##VIDEO ID:h0bLZAi77s8## um calling the meeting to order is Charmaine postal the chair of the meeting um first I want to saying and this before I end our call I want to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving but at this time we ask that the secretary please call the RO um we're letting some people in so give us one second absolutely it's uh 10:01 so do we want to just hang tight for a few minutes while we let people in and give people the opportunity to come in I think we had a number of people come in I think we could go ahead and get started with the roll call perfect hi good morning everybody good morning okay adop a family Jessica padon best foot forward Debbie Elman de I saw her she yeah I'm gonna Mark her yes I see you there Debbie can you hear us I don't think okay and also best foot forward hi sorry my speakers weren't working but I just fixed it Go me hi everybody hi Debbie I'm calling R best foot forward Debbie Elman present online okay and best foot forward Karen spagnardi our new hi good morning welcome welcome first meeting thank you Black Chamber of Commerce Cassandra Oliver card at FAU Sabrina de gois president online okay good morning everyone card at FAU Jack Scott Coalition for black student achievement Dr Deborah Robinson present online thank you Coalition for black student achievement Jacqueline Callaway Compass Amanda conned present thank you Compass Rex Barnes connect to Greatness Dr Cassandra Corbin thades connect to Greatness Andre thades District ESC advisory committee Kimberly spy fire o present online good morning thank you District ESC advisory committee Michelle Bey pres online division of blind Services Caesar vgo pres online good morning Economic Council of Palm Beach County Craig McKenzie El so Jupiter Suzanne Whitbeck Florida Hispanic American Chamber of Commerce Juan Pagan Florida Hispanic American Chamber of Commerce Evelyn Vargas for the children Reggie durandis Gold Coast Down syndrome Sue Davis killing present guatemal and Maya Center Mariana Blanco guatemal and Mayan Center we have um a new alternate or I'm sorry Myra cardinus okay Hispanic chamber of commerce Maria Antonia Hispanic education Coalition Hector Pedra NAACP dedri straw Palm Beach County Council of ptas Charmaine postal president online Palm Beach County Council PTA Marcus Brown presid online good morning Palm Beach County Human Rights Council Emmy Kenny Tri City education committee Eddie rhods morning Tri City education committee Mary Evans just let the record uh show that Ed Ed you just got to turn your Mr rhods your uh mic on when you respond so Mr rhods is present president Miss Rose president sorry thank you uh Urban League of Palm Beach County Terence Reed Terence Reed present online present okay uh volunteer Association of America Whitland Pierre volunteer Association of America carlen Paul and classroom Teachers Association Gordon long Hoffer and back to adoptive family Jessica Pagan you're present online thank you okay so we have 1 two three four five six seven 8 nine 10 11 12 we have a quorum all right awesome um first I want to take the time to again recognize uh Sue HOSA this is her last ddec meeting so if you're online just show up your reactions um just hand claps and applauding her for a job well done a serving as our secretary and everything else thank you it's been a pleasure working with everybody so maybe I'll check out a couple meetings in the future but thank you it's been fun absolutely um thank you for all that you're doing at this time we'll move right on to the approval of the October minutes the approval of the minutes have been or the minutes have been distributed online via your calendar invites do I have any questions at this and they're also online and the floor is open to entertain a motion move to approv necessary Corrections Mo to approve the minutes with Motion in the room by Mr rhods second by Mr RH they heard second by Kimberly you just turned it off though there you go any discussions all in favor motion carries the minutes for October minutes are approved moving right along the agenda to public comments just a reminder public speakers you have two minutes to speak is there any public speakers in the room at this time Mr off there is not are there any public comments online hearing none we will move right on the agenda with the update for the DDC ad hoc subcommittee um Miss Sue I believe Sue Davis hi yeah thank you we just oh perfect yeah great hi um let me pull up our minutes we just finished our second meeting a few minutes ago and um basically what we uh did in our our first well our first meeting we kind of went over all they had a lot of big discussion because it's a a really big uh subject that we could be talking about when we're talking about teacher equity and everything the um this committee we solid ified what our goal was uh which our goal is to present School District leadership with a compr no oops sorry I'm looking at the wrong one to present School District leadership with strategies to ensure that students have teachers with the skills to address their students academic and emotional needs at hardto staff schools the recommendations will include the obstacles along with the corresponding recommended Solutions we have a follow-on goal um that we figured would is important but we had to had to have something that we can handle in a reasonable amount of time the follow on goal would be the same goal but for students with more challenges within all schools so the the main goal is to address the inequity amongst teacher skills uh between say high performing schools and hard to staff schools and the secondary goal would be be looking at how teachers are assigned within schools within the different classes so that and we um District staff has provided us a bunch of data that we requested at our first meeting that we will be looking at And discussing at our next meeting and that's it questions for the subcommittee uh chair Pro we have a hand raised uh Dr Robinson yeah I just wanted to add the comment that um we agreed that we may well tweak that goal as we work correct Davis have any questions at time doesn't look like any other questions in the room Miss postal I did see Miss um I saw Dr Robinson hand up Dr Robinson did you still have a question she made her comment I already addressed it yeah thank you so much any other questions at this time we'll move right on to the update from the chief of equity and wellness um new board members and school safety video so again good morning everyone um also I do want to acknowledge and welcome uh Mr Ferguson who is Online School Board member as well as in the room uh we also have uh Miss Simmons manager of equity and access and uh Mr John soia who is also here who we met last time um again Mr Ferguson who he was on then came back in and then also Mr long Hofer from CTA who also just recently signed on um I'm gonna first uh congratulations to um uh our new school board members who have are now been sworn in had their first meeting on Tuesday so Mr Matthew J Lane uh for district one we have Virginia saviero for district 2 and we have Miss Gloria Branch for District 5 uh so again welcome to those new board members we had a uh a nice swearing in ceremony um at that uh on Tuesday so uh looking forward to working with those new board members um I'm just going to switch over to my next topic also at the our first school board member our school board meeting we had a presentation if I can find it me my tabs um we had a tab a tab we had a presentation by Cambridge so one of the things that we often talk about in this particular committee is about access um to accelerated coursework and how students are doing on that accelerated coursework so Cambridge recognized the school district of Palm Beach County with we've gotten a recognition in the past for opening up access performance so I want to share with you this uh presentation from last week's board meeting um and the comment comments that were shared um by Cambridge who came to that meeting so hopefully you can see this and uh actually Jonathan I don't if you can hear me but I don't know if I'm going to be able to get the volume right can I share this link with you or actually I'm sorry one second John I'm G Google Chat it to you and one additional one okay you should have it now you have a Jonathan I sent you in a Google Chat uh the the one prior to that before this one there's one before that what did I send you H I'm sorry let me read do this sorry it's a YouTube see if this comes through now there it is check your Google chat again [Music] Jonathan go to 34.1 34 minutes 15 seconds again this is a presentation from Cambridge can all go down to the floor good evening chair Brill Vice chair Andrews board members superintendent Burke staff and community members and this evening we have one recognition on the agenda uh earlier this year the school district of Palm Beach County was named a model for equity and excellence in Cambridge implementation since the partnership between the district and Cambridge began in 2008 the district has been exemplary in its commitment to providing Equitable access to highquality education for all students as a nod to this excellent work we received the District of the Year award from Cambridge twice in the past six years now in 2024 Cambridge wanted to provide a unique recognition for the district's dedication to increasing access to Cambridge programs and achieving extraordinary results in the process since the partnership began the district has demonstrated remarkable growth and success we have expanded the implementation of cambridge's aligned multi-year curriculum in 57 of our schools our wellestablished feeder patterns are Eng engaging more students than ever providing them the opportunity to get involved and succeed with cambridge's challenging coursework Cambridge has marveled at The District's thoughtful and Innovative plan to open access to Cambridge programs over the last 16 years the district is a wonderful example of what a school district and Community can accomplish with a Unity of purpose sustained over time we are proud to partner with Cambridge and look forward to continuing to empower students and transform lives through education we have Representatives here from Cambridge to present the plaque in recognition of the district as a model for equity and excellence in Cambridge implementation uh everyone please welcome Dr Matthew K head of policy accountability and Partnerships and Mr Jeremy Rio senior School imple implementation manager North America region and Mr Rio would like to say a few words thank you it really is a pleasure I get to work with all your schools so as she said every year Cambridge recognizes three us school districts as Cambridge District's of the Year award recipients this award is typically based on three years worth of key metrics but when we looked at the data this year we stopped and said okay we need to look a little bit differently because when we look over time and we don't restrict it to three years we found that Palm Beach County leads by far in a number of areas one commitment to serving all students and I emphasize the all it's kind of like the mission and vision there says each student on it that really is important it's not looking at students as this one group of kids who progresses from kindergarten to first grade it's each individual kid in that group and doing what's right for them and Palm Beach county is by far leading in that as when it comes to the Cambridge pathway achieving academic Excellence while providing equity and access to high quality education that's what the name of the game is the model for equity and excellence in Cambridge implementation award is a first time award we've never given it before but we decided that this was a necessary recognition for really just Excellence over time and so this is for continuous commitment to providing all students with access to highquality education via the Cambridge pathway it means that nearly every year nearly 50% of your Advanced students your high school students are enrolled in a Cambridge course that's every year so over time that means likely that every single high school student has access to at least one Cambridge course before they graduate over 2,000 candidates earn the Cambridge Ace diploma which I know you're familiar with but that's tied to Florida Bright Futures we can do all the fun math of $35,000 a year times 2,000 students and we get a bunch of millions right that's a lot of scholarship money but what's really impressive is over 2,000 students makes up 25% of the students who earn the Cambridge Ace diploma in the North American region that's really impressive so all that access has largely been met with achievement as well right we've been increased entries in exams by 28% and 10% more candidates over time have been given access to taking an exam but with that you have remained in the top five achieving districts for large school districts in the US as well so it's that myth of if we open this up Pass rates will plummet that has not been what's been demonstrated here in Palm Beach County so along with all of that there has to be a commitment to teaching and learning Palm Beach County leads in professional development and they lead lead in the purchase of and use of Cambridge resources to support their teachers so that they can deliver that program to a diverse group of students so with that we are very proud to partner with Palm Beach County and we see you as a model to the commitment for all students for each student [Applause] congratulations so uh quite an honor for the school district to get this award uh Jonathan you can stop sharing that um and again uh really important as you work with your organizations to and Jonathan can you change the screen so the layout so we can see more people on the screen um thank you that you let people know about this and it's going to lead into in a little bit later this morning when we talk about Bright Futures and we've talked about that before um and really the intention the goal for this group is how do we accelerate and uh so that more students are getting access especially our underrepresented populations where we have the disparities with our black students in particular to get access to this next I want to shift and talk uh about uh school safety so um our data is showing um an increase in particular around the students who are posting um on social media uh acts of violence to threaten uh the school or someone within the school um now the numbers last year the first quarter were one this year they're 12 but those 12 have a sign significant impact on the system with resources but as well as that individual child most of these cases students are posting things that uh and doing as a joke however the statute and the law does not in uh interpret even a joke is going to face criminal charges so first I'm going to share with you uh yesterday's State Board of Ed meeting a a brief discussion around this particular issue and then share a video that I hope that you do share this video out with your respective um sphere of influence within your organization to educate the parents in particular around the lifetime of consequences students can uh face when posting online threats so Jonathan if you could put up first that one it's a a news report the one that you had up first originally and welcome Mr thus as well who has joined the the meeting yep Florida's Department of Education is looking to improve school safety by putting a stop to false threats the board met today in Orlando discussing the epidemic of false threats that they say swept over not just Florida but the country at the start of this school year we heard about the impacts of that from Orange County Superintendent Dr Maria Vasquez these threats and false reports are extremely Troublesome and they create unnecessary anxiety for our students our parents and our employees this afternoon the board voted to change school safety requirements in order to take steps to get parents more involved in an effort to stop this from happening specifically on the fortify Florida suspicious activity reporting tool our Nicole Griffin shows us the role that students and parents are expected to play you could spend your weekend in a jail cell and you could figure out what that I need to be a better parent vucha County Sheriff Mike Chitwood says he's fed up with false threats he's gone so far as per walking the kids accused of making them he says the County's up to 562 threats this year double what they had last year causing problems for his agency every threat Can it can incur tens of thousands of dollars in investigative and security overtime all in favor say hi the State Board of Education is taking steps to try to stop this voting unanimously to make changes to school safety requirements and monitoring rules in Florida parents and kids didn't understand the serious nature of making a threat to a school in Florida flid and so this is an effort to educate them on that Vice chair Ryan Penny says many of these false reports came through the state's fortify Florida tool which can be used to report suspicious activity to school officials and law enforcement in an effort to stop it the commissioner of Education sent out this letter to superintendent in October saying he is requiring every District School Board to make available a training for parents and guardians of students that includes the consequences for making a threat or false report fortify Florida districts had until last week to make that happen we want to do a better job of educating students and parents about fortify Florida and what its legitimate uses are for which is to protect our schools today's vote now made sure this education for parents will be available every school year going forward we take threats in Florida very seriously they will be investigated by law enforcement and if we find out that they're they're false threats um the students are still subject to prosecution in Orange County Nicole Griffin Spectrum news during the presentation board members asked the office of safe schools if there are more messages on the app reiterating what the consequences are representative said there is now a popup explaining that before a tip can be made they are also working on improving the system thank you Jonathan and then we're going put up the video um so we've we've worked to educate all students about threats and concerning behaviors we provided training the first two weeks of school I think that's why Statewide we've seen an increase of um our fortify Florida tips coming through um a dramatic increase uh as well as what I mentioned earlier about posting on social media uh including the fact that FBI is also watching that uh couple of our students had knocks on the door in the middle of the night from the FBI um and were arrested and uh by making these threats so this video and we'll share it out with you all to please share out in your communities and with your respective uh stakeholders so Jonathan we could pull up the video of Chief Mooney there in the middle it's on the web page I sent you in the Google Chat the number one priority for the school district of pach county is keeping our students and staff safe parents we need you to help make sure your children understand that any kind of threat against the school is no joke and could result in life-altering consequences our school police department and our law enforcement Partners thoroughly investigate any and every threat made against a school the fortify Florida app is available to report suspicious activity or information about a threat to a school safety lately there's been an increase in false tips reported through the fortifi Florida app submitting false tips is not only Reckless but it also results in unnecessary use of resources that are needed for actual emergencies false reporting and fake threats result serious consequences for students parents please talk to your children about the serious consequences that can happen if they make a false threat against a school on social media or deliberately submit a false tip through fortify Florida making fake threat is a second deegree felony in Florida that can lead to jail time and expulsion from school this includes making any threat false report involving a school school Personnel or a school sponsored activity unfortunately some Palm Beach County students have been arrested and expelled for making threats this year it's unlawful to send post or transmit any threat to kill or hurt another person or to conduct a mass shooting or any Act of terrorism there's no tolerance for these types of threats even if a student is making a comment in front frustration or posting it as a joke we encourage our students to talk to trusted adults such as a parent teacher or counselor when feeling angry frustrated or upset instead of using social media to vent if you or your child sees something that requires law enforcement attention say something don't repost or share threats on social media instead report it to law enforcement on campus or through fortify Florida so we can investigate together we can keep our students staff and schools safe thank you so thank you Jonathan again it's really critically important we're going to send this video out to you all to please share this uh talk to students um about this you know our hands are tied when it comes to to to the statute around this and the zero tolerance component um and I I'll tell you that the majority of these um threats are are students are doing them as a joke um however they're now facing a lifetime of consequences um when going through the system and question in the room yes Mr rhs just a question U when I was looking at the first report did I see that the um excuse me that the parents and the student have to go through excuse me please have to go through a program the parents and the student have to go to the program if they're found guilty so if a a student is found guilty um it depends on what happens in court some may go through a diversion program uh through the system uh some may go I mean most will definitely be going on probation with some kind of consequences depending on the the judge I just thought it was a great idea if the parent had to go through the program with the student they' be much more Vigilant if if that was a thing that they would put forward yeah it was interesting uh the state board have had some of that conversation MH uh included potentially locking the parents up for a weekend to to to see I don't know if that's good or bad I don't think that's necessary but um to to to understand the challenges to to drive home that message of talking to your kids about it and stressing um yeah it's very unfortunate we've got we've got great kids making stupid mistakes and making false reports that now it's going to affect them the rest of their life yep yeah you know once you've been have arrest and Mr pan one second we have in the chat how many student from Kim SP how many states have similar legislation making threats or false reports theing also even with false reports the accused student has a threat assessment cannot be removed from their record Kim do you want to add to that before um yes I was just curious if we are different or more strict than other states and I don't know if you have that information but it would be helpful to know and the second thing is um I wanted everyone here to be aware even if a bully or someone else reports something that is absolutely not true never happened um and claims that someone made a threat or did something threatening that that cannot be removed from the ACC accused innocent students file for the rest of their educational career it has to accompany them if they transfer to a private school or to another state basically these false reports kind of ruin the lives of the kids who are accused who have done nothing so um I just wanted you all to be aware of that in in case any of the students that you all are representing um or are part of your organization's clent in tell end up in this situation and um if your organization wants to Lobby against that in their own way um or try to educate the Department of Education about the impacts of that especially on students with disabilities and black students um I urge you to do so I couldn't agree more so absolutely and as far as our state compared to others my understanding just from watching in some of the marger stow and Douglas commission meetings that we are by far I think there's one other state I don't remember which state that's even close to some of the legislation that has been enacted in the State of Florida so we definitely take a hard line based on the conversations I've seen in those meetings and Reporting from the Department of AD in fact the safe schools doe gets many calls it says from other states to look at what we're doing when it comes to school safety in particular around threat assessments so uh definitely uh I think we are one of the most if not the most strict and Mr ban yes you mentioned that you're going to share the copy of that video right uh yes could that video also we make in Spanish and creole with the technology we have today that's not an issue may see definitely definitely that and because you the thing is if the kids receive that and they're the one quote unquote in control and they know their parents doesn't still speak English I don't want to tell M I don't want to tell Mom and Daddy so that's my secret you know so 100% thank you yes that's idea important great idea and then um I think it's uh Mr Brown there are better ways to handle this in the chat I'm going to read the chat for those in the room there are better ways to hand handled this I think then jail this is a pathway to stying our children's lives um so personally agree with you however um the conversation throughout the state this doe is taking a hard line and you heard the sheriff from valuch County uh if I necessarily agree with his approach but that is his approach so again while I'm really stressing for all of you to please please please take this back to you can constituents your responsibility about being DDC is educate your constituents this is an issue uh chair postal said K can you share through staff to share with our organizations associ through Florida PTA education advocacy group more through okay and Kimber yes okay Kimberly agreed to do that um any other comments or questions about the school safety piece again I appreciate your help getting that out um and I've taken up a lot of time so that concludes my updates uh for today chair postal yep can you hear me yes now yes yes oh there you go perfect thank you so much Dr o while we're moving right along I this might be the quickest meeting of the entire year oh no we we got we got more to go don't don't don't get at this time we will um maneuver right over to was there any other questions I know we already answered questions just want to give that opportunity if there is any additional questions seeing none um great presentation I look forward to those videos so that we can share um on our social medias as well as our agency's um social medias ddec agency presentation um Kimberly District ESC advisory committee yes um hi um thank you all for um being here to learn more about the ESC advisory committee I have been a member for about 14 years and um I have official slides and I also added some to tell you more about the group um both Sue and Michelle are also members um we can go to the next slide please hold on okay the official purpose is to advise and assist the ESC director and the superintendent in reviewing the current status of exceptional student education ident identification of strengths and weaknesses development of goals and object objectives recommending priorities for the provision of now this is a term of art from the um individuals with um disabilities Education Act um a free and appropriate public school education um we call it fape and that means that parents and families should not have to pay for the services that children need educationally at school and that the education they receive has to be appropriate and geared towards excuse allowing them to learn and move forward and reach um their goals educationally and for their future um we disseminate exceptional student education information to parents and the public and um ESC means all students who have disabilities and our receiving Services either IEPs individual education plans or Section 504 um accommodations and um uh related Services okay next slide um anybody can attend the meetings and I especially urge you to tell your constituencies about this and um any any parent who is worried about their child struggling um sometimes they are eligible for this kind of support and they can learn more about it um at these meetings but they have elected members who have attended a number of meetings and fulfill different um uh categories we have um no less than 51% of parents of children with a variety of disabilities and backgrounds um then they have uh the School District staff and they have agencies and organizations some of which of you may be um part of that um who send in members who can provide services and um who are working with the same constituencies of kids with disabilities who are receiving services in the school district okay next slide um these are the meeting dates the organization meets the first Tuesdays of most months from 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. and it's virtual um at the end of these slides I give um contact information where you can reach out and get the link or you can reach out to me and I can provide you with the link um it doesn't meet it has listed every single month but a lot of times when there is testing and blackout dates um the group does not meet um next slide please just a clarifying question on that do you have to be a member to attend the meetings no I'm sorry I thought I said that um anybody can attend the meetings but for voting on recommendations to um to the uh ESC department or to the district or um bylaws changes or what we're going to talk about in the future for voting purposes um we do not allow just regular um attendees but anybody and I urge you all to try at least once to go to one of the meetings and I think you'll learn a lot and maybe be able to tell your constituencies about it okay next um here are topics that the group had decided to cover this year um inclusion of students with significant disabilities which is an area that Sue is an expert and she is um usually one of the officers um secretary um or other roles um an update on the resource allocation formulas um there's Federal funding for all students who have IEPs and um other sources of resources and how are they distri distributed um around the district and between different um areas of exceptionality which I will get to in a moment um accommodations for State Testing because every year the state changes what is allowed for students um whether it's extra time or um being able to be in a small environment um whether they can take breaks whether they have assistance with filling in the bubbles or that type of thing um present from different service areas that might be able to help our students such as the library and Community Mental Health Services and legal aid and um other organizations that help provide advocacy and there are new initiatives in the next school year for reading and math which has some overlap with some of the things that we do here in the ddec okay next but that gives you kind of an idea of what is covered um I think one of the biggest um bonuses of this organization is providing information for families when I first um started participating I had a son in first grade and I even though I'd gone to law school knew nothing about rights of parents of students with disabilities and I really had a hard time at the beginning I was even told by staff members that they don't help kids with ADHD at all all and that wasn't true um so coming to these meetings I learned a lot about the services that are offered the people that you need to contact um you know key staff members um what are the community events like we announce community events here that others might be interested in there are a lot of disability trainings and education related community events that would help these families and then every year or it used to be every year there were special events and programs outside of the regular meetings for families with speakers panels and provide service provider booths so they can learn more about what is out there and then there's an opportunity to meet other families who have similar needs and interests suppose your child has dyslexia um other families who may have older students can tell you what is work for them and um share um their concerns and kind of provide um support next slide and um as far as in input from families that's another important thing that we do um they families can come they don't even have to be members and mention something that they're experiencing um with their child um their child is not getting services that the parent feels that they need or um you know sharing good things about what is happening at their school in the school district and offering ideas for resolving challenges that can be taken by Kevin McCormick who is the director of ESC um or sometimes I and some of the members have met with Keith to come up with ideas that can be suggested to the school board or don't don't need to go to the school board and can be implemented next one um this is one area where I would love for people here to get involved in increasing the diversity of the ESC advisory we need more members and participants who represent a wide variety of exceptionalities which still are coming later on a different slide um having Elementary School students or prek elementary middle school and high school students instead of kind of a concentration of one type because um you can share more services and learn more that way um throughout the county and not just certain areas um as far as intersectionality and I feel this is most important the students who have the hardest time in our schools um are ones who have um variances not only with disability but race origin background lgbtq status um as an example I in my job have represented um a number of students whose parents um immigrated to the US and English is not their first language and they have trouble navigating the system and additionally their um children are often considered the problems that they're experiencing are only due to they learning the language in their family not speaking English at home when they may really have disabilities so having a variety of people you know participating will allow um more supports to go to the parents who are a bit marginalized um also lgbtq there is a lot of intersectionality between kids who are neuro Divi neurodiverse and lgbtq and how can we support them in both of these things and then um we would like to have a variety of agencies and partners maybe some of you who address a wide variety of the ESC needs and issues if you're working on academics for students um maybe um here because some of your constituencies would be people who need both of these whatever you're offering normally um except for some of the disability related organizations because obviously you're working on the same issues but um I would love and I'm sure everybody there would love to have more diversity and learn more from about the needs throughout our district so that they can be addressed okay next slide um and then these are provided by the district the ESC Department purpose statement they want to as I said have students receive a apprpriate educational and support services and like the DDC want to increase student achievement and successful po post School outcomes next slide here's the areas of exceptionality I wanted to share this with you because it's very wide it's everything from autism which is an increasing um part of our population they it probably hasn't increased completely it may be that we're identifying it more more um developmental delays and disabilities um emotional and behavioral whether that is a mental health diagnosis or um you don't have another diagnosis but you're struggling with behavior in school gifted is not covered by the ESC advisory but it is part of the ESC department and then everything from a you uh wheelchair user um hearing impairment visual impairment um speech is a really large um section of the population all of these different areas um provi services are provided for these kids so if you know anybody who is already struggling with these things and already identified as such please refer them both to the ESC advisory and tell them that there are supports in the district next slide please um and then the district follows certain laws in in addition to the ones we've learned about in ddec but the individuals with disabilities Education Act covers all students who have IEPs and need actual education that is different from what most students receive they need um specialized instruction the Americans with Disabilities Act covers all students who who have a significant impairment in a major life activity and they need assistance from the school in order to learn and Section 504 of The Rehabilitation Act covers all public entities and for students who have disabilities as the definition in the Ada and do not need specialized instruction but do need um ex um different um changes in the way they receive receive instructions accommodations and related services that is what covers them um and so the more parents can learn about these things the better and the more we can learn as um representatives of agencies the more we can help our constituencies and then next slide please um you can contact Kevin McCormick's office and I have the phone number there or the ESC advisory email I have that there and if you're interested in attending meetings you can contact them and they will provide you with the information the login to go to the meetings and um adapted schedule now the rest of the slides I thought were informative and interesting um but we have covered a lot of this in our meetings so I will leave these here but I don't think it's necessary to cover all of it um anyway thank you for listening to me and if you have any questions please let me know and I can um have this um handed out to people if it would be helpful we will we will share this out and send it out I wanted to add one other note you notice that this is kind of not visually um complicated that it's um you know simple um uh typ face and not a lot of pictures um that is because a lot of people with disabilities have visual or um uh reading impairments for various reasons and I've been told that they find it much easier to follow this if there isn't a lot going on on the page um so just wanted to share that for when you make presentations to keep that in mind so thank you good point good report uh chair post want open up the questions it's quite informative so Dr Robinson see Dr Robinson you have your hand up I do thank you so um Kimberly not I don't need a long answer I could follow up but do you know has the committee had conversations about um what I'mma call the appropriate um Des of a disability and and what I mean by that is um it appears that too frequently students are given a label of having a disability when they're actually reacting to some environmental issues that are not under their control and then it's like they're labeled and they're down this path and can't get out is has that been discussed there and not that I recall in meetings but um and Sue and Michelle can correct me but I will say I wish all kids could have individual educational plans um because all kids need something different from a set plan that as much as as much thought as goes into it and I'm not trying to insult any District staff and this applies Nationwide um every student needs some something different um in order to really succeed at their highest level unfortunately our system makes a student be identified in some way in one of these categories in order to receive specialized education and services um I know and I know from experience in my work that that creates problems especially in certain communities where disability is extremely um a taboo subject and when working on this within the school they have their um vocabulary that everybody tends to use and it's very intimidating for parents and these meetings can help explain them but that vocabulary seems to me be more deficit-based instead of accepting these other reasons that may cause problems however when I have a student student who's experiencing UN in my opinion unfair and extreme discipline or they're really struggling um even though they may not fall into one of these categories I do try to argue and have them um evaluated to see if there's some way I can get them Services even if they're given a certain label and I will also say that when a student goes from high school to college it is there to or to the workplace or wherever they want to go it is their choice to reveal that they had an IEP or a 504 plan and to identify themselves in whatever way they want to um The District's um the transcript is not supposed to reflect that um in most cases and it should not be evident and I've made arguments I think that change things to make sure of that so it doesn't follow them throughout life although it does in some ways um follow them within school but for example a student with speech impairment May reach their goals and be released from the es program or um there are other types of dis what we call disabilities that um a student doesn't need the supports throughout School something like um assistance with executive functioning disorder organizing themselves keeping track of their materials figuring out how to organize essays and all sorts of things once they learn the skills they don't need that kind of support anymore so it doesn't necessarily follow them through life but I can see how it would cause problems during their education and how families may be resistant to providing those supports for their child because of how they're labeled and I wish we could change the we do things and maybe here we can advocate for that but we'd have to do it at the state and National level that was long I'm sorry but and see sh you have your hand up yeah I just wanted to add there was a recent presentation at ANC advisory committee by the school district's um administrators overseeing the multi-tiered systems of support and so in that presentation they did discuss not only the academic interventions that are required um in increasing individual students um supports based on how they respond to evidence-based intervention um for academics but also for the emotional needs um so you know looking within those tiered interventions es wise those are required when looking even considering specific learning disability emotional behavioral disabilities or language impaired um but any student can receive multi-tier systems of support intervention and that is not supposed to be a roadway to ESC it's to meet the child's needs so that that intervention can you know meet their needs and hopefully be faded out so that they can be educated in their least restrictive environment but um Mr McCormack does oversee the work within the mtss team and they did share out at a meeting I well as an advocate outside of the system I will just say although every student can receive it um families sometimes need to initiate that process and know about that process in order to initiate it um it's not just automatically offered Dr Robinson yes so I guess maybe maybe my request would be that at some point in the future we have a presentation on mtss um but I can tell you but Kimberly you were kind of answering my question from a different vantage point um what I'm talking about is kids who don't actually have disabilities right and but they get labeled and because the the issue that they're reacting to is not resolved then these attempts to to help them fail because they quote treating the wrong thing right and and then they just go down like this path this lost path and so um you know and I mean I have a number of anecdotes that I could share um to whoever later if need be but that's I and I don't I never could really figure out how as a like as a board member and our community member observing how to get a handle on that because it's such a eyeball eyeball kind of in interaction and determination so I was just wondering if it had been discussed um Michelle is right mtss can address a lot of those things for students and I would love to advocate for more of our funding that comes through the federal um Department of Education as long as it's here and um the state um to put into mental health supports that address the trauma that students sometimes experience and the interf interferes with their education um and also getting supports um for kids who are kind of um late in the process when they're starting school because they didn't have the resources um you know the books at home or their parents were working three jobs or whatever giving them more supports um anyway mtss addresses a lot of the academic and the mental um emotional Parts but also I wish we just because any student who needs it is supposed to be able to access um varying mental health supports whether coming from outside agencies or um internal staff and I it is my opinion that we need more of that um and I know it's hard to do and I know we've discussed it but if I could advocate for any I would love to advocate for more of it to help our kids who don't fall into the ESC system this is my last Interruption mtss is supposed to do that the question is how do you know it's on a caseby casee basis and so if we have um I love the idea of having a presentation on that then all of us can help our constituents um you know be aware of it and how to follow up on it and you know how does it work um and make sure that they can be informed and fully involved in the process and be able to say hey this isn't working from my perspective or this has been really helpful yeah I agree that's Mr Rose did you have your hand up do you want to make a comment I would just agree with Mr Robertson uh a lot of discipline problems of being being labeled and and that's one of the concern that I have when you start dealing with um special education um so have to be careful when we look at that and some of the time we find ourselves and our kids getting labeled and then it go with them through the through the education career as being you know ESC and they're not you know so that I'll agree Miss Robertson on no I will add something for your awareness there is the label but on the other and students who do have disabilities have protections under Section 504 where there is a meeting and it is determined is it related to a student's disability do they have the impulsiveness of ADHD do they have a lack of social awareness from autism or are they dealing with emotional issues even if it's not falling under um if it's something that they come to school with that can be identified as a disability even if they're not receiving services but if their parents make um the school where my child is suffering from from anxiety and we're giving supports outside then they are protected and if um the behavior is related to um the identified and I know I hate the word to disability then they have protections that students who have behaviors outside of that do not and I've represented a lot of kids in um expulsion situations and highlevel discipline and it is a protective Factor when it applies I'm not saying lie about what a child has but that's why I would when I can and it applies advocate for it um because we have as we learned earlier very harsh um outcomes for disciplinary actions even if it was something that wasn't intentional and really isn't as big of a threat as um as it seems the schools and the school staff have very limited ability to kind of Taken I know this student and they really didn't mean it or are not really that big of a problem it's taken out of their hands and these um tough repercussions come out that may not be what you and I consider appropriate so I'm just showing the flip side of that and I know the stigma of having the label but I also want as many kids to be protected as possible thank you again um important topic and a topic that clearly I think needs contined discussion maybe through the mtss presentation is warranted to understand because there's definitely pros and cons to both sides of that um and how we tease that out and for your constituents to understand that's going to be really important so again as we do these presentations we're kind of winding down a lot of these it's critically important that you take this information back to your constituents so that they are aware of the resource and uh again Kim great job thank you for this presentation I don't see any other hands in the room so and I'm not sure I think our chair was having technical issues our vice chair is not on so I'm just kind of I don't know hope legal's not on I'm gonna quas just move into the next item of the agenda um Miss Simmons introduce next item I'm going to um introduce um Charlene Beckford she's here to talk to us about Bright Futures and um this is really important it kind of piggybacks on what we were just talking about about um the disproportionate um availability of bright future scholarships to students um and those students can be ESC students because they're not receiving um what they need in order to qualify for bright future scholarships and sometimes not the resources in order to know that they do qualify for Bright Futures so um Miss um Dr Beckford is going to give us some information or Bright Futures about um student engagement parent advocacy resources the student achievement curriculum and those things that are involved in um the bright future scholarship program Dr bethford and before Dr Beford sorry to interrupt um again this is also we brought up before connected to the black student Excellence Miss Simmons correct and the work that we're doing through that there's a a huge disparity we talked about this before in the state when it comes to Black students um and uh obtaining black Futures we just saw the recognition um from Cambridge we do know that when they get that two 2,000 students I believe it was approximately that he quoted received the uh a diploma Ace diploma thank you Dr Beford that results in the Bright Futures we're going to learn more about this but you really need to become experts in this because a lot of the constituents that you represent are some of our underrepresented popul ations that this could be it would be a life-changing uh situation for them so becoming experts in this content so that Dr Beford is not the only expert it's going to be critical for us to increase our numbers in this space um and again currently we're double the state um when it comes to black students and Bri Futures but it's nothing to write home about so our resident expert sorry to interrupt back no problem thank thank you good morning everyone uh so my name is Charlene Beckford I am the High School counseling program planner in the division of teaching and learning and I'm going to discuss the bright future scholarship program this morning so first I'll review the general requirements for the bright future scholarship I'll discuss the four award types I'll show you a sample student transcript evaluation and that's a copy of what the students receive um so they can determine if they're eligible for Bright Futures or not I I will briefly just review some strategies that we can use uh to help students qualify for Bright Futures and you know how we can inform them of that and just briefly review the application process so that we can better support our students so for the general requirements a student must be a Florida uh resident and US citizen or eligible noncitizen and that status is determined by the postsecondary institution where they will attend a student must complete the Florida financial aid application so we always hear the term make sure you apply for Bright Futures the only way to do that is by completing the Florida financial aid application and then within that application they'll select Bright Futures and then there are other scholarships and grants that are available that they can apply for within that application as well the application maybe yes the application opens October 1st every year for the seniors and seniors must apply no later than August 31st of course we do not recommend that they wait that long um current seniors can go ahead and apply for Bright Futures now the windows open even if they're not eligible we recommend that everybody applies um and then you know of course as they work towards eligibility then they'll receive their award letter another General requirement is a student must have earned a Florida high school diploma or its equivalent students cannot have a felony charge and they must be accepted in and enroll as a degree or certificate seeking student at an eligible Florida institution now the student does not have to attend the institution immediately after graduation they have up to 5 years to attend so but should I say that's only if they apply in senior year so what I always say to the seniors is even if plan to move out of state or they think they want to take a gap here or they think they don't want to attend college still apply for Bright Futures because they do have 5 years after graduation after graduation to apply for reinstatement if they were initially found eligible and that's very very important because sometimes students move out of state and they do come home so they can still activate their bright future scholarship if they were initially found eligible and students must be enrolled in at least six semester hour hours or the equivalent clock hours Bright Futures also has a community service requirement and on the next slide I will review what these acronyms acronyms mean for the award levels but for the highest award level the FAS uh there are 100 community service hours required all students can submit 100 paid work hours or a combination of 100 work hours and uh community service hours combined and then as you go down you'll see 75 community service hours or 30 community service hours but what you'll see is cons consistently is if a student wants to submit paid work hours it will need to equate to 100 paid work hours or if they're going to do a combination of paid work hours and community service hours it will still need to equate to 100 so for the award types these are the four reward types you'll see the Florida academic scholarship the Florida Medallion scholarship the Florida gold seal Cape scholarship or the GSC and the Florida gold seal vocational so the Florida academic scholarship the student will need a 3.5 way to GPA they will need the required 16 High School course credits so those 16 credits are the four english four math three science three social studies and two credits in a foreign language and that 3.5 GPA is based only on those 16 credits and so what you'll see is that a student's Bright Futures GPA May differ to their high school GPA that they'll you'll see in sis and that's because Bright Futures only calculate the GPA based on those 16 credits we have the community service requirement as previously discussed and then there is a minimum college entrance exam score that's required and for our fy2 grads you can see the scores there for ACT CLT and the SAT and this award amount is worth approximately $25,000 per year in total in total yes next we have the Florida Medallion scholarship and so there is a 3.0 way to GPA again the 16 uh credit hours and a 3.0 in those 16 credits we see the community service hours or paid work hours as previously discussed and you'll notice here that the test score requirement is a little bit lower and this award amount is worth approximately 20,000 however Bright Futures have informed me that if a student attends a community college such as Palm Beach State College the amount will cover it will cover the full amount there if they decide to attend a community Ser a community college so this is just a table I always like to add to the presentation it's a really nice um table that you can share with families students and it just it's a really nice at glance that just outlines the requirements for both the academic and Medallion scholarship and you'll also notice here on this table that they have the test School requirements for the FY 26 graduates as well okay so there are a few other ways to qualify so if a student is a recipient of the National Merit um final list or they're a National Merit scholar if they are a recipient of the national Hispanic recognition program an ace diploma recipient or an IB diploma recipient you will see that for these students there is no test school requirement and so as Mr Oswell previously mentioned for our students that obtain their Ace diplomas it really kind of takes away that burden of having to obtain that pretty high uh test school requirement but they still have to um have the GPA requirement and the community service hours now for student um is an ace curriculum recipient or an IB curriculum recipient what this does for them is that it kind of takes away that GPA requirement or if they're missing some of the credits as long as they've satisfied the ace curriculum or the IB curriculum according to the state then they can be eligible however you will see that they will still need those um entrance exam scores I wanted to share a little bit about the national Hispanic recognition program so to be eligible for this program students will need to take the fall PSAT in 10th or 11th or the spring PSAT 10 when they're in 10th Grade and they will need to score in the top 10% or they can earn a three or higher on two or more AP exams in the ninth and or 10th grade they also have to have a cumulative GPA of a B+ or higher and identify as Hispanic or Latino so last year we had 169 students districtwide that were uh recognized through the national Hispanic program so that meant that they did qualify for Bright Futures and you know we do have programs across the district like I know there are uh I think one or two middle schools that offer AP Spanish um in 8th grade and we reached out to college board and we wanted to know even though that AP Spanish course was taken in 8th grade and not 9th or 10th would those students still be eligible and they said for this year yes they would be so you know we're this is a great opportunity for students to be eligible for Bright Futures through this program next we have the gold seal Cape um I like this one I think sometimes it gets overlooked uh but there's no GPA requirement for this scholarship type a student has to have five Cape postsecondary credit hours so for any student that takes and passes an industry certification exam they are awarded Cape credit hours so for example one exam might be worth three credit hours so if they take another exam they've met the requirement for five cape postsecondary and those certifications do not have to be in the same area and what I like about this scholarship award type is that there's no act CLT or sat school requirement so with this scholarship it must it can only be applied to a career education program or a certificate program so let's say a student is going for their as in nursing then they could use the scholarship towards that so it's very specific to vocational degrees um but not only can it be used towards their as or AAS students can then also apply for up to 60 credit hours towards their BS or Bas degree program it doesn't cover 100% of their tuition and fees but it does cover a significant portion of the fees and again remember with this one no GPA requirement they just need those five Cape credit hours and then for the gold seal vocational which is the last award type I'll discuss this morning there's a 3.0 weighted GPA requirement in their core classes a student has to earn three full credits in a single CTE program so this is a good option for our students that are in choice and career programs they must have a 3.5 unwe to GPA in those CTE courses and then uh there is a minimum requirement for the ACT SAT or per and I'll show that on the next slide so as you can see here for the ACT and sat school requirement it is a little bit lower than what we saw for the academic scholar award and The Medallion award and for this award type students can also use the part score as well and for the gold SE V Gold seal vocational program again it's only applied to certain programs and certain uh degree types and diplomas and then you can see the award amounts there so this one is not one that we see used a lot but it's definitely a great option so I wanted to briefly show you a sample student evaluation so in speaking of Bright Futures you know at this time the only way for a student to be able to see their potential award status and eligibility is for the school counselor to provide them with a hard copy there's not a way for a student to be able to log in the system themselves and view that I know Mr Oswald has been uh working very closely with um some of our programs such as Zell I've been knocking at the door at the state and you know really just letting them know that we need to be able to empower our community and our families with the opportunity to be able to access this data themselves so they are working on it um but at this time the only way for a student to obtain their score is if they High school counselor provides a copy so can you explain to them what Zell is yeah so Zell is our College and Career platform um that I think that's almost another presentation in and of itself there's a lot but all students uh District YK through2 have access to Zell we do have required lessons for our ninth grade students so they go in they do uh career exploration it's kind of you know like one of those interest inventories where they answer some questions about themselves and then it will connect them to um career options not only career options but it connects them to um colleges that may offer that career they can watch videos on you know people that are in the field they can see a projection you know let's say they decide to stay in Palm Beach County how much money could I make in 20 years if I stay in Palm Beach county in this career what if I have a family of five and I have a mortgage so they're actually able to input that type of data and see you know what their living would be like so there's there's so much to offer um there is a course planner which we really advise that students make use of and this that ties into Bright Futures because within that they're able to set up their academic plan for the four years of high school um and then they can really just monitor to see if they're on track with that and Zell does have a feature where it does align with Bright Futures so they can see if they're on track for Bright Futures as well so you'll see here um with this evaluation that the students receive it's two pages so this is the top half of the first page and by now I'm sure you've you can see that it shows their test scores uh Bright Futures will Super score so that's a great thing so you can see all the test scores I can see if a student has applied for Bright Futures via the fa ffaa so you can see I have that Circle there and I can see the students potential award status at the bottom of the page you can actually see if a student is eligible for one of the awards so I can see with this student they are potentially eligible for the FAS and the FMS but they are they do have a couple of missing requirements for the other two scholarship types and then for this student here a second example they have applied for the um Bright Futures via the ffaa again we do encourage that everybody applies even if they're not eligible yet so I can see this student has applied and I can also see what's missing here so for this student they're not eligible for the academic or The Medallion because at this time their test scores are too low and then this is just the second page that the student will see so you'll see all of the courses that they've taken but then you'll see the GPA is only attached to the courses that uh Bright Futures are going to use for the evaluation all right so strategies that we can use to help students um prepare and qualify for Bright Futures so the first thing is for us to really understand the requirements and that's what we're doing here today we need to help our students create an academic plan and again they can do that through Zell it's a requirement in e8th grade that they do that course planner um but you know it's working with the high school counselors to ensure that they Continue to update that academic plan students will need to maintain a strong academic performance and it's really important that we're able to support students with test preparation especially for the students that do not take the ace diploma or IB diploma track um you know that a lot of the time a huge barrier is just not being able to obtain that test score requirement and so if we can support students with you know just connecting them to free test prep for the SAT act and even the CLT that can definitely increase their chances of Eligibility it's important that students um regularly or that high school counselors are regularly reviewing a student's academic uh grades and not only they if they're on track for graduation because we know the high schools do that but it's encouraging the counselors and just reminding them that a part of that conversation is are you on track for graduation are you on track for Bright Futures eligibility as well it's just making it a common part of the language and then of course I always encourage students to apply early I had a um former student recently that did apply until May he had a typo with his name um Bright Futures didn't catch it until like end of September by the time he you know he got his eligibility letter really late it really just delays the process so there's nothing wrong with applying early as they still continue to work towards eligibility so for the application process um the student has to log in they create an account and you can see the fields here that a student would uh need to complete and I do have the live links here so if a student wanted to you know if you want to share the links for where they go to create their account you can just click on those as part of the application process like I said they need to do this by uh August 31st I recommend it's earlier once they submit the application they do need to monitor their email and that's a big thing you know we're trying to uh remind our seniors that you do need to check your emails regularly you'll hear from colleges you'll hear from faser you'll hear hear from Bright Futures they need to be checking that regularly uh they must of course complete the required coursework in GPA as previously mentioned and um the other thing about the program eligibility that I wanted to say is with the ffaa as I previously mentioned there are other scholarships that are attached so what happens is once the student completes this and they enroll in their institution any other scholarships that they're eligible for the fdoe will email that student and say you're also eligible for this scholarship you need to apply for that one as well so I'll give an example attached to the ffaa they have I think it's a bth cookman scholarship the only way to access that scholarship is of course completing this application once the student is enrolled in the HBCU they'll see the student is enrolled at a HBCU they'll be notified you're now eligible for this additional scholarship and then can apply for that as well so there ffaa is more than just um Bright Futures but there's the Jose Marty scholarship there's a few other scholarships attached and if you look at it like the FAFSA right we always say if you apply for Fafa it's not just about pel grants but once you apply for FASA any other scholarships and grants that you're eligible for whether it's federal state level or institutional level the only way that they can kind of notify you about those is if you apply for ffaa and app apply for for the fer as well yeah um I think I've addressed most of these points yes I do I one thing huge I did not realize the whole FFA yeah and I think and it's interesting because I think we say it a lot like apply for the fast for anyway you know because there's other scholarships attached but it's when you kind of word it that way you know when I spoke with the state recently cuz I even I'm still trying to get more information and you know update my verbiage on this and that was one of the things that they shared if you look at it as and I think I added it here word for word what he said he said an eligible student not funded uh no that's not the one when a student applies for ffaa and FAA it will evaluate them for he said pretty much all if not most state federal and institutional financial aid so apply for those two and you should be good good and that also Al includes um scholarships that are available at the college that they attend as well and then one thing I always you know whenever I do this presentation I always remind families and students um ask your school counsel for a copy of your Bri Futures evaluation the state statute says that counselors must provide or that schools must provide students in 11th or 12th grade with a copy of their evaluation once a year what I did this year was I went into the system and I ran all of those reports for all of our current seniors it took me half the summer so it is a very tedious process but I was like there's no excuse here are all of your evaluations for every single senior and so those have already been distributed to our current seniors but the counselors are experts now on how to log into the system and to pull those individual transcripts should a student want to see an updated one or even if there's a night4 10th grade grader that just wants to see um how close they are to eligibility so to summarize the presentations today um you know just the benefits of the scholarship of course it can provide Financial release uh relief excuse me and reduce student loan debt um it will encourage students to pursue higher education maybe for students that had not considered that route because they thought they couldn't afford it and it certainly will open doors for students and I like the fact that the future scholarship provides financial support not only for those on an academic track but even those that want to pursue a vocational education pathway as well I think things for this committee to consider is how can we continue to increase awareness of the eligibility requirements especially within the community and amongst parents and um how can we support students in meeting the eligibility requirements especially when it comes to students that perhaps do not pursue the ace diploma track track and need support in obtaining the test scores I'm not sure if we take questions okay um I think chair postal came back y yes I am back thank you um boy and high was a dead zone um that was a great presentation Miss uh Beckford and at this time we open the floor for any questions and discussions regarding the presentation so because you're driving I will just kind of help you out there so I see Debbie first in line hi thank you that was a an amazing presentation and it's very informative I look forward to studying that um PowerPoint um two questions for you for the national Hispanic recognition program is that an automatic thing or do you have to apply for that for a student the I believe believe the students do need to apply for that I think what happened um this past year was the students that were eligible we worked with assessments and we notified those students um and then they're able to apply I believe but Council I'll check I'll check double check notifi the council usually notifies them okay yeah okay and I I apologize if everyone knows the answer to this accept me but the difference between the cape and the CTE so so with the cape um the student will need to have at least five um five Cape credit hours and the way to earn those Cape credit hours is to um pass an industry certification exam so each industry certification exam will carry a certain amount of credit hours so let's say for example like I said if one exam is worth two or three credit hours the student knows they just need to pass two certification exams and then that would equate to at least five Cape credit hours and then I Linked In the notes in this PowerPoint I attached the list that will show each um certification and how many credit hours it's worth so forever you know you have a student that we know has set for an exam we can pull that up we can see does this particular credit that you earned or certification that you earned will it count towards the credit hours for this award and then for the vocational the student has to be they have to be in a choice program and earn at least three full credits in the same CTE program in the same Choice program so that would be the difference because with the gold seal Cape the certifications don't have to be in the same program so let's say one's in Microsoft and the other ones in Adobe for example well I guess they're both still kind of it but you know what I mean whereas with the vocational for student is in the medical program they just have to ensure that those CTE credits are in the same program but they also have to maintain a GPA in those credits and I know I had a student a couple of years ago that was in a program but unfortunately um the GPA for those credits earned didn't meet the requirement you want to to find it thank you so much you're welcome yeah that is a tricky one um it it took a while to get my head around those two as well that's usually the one where I call Pedro from the state I'm like break this down to me again so it it it is a little bit complex and I think that's why um we don't see a lot of students that are eligible for that I think it's just lack of understanding um but the more we can have these types of conversations and just spread awareness um we'll see that there's a lot of students that are eligible great questions from bestfood forward sorry chair Posta question other questions remember you have to be experts we have Mr roads in the in the room yes yes um my question is and the senior citizen part of me might not understood this but um the the vocational yes part I know a disparity in the price for the regular school in The Vocational School um if a student wanted to go to a let's say a trade school mhm um how how does that work so if they're as long as they meet the requirement for the award type then they can use it at the at a trade school the award amount is worth a less it is there is a disparity there but typically some of those trade programs do not cost as much as a foure degree um but remember with the cape it will cover if a student wants to do a vocational program and that's an a that's an as that's you know associates of science or a Bachelors it still can be used towards that and so if you have a student that wants to go into nursing or something like that where it's considered vocational but it's still an as degree they're still going to get a four-year degree at the end of the day and so that scholarship does cover most of it okay just just curious yeah yeah I'm looking at the technical schools you know you got northtech West Tech and those kids can take advantage if they really have the qualification absolutely good question I will be holding you all accountable that you share this information I'm going to have you signed an oath that you share this information uh Dr Robinson thank you yes it again it was a great presentation and again I still can't absorb all of it so I look forward to the to the PowerPoint and highlighting it and so forth but I have two questions okay so the first is on the present and the second is something else so the first question so on the scholar um for Hispanic students you is that self-identification do they have to be listed as Hispanic in the school districts um sis or something I'm not sure if it has to be in the sis but for sure I know it has to be in the college in their college board account and that's self identified you have to prove your Hispanic that's I've not heard of that um you know it's I think it's always just been how the student identifies okay um and then my other question and this goes back to um the video that Mr oswal showed at the beginning of the meeting with the acknowledgement from um from Cambridge the gentleman made a specific statement I believe that there was a 10% increase in access to taking an exam what is the difference between being enrolled in an ace course and having access to taking an exam so like you mean like clipping like clipping yeah so as far as I know as not what I understood him to say I thought he was saying like this is what I read between the lines you can take take the course that doesn't mean we're going to let you take the exam and in order to take the exam you have to have accomplished XYZ so at the school level if a student is enrolled in an ace exam the expectation is that sorry excuse me if a student is enrolled in an ace course the expectation is that they sit for the exam the school has to order the exams and they do that based on who's enrolled in the course and it does cost the school money so um I would never never heard a school uh you know tell a student you're in the course you don't have to take the exam because I mean the school would lose money I can't and I think that's I think because they work with States throughout the country as well as internationally that in some Florida is unique and the fact that we receive the financial incentive at the school level that not all states have that built into their uh their system so in some places parents have to pay for um accelerated courses so not necessarily all kids will take the test because the the burden is put back on the parent and or the school without any Financial incentive built into the model Florida in Florida is unique it's built into our FTE model yeah we don't put it back on the student but a student cannot um just sit for the ace exam if they've never sat in the course I think that's question unlike AP or yeah exactly oh wait you can CLP a AP you can yes yeah they earn one credit it is good to know and I always encourage that as we're talking about diversity and Equity I always um you know if you have a student that comes from uh let's say they can speak Spanish they can go ahead and take the KP Spanish exam it would be of cost to them they have to take it at the community college but that's automatic college credit um so they they are awarded one full credit we enter it on the transcript as a T it does not affect the GPA but if they pass it they get the college credit it's very good to know yeah so final thing Mr Oswell would you just email the guy that from Cambridge that made that statement and make sure that that's that what you think he was saying is what he was saying yes we can work to get clarification I have to find out who arranged I believe it was part Tera Baro yeah yeah she'll have the content yeah yeah okay just a quick question why will not affect the GPA um yeah yeah they're not it's not a they're not taking the course a grade they just give them credit though it's kind of hard to explain and it's statute that actually says that you can do that for AP and for klep but it does not include Ace in that so um correct your mic on Mr rhods your mic there you go I said GPA has something to do with the time spending the course also yeah yeah because it's tied to a grade because you're not getting the grade but you're just you're running into the credit right okay so again everybody's going to be experts in this um it takes a lot of presentations you got to rewatch this uh over and over Dr beffer needs help to get the word out um um this is clearly clearly clearly an equity issue um we're going to need a GPS to do that um but it's crucial I think and Dr Beckford you've done virtual presentations for other or you know groups and organizations if needed uh for uh for any of you uh I think you have recorded one right not yet I'm working with Communications on that um we do have one coming up at westtech in December so okay I think that's where it's going to be so out in the Glades we'll have a community presentation I'll do that in person I'll I'll attach a flyer to the slides we will have Pedro Hernandez from the FL doe actually present this um virtually on December 4th it's going to be 6:00 till 7:00 p.m. and that's open to anyone to be able to join that virtually so you'll hear a similar presentation but directly from the FL Doe so I'll attach that flyer I'll send that to you Mr oswal attach it to the slid so that please please share that in the community when is the westtech presentation um I think we have a tentative date of December 9th just waiting for confirmation Mr RADS you sign the alarm in the Glades yes definitely theth time something uh we don't have that yet we were just confirming if the you give the time I get the information out okay give it the time okay we will do that and I just want to add the schools do these presentations as well uh when they do their parent nights I know their parent nights are not always attended um for whatever reasons I mean I'm a parent and it's hard to get out in the evening so I you know I I get it but that's why we're trying many different options so I think that virtual night is going to be a good option and then we will have the recording that we live on the district website so parents can access that as well okay again thank you so much for being here today we really appreciate it this A critically important topic and as Dr Robinson correct me it's not just life changing it's generational changing so uh thank you so much um are there any fin bus need to come there is no unfinish business that I have we're losing you Dr post chair Posta I don't know if you can hear us we're we're losing [Music] you you're losing me um let's see is that better yes can you hear better okay I was I shared at this time we have one last thing on the agenda and before um we shared that I just wanted to again wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving and a safe and relaxing break Miss Simmons has announcements chair postal be thank you for those wishes y thank you um chair postal um one more announcement in our January meeting we will have um presentations um from Caesar vgo and Terrence Reed um you're scheduled for January if there's an issue oh if there is an issue please um email me and let me know um if if are if you are not able to present that's all for me thank you Miss Simmons I too want to wish everybody Happy Thanksgiving and happy holiday since we don't meet in December motion to year second so we had a motion to Jour in in a second in the room heard have a great uh Happy Thanksgiving everyone have a great break thank care everybody thank you you too thank you