Okay, we are going to call this Tuesday, August 4th, 2026 uh workshop of the Martin County School Board to order. If you would all please rise for the pledge of allegiance. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic
for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Thank you, Maggie. Would you call the role, please? >> Mrs. Russell, >> here. >> Mrs. Roberts,
>> here. Chair Powers >> here. Vice Chair Morardi >> here. >> Mrs. Pritchette >> here. Superintendent M. >> Perfect. Thank you. Okay, we're going to move right into our discussion items. We have item 2.01, which is our medical
insurance options for future consideration. Uh, Mr. Calderon. Okay. Good afternoon, Madame Chair, members of the board, Superintendent Maine, Don Calderon, director of risk management and employee benefits of Martin County School District. And alongside me is Gabrielle Swain and
Dustin Keane from the Garing Group. Um, as you recall, uh, we were up here two months ago in June to talk about eight or nine different topics for the board to consider for future, um, consideration for the medical insurance plan for the 27 28 year and beyond. Um,
and so, as part of our followup, we are here today to talk about five of those topics. The remaining topics um, we'll be back before you in October to discuss some longer range um, of those topics. Um so we've got five things that we're going to discuss today. Um the first one
being um the PEO which stands for professional employer organization. We're going to talk about um tobacco nicotine searchcharge um things to consider spousal searchcharge an update in our wellness program and um a follow up on the PO runoff analysis um per
request from a board member. Okay. So, I'm gonna hand off the presentation for right now to Gabrielle Swain, who is going to give you an update on the Garing's um information about the school board potentially joining a PEO.
>> Yes. So, we reached out to multiple um offers of a PEO, including ADP. Um ADP, most of them didn't respond, but ADP advised that they do not quote on school districts. Um and this is because
it could result in your loss of FRS status um and pension eligibility was their answer to that question. >> So you did check with FRS. >> We did check with ADP on their ability to quote. >> Okay. >> But you didn't check with FRS.
Okay. Any um questions on school board joining a PEO. >> Miss Roberts, >> um just to close that loop, if you could check with FRS and see what that looks like and if there's anybody else that's doing it. Thank you.
>> Okay. So, the next uh topic that um Gabrielle is going to discuss is um a tobacco and nicotine searchcharge program. So, there's quite a bit of information on here. Um I'm going to let her go over um what they reviewed and what their uh recommended approach is um
after talking with staff. >> Yes. So if you remember from our last discussion, there are two ways if you wanted to offer um a nicotine searchcharge program that you could do it. One would be through an affidavit. That would be a zerocost option to the
school district. However, um it is up to them to attest correctly. The other option is to actually test individuals for their um nicotine status and this would be through a cotenine test. It's a metabolite of nicotine stays in the body longer. So that is usually what is
recommended. Um so there's various ways you can test for this. We would recommend going through Quest um because Sigma has a good partnership with Quest and it was the most cost effective and you could bring them on site and test your employees that way. Um but there's
multiple options oral saliva, vena puncture, dried blood spot, finger stick and home collection kit. So the lowest cost option is the vena puncture. Um other options are also listed in that
dark blue box for your consideration. um finger stick being perhaps the a little bit less invasive, but it is more costly. These all range from $23,000 to um 67,000 if you were to send a home
kit. We did go to multiple vendors to see who would um offer this to you and it would be uh we went to Quest, Liv IQ, and Health Designs. We only received two quotes, but again, we would the cheapest
most cost-effective option is Quest due to their relationship with Sigma, your health insurer. You can see on the bottom we have estimated what the annual revenue would be to the school district. So currently you have 1,812
employees on the plan. You have um a bit over 200 spouses. So in total you have 2,00 um 84 employees and spouses on the plan. If we assume that 10% are nicotine users, which is on
the lower end of the Florida average, um then that would be 181 employees or 28 employees and spouses. If you do a $100 a month search charge, you can see what that monthly um revenue would be for the district.
And in total, that would be 217,000 in estimated annual revenue for employees only or almost 250,000 for employees plus spouses. So, just to give you um an idea of kind of what our local competitors are doing,
um I personally spoke with a benefits manager at both Palm Beach County School District and St. Lucy County School District. So, Palm Beach County School District um does a simple affidavit when employees are hired. Um they just sign something saying they either are a
tobacco user or they're not. Um there's no proof in it. Um there is a $50 a month sir charge for those employees that attest to using um tobacco or nicotine. Um however, employees have the
option of going into their um ERP system. They they They use Peopleoft and they could change their um election any time for that. Um St. Lucy County School District does not do any um nicotine affidavit or testing. Um I was at the
Florida Educational Risk Management Association conference a couple weeks ago in Sarasota and I spoke with um the director of risk and benefits there, Lynn Peterson. um their um school district recently just put in uh a nicotine um and special
search charge coincidentally during their open enrollment for their plan year that starts right now. Um and they are charging um they have a a $100 per month tobacco sir charge um for their for their employees. So, um, we went
ahead and just put in a $100 sir charge. Ultimately, if the board decides to proceed with this, um, it would be at your discretion how much or if any search charge you would want to attest, um, to apply to that.
>> So, I would be curious about the affidavit. What does it say? Is are there consequences if they have a smoking? If they say no and they have smoking related um illness or a chronic illness associated
with smoking, is does it impact their coverage? Like what what would be the consequence of saying you're not a smoker when you really are? Typically, it's up to and including um termination of employment, but there are other consequences as well that you can
that you you can list out for them. >> Yeah, it it's really up to each individual's school board. Um I've got a copy of Palm Beach County's um there's it just varies as to what if any
um penalty they would face for not being truthful. Okay. Uh, Vice Chair Morardi. >> And would you say it was uh which was the county you said was doing the affidavit? >> Okay. And then do you have any idea what
the percentage of that are admitting it and paying the search charge? >> Yeah. And if while you're doing that you can get the specific wording that would be great too because I'm very curious about the wording. And as far as the
other stuff, uh I don't love the whole testing for this thing. I there's expenses with it. I for me I don't really want to be in that uh arena just to give feedback on that. >> Well, and I know the city of Stewart
does it too. um they have a tobacco free uh workplace and I think it's their insurance as well. So you might want to check with them and see. Sorry. We work with the city of Stewart and they do actual testing at their
clinic for that. Um so they they do actual testing, not an affidavit over there. >> Yes, Miss Roberts. So, so if I say I'm not a smoker and
then I either become a smoker or I forgot when I signed the affidavit that I really was a smoker, um besides whatever penalty for for that employment penalty, um is there any medical penalty? Like is there any
medical issue? So, let's say I I signed an affidavit says I wasn't a smoker, but then a couple weeks later I became a two pack a day smoker and then I developed emphyma and then I ended up in the hospital and then I ended up with all these other issues.
Is there any repercussion from that? Is there any or is it just uh Oh well. >> So this would be administered by the district and your team. Um so the repercussions would be by the district
and the district only. No repercussions on >> as far as medical care goes. >> Um no no repercussions as far as medical care goes. Are you asking in terms of accessing care or getting And I'm just wondering and and the second part of that question is so I'm assuming that
some of these um let's say Palm Beach County or something if I signed the affidavit that said yes I am a smoker that I have access to some program to help me not be a smoker. Correct. Is that part of the whole package to get me away from my cigarettes?
>> Yes. And if you go to the next page, um you have to offer whether you're doing an um if you're doing the search charge either way affidavit or actually testing them, you do have to offer them um legally a alternate to this. So they
have to be offered a way to complete a cessation program. Um it would be a four-week course and it has to be offered by the district at least once during work hours. Um some clients offer two of these um courses. City of Steuart
is an example of that. Um supervisors have to allow employees time to attend these classes. Um and you could do if they choose to do a community course, it has to be four-week community courses with the certificate of completion. They can do that as well, but they're not
allowed to just do tools to quit for one a time class. It has to be a four-week course, but you have to offer it to them. And if they complete it, then they do not get that search charge. Okay. >> Are there any other questions about
this? U Miss Perett. >> So, is the sir charge active while they are trying to quit? >> No. So, if if you go to the bottom of the second page that we're on where it says the sample timeline. So, for example, if we're aiming to implement
this on 71 of 27, um if you're doing the testing that would start around September to start coordinating that and um hosting testings from October through March, then you would have to host the cessation classes throughout that period. So, they have either completed it or not completed it prior to open
enrollment. So, you know, if they have met these requirements or not. So in my thought process here, they agree to do a cessation. They do it, they complete it. After
that, unless we test them randomly, we don't have any idea whether or not they are >> correct, >> smokefree. >> Correct. So, I would just say it has to come with some sort of testing
because we're offering them a class to quit, but after that, we have no idea whether or not they have or not. So, right, >> we have to have some some accountability. >> Yeah. Um, and you would test them before
the class either way. So, you wouldn't know what their status is after the test because they just have to complete it. Um, anecdotally, um, we spoke to one of our wellness coordinators and she mentioned that people from the search charge don't tend to quit, but they actually do from the four-week class. They found that people actually have
quit from the class when they weren't going in attending to quit at all. Just get rid of their search charge. >> Right. But I kind of think when we're talking about giving them the opportunity um, that they are
going to be required to pay a search charge if they are a smoker. It goes away if they're not. But then what do we do? That's kind of where I'm at. Like where are we after they say they've quit? You have to have
something to show maybe six months later or whatever whatever the time is. It doesn't just stop. >> Yeah. Yeah. So, you would do it once every year and it does. >> Okay. >> That is per You >> just answered the question.
>> Yeah. Legal legally it's once a year, but yes. Um you can't do it more than that, but yes, once a year you would retest them. This would be an ongoing thing. You test them every year. They they do it um if they test positive and they did their cessation class, but they tested positive the next year, then they have to do another class if they if they
do that. But it's once it's annually that they get tested. >> Okay. Miss Russell, >> instead of a search charge, could there be an incentive for the ones that don't smoke if we have a red reduction in cost? That
would be up to the board's discretion. People do that, >> but that becomes a funding issue. How we're going to fund uh an incentive for not smoking. Um because of the cost associated with it, um the board would
have to decide how they're going to incentivize it. So mo most employers are moving towards the sir charge because of that reason. >> Wait, Miss Roberts. >> No, go ahead. >> Miss Roberts was next and then then I
had Miss Pritchette, then Dr. Mori. >> Thank you. Um, so I I don't like being in the testing business, but I also think that if you're not in the testing business, you've got a whole door that's open where I wrote in an elevator with her and she smelled like smoke and now I
want to turn her in and then she's going to double down and sign an affidavit again and say that I don't know what's wrong with her and we're going to like create a um a hostile work environment with that. Um, regardless of where we land with this, whether we land with a
search charge, don't land with a search charge, etc. I I'm questioning whether we can use wellness dollars to offer the the program, the four-week program for people who want to quit smoking. So, >> you can do that.
>> And and if we can get some detail on that as to what that looks like, I mean, I think there might be some benefit as we're trying to encourage healthier habits, etc. And we know that that's something that leads to longer term issues that probably we would be able to um just to see if there's any interest.
I mean I think you know >> and I think Tobaccof free Florida offers those courses to employers um and their employees for free. >> Yes, that's correct. >> Uh Miss Bridgetette. >> Oh, M. Sorry. >> Can I just um just respond to Mrs.
Robert's um um option about using wellness dollars? That's something if we wanted to do that for 2728, we could definitely have those discussions now, but you'll see later in the presentation. We do have our wellness dollars allocated towards the district's new um wellness program through Sigma
Wellness Experience, and we'll get to that a little bit later. >> Yep. >> Good. Good. >> Sorry. >> Okay. I just wanted to say that I think the incentive is not having to pay the search charge. I don't think we should offer additional incentives.
>> Dr. Morardi. And I just want to just add on to I feel like in general it should be more of like what you're doing good for us should result in uh discounts versus what you're doing bad for us, we
should penalize you. And so just in in the whole general presentation here, I like more of the wellness bonuses for doing good things versus penalizing people and testing them. And I mean, are we just going to test smoking or can we
now test alcohol and sugar levels? And we can really go down a rabbit hole with that. So, I'm really looking forward to your next slide about wellness and and yes, discounts there. That's >> We have gone down that rabbit hole before. Um there are a lot of things
that we can um incentivize. There are there's blood pressure, there's um glute sugar levels, there's all kinds of things that you can but will be very expensive. But go ahead.
I'll let you move on to the next. >> Okay. So, the next topic is the spousal search charge um on slide five there. Um, and so this is um information as a followup to the request
of um what it would look like if employees who have their spouses on our district's medical insurance plan if their spouse has the opportunity to receive medical insurance through their own employer. Um what that would look
like in a spousal search charge. So Gabrielle's gonna take it away. >> Yep. So there's two options. there's a sir charge and a carveout option. So the sir charge would be similar to the tobacco. Um this would be through an affidavit which they can do when they're doing open enrollment. They can attest
to the fact that their um spouse does not have credable coverage elsewhere through for example through an alternate employer. Um and then if they are still if they do have alternate coverage elsewhere and they're still choosing to be on your plan, they would receive a
search charge um for that. The other option is carveout, which means that if that person does have credable coverage elsewhere, that spouse, they would not be allowed on the plan at all. There wouldn't be um a search charge. They just would not be allowed on the plan.
Um so both of these are options. So if you look at the bottom box, that is what it would look like if you did a $100 per month um search charge and a $200 per month search charge. So you currently have 272 spouses on your plan.
We're estimating 40% would be subject to the search charge. Um again the average we see is 40 to 60% so this is on the lower end of the estimate. Um but that monthly revenue would be about $11,000 annually $130,000.
Same concept with the $200 a month um except the estimated annual revenue goes up to $262,000 annually. the carveout um is more disruptive to your employees um as they would just not have they would not even have the option
to be on your plan. Um they would have to go on their spouse's plan. Um but it is an option that some groups take. >> So just for contextual uh purposes, um Palm Beach County, I spoke with them. They currently do not do a spousal search charge. They have discussed it in
the past, but it's not currently implemented. St. Lucy County does not have it either, but St. Lucy County has a little bit of a different structure with their um tiers. So they have employee only and then they have um employee plus one dependent. So you know how here at the school district we have
employee, employee plus child or children, employee plus spouse, employee plus family, they have that employee plus one dependent. And so basically what they're that employee plus one dependent is equivalent to having an employee plus spouse but um they have
that option. So, in case there was a single parent that only had one child, it would they could knock out two birds with one stone. Um, and we just um picked $100 or $200 um because like I said, I I had that meeting with Sarasota County um while I was at that conference
and they just implemented it at $200 spousal search charge. um they gave us some good tips on how we wanted to do it, but ultimately um is at the discretion of the board and we have mechanisms to capture that if you would like either during open enrollment in
our um fentech enrollment platform. Open for any questions. >> I think they already asked that question in during open enrollment, don't they? If your spouse is employed or eligible for coverage. No, >> maybe I'm thinking of another
>> Yeah. No, they they we have a box for for spousal um additions and for dependents, but not for what you're thinking of. >> Okay. >> But we could easily add it in our open enrollment um module.
>> Miss Pritchette, did you have something >> in going over these things that we could implement? How would that change what happens during the year when we're looking at our numbers and we're like at 109%
versus 75%. Does this make a dent in any of that? >> If I actually the right way >> it it eventually could it probably wouldn't the first year. Um, if you're doing nicotine search charches and now you actually have people on the plan
that are now quitting, eventually that would lead to less claims, especially in the COPD space. Um, but that would take a while to get that ROI. Um, as far as the spousal sir charge, there could be savings on those spouses claims
depending on, you know, the level of sickness. It just depends on who that person is. If they're on your plan, they probably do need coverage. Um but they may not have coverage elsewhere since the the board does not contribute more than $6,500 a year.
>> Okay. Thank you. >> Any other questions? >> And you were saying only you talked to Sarasota they do the spousal search charge. >> They had just implemented it and I they went over their whole process. So, it's something that we could easily do if
that was the board's um desire. Okay. Some good information for Dr. Morerti. Um our wellness program. So, um if anybody was checking their emails over the summer, and I know all of you were, um on July 1st, um you received an email
through the benefits hotline. So, we um had heard what the board had wanted um and wished for earlier in the spring about kind of incentivizing healthy behavior and being proactive about their health. So, we totally revamped our
entire wellness program in in about 90 days and it went live on July 1st. So, we partnered with Sigma um and the new wellness program is called the Sigma Wellness Experience. And what it does is it allows any employee who's enrolled in
the district's medical insurance to earn up to $350 uh this year in 26 27 year for completing a variety of healthy proactive choices in their health. Um
and a lot of what we've provided in this uh wellness program are some of the things that we've have been doing. So we wanted we didn't want to lose all the positive momentum from our previous wellness program. So what we did was we built in some um things that employees
can earn um dollar amounts on. Um so for example completed the biometric screening. It's going to look a little different this year, but you could earn $50 instantly by doing that. Completing the health assessment within the um Sigma app or in the portal online is
another $50. And then having your annual physical or if you're a female, having your wellwoman visit, that's an extra $100 right there. So, just by doing the things that most people who have been dedicated um employees to the wellness
program, they could earn $200. And then there's a variety a very long uh deep bench of items that the employees can do to get started whether it's daily, monthly, um quarterly programs that they can do within the app and within the
portal to earn an extra $150. Um people employees that earn this can um be rewarded through a gift card. It's going to come directly from Sigma um to the employee. And um the great thing is
is that Sigma is going to just take it out of our wellness um funds account for this year. And it's awesome because um everything is built into the app. Um we've got a lot of positive feedback from employees on the Sigma app. So the
wellness information is in there. Um MD Live is in there. Um, you can even see your health savings account funds in there. So, the app is like the one-stop shop and we've been really excited. That was a great improvement over our previous carrier that everything is in a
single place for our employees. So, um, we did a we did a launch obviously on July 1st knowing that most of our employees didn't return until July 31st. So, um, starting in the third week of August through September, um, the risk and benefits department will be visiting
every school site and department to go over this with employees and also to talk to them about the new process for the biometric screening. So, we've partnered with Quest for that and employees can actually make an appointment and they can go to Quest whenever they want starting today
through March 31st to get their biometric screenings. We created a one-page flyer with videos and a QR code, step-by-step instructions and um we um delivered this message uh first with the transportation employees during
the inservice training um late last week. So all of our employees are going to be learning more about this through email and then in person with our staff um that will be going out to every department school site starting later this month.
Any questions on that? >> So, is this only available to employees that are on the on Sigma on the Sigma plan >> for earning the $350? Yes. Um, we did we did have the ability to um keep some of
the utilized programs for um people that are not on the district's plan um for wellness. So, we still have um we still have Pelaton um our corporate wellness agreement with Pelaton um that allows
all employees the ability to have access to a free app um that they can use for a variety of health exercises uh meditation and u breathing exercises as well. >> Mr. Roberts,
>> is there a way you can um at a cost of course let non insurance participants do the biometric screening? >> We can get back to you on that. >> Okay. I mean, I I know we have a employees that aren't on the health insurance, but
I mean, I think if we had it a possibility where yeah, you can pay for this and get this, you know, I mean, it's information that would probably be valuable. >> Thank you. >> Thank you, Dr. Morardi. >> Mr. Calderon, on the app it says uh
these rewards aren't in cash, but you mentioned some kind of a gift card. So, >> yeah. So, so they can they can redeem it. Um, it's kind of wellness cash, so they could redeem those points and they can get gift cards um through Sigma. Um,
and it's going to come out of the district's wellness fund. So, it's not actually like they're going to receive $20 in the mail. It's wellness cash and they could they could redeem it. They could also redeem it at I think there's like a couple dozen different um
um retailers that partner up. So if they wanted to, you know, buy something from Target's app, they can utilize those funds to pay for things. So >> Okay. >> And they could, this is every year they could do this or >> Well, yeah, this is the first year, right? So this is the first year we're
we're doing this. Um Sigma has different options. Um and we settled on this one, but um I don't know, they have four or five different options. So we wanted to see how this year went um before we made decisions about future. And the app is very easy to use. Uh it's very easy to
get on there. So uh I like the changes you guys made there. So nice work. >> Thank you. >> Okay, next slide is um a question that I'm definitely going to let uh Gabrielle discuss because it involves math and it's the um topic of the PO plan, the
runoff analysis. >> Yes. So um a question um was raised by the board about when do we predict there will be no more people on that PO plan which is now grandfathered. Um high level we predict it will be near zero in
the 2032 2033 um plan year. Um this is a logarithmic equation but you'll see starting on 630 of 2024. So that's that 172 number in the upper left. That is what you started
right before we grandfathered this plan. We also made um quite a few plan changes to that plan. It dropped down to 151 on 71 of 24. Down to 118 employees on 63025.
Down to 97 by 71 of 25. As of 6:30 26, we were at 86 employees. And then after this current enroll open enrollment as of July 1st 2026 we're now 73 individuals. Um but you can see where we predict it to be as we move through the
upcoming plan years. >> Yep. We're down from so we're it's fallen by 73 employees which is 52% enrollment reduction. M Roberts >> and I think when we started this we thought it would take about 10 years so the projection is
>> falling through. Thank you. >> Okay. So the last slide is just a summary of recommendations based on the information that Gabrielle and Dustin have um provided today. Um ultimately um staff and Gary group who were at the
pleasure of the board. So um if there is future discussions you would like to have on any of these topics um our plan is to come back in October to talk about those other topics that were kind of longer range plans. Um so we can work together if you have any questions
between now and then we can include that as a followup um in a couple of months. >> So I would I would kind of like to see what our policies how our policies are comparing to our neighboring counties. Um, I know for example, St. Lucy County
only offers a high deductible plan to their employees. Um, while we offer a PO and H and an HMO option um to our employees. How how does what we offer compare? You know, because we I've heard
that quite a bit and I know that our benefits are I feel like our benefits are better than St. Lucy County um just because of the options that we offer. Um and I just want to know I know it'll be
harder for us to compete with a larger our larger neighbor to the south Palm Beach. It's just as Miss Roberts always says, you know, it's in the numbers. It's that's but I just want to see how we are kind of sitting.
>> Yeah. and they have a bigger network and they have all the things that we don't have in a smaller county. So, um just just so that we can understand what that looks like um as we make decisions on how we're going to fund it in the future.
>> Yeah. And we can definitely do that. I just want to just state something the difference between our previous care with Florida Blue who um St. Lucy County School District still has compared to Sigma. So, um, while we have that OAPIN network plan that the fee structure when
employees use it is kind of HMO based, but it does provide nationwide services for those um, on that plan. So, like >> Sigma does Sigma does. Yes. Yes. our current provider. And you know, speaking with employees over the summer, um
especially those that are returning the last like week or so, um that we've gotten positive feedback from employees that we've spoken to that they liked having the Sigma plan with the OAPIN. Um so when they were traveling out of state or visiting family members or you
know on vacation that um they can just go to the app find where the nearest provider was that accepted Sigma um which is completely different than Florida Blue because once you leave that in network even you could be in different parts of Florida and they
don't provide it you know Tallahass panhandle. So, um, we'll definitely do that. Um, but just want to state the benefits that our current provider of Sigma has compared to the previous one.
>> I appreciate that, Miss Pitchett. >> Yeah. Also, when you're looking at St. Lucy, how much they give to their employees, I believe it's about 2500 less than we give our employees. 6,500 we give and I believe St. Lucy is
about 4,000. >> Sure. So I think what we'll do is we'll come back with you with like the board contribution per your request but then also the health savings account as well because right our board um contributes $750 towards health savings account. And so
that's a number to keep in mind as well, >> which is a huge huge advantage to our employees, especially because healthy our healthier employees tend to go to the high deductible because it's a zero cost to employees, to the employee only.
Yeah. >> And to have that 750 as a cushion, which continues to roll over time, >> um that they can take with them if they ever even leave the district, that money stays with them. >> Yeah. And that was a positive um we got
some positive feedback last week when we were at NEO, a new educator orientation because um we have like kind of two types of employees at NEO that we speak to. Um those that are fresh out of college that are um on their parents insurance and their parents are like you need to go get a job and get your own
medical insurance. So, they were really happy that we had a zerocost plan um because that way it didn't take anything out of their paycheck, but also we had to explain to them the benefits of the health savings account. Um, so those younger employees were happy and then
the employees that were coming from other districts who had a health savings account, they were really happy that um we had that option that the board contributed um and that we have the ability um through HSA Bank, who is the district's um health savings account
provider through Sigma, that they can roll over things into one account with HSA Bank or if they just want to cash out, use their own their old HSA provider. So they liked having the options there. So um definitely
>> wonderful. Okay. Are there any other questions? >> All right. Thank you all very much. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Moving on to item 2.02. question.
>> Excuse me. [clears throat] Um, legislative advocacy platform discussion. Miss Pritchette, I'll let you lead this. So, you should have before you um the contributions that some of our board
members gave to this uh legislative advocacy platform discussion. And I'm wondering if anyone has any questions about them or are there things that jump out at you? Do you want me to read them all?
What what the um proposed priorities that were submitted or do you want to just take just have a discussion? I'm not sure um how you want me to operate it. I'm happy to read them if you want.
chair. >> Um, >> do you want me to read the priorities that were submitted? >> Oh, I was just What's the pleasure of the board? Sorry. >> That's okay. >> I was looking it down. I apologize. >> Do you want me to read them and then we can have a discussion? >> Sure. >> Okay. So the the ones that were
submitted were number one, an increase to the base student allocation, full funding of the safe schools allocation, modernization of the exceptional student education funding formula to more accurately reflect the actual costs
associated with serving students with disabilities. Relief from Department of Children and Families DCF lensure requirements for school districts that provide voluntary prek VPK programs and revisions to
student transportation eligibility language to address circumstances beyond the current two-mile requirement, including student travel routes that require crossing a federal highway of more than four lanes. And then approval of these priorities will guide the
district's advocacy efforts during the upcoming legislative session and support continued advancement of student achievement, school safety, and operational effectiveness. >> Um so I can speak to item number four, which is relief from DCF um lensure
requirements. Um, this I I feel strongly this will allow our VPK programs to offer wraparound care for families because right now um four year olds um
without if we don't carry a DCF license, they're the they're the one group that we have to get a DCF license in order to um provide those wraparound care services. So um we are exempt at every other level
of child care. So this is just a natural change. Um, and then one other that I think is continuing worth pursuing, continuing pursuit of is um alternate
ways for students to meet graduation requirements through different tests, whether it be through um industry certifications, um, offering multiple ways for a student to graduate. And I am not opposed to
when when we get down to the end if we know a student is not going to meet every graduation requirement being able to offer the GED on our traditional high school campuses. So that they are leaving high school with something because what we know is that when if
they leave without a diploma and just a certificate, the likelihood of them coming back to finish something um their high school education, which you know, there's a lot of things that are set in motion when a student does
not graduate with a traditional high school diploma or a GED. Um, I think we will hear talk this session more about a workforce diploma as well. Um, obviously that's not going to be this year, but in
the future having a specific workforce um type of diploma. So, um, that's just part of that conversation. Um, okay, Miss Roberts. >> Um, yes. So, I support the alternative
graduation requirement and I think that's something that um I do think especially with the new commissioner that's going to get a lot of attention there as far as the DCF lensure relief. Um I think we need to get the statute citation. So, I started to look I didn't
find exactly what we needed but um Marcia maybe >> Oh, we have it. >> You have it. So, you'll know exactly which statute it is we're looking for so that we know exactly what it is we're looking for the amendment piece of. So, if Marca can get that. >> Um, yes, I submitted that one. I also
submitted the transportation language. And I want to back I want to back off of the transportation language a little bit because I'd asked um and the superintendent is getting the information that has by um elementary, middle, and high school the number of
the students that live within the two mile radius that would have to. So if you're outside of the two miles, you get the transportation anyway. But if you're inside of the two miles and you're expected to walk, if we know what that population is. So if we know what the
number is because I really don't think it's going to be do any good to ask for something that in our case it may be, you know, knowing that they don't pay 100%. But in our case, if it's going to cost um the state a million dollars to take care of us and then it's going to cost us another half a million to throw
in for that. But that million when you multiply it across all of the districts is really a very hefty ask in order to go down that road. And I I don't think we want to um knowing that whether you want to call it
a categorical or what knowing that those are never 100% funded to begin with. I don't think we want to be the one that's trying to hey we've got this problem. We're only looking for a million but that million that you're giving us is going to cost everybody else a hundred million. and I think is going to be a major problem and I'm not interested in
that. So I think we need some more information about the population that we're talking about and get some costs on that. Thank you. >> Well, and to your point, Miss Roberts, I think it's really important across AC costs across all districts because what what it will cost us in Martin County
just for kids crossing a four-lane road in Palm Beach, Broward, Miami Dade will be probably in the hundreds of millions of dollars. So, we need to >> and I think if we get it so that um we know what the cost is for us, it's
pretty easy through FSBA for FSBA to to get the data from all the districts to find out what the cost would be across the board to kind of determine as they're coming up with their platform to kind of determine whether that's where you want the eggs that you want to put
that's the basket you want to start sticking your eggs in or not. So, but um but I think it would be helpful if we just know from our perspective, this is what it what the cost piece looks like. So then when we're talking to FSBA and working on that platform, we would know what that is. Thank you.
>> Okay. Thank you, Miss Pitchett. >> Oh, no. >> Okay, Dr. Morardi. >> So, before I share my thoughts on these priorities, uh I'm just curious because this is only my second time doing this. Are we just putting our our pie in the
sky of what we're looking for or are we taking into account kind of what Miss Roberts was getting at in terms of cost and getability and and how like if like if something is easily attainable is should that be like a higher priority or if it's just like a total long shot
should we not really go down that route um or if it needs a lot of funding? Um, I'm just curious because usually when we do lobbying in in the chiropractic world, we try to put up our our best and sometimes our easiest goals
because they might be considered versus uh some long shots that are might be wasting a spot. So, I'm just curious, are we going down that route with these or just putting anything or anyone have any thoughts? Well, I personally believe
you have we have to consider what the cost is not just to Martin County because a lot of these will not be specific to our community. It will be a statewide issue. So, money is always an issue. So, um to Miss Robert's point,
take into like when I look at full funding of the city schools allocation, there is not a single allocation that is fully funded. Not I don't across every single b pocket of money bucket of money that we get there is not an allocation
that is ever fully funded. There's always but that is the amount of money that you must spend on safe schools or that you must spend only on transportation. It was never meant to be the only dollars that you spend. So but yes we do have to take that into
consideration. Um, >> all right. And then if if you if I may, Madam Chair, of course. Um, >> so like the five that are up there, it looks like they're all about funding. So, personally, I I would like to diversify. Um, I really like what Chair Powers said about the flexible
graduation requirements for CTE. I I think that that would be uh a great pathway to include in there. Um also maybe um student attendance strategy um about addressing chronic absenteeism and when we can intervene. I
believe that was a priority last year that again is not based on funding but if if you have to be in school to be successful and when and when kids are not in school and I believe it's 10 absences before we can intervene. Maybe
the superintendent can uh clarify that, but uh you know looking at lowering that number to where we can intervene when there's clearly an issue uh with attendance and that wouldn't take any funding. Um so those would be my two.
The sheet looks good. I think the transportation one is is kind of a long shot due to funding. I think it's a good idea and it's very appropriate to our district, but looking at it statewide, I I think that would be a big ask as well as the safe schools. So, I would agree
with Chair Powers on that one. Um, and then obviously the base student allocation increase is a high priority as well. Thanks. >> So, are you number four, which is the relief from DCF? That's not that doesn't cost us anything.
>> It's just language >> and we we already started that conversation last year. So, it's kind of a continuation as well as the alternative graduation requirements. There was a lot of we've already I've already started having um with our
advocacy uh group having conversations with the new incoming um House staff because that's changed. We had support in the Senate and now we need support in the House. So, we've already kind of started those conversations. So this is like a
continuation of really two prior sessions. Um so having this we hoping this will be the year for the alternative graduation requirements. I am not opposed to tightening up the attendance requirements and tightening up the statute in um what the authority
of the school district is and when we can intervene. Um we'll just need to know what what that is. I think that's a statewide issue that we need to bring to FSBA. Um Amy, if you want to >> bring that up to FSBA and see what their
appetite is because I think if attendance is a statewide issue. It's not a Martin County issue. So, um maybe we can see if um if they're interested in taking that on. Miss Roberts. So, um talking about attendance. So, the the rule for
attendance and I guess I'm looking to Dr. Estz. Um the rule for attendance is when we must intervene. Correct. it doesn't mean that we can't intervene sooner. So, I think that maybe um besides what besides what the FSBA does
and what the state does, which of course we would support, um perhaps we need to ask our superintendent to come up with some plan or some program for a earlier intervention, a procedure and a process to do an earlier intervention that we
can go ahead and and implement locally. And if we did that locally, then we're at least as the state is wandering around trying to figure out what to do on a global area, at least we're addressing our issues more locally. So I think if that's something that um should go there, I agree with you that the two
that are language for and then the alternative graduation are both language things um which I think we should continue. As far as the transportation piece, I I just really want to get those numbers so that when that gets kicked to FSBA, we have the numbers in order to do
it. Um the safe school allocation, I've looked at the formula on the FFP for how they come up with that. I don't think they're going to change that at all. I mean, they may throw extra money at it, but they're they're first 100,000 and then based on a per student basis, etc.
I don't see that that's going to be anything any different. um the ESC funding. I think that's a larger question. That's a question that you know it's it sounds um I can you can understand it from a a
a highlevel look that you know that we need the correct classifications for the correct students. you can understand that, but it really goes to the waiting system of the students. And I think that then that starts to impact the whole
FEFP and and kind of goes down a whole rabbit hole that starts to get really confusing. And I think unless we're I mean we're pretty small compared to the rest of the state. Unless we're planning on doing the heavy lifting for that, I think it's really something beyond our
scope of trying to you, you know, we can come up with our stats of people that are between a 2011 and a 203 and but but we're a drop in the bucket compared to what everybody else is. So that that whole FP waiting thing I think is kind of a
>> Yeah. And I really think that that's going to have to be a discussion with DOE staff before we >> go anywhere. Yeah. >> Before we go anywhere. Is this a statewide issue? How do how do do they have suggestions for improving it? And
then we can take what that information and advocate for the change. >> Yeah. M Russell, >> I support the workforce diploma and the DCF lensure relief. I think so that we can provide our wraparound services for our VPK families because that's a huge
need. Um, but I think it's really important that we pick our top three and that we prioritize those because you give these bullet points and you end up losing them by the fourth and fifth one. So I think that the ones that we deem most important to us as a board, we need
to prioritize those and put those at the top. >> So So as far as I'm concerned, it would be alternative graduation requirements. just because we've worked on this for multiple years now and I think we're almost to the finish line to get
something that is beneficial for our students. And then um the uh DCF exemption for VPK students in public schools and I could also support the you know if we came up with something we
needed to change in attendance. But I think those would be my top two outside of the priorities of um FSBA in supporting that. Um Miss Roberts, I would be more interested in the third one being something that's
very Martin County specific since we do have Greg. So whether that has something that's uniting the robotics piece, you know, whether that has an expansion to robotics programming or something, but something that um we can package in a way that we are not whether it's money
or whatever, but we're not trying to do something that we're trying to to hit everybody in the state that it's very specific to us. I look at Sarasota County that I think did their aviation piece and other counties have done I think Breard also did something that was very specific to them which doesn't
impact everybody else but I think that um Greg is very good at that. I mean Murray Middle School the referendum work I mean that kind of stuff. So I mean I think that that's something that if we had a a piece and right off the top of my head the robotics piece is the thing that comes to mind for that. Well, and I
agree with you. If there's going to be a um a dollar ask specific to Martin County, we need to we need to figure out what that is going to be now. Um and I think that we are in Martin County is in a good position with the new leadership
that's coming in. So, I think we have um we we're in a good position if we wanted to ask for something to enhance a program or um or two. I don't know if we wanted to I think we have to ask if we're going to
ask for an appropriation, we ask for one. >> Yes. um how we how we disperse that across multiple programs or so I'm looking at the superintendent to to say we need to come up with something and we probably need to bring it back to our next
meeting um so we can because we're already starting to have those conversations with staff even though the new leadership takes office the same time we do November 17th or we have our change um in our leadership change. So, um, you
know, it's going to be it's going to be full speed ahead after the 17th of November. So, we the more conversations we have now, the better. So, if if I have consensus around those three, um, we I will have staff begin to
work with Greg Black on language for the alternative pathways, building on what we've already come up with the relief for the DCF lensure and uh what is unique or specific to Martin County by way of a of an ask. Um, that is >> Yes. And if we could have that um for
the board, if you have recommendations or if a board member has a recommendation of a program that you see needs to be enhanced or that we want to make the shining star of Martin County that it it's already successful, but we can make it even better. Um please let
the superintendent know because I would like to be able to talk about that because Greg will be here on August 25th at our meeting. So, if we could bring those um have those discussions with the superintendent before and engage all of our staff to make recommendations and
then we can talk about that and what that looks like at our August 25th meeting. Is everybody good with that? >> Okay, perfect. Miss Pritchette, did you have anything else? >> No. >> All right, perfect.
>> Oh, I'm sorry, Dr. Morardi. And then um I know it's always a fluid situation in Tallahassee, you know, basically seeing how things go and if a bill gets filed that piques our interest. So um I'm good with what the superintendent said. I'm
just curious if if are we allowed to change this at all? Is this at all living document or is this basically set in stone? Well, we want this to be we want to be certain that the issues that we're picking now are yes, there may come a
bill may get filed that we may strongly oppose that may have a negative impact and we absolutely will use our resources, our collective resources to, you know, work against it if it will negatively impact Martin County
>> or schools in general. So, there's a number of things that could happen. Um, and you know, a lot of them don't make it to the very end. So, we would advocate if it was had a negative impact that it wouldn't make it to the end. >> Yeah.
>> Thank you. >> Uh, Miss Roberts. So, in the in the separate programming piece that um, Superintendent Maine is working on before we get to Greg Black so that we'll have that. So my understanding is you will have a discussion with every
board member and we'll all have something ahead of time as to like whether it's two options, three options, one option that you feel strongly about or something so we have something that is kind of finite that we know what the dollar amount is and we know exactly what that piece looks like so we know
where we're going with that. That would be helpful. >> Yeah. And I think that's a great point. Uh Greg's always been fantastic being able to talk those out. So, if I'm able to bring to him two or three solid options, uh, when Greg and I sit down with staff, he kind of has a lot of good
quality questions that he kicks back and then he may know of the three or the two that we submit, this is one that absolutely will have a a higher percentage chance of getting across the finish line. So, that that'll be the way we we work. >> Thank you.
>> Okay. Um, we are going to move on to item 2.0. 03 our school improvement update. No, not time certain workshops. Did you guys plan that? [laughter] All right. Good afternoon, Madame Chair,
members of the board, Superintendent Maine, Lauren Gford, executive director of school improvement and leadership. It is my pleasure to be here this afternoon along with my colleagues to present some school improvement updates to you all.
As we get started, I want to orient you to where we were in March of last school year. We presented last to you our priority updates on our six priority schools. So, it will be important for me to orient you to where we left off
utilizing the same format and using Hope Sound Elementary School as our example. This graphic may look familiar to you. This was the same type of graphic that was shared in March. Hope Sound Elementary School was a priority school
for us last school year and they are the one school who was able to accelerate their achieve a achievement and move into the B school range. As you look at the data on the slide, you can see that the 428, which was the minimum cut score
needed to move into the B school range, was more than achieved as Hobtown Elementary moved from 414 points in 2425 all the way up to 451 points in 2526.
Because of the acceleration that this school exemplified, it was important for our team to take a deep um look into what worked for this school and also to be able to replicate across our other school sites um some of the intentional
work that was done here so that we're moving all of our schools along in the same direction. This slide should also look familiar to you, too. I'll reorient you to this as well. This is the overall school grade snapshot for Hope Sound Elementary
School. A reminder that our elementary schools are graded on eight different components that you see displayed here across the left hand side. On the top right, you'll notice there's a key there to help you navigate through some of the
numbers. Anything that has a striketh through indicates that this is lagging data from 2425 PM3. Underneath it, you'll see 2526 PM3 data. And in addition, you'll see in
parentheses colorcoded green if this particular achievement area increased and red if it decreased. When you take a look at the left hand side, you can clearly see that Hobound Elementary School had a tremendous amount of success across the eight
components, increasing in every single one with the exception of mathematics and the bottom quartile learning gains. On the right hand side, you can see the school year, the number of points Hope
Sound earned, and then the percentage of points and the school letter grade attached. So in 2526, Pop Sound Elementary increased by 37 points, moving them to 56% up four percentage points to that B school
status. One thing that will be important to note throughout our presentation today is that the school grade has now increased. I'm happy to provide you with that information if you have not seen that yet. But the scales have been adjusted
um to make it a little bit more rigorous. So you will see that in some of our schools data although progress was made, it's raising the bar and extending the number of points needed um moving into the school year for 2627.
One of the most important things about school improvement is that schools look for their what I like to call their big rocks or their areas of focus that they intentionally plan and work around. Um it is important that although there are many moving parts and pieces to school
improvement, you can't focus on all of the things. However, naturally some of the other elements will improve un tucked under some of the main focus areas. So looking at Hobound Elementary School, these were their three priority
areas. ELA learning gains for bottom quartile, math learning gains, and science. This slide should look fairly familiar too as these were some of the priorities that Hope Sound Elementary School put into place uh last school year building
on the success that we saw in their end ofear data. You'll also notice that there are bolded items here. So what's important is that Hope Sound, who experienced tremendous improvement, they're not going to take
all of this out, replace it with something brand new. We want to continue building on the success that's already paved the foundation for them. However, in knowing that now this school needs to move to an A school, what can they really double down on and leverage to
continue that upward trajectory? So, just highlighting some of these things for you under bottom quartile learning gains. um really the development and implementation of strategic MTSS intervention plans for tier 2 and tier
three students that lead into small groupoup instruction. Um continuing those data chats and starting those earlier. Um having students set goals and tracking their own progress, their own ownership in the learning. uh for
math uh really strategizing on the professional learning and support for particularly for intervention programming support planning and again weaving in that goal setting opportunity for students. Uh continuing ESSE on-site
coaching support and scaffolding to help move bottom cortile um as well as regular learning gains for all students. And then looking across at science, continuing sitebased school district, I'm excuse me, sitebased and school district coaching supports for benchmark
aligned instruction and planning support. Um, and really capitalizing on those spiral reviews starting that earlier in the school year uh to reviews those key benchmarks and standards and vocabulary. What you'll notice through the
presentation this evening is you will see some duplication across school sites as they were working on some similar items and we want to continue um schools implementing those items that were successful. However, given the nature of each school being slightly unique and
individual in their own right, there are going to be some school site specific things that will look different throughout the presentation. So, this was a little bit of a recap of Hope Sound Elementary School, who is no longer going to be a priority school as they've moved up, but they will still be
on our radar. Um, are there any questions before I move into the next section? Okay. So, introducing our priority schools for the 2627 school year. you'll recognize
um the five elementary schools that are listed up here. They will continue on as priority schools this year. So, we want to continue that support and leverage some of the systems that have already been put into place to get them to that next marker of the B school. And then in
addition, you'll see we have two middle schools that are added for secondary. Um as Dr. McMahon will highlight shortly. They did have a little bit of a decline in their overall achievement status. So, we want to make sure that we're prioritizing them and moving them along
in the right direction. So, I'll be starting by highlighting Pinewood Elementary School. Again, as you look at the graphic for Pinewood, you can see in 2526, the school did have a decline of 11
points and the scale score, moving them a little bit further away from the anticipated B school um range. It's important to take a look at the individual schools and the different components to take a deep dive to really
understand what's happening across the school. When you look at Pinewood's school grade snapshot, you can see that there are successes in their data. They showed improvement in about half of their overall learning um components, as well
as they had a couple areas that stayed about the same. What really sticks out for Pinewood Elementary School is that box that's labeled learning gains of lowest quartortile for mathematics where there was a decrease by 20 percentage points.
That really was the piece that took Pinewood back a little bit. If that had been stronger, it probably would have tipped them over into the B school range. Moving into this school year, Pinewood is going to need 37 points in order to
accelerate and reach the lowest end of the B school slide. The identified big rocks for improvement for Pinewood will continue around ELA achievement, ELA learning gains, bottom quartile, as well as science. um
Pinewood implemented for ELA across the board AVID uh for their first year. So, they're really going to double down on some of the AVID strategies, particularly on incorporating writing um as part of um collaboration and engagement strategies ac across
classrooms. Um again more uh on-site by school district office as well as support from the state regional literacy director um to provide professional learning on the science of reading which is really that foundational piece that all teachers need to understand how
students learn to read in order to set them up for success. bottom quartile learning gains again kind of capitalizing on the work of Hope Sound as well is really that strong development and implementation of MTSS
intervention plans for tier 2 and tier three students um in addition to um utilizing all hands on deck all coaches administration par profofessionals providing targeted additional small groupoup instruction for students
and then in science although Pinewood stayed really at about the same point. They're going to continue to provide within their schedule opportunities for small groupoup intervention and support ongoing throughout the year to ensure that some of the previous grade level
standards are addressed, remediated and strong moving into assessment season. And again, the spiral review focused on the key benchmarks and standards for science starting that work sooner in the school year. Any
questions about? >> Yeah. So, um I guess this is going to be a um Paige McMahon question. So, when I'm looking at your eight components on page seven and I see that one of your um
and I do appreciate the work that's been done at Pinewood. I mean, that's not lost on me and the the gains that you all have made. So, I I do want to say a shout out to that. But then to page um in mathematics the lowest gains of the or the learning gains of the lowest 25
that isn't one of your target areas for you you're not considering that a big rock. I mean I realize that you need 37 points. Are you figuring that since we lost those points we're automatically going to >> I can kind of speak to that and if you want to
>> I can add to it when you're done. >> Okay. So, this is really built off the key priority areas from last school year. They're going to continue this work to because really we have to keep all of these things juggling in the air, but looking at Pinewood, absolutely they will be having an additional focus on
the bottom quartile learning gains for math because that was the biggest area of need. Um, and Dr. McMahon, if you want to. >> Sure. So the bottom quartile learning gains for math was actually our weakest area across the district in our district grade component. Um and to address that
at the elementary level, we are excited to introduce a second intervention block to their master schedules. So students who require intervention in both ELA and math now have an opportunity to receive both. And if they only have a need in math, then that's two opportunities that they could receive additional
remediation. and those bottom cortile students could absolutely receive the the learning that they may be missing and the extra practice to help them achieve those learning gains. >> Okay. So, when I looked at um when I pulled elementary and pulled the math um components, the three math pieces, I did
see what you're talking about. So, what you're telling me is that the math pushin is going all across all 12. >> Yes. All of our elementary schools will now have two intervention blocks. Yes. >> Thank you. >> Or they could be used as enrichment. So it it is versatile to meet the needs of our students across the district.
>> Okay. Thank you. >> All right. And moving on to Port Solerno Elementary School. Looking at their graph, you can see in 2425 they were at 393 points and moving into 2526 they
achieved 420 points. getting very very close to that 428 threshold to move into the B school territory. Taking a more intensive look at the overall school grades snapshot, you can
see that there were a lot of bright spots and successes in the school's data indicated by the increases in green. They did have a couple of areas that stayed the same with no change and the one area that declined was mathematics
learning gains. Um when you look at Port Solerno for example for their points needed to move into B school range they will need 436 points moving into this school year. So 16 points which is very doable.
And then continuing to look at their focused areas. They're big rocks. Um, one of the things that they're going to double down on this year is the development of the individual learning plans for all students that are identified in that bottom quartile.
Knowing every student's name, knowing the data, and really mapping out uniquely instructionally what each of those students need to be successful and continue to make growth. Um in addition to implementing targeted small groupoup
instruction structures for bottom quartile students um over in math learning gains again as Dr. McMahon had mentioned the universal supports with the intervention block will be there but also um taking a stance by the data
that's provided through and the platform and crossing that with any other additional progress monitoring data to provide analysis and support progress monitoring and small groupoup instruction for intervention needs for those students.
And then moving into the science category, uh planning and coaching supports really focused on that content vocabulary with opportunities to extend the learning through science lab alignment. So more opportunity for hands-on instruction, putting um those
skills and concepts in front of students and bringing those to life. Um, and again, you'll see consistent across most schools starting that spiral review a little bit sooner this year to focus on key benchmarks and standards. >> M. Roberts, did you have a question?
>> Um, and and the numbers are very, very impressive. And I I really appreciate the work. I noticed that your rocks are the same, which I think is good. you're using the same rocks that we had used, the the low 25 for ELA, the low 25 for math, and also the science, which I
think um you it's quite remarkable the amount of growth that was done in this last year just to get to there from what it was the year before. So, that's that's really very impressive and I know that um they're doing a lot of work out there and it really shows. Thank you.
Okay, now I'm going to turn the presentation over to executive director Moore who will begin with Seawind Elementary School. >> Thank you, Executive Director Gford. Madame Chair, members of the board, Superintendent Maine, I am Daniel Moore, executive director of academic services
and I will guide you through the next three schools. So, we will start with Seawind Elementary School. And as you can see on our graphic here, we did have a little bit of a slide at Seawind from um 404 points to 396 points. As you may
recall heading into the end of semester 1, we did have some challenges with Sewind with staffing um and student achievement. There wasn't a lot of growth between PM1 and PM2. And we were very concerned that Sewind was going to land in the D range instead of the C
range. So, we deployed all resources, no cards left on the table. Um, and had our coaches pushing into classrooms to teach where we didn't have teachers. Um, and we we did see some significant improvement in the second semester with additional supports deployed, but it
wasn't quite enough to get us there. And so looking at where we landed, they earned eight points fewer than they did in 2425, which is a 1% difference in percentage points consistently across our district. We see
bottom cortile losses in the double digits and that holds true here in ELA. We did see some improvement in math learning gains in the bottom quartile, which is one of the schools that did move up in that area. And so there were some wins. Um but the learning gains areas were where we saw the most uh
deficiencies in our accountability metrics. And so moving into 2627 with our increased escalator clause target for the grade of a B we will now need 40 points. So looking at what Se needs ELA
achievement across the board which does include learning gains is going to be a key priority area. specifically continuing the development with our state regional literacy director in partnership with our coaches and sitebased coaches to really focus professional learning for teachers on the science of reading. It's those
foundational reading skills that have been the challenge and is what has really prevented us from getting over those humps specifically in achievement and learning gains in ELA. Moving into this next school year, we're going to start the year with tracking tools that we started to implement at
the end of last year. Um, once we were able to really target where the issues were and use those to help guide small group, very targeted instruction to recover those foundational skills that are missing. Math learning gain, specifically the bottom quartile, we want to capitalize and continue moving
with the progress that we had there. Some of the big areas of focus will be continued work um with ESSE on those scaffolds for building thinking classrooms, small group planning and grouping for small groups specific to those groups. They do have a large ESSE population and we want to make sure that
all students are are provided for with the tools they need to be successful. We'll also continue our supportive implementation of EXL intervention support planning and student goal setting tools. And so one of the things that we struggled with at Sein last year was maximizing um the capabilities of
our EXL program and at some schools we saw tremendous growth when implemented with fidelity um and consistency and that is something we're going to continue to work with teachers at Sewind and leaders at Sewind on implementing those tools and resources to drive student achievement. And then one of the
items you will see across almost every single one of our priority schools is a continued effort to improve our tier 2 and tier three intervention through MTSS. This is a process that we really started to hit our groove in the the fourth quarter halfway through the
second semester. Um a groundup rebuild. excellent work from our student services department. And we've been working handinhand with student services and um academics curriculum specifically to make sure that those systems are in place and that the interventions used during those systems are appropriate.
And so when we talk about bottom quartile, that is your tier three kids and sometimes your tier 2 students. And we want to make sure that we're hitting all of their needs through very targeted, clean, streamlined systems. And then science, we have two big focus areas. One of them, which I think you've
seen on on every single one of these, is our supported delivery of our spiral review. And so that was district developed last year and sent to schools in semester 2. But as you know, the fifth grade science test, it is your smallest endcount group, smallest number of students impacting a component. Um,
and it's the easiest one to move, but it also measures three different grade levels. So it's third grade, fourth grade, and fifth grade. And so focusing on recovering the third and fifth grade standards that may not be fresh in our students minds is what this spiral review is designed to do and brings back those key benchmarks and standards uh to
help maximize achievement on that metric specifically. Next school is Warfield Elementary School. >> Wait. >> Oh, do we have questions on that one? So um so the the 40 points you need I don't want to focus too much on points
but the 40 points you need to get a B 20% of those points are because of the classification and because of the es escalator correct >> yes >> because normally you wouldn't need the additional eight points if you were using the other scale. So that's
>> yeah the escalator clause does move it up to the >> kicks in and then moves that goalpost a little bit. Okay. Yeah. Thank you very much. All right, Warfield Elementary School. So, this is one of our success stories. Very proud of the work at Warfield Elementary. As you can see, three years
of consistent growth. In 2324, they were a D school. Um, moving up to a C school at a 335 and now at a 358. Um, moving ever closer towards the B range. As we see at other schools, our bottom
cortile math is the area and that most schools took double digit declines. And so had we maintained um even zero growth and just stayed flat in our bottom quartile gains, we would have moved many of these schools into B status. And so that will continue to be a priority area
for us. But as you can see, um, two of the three priority areas for Warfield last year, um, saw significant gains, nine and 10%. A strong focus on English language arts and strong systems for the students at Warfield generated an impressive 23 point gain, um, which
yields 3%. Moving into 2627, with the goalposts continuing to to always move a little further away and raise the bar, we now need 78 points. It's a big lift, but I do think it is achievable with some tailored and specific
strategies and tools for Warfield Elementary. So, as you will notice, you see the word ELELLL jump out a lot on this particular slide. Warfield does have our highest English language learner population, and many of the systems implemented there last year saw significant returns on investment.
for a school that is got a high English language learner population to see significant growth in English language arts across three of your four ELA components is impressive. And so we want to continue leaning into that work. Specifically ELA achievement third grade similar to fifth grade science. This is a low end count or small student
population metric because it's only one grade level of students. and we're going to continue the work that we implemented there um to grow those students as they come out of second grade into third grade where they count not only for um overall school ELA achievement but also specifically for third grade ELA
achievement and so in 2526 great partnerships with school site coaches district coaches and our state regional literacy director to build professional learning focused on the science of reading those foundational skills one of the things that we learned navigating last year is that unlike many of our
elementary schools, our students at Warfield are a little further behind. And so in that third grade cohort, you have a large number of students who are two or more years behind grade level. And so they're not, you know, on the second grade level or first grade level, we have many students that are the kindergarten or emerging into first
grade, grade level, coming into third grade. And so we're going to introduce using our UFI foundational literacy lessons that we use in K12 to improve um student achievement through recovery of those foundational reading skills that that typically honestly plague students throughout their academic career when
they don't have them. And so adding that layer in with support from our regional literacy director and our school site and district coaches will help um continue to push that third grade metric up as well as our overall ELA metric up as well. and then using specific tracking tools for third grade because
it is a little different from fourth and fifth grade on what we're measuring and what we're trying to recover. And so we'll have specific tools implemented that we started to implement last year but we will continue to refine this year. ELA learning gains is the other focus area. A key element of what I
believe pushed a lot of the success at Warfield was teacher capacity. teachers understanding their data, teachers talking about data with students, setting goals, um being very clear on on the steps it takes to get to achievement and continuing that instructional focus while using that data and having those
student data chats and setting clear goals to identify a clear focus, clear scaffolds, um and using very specific strategies with fidelity walkthroughs from their administration to make sure that all those key foundational pieces are happening and moving. And then ELA
learning gains bottom cile very similar to how we're going to uh continue to build on ELA across the rest of the school um and all of our schools is that focus on the MTSS process. Warfield made significant progress last year with their war their MTSS process at the
school. Um, I think some of you came out to one of our our MTSS meetings and got to see everybody in action. And that's what we really want to see at all of our schools. Um, is that collaboration between school site leaders, coaches, teachers, um, and district personnel to make sure that every student's getting what they need when they need it so that
we can move them forward. So, we'll continue that focus specific to improve gains. Um, and one of the things that Warfield is doing in 2627 is is reassigning some of their their personnel and what they do during the day. And so I didn't bold this one, but they are redefining or modifying how
they deploy their ELLL pair of professionals to better support students and also redes reassigning their support facilitators to deepen that instructional impact and strengthen relationships. Any questions about Warfield? >> Um, yeah. So it's very very impressive.
I mean the 25 points in two years ago, then 23 points this year. And I think those are some foundational skills and I really appreciate the work that's being done to not leave anybody behind and to make sure that everybody has something. Um, and I just wanted to check in with you guys that you three um that in the
midyear like in March or something. I mean I don't want anybody to get scared by the 78 points because I don't want us to be chasing a grade when we're trying to build foundational skills. So when we get to March or whenever that midterm piece is, you'll be giving us an
assessment back then again that's showing us where you think you are based on the EXL monthly pieces. Correct? >> Yes, ma'am. >> Okay. Thank you. >> All right. And JD Parker is the last one that I will present before I turn it
over to Dr. McMahon. So JD Parker is a fascinating case study. Throughout the year when we started with our first instructional rigor walk, we knew we had work to do. Um we deployed coaches, we had specific district leadership personnel assigned as liaison. Um we
worked very closely with teacher teams through PLC's through professional learning through specific coaching to their leadership team. And as the year progressed, we saw significant improvement not only through our rigor walks but also through our snapshot tracking that we do every
month. The decline honestly was surprising. We expected JD Parker to be our Cinderella story. Um, and our alarm bells went off a little bit when our our May snapshot data came in from EXL and it showed the only decline all year long. And so we
saw consistent improvement, consistent gains, and then in May, um, a significant drop. And so we we are not exactly sure what happened between April and May for those gains to suddenly drop, but it also was reflected in our school grade data. As you can see, they
dropped significantly um in the 2526 school year from a 401 to a 362. And so this is a 39 point drop. Again, as consistent across many of our schools, it's our bottom quartile learning gains that need to be a
continued focus, a renewed focus to ensure that we're continuing to push our schools. We didn't see any improvement in any of our accountability metrics across JD Parker. And so as we dug into the data, looked at back at our um walkthrough and evaluation data looking
at what we saw during site visits for targeted support and for intervention um training. We think we identified two of of the of the three issues. One of them is the learning gains. Students didn't move. The other piece is is really enrichment for the students that are um
at that level three or above being able to move to make those learning gains or being able to move from that level two to that level three. And so for ELA learning gains which will also impact ELA achievement is a development of individual learning plans um for all students in bottom quartile like we have
to move those students and as we saw in the data they just didn't move and so um our goal is to make sure we have targeted small group instruction for those bottom cortile students working closely with the new leadership team and our on our school district coaches as well as their on-site coaches at JD
Parker. We will continue to work with our state regional literacy director to make sure we have resources and tools to help best meet the needs of those students. Um, but ultimately it's going to come down to what's happening in that small group, how we're training teachers to deliver that small group, and how we're training our leaders to monitor
that small group. Math achievement, continuing to do weekly walkthroughs with coaching support to strengthen math instruction. We saw some good things in semester 2. I think when we started to see the improvements, um, we really didn't get up to that grade level standard until we
were entering quarter four. And so, while we were excited about the continued growth, it just it took a, you know, a whole year to get to the the standard of where they needed to be at each grade level. And so, continued leadership support um, with not only our academics team, but also the school site leadership team to make sure that we're
in classrooms and seeing what we can do to better support them, provide targeted support for teachers. and then specific interventions uh for struggling learners in specific subgroups. And so with our uh federal percent points index and our ESS subgroups, some of these groups are
getting up there in numbers and amount of years in that category. And so concurrently, we'll be focusing on specific subgroups while implementing systems across the board to make sure that we're not only moving us out of C status, but also moving us out of that SS status. And then again, as consistent
across many schools, a strong focus on the MTSS process um and those intervention plans for tier 2 and tier three students, which is a joint collaborative effort across departments here at the district with our partners at schools. And then finally, our math learning gains. So targeted intervention for
students below proficiency. That's going to be the key for JD Parker. We have students that are behind that have significant deficits, significant gaps. um looking at where those holes are. It's foundational skills both in English language arts and in mathematics. And so being very specific on what interventions we're introducing to
students align to what their actual needs are. Um while aligning that with the subgroup needs we also have for ESSA continuing our work with our LL diagnostic data. And so we did have some challenges with JD Parker on on getting our complete snapshot data um throughout
the year. And so it may have given us some false reads when we have low percentage of students completing or only certain populations of students completing. And so we're going to start the year with with 95% plus completion so we have a really accurate picture of where students are performing, where those gaps are, then building skill
plans around those gaps to move them forward. Um, which feeds into our targeted intervention supports uh for students below that proficiency level, which includes the ESC students in that SS subgroup. So, I don't know how many new teachers we have at um JD Parker this year.
So, I'm sure somebody knows that. But my concern is that um that in order to be able to do the student data identification, in order to do the small group piece, that probably I'm assuming that you all have that under control and that you guys are going to go and work
and make sure that this the identification piece happens at JD Parker in particular. >> Yes, absolutely. And across all schools. So with with our new PowerBI capabilities, we have new dashboards that take work that last year would have taken me and Paige a week or two weeks
to put together specific data reporting for all schools that at the push of a button, they have an entire list of their bottom cile students, what SS subgroups they're in, what the specific standard deficiencies are. And so with our move as a district to PowerBI, we do have the ability to provide that data
reporting and that clarity of of which students need attention and what attention they need much more quickly. Right. But I'm looking specifically since you don't have big rocks listed as the low 25 at JD Parker. I think it's important that whoever you have that's
new at that school, whoever, whichever teachers you have that are new, that they know how to look at and analyze their data and that they're given some extra help with that so that they can exactly see because I see everybody nodding their head that that we know that that's a lot of what it takes is
being able to identify the students and exactly what they need. And I my concern is that um not so much a concern, but if we're not if we're not considering that a big rock, it could become a big rock if we're not paying attention to it. But if
we're if we actually help those um new teachers to understand and look at their data, I think it'll be a big help. >> That's a big part of the pre-planning work that all of the schools have embarked on thus far is like going over the school grade calculations so everyone is aware of how that works. And
then also the identification of students on their roster, where they fell, how many points they need to move, what ESSA categories they fall in. So there's a lot of teaching and learning that takes place before the students even arrive on campus. So right continual learning. >> Yeah, I think it is. And I know that,
you know, I mean, I think is doing um it's a great data source, but it's only as good as it is if you know what it is you're looking at. If you don't know what it is you're looking at and you can't pull out the pieces you need from it, then it then it's just another
piece. Yeah. Thank you. >> All right. Good evening, Madame Chair, Superintendent May, members of the board. My name is Paige McMahon. I am the director of curriculum and instruction, and it is my pleasure to present our two priority middle schools this evening. We're starting
with Dr. David L. Anderson Middle School. As you can see here in this graphic, they had a slight drop from 516 points in the 2425 year to 514 points at the bottom end of the B range.
The snapshot for middle schools looks a little different from elementary school as they are graded on nine different components. The third grade ELA achievement is no longer present on this board, but you will see instead a social studies category as well as acceleration which is derived from algebra 1 and
geometry achievement. So overall Anderson had some wins and some losses uh primarily in the mathematics arena. They were excellent huge numbers in acceleration which I know they were very proud of. Uh that was definitely a success and something you'll see that
we've built on in their big rocks for uh this year to come. They had some struggles across ELA with drops in the achievement learning gains and bottom quartile learning gains category as well as that troublesome bottom quartile learning gains for math that we've seen across our elementary schools. Um also a
slight dip in science and a very small dip in the social studies category which comes from our civics achievement. So they will need 67 points to attain an A in this coming school year. At Anderson, they have big rocks identified across the bottom quartile
learning gains for ELA, bottom quartile learning gains for math as well as science. This is really the year of ELA in Martin County. We are very excited to adopt brand new ELA curriculum across K12, which is why you've probably seen slides
that mention standardsbased planning. We want to make sure we are using our new curricular resources and implementing them with fidelity. So, that is a huge focus across every one of the schools in our district, but even more so at our priority schools. We want to continue to see ELA achievement learning gains and
bottom quartile learning gains increase this year. We have some big goals and that's going to definitely help us with some more rigorous and better aligned ELA instructional materials. Our coaches will continue to support them in implementing those with fidelity with planned walkthroughs with administration
on-site coaches as well as district leaders. So, it's a true group effort to increase ELA across all of those components. At the math learning gains bottom quartile, big rocks, um I mentioned their acceleration was a huge win for Anderson last year. uh they I
think a big part of that was the implementation of a support class to support level three students who were placed in algebra 1. They got an extra time to uh remediate any gaps they came in with and practice algebra 1, which really did pay off in their math achievement as well as that acceleration
category. So they're adding something similar this year to support incoming level one and two students who would fall in that bottom quartile um in sixth and seventh grade. So they will now have a foundations of math class to serve as a tier three intervention to give those students the extra remediation they need
on grade level skills as well as prior grade level skills are coming in with deficits for across science. We are excited to add science to eighth grade students. Um this is going to be a great tool to use for spiral review from day one. Uh we actually have built into our
pacing calendar suggested skills that will give students practice of the sixth and seventh grade content that they will also be assessed on when they take their state science assessment at the end of 8th grade. PENDA will continue to be used as an enrichment and a remediation source. And at Anderson, they are
excited to integrate both reading and writing into science to get a little bit extra boost in both of those areas. Murray Middle School had a similar story. From 2425 to 2526, they experienced a small dip of two points
from 518 to 516 points. Again, a mixed bag of outcomes. Theirs was actually almost the opposite of Anderson's. So, Murray had some great achievement across the board in ELA, but they did struggle in math. And you'll see that they also had a a struggle with acceleration, which as I mentioned
before is linked to algebra 1 and geometry. That's why all four of those things are red. A slight dip in science and they had a a considerable jump in social studies, which is definitely something to be proud of. They need 65 points this year to land in the A range.
For Murray Middle School, they've identified big rocks from math achievement, math bottom cortile learning gains, and science. For math, um, you will see a lot more focus on small groupoup instruction, not only at Murray, but across the district. Uh, I think our teachers have learned how to
do that pretty well in ELA, but maybe not quite so much in math yet. That is definitely a focus for my team and something we look forward to seeing more of in our middle schools, particularly at Murray. Uh, that's the best way for students to remediate and build upon the
ongrade level skills and even give them a little bit of enrichment if that is where their need lies. in the bottom quartile math learning gains category. Um they are also implementing a new foundations of math course to support the incoming students who struggle with math uh particularly those who already
fall in that bottom cortile group. So we're excited to see them uh support those students with an extra boost of math to give them more time for hands-on instruction um and extra practice to help them achieve a level three or higher hopefully. And for science again
you'll see similar big rocks identified. They will also have in eighth grade as well as the Penda program. And they are also going to be using reading and writing across science and I believe all the content areas because why not? [laughter] If you're a strong reader,
you're going to be better at reading across all content areas. Um, also at Murray, unique to them, they are very interested in letting data drive more of their science instruction. uh getting into their common assessments backward planning to make sure they've instructed students on all the assessment all the
assessed benchmarks to come and then using that data to analyze and create small groups for remediation after assessments. Are there any questions on Murray or Anderson? Sorry, I forgot to ask at the end of that one.
>> Okay, wonderful. Thank you all very much. >> Oh, sorry. Sorry, I was going to turn it back over to executive director Gford. >> Almost did [laughter] one more slide. >> Okay, >> so to wrap us up uh for our seven
identified priority schools for the 2627 school year, um our team will be providing some unique support specific for these schools. Um this will include more frequent IRWs, those instructional rigor walks. Um, we also will have
opportunities to partner with Florida Department of Education, region 4. They will be able to come out and provide planning sessions for our school sites, particularly around any ESS subgroups that are problematic. Um, we do have monthly administrator
PLC's and these schools will be able to have a smaller PLC group within themselves where they learn from each other's data. There are commonalities as you've seen this evening across the school sites where they can look at trending data and then plan around next
instructional moves to take back and support their school staff. We will have something new which will be big rock reviews which will turn in to be mini data comms. I know they're excited about it. Um this will give us an opportunity for schools to present um
kind of that formative temperature check before PM 1 and three or between PM 1 and 3 to see how things are going and give us a chance to calibrate supports or if we need to go in a slightly different direction so we can course correct quickly.
Um also rapid deployment of targeted supports following the IRW. So really ensuring that there's not a delay once we're out for school sites. If there is additional coaching support needed or professional learning that those supports are deployed immediately.
Um targeted ELA support and coaching with the state regional literacy directory. You heard that theme across many of the schools. This would be particular to elementary school to help raise ELA achievement. Um I'll be working with school sites individually
on leadership team meetings and coaching and making sure that there is a cycle of data review tied with the instructional walks that they're doing and expected to do weekly and then tying that with the connection to the PLC planning so there's fidelity of implementation and
last but not least we'll be doing some new principal residency days so our seven priority principles will have an opportunity to go out meet plan and observe classrooms at different school sites to help leverage some of the areas
that they're looking to improve improve. So, we have an action-packed school year ready to go and we're excited to begin. And I'd like to also thank all of our school administrators who are here behind us for um being here for this evening and also for the incredible work
that they've done last school year and the excitement that they're bringing to move our schools forward in 2627. Thank you, Miss Pritchette. You have >> I want to thank all of you. This was such great information. You know, we celebrate our successes,
but we're being transparent and accountable in noting the hard work that we have ahead of us. And I give all of you so much credit for what you're about to encounter because it is a heavy lift. The big rocks, they're heavy. And I just
give y'all a lot of credit. And we need, while we are celebrating, we also need to be accountable for the areas that need improvement. and I'm I know that this is going to happen. I see it and I see it in all of your faces and I really
appreciate all the work you've done on this. So, thank you. >> Thank you. >> So, I'll just echo what Miss Pritchette said. Thank you all so much and thank you for being here tonight. Just I know you're sitting quietly in the audience, but we know the work that you put in
preparing for this new school year. And I'm just going to put in a plug for um VPK. Um because what we know is that in Florida in general only about half of our students across the state enter
school ready to learn. Um in Martin County it's a little bit a tad bit higher. um but it's not high enough and especially at these schools. But what we know is that of those 52%
kids that are coming in to school ready, 70 over 70% of them attended VPK. So please encourage your parents, especially if they have a sibling already attending one of our schools, to enroll their children in VPK because
it really does set them up for success down the road. and it's um an easy way to um get those uh kids enrolled in a high quality learning opportunity right on our school campuses. So, please
get your um parents to enroll their kids in VPK. But thank you all very very much. Okay, >> Madam Chair, if I if I can just while we're transitioning. Yes. Um I I I just
want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart. This is the three of you relayed the data uh and I appreciate you very much. But the individuals sitting in the chairs are the ones that are executing on the work uh daily. And so
while it is a team effort from the district to to the uh schools, uh thank you, thank you, thank you. Um, I'm looking at an incredibly dedicated group of individuals that I know is very hungry and on fire to make sure that we
get these students everything that they need to succeed. I appreciate the comments from the board this evening on not chasing the school grade, but making sure that in Martin County we are laying a strong foundation for what is to come,
long-term sustainable growth. Um, and I'm just very proud tonight of the governance team from the level of accountability and pressure that the board has of me. Uh, because we want the district to continue moving and to be
the very best and that then trickles down to the school base to the district leaders and the school-based leaders and then on to our teachers. So, proud moment tonight and just really proud of what is happening in the district and thank you. Thank you.
Perfect. Thank you. Um we're going to take a really quick break. Um five minutes and um we will be right back. Okay, we are reconvening our meeting. Thank you all for your patience. Um,
we're now moving on to item 2.04 to review the superintendent's annual evaluation scoring metrics. Heather Platt. >> Yes. Good afternoon, Madam Chair, Superintendent Maine, members of the board. My name is Heather Platt and I serve as the director of organizational
excellence and strategic alignment. Today I am here to facilitate a workshop discussion regarding Superintendent Maine's evaluation instrument for the 2627 school year. My goal this afternoon is to gather your feedback and guidance on several key components so that I can
bring a final evaluation instrument forward to the August 25th regular school board meeting. Essentially, we will focus on three areas. the overall format and structure of the evaluation instrument. We are going to look at domain seven which focuses on district
performance and student achievement and then the process for determining the final evaluation rating. So inside your folders you will find several documents that I will reference throughout our discussion today. So to begin on the left hand side of your folder you have
the current evaluation tool. So I provided you a copy of the current evaluation tool should you want to reference it or if you have any questions but essentially the current evaluation tool is comprised of seven domains. So we're looking at board support, program delivery, financial
stability, human capital and talent management, community, state and public relations, professional skills and abilities and district performance. So those are the seven domains that are currently in place. And the scale is on the right side so you can see uh what score would achieve an unsatisfactory
needs improvement effective or highly effective. So today I'm not recommending that we change any of the domains. Um so you'll see that throughout the presentation and um I'm also not recommending at this time a change in the scale. So the first discussion in
your folder on the right side you have a copy of the uh the slide that we're going to reference in just a minute and it says discussion one but essentially currently the format. So each of you as schoolboard members rate each individual
indicator that is underneath the domain and we have been rating it or you have been rating it to the nearest um 0.5 to the nearest half which averages out to an overall domain score. So as you can see here I just put in some arbitrary scores but for domain one board support
it currently has four indicators. Each board member has rated the indicator and then that rolls up to an overall average. At this time, feedback is specifically required for any indicator that is rated below a two. So that's currently how you um complete the evaluation.
>> So it said on the evaluation a 2.0 or below, not below a 2.0. >> Correct. Yes. 2. So if it's a 2.0, which is effective, it shouldn't require a comment. If it's
below effective, it should. >> Yes. So, below a 2.0. And what about a perfect three? >> How does everybody feel about that? If you're going to rate someone a perfect score, I think that needs a comment,
too. I'll be honest. It goes both ways. [clears throat] >> All feedback is good feedback. >> I did like the metric. I did like the survey type, but I wanted the ability to comment under each one
>> indicator. because a whole comment at the end of that section, but just being able to spec be specific to that point. >> Vice Chair Morardi, >> is this the time to bring up uh where
you do the the nearest 0 five and are we able to do 0.1 would be my suggestion because I had a tough time between that three and 2.5 and two. So that that would be my thing was 0.1 is what I'm looking for.
>> I want to talk about that too. Okay. Actually, >> go for it. >> Yes. >> Because I think they should be whole numbers. I think it should be twos. One, two, three, zero. If um because it's going to add up. If somebody gives a three and somebody gives a two, the
average is going to be higher than a two. Um, I just don't think that this all the points in the middle are necessarily you're you're either highly effective or you're effective or you're you need improvement or you're unsatisfactory.
It's >> so I if I may so for the format options and that might help with the conversation around um which way you all go but what I did want to ask is with the format options are we looking to keep format A which currently is the
domain with the indicators listed and then as um board chair P was saying you're essentially rating every indicator which then rolls up to an overall so to the point of keeping the whole whole number Um or we could look
at a different format. If you're looking at format B would be instead of having those indicators, we would have what we call look fors, which would give you like a plethora of um look fors that you might um want to take into consideration as you determine an overall score. So instead of rating every single
indicator, we would just have an overall score for the domain. Or then format C would be not necessarily look for but more of like a narrative form. In the narrative form again you would just rate one time. You would rate the domain once.
So is there a preference of the board to maintain the indicators and like individual indicator ratings that roll up to an overall or to go more with just one score for the overall domain? >> Mr. Roberts, you had a comment.
>> Yeah. So, um, so I agree that if you're at a two or if you're at a three, you should have below a two or if you're giving a three point. So, this pertains to your format A, B, or C. I think if if you're doing that, if somebody's perfect
or if somebody's below a two that it warrants a comment. Um, but if you did format A, so I'm asking Mrs. powers. What she means when she says that if you're doing format A and you
have six different components for the domain and you had two of them below a two and one of them at a three, does that mean you comment on the three and you comment on each of the individual ones or do you mean of your overall score like
>> No, I would comment on each individual domain it's >> as a domain or the indicators in the domain >> the indic in the domain. Okay. >> So, if it were if I were to give I can't imagine that I ever would, but if I were to give a one in something, obviously I
would make a comment and it would be very clear why I gave a one. Um, and it would be very clear why I gave a three. >> Okay. Um because I think that's important to know what you're what what you're not what
you're not what's not meeting expectations but what you're doing really well too. So I don't think it's fair to just give comments on one thing. Does that make sense? >> Yeah. So then in with that mindset, I
would prefer to stay with format A, but I would pref I would also like to be able to give half points. So instead of just being a 0, one, two, three, to be able to do a half on any of those things because you're going to end
up in the tenth's column anyway when you average unless you're averaging all the >> Exactly. And this rubric is what will So if you give a 3 three two you're going to fall into the highly
effective >> yes >> category >> but I think you should be able to give a a zero one 1.5 2.5 and three. I think we should be be able to give the half steps in between so that you're not exactly
you're you're between effective and highly effective. You know, you're better than effective because you've done something more than effective, but you've not quite reached the highly effective because otherwise I'd always be saying, "Well, you're not highly effective. I'm just going to keep dropping you down to the effective
piece, you know? Morardi. >> So I would agree with Miss Roberts and do format A. And since I would love to see 0.1 and Miss Chair Powers wants to see whole numbers, we could meet in [clears throat] the middle with Miss Roberts at 0.5 where we are at. So
format a.5. >> I just think if you're going to give a half a point, >> you're going to have to explain what you mean. >> Oh, I will. >> Like not just in like a 2.5 like what does that mean? What are what kind of feedback like what is going to push him
to over to be a three. >> Sure. >> So we just need to be I think we need to be very um descriptive and give feedback because if we don't give feedback then
it's a guessing game. So, I typically comment on everything and that's why I would like to see us comment because if I'm going to give a two, I want the superintendent to understand why that it was that specific thing, but everything
else is a three. You know, that's why, you know, I I just think we should be commenting on everything, honestly. [laughter] >> Okay. Okay. So, what I hear you saying is format A, maintain the indicators,
but there's an opportunity to comment on each indicator based on the score. And then we would say anything below a two, but then also a three. And I think to your point, Mrs. P is really feedback on everything. >> Is that what I hear saying? And we're going to the nearest.
>> I don't think you have not heard from everyone. >> Miss Russell has a comment, please. >> No, I was patiently waiting. Um, no, I do agree with the the halves only to even to your point, Mrs. Powers, where you're talking about, oh, well, in this particular domain, I gave threes, but
then in this one, this particular one, I gave a 2.0 because he wasn't quite there yet. So, then you wouldn't be able to rate the full domain a three because there would be that one that was catching you up. And so, I would hate, but you might want to give him a 2.5
because he's better than that two. You know what I mean? But I don't I that's I think that's just sub subjective because what is a two compared to a 2.5? There is I know but there is no there's no metric on here that says oh yeah this is
a um when when it when you average them it's going to come out to above a 2.5 because of the averages. And I mean this is how we rate. This is life scale right
here. This is how you know you don't get an extra point. Well, some I guess some schools do extra points for like a B+ versus um you know a C minus or a C plus or whatever. Um but we use a four-point
scale. It's you know it's easy. three to zero or we could go four to one. It's like whatever. Um that's just my preference and I don't have to give 2.5s. I mean that when we when you rate so
it's it's really a personal preference. I I'm not I'm not hung up on it. So the superintendent will know what I think at the end of the valuation because I will give feedback. Miss Pritchette, did you have something?
>> Yeah. So, I like format A, but I do like the addition of making a comment for every um piece that we give a a score to. So, I'm in agreement with everyone
>> on this. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. Okay. So, discussion two uh is regarding domain seven. So you have another piece of paper in your folder that is tabbed with discussion 2. So this year for domain 7 there were three
specific metrics that were tracked and um provided a score. So you had overall district school grade which is still there as a component. You had percentage of A and B rated schools and districtwide uh district statewide ranking. So those were the three that
comprise domain 7. Moving into 2627, the recommendation is that we increase the number of metrics that we are tracking in domain 7 to 10 metrics. And as you just heard from our academics um and school improvement teams and curriculum
teams, one of the areas of focus this year has to do with the learning gains. So, as you can see within these 10, two of them are specifically related to ELA learning gains and math learning gains. There was some discussion around the district points increase. So that was
something we did not capture this year for superintendent Maine under domain seven. So we are recommending that we do capture the overall district points increase. Graduation rate is is a topic that we want to ensure that we capture here as well. So you see increasing the
graduation rate. Um I know uh Mrs. Russell had provided some feedback around wanting to ensure we had an area where we were looking at the increase of our ELA achievement. So that is a metric that we're capturing here. For that one, we're looking at over the last two years. And then we I already spoke about
the learning gains. We are looking to decrease the number of schools in state status for one or more subgroups. And then the last one being increase the percent increase the percent of the class of 2027 graduating with college and career acceleration. So the way that
these 10 are laid out, you can see the point structure. So the first three um are are how we had it this year. But the other seven you can see that we go um through three points, two and a half points, two points, one and a half points, zero points, one and a half
points across the board would be that we maintain. So if there's not an increase but also not a decrease, that maintain is at the at the 1.5 or one and a half points. And then from there you can see the different metrics. So I wanted to open up the discussion around having the
10 different metrics included in superintendent names domain 7 this year. >> So so I like the all the additional metrics. Um I the only thing I would like to run it and see like using this year's data just because I don't want
there to be a glitch at the end like we had this year. I really kind of want to see how that works out. if there's things that we need to work out, if there's scales that we need to adjust, I just don't want to get to the end and have that issue. So, let's I would like
to see it based on what we did this year and what that would look like if we could. But, I like the additional metrics. I think they're all very important metrics that um you know, whether we increase or decrease, I think that they're good
things that we should be measuring on an annual basis. Anyway, uh, Miss Roberts, >> so I like the 10. Um, I do note that seven of the 10 are you giving a 1.5
if you maintain if you make no movement, 70% um, put you in the needs improvement slot. I mean, that's but but I think that but I think Superintendent Maine, I think that's true. I mean, I think if
we're looking for growth that you would be needing improvement if you're just coming in exactly where you were before because you didn't make any growth. So, I mean, I think that, you know, it's going to be interesting if it falls between the 1.5 and the 1.9,
but it's still it's still the same thing. I mean, if you hit if seven of those components you get a 1.5 at because there was no growth, >> then then it really does need the improvement. So, I mean, it it's >> I would agree with that. >> When you look at the numbers, I think it
it looks harsh on one hand, but on the other hand, it it kind of rings true because it is what it is. You wouldn't want to up those numbers and say that that's acceptable. It's acceptable to remain the same, I don't think, is a a fair statement. So, uh, Vice Chair Morardi.
>> Yeah, this was probably the biggest, uh, criticism I had for this year's survey. So, I appreciate the efforts to take it because I honestly felt like the superintendent was unfairly criticized with just the three metrics. So, uh, I appreciate you upping it to 10. U,,
they're tough. I tell you, these these this is no walk in the park, superintendent. I mean this is it's I I mean I'm almost like this is a little too tough almost [laughter] if if I had to be honest. >> I appreciate that. But I will tell you that uh during the three leadership days
our administrator evaluation system has changed as well. you all approved a very rigorous district administrator eval all of us were sitting back very humbled that it's going to be extremely difficult and uh it is only fair that if we're doing that for all of our district
leaders it needs to be the same for me as well so thank you but uh we're we're leveling level setting to where our other administrators are as well. >> Perfect. And then have you run the numbers on this for this year what it would have been? >> Yes. So I asked uh Dr. laws who's here
this evening um to help us look at if we ran that through the numbers this year. So specifically um what he provided me was what um executive director Moore referenced as the escalator clause. So this is a visual of an Excel sheet that Dr. Laws um provided and this looks at
the breakdown of A's and B. So if you just look at the metric specifically to percentage of A and B rated schools this year we hit 80%. But if you look at if the escalator clause had been enacted this year where we would be that percent would be much different. So I did want
to provide you with that information and we're happy to run additional metrics on this so you have a bigger picture but um this was something that >> yeah I want to talk through some of that a little bit because I think it's a little harsh. I'm not going to lie. So I do want to I do want to talk through
some of that. >> What was your number? You said you ran it. >> So So this year >> Oh, sorry. Go ahead. >> Not necessarily the escalator. If you ran these 10 metrics, >> those 10 metrics, I would have to go back and run those specifically with our
>> Yeah, let's um let's I would like to look at that and sit down and understand it a little bit more. Well, she gets a lower score than last year. >> Miss Pritchette, did you have >> I wanted that information as well.
>> But I also feel like this is exactly what we're trying to do. We just went through a very comprehensive presentation on being accountable and having the ability to look at where we need improvement.
And I think This speaks to that, but I do think there should probably be some tweaks because we, as Chair Powers said, we want to make sure when we do run it that we don't have the glitches. But I think
this is what we need. We need to show that we are willing to put ourselves out there and and be judged like we need to be, you know? I mean, we It's the same theme for me. We
celebrate, but we also need to look at where we need improvement. And I think for the most part, this will be a great blueprint for that. >> Thank you. >> Absolutely. Thank you so much for that feedback. And just to um let you know as
well when I spoke about the district priorities, so these are these are not going to be these are not a surprise to any of our schoolbased administrators. So these are all metrics that we're tracking through our goals this year aligned to our priorities within our strategic plan. So these are things that our team are already very focused on with our schools. So none of them would
be surprised by this. But I hear what you are saying and I will absolutely get you that information. >> Well, and I think it's really important not just for the superintendent but for our staff as well to know that it's okay to be effective. We ha all have our
strengths. We all have weaknesses. And um obviously if there's something that needs to be improved, we're your supervisor shouldn't be waiting until your evaluation to work with you so that you are effective across the at least
effective across the board. And if you're not getting that support, then the superintendent needs to know about that. But um it is okay to not be perfect in every domain. Um and I don't think that that's a reasonable expectation. And so please don't put
that pressure on yourself that you have to be perfect at everything. We can all lean on each other and overall be so wonderful without being absolutely perfect. So don't put that pressure on yourself, please.
>> Miss Roberts, sorry. >> Thank you. Um realizing I just it dawned on me as I'm looking at this your ELA achievement and your learning gains and your math gains. Um, I'm thinking that you need to do it twice. You need to do it once for
elementary and once for secondary because I think as we're trying to do the foundational pieces in elementary, I mean, I think that's a and I think maybe adding in the low 25, but I mean adding in,
you know what I mean? So if you add in the low 25 and then you add four in and do it for secondary at the same time that then you've upped it to 15 components. But I mean I think then you've more captured. So so you're not dinged with one
particular piece, you know. So I mean we're looking at elementary and we're also looking at >> Paige looks confused. Well, I think and Paige is the math guru, but so is but so [laughter] is uh Mrs. Roberts. I think here's what I'm
thinking. >> Um I don't know that I I think that that's probably fair, Dr. McMahon, unless I'm missing something because if we increase in the bottom quartile is where we're where we're really struggling as a district right now, particularly with
math. if that's an indicator on there and we bounce in bottom cortile and it goes up but we kind of maintain or I'm thinking it's all gonna level out right I mean >> I believe uh when director plat asked for our recommendations on metrics to be
used um I actually suggested that we use the district grade components for those just the comprehensive K K12 oh K10 whoever's tested um so that way it would capture all of the schools at all of the levels but in a single indicator um because it could also work against you.
You know, if we didn't do well in a particular, like for instance, bottom quartile math learning gains, I wouldn't want that to hurt you three or four times. Um, but if it was a single indicator, it would only be one. But it works the opposite as well. It would be
to your advantage if it were multiple categories. I just think if we do the district-wide component, that will capture all schools, all students assessed. So, we would have ELA achievement. We could have I believe she said ELA learning gains. I don't remember if
bottom cile gains was its own category but >> so Paige just take the ELA achievement. So >> you could >> So explain to me why I wouldn't want to do elementary as one component and secondary as another component.
>> Well, I'd be adding another component, right? I mean I'd be adding an a larger base, right? And I would be putting myself so that if I excelled at one but didn't necessarily excel at the other, I it's almost like >> it could offset. You're right.
>> You know, it could it could offset and it it gives a more accurate picture. So if um if the Oh, you're part of that team. If the red team is focusing, say on elementary, right, and elementary makes a move, but secondary doesn't, you
don't end up getting hit for that because you didn't get anything at the secondary level, but you got it at the elementary level. I mean, it gives you some ability to It's true, the DOE doesn't report an elementary specific uh metric on that versus secondary. So,
we would just have to calculate it by hand. I just figured the actual like DOE district grade component would be comprehensive. That way it's using, you know, match students and all of those important indications. >> But, you know, I mean, because when I pull them, I So, for instance, I segregate out just the elementary
>> and look just at the elementary. So, I look at the low 25 learning gains, all 12 schools, look just at elementary, look, the prior year, two years of growth, one year, you know, that type of thing. And then I then I turn around and go to middle school because I think some
of it is school by school or at least level by level, you know. >> So I my opinion is that we use the schoolwide like the school grading system. I think it gets really complicated. Um, I think
as a board member that you should address the if it's one or the other, one went up, one went down, one stayed the same, that you should address that in your comments and rate accordingly. >> But I just think it gets a little difficult to add. I think the more components you have, the I mean, we
aren't adding them. It's just a math thing. But I mean, I think it's the more I think the more pieces you have, especially for something that's >> that's fixed in stone that we have no control over. I think the more pieces to it you have, it's like the more
ingredients. If you're making spaghetti sauce and you've got 20 ingredients, if you don't have two of them, it's not going to kill the sauce. If you've got four, you're kind of dead in the water. But we have access to all of that information as we're evaluating the
superintendent on that. >> But we don't do that in this. We don't do domain 7. Domain 7 does itself. >> Oh, true. >> So that's why I'm saying the more that you put into domain seven, >> we can make it a um indicator in one of the other
um >> perhaps >> satisfactory unsatisfactory. I don't I just I think it gets really confusing to do. >> I'm just thinking, Madam Chair, maybe since we're requesting a run of the
data. >> Yeah, let's maybe we run the data both both ways so that we can see. >> Absolutely. No problem. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. McMahon. >> All right. And the last piece,
discussion three, is about the final evaluation. So currently during the final evaluation process, each of you assigns a rating to every indicator. As we discussed, the ratings are averaged to determine an overall score for each domain and then the domain scores from all of you are then averaged to
calculate a final score. So I just wanted to open up the discussion around option one being that we maintain that current reporting. So we would keep it exactly the same as it is, which is the overall domains are an average of all school board member scores. Option one.
Option two would be in lie of averaging the scores. We would look across the five and we would look for the majority score. That would be the final score. Or option three would be similar to option one. So we would maintain that you have you conduct your own evaluations.
However, the difference would be that anything that averages out lower than a two 2.52 and a half would be open for discussion as a board and then consensus would be reached as to a final score. I I think option one
>> and if there is an item that you know comes out lower than a 2.5 and we want to talk about it >> we can talk about it at that meeting um when we all see everybody else's >> well the only thing it >> I don't know that I would want to talk
about it if it was anything if it was below a two we would need to talk about it but go ahead >> the only thing I could see is if you had one board member who didn't like m Mr. Maine and gave him zeros for everything and pulled everybody and it's 20% of the
grade is now pulling everything down and it's set in stone by an average of the five people. I mean that's the only >> I guess I didn't think about that. >> I mean that's the only thing I would think of. I mean, you know, so so you
get somebody who who thinks he's doing a horrible job. I don't like him and, you know, and and I I give him a horrible review. And now it's now 20% of the evaluation isn't what the consensus of the
governance team is, isn't what everybody agrees on. We can throw out the high and the low and >> or I think it's just if I think it's [laughter] I think if you did option one with the ability to discuss it, you know, like with the ability that that
option one can be by a majority vote of the board be changed. I mean, I think that protects you for >> Yeah, that's fine with me. Yeah. If there's something very blatantly obvious like that that it should be able to be addressed by the group. Yes. without
having it in the eval. Well, but it says it's the, you know, it's just the straight average and I just, you know, like messed you all up. So, yeah, something along those lines. >> Okay. Absolutely. >> That was it for me. Any further questions? >> Any other questions? >> I'll get you what you've requested and
then I'll bring it back for >> 25th. Absolutely. Thank you. >> Okay, we are moving on to public comment. One second. Uh, citizen input is vital to the
improvement of our district. Most times, your remarks may be listened to without comment from schoolboard members or the superintendent. This does not mean they are heard with any less intensity or concern. Where appropriate, the superintendent and staff will investigate your comments and report back to you and the school board with an
answer. We thank you for taking the time and having the concern to make our district better. The Martin County School Board respects your constitutional right to free speech. At the same time, politicking by members of the public or by members of the Martin County School Board is not an exercise
of the right to free speech. When addressing the Martin County School Board on matters of the boards or district's governance of our students education, the public and school board must refrain from engaging in any politicking during a schoolboard
meeting. Politicking is the advocating for the election or defeat of a candidate for public office through the use of words, dates, signs, props, or wearing apparel expressing advocacy for a person or group or people appearing on a ballot. Your presentation should not
exceed three minutes. Um, first up is Sam Fandino. Hello, Superintendent Maine, members of the school board. Uh, I know I've said the same thing like five times. Uh, so I will talk more about why I keep coming
instead of you. you guys know full well the the reasons for why. But I think for me it all boils down to gratitude. I'm really grateful to a lot of people in my life, especially my family. Uh and I don't know how to express that really well. You know, I say thank you. Obviously, I feel so much more than just
a thank you could ever really express, especially like my grandmother. So, I just have to hope that they get it. You know, hope that they know I'm I'm like really grateful. And the same is true for my teachers. Like as a group, I would not be a graduate without them. Especially not the teachers at Spectrum. I really wouldn't be. I'm going to college. I I'm really happy with where
my life is going and I'm so grateful to my teachers for getting me there because without them I I would not be there. Um you know, Mr. Theobald is not the most impactful teacher I had, not even the most impactful teacher I had at Spectrum. Probably my English teacher. Um, but in the two months that I had him, he he was a really great teacher
and he did more than what anybody would have expected uh him to do in the sense that his passion and care for the subject was so evident and it really lifted everybody up. You know, he's been teaching since I was in diapers. Uh it's crazy to think about. Um and if how he
treated me is any indication of how he treated his other students, then all he did was nurture the next generation. And for him to be treated in the way that I I feel he's been treated by the school board and district, I I just think it's it's wrong. Like on a on a deeply human level, he's given his life to his
students and for him to be treated like that is is wrong. Um at the beginning of each statement, you guys say, you know, citizen input, the value of it. I would like to know your thoughts on this. You know, it's been a year. Uh you guys have the opportunity to address things. I
would really appreciate just personally, would a single one of you take a moment, 30 seconds to just tell me your position on whether or not you think this school district should accept the court's recommendation. Um, it would mean a lot to me. It would show me that that I am valued, my input does matter, that my
concerns as a citizen and now a voter will will matter. So, please, if any of you could take 30 seconds, it would mean the world to me. So, thank you. I also want to say in um this school board did vote to send it to the court. uh well
the district of uh administrative hearings uh and I would like to know if the if any of you don't plan on abiding by the recommendation of course it's completely your decision it's not binding uh why that is um and I'd be really interested to know why especially
if if it conflicts with previous votes so yeah that's that's all I have to say I won't use the rest of my time thank you very much really appreciate it >> thank you next up is Sher Right. Good evening, school board members. Superintendent Maine. I'm going to try
and speak really fast because I have a lot to say. So in looking and listening to the presentation about the health benefits um I'm wondering and and I know that you don't have to respond but has is there a cash in lie of benefit payment for those uh employees who
choose not to to take the health insurance plan? Also has the school district looked at a health insurance pool there is one right now actively and there are 17 school board school districts participating. It's called the FLHT.
Was formerly known as the FHIP program established in 2009 by the Florida School Board Insurance Trust. And in April of 2025, the program transitioned to the FLHT under the Florida Association of District School Superintendent, ensuring continued
alignment with the needs of Florida Florida's educational leaders. The program estimates savings of 7 to 12% when fully transitioned from a fully health insurance plan to a self-insured FLHT participant within one to two one
to three years. The program claims members will enjoy a savings up to 13%. There are four uh I'm sorry, five uh requirements. The district school board adopts participation agreement. District must be or become self-insured.
transition plan is created with assistance available. The district officially joins the FLHT and each superintendent becomes a member and a trustee of the trust. So, and there are 17 participating districts. My
next comment um at the last meeting of the 28th regarding the budget, there were several members of um staff here and they were concerned. They had some questions. They were looking for their millillage payment. The teachers received their millage payment from last
year in June. Transportation has not received their millage payment as of today's date. Also, the wellness program experience that they that they um show well I can tell you that we actually did that at my former employees or former uh
employer. And what was happening was they were giving cash incentives for those programs where people would maybe do something on their phone. They might say, "Oh, I did a 5K run, but it was digitally done." And it wound up that people were just saying they were doing
it or they were having someone else do it for them. So, that kind of went out the window because the the money that, you know, was being put out, by the time most of the employees got to the end, the money ran out. So, there was people that weren't getting any money. So, that's something, but I I really
recommend that the school district look at a pool option with other school districts. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, that's all I have for public comment. I'm going to move on to um board comment. Open to the board this
time. Uh Miss Russell, >> I just want to say welcome back to everyone. I'm looking forward to this year and all the progress we're going to make. It's going to be a great year. >> M Roberts, do you have anything? Miss Pritchette, Dr. Morardi. Um I just have
um a couple of things. One is I'm very happy to announce been working on this for over a year. We are going to be hosting the state board of education meeting here in Martin County right here in this room um October 14th. So we're
really very very excited about that. Um I did get have an opportunity to meet the new education commissioner. um he's very excited to come and really see all the great things that we're doing in Martin County. So I know everyone is
going to um give him a very warm welcome and the entire board in a October 14th. So lots more information to come. But of course all the um the actual board meeting will be at 9:00 am on the 14th.
Um we are working with the superintendent. We're looking at maybe doing some things um on the day before some visits to schools so that they can kind of see what we're what we're doing and the really innovative things that
we're doing. So if you have suggestions, reach out to the superintendent um and then hopefully we'll be able to um get all of us together and u meet the staff from DOE and it'll be it's going to be a great couple days. So, I'm really excited for Martin County and um really
excited to showcase all the work that our our team does every day. So, thank you for that. And then just a reminder that we are doing the backpack >> giveaway on Friday at Warfield Elementary >> 12:30.
>> Yeah. So, be there as soon as you can. 11 till till it's done. >> So all right. Um that is it. This meeting is adjourned. Thank you all very much. >> Oh my god.