##VIDEO ID:https://vimeo.com/1050215892## Okay, good morning. I called to order this, uh, January 22nd, 2025. Loudoun County School Board, Loudoun County Public Schools School Board Retreat. Um, welcome and welcome. BSBA member. Uh, I guess what staff. Staff. Thank you for being with us today. I appreciate it. Um, I guess we will just go ahead and start off, um, I think everybody's here. Lauren will be back. Sure. Ms. Shernoff will be back soon. I'm sure her stuff is here. Okay. So we're starting off with item 2.01, our VSBA training. Wonderful, Welcome. Okay. I'm not, not quite used to using the microphones and all the, the formalities. So, uh, you know, if, if I, I'm talking and don't have my mic on, please just yell at me and I will turn that on or I get too loud. Um, but it's so great to see everyone. Um, yes, thank you. I'll say I was a, I was a little loud there. Um, my name's Samantha Bosman. I'm the Deputy Executive Director with VSBA. Um, and I'm looking forward to working with you guys today and I'll let Rodney introduce himself. Uh, Rodney Jordan, uh, consultant support to, uh, VSBA and recovering school board member of 12 and a half years. Yes, And Rodney, we're so excited to have Rodney on our team. He has done governance training with us for a number of years, actually in his school board role. And when he retired off the board, if we wanna call it that, we scooped him up. So we're really excited to have his input here. So, um, typically these sessions are a little more informal. So are we okay with first name basis? I can do last name if we want to Please call me Sam. Samantha is way too many syllables, so please call me Sam. Um, this is really meant to be a conversation and we're gonna have a lot of, a lot of conversations today. And so you'll hear us talk. We have a PowerPoint, we have all of the, you know, the information in front of you, but we want this to be a conversation. We want this to be valuable for you. We're here to talk about roles and responsibilities. We're here to talk about teamwork. We're here to talk about your norms and protocols, which you all have written in your policy. So we're gonna reference those a little bit. We only have three hours with you, so we're gonna do as much as we can in our three hours. Obviously we'll take breaks. Um, and then I know lunch will be delivered at some point too. We'll do a working lunch if everyone is comfortable with that. Um, but if you need to take a break, just get up and take a break. You know, we're, we're adults here. Just please feel free to do that. Um, and if multiples of you get up, then we'll just pause for a few minutes and, and go from there. Does that work for everybody? Good stuff. Okay. So, as I said, we're, we will talk a bit, but we're gonna have you guys talk hopefully a lot more than we do. So, so be ready to be ready to jump in and, and go from there. So, um, if I can advance, who, where am I pointing when I do this? Advancement On? It is on, I have a laser pointer. I'm so glad it didn't work for him also. 'cause I would've felt really silly if it didn't or if it did. Okay. We do have a copyright notice. It's a very quick, it keeps our attorneys happy. If there's something you see in this slide show that you would like a copy of, just let us know. And chances are we have it published somewhere that we're happy to give it to you. But we just like to have that there just to, to make everybody happy. Okay. Excellence in the classroom begins with excellence in the boardroom. So, actually, let me pause for a second. I wanna have, since I know some of your faces and I, I don't know some of your faces, let's do a quick introduction, if that's okay. Um, uh, well, we introduce ourselves. So I will, Dina, do, would you like to start? And we'll go around just who you are and a little bit, you know, about yourself or whatever you'd like to share. Um, Dina Breakfast Ashburn school board. Um, I dunno, what do I give? Whatever. And you guys have all been on the same, at the same time, right? So that's redundant, but whatever you wanna share all at the same time. But I lived In, in Ashburn going on 19 Years. Okay. Wonderful. Good stuff. Thank you. I'm April District. Um, I have two daughters we live in district for Okay. Some long timers here. That's great. Awesome. Thank you. Hello. I am Linda Deans and I represent the broad run district. And, uh, I am have lived in Loudoun for 10 years. I'm a transplant from North Carolina, um, in Northern Virginia for the purpose of being, um, a grandparent. Oh, I love it. Where in North Carolina are you from? Goldsboro. Okay. I was born in Goldsboro. I love that. That's wonderful. Well, good welcome. Welcome up North. Right. And I'm Melinda Mansfield. I am DLI District. Um, I guess I've lived there now for 22 years. Okay. Maybe. Um, so, and my children are older. Okay. Um, and just a reminder, everybody, we need to Oh, uh, turn on the microphones when we talk or else nobody can hear us. And also, these are the fun mics that if three of us have 'em on, oh, then the other, then nobody else can turn them on. Oh, okay. So I just want a little housekeeper Pulling mine off whole time. I'm just Okay. Next. Um, good morning. Um, my name is Ann Donahue. I am the at large member. So I was elected by the, I represent the entire county, um, as opposed to an individual district. Uh, I've lived in the Leesburg area for just about 11 years now. Um, my spouse is a product of LCPS. He graduated from Valley in 98. Um, and, uh, as my many other family members who are also products of LCPS, so they're, they're local natives. I'm a, I'm a transplant from the Midwest, and I have, uh, two kids who are in, um, who are in my god, second and fifth grade, uh, in LCPS. And my sister-in-law has been a middle school teacher with LCPS for more than 20 years. So those are my connections to the division. Thank you. Hi, I'm Arban Raffe. I represent the Sterling District on the school board. Um, I've been in the county for about four years, um, and in the DMV area, almost 15, um, originally held from New Jersey. And I have a 5-year-old who's going to enter into LCPS very soon. So Thank you. Uh, good morning. My name is Lauren Chernoff. I'm the Leesburg representative. I have two children in the system. One is 11 and one is 13. So last year in elementary for our family, which is a big step. Um, prior to that I attended the Ohio State University, which I've been dying to get on record to congratulate them because we are the national champion. So now I have it on record. I feel better now. Um, but I, uh, my connection to Loudoun is that I taught here. Um, so I was a teacher for 17 years, 10 in Fairfax County, and then seven here in Loudoun, and literally left my school to come to the dais, um, about a, a little over a year ago. So that is my lens mostly. So very exciting, um, to be a part of this work. Awesome. Are you, are you teaching somewhere else now, or? I am not. Okay. This is my full-time gig. Yes. Um, but I do try to spend as much time in our schools as I can. That's great. Awesome. Thank you. Thank you. Hi, I am Samara. Um, um, I represent Little River District, formerly known as Blue Ridge. Um, I've lived in Loudoun County for 15 years, formerly from the North New Jersey. And I am a practicing dentist for 20 years. And I'm a professor at Northern Virginia Community College full-time. So that, for me, this is part-time. Um, I have two kids, two sons that go to, um, middle school and high school. So, um, pretty busy life and, um, yeah, just enjoy being with the kids. Thank you. I heard about five full-time jobs in your description, so, so thank you for, for doing that. Good morning. My name is Carrie LaBelle. I'm the Catoctin representative on the school board that's out west. I have lived in Loudoun County for 30 years. My grandchildren were all in Loudoun County Public Schools graduated there, and now they've taken all my great grandees away to move to other places. But, uh, I still have my husband, my horse, and my dog. I have been, as I said, 30 years in Loudoun County, but I am, uh, in my 52nd year of being a special educator. And where do you teach? I am retired. Oh, congratulations. I thought I was anyway, until I ran for this position. Oh, no. And we'll talk more about that too. All righty. Thank you. Thank You. Good morning, Sam and Rodney. Thanks for being here today in support of the school board and this retreat. I'm Mark Bergen, the incoming chief of staff. Um, I've been in Loudoun County for two weeks, so, uh, it's my 34th year in public education and I'm very excited to be joining the team and, uh, learning more about, uh, the board members and how I can support them through the conversation in this retreat. So, again, thanks for being here to facilitate And good morning. It's nice to see you both again. Aaron Spence, the superintendent of Loudoun County in my second year here in, uh, 14th year working with school boards as a superintendent. 14. That's a life that's a lifetime. Plus covid that adds like another 20 years onto it too, so. Well, good stuff. Well, thank you all for that. I think we, we said a little bit about ourselves too. I've been with the association since 2008, so I started as a meeting planner and, uh, kind of worked my way up and been doing governance training for probably 13 of those years. So, um, I, I tried to add up how many of these I've done, and then I got depressed, so I stopped thinking about it. But every board is different and every team is different, and that's what keeps me going. It's always very exciting. Um, and one, when you get one new member of the team, it's a completely different team. And you all came on all at the same time with a relatively new superintendent to your school division. And then here we are. So I'm just excited to get the chance to work with you. It's, you've hit a year, right? You've, you've celebrated your year anniversary, so you've got a year and a month or so under your belt. So, um, so that this will be good because you'll have some life experiences to share about sometimes when we do this session. Let's say this was last year at this time, and we do this session at, you know, nobody knows how to do anything. So that's always a challenge. So April, were you gonna say something? No. Yeah. Okay. Should you, like, we're just ready to go, so I wanna make sense. Okay. So excellence in the classroom begins with excellence in the boardroom. This has been up here for a little while. What do you think about this? Do you agree with this? Do you disagree? What are, what are your thoughts when you see, when you see this phrase? I know I'm taking you guys outta your comfort zones, aren't I? Usually you're used to, yeah, just, just jump in. I think excellence in the board, in the boardroom is when the members can accept each other and work together despite differences. And that really comes, you, you're saying that's how excellence is achieved in the boardroom by, by everyone working together despite the differences. Okay. Thank you. Who else? I'll add something. Um, surprise, surprise me. Um, I, this was a big reason why I ran for school board as an educator. Um, I would maybe add that excellence in the classroom begins with in the boardroom, but is most successful when we are connected to the people doing the work in our classrooms. Um, that's something that I felt like was lacking in the past and, you know, has, is something that really drove me to, you know, say, Hey, maybe I need to be one of those nine people if I want things to be more connected to the work. So Doesn't, that doesn't necessarily mean you're going in the classroom and you're teaching or you're doing things like that. You're just aware of what's happening in the classroom as it comes. Okay. Great. Who else? And you can disagree with this. I'm, I'm fine with that too. Well, I, I would say I'm very aware of, um, standing in almost as a role model. I, I understand that, um, I mean, I think having had the perspective of being a, a preschool teacher and a substitute and, um, working with kids over the course of, um, decades that you really are modeling for them. And so I think it's one of those things where really, um, having kids at the forefront and thinking about what's best for kids at all times, times, um, and really having that be the center of the work leads to excellence. Uh, if I can add, um, I agree with all my colleagues. I also think it's one big circle. So excellence could begin with our graduates to see as an example, what we did wrong and right. So based on what we did wrong or right, we then circle back to the boardroom and then, you know, we come up with, well, this went wrong or that went wrong, or this is what we did, right? Maybe we need to develop on that. And then it starts with the boardroom and then so on and so forth. It's interesting, I did a training on what's today, Friday. I did a training on Tuesday and I had a board member say a very similar thing, and I hadn't heard that for a long time. They said, well, excellence starts at the boardroom with the role modeling and those kind of pieces, but there's also excellence in the classroom that can trickle up to the boardroom and vice versa. And so it's just a different perspective that I hadn't heard. And I think that's what you're saying, you know, there's an evaluation and I've actually got, I think it's, yes, it is in the slideshow, um, that it shows how, how does governance work also as a cycle and where does that go? So we'll, I'm gonna make sure that we get to that because it's very much what you described. You see what happens. Where are you all as a governance team in that role, and then what's your output? And then what do we need to do to adjust and how does that work? And where does the superintendent come in? You're going to hear me say governance team. That is the nine of you plus your superintendent. So that's the 10 of you. No offense, Dr. Bergen, but that's the 10 of you at this table who are the governance team, because it's very difficult to do your job without the superintendent and vice versa. He can't do his job without the school board either. So that's when you hear me say governance team, that's what I'm, I'm thinking of. So any other comments on this? I think we also give the guidance, like at the top, you give the guidance for the rest of the, um, you know, for the teachers, for staff, for cabinet and everything else at the board through your policies and things like that, which you tend to focus on. Also, excellence gives excellence in the classroom because you're giving better guidance and, and understanding, um, of, you know, like with our strategic plan and things like that, you're organizing. If you're not organized at the top, then nothing's gonna be organized at the bottom. And I, I'll, I'll agree with that very much so. Because it's, you're setting the tone, you're setting how, or what, what is the professionalism, what is the, um, what is the tone you wanna set for the rest of your school division? And I know you guys are a large school division obviously. So you have central office and then you have a few other layers, and then you have student schools, and then you have students, everything like that. But you're setting the tone here at the top, the top the top, right. That's you guys. And then when, if, if you all are dysfunctional, or if you all are, are working in crisis, how does that trickle to your sup, your staff, your central office staff? How does that trickle down to the building level? And then how does that get to the students? Yes. Yeah, I'll just say one final thing. I agree with all of that. I agree with the role modeling and the leadership. Um, I think if there was a point I would add to what was already said is that what we choose to focus on substantively, uh, how focused that is and how we prioritize how focused that is on kids, families and educators. Um, and really, um, I think a lot of us can agree that, um, you can spend your full, all of your time focused on school board, but what you spend your time on is really important as well. And that also is an example for the rest of the division. She, she turned to me 'cause she knows I, when, when, when we always, always involved in training like this as the school board member. And, uh, there's no question that, uh, what we focus on in the, in the board room, uh, cascades throughout the, the entire, the entire school division, the entire system. So I, I, I think you're right on point that part of this conversation and part of what, uh, you'll consider the rest of the day and consider the rest of your, your tenure here is, is where, where is the focus, where is the focus and how do you stay focused when the, uh, when individuals come to the microphone, when you're at the grocery store or when the newspaper or the news writes something, uh, that you don't like, how focused, uh, are you gonna be able to be as a team and as a board on that, on that main thing. And we'll talk about that some more as we go throughout the day. Absolutely. Rodney and I have even had conversations around just how do we quantify what the board focuses on? Is it the time that you spend talking about students on the agenda? Is it, what does it look like? And it's just a really interesting thought and I appreciate that students were brought out within the first 10 minutes of our, of our conversation. Right. I will not, I will not say students until you guys say students. And it's kind of a little quiz I do for, for school boards. And I've sat in one of these sessions and it's taken four hours for the word students to come out. So then we had a deeper conversation around, well, why are you doing this? What is, what is the purpose of that? Now that board was in crisis. This was years and years ago. They were in crisis. They were dealing with some things. Um, they literally were turned like this to each other and couldn't even look at each other. Yeah. Adults, elected officials doing, you know, acting this way. But they had some things that they needed to work through and that's okay. 'cause they did and it worked out. But there's some work, you know, work that needs to be done. But the fact that students was mentioned so early in the conversation that that gives me hope and that gives me hope for today. And, and for your, your board. Because if you're not here for the students, why are you here? Right? I don't think it's the big paychecks you get. Don't ever add up your hourly, you know, your hourly rate. 'cause that's just depressing. So don't think about that either. You're here for the students and you're here to make a difference. And that's, and what does that look like? And how do you do that? And that's what we're gonna talk about too. So, okay. Make you talk again. What is one word to describe how you're showing up to the training today? And there's no right or wrong. You can say hungry or cold or whatever you wanna say. So what is one word to describe how you're showing up today? So I'm gonna start in the middle this time. So Ann, I'm gonna start with you and then we will kind of go this way and then come around. Tired. Tired. That's fair. Absolutely. Now open, open. Ready to learn. Ready to learn. I'm gonna shorten that to Ready? I was supposed to say that's three. Curious, curious. April stole my word. I was gonna say curious. Okay. Be curious together. That's right. I'll come around. Open Hyen ears. Open ears open ear. Okay. Glistening. Friday. Friday. Yes. Friday. Sleepy. We had an eight 30 meeting this morning. You guys did? Your board did? Or committee. Committee. Oh Man. That's fair. Absolutely. And it's so cold Out, right? Oh no. This is beach weather. This is beach. It wa I will Say I opened the window on my way here. I was like, what is, what is this magic? How do I get to open my window? Dr. Sp Interested. Interested. I love it. Alright, thank you for that. And there's a reason why I did that, but we'll come back to it. So, alright, so on the agenda, I, I should have prefaced this. If you're an agenda checker offer, I'm sorry. Just turn your agenda over and we'll just, you know, we'll talk about it later. So I am an agenda checker offer, and the first few of these that I sat in, I said, this is driving me absolutely crazy. But think about it this way, we will get to the topics on here, we'll talk through some things. It's not gonna be a linear or it may be, I hope it's linear, but if it's not, we're gonna get there because I wanna lead you where the conversation leads you. Right? So if you say it's 1115 and we haven't talked about this slide yet, and it is, it's 1123. So we're a little behind that, but that's okay. Don't worry, we're gonna get to it, I promise. So, um, so that's my caveat with, with that, but we wanna make sure we get, get to the topics, but it might be a roundabout way that we get to 'em. Everybody comfortable with that? I know whose agenda checker offers anyone? Yeah, so just, you can check, you can doodle do whatever you want with it. I'm, I won't look at it, I promise, but, um, just, just be aware of that. So, okay, so foundations for effective collaboration. So we've Got a question for You and I'll let Rodney take This. Yeah. I just want to, uh, take, take us back for a minute and kinda reset. We started off with the conversation of excellence in the classroom starts with excellence in the boardroom. I'd ask you to just give some thought for a minute. Why did the community even bother to create school systems? I mean, what's, what's the, what's the purpose? Why do they exist? So if you can just take a moment. I think you have a pen and pad. Just take a moment. And in 10 words or less, why do school systems exist? Why does the Loudoun County school system school division exist? 10 words or less. Yes, ma'am. Historically, Oh no, I want you to write it down. I want you to write it down. 10 words or less. Then I'll, everybody take a moment and write it down and then I'll come right back to you. I was gonna say, I know it. 10 words or less, why do school systems exist? Why do we even have Loudoun County public school division school system? 10 words or less. Why do school systems exist? Okay. Uh, I was gonna ask who would be the first to share, but Carrie, are you ready? Last word. That's Giving me last word. Okay. Take your time. Like be okay. Historic. Yes. Like you, Sam, I really don't need a microphone, but All the rules. Yeah. Well they're recording us, so that's why we have to have these on. Historically, people realize that education was the key. And that last word that I'm having trouble with was either survival or progress. Both of those things are important to people, you know, do we wanna survive? I have to know what to do to survive. Uh, if I want to make progress, I have to have education. So it's sort of like survival slash progress. There you go. You got 10 words. Alright. Okay. Who would be next to share? Why do school systems exist? Yes, ma'am. To improve the lives of our community members. Okay. Who would be next? Yes. Um, to provide an excellent foundation that empowers individuals to choose a life that suits them. Okay. Who would be next to share Christine's? Um, To be fiscally responsible and allocate, uh, money where it needs to be, uh, for all of our students. As a sharecropper's daughter, my dad told me that education was the means of leaving the fields. And I still believe that it is the means of, um, making progress in today's American society. Okay. Yes, sir. Um, education is a fundamental right and it's the most important public good. Dr. Spence, you have to some thoughts why the school systems exist. Um, provide our children, uh, their best chance at a brighter future. Yes. To meet the diverse needs of our students so they succeed. So community development. Community development. Okay. So as we, did everybody get a chance? Oh, I'm sorry. So throughout my, throughout when I was growing up, it was always to educate the community so that we have productive citizens able to participate in society. Society. So I heard words of, uh, power and, uh, survival, uh, student advancement, um, some, some respects of, uh, community development. Why is it nobody said that school systems exist to build buildings or to wear uniforms or, or to, um, Uh, Hire teachers. Even though all these things are important, why is it that almost to a person, your focus on why the school system exists is to produce positive outcomes for students or positive outcomes for the, for the community. Why is it that you didn't say some of these other things? Yes. Because all the other things are the scaffolding that we have to have in place to be able to improve the lives of our community. Uh, and everything else that everyone said here. Why, why they think our schools are important. Yes. So, so as we, as you move forward and as you give, give thought, and, uh, what I heard you say was about scaffolding, I want you to be, have the mindset and be thinking about, you know, why are you here? You know, we started off with excellence in the boardroom and then being able to cascade down to the, to the classroom. Um, and in the essence of all that conversation is there's the ends, which as the board you are be you are articulating. We want our students to be successful. We want our, uh, community to grow. We want our children to be college and career ready. All the things that you are describing are, are those ends. And then when you talk about buildings and teachers and books and all the other things, those are inputs. Those are, those are means, those are the scaffolding upon which, uh, the system is built to allow those student outcomes to, to occur. And so, as mentioned earlier about focus, so part of what, uh, we will challenge you to do as, as board members to really think about that focus, what is it that you want for your students? And then how do you govern collectively with the superintendent to make sure that those outcomes are achieved while on the other end, the superintendent has, uh, so much responsibility in terms of managing and making recommendations to you about those, about those ends. So just wanted to, something you can often think about when you're, when you're in the, in the meeting and the, and the lights roll and in the heated conversation is happening, is to take a moment, just kind of reflect, you know, why is it that this school system exists and, and why am I here? And what impact can I have on those things that you just said you want for your students and, and for your community. Any thoughts on that? Any reflections? Listening to everyone's comments or anything? I like the scaffolding, um, scaffolding example or analogy too. 'cause you, that's how you get there. That's how you build it. But what are you building? What is the purpose? One of, one of the things that Samantha mentioned earlier about, I'm gonna forgive me for saying we, 'cause I still consider myself a school board member, so to speak. Uh, she, she mentioned earlier about what is it that we spend our time on in, in board meetings. And so I was part of a research project a couple of years ago, and part of my task was to look at school board meetings all around the country and, uh, had a little chart. And I would chronicle from the beginning of the meeting opening all the way to the, to the end. And even noting how much time was spent in closed session and what the, what the research revealed is, even though we just had conversations about, uh, the school system existing to improve student outcomes and student achievement, that more times than not school boards by and large spend our time in our meetings on, on operational matters. We are, uh, you know, asking the, the superintendent about buildings. We're having conversations about salaries. We're having conversation around books and all these other inputs, all this scaffolding. But the research it showed is that at best we might be spending 10% of our time focused on student achievement and, and student outcomes. Even though, if you go back to the original slide, the, the what, the, what the board does, what the board gives his attention is what the superintendent is going to give his or her attention. And it's going to cascade all the way down throughout the system. So if the board is spending its time in meetings talking about student outcomes, how our students are doing, how are they progressing, asking questions of course of the superintendent, of how the strategic initiatives that he is implementing are leading to the outcomes, then we set that tone. But if we spend our time on the operational matters and the inputs, then that student focus does have the opportunity to, to get lost. Any thoughts on that? Agree, disagree. You can disagree with us. You know, we're okay with that, you know. We'll, we'll have a good conversation. Yeah. I think that this particular board, one of the things was a lot of us ran on student achievement and outcomes that very important to us. I know me for literacy and, and other things also safety and, uh, mental health. And so while we might not be talking about those kinds of things in the board meetings, I think our committees are also a part of where we're doing that, that work about talking about data. I mean, we just put together a performance monitoring committee for something to, specifically for looking at how we are going to be, um, defining what student achievement is supposed to look, you know, should look like for our, um, numbers. I mean that's, so I agree with you. Like it's at the forefront and wow, a big division. We still have to talk about like buildings to keep the kids safe and teacher salaries, all the rest of that. Yeah. And, and I should clarify, it's not to say that those things aren't important 'cause they are important. I mean, you have to be able to, to, to monitor those things. It's really about the, the focus and just FYI, so I, I, I read, and so I, I looked at the different committees that you have and I saw that performance monitoring committee, and I know you all are a large board of a large system and, and different superintendents and different boards have different philosophies about, you know, committees. But even as I was tracking that time, I would, it was also including time spent on, on committees. And so even as a committee that may be focused on student achievement, being able to elevate that back to the board as a whole. So it's not just a subset of you that are focused on that, but the, the board and the governance team as a whole can always find the opportunity to give focus, um, to student outcomes is good for you and it's also good for your community. Uh, if you, you know, I admit that, uh, uh, oftentimes we had board meetings. I'm in Norfolk. We had board meetings on Wednesday night and uh, Thursday morning, it was, uh, you know, the desperate school board members of Norfolk was the community conversation. And so what we did in the boardroom could either have that conversation be centered around, uh, whatever it was that, uh, the public may have been focused on, that the microphone or whatever disagreements we may have had, uh, uh, with one another. Or it could be focused on, hey, did you see the, the growth in third grade literacy that occurred they were discussing at the, at the school board meeting. Anything else? Great. Everybody still feeling good? Okay. Okay. Yeah. But I had just one more thing to add. I think that what we as a board do is to focus on what the students want and need. Need is not enough. You have to look at what they want, what do they want to do with their lives? How do they want to learn it? Um, we're talking UDL here, um, in case people don't know what UDL is, universal design for learning, how you get input information into the child, how the child gives it back to you in the manner that is comfortable for them. So it has to be not how the teacher wants to teach, but how the child wants to learn. So a lot of that is, is very important. And I think that this board is looking at things like that. What do they want to be? How much education do they want? How much education do they need to go in the career path they want? What will that education look like? So all of that is part of things that we are starting to look at here as the new board. Okay. And I think as Rodney mentioned, his experience in Norfolk, you know, the, the newspaper would often pick up on what everyone spoke about at public comment, right? Or what one little, you know, nugget happened. And, and typically when, when people come up for public comment, what kind of things are they commenting about? Are they mainly operational issues? Probably mm-hmm. Mainly classroom issues, building issues, things like that. Are they coming at Well, it, I guess that's a loaded question given the past five years, but no. Yeah, maybe not because policy, you know, policy's boring, right? You know, I mean, policy, abs, whatever, whatever. I want to complain about that. Although you guys have a community that probably would complain about that, which is a good thing. I think that's a great thing. Um, but policies are, are how you govern and how you do that. The operations pieces are typically what people pick up the phone and call you and, and try to talk to you about or complain about or, or make comments about. And they have every absolutely every right to do that. You're their representative. But then what do you do with that information once you get it? And then we're gonna talk about that for a long time too. But there's so many things where I have, uh, boards that will say, we wanna spend time on, on policy. We wanna spend time on this. But we just keep pulling, getting pulled down into the weeds of the day-to-day operations because that's what your constituents care about. They care about the day. They care about the experience their child had yesterday or something that happened on the bus or something. You know, something that happened like that. And so much of that should and could and probably is funneled through your superintendent. 'cause he's focused on the operations all day, every day. He's gotta pay attention to you guys from a governance standpoint for pieces of it, right? But so much of the day-to-day is, is through him and those, those kind of pieces. So, um, so sometimes it's not necessarily your fault, if you will. We're not passing blame at, at any point, but you are getting pulled down into the weeds because that's where your constituency brings you. That's where the conversations are not necessarily at the policy level. Sometimes at the po especially in recent years, policy level has made a, made a difference. And that's okay too. 'cause it always should have been right. When you have public comment, we go to travel, we, well, I go to school board means Rodney lived 12 years of them, so he doesn't have to go to too many more, but go to school board meetings and you walk in and you say, you know, look at the agenda and kind of prepare and you see the audience full, okay, what's going on? What's happening? And usually it's a, an athletics issue or it's a, it's an operational piece, right? People come make their public comments, say their piece, and then they leave and then the board does their work and you're working on policy and you're working on budget, you're working on those kind of things. So a lot of times this, it's just what's interesting to people, what's, what do they wanna know about? Um, and you know, so it's just, there's, there's no right or wrong, it's just, just how it is. If you said, here's our policy manual, study it and let me know if you have any questions to, to parents, they'd say, no, thank you. You know, I'm not, I have kids, I have to raise, you know, I have things I need to do. I want you to fix this issue. That happened yesterday on my bus, right? So, and I usually use transportation as an example. I, I'm no, no shade to our transportation people at all. My husband's in logistics, so I try to pick on my transportation people as much as possible. So, um, so no shade to buses. I rode the bus every day of my life, of my school life. So no shade at all. I promise. So someone was gonna say something. Yeah, go ahead Lauren. I just wanted to like, kind of affirm what you're saying and piggyback. One of the biggest questions I get from when I'm out in the community is like, oh my gosh, you must get the craziest emails. And I don't really like 90, not 5% are exactly what you're saying. It's people that have real concerns about their kids or in the community, or it's snow delays or, you know, whatever it may that impacts their life. And you know, for me, what I've, we've sort of had to learn really fast what, where to get the work done and how, and those avenues and, and so much of it is operational and coming from being in the operations as an educator, that was an adjustment for me, was sort of learning how to funnel that to being on the school board. And I think that one of the things that people don't understand about school board is that we do all the policy, we do all of that, and that's at a very high level, but we also are sort of the conduit of getting people what they need. And that goes to the superintendent and the people behind me, um, who support us as well. So I, but I also think there's a lot of value in getting those concerns and being the conduit because you learn what supports are in place for those people, and it, the trends start to rise. And so you start to see what, maybe there might be something, you know, back to samira's point that we need to reflect on that we need to do better on, or that's going really well, although we don't get as many of those emails, but occasionally. Um, so I, I do think that both roles are super important and it's finding that balance. Um, sometimes I liken this and not in a bad way that the Titanic sunk, but Mr. Bergen, Dr. Bergen and I had this conversation yesterday, it's like, it is sort of like moving the Titanic at times and avoiding those icebergs and really making sure that you are, but to move it in order not to hit it, you have to have the foresight, which means you have to have all the knowledge. And so that's one of the things over the last year that in the fire hose of this job that it has been, has, has been a learning curve for me. And I, I think for a lot of us is just how do we become better at having that foresight and knowing the lane to take that work in, um, while still doing our primary job, which is supporting our constituents and our students. And that's a great point. And you'll, you'll be learning whether you are on the board for four years, whether you're on the board for 12 or 20, you'll be learning every day. So if you didn't join this board to not learn, you know, to not learn anything new, I'm sorry. You know, it's the wrong, wrong place to be because you'll be learning things every single day about your community, about the system, about how things work, and then even a little bit, hopefully about yourselves, how do I internalize, how do I do things? What do I do? And that's what makes strong board members is the willingness and the openness to learn and adjust and to learn as a team. You know, again, you guys are learning all of this together, trying to figure it out together. And that's, that's, that's where you either hit the iceberg or you figure out the way around it. Um, if I can add, um, I, I feel like, uh, I'm a vessel for my, you know, my constituents in my district. So I feel like I have to, um, like kind of convey their message and see what can come to fruition for their goals. Um, but at the same time, mine's a little the opposite. I do get, you know, great emails, but I also get emails from not even my district that are a little challenging. So, you know, a little bit on the opposite of what Ms. Shernoff said. So it's, uh, I get things that are more, um, you know, this is, you know, i i an intersection for example. Like there's a problem at an intersection or, uh, we just had snow days, so why do we have a snow day here? There? Or fencing, why do we have fencing here? And I'm like, I don't know that school. But I'm like, okay, I'll get back to you. So it's a little bit, I feel like, uh, on the contrary, I feel like a little bit of a vessel to try to, you know, um, help them out so that their concerns are addressed. Yeah, absolutely. And you guys are, and I, when I hear everyone, everyone introduce themselves by their district, and that's okay. You guys are large. You cover your, one of your districts is probably the size of five school divisions, you know, from other different places. But I'll, I'll give you this talk no matter how big or small the board is or the, the area is, once you are on the school board, once you're on this board, all 200 school, how many schools do you guys have? 102 all. So all hundred of your school. That's it. You only have a hundred, all hundred of your schools are all of your schools, right? They might come from where you are, they might be from your area or whatnot. That's how you got to your position and that's how communication works. Just because that's had to work. 'cause you guys are so large, you need that communication structure. And I'm not just picking on you because you said this, I was gonna say this at some point too. Every 102 of your schools are all your schools, not just the 30 or 20 or however many you have in your area. So that's just a way to look at things. Yes. That's how you're gonna get the communication and that's fine. I'm not gonna argue against that because you, you all have to have some sort of funneling process because otherwise it would be a 10 times full-time job for all of you if you got every single conversation or complaint or whatever or not. But I would encourage you, when you're doing school visits, when you're doing those types of things, go outside of your, just your district because you need to know what's happening across the entire county. Much easier for me to sit here and suggest that, but I would just encourage you as you get, get further along in your tenure, get to know your schools obviously, but get to know all of your schools, 102 of them. So just, just be cognizant of that as we, as we go across. Yeah, I'll, I'll just piggyback on that and say absolutely. Um, when you, when you take a vote, you're not just voting for your individual district. The vote that you take impacts the, the system, the system as a whole. So I think that's important. The other, um, piece I'll just add, even as we talk about receiving emails or individuals that may come to the microphone or, or speak to you in the grocery store when you're out campaigning, uh, you tried to knock on all the different doors that you identified of the people that you wanted to reach and the number of, uh, individuals that voted in the, in the election as a whole, I'm sure far outnumbered the, you know, if you're somebody like me who would send an email as a, before I got on the board who would send an email every day. So you may have known me, Rodney Jordan because I sent you emails all the time, but my brother or my friend or my neighbor on the block who was just busy taking care of, of his household, you know, working with his child at night, that person counts too. And so it's important. You all really represent, uh, the community. You represent division, you represent the values, you're listening to the community. And even as you come together as a non individuals is ultimately what you do as a whole and how you vote and how you decide the, the, the expectations and the goals that you have for the division as a whole is what you're, they able then to articulate, uh, to the, to the superintendent of this is what the Loudoun County community, the system as a whole wants and desires for, for children. Not just my district, not just my block, not just my friends, but you are representing that community as a, as a whole. And so it's, again, it's something that you always have to try to keep in the forefront of your mind that the value, you know, we asked the question why the school system exists. Well, why do school boards exist? Because the school boards have individuals who are able now from whatever backgrounds, whatever geographic representation that you bring, bring to the board now that those values, those experiences, those uh, geographical places that you represent you now, and the system now has the benefit of you coming and bringing all that wisdom and knowledge and experience and intelligence and exposure together to now I think you all have, is it one, uh, one L-C-P-S-I think I saw to be that one, because you are make taking several and brought them together as one to advance the school division as a whole, As a a school board member. I'm just curious, did did you guys share your districts by any chance? Or is it, was it one district per school board member? Uh, I know you're a team overall. Yeah. And we all are a team here too, but did you share your districts aside from the at large member? So in, in, in my particular case, we had, um, five, we had seven, seven school board members. We had, uh, five smaller districts and then the city or the divided in half what they call super wards. So I was a representative of the super ward. They had half the city, like, uh, I think, uh, you like to at large. So I had half the city, there was another school board member that had half the city. The other five were from smaller, smaller districts. But again, I always saw the, um, the representing the city as a whole. If a parent had a concern or if a student needed something to advance their learning, I didn't say, well, you know, you're in the north side of the city. That's not my district. Go talk to somebody else. Mm-hmm. You know, the community, uh, in some respects recognizes you as their representative from the district. But then again, uh, they will want to feel that they can come to anybody to, to bring their successes or concerns or challenges forward. Um, with, with our, I mean, I, I think I, I believe you guys know, um, about the layout of ours. I know we, you, you know, we have an at large and then we have each for our district. Um, however, we do overlap a little bit with our districts. Uh, some schools have four school board members listed on their website, and some schools have like, uh, just two overall. We definitely have the at large, which is Ms. Donahue, as, as for every one of our schools. Not every website. She's very popular. Yeah, she's very popular. Um, but sometimes it could be quite challenging because, um, some constituents, even the ones I get that well, that reach out to me, that although we are a team and we do share, uh, you know, the concerns of our constituents to each other, and we address all of them, sometimes the challenging part is the constituent doesn't know which, which board member is my primary representative. So let me give you an example. Let's say I don't like an intersection somewhere, somewhere, and it's, um, it's someplace far away from me and I, and I, I don't know the logistics of it. So although I would address that concern, and I would maybe even pass it on or maybe involve or tag someone in a dialogue or in an email thread, the challenging part is, is the person that, that, that, that, that reached out to the other school board member, to that main school board member that's not really knowing of that, of that area, would, would find it a little challenging in a sense that, well, I don't know that area that well. I don't know the surroundings, I don't know the community in that area. However, I don't wanna be labeled as, I don't wanna help. So that is some of the challenges that I don't speak from all my board members that I have at least. And I've conveyed that to, uh, many of my colleagues here. So it, you know, I, that's why I asked that question. If you guys shared, and, and I'm glad to know that you had half the city, you said half the county and the other, which is pretty interesting. Yeah. And I, a couple of things. One, I appreciate you saying an I statement, uh, and I'll talk about that a little bit more in a, in a moment. But you know, as, as you were describing it, as I was listening to you describe the, the situation that you had, part of what, um, what we deal with as board members and as representing the community. So there's thinking of your role as a board member from a owner's perspective. So in essence, you the, uh, the, the shareholders of Loudoun County have elected you to be their board. You are there in the board role as a owner, meaning that you are there to set the division, the values, and the direction for the, for the district. Or you could get caught up in thinking as a customer. So if you have, uh, shares in, in McDonald's, when you go into McDonald's and you, uh, you know, order food or if you see that there's a problem, you're, you're acting as a customer. What the challenge is, and what we often don't get, uh, focused on as board members is our role as owner service. And so if you go to McDonald's and you see that there's a problem in the, in the, in the bathroom, you don't necessarily go and immediately fix it. You pass it on to the, to the manager, the person who's responsible. And I think part of what, uh, as I've read through, and I'm sure we'll continue to talk about is what does that look like for you? What does it look like for the superintendent? So as a board member, you are not trying to fix things that are really outside of your purview, but you are in a position to pass it on and whatever the communication process is for you to know that the concerns have been raised, that have been passed on. Uh, I think it was mentioned that, that the Titanic earlier, that the captain of the ship, who is your superintendent sitting here, that you know that he's in a position to decide what to do based upon the information that's, that's been provided. So historically, I think that here in Loudoun there has been a focus on quote, like territory kind of a thing. Um, Dala, Algonquin and Ashburn Broad run where wherever, including also newsletters, like they only go to that district. You can put them on your Facebook page, but typically they only go to your district. So in looking at that more holistic view of a school board, I, and I guess this also comes into communications too, that I think I, I guess we have coming up soon. Maybe keep going. That's why I said we're not linear. Mm-hmm. Communications. What happens when something comes to the full board? What happens when something comes from, like the reason why we have the people on the website is because they have special permission to be there and because they have special permission, the kid, the students have special permission to be there. Then that school board member who is that district is put on that website. So it goes to where the child lives. Yes. And then if you live, if they live in the broad run district, but they're in a school that's in the Algon Quin district, then Dr. Deans is on that school board list. Yes. On that's on that webpage. Okay. Okay. I know it seems a little nitty gritty, but sometimes it Is. Well, and that's unique too because it's, 'cause if I'm a parent and I don't know who, what kids live outta district, you know, or any of that kind of stuff, I'm gonna see Dr. Dean's and Ms. Chandler on it. I'm probably gonna call 'em both. And it's like, oh, I don't, you know, that's, that school's 50 miles from me. I don't, you know, I don't, that's not part of that is an interesting, I don't know that I've ever seen a school division put individual board members on a school website. Usually it links out to all school board members, you know, to all nine of you. Um, just because I, I live in Augusta County. I've never served on the school board in Augusta County. I am on a county commission. We're chosen by our districts very similar to you guys. Um, we have seven districts, but we only have five high schools. And so this, and then of course the feeder schools, so each district kind of shared mine. Mine only has one high school, but some will share high schools based on the population, et cetera, et cetera. Most people don't know what district they live in, in Augusta County. They don't, they know what high school they go to, but they don't know if they're in the Wayne or if they're in the Beverly Manor or if in their whatever. So everyone is listed on everything. And I guess it's pretty, I mean, we've got 11,000 students, so it's a bigger school system, not, however, not a hundred, however many you guys have. 90,000, 80,000. Okay. So you're eight times the size of Augusta. But still the process, if you have a concern, you, you let the whole school board know. Now, with 80,000, that might not be possible, but I do find it unique that if there's one child in that school, then all of a sudden that means there's another school board member who's over, over that school. So, is there, and it's hard. I don't, no one has anyone, no one's been here longer than three years. So I'm curious the, the history of that or why it was that way. Yes, Karen. One of the things that I was gonna add, I don't have an answer to that because I've been here in the county for 30 years and I don't know the answer, but what I do know that has gone on for a long time is that, um, eastern and western loudoun are very, very geographically different. Um, I get letters from people complaining, why are we closing schools? The streets are cleared. And then I get letters from people saying, you're sending our kids to school. We have four foot drifts. We can't keep the roads open all on the same day, because geographically we get different weather. Absolutely. But one of the reasons that you see more than one person is not just because they have a special permission to go to a different school. Their name comes up and it's just automatically sent to them. But a lot of our names are on different school sites because we share, uh, districts, for example, um, we have, I'm from Western Lain. There are three high schools in my district within the bounds. Um, yet some of the people that live in the southern portion of my district are technically living in an area and go to a high school that Sumara serves. And so Sumara and I share those high schools together where the tea, the, the children are, I share with, um, Lauren, because we have kids at middle school, uh, not the elementary, but the middle school that are from both our districts because they line up right along Route 15, and that's where the people live. So a lot of the sharing comes because you live so closely that the district, the school district overlaps, but the schools are not necessarily in your district, but your kids go there anyway. Yeah. And I think that's unique. So what if you have an elementary schooler and a middle schooler, Lauren, that's your, your story, right? So you might have some school board members for your elementary school and then different school board members for your middle school, right? Is that what I'm hearing? So it, It could happen. We actually share them. Overlap they over, yeah. So it's, I don't know, it's just unique. I am not here to tell you anything's wrong by, I'm just wondering about, about communication's sake. Yeah, like communication, I mean, emails, we get a lot of emails, um, of course. And so who's gonna be on point for those? Yeah. And, um, Um, so I have a question for you. You can as I'm, as I'm listening to you. Um, so what I, what I've heard you say is that that's websites and school websites, and on the school websites, uh, board members names are listed there as a contact. Is that correct? Mm-hmm. So with that being the case, uh, why, I mean, what, what is the board's role, uh, that if someone goes, if I, Dr. Spence used to be in Virginia Beach. I grew up in Virginia Beach. I went to Kingsdale Elementary School in Virginia Beach. So what role would a board member have if, if somebody went to the Kingston Elementary School website and had an issue that say, needed to be dealt with in the classroom or at the principal level or at the, I don't know how the organizational structure is here in terms of deputy superintendents and so forth. Why is the school board member's name or contact there? And what is it as a school board member you feel that you are responsible or obligated to do because your name is on that individual school site? Um, I don't have an answer to your first question. 'cause I've, I mean, my name is on the, all the websites, right? 'cause I'm the at large. But I've wondered the same thing because I, I agree with something you said earlier, which is that yes, we are not me. My colleagues are elected from individual districts. And so I understand prioritizing the needs of their district first. But now that we're all on the board, I view the responsibility of all of us is to represent all the students in the county, wherever they are. Um, so I, I've also thought it's kind of curious that the schools put on their individual websites the names of the members who represent the districts from which their students come. My children go to Lauren's. My, I live in Sumer district, but my children go to Lauren's, a school in Lawrence District because the lines are weird. Sure. Um, but I, I mean, generally when I, uh, you know, I get questions from the community, you know, complaints, you know, raising of issues. Um, I mean, generally my, I feel like my obligation is to do something to investigate it. Whether that's just sending it to the chief of staff and saying, is staff aware that this situation is happening? Or, you know, reaching out to Dr. Spence or a member of the cabinet to say, I've, I've had a concern reported about X issue. I would like some more information about how do we handle these types of situations. Um, and then depending on what information I get back, kind of going from there, like, would it be appropriate of me to have a conversation directly with the person who reached out to me? Or would it be more appropriate to say, have this conversation with your principal, or have this conversation with someone else? Um, but I, you know, I, I do view my, my as as we know, our job is not to deal with the day-to-day operations of the division. Um, but I do think part of our job is, is understanding what's going on and to the extent that if our constituents are saying something isn't, something is happening in a school that is not in accordance with our policies and procedures, I do think it's our role to follow up on that and, and investigate if there's any validity to those complaints and then follow up appropriately. Um, and I, I was gonna say something and I trailed off, um, lost my train of thought. Anyway. I, I just wanted to ask Samantha, so Dr. Spence, do you have any, any thought on, on this? Is there some particular operational or some value that you, that you see in this particular piece? Well, I mean, I think, uh, in general, um, I think the board corporate is responsible for the entire division. And I think that any board member who is thinking about what's happening operationally across the division shouldn't be thinking about that kind of relegated to you. You kind of said it earlier. Uh, I mean, this is my opinion, right? It shouldn't be thinking about that only relative to kind of their perspective and their experiences or their district or their neighbors, right? It's like, how does this impact all of the kids in the division? Sort of what Ms. Lavell was talking about. She gets calls about how can we be going to school? And we've got snow drifts when, when the, the decision is division wide. Um, similarly, when Ashburn is calling and saying, why are we not going to school? There's no snow here. You know? And so I think, uh, you know, I mean, that's kind of just the classic example of understanding that it's a division decision and the board is working for the division. Um, but then also recognizing, you know, you wanna be responsive to your constituents. And, and so then the, the transfer there as a part of the governing team is then we are open to, uh, making sure folks are aware both of the division level operational priorities, and then also responding to their constituent concerns. But is there any reason why all, like, there's only three school board members listed on a certain school's website. Is there any historical, so Yeah, that, that has to be historical. Yeah, that was not, that's something we inherited. Yeah, of course. And we haven't really discussed until now. Yeah. So, Um, did, did you have an at large member? Um, I was just curious. And what was their role? So it was, it is a super ward that was the closest to at large that we had that half the city versus we could have had seven individual districts, but the super ward overlapped. So my, we had seven, I was in Super Ward seven, and within Super Ward seven was all of ward three, all of ward four, and part of ward two. So I did have that, that overlap. But I, I will tell you that anytime somebody would come to me and say, my schools, I would say they're all my schools. And at one point, I think the, uh, the clerk or someone in the administration, um, started listing the schools by, um, by our district. And I, I objected and I said, if you're gonna do that, then I wanna make sure all the schools are listed. 'cause again, I'm making decisions for every child, every school impacting the division as a, as a whole. And I, at least for me, I thought it was important to try to break down the silos that, that I know we had in our, in our city where the west was, one thing in the east side was another thing. And it was always this constant thing. But again, if, if as the board member, if we're supposed to be systems thinkers, then I think we have also a responsibility to educate our community as to why it is Yes, you elected me from this particular district. I represent the, the district as a whole. And so it's not as simple as, well, you know, Rodney, you need to just take care of, you know, your district. Yes, I'm here, I'm representing you, I'm hearing, I'm listening to you, I'm representing what you're saying at the, what I hear from you and the values that you put forward at the table. But ultimately, seven or nine or 13, whatever it is, we have to make decisions for the division as a, as a whole. I mean, I just see, like, when I see us, I see us when with these concepts. And I, I appreciate that you shared that. But then I see it as why don't we all be at large? Because if, I mean, then why do we have districts then? Why do we vote? Wait, like, I mean, I like, you know, like everything just keeps, it just keeps coming. So I, I just don't, local communities make, I don't understand it anymore. Like I understand we're a team and I understand we, you know, we acknowledge all the constituents and we address the concerns, but in the end of the day, that causes a little bit of, of a confusion where you just heard from many, many of my members here that just said to you, you know, someone's getting accolades and someone else is not getting accolades. We're opening up a new school. You know, the principal there is like, which one, which board member do I contact? I, I, I don't know. Um, again, I don't speak for everyone here, I'm speaking for myself, but I think I get affected a lot. 'cause I have 42 schools, um, under my name. And that's a lot. If and if you, and I'm no super or anything like that. So I just wanna let you know that. And I, I will say that's unique. The, the, not the ward system, that's not unique. 'cause every, a lot have that. And a lot of it comes into representation on making sure that the whole county is represented. So, 'cause if you did all at large, it might all come just from one area, the, you know, whatever. I mean, there's historical things about that, but there are some school divisions that everyone is at large or, you know, and that's, that's just how it is. So I think it, a lot of it comes into play, especially with the, with the high schools I see the most because it's, you kind of have the ownership of the high school and the this and the that and the other, but right. 42, that's almost half of all of your school, all of your schools that your name's tied to. So, so I don't know if, if I was making suggestions, you know, it's, my suggestion would be why isn't everyone not listed on every website or whatnot? Um, and then you could always do a little link that says, wondering who, who you are representative is. And then you can send them back to where they're voting, you know, who they vote for. 'cause you could argue that who they vote for is truly who their representative is, not necessarily where the school lies. So it's confusing. Yeah. I mean, if I was a parent, I'd be like, well, what, where I live here, I'd vote here, I'd do this. And what, who am I supposed to call? So, but you want to be accessible and you wanna make sure that's available. April, I'm, um, very much he hear what you're saying, and I wanna say yes, and yes. And when I think about my service to this community, I think about the 82,000 students. And I think of that they're all my students, they're all my kids. I, I'm thinking about it in those terms. But when it comes to accountability, right? I understand that I was elected to, to serve 55,000 people who live in Algonquin and District. That's who I'm accountable to. And unlike Sumara, I have 20 schools. Um, that's just how it shakes out. But this is such a large area, and it is such a diverse community. And that's geographically diverse, is ethnically diverse, it's religiously diverse. And what we are, our, our task here together is to look out for the needs of everyone. And in that sense, it's my responsibility to understand the perspectives of the people who live in my community and bring those to the table. But that's not to say that I'm not gonna think about what's good for loud and as a whole, but it is, it is important that we have the ability to take all of those divergent perspectives and bring away, bring it back and, and make through this entity together, one LCPS. But it, it's really hard to consider, right? Like from a logistics standpoint, it's not that helpful if somebody from Middleburg calls me. I live in the furthest like most eastern northeastern part of the county, right? So it's just a, a, it's, I I honestly, I think if we're committed to having that high level viewpoint, having it broken down as it is, is just logistics. It just helps people understand, right? Who do they contact for service? And then it's just a matter of making sure that we're responsible to our community and can help them connect to the right pieces. Because we probably understand that better. I'm not sure that everybody who lives in Algonquin district knows they live in Algonquin district, right? But Right. That's where do you vote? Okay, this okay. That, that's the district you're in. You know, that's how you do it. All those links exist, right? Yes. It doesn't mean that's where your kids go to school. So Yeah. And sometimes you knock on a door and then they say, I vote there. And you say, yes, you do Surprise, right? Like, it's in November. I agree with, with April, I, I think as a means of just management, it's super helpful. And I do think this board does a good job. I've heard multiple people say, like, the people in my district are feeling this way. Let's put that up against the bigger picture. And I, I do think this year I have heard that a lot. Um, and logistically it is easy to manage. And I, I think kind of going back to one of the things you said earlier is like, people wanna get dinner on the table. They wanna get their kids to school. They wanna make sure that, you know, they can pay for their groceries and do all the things. And, you know, they're dealing with all the things. So I think knowing who that one person is that is most centralized to them, is actually more beneficial in that sense. Um, and then it is our responsibility to carry that bigger lens that, you know, in some sense, we are all at large. I'm not trying to take your role, believe me. Um, but I, I, you know, I, I think there is a balance there. So when there is, you get thrown into a sea of like, here's all the school board members. I, I feel like that might distance us from our constituents in a sense, just to play devil's advocate because we are elected by our districts. And them even knowing who we are sometimes is a, is a challenge. So I would challenge that a bit. And, you know, I think the communication piece is something we, we should talk about more and, and circle back on about who responds when and when. You know, it's just, it's a lot. Yeah. So, Yeah, Sure. Um, regarding, we were talking about the snow, how one area, uh, was affected and another wasn't. My area was not affected as much. So we were looking at, uh, four days, uh, for the kids not doing any schoolwork. So that was a real problem for the people in my area. So, um, we're here, uh, this school board is here, uh, to, you know, to help in the facilitation of, um, certain issues where as far as, you know, maybe kids should have been doing schoolwork from home. Um, in those four days, we didn't know, I guess we didn't know they'd be home at that, at that length of time. But we are here to, um, get those questions, get those suggestions. And from my particular area where I felt like I was involved, and maybe I can share, uh, with the superintendent, was we should have a backup plan in place where our kids are not missing out on education for four days. Um, 'cause we didn't know exactly if kids were gonna go back every day, there was a question, or were they going back? This area has ice. My area had nothing, you know? So, um, it's a constant question. And then we had the two hour delays. So when you have the two hour delays, you're also missing part of the school day as well. So I think in, as a school board member, when I saw that, um, you know, all that, uh, coming together with like four days off, automatically, I'm thinking my role is maybe make a suggestion. We have a backup plan in place for our students if that happens in the future. I don't know if that's gonna happen again, I hope it doesn't, but we should have backup plans. I mean, we were home for COVID, um, for a long time, and kids were doing schoolwork from home. So there should be backup plans where kids could still get their assignments and continue, continue to get their education. Thank you. And I think with that suggestion, what did, I'm just asking, what did you do with that suggestion? Or were you just, is is this the first time you've mentioned it? Um, I've mentioned it to Superintendent Spencer. Perfect. No, that's great. Um, but now everybody knows it may come out in one of our digests. Um, you know, that it went to, uh, you I was asking that question. Yeah. But, um, I do believe backup plans should be in place for not just snow, for any disaster that could happen. Sure. We could have hurricanes, you know, whatever it is. Um, we should always have backup plans because now we have the technology to support it. So, um, I'm only referencing this because my area wasn't as bad as, um, miss LaBelle's was. And I saw those, those emails where people were like, oh my gosh, the ice, the snow. And I'm like, uhoh, you know, it's clear over here. I didn't, you know, so, and then I had parents in my area coming to me, why aren't these kids back in school? Why is my son home for four days and he's not doing schoolwork? So there's, you know, even though it's a, it's a huge area we are thinking about, we should be thinking about the whole county in, in regards to something, a situation like that. Thank you. Go ahead. You can do, I, um, I, I, I appreciate that, and I, um, you know, I, I definitely heard you say about the, the backup plan. One, one of the things that, um, as I'm, as I'm listening and pondering and I'm remembering me in your seat, and, uh, so one, one thing that popped into my head as we're having this conversation is how much the conversation is about managing versus governing. And I think that's something that, uh, will, you know, will continue to reinforce. You know, again, you all have the, the responsibility and the opportunity to, to govern. Uh, you're obviously representing, you're elected to represent your, your districts. What it means to serve that from a, uh, forgive me for saying it this way, from a politician's perspective is very different. When we manage our campaigns and we're providing constituent services, uh, can be very different than when we're governing as a team as a whole. And you have a superintendent and all these, uh, wonderful qualified staff people that, um, that I bet probably have three or four different systems. Um, so, so that, that governance piece is something that I know I was always challenged with. And, and, and it just has to, um, be something that you, that you practice and really have these conversations about what makes sense for this board and this superintendent that allows you all to govern in the way that you want to govern for your, for the outcomes that you talked about earlier. And for the superintendent to be able to manage what he feels he should be able to manage based upon the goals that you've set. But that communication is important because there could be things that are brought forward that, that, that have not been considered. Um, the, the other thing I just wanted to, to mention, so one of the things I, in, in some of the consulting I'm doing with the VSBA, I'm looking at, uh, all the district data, uh, you know, across the commonwealth. Dr. Spence used to serve on a task force that, uh, that I've supported, uh, with the VSBA. And we would look at all this different data. And when I was looking at some of the Loudoun County data, I was fascinated by, um, at least the way it was reported. When you look at the, the so-called racial gap in reading, um, how you all were very much at the top of the, of the commonwealth in terms of the how small your, your racial gap was. Then when I looked at the, by, uh, poverty or by student economic status, the gap was, was much larger. And so as we're, as we talk about what is it that you want for, for students, I don't know if you, if if that's something that, that, that you all would give focus and attention to where you would be able to say, um, express that this is an area that you feel in terms of your student outcomes you want to address. And then in doing so, you are sharing with the superintendent that's what your collective will is. And now that superintendent and your superintendent is in a position to come back to you and say, here's the plan for doing that over the next three to five years. And then the conversation, as I've mentioned earlier about what we spend our time on, then all this conversation that we're having, which is good and important conversation could be about how are we dealing with closings, these gaps that we have as a system or even down to your, to your district and, and, um, which can be at a governance place. And I just think that's the constant pull that, that we, that we deal with, being able to communicate back to our constituents how we're governing versus, uh, at least in what I used to do, want to be the hero and say to the constituent, oh yeah, I can go fix it, but if I, I, I can't fix it, school board, individual school board members can't fix it. And so we are, you know, there's this common pretending that is easy for us to do and to, 'cause everybody wants to look good. And so we have to constantly be able to remind ourselves that we can focus on, I can focus on me, and so I can look good 'cause I got Ms. Jones problem solved. Or I can truly have, you know, system-wide impact. To say that as a result of us working together as a team and set a goal to focus on our advanced placement, whatever it is that we say that we value or the community values at once for our students, that that's where we can have, have, have real impact. So, just wanted to, to raise that. 'cause it's gonna be easy to constantly get into the conversation around our, how we are oriented around, I'm gonna manage and fix it. Nobody runs for the school board. And, and we all have egos. We all have egos, and we always feel that we go out and knock on doors and say, I'm gonna fix a problem. But then when we get here, we have to be able to shift to I'm one of nine, I'm governing as a whole and I'm gonna govern it. That at that systems level, Rodney, I think something that's hard for, you know, we want to, like you said, people wanna fix it, but it does take three to five years to see any progress of any sort from something that you've put into place. And that's a hard 'cause. Some of us won't even be here five, you know, five, six years away. You know, it's a hard thing to put something in place now to predict that it to, to make it go forward later. Absolutely. So, um, let's do a quick break for lunch. Lunch is here, but I, I wanna keep this conversation going and I wanna make sure that we talk about, get some kind of finality, we're not gonna make any decisions here, you know, you're not voting on anything. But, um, if we wanna talk about the communication p or we'll talk, we'll continue to talk about communication throughout the rest of the time. But if there's a question on listed on the website, whatever you guys want to do, um, that way we have some opinions on that. So lunch is here. I'm not sure where here is, but it's here. You guys probably know better than we do. So go ahead and break for lunch. Let's take about a 10 minute off mic break, you know, just to step away and then we'll come back and then you guys can continue eating while we continue talking. Does that work for everybody? Okay. Yeah. Okay. Perfect. All right. Another minute or two and then we'll come back and, and get started again. You guys, you guys are talking about Stanton? That's, that's my town. They're talking about Stanton trying to listen, see if they're saying anything bad. Is that where Fred Rutgers is? Wait, who? Rutgers. No. Who? Dwight F Rutgers. Oh, FUD. Rutgers. Mm. Think they stand? Mm-hmm. We don't have a fed Rutgers, like the burger place. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. No, I wish Fredericksburg used to have a Fed Rutgers when I was in college. Carrie, do you have family in Stanton or are you, you have family in Stanton or are you just talking About food? Oh, food in Stanton. Yes. I used to live. Oh, I didn't realize that. Okay. I still live in Augusta County. Okay. Is everybody back? Oh, we've lost, he may have just stepped out for a second. So I'm gonna put this on the board and then we'll, we will start officially when, um, when Arvin gets back. So what are three roles? So we've talked about a lot of these. We've talked about roles and responsibilities, we've talked about communicate, you know, we've talked about a lot of these things through the conversation. But I wanna go through, get through a few of these pieces. What is the difference between the board's role and the superintendent's role? And then if you can, if you, if you would like to kind of classify it, if you will, what are three responsibilities of the school board and then three distinct responsibilities of the superintendent. We all know superintendent's operations. That was an easy one. Operations. Yeah. What oversight of the superintendent? So let's break that down into three things. So it's, you've got oversight and you've got operations, right? So that's, that answers the first question. What are those three main responsibilities of the board? And there's actually a fourth, and I'm gonna see who gets extra credit to find the fourth. So what are, what's one one main responsibility. Big buckets. Yeah, go ahead, Carrie. Policy Making. Policy making. Bingo. I think I heard the other one over here. Somebody said something. Or did you say policy? Okay. Policy's good. What else? Holding That guy accountable. Holding that guy accountable. Yep. We call that retention of the superintendent, but retaining, hiring, evaluating all of those pieces, right? Did we say budget? Budget. There we go. And I hadn't heard that one yet. That's kind of a big one, right? So, and then what's my extra credit? Fourth one. I think we're supposed to also do it for ourselves too. The evaluation of ourselves as well. Eval. Yep. That's, that's one of those kind of best practices. You don't have to do that by law. Um, but there are a number of boards that do choose to do a self-evaluation. Absolutely. What's my extra credit? Number four. What was it? No, Rodney's mentioned it a couple times 'cause he would argue that that's number one. The, um, The make achievement of the students Student achievement. Well, yeah, that's, that's you're right. Safety. No. How about instructional oversight? Instructional oversight. That's, that usually falls under policy. 'cause you all set the instructional policies and then the superintendent oversees that the policies and the, the academics are taken care of. But I'm, I'm looking at the board looking at metrics and saying this is up to par. This is not do something. We need to do something Data. Okay, so from a data, just data, data-driven decision making is that, that was all of the buzzwords a few years ago. That's a piece I think that falls under. I mean really it falls under policy too. 'cause what are your policies that come into, so that's, that's kind of how you get there. But what are some bigger pieces? And actually that could, that could fall under the words I'm looking for too. S strategic Vision. Yes, strategic planning, vision, mission goals, those pieces. If one of your goals is to have strong student achievement, how do you do that? You look at the data, right? So that's kind of gets into the how, so, yeah. So you guys are setting that, that big picture, strategic planning of the school division. You all say, and I use this as an example. Well, I used to use, sometimes my examples put my foot in my mouth. 'cause some, it's an issue, you know? And so I've tried to find an example that's universally not offensive. So I've stuck with building a rocket ship. Is that, is that offend? Does that offend anyone? Let me just check. Okay. Alright. So if the school division, if nine of you decided you wanted Loudoun County schools to build a rocket ship, could you do it if nine of you voted and said, we want to build a rocket ship. Yes. Right? You all are studying The division. If we pass that policy and we Yeah, if we don't have the money, if we don't have have the money, it's highly unlikely. Sure. But you could pull the money from other places. You all the nine of you could make the decision to build a rocket ship. And then the superintendent, he has To figure out how to do it. Yeah. He's gotta figure out how to do it. Right. And then where are we gonna get the money? What's gonna happen? You deal with the community ramifications, you know, but if the nine of you said, I want to build a rocket ship, it could get done. I'm not saying it will be, but you all set that vision and mission. And if you say, this is the vision of Loudoun County schools is to build a rocket ship, that's up to you guys to make that decision. Maybe We can cost that out in our budget packet. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you do, you would do all the things. You'd have to hire staff who are familiar with building rocket ships. You, you know, there's different pieces. But if you guys wanted to do that, you could, I'm not here saying that you should, please don't. But I usually use examples that everyone gets upset about. So, so we're, let's stick with that. So if your vision is to build a rocket ship, you all then put into place the budget piece. You put in the policies around the rocket ship, who's, you know, where, how is it gonna be built, et cetera, et cetera. Then you hire someone, maybe it's a superintendent, maybe it's a, a rocket scientist, you know, to, to do that. And how does that get done? You all set that vision, you set that, where do you wanna go? Where do you wanna be? And then all of the other ways of how you get there comes up with, that's that you're reviewing data, you're doing this, you're doing that, et cetera, et cetera. And then the superintendent does the operations. So he does everything else right? He makes sure he deals with the day-to-day. He's working with the, his central office staff. He's working with the principals. He's work, you know, he's, he's handling all of all of those pieces. How many employees does the school board have? One. One. And who's that? Superintendent. I heard a but But we also have the ombudsman. Sure. The, um, the attorney, the auditor, and Mr. Allen over there. Okay, awesome. So typically you have the one, you have the superintendent, and then you guys, I know, and some will argue and say, well, we also hire the school board attorney, some school boards. The clerk re reports directly to the school board. It's all a little different. But typically it's, you have the one, you have the superintendent, and then he has everyone else that falls under him, right? And so when we think about, we haven't really talked about power and authority at all, and I don't know that we're gonna get to it. When you think about giving direction or asking questions or um, making comments or doing both of all of those pieces, those should be going through your superintendent. I realize you have a chief of staff also who does a lot of board stuff too. But it's ultimately he reports who does your chief of staff report to superintendent? So ultimately everything's going to the superintendent. The superintendent has just said, Hey, work with the chief of staff on this, or Hey, work with the clerk on this, et cetera, et cetera. But all of that's coming through the superintendent. And then here are the four, just to prove to you, I didn't just make them up. Um, so you're doing the planning, you're doing the goal setting. I actually at Rodney's request, I moved that one to the top for the slideshow. Um, you're approve, you're approving those. You wanna build a rocket ship. Here you go. Here's our rocket ship. You all set the policies around that. You designate who your CEO is, who your superintendent is, you recruit, hire, evaluate, et cetera for your superintendent. And then you of course approve and adopt the budget. Those are the big bucket pieces that you do. How do you do these? There's a lot of other steps that get there. And I think I took that slide out for base of time. Um, oh my goodness. There we go. Um, but how do you do that? You are reviewing the data, you're talking with your constituents, you're gathering information, you're attending school board meetings, you're reading up on information, you know, et cetera, et cetera. You're doing all of those things. I've had some people look at this and say, that's all we do. Well, if this is all you do, you're pretty busy, right? If this is all you're focused on, that can take up 10 times the time that, you know, really, really you have to dedicate to this group. Any questions or thoughts on these kind of basic, basic roles, if you will? Roles and duties? One thing I always say is it's when you get kind of to the nitty gritty on, is this a board role? Is this a superintendent's role? Think about, are you paying someone in the school division to do this job that you're about to do? Are you paying someone in the school division to mow the lawn at the elementary school and you're about to go get your mower out and go mow the lawn at the elementary school? It's taxpayer money. So we all pay for it. Okay? Sure. So the school division, absolutely, but the school division has someone on payroll who's doing that, right? So then the board really should not be doing that because there's someone else who's been hired to do that job. Does that make sense? So if, if you say, I want to see, this is where my examples get me in trouble. Um, let's say you want to investigate the route of a school bus. Is there a transportation person over there that I'm picking on? Yes. Where? Oh, thank you. Thank you for the work that you do. So let's say if I, a parent calls me and I had a, I had a school board member argue with me about this on last week. So please, I'm ready If someone says, Hey, my kid's bus route just doesn't make sense. They're making 20 circles, whatever, whatever. And I'm a school board member and I go out and follow that bus to see what the route is doing, right? Should I be doing that? No. What should I be doing with that information? Contacting us, contacting your transportation guy who's gonna probably, he can look it out on the map or he might go and follow the bus. Maybe the driver missed a turn 10 days in a row or so. You know, who knows what, what happened? But you're right. It's not you that are following the bus. It's he and his staff that are trying to figure out how to, how to do that. And I had a board member sit, right? Not here, but wherever we were. And she said, no, I'm, I go out and follow the bus. I said, no, don't do. You know, there are many, many reasons why, but you have someone who can do that or who should be doing that for you. Now if you find that all the bus routes, everyone makes 10,000 circles, maybe that's a common issue. Like you said earlier, maybe that is a common issue. Maybe something's happening and maybe that does need to be brought to the broader attention. Who set up these bus routes, what's going on, you know, what's happening, right? And that's where having that, that ear of your constituency is important. Because if you start to see trends across your area, across the district, then that does become an issue that that is a bigger thing that might come in front of the board. But if it's a one-off and you've got something, you're not the one out there investigating it, doing the work for it. You've got staff who are there that can do that for you. Does that make sense? And again, thank you for the opportunity to pick on the bus routes because it's, they're hard. I like, I don't, I don't, I listen to my husband on his phone calls, I'm like, what? How do you do that? I don't understand any of these words you're using. So it's important work, but it's also something that affects most of your kids, right? When they ride the bus. And that, that's a big piece. So there's another way to look at this. The macro versus the micro. Who's the macro in this relationship? The board, which means the superintendent's, the micro, right? So the board's looking at the policy, the goals, the board's looking at accountability. The board is the community leader. You guys are an extra nine set of eyes and ears for your superintendent out in the community. The superintendent is coming up, he's overseeing the staff, he's dealing with the operations. He's that educational leader. And I appreciate those of you who had said, Hey, I'm an educator. I've done this, I've done that and I've done that. That's wonderful. But when you get on this board, you're no longer, you know, you have that background, but you're not that educational leader. You are in the governance role. And a lot of times for my educators, that's, that's hard. And Lauren, I think you shared that earlier and thank you for sharing that because you're so used to being in the day to day, you're so used to having a parent call you and you can fix their problem right away because you're the teacher, you know, or you're the principal or you're the special ed teacher, whatever, you can fix that. But at this level, you've gotta bring yourself up to that governance role and then let somebody else take care of it. And I would also say, and no matter what you do, if you're an accountant, if you're a dentist, if you're, you know, you're not out there giving dental advice to your, you know, your staff and students right now, if they're, if you're doing a volunteer work, you know, go for it. But think about what you do on the, as your day-to-day work is not your job on this board. And I say that because I've had a board member, this was a few years ago, who is an attorney. Is anyone an attorney on this board? So I I'm happy that I don't see any law books at your seat, right? Because there was a school board member, it's all on the internet. That's, I know they don't even publish the big ones anymore, do they? We used to get 'em in our office. Anyway, they would bring that big LexiNexis Virginia school law book. And that board member thought they were meant to be the attorney for the board. And I know on some nonprofit boards, they do try to hire an accountant, an attorney and a whatever, whatever. But on this school board, that's not how that works. You have a board attorney to do the attorney work. You have someone to do your accountant work. Yes. You're gonna bring your background. And Anne's probably gonna, you know, her ears are gonna get up a little bit if y'all start talking about lawsuits and start talking about other things. 'cause that's the world in which she lives. But she's not your board's representative. She's not your board's attorney. She just happens to be an attorney while she's on this board. Right. Any comments or questions or thoughts around that? And I think, Lauren, I may have asked you if you were a current educator, you know, if you were working somewhere else, because when you are in a system, like let's say you went and you were working in Fairfax, you're living here, you're on the board. That makes it even harder to delineate because you're seeing the things and your real timing. Oh, we just had to deal with this in my school. Is this gonna come up in Loudoun? How does this work? How, you know, so it's, it's, it's even harder to make that separation. So, um, yes, please. Um, I'm so glad you're pointing all of this out because we had a previous, uh, board member when we did training, he discussed, um, he was, uh, he was in business and he did say that, um, a lot of the disagreements you would have on this school board is you have the business people and you have the educators. It's completely different worlds. Two different worlds. So, um, the fact that you're bringing that up, um, and making that point, um, is the point I would like to make. That some of us are educators and some of us are not. So we operate in a different way. And, and that needs to, uh, be understood. Um, so thank you so much and if you have any more to add to that piece, why there might not be a full collaboration because there's a different thought process, that would be great. Thank you. And I think I would take that even a step further. Not necessarily your profession, you know, but just who you are. You know, I know some business people who are totally different personalities and totally different skill sets and educators and like, you know, vice versa. This is the world of education. And so we find ourselves using acronyms and I think Carrie used an acronym earlier and I didn't know what it was. So I I'm, I'm happy that you shared it because I just was gonna smile and nod 'cause I had no idea what you were saying. So in the world of education and the world of business, any world, I'm sure dentists have their own acronyms. You know, when you're in the world that we're in, you want to make sure that every, it's accessible to everyone. You want to make sure that if in, and this is often a challenge with your superintendent and staff. 'cause they can talk acronyms all day in their offices, right? But when they come to the board, they really shouldn't be using those acronyms unless they've taught you what the acronyms are. Sol as everybody knows what SOL stands for. Although when my dad heard the words SOL when they came out, that meant a lot different, you know, 20 years ago than or however many years it was when SOLs came out. Um, but that we, that was kind of a joke in my family. Um, he was like, you're taken what? That's not what we, you know, that's not what I call it anyway. So there's some acronyms that have been generally accessible, but you're right, there's different, people think different ways. But the, the role of this, the 10 of you, is to, to bridge those gaps and to really find a common language between you all. And I would just caution and, and I'm sure your superintendent and his staff have been told, you know, don't use all these educational acronyms. We've gotta get, you know, we've gotta just just lay it out, lay it out in layman's terms. And that's not saying that you're not capable of learning the acronyms, but think about it, you also have your audience who comes. You have your parents, you have your students who are in the room. You wanna make sure that the information, the conversations that you're having are accessible to anyone who's listening. Yes. But I do think that our experiences, um, can help, uh, not just on the board, but um, my grand babies are down in Fairfax and I talk to the, to the teaching and learning people. We don't do that, do we? Because, um, her, um, advanced geometry is taught totally online and with math you gotta turn those angles to figure it out. And um, Mr. Slevin was very happy for me to talk with him. So they are very receptive in listening to that background, um, information that we come up with. Absolutely. And That makes us smile. And your experiences matter so much. 'cause your experiences are who you are. Mm-hmm. What you're living and what your grand babies are living is who you are. Mm-hmm. Especially moving here all the way from Goldsboro to do that. You know, that's who you are and that's your experience. And as a teacher, we taught this way in Fairfax. We teach this way in loud. And it's different, you know, and that's the benefit of having 131 different school divisions. That they are different. You know, there should be some similarities, but there's a lot of differences. But what you come as a business person, what you come as an accountant, what you come as as a dentist, as you, what you come in as a retired special ed teacher. What you come in as a lawyer that matters. And that's who you are. And that shapes your values, that shapes your experience, that shapes your expertise. And that also probably shapes your interests on the board too. 'cause you might perk up if something else is happening. You know, if anyone's really big into like CTE or really big into band, you know, I was a band dork, you know, and I loved it. It was wonderful. And so anytime I hear someone talk about band, I'm gonna, okay, I'm gonna sit up a little straighter and make sure, oh, you know, and you know that language, but you're passionate about different things because of who you are. And there's nothing wrong with that. Nothing wrong with that at all. But it's appreciating and understanding each other's passions that takes you to that next level that takes you to, that we're not just nine people, we're not just 10 people. We're now a governance team where we can understand where each other comes from. And that takes time. You guys have been together 13 months. It takes some time, but it takes deliberate time. And doing things like this, doing things that you can really kind of break down and get to know each other a little bit can only help. Hopefully. Any thoughts? Yes. You mentioned getting to know each other, but, um, we we're kind of staggered in, in when our terms end and begin. So you had mentioned I think a year, a little over a year that it may even take even longer to get to know each other. Sometimes that can be challenging. 'cause by the time you get to know each other, you know, then you have to rerun, I guess. Or hopefully you win and you, you know, you go on your next term. It's hard and it's, you guys all come up at once, right? First time. Oh, this was the first time they're staggered us now. Oh, okay. And I'm, I'm okay with that. 'cause all at once is hard, but they're staggered. I have a couple school boards in the state based on how it's staggered every single year they could have a new board member. Mm-hmm. And that's, that is a challenge. And, and that, that's not to say that they will, but if somebody decides not to run or if they don't get elected every single year, they could have a new board member think how that superintendent feels. You know? That's, that's a challenge. So you're right. And, and also the, the act of what you do, you have to do in public, you know, it's hard to have, let me tell you about my childhood, you know, when you've got 40 people watching, you know, but it's, it's that not, I'm acknowledging the challenge of it, but also saying it's not impossible too. So yeah. Another challenge is the fact that our terms run January to December and school divisions have school terms September to June or August to June. And I think that that's a mismatch as well in terms of trying to get things passed that will impact the kids. By the time you get it through in January, school is out in June, you can't get back to it until August. And I think that that's another mi mix match. Absolutely. And that adds to that three to five years that it takes to really get anything done or to see the, the fruits of your labor, if you will. Because everything takes time. And I mean, I know many of you're probably familiar with how, you know, government work, you know, 'cause it just takes time to do anything. Right? And it's, it's always interesting when, when there's members of a board who are maybe their own business owner or they can make their own decisions and they don't have to go to a board or they don't have to wait for the government. They don't have to do all that. They're used to getting things done tomorrow and seeing the results the next day. And then when you get on that school board, that's not how it works. You know, you might wanna get it done, the superintendent might wanna get it done, the world might wanna get it done, but it's just gonna take time. And that's frustrating. I mean, I don't know any other way to describe it as frustrating. So, 'cause you, I mean, Rodney was so gung-ho when he was a brand new boy. I remember he came on ready to change the world, ready to make all the things happen. And then guess what? Had to wait a little while. You want me to chime in? I Mean, yeah, you can, you can defend Yourself if you'd like to. No, I'm good if you don't have to. No, no. It's, it's, it's real. But I, but I do think it goes back to, um, you know, again, when you're, when you consider the, uh, you know, systems thinking and the strategic planning, the goals, you know, Samantha was teasing why I keep saying the, the goals is to me is, uh, probably the most important thing that a school board does. Uh, and representing the community you, 'cause at the, at the board level here, you're, you're setting the ends. So those goals that are up there, what is the results? What is it that you want representing the community for the students to know and to be able to do? And and ideally when the board has established those goals, and the superintendent has, has helped to frame a strategic plan around accomplishing those goals, then in a, in a, uh, ideal idealistic world, those, those goals survive, uh, board turnover, they survive, uh, superintendent turnover because it's about the vision that the community wants. You're representing that, representing that vision. Clearly anytime there's a new board member that comes on, there's always, uh, work that needs to be done and onboarding. But, but hopefully as you are able to define these, uh, outcomes that you want for students, and you have community buy-in and support, and you have that strategic plan again, now you all are in that position to monitor that that progress. I, I saw that you recently had a, a budget presentation. And you, all of us, you know, this time you're going through budget presentation. So the superintendent is aligning, uh, these recommendations, I believe, around the strategic plans and the goals that you've set. And so when you are evaluating the recommendations that that come forward, you have the opportunity as a board member and as a board as a whole to have an understanding of what are the resources that the superintendent is recommending that, that he needs in order to accomplish these goals that you have established over this three to five year period of time. And I think there's so much, uh, power and value that I think as school board members, we miss, uh, when it comes to nine people coming together and setting a goal and saying, we want to be the best literate school division in the commonwealth. And then being able to approve recommendations that come from the superintendent to achieve that. 'cause the superintendent could easily come and say, if we want to be the, uh, most literate, uh, school division in the, in the Commonwealth, then in order for it to get, in order for us to get there, there may be other things that become less priority. And that's that opportunity that the board really has the power to set in terms of those goals in those in those ends. So this slide is often the one that everyone says, can you send me a copy of that? So no pressure. But this really gets down to what does the board do? What does the superintendent do? What does it look like in action? So the board, like Rodney said, is focused on the ends, the results, the questions that you guys are asking, why are we doing this? What are we doing, how much, how much is it gonna cost? Right? Those are the, the big three that you're, you're thinking through. You have the vision, you're setting the vision, you're setting the mission, you're setting the goals. You approve and, and set the policies. I mean, you do, you, you set the policies, you monitor, are things being done the way they're supposed to be done? Are things on plan, like you had mentioned earlier, and you're making the vote. You're, how, how are you doing that? You're voting superintendent on his side. He's, he's the focus on the means and the methods, the questions he's answering to you or asking his staff, how are we doing this? When are we doing it? Where is it gonna be at all the high schools? Is it just the elementary school? Is it just this area? Who's going to be doing it? Is it the principals? Is it this types of teacher? What, who is doing it? He's answering all of those questions. He comes up with the objectives, how to get the things done based on what you've set. He's coming up with those action plans that are goal oriented, focused on your strategic plan. He comes up with those regulations that are tied to your policies. Right. You'll see, you know, you have regulations in your policy, and they might be in your policy manual, but those regs are typically things that your superintendent's gonna, has, has come up with. He's gonna come up with the procedures here. His staff are gonna come up with the procedures, make sure things are being followed. He's going to implement what, what you all enact in policy. He's also gonna make recommendations to you. I'm sure you've had plenty of times that you ask, well, superintendent, what is your recommendation on this issue? Or what are, what is your expert opinion on this? What do you think we should do? That doesn't mean you have to follow it, right? But you're asking him for his expert opinion because he's your educational leader. What is your recommendation? And you all vote. Do you vote for his recommendation? Do you vote against it? What do you do? You know, and how does that work? And, and what does that balance? 'cause ultimately, he answers to the nine of you, and that's also an important delineation. He answers to the board as a whole. He doesn't answer to individual board members as humans. He has nine bosses, but really he has one boss, and that's the board as a whole. If five of you vote five, yeah. Five of you vote for it. That's how he answers. That's, that's what, that's where he gets his marching orders. And that's unique too. You know, it's, it's, and that's where we get into the power and authority piece. We're not gonna have too much time to cover that. But as a single board member, what kind of power do you have? Or do you have any as a single board member? Anybody? Yeah. Do you think you have some power? I do not. Not much. Not much. Nope. Okay. Your Vote, you have your vote, you have your vote, you have your platform to ask questions. You have your platform mm-hmm. To make sure that issues are being presented to the community mm-hmm. To relay feedback from the community. Mm-hmm. Back to the staff. I might not be able to change the outcome. You know, my vote might not be able to change the outcome of a policy determination, but I can, I hope my intention is, and I hope that I am able to use my position to at least add, to filling out the conversation and make sure that viewpoints are being heard and considered. And, um, as Lauren likes to say, tightening up, uh, the language in some of our policies, um, to make sure that they're saying what we want them to say. Absolutely. So you as an individual have, you know, you're bringing all of this to the table, but as an individual, you're, you're one, you can't just come in and say, this is gonna happen. Right. You've gotta convince four other people. So the power lies in the board as a whole. Right. But what does the community think? The community thinks. You walk into a building, you are the end all, be all. You are the school board member. You have all the power in the world. Right. And that's not ne necessarily something you've asked for. It's just what is perceived. All the school board chairs here, I need to sit up a little straighter. I need to make sure my desk is clean. I need to do all these things. And it's, you know, but they, they think that it's like, if your boss's boss's boss comes into your workplace, you're probably gonna make sure you're, you know, you're, you're sitting a little straighter and your stuff's off the floor, you know, and all those kind of things. That's just human nature. And so when you all go into a building, or when you do, you know, you make a comment to a principal, you, you say something, just know that that is in, it is inferred that it's, oh, it's a school board member asking me to do this. Or it's a school board member saying this, when really it's just Melinda, the, you know, the, the mom or the aunt or the whatever. But it's still school board member or school board chair who's saying this or asking this or whatnot. Has anyone been in a situation where you've had or feel comfortable sharing an experience where maybe someone's given you a little more kind of power than you really anticipated them giving you Yes, go ahead. Um, I, I wouldn't say power, but I, my, one of my children is a special needs student. And, uh, there, there have been, there was one occasion where last fall, one of the teachers at school reported an incident to me and actually asked over email, like, what do you, how do you think we should handle this? And I was thinking like, I, I don't, I don't understand, like, handle this the way that you would for any other student in this situation. Like I am. I don't know that, I don't know. I have no reason to think that they were, that they asked me that question because of my position as a board member. Although they know that I'm a board member. But this, our kids school has always been really wonderful about working with us on our student special need issues and supports. But I, I have the like, worry in the back of my head, like, don't, don't, this is, don't treat me differently. No, no. I'm here in my mom had I'm, I'm not here as a board member. Absolutely. And that's, and you can say that all day, every day, but you're still a board member. You're still mom. You're never gonna take that hat off, but you're also still a board member. But just the fact that it kind of gave you pause and said, oh, no, you know, that's a good, that's a good thing. Just be conscious of that. Be conscious of when you post on social media, when you do whatever, it's, you as a board member being perceived, or you as a representative of the board, not just you, April, the, the, the whatever, you know, the, the, the sports fan or the, this bless you or, or whatever. Anything that you post or say or do is, is also you as a board member. Yes. I think in my, before I was elected, I did a lot of literacy advocacy, and I also did, uh, worked with people for IEP kinds of things. And so now people think that they can call me and say, why don't you come into my IEP with me so you can tell them what to do? And I'm like, um, no, thank you. Um, I'm glad you said that because it's not my rule. Yes. Um, but they do perceive that I could go into an IEP meeting and get something done. Well, that's not how it works. And what would happen if you went into that IEP meeting? I'd get a call from Dr. Spence. Yeah. And what would he say? Dr. Spence, what would you say, Spence? What would you say? Can we talk about your role as a board member? And that's important because especially with a relationship with staff and, and Dr. Spencer, you're welcome to jump in on this and because I know you've dealt with it in many different piece in d many different places. But that any time that you're in a room with staff, whether you're a parent, whether you're a, a, an advocate, whatever you are, you're still the board. And that still, it holds different weight. And anything that you say that the staff could say, oh, the board member asks me to do this. I'm gonna drop everything that I'm doing right now and go do this. And that not, may not have been your intention at all, but that's what they're going to do right now. Hopefully they're gonna call Dr. Spence and say, Hey, I have a board member in my office. What do you want? How do you want me to handle this? You know, or whatnot. But just, just, just be aware that anything that you say can, can be perceived. Yeah. Go ahead, Rodney. No, I was just gonna say that the other practical reality of it is, is that, uh, you know, we talked about earlier that part of the role is holding the superintendent accountable. Well, if the board member is in the middle of the things that are on the superintendent's plate or responsibility, how does the board then hold the superintendent accountable? So if you're in the IEP meeting and there's certain laws and regulations and things that have to be followed, and as a board member, you're, you're in the middle of it or fixing a problem, then how then does the board hold the administration accountable? Once the board has individual board member, or board as a whole has intervened in the responsibilities that fall with the superintendent. And you may not think about it much until superintendent evaluation comes. And then all of a sudden the board wants to try to hold the superintendent accountable. And the superintendent said, well, I tried to do this, but you all, you did this, you did that, you did this, you did that, and you did that. So that accountability, understanding, understanding the role, and trying to make sure that we, uh, have norms and protocols and expectations and communications around what's board work versus what superintendent work is important. Because ultimately, the cost is not to me, and the cost is not to the superintendent. The cost is to the student. Can you say that one more time, Rodney? Yes. The cost is no, the cost is, matter of fact, we are gonna, I was gonna talk about that a little bit. That there's, uh, uh, you know, it's a mantra out there that, uh, you know, student outcomes don't change until adult behaviors change. And the behavior change starts with me as a, as a board member. And so if my behavior is such that I am, uh, uh, being involved with, with operations, or that I am being involved with being a lone ranger, or the hero, or the fix it person that I talked about earlier, it might make me feel good and it might make me look good in the eyes of the public, but ultimately it's the student that pays that pays that cost. And I think it's important sometimes that we, you know, as I said earlier, are focused on, you know, what is the cost to students when our behavior as adults, uh, gets in the way of the division achieving the strategic objectives that we've set forward for the, for the division to achieve. So yeah, 12 and a half years later, still talking about it. Still Talking about it. Yeah. Yeah. I promised you I'd show you this clock. 'cause it's that cyclical nature that we talked about earlier. So the school board is adopting the vision. So look at midnight or noon or whatever time it is. Um, you're adopting the vision goals, right? You're, you're setting, you wanna build a rocket ship, you're gonna build that. Here's your rocket ship. You're gonna adopt your policies surrounding that. Then in comes the superintendent, he and his staff are developing the plans and the regulations and setting those into play. He's implementing the operations that are again, tied to where you wanna go. He's evaluating the progress. He's taking a look at the data first before he, you know, before he gives it to you. So he has an understanding of where are we here, where are we here, what can we do here? What are some interventions we can do, et cetera, et cetera. So he's evaluating that. He presents to you the, the progress. So you all are evaluating the outcomes based on what he's presented to you. This is where we are, this is where we've been. This is what last year's data looks like. This is what this year's, et cetera, et cetera. You're evaluating that. Are you happy with that outcome? Are you okay with that? Or do we need to go back to the beginning? Like, I think, I forget if it was Carrie or Sumara who had asked, who had talked about kind of a cyclical cycle around this. So you're evaluating those outcomes. Is that what you wanted to happen? Was a rocket ship the best use of public funds? Right? Did we'd want to do this? Was this a good idea? Then you're adopting your vision and goals. That doesn't mean you have to readopt it every single time, but you might be changing your priorities or adjusting where you wanna go based on the data, based on the information that's been given to you. And then guess what, we start it all over again. And there's another piece of this chart that I like that dotted line in the middle. Why do you think it's dotted sound blur? Surprised it's not blurry. Yeah. Or wavy or something. Right? There are times that the superintendent's gonna come into your governance role, and there are more times that you guys are gonna go into his operations role. And this is just showing you that there's the acknowledgement that you might get into operations a little bit, and superintendent might get into the board authority for a little bit, but you've gotta feel comfortable enough to kind of get yourself back, get yourself back up, is what we say. You know, back up to the governance level versus the operations level. And like we talked about earlier, people are going to pull you into the operations all day, every day, be there for a second, pass that information onto the superintendent, and then get back up into your governance role. Does that make sense? This is just another way to look at this chart. One thing I forgot to mention on this chart, up at the top relationship of trust, you have to have trust to make any of this work. Anything that we've been talking about today, we can sit here and sing kumbaya and do all the things that we want, but if you don't have trust, it's not gonna work. Right? And the trust lies within the board. So the board needs to trust each other. The board needs to trust the superintendent, and the superintendent needs to trust the board. And if I could snap my fingers and make trust happen, I would not be here right now. I would be somewhere else. I'd probably have my own rocket ship on some other country, because trust is hard. Trust takes work. Trust is easy to break, hard to repair all of the things. I could talk for hours and hours on trust, and we don't have hours and hours, but I just want to put it in the atmosphere, put it out there. That trust needs to happen in order for these relationships. Any relationship that you have, trust needs to happen. Yes. So if trust is broken mm-hmm. What are some of your strategies to bring it back? Communication. 'cause typically trust is broken through communication or lack of communication, right? I think it depends on how is trust broken? What happened? When was trust broken? What happened to make it break? How do you repair it? You communicate, you Go ahead. So does VSBA have any ombudsman or something like that? Because between two board members, sometimes it's hard to, um, communicate and there's not really support because everybody else kind of works for you. Is there some ombudsman or some something at VSBA or something that you've got even looked at? Because sometimes there are things That happen, media type thing. Yeah. We don't have, from a staff standpoint, we do not have that. Um, You do some at times, uh, provide mentors. Absolutely, yes. I mean, you can call if there's concerns. Um, one, one of the slides that we, that we meant went past, and I asked Sam to go past it said on it, excuse me, I am the genesis of, uh, for transformation. And what that is really getting at is that oftentimes in the boardroom, and we have disputes or disagreements or trust gets broken, there's this common pretending that it is that they're the problem, right? So if only they would do this, if only she would do that, if only he would do that, everything would be fine. Uh, rarely do we actually take the opportunity to examine my behavior. You know, what is, what is, what is what is my role? And so this concept of, you know, I am the genesis for transformation, tries to put accountability back on examining my own behavior first. And then once I'm able to examine my own behavior and my role in a situation, it can open the door up to having a conversation with, uh, you know, with, with with your peers and your, and your colleague. Um, and it also goes back to, uh, what we started with in terms of what's the, what's the issue? Is it, is it an issue that's, um, based upon, uh, improving things for students? Or is it really an issue about my ego being hurt, my feelings being hurt? Uh, you did this to me. You did that to, to her. And I go back to the research that I, that I cited earlier, that as board members, we tend to spend more time. Uh, and frankly, oftentimes the superintendent ends up spending more time mediating, uh, adult behavior. And we said the purpose for the school system is to improve things for students. Yet as adults, we are sucking up all this time and all this resources to the, to the detriment, potentially to the detriment of our, of our students. And, um, so there's a, um, uh, there's a process where you can, you know, uh, identify behaviors. There's a exercise that I use sometime and literally have board members, um, write a letter and write three different letters. And the letter will say, for example, um, um, my behavior at this point in time was X. The benefit to me in behaving that way was, y the cost to students was X. And actually have board members write those letters and share it, and share it with each other to kind of open up that conversation and dialogue around what is it about my behavior? Uh, what adult behavior change do I need to make in order for my students to, uh, to benefit? And so I think that's, that whole, it says up there focused mindset. That's part of that whole mindset that we have to practice and continue to remind ourselves we are here to benefit students. And every minute and every, uh, hour, every fraction, whatever you want to use of time that we are in the boardroom dealing with our personal conflicts is really time and a distraction away from, from students. And for me, when it, when it got put to me in that way, it just put a whole different framing on it. Uh, because if I say I'm here to improve things for students and to see things grow for, uh, for my community and for students to prosper, then how selfish am I going to be to suck up the superintendent's time and the staff time and the board time dealing with my conflicts with myself or with another board member when we could be focused on, as I mentioned earlier, closing the gap or excelling with the number of students that we have are scoring an advanced proficiency on, on a math test. So student outcomes don't change until adult behaviors change and the change starts with me. Let that resonate in the room for a little bit. Anyone have any comments, questions, thoughts? Yes. I, I, one of the things that I wanted to kind of mention around this topic of trust is like, um, sometimes I think about what is the currency of trust? Like what, what, what tools can we use to build trust? And I've found, um, and in just thinking all the diverse perspectives on our board, um, one of the things that has been so Ben beneficial to me is that, that power of inquiry. And so if I'm, you know, advocating for something and we're in our budget season, right? And I've identified what I think is a need or a gap, um, that I would like to support, um, I've had other board members come up to me and say, Hey, Arvin, I see you're advocating for this, but I have questions. And you know, what evidence do you have that this is a gap? Or, um, have you thought about this? And have you, you know, have we identified this need because we are behind in, in, uh, in our neighboring divisions? And that power of inquiry, um, that is non-judgmental. Um, and just the, the, just the rigor of our ideas and the conversation that we develop, I think is the most powerful kind of way to build trust. Um, I at least I found that to be super helpful, um, in difficult conversations around budget and, and such. That's great input. And I, that's, that's, thank you for sharing that. And I think everyone could hopefully. So let's, how much time do we have? Oh, again, I could spend all day on trust and, and, and Melinda, you asked about what does VSBA have? We have this training too, you know, where we can dig down and we can do trust like all day. And we also have a session in March or April that just talks about trust as an all day workshop that we just, just dig in and how do you build trust? How, how is it broken? What are the pillars of trust, um, from a philosophical stand philosophical standpoint, but then also from a, how do I do it? How do I ask these good questions and then make sure that the questions are accepted too, you know, because you also have to be open to having that conversation. And 'cause if somebody puts a wall up and says, why are you questioning me? This? That's not gonna help you build anything. But if you're open and you say, please come, I'd like the opportunity to share with you my thoughts. That's how you build it. You know, that's that, that two-way communication, that two-way piece. So I want, let's, let's just write down really, really fast. What helps build trust in your mind? What helps build trust? So just jot down a word or of, of an action or something, what helps build trust. And I'm gonna try to not get on the trust soap box, but it's, it's important. It's a very important skill and a very important tool to have. April, you, you've got yours. Go ahead. It's, Um, being willing to listen and being open to absorbing new ideas. Dina, um, not to piggyback off April again, but um, it is open. Um, it's the word I would say thank you. I think it involves communication and collaboration and the rules around school boards where they can't get together more than two. And the rules around you can't do this and you can't do that. I mean, I mean, if we could caucus or if we could do something collaborative trust could be built faster. Not that it isn't being built, but it takes longer to build it since there are so many rules around it. We have a rule that if we get a, uh, an email and it has all of our names on it, only the chairperson can respond to that email that really concerns me that she's answering for me. And so I think that some of those rules that are so restricted, uh, interfere in the building of trust. And that's fair because the nature of the board, and I think Samara, you were mentioning this a little earlier, the nature of the work of the board, because you have turnover, because you have this, because you have that, it's hard to build that team, and it's hard to build that trust. And the laws around it are, are absolutely a barrier. They exist for a reason, obviously, but that doesn't make it any easier. So thank you for, thank you for saying that, Mel. For me, it's finding humanity because if you think of a person as a person, even though you disagree, you're still coming together as a person. If that makes, I literally stopped at this coffee shop 'cause it was called the human being. And I'm like, how cool. So I'm not advocating for that. I mean, it was, it was fine, but I was like, this, it's the human aspect that you have to have and you have to be cognizant of when you're, when you're in heated debates and when you're in conversations and when you're, you're, you guys deal with some tough stuff. I mean, you're dealing with hard issues, but there's a human right next to you also who's going through that same thing and how does that work? And what, what happens and how does, you know? That's it. Absolutely. Thank you for sharing that. 'cause that's a, that's a huge, that's a huge piece. 'cause if you don't think that the person sitting to next, next to you deserves trust, you're not, you're not gonna give it. So go ahead. Um, so I guess what I thought was helpful, um, with along the lines of what you and some of the others have just said was at the, at the beginning, because we all came in together and we had this opportunity to go through orientation together after we were elected, before we got sworn in, so we could have conversations with each other. And we were all coming into this on sort of an even playing field. 'cause we, none of us had ever run for office before or been on a school board before. Um, I felt like that opportunity to coming in on a similar level and having the opportunity to be learning together, which I think makes all of us slightly vulnerable, to be honest about, you know, if, if we are being honest about, I, I have no idea what I'm doing. I had no idea what I was doing. Um, you know, going into orientation, that, and having the opportunity to talk to each other as individuals in a less charged space. So we're no longer in the heat of an adversarial campaign, and we're not yet to the point where we have to start making policy decisions, where we're gonna disagree with each other. Having that opportunity to just have conversations with each other as people and get to know a little bit about each other as people, not just as a political opponent or a, you know, whatever you wanna call it on the dais. Um, but as individuals, I think that that helped a lot. Um, I do. That's, but I, Melinda alluded to this earlier. I, I do think there's, I think the question of building trust in the first instance is a separate question from how do you rebuild trust when there has been a breakdown? Um, and I, I will say I came into this, you know, being very optimistic about wanting to, and being dedicated to keeping an open mind and wanting to have a good working relationship with everyone. And I believe everyone here said that, and I believe that we meant it. Um, but be coming into it with that attitude and knowing that we all were coming into it with that attitude. It was easier for me, not speaking for anyone else, but easier for me to allow trust to be built at the first step. But then if something happens, like how do we repair it? I don't know. Thank you for that. And I think I, again, I don't wanna get on this soapbox, but people come to the table with different philosophies on trust. Also, I might, I don't know, Rodney, I've never met Rodney before, but I'm gonna trust him until he proves me otherwise, or I've never met Rodney before. I'm not gonna trust him for a second until he earns my trust. There's nothing wrong with either of those philosophies, but acknowledging that different people come to the table with different philosophies just on the basis of trust, then that's hard. You know, that's a, that's a challenge to work through. And then how do you do that? And how, how can we build it that the ideas you all have said are perfect ways to do that, but what does that look like in action? And then, so that, that is, that is, that's hard. And then, but also acknowledging the fact that different people come to the table with different ideas on trust. Just trust as in general is also something you've gotta kind of wrap your mind around as, as you're building that team. So thank you for sharing that. Arvin. Another thing I'll add is that, um, so I, I would say empathy is something fundamental to trust. Um, and it kind of relates to this openness. Um, but a lot of folks think that empathy is just kindness, right? And so empathy is actually just being able to take someone's perspective and, and, um, um, and really try and understand it, um, even though you might disagree. Um, and so I think that that is super important because it shows that you're listening, uh, with both ears. Um, and then at the end of the day, you can still disagree. Um, but, and then also abstracting those arguments or those disagreements from the person and just focusing on debating the ideas instead, I think is, um, another, uh, important piece to maintaining and building trust. Thank you for that. Yep. Focus on the behavior, not the person. And that helps that human element, that helps that all of the other pieces too. So thanks for adding that in, Lauren. Thanks. Um, for me it's about relationships. And I know Dr. Dean's kind of hit on some of the hindrances that we've had. So it does take a little bit more work, I think, for us on the school board with each other. Um, but I'm gonna add the word authentic relationships. I think it's about coming with your guard down, being vulnerable, um, which requires trust, which is sort of ironic. Um, but I, you know, for us too, I think there's an added layer for us with trust because we came into a system that where the trust in this district was completely shattered, in my opinion. Um, and so we're kind of playing catch up in that way too. Sort of being accountable for those things before in some weird way. Um, and also trying to forge forward together. And so I, I think that for me, my approach has been to just dwell in time and space with people and really try to understand who they are, um, in a relationship sense. And I am loving this student achievement lens, like so much. Keep saying it over and over again. Outcome. Sometimes Isaiah, I feel like I'm beating a dead horse, but I think it's worth it. Um, and so something I'm kind of noodling on as you keep bringing that up is that one thing that I found when I was teaching was we found common ground really fast because we were in the trenches together and we just love kids and we love serving children and meeting their needs. And so that's very unifying. Um, and I, I know that we all believe that here too. We, we love the kids of this county. We believe in them. And so I think that that's the common thread that maybe we could all reach, even though we do have a lot of disagreeances and we do have a lot of differences and different hills that we're willing to die on. And, um, so that, that would be sort of my tidbit there is just for, for us to find that common ground and to always bring that question back, you know, what did this do for kids? How did this move the needle for kids? You know, how did this benefit the students of Loudoun County? I love that. So I just really appreciate that, that perspective and, and I'm gonna be, you know, challenging us maybe to keep that as our bottom line. And finding common ground is such a good way to build and rebuild trust too. Let's, alright, we've had these disagreements, we've had these issues happen. Why are we here? What's the focus of why we're here? And if the answer for every single person is students, that gives you a, a direction to go and that gives you an even put it on the diet, put it somewhere, you know, somewhere where you can see it and remember it. How does this impact students? What did this do for students? How did this move the needle forward to just keep you? 'cause you're gonna get in debate, especially budget season, you're gonna get into numbers. You're gonna get into all of the things and you've gotta take a step back and say, how is this impacting the students? And write a little note for yourself and, and put it up there at your seat. And if you guys, if the nine of you can come together and you're gonna disagree on ways to get there, but if you agree that the reason why you're getting there is because of the students that'll help rebuild whatever has been broken or build things that haven't been built yet too, thanks for that. Yeah. Rodney will keep saying it forever and I appreciate that and I absolutely love it. So Samira, I agree with all my colleagues. I also think that there's focus again, you know, we always have to go back to that focus as to why we're here. Um, and if we keep going back to that, we can always say to ourselves, and even if we don't see eye to eye to each of us, we can always say, you know, we agree to disagree. And every time we say we agree to disagree, we can have less, um, any type of bickering or, and then we don't have to be as combative, you know, we can just agree to disagree. One of the factors that I noticed that kind of de helps us or makes us rather deviate from this trust are certain things like, um, uh, I mean, we're here to help our students, but there's an attachment to that. And that's, that's some constituents that are a little divisive or a little different, so to say. And what happens is there's this certain dialogue that they bring to the table and it creates this loss of trust amongst us or who said what to who. And then we also have media. And the media, which comes to every, uh, board meeting or just in general. Um, it'll be something that something will be said in an article or a video or whatever, and it makes the other board members say, well, what did that person say to this reporter or this journalist? Meanwhile, that board member never said anything, but it, it was just a, a play of words. And then it created this, um, you know, lack of trust among the board members. So those are sometimes factors that are outside of us as a group that causes that loss of trust amongst each other. And that's very difficult even with, uh, the superintendent, the cabinet, whatever. Um, and that for me can sometimes be difficult because then you're like, should I go back to that same board member and say, well, why did you say such and such a thing? They're like, I never said anything. And they're like, oh, we got played, or something like that. It's one of those. So, And that goes back to Dr. Dean's point of there's so many pieces of the board as a whole that that makes it hard. That just adds a, as a barrier to it. But you're right. And it could be something that was never said. It was something that was assumed. It was something that somebody took the wrong way. It's like the game of telephone. You guys remember playing that in school, you know, and the message changes the whole way through. Sometimes intentionally, sometimes not. But that's where I think that openness to, to come and, and inquire, like Arden said that, to inquire about, did you say this? Did, is this really what you meant? Is this, you know, whatever. But that takes, and somebody said it earlier, that takes trust to just have that conversation too. So it's kind of a, it takes trust to build trust or it takes trust to make trust. But um, but that's a, that's an excellent point. 'cause people are going to, people in general are going to be fighting, fighting you as a board just because you're the board. It doesn't matter who you are as a person or who just because you're the board. Oh, cool, we got nine new people we can yell at, you know, and they're gonna try to pull you apart. But it's up to you all how you respond to that. Do you let them pull you apart or do you say, we know why we're here. We know our purpose, we're gonna come together and work together as a team. So thank you for that. And Carrie, what is trust back to what builds trust Told you I was sleepy today. Okay, thank you. Um, I think trust begins with a willingness to obtain knowledge of the person that you're interacting with. If I know a little bit about you, it might tell you, tell me where you're coming from and indicate why you're feeling that way. And I think you keep building on that, you know, a little more, you understand a little more. And it has to be, uh, a shared back and forth between people. Um, but I think it's very important to understand where they're coming from that could explain why they're thinking that way. And then it makes it easier for me to respond to gain that trust. I know we all have different backgrounds and I love the fact that we have so many different backgrounds because that makes different focus on a problem and you see it. And if we share it, then we see where everybody's coming from. But we have to trust one another to believe that we are willing to listen, we are willing to understand, and we're still willing to work together even if it doesn't go our way. So I think the fact that you will, after a decision's made, continue to work in the same manner, builds that trust. We know we can always bring our real thoughts to the table because people are willing to listen. I also want Rodney to repeat the thing that he talked about. Adult behavior affects student outcomes. I think that should be a bumper sticker. Actually, there is one, but one, one of the things I would, uh, because I know time is, is short. You know, again, even in this conversation, and you know, I've been in your seat, so I'm talking to myself as I'm, as I'm speaking to you, you know, I mentioned earlier about this kind of common pretending that, you know, if only they would do something, then uh, everything would be okay. Or, uh, trust could be rebuilt. Um, you know, this weekend there's playoff games, the old NFL playoff games, uh, this, this weekend, uh, effective coaches win or lose at the end of the game. They play back the video of the game. Why do effective coaches do that? Why, why do effective coaches play back the videotape of the, of the game, win, win or lose? Well, it's a training thing they call, I mean, even my son does it for his eSports, they call them video, uh, they call vault reviews, video reviews so that they can see the techniques, the strategies, what they could have done better. Because when you're in the middle of it, you can't see it. Okay. Techniques, strategies, yes. And a more objective view when you're watching it outside as opposed to when you're inside of it. And Because even when you win there win, there are almost always other things that you could have done better and differently. Um, certainly and, and if you lose, it might not be because you did anything wrong. Um, and you need to be able to step back and have some self-reflection, um, and consider what you could have done, you know, better or differently In the situation, Sergeant, to say that you can go back and review the tape. It doesn't necessarily have any judgment attached to it. Um, but there, Oh, I would have judgment for myself, Well, for yourself, but I just mean in terms of right and wrong. It could just be, I Never go back and look at my, I've done so many appellate oral arguments and most of them are video recorded, and I never go back and look at them because I don't really want to see right where I screwed up. Right? Because that's all I will see. If you watch the playoff games, uh, you know, the, you know, you're paying attention to the score, right? So, you know, I'm a cowboy fan, but, uh, let's say, let's say the, let's say the commanders are up by 25 points in the first half. Then at the halftime, uh, the, the Philadelphia coach is going to be making adjustments, right? Based upon what the data has, has, has shared. And so part of what our own reflection, if you as a individual board member, you know, think in your own mind, um, you know, replay the, the videotape of, of my behavior and, and examining that videotape and thinking about what was it about my behavior that may have made it more difficult for my children to be successful or for the school division to achieve its goals. It's not necessarily a judgment, but, um, we are often not present to the behaviors. We, we have empathy, we are with each other. We, we, we don't necessarily know how we are being perceived and we're not always present to our behaviors, but being able to go back at the end of each meeting or the, at the end of each interaction and just kind of replaying that videotape. Because if I'm the genesis of transformation, it's not about what I can have Carrie do differently. It's about me examining my patterns of behavior and what I can do differently. Because ultimately I'm gonna be the genesis of transformation. Not, not they, or some, or someone else. And that's, that's the difference. I I think between, you know, watching sports as a fan versus when you're doing an activity in the moment. Um, you know, when I, when I was doing those oral arguments all the time, like I, five minutes later, I wouldn't remember what I said necessarily because I was too focused on what was happening in the moment to be committing it to memory for later, if that makes sense. Um, And I, and I'll leave you one of the tidbits since I am a Cowboy fan, um, You shouldn't Have told that. That's okay. The, the, the board is the owner, right? So you can be Jerry Jones and you can micromanage the coach, uh, or you can be some of these four teams that are getting ready to buy for the Super Bowl, where you never really see the owner. The owner has set the goals and expectations and the owner has turned it over to the coach. And so the coach slash superintendent is the one that's making the halftime adjustments. The coach is the one that's talking in the quarterback's microphone, calling, calling the plays. But everybody knows what the score is because the scoreboard is there. So if as a board you've set the, the goal that you're gonna score 40 points, that your student's gonna score 40 points, you get to monitor that, that progress, you get to have a conversation with the coach, whether or not the team is winning, whether or not the team is, is not winning. But it's important that the coach is the one that's making the adjustments and calling the plays. And I think sometimes that trust and other things come about because you have nine or seven people all trying to be the coach, when really the power of the board is you're the owner, you selected the gm, you selected the coach, you set the goals, you say it for the, for the coach. We started off, we were oh and 17 and we wanna make the Super Bowl. In five years, you have set the goals and expectations, and now you have the opportunity through your behavior to support the coach in achieving that goals or to make adjustments because you are constantly monitoring the progress of, of the team. Carrie, I think you would wanna, did you wanna say something? Well, what I was gonna say, watching the videos, we'll show you how you behaved, not just how you behave, but all the um, subtle visual and tonal clues that shows what you're doing, what you're saying and why. Um, and I personally would've used being a racehorse owner and not a football owner. Okay. That, that's just me. I can work with that. Um, I might in raising racehorses and I have done this, had a, had a cult that was fine, came from great pedigree. And you do things when they're very young and you raise them and then they get to a certain level and you start turning them over to a trainer. Now I have raised that cult. That is my cult. And our goal is to get, not just to the Kentucky Derby, but we're not only just gonna win the, you know, the trifecta, but we are gonna be horse of the year, da da da da. Okay, great. I've chosen the trainer. Now it's my job to sit back and watch the training progress. And he's got people that are working in the stables, people that are working, um, a jockey, a training jockey, a professional rider. And I look at that horse and if I start looking at him and saying, well, you can't do that. He doesn't like that kind of feed, and you're telling it to the person who's doing the feeding, instead of mentioning it to the trainer who is now responsible for doing that. That's what I see us doing as breaking trust. I've told that trainer don't trust me. Mm-hmm. And you can see it if you're watching a video, um, like you're saying with the football team, or even if we watch ourselves after a board meeting that's been recorded, we start to see what kind of signals we're giving off. And that's important to know. And so let's keep your horse training analogy. So if I like it, yes. So if you, and it's a new language for me, so I'm gonna try. So if you are telling the person who's doing the feeding that you don't like that feed, what's that equivalent for you guys as a board member? I'm sorry, what, what, what would be the equivalent? So it would be as if a board member is telling who that they don't Like something. Well, if I start going around two different people in Yes. That are the administrative part staff Yep. And giving 'em direction. Yes. That is contractory to contrary to what they're expected to do from our superintendent. Absolutely. Thank you. And I love that analogy. 'cause that's a perfect 'cause probably that person's gonna pause and say, do I need to switch the feed? What am I gonna do? Where am I, you know, I need to buy new feed. What do I need to do? And that's a perfect example of a board member going around the responsibilities and giving direction to a staff member, a teacher of a central office or whatever, outside of who the trainer. The trainer would do that. So thank you for, I'm gonna add that into my memory 'cause that's a really good example of that. Thank you for sharing that. Dr. Spence, were you gonna say something? You looks like you were like ready to jump in on the, the horse. Um, all right. Horse horses. Oh, uhoh there. They need to be respected, right? So, um, okay, we have two minutes left with you. Um, I want to give you something because I've printed it and I'm not gonna do anything with it when I go back to the office. So that way you all have it. It is something your staff have pulled together as, so we were, had planned to talk about norms and protocols, but we ran out of time. But I do think this is something you guys should certainly take a look at. And what was pulled together, um, by your staff are some of your policies that are um, are basically norms and protocols. So you have a policy that talks about norms and protocols, but then you have some other policies that are specific about community involvement, communication, board, staff, communication, written comments. So you have a lot of information in your policy on how you do what you do. So since we pulled these and printed 'em, they're here for you to look through, review One thing that's important about your policies, they are yours. They are yours to change, edit, make adjustments to as a, as a first year board. That's hard to do 'cause you're just trying to figure out where the lights are, right? But as a second year board, I encourage you to take some time to look through these. It looks like some of these revisions were back in 21. Um, there were a few that are even older than that. Just because you review it doesn't mean you have to change it. You know, it might be perfectly written as it is from the, the version that was hit that was, um, confirmed in 21. But I would encourage all of you to read these very closely because these impact you, what you do, the relationship you have with each other, the relationship you have with the superintendent, and how you get the things done that you do. And if you choose to change them, you have that right. And you have that ability to do that. But of course that would take, take a policy change, you know, but you, you have steps in process to do that. So, um, because we've run out of time, we're not gonna go through each of these obviously, but here's, here's the packet for you. Encourage you to take a look at them and look at them very closely. Not that you haven't already, but because these are specific to what you do as an individual and what you do as a team. Does that make sense? Everybody clear on that? So, um, we're happy to work with you on this. I just, I know you guys have things after us and I don't wanna push us, um, any longer. So were there any norms and protocols or anything in this or any, anything that you really wanted to make sure we talked about today that, that we can talk about in the next 30 seconds? Okay. So this will be some kind of homework for you guys. Take a look at it. Yes. I'm sorry, I was in the ladies room. That's okay. No. So, um, this particular policy is about the norms mm-hmm. As far as, uh, the school board goes, um, decorum. Mm-hmm. Yes. Uh, conflicts of interest. Mm-hmm. Um, I have had many concerns in those areas. I don't know if you're here to answer those questions today or, yeah. So, um, in the, so we ha we're already one minute over, so, and I know you guys have things to do after us. So this was kind of passed out because we had him with, you know, with me. And I wanted to make sure that you guys got 'em. And it was the instruction, if you will, was given. Look at these. If you have conversation or if you want to edit and change, update these, then that would be a conversation the board would need to have. In a perfect world, I could have three more hours to work on these with you. Um, that's not a perfect, you know, I don't have that with you, but that doesn't mean we can't do it again. So if you guys are willing and interested in doing something like this again, maybe with a little more time, we can, we can dig deep, very deep into these, um, norms and protocols, pieces. I'll take a business card. Okay? Absolutely. I have them. Okay. And I'm sorry we ran out. I hope the conversation was valuable today that we've had, again, we can have five days. Are these, these clocks are right, right? I'm not totally off. Yes. Okay. Darn it. I was hoping maybe they were an hour behind and I can get another hour's worth of stuff in. Um, but we do have kind of a wrap up question for you that you, you answered earlier. That's why I said let's take a look at it. So what is one word, and I'm ending very quickly and I hate ending quickly. It's like Hallmark movies, they end way too fast after the, you know, you know what's happening. So what's one word to describe how you're leaving the training today? And that's it. Just one, just one word or an, or a couple words if you want to. Yes ma'am. My word is introspective. I have lots to think about. Okay. I was gonna say contemplative. I think that's exactly right. I'll then say reflective Refocused On student outcomes. Ah, I would say profound, More than one word for me. A lot to think about. Okay. That's fair. Mine's continuance. Say that again? Continuance. Continuance. Thank you. Yes. A beginning platform to share. Okay. A beginning platform to share the nuances that Okay. Of The Work of the, of the work of the board. Absolutely. I'm gonna shorten that and shorten that to nuances, but we know what you mean. Anyone else not share a word? Dr. Spence. Dr. Spence. One, two. I, I think I would lean into the reflective. Reflective. Mm-hmm. 1, 2, 3, 4. That gives me nine. One person didn't share a word. Thank you Laurie. I was a teacher. I will remind you. That's right. Please answer. It's a lot to Think about. It's a lot. Okay. And we're not here to make your jobs harder, but we are here to challenge you a little bit. 'cause it is, you all are doing a lot. The, the, the work in front of you is a lot. Um, the, you know, you're one year in of a four year term, right? Or just, just some of you have shortened terms because of the staggered. Oh man. Wow. Alright. Well for however long your term is, you're here for it. Right? And so that doesn't mean you have to run right now. Oh no. Ah, okay. Well hopefully you'll all come back and we can have this conversation again, you know, and keep building your team. Um, but I do think it's, it's work. It's hard work. We used to have a a slide that says it's hard work, but it's heart work. You have to have your heart in it. And I, I heard many, actually, I think all of you have said the words students today, which is, is something to grasp onto and just know that you're, you're here for the, hopefully you're here for the student. The reason why for the students, if not Rodney's gonna say it 10 more times as we're walking out the door. And he should, and all of us in this room should. So I just challenge you to keep, keep students at the forefront of the work that you're doing. Know it's going to be hard. Know you're not going to agree all the time. And that's not, we, we realize that. And that's, if you did, we'd have other conversations that we need to have. But just know that, that as you continue to work, to build your team, build your governance team and get to know each other. Um, we're here for you Vs. BA is here for you. If you wanna do something like this again, we're happy to do it with you again. Um, and to dig a little deeper and to help build and, and keep moving forward. So thank you all for the opportunity to work with you and Um, I think it's, I think it's been a good day. I hopefully you guys have some of similar thoughts. Rodney, any closing thoughts? Um, to have the winning horse, it takes practice. So this was just one session. Take the opportunity to, to practice. And Madam Chair, anything you wanna, I just wanna say thank you to Sam and Rodney for coming all the way here and, um, you gave us a lot to think about and I look forward to more conversations. Thank you, Madam Chair. Did you wanna do a quick agenda reminder about the break and With my mouth full of cookie? I'm sorry. I just wanna make sure before people stood up, Get out of our rule. That's Totally fair. Thank you, Mrs. Shernoff. All right. We'll come back at two 30 for, um, the next, um, our next presentation with, um, who's, you know, what, who's presenting? It's the DEIA Department. We're on break, but I wanted to say who was presenting. I don't have it down here. Okay. All right. All right. Um, all right. Y'all know we're on break. We're on break until two 30, And he's been driving. Oh, he knocked something outta the doctor's hand. She told the an Yeah. Well, welcome back from our break. Um, at this point, we are moving on to our culturally responsive instruction in the classroom, um, presented by Mr. Mohammed and Ms. Lewis. And, um, if board members, remember we asked them to come to our meeting to, um, help educate us a little bit about that standard. Um, before we get to it, I just wanted to tell school board members on, uh, we have a, uh, school board joint meeting with the Board of Supervisors for our budget, um, presentation. And that will be February 13th at 5:00 PM here in this boardroom. So I just wanted to put that on your radar. Okay. Mr. Mohammad and Mrs. Lewis, it's all yours. Oh, sorry. I about to switch back and forth. Uh, well, good afternoon everyone. Um, thank you Dr. Spence. Uh, Madam Chair Mansfield, and distinguished board members, uh, for this opportunity. Uh, my name is Shaheed Moham. I'm the director in the division of Diversity, equity, inclusion and Accessibility, and I'm joined by my incredible colleague, I let her introduce. Thank you, Mr. Mohammed. I'm Cynthia Lewis, and I'm the supervisor within the division, And we are super pleased to share information on culturally responsive instruction in the classroom. Um, our presentation is around 30 minutes, uh, in length. Uh, there'll be time for some questions, uh, if there are any, and maybe give you some time back to your agenda. I know you had a long day today, so thank you. So first off, uh, this work that we, uh, engage in is aligned to the goals of the strategic plan for excellence. And as we move through the presentation, you will specifically see connections. All the lines of effort from the division of diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility are entrenched in the success of our students, the support of our, for our staff, parents, and families. Our goals for today are to deepen understanding of culturally responsive instruction, learn how the division of diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility, provide learning and support for LCPS staff around culturally responsive instruction, and explore some strategies for culturally responsive instruction. So, the Code of Virginia, as you all know, requires that evaluations be consistent with the standards. All school divisions in the state require their teachers and administrators to be evaluated annually on how well we provide culturally responsive instruction and equitable practices to our students. Uh, teachers and administrators have been evaluated on Performance Standard six since the 20 22, 20 23 school year. And this performance standard is for teachers that we have on the screen for you to read. Uh, the teacher demonstrates a commitment to equity and provides instruction and classroom strategies that result in culturally inclusive and responsive learning environments and achievement for all students. The importance of standard sits can also be understood further by our school, some of our school, um, division perception data. Uh, this data that is on the screen is from 2024, climate survey, and the group surveyed were sixth, seventh, and eighth graders. The data shows that students with different backgrounds have differing perceptions on how well things they learn in school, reflect different cultures, races, and identities, as well as how students treat others with respect regardless of race and other differences. It exemplifies the point that learning conditions and rigorous, rigorous instruction are levers with that promote high student engagement and academic success. And we'll give you a minute just to look over that data. Okay. So I'm gonna start to talk about culturally responsive instruction and what exactly that means. Uh, this is the, the definition that we use in LCPS, and we believe that culturally responsive instruction is foundational to all student learning. Uh, the definition reads a student-centered approach to instruction that respects and affirms all student cultures. It is sustained through reflective and inclusive practices, high expectations and rigor for each and every student. It addresses opportunity gaps, fosters relationships, and increases level of engagement, complexity and relevance of learning for students. Teachers implement culturally responsive instruction through their consistent approach to student engagement and commitment to equitable instructional practices. So this is a very wordy definition. So we wanted to focus on some of the most important ideas that you see there. Again, this is an approach that is student centered and that it affirms students. It's inclusive of all of the students in the classroom holding high expectations for each and every student rigor, addressing opportunity gaps, building strong relationships, and is intentional with increasing student engagement and the complexity and relevance of the lesson. So this isn't a set lesson plan. This is really an approach to instruction that, um, improves connection and engagement for teachers. I'm going to give you an opportunity to talk with each other about these three ideas about all of these ideas. So, in reviewing these con these concepts, I would like to, to think about a time when you've had a positive experience with any of these. This can be in a classroom setting that you had as a student or even observed it, and it doesn't have to be in a classroom setting. When you think of an example, you can share with someone who's right next to you, you might have to scooch in a little bit. And next, I'll ask if someone would like to volunteer a story. These are the types of activities that we have teachers engaged with when we do training around culturally responsive instruction. So at this time, just share a story with the person immediately next to you. I am gonna ask you to finish up your thought in the next 30 seconds. Okay. If you could finish up your stories. I saw some laughter, lots of animated movement. Is there somebody who would like to share one of those stories that kind of comes from those components of culturally responsive instruction? Yes, please. I was just voluntold by the vice chair, so That's the best way to share was when you're voluntold never Volunt. So I, um, as someone who didn't speak English properly in kindergarten, right, I had, uh, faced a, a lot of issues. And it wasn't until a teacher came along, I think it was in third or fourth grade, that kind of got me out of my shell, was interested in my background, and helped me to feel kind of on the same level with my peers. Um, and I took that example, and then I compared it to, uh, one of the schools that I visited recently. I was, I got to sit in on a special ed inclusion kindergarten class, and I was, uh, one of the teachers introduced me. They were doing centers. And so I sat at the different tables and engaged with the, the children. And, um, I was introduced to one student who had just arrived to the us um, probably a few months before, um, and was still trying to learn English. And I saw him, and he was so engaged. I mean, he didn't speak that much English, but he was pointing at the exercises and saying all the words in Spanish. And yes, of course the teacher was trying to say the words with him in ENG. And yes, and this is the English version, but he had so much confidence, and, um, he was so engaged despite some of, so I was comparing that student to what, you know, the experiences that I had were totally opposite. Um, and just thinking of some of these tool sets that, that our teachers have to be able to utilize to like ignite the learning in some of these kids. It was so inspiring. So thank you. Thank you for sharing that. It's really important to be increasing that engagement and affirming that student, letting our language learners know that they can, that they're included in the regular activities of the classroom. So that's a perfect example. When we, when we talk about that approach of really seeing our students' assets and including them, building them up, and, um, really bringing them into the learner, we want that for each and every student in all of the classrooms. Thank you for sharing. So this approach that you've been talking about is, um, has been found through Dr. John Hattie's research to have positive impacts for student learning. Uh, Dr. Hattie is a New Zealand educator and academic. His research on factors related to student academic student achievement calculate the effect size of factors and influences, such as strategies and teacher approaches on student learning. So an effect size of 0.40 or higher is within the zone of desired effects, which represents a growth of one year within one year of schooling. So anything above 0.40 would have an even greater positive impact on student learning. And you can see on the visual that that includes several aspects of the culturally responsive approach. So in our aim to ensure that students are seen and heard, and known and loved, culturally responsive instruction empowers students and teachers. It expands pathways to deeper learning. It engages and connects students to their learning. It creates a welcoming and affirming environment and makes instruction more eff efficient and effective. So the student culture, student learning connection really acknowledges and, and represents, and it honors, um, supporting student cultures and how that sustains a welcoming, inclusive, and affirming learning environment where students' interests, cultures, and experiences become connected to the learning where they thrive. All student cultures and backgrounds are assets, and we make sure that that is something that we keep on top in every professional learning experience that we deliver, that a student's culture and background are assets, and there are also pathways for deeper learning experiences. So connecting to student culture demonstrates cultural competence and culturally responsive practices. It develops a positive identity building relationships and building a sense of belonging that students need, creating a pathway to deeper learning, critical thinking, and higher level thinking. And it builds a foundation for social and emotional learning that helps teachers strengthen their relationships with students so that they demonstrate that they know who their students are Developing an approach toward. This requires reflection. And as you all know, and we heard from some of the experiences that you all have en engaged in today, is that reflection is key. Uh, reflective questions for culturally responsive teachers is something that we early on began providing professional learning On an example of some guidance for teachers are we asked teachers to be reflective in their practices, reflection questions for culturally responsive teachers helps guide their thinking and strengthen their practices. So I'm gonna read these four that we have listed on the page. How do I ensure students have input and can connect to the learning experiences, materials, and activities? So how do I make sure that my instruction is engaging? How do I draw them in? And how do I get students to have a, a voice in what they're learning? How will I prioritize time for activities aimed at knowing my students and students knowing each other? How will I use that knowledge in my instruction and interactions with students? And this goes into the planning when teachers are in planning and in PLCs, they talk about the things that they know their students are interested in and that they have ability to connect to, and they make sure that that is embedded in their instruction and their interactions. How do I address practices and norms that disadvantage student groups and teachers proactively thinking about how maybe they group students for learning or homework assignments? Um, the student response calling patterns that they engage in, um, and, and family and engagement styles. All these things are important to make sure that we are elevating and uplifting all students in the classroom. And lastly, how do I build students' confidence in their ability to engage in rigorous learning? Uh, building the self-efficacy of students makes it easier to teach them, and it catapults students to greater levels of engagement. So these are some reflective questions that we ask teachers to think about on a regular basis when it comes to culturally responsive instruction. So next we're gonna talk about how the division of diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility has provided learning opportunities and support for culturally responsive instruction through professional development, through curriculum support, and through leadership support. First, I wanted to give you some examples of the learning that we provided to staff. So what are some of those examples of learning and discussion around culturally responsive instruction? So this is an example of some early learning that we covered in 2023. All staff participated in this learning that was facilitated at their home school, um, by a team of three, uh, the special education professional, a, uh, language learner teacher, and the equity lead. This session was focused around access, opportunity, and knowledge as a means for designing equitable instruction. So our goal was to build understanding of the role that access, opportunity and knowledge play in student learning. So we think about access as equitable access to high quality instruction and inclusive resources to support students in connecting to the learning and demonstrating their skills. Opportunities are when we're providing opportunities for students to engage in relevant learning experiences, clear critical thinking, and student centered instruction. This results in multiple pathways to success and knowledge. We want our students to have knowledge of their individual strengths, their identities and interests. This empowers students to share their voices, collaborate with others, and engage in deeper learning so that each and every student can reach their full potential. So teachers were provided with strategies for making quality instruction accessible for all students, infusing daily instruction with those opportunities for students to engage in relevant learning experiences, authentic learning experiences that build knowledge that empowers our students. Another example of professional learning for teachers was around student learning communities. This session provided strategies for teachers to build a learning environment where academic safety, belonging, and trust is the foundation. A student learning community is one where the inclusion is visible, the students can see it, they can feel that they're a part of the learning and of the community Engagement and deeper learning is evident and where students see themselves as valued contributors. So some examples that teachers might use to build this are getting to know you activities, morning meetings, having class norms and routines so students know what to expect. Teaching students about growth mindset, celebrating perseverance, celebrations of any kind, um, teachers sharing their own mistakes, so, um, students can see how to handle that. Um, intentional team building. And anytime students are able to share out about themselves and who they are. Another session that was, um, provided was around holding high expectations. Uh, when teachers hold high, expectations is truly the belief that each student can achieve through deeper learning and academic rigor. This approach builds student self-esteem and confidence. It builds student ownership of their learning and educational results. A classroom culture of high expectations for all allows students to see each other as capable learners. So what this is about is about providing cognitive demand and high support to all learners so that every student in our classrooms is engaged in meaningful and complex intellectual work. We typically provide students meaningful, relevant, and challenging tasks, but this isn't a sink or swim approach. We provide that high challenge with high support. Support can include student choice, the teacher providing models, the use of rubrics, rubrics, so students know what the expectations are, high quality, quality scaffolds, which is supports for students that require it. So a scaffold could be something like a graphic organizer, visuals, the use of sentence stems to support learners, uh, frequent checkpoints for understanding peer-to-peer feedback and collaboration with each other. Now, now we'll talk a little bit about curriculum support and how does the division of diversity, equity, inclusion, accessibility, support, teaching and learning to build and implement a more inclusive curriculum. So first, I wanna say thank you to Mr. Slevin for his ongoing collaboration and advocacy for, um, the work that we're doing with, uh, offices in the Department of Teaching and learning. The information that I'm going to share, uh, highlight some work with the math office, elementary, reading and writing, social science and global studies, and the science office. So here are five tenets of culturally responsive instruction and what they look like in mathematics. Uh, student culture and identity learning environment and community asset-based approach, coupled with high expectations and storify and gamify. And one of the main ways that new learning is developed is when it's linked to prior knowledge. Connecting to student culture and identity can engage students and support their learning in ways that's relevant to who they are and what they know. And some examples in mathematics are using sentence stems, uh, using guided notes or fill in the blank sentences before the lesson for students to make predictions about what they're about to learn. Uh, providing a word splash of pictures and vocabulary words for students to make connections to what they already know. A welcoming, inclusive, and affirming learning environment can be fostered in mathematics in the same ways that it can be done in all subject areas and grade levels. An example specific to mathematics is creating a real world context around mathematics curriculum that are relevant to student culture. IE their school interests, their school themselves, people, music, family members, friends, food technology, et cetera. Also using vertical, non-permanent surfaces like whiteboards and word walls. For students to collaborate, try out new methods. Make sure that they have the opportunity to learn from mistakes in a low stake environment. And also, random flexible groupings allow students to work in a variety of groups. And scaffolding, collaboration with a connection or act. Activating activity for students in new groups gets those students talking, feeling comfortable around others, sharing and more engaged with each other. The asset based approach and high expectations go hand in hand. Both are focused on teacher belief in student success with a high level of support. Some examples of supports in scaffolds, in math, or in any other subject we've talked about. Um, number sense routines can be adapted so that students design or facilitate the routine, breaking content into chunks or incorporating visuals, images, or examples. And lastly, people think and learn in stories, and that's what Storify and gamify represent. People are also engaged and motivated through games. We do know that some students are very motivated by competition, but some aren't. So giving those, uh, practices and making sure that we're providing opportunities for students to engage in ways that they learn best is part of culturally responsive instruction. All of these tenets of cultural responsive instruction are not topic dependent. Culturally. Responsiveness is responding to people's culture and who they are. No matter what topic is being taught, teachers are always responding to students and their unique identities, cultures and strengths and all teaching should strive to be as culturally responsive as possible In working with the elementary reading and writing office, through continued collaboration and partnership reading, and with reading and writing, we are building capacity in culturally responsive instruction with a diverse and inclusive resource. With the, with the Holton Mifflin Har Court curriculum, understanding, understanding how different cultures are represented in literature, provide an understanding of culture, and provides a skillset for teachers to connect students to their learning, create student engagement with deeper learning. Now we have talked about cultural hu cultural humility as a practice with teachers and administrators. And on this slide are some exploring culture myths. This helps with the idea of self-awareness, focus on others and outcomes, and a commitment to equity and learning. It is a learner stance where we all recognize that we cannot, um, know about all each and every culture, but that we understand its impact in learning and interacting with students and their families. In these conversations, it's important to dispel some myths about culture that we encounter in our work. Some of them I would highlight on this from the screen, are that people can only belong to one culture, or that culture is equivalent to race and ethnicity. And lastly, the goal is to learn about every aspect of every culture. These are myths that we like to explore. One important note is that's not a myth, is that people and culture are always changing. So everyone is always learning. In working with social sciences and global studies, we provide learning to build capacity and understanding the importance of student engagement throughout the classroom. Instructional culture, which lends itself to the creation and sustainability of equitable school culture. Some of the strategies are student identity, student stories, and reflection. Storytelling is a core culturally responsive practice and valuable in all content areas because our brains think and learn in stories. And thank you board member Raffe for sharing a story earlier today. We appreciate you. Technology can be used to enhance sharing, connecting, and learning. So how does our division build work? To build capacity of leadership, to create culturally responsive environments? Uh, we work with the Department of school leadership to provide learning opportunities for building leaders and for those who aspire to be building leaders. So, uh, the administrators in our buildings are responsible for developing a welcoming and inclusive and affirming school environment and sustaining that culture. In this session, we discuss the dimensions of belonging for both students and staff. So in a session like this, we would ask those administrators to reflect in order to connect to the student or staff experience. So we might ask administrators to think about when do they feel seen? Um, is it because they were welcomed with warmth and friendliness? Are they able to show up authentically as the, as their whole selves? They might think about how do you know you are valued? Is it when you, they might say, it's when I'm heard or I feel trusted. Um, they would think about when and why are you needed? And also thinking about when and how they feel accepted. So this self-reflection, which we've talked about being so important for being culturally responsive, can really help them to think about the student experience when they're in, when they're designing an inclusive environment. In this session, building leaders discuss creating the conditions for inclusion, how practices, language, and culturally responsive approaches help create a sense of belonging for students. So inclusion is intentionally created through learning and guidance, and it's supported by the curriculum. We recently provided a session for building leaders on what to look for when observing Standard six. A few examples that they're looking for in the classroom are that teachers are ensuring equitable participation, that there are routines and norms in place for discussions, that there's evidence that instruction is informed by review of student progress and students' performance data to address learning gaps. Another session for building leaders focused on connecting their own values and beliefs to action and implementation when leading with cultural humility. So, curricular examples. What does cultural responsive instruction look like in the classroom? We're gonna talk about what this can look like through the lens of the subject area, but you'll see the themes of connecting to student culture and identity, diversity of representation, building a safe, affirming learning community within the classroom, and setting high expectations for all students. In the examples that we provide when providing learning with teachers, they actually learn the strategies as if they were students in order to learn how to implement them when they are in the classroom. We mentioned this earlier as one of the strategies of a word splash. So activating prior knowledge. In this example, we can tap into students' cultural knowledge and prime them for rigorous learning. We affirm students' prior knowledge, demonstrating our belief that they have the capacity to take on more knowledge. This is a strategy for holding high expectations. This is an example from an English and language arts setting. Um, an I am poem is a type of personal poem in which the student describes themselves through a series of prompts. So writing and sharing, these are a wonderful way for the student to share parts of their identity, express themselves, and feel known and seen and respected. And also for the teacher to get to know the student, this can build a learning community. So this is an another example of that strategy, and it's also a wonderful way for students to get to know each other. The next example is for a science setting. So in this activity, students draw their idea of a scientist doing science. The exercise surfaces students prior understanding about science and what scientists do. It serves as a launching point for discovering that students in fact, themselves can be scientists, helping them to see themselves in this role in the classroom, and perhaps in the future. It can also show teachers what the students find interesting about science and what activities that they'd like to engage in during the learning And in social science and global studies. One example of an of a strategy is the graffiti wall, where students record their comments and questions about a topic, hear each other's ideas and perspectives, process newer sensitive material, and organize, categorize, summarize, and discuss ideas and thoughts. So graffiti boards are a shared writing space. Students record their comments and questions. The purpose of this strategy is to help students hear each other's ideas. Some benefits of this strategy include that it can be implemented in five to 10 minutes. It provides a way for a less engaged or shy students to engage in the conversation. And it creates a record of students' ideas and questions that can be referred to at a later point. It gives students space and time to process emotional material. You can use the graffiti board strategy as a preview activity by introducing a new topic and helping students to organize any existing knowledge about that topic. You can also use the strategy to prepare for a class discussion or writing assignment about a text by asking students to share their reactions to the text on the graffiti board. We will finish on this quote. Cultural responsiveness is responding to people's culture and who they are. No matter what topic is being taught, teachers are always responding to students and their unique identities and cultures. All teachings should strive to be as culturally responsive as possible. So, going back as a check-in to the goals of our presentation, we hope that it met the goals that we outlined in deepening your understanding of culturally responsive instruction, learning how the division of diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility provide learning and support for LCPS staff around this topic and exploring strategies for culturally responsive instruction. Thank you for providing this time, and if you have any questions, we can answer them for you. Thank you very much Mr. Mohammad and Ms. Lewis, um, board members, do you have any questions or thoughts? No. Yes, Ms. Chandler, Thank you so much for your presentation. Um, I, I really, in, in sort of reflecting on it, um, find it to be so welcoming and the words that stood out to me the most were belonging, um, and humility. And I, I think it's one of those things. We, we have a great responsibility to serve the children who are here in our division, and to meet them where they are, uh, to understand them so that we can figure out a way to reach them, um, and give them the best opportunity for their outcomes that we possibly can. And, and I, I just, I really appreciate the ability to see some of the, um, actual lessons that you're using. And that I am poem is something that's been around, like, it's my senior did it in elementary school, and it's one of my favorite things that we saved. So, um, it tha thank you. I really appreciated it. Yes, Mr. Streff, One of the things I think about when I, uh, was, uh, looking at the presentation is the, the question of, so what, right to each student, like as you're going through a content area or teaching something, regardless of the topic to this, the, the question in the student's mind, a lot of times the question in the teacher's mind is like, so what, right? Why, how is this relevant to me? Or what impact is this gonna have on my life? And, uh, why do I need to know this? And, um, and I think that culturally responsive teaching, um, tools allow, um, teachers to really figure out how do you, how do you engage the student in a, in a, in a way that's meaningful to them so that they can kind of deepen their knowledge? Um, and it was, and, and getting more into kind of methods around like the Socratic method of problem solving and, um, understanding how to debate ideas and issues. Um, but that's really what I think about is I think some of our best teachers, you, you know, try to figure out, well, how is this, how could, could I make this relevant or contextualize this for students coming from different backgrounds or experiences? So just something that kind of, uh, um, I was thinking about as you were presenting. So when my kids were in third grade, the twins, um, you know, I have one who's dyslexic and one who has other processing issues. And, and one of my favorite teachers, Ms. Parker, if she's listening, and Ms. Millham, um, who's now an educational diagnostician, the one thing that they did, and I don't even, I think it was probably before cultural, me and my kids are over 20, but the one thing that they did was they had that morning meeting, every meeting, and it was, you know, will had his iPad. And it was one of the very first iPads around to have some accessible PDFs and things like that. And other kids were kind of teasing him and things like that. And what they did was, and during that morning meeting, it was like everybody had something, someone had alopecia, someone had diabetes, someone had something like, we're all not perfect. And, and they really did work together as a team. Like it, that class, to me, was so connected, and they were so connected to their teacher that I, I can't help but think that's why she made such beautiful games in her reading and, um, and math and everything else, because those kids were connected and they, they helped each other. And that was, so that's something I'll always remember. I don't know that it was ex, you know, called that at that point of time, but that's definitely what my understanding is right now of what it is. So what you're doing is beautiful work. Yes. Dr. Rashe, Thank you for that awesome presentation. I think that what really stood out to me also was the myth slide of disregarding the differences, just knowing that we have differences and just kind of not acknowledging that way. We wouldn't have conflict in the classroom or anything of the sort, but I like how, you know, to acknowledge those differences and to recognize those helps to bring all the students together. Thank you. Yes, Mrs. Griffiss. Thanks, Madam Chair. Um, I would've liked to have read this earlier, um, if it was on the agenda, but I do have a question for slide 19. What does student culture and identity have to do with math? So thank you for your question. Uh, board member Griffith, uh, student id, identity and culture are embedded in all instruction. Um, and the point that it is making here is that in math and science and social, so social science and global studies in any content area, that students' identity and culture play a big part in the way that we can connect as teachers, that students can connect to the curriculum, and that they can see themselves, um, as, um, critical thinkers in the classroom. So the connection is that it connects and interweaves throughout all curriculum and instruction. Thank you. I'm not sure I believe that, but thank you, Mr. Ham. I was wondering, um, so many years ago when I was doing some of these, you know, more into education and things like that, um, and looking at assessments, and one of the things that, that was interesting to me was, and we're talking about math and like a word problem, living in Corpus Christi, Texas, kids knew what the tide was, but living here in Loudoun, Virginia, they might not know what the tide is, and so then they would get that wrong. Is that something that would be something talking about cultural identity and things like that? Yes. Yes. As students, uh, interact with curriculum, all parts of their beliefs or, uh, ideas that play a part in their lives. So when we think about identity, we think about this, the sense of self and who you are. Um, and then we think about culture. You think about things that are interacting, beliefs and ideas that you share with others that you interact with others on. So when you think about the aspect of, let's say the Tidewater or another principle in science, um, you would have to open up the, um, background knowledge and front load with information for students so they have a better understanding of what that is, what it looks like, um, the modeling, the representation so that they can connect to what those topics and ideas are. And then have those conversations about how does that impact you, your family. Some students may not have had those experiences. Some students have that, that way by providing the opportunity for students to share and discuss, they can also learn from the students in the classroom. Um, and that's another part of the instruction that teachers are able to provide. But once they know that these things about their students, they can also plan for these things that students may not have. And so that's a, that's another aspect of the instruction as far as knowing who my students are and what I need to provide to them in order for them to access the curriculum effectively. Thank you. Mm-hmm. Any other questions? No. Thank you so much for coming. We appreciate you. Thank you. And our pleasure. And we be happy to come back and discuss another topic at a later date. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you for your time. Okay. Um, board members, we have, I mean, we have until four. Are there any other kinds of things that you guys want to discuss? Communication issues, anything like that to work through before we end for the day? Or are we just tired? Yes, ma'am. Um, thank you, Madam Chair. Um, we all do our newsletters, and I don't know if I should bring this up, uh, during new business, but, um, we have a policy where, um, our newsletters only go to our constituents. And I was just talking to Natalie Allen in communications that maybe we can revise the policy where maybe once or twice a year we can send a newsletter to the whole county, um, per, you know, even though we're not in a, a specific district. So I wanted to know, and we wouldn't do it all the time, but, oh, oh, I, I hear April here, um, just maybe once or twice a year. So, um, I'm hoping to, for new business to bring that up as, um, you know, to revise the policy. And maybe we could do something like that so other counties can see what other districts are doing. Do you remember what policy number that is? And where would that be? LANP? I can pull it up real quick for you. Ms. Na, Ms. Allen, would that be LAMP? Yes, I believe so. Yes. Uh, vice Chair Donahue. Thank you, Madam Chair. I, I just wanted to ask a question for clarification, is I haven't looked at this policy, but is it, is it the case that we're not allowed to send newsletters to other, I mean, I'm the, at large, so whatever, but Right. If you're, if you're a district person, for example, I would, I would like to get Lauren's emails because my kids go to a Leeburg school. Um, I assumed that if I just ask, I can be added to her mailing list, is If you ask as a constituent, I believe that's probably true. Okay. Per policy, though, um, it, it says as part of frequency that, um, school board members may produce an e-newsletter that LCPS will dis disseminate via email to families within their district. So I think it would be a policy change, um, or expansion of that policy in order for that to happen. And one thing I did say to Ms. Griffis, it might be potentially an overhaul of how we do that, because the other piece of this is it might be inundating families with nine different newsletters and Not At the same time. No, not necessarily, but it's, it's a lot of communication. Um, and so worth talking about potentially at an LAMP meeting, what might be the most efficient way to communicate, for example, if we wanted to do something like this, you know, could it be that it's a school board newsletter where each board member has, you know, a component of it versus like a full fledged newsletter like you all do now. But again, that's just an idea and we'd have to kind of bat around what might make the most sense. Ms. Allen, could you tell us what that policy number is at one more time? Yes. 25 10. 25. 10. Thank you. Yes, Dr. I'd like to bring up four, I mean, new business for May, I guess next time for the district overlaps. Just, I think we kind of, we touched on it earlier today. Maybe we could bring that about as a information item or a discussion about The district. I think we could discuss it now. Although Ms. Shernoff and Mr. Raffe are not here. Yeah. But how, one of the things was either to have everybody on there or nobody on there, or have everybody on there with who find your legislator or whatever. What were the other ones, the other options, just having the primary and the, and the at large, the two and the at large. What are people's thoughts about that? We're talking about the websites, school websites. Yes. I, I do think we should list all our school b school board members, um, for the school websites. I think everybody should be listed. That's just my thought. Um, from my perspective, I, I definitely feel open to making some change. I really, um, empathize with sumera with the idea of having 40 schools when 40, 42, 42, I have 20. Um, I'm afraid in listing everyone, um, that people will get lost. And so I, I find I'm more drawn to the idea of having it primary by location, but I don't know that I fully understand how we have made the decision to include them as it stands now. So if it, it is based on special permission, um, I, if it's based on districting, I mean, right. Like, um, Mrs. Griffiths and I share Riverside, right? But I only have a small pocket, but I do have constituents at Riverside. But when my neighbor went to Independence a couple years ago, should I be respon? You know, that, that's the question. So I, I'm definitely open, um, and I think it would be nice if we could simplify it. And I share, And I share independence with Samira, and I share broad run with Linda, Just to give an example. The Riverside example's a good one. Um, there are five board members listed on Riverside High School's website. So as far as consistency's sake, I, I get where you're coming from. Yes, Dr. Dean. And with the special programs being expanded, it's going to expand the need for even more to be on each website. Something like ham side Or Yeah, yeah. Yes. Vice Chair Donahue. Thank you Madam Chair. Um, I don't, I don't know that I particularly have strong feelings about we should list all nine board members, or we should only list the primary, et cetera. But, um, I, I think to me it's maybe more important to make clear somewhere that parents who have concerns can contact any of the board members. Um, whether it's, whether that is, whether we do that by saying, like, you can contact any of the board members by here, you know, link or go to let's talk or go to the, like, here's the email to contact the whole board or whatever. But not to, not to cause people to conclude that they may only be, you know, allowed, allowed to reach out to one individual board member. Well, the other aspect of that is there could just be a link, reach out to your reach out to the board members. It Says that on every website already, there's a contact your school board and you can click on it and it goes to your board page and it has all the individual board members listed. And then at the bottom there's a button that says contact the full board. Um, so I think the listing part is the, So why do we, why do we list? I've only History. It's just history. Um, I, we, that's the way we've done it before I, and if we wanna change it, we absolutely are open to that. And it's an easy thing for us to do. Okay. Dr. Rasheed, If you go to each of our individual websites on LCPS, and then, you know, it has our beautiful picture and then underneath it, we have like a million, we have like a million schools underneath it. So that, that's another thing. Like, can that be fixed? I mean, I don't, well fixed, I don't know. Because that's where I found out I had 87,000 schools underneath my name. It was like these two long columns and I was so envious of my colleagues. I was like, I just have all these, yeah. That large. So that could be fixed too. I mean, I don't, I mean, and, and who, I dunno who mentioned it earlier today. It gives that confusion that the, the constituent doesn't know who my school board representative. If we list all of them, I don't have a problem having them all down. But then how would they know if they don't, how, how do they know? 'cause they don't even know what district they're in. Ms. Allen, what have you done in your other, I mean, you've worked in several different school districts. Um, typically in smaller print on the bottom of a website is the full board and then, um, the superintendent's name. But to your point about contacting your school board, it could be a button that says Contact your school board on ev, which is there on every page. And then when you click on that, it goes to the board page. Um, Should we have that routed? But then that would be an extra thing to do. Like once someone clicks on that link, can there be some way of some sort having that constituents concern be addressed by someone that then directs it further to the specific school board member and the at large? Just a thought. Yes. Vice Chair Donahue. Thank you Madam Chair. I am reminded of what April said earlier that I, uh, agree with slash find challenging because I am supposed to be, have some responsibility for all of our schools. Um, but they're, but the needs are so different all over the county. Um, it is really helpful for me if I receive a constituent concern to be able to have conversations with, if it's a little river school with Sumara, or if it's a Catoctin school with Carrie, because y know the ins and outs and in intricacies of your district better than I do. Um, and, and I guess that that would be the potential downside of like, just referring, of referring to concern constituents or parents to the entire board is who is the best suited person to help them. I dunno, Dr. Deans had requested that we have a conversation about this, but I don't know how else to have a conversation about it without being here. My, I said have a conversation, but also, and I don't know how this all works, uh, one of those platforms where the community could have input related to the topic versus just us talking about the topic. I don't know if, I don't know if that's logical or workable, Ms. Allen. It's definitely possible. I mean, we could maybe ask a question via let's talk and send it out, um, in a newsletter or something like that. Ask for Feedback. Um, it's not really a policy per se, it's kind of operations in a way. It, it's kind of, it's your purview. 'cause your communications Well, and it's philosophical. Yeah. For you all because I mean, typically as it relates to board communication, yes, it's my purview in the sense of like what we can put on the website and those, and how to make it look good and intuitive and those kinds of things. But I think it's philosophical as far as do you wanna get every communication from every constituent, um, routed to all of you, or do you want, um, you know, your specific constituents to send specific messages to you. So I think it might be a larger conversation. Can I jump in on that one, Ms. Allen? Um, I know this sounds crazy, but I am interested in what's going on around the county. Um, I, I don't know if I'm the only one, but, um, I may not respond to it if it's not my area, but I would like to be updated because I have had some people come to me from different districts. Didn't you know about this? I did not. Um, if I had seen it come through, maybe I would have. Um, I, I really think that I'd like to just be updated by what's going on in the county, even though I might not be able to help or assist. But I, I wanna be updated. Uh, if you don't mind. Thank you, Ms. LaBelle. You've been waiting patiently. I am gonna have to backtrack with this a little bit. I wanna go back to what, uh, Dr. Dean said about having a community discussion with maybe the community that you represent. Uh, for example, um, in Catoctin we had a lot of snow, but we have some subdivisions whose roads were cleared very early. We have some areas in the mountains that you are driving down snow canyons. We have another area with snow blowing across fields, making it a virtual whiteout. I was in one on the way here. So if we could on possibly our Facebook page, 'cause that gives that information that I wanna get out to the, the entire community about, well, I, I'm grateful that your roads are taken care of, but we have these other issues and explain them and then everybody could see it there. And if somebody had something else to add, if it were on Facebook, they could, am I correct? I don't, I don't quite understand the question as far as it relates to our LCPS Facebook page. Like what we would be doing differently? I'm sorry. No, That, that wouldn't be your Facebook page. That would be our personal Facebook Page. Oh, your personal Facebook page. Sorry. Okay. Yeah. We have said, I have, uh, Carrie, uh, Kain District Representative Facebook page. Sure. So if we could put those types of questions on the Facebook page, um, that would put it out to the community. The community would then understand where we're coming from with say, school closures. Uh, and then we only have to say it once, but they could write back in. Like I was, uh, telling someone earlier, somebody actually sent me a video because her children had to walk a mile to, uh, an alternate bus stop, and she had videoed it in the car and what it was like to drive, and it was a mile. She clocked it. Then maybe the people in the subdivisions would better understand what was going on in the more mountainous areas. And that would help with us having to repeat the same answers over and over and over again. They could engage in a community discussion at that point. Ms. LaBelle, I think the, I mean, our Facebook pages are our purview. They're not managed or anything by LCPS. I think that's would be us. Well, what I was suggesting is that might be an answer to Linda Dean's, uh, comment about having mi you. Is that what you meant, miss Dr. Dean's? No. No. Okay, then I'm off Base. But I think, I think what you're probably saying is that the school board could leverage your face, your platforms, your social media, maybe your newsletter, and ask your constituents Yeah. The question which you would absolutely be able to do as school board members. Okay. Yeah. And they could, they could then have their community discussion about what that particular problem was, um, and what they think they can do about it. And then I would be able to hear it and bring it to wherever it needs to go. That was just a thought. I'm kind of at a, at a crossroads here, because it's not something that we're really gonna vote on. It seems operational kind. And there's two questions, right? So it's a philoso a philosophical question that we have to figure out. Yeah. And then I think, right. Okay. So it sounds to me it's two questions. It's what, like, who should be on every website? What names and Kevin Lewis actually have to give you credit, had a really good idea to have all the names on the bottom of the websites, but then bold, the ones who are your representative, which we could do, but as far as the contact, like who to contact, That's up to them. The What that's gonna be up to you all as far, it's right now, if you go to any, um, school website, there's a list of board members, and then there's contact the school board that you can click on. It clicks out of the individual school website. It goes to your school board website, and then folks can either can click on your individual pictures. And so it says, you know, contact Ms. Mansfield or they can click on a button that says contact the full board. And so those are their choices. Like the constituents are already making the choice about who to contact in that regard that way. Okay. Dr. Rasheed, Uh, I, I, I think that's a great idea what, um, Ms. Allen had mentioned, with the exception of on our own personal, um, LCPS websites with our beautiful picture on them. If we can get rid of those other, if we could be more specific, I guess is what I'm saying with those schools. So we can just have the specific ones under each of our names, Not the ones that you have special permission for. Correct. Correct. So that would also include hams. I, because that could be any of us or not. Hsci will continue to expand. I don't know if we start including Hsci. It'll just, Because we all have, it'll go all over the, we all have North Star, we all have academies of loudin. Right. We all have Roby Roby. Right. Right. What's the, Uh, when you said H side, then it'll be, I mean that's at Tuska, Aurora. I mean, then we're gonna, if we plan to expand, then it's gonna be like, It's gonna, Well to that point, like IB schools as well, right? Or Yeah. Um, language immersion where I can be, So that's not really a program. It's more of a mm-hmm. It's a program. Yeah. As opposed to a school. Okay. But the confusion may still lie with constituents that are not part of those special programs. And when it's listed under our name and a parent is just attending, for example, heritage at I, you know, ib, and they contact April or Dr. Deans or anyone for that matter and has nothing to do with that, that's where the confusion lies, is when it's listed under our name, where other constituents that are not part of that special program still reach out to us. That, that's what I'm saying. That's where all that over overlap overlap may get a little bit more confusing later on if we start including special programs. Okay. I'm, I'm happy with not including special programs. How do you guys feel about that? Everybody's name on there, but then the other, the two primary and, uh, uh, vice chair Donna Hughes and she's at large, bolded, and then there's just a link for everyone. Yes. Oh, Dr. Spence. Sorry. Would you like to say something? If, if it's okay? Um, I've just been listening and trying to sort of figure out the issues and, um, I think there's two, there's two things I'm thinking about. Mostly I'm just thinking about like, I'm a parent and I'm looking at a website and I want to know who to contact. Mm-hmm. I don't know that putting everybody's names on there and then it's gonna make that clearer for me. Like that's kind of my initial reaction to that idea. I think it might make it less clear for me, even if it's bolded. Um, so I'm a little concerned about that, but I'm also, uh, two other thoughts. One would be, does, does that make it clear if I'm a parent when I go to a school's website, uh, that I should contact the principal first? Um, you know, does that create that challenge, right? So how do we make sure we're communicating that when we put your school board picture at the bottom, and then the, the next piece of it is, um, although it's always under the administrative page, so maybe they get that. And then the other piece was like, if, I mean, it seems to me, well, it just seems to me in general, the, and this is your, again, this is your all's direction and philosophy, but the, the easier we can make it on a parent to figure out who to contact, the better off we're gonna be. And if that means you just pick like the one primary, and then that one primary says, well, technically though you, yes, this is my school, but you live over in April Chandler's district, so here's who you ought to contact. Then, you know, like it's a little, I I'm just trying to, like, I, I'm curious. I actually kind of was interested. I don't, I hate doing another survey like that to get parents' perspective, but, but the idea of like, what do parents think about that? Like, what would make this, because isn't that kind of the point of the question? What would make this easier on parents? What would eliminate steps for parents to get answers that they need versus having to be told, well, I'm not the right school board member. Okay. Um, April and then, uh, Ms. LaBelle. Okay. Um, I will say what Dr. Spence said really resonates with me. I think we should try to make it easier on parents. And again, I've been around a long time and I'm not clear on how the schools are assigned. So if somebody could confirm, is it truly that if a kid is in special permission, then that your, but live in your district. That's how it's done. Um, because it seems to me like it would be significantly more transparent to have it be assigned to the district at the district level, and then perhaps it could be just a tad bit more work for the school board members to help redirect if that was necessary. That, that's just where I am with it right now. Ms. LaBelle, First of all, Dr. Spence, I can clear things up for you. You're in my district. Okay. We're good with that one. Now. Um, as far as the rest of it goes, um, I think that what we need to do is direct them, use their address where their school is to send out the newsletters. If a parent has a problem, uh, for example, I got a letter from a parent, uh, about his student he'd already talked to. Uh, my first question always is, uh, he already talked to his principal. He the athletic director. It was an athletic, uh, question. And who does he contact now? What's the protocol? So I answered his question and then I said in addition, um, you know, I'm very happy to answer your question, but just so you know, you actually live in Dr. Rashid's district and you might get a quicker response going that way. So if it's a special permission person and they contact you the first time and they tell you, my students over at, uh, in my case, let's say they're at, uh, ROTC and they're in, um, Leesburg, and that's not one of the schools listed on my page, uh, if they called me or contacted me, I should say, because their child's there on special permission, I would be able to say to them, well, I deal with you. My name was on your list because I am the representative for where you live. But if you want to talk to the representative that actually handles the RC program at county, that would be Ms. Shernoff. So it would be my responsibility to point out what their other options were, simply because we know where we are dealing with people, they don't, and it's just easy for us to handle their problem. Or if you don't know an answer, then refer them and, and still let them know, you know, we're more than happy to help you, but next time you might wanna try. That kind of thing. You know, I'm, I'm coming more towards the whole survey, even though we are all surveyed out, but, um, I think I am Dr. Dean's. I, I kind of am kind of, you know, Dr. Dean's and April and, um, Dr. Spence. Could I suggest a focus group potentially instead of a survey? Yes. Miscommunications chair, you. Yeah, of course. I'll defer to you on that. Just Thinking about the context, like this is a lot of context and nuance that we're talking about, and I can't imagine being able to capture what we're talking about in a survey, but having a focus group of parents, or even bringing this to Leaf potentially as a conversation might be a good start to just say, you know, this is a problem that was brought to us by our school board. Can you tell us what you think? Um, LEAF has, you know, representation across all of the districts and, um, majority of schools. So that might be a, a good starting point For that point. Leaf sac and Ciac, I think, I think that would be fine. Sure. Um, what do you guys think about that? Just a little focus group and, and I, this seems so small, but it does, it is communication, which could possibly be a big thing, right? It is a big thing. So, um, why don't we do that? How do you guys feel about that? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Great. Done. One more thing. Yes. Um, one more thing. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, as far as the agendas go, um, I've noticed, and unfortunately Ms. Donahue left. She had mentioned it before. Um, the agenda should be put up way before, um, so we can view them or the public can view them not the day of and an hour before presentation. And that's been happening a lot lately, and I think that needs to get under control. Plus the, uh, slides, I think we, we talked about under 20 slides as well, so if that's something we can, um, work on, I'd really appreciate that. But I, I think I, I'm not speaking for everybody, but I'd like to see the information ahead of time. This retreat was planned I think over a month ago, and correct me if I'm wrong, um, I don't see why the, uh, agendas from the VSBA and the culture culturally responsive, uh, presentation were put on very last minute. Um, so I just wanted to add that as well. Thank you. Mr. Allen, could you tell us the legal requirements for having agenda and everything else up? So the, the policy is what we, the school would, should be applying 'cause it's a little stricter than what's required by, by law. So we're, we would be looking at, um, policy 24 30 section C, which reads agenda items and supporting documents or other information should be submitted to the superintendent. Um, uh, ultimately to answer this relevant question, uh, board members should be delivered agenda items at least two days prior to the meeting. And then according to foia, which is under 2.23707, um, the requirement is that any items presented to the school board members must be made available for public inspection at the time it's presented to school board members. So when it that and how, uh, customarily that's achieved is by posting on board docs. And that's 24 40 you said? Uh, The policy is 24 30 section. Oh, thank you. Thank you. So if the, if there's a presentation that's not exactly, um, fleshed out completely yet, and we don't get it two days ahead of time, then it would be what Then an under policy, um, that could be viewed as problematic, but not under law necessarily. So let me, um, add to that, and I, wes I want, uh, just to ask a clarifying question. The agenda and the what is made available to board members are not precisely the same thing, right? So the agenda has to be posted, but if we don't have a presentation ready as soon as the board members are seeing the presentation, if that's posted, then that meets the policy, uh, goal, correct? Yes. Right. That said, I would also say, um, we have had this conversation and we have created a new calendar for staff of how we get things to the board and how we get things, um, up onto the agenda ahead of time. It would be helpful probably to have some discussion about special meetings, because that's different than the normal course of how we do the agenda planning and how we get things up and how our staff works off of our calendar. Um, and so that's probably the issue here is that this is a, a kind of different meeting and we don't, we haven't had the same direction or conversation about that. Um, we're, uh, as I was mentioning, uh, we were refining the presentation, uh, as late as yesterday afternoon. Um, the, not the VSBA one 'cause that's not ours, um, uh, but the, uh, the presentation, um, as late as yesterday afternoon that you saw this afternoon, um, we didn't have the same calendar and expectation set for that because that's part outside of our normal process. But I mean, we can talk about it. I'm, we're not opposed to it and we're certainly not trying to hide anything from me. I don't know what we would be hiding. Um, I just think if the board wants to give us, uh, um, any direction on that, we'd be happy to take it. And, um, you know, again, kind of remarking that we did have that conversation about the other agenda, uh, development, and we, we, we took that and created a calendar and I think I, I actually would disagree and say that we actually have been pretty on top of making sure all of those things get posted to the agenda as quick as, as quick as we can. Dr. Spence, would you say committee meetings were separate then school board meetings as well? Um, well, so your committee meetings, um, we, I think we follow the same process because that's what's outlined under the policy. Special meetings are just different. They just have a, they, they kind of have a different, uh, attention to them. It's like when you have your, um, we got a special meeting the other day and, you know, you post the agenda, but not necessarily any, any aligned materials. But again, we'd be happy to take, uh, any direction on that. I think in this case, the, this retreat was planned over a month ago, so, um, the presentation was very last minute today. That's my point. I can tell you, working on the agenda with VSBA, there was, we, we had, you know, just 'cause it was planned a month ago doesn't mean that we worked through everything. Um, and then again, the presentation from VSBA, it's v SBAs, and so we can work through that another time. Um, I was willing do it again, talking about the other one, the other presentation, and so we can, um, and then I, I just wanna make sure about the committee meetings too, that that's the same expectation. Yeah, I I think it is the same expectation. Our staff understands that materials that are up for discussion and committee need to be posted, um, two days in advance Including presentations, or is that something that can be worked on until the, until they're ready to present. I think that also includes presentations, but I'll have to double check that with staff in our calendar. Thank you Dr. Smith. Yep. I mean, Dr. Spence. Okay. All right. If there are other, any other questions, concerns? Okay. All right. Our, uh, what's today, January 24th, um, retreat is now adjourned. Thank you.