I know that it's uh you know as a past teacher and understanding the challenges that many schools have um in terms of indicator 3.1 in schools demonstrating at or above State average for performance um I know in the past Dr hebburn we spoke about some of our great leadership within the schools um that are doing an excellent job in District 5 for example um we had Endeavor showing significant um gains so how are we capitalizing on the success of some of our school based leadership in ensuring that the schools that are not performing as they need to be um that these other school-based leadership are involved in in supporting those schools Dr heer um thanks for the question I I want to Ste Dr Fon stunder because she's probably itching to answer this question so go ahead Dr Fon good morning and thank you so much Dr hones for the question I will say we have a lot of great best practices and examples of exceptional leadership across our district so every month all of our principles come together in what we call Regional meetings and they are akin to best practices where when there are great things that are happening in one School principles come together and walk that school where that principal talks about what are the exceptional practices that are going on that they can scale out to other schools it allows other principles to come there to see it firsthand ask any questions that they may have about the pr best practices that are going on and then we're able to scale that across our district we also not do that within Regional meetings we cross over to other regions because we are one district and we want to make sure whatever's happening in this region that we're scaling it across all of our schools across bar County because our main goal is always to be an a district for all of our students great so I appreciate um you know some of our principles looking at these um great performance schools that have significant gains and so on but sometimes for example Miss beavers was at uh Endeavor and she moved to Walker um how are we when these uh principles who have achieved um significant results at their schools in addition to um leadership visiting the schools that are doing well um even when these principles move to other schools how are we um utilizing their expertise in getting s such great results um to help uh principles uh you know adopt similar practices and so on so since you say Mrs beaver I share an example of how we're scaling up her leadership she also mentors the principal that is currently at Endeavor Primary Learning Center she is a first year principal and one of our program uh that we provide for all of our first year principles are a mentor and we strategically select mentors by skill set and so it was a great opportunity to match um the principal at Endeavor right now with Mrs beavers so that she now is able to Mentor develop her and grow her so that all of the best practices that are in grounded at Endeavor are not lost and uh she's also available for any time that she wants to pick up the phone call or and talk to her but additionally with that we also use Miss beavers and several other principles we also have a great example at North Fork as well too with Mrs um Atkins Brown where the two of them uh walk campuses of other schools walk side by side with other principles and really get an Insight on what are some of the challenges that you're having and they're able to give their firsthand experience because often times the challenges are the same but now you're able to work with a principal who has walked the shoes of what they're going to and they can give them their experience of what they did to grow schools and so I think it's very important that we do a lot of mentoring and budding up our principles because principles learn very well from each other and they have the respect of each other's work very good so uh I I guess I can um uh conclude then that this is a districtwide effort in in utilizing those principles um and um you know I appreciate uh what happens with Miss beavers and and I hope we have many Miss beavers across the district and I'm sure we do but I think if we can utilize their you know have it result driven when we uh looking at these principles and uh looking at their results along with their experience um I think it's a great um effort in in trying to improve the overall performance of schools districtwide so I wanted to also talk about um indicator 2.1 um and also indicator 2.3 so I remember when this came to us in the past last year um I spoke um on the students access to uh computers um I am a little disappointed that that's not met here um because that was something something I spoke strongly about there are kids who may not have access to a computer at home there are kids who may not have access to the internet at home um we can't you know assume that because an internet a basic internet cost maybe 1020 whatever dollars it is some families truly just cannot afford it and so I've mentioned this last year and I really kind of uh was looking forward to us achieving this indicator this year and it wasn't so Dr heurn can you speak to how are we going to ensure that all of our children those who are economically disadvantaged can succeed by having Equitable opportunities for access to the internet as well as access to computers because uh you know I have two kids in BR County Public Schools and majority of their homework assignments uh at least 50% or more is computer based internet based I can't imagine the challenges a child will have when parents cannot afford to provide these for them to succeed in our schools so what are we doing to ensure that these kids will have Equitable opportunity for Success Dr heer yes thanks for the question and I know Mr Davis is back to ISS to answer this one too I I'll uh start it off it is our goal to make sure we go onetoone devices for all of our students um and also our goal to uh assist students that have internet and Wi-Fi access as much as possible it may not be a free solution but it would be a very lowcost solution working with with with our partners such as uh uh Verizon and other U Wi-Fi or Internet providers um just to make sure it's an affordable solution um for families and then I'll let uh Mr Davis talk about the existing um plan to ensure that happens um to to move one to one for all of our students good morning Trey Davis Chief Information officer uh to complement what uh Dr hebburn said we actually have met relative to our 0 80 ratio for the number of devices that we have across the district so we actually have what accounts to amounts to 1.2 devices per student where we are lacking um is the deployment uh to students to take home uh when required where they may not have a a computer at home um the principles do have autonomy in some in some cases they actually do issue computers to their at need uh students um While others uh do not so we are we are working to formalize uh that a bit as far as the number of devices though in our inventory we have actually exceeded both from a teacher and a student standpoint um the uh devices uh one toone in a one to one sense relative to internet uh Service uh irrespective of say socioeconomic stat status if you were to um you know enable every student with internet access it would be uh north of $20 million expense to the to the district um the district through for example prior plans like the instructural continuity plan um you know has put out information on uh the 10 million program Internet Essentials now internet that information is available you know up on our website um some of those of course are lowc cost and you mentioned uh the cost could be a burden uh for some especially even at $10 uh there are like usack Lifeline programs uh for select uh providers that do provide uh no cost internet services uh that's also been put out on the website as well that being said I do think that um some more current communication and uh and surveys would be warranted relative to what the need actually is at each at each school so uh I just want wanted to to put that out there Dr helness okay so Dr heurn um I am concerned because the comment that I've have heard is that some principles provide access to at need students and some principles do not so how are we going to create consistency across the district it seems as if there needs to be more of a directive rather than a choice because we're talking about student learning outcome of economically disadvantaged students so how do we take that away from the principal instead of it being their choice into making it a directive that this is accomplish and then have another question and then I'll be done Dr heer yes so um we're actually working through that process right now um one thing U with Mr Davis came on board was to actually review our inventory just to make sure we actually have enough devices in the age of those devices to make sure they're they're usable and also assess the landscape which we found out some principles do some principles don't so we're in the process of creating um uh processes and strategies to make sure principles know how to hand them out know how to maintain the inventory know how to address broken or stolen with an inventory that's on campus so we're working through all those nuances right now we proofed the concept also last year uh with about I want to say probably 12 schools and giving those students um devices for some of our lowest performance schools that actually pay dividends for those kids so working through that process right now to roll back the autonomy so that we have consistency across the system but we did a lot of research and fact finding first just to understand our current state so we can address it um in in an appropriate manner okay so are we hoping to achieve this in the upcoming school year um where we can work through all of those uh concerns and the principles can then be on board with um providing access yes so we're we're taking this in a in an equitable manner like like right now Trey and his team is working with um Miss hudge and the St office first because those our most fragile schools um and then we'll work our way up from okay so Dr heurn like I said last year I was very um disappointed about but I I I really had expected um that this would have occurred so I'm hoping when this comes back to us next year the internet access and the computer access is not going to indicate not met because I think this is really important and I think as a district we can do this for our disad our economically disadvantaged kids and just one last Point regarding the no cost internet or low cost um you know are we using any kind of measure for families that are uh have significant um economic uh issues those in abject uh poverty situation that those kids at least can have that at no cost even even if we have uh majority of our kids at low cost are we using any kind of economic line to determine who can which of our families can get access to Internet at no cost I think that's something we should look into if we're not um there need to be some measure um based upon uh Financial uh situation to uh even provide it at no cost to some students so is that something we can achieve yes absolutely um when we work with partners for low cost or no cost they have to demonstrate Financial need with the partners okay so there would be some families that will be no cost based upon their financial need depending on the availability of certain programs there's a lot of very low cost options up to as low as $10 a month for Wi-Fi access um but for no cost options it just depends on the availability of the program through Partners through through nonprofits through for-profit or even through state or local or federal government okay all right well Dr heurn thank you so much and I'm looking forward next year to seeing Improvement in those years but I appreciate all the other years that we've met thank you thank you Landon good morning I want to thank Miss Batista for giving me a very thorough summary of uh the background on this uh very easily understandable I I echoed Dr hess's comments about the Wi-Fi and computer disparities at some of our schools that's something Alana and I hear uh often at schools so I'm looking forward to some improvements in uh students access to that at home I have a question regarding what Miss alad was speaking about um for the schoolwide positive behavior plan is that state created criteria criteria or is that a district created criteria Dr Hepper Dr Washington so we work hand inand with the PBIS project out of the University of South Florida so it is a hybrid of um their blueprint versus what over the last six or seven years we have found to work in Broward schools so I know uh thank you um I know students at our high schools serve on the Sachs at their school um and are able to provide input on this plan uh but I think it would be beneficial to look I know some principles already do this but uh involving students in the creation of a positive behavior plan right because I can you know choose any school and look at their positive behavior plan and probably ask them their students about if they know what's on this plan or have been impacted by anything on this plan and they will probably uh tell me that they are not aware right so I think that's something that would be uh really effective in the years to come I have one question on indicator four or I'm sorry condition four when it comes to indicator 4.4 with high schoolers collaborating with students to strategically design schedules uh we hear often at schools that students feel like they get to their sophomore junior even senior year and they're like wow I missed out on a lot of opportunities I fell behind and I wish I knew freshman year you know what the opportunities were available to me uh we ask the question sometimes at our at our at our school visits if you could be a freshman again what would you want to know about your school so I know that this is a little bit of a complex recommendation but I figured I'd throw it out there um when students go in as as freshmen working with the school counselors to kind of map out what four years looks like right because that kind of sets students off on a on a path that they know that they can follow um I think would be something that would be very beneficial for a lot of the students and certainly something that students we talk to or asking about and finally when it comes to the area indicator 4.2 about students having access to courses not taught on their campus um our partnership with Broward College through dual enrollment is phenomenal and we have a plethora of opportunities for students to be able to take advantage of um so I think it's important you know beyond bar virtual school and Beyond Florida Virtual School to promote those opportunities uh at our schools for students to be able to take ADV AG of um but overall I want to say thank you for this report it was very easy to understand um and I'm looking forward to the students that serve on the diversity committee providing feedback on the diversity committee's report thank you thank you and also just so everyone knows dual enrollment we also have FAU FIU UF I was getting even on choke on that um anyway Mrs Thompson good morning uh thank you first for this report I had two comments um first for the athletic and I Al obviously lost my page um for the athletic fields is this a an area where we could partner with municipalities because I know for West brow in particular the penber Pines commission has voiced publicly that they're willing to invest in a field um field lights or field bleachers I know that there's a parent group that's actively fundraising for this however because of the cost they it's not obtainable just for a parent group so is this a project we could um research Dr heer yes um so those are actually ongoing discussions um and working on more inter local agreements because usually when you get the cities involved with some of the fields that community may have access to um outside of school hours it's a benefit to us uh they they do a better job sometimes in being able to readily maintain them and keep them uh up to dat in in the specific upkeep um and then some of the some of the challenges with uh stadiums or facilities with without Stadium lights um we work through those because sometimes it's the the community uh don't I've been through this as a principle we don't want the baseball field to have lights you got enough lights with the football field so so it's a it's a push and pull with Community sometimes as we as we work through that uh so some people in the community are Champion it and then overall you find out that the neighboring HOA says no know and they're working with their commission so those are ongoing discussions but the the one leverage point that we can utilize for field conditions is working with our cities and creating more interlocal agreements where appropriate um where we can have some shared space outside of school hours as a followup could I get an update on the conversation about West Broward because it seems like the community is in favor um and then I would like to dive in more to page 40 with the student support instruction specialist how is it determine the schools that they're at the 55 schools Dr heurn I'm sorry repeat that question I was writing down a note on that you just mentioned about Wiest brow no worries so on page 40 at the bottom the student supports instructional Specialists were hired at 55 schools with the greatest need as identified by multiple data sources so what was that um Dr Washington yes thank you for the question so um behavioral data referrals from School social workers uh referral to family therapists uh attendance data uh students with chronic health conditions it's a overall um Wellness data is what we refer to it as so just anything that could be a barrier to academic success for students those the schools with the highest numbers of of those barriers were those that were selected for the ssis positions okay and I know we're going to dive into this later but how are they trained to provide these services so if we can po put a pin in that part of the conversation and have that at the in the next because they are part of the next workshop and Vera winter is the director of Mental Health Services who oversees the ssis um program and Personnel I think she'd be able to give you a better answer than I will um so if you're okay with pinning it I can give you high level overview but I think she would do better we can pin it I have a lot of questions for the next one so okay perfect thank you uh Mrs Bowman thank you um I just not to beat a dead horse but I just wanted to revisit uh number two 2.1 and 2.3 that doctor holess already brought up um but to me having when all of our educational platforms are internet based for students not to have internet access at home it seems like that's a major um obstacle to gaining Equity so I'm wondering barrier so in addition to um uh possible lowcost solution are there any other strategies such as hotpots that are available un let Mr um Davis um um answer that if you go ahead Mr Davis Trey Trey Davis Chief Information officer um so there there are hotpots available uh at select schools um though um they aren't always distributed uh when necessary but uh to answer the question when there are issues in a particular home um where there's no coverage uh there all are alternatives though I I personally find those unacceptable uh and that is to go to the library Etc right because there are free options to the Internet available in select hotpots what I personally don't like there is the fact that um there are safety issues associated with that when a particular student has to exit their home to go find internet access um so thank you great and there's also barriers to Transportation I mean because you're assuming maybe a high school student but you could have a second grader that has to I mean that's not necess say a sixth grader that's doing things online so yeah and you know during um uh the pandemic we had a lot for-profit nonprofit cities uh municipalities really kind of support these initiatives and having uh buses that are equipped with Mobile Hotspots for certain communities and it's been a lot of pullback because that that money has run out with the eser dollars because they receive similar funding uh from the government at that time and pretty much uh run its course right now so we're as we're working on our plan of deployment we're also working with Partners to figure out some low cost and free solutions for families that have that specific need well I I just think if this is the plan if this is the way that we're delivering education and there's a huge barrier for I mean there's a difference between coming home opening up your computer and doing your homework at some people's houses and then not having that luxury um that's a huge gap I think we need to really address I mean that's like a you know just a basic exactly you just took it out of my mouth maybe in a future legislative platform it is a basic need for everybody in our country now um it it's pretty much a requirement for everybody um today to have some form of Wi-Fi or Internet access um especially our kids um so we're trying to maneuver um and strategize by working with Partners to to find the best Solutions but um it is a a basic need for for everybody today to have some form of internet Wi-Fi access thank you okay thank you I'm going to go and then we have two other people but we have to be cognizant of our time so I'm going to just briefly mention computers again but more so the onetoone computers is really about in our school and as we learned as Landon has said we've heard from students although it may be on paper that we have Ono one and you know also very well it doesn't roll out as onetoone in an actual classroom if they're on a on a um computer cart maybe there's 32 students in the classroom but there's only 25 computers in the cart so these are things we hear all the time so although we may look like we're on toone on paper we really have to make sure we do a better job of making sure we're actually Ono one in the classroom um beyond the you know having computers outside and also for internet access I was actually going to say maybe we could work with um the county or municipalities or even the state government as someone who wandered around for two hours in Norway because I did not have Wi-Fi and couldn't find my way back to the hotel um it made me think that maybe it was really important that that was a a public need um for a variety of reasons so I think it would be great if we could partner with getting those hot spots or getting some kind of public Wi-Fi where um that's not a barrier anymore to anyone and I'd love to be able to partner with other people to help that happen condition five the athletic facilities it talked a lot about the football fields and it it's it spoke briefly about baseball and softball but we also have um pool facilities there's all kinds of different Athletics the gyms didn't mention basketball in the gym so I think we need to when we're looking at athletic facilities it's more than just we're putting putting Turf um or lights on a on a um football field and I will just mention that really important is the lightning detectors and some baseball fields have it but at the same school the softball fields don't um and that's not safe for anyone especially since we live in South Florida so those are things that I think should also be included we can't just check and say yeah everybody has Turf um so I think we're not um all the facilities are in there yeah we're not the only facilities I saw on there was baseball and softball it didn't mentioned pools or gyms or that I saw so maybe I was looking past it um for condition six the maintenance of schools we we we know that that's not happening equally across the district some of it has to do with timing but some of it does have to do with budgeting so I would like to just have more information on that and same thing with books in the media center some of it is because of media Specialists versus Media clerks but if you go to the libraries in the western part of the county they're full and when you go to the east side for example Dan Elementary just got a beautiful new media center but their books are very scarce so maybe we can partner with people who help us get appropriate books that they have access to that are um in the right age or you know the right time frame but I will just tell you that there are way less books in the East than there are in the west and that's just a statement I'm going to make um and then condition 8 8.1 where it says about um it says it's met but every five like a fiveyear priority plan I know we have a dfp but I personally wouldn't say that that falls line of priority so I would not call that met because it it it spells it out but there are things that should be moving along faster than others so I just question um saying that we we do have a a dfp but when it says that it's prioritized I don't believe we have that so we really should be working on that as we look at our dfp so that's it for me very briefly um we have two people who wanted a second round and then we're going to wrap this up because we are coming to time so Mrs alhida yes so on the lightning detectors we need to make sure that it is a priority that our lightning detectors are working at the schools that have our lightning detectors and then as far as the onetoone on computers I agree with my colleagues this needs to be a priority but we've we've done this dance we went through Co and we did a fantastic job with making sure that every student had a computer and had access to Wi-Fi so we have the experience already about rolling this out and one thing I want to just say especially at the middle school level if you ever have seen a middle schooler their backpacks you know they look like Ninja Turtles their backpacks are so heavy they're almost falling over and so I think there truly genuinely Dr heer needs to be a conversation regarding the the health you know of the child with such a heavy backpack the effect it's having on their their spines and how we can give them a computer to possibly eliminate for having all these textbooks and then also having conversations with teachers and principles in regards to you know maybe you do not need to bring uh have a three- ring binder for every class and bring every every single page in assignment from the beginning of the school year to this point in time now in in January 2025 so I think these are are real issues that need to be solved thank you thank you Dr Zeman for brief statements well I'm not going to be brief chair um this is very important and our community cares deeply about this and and there's some important things to talk about something that's not as important to miss ala's point is I walk my seventh grader to the the school bus in the morning and I carry her backpack and we used to skateboard together and it's so heavy now we just walk because it is it's a it's it's it's north of 50 lbs it is massive um I'm I'm a big enough guy I can carry it but I feel bad handing it back to her to carry the rest of the day and then carry it all the way back home and a lot of it is because there's no storage at school anymore so we don't let kids use lockers where they used to store their books and then just go get it for individual classes but the consequence of that I'm not sure that we've taken uh into full consideration nor have we kind of stopped and thought a little bit about the co experience I think that's a really important point but the community wants every kid to have a chance to learn they want every parent to have access to to to paying for field trips online uh they want access to many of the beautiful apps that we've created uh that are so efficient and are are are rapidly reducing the amount of paper that we need to move around uh between schools and homes and things like that so um I'm going to take Dr holus to another level and say that you know we need to talk about this at a board at our next school board meeting and set a goal for August 11th where we can say to everybody in Brower County that if you don't have it provided by a foundation or municipality or a Kanas club or uh another group uh that has provided you know Cy drunk going through District 5 has an entire internet Corridor paid for by the city of Fort Lauderdale which is great if you're within five houses of cun if you're the sixth house not so great right but I think given that we deliver services online more now than we deliver you know them in physical media uh that this now has become an an imperative so what was written 25 years ago isn't good enough anymore I mean if you guys read the details it's one: one for teachers as well like we passed the need for that a long time ago if you're teaching and you don't have a laptop you cannot do your job well my my belief is if you're a student in Brower County you can't do your job without both an internet uh access and a laptop um and it's a big deal I think it's a differentiator for other choices of school too um instead of you know looking at our students and saying you need to pay for the bus like a lot of public Charters do or you need to go buy yourself a laptop and internet and good luck um we're better than that you know we look at people and we find them where they are and we do individual assess ments um I'm really ashamed that there are wireless devices that provide internet service in our schools that are not being used like we paid for those with PX taxpayer dollars and something is stopping them from getting to a home that doesn't have wireless internet access that's that's something we should all be ashamed of and we should fix it quickly but what I'd like to talk at our next Schoolboard meeting is what date we want to set in stone to say Broward County provides lap tops and internet access to every student where there's need if it's not provided by someone else and again we're not going to vote on anything today in a workshop uh but we can bring it back to the next Schoolboard meeting this is why these kinds of reports are really important that's why data is so important for a board like this that's supposed to be legislating to make our system better these data really help last Point chair and I'm sorry to to take a little bit of time here if we wanted to update these conditions how would the general Council advise us to do that Miss Batista thank you for the question um so as I think either you or somebody else mentioned um you know the conditions have been there for 25 years um and some of them um such as the ones relating to technology are are really outdated so that's something that we I really would have to research um because this is part of a settlement uh there was no sunset time under the settlement to um to address or to have an opportunity to change the conditions so that's something that I would like to do a follow up on them chair let me just follow on with that specific point again do these settlement conditions represent the minimum standards for bar County Schools Miss Batista so at the time when they were negotiating it um it was the desire of the board to just have Equity across the district um certainly you know the board can address or give more than what is um stated there I I just wonder chair if we can think a little bit more about that and come back to it about it's a big issue right and maybe the diversity committee maybe our experts in this field um maybe we go back to the litigants and say hey we want to update this you know the the lawyer that brought the suit is still practicing uh we could go back to Mr fertig and and talk to Chris and and say you know something I just feel like you know we're kind of walking blindly you know on a yard stick that we created 25 years ago and the whole world went from yard sticks to digital things which you can't measure in physical uh dimensions and so if we care about Equity maybe the board wants to say these are great for a minimums just like state law right you got to meet state law I get it but it doesn't mean that's where you stop sometimes we consciously and intentionally try and do better than what state law sets as a minimum standard I know we have to comply with this there's no Sunset to it but it would be an interesting exercise to come back to this board and and give us an answer uh chair is that uh something uh we can ask for consensus on maybe to ask our general counsel to come back and give us some ideas on how we can update these uh conditions to uh more modern conditions and maybe even exceed them if we choose to do do so uh sure I think Miss Batista said she was willing to do it oh great so um she'll come with a followup maybe to the do you want to bring it to a meeting or to a workshop or just email us and then we'll figure out how to move forward right so normally I just when I do a followup I send it to all the board members okay and then you decide and then want to do terrific I just want to point out one last fact because this is not in the report but it's important we look at c-rated schools because in bar County we don't again I'll say this every time if I I can't we don't have f& D schools anymore like it's awesome not only a district we eliminated the bottom performing schools so when you look at the c-rated schools 83% of our c-g graded elementary schools students are Black Or Hispanic we need to think about equity and and cause and effect and are some of those academic performance scores low because those students don't have internet access at night my kids are up till 9 and 10:00 at night doing homework online without it they could not get their work done um it is uh it's essential uh and as long as we have inequitable racial outcomes on academic performance I think we have work to do on equity and this is something Dr holess that I think is a is a it's not cheap not saying it's a freebie but but um if if if are we are we providing everything that a student needs to be successful and the answer is in some places due to economic disparities if they don't have a laptop at home and don't have internet at home we're not and that's makes it just as essential as a teacher or a textbook or a classroom um and I think we have to always make sure that we're providing all of the things that are required for Success otherwise how do we look at 83% Black and Hispanic students in our lowest performing schools and say that there's some other inexplainable reasons why that inequality exists uh that inequality is not a natural inequality it is something that's created and we got to figure out how to kind of beat back um any kind of things we're responsible for that cause that so thank you chair thank you uh Mrs leonardy yeah very briefly I share the same concerns and passion that my colleagues do around internet access and Technology access so I second that um to the textbooks piece I I do understand um the concern around the weight of the textbooks and and students carrying them around I will just add a caveat to that um you know when I was in the classroom I had students and I think we assume that because all of these students have grown up in the digital age uh that they prefer electronic textbooks a lot of students want a hard copy textbook so while I I support the move to electronic you know it's more eco-friendly and all of that um I think we need to use common sense when we are applying this um and and honestly you know some sometimes students need a hard copy according to their IEP so I think we just again I support moving digital but we need to be able to provide those paper uh those hard copy textbooks when students want and need them um and just make sure also that uh teachers in classes have the textbooks that they they need um two uh my colleagues point about um updating the the conditions um I'm wondering when we can expect the followup Miss Batista I can have it within a week okay thank you and I would also just ask that in the followup we are um there are action items available to the board so like if we do want to move forward with updating the conditions what does the board need to do to make that happen so does someone need to bring a b item um something along those lines so we have concrete steps that we can take or or different options that we can choose from thank you thank you and we'll end with Mrs rert thank you mine will be 30 seconds um it's on condition number nine yes we've we've met it overall but we can do better um but ideas for more student opportunities using school choice for all not just the well informed we truly need to step our game up for all students students and families to have and understand benefits of school choice programs college career accreditation certifications they open up Financial Freedom when it comes to uh freedom for the rest of their life and uh have the ability to be knowledgeable of financial decisions we're not getting it done and uh for particular people especially uh students of um Esau families so it's it's rather difficult and we need to kind of take a good look at it and figure out how we can bring that up so thank you thank you so much okay the next item is Mental Health and Wellness Resources for students and I now turn it over to staff for a presentation we're going to recess the meeting to set up the board [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] you [Music] he [Music] [Music] [Music] he thank you again um the next item is Mental Health and Wellness Resources for students and I now turn it over to staff for a presentation good morning everybody Simone Hollingsworth Chief academic officer want to thank the Schoolboard member superintendent Dr heurn today it is my privilege to introduce the dedicated members of our student services division Dr jod Washington our task assigned executive director of student services initiatives Miss Vera winter our director of mental health Dr Daniel Shapiro director of School counseling and Miss Marissa sotillo director of student services today's presentation from the students Services initiatives division focuses on a critical priority of our Collective Mission the mental health and wellness of our students the presentation will provide an overview of the comprehensive supports and services we offer to meet the diverse and evolving needs of our students additionally it aims to amplify the voice of those impacted by these efforts you will hear directly from students staff and a parent who will share their personal experiences and insights these stories serve as a poignant reminder of the significance of our work and provide a foundation for continued progress thank you for the opportunity to Spotlight this essential work I now invite Dr jod Washington our task assigned executive director to begin the presentation good morning again everyone and thank you Miss Hollingsworth um my team and I are excited to bring this Workshop item forward to you today highlighting the ways we are supporting students and their families when it comes to their mental health and wellness the student services initiative's division has been working diligently to streamline our services to ensure the comprehensive needs of students are met in ways that are relevant and meaningful to them throughout today's presentation we would like for you to think of Mental Health Services being the work of every member of the organization while our primary Mental Health Providers are our school counselors social workers and family therapists who provide intervention services we have several mental health is also the work of the bus drivers who greet the students as they board the bus the school staff members who welcome them on campus each day the Food Service employees who serve them a warm meal of on arrival and the teachers who are not only providing instruction but also constantly observing their students to determine when they may be showing showing signs of distress mental health is also the administrators Mentor mentors and Club sponsors helping to create a sense of belonging with our students whether that is through being part of the school band 5,000 role models of Excellence program mentoring tomorrow's leaders a wellness club students against violence everywhere choose peace agents of change human relations Council or the dozens of other Pro social clubs we have on our campuses countless Studies have shown that students who have a sense of belonging in their schools have lower levels of depression anxiety and stress not only during school but also into adulthood they also experience improved academic outcomes and increased levels of persistence in the face of challenges and now I'll turn it over to our director of Mental Health Services Mrs Vera winter to get us started good morning good morning we're can we have the presentation up perfect thank you good morning we're going to start with a ful moment and a few of our student speakers my mental health is my mental health is important because it helps me thank feel and act right when my mental health is good I feel good about myself I am happy and I love the people in my life hi my name is Sarai bracley I'm 8 years old and I am in second grade at Westchester Elementary this year my teacher Miss goiz introduced my class to Inner Explorer we do a lesson every morning before we do any work I love the program because it help it calms me down and causes me to be more focused for the day it makes us slow down for 10 minutes and refresh by listening to the practice but before that it has us pra stretching our bodies which makes me feel more relaxed right away after we do the lesson I feel different than when we started my favorite exercise is the shark fin which we do which is when we do long slow breaths and it makes me feel calm sometimes I do breathing I learned an in Explorer at other times it makes me Happ happy to do in explore every morning and it makes me feel good can you Shar [Applause] now we're all experts in shark breath and now for our student openers good morning my name is Gabriel Rodrigo and I'm currently senior attending marar stowman Douglas and honored to have this opportunity to discuss my EXP experience with help it as it relates to mental health mental health is one of the most important things as it carries out who you are as a person and the decisions you make on a daily basis what most people are teens Miss is that mental health can be a huge burden to carry alone and that's why it's important to know that there's a support system you can rely on the reality is that there's always someone that willing to help you and want the best for you whether that's someone is your parents friends counselors or mentors there'll always be a person that walk you through hard times for me there's been countless people that help me over my life especially both of my parents the reason why I stress this so much is because just like many of my peers I also felt alone in many cases throughout High School while go a great example of the struggle I had a transition between Middle School and High School while going through a pandemic like most of us it was an unknown and scary time especially one where people could not physically be anywhere near each others this is when I met Melanie Taylor a district support counselor at my school Miss Taylor quickly became the trusting hand who demonstrated care for my well-being academic journey and college preparation anytime I felt doubtful insecure or with lack of self-confidence Miss Taylor would be right there for me she's been one of my biggest influencers and mentors in life and continues to be to this day even just a couple months back when I started the process of college applications I felt completely overwhelmed and didn't know where to start I approached Miss Taylor with my concerns and she immediately grounded my senses and reliev me from the severe but common thought of an unknown future that would become for my decisions now she worked with me for countless weeks to able to guide me towards a strong mental state alongside a set plan for my future in college to finish in our district the help is here initiative reminds us that no students ever alone and there are people at the school who want to help you succeed and help you walk around with the bright smile in this tough game we call life I want to express my appreciation to Brower County public schools for having someone like Miss Taylor to make a difference for me and many other students just like me thank you [Applause] allias wind allias allias good morning good morning hello my name is indas Orga I am a senior at miar high school where I serve as the president of the 5,000 Ro models of Excellence the 5,000 Ro models of Excellence is a leadership and mentoring program for boys the 5,000 Ro models of Excellence project has helped me become a better student leader at my school and in my community it has taught me to be a better organized and learn another of new things through field trips and workshops thank [Applause] you to me mental health means prioritizing my mental and physical well-being by prioritizing my well-being I can become the best version of myself succeed and view life from a healthier perspective I believe mental health means never denying my needs or putting other demands over my mental health we have to take care of our mental wellbeing then we can help others mental health affects every individual aspect of our lives and is essential at every stage of lifei [Applause] good morning everyone my name is Jabar Joseph I am a junior at Coral Springs High School where I serve as the president of 5000 Ro models of Excellence 5,000 Role Models is a leadership Mentor program for young males helping instilling values such as respect responsibility and integrity the 5000 mods of excellent project has helped me become a better student and a and and a leader at school it has taught me how to be a listener and helper to make my school a better place mental health often refers to how someone feels thinks and copes with the challenges they face in their lives mental health is about their emotional well-being how they handle stress relationship school and other pressures and how they deal with things like anxiety sadness or anger thank [Applause] you mental health is an integral part of all of our Lives while we may all Define mental health differently it impacts our daily experience and how we show up for ourselves and others as you can see from these various student perspectives students needs vary and that's why the unique needs of each student and what mental health looks like to them whether it's regulating their emotions feeling connected to others or receiving therapy is so important that Broward County Public Schools take us takes a multifaceted approach to mental health good morning I'm Vera winter director of Mental Health Services our student services initiatives division presents today's Workshop mental health and wellness supports for students presenting with me today are the leaders of our division who play a critical role in the m health of our students thought I was going to get a queue going morning Marissa soell director of student services morning Dr Daniel Shapiro director of School counseling Pat Riley once said Excellence is the gradual result of always striving to do better we have some amazing staff and programs in our district to support support students mental health and wellness which we are excited to share with you and our community today we also recognize that there is much more work to be done when it comes to health and wellness for each and every one of our students and are constantly striving to do better and explore new ways for us to expand Wellness in our students communities as a team we work together to increase the success and wellness of all students and families by promoting mental health awareness fostering resilience and building positive Community connections today we will share an overview of M mental health services available to students and families in our district which align to guardrail 5.1 and 5.3 of our strategic plan our goal is to provide mental health awareness and access to resources through prevention and intervention that promote Wellness for all students and families we'll begin with an overview of mental health and the Broward County Public School mental health supports that we have in place then we'll walk you through highlights of some of our prevention and intervention programs and initiatives we'll follow that with a highlight of Our Community Partnerships which are essential to our mental health support following that we'll walk you through a sample of how a student may interact with mental health supports throughout a given school day then we'll share a few action steps that our division are working towards and our commitment to continuous Improvement lastly we'll hear directly from a few speakers about their experience with our District's mental health supports at this time I'll turn it over to Dr Shapiro all right thank you Miss Winter good morning everyone as the students explained so well mental health is about our emotional psychological and our social well-being and it it determines how we handle stress how we relate to others and it's about healthy choices the first point we want to make is that mental health in the school setting and in the clinical setting are different but they're also complimentary so some students will need that support in the school setting others will need it in the clinical setting and some will need it in both um some of the differences are that in the school setting it's usually shortterm it's identifying um the the situation that the student's going through it's building awareness it's brief solution focused counseling and it's collaborative between members of the school Community whereas in the clinical setting it's longer term there's more of a comprehensive treatment plan um it deals more with diagnosis and also medical management so it's it's important that our students are either in in school or out of school and that we're taking care of their mental health in both places our our approach in Broward is fourfold so there's prevention um many of the students have mentioned a lot of the great programs that help to to prevent um situations with mental health um also intervention once a student is um showing uh showing signs of uh need for improvement um we also have personnel which we'll go into in more detail throughout the presentation that that plays different functions in mental health and many important Community Partnerships another important point to make is that mental health is not only for the well-being of students which is top priority it also affects their ability to learn and grow academically uh it helps to improve focus it increases engagement um it helps them retain information at a higher level and it gives them a higher level of receptivity to learning so in our district we have family therapists we have school counselors School psychologists School social social workers and students support instructional Specialists and select schools that support students with their mental health briefly the the family counseling program family therap uh therapists provide strategies that help improve family relations um they have 12 sessions available and it can be extended to 18 to work with families the social workers do mental health counseling Crisis Support home visits they work with non-attendance and and treny and can also do psychosocial evaluation and often work with btas behavioral threat assessments suicide risk assessments and consultations the school counselors work in the areas of academics life skills and wellness and College and Career Readiness and the way they deliver uh these services to students are through Individual Counseling group counseling classroom lessons schoolwide School counseling initiatives and also Community initiatives that bring resources in for the students to support their Mental Health the districtwide mental health support is a multi- department collaboration where each plays an important function that um make sure that students receive the wholeness of of support um there's School counseling uh our uh our department there's Mental Health Services there's coordinated student health services exceptional student education there's Equity diversity in school climate and also the student services department Each of which have um roles and Personnel that support different aspects of student students mental health now I'm going to pass it back to miss winter to talk more about how these departments work together to support mental health within the student within the student services initiatives division there are four primary departments that have programs supporting mental health which are all highlighted here such as student services School Social Work Equity diversity and school climates mentoring programs school counseling's life skill and wellness initiative and Mental Health Services family counseling program mental health support throughout our district has a tiered approach with some support available to all students some support focused on specific schools and students and others with a much more targeted mental health approach I'll outline a few highlights of each tier and then provide an opportunity for a speaker to highlight their particular role in mental health keep in mind speakers are only highlighting one aspect of that tier of support and are not responsible for all items captured in that tier we selected one tier item to take a deeper dive tier one highlights mental health support that is available for all students such as access to mental health professionals on campus as well as classroom lessons teaching life skills and wellness school counselor presentations and resiliency education we also have a number of prevention programs and social services such as foster care heart and nursing as well as positive behavior intervention supports around bullying viol violence and abuse schools have staff onsite in roles such as Suicide Prevention designes resiliency designes and equity and prevention Liaisons who are instrumental in providing mental health supports daily in their building as well as individuals trained in deescalation strategies the mental health services department also facilitates the district's youth Mental Health First Aid awareness training to teach staff how to identify understand and respond to signs of mental health and substance abuse challenges among our youth ages 12 to 18 as well as how to help youth in both crisis and non-crisis situations currently over 26,000 of Broward County Public School staff have completed the youth Mental Health First Aid training and more are completing this course throughout this year Well above the state required 80% our first Speaker as an example of tier one mental health support is Miss Stevenson a school counselor at Rock Island Elementary School lot thank you good morning everyone uh my name is Jean Viv Stevenson blame my mama for that I don't know um but my name is Jean VF Stevenson I am the school counselor at Rock Island Elementary School and I'm the proud uh president of the Brower School Counselors Association and today I want to talk a little bit about um the importance of mental health support in our schools particularly from the school counseling perspective as a school counselor for over 20 years I I have seen firsthand how we play a vital role in nurturing the well-being of our students holistically through academic personal College and Career Development just like how we prioritize academic learning we must also promote our children's social and personal development so that's why I'm encouraged to see that many of our schools are implementing a multi-tiered approach to mental health and through a comprehensive School counseling program at the Tier 1 universal support 80 to 100% of our students do receive preventative Services it's especially important to have school counselors and mental health professionals accessible to all students it also includes integrating life skills Wellness education into the curriculum providing valuable resources like resiliency programs and social services along with the help of our other mental health professionals as a school counselor we also use and provide evidence-based practices to address pressing issues like Bully prevention violence prevention and abuse through effective positive behavior intervention support systems classroom lessons at every level and schoolwide initiatives for access to all students furthermore Pro Pro active not reactive strategies like school-based Crisis Prevention programs along with designated designes resilience resiliency Liaisons and equity and prevention Liaisons which are the Cornerstone of all of our mental health programs our tier one programs also emphasize the importance of deescalation strategies and training staff on how to handle challenging situations calmly and effectively by priority prioritizing mental health support and a comprehensive School counseling program in all schools at all levels we create a more comprehensive inclusive supportive and nurturing learning environment where all students can Thrive thank you now we'll move to tier two strategies in our presentation tier 2 supports are a bit more focused such as when a mental health assistance allocation Response Team responds to a school crisis or the district facilitates Suicide Prevention lessons at schools as needed schools engage in deescalation strategies make referrals to the family counseling program Broward Behavioral Health Coalition and other Community Partners schools provide identified students with individual or group counseling as well as engag families in the response intervention process scum schools also receive the option for parents to opt into their child participating in the Terrace metrics behavioral health screening to proactively measure students resiliency and Behavioral Health then connect them with a mental health professional as needed to highlight an example of one tier 2 targeted support at some of our schools I'd like to introduce our next speaker Miss Susie Gluck which is a student support instructional specialist also known as ssis which is a new role to the district this year our ssis in Broward County Public Schools have made over 2,000 referrals to date to mental health professionals Miss Susie Gluck good morning my name is Susie Gluck and I am the student support instructional specialist at Monarch High School my role as the ssis is to be visible and accessible students are observed and identified for a variety of needs as they enter the building in the morning during class changes at lunch time and a dismissal through collaboration I ensure that interventions resources and supports are tailored to each individual's needs students requiring additional internal resources are not just given the name of a person or an office to seek out I personally escort them make the introductions and follow up to ensure success many students are not aware of the resources available to them how to access the resources and are possibly lacking the self advocacy skills and initiative to become independent and successful members of our schools and communities as the ssis I am accessible I am here to help and if they need more I know someone often times I am able to link them to internal or external resources they would not have taken the initiative to find on their own students show up at my door daily some need to talk and I serve as one of the trusted adults on campus While others are in crisis and require immediate crisis interventions and I connect them to a mental health mental health professional on campus I do check-ins with students we practice calming strategies I offer encouragement for the steps they've already taken and they leave feeling empowered many return to share their big and small successes thank you for your time and thank you for allowing me to make a difference in this new role we'll now proceed to tier three strategies within our district tier three are more intensive mental health supports such as those who experience a crisis and require immediate intervention as well as students who may complete a suicide risk assessment or behavior threat assessment staff continue to engage in deescalation strategies at this level as well as sometimes use the mobile response team to assist in those deescalation efforts with involuntary examinations being a last resort for our students we are also partnering with several Community agencies on a bakera transportation pilot program beginning this spring to reduce the potential trauma of baks by providing alternative transportation from schools to the hospital rather than the use of a police car we are also working diligently to provide referrals to snet and Community Partners as needed to share a few examples of tier three supports that our Mental Health Services Department provides all schools in our district we have one of our Suicide Prevention coordinators Miss Summers and our crisis coordinator Miss Fuentes good morning my name is Tanya Summers and I'm one of the suicide prevention coordinators specifically for the central region Broward County Public Schools last year had the vision to create three suicide prevention coordinator positions and I hold one of those positions as a result we've been able to create and implement a more comprehensive program um inclusive of support for all stakeholders in the realm of Suicide Prevention the work that suicide the suicide prevention program does is two-fold um to impact and support the mental health of all of our students we provide Suicide Prevention curriculum to students in elementary middle and high school in a tiered approach and we also support schools throughout the district with the suic de side risk assessment process thank [Applause] you good morning my name is Jamie Fuentes and I'm the Mental Health crisis coordinator who oversees the mental health assistance allocation Regional team also known as mhart mhart stemms from Senate Bill 7030 which initially speaks to implementing the recommendations of the margerie stowman Douglas High School Public Act which comprehensively addresses school safety Senate Bill 730 was then amended to ensure each Florida public school student has access to a mental health professional the mhart team assists with ensuring students have access to a mental health professional who can provide Mental Health Services in an expedited manner collaborate with school-based mental health professionals to increase the awareness of mental health and operate as an added layer to schools in collaboration with their school-based mental mental health Team the mhart team also promotes The Talk app which is tell another listening is key which is app on every student's clever portal where they can submit a request and be connected to a Broward County Public School mental health professional on the M heart team for support Additionally the mhart team continues to spread mental health awareness to stakeholders at community events and school presentations with mental health being our Focus we also support the district by providing crisis response to date through crisis response alone we have supported over 700 students through grief intervention thank you [Applause] now that we have outlined a few of our key pieces of our tiered support for bradwood County Public Schools we think it's important that we highlight a few of our prevention measures because oftentimes when we think about mental health we think about the intervention but brard County Public Schools take such a proactive approach to mental health that we wanted to highlight a few of the prevention items that we have in place to support students from a proactive perspective there are a variety of platforms utilized to increase awareness and access to mental health support such as websites parent links canvas and clever portal as a means for us to communicate about mental health prevention for parent nights and Community event presentations we have the BCPS supports and resources shared with parents and stakeholders through school events parent nights and community events to discuss our various prevention and intervention topics Wellness walks and talks is also a new initiative this year where the student services initiatives division staff visit schools throughout the district to speak with various School personnel and students to identify potential areas of improvement and supports that can be provided at the school site the district also offers inner Explorer which you heard one of our speakers share and it's a mindfulness application designed to support self-regulation coping skills for stress and improved Focus staff are encouraged to practice mindfulness with our students during the school day and the application is also available for All Families free of charge after hours at home our student L prevention programs are engaged in all of our school buildings to create a positive School environment and build student connections as Dr Washington shared at the beginning students feeling connected is a key piece of their mental health and our student-led programs assist with that students also receive a variety of classroom lessons regarding mental health topics such as life skills and wellness resiliency education and school counselor presentations for our student support instructional Specialists as I mentioned this was a new position added in 2024 and ssis are working in select schools to serve as an additional trusted adult at the school to recognize the subtle signs of mental health needs of our students and connect students with mental health personnel and resources SSI is focus on proactive measures such as hosting Wellness clubs creating Wellness awareness bulletin boards and conducting student check-ins to ensure the mental health and well-being of all students by establishing a comprehensive and supportive environment in our schools our wellness centers at a few of our schools our wellness centers offer a safe supportive environment where students can process life stressors and emotional challenges these centers provide essential resources including Counseling Services Stress Management Programs and resources to help students manage mental health and build resilience our youth mental health awareness training consists of the youth Mental Health First Aid which benefits students by fost in a supportive environment promoting early intervention reducing stigma and enhancing collaboration amongst stakeholders now that we have outlined a few of our preventative measures for mental health we'll now go into some of the interventions that we have for those students who need I'll turn it over to miss soell thank you Mrs winter this slide provides a highlevel overview of some of our mental health professionals and programs school counselors are generally the first point of contact for students the services provided by school social workers School psychologists and family therapists include conducting assessments and screenings providing direct counseling and therapeutic services and Crisis Intervention terce metrics is a behavioral house screener that started as a pilot in four schools and has grown to 36 schools the mental health assistance allocation resource team again short for mhart assists in organizing our responses to crises and requests submitted through the talk app two of their staff are also assigned to the district threat manage management team knowing that we cannot do this work alone partnering with Community agencies and organizations is vital this side includes a few of our partners for decades the Brier County Children's Services Administration has awarded funds to the family counseling program to provide counseling services to students and families last last year they were awarded $2 million this year as of January 16th the program has served 1,066 students in 2022 Broward schools entered into an agreement with our managing entity Broward Behavioral Health coalition to provide Comprehensive Mental Health Services from its Inception in April 2022 we have referred 2,535 students this school year alone as of January 27th we have rehear referred 547 our partnership with the United Way and Children's Services Council includes choose peace a violence prevention program and Substance Abuse Prevention through school assemblies and town halls sednet and Ida funded project facilitates connections between schools families and the community in Broward the snet coordinator leads the Behavioral Health Partnership to help further assist these efforts for students with emotional and behavioral needs needs agencies in the Behavioral Health Partnership go through a stringent process of Eligibility and screening of their operations as well as their mental health professionals on an annual basis currently we have 19 agencies since mental health looks different for every student so does the support that every student receives we want to share an example of two students going through their school day and what mental health support interactions may look like these are not specific students nor what every student experiences but they're simply a picture of what mental health services in brow County Public Schools may look like for students in the school setting I will now turn it over to Belinda day supervisor of life skills and wellness good morning A day in the life of an elementary student in Brower County public schools in Mrs Adams third grade class the school day begins with a routine to help students begin on a positive note Emily a student in the class appears to be struggling with anxiety Mrs Adams using her youth mental health awareness training y MH a t that she learned as part of the youth Mental Health First Aid greets Emily with a warm smile and speaks with Emily about what she is experiencing after confirming Emily is feeling anxious Mrs Adams connects her with the school social worker the school social worker Mrs T Mr Torres uses play therapy to help Emily Express her feelings and work through her anxieties they talk about their worries practice deep breathing exercises and play games that build her confidence Mr Torres ALS also collaborates closely with Mrs Adams sharing strategies to support Emily's emotional well-being throughout the school day today is help is here day a special initiative encouraging all students to connect to a trusted adult on these days Emily looks forward to her meetings with the school counselor Mrs Johnson Mrs Johnson provides a listening ear and teaches Emily Co strategies tailored to her needs throughout the week Emily's interactions with her teacher social worker and school counselor create a web of supports that helps her navigate her challenges of her anxiety she knows she has a team of caring adults who understand her struggles and are there to help her succeed both academically and emotionally the day in the life of a secondary student in brow County Public Schools 10th grader Alex struggles with building social connections with his students with other students every morning he starts his day with a life skills and wellness class led by Mrs Carter this class covers essential topics such as communication empathy and Stress Management Mrs Carter uses engage engaging activities and discussions to help students develop their social skills later that day Alex completes resilience education lessons with Mr Brown one of his teachers in these sessions he learns how to cope with challenges and setbacks Mr Brown teaches them about self-awareness self-management responsible decisionmaking and relationship skills Alex finds these lessons empowering as they provide him with practical strategies to develop resilience Alex's parents attend a response to intervention meeting with the school psychologist Dr Martinez during this session Dr Martinez Works closely with Alex's family to identify specific barriers to forming friendships they discuss Alex's interests explore social social scenarios and develop personalized strategies to help him connect with his peers Dr Martinez also provides them with resources and tips on how Alex can join clubs or activities that align with his passions making it easier for him to meet like-minded students in the evenings Alex and his family attend counseling sessions with Mrs Harper the schools's family therapists these sessions focus on strengthening family family Dynamics and enhancing communication Mrs Harper works with Alex's parents to help them understand his Social Challenges and support his efforts to make friends together they practice conversation starters discuss social cues and build a supportive home environment that encourages Alex to step out of his comfort zone thank [Applause] you as mentioned earlier mental health support and wellness for our students and families is an ongoing process of making strides in what we currently have in place and acknowledging and exploring ways that we can remain committed to continuous Improvement each and every day these are a few action steps that our division is committed to in terms of our continuous Improvement one is increasing awareness and access to Mental Health Resources we are leading marketing campaigns directly to students and parents sharing Mental Health Resources through various platforms like canvas and Parent Link promoting the help help is here initiative highlighting trusted adults on every campus signage and visuals throughout school campuses of Mental Health Resources and mindful practices and we will continue to increase efforts to make our stakeholders aware of those Mental Health Resources and how to access them secondly our district participates in a range of activities such as mental health fairs Town Halls school events resiliency pop-up shops and a parenting series to engage School communities we will continue to engage in events and activities that promote our division's excitement to attend school and community activities to share BCPS resources third to gather student and stakeholder input for continuous Improvement representatives from various departments Garner input from students school teams parents and Community Partners through Avenues such as Wellness walks and talks student advisor feedback in student groups district and Community groups we will continue to explore other ways that we can make sure that every single one of our students is aware and has access to the Mental Health Resources in our district the most valuable information we receive is from students and we listen to students and aim to shape our services to meet the unique needs of each and every student and continue to tailor what we have in place to meet each of those students needs as they experience them last but not least we aim to enhance staff development on Mental Health and Wellness we we will continue to provide staff with professional development such as life skills and wellness grief sensitive schools inner Explorer mindfulness and youth Mental Health First Aid training while we ultimately aim for all students to feel a personal connection to mental health supports available in this District we'll continue to strive to increase that awareness and access through the action steps we've identified we have a variety of school and Community highlights that we continue to draw from from our Wellness clubs our comfy corners our wellness centers all of which are pictured here and to provide an opportunity for you to hear directly from those that have been impacted by brow school's mental health supports on their personal Wellness Journey we have a few of our speakers here to share hello everyone my name is Ashley and I'm in third grade at met Brook Elementary and today I'm so excited to talk to you about something really really special the kindness the kindness Club this club is all about spreading kindness and making people feel good and helping others in any way we can you know sometimes life can be tough and not everyone has someone to turn to when they feel sad or alone but in the kindness club we believe that even small acts of kindness can make a big difference whether it's holding the door for someone complimenting a friend or even just giving a smile can brighten someone's day in the kindness club we don't just talk about being kind we do it we come up with fun projects like writing kind notes for our teachers painting rocks for our school's Peace Garden and practicing deep breathing to stay calm we even decorated boxes like turkeys for our school Harvest dry food collection being part of the kindness Club has taught me that everybody can be kind when we show kindness it spreads and other people want to do the same imagine if every person we meet passes on a small act of kindness the world will be a much happier place so if you ever see someone who needs help or you feel like doing something good remember that you can always be part of the kindness clup you don't need a badge or a special invitation kindness is something we all can share let's try to make today a little brigh for someone else thank you [Applause] hello my name is Daniela angland I am in eighth grade at Plantation Middle School today I would like to speak to you about the wellness club that miss naiden our student support instructional specialist hosts at our school Miss naen comes in and does an activity with us every month I feel like it's important because being in middle school there can be a little bit of drama but during our wellness club we can come together and actually work together for example in December we did a mindfulness scavenger hunt it was really fun and we all had a good time trying to figure it all out when she comes in it's always a good time and we do activities that teach us about problem solving and how to communicate I think this club gives us an opportunity to get together and the feeling of comfort to know that you're not alone thank you for your [Applause] time good morning my name is Kim Welter I'm currently in 10th grade at Coconut Creek High School today I'm going to discuss with you the impact of the M program as a student for starters mentoring tomorrow's leaders is a peer-to-peer mentoring and student leadership program that helps us students achieve academic advancement Community involvement student enrichment and family involvement we achieved this by hosting informational club meetings and having menty and Mentor hour where a mentor can help out any mentee with any problem they have such as any homework or family struggles in this club I have excelled in many ways that I have not before such as gaining a high level of support for my educational goals by opening many doors for me regarding service hours and scholarship opportunities I've learned to be a true Leader by being cooperative having Integrity being honest and most importantly being true to myself and others around me these very characteristics have allowed me to become more confident in my collaborative and social skills which are both essential when it comes to real life scenarios I love attending Mt for its amazing incentives when it comes to scholarships service hours and field trip opportunities we are given many chances to take part in college readiness events and fairs preparing us for Life After High School I also treasure the atmosphere that's been created by both our counselors and other Scholars just like me I never fail to feel included when it comes to MTL Everyone is always a part of something I've met many incredible students who are also looking to be involved in our school's community and to refine their leadership skills and preparation for the real world this is what MTL means to [Applause] me my name is vivon keani and I'm a student at Falcon Cove middle school today we're excited to talk about a transformative program that has had a profound impact on myself and many of my peers resiliency lessons in this era everyone is on their phone and hence accesses the on online world one of those people is me who after working on the course immensely benefited from the resiliency lessons specifically thanks to their wonderful syllabus and outstanding options I personally have seen myself grow more knowledgeable about Online safety for instance when I was younger I used to visit unknown websites fall for scams easily and just be completely clueless when navigating the internet today with the incorporation of resiliency lessons such as their virus protection techniques I can safely and fearlessly navigate the internet although resiliency lessons have not just helped me online I have seen Improvement in my resiliency creativity leadership qualities and much more with its smart and Innovative way of thinking resilency lessons have helped me along with many others approach my challenges with confidence and creativity thank [Applause] you hi my name is aara kunala and I'm also a student at Falcon Cove Middle additionally resiliency lessons has made a significant impact on addressing anxiety and offering effective strategies for students to manage it anxiety can affect a student both mentally and physically mental anxiety can cause excessive worrying excessive fear and thoughts which can negatively impact academic performance and social interactions physically anxiety can cause problems such as hyperventilation and increased heart rate which progressively can harm the students well-being and health to address various types of anxiety resiliency lessons offer mindfulness practices and educational resources designed to help students with anxiety these resources assist students and effectively managing stress to techniques like breathing exercises mindfulness and other relaxation practices as someone who personally experiences te Tex anxiety I explor various strategies to resiliency lessons and Incorporated techniques such as breathing exercises to help manage my anxiety during tests these techniques reduce my heart rate making me feel less stressed which improves my concentration during test this technique has allowed me to get better grades on test in addition to providing practical tools for Stress Management resilience to lessons also raise awareness about anxiety and the effects of it to help students better understand thank you [Applause] hi my name is eer Conor I'm 8 years old and I'm also in the second grade at Westchester elementary I'll be sharing my experience with inner Explorer the program helps me be calm by practicing deep breathing stretching and and and taking a mindful minute and dinner Explorer is not just to calm your body down it helps everyone relax and enjoy their time it also helps everyone start their day with positivity inner peace and great energy my favorite lesson from inner Explorer is the shark fin it's my favorite because it helps me relax my brain and calms me down when I am mad or sad my favorite sound practice is a Native American and deu I encourage everyone to join the inner Explorer program thank you good morning my name is deed Reena coka and I'm the proud principal of McNichol Middle School in November of 2023 I expressed an interest in housing a Wellness Center at McNichol in response to a survey we identified a critical need for a wellness center at mnel based on the life skills and wellness assessment data which revealed that 66% of our students scored low or very low in key areas like self-management self-awareness self um relationship skills responsible decision making and resilience this data confirmed the importance of providing mental health support for our students the establishment of the center started with a wellness walk and talk in December of 2023 by the student services initiatives division a diverse group of students and staff openly shared their experiences highlighting the challenges of the pandemic and its lasting impact on our social and emotional well-being the trauma from covid is in addition to divorce death homelessness and low self-esteem to name a few this Center has since become a safe non-judgmental space where hundreds of students receive support the students have access to two counselors two social workers and a registered Behavior Tech the wellness center offers individual and Family Counseling Group sessions on top topics such as conflict resolution coping with loss and social media will begin in the near future our parents have embraced this initiative signaling a positive culture shift in seeking mental health support we are committed to revisiting our data at the end of the year to measure the impact and and ensure we are meeting the needs of our school community at mnel we are dedicated to supporting the academic social emotional and cultural development of our students as they so aptly say in student services help is here thank [Applause] you good morning members of the school board my name is Nora giaro and I'm aen mclin's mother I'm here here to share my experience with the family counseling program and the positive impact he had had on my son Aiden as a parent I have always tried to be the best mom I can be but like many families we have faced challenges before he started in this program Aiden is with frustration frequent tantrums and difficulties managing his anger he also had a hard time respecting other people's opinion since joining this program I have been seing significant Improvement in his behavior his anger control has improved he is now showing more respect for the other viewpoints now our home feels calmer and more connected I feel closer to my son and I can see how much more confident and secure he has become this experience not only has improved our relationship but it's also helped me grow as a parent the guidance and expertise provide through this program allow me to better understand how to reir my Approach with Aiden he's now leaving a much better life with increased self-esteem and a much more positive attitude toward his school in responsibilities Aiden feels free and happy to be who he is he's so confident Aiden is my third and youngest child my other two children have also benefit from this program I try other therapy places but this program has been the most effective for my family in my opinion this counseling program is not just beneficial but essential for the educational emotional and mental health development of children it has been a great foundation for stability and progress in aden's life and for our family as a whole I like to specifically comment the program for having a professional like Mr Stephen Hy who is not only only highly experienced but also deeply knowledgeable about both learning process and the development needs of children according to their age and so thankful to the school for offering this kind of support recognizing that when families are a strong children Thrive I truly believe that programs like this are available and I hope you can continue to make them available to all the student who may benefit from it thank you so much thank now that we've had an opportunity to hear from those directly impacted by the efforts of mental health programs and initiatives within our district we want to take a moment to thank our board our superintendent our district leadership team and all of the amazing staff throughout our district who work tirelessly to support students mental health and wellness each and every day while we Embrace there's plenty more work to be done and that we are continuously striving for ways to improve mental health in our district we appreciate all that our district currently has in place and the multifaceted approach that has been taken to meet the many individual needs of our students together we connect those supports for the wellness of every single student and every single family we appreciate you and open the floor now for board discussion thank you so much and and wow just wow how what a what a true pleasure and treat to have students talk to us about resiliency lessons Wellness clubs and centers MTL 5000 Role Models inner Explorer and I think we would all agree we need more kindness clubs so thank you so much for that before we go to the um board discussion we have some public speakers um the first one is hard to read so if I say it wrong I apologize Jay agnesa from Sunrise I'm not sure if everyone on here actually wanted to speak or if some of the students just signed up when they came in but um Jackie LOM hi good morning and that was such a lovely presentation and showcasing all the various um programs and models that you have for um mental health and wellness are wonderful thank you so much to all the staff that do so much um I brought up at District advisory Council a model that um staff didn't know much about at the time um I think there are others in the um in the district who might um and that was the center for mind body medicine which was brought in after after the um tragedia MSD to help with the um uh mental health needs of students and staff and um there was a whole lot of work was done in the district um the there was a program supported by um philanthropic funding um and a lot of people were trained both students and staff so some of those students will have migrated onwards out of the school district um but there are remnants of that program left and I feel it would be good to look into see who still has that expertise um from the center for mind body medicine and resurrect that program too or at least look into it um and its potential um value to um our students um it I'll read you a little bit of what it does it helps communities create and Implement evidence-based inclusive accessible affordable and sustainable Public Health interventions to heal and relieve trauma grief chronic stress and anxiety and build resilience it creates programs that share self-care tools and strategies that fos Foster physical and psychological well-being Mutual support and community building and it provides this through both online and inperson um training um I can provide a handout for you if you like but I just feel that having put so much into that program just in in the last few recent years that was an investment that kind of needs to be continued onwards um and there are a lot of folks that can tell you about it um I'm also just not clear um on funding allocation for mental health but I know when the referendum went out there was a lot of talk about extra health and um Health extra supports for mental health I think it would be helpful to be able to see how that money is broken up um look at investing more in school social work be looking at recess the value of recess not just in elementary but right through the various layers of school Circle time at least having kids finish the Academic Year even knowing the names of the other kids in their class it's horrific that there are some that don't um and I think as well that drift time at the end of the school year when kids are kind of coming and going and there testing and a lot of twiddling of thumbs I think that might be an awesome time to be looking at programming some of this mental health um preparedness um because rolling it out through the course of a calendar year so you don't get to one particular topic say till January or February you could be preempting that by using that end of year time too thank you thank you and I have to say I um have been to schools where they are very much using the mindfulness practice so if Mr Shapiro could um just maybe comment on that briefly yes thank you we have several different mindfulness approaches and those who were trained by the center for mind body medicine still do some of those sessions um so we're definitely open open to continuing to expand that great thank you uh next is Katie Van good morning everyone my name is Katie Van I'm Shamari Walker I'm KY Robinson and I'm Kaa Moore we are eighth grade peer counselors from glage middle school and we would like to take a few minutes of your time to talk about the numerous events we have at our school at our School we're given numerous opportunities to be leaders and be the change we have pro-social clubs such as the human relations Council and choose peace stop violence that allow for us to work towards creating a culture of Peace for example the hello challenge is a new initiative created by HRC and kindness counts that allows students for create new PE create new bonds with their peers during this initiative we have students from different grade levels meet and get to know one another as they talk about their favorite colors Hobbies and ask this or that questions the whole purpose of this event is to strengthen connections and create lasting bonds during these before school um sessions we play music give out treats and prizes and just try to create a fun and welcoming environment another initiative at our school is anti-bullying week during anti-bullying week we learned to be an upstander instead of a bystander we were lucky enough to have the Speak Life and bullying assembly in November where he showed a special film to over 400 of our students here at Glades Middle School the students were able to voice their feelings and opinions after the film with a Q&A with the producers after this The Producers spent the rest of the day with our peer counselors speaking about self-awareness empathy kindness and bullying and many other things besides the assembly we are also immensely proud in our Pinky Promise activity which allows students to get their pinkies painted to show that they pinky promise to stand up against bullying alongside this we we hosted tasty treats with upstander messages weree blue chocked positive messages on our school grounds and participated in anti- Ming lessons through our C connect classes it is our hope that weeks like this teach and raise awareness that each one of our students treats one another with respect and makes Positive Choices all of these events and initiatives ensure that our school is a no place for hate and they've also impacted all of us immensely me personally entering the school was scary but I always felt welcome from day one it's not just academics at our school but there's so many events that we can look forward to that also spread a positive message to the community when I was in sixth grade I was very anxious but knowing we have Spirit weeks and many other initiatives made me gave me much relief knowing I helped with some of these events now makes me feel like a leader knowing I'm giving back to my community during my sixth and seventh grade years I was very shy and not too involved with all the activities because the order kids who led them made me nervous but there was always something to look forward to because of these events and activities this year being one of the leaders who leads these activities I've become more outgoing and I'm able to bond easily with my peers coming in my sixth grade year the change is definitely overwhelming however having these initiatives to help me come out on the show really helped from the supposedly big and scary eighth graders saying hello to me on my first week at a new school to the tasty treats to allow me to enjoy something with my new found friends it is these efforts that didn't just help me but helped everybody come out of the show open up and really enjoy middle school so I want to thank the board for listening to this presentation by Glades Middle School thank you so much thank you for coming out and sharing that presentation with us uh next up is Samantha sedr hello how are you guys it's so nice to see you guys all here helping out mental health it's really good to see you guys making a change not just us um but my name is Samantha STI I'm here with Sheridan Technical High School I'm the president of our spoken word club which is led by our sponsor Miss McAfee who is super amazing just like our other amazing teachers at our school um a lot of you guys know what poetry is it's more rymy Cat in the Hat Dr Seuss type stuff but spoken word puts more of like meaning behind it we're able to talk about real problems that are happening like I have dyslexia and I wrote a poem about having dyslexia that I shared with some of the district members I've shared with my school I took it to a competition called louder than a bomb and my poetry group won um semifinals which is really amazing um this club helps us build community within the school it gives you a safe environment to talk about your feelings and what's going on in a fun way you know like not just oh this is going on blah blah blah but you're able to talk about it fun and express yourself and talk about it actively the paper always listens to you so it's a good thing to know that people are listening also thank you thank you and um if you haven't seen the present a that Samantha does with her partner it's pretty phenomenal so thank you for coming out next is Sydney dolin hello my name is Sydney dolin I'm in 12th grade and I'm president of one of the many social clubs at Sheridan Technical High School hello my name is Anastasia I am also part of Sheridan Technical High School and I am also president of one of the many social clubs one of those Social Clubs is the human relations Council or HRC this is Dom main club of cheridan that acts as an umbrella for all the other clubs the members are nominated by teachers and staff which allows them to be selected and feel special we organize many events in HRC including the teen Summits where we form a positive community and get to meet many people from different schools it helps individuals learn how to advocate for themselves and each other and promotes peace and positivity also HRC organizes student panels where we talk about the stuff that many students believe is not talked about where we mention concerns and opinions based on the school conditions that were brought up to us by Anonymous members we also have the save promise Club save stands for students against violence everywhere and in this club we promote a positive atmosphere and prevent violence inside our school for example we encourage students to be upst standards instead of byst Standards so one of the activities we had under this club was to start with hello campaign and it motivated students to start their day by uplifting others and branching out to new people it also made students feel welcome we also did the lunchtime mixer where we just set up different categories like Arts Sports sports music and we had students select their interest and get to know other students in our school through that and it was very successful um we did The Trusted adult postcards and it lets students know they have adults that they can trust and go to if they have any personal issues in their life the final Club is the choose peace stop violence Club where we spread the message of Peace one of the activities we did for this club was the chalk for peace where students went outside and let their creativity flow using chalk on the school concrete the drawing allowed them to express themselves and up uplift themselves as well as their peers another activity we had was wear white day where white symbolized peace having everybody wear something similar gave them something to bond over and talk about allowing them to meet new people and make new friends we also did positive social norms training which welcomed positivity into the school it taught students how to stand up for themselves and others and the Speak Life and bullying musical which gave Insight on bullying consequences and everyone has it showed how everyone has reasons to act the way they do and it was a fun and unique way to show that and lastly we did the Black History Month quilt and it shows support for different cultures ethnicities and backgrounds by making different parts of a quilt that signified important parts of Black History Month and it was another way to support self-expression through collaboration in the end although there are many clubs with many different names they all have one main goal and that is to support mental health and build relationships between students and their peers and teachers all these Club all these clubs allowed students to find their inner peace whether it's through Hands-On activities or collaboration we welcome everyone to find their Outlets by supporting ourselves and each other and uplift each other when times they're rough and even when times they're good we still support each other and stand behind each other thank you thank you very much next is Caleb Campbell good morning student board members my name is Caleb Campbell and I'm the president of black St Union at South BR High School I was the vice president last year and have been a part of the club for my entire High School career this year as president my purpose and goal for the club is to give everyone an opportunity whether it be culture experiences service hours or historical Insight many think that since it's the called the black student union only allowed for African-American students which isn't the case the club is inclusive and anyone from any background can join and participate we do many service projects and collaborate with other clubs like history Honor Society and the Hammerstein Hollywood history and Virginia Beach cleanup where I learned many historical facts about Virginia key being the first black Beach of South Florida and Dana being the first city of brow County we strive for participation and excellence in the club especially in Black History Month which is our time to shine as a club and go above and Beyond we host an Ann an annual auditory contest sorry where students can perform and display poetry by figures who contributed to the cause for African-Americans or African descents I feel accomplished when everyone comes together to participate like one Beloved Community a philosophy Dr Martin Luther King upheld has contributed to the incline of my mental health along with the members and it has also opened up many opportunities for me like being able to speak on a panel for the Martin Luther King teen sum and here to you today although these accomp although these accomplishments are exciting I still face hardships just like Dr King being president or leader isn't easy still it is nothing I have not overcome I love and prioritize the club I lead and is nothing I regret I do it to leave a lasting impact on the students and the school itself and hope a Beloved Community remains thank you thank you very much okay well now now go to board discussion thank you for all the students for coming out um Miss Thompson didn't realize I was first but that's great um thank you so much for putting together this presentation I think it is much needed in the district and I hope it's one of many um because as you said there's a lot of great things going on but I do think there's some room for improvements um so as many of you know my background is in mental health I'm the only mental health professional on the board so I say all of this with much respect and I hope you take it that way um so my first question is how are students support instructional ssis people trained Dr heurn miss winter so part of the part of the criteria for ssis has to do with um their years of experience with mental health so in order for them to qualify for the role they had to have had um a degree in mental health or similar respect but also have had years of experience in uh work with youth as well as work directly in mental health and I just want to share some feedback I've gotten from different schools is that they have been told that their ssis people are not mental health people that they are there for crowd control they are there to spot similar to what the speaker said she's there to to be in the community than take them to the mental health professional um I think there's a lot of overlap in the variety of positions we have um so that's some feedback on that uh when our students are returning from hospitalization or Baker Act what is the process that they are being supported Miss H thank you I'd like to defer to miss Summers or good morning um our process when students return from a Baker Act um there's two steps so if the Baker Act was initi um initiated by the school we have a suicide risk assessment that's done and also a safety plan and then the school continues on with the safety plan and they uh let all the stakeholders know parents teachers whoever needs to know whoever touches that student if a student has a baker act that is not initiated off campus we ask that the mental health professionals still meet with the student and assess their current level of functioning through a suicide risk assessment and also a safety plan as well and that continues on and communicated to all stakeholders that work with the student thank you for that for clarification who is the point person for that student when they return the point person is typically the school counselor okay thank you um you might as well stand up so for suicide prevention curriculum can you walk me through that curriculum and the use of videos in the classroom well through our Suicide Prevention curriculum um there is one video in the Middle School curriculum uh the suicide prevention curriculum is for fifth graders uh that one is called riding the waves the Middle School curriculum is called look listen and Link for sixth through e8th graders there's one video that talks about suicide and a student who is struggling with their mental health um and some different scenarios in middle school and the high school curriculum does not include a video and that is called Help is here okay and when you're showing these videos who's in the room well for our curriculum um we have it's typically what school we're going to we do provide consent forms and they are watching the video so it's the students the teacher um and the facilitator are the teachers uh who are facilitating those our teachers on special assignment so there's a trained facilitator in every classroom where that video is showed yes we do uh our teachers on special assignment do those curriculum primarily okay um that's all on suicide thank you thank you and then I want to just dive in a little bit more because we talk about how each school has assigned social workers and there's a mental health professional at all times in every school um how many schools do school psychologists have Dr Ard Miss hollinworth I'd like to call on Miss Egan for that the majority of our school psychologists have about two locations but it is based also on case management so our supervisors of Psychological Services are frequently monitoring the number of cases at each individual site and if they need to deploy additional staff or you know regroup staff they're constantly doing that to make sure we're meeting the needs of students okay and how many so School psychologists primarily in my experience are doing testing and evaluation so you're saying that each school psychologist only has two schools that they're in charge of the eval valuations in the testing as a you know I I can't tell you exactly because we do it based on the needs of the school as well but there's usually no more than two and they do in addition to testing and evaluation they're also supporting students academically and behaviorally sometimes with um supporting our mtss process and ALS always supporting our mtss process but sometimes they're also doing some individual support for students and communicating with families and stakeholders okay and um for school social workers how many schools do individual social workers have good morning good morning I think it's good afternoon thank you for the question that's f um our social workers uh they they are either full-time out of school which many schools do have a full-timer the others may have two to three our Bilingual School social workers only have two schools depending on whether it's an elementary school or middle school will deter how many schools they have as well due to the case load I would like to see a followup uh breaking down social worker assignments because as a social worker I had four schools my colleagues that I continue to talk to has three-ish schools and then one bilingual social worker has one primary school but 10 schools that she's the bilingual social worker for um so if I could get that data that would be awesome absolutely thank you um school counselors they one per School Dr heer Miss hunsworth yes typically the school counselors are one per school and Dr Shapiro if you'd like to add anything to that yeah so elementary schools have one per one per school um those that have over 700 can have more than that um typically the middle schools have a director with two counselors but uh school counselors but depending on their population um determines the amount and then high schools also have a director with with um school counselors working with them depending on the student population and what tasks are school counselors doing while they're at school breaking it down by gr by level please yeah um so what all of them I'll I'll say what all of them have them common and then I'll break it down um but what all of them have in common is um the first thing they want to do is build relationships in the school and make sure they know their students um they also use data to to understand their students and their needs they do individual counseling sessions which are brief solution focused sessions they do group counseling based on the needs of students and and the data they do School counseling classroom lessons they do schoolwide initiatives like kindness initiatives and other initiatives that support students mental health and they do community initiatives bringing in mentors tutors Community Resources to support students and bringing students out into the community to um uh for their benefit they also facilitate parent teacher conferences to make sure they're productive and and positive and um help the students they consult with staff uh administrators parents teachers to give the school counseling perspective and they connect students and families with Behavioral Health Partners so all of them have that in common um in the and they also so every they're assisting students in academics in uh in the life skills and wellness and also in College and Career Readiness so that's at all levels um now it looks different at the elementary school especially for College and Career Readiness um and as uh students progress into middle and high school they're making sure they're in the correct courses they're making sure they're on track for graduation they're making sure that they're developing a meaningful education by platforms like Zell where they do strengths inventories interest inventories and start to promote um post-secondary options um also facilitating financial aid scholarships um and systemic ways of making choices about their their next steps so I hope that's helpful that is helpful thank you um and then I know these questions seem a little random sorry um and then the Terrace metrics behavioral health screening I understand that that's in about 30 schools yes 36 and then once those screenings those students are identified who is in charge of the casework for those students identified so I'll I'll speak uh I'll start to speak about it and then um defer to colleagues uh so it's um District staff goes to the school and um Works along with the school administration to organize the implementation um the students have to be opted in by their parents in order to participate uh once they're opted in uh the a school a trained School staff member delivers the uh the assessment um once the results come back they're immediately reved viwed so students who are in a category one receive immediate support because their um their results show that and then if they're Category 2 it's within uh 24 to 72 hours if it's Category 3 and and so on so the results are um distinguished immediately and then support is is organized uh for them but who is providing said support the uh school counselors social workers uh depending on the need of the student the support is is provided okay um and then going back to social workers what would you consider a social workers task at the school they're probably the discipline that wears the most hats that's for sure um and they probably should have one in every school but we're getting there um if anybody finds more money but um um they have um over the course of the last several years definitely um aligned more with mental health duties um we tried to minimize the additional social service programs that we have I'm a social worker by trade as well so um and a clinician so that's what I've tried to also build in the program so that we have a balance of the Social Service needs as well as the mental health needs and that has increased in terms of what they're doing at the schools um but yes they are often doing btas sras psychosocial evaluations some of them if they have the opportunity um if they're full-time primarily they may do groups um and obviously see students more for individual counseling and monitoring and how much of their task is attendance-based in your opinion that's that's a big one too yes and obviously this year it's a lot more um and will for the rest of the year primarily because we are uh trying to get everyone acclimated to focus and the new foundational attendance protocol that's built into that sis and if you could explain why do you believe attendance falls under a social workers's purview um um thank you for that question because I have pondered that thought as well for many years um I will tell you historically and nationally that attendance falls mostly on school social workers Nationwide um and this the Department here even in the district used to be called School social work and attendance um but I I definitely don't agree that that should be one of their primary roles I appreciate their response um so I just want to kind of break it down for for my colleagues about really how Mental Health Works in a school compared to this amazing presentation that the staff has put on and I really than all the feed back um a lot of a social workers role like I said I had four schools was spent on attendance so we weren't actually able to do mental health as defined in the roles here I would say probably 3ish hours on attendance if on average um while you're at your one school one day a week you're doing RTI meetings and you're doing attendance so you're not truly able to use the skills and the trade that you've gone to school for the same with school counselors my school counselor at one of my school in a high need school was spending most of her time doing testing and then sras because there wasn't the social worker there every day to support her um and then our school psychologist in my experience had more than two schools and we're always out testing so the direct service component that we hope to bring to our schools in my experience and no disrespect isn't actually happening in our schools maybe not every school there should be I'm sure there are some schools that are great but overall I have concerns about what we are selling and what we are actually getting if that makes sense um so just summarizing three points and then I'll let other people take over I think there's a big Silo in our mental health so I I think school counselors are doing a terrific job at school counseling but they're not necessarily talking to school social workers or talking to school psychologists when we're all supposed to be a team serving students best um I would love to see a communication plan or interdisciplinary in team based at the schools so that everyone's on the same board I know no one wants more meetings but I think that would be a way that we're making sure we're using our amazing resources the best way um I think also establishing stronger roles it would be great to have a point person for the Baker Act again that's hard when a social worker isn't there every day or a school counselor is spread by multiple task and school psychologists aren't there every day I am a big proponent of having a school social worker in every school I think that will be life-changing for a lot of students um and it will also alleviate some of the burden on our other mental health SL School curriculum planning um so a way to establish stronger roles not just for those professionals but also for the principal so they can know how to best utilize the people that are in their schools um and also that would help with marketing because I can tell you my elementary students don't know who to go to if they're sad like my personal children um I asked them last week who would they talk to and they said maybe their teacher and the teacher would call you I was like well yay um but there needs to be a better communication of what these people do and I think one of the ways we can do that is by allowing more social workers in the school so they can do groups people know who they are same with school counselors to make sure that their task are are actually mental health based um and then finally just I know we have amazing programs um really siphoning some of them down so that we can put more funding into the amazing professionals we have so we can have more social workers so that it's only one school psychologist per school so we can really truly um maximize the support we're giving and have the greatest student impact I know that's not you guys that's us and Dr heern um but I'm just putting that in the universe that we have really good supports and we have really good programs and we have really good people we just might not be using them in the best way possible thank you so much thank you Mrs Leonardi thank you um and I wish our students were still here because I really wanted to acknowledge all of the students who spoke before us today and all of the students who are doing the work at our schools um I think as adults we have a lot to learn uh from you know the the insight and bravery and um thoughtfulness and kindness of our students so I just wanted to acknowledge those students as well as well as the adults in our schools and at the district who make that work possible all of the club sponsors um you the the MTL sponsors the 5,000 Role Models um the the folks who sponsor the black student unions all of the groups that we heard from today there are adults often doing work for free uh to support those those causes so I just wanted to acknowledge them as well um in the presentation uh specifically following um you know taking us through the day of a the life of a third grade student Emily um there was a specific example mentioned that uh after a teacher confirms that Emily uh is anxious the teacher connects her with the school social worker how does that happen Dr heurn St so that was one example um of a connection to a mental health professional often times they may call the front office and ask for an escort to the social work uh office or call and see if the counselor is available so it really is looking at how the teams work at that particular School site as to who the teachers connect them to and that's why we try to make sure that we emphasize that there's multiple staff members that are on the School site so if the counselor is ever busy you're still aware that you have a social worker you have other trusted adults so that's kind of a a sight by site um process okay so because I think it's very important for us to get into the the concrete details of this and I think Mrs Thompson um did a good job of that just now um so I'm a I'm a teacher I'm concerned about the mental health of my my student I get on the phone and I call the front office who then calls the school social worker or the the counselor like at because 5 years ago when I was in the classroom we would go online and file do a a school of social worker referral does that not happen anymore Dr heurn staff thank you yes that is the process but the the urgency is what's the point here because that that then bypasses that um we always inform our social workers that that's the best way to get referrals but not if it's in a crisis situation um they can immediately send the student or have someone walk the student to the school counseling department that's typically where the social workers may be so that they can see them right away okay um in the example that that was given you know just one example it did not seem like a crisis situation and I'm not going to pick apart like the the different hypothetical examples that were presented us to us here today but I think it's demonstrative of um maybe a need for uh concrete communication about how these things play out in our schools um because for me as a teacher it was different schoolto school um and I think as Mrs Thompson Illustrated for us the school social worker may not be immediately available as well as the counselor as well as the school psychologist so I will just say in my experience um you know I had students who were in crisis and they could not meet with a mental health professional and I think that is a reality uh today um and that is my immediate concern um a comment was made about uh if we had more money uh we could have more school social workers and I I um am a little frustrated because in previous years we've had uh extra funding in the mental health allocation of our referendum to the tune of $8 million um so I'm wondering where the disconnect is there and I I know that preceded you Dr heurn um but it is frustrating to hear that we need more money for school social workers which I I think is a reality that we all are aware of but the the frustr my frustration is around well we've had this money and we roll it over and then we allocate it to things that are not mental health related so can someone speak to that Dr hurn yes so um we'll have to look at the situation um my first time hearing about the uh the need for additional social worker we've always talked about the need for additional mental health support services and that could span the gamut of people and also um uh products um that we may purchase to kind of supplement our needs so um as the board has directed us in the past to spend that money to the to zero um that's what we've been doing uh so we'll look at the the need for additional social workers and take the appropriate path necessary thank you and I think Dr hurn you've done a very good job of just organizationally breaking down the silos um and I it it seems like to me that this is one area where we need to work on that um and my last question is around attendance since Mrs Thompson brought that up I think this is a topic we've discussed in the last few months but what is the the plan around improving attendance um countywide Dr heer so um I I'll let them talk about some um current strategies but we have a future Workshop coming to discuss attendance and strategies um many of our schools that we've been concerned about their attendance rates um as a result of of strategies that have been implemented um those attendance rates um have decre the absentee rates have decreased I also have a work group of principles that have some best practices that they've been working on and sharing with their colleagues but but you can talk about um any additional things as far as current state but we have a future Workshop to talk about attendance and strategies to continue to address our absentee issues yes so we have been working um regularly with school principes with social workers um actually with community members as well we have a couple of attendance um committees working on what strategies can we put in place that will get the message to those that need to hear it I am happy to share that our average daily attendance rate has increased we're almost at 94% on a consistent um day-to-day basis through just individual interventions that schools have put into place but one of the main things with the transition to focus is it has made it very transparent um and easy to pull reports which wasn't the case before we can with a click pull the number of students who have 10% or more absences are they unexcused absences versus excused absences um and being able to pull the data that quickly allows us to intervene in a targeted Manner and those interventions are going Beyond just the school social worker it I've worked really hard just in the time that I've been task assigned to make sure that everybody understands attendance is everyone's job just like mental health is everyone's job attendance is everyone's job like the teacher probably has the best relationship with the student and the parent and they should be the primary and first point of contact not just like okay there's a problem here get the social worker involved no make contact by find out what's happening and if there is a social barrier a social services need then yes refer to the social worker but if it's just um maybe they don't understand that coming to school every day is important you can handle that conversation as well so changing some mindsets but also um One new intervention that's going to be rolling out next week I think it is or or this week is focus is generating automatic attendance letters that will go to parents at 5 days 10 days and 15 days that used to be manual process that we'd have to pull reports and then the social worker would have to get the Letters Out and those are being generated automatically in Focus the school administrators have to go in check make sure they're accurate and they Auto send on Friday so like there's no thinking behind it and then it's on the parent to then schedule a meeting because if a letter goes out then it has to be followed up with or the letter will continue to go then the attendance um case manager whoever it is will have to go in and document what's happening otherwise the letter just continues to go um so there's a lot of new things that are coming we're also working on a new uh marketing strategy for the upcoming year to be able to make sure that parents understand the importance of their kid being in school all day every day um and what that does for their academics and um so that's something that we're really going to push out a little bit stronger next year some more literature around it and getting right to the parents level but not just SOL relying on the social worker thank you and shout out to all of the teachers who are making those attendance phone calls um taking hours after school to do so um so like you said you know it is a everyone's job and um I know that our teachers are taking that seriously as well um and just the last point I want to end on um I don't want us to forget about the mental health of our most vulnerable population ations that are very scared right now um particularly our lgbtq students um you know and our our immigrant students I am hearing from our schools that people are very scared and I I hope that we are doing the work um of supporting those most vulnerable communities um you know obviously mental health is something that impacts students regardless of um their different identities uh but there are higher suicide rates um for for different communities and I I just hope that we can we're I know we are doing that work but I I hope we continue to do that work to support um those communities that are disproportionately impacted thank you thank you Mrs rert thank you uh my question's on page 11 and um very interested in the Baker Act Transportation pilot program partnership uh I'm not not sure if um Miss Thompson already covered this I had to step out and get my winter coat and gloves to come back in so please forgive me um so if if somebody can tell us a little bit about why this was started i i as a parent understand why um but I think it's important for for people to know that and are we seeing positive outcomes with this pilot program Dr heer miss winter thank you for this question we've been working on this pilot program uh for a while um I actually left a meeting this morning in order to get here uh because all of the agencies were coming together so um there's a a collective approach it has not started yet it's in the final phases um and it's scheduled to begin uh very soon uh but it's a it's a collective approach between the Broward County Human Services the Community Partnerships division Broward Behavioral Health Coalition BSO and and and various agencies like the hospital receiving facilities for our students uh and the goal behind that is to start with nine of our schools that have EBD programs um so that rather than students being transported with a police vehicle that they are transported with an ambulance service and so uh this morning was just one of the final conversations for final input before we actually started and so we look forward to Gathering data over the next few months and into the beginning of next school year to look at uh the impact of students and and the Poss possible trauma that's associated with uh that transport process and hopefully this pilot will give us great information uh to possibly expand it to um many of our schools throughout the district so that all of our students can uh be reduced in their traumatic experience in that way that that's awesome thank you and I also know that municipalities are more and more having somebody as a de escalator going to the houses on these calls because as we know many many many calls go there first before um quite frankly the they they get the health help that they possibly need so I'll be curious to really see I mean from my perspectiv is a positive and and I hope that we're able to implement that soon and look forward to hearing from that but um I also wanted to talk about and thank you um miss lardy about our family's fear and anxiety uh about our new federal mandated immigration status how are we helping our students and families through this very troubling times and I know we have a policy from last time and uh we had a best practice that we were doing uh are we still following that policy and is there another part of it that we have to um actually um you know help with either creating more policy or or finding out um you know protocols where are we with that aspect because it is happening right now and especially in um you know in my area a lot of the pump Ando and deer Beach they're they're very frightened so Dr heer yes so um thanks for the question I know there's some things going on in Ry County right now as we speak um we're getting the information as as we're talking here um but specifically for our schools and I'll have Dr Fon provide um additional information um we've sent the memo out to the principles already just um detailing how you should approach a situation if anybody's coming to gather student information or even see a student we simply Following on guidelines um you need specific documentation to see Student Records um you need specific documentation to actually see a student also um no different than when a police officer usually comes to our campus to exercise a warrant or to detain a student for something that's happened outside of Campus so it's the same very protocols um but we also um have a additional layer with the support of our Esau Department if it is a immigration related issue where they're ready to deploy and provide services to the school to the students and to the and to the family so we monitor daily um just to make sure that we can respond appropriately to any and all situations that are coming across um and and working with Partners outside of our schools just to take the temperature PS um if they have any specific questions because often times the communication to some of our other um constituents in the county or groups of people around the county they like they they will receive it better from their support system if it's a local church if it's a local um organization that they're used to engaging with um and then Dr F there there if there's anything in addition um to what I um just mentioned you want so I would say you you are correct and certainly we are monitoring the new developments that are going on and um it's it's everchanging information that's coming out there and it's actually causing a lot of angst in our communities and even our schools and so we've been working with uh Mrs Sada who is over at Esau department and prior to all of this happening we we've had an immigration support plan in place for probably about 7 years now right and so uh we we have been supporting all of our students especially our immigrant students we will continue to support them as well to uh we're reaching out to schools but the main thing is we're having schools let us know where there may be some anomalies in attendance or lack of attendance with certain groups of our students we have not seen any as of yet not to say that they that may not be something in our future but we want to make sure we're keeping a pulse on what's happening with our students but the the most important thing that we want our families our students and our staff to remember we will continue to provide a very inclusive environment for all of our students all of our students are welcome in brow County Public Schools and we will continue to educate them and support them as their needs arise thank you and um through the superintendent uh follow-up question um I've been hearing about absences that it's it's increasing so these students are staying home what kind of outreach are we doing to them and are we able to accommodate um our classroom instruction uh how how does that go on do they are is somebody discussing maybe Broward virtual uh I mean I don't think this is I don't think we've even hit the Apex yet so Dr heer yes so we've been actually monitoring attendance we haven't seen any anomalies in attendance yet so um uh once the messaging got out about changes in um immigration policies at the federal level we started monitoring attendance because we you know we went through this iteration um before so we haven't seen any anomalies um we we're certainly provide as as much support as possible um including our virtual uh our virtual franchise if needed um as far as um providing um learning opportunities outside of virtual uh our virtual franchise we can't do that because because there is no such thing as hybrid learning and all those things anymore uh so we have to stick within the guidelines and the rules of the of the doe for um for the state um but we're we'll provide as much support as possible because we know there are situations that could happen if a parent um may get deported and then the kid is is is a citizen and stays here um and may get caught up in the Foster system and whatnot so we we have all those connections with organizations to help us identify who those kids are and then we'll deploy to the sport that's that's needed to make sure they stay align with their academic needs that's that's awesome thank you thank you so much um that that's it for me all right thank you Dr holess thank you madam chair I appreciate the opportunity to respond to the wonderful students that we've had here today I thought they were very impressive and in fact um I heard one of her I think she's 8 years old from the elementary school said sometimes life can be tough it was adorable and I was very impressed with that because that is AB absolutely true and the kindness Club can help you when life gets tough right so small acts of kindness we can learn a lot from that as adults and I certainly appreciate that so I know the kids are gone but I would be remissed if I did not say let's just give them a round of applause because they were just so wonderful and so um I'd like to thank you Miss Veronica Winters for for such an awesome presentation this is well planned well thought out and thorough and we appreciate it when we see this kind of quality presentation it is impressive and I thank you so much you and your team everyone in the team Miss Stevenson I believe and we have uh um Miss Miss uh uh Gluck did I say that correctly and the others thank you thank you so much now I just wanted to um talk about a couple coup of things from other board members who mentioned uh some points that I thought were interesting and then I'd like to mention some of my concerns um so board member uh Thompson uh she's not here right now but she did mention uh to which the superintendent responded uh regarding um the um um the social the number of social workers that we have throughout our district um and service in our schools and I can recall also there was a concern regarding the um the job that these social workers are doing as opposed to actually doing social working right so um I do recall we had an item way back where we changed a job description um of our um guidance counselors I believe I'm not sure if we did that I believe we did it for social workers as well for all of them so I am quite surprised to learn here today uh from board member Thompson inquiry that our social workers are still doing um or appears to be doing um uh you know duties outside of their job description that this board uh revised those policies to ensure that they're doing uh the specific job of Social Work and guidance counsel so uh Dr heurn can you speak to that because I am hoping that we are adhere to the policy that this board created Dr heer um if I can get the team to address that I don't know if we actually changed the the description of social workers and if so what are the specifics in the the task and responsibilities go ahead um so I'll start and then I'll I'll kick it over to Mello but what I would argue is that um School social workers help address barriers to academics to education and um when they do work around attendance often times what we find when we do peel the layers of the onion back there are barriers to them being able to access their attendance um they may not have school uniforms um they may not have transportation there are social service barriers that th that is within what school social workers um their job description and what they should be doing um I will ask Miss satell to talk specifically about the job description and if that was updated thank you Dr Washington um the job description of the social workers was reviewed along with all the other job descriptions that we made revisions to there was only one bullet changed on the job description for the school social works at the bottom that said other duties as assigned um because their scope of work is is completely aligned with their job description as is their job description it's a variety of things psychosocial evaluations Community Connection parent connection with teachers all all of that so it's not like there was anything out of the scope of work again in reviewing it really and reflecting on the concerns I know that I even speak of that they have that they wear many hats so you know we're trying to minimize those things that they need to do but to Dr Washington's Point um it's really the whole child that really they depend on their work on um because there's so many facets of what they need to do to support the families and unless you have other support staff perhaps at the schools you know some schools have commun on at times that help with things like this but it really does fall under their job description to support the students that way understand so uh now that that has been clarified that attendance would be under their job description I guess the concern that was expressed then is that they seem to be inundated with primarily attendance in some cases um so if that is the concern and tendences within the scope of the job description um can you reiterate how we're going to um deal with the concern of um their focus being primarily on attendance as a opposed to the wide range of um duties they have within their job description Dr heer yep and I'm going to pass it on to Miss Washington a minute but I want to build some context around the attendance issue coming out of the pandemic uh student attendance uh was a concern across across the country average of 30 35% up to 40% depending on the communities of absenteeism so it was a became a large concern for many communities hence why we we see more people um supporting initiatives around attendance including our social workers so that's why you're probably you're we're witnessing more support um uh from social workers and probably other roles within our district as as well as um replicating what other school districts are doing to address attendance needs and I think once we uh uh see a decline in absentee rates we'll see um other things that they're engaging in but I'm going thir and Dr I know you pass it over but I have a followup to that so then it appears because there's a greater need to focus on attendance due to certain factors then their work sort of increase as far as that area so um we did mention uh would you say then because we did talk about increase in the number of social workers would you say that increas in the number of social workers would um allow them to focus on the other areas that they should be focusing on instead of being completely inundated with attendance I I can't give a definitive yes on that I would have to evaluate um what's going on um because I know just like Miss Dr Washington mentioned earlier um attendance could be a result of many factors going on in a home or outside of a home um that's causing a student not to come to school so peeling back that onion you find there are some um some issues that are causing mental health stress there are some issues that are causing homelessness and things like that um so I won't be able to answer that question till we dive dive into what's going on what's our current state um analyze it and see what we need to do to fill any gaps that we've identified and that may result in the need for additional um understand so so what plan of action or maybe you can't answer that today but what plan of action can we have in place to ensure that the social worker is not only dealing with attendance but all the other areas that are of Need for students um in addition to attendance how do we how do we make sure that all areas are covered as board member Thompson had expressed that concern y um as so reflecting on what uh Miss Thompson and um Miss Leonardo miss miss about to call you miss Leonardo Miss Leonard Leonardi ever since I heard that a couple of months ago Miss Miss Leonardi U mentioned is really looking at if we are op have some silos and operating isolation within the department itself and breaking those barriers down just to make sure there's a cohesive system of support across the board so evaluating it looking at what our current state is looking at what our desired state is and then coming back we can come back with some specific answers and specific plans of action of how we're going to address those needs not a problem did you still need to go to staff or do you want if she remembers what the question was go ahead I do I think um some of the concerns around attendance um previously a lot of the processes were manual and it made the work a lot more just tedious it was yeah it was just a lot and I think um with our shift in ensuring that everybody understands attendance as everyone's job in the system it's not as as a former School principal when I had a kid who you know an attendance issue the first thing I said was call the social worker like I'm guilty of that same thing but now I you know in this in this role And discussing just across our division and all of the supports that we provide attendance is everyone's job and that is the message that we have shared in every principal meeting meting that we have been to we talk within our groups of of individuals with the school counselors like what is your role in attendance what is the mental health professionals role in attendance what is the social workers role in attendance what is the teacher role what is the administrator's role and then by automating some of the the letter systems that also helps with um taking some of what they had to do that just took so much time it has taken some of those things off their plate okay so Dr Washington I can safely say that now right yes um okay so with that in mind considering that we're automating the uh a lot of the attendance um procedures um uh now that that's taking place uh would you say that board member tomson's concern is no longer that great of a concern because the strain that was on the the time of the social worker to pay attention to attendance has now been alleviated I wouldn't say that it's to totally been alleviated I would not um they wear a lot of hats they have a lot to do so I but does the automation of attendance impact the the time to Which social workers were spending on attendance I will say it helps okay but it doesn't totally alleviate it no understand so it's still a work in progress all right good so I have a um uh those were my followup to board member Thompson but I wanted to make some other comments now I did hear um issues regarding uh that was mentioned by Miss uh Veronica Winters regarding um a lot of effort in awareness of resources and also a lot of effort in how to access those resources all right so um you know I have two sons in BR County Public Schools one of them uh is an ESC child and um what I realized for a lot of ESC students when they have compounded issues on school grounds that in addition to their learning challenges it really makes for uh a great stressor on them and so being able to for the staff to be able to identify their stressors and to intervene and respond to them is very important so I did notice that um my son was in one high school and now he's in another high school and there were inconsistencies it appears in the um identification process of stressors as well as the intervention process and I have to give uh I don't know if they're saying kudas anymore but thumbs up to Piper uh because the team there the guidance counselor the ESC team the principal Miss hardigan have done a phenomenal job and I see where my son stress are reduced significantly and his learning outcome increased significantly I can imagine this is the same for many parents because I've experienced it myself self so Dr heern how do we create consistency in terms of how schools identify stresses that students are going through that impacts their mental health and how do we then create consistency in how schools intervene because on a personal level I experienced completely two different approach from two high schools one of them being very effective and the other one slow to respond slow to intervene that had I not make changes it would have impacted my own son personally so how do we fix the inconsistencies among schools to make sure that everyone is on the same page Dr heer yes thank you for the questions um so to to simply answer that right update make sure our processes are meeting the needs of kids at the individual schools but also train Monitor and continue to support so make sure our school St for well trained to identify and address the needs we also need to have robust mechanisms to monitor um our our regional support teams with regional soups directors um mental health uh folks that are going out to schools and then continue to support if we find those GS okay so how do we evaluate the success of intervention and identification of mental health or stressors that kids experience across the district or districtwide I'll let the mental health staff um talk about how outcome comes um look as far as the successful successfulness of it go ahead all right I'll I'll start but I think it's it's looking overall at the wellness data that I referred to previously um uh as you know the director over the department that manages Behavior right behavior is communication it's a way a student communicates an unmet need and so if we're meeting their needs the incidence of behaviors are going to go down so that's one way to monitor it right right um looking at in improved academic outcomes because if we can manage the stressors and we can intervene appropriately to your point into research Point um academics will improve their ability to persist when things get challenging will improve their ability to self-manage will improve so I think being able to look at some of those um there are some quantitative data points that we can look at such as Behavior such as referrals to outside um providers or even our internal social work referrals our School counseling referrals and just being able to kind of follow um students that have been referred are their behavioral referrals decreasing if that was their primary way of of communicating their unmet needs some of our kids um just internalize things and they don't outwardly behave but they still need the support and what does that look like were they struggling academically before and now they're not were they quiet and disengaged in their school environment and now they are engaged in their environment so I don't think there's like one specific way we can measure the impact of what we're doing I think it's very kid specific situational and we have to be looking at all aspects of it and I will tell you that in our team we do look at all of those aspects like H that's an interesting thing that's showing up in the data like what's happening okay great so so then I I would like to Dr Hein uh for the district to explore ways to improve identifying students that need Mental Health Resources because we have significant amount of resources and support that we provide but if we don't identify them I remember um when Dr W and I when we went to the the last um sort of redefining meeting it says if they don't know they won't go right so if they don't know that these resources are available they will not access them and including parents um so how do do we create how do we improve on identifying students and parents identifying the resources creating greater awareness and I don't know how that can happen maybe there can be a survey that we sent out to parents are you aware of these resources that we offer you know um and and how how can you access these resources what would you like to see us do better in terms of mental health and so on a very simple survey can give a lot of inform answers from parents and other stakeholders um I just think there has to be better ways that we we capture and able to identify students because as uh Dr Washington mentioned some students internalize things they may not outwardly Express they have a problem but maybe if we have a survey that goes out to parents we will know they have a problem so what else can we do to um to identify students and then to intervene because we have the great resources we have the great support but if we're not identify students and bringing them to it then then they're just in place but they don't know so um I would like to and maybe on canvas Dr heurn I don't know how much we put on canvas but maybe on canvas students can um we can figure out ways to make students and parents be more aware of the great resources because BR county is a great place BR count County traditional schools I don't think there's anywhere any other competition we have that have more resources than we do at Broad County Public School tools but we just need to do a better job I think in making sure parents know and um that we have the best resources we have the best support and we will continue to improve our identification process and we'll continue to improve our awareness of these resources and I'll just say this one more because I love this part choose the best choose BCPS right thank you appreciate it thank you Mrs alad thank you thank you to staff Dr heern and to the students for coming today and and speaking this has been an amazing presentation and um it's been as long as I've been on the school board one of the best mental health presentations that I've seen thank you so much so my first question is in regards to the talk app and if if Dr he if you could speak to do we have statistics on per school like how many students are accessing The Talk app Dr heer Miss hollinworth so yes we do have uh statistics as of today we have over 70 students that have accessed that and then approximately um 15 that have been been referred for future and for deeper Services um but Dr holess must have already um had a a bird's eye view so talking about the canvas we have an alert that's going out to students via campus that has the talk app and other things he he must have known um so that's going out for students so that they are seeing that because really truly and I I keep hearing this and taking obviously very detailed notes about how do we really make sure that we're increasing that awareness to our students and our families of all the services that are available and really needing to continue to go on that road show and looking at that road show from different aspects because everybody receives their information differently so the talk app is on canvas if a student needs help or they're struggling they can access the talk app and fill something out and help will be on the way yes perfect so uh today with the students and in speaking um Mr sven's team will have a lot of video content for students social media posts to use thank you to miss luscom for bringing up the center for mind body medicine um I'm glad to hear that we're we're still doing it uh but we can prob do more of it and then one of the things in the slide deck I would have liked to see is an update of exactly where our funding is going to right as school board members you know it's our job to make sure the funding is being done responsibly and then where and what programs it's going to because you know if we need to put more money into more social workers well we need to know where we we're going to get that money from um or where it's currently allocated maybe there's a redundancy of some type of program I don't know but if we don't have eyes on what the funding and and money is then we can't speak to that thank page 13 of the P PowerPoint presentation the Terrace metrics Behavioral Health screener so I was glad to hear that we we started it we're doing it in more schools I think you said 30 two schools and so if you could just quickly speak to what that is and then also uh our parents needing to opt into this Dr heer Mr CH thank you yes thank you yes so this is a behavioral health screener and students take a 15minute uh screener that identifies their level of need um there's five different levels of need um the first one is an immediate need where there where where there's something urgent the second one is between 24 and 72 hours and the third fourth and fifth um incrementally are are less urgent and we still talk with the students and work with them and also send resources to the parents um so the program started with with four schools um it increased to 10 schools then 20 now we're up up to 36 schools so we're continuing to explore ways to build capacity uh to make sure that we we uh have the ability to roll it out at the schools and have the staff to to follow up um we've been advertising and getting out the message to parents as much as possible how important this is for students to participate and we're starting to see numbers rise but we want to continue to improve to make sure as many students are opted in so they can participate as possible okay so parents have to sign off that they agree to have their child do this screener yes okay and is there a cost to doing the screener no at this time um we're we're in an in-kind agreement with that company but that will be finishing after after this school year so we're going to be exploring uh an an agreement to expand it but that will be a paid uh each screener will have a cost okay so U Dr har I would be interested in seeing what that c what that is and how we can expand that in all of our schools I think this is only is this only being done at the high school level right now uh high schools and middle schools and middle schools right okay I I would like to see what that would look like uh then the bullying prevention um we need more more is needed we need to do more with with bullying and you know I I heard one of the students speak to doing an anti-bullying week that's great but I I still think that that bullying is a rampant in our schools and we need to do more to to stop that bullying from happening one of the resources one of the amazing resources in District 4 is Eagles Haven that was started after the the tragedy at Mar stowman Douglas High School my question Dr Hein is have you started to have conversations with Broward Health Dr heurn yes Mr akabo has scheduled the first round of meetings for for negotiations um we will have him and um some other team members on that at the table to discuss um the many of the items that that was added to the U motion for for negotiations with Whit brow held well I'm happy that this is started but for me Dr govern I would really think it's important that you are part of those negotiations yes absolutely um I've been in um communication with the CEO okay thank you uh the immigration support plan if you could please send that to the school board that was spoke about today Dr heurn that's noted and as far as Focus um they are on it text messages emails if your child's late to school absence they are on it so you know as I was hearing the conversation with the board you know when it was first brought up about social workers I wasn't comprehending that you know they were I guess looking into well why is this child after from school and what are they going to do about it it wasn't these like manual types of things because focuses is sending out those alerts parents are getting them in in a very you know timely manner and then the in school all day every day now that should be promoted now I don't want to wait to next year I want that to be put out whether it's on social media whatever that campaign is we need the students in our schools now so they can be educated and we can continue to be an a-rated School District thank you thank you Dr Zeman thanks chair National Institute of Mental Health tells us a lot of really great things uh they have a system for tracking teenagers and they say that 20% of our teenagers have considered suicide in the last 12 months this is one indicator of the epidemic and mental health that we're facing particularly amongst teenage women teenage young ladies I appreciate all the work that went into this to share the practices and the policies and the positions that are involved what the community wants to know is are we meeting the need chair are we meeting the need of Broward County students for mental health Dr heurn yes we're striving to meet the need with the resources that we have available at our disposal um and collecting as much feedback from this table and other constituents as possible to continue to our um efforts to improve I want to ask that question again but I want to ask it in a little different way um if 20% of our teenagers roughly give or take 880,000 people have Commit have actively considered suicide in the last years that means 16,000 of our students have actively considered suicide just as one indic of the mental health epidemic have we done something for those 16,000 students yes um I think the the team and um ni can add to this have done efforts to inform um through required instruction um that we provide on a yearly basis to certain grade levels just to make make them aware of certain um resources and and strategies um but of course we have areas for improvement to continue to to enhance that I appreciate that uh and while I've enjoyed listening to the students and the staff um talk about this I think we're missing an opportunity to really put together mental health strategy and what would be included to get to all of my colleagues points up to this point and by the way I appreciate a comment about social workers that was kind of thrown out there right um the result of a strategy would tell us among the ssis The Suicide Prevention coordinators the school psychologists the school counselors the family counselors the family therapists the social workers and the crisis coordinators it would tell us which of those things we don't have right where's the greatest demand where's the greatest contribution um it would start with the threat and it's not just suicide I I would say that one of the hugest threats that we have to our mental health right now is tens of thousands of our students are undocumented guests in the United States they are living under a duress that is almost impossible to explain if the superintendent is right and we haven't had any absentee growth uh about that I'd be shocked um these people are scared they're horrified they're traumatized just by the decisions that are being made and uh I think we'd be foolish to ignore that suicide is a is another one bullying is going on in in ways that we don't measure very well people do not raise their hand and say they want to check up from the neck up men in particular do not do that young men are told that it's a sign of weakness our teachers are the front line on this entire battle but what I'm looking for is a strategy it starts with the threat all the threats that I just described and I'm I'm not in your business but I can look at these things for my children and for the children that I know and I see it the statistics and it's a it's an epidemic and and then I want to know as Miss uh Miss uh alade but I think others pointed out how much are we spending on it compared to what we spent 10 years ago because the crisis started 10 years ago by the way not not to be missed it started with technology being introduced in the K through2 that allowed you to do anything you want 247 and and some policies that we've changed that allowed people to do it during the school day there's a great article written by Jonathan height that said how did this generation become so stupid and it's a great headline but it's a good point which is this generation is clearly different than the gener generations before and you might think about the Advent of Technology not just cell phones as as a cause of these things so uh chair what I'm looking for is a real strategy because to miss Thompson's point if we have social workers working on absenteeism that we can have other people work on why aren't social workers 100% of the time working on Mental Health we're in the middle of a mental health epidemic it's all hands on deck this board said every mental health professional will be fenced off from all the duties assigned chair have we done that for ssis suicide prevention coordinators School psychologists school counselors family counselors family therapists social workers and crisis coordinators Dr heurn without a rose what was the specificity of the question have we uh eliminated the line in the position description that this board decided over a year ago to take the line out of all mental health professionals that work for Brower County schools that says they can be assigned other duties not related to mental health if staff can um provide info what job descriptions came I want to say probably in the fall or last spring can't remember if it was all of those but I know we brought um some positions forward to strike that line out so I was going to ask if we could do a followup on that just no just no we can't because I asked this and the board asked this a year ago so why why why do we need to take like an action for this this should have been done the board made it very clear that we're in the middle of a mental health epidemic their Community is asking these elected officials to do something about it we did something I I hope it's been done well as I remember um from probably six what however months ago it was guidance counselors um social workers and school psychologists family therapists school counselors School social workers and the student support instructional specialist yes all on CH on page six is the ones that have that um last item from their job description stricken ssis yes sir uh Suicide Prevention coordinators that's I I don't believe that was taken out of that one school psychologists yes sir school counselors yes sir family counselors yes family therapist family therapist excuse me social workers yes sir crisis coordinators don't believe that was taken I'm going Dr Mr ASO so we're eight out of 10 eight out of 10 all right well I hope the next two can come next week because we are again and what I think the board is asking like individual tactical questions about is are we doing enough our job is to approve the budget if we're not doing enough we can do what we can to to add money where we need it but we uh can't and shouldn't be mental health experts you know other than some of us having you know been blessed by having great therapists in their in our past but um we do need to know kind of which one of these ingredients are working which one of these ingredients are in the greatest demand where are kids suffering in new and different ways where they need a a different reaction I'm very skeptical that social workers Miss Thompson should be doing absentees like it's just to me there's just so much need for social workers to be doing social work um that I hope that that we can think about this strategically again what does the strategy look like it starts with the need the demand what's the requirement it shows kind of how we're meeting that requirement now and then it gathers a mountain of data to come back and say Here's an area in which we are not meeting the need and here are the positions and the numbers of position i s uh that can do it um it probably would involve people like Landon and his friends helping us understand what this looks like on the pointy end like what is it what does the receipt of mental health look like in schools particularly high schools you know where we have uh a tremendous need and I know that you've gathered some information about that uh but I'm still interested in a mental health strategy that will guide our job the job of the school board is to set budgets and to write policies and in this particular venue uh the budgets and the policies have a big impact on kind of what the operations are uh we also approved a an item last year that excuse me a year and a half ago to expand the number of of therapists by 60 and so we will uh get a follow on that I've already submitted about uh what happened with those resources to make sure that those are um being spent in a way that we at least have uh visibilities on but we need to know whether we spent more money we we need to know what that money is being spent on we need to know where there's great demand that we're not meeting um so that we can answer questions about uh is it more therapists is it more um education of teachers is it is it more education of parents is it sit around and pray to hell that the world changes so that we don't have kind of the external uh threats that are putting our kids through uh through so much um I don't believe hope is a strategy uh but I do hope all the time all the time you know that things get better uh but in the absence of that actually happening I think that we are really in a in a time where uh school districts are thinking about substantial increases in resources and practices and policies uh and this school board being responsible for the money and the policy parts of that uh I think needs to play our role but the but the descriptions of practices and process and positions um is is a big part of that but I'm curious about what our strategy is and whether or not there is ways uh where we need either shift resources or add resources uh change policies reinforce policies so that in fact uh we can get after this because this is um something the community knows is a big issue it is a weird weird problem because people don't want to self-report they just don't want to walk in and say I'm depressed I'm anxious I think I have signs of this uh it's still perceived uh unlike physical uh illnesses as uh as something that makes you less of a human being you know by admitting it and until we get rid of that stigma um you know we're going to we're going to have a challenge getting it perfect but we still ought to make sure that we do the best that we can so I look forward to learning more uh at some point maybe another workshop on the actual strategy and and the ingredients that we have to go after the requirement and where we're not meeting the requirement and where uh we can adjust resources and policies in order to make a big difference thank you chair thank you Mrs famam thank you so much Madam chair um firstly I'd like to thank you for coming today and giving us this presentation and I'm I'm going to ask a lot of questions and I'm going to ask for a lot of data because I want a clear a picture and I think the board as a whole would appreciate that as well um first of all what I'd like to say is um in the past two years since I've sat on this board we've always had a surplus for mental health at the end of the year and it's been rolled over and we've also had a surplus for ESC students um I want to see as well what Mrs alaf spoke about I want to see an itemization of where our money is being spent so we can figure out where it's not being spent so we can use those excess funds where we need them I found it particularly disturbing that we had um an excess $10 million uh after covid but that money wasn't used during that time so that was really um disappointing as far as I'm concern um moving forward I I just wanted to say I'm part of I'm a designate on the Children's Service Commission and I don't know if you've reached out and partnered with them you didn't name them today specifically but we've been working on um children being Baker Act where they're taken even in Ubers or special cars um or ambulance but um not taking in police cars because I don't think we need any more studies I think everyone here on this board will agree that that's traumatic you're putting a police car and I think they're handcuffed as well so um I I I would like us to move forward we don't need any more data on that we we need to a fix um and if there is a private car service that we can come up with because I think the students even prefer that uh more over than going in an ambulance they just want to be discreet they don't want the school to be on notice that there's something going on and there's something wrong so I would suggest that you reach out to them as a starting point um I have other questions um one of the things is I know you discussed school counselors and you said um it depends on the number of students is on how you allocate how many school counselors what is the number of students what is the cut off is it 50 students the school counsel get is it 100 students please advise us uh person 700 students so there's one counselor per 700 and if it's over 700 in the elementary school they they get more and then in the in the middle school and high school they have a director and then they have uh they have additional counselors with them is director full-time counselor as well they're taking on 700 students a minimum some of the directors have a case load and others others don't have a case load but there's a director at the middle and high school level and then there's school counselors who are practitioners not not just not a director I would I if it's okay Madam chair I would like Landon to speak at this point because he's nodding no no no no so if you can let him speak as to what he's seen he's going to go after Miss pman if you don't mind go at the very end okay I have a lot of information I'm going over okay um in addition to this what I would like to do I wanted to see some data um specifically um I want to know you have on page 12 and 13 of your report specifically if you go um page 13 you have all these counselors listed and I I made a list of them I'll go over family therapist School social worker school counselor school psychologist Behavior Health psychology assessment assessment team suicide risk assessment team mental health assistance for crisis response team and then also on page 12 you have um instructional specialist Wellness Specialists mobile response team and I I assume there's a big act team I'd like to know how many people you have on our that how many that are working in our school district and how many students they're responsible for I think we need a breakdown to know if people are overwhelmed or in certain areas maybe they're underwhelmed where we can do some shifting but we need a whole layout of print out data of of saying who's out there not by name but by the amount of numbers in the middle schools Elementary and high schools and also um the number of cents that they're um been representing I would say in the past two or three years is that number gone up has it gone down you know we we need to know where we stand and I completely are with um Dr Zan here and support that we get data and one of the things I'd like to know as well oh is he here yeah one of the things I'd like to know he said there's 16,000 students that have attempted suicide I want to learn some data I want to know one I to assess our Effectiveness I know I want to know how many how many those Su what oh cons yeah that considered okay we won't say attempted I want to know how many attempted suicide was not successful and how many were successful and then I want the data to see how much how many students that we stopped and intervened in time to stop a suicide so I want to know are these uh just someone that's having a bad day that goes from zero to 100 and says I'm going to kill my or I want to know if these are really serious threats when we need to assess that you know what's going on this this we have to right now we're speaking a very broad range we have to bring it in and isolate isolate what's going on and I think that's what Mr Zeman is asking that we have to figure out and get our our hands around the problem ourselves to selfix we can't just do it in a general way and say you know well there there everyone you know we have 16,000 that are considering we need to know why we we need to get to the meat or the Grassroots or what's going on here because we're never going to be able to fix it you want to fix it at the end no we want to fix it at the beginning we don't even want to get to the end so I'm asking that we just start to acquire data bring it forth so we know exactly where we stand and why we're there how we got there okay um I have some other questions for you um um one of my concerns is I not just I I know we've been talking about attendance today it kind of flips around to this because you're saying um that attendance is a problem I do agree with Mr Zan we should have someone that's or team that's uh dedicated and committed solely to following up on attendance that shouldn't be our our our health workers you know they're too valuable so so we can have people placing phone calls to do that um what I would like to do is um say my concern is also the financial aspects we're talking about people leaving the districts voluntarily or involuntarily but that's going to impact on us financially if this District loses state and federal funding what are we going to do we have right now um a large majority of people that may not be here in the country um legally that might be returning on their own or made to leave so that's going to all impact the amount of uh finances that we have for this District so I want to know what the plan is for that what are we're considering doing um has that even been contemplated okay um another question I have is what how are we registering um students that don't have social security numbers what is the process for that how are we doing that because normally you have to come far with the Social Security number so you don't have to reveal your immigration status but they they usually ask for a social security number dror heer but I'm still going you don't want me to go through all of them I thought you did no I thought you asking a question no I'm still going um and then the last question is if you want to go ahead do I have I have no problem but I'm not finished but go ahead whatever you prefer Miss fam yeah and we can I'm writing down notes and we can certainly send all that in followups or answer as much as we can today when you're done if you are we considering the fact that we might have to give money back that if we have students that are removed that we accepted $8,000 for the year that that they're no longer here or eligible well um there's a specific process in students um H being in attendance During certain FTE Windows to get funding from the state from those students so not just students that may be impacted by deportation but a student that just may simply move in and out of the the area the county um so if they're not within a specific window for us we don't get the money anyway regardless of deportation status so and I'm concerned about the fact that the the law says that we can't even transport people that are illegal so we have we have kids on our buses we we might have bus drive I don't know but this all impacts this district and we need to to go over this and and I don't want to be the elephant in the room but this needs to be evaluated so I I'll ask Miss um Batista to kind of clarify as a as a school district within the State of Florida um what we're obligated to do under the law regardless of a kid's um documented status so um thank you for that question the so we as a district we are not able to keep data related to immigration status of any of the students we know that right um so um so I'm not sure what else you want me to add as far as as far as a institution of learning in the State of Florida um if a kid comes to our door regardless if they're documented undocumented black brown white ESC nonc what are we obligated to do under under law right so we we have to educate every every student every child that that comes to our district um that's not only by state law but also the Supreme Court has decided that in a Supreme Court case many years ago that every student needs to regardless of immigration status needs to be educated well this is kind of a different standard now we're actually um there's more affir affirmative action to remove illegals going on right now so I I don't know um I know in the past that this board um went again against a um executive order about masking and then we lost funds all I'm saying is how are we going to not go against an executive order um by I mean can we just look the other way or we GNA because that actual rule says it if you're um like willfully ignorant then that's still just as bad and people can be arrested they can be fined there's all kinds of consequences and penalties I mean are we going to put our teachers in that position and our staff where are we going with this are we taking affirm stance as that's it we're not doing anything it's not our problem you know if we have someone where we stand I'm I'm sorry I had a question for general counsel um because I I was under the impression we were uh discussing mental health supports for students um is this you know line of questioning pertinent to the workshop that we're discussing right now so no well we're talking about the mental health of students that may be deported I thought it it all looped together so we we're not concerned about the students that maybe deported their mental health I'll move on that's not what I said um I was just we're talking now about the like Social Security numbers and things like that not about specifically mental health supports for students so I was just I'm no longer chairing so I leave it up to Madam chair so if you it I mean it's just sounds like you don't want to have this discussion that's what I'm hearing loud and clear is that correct can can I maybe make a dis a suggestion that you send it as a a request for a followup through an email we're we're running an hour behind and the students are waiting to go so I I fine I just thought this was a public interest question that a lot of people have concern with because Dr Zan just scared that people are um just shared that people are scared and frightened I wanted to at least give people an idea of the foundation we're working on right but you wanted to follow up later so anyway can maybe we can work on a a workshop to share what the policy is and have a a place to ask these particular kinds of questions I'm not opposed to that yes or if you submit the questions or we're taking notes right now we could provide information via followup also heard the question about the need or uh if we need social ities or if students need Social Securities to enroll in our schools and also um we can follow up with some of the legals as far as federal and state laws to where we're obliged and obligated to educate every student that comes to our door I would I would support a a um workshop on this definitely because I think it's a great public issuance so okay I will move on then to other things um this is my other questions that I have and and another reason I'm asking that is because that's going to impact school club closures you know depending if we lose a large number of students we have to revisit that whole aspect as well and again that's a huge public interest to our community um one of the things I wanted to ask about I saw that we have partnered with um no place to hate am I correct Dr heer yeah team if y'all can elaborate on a on on that specific partnership we do um have schools designated hases no place for hate schools for completing pro-social activities such as anti-bullying week peace week we do not use any of the curriculum associated with the ADL where is the um curriculum that they use to train them and teach during that period of time for the bully and where can I find that and the parents find that online The Bullying training is available on the equity diversity and school climate web page for students parents staff everybody it's all there there is no curriculum associated with with no place for hate no place for hate designation is given for schools that participate in Red Ribbon Week for example peace week um they'll do kindness week the kindness Club these are after school activities that parents consent to have their child attend there's no curriculum associated with it okay well can I get a copy or the parents get a copy of what exactly there um students are being shown during these committee meetings because you're saying there's no curriculum are they just talking about nothing where can we get copies of what's being shown and taught at that point in time so every school that has an after school club they have to provide a permission form that talks about the when the where and the what is going to be covered in that and every parent has access to the club sponsor to get ask any questions that they have there's not a consistent in every single school they're doing this for anti bullying week it is driven by the students what their wants and needs are and it is sponsored by a faculty sponsor so each school is going to look different there's not one thing that we could put up on a website for parents to get access to they would need to go to their school and ask and and if I can add in addition due to the parental rights um act um parents have to sign off and um opt their kids into activities like that so the schools provide uh a variety of information um that um Dr Dr Washington just detailed and they have to sign and consent that their kids can participate in that I know some of the students mentioned um a film they had seen when they can I ask you the name of the film and and and Dr heer what was Sean thank you it's not a film there's a live play about bullying I got to um let me find out the name of it and is that through the school district that was made I think you referring to when they were U presenting earlier about U film yeah they said that they had been shown a film um I just wanted the name it's a live play um Tom's getting the name of it but it's again it's an extracurricular activity that parents consent to have their child attend even if it's during school hours but is that from the school district that live play or where did that originate from it's an outside organization that comes in that parents consent to have their child be a part of what's the name of that organization I'm getting it for you okay thank you I do have concerns because I don't support the Pyramid of hate I don't think children should be taught to hate and if you do this act or that act that means you're a hateful person I'm not a big supporter yeah I just want to clarify Miss fam that anything that we do outside of core core instruction or Core Curriculum um um extracurricular activities um be it Athletics clubs um or other student interest activities our parents are required to sign a consent form for kidss to engage in those activities um we don't allow kids just to participate in something without parent permission so just want to clarify that for for the board and the public no I understand that completely but parental rights says that the parents have a right to participate in the education of their children so if their child's being shown a movie or doing exercises they have the right and absolutely absolute right to know about that and that's why I'm inquiring so please don't shut that down abs Ely I just wanted to clarify for the board and the public is it we're going to move to U Mrs Bowman and then we'll come back when they have the answer to your question yeah I think really that's the last one I just and and how frequently is is the curriculum taught by I saw no place for hate counselors there is no no place for hate curriculum okay I didn't say it was no place for hate curriculum I said is the materials taught by no hate um no hate um no place for hate counselors are they I know according to our contract they come in and they teach teachers no they they also teach during I think it's um um what is it um here I have in my notes no no work has been done under the contract that you're speaking about so they haven't come in and done any training of our teachers or anything like that so that if if that's what your question is as as far as what is happening in our after school clubs those are Broward County Public School Employees whether they're teachers counselors administrators whoever is the club sponsor is the person responsible for facilitating the activities that students do do you have any no place for hate counselor sponsors we do not have anybody from the ADL coming in and doing work with students so does that mean the same thing if they're with the ADL then they're not a no place for hate counselor we don't have any no place for hate counselor I don't that was my question okay all right thanks you're welcome okay Mrs Bulman well thank you um so I would say that my colleagues have asked most of the questions that I had on my list um I can't stop thinking about the kindness club and all of the awesome presentations from the kids I think you guys did a fantastic job putting that together and um you know we had talked before this meeting about making sure how your one of your goals is making sure that the kids have some kind of connection to school to someone at their school that's so important for your mental health and I think you did a excellent job illustrating all the ways that you're working on accomplishing that so I think that's fantastic I mean this is a very heavy lift for any organization and the vastness of this is um demonstrated by everybody's follow-up questions and all the concerns they have but I mean you know I think that you guys are doing a great job you understand what the tasks are and you're really working in that direction so I really commend that um and I would just leave you with one thing because you know it's been mentioned more than once that the Mental Health crisis is really significantly precipitated over the past 10 years and Dr Zeman mentioned I think we agree on this you know technology plays a role in that so it's kind of a question of are are are we trying to fix an illness or a problem when you know when you kind of know what the the problem is but we're not addressing the actual problem of the technology that's actually causing the problem um and trying to put a bandaid on that I don't have an answer for that but I do think that maybe looking at that a little bit more deeply and how we can kind of um address the actual technology and what it's doing for our mental health would be a something to look into and thank but anyway thank you very much thank you to everyone who's here and thank you for all of the time and being prepared like you're in a congressional uh Committee hearing thank you Landon I'll be very quick because I know we're running behind and I'm excited about our next presentation I have a lot of feedback on this topic and I wanted to make sure that uh it's all captured so I will share it with you all offline in the sake of time uh but I have to I have to acknowledge in front of the board um the collaboration that Alana and I have with you all and your team very few things go through Dr Washington where she doesn't come and ask for my input or ask for greater student input uh and it would be wrong if I didn't recognize that in her commitment as well as a former student adviser miss winter so they're an amazing team um and I I have to I have to just say that when we School visits and in my personal School experience we see that our students are thriving in their connections with one another our students work together our students love each other no matter what barriers we don't teach students to hate one another we don't we in fact it's the opposite we teach students to collaborate and be kind to one another and I'm grateful for the initiatives that you all and your team have implemented at the school based level and I'm looking forward to additional continuous Improvement thank you madam chair this will be very quick I haven't gone yet oh I'm sorry after you okay yeah and we're is I'm only going to be two one minute not a repeat because it won't be a repeat thank you we're we've already cut into advisor's time um just a couple uh I have a couple of questions and some comments so um How are schools selected for the SSI we said that they have ssis in about 50 plus schools how are they selected we have ssis in 56 of our schools including all of our St schools and we looked at a variety of information from their discipline data their attendance as well as things like their SRA data to identify the schools that um would be best to start with our ssis as this first year okay and is there since it's data driven is there like a cut off where you decide or was it because we had 56 so if we had 60 would you how would you is there a cut off for that data or like how do we know if we need more I guess is what I'm trying to ask right does the data drive it or the number of employees we have is my question it's not a hard stop on the data it was kind of a fluid selection process just utilizing a variety of data points we have 40 ssis they're just located in 56 schools so there's a total of 40 of those positions gotcha okay perfect thank you for that um my other question is the life so when we took a a travel on the day in the life of a high school student and I'll say one thing before I ask my question I really appreciate the fact that you had them hold up the signs and stand there because it was a visual that was important when we talked to students they always say they just want someone to talk to so as you had people stand up it was and I'm sure that was intentional cuz I'm seeing heads nodding back there um but it was a visual for for us and I hope for whoever was paying attention to see how many places students can speak with an adult so that was really really good to have but um our our secondary student as he travels on the very first thing he um lands in a life skills class what what class is a life skills class I mean I know they have them specifically in the ESC um population but I don't know what that looks like in a in a gened population some of our schools have various electives and so some of those electives are tied to life skills and wellness so if you'd like to hear more we're going to defer it to okay Miss days just briefly thank you so as are have electives where they are supporting students and teaching them the competencies that we suggest in regards that align to our mental health resiliency lessons such as the self-awareness self-management and so forth the five that we mentioned and making sure that students are developing the resiliency skills uh to help them as well as help their peers thank you so on in a followup could you just send to all of us um a list of the electives that that would fall under just so we have it okay thank you and and I'll say really appreciated the student who spoke about the resiliency lessons and how it tied to technology as um board member Bulman just said because those are really important things for when you hear life skills or you hear hear resiliency you might not have initially thought of technology so that was really interesting to me because that is a life skill in today's world and knowing how to not get scammed um which I wish I had learned before Taylor Swift tickets went on sale um and you know so I I think that was really really important I also agree that we're not doing enough for bullying and not for lack of trying but that it's just a huge huge problem as we've had a discussion about so I think we need to continue to do that um and you've mentioned this already but I'll just repeat it and it's been said a number of times when we sat with the students and asked how would you like to get information they said from canvas that they look they have to log on there every single day and it's and and actually parents said through email um but I just it's important to make sure that we're sending out alerts that way on things that we want to make sure students are aware of and I you know really appreciate this I sit on this the Children's Services Council and the bbhc um so this was really really important to see how those dollars and what we talk about in other meetings how it rolls out in Brower County Public Schools and I'm just going to do a Shameless plug on March 2nd um at Plantation Middle School we're hosting a healing through the Arts which will include a lot of the mental health resources that are here um and students will be bringing their art to show how that works so it's from 9: to 2 and I would invite oh March 1st I'm sorry I keep getting days mixed up Saturday the Saturday March 1st um Plantation Middle School 9 to2 thank you so much um I so I know that we asked could we have two additional workshops one is on mental health strategies or additional mental health things and then also the immigration concerns that were brought up so if you'll please make sure that those come forward and did that cover what you wanted okay Dr holl have 30 seconds thank you Madam chair I will get it done in 30 seconds so I'd like to direct the superintendent doc through Dr fton um to bring back to the board an update on the implementation and success of policy revisions to the job descriptions of all mental health professionals where we um voted to strike out and other duties um secondly I'd like to direct the superintendent to look at any other Mental Health professional areas we left out such as Suicide Prevention and Crisis Intervention and any others that we may have missed to bring those job descriptions back to the board for further revision uh to include removing and other job duties from those um for a future board meeting okay so I'll just as I have heard over and over again one board member can't direct the superintendent to do okay so how can I do this so you might suggest a follow up on that or we if you want it to be a directive we can take okay well let's take a consensus on that because I think Dr Zan also mentioned this and this is absolutely really important so all those in FA all those that would like to direct the superintendent just just point hold on we're not voting okay giving a thumbs up we're giving a consensus that's not what it sounded like yeah okay but can I would like to speak on this okay go ahead so I do not think it's a good idea for this direction I think we have sat here for a few hours Dr Hein is aware of what needs to be done you know this is in his purview to be able to go through job descriptions and bring back what he feels necessary to the board I think that we are going down this roller coaster of having to vet out so many different polic IES and job descriptions that need to I think come it's coming from us I know that's our job as policy but the superintendent based on what he sees going on should direct you know bring it to us to then have to look at but I think this is not a good idea Madam chair may I speak Dr Holmes okay I would like legal counsel to guide us if I can during a workshop um ask for consensus on a direction to the superintendent as we are and as we are equally waited as board members to take actions M shock Adams thank you you can ask each board members for their thoughts on it to reach some sort of consensus okay so I'm asking now that legal has said I can do that I'm asking for consensus to direct to have the superintendent update the board on the implementation and success of policy revisions we've made to mental heal Professionals in striking out and other job duties and secondly for the superintendent to bring back the job descriptions or to bring the job descriptions for suicide prevention and Crisis Intervention professionals and any other mental health professionals for further revision Mrs rer uh agree or disagree okay um do um Mrs alad disagree Mrs Thompson agree agree okay I disagree Mrs Leonardi I agree I want the kids to come back too I agree Mrs fam Mrs fam okay yes Dr holess correct okay so where are we do we have consensus okay so and I would just say I I believe a followup does what you're asking for so I'll ask for a followup on these things and we've asked for the these things to come back at different workshops so yes um Dr fton so I want to thank um the student services team for an amazing job today in preparing to come back and bring this information for the board and for the community but I also want to thank Our Stars of the day our students who really did a good job giving us their lived experience on these Services support them every day I agree you thank you all for your time your effort it was a fantastic presentation and please bring the students back when you come back we really enjoyed them thank you so much and um our team just wants to acknowledge that part of our presentation highlighted the help is here initiative in that we want to make sure that every single student has at least one trusted adult so we have a gift for each of you uh so that you have the same shirt that many of our counselors our ssis um and our administrators wear so that our students can see that you are another trusted adult and that you support students mental health we appreciate you thank you so much and we're going to take a brief recess so that the student advisers can get ready for their presentation thank you all for coming today [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] you [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] a [Music] e [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] thank you and thank you uh welcome back to the board Workshop the next item up is the student advisor update on student engagement I now turn it over to Landon and Alana and staff for the presentation so good afternoon uh school board members District staff superintendent heurn um our colleagues across the district our honored guests with us today and everyone I'm Valerie wanza I am the chief strategy and Innovation officer for the school district um one of the highlights of the division of strategy and innovation is to actually support the work the advocacy and the activities of um Athletics and Student Activities of which the student advisers um work in concert with Miss Brown the director as well as Miss Santiago um the department liaison and I will say as the 1987 88 BCC Treasurer and sgaa president from Miramar High School it gives me great pleasure to with these fine individuals and we look forward to the conversation that Landon and Alana will guide us through today thank you Dr wanza chair Hixon Vice chair Leonardi superintendent heern and most importantly our 250,000 peers my name is Landon spelberg and I have the distinct honor of serving as a student adviser to the school board of Broward County collectively Alana and I are the 50th and 51st student advisers to the school board [Applause] I'm grateful and excited to be here today to provide an update on the work that we have been doing in engagement with our peers good morning my name is Alana barrero the alternate student adviser to the school board today we'll walk you through our process of speak up speakout sessions and the meaningful feedback we have SE received from students so far then we will look at the highlights from the superintendent student advisory committee meetings from the first semester then finally we will present a board requested proposal for the quarterly joint student and School Board discussions so who are we each year the Broward County Association of student councils holds election for the student advisor to the school board following the guidelines outlined in Schoolboard policy 1330 the student receiving the most votes is elected as student advisor and the student receiving the second most of votes is elected as the alternate student adviser however the role is shared respons ibility both the student advisers taking on different tasks and responsibilities which include representing students at all Schoolboard meetings and workshops appointing a team of 13 students from all over the district to Schoolboard committees conducting our speakup speakout sessions and implementing various student engagement initiatives through our district Student Government Association as a part of our role we recognize the importance of equitably represent presen in our peers we also recognize that each student in the district has a different School experience in order to address this Gap and ensure that we're accurately representing all of our students we have launched a districtwide speak up speak out effort in our Traditional High Schools technical high schools combination schools and our Center Schools we would like to take a moment to express our appreciation to our high schools and supporting this initiative our principles have been very open to hearing from students and many of our visits have sparked site-based listening sessions with our students each session follows the framework well better and next what is going well on campus what could be better and we ask students to share their ideas for what's next and what they would like to see in their future at their school following each session principles are provided with a comprehensive report that synthesizes the feedback we receive from students now I will turn it over to Landon to share an update on our progress with these sessions thank you the data provided on the deck is as of January 8th 2025 the publishing date for this Workshop since then sessions have been completed at Northeast and South barard High School and two sessions are scheduled for later this week at Deerfield Beach and Piper High School bringing our total completed sessions to 19 sessions each board member has been provided a sheet on the speakup speakout sessions in their District uh with data that is updated as of today so that is the most up-to-date data on scheduling sessions in your respective District our sessions were prioritized based off of when the last session was complete at the school and our previous engagement with students at the school we felt it was imperative to PRI prioritize the schools that have never had a speakup speakout session and hear from students that we have not heard from in the past our goal is to complete 36 sessions by Mark March and we are on track to reach that that goal we thank our high school principls for their support in making this happen a major a major priority for Alana and I is making sure that we speak to a diverse cross-section of students that represent both the diversity in the school but also diversity of experience as of date we have spoken to over 500 students at our visits the combined data from all sessions is shared on the deck please note that this Anonymous survey to capture student data is optional so not all students at schools have provided responses it's also important to note that our sessions feature a variety of students who are representative of the entire School population our sessions do not just include students involved in student government or Club officers rather a wide range of students on campus on this slide you will see six trending topics from our sessions completed in the first semester our intent is to provide the board with a year-end comprehensive report of feedback from our sessions starting with mental health support students have shared the need for more awareness about Mental Health Resources available to them thanks to collaboration with the student services initiative Division and director winter from Mental Health Services we are in the process of forming a student workg group that will provide valuable feedback on the various Services the district provides we know that great strides have been made on Mental Health but continuous Improv improvent in this area is something students would like to see shifting to Safety and Security students have shared positive feedback about safety and security policies implemented this school year including metal detection additionally we regularly hear site based feedback about campus security operations and we are grateful for chief Lozano and the SSP Divi division for their support and addressing concerns that students rais to us moving on to programs students have shared great feedback about course offerings on their campuses including programs they believe could be sunsetted and programs they want to come to their school as part of the second phase of redefining our schools we are looking forward to collaborating with the strategy and Innovation team and Dr wanza to develop a district-wide curriculum survey to students that allows site-based leadership teams to hear what offerings students are looking for in the area of clubs and co-curricular activities and many schools we hear feedback about the club approval process as well as varying access to clubs we've had productive conversations with Dr heern and finance and business operations in this area and we look forward to potential streamlines in the process of club and Student Activity approval moving on to school climate we regularly hear from students about the need for clearer explanation of policies included in the code of student conduct in the words of our superintendent complexity creates confusion so we look forward to collaborating with staff to create a clear way for students to understand the policies they are expected to follow and finally one of the most important areas of feedback we hear student voice on campus at almost every school visit we hear the need for students to have enhanced voice on their campus students are not necessarily looking for a say in the school operations but rather an opportunity to freely share feedback with their administrators with the support of Dr heern we are in the beginning stages of developing a comprehensive student engagement P plan that will power Empower our schools to regularly hear from students about their experience with all that being said I will turn it over to Alana to provide an update on our superintendent student advisory committee each year students are elected to represent their board members District as a member of the superintendent student advisory committee this year 20 students were elected to the this committee including representatives from districtwide student leadership organizations the committee which meets five times a year has provided meaningful insights to Dr heurn on various topics in September students had an opportunity to provide feedback on programs in their school as a part of the redefining our schools initiative in October sept uh in October students were challenged to talk to their peers and answer the following question what do you want the superintendent to know finally in November students met in small groups with members of the student service leadership team to provide feedback on the district's mental health initiatives at each meeting students will submit questions to the superintendent and staff provide solutions to various concerns that students collect from their schools each board member will be emailed with the contact information for their District Representatives on this committee we would like to also take an opportunity to induce some members of this committee joining us today if you part of the superintendent student advisory committee please stand we thank you for your time and effort in amplifying student voices Across The District board members we encourage you to meet your representative in the committee and hope that they can serve as another vessel of student voice finally we are grateful for the board moving forward with the quarterly joint student and School Board discussion following the consensus reached at the December 10th Workshop we have drafted a proposal composition for this discussion with one middle school and one high school student representing each Schoolboard members District additionally we will work with our Center Schools to ensure there is representation from their students with two Center School students participating quarterly we will produce a districtwide alert to students inviting them to participate parent approval will be required for the participation a the group of students will change each quarter and Our intention is to ensure that a group of students accurately represents the makeup of our district and knows that they can honestly share their input we look forward to receiving consensus on this proposal from you all before moving forward on behalf of Alana and I and as well as the student leaders joining us today we are grateful for the opportunity to present to you all on the work we have been doing I I would be remissed if I didn't take an opportunity to thank the superintendent a great entrance good timing there um to thank the superintendent for his commitment to hearing from us uh and as well as members of the cabinet and especially Dr wanza for providing ongoing support and mentorship to us uh that is something we are extremely grateful for and we thank you for your time Madam chair we'll turn it over to you thank you thank you so much for the great presentation uh now it is time for public comments so we will go through those um jcer Leon first up hello I'm jir Leon I represent the great School of South barad High School I serve as the SGA president there as well as bcac vice president being a part of being a student leader has been one of the most rewarding experience of my life over the past seven years in SGA I've learned the value of teamwork communication and making a real impact on my school and Community organizations like bcac has played a huge has played a huge role in my journey bcsc has been an incredible resource for softb SGA it has helped us connect with other schools share ideas and bring back new strategies to improve our events and projects the students advisers to the school board has also played a huge role by sharing important updates and giving us a voice and in decisions also affect you guys though bcsc even have had a chance for to have us grow as leaders by showing us a huge impact on how we can be here with you guys to represent the great Brad County School District thank you so much next up is Lily Reid okay good afternoon everyone my name is Lily Reed and I represent Western High School where I serve as the current class of 2027 president and I also repres present us as the bcac which stands for Broward County Association of student council's president this year the bcac president position has given me such wonderful opportunities to not only meet all sorts of staff and students across brard County but also to hold a seat on the superintendent student advisory committee which really allows me to ensure student voice and opinions are given directly to the people who make the choices that affect our everyday lives one of the topics I was lucky enough to bring up at the past ssac meeting was mental health I've been passionate about assisting students with their mental Health since I was in seventh grade and getting to speak directly to the type of people who can Implement those types of changes was such a wonderful experience that I'm so grateful to have had I believe it is important that we continue to offer students resources like bcsc and the superintendent student advisory committee so that they can truly make the change that they want to see thank you so much next is Donnie V hi my name is Dono from cor Springs High School and I'm the current bcac Treasurer I would just like to say that being the bcac treasure I would I was able to connect with so many so many different students from all over the county and help raise the membership which I met so many leaders who needed someone to come to them and ask them about and um I would just like to say also that the student advisers to the school board have played an immense role in changing my school because after they came to my school and spoke to us and received the feedback and they went to our principal and spoke about it there has been changes and improvements I would just like to say that as an officer at my school too who is very involved and among the student body thank you so much Josh Collins hello everyone my name is Jos Collins and I am a senior at South Plantation I have had the honor of being a part of the brard County Association of student council's board for four years I've also been a part of the superintendent stud student advisory committee for three years being a part of these organizations has given me a lot of opportunities to make an impact on my school and my community at the ssac meetings students have a voice to speak with board members and Dr heern about issues and concerns we see at our schools and in Broward County at one of our first meetings we were given the chance to talk about classes at our schools and even what courses we want to in the future we were able to learn about what classes were at other schools and how impactful they are I can't wait to see our input implemented at schools as it will contribute to the betterment and future success of students I want to give Landon and Alana a huge cutas as they have done an amazing job in forming Broward County students with concerns talked about at these school board meetings and are always very informative thank you awesome thank you next is Marley Brooks you can go there Marley you can go to that hello everyone I am Marley Brooks and I serve as the SGA president at Piper High School one things that I love about the student advisory committee is how optimistic our advisers and our leaders are Dr hebr has done a great job at understanding and hearing and supporting ing everyone all of the students that attend these meetings are very ambitious and very dedicated to the work that they contribute to their schools I just wanted to say that a big big thank you to Alana and Landon for their support their constant communication with us you guys are doing a great job and I really support everything that you guys have doing thank you thank you so much seems to be a common theme here um Kevin Herrera good afternoon I'm Kevin a sophomore from sof Plantation High School and I am the bcac parliamentarian and before I took this role I was like a little turtle in my sh and like I was not very like like I wouldn't do this before like this position but with my advisor's help and like my counsel and my partner Stephen I feel like I grown as a leader and I can help other people become leaders like me and I just want to say thank you to my bcac board and to all my friends who like like helped me through this thank you thank you so much and we will finish up public comment with I think it's Haley swickle good afternoon I'm Haley swickle and I represent Coral Glades high school as the Broward County Association of Student Council secretary throughout this journey of being secretary I've been able able to create meaningful connections with many students and schools across the entire County I have also been able to grow my leadership skills allowing me to thrive under pressure and hold myself accountable in many situations while being Secretary of bcac I've also had the pride to hold a secretary position within my school this has allowed me to take what may seem like a small issue in my school and bring it to the county level and further learned that these issues within my school were in many other schools as well at a speakup speakout session the students at my school are very passionate about the different Pathways that we have at our school after speaking with the administration our school is working to offer an EMT pathway as well as a cosmetology pathway next year without the help and guidance of Landon and Alana this session would have never taken place and these problems may have never been solved for that i' like to owe them a big thank you throughout this past year my passion for leadership has soared and I can't wait to continue this journey into my senior year thank you so much for your time thank you and thank you to all the student speakers for coming out today next we will go to board discussion and we'll start with Mrs ala thank you great job Landon and Elena and all the students that are here today this is an amazing presentation my first comment is on page five I I love that you prioritize the schools that didn't have a speak up speak speak out session that was a great great idea great strategy thank you my question on the metal detectors you said that you received positive feedback was that through a survey was that testimonials how did you quantify that statement to the chair Landon thank you uh we when in the original discussion which I think was maybe in March or April of last year uh we conducted a survey through our County student government organization which was a it was a pretty small sample size um where we received overall very positive feedback prior to implementation and then at every speak up speakout session we ask students about the metal detector program and the overall consensus from students is they you know feeling like this is a it's been a smooth implementation um and they feel safer because of this I will note that at some schools we hear about some improvements that can be made with the metal detection and we regly Shar that feedback with the principal as well as the Safety and Security team uh to try and alleviate those concerns okay awesome and I would also just say with the it would be great to share that with Dr hurn too absolutely yes through the superintendent we we share that information perfect on page seven under clubs and co-curriculars it says that students have barriers in club approval process and access to Club recommendation to create a districtwide process for project approval can you expand on that through the chair Landon so I'm sorry were you so so there's a standard practice bulletin when it comes to this uh this is speaking directly to um not autom uh not automating digitalizing the process uh we hear at schools that the process varies from school to school which the standard practice bulletin kind of allows right because it's not a set process every everything works differently at a at different schools um so we've had initial discussions with members of cabinet to address this um and see if there can be a more consistent process that would be helpful for administrators I don't know if I forgot anything Dr wanza that's great and I would be interesting to see that come forward and you spoke about each board member having a representative I'm I'm assuming that was on our paper that was handed out to us Amani and Emma can you raise your hand here hi awesome well I would love you know if we could schedule a zoom meeting and so I could just learn from what your experiences are and then my next question my last question is you know the students here are very engaged and very involved how do you connect with students that are are shy and they're not so engaged and involved through the chair Landon thank you absolutely um I can tell you as part of the reason being very honest with you part of the reason that I ran for this position was because of my frustration with the lack of student involvement beyond the student advisers and your typical involved student um Alana and I have made it a shared commitment that when we visit schools we ask principles to give us a very holistic group of students that represent everything from your student body president to the student that came right out of internal suspension um so our principals have been very supportive in that effort I think at every session we can confidently say it was a wide array of students but to your point there's there's still more work to do to ensure that we are talking to you know I I don't want to say that the normal student but the student that comes to school and leaves right so um we are working with our High School principles to try and build build that up within our sessions because we can get some of the most authentic feedback out of them perfect well amazing job thank you thank you to everyone who's here today thank you Miss Alida for your support thank you Miss Thompson hi so first I'm just so immensely proud of Landon and Lana and everyone in the background as well you guys are not only the leaders of tomorrow you're the leaders of today and what you guys are doing are making an amazing impact in your school so thank you so much for hanging out with us sorry we run behind it's pretty typical um sorry uh can Justin Flores and Leah James wave if they're here hi okay super excited about this I wish that was something I knew we had before as little representatives from our high schools so that would have been great but now we know and that's awesome and I want to kind of ask for some feedback not only from our two student advisers but if anyone I don't think we can do that can we do that we can't do that so our two advisers um how can we as board members really engage the students I know you guys keep your speak outs speak in speak outs as kind of a student focused activity but I do think other than just asking for your as's opinions we at least myself would like to take it upon myself to reach out to the students especially in my district to get their feedback and have more of a pipeline between myself and the students what would your recommendations for us be through the chair so that that is a a two-phased answer the first answer is hopefully by getting consensus today on the joint Schoolboard discussions that Miss Leonardi initially brought up um we're hoping that that is a group while we while we love these group of students that are here we are hoping that it is a group of students who represent an authentic and honest look at the district right um so that's number one number two is we're working on on next school year with the support of Dr he to bring more school-based student feedback opportunities we see every year in our yearly student survey the percentage of students stating that they have a voice on their campus is far below 50% so we want to make sure that we're enhancing that and we're hoping through next school year we'd be able to grow that and I don't know if Alana has something else to add about that so a followup what can we as board members do and take some of the responsibility off of you guys I will say your support in um well first of all your support in a conversation like like this forum and being able to regularly share what we're hearing uh but also I think more it's what can we do to help you as well and I think connecting each board member with students in their District to be able to have discussions um is something you know would be a mutually beneficial relationship thank you and I'll just give a quick answer I know that Mrs leonardy and I and it may be more people that do that actually have been holding student virtual Town Halls to get that so that might be something that you would be interested in and Landon and Nana have been awesome and helping us to get those up and running so thank you next up is Mrs Leonardi thank you um and I don't know if you were asking for consensus but obviously I support um the quarterly joint student and School Board discussions proposal that you have in the presentation um I just want to first start off by saying that today has been lovely with the amount of student involvement we've had um I want to hear from students this much every Workshop in meeting if that's possible um I would I think that would be amazing um and I just want to shout out everyone who's here um as a one semester sgaa sponsor um one semester speaking to the the level of work that is involved with that I know that you guys work really really hard and you're super dedicated so thank you all for for um being leaders in your schools in our school district um to one of the proposals in the presentation how do you think we can communicate clear expectations around the code of student conduct absolutely and I I I'm going to jump one moment because I totally forgot to mention something if that's all right um to board members supporting the work that we do and the work that schools do seeing on school campuses the after school activities that happen sporting games the different events where we recognize students um as well as going and speaking to students at schools through their clubs like human relations Council or other events happening at the school that's the best way for you all to support student engagement so I wanted to make sure I mentioned that to your question Miss Leonardi um you know we found that this code of student conduct is way too long um and we recognize the need for a longer document to be able to stipulate all the rules uh what we would like to see is kind of a one or two-page document that students are able to you know easily go to and say dress code I can't do this this this and this or cell phone I can't do this this this and this rather than maybe the one or two students that you're looking at that will go on to the website do a search in the code of student conduct document and try and find that information um you know we have videos in the past that have supported that but I think a easy to look at one pager is something that students would find very beneficial got it thank you so like Eclipse notes exactly yes awesome um so I I hope that our staff can take that and run with it I also think um maybe some like short social media videos might be helpful um so thank you for clearing that up and to your point about you know coming to see after school activities and extracurriculars please invite me I will come um where my schedule allows um I love the idea of the quarterly principal advisory meetings and I'm wondering I guess I have a larger question I think um Mrs Thompson asked some of these questions as well about like how we can get how the board can get um the feedback shared in these different forums and so like I'm just very interested in hearing uh what you know the general feedback from the principal advisory meetings the the superintendent advisory committee meetings um and I also am wondering um like how we could use thought exchange so just different ways we can get that feedback but um I think Mrs Thompson asked the larer I was going to ask you know how can school board members uplift student voices more and I think you've you've spoken to that thank you thank you next is Dr Zeman thanks so much chair um I was going to ask what Miss lardy did about the student code of conduct so thank you uh for sharing that I appreciate that's what you meant by it rather than rather than other things uh to that end you know there's there's a a pretty healthy investment in um apps on our website and apps available through other technology that allow people to get summaries of critical things to today we had a a long document uh reporting back on a very critical settlement we started 25 years ago um was 53 Pages that's long but two pagers uh there's a lot of U students and non-students in the community that would just love to know kind of how we're doing where we're making progress what the next things are and so I'm hoping that there's more than just a student kind of version of that but we start to get more uh executive summaries uh for for the things so that people can read that and then decide do they want to invest the time to go further um also just kind of one quick participatory thing in the back raise your hand if you represent someone between districts one and seven do you represent a school board member any District I think most of you right everybody well thank you I will invite all of you to a teams meeting and Debbie could do the same since uh countywide people didn't seem to get listed in land's list I'll just I'll just subsume all of them and uh we'll invite you and and we'll have a good uh discussion about kind of um what you see and and some ideas that I had as a former uh student body president at Fort Lauderdale High School 10 billion years ago um and uh I look forward to that thank you very much Madam chair if I could just address something real quick yes the we wanted to it's going to be in your email uh we wanted to make sure that the long no I every you're going to get the whole list we wanted to make sure because it's over 30 names and emails that you'd be easily able to click it rather than just seeing a document where you'd have to manually type it in so you will both both countywide members will be receiving that feedback thank you Dr thank you um Mrs Bowman thank you chair um always impressed with Alana and Landon um from the time that I've been coming here which is not very long but and before observing I mean it's just amazing what you guys do and how you've contributed to our um School District so thank you very much and thank you to all of you who are participating I I can't stress enough how important your leadership is um we have I guess the benefit of experience but you have the benefit of uh vision and so please continue to contribute in this way as you move forward because it is so important to all of us in our community and I just really appreciate you guys and the extra time that you're spending on this um I have Alana the privilege of having Alana in my district along with Madison Davis and zidane Francis he's not here here all right well so I'll be oh right on thanks um so I'll be um arranging to meet with you guys so thank you for your service and just one question I love the idea of having the open lines of communication I think you guys have done a really good job of um creating a a forum for that and um something that I have as a parent I guess is a lot of feedback from my children about things that are going on at school teachers things like that is that I don't really know even how to respond to that because you know you're kind of getting um one person's perspective maybe or a couple people's perspective and hearsay but I do think when you have enough people kind of giving similar feedback then you can address things that are going on in the school so is that is there anything that you have um on the horizon for to address something like that to you know issues that might be happening in the school that if you had enough supportive uh and evidence of it that you could probably bring in a nice manner absolutely forward to the principal or whatever do you have any suggestions for that Landon so as part of our effort for next year uh we're working with marketing right now to be able to develop a landing page where students can kind of understand how to voice their concerns right there's different processes especially when it comes to addressing something regarding an employee there's a a process that students have to follow right so we want to be able to empower students with that information um because you know we can only go to their school once during the year right and maybe when we come at that time that's not when they're facing an issue in a classroom or something like that so we want to be able to open that up but I also want to do give a shout out to a lot of our principles that do provide regular opportunities and open door policy for students um and we are hoping to see more of that you know continue awesome all right well that is fantastic keep up the good work thank you thank you Mrs rert thank you um I'm going to say something that probably going to surprise people now you're going to find an irony in this right I'm a typ a personality I'm betting a lot of you are secretly are typ a personalities but my experience and I'm a little bit older than you just like many decades and when I experienced at high school it was everybody rowing in their own boat we're all looking to get somewhere but rowing separately in our boats what I see here today is that you guys really brought a cohesive into this organization and I for one am super super thankful for that and if you're in district 7 can you raise your hand hi two of your representatives are not were not able to make it today I'm sorry I'll write him a note No but anyways I look forward to uh you know speaking with you my number quick write it down 954 292 2270 that's my work cell um yeah that's all I give but I look forward to it and I'm open to all suggestions and conversations and really just to hear more so thanks so much thank you thank you and I'll land the plane here um just very quickly thank you so much for coming today the theme from all of your peers was that Landon and Alana have done a fantastic job I think so yes thank you so much we did not pay them to say that yeah no we know they did get free lunch though maybe it was a bride we have seen you in action so we're we're aware um you know the end user of what we do are all of you here and it was amazing to see so many students in this boardroom today I do also wish that that happened every single week because it reminds us of our why right we sometimes get bogged down in adult behavior and it really is about all of you so we really appreciate we know that you had to miss class today some of you might not have minded that but um it does make an impact but it is important and you have made an impact coming here to speak to us today so I want you to know how valuable it was to see you here and and sharing your thoughts with us so we appreciate that we look forward to the the student discussions that come forward and I want to say to the adults that also allowed this to happen because there is a field trip process that allows the students to get here that um adults have to go through so thank you for the support and the work that you do with our students um the more the more we can get from our students I think the better job we can do as a as a board so um I'll end with that I thought we were done because no one else raised their hand but we'll end with Miss fam and then we will um wish you a great day thank you madam chair thank you everyone for coming today um it's really really great the things you've accomplished the things youve put together and working as a team as you do especially as such a a young age as um Mrs ruper said out before when when she was going through this experience everyone was in their boat Rowan by themselves so it really says a lot about the level of maturity um how successful you're going to be in your future endeavors and you should all be very very proud of yourselves want you know that for my people here I have Jos Zoe Blake Lily and Landon of course I'm going to take you out for the best pizza you've ever had so and we'll sit and talk then I I just want you to know I I really like my principles that that each and every one of them I think they're very approachable that's very very fortunate and they're really great at what they do and they really have the best interest of the students so I think District Six is very very fortunate I do have one question now I'm wondering and I'm going to direct this the chair to Landon um is there any way we can make this group more inclusive because um I have seven High School in my district and there's only three high schools representative so I'm wondering if you would as a group ever consider expanding so at least one person from every high school has a voice so that way you're representing the district as a whole Landon thank you Mrs fam for your for your comments um district 6 actually has the largest amount of students that represent on the committee because I serve as the student adviser and Lily serves as the district sgaa president so so to that point not regarding the people regarding the students we don't uh no no board members district has a representative from each School in their District uh this is elected as a subsection of each board member's District um so we don't have a a representative from each high school that makes up a committee with the superintendent that's something we can look at but that's not currently in place please because according to this I have three people from Western un um Western High School and I said I have seven high schools in my district I would rather as we were discussing earlier that that spread around the wealth so we have more representation for more high schools because I I feel confident that any one of you could um represent your high school that that we don't need three and I would like to get other voices there thank you and if I can I just want to make sure I I be be be clear and and thank you for what you're saying there's one student from Western that was elected to the there's there's two students that were elected to the committee from district 6 like every Board memb District South Plantation High School and Western High School there were additional I'm sorry there was I apologize it was actually Cypress Bay High School and Western High School there's additional seats on the committee from members of the Broward County Association of student councils which happens to have three students from district 6 as district 6 has one of the largest number of high schools in the district so that's why there's that so many from Western but we absolutely you know hear the call for a a greater variety of of schools um and we're hoping that next year maybe that's something we can we can look at certainly either expand or or in other alternative ways but um I think it would be great to have more voices thank you thank you Miss famam and I just realized we did vote as a board to have the joint meetings but you're asking us for some consent for the proposed composition and since we have many times in the past taken consensus that's what we're going to do right now so we'll go through the proposal here is at our Jo joint student discussions there will be one Middle School student one high school student two center student um two Center School students and that there will be an application process so I'll go around as Miss jock Adams suggested to take consensus from each board member that we're okay with this proposal that they have so that they know what to do moving forward so I'll start on this end Mrs fam yes yes I support it m Bowman good Dr Zeman we're not voting on anything it's a consensus could you uh read the list of this it's right here it's on page nine of The Proposal so one Middle School student one high school student two students from the center schools and there would be an application process and though they would change every time the students come to us thank you I'm fine with the proposal um Miss Thompson Mrs alhad yes Dr holness and Miss rert yes and Mrs Leonardi okay great so uh we look forward to the first discussion that we have thank you again so much for coming well Madam chair if we may I would like from um Miss Brown to actually thank some of the as you um mentioned at Miss Leonardi some of the adult spons spors who got us here today and made sure we've want to personally thank one of our chaperon Mr John Sullivan doing a very good job now I do want to express my gratitude on behalf of the Department of Athletics and Student Activities for your support because without it our department could not function as it should nor could our student advisor so we greatly appreciate you and yes certainly for the one who is very quiet behind the scenes and truly uh boots on the ground but allows our students to lead and speak for themselves uh without intervening and that is Mrs senia Santiago a phenomenal job and of course for all of the sgaa sponsors at each of the schools we definitely appreciate them and we do have one here today from Plantation High School and though she looks like a student herself where is she and from Western High School as well and from Western oh oh yes please Western where the plantation Miss esol in here she would blend but no we do uh we appreciate all of your support and cooperation if I could very quickly I need to reiterate what Landon said about the support that is needed by you coming to the school for the co-curricular activities after school it is what draws our students into our schools as we're talking about increasing our numbers and that is where you will have true engagement with our students when you come to them on their home turf and see them in their co-curricular activities and interact with them or The Spectators you will definitely hear all student voices so thank you again for your cooperation and support thank you we're going to take oh thank you oh sorry Dr he if I may if I get a point of privilege because I wasn't here for the opening um so certainly want to thank um Landon and also Lana who I call Mr President and Miss vice president um so I guess Madam president M Mr Vice President okay all right see you going places going places learn real quick so I guess that would make um the rest of the advisor uh House and Senate uh so we certainly appreciate all the contributions um you know one of my efforts is to ensure that all of our faculty and staff in brow County Public Schools stay student centered and understand the importance of student voice your contributions of our students and if we listen to them we can really solve the problems that are plaguing our district if we just sit back listen to our students listen to the ones who are actually the ones that are going to be impacted by any decision that we make at the district level or at the school level so we certainly appreciate your advocacy we certainly appreciate your leadership on your campuses um keep pushing us right to do better for you um all the feedback that you provide to us is certainly a gift so we can accelerate faster to meet your needs and the continuous needs there other students that are coming behind you too so we're depending on you you know I depend on you um certainly to to learn about what's going on and the nuances in our in our district and continue to make those improvements I appreciate all the things that you do to support us as a system support all the leaders in our schools and support our district leaders too to continue to support you day in and day out thank you thank you Dr thank you and we're going to take a recess if you all don't mind taking a picture with us we would um love to celebrate the fact that you are here thank thank you everybody [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Laughter] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] thank you the next item for the workshop is policy 4,000 student progression policy staff did a great job in the presentation they sent to us so I'm going to go straight to public comments and then board discussion so first up for public comments is Jackie lcom hi Jackie Las mararo Springs thank you very much um I wanted to bring up two areas of um highlight a couple of areas you might want to um pay more attention to in here which is on page five where we're talking about K to five um students there is a category called uh number eight digital tools um and it states that curricul for students in prek through G through grade five must um contain instruction that allows them to attain um progressively higher levels of skill in the use of digital tools and applications and that language has been struck through for um omission and there is another part that also says each school should make available digital instructional instructional materials including software applications to students with disabilities um I followed up on that because it it felt like that was a bit of a um an odd thing to be actually taking out um and my inquiries um into that um went beyond yesterday's 1M deadline for written comment which is why I'm here um the uh caste director Miss formoso told me that there's a Senate Bill 240 that removes some of the language around digital tools for students with dis disabilities um I would um suggest that that doesn't necessarily mean we have to in um in brow it it would be good to have some explicit language still in the policy and then she also said that in reference to digital tools with a capital D and a capital T um that was removed from the K5 segment of this policy or proposed for removal because it is a micr credential like an industry certification that doesn't apply to Elementary however digital tools capital D capital t is just the name of the course it doesn't mean that we should remove our commitment to providing digital tools with a lowercase DNT um or digital materials to students at all levels so I think some of the language that's been struck out relating to the um industry certification we have swept along in that um a a proposal to also remove language around digital materials generally and student access to them um we should be providing all students instruction that allows them to attain progressively higher skills in the use of digital tools and applications um and I would um suggest maybe that Lang language just needs a closer look before anybody agrees to strike it through I have spoken to Mr bamoa about this outside as well and it seems a bit of a gray area in terms of how the language is phrased maybe but um I think everything that's been struck through is too much to take off thank you thank you so much next up is Trudy Janovich pup PR well viewing the pupil progression plan requirements I was pleasantly surprised to find that grades on report cards will finally be taken into consideration as proof that students have met requirements for promotion I believe this is a very positive step to bringing the teachers expertise back into Focus I along with teachers and parents all over social media applaud this change to count the 180 days of effort for each student thanks to Dr Dr Hepburn and the curriculum staff for finally implementing this change it was stated um there are some things that need to be changed and Jackie and I seem to tag team everything we do I had many of those things in my written comment um but after listening to the CCC report this morning we know that we still have inequality of technological resources for students I'm concerned about the removal of requirements for teaching the use of technology and learning basic life skills such as typing word processing use of a spreadsheet or presentation software I believe these skills which should be taught to every child and not something which is a school-based decision there were changes in elementary student for computer skills as she said and it went from required to optional uh digital tools were also readed which she discussed I have a question for everyone in the room please raise your hand if you've ever read an entire book on a computer I knew I knew there'd be a couple of you especially people who were there however how many of you have read a book on a tablet or an iPad or something like that you're you're asking students to read books on a computer which is very difficult to do many of you here use tablets as you're as you're doing your work the use of correct technology is important for instance when you move to a total use of online textbooks every child should have a tablet my iPad has about a hundred books on it and documents we need to go with the future and unfortunately you have a technology depart Department that is not dominated by teachers it needs to be go back to putting teachers on the technology Committee in good numbers not just to say oh whatever they say up up top is what we'll do because we have done in this District a a real disservice by only testing on computers and making kids hate them especially first graders taking tests on computers please make the Educators make the decision thank you very much board discussion anybody have anything Dr Zeman Mr rer much um I understand uh the state law chair and could you tell me what uh changed in the state law for grades K through two uh in terms of their uh standards for um assessing completing a grade successfully Dr heer staff Miss Holtz is gonna answer that absolutely just press the button there you go thank you the state has ADD is the requirement to add math to promotion criteria in grades K through 2 specific criteria for grades K through 2 in math trific and chair do you know what the staff is recommending that we add in k through2 for those standards Dr heer staff we are recommending that they have three options the first is a level two the second is a Le level two on the fast math or the fast uh star math it's called star math in K2 fast math in three and above a level two on the I ready diagnostic three or report card grades that come from assessments projects um and classwork at a average of a d or higher terrific and chair um that will be new for our parents right and so there'll be um some degree of a requirement to start sharing that information as soon as possible so that um parents who in Broward have been in Statewide presump pred pres predominantly presumably excuse me um have always been focused toward third grade right where we had the first you know progression standard set by the state uh do you know what our plan is for sharing that information with parents Dr heurn staff yes once this board approved we'll be sharing the information with teachers through a pivot memo um through principles and also through coaches meetings uh monthly coaches meetings that we have and also through our regular channels of of communication with teachers as well um how how are we going to do it through with parents though we'll be sharing that also through our local communication through schools uh through their updates uh what they have their nightly events uh parent interim reports rep report cart meetings and so forth in interims terrific and chair will those standards be applied k through2 for promotion or are they just standards for performance Dr heurn Dr Kong it's Kate through 12 for promotion terrific um that's going to be a lift on on the communication side and I know that and maybe my colleagues and I will even help as much as possible to spread the word when we go out and talk uh just to make sure parents are aware of that second issue is that if I'm correct on slide 11 uh staff is recommending adding math science and social studies standards for promotion to fourth grade is that correct chair Dr hurn to come that is correct thank you very much um I think that that's for all grades yes I appreciate that I'm just and I'm just focused on 11 as a example um I think that that those kinds of changes will kind of reveal the confidence that we have in educating our students in Brower County traditional Public Schools um chair this is a voluntary standard that exceeds the state level is that correct Dr Hepper Dr con yeah it's the statutory requirement um yes and we've added some additional components as well um we were fortunate enough to have some conversations with our peer districts and also level set as well so yes um let me try and ask it a different way the state mandates a level two or above on fast pm3 for promotion to fourth grade it says that we have to have standards for math science and social science as well but we've defined those uh Brower County Public School staff has done that for the SEC second third and fourth criteria that is correct that's awesome and I think again you know from a competitive standpoint what we're saying is while the state set this standard and said this number for that standard uh we're going to go beyond that um in in setting what the actual specific standard is for the other three categories we still have good cause criteria there's still the whole student um uh approach it's very very clear in our policy I I think that there's an opportunity to Market that and to communicate that to people so they understand that we are not shooting for the state minimums we are shooting for what's best for the students and best for the community and we're challenging our system because we're so confident in it in their performance uh to do up above above and beyond the only one that kind of sticks in my craw because I was originally in favor of of and I'll get back to this later but I still believe that grade level is actually our expectation or our standard even if it's not used for for for progression but why chair do do how do we justify to the community that a student who doesn't get a two on Fast doesn't get a two on I ready but gets a d or above on a report card is ready for progression Dr heurn Dr Co it's the same criteria we use in middle and high and so in order to make sure we bring voice and Equity to use that soft term um we want to make sure that uh the the Level Playing Field is equal uh let me just try and say that back uh chair that would be Equity across grades by saying that a third grade student and a 11th grade student would both be assess that you'd be passing if you got a letter d d on the scale um and I've I've read not extensively but a good bit about kind of the pros and cons of holding people back in grades and I and I I appreciate that is is real um I'm just maybe concerned a little bit that we're telling the community that someone who has a one on Fast Math one on fasta and a d on a grade Broward County school says should go forward to the next school to the to the next grade so I'm just going to throw that out the point that I think that is maybe worth considering in adding to this policy is to set either an expectation sentence or a standard sentence in the in the in the policy that says um it is Broward County Public Schools policy that the standard for educational Excellence is to be at grade level or above and and and I'm not asking anymore for that to be in the progression standards but I do believe that we want to tell students and parents and teachers and Educators that while progression is is uh something with pros and cons and we want kids to have the opportunity you know um a child held up in third grade um gets third grade again and and their growth is what it is but a child that goes to fourth grade that that got there without uh exemplary scores on standardized tests is now being challenged by fourth grade and often times will rise to that challenge and we have a lot of evidence that um you know failing to progress students by itself isn't a Panacea uh for a long-term educational uh achievement for a whole bunch of really obvious reasons but I still think it's important for barer County Schools to say that our standard is grade level we might progress kids at two or or even one one and a d on their on their grades uh but our standard is to get people to grade level um in order for us to Define educational achievement or educational uh Excellence so I'll throw that idea out to my colleagues and see if it gets any traction uh but I believe deeply in standards I believe deeply in expectations I believe in a very positive look on things that stretches people and says this is what we want but I know one thing for sure that is what the community wants the community doesn't want 12th graders graduating with D's on their report guard and ones on their final exam they want people to graduate by the end of their experience with us that are at grade level um and they' recognized that to be successful um contributors to uh to to our Advanced economy the standards for cognitive achievement are much higher than they were a generation ago and substantially higher than they were two generations ago so they're not afraid of of us saying hey we've got to figure out a way to do even better that we've done in the past so one thing that I'd like us to think about is can we get a standard in there that says our our standard or our expectation is to perform at grade level thank you chair thank you Mrs rert thank you um actually I had a question on page 16 were there's two scenarios are you asking for uh excuse me through the superintendent um is Staff asking for which scenario that that we will hone in on Dr go ahead Dr KH so on slide 16 yeah uh M rert uh scenario one is the standard of where we say we want everyone but if the board had an appetite to increase the the rigor uh beyond the state uh statute uh we we included scenario two and said if you had a desire to look at Beyond third grade reading and we're using third grade as an example because that's the great level that um retention can start uh if you had a desire to look at third grade reading level two math level one level two that would essentially equate to about 7,26 students all together uh if we wanted to keep it where you know most districts have it it would be using our numbers 358 and then you see the other additional slides to break down by demographics right and and thank you for that um really it's the next two slides 17 18 as you go downwardly in our subgroups or at our students um it's it's horrifying and it's something that every year I think it's except the last year two two years um I had put in the superintendent's um evaluation these these very same uh subgroups because we were woefully not um not reaching them so really my question and not to be answered today uh would be are we going to be using specific best strategies to reach the subgroups um what I'd like to see is just a little I hate to say what everybody else has been saying about a little breakdown of it but what are we what are we doing to actually help increase the passing of our particular subgroups I'm looking for that and I don't really want you to go into like major pages of it nothing like that I just you know looking at these year after year I'm I'm exhausted for the parents and the students in our community because they we've made certainly terrific um gains in the last two years very much so but we still have a lot of work to be done and I think I'd be remiss if I didn't say that um so just at some point um you know let the superintendent guide you in these this area but I I think it's important for us to to make sure if it's a particular reading program or whatever we're going to be using is that we need something that's going to work and not two years from now but right now so thank you so much thank you anybody else no one else had their hand up okay so are um are you asking us on slide 16 to kind of give you a consensus as to whether we want scenario one or scenario two yes okay so we will again take a consensus we're missing some people um but I'll go this way Mrs Bowman can I if if I may um Madam chair I just want to make sure that the board members are clear on their understanding of scenario one and two okay before we ask and um you know we leave this room and something's implemented but there wasn't Clarity just want to make sure that everybody has Clarity on what the options are if Dr con if you just want to give a real high level view of sure what's two what's one what's two um why the numbers are different sure so in scenario one um if we align our promotion criteria to the state and other large District districts those are the numbers that if we use the same numbers from last year which are a total of 14,545 154 3,058 students scored uh a reading level one that's the criteria that's the standard that's what most districts are using the state gives districts um flexibility to adjust the standards if they wanted to in policy and make it more challenging for students and so beyond third grade reading level is the option two so if the board wanted to choose third grade reading level one and third grade reading level two they could or they could choose in addition to that third grade math level one and third grade reading level one so we gave you all of the breakdown of what that would look like um so if you wanted to have a composite of one or two or extended to level two for math and reading you could do that and so what you would be what we be would be asking you is based on scenario two are any of those in addition to third grade reading level one you have a desire to add as an additional expectation or would you like to keep scenario one chair I just have a question for clarity if you don't mind go ahead Dr C thanks so much my reading of the draft policy was that it was going to be at least has drafted um so math is included in there in the in in in the actual policy that we're bringing forward because that's now what the statute says Roger that so let me just say the numbers back if you don't mind Dr con that that means that 3,000 in last year's data got us got a one on Ela yeah another 2200 roughly got a one on math uh math fast score third grade so under the drafted policy and again this is this is interesting data because this is saying that when we were emphasizing Ela for progression right uh 3,000 still didn't get there oh by the way 2200 math is but math wasn't a focus for progression at that point so we may assume that once it is equally if both are used there that number may be less under under a prediction right more or less yes thank you so but without that shift 5200 or so students would uh under that criteria not be in the category for progression they could still progress because they got a deer hire correct and they could also progress because of the good order yeah but that's I think what we're saying as currently drafted 5200 under the old scenario uh would not qualify to progress based on the fast scor roughly if I can clarify provide some additional Clarity um um Mr bomb I don't know if if you can run the data real quick um because some of these num some of these students may be duplicated so a student may have a level one in reading and a level one in math so it I thought these were additional 20 so it wouldn't be a total of the over the 5,000 it may be 3500 it may be close to four some um positive that many of those students are are um duplicates um if if uh we do reading and math uh go ahead Mr bom if you have to duplicate it number number all right good afternoon uh Richard B director of uh testing and research educational analysis assessment and research um so it would add an additional 600 students to the 3,000 uh so so about almost 3,700 students approximate right gotta that would be the additional uh level one in math and reading combined yeah yeah gotta thanks Richie sure okay please forgive me because I just got confused so we are the statute is now requiring math as well yes level one that's not so we have to add math yes okay so this that's the policy that we're bringing forward okay so scenario one where we only have reading isn't we really need to have okay so the question is whether we want to have it as a level one or a level two or two or two right so if we want to elevate it and um when we're talking about a level one are these um kids that we're not using any other criteria to potentially um Advance them like the portfolio or the other things or it's just so what are we looking at for the real numbers of the people that are not actually going to advance so these are two different questions you're asking so I got the first one I think yeah but you're doing well I got that one you're doing well so whichever decision we make as a as as a board um it could be 3500 students but of those 3500 students then we go into what the plan is for good cause promotion uh some so for example with third grade you have uh if you go to slide 11 as an example you see criteria that teachers can use to provide additional uh remediation or support so they can look at grades they can look at a portfolio they can look at a different assessment alternative assessment for good cause so that number typically goes down and in third grade in particular those students have the option of going to summer experience and then they can take another assessment when they come back the following year there's an open window that where they can take an assessment in the first two weeks and go on to the next grade level so there is good cause promotion that every district has to provide to move those students beyond the statutory test so when we're looking at the the test grades we're not necessarily looking at the number of students that are not going to progress correct okay so that's just a baseline okay that's all I want to know thank you okay so if we can Madam chair I have an in okay hold on just one second um so just to clarify the question we're asking is it isn't really scenario one versus scenario 2 because you have to include math so you're asking us do we want to make progression a level two or higher as opposed to a level one so thank you for clarifying that because that wasn't really clear Dr holess does your question go to this or can I get the consensus first and then go to your question no well consensus CES would be dependent on my input just like the others gave their input so I am trying to give my input as the others before we go to consensus okay that's what I I didn't know if it was about this particular yes it so go ahead all right okay so um it it appears to me that if we increase the promotion criteria for third grade to a level two pass in for for for math and reading correct then this may result in more students being retained or it could potentially result in a lot more students being retained considering that we're adding math or the state is now requiring math at a level one and reading at a level one so what we're voting on here is either to choose scenario one or two two being we are increasing the requirement um for promotion at the third grade level am I understanding that correctly well it's already at a two want to increase so do you want to increase to a three okay so if we increase it to a three this would then possibly increase the number of students yes um that are being held back right um so I am not in agreement with increasing it to A3 because now we are potentially going to have a lot more of our students being retained at the third grade level I think what we should more focus on is looking at the initial fast testing data and Implement action plans so that we don't have to have our students being retained um I think for me that would be the better approach I would much rather go with the state minimum requirement because I think if we change this to a higher requirement as a district that's going to increase the number of students being held back and I don't think that's what we want thank you I just because it sounds what you said sounds different than what you said before so I thought we were adding level two but you're now saying we're at level two so we're adding it to level three that wasn't what you just said before this so I just want to make sure we're all having a discussion on the right information so um M holling so just for clarification right now for State Statute is that you have to score a level two to be promoted so that's the level one what the ask is is that if we want to say that you have to score level three for promotions that would include level one and two which to Dr hess's Point could possibly increase the amount of retained students that that's the conversation on the on the floor maybe basic layman's terms okay and I think that makes more sense so Madam chair can I just finalize sure okay so I'm glad that was clarified because we would have been voting on a consensus that would increase the requirement to be promoted that will potentially and likely result in a lot more student being held back I don't think that's what this District want so I rather go with what the the state has in place and we as a district needs to look at our fast um pm1 data and work with the students we we currently have under the state requirement to get them promoted I think we're trying to reduce the kids being retained as opposed to increase that and if we go higher with the requirement it's going to increase students being retain so I don't think that's what we want to do okay thank you so just to reiterate a couple of things we're not voting we're taking a consensus because we're in a workshop this is going to come back to us to be voted on so I just want to be clear because we've been taking again consensus for years I don't know why it got so co-mingled here recently but it we are allowed to do that so we're taking a consensus to ask do we want to keep it at what's now State requirement of level two or do we want to increase it where to be promoted You' be a level three so we're going to go around the room you can just say keep it or go to three um and that will be the consensus and then the policy will come back for an actual vote at a later time so Dr holness strongly keep it at level two thank you Mrs alh I just want to state that I have no issue with us getting consensus for earlier at well I needed to express how I felt about it I had to give my input on it that's the difference keep it Mrs Thompson keep it sorry Miss Thompson I vote to keep it Mrs Leonardi keep it Dr um Zan keep it good Mrs bman Mrs fam it's great level Dr heurn no um level three is the achievement score from the fast test at the end of the year it's not it's not comparable to a letter grade um so a level three for some of our tests that are needed for uh like for ninth and 10th graders um and I forgot what a grade level in U Middle School for proficiency sake to say you're either at proficiency or approaching a proficiency it doesn't have any correlation to a letter grade it's it's approaching it's getting there um but the state currently only requires that a student scores a level two or above to get promoted to the next grade if they score a level one there are certain things that we need to do and put in place to give students all alternate options to demonstrate um the level of learning for that great for that great level okay thank you so it seems like the consensus is to keep it at What's um oh oh I'm sorry I forgot to come back around m rert is um keeping it at a level too so the consensus is moving forward to keep it at the level two did you have any other questions for us yes just just my proposal to add a standard that says in our policy not related to progression but that our standard in this policy um is for people to perform at grade level um I just want that sentence in there to communicate to all our Educators and to our parents that even though we progress people below grade level we that's our standard we really want or our expectation I don't care which word we use uh but I think it's important to tell the community that even though we'll progress people below grade level proficiency that is what our our standard is Dr heurn go ahead Dr con yeah so um we agree with you so we we do have a document similar to what Mommy does and they have what is the expectations uh for great level standards and so we'll we'll include that when we bring policy back terrific then we don't need consensus thank you sir thank you okay thank you so much for that item and we're moving on to the last item which is Rule development Schoolboard policy 5070 enrollment and withdraw um I'm again you did a great job of sending us the information so we're going to go right to public comment do we have any public comment me oh he went to get the paper hold on no chair can I are we do we have 10 seconds uh sure I just wanted to offer a perspective on our getting consensus in my experience on boards we get consensus for what the staff will bring us back to vote on correct that's why it's not a vote all we're doing is giving direction to the staff and say look there's a consensus to do 73 instead of 62 or whatever we're we're getting consensus on all that does is that that's what they bring back for us to actually vote on in the future so it's totally legit every board does it but it's not to make a decision it's just to give the staff Direction about what to bring back corre for a decision so I just want everyone to feel good about what we're doing don't know why um thank you and our public speaker is Dr Judy trich Trudy I don't know gives me time to for the mic um my name is Dr Trudy germanovich and this is a rule development as we had last time and I wanted to point out that I don't believe believe that um the public has any idea what rural development means uh for instance um I had to search frantically to find when we're going to have the rural development Comm community meeting for the last policy which is going to be next week at um 6: pm and I don't think anybody anybody and and maybe you're going to be sending out to community members in some other way but I don't think anybody knows that's even going to happen and so I just want you to not do the same thing on this one so if you're going to do a community meeting we need to you need to inform the community that you are changing policies in some way that gets them to understand what you're doing and um on this particular policy this may be even some time for you to uh I mean a lot of do or Miss Miss fam's um questions from earlier are in this policy so I just wanted to point that out as well thank you Dr he she'd like to speak as well you have to have been signed up thank you for the comments um we we hear the concern and um there was a change Midstream that we learned about as well as people in the audience um the the last board meeting so we're trying to Pivot accordingly while trying to stick to our guidelines uh um of when things need to be posted for policy so we're we're making the we're turning the the ship around trying to move in that direction um um from what we learned in the last meeting thank you okay I will go to board discussion is there anybody that has any discussion on this item okay oh Mrs Fam thank you madam chair the one thing I I would say on page six if you look um oh maybe page six hold on I'm sorry page five it talks about um the updated definition of address a resident and it says more than 50% of the time and then also down here it says um if they reside somewhere more than 50% of the time a lot of the divorce decrees say 50% for each so that might put you in a sticky situation where you might say um you know pursuing to a court order or something where you don't have to make the decision this child lives more because right now you don't you're just saying someone has come in and you know kind of prove it up on their own so um and and I've seen that a lot 50 and 50 you know kind of thing so you might not want to land there yeah but your choice Dr heer yeah I'm going to let Mr Mr Piro um address that because we deal with divorce um parent issues all the time at the same um scenario 50-50 share a time go ahead yeah thanks Dr heurn um and I wanted to clarify that this um these are legal revisions that didn't make the edit the last time so the the policy was voted on but there's some def definitions of terms that um the legal department updated so that's the um the that's the essence of why we're here um yeah I appreciate the feedback Miss fam and um we added that in b um the legal team added that in based on the the statutes but I'll definitely bring that back for a conversation pursuant to court order something something like that because someone has control over where that child goes thank you thank you thank you Mrs fam I agree um I was a guy pseudo guidance counselor for a long time and you know the K the students get caught in the middle of what that happen so they may be boundar to a school but we we find that a lot with the bus issues right are they getting a bu they're only getting a bus half the time but so I think as a district we need to look at that because it's um it's part of the reality our students live in so I would concur with that right anybody else okay thank you so much okay at this time do any of my colleagues have anything to bring to the board or student successes to share um Dr holes thank you madam chair so I am excited to announce my plans for this year which I called a day in the life of our employees through broad County public schools during this initiative I will assume the daily roles and responsibilities of various essential positions within the district including teachers power professionals facilities Personnel food services staff bus attendance clerical staff and other invaluable staff my goal is to gain a deeper understanding of the daily work and challenges faced by our dedicated employees while also highlighting the hard work work and commitment of those who contribute to the success of our district tomorrow I eagerly anticipate gaining firsthand insight into the essential work of the facilities Personnel at Bard Anderson High School thank you thank you Mrs Al the Marjorie stowman Douglas boys soccer team won last night the district finals championships against Boer rattana High School four to zero congratulations that's a yes great job great job I would um have two things one just want to give a shout out they they a lot of them left but to the ESC department on Friday they hosted a a very phenomenal in-house resource fair for each other where they were able to collaborate and share resources and be best practices and I have to say my favorite presentation was the SLP OTS and PTs they had a Taylor Swift theme they had um all the the pictures the nine pictures but it was just a great opportunity for people in our ESC Department to talk about what they do because their services overlap and they don't often get that opportunity and they were very excited and did a great job in the presentations that they did um I'd also just like to say today begins a 17-day leadup to the 7th year commemoration of the February 14th MSD shooting I'd like to ask ask everybody to take a moment over the next 17 days to think of one of those victims each day and realize the loss of that person to their family to the community and to the world as a whole thank you this board meeting the schedule oh sorry Mrs fam okay thank you um I'd just like to say that tomorrow morning I'll be at the mentoring across Broward partnership breakfast so if anyone here is is interesting in mentoring or or getting more information about that I'll see you there and I hope that everyone's attending the ID Expo program this Saturday I don't know if you've ever been there it's fascinating where teachers um and students combined contribute and they come up with innovative ideas that we can use in the district and they're it's really creative and original and it's definitely worth the trip so thank you okay anybody else okay the scheduled order of business for this the school board Workshop of the school board of Broward County Florida has been completed seeing no obligation I adjourn the meeting have a great day [Music] [Music] [Applause] yeah [Applause] yeah yeah yeah [Applause] [Music]