. Please. I know it's summertime, but we can do way better than that. Good afternoon everybody. Oh my gosh, we are in a school setting, I love it. I want to thank everybody for joining us today. We started something new
last year where we were going to get together for a few minutes before every board of education business meeting, and take the words off the page of some of our resolutions and celebrations and make them real. And we're so honored that you
could be with us today to to help celebrate some fantastic things that are happening in the school system. This summer, we get to celebrate two really, really fantastic recognitions.
We are recognizing our Scripps National Spelling Bee participant. Just absolutely thrilled for that fantastic experience and accomplishment. And you might find this hard to believe, but we won an Emmy,
y'all. Very cool. And most, most people don't realize this, but it's a lot of schools have like a school song, but not a lot of school districts have a school district song. M.C.P.S.
has a school district song. And if you haven't seen it, you get to meet the fabulous musicians and the many hands that were working behind the scenes to bring that music to life. And we'll even show you that that music video at the end of today's presentation. So
without further ado, let's jump right in. I'm going to invite our board member, Natalie Zimmerman, to make our first recognition for the Scripps National Spelling Bee participant. Hello. Good
afternoon. Immortalized in movies, TV shows, and pop culture, the Scripps National Spelling Bee is many things competition, tradition, and a chance for students to showcase their intellect, intuition, and special talents. And it's not
every day that you meet a spelling bee professional. But today there's one among us. Hailing from Robert Frost Middle School is Montgomery County's very own Lauren Mariano, who finished as a semifinalist at this year's Scripps National Spelling Bee. And I'd love for her to come on
up as we say nice things to her. This isn't even her first time reaching the semifinals. Last year, she finished in 20th
place. This year, she tied for 10th in the nation. Right. Think about what that means. Millions of students begin
their spelling bee journey in classrooms and school competitions across the country, but only about 250 earn a spot at the Scripps National Spelling Bee. From that extraordinary group, our own Lauren finished among the nation's top ten spellers, a remarkable achievement that
brings tremendous pride to her family. Robert Frost Middle School, Montgomery County and all of M.C.P.S. I know. So today we are joined by Lauren
and her family, as well as Doctor Joey Jones, principal of Robert Frost Middle School. Thanks to your leadership, students like, like Lauren are
able to thrive and become their best selves through fostering a healthy academic environment for both competition and curation of talent. And a heartfelt thanks to Miss Mariana's parents and family for their unwavering support and for nurturing Lauren's academic strengths, talents,
and love of learning. Lastly, I want to share a word that fits Miss Marianna to a T, and that word is cognoscenti of Italian origin. COGNOSCENTE. Cognoscenti, which
Merriam-Webster defines as a person with expert knowledge in a subject. Lauren Marianna is that expert, and we couldn't be more proud of her tenacity, wit, and intelligence. So on behalf of the board, congratulations on your placement. Lauren. You
are a shining example of what M.c.p.s. Has to offer all students. We are extremely proud of you and your invaluable skills. Now take a
picture. There. Big smile, the spell. Smile together.
Beautiful is the one more. One two. Three. Thank you. Next,
we're going to invite our board president, Grace Rivera-Oven, to make our next presentation. Very excited about this. And we have many of our student musicians here today. Yes. Good afternoon. Buenas tardes.
Bienvenidos. Welcome all. This is pretty exciting. The next celebration comes as no surprise to us. From the very first time that we saw this, this very special project, we knew that it had the power not
just to inspire, but to connect and to tell the incredible story of our students, the educators, to the universal language of music. And now that excellence has been recognized as one of the biggest stages in
media. It is my honor to celebrate the Emmy Award winning video Unleashing Potential. Let's take a look at a clip from that video. Even if
my day goes bad, I'm. I still do me. Cause I'm future ready. No matter what people say. My friends got my back so I won't worry. I'm learning how to be myself and set the stage for
love, for life. I know where to go for help. To keep my future right. No matter what tomorrow brings me. I know my future's bright. I've got the skills to
take me higher. And learning is my life. Natalie, this is special for me because I visit
these schools all the time. But this is such an incredible accomplishment for our district. So at this time, I'd like to invite the creators and the stars of this award winning production to join us. Video producer Brian Babcock. Musical
director, musical direction. Abby Silver. Jennifer. Jennifer Berry, Ken Quimby, Northwest High School principal. Scott Smith. Students. As you hear
your name, please come up. Abby. Adam. Afia. Alexis. Amy. Cameron. Demari. Dasha. Desiree. Emily. Isaiah. Isaac. Kelsey. Liam. Pierre, Roland. Roxanne.
Shiloh. And Sierra. Congratulations. Congratulations to each and every one of you. And on behalf of the Montgomery County Board of Education, we are extraordinarily proud of your achievement of winning an Emmy
Award. It's a remarkable achievement and a great honor that reflects the creativity, creativity, collaboration, and passion of excellence. And a special congratulations to Mr. Brian Babcock, whose vision and storytelling brought this project to life through
outstanding music teachers. Thank you for inspiring your students, for nurturing their talents and creating opportunities for them to shine. And to our incredible students, this award belongs to you as well. Your voices, your artistry, your energy, and your
commitment. Transform this video into something unforgettable. You did not just perform. You told a story of what makes Montgomery County Public Schools such an extraordinary place to learn, grow, and create. The Sami is more than an award is a
celebration of what is possible when talented students dedicated to caters and a supportive community come together with a shared purpose. Thank you for representing M.c.p.s with such pride and excellence, and for believing in each and in each of you.
Congratulations once again and winning this great achievement.
Right here. Three. Two. One. Thank you. Okay, before you go, can I get on three Emmy winners? Okay. Three. Three. Two one
everywhere. This is the third time, right? You are the
regular. The regular.
Even if my day goes bad, I'ma still do me. Cause I'm future ready. No matter what people say. My friends got my back so I won't worry. I'm learning how to be myself. And set the stage for
life, for life. I know where to go. For how to keep my future bright. No matter what tomorrow brings me. I know my future's bright. I've got the skills to
take me higher. And learning is my life. No matter what tomorrow brings me. I know my future's bright. I can still take me higher. And learning is my life. Go where you want to
learn what you need. We all gravitate to the knowledge that we see. And everywhere you look around, you see diversity. Every day we're breaking boundaries for a future perfectly. No matter what the trade or the greatest. I'm making connections and forming
my network. Support me. Friends that adore me. Eventually building a foundation for my life. I make friends, I like what I like, but the difference is work. She's locking her group. Yeah. Every day I go to school, my cousin picks. You know, I can choose what I do.
Every day is different. It's never the same. Me. It's hard to make class. We never gon lose. I've got my classmates and I've got my teachers. From turning in classrooms to cheering on bleachers. This is essential. That's where we are heading. Unleash my potential and future ready. No matter
what tomorrow brings me. I know my future. I promise to take me higher. And learning is my life. Where tomorrow brings me. I know my future's bright. I've
got the skills to take me higher. And learning is my life. We're building up our skill. Set to the sky. And we're starting from the ground. You
can rely. No matter what the making connections, connections. Forming my network. Yeah, I'm patiently building a foundation for my life. Yeah, I future
ready. Oh, yeah. Imagine tomorrow brings me. So I've got the skills to take me higher. And learning is my life. You know it's gonna. And now I've
got the skills to take me higher. No matter what. Tomorrow. I've got the skills to take me higher. And learning
is my life. No matter what tomorrow brings me. And I know I. I've got the skills to take me higher and learning is my
life. Good afternoon and welcome to the July 16th, 2026
Board Business Meeting. Bienvenidos. Welcome to our board members. M.C.P.S. staff and members of our community who are joining us here today. And to those who are watching this meeting via live stream. Let us begin by standing for the Pledge of Allegiance, which
is in the back. I pledge allegiance to the flag of 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 very
much. I will now ask my colleagues to please introduce themselves to establish a quorum. I will start on my left. Good afternoon. I'm Natalie Zimmerman. I represent district two. Good afternoon, Julie Yang. Good to see everyone. District
three good afternoon. Buenos tardes. Carla Silvestre. School board member at large. And I will ask our student board member to please introduce himself. Good afternoon. Student member. Thank you very
much. There is colleagues. There is a request, a request to remove from the agenda item 8.8.18, the annual Ticketed Event and Meeting list for 2026 2027 for consideration of a
future meeting. Is there a motion to amend the agenda to remove this item? So moved. Second, there is a motion. A second is there any discussion? Seeing none. All those in favor, please raise your hand. Against.
It's unanimous. And that is unanimous. And it carries. Thank you very much. The next item on the agenda is recommendations of appointments by Miss Rivera-Oven Taylor. Yes, sir. Just real quick, we need to now approve the agenda as revised. Yes, sir. Thanks for
keeping me in line. Is there a motion to approve the agenda as revised? I move to approve the revised agenda. Second. There is a motion and a second. All those in favor, please raise your hand. And that is unanimous by those present.
Thank you. Thank you sir. Now going to item 5.1. The next item on the agenda is the recommendations for appointments by Doctor Taylor. Doctor Taylor. Thank you so much, Madam President. It is an exciting time for us. Tis the
season for administrative appointments. It is busy in M.C.P.S. time for us to have transitions and plannings for the following year. And I am so excited to present this very talented slate of leaders for
your consideration today. When I say your name, if you could please stand up while I say some wonderful things about you and are already off to a strong start. Thank you M.C.P.S. TV.
And we'll we'll hold the applause until after the board has a chance to consider your, your, your your position. And first for consideration, Miss Nicole a for the position of associate Superintendent in the Division of School Leadership and Improvement. Joining her
today are her supportive colleagues and friends who have been a part of many curveballs in her journey, and she is thankful for this best pitch. Miss sausage has been employed with M.c.p.s. For 22 years as a teacher, assistant school administrator, assistant
principal, principal, intern, principal and most recently as a director in the Division of School Leadership and Improvement. She looks forward to serving the school communities in her area and to support excellence for all students. Account leading with accountability and integrity.
Growth for future leaders, elevated intentional school improvement efforts and safe learning environments for all students. Shout outs to her family in Florida. Mark. Megan. Grayson, Cade, Cade and Cameron,
as well as family in Pennsylvania. Nick, Jennifer, Logan and Ty. And a special shout out to her parents, Nick and calm for their unwavering support and love. Move. Approval. Second. There is a
motion and a second. All those in favor, please raise your hand. And that is unanimous. Congratulations. Next for
consideration is Doctor Jamila W for the position of director in the Division of School Leadership and Improvement. Joining her today is her mother, Pamela, her daughters Jordan and Jada and her brothers Khalid and Jelani Walker.
Doctor Denee has been employed with M.c.p.s. For 20 years as a substitute teacher, teacher, English cnt specialist, assistant school administrator, assistant principal, principal intern and most recently as the principal at Pine Crest Elementary School. Doctor Denee
looks forward to serving the school system and feels humbled to be able to serve students, staff and the community in this new capacity. Shout outs to her Uncle Greg and Aunt Ruby, the Pinecrest community and to her colleagues in the boardroom who
are present and those watching online. Very special acknowledgment to her father, Doctor Vance Walker Junior, who recently passed away. Move. Approval. Second, there is a motion in a second. All those
in favor, please raise your hand. And that is unanimous. Congratulations. I'm loving
this. Next for consideration is Mrs. Shannon M farmer for the position of director in the Department of Special Education Services. Joining her today is her current director, Doctor Karen Cruz. Her colleague, her college mentor Sheila Shea, her
friend Johnny Earth and her team, Rebecca James and Nasif. Missus farmer has been employed with M.c.p.s. For 15 years as a special education teacher, reading specialist, team leader, instructional specialist and
most recently as a coordinator in the Department of Counseling Services in the Division of Specialized Services. She looks forward to partnering with educators and families to strengthen collaborative systems of support to meet the unique needs of every student, especially our students with
disabilities. Shout outs to her husband, Cory, for his unwavering support and belief in her success. Move. Approval. Second. There is a motion and a second. All those in favor, please raise your hand. And that is unanimous.
Congratulations. Though she's not present today, we still would like to recommend and recognize Doctor Lisa M Gaylord Jones for the position of director in the Department of
Special Education and Related Services. Doctor Gaylord Jones has been employed with M.C.P.S. for 26 years as a teacher, resource teacher, assistant principal, acting principal, principal and most recently as the Associate Superintendent supervising the Division of
Special Education Services. She looks forward to continuing her work with the Department of Special Education to support academic, behavioral and wellbeing needs of all students. Shout outs to her supportive husband Anthony and their three
children, Chelsea, Kayla and Kayleen on who are watching online. She would like to thank her chief doctor Margaret Cage, for this exceptional for her exceptional leadership and this wonderful opportunity. Move.
Approval. Second. There is a motion and a second. All those in favor, please raise your hand. And that is unanimous. Congratulations. Next for
consideration is Miss Kashara, a Perry for the position of Executive Director in the Division of Specialized Support Services. Joining her today is her husband, Drexel. Daughters Dasha and Carissa. Her sister
Alicia George, her brother Cory George, Pastor Patrick Russell, and First Lady Takisha Ruschelle. Miss Perry has been with M.C.P.S. for two years as a coordinator and most recently as an acting supervisor for
Autism Spectrum Disorders. Prior to joining M.C.P.S. Miss Perry worked in various school districts as a teacher and administrator. She looks forward to continuing working alongside students, families, and educators, and the community partners to ensure
that every learner has access to the supports, services, and opportunities they need to thrive. Shout outs to her husband to excuse me, to her parents, Jude and Ellen. George to her brothers and sisters Sean, Karen, Kathleen and Kiani,
who are watching from New York and Grenada in the West Indies. Move. Approval. Second, there is a motion and a second. All those in favor, please raise your hand. And that is
unanimous. Congratulations. Rounding out our special education team and our central services recommendations is Doctor LaTonya R Williams for the position of director in the
Department of Inclusive and Specialized Learning Support Services in the Division of Specialized Support Services. Joining her today is her husband, Derek, her son Jr, her daughter Jolie and her cousin Doctor Lakisha Lashley. Doctor
Williams has 22 years of M.C.P.S. experience as a special education teacher, team leader, special education resource teacher, coordinator, and most recently as the Acting supervisor in the Department of Special Education Services. Doctor Williams is committed to
strengthening inclusive systems, fostering collaborative partnerships, and advancing equitable, high quality services that expand access and improve outcomes for every student. Shout outs to her family and close friends who are supporting her virtually from Delaware, the Philadelphia
area and beyond. Move. Approval. Second. There is a motion and a second. All those in favor, please raise your hand. And that is unanimous. Congratulations. It is summer.
There's more to come. Is that it? No, ma'am. Okay, we have some principal appointments, which is very exciting. Right. Oh, this is for your consideration today. The party going. Please join me in welcoming our first principal. Recommended appointment for
this evening, miss Jeannie M Chen for the position of principal at Roberto W Clemente Middle School. Squad. I love
the enthusiasm, but we got to time this, like, a little bit better. Joining Miss Chen today is her husband, Douglas. Her children Kaitlyn and Zia. Zia. Excuse me. Her parents Sami and Mia Kim, her brother Mark, his
wife Jenny, their children Miles and Micah and her in-laws, Richard and Ginger chin. Miss chin has been employed with M.C.P.S. for 24 years as a teacher, resource teacher, consulting principal, content specialist, assistant school administrator and most recently
as the assistant principal at Hubert Herbert Hoover Middle School. She looks forward to joining the Roberto Clemente Middle School team to support the academic, social and emotional growth of every student while fostering an inclusive environment for success, achievement and the
daily joy of mentoring the world's future change makers and trendsetters. Shout outs to her family who are watching online from Philadelphia, Atlanta, New York and all of her M.C.P.S. colleagues for their unwavering support. Move.
Approval. Second, there is a motion and a second. All those in favor, please raise your hand. Congratulations. I think
I got a little too excited. I might have to redo that one because I said I said all those in favor. Let's do this again. All those in favor, raise yhand. Because I got really excited. So all those in favor, please raise your hand again. No, but I don't think I said all those
in favor. I just said I got ahead of it. Oh, yes. All those in favor, raise your hand. And that is unanimous. Sorry, we did a retake. Thank you. All right. Next for consideration is Doctor Clifford J. Cooper Jr for the position of principal at Garrett Park Elementary
School. Joining him today is his wife Jennifer. Daughter Chloe. Son Clifford. His mother Susan. His father Clifford Cooper. His in-laws, Kay and James Lime, his sister Candice,
brother in law Jake and nephew Cooper Rapoport. Doctor Cooper has been employed with M.C.P.S. for 16 years as a teacher, assistant school administrator, assistant principal and most recently as the principal intern at Robert Frost Middle School. He is beyond excited
about joining Garrett Park Elementary School shout outs to his principal developer, Doctor Joey Jones, and all of the supervisors, mentors, colleagues, students, staff, Family and friends who have supported him through the years. Move approval. Second, there is
a motion and a second. All those in favor, please raise your hand. And that is unanimous. Congratulations. But
wait. There's more. Next for consideration for the board is Doctor Joshua s fine for the position of principal at White Oak Middle School. Doctor fine has been employed with M.C.P.S. for 19 years as a teacher,
resource teacher, assistant principal, principal intern, and most recently as the principal at Flower Hill Elementary School. He would like to thank the entire Flower Hill community for all that they've accomplished together, and is excited to join the White Oak family to ensure high
academic expectations for each student in a joyous learning environment. Shout outs to his husband and parents who are watching online. Move. Approval. Second, there is a motion and a second. All those in favor, please raise your hand. And
that is unanimous. Congratulations. Next for consideration is Miss Jada Langston for the position of principal at the Carl Sandburg
Learning School. Miss Langston has been employed with M.c.p.s. For six years as an assistant principal, acting principal, principal, and most recently as a director in Specialized Education services, and she is committed to fostering a welcoming and inclusive environment for all learners.
Leading with compassion and connecting with her students on a day to day basis. Shout outs to her family and friends who are watching online. Move. Approval. Second. There is a motion and a second. All those in favor, please raise your hand. And that is unanimous.
Congratulations. So close. We're going back to Central Services because we do need some help with a great many things. And to help us with that as our next recommended appointment for consideration
is Miss Desiree C Adams for the position of supervisor of I.t Operations and Delivery in the Department of Business Information Systems. Joining her today are her daughter Samantha, Danita and Desiree and her good friend Larry. Miss Adams has been employed with
the M.C.P.S. for 18 years as a development project manager and most recently as a supervisor in the Department of Business Information Systems. Miss Adams looks forward to supporting the Department of Business Information Systems and continuing to advance the district's mission through innovation and operational
excellence. Shout outs to Docca and her grandchildren, who are watching online from North Carolina. Move. Approval. Second. There is a motion and a second. All those in favor, please raise your hand. And that is unanimous.
Congratulations. Very excited to welcome this next person for consideration virtually, please welcome Doctor David Guzman for the position of supervisor for
Community Schools in the Division of Early Childhood, title one programs and Recovery Funds in the Division of School Leadership. Mr. Guzman brings. M.C.P.S. brings to M.c.p.s. More than 20 years of educational experience as a teacher and administrator. He looks forward to supporting
students, families, schools and communities through strong partnerships and systems of support. Shout outs to his wife Kendra and his daughter Sydney, who are also watching online. Move. Approval. Second. There is a motion and a second. All those in favor, please raise
your hand. And that is unanimous. Congratulations. Next, for consideration in our Division of teaching and learning is Miss Miriam R
Plotsky for the position of Supervisor of English Language Arts Curriculum. Joining her today is her husband, Kenny. Miss Plucinski has been employed with M.c.p.s. For 25 years as a teacher, resource teacher, instructional specialist and most recently as
a pre K through 12 Content Specialist for English Language Arts and Reading in the Division of Teaching and Learning. She looks forward to contng her collaboration with the Ela team to support teaching and learning in our middle and high schools. Shout
outs to her three children who promised to watch online and. And to Jackie Lightsey for her leadership and support, and to all of her M.C.P.S. colleagues and friends. Move. Approval. Second. There is a motion and a
second. All those in favor, please raise your hand. And that is unanimous. Congratulations. This is our last recommended appointment
for your consideration for the Summer board. We have. We've gone a long way, and it's fitting that we close out with a cornerstone of your future ready strategic plan. A focus on college and post-secondary
career opportunities for our young people. With an appointment for the position of supervisor and career and post-secondary partnerships. And so we'd like to welcome Miss Nicola A Richards, right. And the Department of College
and Career Readiness in the Division of Teaching and Learning. Joining Miss Richards right today is her husband, Max, and her son, Tariq. Miss Richards, right, has been employed with M.C.P.S. for 14 years as a teacher pre K through 12 content specialist
and most recently as a coordinator in the Department of College and Career Readiness. She looks forward to continuing her work within the Division of Teaching and Learning and supporting the work of the Department of College and Career Readiness, and advancing equitable opportues and successful post-secondary
outcomes for all students. Shout outs to her, her son Rashad, her mother Lina, her sisters Georgia and her other family members watching online from Jamaica, and her sister, who is also watching online
from Switzerland. Move approval. Second. There is a motion and a second. All those in favor, please raise your hand. And that is unanimous. Congratulations. Thank you,
Madam President. This concludes our appointments for a very talented slate of leaders joining M.c.p.s. This summer indeed might give a couple minutes for folks to clear out. It's a rather large crowd. Yeah, I think it's the most we had in
a long time. Appointments since last summer. Yep.
Okay. Thanks. Thank you all. And coming back. So we're going to go to item number six Association comments. The next item on the agenda is association comments. I will ask any designated representatives here today to provide association comments to
please come forward now and introduce yourselves. For the record, prior to beginning your comments, following any in-person testimony, we will proceed with a prerecorded comments of the submitted on behalf of the SEIU local 500
from Mr. James Elrich. Good afternoon, honorable members of the Montgomery County Board of Education. My name is Christopher Cano, director of political and legislative affairs for SEIU local 500, and I'm here on behalf of thousands
of educational support staff working in our public schools. We wish to convey how deeply disappointed we are by the board's decision to adopt budget cuts that eliminate 12 month positions and force dedicated support staff in a ten month schedules, while still failing to provide
commensurate summer work as contractually obligated. These aren't just line items in a budget. These are district employees who keep our school district running every day of the year. They support students in their families who have needs that a classroom and teacher cannot meet. Along with
managing technology, they ensure Central Office is operating effectively to support school based staff. Their work did not simply disappear in June, and by failing to meet these involuntary transfers with equitable work, the board is effectively asking workers,
many of whom already struggle with the rising cost of housing, food and healthcare to absorb thousands of dollars in lost income. That is not a budget solution. It is a pay cut. Montgomery County has repeatedly said it wants to recruit and retain the best
employees, but actions speak louder than words. District workers are already doing their jobs with maximum effort. How will they take on the additional responsibilities of assisting the students, families and staff who had previously been supported by the 415 positions this board
chose to cut? We are losing or have lost experienced staff and when experienced support staff are forced to find second jobs or leave M.C.P.S. altogether, it is our students, families and remaining staff left behind who will ultimately pay the price for these decisions made.
SEIU local 500 urges this board to revisit these reductions, identify commensurate summer work where it exists and restore 12 month employment whenever possible. Budget challenges are real, but they should not be balanced on the backs of workers who make our
schools function every day. Our members deserve stability, respect and the opportunity to earn a full year's wages for the essential work they provide. Thank you for your consideration on these important issues. Thank you so
much for your comments today. Moving to item number seven. This is public comments. This item on the agenda. While the board encourages public input on policy programs and practices and will consider the comments received, it is not the board's practice during
this public comment. Meetings to respond to questions, provide comments, or take actions on the issues raised. This is a public meeting and the board expects the conduct of all speakers and members of the audience to be within the bounds of proper etiquette. Inappropriate personal remarks,
rude retorts, or other such behavior is out of order and would not be tolerated. Those who demonstrate disruptive or disrespectful behavior during public comments 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 their comments. When your name is called, press the button and speak clearly into the microphone. A yellow light and a single beep indicates you
have 30s left a red light and repeating beep signals. Your time has expired. Once you have finished speaking, press the same button to turn off the microphone. Following the following live testimony, audio and video testimony will be played. Copies of the
testimonies are posted with the or with the other materials for this meeting on board docs. Okay with that? If you hear your name, please come forward.
New. New. Rachakonda. Grace Xiao, Betsy Tao, Diep Wolff, Catherine macho and Stockton
Gilman. Reilly. Okay, I'm going to call one more name and that would be Norlin. You. Thank you.
Okay, miss Grimshaw, if you could start, please, and push a button in front of you. There you go. Thank you. Hello, everyone. My name is Grace Xiao and I'm a rising senior at Montgomery Blair High School. Over the past year, I have
taught free Saturday workshops for students across the county, and I've even written my own SAT reading textbook. And through this I've noticed a big problem. The biggest barrier to success is not a lack of free resources, it's a lack of
awareness. M.C.P.S. already offers every student a free SAT every year, which is awesome every March, and there are excellent free resources available online like Khan Academy, schoolhouse Dot world, and Public Libraries. However, there is still an enormous gap in students across different
races and socioeconomic backgrounds. From what? From what I've seen, the problem is that most students don't know where or when to start studying, and this is discouraging. SAT preparation takes months, but most students don't know about these free resources until it's
too late. My suggestion is simple M.c.p.s should create an easily accessible, one page website that answers three important questions. First, what should students use to study? How should they use those resources and when should they start? It could include sign up deadlines for the many
free Saturday workshops the county already provides, like lists of library books that students should read and other free resources all in one place. I would be happy to create this website and organize these resources at no cost. If M.c.p.s could share this with
students county wide, it would improve the equity and accessibility of SAT preparation. And fundamentally, Saturday reading is part of Literacy Now. The M.c.p.s website already has a page on SAT preparation, but it's severely outdated and a lot of
its links no longer exist. So I hope that we can follow up. And I'd love to talk about this opportunity further after the meeting. Thank you so much. Thank you so much, Grace. Betsy Tao, good afternoon. My name is Betsy Tao and I'm an M.c.p.s. Parent. And I'm here today to
let you know that almost 600 parents and teachers signed a letter of support for the board screen resolution. You have their names and testimonials, and I urge you to read them. With that said, I'd like to speak to you about AI because I know M.c.p.s. Is currently drafting its AI regulations.
The most important thing you need to know about AI is this there is no evidence that AI products are safe and effective for learning. In fact, after I submitted my written testimony yesterday, NPR reported that Google's AI search functions
pose an unacceptable risk to students. These functions are currently accessible by all students in our schools. Technology has proven to be distracting and a poor way to deliver curriculum, but in the age of AI, it has now become a way to avoid learning altogether. The human mind will
always seek the path of least resistance. When our educational system provides that avenue for teachers and students, they will take it. A group of high school students at a summer camp recently told me they knew AI was bad for learning, but they couldn't resist using it because they were under pressure to get good
grades. They also lost respect for teachers who used AI for class prep and assessments. Their counselor told me he relied on ChatGPT all through college, and now that he's in the workplace, he realized he has no knowledge and skills to rely on. This is the challenge facing M.c.p.s. How can we
reorient the school experience to ensure that when a student graduates, they have actual skills beyond the ability to type words into a box and cut and paste what comes out, you know what the University of Chicago's law school is doing for all first year law students? They are prohibiting the use of
laptops, tablets and phones in the classroom. When technology is readily accessible, it will get misused and overused. The solution is to change the conditions in the classroom to refocus on what has always worked best books, writing and
solving problems by hand, and human relationships. Thank you. Who's next, miss Lee? Miss Wolff de Wolff. Yes. Go ahead please. If you can push a
button in front of you. Thank you. Good afternoon, honorable members of the school board. My name is De Wolff. You know, recently I found this old picture of me from senior year of high school. Might be a little far away, but to sum it up, I was shocked to realize
I'm actually a bit of a heartthrob in senior year. And I was shocked to realize this because senior year of high school was also the year when I tried to kill myself. I tried to kill myself because I hated
my body, because I'm transgender. Today, I'm a transgender woman, an attorney and mother of two wonderful children. I'm so glad I
survived to be here. But not every transgender teenager does. I wish I could have gone to schools as supportive of transgender children as the schools right here in Montgomery County. Your gender
inclusive policies literally save lives. We all know the Department of Education is investigating the school district because of those gender inclusive policies. And we all know that investigation
is going to lead to a lawsuit to attempt to force you to abandon those policies. We are counting on you to fight to protect those that policy, those policies, and to protect
our transgender children, to literally protect their lives. We are counting on you. Thank you. Thank you, Katerina. Good afternoon. My name is Katerina Mitro. I'm an M.c.p.s. Parent
and a social studies teacher at Walter Johnson High School. I want to thank board member Julie Yang for bringing forward today's resolution on screen use in grades K through eight. I support it. I'm here to ask the board to extend that attention to high schools. Too
often there seems to be less political will to restrict technology use for older students. My main concern is student phone use. On paper. Phones are already banned from high school classrooms, but there's currently no meaningful enforcement mechanism.
Enforcement falls on individual teachers, but phone use should not be treated as a classroom management issue. Phones are addictive devices. We would not let students carry cigarettes around school and ask each teacher to decide whether students may use them during class, or step into the hallway
for a quick cigarette break. Yet that is essentially what we're doing with phones. In my own classroom, I enforce a strict no phone policy. Students need a space where they can read, write, think, listen, and talk without the constant pull of a screen. But
enforcing that policy has become one of the hardest and most frustrating parts of my job. Several times a lesson, five lessons a day. I'm put in the position of denying students access to a device they are addicted to. That repeated confrontation damages the teacher student
relationship we are always told to build. Lately, the phone issue has become even more urgent because of AI. Students now carry tools in their pockets that allow them to outsource thinking, reading, writing, summarizing, and analysis the heart and often frustrating task of learning
and growing intellectually within seconds. Phone access is now an academic integrity problem, and it undermines much of what I'm trying to teach. The governor has already signed legislation requiring counties to have bell to bell phone
policies in place by the 2728 school year. I urge M.c.p.s to use this coming school year to build a workable, system wide policy for high schools. Do not leave teachers alone with this any more. Thank you, thank you,
Siobhan Gilman Reilly good afternoon, President Rivera, members of the board. My name is Siobhan Gilman Reilly, and I'm a resident of Montgomery County. Three weeks ago, the Department of Education announced a baseless title nine investigation into the gender inclusive policies in Montgomery County public Schools. These policies simply
allow transgender and non-binary students to exercise the same basic rights as their cisgender peers. The Department of Education's cynically attacks these policies, which save the lives of vulnerable children, as part of the federal government's explicit effort to eliminate transgender and non-binary people. The
white House is not shy about that word eliminate. When it talks about my community, they put it in a press release not two weeks ago celebrating these ongoing efforts. The Department of Education believes that it can intimidate this board and others like it into collaborating in that campaign of elimination. It wants the
board comfortable with the idea that sacrificing the safety and welfare of these students, there's no reason to be intimidated. The reality is that states and school districts around the country that fight back against these investigations are winning. State law unequivocally prohibits schools from discriminating on the basis of sex, sexual orientation or
gender identity. A bill proposed during the 2026 legislative session of the Maryland General Assembly sought to change that. It would have codified bigotry into law by prohibiting some girls from participating in girls sports simply on the basis of being trans. That bill failed to even
make it out of committee. Nearly identical bills were proposed in 2025, 2024, 2023 and 2022. Each bill ended in the same spectacular and well-deserved failure. Not once have these or other transphobic
bills received the support of the Montgomery County delegation. This should come as no surprise. Cruelty is not a value of this community or this state. I call on this board to stand firm in protecting its. The transgender and non-binary students in Montgomery County public school system, the
community, its elected legislators and the law itself are with you if you do, and it's the right thing to do. Thank you, Mr. Norlin. Good afternoon. My name is and I will. I live in Bradwell Court
in Stonebridge, community of Rockville and North Potomac. I'm asking you to reconsider the decision to classify Stonebridge as a work zone for Thomas Wootton High School at the New Crown Campus. According to our HOA, 376 townhomes in
Stonebridge will not receive bus transportation because they are considered to be within walking distance of this school. While single family homes in the same area have bus transport, bus transportation. However, the actual working route tells a different story
from my home on Bradwell Court. The walk to the school takes 45 to 50 minutes each way. I submitted maps from Google Maps
and work working zone. Every day. Students would have to cross several major roads, including Darnestown Road, Meadow Branch Road, Great Seneca Highway, Key West Avenue.
These are busy commuter roads with heavy traffic, especially during school hours. Winter makes also more difficult for working. Students also have to
work in the dark. Snow. Ice. And nearly 100 minute road trip walk every school day is not only a safety concern, it also leaves students tired before they even begin the school day. Many parents will likely drive
their children, instead, creating more traffic around the school and more burden to parents. I respectfully ask the board to reconsider the work zone designation, review the safety of the working roads and provide bus, transportation or another transportation solution
for Stonebridge students. Thank you for your time and consideration. Thank you. Thank you very much for coming today. Okay. Thank you all. I'm going to call. The next person is
Joel Schwartz. Pick your seat. And you can start any. Only you.
There you go. And just push the button in front of you when you start, please. I was about to read the email that was sent to me, so I don't want to hear that one. Thank you. Good afternoon, honorable members of the board. My name is Joel Schwartz, parent of four
children, three in M.C.P.S. schools. Professionally, I'm a former government cybercrime prosecutor for the Justice Department and Intelligence agency privacy officer. I currently run my own privacy and cybersecurity consulting and legal firm, and I teach in law school. I'm also co-founder of the Student Data Privacy
Project. In April 2026, M.C.P.S. launched a pilot with a local company, volt AI, to monitor video cameras at three pilot schools for quote unquote events of interest. The pilot went live despite requests from multiple MCPs PTA committees to delay it. After we rejected the
opportunity to help them design privacy safeguards, I had a call with M.C.P.S. as the vice chair of the Tech Committee. God bless you and volt representative at M.C.P.S. Just one week out where M.C.P.S. had not even yet developed the rules governing what student activity would be flagged as
events of interest. Finally, also M.C.P.S. communications about the pilot fell super short. Most parents learned about it through word of mouth or brief newsletter mention. Many were very upset and contacted us directly. M.C.P.S. then hastily scheduled a couple of outreach sessions, which created more confusion and contradictory information,
which actually required me to spend some time on special calls for the tech committee to actually help clarify things. After speaking with M.C.P.S. and getting some clarifications, my own concerns deepened when I spoke with some of the staff who helped vet the proposal, and they couldn't answer some of my basic questions, such as where would devices be placed
if they were being placed, what data would flow, etc. anyway, pilots done. In May 2026. We asked for a debriefing. More than two months later. We've not gotten any debriefing or any responses actually. So what are we asking for? Number one, M.c.p.s. Needs to collaborate with MCPs to develop a set of
guardrails to protect privacy for all future AI use period. Full stop. Two we need to M.C.P.S. to work with us to help develop a holistic risk assessment framework for adoption of AI in schools, which is something most commercial. The commercial world does quite often, and number three, involve in a community. Experts from the
community, an AI knowledge and AI planning for M.c.p.s. We've made this proposal numerous times for advisory group over multiple school years, but. Thank you. We have your testimony. Thank you. Mr. I'm
going to ask our staff now, please, to do our video testimony. We'll start with Miss Erin Hoffman. Good afternoon, Doctor Taylor and members of the board. My name is Erin Hoffman. I'm an M.c.p.s. Parent and active member of schools beyond screens, Montgomery County. I'm here
today to support the board's screen resolution and share results from a recent survey, the M.c.p.s. Things to know. Summary of policy. IG's affirmed that teachers remain the primary decision makers in the classroom when it comes to student facing technology. Interestingly, teachers have been reaching out to our group
to share their concerns, so I figured if anecdotal evidence carries weight, then we should organize it and invite more perspectives. We distributed a survey asking M.c.p.s teachers and staff how technology is affecting their classrooms. In just three weeks, we received
175 responses. I included the full results as my written testimony and I'll share some highlights with you. Now. Teachers do not feel empowered to be the primary decision makers. 93% say AI has no place in the classroom, as it encourages cheating and tricks students into thinking that
they're learning. 95% say phones need to stay far away from the classroom in pouches or lockers, and 77% of respondents believe students spend too much time using technology for school related purposes. The million dollar question is why. In regards to
Chromebooks, they identified curriculums, frequency of online assessments, limited time to teach classroom expectations, and unreliable copiers as just a few reasons. Chromebooks have become the default classroom instruction and non-instructional tool. Addressing technology in our
classrooms is hard, and it's important. The overwhelming empirical evidence shows that less screen time and more person to person interaction benefits. Learning your audit is critical. I'll leave you with one teacher's response. Providing a Chromebook offers a permanent opportunity for
students who struggle to escape into the world of their Chromebook and avoid non-preferred tasks. Thank you for your support. Thank you. Can we play Ashley Bowers testimony, please? I'm Ashley Bowers, parent of an M.c.p.s student. Last year, my first
grader came home one day describing what sounded like a Google image search he performed during what he called free Chromebook time. He saw images of a teen rated horror video game that he heard another student mention, something we would never allow at home. I contacted his teacher because I was surprised
first graders had access to Google search. She was very responsive, but I was concerned that no formal process was initiated to report or address the issue. This prompted me to meet with our principal and M.C.P.S. CTO staff, where I learned there's actually no way to block Google search, as it's
integral to the Google platform. Growing more concerned, I logged into my son's account on a student issued Chromebook connected to the school's WiFi. I performed simple searches any first grader could think of like, what is sex? The first result was a Google AI overview
and chatbot with explicit information that is inappropriate to repeat here. Despite being easily accessible to M.C.P.S. youngest learners, this required no workarounds, no bypassing filters, or even correct spelling. Just start typing and suggested searches
appear. I believe these findings raise serious concerns about M.C.P.S. compliance with federal regulations, and I sent my findings to the board and the superintendent on June 3rd. I want to be clear this is not a war on tech, nor a criticism of my students. Teacher
experiences like mine are not uncommon, as shown by the number of parent reports to MCPs PTA tech Committee. Rather than relying on imperfect internet content filters, we need policies that protect the learning environment by ensuring that internet connected devices are not
provided to unsupervised children without parental consent. Please support the screen time, audit and resolution so we can all have a clear understanding of how Chromebooks are used and whether that use is safe, age appropriate and educationally
justified. Thank you. Thank you very much. Can we look at the video of Marissa Walker? I'm Marissa Walker, M.C.P.S. parent, MCPs tech committee vice chair and member of Schools Beyond Screens, Montgomery County. I strongly support the Screen Time audit resolution and I
urge you to do the same. I testified back in May that internet access on the school Chromebooks means that students see all manner of non-educational content, ranging from the merely distracting to the outright obscene. This is puzzling, considering that M.c.p.s. Pays a lot of money to companies
like Lightspeed and Iboss to filter and block content. But based on what kids can access, the Iboss filters are clearly not working well enough. Moreover, both Lightspeed and Iboss have parent portals that could empower parents to know how their kids are using
screens at schools. But MCPs does not appear to have these features. So parents are in the dark and cannot put their own controls on school accounts. Recently, in April, a game called Five Nights at Epstein's was going viral among M.c.p.s students during school. On
school devices. We emailed the M.c.p.s. Tech office about the game, giving an example of how to find it online. They responded that they blocked it based on our tip, yet immediately afterwards we were still able to find many other ways to access the game on a school Chromebook signed in to
a student account. Blocking one URL at a time just doesn't work with today's internet, where harmful content spreads quickly across many different websites that change all the time. In short, existing filters and blocks don't work well enough and maybe never will. Please
support this resolution so we can better understand what students are accessing on school devices, and we can begin to solve the problem. My preference would be that we greatly scale back student internet access, return to time tested, human centered teaching
methods, and use technology more sparingly and intentionally with informed parental consent. Thank you. Thank you very much. Can we see the video from Hannah Donat? Hello, I'm Hannah Donat, I'm testifying as vice chair of
the Health and Wellness Committee at Poolesville cluster parent and environmental scientist. My written testimony includes a cosponsored student Climate Action Council and MCPs co-sponsored petition advocating for the board to invest in real grass instead of plastic turf. MCPs is committed to partnering with MCPs and the
board to make informed, evidence based decisions rooted in real world data, up to date science and cost effective strategies. With limited resources and many outstanding capital needs, we are urging the board to prioritize students indoor learning environment, where all children spend most of their time. Instead of allocating over 55
million for plastic turf. Real world data and independent studies have demonstrated that we can significantly save by investing instead in organically managed, well-maintained real grass, which offers a safer, healthier, more sustainable and less expensive alternative to plastic turf. And rather than investing in out of state
plastic turf companies, we could make it local, keep it local by investing in landscaping businesses in state. Today, M.c.p.s. Is not provided a full life cycle. Cost analysis the chart on top of this slide is the ten year cost analysis they presented to you last November, which failed to account for 1 million in
plastic disposal and replacement costs. The bottom chart includes plastic disposal and replacement using MCPs own data to show the full estimated cost over just ten years for plastic. Plastic costs more than twice as much as real grass, and these costs don't include costs to our kids and communities, health or
environment. M.c.p.s. Is also not provided an independently verified actual use data, relying instead on reserved cut flowers, not accounting for extreme cold and hot weather and use on poorly maintained grass. In these longer, hotter summers, kids cannot safely play on plastic heat. Islands and school athletics are restricted outdoors in freezing
temperatures. The legal authority and responsibility for determining field surface rests with this board. We respectfully request that the board do their due diligence by requiring an RFP for grass, an updated health protective heat policy, an independent life cycle, cost analysis, a transparent evaluation and public review of all viable
field alternatives before approving any turf fields. Can we please, please play the video for Corinna Smith? My name is Teresa Smith. I'm a Fairland Elementary School parent, PTA vice president and chair of the MCPs to Health and
Wellness Committee. Our communities deserve transparency and due diligence regarding the risk of synthetic turf. Natural grass is organic, equitable and cost efficient. It is not the alternative. It should be. The default. Plastic turf poses several risks, including heat stress, injury and chemical exposure.
Environmental hazards don't land evenly. Students with chronic health conditions are especially at risk. They are exposed to dangerous microplastics, heat islands and chemical contamination, including PFAs. When school leadership chooses plastic turf, a child with asthms no choice. That is not equity. It
is a health burden placed unevenly on kids who already carry the most. In addition, low income communities are disproportionately impacted by the installation of synthetic turf. These neighborhoods have historically been subjected to a greater share of environmental burdens, while having fewer opportunities to influence land use decisions.
When these fields are placed in underserved communities, residents face a disproportionate share of these potential risks. While lacking equal access to greener, natural recreational spaces and the resources needed to address environmental health concerns, consider what the roughly $50 million budgeted for turf could
fund. Instead. About ten new elementary school Hvac systems for clean, air filtered hydration stations at every M.C.P.S. water source for lead free water, or about 15 roof replacements. Preventing water damage and mold. Is turf really where our most vulnerable students need this money to go? My written testimony includes
the MCPs PTA resolution on synthetic turf. We ask the board to pause new turf installations until M.c.p.s. Completes a full life cycle cost analysis and issues an RFP for sustainably managed grass fields. We also ask the board to update its heat policy by using wet bulb globe temperature measured at the
field, consistent with federal guidance and stronger child protective standards. The board's role is to ensure decisions are transparent, evidence based, fiscally responsible and in the best interest of all M.c.p.s. Students, I look forward to partnering with you. Thank you. Thank you very much. This will
conclude our public comments. The next business meeting of the Board of Education for Public Comment is on Thursday, August 20th of this year. Sign ups for public comment will open on Thursday, August 13th of this year at 6 p.m. In addition to the online sign ups for public comment, we allow
for in-person standing sign ups when space allows. An allocated slots may be filled on a first come, first served basis on the day of the meeting. I also like to welcome our colleague Miss Rita Montoya, who is joining us
via video. With that, I will open to my colleagues if they have any questions or comments before we do that. Let me get my out of the way. I would like to thank Grace from grace to grace. Thank you so much for
for such a great initiative and for caring for for other students. And you're right, as a first generation, I can tell you that having no idea what the SATs were, even were and
having, you know, to study for them, it was not an easy thing. So thank you very much for supporting other students who. And we were looking to that. And and I hope Doctor Taylor, we can take her up on her offer. That is an amazing offer. And what better to have our
students who know better, who go through, you know, those trials of trying to do something. And that feedback is so, so valuable. So Grace, thank you very much. And to Mr. Norlin, is he still here? I think he was. He left. Okay. We
will definitely look into the work zone designation for Stonebridge. I know exactly the community that he's talking about, and it's definitely worth taking a look at it, because these are the little littles people that we have who will be walking. And I don't
think we're done with that study anyway. Correct. Doctor Taylor so that is that. With that, let me start on my left, Miss Zimmerman. Thank you. I also want to thank everyone who came out to testify in your continued involvement in our school system, even though it's
summertime and in an effort to be additive and not repetitive, I also wanted to thank Grace. And I know that while we have the highest SAT scores in the state, I am very competitive, so I would like to see them to be even higher, see us compete
perhaps on a national scale, and put us up in that realm as well. I also wanted to take a moment to reaffirm and restate our commitment to fostering a safe and inclusive learning environment for all of our students. Thank you. Thank you,
Miss Zimmerman. Miss Stewart. I also sign up with these comments. Thank you guys. I want to say that we as a board
support the current M.C.P.S. policy, and we continue to do that. But thank you so much for coming out here. I know sometimes it's not easy in this environment, so I appreciate the testimony regarding our
continuing our values. I also would like to. Just address some of the testimony on artificial turf. A couple things I just wanted to ask. It
was mentioned that we use a heat policy for our turf in one place in Montgomery County, and then apply that to all the places Montgomery County. And as we know, we have a lot of different climates in Montgomery County. And so I
thought maybe it would be worth it to look at our heat policy for our field use. We are right now in a major heat wave. And so we need to, I believe, keep a careful watch on how we use these fields. As you can see from the temperatures, it does
get much hotter on those fields. So if we could take just review our heat policy to see where we are and compare with other districts, I think that would be helpful. And the other issue I had was, I don't know if we
use actual field use numbers. And there was a presentation almost a year ago, I believe, about how many hours we use our fields. I would like to know if that's actual use or is that
projected use or modeled use? Because as climate changes, I would think that sometimes we might not be able to use a field because of the heat. So I just would like that extra information as we get into a
different climate zone. So thank you, Miss Yang. Yes. Thank you. I want to thank everyone for coming in. I want to associate myself with a comment given by colleagues for the transportation work zone
and the affirming our systems inclusive value. And I would like to ask staff to help take down miss Grace email so that make it easier for her to navigate and connect so that
with the school system. Thank you everyone. Thank you very much. I'm going to go to our student board member. You know, try my best to be additive and not repetitive. My first ever board comment. I do want to
thank Grace, you know, student to student. It always is great to see, you know, such an underlooked topic. That is very like just as important that I know that a lot of peers, including even me going in next year, would have definitely benefited from. And I thank you for coming out to testify. It's always great to see students, you know, show up. So I do hope
to maybe see that software come into play next year as I'm preparing for that. Thank you. Thank you so much, Mr. David. That would conclude, I think, and I appreciate it. And again, thank you so much for for coming and for testifying. Moving on to our next item
number, which would be item number eight on our agenda consent items. Are there any consent items that my colleagues would like to request to be pulled out for clarification? Mr. David, do you have your your hand raised?
Is that from last time? Sorry. Yeah. Okay. I just wanted to be sure. Thank you sir. Seeing none, is there a motion and a second to approve items? 8.1 through 8.21 in block, move approval and block. Second,
there's a motion. And second, all those in favor, please raise your hand. And that is unanimous with all of us here. Thank you so much. The motion carries. Madam president, I have a couple of announcements
to correspond with your consent agenda, if that would be all right. Sure. Thank you. Today, the you recognized M.C.P.S. team members who recently passed away, whose service and dedication has left a lasting impact on the communities that they served. This included Mrs.
Audrey R Boddy Jackson, a special education teacher at John F Kennedy High School who served M.C.P.S. for 26 years. You also recognized Miss Ashley Jones, a bus operator at the Shady Grove Bus Depot North, and the Division of Transportation, and she served
us for three years. We extend our deepest sympathies to their friends, their families, their coworkers, and to the students that they served as they grieve this loss. Additionally, it's hard to believe that this is right around the corner. Summer
is slipping away. Board members, you also recognize resolutions that we will get to celebrate next month in August, and they are the get Ready for kindergarten month. It's an official month that we recognize and encourage
families, schools, and community partners to work together to support a smooth and successful transition for our youngest learners as they begin their educational journey in kindergarten. Second, the board recognized National Back to School Month, highlighting
the importance of school readiness, strong family school partnerships, and ensuring that every student begins prepared for success. And your final resolution that you recognized was the National Immunization Awareness Month, emphasizing
the importance of routine immunizations and support of student health, regular school attendance, and safe learning environments for all students. These resolutions, which the Board of Education has just approved, will be shared and celebrated as we prepare for
the start of the 2026 2027 school year. At your next official business meeting. Thank you, Madam President. This concludes announcements for today. Thank you, Doctor Taylor. And of course, we also concur with our most heartfelt condolences for those who are no longer with us and to their
loved ones. Next on the agenda will be item 9.1. This was a an item on the agenda that from our previous from our previous new business auditing students screen time K through eight. I
will turn it now over to Miss Yang. Miss Yang, thank you so much, Madam President. I am excited that we are here on to talk about this resolution. Thank you for the parents here
and online to voice their support for this resolution. At the June 4th work session, I presented the board for for the board's consideration, a draft resolution calling for M.c.p.s
to review student screen time and digital tool use to prepare a report for its findings to the board. There's no doubt all of us know that technology has transformed education in remarkable ways. The question
is not whether students should use technology, but the question is whether we use it intentionally, thoughtfully and in ways that best support learning and student well-being. And today, we don't have a
comprehensive picture. So I appreciate the administration has already begun important work in this area. They are. Presentation on June 4th. Outline some plans to review our practices and and and also
to, to, to gather stakeholder feedback and some develop some future guidelines. I see this resolution as a complementary to that work. The board's responsibility is governance. Before we make policy decisions
or consider system wide changes, we should understand where we are today. Good decision begins with good data. So this resolution asks for comprehensive audit of student screen time and digital tool
use. It asks us to quantify how much screen time students are experiencing. Distinguishing instructional from Non-instructional. Examine why, whether there are opportunities to reduce unnecessary screen
exposure. Evaluate The effectiveness effectiveness of our content filters. Some parents were talking about that and provide recommendations informed by evidence. So I'm
I'm very excited. It's here on the table now since. In its introduction on June 4th. In considering some feedback I received on that draft, I would
like to move to amend the resolution by revising the second rarest cause to read as follows. Whereas screen time is defined as time students spend on a school issue device, such
as a computer or tablet, accessing digital media on a 1 to 1 basis, or in small student groups for, but not limited to educational purposes such as learning, studying or
completing school work. And. Thank you. Thank you, Miss Yang. There is a motion to amend the resolution. Is there a second? I second. Okay. There is a second. Is there any discussion on the proposed amendment of
the resolution at this time? Let me go online. Just the amendment. Just just the amendment. Correct. Any discussion? Okay. Seeing none, if there's no further
discussion, all those in favor to the amendment, please raise your hand. And that is unanimous. Thank you very much. So before we proceed with any additional discussion, I would like to ask Miss Yang again to please read the results of the
resolution. Thank you, Madam President. So resolve that the board encourages the responsible use of digital devices, reserving screen time for activities where technology offers clear, independent,
evidence based instructional advantages. Resolved that M.C.P.S. will conduct a comprehensive review of student screen time and digital use, and prepare and deliver to the
board no later than March 2027. A report that one quantifies averages, daily and weekly screen time for students in elementary and middle school during the school day.
Distinguishing between instructional and non-instructional use and including program specific caveats and assessments where appropriate, to assess whether there are opportunities to
reduce screen time exposure in age appropriate ways. Three assesses the effectiveness of content filters and blocks to protect students from using school issued devices to assess
harmful or inappropriate content. Four provides a recommendation regarding district wide guidance for age appropriate screen time, and five outlines the anticipated
costs, benefits, and operational impacts of any proposed changes. So with that, I move that the board approved the resolution as amended. Thank you, Miss Young. There is a motion on the table. Is there
of the. There's a motion on the table, as a resolution, as amended. Is there a second? Second. Okay. There is a motion, a second. Is there any discussion? This is Miss
Silvestre. Yes. I wanted to ask Doctor Taylor you had presented previously about the work that you were going to do in this regard. How does this resolution differ from what you were already planning to do? It's complimentary. It's more comprehensive than I think,
what we had originally scoped out. And I think that this works well with what we were planning on doing and is more comprehensive. And I think we'll give the board a clearer picture of screen use in our
schools. And. My brain goes right away to how are we going to do this? But you're going to figure that out. But I, I do want to that the language of a comprehensive review of student
screen time, I mean, the the evaluation folks have ways to do that, to figure out how to, to do that. It's kind of daunting to think about how to get into every classroom and analyze this, but I don't know
if you have any thoughts about that. Yes, certainly. We'll take a mixed modal approach to examining this. One of the ways that we leverage that is a little bit easier and very comprehensive, is to look at
our actual usage data that we're collecting from devices. So school issued devices will tell us an awful lot about the programs that are used. The software that we use, how frequently we use it, when, where, etc. And that will be a critical data point as well as
teachers perceptions, parents perceptions, and students perceptions of how much time they're spending in place and how well that lines up to what our data reflects. Okay. And any cost implications that you anticipate in just doing the
comprehensive review? That's an excellent question. At this time, based on the scope of what we see right now, we believe that we can handle that within our current capacity. We will likely come back to the board with a work plan of what
this would look like and what we anticipate and if we need any help. But at this time, we're not requesting any additional help from the board. Okay. Of course, workload is workload, so I'm sure other projects will be have to be put aside so that this can take
precedent. This definitely crowds a very crowded plate for sure. Our tech team works very hard, but we do have an interest in making sure that we have the most optimal learning environment. And, you know, we're sensitive to this. We're
paying attention to this issue just like everybody else is. We want to make sure that our our kids have access to a world class teaching and learning environment. And we need to grow and evolve just like everyone else. So this is a
potential for us to improve our learning environment and to learn from our, our learning environment as it's situated right now. So we look forward to this opportunity. Great. Thank you. And I, my, my questions are just to that end, sometimes we pass resolutions and sometimes the board is
disappointed with the outcome of the work. And so I just wanted to make sure that we're putting kind of clear guidelines and strong foundation from the outset so that we get a deliverable that we are all happy with. Thank you for flagging that, Miss Silvestre, because I think that
the the next step of this beyond your resolution is coming back with a work plan as to like, what this might look like as a finished product. So you know that we close that, that perception gap of, of what you were expecting versus what
is produced. So hopefully we can get closer to that, that vision for you. Thank you, Miss Stewart. I simply want to thank Miss Yang for working on this. I think it's time, especially with the new technology coming
out for us. It's good for us to get a handle on what's happening in our classrooms, and I look forward to the report and the work plan. A realistic work plan, right, so that we don't expect something
that's just not doable. So I like that idea. And I want to thank especially Miss Yang for working on this. Thank you. The only comment I'd like to add is I just wanted to be realistic on the time that we're talking
about, because we have 213 schools. Is it realistic to have a report by March? Yes, I think it is realistic. How? However, I think you're
flagging an important issue to that, that some of the activities that happen in schools are seasonal and that to capture the seasonality of what happens in the classroom, the activities that are happening in the fall are, are
different than the activities that are happening in the winter and that are happening in the spring. One of the findings which which may lead to the, the satisfaction gap that Miss Silvestri was talking about is we may come up with a finding, which may be. We need
more information about what happens during the spring assessment season as well. That was definitely brought up in testimony today about online assessments that the kids are using devices for, and how much time that that takes. And
realistically, the month of May is irregular by comparison to the rest of the school year. In the volume of time that kids are behind screens. And that would be outside of the scope of this. So I think that's an important consideration. It is something that we should we should look at. I think it
would be helpful for us to get started with this work, and maybe even give progress updates as we go along. I was going to suggest, Doctor Taylor, that maybe the way you do it is important. Two parts. You give us an update in March, and because there's more activity at the end of the school year,
then this should really be, at least in my opinion, a whole year, a holistic whole year for school, for school year for students. Because I think we're just capturing part of it. But if we really want to capture everything, it should be from A
to Z. Just for what it's worth. Okay. All right, Miss Zimmerman, thank you. I just wanted to bring up that this is like one step forward in a much greater conversation. I think about my
own classroom. And, you know, I would say that kids were maybe getting about 20 minutes a day on their Chromebook, but that's one classroom in one school. And this will really help us capture some of that better. But it also is part of that testing conversation and things
like this. So I look forward to us continuing this conversation and how this initial set of data will help us move forward. Okay. You have an additional comment? Yeah. Oh, actually,
Miss Montoya, can we go to Miss Montoya first? Yeah, absolutely. Miss Montoya, thank you. I know that I see in the resolved that there's a space to kind of distinguish between instruction on instruction, program specific assessments, etc. and
I'm wondering if it's also possible to indicate somehow where we don't have control over that. So for example, I recognize this is K through eight. But if we were talking about high schools, the AP exam, if it's administered that way, there's nothing we can do about
that. For example, just so that we can see where is there even room to make a change somewhere within what we're dealing with. And then I just wanted to know as a clarifying point. So for example, when we're talking
about program specific caveats, if your child is taking digital art, then obviously we expect that's going to be needing some sort of technology or device, right? We're not going to be cutting digital art from the curriculum. Yeah. Okay. Miss
Yang yeah, I really want to express my appreciation in, in this work of feedback I received from colleagues on the dais and partnership from parents, especially the MCPs
PTA Technology Committee. So this is this is a group work. Education is a team sport. And thank you everyone. Okay. Thank you to all. If there's no further discussion. All those in favor, please raise your
hand. And that is unanimous. Thank you very much. All right. Moving on. Item 10.1. This is. The approval of the board
handbook. The board reviews this handbook periodically in an effort to align language and practices in working to best consider proposed updates and communicate the rationale, we may wish to consider postponing this item, colleagues, to a future meeting. Is there a
motion and a second to table this item for to a future meeting? I move to table this item until a future meeting. Second, there is a motion and a. Second, is there any discussion?
Oh, I'm so sorry. Yeah, just this gives us more time to review and comments on the things that we want to keep. And we want things we want to change. Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you very much. There's no further discussion. All those in favor, please raise your hand. That is unanimous.
Appreciate that. Item 11.1 this is elementary school boundary study. Doctor Taylor, take it away. First things first. Welcome to our 49th student member of the board for your first meeting. We're delighted
that you're here. We would like to congratulate you once again for assuming this awesome responsibility. And thank you for your courage and stepping in to to the beginning of two very challenging discussions.
As you know, we found ourselves in an interesting place in M.C.P.S. history and in Montgomery County history. It is not unprecedented. We've experienced this before where we have seen fluctuations in our enrollment, but it's been an awful long time, 40 years,
as a matter of fact, since we saw this last significant dip in enrollment. And hopefully it's not long lasting, but we do need to adjust for it and to think about things differently. So today we will preview a two
year timeline for the board's consideration of potential school consolidation enclosure study process, a phase one of of this process, which will also include the countywide
elementary and middle school boundary study, which will take into consideration any potential findings from a a consolidation and closure study. We will review the types of data today that could be considerations that could
inform the development of the metrics and decision making process for any potential consolidations or closures. We will touch briefly on our planned framework for engagement and enhanced engagement strategies for both
phases of this work over the next two years. We will also share an update on the Facility Condition Index and the comprehensive facility assessments for all of the Board of Education owned buildings. This was a new term
added to the M.c.p.s. Lexicon. This past year as we launched a very aggressive capital improvements program, and we will talk a little bit about how that that data and those data impact our future work. We
will compare the data on live births for Montgomery County Public Schools and the Maryland Department of Planning, and how those differences may have impacts on our progress moving forward and the impacts on our enrollment projections. Finally,
we will review how our elementary school capacity ratios will shift with the new four tiered approach of classifying schools and provide more targeted staffing and resources, more closely aligned to the unique needs of each school community. This is at
the very heart of our values in meeting our children and families with what they need, where they are. I now turn things over to our Chief Operations Officer, Mr. Adnan Mahmood, and his team for this presentation. Good afternoon.
As Doctor Taylor mentioned during the past several years at M.c.p.s. We have experienced sustained county wide shifts in enrollment patterns leading to an overall decline. This is not just happening at M.c.p.s. We're seeing this statewide as well as nationwide. While
certain areas of the county are experiencing localized growth, we do have nearby schools that often have significant available capacity. In addition, several Boundary Elementary schools have island assignments on, on, or noncontiguous attendance boundaries, which
contribute to a longer student transportation time, more frequent split articulations and operational inefficiencies. Because the facility and boundary decisions are inherently linked, it's necessary for us to conduct these studies in a coordinated
manner to support informed long term decision making. So on March 26th, 2026, the Board of Education approved the scope of the School Consolidation and Closure study for elementary and middle schools alongside a system wide elementary and
middle school boundary study. This study would analyze the potential school consolidations and closures, followed by a study to review and adjust elementary and middle school boundaries countywide. So today we will review the two year
timeline for this work. As Doctor Taylor mentioned, including plans for community engagement and alignment to the statutory policy and regulation regulatory framework. We will briefly touch on the data and metrics that will inform the process, and we will also provide an update on
comprehensive facility assessments, highlighting slight differences between the state and M.c.p.s. Enrollment projections and share t updated program capacity framework. So for the the Comprehensive Facility
Portfolio Review and Boundary study, we. The following are going to be included. To evaluate existing program delivery models, including paired schools. Assessing school capacity with current and projected enrollment. Informing future capital improvement planning and long
term investment priorities. Balancing enrollment across elementary schools and middle schools to optimize use of existing facilities. Addressing Noncontinuous contiguous attendance boundaries or island assignments, and trying to align feeder patterns to support continuity and
stability for students and families. And as Doctor Taylor mentioned, the study is going to be in two phases. The this slide shows the phase one timeline, which, you know, today, you know, in the consent agenda, the board approved the
contract for the consultant. So we will be, you know, meeting with the consultant and initial data gathering in August and September. And we will have community outreach and engagement around talking about the metrics and criteria for decision making between October and January, and then
development and presentation of superintendents, recommendation for school consolidations and closures will be presented in March. And then there will be public hearings and written testimony discussing the consolidations and closures, with the board decision
expected in May of 2027. So that takes us through the first phase of this study. The timeline for phase two, after the decisions about the closures and consolidations are made. You know, we will start the boundary study process and
we will have initial public information sessions in June, June and July of next year. And then first round of options would be presented in August and September of 2027. And then October 2027 would be time for us to gather feedback and
analysis from first round of options. And then we will have public information sessions about second round of options in winter of 2027, and then development of the and presentation of the superintendent's recommendation would be early in 2028, with
the board approval about boundary changes due in May of 2028. So because it's a two year process that includes potential consolidations and closures, we need to be very mindful about how we build
understanding and, and, and inform the community, staff and families to make sure they are able to understand the process as well as follow along as we do the studies. Our engagement will be focused on student experience and ensuring that we create the right balance of
students and resources in our schools in order to maintain high quality learning experience for all of our students. So the process includes potential consolidations and closures in phase one. As I mentioned, we
will be aligning that work with the Code of Maryland Regulations, or Comar, and the procedures that govern school closures, closings. Obviously, our all of our work are aligned to board policy FAA and a, B, A, as well as regulation F, a a r
a from. As you have seen in our recent boundary studies work at the next board meeting in October, we will share more information about Facility Advisory Committee, which is in. Aligned to our regulation FAARA,
and tap into the wealth of experience and knowledge of those in our community for long term facility planning issues and strategies. We will continue to align our work to these policies and regulations, as well as keep strategic plan at the forefront for front of
our work, including especially goal number two, which for us charges us to ensure safe and welcoming learning and working environments through positive climate and effective operations. So possible engagement strategies. We're
definitely excited to begin our community engagement work and build on the strategies that we have found success in our previous boundary study, and as well as enhance our efforts to ensure understanding and engagement throughout this process. So we will use a
combination of in-person virtual sessions, in-person and virtual sessions, as well as making sure that the in-person sessions are held at all six regions. Direct outreach to students, staff and families. Collaboration with community partners and organizations.
Definitely offering our communications in multiple languages and modalities. Using focus groups to get feedback, and then using M.C.P.S. communication channels, including our social media and obviously surveys to get feedback from our communities.
I will now turn it over to Miss Docca to take us through the next part of the presentation. Good evening. Thank you Adnan. DJ and I are going to bounce back and forth between the next two sections, and we want to start with the decision making framework and recommendation.
If we can go to the next slide please. So now that we have let's go back one. Now that we have the consultant on board, the first step, as we work with this consultant to frame out both the two year process and more specifically, year one in this phase one for school year
2627, we need to start working through what is that metric development look like? How will we determine and help make a recommendation to the superintendent of what recommended schools to close and or consolidate? Some of our initial thinking are taking into consideration facility condition, enrollment and
utilization, site characteristics, geographic considerations, the receiving school capacity, educational programs, and the paired school model. This is not an exhaustive, exhaustive list. This is also what we will seek community engagement on. In the fall, we will come out with a
more detailed and comprehensive understanding, and again, we will seek that community engagement on the in the fall. Next slide please. As part of this facility, condition without a doubt will play an impact in this. And you all have been tracking over the
course of the last year with us the facility condition assessments. I am happy to report that online. All 224 reports are posted. Final and summary report. The public has access to that. As you know, we have been posting as we have gone throughout the year and
you can sort by elementary or secondary or special schools that overall. FCI. So feel free to take a look. I know many, many communities have been and they have been messaging with us. So I'm excited that people are using the website and the data. All right. We're back
here talking about enrollment to give you a quick update, since we didn't talk about it enough this spring season with the CIP, every year, every spring, the Maryland Department of Planning does provide an update with their enrollment projections. It is important to note that they do kindergarten
through grade 12. So we we also do K-12 as well as pre-K 12. We typically don't review this, but we did find that it. We felt like this is very important given everything going on with our school system, with enrollment decline, with
the upcoming possible school closures and consolidation. So these next few slides, you can see both the projections and what went into the projections, both with M.C.P.S. and MDP. Again, these projections do not
include pre-K, Head Start or Pep. We do have an attachment. Attachment B that does go over. It's a table as well. It shows you the percentage of difference and things like that. And you can see we'll get into
why both go down. But go ahead. All right. So when we were going reviewing this in the spring we we sort of went over the building blocks of how projections were created and live birth rates and birth trends. You know, that's how you start with your enrollment
projections. So the chart to the right in that purple color, you're going to see actual births reported by the Maryland Department of Health. The last year reported was 2023. From
there you can see the projected live births, both from Maryland Department of Planning and M.c.p.s. You can see it's pretty clear since 2004 2007 time frame, time frame, there
was a slight increase. But since 2007, it's been a gradual decrease in live births. So if you look to the right of 2023, you will see the dashed line in red. That is the Maryland Department of Planning birth
projections. And you can see that there is a slight increase, which we think is a little bit optimistic. We would love for that to happen. In the blue dash, you can see the M.C.P.S. projections, which is a slight
decline but does follow historical trends in the trend data that we've seen in the past two decades or so. So the overall impact with higher projected birth rates and also kindergarten capture rates,
which we'll get into. It's leading to some pretty favorable and optimistic projections, to say the least. We do have an attachment C at the end of this that shows kindergarten capture rates. And just to remind everybody, a kindergarten capture rate is you take your live births, and
then five years after that, the percentage of students that were born in Montgomery County and that end up in M.C.P.S. as M.C.P.S. students, that is your percentage. That is your kindergarten capture rate. So we do have a table at the back that shows historical capture
rates, as well as what each department or school system projects for their capture rates. Can I interject here a little bit just for. There's a lot there's a lot of B's and C's and D's and A's. And so I just want to be. When you. With
the way that we project. So are you saying there's a difference between we project and MDP projects in live births. Yes. Correct. All right. And. If you can compare it, what is you know, the difference. But then
you said there would be an optimistic. And I can see that. Okay, for for live births, but it's that consistent with the past and, and why you, you believe there's a difference. So if you look at that, the, the line, the blue line, which
is M.C.P.S. We are we are following more traditional trend lines from the last two decades where the Maryland Department of Planning are not really. So I'm going to add some additional commentary here, and I'm. I am an optimist by
nature. I wouldn't be in the line of work that I'm in if I wasn't just put on your algebra hat for a second here and look at the slope of these projections. And if you're looking at the slope of the historic projection and you're
looking at our blue line, our projection is an optimistic projection, correct? It is not a pessimistic projection. It is an optimistic projection. The state's projection is not just
optimistic. It assumes that there is a complete reversal of fortunes, and that there is a 180 degree change in direction, and that they are projecting
growth. So we're not confident that there is compelling data that supports that. We would love to be optimistic about our our fortunes more favorably. Thus, a less dramatic slope that you see in the purple line.
However, this two in our projection in blue may be a conservative projection based on where the data seems to be pointing us. Now, I also just want to point out that even if that projection is correct,
we're still below 2022. Like it's still a very slight projection even at the state level, right? So just keep in mind, like we're not talking about going back up to where we were, you know, ten years ago. Yeah. And that second bullet
point, the kindergarten capture rates along with attachment. See, talking about being optimistic right now, this year we had a 84.7% kindergarten capture rate. So 84.7% of the of the students in our school system were born five years ago
in Montgomery County. The the highest it's been in the last ten years was 2019 at 87.2%. And our projections are at 87. Yep. One more slide. So I'm
talking about kindergarten capture rate being high in these projections. These are also a different type of capture rate. We were talking about kindergarten capture rate. This is actually capture rates for all students born in Montgomery County K through 12. So this is coming from the
Maryland Department of Planning. If you see right now in 2025, we are at 90%. So 90% of students that are in our school system, it's 90% of students that were born between, I don't know the years, but K to 12,
what, 12 years ago? You get what I'm saying. Their projections include that students what year is that? 2035, 97% of those live births that they're projecting higher
than normal are going to end up in M.C.P.S. So those numbers are all into their projection. So let me translate that for you. The what the state is assuming in this projection is that every bit of historical
data in the past that we will exceed that. And I got to tell you, I love that the state has this level of confidence in M.C.P.S. that 97% of those students that are born within that 20 yeardow, really,
that 97% of them will go to M.C.P.S. specifically. They won't go to private school, they won't go to homeschool, they won't be educated elsewhere. They won't move. They'll stay right here and they'll go to M.c.p.s. And
there's no historical data that would suggest that that would happen. Our peak was at 92 and we're right at 90, right, right now. So that is their projection. And so their their projection is largely predicated on, on this very
optimistic outlook of M.C.P.S. performance. I love it. I too am optimistic about M.c.p.s. Outlook. I'd love to capture 90% of the children in Montgomery County. It's a good goal. Thank you. So so to
summarize, it's this, you know, we have the same trend enrollment forecasting going down. And one more. We both show enrollment decline. It is a difference of 2%. There are just different degrees of what we're projecting and how we're
projecting. Yeah. I'm going to take us through the last section of this. So another big part of what we want to talk to you today are about program capacities and how those relate to our staffing standards. And why do we want to talk to you about this today? This is going
to be really important, and it's important for us to start this conversation today as part of our consolidation and closure study and the boundary study program capacity is a key factor in evaluating our school utilization and informing recommendations. It has always
been a part and will continue to be a part of our capital improvement program and our CIP book that many like to both look at in the hard copy or online. We want to ensure that our school communities understand how program capacity is calculated and what those calculations represent. It's
also important that we receive, you know, we often receive community feedback on what the current capacity calculations look like. How does that translate to how we're actually operating the schools today? We also wanted to take a look at we updated and you all updated staffing standards across
elementary, middle school and high school. And how does that translate and compare to our program capacity? And then we also wanted to benchmark against the state and their guidance and practices. And we also looked at other school districts in terms of the methodologies so that we remain up to date, accurate and
consistent, while also specific to M.c.p.s unique goals that we have if we go to the next slide. So these next series of slides are all going to focus on elementary program capacity. And I want to emphasize that because we do calculate secondary differently at this time. We're not proposing any
changes to that. And we are really focusing on the elementary again one it is calculated different than secondary. And two, because of the upcoming closure, consolidation and the elementary boundary study. So currently the program capacity ratios are defined in the
M.c.p.s regulation FAA, r a. Our program capacities reflect the number of students that can be accommodated based on the current programing at the school. We often refer to classrooms as a teaching station, and those are the only rooms in a school in an
elementary school that count towards capacity. So other things like offices or, you know, our main office, the smaller support rooms, you see something labeled there in the middle called small instructional support room. Those do not count towards capacity. And this is a hypothetical floor plan just to
help orient you. But everything in green is your core classroom or teaching space that is counting towards capacity. Art, music, dual purpose are not included in program capacity because students rotate through
those spaces while still having to be remain assigned to a homeroom. Again, this I cannot overemphasize that this is specific to elementary. In a secondary. Those all count. All our science, all our art, all our music. Those count towards capacity. That is not the case
in an elementary school. And then I wanted to note one thing again, since many people are familiar with how we, you know, describe things and write things in our CIP book, historically, there are tables in there and they show the program capacity that will continue to remain. We actually have a screenshot coming up in
one of the slides to walk people through. We have often referred to some of these as support rooms. And what we have always meant are the specials. So that art, music, dual purpose, we are going to rename that to be called specials so that it's clear because we also use, you can see in the floor
plan that small instructional space. And those are different. Those are usually half the size of a classroom. And so we want to make sure people understand we have specials that are more the size of a classroom, if not larger. And then the smaller support rooms where you might be supporting a teacher in four students, you pull them out
into the room and you help them with that. If we can go to the next slide, can we stop there for a second? Can we go back to that slide just so it's clear? So we're just talking about elementary school. So let's be clear. This is just elementary school. We're not talking middle school and high school.
So who who makes a decision that a classroom is a classroom versus a non classroom? Like who, what's the process for that. Facilities determines that and it's based on square footage. Okay. So if it's a 400 square foot room, even if for some reason a school decided to
use it, we would not count that towards capacity because that does not meet our minimum classroom size. Okay, so there is a minimum that has to be there even though the school might be. We see this all the time, and a lot of our overcrowded elementary schools
that we see certain areas being used technically as a classroom. Correct. Okay. So in this scenario here that you have the, the green squares, those are
classrooms. Can a principal determine because they need space, can they determine that one of those pink other rooms can become a classroom? Can they do that. They can utilize that space as a classroom, but it will not show up in our CIP,
and we will not count it as classroom capacity. Do we like that? I mean, no, but it is a necessity. And I'll tell you, we're working with a couple schools this summer right now.
Most have gone down, but we have a few that have had a bubble and we have to work with them to solve that. So while we don't want to show that formally, it'll show that they're over capacity. And that's an important sometimes they structurally just have to out of necessity, right?
Rearrange things to accommodate those incoming students. Okay. I just want to. Okay. If we go to the next slide, also, just wanted to articulate the difference between program capacity and core capacity. So
for our core capacity, the spaces that we're talking about are your main office. We often also call it the all purpose room or your cafeteria. We have the library media center. These are all part of your core capacity. And depending on what that program capacity is, you
might have a larger space. So in these two diagrams, we show a core capacity of 640 versus 740. That's the number of students right, that it's designed for. But you will look at the a p r, the all purpose room, and that the square footage changes. So we would go
from 3700ft to 5000. Because as you grow that student enrollment, you need a larger cafeteria. So you're not hopefully serving six lunch periods, right. But you keep to that 3 to 4. So those spaces grow as the program capacity grows. And we need larger core
capacity spaces. All right. We're going to review some of our current capacities that we had last year and then how we're moving forward. So for those of you that have looked at our CIP and looked at our
capacity tables, you will notice that we do differentiate between our focus schools and non focus schools. We also refer to these as class size reduction schools. So the table to the left you can see how we calculate capacities for pre-K and head start. And then K
through five as well as special education. So our our non focus schools, which is that middle column actually aligns perfectly with the state rated capacity. So the state does give guidance on this. And our non focus schools do align
exactly as the state does. The only difference would be by special ed. They they give a capacity of 1010 to 1 for every special ed service in the state of Maryland. In the far left column, you do see the focus
schools. The considerable difference here is K to two is 18 to 1, where grades three through five go back up to 23 to 1. Because our class size reduction schools, we do reduce our staffing for K to two.
We're going to look at some capacities moving forward. So again previously schools were classified as non focus focus or title one schools depending on if they were slightly impacted, impacted or highly
impacted. A you know, we are transitioning to our four tiered approach to try to provide more targeted staffing and resources to allow support to be more closely aligned with the unique needs of each school community. And I'm not going to go through each tier, but it is
dictated by the percent of students receiving farms free and reduced meals. And you can see in that column to the right how it does, how the FY 27 tier model aligns with our previous
designations, and the table to the far right breaks down the school year. 2627 our upcoming school year, our staffing standards for pre-K, Head Start, kindergarten, and then grades one through five. And you will
note that special ed does vary by service. Moving on, the. The blue columns are what we currently have in our CIP. That has been our capacity ratios for as long as I've been in
planning. So 7 or 8 years. The columns that are in yellow are what we are proposing, and the white columns are the staffing standards. So you will see the base tier and tier one to the left. And those traditionally
have been our non focus schools. So you will see our non focus school again our non focus school ratios in the far left where it's 22 to 1 for kindergarten, 23 to 1 for grades one through five. And again that aligns with the state. And we are proposing
that k through two would be 22. Similar to what the current kindergarten for non focus schools are. Grades three through five would go up a student to 24 to 1. If we move to the right side, we are going to talk about what
traditionally was our focus and our title one schools, which now are tier two and tier three schools. You can see the staffing standards right next to that, to the grade. And you can see what traditionally we have had 18 to 1 for K to two
will now be going increasing by one to 19 to 1. And grades three through five, which traditionally have been at 23, will be reduced by 22. And again, special education will go over. We'll have a dedicated
slide for special education. Here. We are special education. So we do have different capacities for each special education service. The current capacities are in blue. To mimic our previous slides. Our
proposed capacities are in yellow. And again state rated are in that light red color. So you can see the state rated capacities are 10 to 1. No matter what we have had varying
capacity ratios for each set of service. And we are proposing similar to the state, sort of standardizing the capacity but reducing it to more reflect closer to our staffing standards. It's important to note that we are going to we
are proposing to keep our Pep or our preschool education program capacity the same, and that those are six, 12 and 18. We have a plethora of Pep programs, so they are different for each program. And how did
you. Okay, so that's great news. First of all, except for Pep, I think still a little bit high. So Pep pep is similar to our pre our gen ed pre-K. You'll notice in our, in our capacity tables, in our CIP, we have some that are at 20, some are
40. Because 20 is a full day program, 40 is a half day because 40 students are coming through those that that one classroom. So for Pep, we do have some half day programs that are at 9 to 1. Okay. That class can handle 18. Okay. That's not 18 students at any given time, but it's throughout
the entire school day. Okay. Yes, ma'am. Gotcha. Okay. So that was good for the public and the data that you use to arrive to these numbers. Like what was the process that you used for the special, the 8 to 1 special education? Yes. So we looked at the, the L, R, E, A, B, and C staffing standards
that are coming down and being rolled out over a multi year approach. And we found that that sort of was that, that sweet spot, that average of, of what it actually currently is. There's only when we ran the numbers, what was the
difference of what we're moving towards to if we utilized our current information and it was very, very similar. Okay. Thank you. Miss Wysocka talked about the specials sort of at length with elementary schools. Again, these rooms do not bear any
capacity. When you when you hear about the capacities of an elementary school, the support rooms do not bear any capacity. The art, music and dual purpose room traditionally. So what we have previously done for our non focus schools, they. Every single one they received three
rooms that did not bear capacity, which is typical art, music and dual purpose. That means a non focus school that had 300 students got three rooms that were taken out of capacity. That means that a school that has 800 students, that's a non focus school got
three rooms taken out of capacity. Enrollment did not matter. Our proposed specials. We are no longer calling them support rooms. Our our proposed specials for the base and tier one schools, which do align with our current non focus
schools would be three rooms. Plus schools will get an additional classroom taking offline for capacity. If they have more than 700 students. And they will also get another room taken out of capacity if their community school. For the schools that align with the
current focus schools that are going to be tier two and tier three, what we've traditionally done is the focus. Schools received four support rooms that were taken out of capacity, and title one schools received five. Now what we're doing with our tier two and tier three
schools are we. Every school has four rooms taken out of capacity. If you have enrollment of over 700, you get an additional room. And if you are a community school, which almost every one of these schools do apply, you'll get an additional one. So in lay terms,
almost every one of these schools is going to get at least five classes taken out of capacity, if not six. And I believe our last slide here. So this is what our capacity tables currently look like in our CIP. If you look at our FY
20 CIP and our master plan, which hopefully everybody knows quite well, this is what you will see at the at the end of each cluster. This is our capacity table. It tells you the school name. It tells you what grades that school serves,
the capacity, how many total rooms. That's the total teaching stations in a room that's not total number of rooms, offices, small support, things like that. That's total teaching stations. And then in the red you will see the program capacity by type. So
those will be changing. In that third column in the in the red you see CSR that is class size reduction. So that is our focus in title one schools. Those will be changed as well. So we want to familiarize everybody in the dark gray. Those are our special ed, both our quad cluster base and our county and
regional special ed services. So these will all be updated in the fall for FY 28 CIP. So hopefully for those that have paid attention to this, you will appreciate the the updates coming in the fall. And with
that, we're happy to answer any questions. Okay. I'm going to open it to my colleagues. Just very quickly. Phase two. So we just went through the boundary for the high schools. And this is a much heavier load in the
number of high schools and number of elementary, the number of people. Right? It does. Right. So I'm just trying to wrap my head around phase two with that many schools being able to be done in that
same scope line of a one year period. Can you help me out to understand a lot? Yes. And we're going to have to work diligently to make sure we get out to each of the regions that we are out with the community. I mean, that's I think we're
going to learn a lot in this first phase, too, as we go through the closure and consolidation and go through the regional process and out in the community. And then we're going to have to do even more. If you see, we'll start a little earlier, right, in June of next year, starting to go out versus this for this one, we're going to be out more in
October through the fall and into the winter. So I want to draw the board's attention to the scope of the study that the board adopted is a county wide scope. One of the lessons that we learned from the secondary
boundary study is that even though we may have had secondary schools that weren't as germane to the narrow parts of the study that we we were doing for high schools and middle schools, that there was
a domino effect that still impacted their school environment, and it might have been in our best interest to do a county wide high school study that that was definitely one of the learnings that we pulled away. We're hopeful that as we
take a look at some of the the metrics and we refine this, these metrics to create a framework for your consideration to help with decision making, it might help rule out some areas of the county that that are, are a focal point. And it may also
focus some areas of the county where you may want to draw your attention. Our intent we're going to be very crystal clear about this, is that we we will be focusing more in the areas that are going to be greatly impacted by the findings of the study, based on the framework
that you adopt. Okay. I'm going to start with Miss Stewart. Okay. I'm going to start on the very first page. The title. So
it is the Elementary schools boundary study. But we also will be looking at some of our middle schools. And as we communicate, I think maybe we should think about that in the actual title, just to be
descriptive of exactly what we are doing. And I don't know how to do that without also just saying secondary because we did a secondary boundary study. So but maybe we can put our thinking caps on to see if we can get a title that's a little
more descriptive. I think we can land on and middle and just throw that in there. All right. Okay, great. Yeah. People just like, you know, to feel like they're looking at what they're
looking at. Okay. My other questions are about. Some of our. Population projections and how we communicate that. So I
am looking actually at. One of our same trend, different assumptions page. I'm sorry. 13 there we go. So we talk about birth capture rates for the
whole county, which is great, but should we be looking at regional birth capture rates? Is there a way to do that? Is there a way to look at birth
capture rates by zip code? Is there any other way to do it other than just by county? Yeah, I believe we can do that. I don't know if we go into that level of detail, but we do do
historical trends. Well, yeah, our demographer does take that into consideration as well as the typical cohort survival percentage. And she even breaks it down like 89.9% from second to third grade, like it's a
grade by grade cohort survival. So it's very detailed. There's a lot whenever we come here to the table, we're going to present a lot of numbers. Just know that there's about 15,000 numbers that we're not showing because it is very, very detailed work. The reason I bring this up is because people
will see this chart, right? And yet there's some folks that might live, let's just say, in Clarksburg and see lots and lots of births happening, right? And so sometimes it's nice to see what you're seeing, what
you're experiencing in the data as well. And so I'm not saying get to the nitty nitty gritty, but there might be one level down. So we can just kind of show where our, where population growth is happening, where it isn't happening. And
so that could make sense as we're moving forward. It's just a suggestion. Also, do we track kids that come in that aren't born in Montgomery County? We do live in a somewhat transient transient. AM I saying that
right area some some there's mobility and some areas might have more kids that aren't born in Montgomery County than others as well. So is that something we also track? Yeah, we do have transfers in and transfers out, and we have
private school and homeschool numbers as well. So again, if we could maybe look at that by certain regions again, just to reflect people's reality. And so they understand that we do take that into consideration. And as we move through the
process, I think that's all I have for now. But I'll reserve for another question if it comes up thanks to Miss Yang. And I just want to say we did that with the high school. We look at all these numbers. Correct. So we're this is going to be very similar to doing the
same thing. Okay. Miss Yang yeah, I first want to thank you in advance. You're going to have a lot of work in front of you. I have two comments for your consideration and for all
our consideration in this work. And then I have a question for you. Number one is we are talking about elementary school and middle school boundary, and we are talking about potential consolidation and closure. And
right now, the presentation focused very heavily on the building facility, right? The capacity, the utilization, the capture zone and population captured. And I would like us
also to think about when we are planning our schools and talking about consolidation or closure. We talk about the learning experiences and how how do we measure student
experience or success in this process? Elective, like you say, for example, the specials offers, the interventions we can offer and and all those things should the program we
can offer should be part of this conversation. So when we decide on the different criteria together, we need to put that front and center the outcome for our students, our
student experience. That's number one comment. Number two comment. We did. We are going to look at all different categories in the past two years, two years. One of the
things that the system and the board did together that I really like is the building facility condition index, which you completed it, you know, and show it today. And what that did is it has different
components, but you give weight to different components. And when that happens, people actually feel that's transparent instead of being subjective. So in our process of doing this, I hoped that is
an approach. We can strongly consider that giving weight to different aspects. And I think that that will help us. And my question to you is we just came
out of a high school boundary study. What lessons do you think we can take to do this study? I can start and let others chime in. I don't know if you can actually go to slide
six. And I think this gets to the the comments you were making before. I think this slide in particular for us was a lot about the way we hope to approach it this time around with that centered around that student experience. I think that definitely gets lost in
the conversation so much because we do absolutely have to take into facility condition and utilization and just the overall size and transportation, but emphasizing and focusing on that student experience. What are the services we are able to provide at these different
schools? Based on the sizes, based on the staffing that we have available? How do we keep it focused on that? That's why we put a whole slide towards this. I think that can often and easily get missed in this process, and we hope to constantly bring this front and
as we are out and about. Thank you. So you you think that's the lesson that we take from the high school? I think that's one of the biggest lessons. Thank you, Miss Zimmerman. Thank you. I want to thank you
for all of your additional information on capacity, because I think that's just very often misunderstood, and I appreciate the additional clarification and thanks. And one of the things that I'm thinking about as we move forward with this, as we're
looking at the different tiers, is that if we look to potentially close or consolidate buildings, that it's possible the tier of that school will change. So how are we considering that in in terms
of the study? Because that will change what we're looking at, right? 100%. And we will need to keep that in mind because that could change the program capacity, particularly on the slide that D.J. presented right about the specials and the number that you get depending on the tier. So we will absolutely need to think about
that and take that into consideration so that we are not cramming ourselves. I mean, we're going to need to leave some capacity in there too, right? Definitely. We don't want to get too close to that line. We all hope that there's growth in the future, right? And so we need to keep that flexible, right? And I'm sure as recommendation
recommendations come out, we have subsequent work sessions. That kind of information to continue to clarify would be really helpful going forward. I know that's down the line, but, you know, letting you know that now would be great to look at. Similarly, I was thinking about that like specials and the, you
know, over 700 students. Does that also match how we allocate our specials teachers? I mean, I'm thinking about like, gosh, it would be really impossible to have like two gyms, you know, for PE classes and things like that. So or right. And, you
know, two music rooms or a shared music art space is a little bit easier than a PE classroom. Just I was curious how that matched up. Is that how we see it match up? Yeah. So the specials, the art and music and PE are aligned to FTE
classrooms. It is is very detailed with a tier two or tier three school, you're going to have more teachers than you know for 700 student body than a base tier in a tier one. But you have a school that is a tier three school, typically a
title one school that doesn't offer special ed services and other programs. They actually can equate same amount of FTEs as a non focus or base tier school with 700 students. Interesting. Okay. It's very, very complex. Got it. So we did
we did model different scenarios. And it is sort of a wash when you when you put our new because we didn't want to drastically change the capacities in, in advance of this possible closure and consolidation. Got it. And then kind of my last thought and
consideration is that I didn't hear anything about like modular classrooms or portable classrooms. Those do technically provide other teaching stations. They could provide an additional like they could provide like a specials
space. They could. I didn't hear anything about that. I'm wondering how that's factored into capacity. How do we consider any of that? Even if we look to close or consolidate schools like some of our. I don't imagine that we're necessarily looking to tear down all of our modular
classrooms and things. I it's just additional curiosity. I'm wondering how that factors in. So those 864 square foot classrooms called portables, relocatable learning cottages, whatever you want to call them, do not count into capacity. If they are not in the physical
building, they do not count. Okay. So if you have a school with eight portables in the back not counted in capacity, so it will still show in our effects tables in the CIP is overcrowded. Okay. Thank you. And I will say that is our goal. Certainly. Right. Is we do have a number of schools that have
portables. It is to remove those and rebalance. We. This will always be a strategy for us as we have bubbles in schools and there is growth. It is a strategy that every school district utilizes across this country. So I want to be clear that that will always need to be in play. But our goal is to
get and remove as many of those as possible as we redraw and balance things out. Great. Thank you. And I look forward to hearing a little bit more about that going forward to I'm going to go to Miss Montoya because I know she had her hand up. Miss Montoya. Yes. Thank
you. I have a request for some additional data based on appendix E. For the elementary schools. I know that there are quite a few that house centers for Enriched Studies. And so
I'd like to know, with the 2526 enrollment, if we can have that split out for those schools, like how much of their enrollment is from the SES program, because the children come from a variety of schools versus how many are from the
actual boundary lines? Absolutely. Great question, Miss Montoya. And then I also just want to, I guess, just kind of elevate the idea that, for example, my fifth grader,
he's not going to be impacted by these changes and whatnot. So as a parent, I'm not the audience for those changes or those discussions. But are, for example, parents of children who are 0 to 5 years old, who
may not even be in M.c.p.s yet. They are going to be impacted, but they may not necessarily have this on their radar because they're not here yet yet. So I just in terms of our community engagement, I just want to make sure we're casting
a wide net and maybe work with our pre-K providers to just get them the information that they can disseminate. Thank you. Great point, Miss Montoya. This is definitely you need to involve like the folks at Head Start in infants and toddlers
and pre-K group. That's definitely the audience that also needs to be engaged. We're going to do one more question each. I'm going to go to oh, Miss Phillips, you haven't you? Then you go right ahead. During
the last boundary study, we heard a lot about future development and how that will impact enrollment. I imagine that will come up again in this boundary analysis. How are you factoring that in? It's we've
always factored in future development in every enrollment projection and every forecast we've ever done. So it would be the same methodology, student generation rates, mobility rates, every all the projection criteria that we have used in
the past, we will absolutely utilize. And as you all know, you know, we emphasize this throughout. We work very closely with Montgomery planning, right. And we will transmit files and the development like we have shared throughout the process. We had our monthly meeting with them yesterday. And so we are
constantly keeping them in the loop. This is a topic on every month. We will have meetings in between as needed, but they are very like step by step with us along the way so that we can talk about these projects. And we also had feedback about the local municipalities and their
plans incorporated into our. I think that brought to light a lot of conversation. We are going to continue to ensure that those municipalities send it to Montgomery planning so that we get a consistent file. I think that was a lesson learned from those two municipalities, who might have been a step behind sharing that information with planning. But
I think we are all aware, and we're all going to make sure that that data is given so that the file we get from planning is inclusive of that information. Yeah. Look forward to this amazing communications plan that it's going to be developed. As I said last time,
I want to be in the grocery store and everybody's talking about the positive aspects of this boundary study review, because there are I think there's going to be like, oh my gosh, my school is closing. This is terrible. But there are it's necessary for one thing,
and there are positives that we need to emphasize to our community. So thank you so much for the presentation and look forward to the work. Thank you, Miss Silvestre. Miss Stewart, besides the the Rs centers,
there's also other programs, right. So if we could any program that takes up significant space, I think should also be considered. And in that direction, I'm just thinking about special education programs. Some of them are larger than others.
They take up more space and some of our schools. And we need as we're looking at this process, will we be looking at our regions and moving towards that direction? Every region
will have access to discrete special ed programs and also other special ed programs. And will we be using this study to help us get to a place where we have good access in all our
regions? Yeah. I'll jump in and just say that this this is actually one of the positive byproducts of going through this process. One of the, the challenges that, that we have done, and I'm going to tell you right now that this has not been the right way to go about
this process, is that we have been putting special education programs where there has been space when we need to be designing with that intention on the front end, and that needs to be the first decision that's made, not the last decision that's made. And, and
not not only does that create a little bit more efficiency, but we're serving children closer to their home school and their neighborhood schools and in more cases than not. And so that that really is one of the positives that comes from doing something countywide is that
you really do have the opportunity to reduce the travel time for some of our students with disabilities and serve them in, in programs that are either at their home school or close to their home school. Great. I love that answer. And just a little piggyback on that
same line of thinking. I know early on, well, sometime last year, you mentioned how in middle schools you would like to see more programs for language programs. And so hopefully we can look at that too, as we move forward. So kids don't have to travel as
far for that as well. Thank you. And the last question, Miss Yang. Yes. Thank you. Like you mentioned before, that we are entering into a new phase of declining birth rate. Now, I
want to understand, beyond this specific study, what is our long term vision for right size, you know, appropriate size, M.c.p.s you know, what principles are you using to
guide for our planning for the next 10 or 20 years? I don't want us to piecemeal. So that's why I'm asking this question. So those are those recommended sizes are actually in the regulation currently. And we
had the conversation coming into this presentation. Do we bring a proposal to you. And actually what we'd like to do instead is that is going to be part of the conversation in the fall with the community. What when you change size, that changes access to programs and resources and many different things. And let's talk about
the benefits of those and bring up, you can see again in the regulation what those sizes are. And let's have that conversation, and then we will come back to you all with the feedback that we've heard from that engagement. And if we would like to make any recommended changes, but we would like to engage with the
community on that this fall. So this is a great opportunity to to talk to our community about the student experience and what they expect. There are some economies of scale that can be captured in one size of a
school that you can't capture in another size of a school. And I think it's important for folks to see that math and to see what that looks like. And there are benefits and drawbacks to every school size small, medium, large, what have
you. And I think it's important for our community to tell us what matters to most to them in terms of meeting their needs, because we will not be able to choose. There's there's an old adage in business that you can
have something good, you can have something fast, and you can have something cheap, but you only get two out of the three. You can have something good and cheap, but it won't be fast. You can have something fast and cheap, but it won't be
good. And that doesn't that's not dissimilar to our scenario, which is that we can't have, you know, very teeny tiny small schools and a ton of elective opportunities and still make that work within the budget that we have. So, you know, it
is a bit of a balancing act. And I think this is the perfect thing for our community to opine on and to, for them to, to give some feedback and some direction to the board in terms of how they prioritize the things that matter about their child's experience. And that I
think will point us in some pretty clear directions about what steps we should be taking first, and how we might configure this and how we might prioritize. And to your point, Miss Yang, how we might weight some of those categories based on their feedback to, to
building that framework for decision making. Thank you for that. And. Slightly that go with this, but taking it in a different way is right now,
M.c.p.s also have a lot of properties that we are not using. For us to have the long term vision for the system. That has to be part of the conversation. What to do with
these empty, many of them very small, that are facilities and and I would like us to have a vision and, and, and then work
on a plan. Thank you, Miss Silvestre. Well, we are in great need of early pre-K centers as a part of our blueprint. So that would be a good use of our to address that.
But my my question is all day with the elementary with the middle school boundary study in particular, will this allow us to maybe fix some of the articulations that maybe were less than ideal in the
secondary boundary study? I would say the intent is more that if there is a decision to close or consolidate a middle school, that's really where the boundaries are going to be reconsidered. So we want to be careful as to not, you know, the stability is important. We
just went through the extensive. And so we are not trying to open a whole can of worms unless there is a decision to close or consolidate a middle school. So I'd say that's really more the intent behind the middle school part. Okay. Thank you. That's all. Well,
thank you so much to the staff for your hard work. This is work in project. We're looking forward to more briefings and learning more. We appreciate the time. With that, I'm going to move to item number 12.
Several informational items colleagues are included in the board's packet, so there's no action required of the board. This items at this time. And the final item on of information is the announcement of the July 13th, 2026 opinion
of the Open Meetings Compliance Board. The Board of Education recently received an opinion from the Open Meetings Compliance Board dated July 13th, 2026. The Compliance Board found that the Open Meetings Act was violated when the Board of Education Advisory
Committee on Communication and Community Engagement took too long to approve the meeting minutes. Specifically, the committee approved minutes for its May 7th, 2025 meeting. At the next meeting, which was held on September 18th, 2025,
it approved minutes for September 18th, 2025 meeting. At its next meeting, which was held on February 11th, 2026, and approved minutes for its February 11th, 2026 meeting. At its next meeting, which was held May 14th, 2026. Although the committee did not meet
between those meetings, the Open Meetings Compliance Board determined that the committee needs to find an alternative way to adopt the minutes between meetings. Additionally, the Open Meetings Compliance Board also found that the Open Meetings Act was violated. Excuse me? When the board failed to post the minutes that have been approved on the
online on a timely manner. So a copy of the compliance board's opinion is currently being circulated and signed accordance with section 3-211A2, and I'm signing it right now myself, and I'm going to pass it down to my colleagues.
Taylor, if you can pass that in. Excuse me. Okay. If there's no further business of the board, may I have a motion to adjourn? I move to adjourn. Second, all those there is a motion to adjourn. All those in favor,
please raise your hand. That's unanimous. We are adjourned. Thank you very much, everyone.
Safe travels.