e going to do the get ready for kindergarten celebration. Come on, let's get it started, people. This is an exciting time. It's an exciting time. If you open the new school year. So good afternoon everyone. My
name is Julie Yang. I'm very honored to serve as the president of Montgomery County Board of Education. Now, on behalf of the Board of Education, with all my colleagues and the superintendent behind me, welcome to get ready for
kindergarten celebration. All right. Now I have to tell you, this is more than a celebration because it's a milestone for these children and this these families, right? Kindergarten is your first step in our
school system for a lifelong journey of learning. It's where curiosity takes root, where children discover the joy of asking questions, and where friendship begins to bloom. Now, the word kindergarten actually
comes from German. It means children's garden. Almost two century ago, the founder of kindergarten, Frederick Ferber. I'm saying this right believe that young children should be nurtured like plants in a
garden, given sunlight, space and care so they could grow and thrive. What a beautiful image for us to carry today. Now, as we celebrate the first chapter of these children's education,
now with my own experience, my. When my two kids are adults now 2421 started kindergarten, I remember the first day with their tiny backpack, nervous smile, and you know when they let go of my hand to step on
that bus, who got emotional? And I actually don't tell anyone outside of this room. I actually follow the bus and drove to the kindergarten. All right. But this is the beginning. It was the beginning for our family too. So that is
how significant that was made today. So special. So to the Guardians and the parents out there, you have been your child's first teacher, shaping them with love, patience and guidance. Now our teachers and
staff will walk beside you, building on that foundation and helping your child grow academically, socially and emotionally. Together, we will nurture their potential and their dreams. Our motto is
Unleash Potential. So to our kindergartner, this is your big day and this is the very first page of your school story. And in this story, you are the heroes. You are the heroes.
Brave, curious, and ready to explore. Now I need your help. I need your help. And maybe everyone's help when I say, are you ready for kindergarten? I want you and you all to shout back as loud as you can. Yes.
Can we do that? Let's give it a try. Okay. Ready? Are you ready for kindergarten? Yes, yes, we are good. We are good. Okay. All right. You are ready for
kindergarten. And our kindergarten is ready for you. So with that, I want to invite our superintendent, Thomas Taylor up. Thank you so much, Miss Yang. And thank you all for being here. I know that you were planning on coming to a Board of Education meeting, but
we thought we'd start things off a little bit different and start some new traditions this school year. Today we're here to celebrate you, our brand new kindergartners who are ready to learn, grow and shine, and also our amazing teachers, staff, families who have been working so hard to get you ready for kindergarten. Your journey
begins actually on Monday, August 25th during our first ever Transition Day where we will welcome kindergarten students, our sixth grade students, ninth grade students, and anyone new to our school system into our schools for the very first time. This is critical because it's going to
help you figure out where to go and meet new friends, and build new relationships with new people. To our honorees, thank you so much for being here. We hope that this is a wonderful occasion for you, and we have some gifts that we want to give
you to. Thank you. Today. We are so lucky to be joined by our friends from College Gardens Elementary School, which is our neighborhood elementary school, to this building. So you guys get to be the first people to receive this recognition. So let's give
a big cheer to our students, our teachers, and everyone who makes kindergarten such a special place. I'd like to welcome Sonia. Sonia, our principal at College Gardens Elementary School, our kindergarten teachers who are here today, Miss Jones and Miss two two below. Okay. Got it.
Fantastic. And to all of our kindergartners who are here today, we'd love to have you come up and get a special recognition and join us for a picture. You guys up for that? Thank you guys. Come on up. Let's give them a round of applause and encourage them. Please. You can give them a
gift. Each kindergartner gets a gift. Hello. You come and get your. You draw me a picture of her. Do you like that? Yeah.
Your purple and pink backpack. Okay. Turn around and let him get your picture. Yes, I love
it. That's yours, that's yours. Stay there. So while we're getting set up for our picture here, last month, the Board of Education adopted a resolution recognizing get ready for kindergarten month. And today we're presenting this
resolution to our school principal at College Gardens Elementary School. So you get to hold that for the picture. Here. If all the way on this side by side. So probably you
all right. Shift left, shift left. All us. Thank you. To the center. Okay. Lesson. Before we
start, can we get a quick video saying ready for kindergarten? Yes. Okay. Yes. Okay. 123. Ready for kindergarten. Okay. We're going to do this again.
Okay. At the count of three okay. One, two. One more member. Sorry. 123. Ready for
kindergarten. Woohoo! One more. We got one more friend joining
us. Oh, there it is. Hold on, hold on. Where is he? Everybody.
Get ready. 123. Five. All right. Thank you. Thank you everybody thank all right. Something fun.
I'm all these people. Thank you. That's it. You just want to say
all right. Yes. Yes.
Yeah.
Good afternoon. Welcome to August 21st, 2025 for business meeting. I want to welcome my colleagues, everyone in the audience,
people joining us online and students and staff. This is the board meeting that is before school starts. So I'm really, really excited for today's meeting. And before we start, let's stand for the Pledge of
Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and
justice for all. Thank you all. And before we begin, I will now ask board members to introduce themselves to establish a quorum. I will start from my left. Good afternoon. A student
member of the board. Good afternoon, Natalie Zimmerman representing district two. Buenas tardes. Carla Silvestre, school board member at large. Good afternoon. Buenas tardes, Grace Rivera, oven district one. Good afternoon, Brenda Wolff.
District five. Good afternoon, Laura Stewart. District four. Online. Good afternoon. Rita montoya, board member at large. And good afternoon, Julie Yang representing district three. So thank you for joining us. And now, before we begin, I would
like to explain some procedure changes in the structure of board meeting for this school year. This school year, we are dividing our board, our meetings into two different categories business meetings, where we take actions on the
business of the school district. And then we will have work sessions, which we delve deep into issues and have discussions between the board and the school communities. And with that background, is there a motion for approval of the
revised agenda? So moved. Second, there's a motion and a second. All in favor, please raise your hand. That's unanimous. Thank you everyone. I'm going to move to item 5.1. It's always my one of my
favorite things to do at board meetings is the recommend recommended appointment. We need to staff our schools if we want to open our doors for students. Doctor Taylor thank you, Madam President. We have a number of administrative appointments this this evening
and this afternoon. I'm thrilled to to make these recommendations to the board for your consideration. And when I call your name, if you could please stand to be recognized as I say some wonderful things about you before the board takes its vote. And we get to congratulate some folks. First for consideration
is Doctor Lisa m Gaylord Jones for the position of Associate Superintendent in the Division of Special Education Sers. Joining her today is her husband, Doctor Anthony Jones. Daughters, Chelsea and Kayla, her son Kayleen and her mother,
Rebecca Gaylord. Doctor Gaylord Jones has been employed with MCPs for 25 years as a special education teacher, special education resource teacher, assistant principal, Acting Principal and most recently as the principal at Rock Terrace School. She looks forward to
strategically leading inclusive, data informed practices that elevate equity and access for all learners, particularly those with exceptional needs. Shout outs to her family and friends who are watching online and her supportive leadership development team. Her mentors
doctor Doctor Donna Redmond Jones, doctor Eugenia Dawson, Doctor Tabitha Campbell and Doctor Rotunda, Floyd Cooper and Miss Kimberly Bolden. Move to approve. Second, there is a motion and a second. All in
favor, please raise your hand. That's unanimous. Congratulations. You have your
fan club? Yes. Although she's not with us this evening, it's my pleasure to introduce an offer for consideration. Miss Ebony Langford Brown, for the position of director in the Department of Academic Programs and the Division of Teaching and Learning. Miss Langford
Brown is no stranger to M.C.P.S. In her more than 31 years of educational experience as a classroom teacher and an administrator. 19 of those were with M.c.p.s. She looks forward to returning to M.c.p.s and joining the Academic Programs team to support students, families, and staff. Shout outs
to her husband Darren and her daughter Clark move to approve. Second, that all in favor, please raise your hand. That's unanimous. Congratulations.
Next up for consideration is Mrs. Vanetta Christian for the position of director in the Department of Special Education Compliance. Joining her today is her husband, Kimura. Her son Kieran. And Mrs. Christian has
more than 20 years of experience in education in various districts throughout the Washington, DC and Maryland area. It has been with great enthusiasm that she now joins the ranks of the special education, leadership and M.C.P.S. shout outs to her other children, Camille and
Caleb and her three brothers and her family and friends who are always supporting her move to approve. Second, there's a motion and a second. All in favor, raise your hand. That's
unanimous. Congratulations. Next for consideration is Miss Emily B Rachlin for the position of legal director in the Division of Legal Services. Joining her today is her husband, Jeremy, her daughters,
Alyssa and her daughter Alyssa. Miss Rachlin has been employed with M.C.P.S. for 14 years as an assistant general counsel in the Division of Legal Services. Miss Rachlin looks forward to continuing to serve M.C.P.S. in her new role as the legal director. Motion to approve.
Second, there's a motion and a second. All in favor, please raise your hand. That's unanimous. Congratulations, Emily. Next for consideration
is Miss Samantha, a Smith for the position of supervisor of the Hearing and Vision services in the Department of Special Education Services. Miss Smith brings 11 years of experience to M.C.P.S. in the educational field. She looks forward to joining M.C.P.S. to support the
staff, students and families in the deaf and hard of hearing and visually impaired programs. Motion to approve. Second, there's a motion and a second. All in favor, please raise your hand. That's unanimous.
Congratulations, Samantha. That rounds out our our central services team. And now we get to talk about some of our building level appointments. Very exciting. First for consideration is Mrs. Deja
Chapell for the position of principal at Benjamin Banneker Middle School. Joining her today is her husband, Dominic. Mrs. Chapell has been with MCPs for four years as an Assistant Principal, Principal intern and most recently as an assistant principal at Sherwood High
School. Mrs. Chapell is honored and excited to serve and advocate for the students and community at Benjamin Banneker Middle School and looks forward to leading alongside the staff, students, and families to strengthen and build upon the school's many successes. Shout outs to her mother, Shannon,
and her friends and family watching from Maryland, Virginia, and Nevada. Motion to approve. Second, there's a motion and a second. All in favor, please raise your hand. That's unanimous.
Congratulations. Next up for consideration is Miss Sonora J. James for the position of principal at Fairland Elementary School. Joining her today is her husband, Benjamin Johnson, and two of her five
children, India and Jason and her colleagues, Shanice Brevard, Carrie Whittington, Doctor Joshua Find, James. Ulrich, Penny Santos and Anne
Dondarrion. Miss James has been employed with M.C.P.S. for 28 years as a teacher, instructional specialist, staff development teacher, consulting teacher, assistant principal, principal intern and most recently as the Assistant Principal at Benjamin Banneker Middle School. Miss James is
looking forward to embracing the new students, staff and families at Fairland Elementary School. Shout outs to her mother Carmen, and her mentors, Gary Barty. Trevino, Trevino Nelson and Doctor Jane Ennis,
who are watching online. But I see Doctor Jane Ennis is here today, so she made a surprise visit as well. Motion to approve. Second, there's a motion and a second. All in favor, please raise your hand.
That's unanimous. Congratulations. Our last appointment for the board's consideration this afternoon is Mr. Justin. A crop for the position of principal at
Francis Scott Key Middle School. Joining him today is his wife, Brittany. His daughters, Charlie and Andy, his father, Richard, his mother, Eileen and brother Billy, which are both M.C.P.S. employees. Mr. crop
has been employed with M.c.p.s for 14 years as a substitute. Paraeducator special education teacher, assistant principal and most recently as a principal intern at Albert Einstein High School. He is excited to join the Francis Scott Key Middle School team, where he looks forward to
serving students, staff, and the entire community to ensure that every student thrives and is well prepared for a successful transition to high school and beyond. Shout out to Mr. Mark Brown junior, the principal at Albert Einstein High School, for his example and mentorship and trust and
commitment in developing new leaders in the district. Motion to approve. Second, there's a motion and a second. All in favor, please raise your hand. That's unanimous.
Congratulations, Jim. Thank you, Madam President. This concludes administrative appointments for today. Thank you everyone. Congratulations again to all of you. We look forward to great work in many years to come with
M.c.p.s. Our next is public comment. During this transition time I will read quickly the standard verbiage. The next item on the agenda is public comment. While the board encourages public input on
policy, program and practices and will consider the comments received, it is not the board's practice during its public meeting to respond to questions, provide comment or take action on the issues raised. This is a
little bit. I'm going to pause. Seems like we are going through a transition. I'm going to pause until the boardroom can return to order. There's a lot of excitement here. Must mean
we appointed some great leaders today. Madam president, this is exciting. It's a lot to eight. It's a lot to. Tis the season. Yeah. Thank you everybody who came to support our new leaders who were appointed today. And thank you for allowing us the
chance to transition. Yeah. So it's recorded. I read the first paragraph. Let me go on for the second paragraph. All right. So this is a public meeting. And the board expect expects to condof all speakers and members of the audience to be
within the bounds of proper etiquette. Inappropriate personal personal remarks, rude retorts or other such behavior is out of order and will not be tolerated. Those who demonstrate disruptive or disrespectful disrespectful
behavior during public comment may be asked to leave the room. In addition, public comment is not the proper avenue to address specific student or employee matters. Such matters should be directed through the complaint or appeal process.
Each speaker has two minutes to deliver comments when your name is called, press the button and speak clearly into the microphone. A yellow light and a single be indicate you have 30s remaining. A red light and
repeating beep signal that time has expired. Once you have finished speaking, press the same button to turn off the microphone. Following live testimony, audio and audio testimony will be played. Copy of testimony are posted with
the other material for this meeting. On board docs. I'm going to call the first eight people to come to the front. Please fill up the seat from my left side to my right. First
one is Bill Chen. Lula. Wheat. DeWitt. Lu DeWitt. Mohammed Ben. Monsieur. La loggia. Shepreth.
Sreepathi. Christine. Handy. David. Stein.
Bill. Go ahead. Good afternoon, Doctor Taylor and members of the board. My name is Bill Chen, and I am a rising junior in the Stem program at Montgomery Blair High School. I'm here today to discuss my concerns with the new program, changes regarding
a shift from countywide programs to a regional model for many students, including me, the most important thing that a program can offer to us is a community of like minded individuals. The Stem program at Blair fosters a close
environment of students with similar passions, providing a sense of belonging and a source of healthy competition and support. Splitting the countywide programs into six smaller regional programs will inevitably weaken these communities, heavily defeating
one of the main motivations for attending a program. Why? I believe that access to programs is a big problem in MCPs. This regional model will not be an effective solution. In addition to the problems mentioned before, the new model is expected to be complete by 2027,
which is nowhere near enough time to transition successfully. It takes time to find and train teachers who are capable of running these special classes and doing it within two years for one program is already difficult, but doing it for six
is impossible. Furthermore, the model mentions how it will fix the problem of long travel times that current students and programs deal with. However, under the new regional model, some students endure commute times of more than an hour,
which is even longer than many commutes currently. In the end, the regional model not only fails to solve many of the issues it was created for, but also destroys programs and communities that students have cherished for decades, something that takes years to build back up. We should
instead expand and replicate the already successful programs. I highly urge you to consider the consequences of accepting the regional model and what students decades into the future would lose. Thank you,
thank you Luo. Please go ahead. Good afternoon, Superintendent Taylor, president Yang and fellow members of the board. My name is DeWitt and I'm a rising sophomore at Northwood High School. I've come before you all today to speak on the status of northwood's delayed construction and the reality that despite being asked to
sacrifice more than any other school, our priorities are consistently placed last. When the Woodward site was chosen to serve as the holding facility for the Northwood community, the phase one proposals intentionally excluded an auditorium and stadium field, knowingly guaranteeing that the Northwood community would go years without quintessential spaces for performances,
assemblies, and actual home athletics. Since these announcements, Montgomery County's very own Capital Improvement Program, or CIP, spanning from 2025 to 2030, claimed that Northwood's construction was scheduled to be completed in September 2025 and now in the most recent CIP cycle. The goal is August 2027,
a full two years from now. In this time, Northwood students and staff have been expected to attend a holding site that lacks an auditorium and stadium, meaning our community will spend three years without the core facilities that every other high school in the county gets to enjoy. Personally, as a student involved in numerous extracurriculars, I rely on my parents to pick me up in these
places throughout the county, nowhere near me for competitions, games and performances solely because there is no other way to attend and be a part of these events due to this lack of facilities. So imagine the burden of the 1800 other students of Northwood involved in extracurriculars. To us, it feels like M.C.P.S. has asked Northwood shoulder the costs
that come with system wide growth, while the other ambitions of M.c.p.s receive priority. Why is it that we are stripped of our high school experience to accommodate a schedule we have spent too long being flexible for? So today I stand for the 1800 other students of who are just as deserving of the complete high school experience as any other
M.c.p.s student, and I ask this board to make a clear commitment to ending delays, delivering facilities on time, and providing resources and support for the students who have lost so much. Please don't ask another generation Northwood students to graduate without experiencing high school in its entirety. Thank
you Mohammed. Good afternoon, Doctor Taylor. Members of the Board of Education. My name is Mohammed bin Mansoor and I'm a senior at Northwest High School. Today, I speak not only as a student, but also as a human, impacted by my environment and surroundings. The condition of
our school facilities, not only in terms of infrastructure but also of general design, is urgent. Our schools are too hot, too cold, with poor air quality, thin walls and harsh lighting. Students carry layers to stay warm on an 80 degree day, which distracts from their education.
The lighting makes us feel like subjects and not like people. And most of all, our schools lack communal and welcoming spaces where students can connect and belong. And a study done by the Texas Association Association of School Boards students in Newark schools scored 6% higher in English proficiency. And in that same study, exposure to natural
daylight led to 20% faster math learning and 26% 26% faster reading gains. And physically, we are impacted to Harvard Schools for health confirmed that ventilation, thermal comfort and lighting are directly linked to mental health focus and immune system strengths, and we can mutually
agree that school belonging allows students to attend more, achieve more and feel better. Overall, the constant disregard for school facilities and their quality are impacting us academically and physically. M.C.P.S. his own policy, FAA promises input from impacted
communities within facilities planning, yet it falls short. Student and staff is the very people who live and learn in these spaces nearly every day are often left out, or only brought into the picture after the major design choices have been made. It is vital for the very students and staff that exist within these spaces to be
included in discussions, decisions and designs concerning our buildings. With investments in healthy infrastructure and communal spaces, it would help schools across M.c.p.s achieve the general mission of fostering learning and belonging. I am one voice, but I know for a fact I speak for, if not all, the majority of students of
M.c.p.s. Thank you. Lawyer. Hello members of the board. I am Lucy Sripathi, a member of the robotics team. 25611 I'm a part of the Robotics Alliance, a student led initiative representing every single kid in Montgomery County who is interested in robotics. We are all here today to tell you
about the issues that robotics faces in our county and how we can fix them. A study conducted highlights the impact that robotics has on closing the gender gap. When it comes to jobs in Stem, 53% of female alumni from robotics programs are working in Stem related job, and 77% want to work in Stem.
To put it simply, robotics has a profound influence on the educational environment of our county. All good things don't come without their share of problems. Every single team in Montgomery County has run into their fair share of funding issues. Take my team for example. Our coaches are having to pay over $3,000 due to a
lack of monetary support from organizations in the form of grants or sponsorships. Due to this money going to places such as team registration and qualifier costs, we are unable to afford equipment to further our learning. One of the main things we wanted to do was learn how to use a 3D printer
and create designs online, but we weren't able to access one readily. Which leads me to my next point a lack of centralized machine shops available for tools such as CNC machines and 3D printers. This hindered our chances of advancement, as we were unable to access 3D printers close to our location, we were forced to rely on 3D printers located in
our members schools, which meant we couldn't get the parts on time when we needed them. Everyone has different definitions of the word robotics. The dictionary defines robotics as technology dealing with design, construction, and operations of robot and automation. For you, it may be just the same to us.
Robotics means so much more. It means solving problems and innovating. It means having fun with their peers. It means participating in competitions and making connections that last a lifetime. The only thing we are asking from you to preserve this opportunity for our community is a committee just for robotics to provide us
with a direct line of communication so we can work together to resolve these issues. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Christine Handy. Good afternoon. I would like to address working conditions within the Division of Human Resources and Talent Management.
We recognize that July and August are peak months for hiring. Our staffing coordinators are dedicated to ensuring every vacancy is filled, every hire is cleared, and every employee is paid accurately and on time. But the current workload is unsustainable. Many coordinators work 12 to 16
hours a day and put in additional hours on Saturday and Sunday. That is the equivalent of two full time jobs. This level of sacrifice cannot be the expectation in M.C.P.S. the structure we previously had, which separated staff and employees by union,
was more effective. Combining SEIU and NACA under one person has created overwhelming demands because of the complexity of the contracts and processes. We broke a system that wasn't broken. The distribution of assignments is inequitable. Three coordinators serve one cluster, which
typically comprises about ten schools, while the others manage 18 or more schools, effectively doubling the workload. When hiring for both SEIU and NACA positions, it's like 36 schools. On top of that, using the Hub Plus system frequently results in errors.
Add to this the intricacies of the new pay structures in the SEIU contract for Paraeducators, which makes completing the para griot even more complex and time consuming. Now add limited time for training and learning the contracts. This combination has made the workload
unmanageable. Our employees are committed, but they are not robots. We must recognize the limits of human capacity for the sake of our employees and the integrity of our system. Our urge, Doctor Taylor and the Board of Education to conduct a thorough review of the current
model and to restore staff capacity and equity for next year. And I urge you to consider what can we do right now to reduce the workload on the employees in this department, as as it is simply not sustainable. Thank you.
David Stein. Good afternoon, president Yang, Superintendent Taylor and members of the Board of Education. It's good to be with you all as we begin a new school year. Is it just me or do you all feel like we've been running a marathon since the end of last year? And, and I think the next year is going to
feel like an ultramarathon, but I mean, that's okay. I like to get my steps in the the first step that M.c.p.s needs to take is ensuring that educators are paid in full and on time for their work. Like most other families in our community, educators can ill afford. Ill
afford not to be paid on time. Any remaining issues with Hub Plus must be addressed immediately, and action must be taken to prevent this from ever occurring again. Anything less is unacceptable. This was a summer of getting things wrong, but let's have a year of getting things right. NACA is
very excited to begin the implementation of the negotiated improvements and professional autonomy. Over planning time, we expect M.c.p.s to take steps to ensure that the new planning time policy is implemented accurately and consistently across all of its work sites.
And there are also steps that we can take together that we're going to need to take together. If we're going to strengthen public education in Montgomery County last year by combining our forces, by speaking out, testifying, rallying, the council heard us and funded a budget focused on helping students learn and excel,
particularly our special education students and emergent multilingual learners. But this year, we can anticipate facing more headwinds in our efforts to pass a budget that needs to tackle even bigger issues like staffing ratios and last year's Hail Mary. That from the county
council was a one time fix. And all of us here know that we need long term funding solutions, not one term fixes. We are going to have to work harder, dig deeper and fight like hell for a budget that is going to do right by our students, families, and educators. I believe that if the public education community
comes together, including parents, families and allies, we can get this done. We can build a stronger and more robust school system that meets all of our students needs and helps them achieve and thrive. So let's get going. Thank you. Thank you to all of you. I'm
going to call the next set of six to come forward. IT storage and Hoffman Catherine Stocker. Jack Thorne, Ronnie Pugh. Makita, Helen Marion. And
Daniel Lagache. Dorigen. Go ahead. President Yang and members of the board. My name
is Dorian Hoffman and I am a cluster coordinator for the Walter Johnson Cluster. This week we had our summer area meeting and heard from 100 students, parents and staff. Thank you to the board members who also attended. No matter the cluster, many of the themes about the boundary study were
the same, and we are pleased to see those themes echoed in MCPs presentation later today, particularly the importance of walk zones, proximity and stability in our school boundaries. We do continue to have concerns, of course, three of which I'll discuss first,
planning for growth. One continued omission is planning boundaries with future development in mind. Areas of our cluster have seen tremendous growth, with thousands of more units on the horizon. Despite M.C.P.S. dated assumptions, these units will
have students and may be must be considered now. Not when schools are bursting at the seams in this planning needs to include elementary schools, transportation. We see m.c.p.s. Has begun a transportation study. Thank you. We encourage
the board to consider what transportation will truly cost. Real rush hour time, safety of routes, availability of public transportation, and environmental impacts of different boundary maps. Some of the initial options would definitely negatively impact students due to longer
transportation times and higher costs. Finally, program implementation. Our cluster is concerned about the details and implementation of the new regional model. For instance, will the new model take away from what the current what is currently available locally? We
see the core AP classes being promised to all schools, but WJ and hopefully Woodward currently offers many more AP and high level classes to all students. Will those be eliminated? Second sex successful local programs such
as WJZ Apex program should continue if they turn into a regional program, only many current students would be excluded. Thank you very much. Thank you, Catherine Stockton. Hello, my name is Kathy Stocker.
Thank you all for your hard work and effort during this time of consequential change for our county. I would like to share some serious concerns I have about the program analysis. GW Professor Doctor Jerry Harvey described The Road to Abilene Paradox, a story in which he describes a hot and dusty Texas day when a
well-meaning dad suggests to his family that they all go to Abilene for ice cream. Everyone goes along with the idea because they assume that everyone else wants to go, when in fact no one wants to go. I'm going to be the cranky person in the car and ask, where are we going? And why are we doing this? With respect to everyone
who has been working hard on this plan and analysis, I do not understand the underlying vision or purpose of these proposed changes. What problem are we trying to solve? Who does this plan benefit? What evidence do we have that this plan can be operationalized and cost effective? I spent my summer meeting with school
communities about the boundary analysis. We're all hearing a lot of feedback that proximity, geography, and neighborhood schools are a priority for our community, but this program analysis introduces a framework that blows apart any potential boundary proposal and threatens the fundamental cohesion of our community based schools. This
plan, I worry, already jeopardizes excellent programs and creates space that creates space and resource scarcity and local programs that are already working. Building these programs takes years. Professional training and community support. We have great results at B-cc. For example, a program, an IB
program which is open to all students at B-cc. That program, though, has benefited from aggressive volunteer and financial support and investment from a private, community based foundation. It required years of effort and commitment to build an excellent and equitable program. I respect the well-intended
ambition, but we need to hit the pause button and slow down. And let's enjoy our ice cream at home until we have a clear direction, purpose and plan about which we can all agree. Thank you all for your service to the families of Montgomery County. Thank you Jack. Tara.
Great. Good afternoon and thank you for the chance to speak with you all. My name is Jack. I'm a parent to a rising sixth grader, Julius West Middle School, three kids at Bell Elementary School, and two more kids who are coming after them. We will have kids at M.c.p.s through 2042 back in business.
Thank you. And we need and we need you. And we really appreciate the work that you're doing. I myself am an alum of all those schools. We moved back here in 2020 and I'm always growing up was amazed. And today I'm even more amazed at how many students and how
well they're educated. By M.C.P.S. So thank you for all that work. I am here to talk and to give some context and defense for the IB program less from like an analytical programmatic level, but more from an emotional level. Doctor Taylor had in one of the communications to the M.c.p.s
community, had said that we should be able to have our cake and eat it too. I would take that extending the ice cream analogy and say the IB cake took a lot of work. That program started when I was two years old. It is the product, not just of a curriculum that
came out in a PDF. It's it has been built into what it is a world leading program through iterative, passionate inputs from teachers, from the community, from generations of students passing on not just lessons learned, but like a
culture of intellectual curiosity and excellence. That cake is really valuable. It has many challenges to it. I'm very appreciative and supportive of the effort to say every kid in M.c.p.s should have access to an absolutely excellent education. You all have a hard job. That's not an easy thing
to solve for. What I want to say is that the RMI BBQ is special. It took a lot of work and we should be very careful about discarding it, taking apart the ingredients, or thinking that it's something that can be easily copied and pasted. We're going to be here
a long time, decades. Be very glad to share more and just encourage you to learn about that program, how it came to be. I think my dad has some of the old papers in his basement. From what it looks like, it just understand the passion that that community has and look forward to working with
you to to make it a good thing into the future. Thank you, Ronnie Peel. Hi, I'm Rodney Peel. I'm here today as a rich Montgomery cluster coordinator. Many, many people think that commanders are Super Bowl contender this year, hoping they made the right adjustments
to advance further than last year. Few people are as optimistic about the M.C.P.S. regional program proposal. M.C.P.S. is promising results, but there's no plan. There's no resources, and there's no central office track record of
success. Opening two new high schools puts pressure on the operating budget. But where are the creative solutions? Where is the comprehensive transportation analysis? We you want to complete the programs analysis to inform the boundary study, but the timeline to create multiple new programs and multiple schools that
students will have to apply to next year is unachievable. It's not fair to students, and it's not equitable. You need to retain broad access to the programs that are working at Blair, at Richard Montgomery, at Poolesville, Whitman and elsewhere, and you need to retain that access for much longer than one more year, and
you need to make time for engagement with students, families, staff, communities and other stakeholders. So far, we haven't had that engagement. We've had non-disclosure agreements and a flawed survey, and MCPs should present balanced information about the challenges and options. Since
May, we've invited MCPs to come to MMB to discuss the programs. Months have come by. No one has come, so don't just come to present what you've already decided and promise things that can't be delivered. Come share ideas and listen. Six years ago,
m.c.p.s. Tried to replace the countywide IB magnet program with regional programs and then promised not to eliminate the countywide program until regional options were comparable. And after six years, the data shows that those programs aren't the same. MCPs admitted that no one chooses to
go to the regional IB programs when they could contend attend the countywide program instead. So why are you trying to replace programs with other regional alternatives? Why are you promising to do in one year what you haven't been able to do in six? We can't count on a
Hail Mary. Thank you. Makita, Jimmy and Marion. Good afternoon, Doctor Taylor and members of the board. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak before you today. My name is Doctor Hailemariam. I am a mother of a rising third grader and kindergartner at
Bradley Hills Elementary School and a resident of the neighborhood. I would like to address two factors taken into account during the boundary study. As the mother of black children, a predominantly white community, I deeply understand the importance of diversity. It matters greatly for my children
to see others who look like them in their classrooms and hallways and not feel like the only one. But this raises a critical question at what cost does diversity mean children? My children may have to leave behind their friends. They've grown up with friends who have become like family. Does it mean being separated from a
school community that has embraced them and provided stability and support? At this stage of their life? School communities are the core of children's social world. Uprooting them would not only disrupt these essential bonds, but also place unnecessary strain on their mental and emotional well-being. In my
view, that disruption outweighs any potential benefit of attending a more diverse school when the change is forced rather than chosen. While families and children choose a change, when families and children choose a change, students thrive because they are welcoming the new environment. But that is very
different from the disruption caused by rezoning. As an immigrant who moved frequently after arriving in the United States, I have personally experienced the harm of instability and the pain of not belonging to a community. I know many of the international families in our district can
relate. Our family goal in moving to Bethesda was put down to put down roots and build lasting connections. We have finally found the sense of community through our children's school friendship. Please don't ask us to start over again. I strongly urge you to consider the deep impact that split articulation and
rezoning would have, not only on our children, but on the community as a whole. Lastly, I want to acknowledge the lack of diversity in our schools reflects the lack of diversity in our neighborhoods. Bussing students from different areas may temporarily, may be a temporary solution, but is only only be a small Band-Aid if the
county instead focuses on addressing barriers that prevent families of diverse backgrounds from living in our neighborhoods, there would be no need to redistrict schools for the to create diverse student body. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Jack
Lagowski. Good afternoon. My name is Danny Legacy. I have two students who attend our. Oh, sorry, Daniel. I said your name wrong. No, that's all right. Sorry. I'm just trying to get through. So I have two students who attend Arcola Elementary, and I am here to advocate for zoning. Option three for the
DCC. The Down County consortium is starkly divided by class, race and outcome. Now, when people think of the topic of segregation, they think of like Alabama, Alabama Governor George Wallace, and they think of segregation as this bygone problem that has been solved. However, the problem is,
although George Wallace has gone 60 years later, segregation is entrenched in Montgomery County. Now, last year, the American Sociological Association determined that racial segregation is still a primary factor driving the achievement gap in the United States. They provided two solutions more equitable school
assignment policies and establishing connections between disparate communities. Now, to me, that sounds like zone option three of the four potential zoning options provided by M.C.P.S. for the Down County consortium, only one addresses segregation. The
others do not. Option four grossly exacerbates it. And I'd like to remind us all that a key objective of the county is, and I quote in their mission statement, the county will identify and eliminate any institutional barriers to student success. Segregation is,
for the last 60 years, been one of the most identified barriers to academic success in the United States. Now, there are many parents who are reactive and resistant to change. I'm a parent of two students. I would like to say that their fear ista negative impact on their
students and their high school experience. However, what are we teaching our students? Are we teaching them that doing the right thing and making our community a better place only matters when it's convenient, and there are no negative outcomes, or sometimes is doing the right thing and making your
community a better place. Does that require some effort and sacrifice from those that are already benefiting from the status quo? So thank you very much. I will be teaching my children that it is actions, not slogans, that define you as a person, and I would like to advocate for zoning. Option
three. Thank you. Go birds. Thank you. I'm going to call the next set of parents to come forward as. Does not. Please Amy Akbar Hastings. Couple K
Kayla, Bridget Meyer and I think the rest are these for the rest are audio and video. All right. Please go ahead. Good afternoon and thank you. One benefit of transplanting my
life from Philadelphia to Olney is being able to appreciate what's great about Montgomery County without taking anything for granted. That's especially true of M.c.p.s, which provided my children with a world class education. I sometimes wonder how liberal arts majors like Beth and I got such Stem
focused kids whose resumes range from Microsoft and Booz Allen Hamilton to the NIH. But they are who they're meant to be. The magnet program at Montgomery Blair High School, which all three of my children attended, is a big part of that. I don't like singling out one of my kids over the others, but
my son George is an instructive example. George's senior research project from Blair was the foundation for the 2018 winner of the NSA's Best Scientific Cybersecurity Paper competition. George, who was a sophomore at UMD when it was awarded, was credited as the lead author a very rare
distinction for an undergrad. I'm sure this kind of achievement can be the norm across M.c.p.s, but getting there involves treating the Blair magnet as a model for how other programs can bring out the best in their students, not in stripping it down for parts.
The regional approach being debated for special programs is clearly well intentioned. Expanding access and improving equity are worthy goals, but how goals are pursued matters. Dismantling a program with a multi-generational history of academic excellence would not
just be an affront to the values M.C.P.S. prizes, but also counter to the aims supposedly being pursued, even if m.c.p.s. Can find enough teachers to start this effort in the 2027 school year. Simply assigning them to various schools won't in itself make
programs overnight. The Blair Magnet isn't a static entity coasting on its reputation. It's a team that constantly challenges themselves to meet the needs of children. Like mine. For years, it served as a guiding light for its students. It can and should play that role for other programs within
M.c.p.s. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, Amy. Good afternoon, President Yang and members of the Board of Education, Doctor Taylor and M.c.p.s staff. My name is Amy Acker Berg Hastings. I am the parent of a Richard Montgomery High School senior
and the Central Area Vice president for MCPs PTA. I am here today to share questions that stakeholders in our communities are asking about the logistics for the proposed regional secondary programs. Please see my written testimony for additional queries. The
county wide magnets and comparable existing programs are so successful, in part because they were built on grassroots foundations. How will M.c.p.s engage with local energy and leadership to stand up multiple new programs simultaneously? When is Central
Office going to seek buy in from administrators, teachers and staff? Why is so much institutional memory and pedagogical experience from current programs being left on the sidelines? Where are the quantitative and qualitative data documenting what students are looking for from from
programs boosting participation by underserved student cohorts is an important goal. But how will existing disparities in demographics and special education be addressed before eighth grade? So all students are academically and emotionally prepared to choose programs? What are the actual
cost projections for the proposed regional programs, and how do they compare to current expenditures? Is M.C.P.S. able to invest the resources necessary to create rigorous, well-organized programs? For months now, MCPs has come
across as rushing through the program's analysis in order to replace countywide and local programs with regional programs. However, there is no harm to students in slowing down and giving thoughtful consideration to each step. Advocates will ep coming here and asking
MCPs to pause the program analysis long enough to work out the details. Because taking the time to do this right is simply good fiscal, educational, and societal stewardship. Thanks for your attention.
Thank you. Gopal Carla. Make sure you have the sheet with place on it. It just changed my comedy, I just. Okay, okay. Go ahead. Yeah. Good afternoon. My
name is Gopal Kaler and I would like to present some objections to the abolition of countywide programs proposed on July 24th. My first objection is that we need the countywide programs to compete with programs across the river. Like Thomas Jefferson. Our programs are
competitive because they access the broadest pool of high achieving students. They are consistently nationally recognized and crucial in attracting new businesses and residents to this country, to this county. Given the smaller pool of advanced students
available to each regional program, it is statistically improbable that six programs would all be equally competitive with one another and with institutions such as Thomas Jefferson. My next objection derives directly from
the July 24th presentation. Miss Franklin pointed to students preference for attending countywide programs over regional ones. It's natural. The regional programs are young, literally. They have graduated two cohorts, while the countywide programs have been building their reputation
for decades. In addition, the countywide programs select from a larger pool, and statistically speaking, the cohorts may consist of high achieving students. So naturally, many students might prefer to attend these programs. If anything, this problem should tell us how difficult it
is to set up a program and grow it to national prominence, and why dismantling such program is a blunder. It is extremely misleading to compare the transportation requirements of an established countywide program with those of regional programs that are still trying to find their footing, and then
use that comparison to advocate for the elimination of countywide programs. It was also suggested that the regional programs do not have some IB classes that ARM has. If regional programs are unfairly provided with less resources, then we should provide them with more, give
them more teachers, more course offerings, but instead, abolishing the countywide programs is irrational. It's punishing them for doing well. I'm just going to skip the last one. So while establishing new regional programs is commendable, abolishing the countywide programs is not the
solution. Thank you, thank you. Please go ahead. Good afternoon. My name is Doctor Bridget Meyer and I work in special education in central Services. It's been seven months since we were informed of the elimination of numerous positions, including
my own. In that time, I felt that you've dismissed my work as unnecessary central office bloat. Despite these months, we remain in limbo with leadership vacancies and no transparent plan. Doctor Taylor, you assured us that all staff would have a position, although
perhaps not the job we wanted. At the CPAC meeting earlier this year, you acknowledged the parents, that special education has long been under-resourced and new positions would be added to directly support students. This board adopted a culture of respect policy, yet
there is no plan for the unchanged scope of work. Special education cuts were widespread at central services. Per the MoU. Between M.c.p.s and MCE, job duties would be commensurate with allocation. But on July 1st, those of us
whose positions were eliminated were told to incorporate all former duties into our new roles. As a result, for example, I am supporting the special education needs at 20 schools and doing my prior job. Let me be clear I'm working two jobs
being paid for one here at M.c.p.s. We are used to consistently working beyond our duty day, taking on extra responsibilities which are labeled as other duties as assigned. What is happening today is far worse, far more egregious. I care deeply about
this work, but how does this workload reflect a culture of respect? It's unreasonable, unsustainable, and shows a troubling disregard for staff contributions. The amount of work in Central Office for Special Education did not change, but the people to carry
it out significantly did. You gave the community the impression that there would be more direct, special education support in schools, but if we are expected to do the operational work of all the position cuts, how is that possible? Thank you, MCPs, TV,
please roll the three video testimony. Good afternoon. My name is Susan Jenkins and I'm the CEO of the Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County. I'm here today to talk to you about some very important work that we're doing for the county. We are working on a new cultural plan
for Montgomery County. Why would we do this? Well, in the last couple of years, we have gone to many communities throughout the county asking, how can Montgomery County help its residents, lead culturally rich lives and best support community backed priorities
through arts, culture and the humanities? And the community came back and said, well, what's important to us is the concept of belonging, the concept of intersectionality, and the concept of cultural resiliency. So as we consider
the plan, we wondered what objectives would we want to meet? Well, we decided that we need to establish cultural policies for Montgomery County for the next ten years that cohesively advance these community backed priorities for arts, culture and humanities
and that coalesce with thrive 2050, the county's new general plan. We also want to provide specific, actionable steps for CMC, MNC, PPC, the County Council, and the arts, culture and humanities organizations that align with the county's
resources across all of its agencies through a cultural lens that would address funding, facilities and land use programing, educational activities and catalytic projects, and the management of community planning and land development. And so as we
consider how to incorporate the community's voice in this plan, your attention to this is important because it will impact students and families that are here in Montgomery County. So I want to thank you so much for the opportunity to
come today to talk to you a little bit about the cultural plan, and I invite you to our website at Creative Commons that will tell you more about the planning process and how to get in touch with us. Thanks again for this opportunity. I
am Megan Gudelsky and this past February, our families world shattered. My children lost their father in a tragic car accident, and my sister Aaron's children lost their beloved uncle. My husband Morty and I were on our way to Bethesda to
be there when our children returned home from school that day, we never made it. As I recovered from my injuries, the first clear memory I have is a draft email written by Mr. and Mrs. Kemp. The principal's joint message on behalf of the Pyle and Bradley Hills School brought me to tears not only
for what had been lost and our new reality, but because it showed immediate United support when I couldn't even yet stand on my own. That support extended to Aaron as well, as we both struggled to to care for our five devastated children, Quincy and Mac, going into sixth and seventh grade at Pyle and Violet, Poppy and Lane
going into fifth, fourth and third grade at Bradley Hills. In many ways, that email symbolized the foundation of this community, the one that has held us up ever since. That unwavering support from Pyle, Bradley Hills, Whitman and the families here has carried us through. That doesn't happen by
chance. I spent the last 13 years building and investing in this community. Aaron and Rich saw the same strength and chose to move their family here from Malibu seven years ago. Together we poured in our time, energy, and love. None of us ever expected anything in return. Now, after such
unimaginable loss, we cannot endure another. To break apart this community would cause lifelong damage. Please, I beg of you not to tear apart. With so many of us have worked so hard for so long to build, we've already lost too much that cannot be replaced. It is
the one place that still feels safe and is the only foundation that we have left. All five children, Quincy, Violet, Mac and Poppy and our families are depending on this community to hold. Hi, my name is Amelia Lancaster and I'm a rising
senior in the Humanities Magnet program at Poolesville High School. I'm here today because I strongly oppose the proposal to replace countywide magnet programs with smaller regional programs. Being surrounded by exceptionally high achieving, humanities minded people has done so much for me. They've motivated me and pushed me to
be better and I learn so much from them. From high quality discussions in English class to creative projects in art history, my educational experience has been enriched by my classmates in a way that simply would not be possible with smaller regional programs. Poolesville is an extremely competitive school, and as a result, I've been consistently
pushed to perform at a higher level. I've taken more difficult classes that I wouldn't have otherwise taken, and I've been better for it. If I had been at a regional magnet program, this likely would not be the case, since the competitive nature at Poolesville would be extremely difficult to replicate with a smaller magnet population.
Before I had magnet programs available to me, I was extremely bored in school and not challenged in the slightest by my classes. In elementary school, my teachers would use me as a teacher's aide of sorts, since they had to meet others needs before my own. And when I was finally able to enter a magnet program, it made the
world of difference for me. Teachers have such a range of needs to meet in their classes that they have to teach to the majority of the class, which means that the needs of the more high achieving students simply aren't met without rigorous magnet programs. High school magnet programs have already been diluted in purpose by turning them into a lottery
system, instead of one that is solely merit based. To further dilute these magnet programs by turning them into smaller regional programs would be to do a disservice to all of the students who need a rigorous educational environment to challenge them. While I certainly understand the need for greater equity within these magnet programs, I don't think
that further diluting their purpose is the way to accomplish this goal. For this reason, I urge you to not replace countywide magnet programs with smaller regional programs. Thank you. Thank you. I'm going to open up for comments and questions for my
board members. I'm going to start from my left hand side. Mr. please go ahead. Yes. My right. Sorry. My right hand
side. Here we go. I wanted to go back to Northwood. And what do we expect? When? At Northwood? At Woodward. As far
as the auditorium, I wasn't quite sure if they would get access to the auditorium before the three years were up. And also, we heard about the design
of the building, and I don't know if some of that. Testimony was because there's still some interior that needs to be done. All right. So the speakers, you
can return to your seat while the staff come forward to answer questions. Thank you for your testimony and comments today. When staff come forward, please introduce yourself first and then go ahead and set the questions. And the second part is that is. I've also heard
that Northwood itself, not just Northwood, Woodward. There's some questions in the community whether that's going to be ready. So if we could just get a very brief overview of where the pieces are. Yeah. Yes. Hi. Good afternoon everyone. Andrea Sueoka, the deputy chief of
facility management. I'll start with the Northwood building that will be open for August of 2027. The concerns and probably clarity on the date probably predates many, many years ago, but we are on track to open for
August 2027, so I'll just keep it as simple as that. The auditorium will not open until August of 2027 at the Woodward site. So that is correct that the current Northwood students will not have that. They have a black box theater, but they
will not have the full auditorium available while they're there, as like they're holding center and then the field. The goal is to have the field available for them for next fall season. So fall of 2026, it is correct that they do not have that right now. Okay. Okay. I appreciate that.
It's good to have that update because we do hear about different dates in the community. Thanks. Thank you, Miss Rivera. Evans thank you. Thank you for the update. I just wanted to thank the students for coming a week
before school. They can still come around this time. And and I wanted to address the young people who are here with the Robotics Robotics group. It just pains me that we still in this county, we have an equity
issue when it comes to programs like robotics. And it's I would like us to find ways to be able to support these after school programs, because I see the inequities and disparities, especially in my district, as
somebody who has supported robotics for high school and other schools, it is really on the shoulders and support of the community, and I just feel very strongly that we have such amazing young people in our
community who want to do after school programs, but there are some schools who can and some schools who absolutely can't because they just don't have the the finances to back them up. And that is a shame. So I'm hoping that we can do a little
better. I know Montgomery County is an incredible place. This is where I grew up. I'm a product of M.c.p.s. But I know you know the pain sometimes that it takes for for our kids to to be able to do the extracurricular activities. And Stem is so important and it's so important for our kids to be
engaged. So I want to say, I want to say thank you to the young people who came to testify. Thank you for the volunteers who do robotics. We have incredible institutions in this county, like NIST and others, who I think we need to tap into to be able to create
partnerships so they can actually be part of the solution. I'm all about solutions, so I'm looking forward to that conversation. And I'll and I'll just end by saying, I just want to give my most heartfelt condolences to Mrs. Gudelsky for the loss of
her husband and a loss of a father, and a loss of our member and our community. Can imagine what that would be like. So I just wanted to say my condolences and anything we can do to make this transition of the school year for for her and her kiddos better. But that's
all. Thank you, Miss Wolff. Yes, I want to thank everybody who came to testify today, but I particularly want to address Mr. Stein of MCE. You know, we we recognize the concerns
raised by your constituents regarding pay. And I completely agree, some of the things that went on this summer really need some serious work. I want to let you know that we recognize it. We understand. We know that
many of our employees live paycheck to paycheck and that they have bills. We have bills ourselves, so we're completely sympathetic. I also want to echo some of what Miss Rivera Oven says. We have a lot of inequities in this county, and
I know that change is very hard. I want to thank I believe it was Donald Klees for for coming out on option three. That's not to say that I support option three, but I appreciate his comments about sometimes this
is difficult work and everybody's not going to be happy. But I think it's necessary work to look at the inequities we have around the county. Thank you, Miss Silvestri. Thank you. Just wanted to give you all thank you. Thanks. For those of you
who testify around the programs analysis, the program expansion, I think we have a great opportunity here. And I hear you. And every time that you we present this and with your feedback, with the board's feedback, it only gets better
and better. And so we have a great opportunity to expand access to programs in this county. It's a once in a generation opportunity. And yes, we want to get it right. So please continue to make your voice heard, continue to tell
us how it can be improved so that we do do this. Well, thank you, Miss Zimmerman. Thank you. I wanted to. Also thank for the update and clarity on the
Northwood and Northwood at Woodward update. I'd like to align myself with the comments from my colleague Miss Wolff. I also want to express my appreciation for all the engagement on the program analysis and the boundary study.
I also look forward to today's presentation, as I'm sure many of you do, and look forward to the next set of refined boundaries coming out that the community can stay engaged on those. I also want to thank the staff members that came out to testify today, and those who
spoke on behalf of our staff. It's really important to hear from all of you. Thank you, Miss Malone. Yeah, I want to echo all of my colleagues statements and commend you all for coming out today, especially the students. I love seeing it, and your voice is the most powerful way to ensure that you're being heard. I do
want to say that as a student from Montgomery Blair's program, the magnet program specifically, I truly do empathize with a lot of the concerns being brought up. And I want to be clear that on both ends, I hope that there is strong communication about the future of these long lasting changes, because I
experience it daily. So many students and parents are going to be affected by it, and it's on both ends. What happens? And thank you everyone for coming out. Oh, Miss Montoya. Now the screen turn on. Please go ahead.
Thank you. I'd like to thank everyone for coming out, especially our students. I know you technically don't start school even until next week, so you could be doing all kinds of other things on your last week, but you chose to come down here and use your voice and even bring some of your student
colleagues. So I really appreciate that. And I'd especially like to commend the folks that were out there fighting for robotics equity. I know we heard from someone about a month ago, there's a packet that they provided that I've been thumbing through as well so that I can make sure that I learn more. But whether it's robotics or music or
theater or sports or any of the other multitude of programs that our children can engage in, I just think the important word here is that we make sure they all have equitable access. Right. I see some of our programs in some spaces in the county, or certain types of programs that could be on par
with like professional level programs. And I think that's fantastic, and I want that for our kids. But I want to make sure that our kids who are interested in other items also have access there and have the adequate supplies and tools they need for their passions as well. So again, I appreciate everyone coming. I also I
appreciate everyone coming to talk about the programs as well. It's important that we take all of this feedback. I know as a parent of two young children, I'm really excited about the idea that programs might be more accessible because I hear very often how some students don't even apply to the programs, because they already
know that their families can't get them there, because there isn't necessarily transportation. So I really look forward to continuing to hear community feedback and seeing options that we have to present. Thank you, thank you. I also want to thank everyone for coming out. As I listen,
the majority of the testimony and comments was on our program analysis. I think parents and students are right M.C.P.S. already have programs that work. The ♪magnet, the IB and many
other countywide programs and models have transformed lives and earned national recognition. And from how I see it, we need to increase access. Absolutely. But I want to ask, is the
answer to dismantle what is working? I absolutely want to preserve excellence, and I think we also need to definitely increase access. So I think this is a conversation that we need to have. We need
to invest in the teachers and bring the teachers in this conversation. I haven't heard teachers in this conversation. I want to grow our successful model and bring more students in. And and I think we all can
say equity and quality can go in hand in hand, and we can build what's already strong instead of tearing it down. So I think we all need to take a deep breath. Listen carefully, design pathways that actually
expand access, and then the future. Our children really depends on this. I echo the sentiment that we have this chance to get it right and let's get it right. So with that, I see no other lights.
That conclude today's public comment. Our next work session meeting will be on Thursday, September 4th. A signed up for public comment will open on Thursday, August 28th at 6 p.m.
in addition to online sign up for public comment. We allow for walk ins in person, same day sign up when space allows in order sign up in person. Please arrive at least 15 to 30
minutes before the start of the open session and checking with staff in person. Sign up will close 15 minutes before the board meeting begins and when all slots are filled. Thank you everyone, and let's move to the
next item on our agenda, which is consent items. Board members, are there any consent items that you would like to pull?
Yes. Mr. I would like to pull from 7.1 item 4979. So 7.1 okay, any other items to be pulled, Miss Montoya? Yes. Sorry, I'm
having an issue accessing board docs, but it's item 7.1. I think it was two three. Am I five? Okay, so item 7.1 okay, can I can I have a motion to
move the rest in blocked. Motion to move second? All in favor. There's a motion and a second. All in favor please raise your hand. That's unanimous. Thank you. And let's
look at the consent items. Mr. What's your question? Yes. So this item, if you just wait one second, I need to bring it up.
It is the. Study of IB and AP equity, and I just wanted to I know this I believe we've had this contract for this last year. And I just wanted to hear
how it's helped us to expand opportunities. Hi, I'm Jennifer, I'm the AP IB district coordinator, and we've been in partnership with Equal Opportunity Schools since 2016.
And in that time we have increased access, especially for underrepresented students just about every year. I think we took a little bit of a hit during Covid, but last year we increased by 978 students. And looking at the trend data, our
schools, all 19 of them, have been able to maintain or continue to increase access for students. And I'm also curious about. The not just getting
access, but how has the support been to actually get credit if they take the test? Are they taking the tests that those do? We have that kind of data. So support for students is a continuous conversation that
the schools are networking with. When we have professional development, many schools offer a learning skills kind of class. In the IB schools we call them approaches to learning. But a lot of the schools that are not IB are also offering kind of
like a resource class for students new to AP and IB to help them, as long as it fits in their schedule. And and then we're working to advocate, you know, to to work and see how we can use other staff in the schools to help support this, support the students and the
teachers. So I'm really happy to hear that. That's great news that we're increasing access. I'm always looking for what we can do in-house versus when we need help. And I think this is
something we should keep evaluating as we go through, because can we hold that thought? Because I want to ask something on your note on that. This is the consent item I pulled last year. And my question to the system is at
what point I understand we want to increase access at all for that, but doing the AP IB work to increase access? I see it as a systems work. So when we at the beginning don't have expertise and need help, I
fully support going have a contract with an outside organization that helps us, but we have this since 2016 and this is nine years. And I asked the same question last year to
say at what point the system we will learn enough ourselves to support us. You say, right, we have been making incremental progress. So at what points that we feel that we have equipped our staff and our
school to to do this work with our students so that we don't always rely on outside people to help us to say, how do we increase access for our students after nine years of contract? Thank you. I do
recall you bringing this up and that is a good question. That is something that we're going to have to evaluate whether or not this is something that we can scale up and, and take on at the district level. Same answer. And so the same answer
is the second time, I hope don't hear it the third time. So we we're going to have to currently this is our one person at the district level. So we're going to have to look and see what resources we have at the school level to be able to support students, to be able
to do that work. But I do hear your question, and we'll have to, as we move into this new budget season, determine whether or not that's something that we can stop doing in terms of using our outside resources to be able to do in the school house. Thank you. Julie, I
don't have anything to add, so you can move on, Miss Montoya. Thank you. I know Miss Stewart pulled it, but I would have if she did not. I am actually still confused as to what we're getting for our money. It's not
clear to me like what is actually being provided. Is it people that are giving ideas on how to reach out to students who maybe historically, quite frankly, not given opportunities to do these? I just that part is unclear to me. And I guess my second question
type comment is that I would join Miss Yang's confusion as to why we're still doing this after nine years, but I don't see the growth. I know we're going to have a presentation, I think, later today about that touches on this, but I believe
it's like only 19% of those students who take AP and IB exams are even maybe students who would qualify for free and reduced meals, for example, and things like that. So I guess I'm just unclear as to why. After nine years, we continue
to renew this. What we're even actually getting. I'm still unclear. Like when we pay this bill, what what do we get for that? Thank you. That's a good question. The main one of the main services that they provide is they create a survey. We call it the fall survey that
students take in ninth through 12th grade. And it is to find out their desires, their goals. Why are they in AP or IB class? Why are they not in AP, IB class or dual enrollment that's
also now included. You know what? What do they want to do after high school? What are some barriers that they experience that stop them or that they feel are in place? What are things that help them want to take the class or feel that they're doing well in the
class? And then so that comes from that survey goes out and and equal opportunity schools then correlates that data. And then our system OSA then provides demographic data. So we know who the students are, provides the academic data that
we have for grades testing. And then we put that all together. And then we get what we call insight cards. And so then a school can look at a student and see exactly what courses they have taken, what courses they might like to take, why they would do it, or why they
would not, and also teacher recommendations to say that this student, we think that they're not in an advanced course, but we really think they should try it. We believe in them and we want them to try it. And so then they become our outreach students. And then schools are able to have this list, and now they know what
students to go talk to and to have a trusted adult within the building to help encourage them and find out how can we help them make that decision if this is the right one for them to be in an AP, IB class or dual enrollment? Right. But but this particular vendor, this
particular contract is just that survey part that you're talking about. They also help us pull the list. Okay. So we've been doing this same survey. I'm sure there's been some modifications. Okay. Well hold on, hold on. So we've been doing this survey now for nine
years. That survey sounds like probably some survey I probably took in high school 35 years ago. And I know we also have all of these other. And I'm not gonna probably use the right vernacular, but different organizations and entities that help with like college planning and post-high school plans and even my elementary school kids
come home sometimes talking about the career people that came in, telling them they have to pick a job today. So I know our kids get a lot of this. I guess I'm still feeling unclear as to one. Why haven't we created our own survey by now, especially if we've been using this one for nine years? I mean, can't we do something like that
on our own? I just I'm feeling very confused as to why we need this. It sounds like it probably overlaps with other organizations that I see doing work in our schools. In the same regard about planning, it just still feels unclear to me as to why this is a good use of.
County spending. Thank you and Miss Wolff, I want to echo the sentiments of my fellow board members, but my question is, you know, under the blueprint, we're doing some workforce development stuff. Some of what
you just described sounded exactly like what they're doing. I'm wondering if we are paying for duplicative type of services. Number one. But number two, unless I misunderstood what you said, I didn't hear anything being done
under that. Under the a b a p b contract, except for the survey, for the most part. Everything else, you're generating the data and giving it to them. So the the organization takes our
data and the student survey data and puts that all together. But don't we have couldn't we get a computer, get somebody to design a program to put it all together for us, how that is collated and how it's put together? I'm not I'm not sure that our systems would be able
to do that, but also that's not my field. So I don't feel comfortable saying that. Yes or no, we could because I'm not sure. The other thing that the organization provides is professional development. That's something that we've worked on with them to continue that. They come and provide two
in person days for the school teams to come and work together on what their outreach plan specifically will be and how to continually increase it. And if we're not getting to all the students in the families, like, how is that happening? It's networking among the 19 schools. And then we also do a student
spring survey to experience survey to find out, you know, how do you feel now that you've taken these classes? What was it like in them? And then how do we how do we what do we do for next year to improve that experience? Thank you for your we're in the business of surveys in this school district.
And and we are very good at it. We are everything. And I think we could develop our own survey for that. So I have real concerns that that work could be done in house, and that some of what I'm hearing is a little bit duplicative of other contracts. And we might want to take a look at that. Yeah. So
I'm going to move to I'm going to I think that concludes the conversation for this line item I'm going to move to Miss Montoya's line item that she pulled Miss Montoya. Go ahead. Sorry. Just so I'm clear though because we pulled it. Don't we
have to vote on it first before we can move? We we we have I'm going to ask the procedure question later on because in 7.1 there are multiple line items. Okay. That's great. Your question first. Thank you. And so it's consent item 7.1. And the item is two three Misc.
five. And I just wanted to ask if Doctor Taylor could just give a very, very brief explanation for the community as to what that pertains to and why it's important. Actually, Miss Montoya, I'll jump in to speak to that very briefly. As
folks I think are aware, we are going to be expanding significantly our efforts to ensure that all of our clearances and fingerprint clearances for existing employees are up to date. And
so in order to do that, we need some expanded fingerprint capacity beyond what we have in our own offices right now. This contract will allow us to, again, have that expanded capacity for some additional fingerprint machines will be going out to schools beginning
early in September and in the weeks following that, so that we can again ensure that we are going to employees where they are going out to our schools to make this easy on our employees and on our schools, but also at the same time, get those clearances back up to date. So
the purpose of this contract is, again, to increase that that capacity as part of this effort in the fall. Thank you so much. Thank you. I'm going to ask staff for a procedure.
Questions 7.1 have multiple line items. Two line items are have questions. So going forward can we maybe what I would like to do is I want you to check on the procedures to
move in both other line items, not these two that have been pulled for, for for vote. And then take these two line items and vote on them separately. Yes, yes, that would be the way to do it. Thank you. Can I have
a motion to move the rest of the 7.1 items in bulk? Motion to move. So moved second. Okay, there's a motion and a second. All in favor, please raise your hand. Right. That's unanimous.
And now we are going to vote on the item for the. The Mr. has pulled for the equal opportunity line item. Is there a motion to approve this item? Isn't that part of Cevenini? No, because we we separated. We
pulled it. We separated it. Is there a motion to approve it? So, Miss Yang, just to confirm, for the record, this is item 4970 9.1. Thank you. I don't see any motion. So that line
item fell. May I move to the. What was yours? The equal opportunity? Yes, it was 79. I mean 4979. Increasing access to Advanced Placement and
International Baccalaureate courses extension. Ms. Silvestre. So we just approved the fingerprinting and we haven't we haven't got to that line yet. Okay. We only moved
all of 7.17.1 has many, many items. We approve all the rest except these two. Now we are voting on these two separately one by one. Thank you for your patience. It's a different procedure, so I'm not sure what I'm doing. Yeah, your light is
on. Do you have something to share? You asked for a motion? Yes. For that line item. For that line item. So I move that line item move for approval. Yes. Okay. Is there a second. Sorry. Which item are you moving? I thought we just said
it failed. No, she. She said she wasn't clear on what we're voting on, so. Okay. So that's okay. So we're going back to 4.979.1. Yes. Clear. Okay okay. There is a motion to approve. Is there a second second okay.
There's a second. There's a motion to approve. And a second. All in favor please raise your hand. Are we going to have discussion first. Do we still need discussion? Okay. Would you like. Well. I guess I guess
we already had discussion. I just making sure because usually we have discussion after it's. Yeah. So I would just say that I think that I would encourage the superintendent and the staff to look at this contract in the context of our program
expansion work that we're doing now. We could target this funding to maybe schools where we don't have a lot of historical participation in our AP IB programs, rather than doing it everywhere where we're doing it now, but start to do
plant the seeds that are going to make our program expansion successful in the future. So that is my why I support this and my recommendation to the superintendent. So there's a I have a comment or question. And
then Brenda, thank you. I can appreciate my our colleague Miss Silvestre comments about trying to maybe retrofit this contract a little better, but my understanding is that is exactly what they were doing for the past nine years, right? They were supposed to be
targeting certain schools or certain populations, and I just don't see the growth. And I it sounds like a lot of things we're already doing. I mean, we pop out Google surveys like that's our second business. So it seems like we should be able to handle this within our capacity, because it's a very
small sliver of what's being done to reach out to these populations as it is. And I'm sorry, but I just don't see it in the numbers that it's actually working. Ms. Wolff I wanted to know they're not already doing any work under this contract for this period,
are they? Not for the extension period? So that that's all pending board approval? Okay. I just wanted to check, but I also want to know, is, is this an opportunity to reframe what we're asking of them for this,
for this extension period so that they end up training our staff on everything they need to know so that this could be the final year of it. I'd rather have the item pulled and come back and answer that. If
if we're going to reintroduce that with greater clarity. Okay, okay. So there's a motion and a second. All in favor please raise your. You almost lost your opportunities there okay. Keep your light on if you have
something to. Go ahead, Miss Rivera-Oven. If the superintendent is going to pull the item, then what are we voting on? You already have a motion sitting on the table. You need to vote on it. Okay? Okay. Is there a way to
withdraw the motion to table this and come back? You can also you can also just vote for it. But we don't change back and forth. All right. But it is a democracy I would like to withdraw the motion. I'm running the meeting. You. Thank you, Miss Sylvester, for withdrawing the motion. And
then let's move on to the item pool by Miss Montoya. Can you state the number, Miss Locke? Mr. Yeah, I have it. It's item 7.1, line two, three misc five, and I would make a motion to
approve the item. This is at the top of page 11 of your attachment. All American Protective Services LLC for $800,000. Thank you. And is there a second I second all right. There's a motion and a
second. All in favor, please raise your hand. That's unanimous. Thank you everyone. I'm glad we got the consent items. Thank you, Madam President. As the board has approved its consent items with
a couple of tweaks. I'm glad to make this announcement. We have done something a little different at today's board meeting already. Prior to the start of the formal part of the board meeting, we recognized a group of our kindergartners and
kindergarten staff for Kindergarten Readiness Month, and we had a little bit of a short celebration and recognized them with a resolution that the board actually passed last month as part of the board's consent agenda. We had a number of
other resolutions that the board passed just now, and instead of reading them word for word, like we've done in the past, I do want to announce them and say that we will be making these presentations at various points throughout the next month as part of our
celebration, to try to make our resolutions that come from the Board of Education a little bit more celebratory, and not just on paper. So with that, it is my pleasure to announce the Board of Education's Resolutions for celebration and recognition, the first one that
was in the consent agenda today was the International Overdose Awareness Day for August 31st, 2025, which acknowledges the importance of awareness, prevention and support for families who are impacted by substance overdose. National Recovery Month for the entire
month of September 2025, supports recovery from substance use and affirmed the importance of health and resilience. National Suicide Prevention Week in September 7th through the 13th, 2025, which promotes awareness,
prevention and the care of students, staff and families. We also approved International Literacy Day on September 8th, 2025, which affirms literacy as a foundation for student achievement and lifelong opportunities of learning. We
also approved Hispanic Heritage Month starting on September 15th and ending through October 15th, 2025, which recognizes the culture contributions, history of Hispanic and Latino communities. National Arts in
Education Week from September 14th through the 20th, 2025, celebrates the role of arts and creativity, learning and student expression. National School Parent Group Appreciation Day on September 26th, 2025, which honors the
partnership of our parent groups and strengthens the School and Student Success Partnership. These resolutions are now approved and will be shared and celebrated with our honorees next month and on special days that the board has recognized as part of our
continuing effort to recognize the people, values and causes that strengthen Montgomery County Public Schools and make Montgomery County a great place to live, work, and learn. So with that, Madam President, we are concluded with the consent items and ready for the next part of the agenda. Thank you.
I want to acknowledge Miss Laura Mitchell, who's in the audience from Montgomery Goes Purple. Thank you for your organization's work. And item number 8.1 is an exciting one. Is the agreement with the
association agreement between Montgomery County Association of Administrators and Principals, for sure, and the Board of Education. So, Doctor Taylor, this is a great opportunity for us to recognize and celebrate a great
collaboration in our school district. Thank you. President Yang. I'm pleased to present an updated 2025 2028 collective Bargaining agreement with our administrative partners that's ready for signature today. So we get to have a little celebration as well. This is
this was an interest based negotiation that resulted in a strong, mutually beneficial agreement. Key priorities in this agreement include the development of two joint working groups on staffing standards, aligned with our strategic plan to ensure
effective staffing and resources for schools, as well as measures that promote work life balance and provide enhanced opportunity for promotion, reclassification, career development for administrators. And we heard a little bit of that today in public comment. This agreement
reaffirms our shared commitment to professional and operational excellence, strengthens employee rights and advances transparency and collaboration. The 2025 2028 Collective Bargaining Agreement supports our core mission of teaching and learning, expands
opportunities for system wide equity, and advances the strategic goals of Montgomery County Public Schools. Also joining us today for the signing is Miss Caitlin Connelly, our Chief talent management officer. Mr. Michael Stein, our Director of labor relations, doctor Christine
Handy, the president of Montgomery County Association of Administrators and Principals, Mr. Andre Phillips, our new executive director at Mcap, Mr. Ryan Forker, the Executive Vice President and liaison to the professional growth systems in our human resources department. And we
would like to welcome back Mr. Edward Owusu, a former Executive Director of Mcap, who is going to join us today. I'd like to thank and recognize the work of the negotiated teams, negotiation teams and and welcome them here today. So
thank you so much for being here. And I know that President Yang, we have some work to do. Yes we do. And actually also very excited about signing this between the Board of Education and the CAF. I know that when I read through it, I'm so glad to
see we have clear definition of work groups, expectations and timelines and and outcomes. And I'm also glad to see that we have the work life balance put in place so that we will be able to attract and retain our administrator for many years to
come. All right. With that, do we just all move down? Actually, the board has some work to do. The superintendent recommends approval of this contract. Oh, we need to do that first. Absolutely. Okay. Now I need a motion. Motion to approve.
Second. Okay. There's a motion and a second. All in favor, please raise your hand. That's unanimous. All right. Congratulations. Let's go.
Let's do the work. Order. Yeah. All board members get to come
down for the photo. Okay. Doctor handy. Scooch over for
you. Okay, we're going to turn everybody around to dancing
picture. Come on in. Andre. Yes. Thank you. Two roles. Two roles. Tall people in the back. Back. Welcome back. Good. About. It's
only me tonight. Yes. Okay, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're good, you're good. Great. Good good good good. You're good. All right, all right, here we go. One. Two three. Okay. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Very
right. Thank you. Thank you for. Congratulations. Thank you, thank you. Yeah. Hey.
Congratulations. All right.
Thank you. All right. What? About you look good. You always look professional. All right.
So. You do. Come. Oh, come on out. Yeah. I'm a little bit fuzzy about our procedures here, so we need to speak, do we? Okay. All right. So I'm okay.
So Doctor Handy, thank you for being here. It's an exciting day. And then we would like to hear your remarks on this signing of this agreement. All right. Good afternoon. Is it still afternoon? Yes, I think
so. Cap members president Yang, Doctor Thomas and members of the Board of Education. On behalf of the Cap, I am proud to celebrate the signing of our new contract, an agreement that reflects true collaboration between Mcap and M.c.p.s. This
contract establishes clear expectations for workgroups, including important discussions on comprehensive staffing allocations and elementary school staffing. It also provides clarity on the red circle and reclassification processes. It improves sick
leave payouts, outlines clear procedures for DCI investigations, addresses workload and working conditions, and enhances supplements and stipends. I'm especially pleased that we use an interest based bargaining process with
the guidance of a skilled facilitator, whom we later welcomed as Cap's new executive director, Mr. Andre Phillips. We were able to craft a thoughtful, balanced language through collaboration. Now, I'd
also like to thank the Mcap and MCPs negotiations teams for their diligence and patience, as well as our Executive Vice President Ryan Forker, and our then Executive Director, Mr. Edward Owusu, who came to join
us today. I also like to thank the Board of Directors for their oversight and direction and most importantly, our members for their input, trust and confidence that we would secure an agreement that
protects their well-being and best interests. Mission accomplished. We are proud of what we achieved together and look forward to a strong year working alongside our partners, SEIU, MCPs, MCE, and MCPs in
service of our students and our schools. So it really is amazing what we can accomplish when we truly work together. Thank you very much. Thank you.
Wow. We have a lot of celebration today. We do? Yeah, a lot of appointment. We can have. Right. Item 8.2 we are going to talk about our adoption of legislative
platform. Our Board of Education is the legislative branch of the school system. And every year we work closely with our state partners in advocating for legislations that benefit our students,
families and community. And. With staff coming to the table. Please introduce yourself and let's get this going. Good afternoon, President Yang Doctor Taylor, members of the Board of Education. My name is
Patty Ursprung. I am your coordinator of legislative affairs, and I'm here today to present the board's proposed legislative platform for the 26 2026 legislative session. The theme for this year is Purposeful Policy Unleashed
Potential. So just as an overview, the purpose of the platform is to guide our legislative advocacy during the legislative session. And generally, we're hoping to accomplish that advocacy that would promote the needs and interests of M.c.p.s. To our
state officials. In doing so, we are guided by the priorities, vision and mission of the school board, which is grounded in M.c.p.s Strategic Plan. This means we're focused on equipping all students with the knowledge, skills and confidence they need to thrive. And again, we're promoting our belief that purposeful policy
has the power to unleash student potential. You'll see there are three sections for our platform priority issues, areas for increased advocacy and ongoing interests. The platform as a whole contains both global large scale kind of overarching policy positions.
Those are contained in our ongoing interest section, and then more discrete and specific initiatives that the board wants to pursue. Those would be in our priority issues and increased advocacy sections. We're going to take a look at each section, and we're going to go in reverse order, leaving
the most exciting stuff for last. So first we have our ongoing interests. These are. There. You have our list in the platform itself. Each of these topics has detail and kind of
examples of of what falls within them. But these are items that remain largely the same year after year. Such as our preference for local control, our desire for adequate funding, and wanting to avoid unfunded mandates and focuses, you know, our focus on school safety. The other
sections, the in the areas of increased advocacy and our priority issues might be kind of more exciting, but this is really the meat and potatoes of the platform. This is the section that has kind of our global policy positions. And this is where most of the board's platform positions that
we take during the legislative session are determined. And this is where they're found. So during the session when I submit testimony based on our platform, this is generally where it's found. And that allows me to move quickly and stay in sync with the legislative session that moves
very, very fast and does not always align with our board meetings, where we ask for the board to take positions on some bills. So this portion in particular allows me to just kind of stay more engaged with the session. And a couple of examples from last year. There was a bill that did not pass,
but it dealt with teacher licensure and granting reciprocity for teachers who have already obtained licensure in other states and then moved to Maryland and allowing them to kind of waive into our school, into our license program. So under the recruitment and retention portion of our platform, I was
able to support that initiative. On behalf of the Board of Education. This is also where things like curriculum bills, which we oppose based on local autonomy, kind of falls. And I just want to make clear, especially for those bills that
we oppose, that our opposition, based on our platform position of something like a preference for local control, does not necessarily mean that we don't agree with what the bill is trying to accomplish. What we don't agree with is the method that they're using to try to accomplish it. So some of might
bring a bill thinking thatmacray important skill that everyone should have, and it should be part of our arts curriculum. We might agree with that. What we don't agree with is the state or our General Assembly proposing a bill that requires that we do it. That is something that is under the authority of the board, and we
don't want bills that are going to circumvent or supersede the authority of the board. So that's something that we would oppose, even if we agree with the goal of the bill. And we could then, on our own initiative, make those changes in the coming years. So I just want to be clear that the positions that we take under
this portion of our, of our platform don't necessarily or not necessarily, and it's incitement of what the bill is trying to accomplish, just the method that it would be using. So next would be our areas where we have some increased
advocacy interests. So this year as we were developing our platform, I received ideas on a number of topics from both the board and some of our administrative staff. Where there are some areas where improvementsoughout through
the legislation could be accomplished. We reviewed all of these and determined which ones we wanted to be our priority issues. So those are the ones we're really going to advocate strongly for. We're going to try to get sponsors for bills, all of those things. And we decided on a small group of those, and then we were left with these other ideas. We
didn't really know what to do with them. So we decided to make this kind of step down section where these are bills or legislative ideas that we think is important to push forward to put out there for discussion. If other people are
interested in the same idea, we would be happy to kind of join forces and move forward. So we think that there's still value in highlighting these areas, even though they didn't become priority bills for us. The first one is employee self-reporting of criminal charges. So currently the
education article prohibits schools from employing individuals that have been previously convicted of certain crimes or if they commit one of these crimes during their employment. We can't continue to employ them. And this is a really small, relatively small subset of crimes, largely
crimes of violence or crimes against children make sense. But we also think that there is some value in receiving notice of any charges that are brought against any of any felony charges that are brought against any of our employees. And this is one if there's a felony charge brought, that
employee is probably in some sort of crisis, and we have resources available for our employees that they can utilize if they need. So notifying us of these issues, we can get them the help that that maybe
they they need to work through it. And yes, also we need to determine if that employee based on what happened, particularly if the charges are founded and they're found guilty, if that should impact their employment relationship with the with the school system, given that they are in a position of trust and authority
with students. So we would support efforts to require self-reporting of criminal charges. The next one is the Maryland Report Card graduation rate calculation. So this has
to do with the Maryland Report card. And we have made a shift as a school system to look to the Maryland report card and the star rating to evaluate our schools the same way the state does. And one factor for high schools in determining what the star rating is, is the
graduation rate. The calculation is done by looking at how many students graduate and graduate with a Maryland state diploma, and how many are in the class in the graduating class. The problem that we see is that we have some students
who have alternate follow alternative ways pathways to graduation, such as students who earn their GED and special education students who earn a certificate. Those types of diploma pathways are not recognized in that graduation
rate calculation. So not only does this undervalue the accomplishments and diminish the achievements of these groups of students, but it also artificially lowers our graduation rates by not not recognizing those diploma types. So we would support updating
the formula to include all valid diploma pathways. The next area is reportable offense law. So the reportable offense law in its current form requires school notification of
a student's involvement in off campus activity that results in police, in the police responding in 2025. This was a big item that was discussed. There were many bills that were proposed to kind of update the requirements of this law, and
the bills did vary in what they were trying to accomplish. But by and large, the thread that ran throughout all of them was a requirement that the. Notification requirements be updated and improved upon. That
is something that we also see as an area for improvement. So this is something that we anticipate will come back this year. And if and when it does, we would support the efforts to improve the notification requirements of the reportable
offense laws. And then our final area for increased advocacy is teacher preparation programs. So there are state approved programs that teachers that are, you know, take for teacher training purposes. The coursework varies between
programs and in some cases depends on what specialty or area the the the teacher is looking to pursue. There are two courses that at times are limited only to specialized fields, and that is teaching special education students and teaching students who are
English language learners. But what we see in practice is that the knowledge and how to teach these groups of students is important for all of our teachers. We have increases in these student populations across our schools, and even teachers who aren't teaching in
those special specified areas are still interacting with and teaching these students day in and day out. So what happens is that we then are required to provide training to these, these teachers so that they are ready to teach and be effective teachers in the classroom. So what we would like to have
happen is have these two courses required in teacher preparation programs for all teachers so that they're ready to to come into our classrooms as effective teachers, and it eliminates the need for us to then engage in costly training for our teachers across the
system. And then finally, we have our priority issues. So as I said, these are the topics where we really want to target our advocacy. We will look to find legislators who are willing to sponsor bills on our behalf. We will have strong advocacy at, you know, publicly
at bill hearings and behind the scenes so that our elected partners understand the reason and the need and why these bills and these ideas are so vital for us. Last year, one of our priority issues, which was to require that the GED exam be offered fully in English and
Spanish, was successful, and we are looking to build on that momentum. So the first priority issue we have is the graduation credit review. This is a priority issue that we identified last year as well. And we, you know, still see a
need for changes in this area. Hearing from our students primarily, but also our staff members. We have been told that the graduation credits that are currently required are not necessarily relevant or adequate, adequately preparing students for their
post-secondary pursuits, whether it be further education, the workforce, whatever they're they're planning on doing, they they feel that the graduation requirements currently in place are not relevant for them. The last time that our graduation requirements were reviewed was
by a task force that was convened in 2018, and they made recommendations in 2021. So our seniors who graduated last year were the they were the first class that the new graduation requirements applied to. And they echoed the same sentiments of classes before them. So the
changes that were made at that point did not adequately address the issue that that our students are seeing in schools. There have also been major changes since the last time this was reviewed. There's been a global pandemic. We adopted and started to implement the
blueprint for Maryland's future, and there have just been large changes within our community and our society. Technological advances, the prevalence of AI, things like that, that are ever evolving and always changing. And if we can count on one thing, it's that change is going to happen. So what we
believe is that there should be an update to our current law that requires certain and regular reviews at a specified interval of our graduation requirements and changes made as needed, so that we can be sure that our graduation
requirements are always up to date and always relevant for our students and preparing them for their futures. The second priority issue, which is also a carry over from last year, has to do with the the school system, required funding of AP and IB exams, and we had a
little bit of a discussion about some of the AP and IB exams and and trying to make them more available to our a wider array of students. So right now, what the blueprint requires is that we pay for AP
and IB, AP and IB exams and courses for any student who has met the college and career readiness standard that's found in the blueprint. There's no limit on how many courses they can take. There are no qualifications that need to be met in order for the payment to be made on their behalf. Last
year, we spent over $4.2 million on AP and IB exams and as was mentioned for the AP exam specifically, only about 19% of the students who took those exams would qualify for free and reduced meals in our
school system. So we recognize that we have families that have financial need and needs assistance to be able to access those programs, and we also have families that don't need that support or maybe not that level of support. So what we
asked for last year, and what we will continue to advocate for this year, is implementing a needs based system so that our our families with the greatest needs will still have full coverage of the cost of those exams. And then we would use a scale that goes up to the
family paying fully for the the. The exams, and that would allow us to recapture some of the funds that we spend in that area right now so that we can support other blueprint initiatives and requirements. So it grants some flexibility, which is going to be a main
theme for blueprint from the school systems this year. I believe our next priority issue, which is a new one this year again, is flexibility in spending for blueprint funds. So this one deals with community schools. Community
schools have a goal of ensuring that academic and social needs of students are met. So whereas traditional schools focus largely on academics, community schools are more fulsome approach, allowing the students to get both academic needs, needs and social needs. The
blueprint sets the metrics that determine what schools qualify as community schools, and we currently have quite a few schools that are community schools. These community schools get additional funding to provide largely non academic support for students. And these are needed to act for the
students to access the education. These are called wraparound services. So these could be things such as psychological and somatic health. The availability of of the health care, free food, after school tutoring programs, incentives to address
absenteeism, things of that nature. These are largely nonacademic and focused and vitally important for these schools, these students, to fully access their education. But the use of the funds that we get are quite restrictive. And what we would like to do is
relax some of those restrictions so that the funds can be used to also focus on increasing academic performance of the students as we care for their various other needs. So an example that that in talking
to our staff I was given. These funds really pretty much cannot be used for for personnel. They can't be used for the teachers of record. For any teacher that's going to to give grades they can be used for to obtain
paraprofessionals, intervention specialists, things of that, of that nature. But I was speaking to someone who was a elementary school teacher, and in her reading class, her English language arts class, she had students that fell into three ability group levels. Some were
reading above grade level, some reading at grade level, and some reading below. So when she was a teacher, she would have additional teachers push into her classroom and teach two of those groups so that she could focus in all of those students were being able being able to be taught at a level that was
appropriate for them. Those individuals were teaching the students, assessing the students, providing grades for those students. They were the teacher, their reading teacher under the blueprint, or the community schools funding that wouldn't be allowed those
teachers. We couldn't pay for those teacher salaries to target those groups because they would were not. That's just not a permissible use for those funds. So something like that. We would like to get a little bit of flexibility so that we could have those targeted groups so that the
students could be receiving educational services at their levels. The other thing that we where there's a little bit of restriction, is we can use the funds for professional development, so we can use the funds for conference fees,
things of that nature, to to purchase the programs that the, the teachers will do for professional development purposes. But we can't do is use any of the funds to cover the cost of substitute teacher salaries so that those teachers can go and do the professional
development that they need. We can't use it to pay for substitute teachers, so that those teachers can have additional planning time to meet with their their colleagues and discuss students who might be having some academic struggle struggles and
could utilize some additional supports. So again, we're just looking for a little bit of flexibility so that we can use those funds in the way that the schools feel will be best and most effective in those school
communities. The final priority issue deals with minimal instructional time requirements, and this is something that we would propose to be a local bill. Under current law, schools must be in session for 180 days and 1080 hours of instruction annually in order
to meet the minimum instructional requirements. We ran into an issue this year with snow closures that we were able to meet the hourly requirement, but we did not have enough additional days built into our calendar to meet
the the minimum days. We submitted a waiver to the state, as we are permitted to do in the state did not grant our waiver, so we ended up having to extend our school year, which was supposed to end on a Friday in June, by two days, Monday, June 16th and Tuesday,
June 17th. These were both half days. The absenteeism rate was unusually high for both staff and students, and there is little instructional value that was gained on those days, partly because there was so much absenteeism. It also cost
us quite a bit of money to keep the schools open for those two additional days. It was more than $1.7 million for personnel costs. And then, of course, the additional costs that are associated just with keeping the facilities open for the additional period of time. So
to address that issue, what we will be looking to do is to ask to change the law to meet the minimum requirement with 180 days or 1080 hours of instruction. If that were the case this year, we would not have had to extend the school
year and we would have avoided that unnecessary cost. So that covers the basics of our platform that we're proposing. On this slide, you'll see some important upcoming dates. The first one is today where I put
that we have adopted our our legislative platform. So a little like forecasting there. The next day you'll see a September 15th, 2025, which is three weeks from Monday. Which makes me panic a little bit,
but that is when we will have our legislative summit. It's going to be held at Richard Montgomery High School, and this is where we will introduce our platform to our elected partners. And we'll provide a little more detail and background as to why we chose what we chose to to have as priority issues and how it impacts our students. And then
the last date you see is January 14th, 2026, which will kick off the 2026 legislative session. So at this point, I will open it up to questions or comments by the board. At the end of the discussion, we will ask the board to make a motion to adopt what is currently a
proposed platform as the board's 2026 legislative platform. I'm going to open it up for for questions and comments. I'm going to start from my left hand side. Seeing Miss Silvestre. Thank you for
the presentation. I wanted you to speak a little bit about what happens next in terms of the work with the delegation, in order to adopt some of these priorities. Yeah, thank you for that question. So that work has
already begun. I have been meeting with the members of our delegation, and we'll continue to do so at this point, because we have not had an adopted platform. I've spoken with them preliminarily about some of the ideas we were talking about. So
what we will do now, once the platform is adopted is I will go back, particularly with our priority issues, and see about starting to get sponsors for the the bills that would initiate those for items we'll work with, with them both with
those specifically and then just largely as the session progresses, to let them know to help support our bills, our our priority issues in any way we can, and then just bills that come forward. There's just constant communication between
us and our elected partners to let them know what our positions are on those bills and how they would impact the school system, good, bad or otherwise, so that we can make sure that we're hopefully, as much as possible, aligned with how the position that they then take on those bills. And thank
you for giving us some examples within your presentation today about what we mean by this priority or that priority. I think the more concrete examples of how these priorities are affecting us and what our positive outcome legislation could have, I think
is all the better. So continue to paint the picture. I, I particularly the teacher prep issue, I think is very important because colleges and universities, that's where you're supposed to be learning to be an excellent teacher. And if you're not getting a lot of special ed or you're not
getting a lot of teaching around emerging multilingual learners, then you're not ready to come to Montgomery County Public Schools to teach. And then we have, as you said, pay a lot of of existing funding to to cover that professional development. So I think that there's an opportunity for
collaboration and partnership with our higher ed institutions so that there's more of that and our teachers are ready to hit the ground running. And throughout Maryland, but especially in Montgomery County, the the grad credit review, again, you know, it would give us a lot more flexibility to do
things within our electives and other types of courses. If we had a good review of that and modernize it, bring it to the to the modern era. And the instructional time issues are very costly as well. So thank you. Mr. Rivera-Oven. Thank you,
Patty. Appreciate your work. I would like to echo my colleague, Miss Sylvester, for all those things. I I'm also very interested in the safety of our students, and I think it is time that Maryland passes the
law to ensure we're in the business of teaching children and youth, and we want to make sure that they are safe at all times. So thanks for the for the work and the advocacy for the reporting of criminal charges of felonies that at this point are not required by
law for people to self-report. And that is, I think, really important for for us to do as a state the teacher program requirements. I don't think Montgomery County. I think if we look across the state, you look at our you look at Baltimore, you look at a lot of
the big counties, Prince George's and so on. They need to have teachers with those qualifications to be able to work with the populations that are probably, you know, the fastest growing populations in, in the state. So it does make sense. And the blueprint, I think the theme this year from
all counties is flexibility, flexibility to do what we need to do. You know, to have this model that we're going to have the same, you know, the same rules for every county when we are so different in the state of Maryland. And some of us,
you know, like Montgomery County, are the largest system in in the state. And not to be able to have the flexibility. I know schools, for example, that could use that tutoring time for their kids that would be so beneficial to populations that used to have tutoring during
the pandemic. And they lost that. And teachers are like, we need we would love to have some flexibility to be able to bring that back. So I know that that is not just us. So I appreciate the report. Mr. Yes, I
appreciate this comprehensive plan. I can't wait to help get it some of this over the finish line. I do want to go over to an ongoing interest, just because even last night,
actually, almost every day I hear about the state of our air quality. And so there's all different pieces to that. But one of the pieces is just how much it takes money it takes to
get our HVAC systems upgraded. And, and they can be upgraded in a way that will be future focused. I talked to a parent yesterday about that, about different technologies. So that's a discussion I would
like to continue to have with legislators in Annapolis to talk about resources for that would improve air quality, because, again, I hear about it every single day. So thank you
for that. And I have asked for some information from our staff on schools where maybe HVAC improvements are are needed, but maybe aren't quite in process yet, because obviously the list is what the list is. And and we are thinking about
potentially looking for some local bond initiatives to maybe get some additional funding for those specific schools so that we can hasten the the improvements that are outstanding. That's great. And just let me know if I can ever help. Thank you, Miss Montoya.
Thank you. I was actually going to ask about the local bonds to help out with some of our CIP needs that are just ongoing, that seem like a hole that we can never get ourselves out of because they're just so extensive, because this is such a large school system and they're so costly. So I'm glad to hear that I just and I, I
agree, we always especially because our system is a little different sometimes and operates differently than others, that we always do want to preserve our local autonomy because our county is diverse in just so many different ways, including just geographically in the county. So that is very important. But I do get
concerned about the potential to exclude ourselves from the conversation. On the issue of the bill. Right. If the state decides, well, we hear you that you want to have local autonomy, but we're going to discuss this bill and raise the issues
anyway and potentially vote on it. Then if we categorically just say, well, we're not going to support bills because of the local autonomy aspect, we remove ourselves from the conversation altogether when the topic itself, again, if they're going to disregard the
local autonomy, then we're not part of the conversation about the topic. So I you know, again, it's part of it's procedural. But I think we just need to find a way to try to address both aspects, because there are definitely going to be times where it doesn't matter if we want to preserve our local
autonomy. The issue is going to go before the state delegations, and then they're going to have a vote. And we just want to make sure that we're a part of those conversations. I second that. Thank you for your comment and not seeing any other lights. Thank you for this presentation. And if
there's no questions or comment, is there a motion and a second to approve the legislative platform? So moved second. Okay. There is a motion and a second. Any more discussion seeing none.
All in favor please raise your hand. That's unanimous. Thank you. Patty. All right. We are moving to our item 8.3. And
this is about mentoring by example. College and career Academy business Learning Institute charter school. They have a request for adjustment to target enrollment. Doctor Taylor. Yes. Thank you, Madam
President. I'm bringing forward a request from our operator the mentoring by example College and career academies, business Learning Institute, or MBA charter school to increase their first year enrollment from two 250 students to 290
students. Last fall, the board approved Mbly to open for this school year, the 2526 school year, with 250 students in grades six and seven, eventually growing to a capacity of 700 students in grades six through 12 by the
year 2030. Since then, MLI has faced delays in construction at their permanent site and is temporarily located at the Radnor Holding Center, which is part of the M.c.p.s. Portfolio. In late July, a request to raise its opening enrollment by
40 students was received, indicating the increase is needed to sustain operations, keep their promises to family and families, and strengthen programs. This request was submitted after the deadline in the charter agreement, which
required any enrollment changes to be submitted by October of the previous school year to the board so that the board could budget accordingly. And yes, this does have a fiscal impact. Copy of the letter is attached to board docs as well as the
agenda item that was approved last fall. It's important to note that M.c.p.s. Based this year's operating budget on the original agreement of 250 students at this point. This. The school also is still working through significant
staffing shortages. Of the 32 teacher positions, only 22 are filled, with four more in process. With 250 students already enrolled and is relying heavily on substitute teachers to cover classrooms for the first weeks of school, adding
nearly 40 more students without the staff to support them would make these challenges worse. The responsibility for knowing the charter agreement, meeting deadlines, staffing and facility readiness rests with the charter operator as outlined in the agreement. While the request to increase
enrollment was submitted after the deadline specified in the charter agreement, I'm still bringing this forward for the board's consideration and review. I recommend denial of e request to increase the first
year enrollment for the reasons that I outlined. Oh, thank you, Doctor Taylor, could you please read the the resolution, the resolve part that you have brought forth certainly resolved, that the Montgomery County Board of Education
approves the mentoring by example Foundation, College and Career Academies incorporated request to increase first year enrollment for the 2526 school year from 250 students to 290 students, while maintaining the total maximum enrollment of 700
students as stated in the charter agreement. Thank you for reading that. Do I have a motion to move this forward? I need a motion and a second to
move this forward. Seeing none. Seeing none. This resolution would not move forward. There's no vote from the board. Thank you. I want to ask the staff to check on the procedure wise. So
if there's a motion, if there is no motion that is made, then then we move on to the next item. Thank you so much. Yep. Okay. Actually we are ahead of schedule. Are we ahead of schedule. Oh all right. So we
are going to take a recess. We have been at this for a little bit. We have two very exciting topic coming up which is boundary study and program analysis. And our CIP capital improvement strategy. We will
be back at we'll take a 30 minute break. We'll be back at 520. Right. So see you in a
little bit.
Welcome back everyone. We are resuming our board business meeting on August 21st, 2025. We have two very big topic coming up. Item 10.1 is secondary program
analysis and boundary studies. Community Engagement Plan update and 10.2 is framework for prioritizing our capital projects. So Doctor Taylor, thank you. Madam President. We are returning today to share progress on two major
initiatives at the heart of our commitment to equity and excellence our boundary studies and secondary program. Access. First, the Boundary Study team will share their working assumptions for the next round of options. Provide a brief update on the upcoming
community engagement plan, and share some insights on student Transportation services costs and some of the considerations related to boundary studies. Our and our secondary program analysis. Then the programs team will provide an update on
how we plan to expand access to high quality, excellent academic programs. We want to be very clear, strong existing programs are not being eliminated. Our plan is to preserve and expan on those
successes. At present, we have more qualified and interested students than available seats in some of our most popular programs. Too often, students are unable to participate because of limited space or because the program is located
too far away from home. Oftentimes, this disproportionately impacts students who are even zoned for the schools that have these programs. Our recommendations are designed to change that, to make programs more abundant,
more accessible, and more equitable across the county. I now turn it over to Mr. Adnan Mamoun, our Chief operations officer, and Mrs. Nikki Porter, our chief academic officer, to continue today's presentation.
Good afternoon. Today we will share our working assumptions, some of our working assumptions for the next phase of the boundary study process and as well as some further insight into the transportation considerations based on some of the questions we have received
from the board members. And then Miss Porter and her team will share expanded recommendations for the program. Access and equity, as Doctor Taylor already mentioned. So our topics for discussion today align with the goals one, two and three in the M.c.p.s.
Future Strategic Plan 2025 to 2030. So just a quick reminder where we are in the boundary study process timeline. So as we shared in the in previous presentations during the month
of July and August, we are in the finalizing synthesizing all the community feedback that we have received. We have shared the the public comments with the board members as well. We will continue to analyze the feedback and then work with our
consultant Flow Analytics to produce the refined boundary boundary options and go out to the community. In the end of September, we're going to be sharing those dates with the community. We wanted to wait till the the beginning of school year before sending out the invites, so that the
invitation emails don't get lost in all the communications that's happening currently, and there will be ample opportunities in September when we do go out to the community for the for additional feedback from the community members on the refined boundary options,
and then we'll go back and synthesize those feedbacks in October and November. And then in December we will work with Doctor Taylor, and then in January we will be able to present to the board the superintendent's recommendation, and then there will be public hearings in February and March
prior to the final decision by board in March of 2026. So we just want to start out by saying we understand that, you know, a lot of concerns that we're hearing changes definitely not easy. So but I
mean, we're talking about a lot of change here. So in 2027, 2028, we're going to be opening the Crown High School. And then obviously the Woodward High School. And this boundary study includes 19 of our high schools
and 31 middle schools. And that's a lot of change for our the students and the high school assignments within the boundary study scope. These changes will obviously feel disruptive to the students and the families. Changes to the secondary academic programing are also important for families
to understand, and they have to provide input and feedback on the potential boundary changes. However, these changes will help for some of the challenges that we are also facing. Opening to high schools will allow us to address the overcrowding that we have in
our high schools, and then regional modeling will help provide access to equitable access to programs for our students. We wanted to talk about some of the working assumptions for our next round
of boundary options. And these are going to be in alignment with our board policy, FAA and based on also the feedback that we have received from the community in the first round of community engagement, we will be the one of the first things we are planning on doing for
the next phase is to incorporate the proposed six region program model into the development of the options. When the first round of options went out, these regions were not finalized at that point. But now that we do have the
regions identified, these are going to be incorporated into the next round of options. And then we also want to acknowledge one of the number one piece of feedback that we have received from the community for both the boundary studies, and that has been a request to prioritize the
proximity of neighborhoods and communities to schools. Some of the other comments that we have received, and we're going to be, you know, attempting to address in the next round of studies, are going to be minimizing the length of bus rides and
maintaining safe walk zones. Whenever possible, avoid avoiding disproportionate split articulation whenever possible, minimizing disruptions for communities who have experienced recent boundary changes and those who have experienced additional school transitions between the primary
and intermediate schools. Maintaining trying to maintain the 80 to 100% facility utilization per board policy FAA, and then considering cost of resources associated with options, the staffing facilities, transportations in
order to be fiscally fiscally responsible. So we will be coming back in September for virtual and in person meetings. When we share the refined options, we will have Google site. Same with the previous round of options with which
will. We will share the new options, resources and survey. We will hold virtual office hours in addition to Spanish only option. We will also be, you know, going to these back to school fairs and have information available for the
families so they know the upcoming opportunities as well as the resources they need to engage. And we will be obviously continuing our communication via social media, email, text, phone calls and school newsletters, and then community outreach with the support from internal and
external partners that we have been doing throughout this boundary study. So I want to start by saying this might look like we spilled a bowl of green spaghetti on the county's map, but this is actually just to
highlight. We wanted to highlight the the hard work that our transportation team does to provide transportation for special programs. We have gotten a lot of questions about transportation costs associated with boundary options and program models. In the early
phases of the work, before we can begin to look at some of those estimated additional resources, we wanted to share several examples of transportation services to give you a sense of the varying levels of services that currently exist across the
county. This is the map that shows the current bus routes for high school magnet programs in the Montgomery County Public Schools. Again, as I said, this might appear as a chaotic as a box of spaghetti that has fallen on the floor, but there is a lot of very sophisticated technical work behind the
scenes related to routing the busses and taking traffic patterns and safety considerations into account. So this is a map of our magnet transportation currently. In addition to sharing that transportation services at a
high level, we wanted to provide two quick examples of the current local transportation services at high school level. This is Magruder High School's transportation map. This is not included in our either one of the boundary studies. It is included,
however, in the region five of the proposed regional model. As you can see here, Magruder provides additional transportation services as well as special education, transportation services and on. On top of that, five additional bus routes for academic programs, which includes the
countywide Aviation program. This is the another example of a high school. This Bethesda Chevy Chase is included in the Woodward boundary study scope and is included in the region one of the proposed regional model. This is an example of a
comprehensive high school that currently provides traditional transportation services and special education transportation services. It does not offer additional bus routes for academic programs. We just wanted to be able to share some high level maps so the everybody can get an
understanding of the different type of transportation models we can have for different type of either programs or comprehensive high schools. So we wanted to get a quickly into talking about the additional resources we think we'oing to need. First off, since we
are opening two new high schools, they're going to be need for additional transportation services. We are making some assumptions as we are creating these models, to look at how many additional busses we might need, and we wanted to kind of point out that as these new high schools
open, the transportation is going to start out. If we assume that the 11th and 12th graders are grandfathered, these two high schools are only going to open with ninth and 10th grades. So we're assuming in the the first year of implementation in 20 2728,
we're going to need about 15 regular transportation bus routes and five additional special education bus routes for each of these schools. As we get into school year 20, 28 and 29, one more class will be added to both of these high schools. So we're going we're
anticipating needing roughly 20 traditional bus routes and eight special education routes for both of these schools. And then in 2029, 2030, this is the year when both of these high schools, assuming that 11th and
12th graders are grandfathered, are going to now have all four grades going to those high schools, and we anticipate needing 25 additional routes for traditional bus services and ten special bus services for each of these high schools.
We are assuming that there's going to be savings from existing routes. We also understand that overall ridership is not increasing. However, we would have to create additional routes to support these two new high schools. We also anticipate
that there's going to be some needs with the new regional model. As we start out, the regional model, we would be needing, you know, any of the regions like region one, region four and five with five high schools will require 20
additional program routes, because we anticipate that each one of these high schools are going to have a bus going to the other high schools within that region, and the regions that have four high schools within them will need 12 additional will need 12 additional program routes to
support the new regional model. What we want to emphasize is that what we just talked about is the additional needs from the initial implementation of both the the new boundaries as well as the program regions.
However, there is going to be that short term pain of ramping up our transportation services to support both the grandfathering, because there's going to be multiple routes that supports the students that are staying in their current region. And, and, you know, students from that same area
might be transported to a new high school and same thing with the program regions. However, as we get into 27, 28 and going down and as the grandfathering slowly goes away, we anticipate that with the new regional
model, our transportation is going to be a lot more efficient and we will be able to, you know, get full utilization of our current resources, and we anticipate that the resource needs will go down as we fully implement both the new boundaries as well as
the program regions. With that, I'm going to turn it over to Mrs. Porter for the secondary program analysis. Thank you very much. I want to start by addressing one of the parents
who testified today, who asked, why are we doing this? And I just think it's really important to remind us again that this program's analysis is about equity and access. And we want every student, no matter
where they live, to have the same opportunities to engage in high quality, enriched programs. And we know that our current model requires, as you saw, long bus rides and a handful for a handful of centrally located programs. So it's time
for us to reimagine our structure. We want to move from a model of scarcity to a model of abundance, and expanding pathways and choices for our programs is really going to strengthen our district. So
with that framing, we're going to provide you some updates on our community engagement. We are going to talk about our program assets and some developments that we've made with the program since we've last talked, and then also
share with you some recommended regional programs for FY 27. Next slide please. So as we continue this work, engaging our community is really
essential. And so you can see there we have a variety of areas and ways that we are going to be meeting with our community and our stakeholders. Back to school fairs coming up and some other school based events this month. And then in September and October, we will
be holding regional public information meetings as well as dedicated sessions with the Down County and Northeast Consortium communities beyond. The events will be having ongoing communication through our newsletters and mailings,
social media, district outreach and we will also be meeting with our internal and external partners. We've already had a few meetings with our high school principals, and we're going to continue to meet with them. They have been providing us a lot of really wonderful
feedback that we have been using, and we want to also make sure that they have toolkits and information available so that they can share with their communities. We want to not only inform our communities, but we also want to have a
dialog. We want to have that feedback. I will say that we some of you also attended with us this week, MCPs, PTA Advocacy meetings. We were at Neelsville Middle School this week, and we had a strong reminder that it's really our
seventh grade students and younger that we really need to be reaching in terms of the families, because it's really going to impact them with these regional changes. And so that is something we really want to keep in mind. And I heard from
a wonderful student shout out to Kayla Holmes, who is at MLK Middle School, and she gave some wonderful recommendations for how we can engage students. So we want to make sure that we are doing that. And we heard that in the testimony today as
well. If you go to the next slide, please, before we start talking about our programs, we want to make sure that we are echoing the sentiment of our community members who say that
our high schools, our local programs are really important and we cannot forget them through this process. In our current regional countywide admissions process, about 25%
of our grade eight students apply for programs, 25%. So that's about 3000 students. There are 1438 seats available across all full time criteria and interest based programs.
And then that does not include the seats where local students may enroll locally in their interest based programs like MC Squared at Northwood High School or the Career Technical Program at Seneca Valley High School. So lots of questions
might you might have about that. But the reality is 75% of our students are accessing their local programs, their local schools. And so we want to make sure as we are continuing this process, that we make sure that we are building strong local
schools. And if you go to the next slide, as we've been engaging our communities, they have shared with us what they would like to see. All of our schools have. And so here you have listed six main areas
business and finance. We have in yellow because that once was actually something we had considered for a regional program. And all of our feedback said no. Actually, every student in every school should have access to that. So that is something that we just wanted to highlight as feedback
we've received that we've made some adjustments to. You can also see their parallel advanced courses, making sure that all of our schools offer courses like calculus so that everyone has opportunities, regardless of their zip code,
well-rounded course program opportunities so that students can build on their interests over time. Distance learning also is a big area that our families want to make sure students have access to courses,
even though it may not necessarily be in person. So that is something that we are considering preparation for advanced coursework and then research opportunities is also a big one that our students and and families feel is important for all students to have so
that they can thrive in college and beyond. So we are considering all of that. And if you go to the next slide, you can see that this is just an example again, of what all of our high schools could offer. As we look at making sure they
have Advanced Placement or IB dual enrollment. And just again, that preparation for advanced coursework, we've heard a lot of concern brought to the table about whether or not we can implement all of this successfully. And so we want
you to know that beyond this, the three of us, we have a strong team of academic program folks working behind the scenes to either build out or refine a lot of the courses and programs so that we can come back to you
in a few months with a better idea of what these local schools will offer as we move forward. If you go to the next slide, I'll hand it over to Miss Franklin. Good evening everyone. It's good to see you again. So I'm going to walk you
just through a few slides, just to do a refresher of some of the information we had before. So we can go to the next slide please. So this is a slide of our stair step to kind of indicate to you, the students who were the classes of students were working with and highlighted in yellow is to
show you just to connect with the transportation pieces, that those are the three years for which we will be phasing out the current process and phasing in the new process. So we're expecting that there will probably be lots of dynamic movement at that time as we're
running two different processes, but we just wanted to highlight from 2027 to 2030, these are the years. And you can see the students for whom they'll be will be impacted. You can go to the next slide. Miss Porter talked about the grade seven students for whom the new
process board pending would impact. And so they are the class of 2031. So highlighted in yellow are the students grade seven students. They are grade seven students this year starting Monday and then students earlier will all be impacted by the new process.
And then by 2030. Is that right? Will be our fully new process in place okay. Next slide please. This is just a refresher on the regions. We wanted you to see the map again, where we'll have 4 to 5 high
schools in each of the different regions. So this is just an example for you once again to have to refer to as we're having the conversation today, because that's going to be really important. We can go to the next slide. So these are the regional programs. You've seen these before but this time
we've color coded them. So we want you to know a little bit about the color coding. The color coding is going to help you as we go forward, because we have some visuals that are color coded. Just to help you with some of this information, we want you to also see that in the five different themes, there might be multiple names
of a program. So an example regional for medical science and health care. Those are two strands in the same program theme. If you go into the royal blue you'll see science, math, technology and engineering. There's a few program strands
in there. So we have five program themes. And it's important you know this part because it's going to mean something to you when you look at the visuals going forward. So we can go to the next slide okay. So as we get ready to look at the asset maps, what we
wanted you to know first before we started looking at them is that the asset maps are designed with four major criteria for for us to look at. We know that our schools have a number of different programs and pathways and courses that make them incredibly valuable, but we wanted to isolate it to
four big pieces. The four big pieces are career and technical education. We got feedback from arts, from the arts team and facilities about their about the facilities. We also got information about the regional
and countywide programs, and we also had information about what's one more. There is one more. So I'm going to see it when I go to the next slide. So let's go to the next slide. So
there are five program themes. It's on the it's on the slide deck. I should have done that. Of the five program themes, we want you to know there are 15 program strands and we'll point those out to you. So it's centrally managed regional programs career and technical education programs. Less commonly taught languages is
one other and then the arts offerings and facilities. So those are the four major pieces. What you're not going to see on these asset maps, because we know that this has been an interest of our design team, and some from our community and our school staff. You're not going to see local application
programs, local academy and signature programs. Those are designed for the local students. So those are they should continue, should they be highly desired and highly impacting student student achievement at the schools. So what we wanted you to see, so you didn't react
adversely to it, is that these are the four pieces. Okay. So the other piece you're going to see on this chart on the visuals is the gaps. And it's going to be really interesting for us to look at that together. So let's take let's take a look.
So let's look at region one and two. Let me just orient you to the slide. So down the left for region one you're going to see the five high schools. And then at the top you're going to see the color coding of the names of the of the different program strands I just talked about. So the green medical science and health care, there's two
columns for that because there are two strands. If you look at the royal blue, the science, math, technology and engineering, there's four strands for that. So you'll see four columns and so on. And so then what you're going to see at the very last row it says to be developed to be developed is
if you see any coloring in those markings there or that space there, that means that those are program strands we need to develop in that region. So the great thing about these visuals is that we have color everywhere. But what you're also going to see is that for a
school, they're going to have multiple assets in multiple program themes. So that's really important because we want to definitely take advantage of what the schools are already offering, what they do well. So let's walk through Walt Whitman, for example. It's
the third one on the list. If you go across the first marking that they have is the technology, the technology engineering. So they have a royal blue marking. There you go further. They have a marking for less common language and purple. Then you go further. They have a marking for
leadership. And then if you go further they also have they have credit for education. And so you're going to see that for all of our high schools as we go through this. So I just want to make sure that you're oriented to that. So in order for us to do an assessment of what we're going to need to
help support our schools do, the great thing is that we have a lot of assets to work from. But in each of these regions now, by way of this visual, we're able to know what we're going to need to stand up in each of these different regions. So in region one, the programs that we need to stand up,
medical science and health care, we need to look at humanities and also design so we can talk about those as we go through. So that's four different programs strands there that we have to stand up. Let's look at region two. Region two is Blake Paint Branch spring Brook and Sherwood. It's the northeast
consortium with Sherwood. And you'll also see the same row with to be developed. In this example. Three of the schools do not have any regional countywide programs. So we were expecting that we probably would have to stand up a lot of programs here. But with four schools, we only have five
programs strands because the local schools have offerings that we can use to build upon. And I just wanted to point out in region one, we have five schools and we have four programs, strands that we need to build up. And then in region two we have four schools and five program strands. We need
to build up so that that's where we are with region one and two. It's not this simple going forward. So let's take a look at the next regions. Let's go to the next slide please. So here's region three. Region three is Kennedy Walter Johnson Woodward and Wheaton. As you know Woodward will open in 2027.
We have that indicated. And Woodward's building we have a preview, a preview of the facilities. We know that they're going to be offering arts. And so we claimed it for them. That's why it's in the lighter color. So they are going to be they have visual arts. We're saying that they
have visual arts right now as they go to open. And then you'll see the other coloring bands for the other schools where we gave them credit based on those four criteria. And in region number three, with four schools, we have three different program strands to stand up. So we're doing really
well here because these programs strands are not brand new. We have these existing in other places. So we definitely can expand our learning and the program models. Region four. So region four is a little different. We have Richard Montgomery, Rockville, Churchill and Wootton four
schools. And you can see the color bands and where we're giving schools credit based on those four criteria. And you'll see that even in this example, most of the schools have a less common language. So generally how we approach this is just
indicating where where the students where the schools have these programs. And now we have to look at what has to be developed. And in this example, we have for a few more programs, strands that we have to develop. I think that is one, two, three, four. You can count with me five, six, seven, eight, nine.
There are nine strands in this example. So this is a school area. And where we're going to need to provide some real direct support. All of them of course. But with nine program strands we definitely need to pace ourselves with with this region in particular, let's go
to the last two regions, five and six. Next slide please. Thank you. So this is region five. It's Crown Magruder Gaithersburg Damascus and Watkins Mill. You'll see that Crown will also open in 2027. And so we're claiming for them
technology and the science related career and technical education science. But you'll also see here that more most of them have at least three representation or markings for each of the program themes. And then you'll see for the ones
that need to be developed. This is another area, this one I think has seven, where we're going to need to provide some support to stand up seven programs, program strands here. Okay. And then region six, our last region we have Seneca Valley, Clarksburg, Quince Orchard, Poolesville and
northwest. And you can see that this region, interestingly enough, is very strong in technology and technology engineering. Almost every school has that. And then we're we have to be developed. We have the science related CTE leadership, visual arts and
design. So in all of these regions, we wanted you to also know that the feedback from facilities and the arts team was really important, because a visual arts and a performing arts program is different. We have not we don't have a performing arts currently. So that information was really helpful to have us look at the
different regions and identify where we're going to have some opportunities going forward. Because visual arts and performing arts are two of our program strands. So we can go to the next slide. So I'm going to turn it over to miss McLean
to talk a little bit about the high school program development. Good evening. The next slide please. Can I get the next slide please. Thanks. So the
last time we were here we explored what an interest based pathway could look like. And today we want to take that a step further and show how a regional program can grow. When we build on the assets that a school already has. In this example, we're looking at a sample regional medical science
and healthcare program. This school already has an existing and strong certified nursing assistant program and certified medical assistant program. So there's a solid foundation to build on here. This regional program would have three
pathways a criteria based medical science pathway, and two interest based clinical pathways nursing assistant and medical assistant. Many of the key pieces are already in place. They're specialized classrooms, qualified teachers, some who have real world professional
experiences and strong industry partners. So to grow the existing programs, the interest based programs into a regional program, we'd focus on the ninth grade program, perhaps a cohort science class, making sure that there are extra curricular and co-curricular activities for students and
potentially expand it. The criteria based medical science pathway would require more development using some existing courses, but also adding new classes and experiences outside of the classroom. Next slide. Closer. Okay, here we have a
sample for four year plan for students in a criteria based medical science pathway. The pathway uses a combination of existing science courses. Completion of the Biomedical Sciences CTE program and includes accelerated science learning. Students would move
through these courses as a cohort in grades nine and ten, and continue that model in their biomedical classes. This is to build community, to help teachers coordinate instruction and ensure the needs of highly able students are met, and help students and teachers connect program themes across their classes. This pathway would
also include the opportunity for an industry recognized certification, the Bio Technician Assistant credentialing exam, called the Base. Earning this credential makes students more competitive for entry level roles and high growth fields like biomanufacturing, quality control, research and
development, and clinical research. Additionally, students would have access to exceptional capstone experiences, including work based learning, scientific research opportunities, and dual enrollment college courses. This may sound familiar to some families. This model is similar
to the existing and wonderful Biomedical Science application program at Wheaton High School, and that would give us an added advantage as well. Experienced staff within the district who can provide expertise and guidance as we stand up this
new program. Next slide please. So high quality program includes experiences beyond the classroom where students build relationships around shared interests, immerse themselves in the content. Have fun competing towards common goals or against others. Gain
authentic hands on experiences and learn directly from professionals in the field. So examples might include job shadowing and work based learning with partners that we that we have currently, such as Holy Cross Hospital and Montgomery General or partners that we may have in the future, field trips to the National
Museum of Health and Medicine, or tours of the Shock Trauma Center at the University of Maryland Medical Center. Capstone research projects can be conducted in partnership with post-secondary institutions. Students can join clubs like the future health professionals, attend conferences complete and health
and science compete. Pardon me and health and Science Skills competitions, and earn student service learning by volunteering at health fairs. So together, high interest challenging courses combined with rich co and extracurricular opportunities ensure that students are well
prepared not only for college but for careers in the medical sciences. So now I'll share some thinking on what it would take to implement a program like this in terms of staffing and resources. Next slide please. So when we think about
staffing for a program like this, it's important to point out that teacher staffing would continue to be based on school enrollment and the courses and programs students sign up for. But what we do propose is that to make all of these exciting experiences possible for students is that we need a
program coordinator. A program coordinator could coordinate co and extracurricular events and opportunities, including the competitions and the field trips, recruit students into the program, help them understand the opportunities, monitor students as they move through the program, make sure they're on track, work with our
families and keep our families informed and develop and maintain the partnerships needed with health care providers and post-secondary education and community organizations. We propose that we propose, starting with a halftime coordinator in the year before the program launches. This could be a teacher already in the program
and then moving to full time as the program grows. And that's what you see there. And finally, because this program includes such a strong extracurricular component, we would need to dedicate stipend funding to support a teacher who can take on this work outside of the
school day. Next slide please. So we'll start looking at some of the resources needed to develop this program. This program has two types of courses. Existing courses like Honors Biology, Honors Chemistry, AP biology, AP biology, and the biomedical
courses. And what you see here is a potential professional learning plan for the teachers of those existing science courses. The program will be phased in over four years. So you'll see we begin preparing with the honors biology and honors chemistry teachers. So for example, these teachers
would receive new magnet teacher training tailored to their courses. This would ensure they have strategies to engage highly able students, and can weave program themes and experiences into the curriculum. We might also give these teachers an opportunity for a paid externship out in
the field, with our partners in the medical fields or biotechnology and working alongside professionals, they get a deeper, firsthand understanding of the field, and they'll bring that back into the classroom. Collaboration will be essential for program quality. We're proposing dedicated time and funding for
cross-regional planning and professional learning, so that staff in all six regions can build and sustain strong programs together. And while there's an initial investment to launch, over time the costs become more modest, it becomes more focused on the professional learning
communities and training new teachers in the program. Next slide please. So this shows the professional learning plan for teachers of biomedical sciences. Can we go back one please?
Unless that was a hint. It's it's very close. It's very similar to the plan for existing courses. But with the addition of course training in the biomedical science courses.
One major difference here is you'll see the blue asterisks. And because this is a program made up of existing courses, but including a career and technical education pathway, some of the things the training,
the materials for new courses to start up. Because these courses are pretty exceptional, they're eligible for Perkins Grant funding. Next slide please. This slide is a summary of the additional cost for
adding a criteria based medical science pathway and building out a regional medical science and health care program in a school that already has related programs in place. So here you see the cost for the additional staffing, the coordinator and after school stipend, the
professional learning, and the additional materials needed to launch the biomedical portions of the program. So looking ahead, after 2030, 2031, the ongoing cost would be more limited. You would support you would we would continue to support professional learning communities. There would be
replacement materials, particularly for biomedical. There would be the cost of the new industry certification and training for teachers. So there's an upfront investment. But this after that, excuse me, we're focused on sustaining quality. So I'll now turn it
over to Mrs. Porter. Thank you. Miss me? I'm back. So can we go to the next slide please? Okay. So before we get into the initial recommendations, we
know that there is there are a lot of questions that we have been fielding and also some advocacy that we've been fiel. But what we want to make sure to let you know is that this is the first part of our work as we've collected all this data, what we need to do after we get all this data and
make these recommendations and start to work with our schools and our community for feedback, and that's going to be really important, because what we have is a lot of quantitative data that we'd like to get some qualitative data for the lived experience for from the schools. So let's go ahead and go to the next slide. So here's our
working assumptions. We are our initial recommendations again are made from looking at our regional countywide programs our career and technical programs, looking at less common languages and looking at the information from arts and facilities. So that's how we
designed this. The this round of recommendations may be adjusted. So we want folks to be aware of that. The existing successful regional programs that are not elevated at this round for the six region model may be elevated or have the option to continue as a local pathway. So this is not if you
don't see it up there, it doesn't mean it's going away. It can remain as a local school program, but we'd like to work with high school principals and staff to talk about what that can look like going forward. As we're strengthening high school programs, it's expected that successful local pathways can
continue, and the five program themes have a total of 15 program strands. And we'll we'll talk about that because you might be counting some things. So let's go to the next slide. So here is our first proposal. So what I want to
also say is that in our current model our students have about 13 to 20 regional programs that they're they have access to to apply. And so this is pretty much in alignment with what they have been accustomed to.
So some of our school clusters have 13, some of our school clusters have 22. And there's a range in between. What we have here are five program themes but with 15 program strands. And so you're also going to see them in different places. So I told you that color coding is
going to be helpful for you. Because what you'll see for example, let's just start with region one to orient you. Bethesda Chevy Chase is listed first. We're proposing the International Baccalaureate in the Humanities program there. That's that purple. But let me
tell you how we arrived at some of these recommendations. So first of all, we looked at that asset map and we looked at what schools had to offer. And some of our schools had more to offer than others based on those four criteria, just based on those four criteria. And so as a result of that, what we
needed to do was look to make sure that each of the schools had a vibrant opportunity to offer a program that would be highly desired by students. So then we just started making recommendations where programs would go based on what they were already offering. So in region one, you may know that
B-cc and Albert Einstein both offer the International Baccalaureate program. Neither are regional, they're both local, and both are solid programs at their schools. However, B-cc did not offer a regional countywide program, so therefore it was recommended
for them to offer the International Baccalaureate program because they also they have it. If you look at Montgomery Blair, we know that we heard some testimony. Folks were very concerned about the science math, computer science program going away. That's not going away. It is here to stay. And we're also adding proposing
engineering and communication to also be added to the school communication in the form of its communication arts program that's already there. So that's that's probably pretty familiar for some of our folks. Walt Whitman Walt Whitman, Walt Whitman is in its second year,
I believe, or going on its third year offering its leadership Academy of Social Justice. So they're going to contain continue with that. We're also going to add public service and languages in Albert Einstein. They have the Visual Arts Center. You'll see that that's remaining there. And then we're also adding design
and education. And then at Northwood. Northwood is opening also in 2027 with their new building they have they're going to we're recommending the performing arts to be at that school, along with medical science and health care. So what I didn't get to point out
to you, but you might be following along are is the key. So the fonts are all different, different styles. So the reason why if you see them capitalize, it means that that's a program we have to stand up. If you see that it's italicized, that's the actual name of the program
that exists. So it's likely going to go forward that way. If you see a carrot the upside down V you'll see that that is noting the less common languages. We don't have a language program, but we want to recommend putting that forward because as you know, we
have an elementary middle immersion world language programs. Most students return to their home school for language programs. But what we want to do is broaden that opportunity here. And then if you see an asterisk, we are proposing criteria based. Okay.
So let's look at region two. So we're going to follow kind of the same format at for James Hubert Blake. We'reoing to offer a proposal for them to offer the whole strand of the visual and performing arts, along with the communication design. Many of the schools offered education. They're also going to offer education at
Paint Branch. Paint branch has strong science program, so they're being proposed to offer medical science and health care, as well as leadership and public service leadership. As a program there, they'd have to stand up at Springbrook. They already are an International
Baccalaureate regional program. They're going to continue that. We're also going to add the science, math and computer science there and then at Sherwood. Sherwood does not have a regional program, but they have an engineering program strand. And then we're also adding humanities and
languages to their school. So let's go to the next two regions. So region three and four. You'll see here with the four high schools and with Woodward. Woodward I'm going to point it out is going to offer the whole arts and
communication and design strand. No, not the strand, the program theme. They're offering all of that. Wheaton is offering all of the science, math and computer science and engineering strand program theme. John F Kennedy is offering two different kinds of programs. So that's going to be
important for us to note medical science and health care and the IB program. And Walter Johnson is also going to be offering two different program themes, languages and humanities. And the strand of the leadership public service and education. So again, these are our proposals going forward
with region four. We have IB at Richard Montgomery, along with Humanities and Performing Arts. Rockville were proposing the medical science because they offer pltw biomedicine and health care. And also two of the programs, strands of Leadership and Public Service.
At Churchill. We're proposing visual arts, which is going to be criteria based design and communication. Also, the program strands of languages and education. And then Wootton will offer the whole strand of the science, math and computer science and engineering. If you recall, last last board meeting,
we presented some data to you that showed which students were coming to populate some of our programs at Montgomery Blair High School. Wootton High School is one of the largest groups of students that populate the Montgomery Blair High School, so this is a great
opportunity for us to program in place. So let's go ahead and go to the next. Last two regions. So region five. So we have Crown Magruder, Gaithersburg Damascus and Watkins Mill. We have five here. You can see we have a lot of
capital capitalized programs here to support. What we wanted to point out here. For Magruder in particular, aviation is a countywide program there at Magruder, and it has regional transportation. What will happen is that they will be
able to continue offering that to the region. We have Crown. Crown is designed to have the science, math and computer science program. We kind of shared that with you at the data slides. And then you can note the rest of the the program themes. Watkins mill is offering the whole program
theme of IB Humanities and Languages. Okay. And our last region I know I'm almost done. Hang in there. Okay. So Seneca Valley, I see you I feel I feel folks are kind of sulking and going down. I'm sorry, but I
want this is very exciting. So for me. So let's look at Seneca Valley. You'll see that International Baccalaureate is the only program listed there. However, they are a career hub, so they're going to be supporting three regions likely
with their career hub. So we're very we feel really solid about that. Clarksburg is offering medical, medical science and health care. Quince Orchard is offering three program, three three program themes. So communication languages, leadership and public service.
Poolesville. Here's another that might look familiar. They're offering their current science, math and computer science program with global ecology and engineering as well. And then they're going to keep their humanities program there. And then northwest. They're going to offer a large part of
the arts and communication design theme, as well as education. So who so that is. I have great friends who said you should do all of these slides.
I was very excited about that. But what we wanted you to see, because I think when we first started, we were talking about the five program themes. And so I think people were thinking, okay, so one school is going to have this program theme, another school is going to have this program theme. But when you started looking at the
assets, we really wanted to work smart and we really wanted to build upon the identity and the culture of the school. And so this is how we're able to do that, by separating them and dividing them up. And the great thing about this that we did hear from a few principals is that they like the idea of that. Some of the program themes are
going to attract different kinds of students to their schools, so that's also a really great opportunity for them. So those are the six regions for proposal. Again this is initial. And again this is also about the opportunities that we're providing is very much in alignment with what
they're accustomed to. It looks a little different in this in this matter. And then the other part that's going to be different, of course, is the catchment. Because we have county wide, we have different catchments and up county and down county, we're moving toward more regional. And so it's really exciting to know
that we're removing these barriers and that we're going to increase opportunity for students. We're going to have to create a new norm about the application season. Even though Miss Porter talked about 3000 students applying out of 12,000, in the current process, it could look different with this
new process because the barrier of transportation and distance could still be removed. So that's really exciting news for us. Okay, you can go to the next slide. So this is an example that we wanted to show what can happen and what it can look like at a school. So this
is not exactly what it's going to look like. But we wanted to give you something just to think about. And we wanted to showcase for our viewers what a school will look like in this new region model. So on the left we have strong local high school, and we shared a few
slides about what that looks like. And so we wanted you just to know that that really is where most of our students are going. So Gaithersburg High School has roughly in their capacity, 2444 students. Is that right, Adnan? That right? I'm kidding. Okay, so it's 2444
students. I looked it up earlier today. And so we we know that roughly 75% of those students are going to go to Gaithersburg. Many of the students will look at the regional programs, but we're thinking roughly 75% to 70% of
those students will go to Gaithersburg. So that means that we have to have strong local opportunities for those students. And we've also been told by our design team who represent Gaithersburg that they're really happy with their opportunities and they like to stay in their cluster. So
that's really important for us to know. But now we are going to look at the working model with the regional program can look like in Gaithersburg is used to having regional programs. But here are some examples of a regional program theme the visual arts and design and the Medical Science and health care are two of the
program themes we're listing for you. The sample pathways of Arts and Design and game Design. If you see the asterisk by visual Arts and design, that's a criteria based. And if you look at game design, that's interest based with the two asterisk. And then you can see the same for medical science
and pharmacy. We're giving you those examples. Now on the third column we want you to see the proposed number of grades nine through 12 regional seats. So these are students who might be coming from the other schools, not Gaithersburg, but from the other schools applying and wanting to get into the programs. So we're proposing
200 to 240 seats for one of the first band of programs, and then the medical science and health care 200 to 240 there. So that's roughly 200. That's roughly 440, 480. I can do math 480 students that might be coming to that school to
participate in those programs. But then one of the other pieces that's really important that we wanted to stress the majority of our secondary programs offer local seats. And the reason why this is really important is that local seats really support one school
community, and we want to ensure that students don't feel squeezed out, getting access to programs that are in their school. And we've seen this in the choice process. We see that families pick their home school, they've done their research of all their schools, but they still pick their home school.
And part of it is because they like the programs. Part of it is because it supports their life circumstances. Part of it is because of legacy. Whatever the reason is, we wanted to ensure that where students are qualified or where they have interest, there would be opportunity for them to be able to attend a program at their
local school. And then when out of area students come to that local school, it's easier for the school community to be built. There's inclusion versus a sense of exclusion. And so in many of our elementary, middle and high school programs, reserving local seats is a really important role because
it really fosters support that it's not an us and them, it's a we. So we really are proposing to look at 100 seats. And then that would be one of the concerns that we've heard are not a concern, but one of the
advocacies is that we wanted to make sure that we had critical, critical mass of students so that schools can schedule and provide enriched courses. So this is where we have a total number of students. Proposed number of grade nine through 12. Total seats 300 to 340. And
then 300 to 340 for the second second band of programing. But for Gaithersburg, that means that they might get between 4 to 500 out of area students. But our current data shows that over 100 students, about 110
students have are at different schools from Gaithersburg. So we believe that this is a really good working model. The program that has the largest number of students in a regional county wide program is Richard Montgomery IB program. They have 400 students total
for out of area, plus another 100 students for local. That's 500 students that they program for. So 500 students you can you have lots of opportunities to program for courses and opportunities. So that's really exciting. And so that's what
these schools we hope are also going to be able to provide. And we're not going to help. We're going to design them so that they can provide them. So those are the numbers that we're working with. So that's just an example. But this is what will be available as an example at Gaithersburg High
School okay. Go to the next slide okay. Thank you very much Miss Franklin. We appreciate your enthusiasm. All right. We are almost finished. We just want to end up with some questions that we have been
receiving from the community. And so like last time we're just going to go through a few questions and answer them. What happens to existing local signature and academy programs. And so we want to make sure
that the community is aware that these pathways may continue if they continue to reflect student interest. We want to make sure that we have enrollment data, completion data and outcome data to help us guide those decisions. So we,
again, are not interested in eliminating programs, but we want to make sure that those that are successful maintain. Next slide please. What will aviation at Magruder High School be available as a regional program. And Miss
Franklin already mentioned that the answer is yes. It may continue as an interest based regional program. Next slide please. It is rising grade nine, the only entry point to the
regional programs. So while many students will begin in grade nine, there will be additional on ramps for students to enter later. We know that students can show interest and develop interest over time, and so we want to make sure that there are other
opportunities for them to access programs. So we want to keep things flexible. Next slide please. Go back one slide.
Will local high schools continue to offer application only programs. So this is still to be determined. Many of these programs were originally created to give students access to opportunities similar to the criteria based programs, but
within their local school. So as we strengthen regional and local pathways, will carefully review these application only programs to see if it is necessary and if they continue to add value. The goal is not to take away opportunities, but
to make sure that programs are consistent, equitable and aligned with student interests and outcomes. So that is to be determined. And then the last slide we are really almost finished is our timeline. So we just want to remind you of what
is to come in September. We'll focus on community engagement. And our design team will continue to work alongside us to refine the ideas that we hear. October will come back to a board presentation where we will share more details about
the local high school pathways and specific program design options. And we'll even begin to talk about middle school. We will talk more about the community engagement in November. We'll identify what professional learning teachers
and staff will need, and will also build, share information about the budget and resources in. In December, the program analysis plan will be finalized and we will start communicating the plan and preparing for
implementation. And January Superintendent will bring forward the recommendations for boundaries and program access. And then in March, the board will finalize its decision on the recommendations. And then in fall, you see the outreach
season begins. So next slide please. We will stop there for questions and discussion. Thank you so much. That is a 60 minute presentation which we haven't seen for a while. Thank you for all the work you have
done and continue to do for the boundary study and program analysis. And I'm going to open up for my board members to ask questions. And this is an important topic. I'm going to try to go as many rounds as
possible by ask my colleagues to be brief with comments and heavy on your questions, because this is a process. I know we do still have a lot of questions remaining. And before we start that, I'm just wondering whether this is a
what it is or is it a an oversight on slide 41 and slide 42, I noticed when you talk about the region, no programs are out of the six regions for
has education, two do not have education. That's region two or region three. And region five. Is that intentional? Yeah. Are you saying that it's missing from the slide? Yeah. On 41.
That's region three I don't see oh there is education. So I missed it. I missed it because but it's not capitalized. So that means it's already existing in the schools. It has an education program. Correct. Okay. All right. Thank you so
much. All right I'm going to start from my. Two dozen. Two dozen. That's that's that's okay. All this all the programs are right there. Right there on the paper okay. Very good, very good, very good. All right I'm going to start question first
round from here okay. All right. One I just want to say that I really appreciate a lot of the visual modules. I think that it's very easy to understand off that. And it's clear which I think is very appreciative when we're all tired. But as we
move toward the regional modules, what will happen for transportation for students that are attending programs outside of their regions that are proposed? So let me make sure I understand the question. So are you talking about the students that are currently
part of a program that are attending outside of the region? So that is again, I think we discussed about that. That's a, you know, based on board's decision. If they continue to stay in that program, then transportation, which is why if you remember the slide where we talked about that, there's going to be some additional
resources. So as if this is, again, you know, if they're in a program and it's decided that they will continue in, their transportation will be provided till the time they finish out the program. Okay. Are we doing one one question. Yeah. But
we'll come back. I will do as many rounds as it need to be. This is a big topic okay. And thank you for bringing very brief. Thank you, Mrs. Zimmerman. Thank you. And thank you for the marathon presentation. I know that was a lot for everyone. I appreciate the hard work that went into
all of it. When we looked at some of this information before, one of the things that we looked at were some maps that had like high school GPAs on them, and this was showing the success that our students are seeing. I would also like to
see the same maps, but with map data. I'm realizing now saying map map data sounds kind of ridiculous. I mean, the measured academic progress data, I think that that would be useful for us to see as well, and to see, you know, how some of these programs might be helpful for our students and
where they are regionally. Thank you. Miss Silvestre. Yeah, I wanted to bring up the IB expansion efforts that we've done in the last four years or
so. So that that was an effort to bring more equity of access of IB programs to different regions of the county. Based on your experience, like what can you share in terms of what we learned from that process that
can be applied to our current work? So one of the things that we can definitely share is that at the time that we proposed to have the regional programs at Watkins Mill, Springbrook and John F Kennedy, one of the
highlights of that project was that those schools were graduating students who were black and brown and impacted by poverty at higher rates than students that were at the Richard Montgomery IB program. So and they are not they were
not in a cohort model so that black and brown and students impacted by poverty at those three schools were graduating in the diploma program at their IB school at higher rates than the Richard Montgomery program,
who also offers the IB program. And so the question was, they didn't offer a cohort model. It was you could start in 11th grade in IB. And so because they had that culture, we wanted to expand into those three schools and then also
offer. But at the same time, we wanted to we understood that if the admission process was not equal, by having regional programs in a county wide program, there was some concern that there might be a perception that one was more superior than the other. And so
we worked really hard to try to level them at the same standard as Richard Montgomery. But resources were different. We did not have the same numbers of students applying, and we worked really hard at that. The the coordinators would go to
the middle schools, they would recruit students, they would provide the student, the teachers got the same training, but unfortunately, we learned that the Richard Montgomery IB program is so is highly established, very entrenched in our community, continued to be
the one program people sought out sought after. So as a result, we were able to have a number of the local students participate in the program, but they did not reach the same levels of program offerings and
enrollment in the program. But they continue to graduate a number of students in the diploma program. And so that's a very big success for them. So we believe that when the regional model moves forward, students will have an
opportunity to continue to apply to the IB program in the region. And we don't have numbers for seats right now, but we believe that if the all the programs are resourced equitably, that this program should look comparable to each
to each region. That's what we're looking forward to. Okay, so the program, the regional programs were under-enrolled. The regional programs have 75 seats for the program, 50 are for out of area and 25 are for their local. And they pull
maybe 6 to 7 schools where Richard Montgomery pulls from 25. So sometimes the students are applying to both programs. And if they get invited to Richard Montgomery, nearly 100%, they're accepting Richard Montgomery's program, even if
the right is longer or if it's further. So that is what we are seeing. But the programs, the each of the programs are under-enrolled. They range between 60 and 80% of enrollment, and they each had the same amount of offerings,
high level offerings across the board. I think that varies. And teacher training, teacher training is identical. Yeah, it's hard to gauge because as Miss Yang has and I have talked privately, is just AP and dual
enrollment credits are more accepted at Maryland colleges than IB. And so it's hard to say. It's, you know, that might be a factor to the growing popularity of dual enrollment in the region. So I have more questions. It's economically
challenged region. And yeah, Miss Rivera, no, I'm just going to say that as somebody who had a kid who did IB and who no credits transferred versus a kid who did all AP and all credits transferred, it's a
huge difference. So just just wanted to to say that. But I then going into this theme of consistency, my question is. Whether it's perception or not,
but you look at some of the the data with grading and similar programs and the passage of some of those programs, whether it's the. The, you know, the physician assistant program or the assistant nurse program or
the pharmaceutical program that we offer. And there's there's there's a big difference in schools with the passage rate. But yet you're telling me we have the same training for the teachers? So my my concern is
consistency across the board. When our kids are taking right the same courses. But is it experience? Is it because I know that, you know, kids look
at schools and and that's why you have some kids applying to two programs. So three programs and so on. But sometimes they don't want to apply to the local program. So my my question is about consistency. How are we going to measure
that. So that will be something that we'll have to come back when we are building this out. We'll have to talk about how we're going to make sure that we have consistency across all of our programs. So we'll we'll
come back when we talk about the program development. We'll bring that as a topic. I think that there's something else to add to that, which is one of the challenges that we have with having either one or just a couple of similar programs is
that there aren't peers. And if we were to create some organizational energy around getting some of our peer educators together to level set, I think it might help reduce some of the variance between some of the schools. I think
that even when we have a program that's titled the same at one place and titled the same at another place, the offerings are still very different and that there's not collaboration on the syllabi, there's not collaboration on the professional development, there's not collaboration even on the core sequence all the
time, which is not amazing. So there's really an opportunity here to create peer groups and to and to create some consistency where there hasn't been some before. Miss Wolff. Yeah, I think a lot of what I'm
actually thinking has been hit upon, but my concern is opportunities and how you're going to support innovation. Specifically, I looked at page
slides on pages 2829. You know, where you were doing the regional programs and telling us what each school has. And two of the regions have opportunities for IB programs at two different schools. So
I'm wondering, one, are you there's still there's still a disparity there. To me, unless you create at least the same number of opportunities in each region. That doesn't say every program has to be exactly the
same, but I think if you don't, when you when you start going to a regional model for the IB programs, people are going to believe all you did was dismantle Richard Montgomery and send them out to a region, not a region that doesn't have
the same number of opportunities and isn't providing the same level of education. Am I making sense here? And the other thing that's quite obvious is that where there are two, isn't that doesn't that give that region,
give the students in that region two opportunities to get into an IB program as opposed to the one regional opportunity? So we have so it's a similar model that we have currently.
So we have eight high school IB programs. And then we also have of those IB programs 3 or 4 are local only. And then for our regional and then we have one countywide. And so what we have is students may elect to
participate in their local IB. Some of them at the same time apply to a regional IB. And then some of them apply to a countywide IB. So what we recognize it's not really equitable that some students have three opportunities to
apply to a program to access the International Baccalaureate program. Yes. Where one student only has one opportunity, which is the regional, which is a countywide, which is our Julius West kid. So we but this is
what happens over years of layering different programs. And so we will look at the opportunities that that you just raised. We'll have to look at that as we begin to finalize our proposed programs. That will take a little bit of time,
because we definitely want to have an opportunity to talk to the principals and the school and the communities about what we're proposing, and then we'll be able to look at seats and opportunities, as you have discussed. Yeah. So the short answer to Miss Wolf's question is, yes, it's an equitable by
region. And and part of the challenge to to miss Franklin's point is that there hasn't really been a comprehensive county wide strategy for program application. And so you kind of get this chart that
this multicolored chart of assets are all over the place without any real intention or without any real focus. And so this is kind of the opportunity to, to say this is what our strategy is, this is what our approach is so that there can
be equitable access. I want to thank you for the work you've done on this. It's come a long way, and you're starting to put at least some meat on the bones for me, but I still want to know how you're going to support this innovation. I mean, I thank you for the dollar amounts, but it's a lot more
than just the money. How how are you going to get these regional programs to be similar to the countywide programs that we have when you start expanding out? Mr. So my colleagues talked a lot of the
big picture. I'm just going to zoom in on a school at this point, and I'll come back to the big picture. So I'm looking at region one surprise, surprise. And looking at the
asset mapping. And then the proposed regional programs, and specifically Einstein, which has the asset mapping for visual arts. But there was a
strong Vapa program there. It is Vapa, which is the Visual Arts and Performing arts academy, which kind of works with the Visual Arts center. And personally, I know several
people that pick Einstein just because of instrumental music like that is the. That is a huge focus. I'm not sure if this got captured about the instrumental music, which I see slightly different than overall performing arts. It's something
to think about instrumental music. And also I like how you did the visual arts and then the new program proposed would be design, which can work with as like you said, I'm thinking
steam. Okay, so if you think about steam, that could be designing computer games. That could also be doing electronic music, which is extremely popular. And that takes a lot of tech know how. Because when you are concentrating on arts
in certain programs, really the some of the academics side of that to bring in math and some science would be a Steam program. So I just want to I know there's opportunities to like build upon this vision. So
I would like to put that out there because Einstein is not you know, they do have the local IB and kids do and it's building I get that. But really from what I saw, it's that arts
design and you know, that steam I think is a is a way to make that a stronger option. So thank you. Would you be willing to look at that? I guess that's my question. Okay. Let me go to
Miss Montoya online. Thank you. Thank all of you for all of your work and being here so late into the night. It's a lot of logistics, but I know that you guys are up for the task. And I mean, really, when you guys presented, it's clear that you understand what you're doing and you're really
checking all the bases. So I appreciate that. I also appreciate the acknowledgment that we need to focus on our middle school and elementary school students and families because we, as I am one, are the ones that are actually going to be most impacted. I think my rising middle schooler might be the first year of kids
that actually really fully deals with the impacts of some of this programing, so we definitely want to make sure that our families in elementary school and middle school even know that this is happening and how it may impact them. So I actually really like the regional model. I really appreciate what you guys have
put together. One thing I'm wondering is how do we make sure, though, that students don't get put in, whether it's by themselves or others, kind of in a box? Because, for example, I get really concerned
when I hear kids or parents of kids say things like, oh, well, they're not a math person. We're all math people. We all need to know how to count and do mathematical computations and things like that. And I think that some of that becomes teaching us that maybe we're not math people. And so, for
example, if you have a child who loves music and math and is good at both or right, so we want to make sure and I strive as myself as a parent to make sure that my kids know they can succeed and excel in all of these areas. And so then I just worry about, are we putting
them too much on a path too young to where then we're not developing those other parts of them and their brains and their capabilities? Thank you. That's a very good point. And so one of the things that we have as a
part of the work in our office is career advising. That's taking place in middle schools. And so we really want to make sure that our students are learning about all of the different opportunities starting in middle school, and
we really want to do a great job of communicating what the opportunities will be available to them at their region. But that's where also the strong local local component comes in, so that they have opportunities, if not within these special programs with but also in their
local schools. And so we want to make sure that students, they may go on a path, they may decide that that's not what they want to do. They may decide to make some changes and that there's opportunities to do that within their local school or within their region. Please. So I'd like to add so
one of the things that we do that's really fabulous with the Northeast Consortium and Downcounty consortium is that we do have lessons where the counselors work with students as early as sixth grade to start talking and learning about the different academy programs, the career interest
inventories, and then start thinking about in seventh grade what's going to happen in eighth grade, because we have to get them ready for all of the evening meetings and all the outreach that's going to happen, and all the programing that's going to be coming at them at eighth grade. So we have a great infrastructure to
build from to help support them in middle school. So by the time they get to eighth grade, they would have maybe narrowed it down to some of the areas that they're interested in. But another piece that's really great about this model going forward is that in grade nine, we want students to immerse themselves in a content. And we
did say this, I think, at the last board meeting, that learning what you don't like is just as important as learning what you what you do like. And so in grade nine, if you find that you love working with people, but you decided to go into graphic design, which might feel really lonely, then you have an opportunity to
change. And so you'll have an on ramp later and an off ramp. You'll have an off ramp and then an on ramp to something else that might be available to you. So I think that this is the this is the place where students should be exploring and immersing themselves in opportunities. I do think that
students struggle with this. They say the College Board said that around grade seven students are making decisions about what they want to be and who they want to be. And so we really want to make sure that these lessons address exploring opportunities and letting them know what's available in high school. Right. And I hear all
of that. And I know that we do a lot. Even as early as third grade, my kids were coming home saying someone came to talk to them about career, technical and vocational and all these various things. And I think that's fantastic. But I think that actually just further proves my point that at a very young age, my children were
eight, were telling them, okay, pick a path. And are we are we making sure that when we do that? And again, I like this model. Right. So I'm not anti the the regional model. But are we making sure that we're also
developing these other parts of them. Right. If I have a child that loves music and they're going to go to the music program, but they're also really great at math and they love history and writing because that's just what we've developed. Are they going to then almost to their detriment by choosing this program?
Because we're not also giving them a path to know how to count their money when they get these projects or things. Do you kind of get where I'm going with this? Yes. Thank you for your comment, Miss Montoya. It was a it was a question and I haven't received an answer. So it wasn't it wasn't a comment.
So so I think so. And part of it is, is that every student still has to meet Maryland requirements for graduation, which are diverse in their program of study. It's a little bit different than, say, like majoring in something in a in a college environment where you can overload heavy courses.
You're talking about really the opportunity for 1 or 2 electives, which does leave a little bit of room for some other choice and some other explanation exploration. And I think you've captured something that we're all very interested in, which is how do our kids find something that that makes
them passionate and kind of, you know, ignites their spirit, but at the same time doesn't close them off to other opportunities? This is not going to be for everyone. And it seems like we're spending an awful lot of time talking about programs that are going to capture the interest of about
25% of our students. Great. We also need to strengthen what's going on in the the schoolhouse for the other 75% of students and make sure that they have really, really great opportunities to write. And that's where I'm going. Are we only going to have robotics
teams at the Stem school? Right. Because there might. And so I guess that's where I just want to make sure that we're providing that space for kids to still develop those parts of themselves. Thank you, thank you. I for this round. My questions is around curriculum
and evaluation with thinking about offering these programs in different regions and and. I'm wondering, do we have curriculum standards and frameworks for all these
programs and that we are talking about if we do, fabulous. If we don't, how are we going to secure? Are we buying standard curriculum? Are we gathering our staff to develop curriculum? I will use
one example to illustrate my point for computer science technology, a common high school. Use Code.org as their curriculum for computer science, and depending on pathway,
certain high school use, the Apple program and certain high school use the Cisco program, depending whether they want to do web based, whether they want to do programing, whatever web design. Now, however, as I understand the program at Blair
and Poolesville, they don't go with any of those programs. The teachers do some enrichment and elevation and, and, and all those things to, to to set up their courses at their school. Now we are talking about six
regions to do the same thing. So are we thinking about purchasing standard curriculum? Are we thinking of getting staff together to develop a standard and a framework? How are we going to do that? How long does that take? How much does that take? You know, I
would like us to be consistent, going with the theme of consistency and quality. That's my question about curriculum and evaluation. So I'll let Mrs. Porter fill in the gaps. But this is just taking a look at our asset map. We're not
reinventing the wheel. We we are ready have this programmatic layout already built out in a lot of our schools. It's just not available to every student. And so by replicating programs in each region, we can capture the
learning from other places and, and put it into play. I do think that there's a huge opportunity for consistency, because even when we do offer something in multiple places, we don't have the consistency. So there is a chance for us to to do exactly what you're
saying by creating some of that consistency, by having there be peers between schools. From a curriculum standpoint, I don't know if it's worth going to this slide or not, but the the layout slide that showed the the criteria based pathway for
the medical sciences program, there's not a whole lot of Add that's not a part of the general curriculum already. There's a couple of elective courses and a couple of internship externship experience pieces that are
added to that. But but that already exists. It just doesn't exist in multiple areas throughout the county. So I don't think that we need to go out and buy anything. I don't think that we need to invest our energy into developing a
whole lot that's new. I think we do need to invest our energy in level setting. I think we do need to invest our energy in making sure that if we're going to offer a program in one place, that it needs to be the same high quality in another place. I'm going to go for the second round of questions and go to
Mrs. Oh, sorry, Miss Malone. Yeah. So first a lot of my questions got answered luckily. But and I do want to align myself with the comments about concerns about continuity and the inequalities throughout the already existing programs in our county that are replicated.
What I do want to ask is regarding teacher training and the implementation of these programs, how is that going to be? Is there an example that could be provided about how that's going to happen in the future? Would it involve shadowing existing teachers that have similar programs of
those qualities and assets that you're trying to take and replicate? Can you go to slide 35? There we go. So this is
just one example of some of the professional learning that we're considering for these types of programs. But for this one this is the training that we provide to the honors biology chemistry and AP chemistry teachers who are biology teacher. Excuse me, who
would be teaching as part of this program, this medical science program. And they've had AP training. You know, they have certification in science. But we want to make sure that they're prepared to teach the students who met the criteria for the program as well. So we would want to do some new to
magnet training for the teachers. And I do think that the opportunity to do an externship to get out in the field, you know, the medical field would be very powerful as well. But I agree with Doctor Taylor that that ongoing professional Learning Committee,
community committee. Sorry it's late, which is the ongoing cost around the professional learning for these programs is going to be extremely important. And, you know, I, I think that, you know, the teachers working
together and using that as a venue to provide additional training as well. So that's one example. And this is one example. So we would have to build this out for all of our areas. And then as I shared in November, we'll come back with our professional development plan. Okay I guess just to
clarify though, would these trainings be based on the programs that the teacher is going into specifically? And it would be basically, if you have organic chemistry offered in a Stem program at Blair, the teacher is especially trained in that aspect for that elective. Would it be like that
for like that type of training? Yeah. Correct. Okay. This is a movement. Thank you. I have a similar question to what Miss Rivera-Oven asked. And I would like for us to develop some
kind of rubric for our regional model. Our strategic plan is set up in this way, kind of in a rubric, showing our growth and our strengths and things over time. I think it would also answer to the community
the questions about why we're doing this. If we have some specific data points that we can measure with our programing, make it available to the public. I think that would help all of us understand as well, but also communicate to the public the returns on the investment that
we're getting as we're looking at the real cost, the investment we put into this. Thank you. Thank you, Miss Silvestre. All right. I'm going to try to do them all in one quick fell swoop. I wanted to point out to the public, and if
we could emphasize it more in our future presentations, the wealth of opportunities that exist in dual enrollment. Every student in Montgomery County high schools can do dual enrollment, and there are dozens of degrees where you can
graduate high school with an associate's degree in dozens of options. So I just I think that is a huge resource that we're not really talking about that much, just dual enrollment that's deep. That is deep with
lots of options. There's transportation options. It's free. So we need to emphasize that more. I would say that like Miss Zimmerman said about
the external measures of our students, to show that there are students all over the county that could fill these programs. I think that would be helpful for the future. And just a quick question. Will any of the arts performing arts
program require a facility upgrade? In our latest conversation with facilities? No. As I think with Northwood will be opening a new school, so they're proposed to have it.
Damascus is was one of the other schools that's been going to be offering it. We did ask this question from facilities, and so they proposed to us the following schools were ideal and there were several. So that was helpful. Okay. And then for
the boundaries presentation, I think for the future, people really want to see the real traffic times. When you're estimating bus lengths and so forth. Like, you know, people that live in highly congested areas are not going to believe
your estimates. It has to be kind of rush hour traffic times. That's really important. And I've also heard good feedback in terms of when you release the new options, give people a cheat sheet about what are the what are the benefits of this option, like where are the
strengths and where are the benefits. So they don't have to try to interpret it on their own. And what are your plans to solve capacity issues at at the elementary school level, given that this boundary study is not touching that? So I think it kind of giving us your ideas of
what's going to happen with that would be helpful. And so my question then is just about the eighth graders, I mean, you, you in your chart where you have the different I think there's a lot of questions about the current eighth graders and how they're going
to be impacted by this. If we could pull up that slide, could you just walk us through? You mentioned the seventh graders. They're going to see the the the new changes. But what isn't it more of an impact for the
eighth graders if we can look at slide 21. Is this the slide Silvestre. Am I am I correct that the eighth graders are kind of the limbo? Yes. So from
the program perspective we made, we had a decision point in July that suggested if students are assigned to a regional countywide program this year to start next year, or you're assigned in the Northeast
Consortium or Downcounty consortium, the decision point was that you would be able to graduate from the school you start at. So that's where we were highlighting here in theyee lots of resources needed to support students who are finishing out the current
programs and then starting the new program. So eighth graders who are going to go through the Northeast Consortium in Down County Consortium process this year, along with students who are applying to programs wherever they go. The decision point was to let them stay and
finish. So if I'm if I I'm a neighborhood student of Einstein and I get Einstein and then the boundary changes on me, what happens there? You get to stay at Einstein. Or we may have an option that you can go to your boundary school. Okay.
But that was a decision point we talked about last week, I mean, last month, because there was a lot of concern for families because they're getting ready to go through the choice process. Right. Okay. Thank you, Miss Silvestre. I'm going to skip you in future rounds. All right. Let's talk
about as long as everybody else. Miss Rivera-Oven, thank you for clarifying that, because that was a true concern for folks. And I think that's the right and fair thing to deal with that issue. But I just again, I just want us to focus a little
bit on programs that I think are having a little bit of a hard time, even with the IB programs or some other programs. I just want to have a better idea of how we're going to lift those programs. And the amount of teacher training and the
commitment, I think. But with teacher training, it doesn't happen, you know, oh, we're going to you need money for teacher training. So I'm just trying to understand the cost that is going to to need it in
order to implement this in a manner that is, you know, like Doctor Taylor said, that when a kid walks into an IB program, whether it's a Kennedy or whether, you know, it's it's a Montgomery or whether it's a
Watkins Mill, that they get thed they get the same quality of experience. And I guess that's where my question is, how are we fostering the talent to be able to have this plethora of
folks who were our big county? And I think this is great. I like this model, but again, how are we going to be able to do that? And are you guys putting some money signs to it so the
advocate can start now and and we can, you know, and then we're not at a point where we're not going to be able to implement it the way we thought we could implement it because of that. Yes, yes. So we we
definitely are working on for each program and on all of the regions what the cost will be. So that will be something that will we're, we're building out. But we also believe that we have the talent and the and the staff already existing in
M.C.P.S. And so we really will need to do some work to figure out where we where we have people in schools and where, you know, really maybe doing some recruiting to see if we can get teachers to want to be in different spaces. But that
will be the work. That's kind of the next phase of our work as we build this out. So we'll come back to you with all of those pieces. Mr. can I just respond real just briefly, I just wanted to comment that we want to make sure that we are
saying that all of the IB programs, the regional and the countywide, they have very committed teachers. The students are very invested. What may be different is some of the staffing, what might be different or some of the course offerings. Some of that is due
to enrollment, but we certainly don't want to mischaracterize that the regional programs are lesser. They are definitely not. They're very strong programs, but they are also very early building programs. It's very difficult at times to compete with a brand that's been
established for 40 years, has has had many years to get it right. And so we are still expecting these three schools to be able to deliver the same program and outcomes, which can be challenging when they are only pulling from a quarter of
the student body that another program is. So I do think that there are a lot of variances. I just don't want us to mischaracterize that the regional countywide programs are any different in terms of quality. Mr. okay, back to the
big picture. We really are. There's a lot in the community that wants to hear from transportation and dot Michael Lewis to come and help explain the costs associated. I see you
have initial cost estimates, initial purchase. I don't think I see numbers along with the this is for the transportation. And then is this. This is for the first year, right. The
additional and then as the years go through as the next slide I think talks about it goes down. So it would be good to see this. Some numbers put on these visuals which would be amazing. And then I have
another question. This is kind of a big one. It's something I've talked about with a few people, but not a lot. I am getting some heartburn about flipping the switch on our
county wide after those four years. Like just go from countywide to regional on our countywide programs. So I would like us to explore if, for instance, at Blair right now we
have 100 students from outside the Blair area and 25 for each class. If we could think about either even, even or flipping that right. So after the four years, you have some seats
available for outliers and what the cost of transportation would be if we had some kind of ramp up, you know, instead of like a hard cutoff. So if there as, as we're building capacity
because we don't know exactly the capacity in every area, as we're building capacity with teachers and classes and enough kids in a cohort as we're working, I think when we see, you know, putting resources in the younger grades to make sure
kids can have the prerequisites so they can take advantage of all these great programs in the region. We there might be some work to be done. And I would like to have a model like that and have it priced out. That's
my request. Thank you. So I'll tackle both. And the the short answer to the transportation question is there is no way of knowing until you actually know what kids and what program capacity you're assigning to each program. So any model that
we put out or that we assign to a cost would have to be with a ton of asterisks and a ton of preliminary and a ton of conditional. Because here's part of the issue. Your ridership changes. So even though we project, you know, 12
busses for one region or 20 busses for another region, what is going to happen is that that is not a net number, because your net may be offset almost entirely, if not by some in some regions, because your
ridership in other areas will go down. So as it stands right now, about 110,000 students access our bus transportation network. That's not likely to change. We will still be transporting 110,000 kids. The
question is, how are we transporting 110,000 kids? Whether you are realizing efficiencies by shortening the routes, going to a region model, or whether you know, because you are at a region model, your regional busses go up and your
local busses go down, but you are going to realize a net effect. And so we have to plan for a range of busses because not we will not know the specific numbers until we start projecting out the capacities for each program. That's one
answer. That being said, we have a pretty good idea. But you know, until we get further along in this process and decide what those capacities are for each program, it's going to be hard to come up with that. And it will be
different for each each region. And it will be different from year to year because the interest will change from year to year. In terms of the the, the ramp up versus a cut off. I think that that's exactly what this is doing, is that you you
have the sunset of a series of programs while you have the sunrise of a series of programs, and that there isn't just one day, it's this program, and then the next day it's gone. You actually have those two things happening simultaneously. And for example, you chose the
computer science program at Blair. We're not getting rid of the computer science program at Blair, but the applicant pool will slowly decrease from being a countywide program, while slowly increase in being a regional program at the same time. And if we're offering a
commensurate program across the county in another student's locality, no, we would not transport them across the county just to preserve a few additional seats, because that would actually reinforce some of the inequities that we are
combating right now with this proposal. I'm still, I have to say, I'm still thinking about a little bit of a slower ramp. So slower in a way that if there's
true outliers and we're not offering, if we are offering all of the same courses and those, even if it's only ten kids that can take that course, or if there's a really good. Way to access it digitally, I'm
not as worried, but I'm just letting you know where I'm at, is that I want to make sure that there's if there's outliers that the kids at Blair, for instance, don't have the opportunities of the kids and maybe the neck have. And so so
I would like to see that assurance as we move on through the process. And then if we can't, if we need a couple more years of ramping up, then it might be okay to be open. Not forever anyway. That's just
this is where I'm thinking and I'm willing to have that conversation. So thank you. Thank you, Miss Stewart. I'm going to Miss Montoya. Thank you so much. I noticed on the
proposed model that only one school in one region was designated as a career hub, and I was wondering if maybe that's those are the kinds of programs that you mentioned, like, well, if some schools have programs and they're working, they could
keep them. Or if we're going to have more career hubs, it just seems like that's a really viable career path and post-secondary school plan for a lot of folks, quite frankly, without student loans and everything as well sometimes. So I just would like to see more opportunities like that
rather than kind of college, you know, traditional college university prep programs solely. Yes. I when I was going through the slides on slide 41, Wheaton is also designated as a career hub. And so I didn't point that
out. So it's Wheaton High School will be partnering with Thomas Edison High School as a career hub. And then we also have Seneca Valley as a career hub. And so we will be designating regions that would go to those both of those different career hubs. So we're
still only going to have then in the entire county. Two. Yeah. So I'm I'm glad you brought that up, Miss Montoya, because we we would love to expand and add additional career hubs and, and those opportunities. That is where you're going to see a sharp increase in cost. The
things that we're talking about right now is actually leveraging a lot of the resources that we already have. And, you know, teacher training relative to the scope of our budget and what we do. This is small. Even the net impact of transportation, relatively
speaking, on the downslope is actually a savings. But in the outlying first couple years, it's actually an increase. But to add another facility, we do need to start thinking about that in terms of of of our CIP as well, because the the
facility needs for the programs that you're talking about that does add cost. That is going to be an impact. And that is something that we should think through. Perfect world. Yeah, we'd have one in every region and that is something to think through. But it is. That needs to be like a long term
conversation about what the board envisions, about what they want to see career and technical education look like. Okay. Thank you so much. Thank you. I would like to ask about after school activities. As we we are talking about the 25% of
the high school students, and we want them to be fully engaged in all aspects of our school life. I have my one child that went to Eastern Middle School, and basically we didn't do any after school
activities because she needed to catch that bus home. Otherwise, you know, we can't we can't. Okay? Even in a region, students are still traveling between school to school. And most of our school students don't drive and will
depend on school transportation. How do you envision students who participate in sports clubs after school be able to get home? So that so that's a great
point. We definitely need to make sure that we have after school clubs and activities built in to our regional model. So we will put that factor that into our planning and budgeting
as we come forward the next time. But thank you. That's a really great point that we'll make sure we address. Okay. It's already captured a little bit with the medical science example, like having a Hosa club. But having a club available is not really the challenge. It is some of the
logistical things that you're talking about. So we can articulate what that looks like next time. So as you I know you have future months to bring in. You give us a timeline. One of the things is even though staffing is not, I do still
want to see that transportation cost just a gross estimate and but but sounds like you're adding coordinators into each high school. Sounds like you're doing staff training, development, all that stuff. I
would like to have a ballpark of what that's going to cost us as we move forward. All right. I'm going to another round. This one, please go ahead. I also wanted to note about extracurriculars at the Blair Magnet Stem program. We have a ninth period, so we end school
at 320. If you're in that, that's an important thing to keep in mind as well. If you want to continue that along with this final question. But I did want to ask from my question from last meeting about fostering and keeping that competitive nature that comes with these programs. What are we doing to ensure that in
the future models, so many of our programs are criteria based, which will have multiple measures for students for review. So that is going to be really important because we want to make sure that we are providing enrichment
opportunities for students. So that's not going to go away. So we believe that that's going to be one of the drivers for the competitive nature for for these programs. But the real great thing about that is having opportunities in multiple places for students.
So the application process will still be centralized, will still do considerable outreach, will be working with the middle schools to ensure that because one of the pieces of feedback we get from the design team is, these are really great to have these enrichment programs and these accelerated opportunities,
but we still need to get students to have access to them. Thank you. I was asking about specifically competitions like interdisciplinary competitions between similar programs between regions. So that's a really neat idea. I did not think about that. So that's
great. Thank you very much. Yes. So we're very committed to making sure that the co-curriculars such as competitions, field trips, externships, all of those pieces are involved. But you're absolutely right. We now can do this within a region okay. Yeah. Amazing. Miss Zimmerman thank
you. I have similar related questions to quite a few of my colleagues. Miss Rivera Evans question about professional development and our staff. I think that's really what's missing in our asset mapping. I look forward to what you bring back to us in that regard.
Similarly to what Miss Yang said about real costs, the community does continue to ask us about this same thing. I look forward to the updates that you'll bring back to us. And then related to Miss Silvestre question, Mr. Mamoon, I don't want you to feel left out. We have questions for you
too. Really. We we continue to get questions from the community about traffic patterns and safety that come along with our boundaries. Could you just give us a little bit more context about what goes into these proposals that we see for boundaries, and how
traffic and safety is related? Yeah. So obviously with any options that are, you know, our consultant produces for discussion. We do have internal teams. So we do look at it with
our internal transportation team. They look at the the the the zones that are created, the boundaries. And they will look at the safety zones. They will look at the walk zones for each of those schools. And those are all that those discussions and the feedback from our
transportation team then goes into the options development. So one of the things I also pointed out earlier in the presentation that going forward that, you know, one of the things that we're going to be doing in the future, options that are coming out in
September, that all these boundaries, we're going to strive to make sure that we're staying within those zones, the six zones, which means that, you know, if a school is within, you know, say, zone one, their articulation will not go into zone two and then bring them
back to zone one. So all of those are going to be, you know, something that we will be working into our, you know, future options. But any option that our consultant develops we do review that with our, you know, our transportation experts, the Dot. You know,
there we have multiple people looking at these options. We actually have a meeting tomorrow to go through, you know, to talk about these future options. So what we do look at is, you know, again walk zones, whether they have, you know, continuous sidewalks for, you know, students to be
able to access because sometimes, you know, proximity could look like it's very close. However, you know, our transportation folks can easily point out that even though it looks closed, you know, there may not be a safe access to the school for those students. So those are the things that we definitely take into account as
we develop these options. Thank you, I appreciate that, Miss Rivera. Evans, I wanted to follow u on something miss Montoya was talking about the the the options for technology schools that the fact that we only have Seneca and then the
Wheaton Edison program. And I'm looking you know, every day I'm looking at how we're building Crown. And Crown is literally on the biotech corridor of this county. It is an area, one of
the biggest biotech groups in the country. So I'm looking at the two things that we're offering so far. Crown. I don't see anything medical. I don't see anything biotech. I don't see anything in those areas. So cybersecurity thinks that. Our
young people can actually even walk to internships in that area, literally. So I, I just would like us to to look into that and the opportunities that that area lends itself to look
at jobs for the future. You know, with I, with everything that we have in that area, it's a booming area and I think we would create great opportunities for for our for our students to take advantage of. So if we could do that,
that, that I think will make a lot of folks really, really happy. It's costing us a pretty penny to build that school. I want to get the most out of it and the best opportunities for for our young people. So those
are my $0.02 on that. Thank you. Thank you, Miss Stewart. Okay. Over to Adnan. I spent a lot of time in PTA circles at their summer meetings. I went to
almost all of them. And the one thing I keep hearing is how confusing it was looking at the maps. A lot of times people were looking at it on their phones, and so they went to start to fill out the survey and actually gave up because
they were like trying to toggle back from the survey to the map and what you like or didn't like. And there was four. And it was I mean, they literally gave up. And so as an individual, I've been going out with our printed maps and laying them out like on the table, and people will go and
look and look at the next one look. Oh, I see the difference now. So my question is, could we possibly get some physical printed maps to each cluster so schools could have map sessions on their own or with in
conjunction with PTA? Just because I kept hearing how confusing it was navigating the SEL and the system. I think that's a great suggestion. So yes, what we can do is print out the large scale maps one
the next. When the next round of options are available, and make sure that all the 19 high schools are even. We can make sure all the all the high schools have those maps. If, you know folks want to use those to to, you know, provide as a resource to the community
so they can look at it. That's a great suggestion. Thank you. Thank you. Double checking online to see if Miss Montoya. No. Okay. I would like to ask a question. You know, our job here as Board of Education is oversight. And so what if so,
tell me, what if if a program is under-enrolled and underperforming, how often do you evaluate it? When are you going to develop the evaluation rubric and how would that be conducted. Can you just
illuminate a little bit? Because we are very big system with a lot of programs right now. We're still trying to catch up with the last school years evaluation. Right? So, so as we are expanding this many programs and some of them
actually, we have never seen an evaluation on them, whether it be this Stem program, that leadership program we have never seen or two way immersion program and language program, we've never seen an evaluation
before. And now as we are expanding, help me do my job. How can I be more effectively conduct my oversight? So one of the things we definitely will need to do is have a high school framework evaluation
tool. And so that's going to be for for any of these programs. What happens currently is that when we have programs that might not be thriving, we see that in enrollment. And so we start asking questions about that. So that's one of the first places we notice is that
there's low interest. And so we started to examine what might be the reason for low interest. Sometimes it's personnel. Sometimes it's low awareness about the programs. There might be a variety of reasons why there might that might be the case. So we have in the past
had to sunset some programs for those reasons. And so we do usually it does start with enrollment low enrollment as a as a place to start. When we come back to one of our future
meetings, we will have built out for you our evaluations for the programs. I will appreciate that very much. Something more concrete, more was the time line purpose and measurements we will use that will be fabulous. I'm going to look around the table to see if we
have any more. Yes. Mr. One one comment I have the University of Maryland International Baccalaureate exam. What they take for credit and university Maryland does take. Some
credits from IB exams. I know that because my son got credit that's at University of Maryland. So anyway, but we should probably look at this list and compare like I think that's part of evaluations. Compare what kids are getting
for the hard work they're doing to. There's a huge variation what colleges accept, right? Yeah. So it's worth looking at because if we are talking about the cost of education, we really need to help our families understand that part
of it, too. I have to say, he was overly prepared for his program at University of Maryland, so even if he didn't get credit seeing no other lights, we have been on this for two hours. Let's give ourselves a round of applause. Can we just listen? Let's do it.
Let's do it, let's do it, let's do it. Everybody stand up. Stretch for a minute. I have been standing up. Thank you for the team presenting. We are going to move on to our next item. Equally as exciting. And
the team has been waiting patiently there. And is our item 10.2 framework for prioritizing capital projects. We really move this one up, Doctor Taylor, because we want to be able to have a good
conversation with our community when they come to engage on this topic. Doctor Taylor, thank you, Madam President, and I'll make this quick. But you're exactly right. We did move this up because it is absolutely critical as far as the timeline goes, to keep us
on track for the CIP and to present that publicly, because we do want to get genuine public engagement on this topic and on this particular issue. So making her debut for the Board of Education, you actually already got to see her
a little bit during the procurement session of of the beginning of the meeting is Andrea Sueoka. Who is our Deputy chief of Facilities and maintenance, and with her is
Adnan Mamoon, our chief of operations. So with that, they're going to lay out a proposed framework for prioritizing capital projects. The central question that we're trying to answer is something that our community has all the
time. How on earth do you prioritize the projects that you prioritize in the CIP today? We want to answer that question. So good evening again. We're going to talk about how we are
going. Our proposal is to try and use data driven decisions going forward. And we're going to talk about a framework for prioritizing our capital projects going forward. We're going to discuss slight change in our primary metric that we
use from a data perspective. Some of you might be familiar with the term Cdfi Key Facility indicators. That was in our the policy as well as regulation as as one of the metrics being
used for, you know, documenting the conditions of our existing buildings. We're going to propose changing it to a facility condition index. This is something we have talked about over the past year. It's more industry standard. And and we want to make that the
central driver of our decision making framework. We will also discuss a little bit about transparent, transparent reporting using the FCI results and sharing it with the public. And more holistic criteria will share some criterias that we were proposing as far as
conditions as well as utilization, adequacy and enhanced student needs, and then advancing progress. Build the momentum of major capital projects by pursuing approaches for renovations and replacement. And then we'll also share some dates with the stakeholders in
the community, can engage and put some feedback into this framework that we are proposing to the board tonight. With that, I'm going to turn it over to our Deputy Chief, Andrea Sueoka. Thank you Adnan, it's great to be here this evening. I too, like Miss Franklin, am very
passionate about this topic, so hopefully we'll keep you all awake as it is late I think. Before we jump to the next slide, it is most important to note that this is not the recommendation for the CIP. We are coming earlier before October 13th to talk about what
our framework is as we are developing that CIP for October, you will find out in a couple slides. We have made the website live with all the initial round of facility condition assessments available for everyone. Parents have already started to look at that this afternoon, and the
immediate question I got was I don't see a recommendation in there. That is not what this is about this evening or what that website is about. This is just about the framework and the assessments that are underway to help inform the decision for the CIP on October. So in all
of this, it is important that we are constantly aligning back to the strategic plan and really focused on goal number three to ensure that we have a safe, welcoming and inclusive learning and work environment for all of our students and staff. If we go to the next slide, we wanted to frame a few slides of where we are today.
So we operate 137 elementary schools, 65 secondary schools. That's 40 middle schools, 25 high schools. We have 76 schools that are in that 0 to 25 year old range. We have 113 schools that are in the 25 to
50 year old range, and we have 13 that are older than 51 just to kind of set where we are. And you can see the average and the elementary versus secondary as we think about where we're going for this long term facility. And we're both thinking about the six year CIP that we're going to come to you
with, which is the FY 27 to 32. We are also thinking about where do we need to go over the course of the next 20 years. And so these are really definitions to help anchor our conversation. These align with how the state defines things. And as they think about funding and matching for us they align
it in these terms. So we want to think more strategically about using the renovation model. And this is really thought of of when you get to that sort of 25 year mark, you are not necessarily in need of a full renewal or a full replacement. And I'll explain this to you in a minute, but
you might need some pretty significant system upgrades. So you might need both a roof replacement and HVAC replacement, and maybe an electrical switch gear upgrade. That is what the renovation means, right? Your exterior, your structure, that might all be fine, but there are many systems that need to be
upgraded. The renewal again, trying to align with how the state defines it. You know, you think about closer to the 50 year and certainly by the 70 year mark is really what we're talking about. It is a complete gut of the entire building. There are many structures that can last 100, 200 years, and
you might never need to touch that, but you would completely strip the exterior facade, the insulation, all of that. That's really what the renewal is about. And if that is not possible, then we would move into the replacement right where you demo the building. And it's a completely new structure. We have a lot of
catching up to do, and that is really a part of our strategic plan. So if we move to the next slide again really helping define there are two slides here. So this one is going to focus on elementary schools and breaks down that 137. So we have 60% of our elementary
schools that are eligible for renovation right. That fall in that 25 year and older. So as we're thinking about the long term goal, we really need to renovate, renew or replace 6 to 7 elementary schools per year for the next 20 years. That is
not what we are doing today. So just let those numbers sink in. You can ask me questions at the end. We'll come back to that. Let's jump to the next slide with the secondary. Similar. We have 60% of our secondary that
are eligible for that renovation and 10% that are eligible for the renewal and the replacement. So we really need to be looking at three at a minimum, you know, renovation, renewal or replacement at the
secondary level. Okay. So a big part of thinking about this framework is thinking about the systems from their expected useful life. So we just gave examples. There's many more things to think about. And these are averages of what you
know flooring is a good example. It very much depends on the flooring type. That's why we put VCT as an example. If you have a terrazzo floor, it is going to last a lifetime essentially. So it depends. But on average looking at both roof and HVAC, those are typically
about a 20 year expected useful life, particularly HVAC, as long as we actually properly maintain it. I think that is key. And it's important, you know, this was represented on the other slides. But we have 126 schools that are older than 25 years. So again, really thinking about it from that
renovation standpoint, let's keep going. So I wanted to give two very concrete examples for everyone to think about where we need to be going. When we think about the CIP from a sort of a catch up standpoint. So you saw in the last slide that the roofing, right, is
typically an expected useful life of about 20 years. So assuming that and taking the 202 schools, we should be doing approximately seven, sorry, ten roof replacements per year over the last three years on average we've only been doing five. And
that includes a new replacement school on top of like the summer we have been doing East Silver Spring Elementary School. That's just a standalone roof replacement. Currently. Wait, sorry, I'm going to go back to the bottom. Currently, we have
identified 175 million and this is in today's dollars. So that number goes up constantly right. With escalation in roofs that are older than 20 years. And if it's helpful to stat a few more numbers that are not on here, we have 29 schools with might not be the whole roof because
we have definitely, you know, with additions and stuff. We have different ages of roofs across every building. So portions of 29 schools are greater than 23 years old. That represents 114 of that 175 million. And then we have
another 24 schools that are anywhere from 20 to 23. So we're not even talking about, you know, those that are 17, 18, 19 years old, right, that are getting close to that 20 year mark. So similar analysis for the HVAC. They happen to have
similar expected useful life of around 20 years. Depends on the component of the HVAC. But so we're going to use this broadly again. On average over the last three years we have been replacing the HVAC of about five schools per year. HVAC is
far more expensive. It is the most expensive component in a building. It's just we have over $740 million worth of HVAC that needs to be replaced based on this expected useful life that represents 66 schools,
including holding schools. Okay, we're going to keep going. So as we think about the key components of the CIP for this year and the framework, the facility condition assessments, and of that, it develops what we call an FCI, the facility
condition index. That will play a big factor in this. The website is live as of this afternoon. I welcome all of you and all of our community and cluster to dig in. This includes the initial 52 schools that we've been talking about
since the spring. And again, we will continue to assess all schools that were built prior to 2023. Over the course of the next year, you will see the we're using a third party assessor, and they will be out and about and we will, you know, batch upload the other reports
as they come in, the other components that are going to be part of that is we also and we have a slide coming up developing sort of a four part criteria, building on the FCI information and layering on a few others. In doing all of this, we have also noticed that
we do need to update the FAA regulation and two different areas. And so I want to go ahead and jump to that. We'll go to the website update, but share with you where in the regulation. So this is the new website. This is essentially replacing that cdfi the key
facility indicator for historical context. We did not take down the Cdfi website, but we have added a note up there to direct people to this new website. Again, that initial list of schools are there, and once you scroll down from the two intro paragraphs, you will
see the schools listed. And we provided two different reports for people. We provided a shorter summary report that will at the end give the FCI number, and I'll explain what that means in a little bit, and then also provide summary of some of the different conditions, whether they're good, fair or poor. And then we
also provided the full report that the assessor gave to us. So some of them are 80 pages. They're quite detailed. But it was important for us from a transparency standpoint to provide both of those to the community. And let's go to the
next one. Okay. So what is a facility condition index and depleted value. This there is a number. And again you'll see it at the end of the summary report. It's the very last thing on that. It's included within the first couple pages of the full report. It's a
scale of 0 to 1. So if it is a brand new building, like when Burtonsville Elementary opens next August, they will have an FCI of zero. It's a brand new building, all new systems as those assets deplete over time, as they all do. Right. And you need to replace them, your
number is going to grow closer to one. So if a system is really old, you will see we have some that are in like the 0.6 and 0.7 they're getting. We don't have any ones, but we have some that are getting closer to one. Right. They have very old systems. It is
important to note that it is a value, and it's based on the dollar value of the asset. So your most expensive assets in a building, right, are traditionally your HVAC, your plumbing, your electrical and your structure. If any of those are in very poor condition,
that will drive your FCI number closer to one. Visually, people might walk in and say, my flooring is really bad or my lighting is really bad. That doesn't actually have a high dollar value from a replacement. And so if that's the only thing that's in poor condition, you
won't see your FCI number closer to that one. It might be closer to the zero, because that is easier from a cost and a dollar and a capital investment. Okay. Let's keep going. So these are the sections of the FAA regulation,
the areas that we will be updating are section four. And this is really to replace what currently is in there from Cdfi to transition that Cdfi language to the FCI, since that is what we will be using moving forward. And then in section
six, we would like to add the criteria that we're going to discuss on the next slide. That continues to be the framework for which we are considering in this next round of the CIP. I do want to note, and it's on the schedule at the end. But again, in making these updates to the regulation, we do want
to propose a technical revision to the policy, the FAA policy, simply to just replace Cdfi with CFI. So I just wanted to point that out. Okay. So here is the proposed criteria for the CIP. We are looking at four
different criteria and they're each weighted differently. We feel that the building condition, which is really that FCI depleted value score, is the most important initial part of this. So we are waiting this 50% of that criteria. The next
thing we're considering is the educational adequacy. So this considers things like do all of the core classrooms have access to daylight. And we still have a few schools that do not. We are going to take into consider air quality data. We have
attune IQ sensors in all classrooms. So we have that data available, and we're excited to use that as part of this decision making framework. And then the classroom size we are looking at, and we have measured all classrooms in the building of the schools that we're considering and assuring
that they are within 10% of the educational specification. If they're incredibly too small, then then that would sway them down. The next criteria is the enhanced student need taking into account farms data. And
then the final one is building utilization for each. So again are they at 80%. Are they at 95%. Are they at over utilization above that 100% okay. So next steps where are we going to go from here. We're
going to have three community information sessions and participate. We will be joining the MCC PTA board meeting next week on the 27th to continue conversations. They're a key partner in this given the cluster comment involvement,
all of the clusters provided comments to us in their traditional manner. In June. We have held all of our cluster meetings over the last several weeks, and we started to discuss this and share this with them and so excited to continue that engagement. It's a really great way of advocacy. And then we are working closely
with our community engagement team, and we will work to get this message out, but we will have two zoom opportunities on September 4th and September 8th, one in the evening, one during the day for people to join. Learn more about this and participate. And then we also
plan to do a short little video that explains some of this. So if people are not able to participate in any of those, they can simply just watch a much shorter video. And then on the September 3rd, we'll join the board policy committee to again, just to update from a technical revision, the policy
just from the Cdfi to the FCI, not a substantial change, and that will need to go to the board on the 25th as well. And all of this, we're going to go to the next slide. You know, these dates have been set for a while. They're they're in the CIP document that was published
at the end of June, is preparing us for what will come on October 13th and the presentation on the 14th. So really that was this is certainly the number one thing that I have heard over the last few months. And during these cluster comments, how are you making decisions? How are you
deciding who is in the CIP and what order, who receives a renewal or replacement, a roof, just a standalone roof replacement. And so we're hoping by sharing this, that helps understand the data that is driving the decisions that are being made. So with that, we'll end on one of the first
slides we started with. And we're happy to take questions. Sure. I'm going to start from my right hand side Miss Stewart. Go ahead. First of all, thank you for this very clear presentation. It was extremely
understandable. Clear. Yeah. It's just nice to have that okay. Next is I was looking quickly at the FCI guys that are out now, which I'm finding already very interesting. But I
was curious if there was a way to like, put this all on a graph or some kind of chart because I'm opening every single one, I'm like, oh, this is I like to have that nice,
clear, full view. Yes, we can definitely work on this. This is live. As of this afternoon, we've already been talking about wanting to add a column just so the FCI number is there, front and center. I think it's important it stays alphabetical because that's how people are used to finding their school. But yes, I think particularly
as we go and we have all of them, we do plan to have a summary as well. And I'm just curious. I don't have to click on each one. What what was the highest score, which is actually the worst score one I can give you? I think the
highest that we got is 0.7.7 something numbers after that. Okay. Just curious. Thank you. Right. Miss Rivera-Oven, which is really bad. Yes. Point seven is pretty bad because I looked at some I know that have issues and they were like between 5
and 6. I saw a demolished building. Yes. Yeah. Thank you, thank you. So I guess for me so I appreciate all this work I it's it's pretty depressing to
say the least for a 730 time of the day. We knew we had issues. I appreciate the fact that we're finally seeing how bad it is. Right. But I guess my question is, a lot of these schools are in my district as
well. I really want to know how you're measuring direct impact. Meaning interruption of class time. I'll give you a quick example. One of the schools in
my in my district in January, you probably know who I'm talking about. And an up county Martin Luther King had to literally evacuate the school. Right. And and it was six degrees outside. So it was pretty pretty much the
instruction really that that happened that day. So I know we're measuring a lot of things, the conditions. And but I want us to measure the direct impact because I think that I think that narrative is important
when we're advocating for funding with the council, because that has a direct impact on the education, quality of life, quality of teaching for teachers. Right. And then the environment. So
how can we measure that if we can think about it? Because you probably know when schools have to let go early because they don't have air conditioning, or they have to let go early because they don't have heat or because, you know, pipe bursts
or but that has a direct impact on our kids. So I just want us to see if we can have quantify that so we can tell a better story. That is not just like, you know, I have to get a new HVAC system in my house, so I'm
not going to feel bad anymore after seeing these prices. But you know what I mean? I just want us to be able to tell that story because there little people impacted by by all this and their teachers impacted by all this, and there's interruption. So I don't know
how we can do that. I seen I think Fairfax did something similar. You probably know, but they quantify that kind of impact, which is the direct human impact in learning. Yeah, we can definitely dig into that a little more. I think my
initial reaction to is, that's why I hesitate to always give an exact year for expected useful life, right? That is ideal for your HP, but there are many reasons why it does not last even that long. And I think that's what you're talking about. Just because we're waiting and trying to get
to 20 years, there might be very valid reasons. It only makes it to 15 because of x, Y, and z, and that needs to be played in not just, oh, we're at 19. We're not going to touch that yet. No, we have had to close school for X number of days, even though we're only at
a 15 year. And I think that hopefully plays into your direct impact. Thank you, Miss Silvestre. Yeah I had questions about the criteria chart on page 15. I'd like a little bit more explanation about the
Farms data. Why that? Why you think that's important to take into consideration and also the utilization because. We're going to be doing well in terms of utilization soon after some of these major projects are
built. So and Miss Maguire always educated me about the use of portables as a good strategy rather than building. So I drank that Kool-Aid a long time ago. So help me understand both of those criteria. Why these are important. Yeah. So let's start with utilization.
And you will see both of those are weighted the lowest on intentionally. Right. Only at the 1% the one wait or 12.5. So for utilization portables certainly those should not be always a permanent. We've used
them for much longer than a permanent solution here. So we do need to start to address that. We have a lot of portables in this county. The other option certainly is a boundary. And so that but there are certain that are over utilized that where their neighboring schools might be as well. And that should play a
factor in deciding, you know, who is sequencing in to the CIP. So I do think that that is important. It's not a standalone number. We do need to look at the other area schools to to confirm their utilization, but it should still play a factor, but not as
high and on purpose as the building condition. In terms of farms, what we're looking at, we don't have a specific definition within Montgomery County of sort of high, medium, low. So we've actually looked at what the Department of Education at the federal level uses. So anything above 75% is
considered high. And so those are the framework that we're going to use for that one. You could also consider at title one we had. But that sort of drives a lot of your farm data. But the rationale is that this will help student achievement. This will attract teachers to
come work at this school. What is the rationale? No, really making sure it's of areas of need that we are prioritizing our projects and and frequently also those are schools that have either additional resources or additional services or other sort of
programmatic impacts on the building that that also kind of go with those considerations. Okay. I'll have to see how they they play out in the, in the big chart that you're going to produce. Thank you, Mrs.
Zimmerman. Thank you. I'm assuming that the like FCI score is going to follow the same format for timing like an updating as we did previously. For those that might not know, can you explain a little bit
more how often we're going to update the score? Yeah, the plan is to update every four years. So we would do it like a quarter of the portfolio every year so that your FCI is updated every four years. I don't believe anything has been updated. I think that was part
of what happened with the Cdfi is we did it, and then it just stopped. And a good example of that, we're actually already going to have BV quickly go back and do Monocacy. They assess that school so you can see what's on there right now. They did the assessments for
this first round back in April. And we can use this as an example. We're going to have them go back. Monocacy had a both an HVAC and a restroom upgrade this summer because it's an HVAC project that has the highest dollar value from an assessment, a systemic right.
It will change their FCI again, that's been completed. We're excited to have students in there on Monday, but that is important. Why these are constantly updated? Because we are always going to be doing projects like that. So we do need to update them every four
years. And again, we'll do them on a rotating basis. Perfect. Thank you, Miss Malone. Well, my answer was just my question is just answered. So I just want to say on a positive note that I really do appreciate this website explaining everything very clearly. I think it's easier for me, as a
member of the board to refer students to it if they're asking me questions on it, and so very appreciative of that. Thank you, thank you. And then Miss Montoya is online. I'm going to go online. Thank you
so much. Thank you. I've been looking through some of the FCI reports and I did see the Monocacy one. So glad to hear that we might be getting that number lowered because it was pretty high. My question is, is when we are putting these new HVAC systems in, or we have
HVAC system issues and we need to figure out what we're going to do about heating and cooling for our schools, or we're building brand new schools. Are we looking at geothermal as a type to use for HVAC? I recognize, again, it's similar to some of the things we saw
earlier. There might be a higher upfront cost, but then it's lower cost later. There's environmental savings. I'm just not sure if we are looking at anything like that, if we even have the ability to really look at something like that as a practical matter, because of the number of systems and, and schools and things that we have,
we actually do a lot of geothermal in this county. So both Burtonsville and the two elementaries that are opening both have geothermal there asked us Crown. So we've done a lot and that has honestly been most of what we've done with the new replacements recently. Okay. Wonderful. Thank you so much. Someone had asked from
the community, so I wanted to make sure I had an opportunity to find out. Thank you. I have a question about how we utilize these criteria. Right. Criteria aside, I'm in a schools. The water, the water main break or
the roof start start leaking or the HVAC stop working. We are not talking about when we have a situation like that. We go back to the index, say, oh, you are scheduled in two years. We go in and fix it right away, right? That that will might
bump some some schools up the list a little bit and then adjust their index later on when that project is finished. Am I right? You are correct. And I think the important thing to note is this is not fixed
things. Things will happen exactly as you described year over year. And so locking us into this is the list for the next 20 years is not what the goal of this is. We need a framework to help us, and you all make decisions of what is in there. But we need to make
that fluid. So when major systems like that change or happen, that we can have that flexibility to go with that line. Just to clarify, we will do the ongoing building maintenance. The faucet is not working. The sink fell off,
fall off. We'll fix those. That doesn't wait for a major capital improvement project. Okay, so there's a few points to add to this, which I think will add some value. This past year we added a lot to pay as you go major maintenance efforts because of just what
you're describing, that there are some things that can improve the learning environment through some ongoing and regular maintenance. Not a strength, not a strength of ours. So this this needs to be a dynamic list that will
change as things get better. Their score will improve over time. The Monocacy example is a great example there. FCI will improve as a consequence of their renovation and they will go further down the list. So there's a couple of
methodologies in CIP that have been used in the past, one of which is the line you get in line and where you are in the line doesn't move. That's not what this is. This would be very dynamic based on how your score is and how it changes
over over a few years. Another methodology. And and this is ultimately the board's decision. This is not we all we do is make a recommendation is where there is energy in the community behind advocacy. And
so what this scoring mechanism is aiming to do is to to let the math speak for itself, let the facility condition speak for itself so that the communities that sometimes are not as great at advocating for themselves don't get marginalized in this process.
So we are talking about making data work for us. All right. Yes. All right. Mr. I just wanted to bring up using the farms and title one data in the score. From what I've seen, a
lot of the schools that score the worst sometimes have air quality issues. And I talked about this earlier today. And a kid that, for instance, has asthma needs constant medical care, and some kids have more
access to medical care than others. And so in an area where there's more resources, those kids tend to be able to be treated more regularly. And that can affect the learning in the classroom. And then other
kids might not have as much regular care. So I just wanted to bring up as one of the factors that could make that building a little more problematic for certain populations. So I do agree that
there should be a slight bump there. And it is, I think, 12.5%. So it just gives you a little bit more oomph to get your building, you know, improved. Ms. Rivera-Oven. When
we are doing these replacements, are we looking also at latest technology or geothermal or anything like that that might save us money in the long run. Did you just ask about geothermal? I sure did, yes, I know it's late for geothermal,
but we have just had the same question. And absolutely, we've done a lot of geothermal in this county. And again, Burtonsville and Lilac that are both opening in August, both next August. Both have them around us as well. That's sort of been our traditional path for HVAC lately. Yeah, I think it's a little bit more
expensive at the beginning, but I think long term we save some money and it's also a lot better for yes, for the environment. Thanks. Thank you for the administration for providing this presentation and giving the community an opportunity to provide feedback
and to see it well, before we go into the full swing of the CIP season. So thank you so much. I'm going to move on to the next item, which is item 11 for informational purposes only,
and no action is required at this time. Now at 805 I'm going to item number 12, which is a German. Anyone would like to make that motion to adjourn.
Motion to adjourn. I'll second that. And there's a motion and a second. All in favor, please raise your hand. That's unanimous. All right. With those present. Thank you everyone. Thank you for tuning
in. Thank you for joining us.