WEBVTT METADATA Video-Count: 1 Video-1: youtube.com/watch?v=8nCujwl7zyE NOTE MEETING SECTIONS: Part 1 (Video ID: 8nCujwl7zyE): - 00:15:42: Board Convening and Closed Meeting Motion Reading - 00:17:28: Closed Session Recertification Process and Roll Call - 02:24:53: License Issuance and Revocation Roll Call Votes - 02:27:25: Early Childhood Education in Virginia - Introduction - 02:32:29: Importance of School Readiness and Funding Changes - 02:38:09: Brain Development, Kindergarten Readiness Data, and Success - 02:44:39: Early Childhood's Impact on Working Families/Economy - 02:49:06: Public Comment - Defining Available Parents - 02:50:10: Public Comment - Gratitude for Readiness Data - 02:51:13: Public Comment - Broadening Eligibility/Increasing Dollars - 03:03:20: Public Comment - Support Business Community Share Data - 03:06:53: Public Comment - Summary on Slide 36 - 03:08:14: Public Comment - Discussion on Student Readiness Data - 03:19:22: VQB5 Introduction: Quality Measurement and Improvement - 03:25:35: Classroom Observation Statistics and Improvement Cycle - 03:26:58: Ready Regions Network: Local-Level Community Support - 03:28:05: VA Connects Data System: Integrating Quality Data - 03:29:26: Linking Preschool VKRP and VQB5 Quality Scores - 03:32:28: Public Comment - Thoughts on Data Scale - 03:35:28: Quality Profiles: Public Access to Program Ratings - 03:38:13: Diving into VQB5 Data: Variations and Site Types - 03:44:56: Public Comment - Discussion on Exempt Organizations - 03:46:01: Honor Rolls: Recognizing Excellence and Improvement - 03:49:13: VQB5: Informing Families Through Ratings and Tools - 03:50:48: VQB5 Participation and Collaboration for Success - 03:54:56: Public Comment - Toddlers Interaction In a School Setting - 04:02:42: Public Comment - Impact from Approved Curricula - 04:10:00: Public Comment - Understanding demographic Make ups - 04:15:04: Public Comment - Interactions are important in School - 04:19:38: Closing Remarks from the Superintendent - 04:20:26: Commonwealth Listening Tour Overview and Genesis - 04:25:03: Highlights and Feedback from the Listening Tour - 04:32:07: Concluding Remarks and Gratitude - 04:37:08: Public Comment - Questions for Technology and the Agencies Part: 1 1 00:15:42.079 --> 00:16:04.480 We're going to convene. Go ahead and convene our meeting. Please make sure your microphones are on. >> Okay. Good morning. My name is Miche Ashen. I am president of the board and uh happy Wednesday, April 22nd. Though 2 00:16:04.480 --> 00:16:24.160 it's feels cold outside, it is spring. Um with that, I am going to ask um Dr. Norm to go ahead and read the motion for this morning. >> I move that the Virginia Board of Education convene in a closed meeting 3 00:16:24.160 --> 00:16:39.519 for the following purpose. discussion or consideration by the board of education of information relating to the denial, suspension, or revocation of teacher licenses subject to the exclusion and subdivision 11 of section 2.23705.3 4 00:16:39.519 --> 00:16:55.040 pursuant to section 2.23711A40 of the code of Virginia and consultation with council regarding specific legal matters requiring the provision of legal advice pursuant to Virginia code section 2.23711A88 23711A88 5 00:16:55.040 --> 00:17:10.400 of the code of Virginia and that legal counsel to Virginia Board of Education and staff whose presence will aid in the board's consideration of this matter participate in the closed meeting. Thank you, Dr. Northern. I will take a roll call for us to move to close session for 6 00:17:10.400 --> 00:17:28.079 our lensure cases. Miss Reinhardt, >> yes. >> Dr. Bridges, >> I. >> Miss McFersonson, >> I. >> Dr. Northern, >> I. >> Dr. Wilson, >> I. >> Mr. Mr. Robinson >> I >> Mrs. Kilgore >> I >> and Chair RHS I Okay, we will now go 7 00:17:28.079 --> 02:24:00.399 into close session. Um I think that's it. Correct. All right. If you would uh turn your microphones on. Uh we convene today in a closed meeting pursuant to a recorded vote on the motion above and in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act section 8 02:24:00.399 --> 02:24:17.040 223712 of the Code of Virginia requires that the board certify that to the best of each member's knowledge, one only public business matters lawfully exempt from open meeting requirements under this chapter. and two, only such public business matters as were identified in 9 02:24:17.040 --> 02:24:33.120 the motion by which the closed meeting was convened were heard, discussed, or considered. Any member who believes there was a departure from these requirements shall so state prior to the vote indicating the substance of the departure that in his or her judgment has taken place. The statement of the 10 02:24:33.120 --> 02:24:53.040 departure will be recorded in the minutes. So now uh we'll go through each one. Is that right? Okay. Thank you. >> Okay. Board members, again, please make sure you have your uh microphones on. 11 02:24:53.040 --> 02:25:09.280 In case number 20269, the chair will entertain a motion to issue the license. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Great. Miss Reinhardt. >> I. >> Dr. Bridges. >> I. Miss McFersonson 12 02:25:09.280 --> 02:25:25.040 >> I >> Dr. Northern I >> Dr. Wilson >> I >> Mr. Robinson >> I >> Miss Kilgore >> I >> and chair votes I. Thank you. In case number 20268, 13 02:25:25.040 --> 02:25:40.800 the chair will entertain a motion to revoke the license of Harold Bradley Dalton. >> So moved. >> Is there a second? >> Second. >> Second. >> Second. Miss Reinhardt >> I. >> Dr. Dr. Bridges >> I >> Miss McFersonen >> I 14 02:25:40.800 --> 02:25:59.760 >> Dr. Northern >> I >> Dr. Wilson >> I >> Mr. Robinson >> I >> Miss Gilgore >> I >> and chair votes I >> okay in case 202610 the chair will entertain a motion to deny the license 15 02:25:59.760 --> 02:26:15.600 to Kevin Ernest Palmer >> so moved >> second >> second >> Miss Reinhardt >> I >> Dr. Bridges >> I >> Miss McFersonson >> I >> Dr. Northern >> I, >> Dr. Wilson, 16 02:26:15.600 --> 02:26:31.280 >> I >> Mr. Robinson, >> I >> Miss Kilgore, >> I >> and chair votes I. >> In case 202613, the chair will entertain a motion to issue the license. >> So moved. >> Is there a second? 17 02:26:31.280 --> 02:26:47.680 >> Second, Miss Kilgore. Thank you, >> Miss Reinhardt. >> I, >> Dr. Bridges, >> I. >> Miss McFersonson, >> I. >> Dr. Nor, >> I. >> Dr. Mr. Wilson >> I >> Mr. Robinson >> I >> Miss Kilgore >> I 18 02:26:47.680 --> 02:27:08.880 >> and chair Roots I >> in the case of 202614 the chair will entertain a motion to issue the license >> so moved >> second great second thank you >> Miss Reinhardt >> I >> Dr. Bridges >> I >> Miss McFersonson 19 02:27:08.880 --> 02:27:25.280 >> I >> Dr. Northern >> I >> Dr. Wilson >> I >> Mr. Robinson >> I >> Miss Kilgore >> I >> and Chair Rotes I >> thank you that concludes our lensure hearings I will now turn it over to Superintendent Conway. 20 02:27:25.280 --> 02:27:41.520 >> Good morning uh board president Ashton. Good morning members of the board. Um uh thank you for joining us this morning. We have two items on the work session. Uh the first is an orientation on how 21 02:27:41.520 --> 02:27:58.479 early childhood works uh in Virginia uh since we've had some recent legislative changes and operational changes that have moved oversight of all birth to five care and education outside of the home to under the opaces of the board of education and the virgin department of 22 02:27:58.479 --> 02:28:14.840 education. This will be a primer in preparation for tomorrow's item on changes to VQB5. With that, I would ask uh Deputy Superintendent Carol to come to the mic and the team. 23 02:28:14.960 --> 02:28:31.920 I would also ask and I know that I am very familiar with these set of uh leaders but I would also ask the deputy superintendent to introduce the team uh to the board so that as we do this work uh this small but mighty work over the course of the next few years together 24 02:28:31.920 --> 02:28:53.920 that you understand the leaders that are supporting this in partnership with our 3,00 uh 300 early childhood sites across the Commonwealth. Is it on? No. Okay, got it. Uh, thank you, Superintendent Conway, and members of the board for having us here this 25 02:28:53.920 --> 02:29:10.479 morning. We're very excited, um, to share this presentation with you. Um, as, uh, Superintendent Conway was indicating, we're really going to do a few things this morning, uh, hopefully gearing us up for, uh, another discussion tomorrow. Uh we want to take 26 02:29:10.479 --> 02:29:27.120 uh the first portion of this presentation to really provide an overview of the birth the five system in Virginia um and all of the features that we think really contribute to making this uh a premier system uh across the country. Um and one of those key 27 02:29:27.120 --> 02:29:43.439 programs and features is VQB5. So the second half of the presentation will really focus on VQB5 which you will learn is our quality measurement and improvement system. Um many key leaders uh on our team contribute to these efforts and some of them are here today. 28 02:29:43.439 --> 02:29:59.040 So you will hear from me. Uh again, I'm Erin Carroll, deputy superintendent of early childhood care and education. Uh you will also hear from Chris Meyers, our director of quality measurement and improvement. And I also have three other 29 02:29:59.040 --> 02:30:15.840 uh phenomenal leaders here with us today. We have uh Jeff Williams right there. uh he is our assistant superintendent of child care health and safety. Um this is the team that does the regulating and uh monitoring of 30 02:30:15.840 --> 02:30:33.359 health and safety of uh 7,000 or so uh sites across the um well 5,000 rather uh sites or so across the Commonwealth. And you uh can see some of the very distinct features of that team on one of the handouts we provided. uh we wanted to 31 02:30:33.359 --> 02:30:49.439 especially feature that work because it is um a huge uh part of what the VDOE does but very distinctly different than some of the other uh functions of our agency. We also have uh Rebecca Olrich, our assistant superintendent of access, 32 02:30:49.439 --> 02:31:06.479 enrollment, innovation and policy. Hopefully I got that right. Close. Close. Okay. Uh you know we're we're trying. Ah, and Becca leads our work related to um access and policy. She oversees our childare and development 33 02:31:06.479 --> 02:31:21.760 block grant and our child care subsidy program um among many of the programs and initiatives that we take to expand access and really collect and share uh excellent data related to that. And then speaking of data, uh master of all 34 02:31:21.760 --> 02:31:38.720 things data, uh we have Tiara West, our director of uh early childhood analytics and technology. Um the leader of the data work on our team. She oversees um the collection and dissemination of data as well as um all of our early childhood 35 02:31:38.720 --> 02:31:56.000 data systems, including the uh very exciting uh VA Connects data system, which I believe we will share a little bit more on today. Um so with that we can jump into the next slide. Uh so we again I'll be really covering 36 02:31:56.000 --> 02:32:12.720 two areas uh today. I'm going to cover this first chunk about why school readiness matters and what we're really talking about when we're talking about the birth of five system in Virginia. And then um I will turn it to Chris Meyers to take us through um the VQB5 37 02:32:12.720 --> 02:32:29.920 101. That'll really set us up for a good conversation on the proposed revisions for tomorrow. Uh, next slide. So um we always like to start with just a a step back um when we are digging 38 02:32:29.920 --> 02:32:44.880 into these kind of median andheavy presentations to really remind ourselves ground ourselves in what it is we are trying to achieve here and what is the shared vision when we talk about this diverse and dynamic set of early childhood providers that support the uh 39 02:32:44.880 --> 02:33:01.120 Virginia's birth to five population. Um and ultimately we are working towards the goal that all children are able to enter school ready to succeed and thrive. Um this requires um many things. It requires that we have uh affordable 40 02:33:01.120 --> 02:33:16.240 and accessible choices for families. It requires that we have a system for measuring, recognizing, rewarding programs that are succeeding and and supporting children's development and growth. Um and it requires that parents 41 02:33:16.240 --> 02:33:33.600 have choices um that meet their needs so that they can do what they need to do during the day. We know that that is a um key part uh of um what we are providing here. And so making sure that the choices are plentiful and flexible enough uh for 42 02:33:33.600 --> 02:33:49.359 families to do what they need. always um at at the center of this is our uh north star is school readiness and uh making sure that we are collecting the information we need and providing the experiences that will prepare uh 43 02:33:49.359 --> 02:34:06.479 children to be successful. Next slide. So what does this look like? Uh in Virginia we're really talking about a diverse system of um early childhood programs. This slide gives us an overview of what this looks like. Uh but 44 02:34:06.479 --> 02:34:22.880 again, this is um family child care homes, licens licensed childcare centers, public schools, religiously exempt childcare centers, and Head Start grantees. Um it is a large system that is both publicly and privately funded um 45 02:34:22.880 --> 02:34:40.880 and enrolls uh children of all ages uh throughout the Commonwealth. Next slide. Um and so and I I know the baseline is here already but uh this system does function uh differently in some ways 46 02:34:40.880 --> 02:34:56.800 than K12. Um and one thing that is very important to highlight here is the way that public funding um works in the early childhood birth of five space um which is different than the public school uh K12 space. Um public funding 47 02:34:56.800 --> 02:35:12.560 is really essential to this system. It is of course heavily reliant on um both public and private funds, but public funds are essential for keeping our options both affordable and accessible particularly to those families that we 48 02:35:12.560 --> 02:35:29.040 know really need and rely on care. Um so very differently and uh this is a given though we don't always think about it this way. Um children are not guaranteed a spot in a birth of five or preschool program. Um this really works in more of 49 02:35:29.040 --> 02:35:46.560 a market demand and what is available type of economy. Um and that really uh impacts the way that uh opportunities um uh fluctuate um and are available across the state. Uh it is through these um 50 02:35:46.560 --> 02:36:04.960 oops um just got like very light. Uh through these public funds uh that go to uh public and private settings. um that families are able to choose the options that meet sorry that's okay 51 02:36:04.960 --> 02:36:22.960 >> we got it okay uh that are able to meet their unique needs uh for that um so through that our our goal through this unified system is to really uh create a set of unified expectations this looks like um working on uh 52 02:36:22.960 --> 02:36:39.040 streamlining and and updating our expectations for health, safety, and quality, which we will talk about today. Um, working on how we support enrollment across all of our programs. Um, and then, uh, as we will also cover today, really improving and, uh, refining the 53 02:36:39.040 --> 02:37:02.720 way that we capture data, uh, to demonstrate the impact of early childhood on those K12 experiences. Next slide. Um so again we have seen some really uh significant changes in public funding uh 54 02:37:02.720 --> 02:37:18.240 for early childhood over the last six or seven years. This graph is uh pretty dramatic uh and it is a very dramatic change that has happened. Um so since 2018 uh our our overall funding has increased 55 02:37:18.240 --> 02:37:35.520 by uh 380 million or more um in the last eight years and a huge portion of this is represented by an investment of state general funds. Um so you can see that uh 261% increase. Um and that was the result of 56 02:37:35.520 --> 02:37:52.240 some uh very responsive actions uh to need and demonstrated demand from parents around the Commonwealth um that has taken place in the last eight years. Um as a result, more children than ever are attending a publicly funded program. 57 02:37:52.240 --> 02:38:09.359 Um and more children than ever are having the opportunity to uh increase their school readiness and and come in uh with those foundational experiences. which leads us to our next slide. So, uh we're very proud of that uh 58 02:38:09.359 --> 02:38:26.880 increase in access. Um and you know the reason for that again taking a step back and doing a little bit of grounding um as to why all of this matters. Um uh we uh affectionately refer to this as the brain slide. Uh and you know I don't 59 02:38:26.880 --> 02:38:41.760 know what else one would call it to be honest. uh uh but this slide really uh shows us just how much is happening in those first five years of life. Um, I didn't mention this when I introduced myself, but I am the mother to a almost 60 02:38:41.760 --> 02:38:57.439 six-month-old and almost three-year-old. And um, this is evident every day, every morning. Uh, they are different people monthtomonth. Um, and, uh, it's amazing and scary sometimes, uh, but amazing 61 02:38:57.439 --> 02:39:13.040 also. Um, and those one million neural connections being formed every second are critical. and where those young children are um uh during those years when this is happening matters. We know that. We have 62 02:39:13.040 --> 02:39:28.399 lots and lots of research to demonstrate that and um that that powers our uh motivation and our uh passion for making sure that we are um supporting those environments. Next slide. 63 02:39:28.399 --> 02:39:44.399 So, we have one way that we uh well, actually many ways, but one way that we uh look at this year-over-year in Virginia is through um our statewide kindergarten readiness program. This is called the VKRP, Virginia Kindergarten 64 02:39:44.399 --> 02:40:01.040 Readiness Program. Um this is a assessment that is given to every kindergartener um at least twice in the fall and the spring and provides a a very strong benchmark for us and understanding what kindergarteners need 65 02:40:01.040 --> 02:40:17.680 coming in and what does that reflect about what they're getting before they get to kindergarten. Um, so what you see here is the data from, uh, fall 2025, um, in which 43% of Virginia's kindergarteners began the year still 66 02:40:17.680 --> 02:40:34.640 needing to build skills in one of the four areas we measure. Um, the areas we measure through the VKRP are literacy, math, self-regulation, and social skills. Um and so you can see in detail there was uh the most uh need still in 67 02:40:34.640 --> 02:40:49.600 literacy and math and then self-regulation and social skills looking similar. Um again we track this number uh very closely. We think it tells us um both what our kindergarteners teachers need to do but 68 02:40:49.600 --> 02:41:06.479 is also a incredibly important piece of information uh for our preschool and our uh early childhood community to be aware of. um as this changes. Um the next slide will highlight uh some very exciting information here um and an 69 02:41:06.479 --> 02:41:21.840 example of the way that we can use this data to really uh tell us what is happening in the Virginia ecosystem. Um so uh we are uh always incredibly excited to share this statistic but um when we 70 02:41:21.840 --> 02:41:37.520 compare our school readiness data from this year from fall 2025 we see that it increased by six uh percentage points from fall 2024. And that's really huge if we think about what that means. Um 71 02:41:37.520 --> 02:41:54.880 that is our statewide uh overall um every kindergartner attending uh public uh school participating in that um really a significant amount of growth. We saw the most growth uh take place in literacy. The second most growth take 72 02:41:54.880 --> 02:42:09.680 place in math. Again exactly the areas where we're collecting data that we need additional focus, we need additional attention and seeing that impact already. Um, importantly, we saw this through uh all of the student subgroups 73 02:42:09.680 --> 02:42:26.800 that we uh keep special attention on. And then finally, you know, I think um you know, just to say it plainly, I think this really demonstrates if we think about, you know, these are our kindergarteners who are coming in at 5 years old now. um this attention to 74 02:42:26.800 --> 02:42:42.240 increasing access and focusing on quality and thinking about um what is happening uh from those classrooms where you're talking about itty bitty babies all the way up to our you know three and four year olds that really we put a 75 02:42:42.240 --> 02:42:56.640 increased focus on that you know about five or six years ago right and so we really think that this is showing um some return on all of that time and focus on um expanding access and talking about quality And so we are incredibly 76 02:42:56.640 --> 02:43:16.800 excited uh to see this data this year. Next slide. Um and again it is not only that uh we think it is great for kids to come into kindergarten ready to succeed. It is uh we want them to come in and have those 77 02:43:16.800 --> 02:43:32.960 foundational um skills and be able to jump right into the kindergarten um standards and curriculum. Uh but we also know that where kids are coming in sets the pathway for where we expect them um to be or where we find 78 02:43:32.960 --> 02:43:48.640 them to be uh later in life. Um so this slide really breaks down um and this is from data from um when we were using PALS but it breaks down um in quintiles uh the the scores that kids 79 02:43:48.640 --> 02:44:05.760 had at kindergarten entry, right? with the five being the higher and the um one being the lowest and shows where they were as far as proficiency in third grade um literacy assessments. So really you can see there the where the kids 80 02:44:05.760 --> 02:44:23.279 were coming in um in kindergarten regarding literacy followed through to third grade in a pretty dramatic fashion. Um and we all know that in third grade where our literacy scores are really matters for um how kids will 81 02:44:23.279 --> 02:44:39.840 continue to learn going forward. Um so again really strong correlations there uh that make us really want to make sure that every uh kiddo is able to come in with those uh foundational literacy skills. Next slide. 82 02:44:39.840 --> 02:44:55.840 All right, this last section uh before we get into uh the meat of VQB5, we will talk a little bit about um the the part of early childhood that is also supporting families. So, we've been talking about um how critical early 83 02:44:55.840 --> 02:45:13.200 childhood is to uh neurological development, how we measure it, how important it is to later academic success. But we also know that um early childhood experiences are critical for working families and for our economy. Um 84 02:45:13.200 --> 02:45:29.760 you know I am here today because somebody's taking care of my children. I'm not the only one in that situation. We need that for uh people to be able to go to work. Um we also know that the percent of families with two parents in the workforce is increasing. So today we 85 02:45:29.760 --> 02:45:47.359 have about seven out of 10 uh of our families have both available um uh or all available parents in the workforce in Virginia. So there is a need for care um for about 70% of our kids. Next slide. 86 02:45:47.359 --> 02:46:05.760 um through the uh improved and detailed data tracking that we have been doing and um uh excuse me for bringing this complicated slide to you. Uh just a little bit of a math problem. I'm going to do my best. Well, I'll just 87 02:46:05.760 --> 02:46:22.000 do our best with it. Uh Jenna is laughing because uh she she's a fan. uh but uh we are able to track and look at what uh early childhood program participation, early childhood weight 88 02:46:22.000 --> 02:46:38.399 list look like in correlation uh with the labor participation rate. And the key takeaway here um that you know while the data is incredibly interesting um is that workforce participation has increased as early childhood part as 89 02:46:38.399 --> 02:46:56.080 early childhood participation has increased and then uh decreased when we hit the cap of what we could offer um last year and began implementing weight lists again. So there was um a period here again where we were dramatically um 90 02:46:56.080 --> 02:47:10.080 expanding the number of children that are participating. If you look closely at those shades of blue, you can see that there was a huge amount of growth in the childcare subsidy program um and some continued growth in our uh other two programs that we have represented 91 02:47:10.080 --> 02:47:27.200 VPI and mixed delivery also. And then in um FY25 when we shifted to having a and FY26 when we shifted to having a weight list um you can see that represented with the orange bars there. Um the blue through 92 02:47:27.200 --> 02:47:42.800 line is the uh labor participation rate. So really showing an increase in labor participation, a flattening and then actually a little bit of a decrease um which corresponded directly with uh when those weight lists went into place. 93 02:47:42.800 --> 02:47:59.760 And the next slide um is somewhat uh the the inverse but this is looking at the unemployment rate. Um so unemployment was decreasing as early childhood participation grew and then increased when weight list went into effect. So 94 02:47:59.760 --> 02:48:15.840 this is the same um look at uh subsidy growth and program growth. Um but it's mapping what unemployment looks like compared to that. So you can see that it went way down um in FY22 and then um has 95 02:48:15.840 --> 02:48:33.200 u ticked back up a little bit in more recent years. All right, so that was um a true crash course um in areas that I promise we could do um hours and hours on, but we 96 02:48:33.200 --> 02:48:50.640 won't do that today. Um but I think and hope um really sets us up well uh for um the next section in which we will talk in depth about uh VQB5 um and the quality measurement and 97 02:48:50.640 --> 02:49:06.080 improvement system that supports uh all of these publicly funded programs. Yeah, Jenna >> Erin as uh Chris is coming up uh let's open it and see if there's any questions for the >> Sorry. questions. >> Should admire Deputy Carol's bravery. There's nothing harder than presenting 98 02:49:06.080 --> 02:49:23.120 someone's slides to them. And so, uh, just a moment of of of recognition, uh, for for that. >> That is exactly what I said. >> Great. Um, uh, yes, Dr. Wilson. >> Uh, thank you very much. Just a 99 02:49:23.120 --> 02:49:39.120 question, a definitional question. >> Available parents. So, the number of parents available to be in the workforce, is that does that take into account those parents who may not choose to be in the 100 02:49:39.120 --> 02:49:54.080 workforce regardless of whether or not childare is available? >> Was this the most recent slide? >> Yes. Yes. So, the the definition of available parents mean parents in the household. So, parents that reside with the child um and who are available 101 02:49:54.080 --> 02:50:10.560 meaning they are incarcerated, not otherwise unable to work. So the uh that percentage would um any child that doesn't have all available parents in the workforce, that might include parents that are opting out or who otherwise are unemployed whether they choose to be or not. >> Thank you. 102 02:50:10.560 --> 02:50:25.760 >> Great. Mr. Robinson, >> for a solo parent who would be the one parent, right, for the one house there. >> Great. Mr. Robinson, >> first a comment. The data on slide uh nine is just incredibly inspiring in terms of the percentage of students 103 02:50:25.760 --> 02:50:41.120 overall and also for the students traditionally furthest from opportunity who are kindergarten ready thanks to the hard work of the team and so many educators across the commonwealth. So just want to first of all express gratitude, enthusiasm and what that means for our responsibility for 104 02:50:41.120 --> 02:50:57.840 continuing to raise expectations for what these students have choices to do uh given their readiness. So first of all just gratitude. Um my question is on slide um uh eight as we look at the uh readiness using the VKRP data. 105 02:50:57.840 --> 02:51:13.040 >> Um knowing that different states have different measures um you know I'd be interested not necessarily now but at some point I for the states that have the most comparable data yeah >> how we uh compare to other states in uh student readiness. 106 02:51:13.040 --> 02:51:28.720 >> Yeah. and and we can certainly look at that um and think about what would be the best way to share back. Um it's a complicated question uh because uh very few states even have Virginia is unique and honestly very fortunate that we 107 02:51:28.720 --> 02:51:44.479 started we started with the VKRP kind of early in the focus on early childhood. >> Um but uh many states use kind of a mishmash and this and that the other but we would we would be happy to kind of summarize what we do know um on that. I don't know uh if others have others to 108 02:51:44.479 --> 02:51:59.040 add. >> Yeah, I just want to emphasize that most states do not have for every single kindergartener entering a public schools a consistent set of indicators. Um many states only measure literacy and you can 109 02:51:59.040 --> 02:52:15.760 see from this graphic the shortcoming that that incurs. I mean ready means ready in all four areas. And so you see uh we often get asked this question well how does it go from 16% or 20% to 43%. And it's that that full set of skills. 110 02:52:15.760 --> 02:52:31.920 If you speak with a kindergarten teacher they will tell you that they can tell right that these are all kind of essential skills that they would love for more kids to have the opportunity to come in in in ready. And I should also note and uh we are uh grateful for our 111 02:52:31.920 --> 02:52:48.479 partners at the University of Virginia at the at the Virginia kindergarten readiness program at at vows that Virginia now has one of the most rigorous literacy screeners in the country. So previously it just focused on the literacy elements which is the 112 02:52:48.479 --> 02:53:05.520 things relating to decoding sound awareness. it now actually includes language as well. And that's when we went from PALS to vowels. Um and that really means that um we're looking at sort of holistically 113 02:53:05.520 --> 02:53:22.319 uh the extent to which kids have opportunities to not only develop some of those tactical skills related to literacy, but their underlying vocabulary, which we also know is highly predictive of future academic success. >> Great. Yes, Dr. Northern 114 02:53:22.319 --> 02:53:38.880 >> um I actually have two questions. The first is um did we what did our widening of eligibility look like as a result of the increase we had in dollars. So I don't know whether you know we were allow you know how much we were able to raise the uh criteria for low-inccome or 115 02:53:38.880 --> 02:53:54.880 change the criteria for special needs. So I'll I'll pause there so you can address that one first if you don't mind. >> Yeah. Yeah. So um some of all of the above. uh there was a broadening of the criteria. It's looked um different for different programs, but uh with the with 116 02:53:54.880 --> 02:54:11.840 the childcare subsidy program specifically, uh Becca can recite this. >> Yes. So, uh prior to >> um so, uh prior to the the pandemic, the uh eligibility for the childare subsidy program was sort of regionally based and 117 02:54:11.840 --> 02:54:29.120 it was uh based on whether you were a a heavily rural, suburban, or more urban area. Um, and the uh maximum income level ranged from 150% of the poverty level uh up to 250% of the poverty level, though that 250% really just 118 02:54:29.120 --> 02:54:44.080 applied in Fairfax County, Arlington County, and Alexandria City. Um and uh so most of the state had a maximum eligibility level of about 185% of the poverty threshold which uh today for a 119 02:54:44.080 --> 02:55:00.080 family of four is like less than $66,000 a year. So it was it was quite low. Um and uh during the pandemic, the general assembly uh actually initially enacted emergency legislation that expanded that up to 85% of the state median income, 120 02:55:00.080 --> 02:55:16.479 which now is a little over $100,000 a year for a family of four. Um and uh also uh originally you had to be working or in school. You could not be looking for work. And as everyone knows, it's very hard to get a job uh if you don't 121 02:55:16.479 --> 02:55:34.080 have child care. Uh and so uh as part of that expansion of eligibility uh the general assembly also uh directed us to um uh include job search as an allowable activity for initial eligibility for the subsidy program. Um and uh we uh were 122 02:55:34.080 --> 02:55:49.040 able to then it was initially kind of a temporary expansion of eligibility to address uh COVID recovery. we were able to leverage available COVID dollars to maintain that expansion and then it was actually kind of codified into eligibility permanently for the subsidy 123 02:55:49.040 --> 02:56:05.359 program um in the uh 2022 session. Um and then as mixed delivery also expanded uh there were some sort of efforts to uh include parallel expansions in mixed delivery uh uh eligibility as well. So 124 02:56:05.359 --> 02:56:21.279 inclusive of right there's some um parental activity requirements in mixed delivery but they mirror that of subsidy. Um and then uh in VPI of course we also included um the uh uh categorical eligibility for kids with disabilities regardless of income and 125 02:56:21.279 --> 02:56:36.000 that applies in mixed delivery as well. So mixed delivery eligibility is a little bit of a hybrid of VPI and uh and subsidy. >> And it should be important that um this has been uh uh expanding over time in 126 02:56:36.000 --> 02:56:52.479 close partnership with governors and legislators of both political persuasion. So, it's been a bipartisan year-over-year effort that has been in real response to what the demat the data on parent demand looks like and then trying to thoughtfully expand 127 02:56:52.479 --> 02:57:08.880 eligibility with the core premise going back to what the deputy superintendent said is that if it is otherwise unaffordable, if your take-home pay cannot cover the cost of child care, then it is out of reach and that the the child loses out in terms of the developmental experience and the parent 128 02:57:08.880 --> 02:57:25.359 is unlikely to be able to participate in the workforce. So are weight list Dr. Northern. >> Yeah. Yeah. I was just going to ask you so what percentage have we seen the weight list go down relative to the expansion or now have we got a bigger weight list because we've expanded the 129 02:57:25.359 --> 02:57:42.720 criteria about which >> so uh there's been some uh some fluctuation in weight list over time. So when eligibility was initially expanded, we were running a wait list um of about I think that the the last number was around 3,000 kids statewide. Um but of 130 02:57:42.720 --> 02:57:59.120 course during COVID enrollment also dropped um right as families were uh stepping back from the workforce or maybe just not comfortable sending their children to care. Um, as we, you know, made those efforts to expand access, expand availability, um, around the same 131 02:57:59.120 --> 02:58:15.200 time that we expanded eligibility, we also increased payment rates for child care providers, which was a really important, right? It's a little bit more of a provider sort of facing side of uh the program rules, but the extent to which we are adequately compensating 132 02:58:15.200 --> 02:58:30.319 providers for the care that they're providing, right, to meet health, safety, and quality expectations, it gives families more choices, right? Because uh it incentivizes more providers to participate. It means they're more willing to enroll more children. Um and so kind of the the 133 02:58:30.319 --> 02:58:45.920 collective of all of those changes, we started to see right major increases in enrollment, weight lists were uh reduced or or more or less eliminated. And then we received a directive in the 2022 session uh to use all available funds to 134 02:58:45.920 --> 02:59:02.479 continue to eliminate weight lists. And so for a a 2-year period, we did not run a weight list whatsoever. every family that was eligible that came through the door and completed the application process received a slot. Um that was largely supported with COVID uh pandemic 135 02:59:02.479 --> 02:59:18.160 dollars that were of course timelmited. Um and uh we uh so while there was that you know really significant increase in state general funds, what that allowed us to do was really to sustain all the growth that we had um experienced over 136 02:59:18.160 --> 02:59:35.439 the the course of the last several years but did not allow us to continue at that rate of growth uh because the state funding was effectively you know filling the hole that the federal pandemic money left. And so since then we have had the uh ability to um incur some growth uh 137 02:59:35.439 --> 02:59:51.200 over time. Uh but we we our weight list was at around uh 10,000 kids uh toward the end of 2025. Um we've gone through several uh kind of really intensive technical uh kind of adjustment efforts 138 02:59:51.200 --> 03:00:08.080 to make sure that our local departments um are uh effectively sort of offering slots at a rate that will enable the most number of families to accept a slot. Um, I think the application process is time consuming and and typically when families are approaching 139 03:00:08.080 --> 03:00:23.279 a local department and submitting an application, it's because they need care right then. And so sitting on a wait list for a month, three months, six months, right? The opportunity often then passes them by. Um, and so if we're waiting too long to offer them a slot, 140 03:00:23.279 --> 03:00:40.000 by the time one comes around, that job might be gone. That opportunity to take a class might be gone. and oftentimes they have to turn away that care. Um, we have reduced our weight list down now to about 4,000 children. Um, and we've increased enrollment by about 1,500 141 03:00:40.000 --> 03:00:55.680 children in the last four months. So, we're we're seeing some turnaround based on that that kind of those technical adjustments that we've been working to make um to keep the weight list lower and keep processing moving. Um but the the real lesson learned and we've got 142 03:00:55.680 --> 03:01:10.560 tons of data that we can share with you all about weight lists uh in another uh another session. Um we know that that the weight list is just incredibly harmful for families and and has real uh economic and uh child development implications as well. 143 03:01:10.560 --> 03:01:27.439 >> So if you take a big step back and to the point Mr. Robinson earlier about the kind of comparison with other states. Very few other states did what Virginia did, which is you had this significant drop in workforce participation. Virginia, I think, was 38th in the 144 03:01:27.439 --> 03:01:43.680 nation in terms of parents, particularly mothers, opting out of the workforce, right? And it was then a vicious cycle in terms of how do you get them back if there's not care or school opportunities. what Virginia was said across all of its programs, the state prek known as Virginia Preschool 145 03:01:43.680 --> 03:01:58.160 initiative, mixed delivery and childcare subsidy, we're going to put sufficient funding to grow at the rate of demand with the idea being that we're also setting the eligibility criteria for those who otherwise cannot afford child care and are at kind of greatest risk. 146 03:01:58.160 --> 03:02:14.160 And what you then saw was BPI grew, mixed delivery grow, childcare subsidy because of the large number of families who need full day, fullyear care grew the most um with some of our highest rates ever of demand from infant and 147 03:02:14.160 --> 03:02:30.160 toddler working families. And so other states, they've picked a sort of a select program or they've said this is a a pot or pie of money and we're going to divide it up. Virginia's approach was highly innovative and it said we're not going to do that. we're going to sort of put enough funding out there to meet the 148 03:02:30.160 --> 03:02:47.279 demand. And you saw year-over-year growth. We then hit a point where there was uh not sufficient funding to serve all of the children. And that has been uh a debate embraced by our governor and legislature the last three sessions and will in fact again this week uh as they 149 03:02:47.279 --> 03:03:03.760 figure out how to balance. But this data that you see on slides 12 and 13 is is truly uh nationleading in terms of the kind of how you think about it. Most early childhood and other places is either universal or you're dividing up a 150 03:03:03.760 --> 03:03:20.800 narrow set of money and Virginia has chosen this kind of different path that is very focused on measuring and meeting parental demand. >> Great. Um Mr. Reinhardt, >> thank you and thank you Superintendent Conway. certainly underscores what was going through my mind um what you just shared 151 03:03:20.800 --> 03:03:38.080 and that was a phenomenal presentation because I think about I put my chamber hat on and working with businesses and working to you know shore up our economy and our community and really the region and beyond that data is so profound and 152 03:03:38.080 --> 03:03:54.319 telling and I think about working with our business community and I mean the bottom line is you still have folks who think that these are sound bites sometimes like is there really a child care or early childhood um void? Is it really that important? I mean that still 153 03:03:54.319 --> 03:04:11.359 exists to some degree. So having that hard data is so critically important and seeing what Virginia has done. We work with other chambers around the country and Virginia certainly is um the leader in a lot of ways in this work. Um I I think too just thinking about you know 154 03:04:11.359 --> 03:04:28.080 how we focus on economic mobility for our families. I mean, it's it's an underpinning and uh core and I'm preaching to the choir, I know, but um just it's so nice to see this data and all the work that's been done. So, kudos to you all for that work and and for sharing it because I I look for 155 03:04:28.080 --> 03:04:42.800 opportunities now. How can we share that? How am I going to go to my business community and tell some of these stories that gives them what they need and to again to our elected officials who are making funding choices. So, thank you. >> Yeah, absolutely. Um just one comment 156 03:04:42.800 --> 03:04:58.000 from the chair which is um I looked at data on slide eight um and it um I'm just really inspired by the data when it says 43% um are not you know not on track. Um I I failed kindergarten and that is actually 157 03:04:58.000 --> 03:05:14.720 true and so I would have been in the 57% um and I think about folks just focusing on literacy but seeing the comprehension literacy self-regulation I know mine was for social skills so I just want to applaud the team for that. I feel very 158 03:05:14.720 --> 03:05:31.279 inspired. Um I think about um in Superintendent Conway your part around bipartisan support around this uh is really important. I think about you know these f these kindergarteners now and them being on the path to really 159 03:05:31.279 --> 03:05:47.920 accelerate their learning in five 10 years from now is really going to be the group of students that put Virginia first in the country. Uh and so just echoing the appreciation, the data, the lessons learned. Um thinking about the 160 03:05:47.920 --> 03:06:03.439 what I what I was wondering about and I don't know if we have the data about our educators who need child care. I I know in the pandemic like that was part of the challenge is we can't get teachers back because they're home with their kids. And so I'm wondering do we um are 161 03:06:03.439 --> 03:06:20.319 we able to pull out that data around educators? >> Oh, we have data for you. Okay, great. >> Yeah. So, one of the and huge thanks to the work of uh Becca and our partners at UVA, we did um good and the bad news is 162 03:06:20.319 --> 03:06:35.760 that when you apply for childcare subsidy, it's a manual open-ended form where you work. Um so, it requires I know that gives you like a heart attack. Um so it requires analysis but basically one of the really one of the most powerful slides and we can get this to 163 03:06:35.760 --> 03:06:53.439 you board president is looking at where who are the employers of uh the participants on the childcare subsidy program and nearly 100 of our 131 school divisions are listed as the employers. Right? So the idea is we have bus 164 03:06:53.439 --> 03:07:10.160 drivers, janitorial workers, instructional aids at you know at at upwards of uh 70 to 80% of our school divisions who are able to be there um because uh of of of child care assistance from the state. If you look at that list, it also lays out and 165 03:07:10.160 --> 03:07:28.240 outlines jobs that are essential in person and that are not going to go away with AI. It's, you know, everybody from our postal workers to folks who work in retail, who work in food services, health and and hospitals are are are also up there. And so this idea of you 166 03:07:28.240 --> 03:07:43.600 more and more children, young children having all available parents in the workforce and continuing to have a pronounced workforce need for in-person essential uh ostensibly lower wage. Although um again it's less about the 167 03:07:43.600 --> 03:07:59.040 sort of the the wage itself than it is does your post tax uh take-home pay for child care. Um, and that is what is essential if you want to be able to participate in the workforce. >> Great. Thank you. >> Uh, and I was just reminded that this 168 03:07:59.040 --> 03:08:14.800 actually is summarized on slide 36. >> Oh, wonderful. >> We love an appendex. >> We love a an appendix that we've forgot about, but it's it's there. It's there. >> Superintendent Carol, I think there are any other questions. Should we continue 169 03:08:14.800 --> 03:08:29.920 >> move to the next section? So, >> Miss So, I I wanted to highlight slide nine because I do think it's important for the public to understand and be aware of the fact that this um 170 03:08:29.920 --> 03:08:47.279 readiness has gone up by plus 8% eight points in literacy and 2% in math uh over the course from 24 to 25 is our understanding and I think it's significant that we look at it's a plus seven percentage points for Hispanic and 171 03:08:47.279 --> 03:09:03.120 Latino students and 6% for black students. six percentage points for students in lowincome households, 5 percentage points for English language multilingual learners, and 4% for students with disabilities. And I just don't want us to overlook that because I just think 172 03:09:03.120 --> 03:09:19.520 this is highly significant that we've had those type of increases. I noticed that self-regulation and social skills have remained steady. >> Yeah. So, I'm wondering um as it relates to the percentages that are on the graph, is that comparable to nationwide 173 03:09:19.520 --> 03:09:36.319 or any other data that you have? Because I mean, I understand it's young people trying to regulate themselves and trying to figure out social skills. >> Very big feelings. >> Probably wiggling everywhere. So, I'm just wondering, are we within the norm as it relates to self-regulation and social skills? 174 03:09:36.319 --> 03:09:52.000 >> We use a national tool for that. Um, and so we can work with our partners EVA to get an answer for you on how that compares to the rest of the country. That is that is a national tool. Not the literacy and the math tool are Virginia specific developed by UVA, but the self-regulation and social skills are 175 03:09:52.000 --> 03:10:08.640 national tools. So we can get a normal reference. >> I just be interested because I understand that >> social environment and self-regulation can actually end up becoming factors as I've looked at some data that can prevent progress 176 03:10:08.640 --> 03:10:23.920 >> and maybe if there's something that we need to do before these toddlers get further along, you know, in in their progress and going into school that we could put into place. And um I was interested in whether or not we have 177 03:10:23.920 --> 03:10:39.760 additional data regarding the percentage of funding that is going to households where there are parents who are looking for employment but are not yet in the workforce. How what that percentage is as it relates to the 178 03:10:39.760 --> 03:10:55.760 subsidies that we are giving out to parents who are employed and whether or not we need to begin to look at now that we're post pandemic how we for that funding. And that's not to be a slight against people who are 179 03:10:55.760 --> 03:11:10.960 looking. It's just to say that when there's limited funding, should we really be looking at that now? >> Yes, ma'am. Um, so we we do have that data. Um, we uh uh I don't have it in terms of the percent of funding, but in terms of the total case load, so we have 180 03:11:10.960 --> 03:11:26.560 a somewhere in the ballpark of 22 to 24,000 families that are enrolled in the subsidy program. only 10% of them have one or more parents that are looking for work. Um and I believe it is only 5% where that is the only thing that they 181 03:11:26.560 --> 03:11:42.640 are doing for all available parents in that household. So um parents can uh be eligible for subsidy through a combination of activities, right? So you might get to full day fullyear care because you are working part-time but 182 03:11:42.640 --> 03:11:57.359 you're looking for a full-time job. And so the part-time work plus your job search gets you to full day care. Um and so um or for example, you could be in school and you could be then looking for work, you know, kind of uh once your 183 03:11:57.359 --> 03:12:14.880 your uh training or vocational program is completed. Um or you could have a two parent household where one parent is job searching and one parent is working. Um and so uh 10% of cases again have a parent that is looking for work. Just five. uh is that the only approved 184 03:12:14.880 --> 03:12:32.560 activity for the case? Um now we did make a change to uh the job search uh policy in uh just this past fiscal year. Um job search is now limited to 90 days. So families have uh up to 90 days to 185 03:12:32.560 --> 03:12:48.000 find employment or another qualifying activity for their eligibility. They can get up to one 90day extension. So, say you're coming up on that 90-day period, you're still interviewing. Maybe you got a job offer, uh, but you have to do a background check or a drug screening or 186 03:12:48.000 --> 03:13:03.840 something along those lines. Um, they can get an >> short term. >> It is short term now. Yes. Yes. That's exactly right. >> And that and that came out of the work of the bipartisan commission that Yes. landed on the exact same point, which is that um when you have thousands of 187 03:13:03.840 --> 03:13:20.240 families on a wait list or children on a wait list, you've got to kind of think about those trade-offs. >> And even prior to when that temporary policy was in place, our data suggested that uh two out of every three households that was job searching, by the next time they did their redetermination, they were employed. So, 188 03:13:20.240 --> 03:13:37.439 the vast majority of those folks were ending up in employment. >> Any other questions? >> Yes, Dr. Northern. Sorry. >> So much good data over here. >> I know, right? Just one one table gives us all this these good questions to ask. Um I'm on little bar chart 82 on page 189 03:13:37.439 --> 03:13:55.439 eight. Um, I guess I'm just wondering, so we're saying 72% and 80% of our kindergarteners are meeting benchmarks and is the idea that this readiness is actually picking up the kids who are just struggling the most, you know, at 190 03:13:55.439 --> 03:14:12.239 the very like this is like big red warning sign. Yeah. >> Um because that strikes me as kind of >> optimistic. Um especially since we know I just looked it up because I was curious that 16% of our uh black and Hispanic kids at fourth grade are prof 191 03:14:12.239 --> 03:14:29.840 16% or making proficiency on NAPE. >> So I'm just wondering is there some idea that okay we're intentionally trying to get the really you know the kids who are just on life support here for lack of a better word and that was a terrible metaphor. Um and is there an idea that 192 03:14:29.840 --> 03:14:45.760 maybe we should be you know ratcheting this up? um gradually or is it really just intended for the kids who are really needing it the most? >> Yeah, I mean I I think that's a great question. Um and so yes, the way we draw 193 03:14:45.760 --> 03:15:02.000 those uh readiness and not ready benchmarks is um kind of a blunt instrument, right? It is uh yes or no. And um actually in our our preschool version of the tool, we don't do that. we do it more on a a graduated scale 194 03:15:02.000 --> 03:15:18.960 somewhat to that point, right? It is not a you did or you didn't, right? There is a lot of area in between. Um and uh something superintendent Conway has always said is okay, but what about the kids that are one point right above that, right? Or uh really right there. 195 03:15:18.960 --> 03:15:35.120 Um and so we do look at that um in our uh in our review of the data and those are more available um in terms of the reports that come out to teachers as far as you know what the actual scores and gradations are there because you 196 03:15:35.120 --> 03:15:51.200 certainly would not want to um be classifying a whole you know it sounds like a lot right 72% of kids are are meeting that benchmark 28% aren't like that does not mean that those 72% 197 03:15:51.200 --> 03:16:07.439 uh are high-flying and have no needs, right? There's a lot of uh differentiation that needs to be done in there too. Um and you know, I I we have looked at the tools every year. Um you know, we did this is our second year 198 03:16:07.439 --> 03:16:23.439 using the revised version of the literacy assessment in kindergarten. So, we used it um was present in 2024 and now again in 2025. um really in response to to realizing that we needed a a improved and more in-depth assessment 199 03:16:23.439 --> 03:16:39.040 that really um aligns with all of the literacy practices that we're working hard to promote in later grades. >> Uh and I think if you look Dr. Northern sort of both eight and 10, it's a it's a helpful framing here. On the one hand, 200 03:16:39.040 --> 03:16:55.120 we want to be very careful. No one wants high stakes uh evaluations for kindergarten including board president Ashton because clearly that was not not not uh so there is a lot of fluidity in children's development. Um if you look 201 03:16:55.120 --> 03:17:10.800 at uh in particular the vows that group that is not meeting benchmark we are saying is at high risk of reading difficulty. So it truly is, you know, you're, you know, sort of trying to thread a needle around saying we need to pay a lot of attention to these children 202 03:17:10.800 --> 03:17:27.680 that they are, they are coming in not ready, right? And that um and that that we know there is a a subset of them that it relates to language and literacy and a subset that relates to mathematics. If you think about what we're trying to achieve on 10 is you really want kids to 203 03:17:27.680 --> 03:17:44.640 come in very ready, right? Because then across a big system as you see those kids who come in very ready regardless of which school uh across our 131 divisions 90 over 90% of them will be reading on time by third grade. In sharp contrast those that come in least ready 204 03:17:44.640 --> 03:18:00.239 right who are that group uh in the orange back on eight. It is truly a coin toss right across you know all of the work and investments of our incredible K3 teachers. it is just really hard to get kids there. And so that's if you 205 03:18:00.239 --> 03:18:17.359 think about really these two slides together where you have to say on the one hand we recognize that it's a uh there's a lot of fluidity and development among young children. On the other hand, the readier we can get you, the more likely we're going to uh when 206 03:18:17.359 --> 03:18:32.880 you come into our K12 system, get you to reading um and doing math on level uh across across a big system. So I think that's an important note. Um and you know we've also talked with our partners of EVA how do you think about um you 207 03:18:32.880 --> 03:18:49.920 know scaling this so it's not just this binary ready or not because there are a subset and now on the vows they do high risk moderate risk and low risk um which was also a change when we went from vows to PALS and thinking about those folks in the middle who are at risk of not 208 03:18:49.920 --> 03:19:06.160 being on level when you get to third or fourth grade. Great. Okay. Superintendent Carol, would you like to >> proceed? Okay. So, uh I'm very excited uh to reintroduce again Chris Meyers. Uh Chris is the again the director of 209 03:19:06.160 --> 03:19:22.640 quality measurement and improvement for our team. Um and has been uh instrumental in the development and launch of uh VQB5 Virginia quality birth 5. um she will provide the background here and I will let her take it away. 210 03:19:22.640 --> 03:19:41.120 Again, this is uh the content for which we will be pro uh proposing a set of uh revisions to uh for you tomorrow. >> Awesome. Good afternoon. Oh, good afternoon uh Superintendent Conway and members of the board. It is now 211 03:19:41.120 --> 03:19:57.680 afternoon, just a few minutes after. Um I am excited to talk with you. I want to thank my colleagues for all the great information that they uh shared because having a strong access to early childhood experiences is so important to build the work that we're talking about 212 03:19:57.680 --> 03:20:13.520 which is not just about having access to early childhood but making sure those experiences are actually quality experiences. Uh my children are older now, but my first job back in the 90s was as a kindergarten teacher. And I can still remember how about 20 minutes into 213 03:20:13.520 --> 03:20:28.880 that first day, I could tell which children were coming in ready and what that meant uh kind of down the road in the work that we had to do to help get them uh even, you know, further along. So you can go to the next slide. Um so uh when we started uh Superintendent 214 03:20:28.880 --> 03:20:43.680 Conway referred to the state law that unified early childhood under the Department of Ed. that state law from about five years ago, maybe six years now, uh also uh laid the groundwork for what became our VQB5 system. So it said 215 03:20:43.680 --> 03:21:00.319 that we had to establish a unified way to measure and improve quality in any publicly funded program. So that includes our VPI, our head start, our subsidy, mixed delivery, military subsidy. Uh if you get public dollars, the state law said you now have to 216 03:21:00.319 --> 03:21:17.359 participate in this system. Uh the state law also said that programs who don't receive public dollars have the option to participate although most of our sites as we'll talk about today are publicly funded. Um so we developed uh and looked at the research looked at the data and developed what we believe is 217 03:21:17.359 --> 03:21:34.319 also a nationleading system uh that we lovingly call VQB5. Um we also had to design this in a way that's a little unique from other states because it wasn't just about improving quality which u many states do. we have to tie it to school readiness and obviously you 218 03:21:34.319 --> 03:21:51.120 all are interested in that and that's important to us that we're doing it in a way that's going to show improvement for children. So we have specifically focused in on two nationally recognized indicators of quality. Uh the first is interactions which is me measured with a 219 03:21:51.120 --> 03:22:08.000 very rigorous uh assessment tool. I brought a copy if anybody's curious to look at it the classroom assessment scoring system. uh it's about 20 years old now and it's been used it's used across the country it's actually used across the world uh and it is the most researched and validated tool to look at 220 03:22:08.000 --> 03:22:24.479 the quality of what's happening in classrooms with children there's an infant version a toddler version and the prek version that we use here in Virginia uh the second aspect that we look at is the use of approved curricula so we have a process for uh kind of looking at the quality of early 221 03:22:24.479 --> 03:22:40.239 childhood and again infant toddler preschool curricula that align with our Virginia Early Learning and Development Standards. By far, as you'll see today, our focus is really um on interactions and using curriculum as more of a tool to improve those interactions. So, we 222 03:22:40.239 --> 03:22:56.399 are very much focused on uh improving what's happening for children because uh research shows that that's what will help them be ready for school. uh curriculum use as it is noted there is optional uh but strongly encouraged and we'll talk a little bit tomorrow too about part of that change that the board 223 03:22:56.399 --> 03:23:14.239 approved last year as well. Next slide. So when we say that publicly funded programs are required to participate just want to kind of quickly summarize what that means. Uh so again any uh program that receives any type of public dollars uh is required to do three 224 03:23:14.239 --> 03:23:30.640 activities every year. This is an annual system. uh and other programs if they voluntarily choose to participate also have to do these three things. Uh so the first is they use what we call our link B5 data system. Uh they log in there's a registration period every year and they 225 03:23:30.640 --> 03:23:44.960 provide us with very detailed information about their site about their classrooms about their teachers and their child enrollment. And then they also tell us whether or not they are using one of our approved curriculum options um and which uh curriculum they 226 03:23:44.960 --> 03:24:01.600 are using if they are. that helps us uh do a lot with our data and is helping us do even more to link information about educators and classrooms to child outcomes as we move forward. The other two activities are both related to the use of the class tool and these class 227 03:24:01.600 --> 03:24:16.640 observations. So the first is that every eligible classroom which is over 11,000 different classrooms that includes family day homes they are we consider those classrooms uh they must complete what we call two local class observations. They do one in the fall 228 03:24:16.640 --> 03:24:32.800 and one in the spring every year. Um we enter those scores in link B5. Uh we'll talk a little bit in a future slide about ready regions who help coordinate this at the local level. But the important thing here to know is that these are certified and reliable observers. Uh you have to go through a 229 03:24:32.800 --> 03:24:48.160 certification on the class tool. Uh but these are primarily folks that have more of a local connection with sites. So they could be a site leader like a principal, a coordinator, a director who again is there to support not just those observations but ongoing uh 230 03:24:48.160 --> 03:25:04.160 understanding and expertise of the class. So then we also have a way this third activity to ensure the accuracy and the consistency again across these 11,000 classrooms of our state that we call external class observations. Uh these are through an external 231 03:25:04.160 --> 03:25:19.040 contractor. These are more like a third party, more of a researchbased approach where u not only are they certified and reliable, but they have more rigorous standards as far as calibrations and checks that they have to do. Uh and we require all sites to participate in 232 03:25:19.040 --> 03:25:35.840 those at each age level served. So not every classroom gets one, but we have a way to use these for consistency and accuracy checks. So those are the three things that every year our publicly funded programs uh have to do for VQB5. Next slide. 233 03:25:35.840 --> 03:25:51.600 So between those local observations which is about 22,000 a year because again every classroom is getting uh an observation in the fall and the spring and then about 8,000 plus uh external observations. We end up with over 31,000 classroom observations a year and that 234 03:25:51.600 --> 03:26:08.479 is truly a nationleading stat. Uh we don't know of any other state right now that's doing that many observations down to that classroom level. Um and that enables us to give every birth to five educator uh that really specific classroom data that is helping drive 235 03:26:08.479 --> 03:26:25.680 improvement. Uh this includes an annual cycle. Again, this isn't something that happens every three years or every five years as it does in other states. Uh every year they have multiple opportunities to get prepared to understand what they're being measured on, go through that measurement, get their data to guide improvement. They 236 03:26:25.680 --> 03:26:42.319 get individualized feedback. That feedback helps point out what they're doing well and where they can improve. It helps guide them towards different types of support. We have some supports that are state funded for and prioritized for those with lower scores, but there are also other options available to them at the local and 237 03:26:42.319 --> 03:26:58.560 regional level. And then we encourage them to kind of use their data to reflect on what works, make adjustments as they move forward in the cycle. So, it's really it never really stops in our system. It's ongoing uh throughout the year and even over the summer. Next slide. 238 03:26:58.560 --> 03:27:15.200 So to do all this work, uh we could not do this alone at the state level and get to all 11,000 of these classrooms. So uh part of the state law and part of what we learned during our practice stages was to have these local level community networks that developed into what we now 239 03:27:15.200 --> 03:27:31.840 call ready regions and it was added to the state law I believe in either 21 or 22. uh we partner with the Virginia Early Childhood Foundation uh who provides uh that coordination so that these nine regional entities can really understand those local needs uh and they 240 03:27:31.840 --> 03:27:49.359 help these programs complete these VQB5 uh activities. They are responsible for making sure those local observers are certified and reliable and get support to continually strengthen their skills. That's one of the main things they do. but they also have family councils and other things that help uh us grow our 241 03:27:49.359 --> 03:28:05.279 system as well. Um this is a competitive process. So the nine regional entities that are now our ready regions every about four years they go through another competitive process but it is part of the state law to have these nine um entities. 242 03:28:05.279 --> 03:28:21.439 Next slide. So this is uh our VA connects uh data system which we are very excited about. Uh we started with what we called link B5 uh which was really designed for our VQB5 system five six years ago that 243 03:28:21.439 --> 03:28:37.760 captured all of our information about quality that I just talked about. But then as Aaron was just talking about we knew that in order for us to get to the point where we could really link the quality of these classrooms to what children were learning uh we needed a stronger data system to do that. And so 244 03:28:37.760 --> 03:28:53.439 last August we launched VA connects where we uh integrated all three of these data systems. The link B5 data system, the Val system and the VKRP system. Uh so now it's really a birth to eighth grade uh data system. Uh you can 245 03:28:53.439 --> 03:29:10.239 see those numbers there. A lot of users sites classrooms. These are elementary schools, middle schools, and all of our early childhood programs. But this is allowing us to get closer to looking at information. And I'm going to share a little bit of you with you today on kind of what we're starting to see in those 246 03:29:10.239 --> 03:29:26.880 connections between quality and child outcomes. Uh and a lot more to come as we start to look at the longitudinal information of what's happening in our system. Next slide. So uh there we have two slides here. This is similar to what Aaron uh was 247 03:29:26.880 --> 03:29:43.439 just sharing with you about the kindergarten VKRP, but we also have a version of VKRP that's a preschool version. And as you I think they were referencing it's a little bit different. It talks more about measuring bands of growth in some of those skills and it's uh for three and for four year olds. 248 03:29:43.439 --> 03:29:58.560 We're going to look at information on the subtests for four-year-olds. Um this is primarily right now used in our VPI public school classrooms. However, there are some other publicly funded programs that have opted in uh to using VKRP. Our 249 03:29:58.560 --> 03:30:15.040 mixed delivery uses it and we're trying to expand to other uh publicly funded programs. So any VQ any VQB5 program could start to use it as well. What this is looking at on the left is the quality of the class score. And so class is a 1 250 03:30:15.040 --> 03:30:31.359 through seven scale. And so showing kind of different total scores for that class score about the quality of what's happening in those four-year-old classrooms. And then it's breaking apart uh the growth that these four-year-olds had from the fall to the spring. Um and 251 03:30:31.359 --> 03:30:47.200 so if it's orange, it means that they dropped uh from fall to spring. That dark blue is if they grew from fall to spring. So we want to see that dark blue uh is is our goal there for children to grow from fall to spring. And what we're finding in this kind of emerging data 252 03:30:47.200 --> 03:31:03.920 that we're uh Tiierra is working on pulling a lot more of uh is we are seeing a clear connection between the quality of those class scores which means higher quality experiences for children and the growth that's happening in those classrooms. So again even children if they're coming in lower 253 03:31:03.920 --> 03:31:20.080 they're showing that growth uh which ultimately is what we want for those children. So this is looking at math you see that that's true in math. It was true in both the social skills and in the self-regulation skills. We saw more growth when the class score was higher. 254 03:31:20.080 --> 03:31:37.840 On the next slide, uh similar uh but this is that Val's literacy assessment that you were hearing about. Again, this is the four-year-old version uh but similar types of uh literacy skills. You can see there's more skills that are looked at uh from the literacy level, but again across the board uh some even 255 03:31:37.840 --> 03:31:54.640 more than others dramatically. uh you can see that there's more growth in those four-year-olds from fall to spring when the class score was higher. Uh particularly letter names, namew writing, a lot more growth in those higher quality classrooms. So again, we know it's important to get children into 256 03:31:54.640 --> 03:32:11.439 our publicly funded uh programs, but we also know that the quality of those experiences is making a difference. And we're excited to be able to bring you some of this data now, but there's a lot more of this that's just starting to emerge as well. So, I'm going to shift gears into the 257 03:32:11.439 --> 03:32:28.239 profiles, but anything about those two slides that we just shared before we shift gears. >> Okay. >> I I would just say, and I I know you guys are going to get tired of hearing this um from me, but nobody in the country has data like this at scale, 258 03:32:28.239 --> 03:32:45.200 right? That basically this is across thousands of classrooms. It shows you both the importance of improving those interactions and it also shows you if you look for example at the literacy where we're not seeing that growth right so we've really been getting the f the system to focus for example in the last 259 03:32:45.200 --> 03:33:00.560 year on expressive comprehension and that is you know that is a very sophisticated skill for four-year-olds right you are you have as an educator you need to ask open-ended questions you need to not uh immediately you know cut the child off you need to get the child 260 03:33:00.560 --> 03:33:16.640 to sort of your what trying to do is get the child to put together multiple sentences, right? Using more sophisticated vocabulary and to kind of understand that that's an area, for example, right, that we really have to focus really represents uh at a systems 261 03:33:16.640 --> 03:33:32.880 level to be able to hone in not only on more broadly is this quality or not, but what are the specific skills that our educators need additional supports to work on across a very big system. Okay, >> Mr. Robinson. 262 03:33:32.880 --> 03:33:49.920 >> Given that this is a nationleading effort, I I commend the testing the theory of change, testing the hypothesis by actually measuring whether the class scores result in the these things. And it it just leads to curiosity. I know in the later slides we'll kind of break down quality a little bit more, but um 263 03:33:49.920 --> 03:34:06.319 as I look at, you know, uh here the ones where the scores dropped, scores remain the same, scores grew. great data to show that the scores result in uh better student readiness. Do you have a rough breakdown of like what percentage of um 264 03:34:06.319 --> 03:34:23.600 uh classrooms fall into each of these buckets? I know it will I know it will change based on indicator, but that might help me interpret the data a little better. for the classrooms that fall into the class score like >> what what percent of classrooms have their class score ban drop versus which 265 03:34:23.600 --> 03:34:40.239 percentage have their their band grow um you know etc. It's just you know obviously we we want to see more with the band growing and and and just curious kind of where we our baseline data knowing that no other state has this baseline data um could help for the 266 03:34:40.239 --> 03:34:55.600 future. >> My guess is we probably want to send that to you via a followup. We can give you all those percent. We have a whole deck on that. So, yeah. But that >> we absolutely have it and uh can can figure out how to get it to you. 267 03:34:55.600 --> 03:35:10.720 >> That's very exciting. Uh and I forgot to mention too with the class tool itself, it also breaks down teacher child interactions into interactions that focus more on emotional and social development on classroom organization and instructional support. And so we're also in fact I was just asking Tiara do 268 03:35:10.720 --> 03:35:28.160 we have information that shows when those different domains score are of different scores and how is that impacting quality as well. So all of that is in the works. >> Exciting. Thank you. >> Awesome. Let's go to the next uh I think you can go forward two slides there. Um 269 03:35:28.160 --> 03:35:44.319 so uh we are very uh excited about our second full year of implementation. Uh so this past fall was our second year of publicly releasing our VQB5 quality profiles. We had a couple practice years uh during COVID. Uh and then uh we 270 03:35:44.319 --> 03:36:00.880 developed this new website called early childhoodquality.girginia.gov. Uh so this past fall there and currently if you go to this website you'd find 3,293 quality profiles. Um these profiles are similar in the sense to the K12 profiles 271 03:36:00.880 --> 03:36:18.000 where they measure for the year and then we publish the results uh based on that previous year. So we will have new results every year that go out in the fall. Um this website when we made this slide had been viewed 190,000 times but it is now over 200,000 uh times. Uh it 272 03:36:18.000 --> 03:36:33.279 is getting a lot of attention and views and we track that and we're very excited about that. uh it can be used to find individual site information and to find the their overall rating, their interactions and their curriculum, kind of a summary of their performance. It 273 03:36:33.279 --> 03:36:48.720 also shares information about the type of public funding that they receive and then it links to the health and safety information that our licensing team has. Um so we uh as uh Superintendent Conway refers to it a lot, it's kind of a one-stop portal for families to connect 274 03:36:48.720 --> 03:37:05.359 health, safety, and quality. Next slide. So, I'm going to share a couple slides on the results uh from our first two years and sort of the change we saw um over time. Uh you also have a handout that goes into a little bit more detail here and breaks it down by our ready 275 03:37:05.359 --> 03:37:22.000 regions. So, in this uh second year, this was our first time to really compare the quality results from one year to the next through our full implementation. Um again, we had 172 more sites that got a quality profile that second year. So a 6% increase. Uh 276 03:37:22.000 --> 03:37:38.720 during our second year of measurement, 99% of sites met or exceeded the state's quality expectations. That was uh similar to the first year, but slightly higher uh which was 98%. Uh in the second year, we had fewer sites in that lowest rating that we call needs support 277 03:37:38.720 --> 03:37:55.680 um than the previous year. So there were 51 sites the first year and 25 uh in the second year. Those were not the same sites. So, all of those sites that had a need support rating the first year moved out of need support, but then there were 25 sites who fell into that bottom level 278 03:37:55.680 --> 03:38:13.200 of that second year. Um, some of those stats, keep those in mind because as we present our proposed changes tomorrow, we'll refer back to uh this information that kind of led us to proposing a change. Next slide. So when we see and hear in our data that 279 03:38:13.200 --> 03:38:29.840 99% of sites are meeting or exceeding the state's expectations, we wanted to take a closer look at this data to better understand sort of the variations of quality. So what this is showing is on the the top and those boxes are those three big broad bands 25 in need 280 03:38:29.840 --> 03:38:46.399 support. those sites are required to have very intensive uh improvement support in order to maintain their public dollars through uh intensive coaching and monitoring. Um and then we have uh 101 at that top level which is currently called exceeds expectations 281 03:38:46.399 --> 03:39:03.439 and then really all the other sites are falling into this very broad meets expectations. So what we did is we broke it down by 100 point intervals because we notice that each of those 100 points represents a shift in the quality of what children are experiencing. And there's a pretty big difference we have 282 03:39:03.439 --> 03:39:20.319 started to notice uh when we look closely at the data between a site that's getting a 400 uh up to a site that's getting a 699. So those 400 to 499 we consider on the lower end of meets expectations. a 600 to 699 is on the higher end of meets 283 03:39:20.319 --> 03:39:37.600 expectations. The quality profiles do show the actual three-digit score. Um, but we also recognize that that can sometimes be a little confusing to understand the three-digit score as opposed to seeing that you're basically meeting expectations and all of these 3000 programs are in that same category. 284 03:39:37.600 --> 03:39:54.319 So, this side in particular will be uh helpful to refresh your memory on as we talk tomorrow. Next slide. Um, another thing that we were really interested in better understanding was the quality across our different site types. Uh, and so we were really pleased 285 03:39:54.319 --> 03:40:09.680 to see that when we look at our highest performing uh, scores within family day homes, childcare centers, and public schools, uh, we saw high performing sites in all three of these site types. So, there was a very high performing uh, family day home, just one point lower 286 03:40:09.680 --> 03:40:24.960 than a public school, the second highest performing site in the state. Uh the first year actually the highest performing was a family day home. So that was consistent from our first two years. Uh we had high performing child care centers and high performing public schools. Uh but then you can see by the 287 03:40:24.960 --> 03:40:40.080 blue bar as well that there's quite a range. Uh we also had very low performing family day homes, lower performing childcare centers and some lower performing public schools as well. So the biggest range is in those family day homes. The lowest uh to the highest 288 03:40:40.080 --> 03:40:56.560 uh was a family day home. uh but we see a variation in all three site types. This is really important because uh quality can't be dictated by the type of the program that it is. We really have to go in watch what children are experiencing. Uh these class 289 03:40:56.560 --> 03:41:12.560 observations are not a quick check. They are 60 to 80 minutes of us watching what children are actually experiencing. Uh and that's helped show us that these quality experiences can happen in a variety of settings. And as Erin talked about earlier, we know families rely on different types of settings uh for their 290 03:41:12.560 --> 03:41:29.359 care needs as well. >> I I know I'm not supposed to interrupt. No, I know you love this slide on the on this slide um that I want to just about to say for the for the board. I think the first is >> again this idea of changing hearts and 291 03:41:29.359 --> 03:41:46.399 minds around judging a a building or judging a book by its cover, right? in this and it is it is so important when you think about uh child care and family child care in particular who those educators are the history of that in this country that saying that they are 292 03:41:46.399 --> 03:42:02.399 quality and being able to show evidence of that at scale is incredibly incredibly powerful. I think this the second and I learned this from a community leader in New Orleans many years ago is one of the most important roles of this body of the board of 293 03:42:02.399 --> 03:42:17.279 education is to think about those kids and families who are furthest from opportunity. And so by raising the floor, by getting that blue bar higher over your work, it means that if you have to rely on a public dollar, which 294 03:42:17.279 --> 03:42:33.359 is by design a family in need, that you get to choose quality, right? And that there could be maybe potentially no more important work that this this board does in early childhood than that. Um, so this is not only about aligning choices 295 03:42:33.359 --> 03:42:50.399 to family need, but ultimately saying, and again, most states still have optional measurement systems where you parents just don't know what they don't know. But if this board can get that blue bar, that number up. So whether you ch all that's in your community is family child care or child care or 296 03:42:50.399 --> 03:43:06.239 school-based program. But to know that no matter what you picked, it's of a sufficient level of quality is a is uh the single most important thing that this board can do in the in the space of early childhood. >> Awesome. Thank you. Next slide. 297 03:43:06.239 --> 03:43:21.279 So another piece that we were interested in in our second year was looking at change over time. And so what this slide is looking at is uh something we've identified again as somewhat of a challenge uh that our proposal uh will address um is looking specifically at 298 03:43:21.279 --> 03:43:36.479 those interaction points and that does make up the majority of their quality rating. Um and that's comes from the class scores averaged altogether from the classrooms at those sites and for sites that were returning and that was most of the sites. 299 03:43:36.479 --> 03:43:53.199 There were about a little over 200 that were new to VQB5, but most had uh participated both years. Uh we saw about 53% of them that grew, and that means they grew by either one point or more in their interaction points. Uh a small percentage that actually stayed the same. Uh and then 46% whose interaction 300 03:43:53.199 --> 03:44:09.040 points again went down, which means that they went down by one point or more. Um we were glad that it was a little over uh half that showed growth, but ultimately we want that number uh to be much higher. And so our goal is to have really all programs as much as possible 301 03:44:09.040 --> 03:44:24.080 showing that growth or if you're already at those highest levels that you're maintaining those highest levels as well. Um I think there's some stats uh within either the handout or in the appendix that talks a little bit more about sort of the range. So the most common growth was just about a 302 03:44:24.080 --> 03:44:40.560 threepoint kind of a modest growth. Um the most uh kind of the typical was to move up or down about 20 or 30 points. There were also a few sites that had uh you know hundred or more points that they grew and that's not from their curriculum uh points but truly just from 303 03:44:40.560 --> 03:44:56.960 improving their class scores or declining. So we're also able to take a closer look and find out why were some programs uh improving? What can we learn from those and why did some programs decline so that we can better understand and support them as well. 304 03:44:56.960 --> 03:45:13.680 >> Next slide. Did you entertain a question? >> Yeah, >> I have a question. So for church schools, religiously exempt organizations, is am I correct that they're only participating if they're volunteering to participate 305 03:45:13.680 --> 03:45:30.479 or if somehow there is some I would normally think that they would not necessarily have public funding. So just can you explain to me what the difference is as it relates to psych performance and 306 03:45:30.479 --> 03:45:47.279 >> whether they get to participate in meeting expectations >> y >> or not. >> So a religiousexempt program can become a subsidy vendor an approved subsidy vendor and so we do have some religious exempt programs if they are an approved subsidy vendor uh that they are required 307 03:45:47.279 --> 03:46:01.760 to participate. So that's a fair amount, not all of them. And then there are a few that just choose to voluntarily participate, but a a religious exempt site can become uh approved subsidy vendor. >> Subsidy. Okay. 308 03:46:01.760 --> 03:46:19.040 >> Okay. Great. >> So another uh new piece from this past fall was honor roles. Uh and so this was a way for us to kind of uh in addition to the overall ratings kind of highlight some different aspects that we feel are really important to our system. Uh so we 309 03:46:19.040 --> 03:46:35.279 looked at awarding honor roles in three key categories. Uh the first was to look at overall excellence. Uh for programs to get to that 700 to 800 range is uh quite an achievement. It truly is a national exemplar level of class scores 310 03:46:35.279 --> 03:46:50.720 uh that you just don't see very often. And so we wanted to make sure that we were recognizing those sites that were in uh that excellence top rating with honor roles as well. And you can see 101 total sites uh got that honor role and that included centers, family day homes 311 03:46:50.720 --> 03:47:07.120 and again public schools. Uh the second category was improvement. So we want we are a measurement and an improvement system and so we wanted to recognize programs that showed significant improvement. Uh they may have not gotten to those higher levels but they showed improvement. and again specifically in 312 03:47:07.120 --> 03:47:22.560 their class scores. Um it wasn't just that they got some points for using a curriculum. So we looked at the returning sites again the sites that were there for more than one year and the top 10% of improvement in their class scores and that was 294 sites. Uh 313 03:47:22.560 --> 03:47:38.160 that was about a 63 point improvement is what ended up being about 10%. Uh and again that included a lot of centers, family day homes and some public schools. And then the third category is really just for child care centers and family day homes uh that are serving our 314 03:47:38.160 --> 03:47:54.720 infants and toddlers. Again, it's the most expensive type of care uh to provide. We know there's huge weight list and for those that are doing it well, we wanted to really recognize uh those programs. So, we looked at their uh interactions and class scores specifically in those infant and toddler 315 03:47:54.720 --> 03:48:09.680 classrooms. They may have also served preschool, but we were looking at where they were um how they were doing in those infant and toddler classrooms and looked at the top 10%. And so there were 216 uh programs that got the top infant toddler quality uh both centers and 316 03:48:09.680 --> 03:48:25.359 family day homes. These honoral sites get an additional certificate that they can display in addition to their ratings. Uh they're also the profile has a little icon on it to indicate that they were an honoral site. uh and our ready regions help us celebrate them which I think on the next slide actually 317 03:48:25.359 --> 03:48:41.359 we have a few pictures of some of the many many pictures that were shared on social media. Uh again these are not just honoral sites but the honoral sites in particular seem to really want to highlight and celebrate uh the recognition that they were receiving. Uh 318 03:48:41.359 --> 03:48:58.239 so we saw lots of posts like these where they were uh highlighting their achievement. sites also get a certificate for their rating and so we also see sites that are just uh excited and promoting their quality achievements. Uh so we're really encouraging this uh and love seeing uh these additional uh photos and ways to 319 03:48:58.239 --> 03:49:13.760 celebrate this too. Next slide. Uh so a big goal of our system is to make sure that this information is available to families. That's also part of our state law. Uh so we are really trying to work on not just having these 320 03:49:13.760 --> 03:49:29.600 profiles available but using it in a way to help families understand what's important in early childhood programs. So all of our sites are required each year to inform families that they are participating in VQB5. We have a flyer that you see there on this slide called 321 03:49:29.600 --> 03:49:45.760 VQB5 for families that kind of breaks it down to what VQB5 is. Uh what does sites have to do? What is class? What is a quality curriculum? Uh and then we have other resources that we've developed to help our sites uh leaders in our ready regions help promote this with families. 322 03:49:45.760 --> 03:50:01.520 So uh we have a PowerPoint template that a site could use if they wanted to do an info session for families. We have tips for how they can promote their quality rating not just on uh social media but in newsletters on their website in other ways. Uh we have a whole toolkit on 323 03:50:01.520 --> 03:50:17.439 student child list which is part of how they inform families uh because we are looking at child level information. So that has some letter templates that they can send to families and then the website itself has some FAQs which will continue to expand based on uh feedback 324 03:50:17.439 --> 03:50:33.680 that we get from the field. Um every year we also go to our ready region family councils and we share the information and tools that we have for families and they help give us feedback uh on our tools and resources and give us some suggestions on either the wording that we have or perhaps some new 325 03:50:33.680 --> 03:50:48.399 tools. So we're in the process of developing even more resources for families. Next slide. So just a couple slides here to wrap up our time today about our current year participation and that'll lead us in 326 03:50:48.399 --> 03:51:06.319 nicely to tomorrow's uh session. Uh so you can go to the next slide. So we have just about the same number of sites that are currently participating in VQB5. Uh we continue to be really proud that we have sites in every city and county in Virginia. Uh and these are 327 03:51:06.319 --> 03:51:21.600 the sites that are participating right now, the childcare centers, the family day homes, the head starts, the public school preschools, uh that are in the process of getting their class observations done and entering information about their curriculum and they will receive their 2526 quality 328 03:51:21.600 --> 03:51:38.720 rating in the fall of 2026 as well. The map just kind of gives you a a quick snapshot. you can kind of see our heavily populated uh areas but really proud that there are sites all across the state in centers, family day homes and public schools. Head Start uh sometimes folks ask they are primarily 329 03:51:38.720 --> 03:51:54.560 the depending on how they are funded and organized either through centers or public schools primarily. I think there's a few family day homes that get some Head Start funding uh but Head Starts are captured in those numbers as well. Uh and then our last slide is definitely 330 03:51:54.560 --> 03:52:09.199 a celebration of a lot of hard work uh from our team, but really even more from our ready regions and our local observers all across the state. Uh Tiara and her data team have been closely watching our class observation numbers since our first two practice years. And 331 03:52:09.199 --> 03:52:24.800 this past fall, uh we uh uh got to that over 100,000 class observation level. And you can see most of those are local observations which means again this is by people who understand the class tool at the local level and can really help 332 03:52:24.800 --> 03:52:41.760 provide that kind of ongoing support uh to programs as well. Now the number alone is exciting but uh we did the math uh and again these observations are about 60 to 80 minutes. So this represents uh 7.6 6 million minutes of insight into what infants, toddlers, and 333 03:52:41.760 --> 03:52:57.920 preschoolers have been experiencing in Virginia over the last 5 years. And it's those insights and us better understanding what they're experiencing is helping us give better feedback to educators so that they understand what they're doing well and where they can get a little bit better to even 334 03:52:57.920 --> 03:53:13.760 strengthen those uh highquality learning interactions. So with that, I will pause. Uh we are looking forward tomorrow to sharing with you uh the feedback that we've received from the field in addition to the data that we shared today and then our proposal for a couple revisions to our 335 03:53:13.760 --> 03:53:31.120 system. >> Thanks Superintendent Conway. >> Uh thank you Chris. Thank you Aaron. Thank you to the early childhood team. Another thank you if they're listening to the Early Childhood Foundation and their formidable leader Kathy Glazer who 336 03:53:31.120 --> 03:53:48.239 has been instrumental in this work uh since the law was passed as well as our nine ready regions uh who have led this work and their communities, our partners at the new E3 uh for their leading work around VKRP and literacy and our 337 03:53:48.239 --> 03:54:05.520 partners uh at UBA and our other higher ed institutions who've helped make this possible. It truly is a public private research policy partnership effort across the Commonwealth. Um our folks are the ones who get lucky enough to present it. Um but it reflects a 338 03:54:05.520 --> 03:54:20.880 tremendous amount of work by individuals. Last but not least, uh to all of our early childhood educators who are out there probably now getting ready for nap time. Um and so did were not able to watch this. uh but uh they are 339 03:54:20.880 --> 03:54:36.960 the real difference makers. As you can see, this just represents a tremendous amount of change for a sector um that uh already faces a lot of challenges including during um the pandemic. But but to be able to recognize this sector, 340 03:54:36.960 --> 03:54:53.040 to recognize them as educators regardless of the setting in which they worked, to recognize them as highquality educators regardless of the credential and the opportunities that they may have had. um is just a a tremendous privilege uh of of our team and of the folks here 341 03:54:53.040 --> 03:55:07.600 in this room. >> Great. Thanks, Superintendent Conway. Just a couple of questions, Mr. McFerson. >> Yes. So, as it relates to the programs for the the I like to call them the toddlers. Um can you tell me what the 342 03:55:07.600 --> 03:55:24.160 average number of hours are for the programs? Is there average hour? And is there are there materials that talk about the division of time? Like are we given in a 4-hour day are we given one hour of instruction, one hour nap or two 343 03:55:24.160 --> 03:55:39.920 hours of naps or an hour play just is there a model that we pattern. >> Yeah. So um you're you've got uh depending on how they're funded, there are different expectations. So for example, Head Start only pays for a 344 03:55:39.920 --> 03:55:55.920 proportion of the year. child care subsidy might go up to full day, full year. I'll ask Chris to talk a little bit about the toddler tool. What we try to focus in on is that is that kind of morning period where so we don't you know we don't want to get the beginning 345 03:55:55.920 --> 03:56:12.640 of the day where everybody's coming in. We don't want to get the end of the day where it's probably more just kind of free play. But the toddler tool kind of in what it lays out kind of gives you a sense of what we're looking for. It's important to note that the teacher child interaction measure can be used across 346 03:56:12.640 --> 03:56:29.680 different curriculum. So the spe the specific curriculum whether you choose to use stream and three which is the state's kind of open educational resource or you choose to use a commercial product or if you're a faith-based program and you've sent us your curriculum and we've reviewed it that kind of lays out the specifics of 347 03:56:29.680 --> 03:56:45.680 that. But I'll ask Chris to talk briefly about kind of what the toddler tool measures and that'll give you a sense of what we're looking for. So the toddler tool is the one we most frequently use with mixed stage settings as well in family day homes. And when it's measuring both the emotional supportive interactions and more of the 348 03:56:45.680 --> 03:57:01.279 learning focused types of interactions. It's also gathering information about the activities that are happening throughout the day. So it could be happening when they're playing on the floor, when they're feeding them, when they're diapering them. uh it's really meant to capture uh interactions of a 349 03:57:01.279 --> 03:57:18.239 variety of types of regular routines since we know our littlest learners actually learn a lot from when they're eating and you're talking with them and having conversations. Um we with the class tool we can kind of track some of that and look at the activities that they're doing like how many of these observations happen during a meal time, 350 03:57:18.239 --> 03:57:34.800 how many happen during a free play time, how many happen during more of an instructional activity and then we also gather the content. In fact, Tiara and I were just talking about some of that, like was it sort of a literacy activity or an art activity or a math activity? Uh, and starting to look more at the 351 03:57:34.800 --> 03:57:50.479 connections between the activities that are happening in the class scores. And that's part of that this kind of early uh look that we're uh doing right now. >> Good to know. No, that's good to know. >> Yeah, it's important to note that it looks so very different for toddlers 352 03:57:50.479 --> 03:58:06.000 than for older grades, right? So there are no worksheets, there are no desks, right? And so it could if you walk in there as a as a high school educator, you might say, "This is chaotic." Um, uh, and very loud and there's a lot of 353 03:58:06.000 --> 03:58:20.960 touching and there's inevitably there's going to be tears. Like you're not going to observe an hour and a half in a toddler classroom and not have tears, right? And that and what the what the tool does and why the evidence basis and the research basis on the tool is so important is that it figures out what 354 03:58:20.960 --> 03:58:36.960 matters most for kid learning without trying to sort of but by being sort of age and developmentally appropriate right so what we measure from the teacher is not do you prevent tears I mean good luck right for preventing tears right when one three-year-old takes another three-year-old's magnetile 355 03:58:36.960 --> 03:58:54.160 they're going to be feelings and they're going to be tears but it's more on how is the affect of the teacher Is the teacher scanning the room and figuring out who's about to take somebody else's thing, right? Is the teacher then responding and helping both parties work through that, right? Um, 356 03:58:54.160 --> 03:59:11.040 think about kind of the the response to that, getting both children, you've heard the phrase, to use their words. Ida, when you took my magnetile, it made me very very mad, right? And I say, but I really want that magnetile because it's purple and it's my favorite color. um and then sort of thinking about how 357 03:59:11.040 --> 03:59:28.160 they're sort of shaping the day. And as you get younger, it is less about all right guys, like we're doing, you know, this it might be centers and you're letting the kids have choice around which centers and then you're responding. So it's a it's a really detailed tool. Um but it is it is meant 358 03:59:28.160 --> 03:59:45.359 for babies and toddlers and preschoolers. Um and it again allows across all these different setters settings rather to maintain rigor but also offer flexibility. >> Okay. Thanks. >> So I'm going to go to Dr. Wilson and Robinson and then Dr. Norm. 359 03:59:45.359 --> 04:00:00.399 >> Thank you all again. Thank you again. Um so an observation and then a question. Uh, I love seeing pictures of kids >> and so the social media posts and those screenshots, fantastic seeing kids. Um, because you that's how you know when 360 04:00:00.399 --> 04:00:15.680 you're doing good work. Um, this slide here, I'm glad that you talked about the local observation because I was wondering, you know, who is actually conducting the observations. I heard you say the local kind of those folks who are right there but I'm interested in 361 04:00:15.680 --> 04:00:32.880 knowing who might be some external observers like what is the profile of that individual who would be an external observer. >> Sure. So I'll talk about the local first. Uh there's over a thousand local observers across the state. So it's a more diverse pool of folks. Uh we try to 362 04:00:32.880 --> 04:00:48.560 get as many site leaders themselves to get certified and reliable in the tool uh so that they have the expertise to do these observations and support teachers. So we do have some principles, some site directors, uh VPI coordinators, uh do them head start directors. Uh our ready 363 04:00:48.560 --> 04:01:05.279 regions then can also hire contracted uh observers again to try to find folks in the community and in those areas. A lot of times they try to find somebody who has experience with family day home providers uh and who understands those contexts and then occasionally they use uh some of their own staffing uh to do 364 04:01:05.279 --> 04:01:21.279 the observations. So they all have to become certified and reliable in the tool. Uh but they can have a variety of kind of working relationships with them. And then the ready regions kind of watch their data and their trends compared to the external. Uh and when they need 365 04:01:21.279 --> 04:01:37.359 support, they step in and they support them with strengthening their skills or offer different trainings to kind of keep their observation skills. The external observers are a much smaller core group. It's about 140 uh statewide contractors uh that are more again of 366 04:01:37.359 --> 04:01:53.040 third party. They cannot have a working relationship with the site. There's a strict conflict of interest policy. Uh in addition to becoming certified and reliable, they have additional double coding calibrations monthly and higher actually levels of pass rates that we 367 04:01:53.040 --> 04:02:09.279 look at to keep them kind of as rigorous as possible. uh they can again we look for folks who have some education background but ultimately we look for folks who can be very objective and follow the class manual and have good reliable uh results on that tool. >> Thank you. That's helpful. 368 04:02:09.279 --> 04:02:25.439 >> And just for clarification, so in order to be certified, it's it's not a paper test. It's you actually have to watch >> four videos and score reliably. So it's very much a practical observation tool rather than a multiple choice test. >> And you have to renew it every year. I 369 04:02:25.439 --> 04:02:42.239 just did my infant this last weekend. I renew all three uh every every year as well. Um so it is just becoming certified alone, but then there are additional pieces that we uh do to maintain kind of the integrity of the system. >> Thank you, Mr. Robinson. 370 04:02:42.239 --> 04:02:59.600 >> Again, just uh incredible gratitude for equipping us with this information to be partners to educators across Virginia and and lifting that blue bar. It's such a great call to action for us and I'm just curious to help educate us further in what you're learning about the theory of change related to the curriculum. So 371 04:02:59.600 --> 04:03:16.160 I I understand that uh the the measurement more focuses on interactions and you get a higher score if you're using curriculum, but we we now have data that we've never had on whether that theory of change how it proves out whether having the approved curricula 372 04:03:16.160 --> 04:03:31.439 results in th those higher interactions. and you know so so I know tomorrow is more about the now what but to help prepare us for that what what are you learning about um the use of approved curricula and how that and the impact that has 373 04:03:31.439 --> 04:03:48.960 >> you have yeah we have looked at that um so a couple things that we noticed we looked at just the reported use of curriculum and compared to the class scores uh and we did see overall that the classrooms that supported using and approved curriculum had higher class scores we also broke it down by the age 374 04:03:48.960 --> 04:04:06.479 level and the domains. And what what I found particularly interesting was that uh if they reported using a curriculum, it didn't have as much of an impact on the more emotional supportive interactions, but it did have higher class scores on those more instructional focused domains and dimensions. And so 375 04:04:06.479 --> 04:04:22.560 that seemed to be where having that curriculum using it more effectively makes the biggest difference. We also noticed that in our lower performing sites, there's much less use of approved curriculum and even those that are reporting using it are not using it as effectively as they could. So part of 376 04:04:22.560 --> 04:04:38.399 the coaching and support they receive is to how do you use it to support those higher quality interactions as well? What would you add? >> Um and and we'll cover a little bit more about this tomorrow also. Um but you know I think the the focus on curriculum 377 04:04:38.399 --> 04:04:54.720 in VQB5 is distinct especially when we think about it across site type. Um so this is one area where prior to VQB5 the use of curriculum looked very different. um at the very earliest data we had 378 04:04:54.720 --> 04:05:10.800 looked very different in our family day homes versus our public schools who were all using curricula most of which is now on our approved list compared to the family day homes where the uptake in that was very um limited u I'm not sure if we have this chart included tomorrow 379 04:05:10.800 --> 04:05:28.080 or not but the growth we can find it uh the growth in our family day homes and child care program specifically in achieving that goal of using one uh curriculum and one classroom, one age group to get those points has been huge, right? And I think that that um is an 380 04:05:28.080 --> 04:05:44.399 important milestone for us in our theory of change for how to get people on board with curriculum. If you haven't thought about it and you're not a teacher who has been traditionally using curriculum, that could be a very scary um premise, right? Um, but now, and we'll talk about 381 04:05:44.399 --> 04:05:59.439 this a little bit more tomorrow, we're really working to integrate that um, and help help all classrooms and all settings see the value of that in in every age group. >> The uh, important piece to note, I should note, there is one other state 382 04:05:59.439 --> 04:06:15.359 that doesn't do as many observations overall, but per capita does as many observations, and it happens to be Louisiana. um uh where you have a similar model that is now uh has more than than 10 years of impact. Part of 383 04:06:15.359 --> 04:06:31.520 the original drivers, Mr. Robinson of including curriculum is that when this similar model was rolled out in Louisiana um after a few years of the measuring only interactions child care actually came to Aaron and myself and 384 04:06:31.520 --> 04:06:48.560 said we need a resource for our educators who are not traditionally trained in educator prep but they can do the warm and responsive they've begun to reorganize how they uh think about the day but the idea of intentional learning and how to do that in a developmentally 385 04:06:48.560 --> 04:07:04.239 and age appropriate way. Like we need a resource. And so at that point in Louisiana, it was not part of the measurement system, but we began to fund programs to use it. And so then when we had the opportunity to develop a system here in Virginia at the outset, we 386 04:07:04.239 --> 04:07:20.479 recognized that that was likely to happen. I as Aaron noted, I think fewer than 40% of family childcare even use any form of curriculum in the beginning. And so we created a simple incentive to participate as these folks will talk about tomorrow. We are uh increasing 387 04:07:20.479 --> 04:07:36.640 that. But the idea is about the coherence so that you're going to start to see if you effectively use curriculum across a variety of kind of quality choices there that um you'll see a more positive score in terms of the 388 04:07:36.640 --> 04:07:51.279 instructional support and that encourages you to use the curriculum more. um uh and trying to kind of build that cycle uh as part of the theory of change. It takes time. Um uh and so you know we we we know we've tried to kind 389 04:07:51.279 --> 04:08:07.359 of pace all of these changes. uh again Head Start and BPI have been using curriculum for years and for there we're about actually how we're using the child level data to think differently about your interactions and how using your curriculum versus it's a kind of more uh 390 04:08:07.359 --> 04:08:23.600 differentiated approach for family child and childcare just starting to introduce and support the continual use of of curriculum. >> Dr. Norom hopefully this will be quick. I'm just piggybacking on this external observers. I let us on slide 40 and you 391 04:08:23.600 --> 04:08:40.479 guys have explained this before and I've uh just forgot. So tell me again how their scores get replaced if there's something inconsistent and how that kind of plays out. >> Yeah. So uh we basically we get enough external observations so that we can compare local and local and external in 392 04:08:40.479 --> 04:08:56.319 the same observation window. So if uh teacher A's classroom has a local observation in the fall and we have an external observation, we compare those two scores and we look for domain level consistency. So depending again on the age level, there's different domains, 393 04:08:56.319 --> 04:09:12.080 but we look for scores that are within one point uh consistent. And that's um the same way the class tool reliability works. You have to be within one point uh to be reliable. So if the scores are consistent, we keep the local scores. Our goal is to have as much autonomy on 394 04:09:12.080 --> 04:09:28.640 those scores uh to have those strong observers at the local level. But if the scores are um inconsistent, more than a point difference, we replace that domain score with the external score. Uh so the stats I believe here uh talk about over half of these observations were fully 395 04:09:28.640 --> 04:09:44.080 consistent, had no replacement at all, and we're seeing more consistency each year. In fact, in the practice years, we only had 39% consistent. So they are getting more consistent which is our goal. Um and then when we do a replacement it's typically just in one 396 04:09:44.080 --> 04:10:00.239 area. So it's a mix of some local and external scores. It's very rare to have a full replacement but if that happens we we take a close look at it with our ready regions to see how we can support those observers. >> Are there any other questions? Yes, Dr. Bridges. 397 04:10:00.239 --> 04:10:16.239 >> Thank you so much. Echoing the kudos to the team on this. It's really incredible work. I hope I'm not the only person that was thinking about ways that lessons learned and and the fact that you've got a truly comprehensive and coherent system of accountability and 398 04:10:16.239 --> 04:10:32.080 support that drives towards continual improvement um the things that we could do at K12 um in that direction um to really build that same coherence. I know they're very different um I don't want to say animals but you know they're very 399 04:10:32.080 --> 04:10:47.920 different uh sectors but there that the system design that has gone on here there are plenty of lessons uh to be had my question about this system in particular is I know less than nothing about prek and early childhood but the 400 04:10:47.920 --> 04:11:03.840 bit I do know is around the research around early childhood and segregation and then some nent research on on that impact on on even CLA class scores. Um, and so I'm wondering, you know, are are you able to break things down to at 401 04:11:03.840 --> 04:11:20.399 least shine a spotlight on whether or not that's happening in Virginia in terms of looking at um uh not just the types of centers, but the demographic makeups uh socioeconomic and racial? >> That's a a great a great question. So 402 04:11:20.399 --> 04:11:36.479 part of the importance of VA connects is helping to uh again because this is at scale right um that to really think through what are all the factors impacting children and then students uh 403 04:11:36.479 --> 04:11:52.960 kind of within the classroom but also what do we also know about those those those children uh those students those educators and and their uh communities right so for example uh across these different settings and we didn't even really touch on workforce today, but you 404 04:11:52.960 --> 04:12:09.680 have very different expectations around preparation and very different structures around compensation which still makes sort of this structure and coherence you know in some ways near miraculous. Um what um the reason we asked the team to share 405 04:12:09.680 --> 04:12:26.560 that data upfront about the kind of the different settings is because all of that is in play. So as a society we face a dilemma between we want to prioritize kids and families in greatest need, right? Those who can't otherwise afford child care. Inadvertently what that does 406 04:12:26.560 --> 04:12:42.720 is end up concentrating kids and families in greatest need. And so you end up with in sort of our Head Start and our Virginia preschool initiative classrooms that tend to be more demographically similar, whether that's socioeconomics, that's um language, whether that's 407 04:12:42.720 --> 04:12:58.800 that's race, right? And so your tradeoff is we might get a more so economic diverse class but then we also want to prioritize to the point that uh that that that um Miss Witherspoon made earlier around you know if we have scarce dollars they should go towards 408 04:12:58.800 --> 04:13:13.199 those in greatest need and so there are some trends around looking at segregation that is uh partly about uh kind of communities and history but is also partly about prioritizing families and children in greatest need. Uh part 409 04:13:13.199 --> 04:13:29.120 of why we have uh in a very bipartisan way tried to kind of get folks more interested in funding the child care subsidy program is that provides more opportunity for socioeconomic diversity, right? because you can take that that 410 04:13:29.120 --> 04:13:45.040 childcare scholarship or voucher or kind of uh wherever uh including with sort of a set of privately funded kids who might um look different and represent a different uh uh language linguistic competency or a different socioeconomic 411 04:13:45.040 --> 04:14:02.239 um background. And so it looks Dr. Bridg is different across our programs. I think as we get more and more data, we are working really closely with programs to understand uh and work with parents to get even parents who are not publicly funded to opt in and include their 412 04:14:02.239 --> 04:14:18.479 information on the child list. So we can understand as we capture which kids are in which classrooms the positive benefit of those high quality interactions and then what does that mean for the children who are receiving public dollars and what does that mean for the other children. It's 413 04:14:18.479 --> 04:14:33.439 always a choice whether or not you want to be a part of that. But by capturing some of that data, it will actually help us understand particularly when those children enter uh kindergarten kind of what that what that all means. The the the challenge is we got to wait for time. We got to wait for the kids to 414 04:14:33.439 --> 04:14:48.640 move through the system to enter our K12 system and then we'll see that. But VA connects um creates that infrastructure to look at all sorts of issues that go beyond just that uh immediate classroom quality. 415 04:14:48.640 --> 04:15:04.000 Yep. Miss McFerson. All right. So, using as a base that obviously having interaction in a a school setting K through five is important as it relates 416 04:15:04.000 --> 04:15:21.199 to not having one. Far more important. Okay. So, as we go forward, if you would let us know why you're finding that even though some kids have been exposed to having that, they're still struggling to get to the K to the 417 04:15:21.199 --> 04:15:38.560 third grade level as it relates to instructional performance. You know, we'd be interested on why it's still taking kids up to third grade to be able to perform at third grade level >> even though they had their four or five 418 04:15:38.560 --> 04:15:56.720 years in prek. >> Absolutely. And I think just an important point and I know this is going where Dr. Northern was going too. Um, right now the dilemma of BKRP is it's very binary, right? are you at great risk or are you at not? But the 419 04:15:56.720 --> 04:16:12.960 actual distribution of those children if you were to look at kind of how they did is probably a full arc, right? Rather than, you know, here or or here. And so trying to kind of understand where kids are at and then I think trying to think about how is the system in a way that's age and developmentally appropriate do 420 04:16:12.960 --> 04:16:29.760 you maximize that growth? There's research right on sort of that Even the vocabulary of a three-year-old is highly predictive, right, of of of future academic performance in a way that feels hardly to believe. There's 421 04:16:29.760 --> 04:16:44.720 research on 18 months old, right, that like sort of some of the very initial there's so much that is happening in terms of that brain development that's highly invisible. And so what we would want to build is a system that not only is continually improving, right? and 422 04:16:44.720 --> 04:16:59.840 you're raising that that blue bar, but also that is getting better at better at understanding how do I maximize regardless of where a child when they first enter the system because it's not compulsory, right? It's a parent's choice whether or not I want to put my 2-year-old in this experience and we've learned lessons from other countries 423 04:16:59.840 --> 04:17:15.600 around sort of warehousing young children is also not effective. But the moment at which the child enters the system, how do we do the best job of moving them as far as we can and then understanding kind of what that means as they get into kindergarten and beyond? 424 04:17:15.600 --> 04:17:33.439 But that is absolutely the kind of the most the sort of the most important work of that system and thinking again less when we're dealing when we're sort of talking with sort of broader stakeholders you know and Miss Reinhardt is talking with businesses they want to kind of know 425 04:17:33.439 --> 04:17:48.720 ready or not but ultimately our system should be able to quantify growth and in addition to this kind of binary ready or not >> and that then that interaction at um kindergarten clearly really becomes the data that we find right there may give 426 04:17:48.720 --> 04:18:05.279 us a better indication of whether the the prek you follow me is measuring the growth and providing the growth and are we falling off once they enter into kindergarten and need to do more right there at that intersection. So as we go 427 04:18:05.279 --> 04:18:20.960 forward I'd be interested in that there >> and and I think the other piece on that and where is that kind of more tactical skills? So, we see quite a bit of catch up on some of those tactical skills. Um, and then we see when we get to to later grades that if the underlying vocabulary 428 04:18:20.960 --> 04:18:36.000 and content are not there, then you sort of see that drop off. And so being able to look at it across the system to diagnose exactly what's going on is is really important. >> Great. If there are no other questions, my um thank you team. Uh the only I 429 04:18:36.000 --> 04:18:51.680 guess final uh comment from me is um Dr. Bridges, I was exactly thinking about what you asked, which was this uh is really tremendous. I just wrote a couple notes. Um just being able to lead with the data, thinking about the scale, uh 430 04:18:51.680 --> 04:19:06.880 the point around accountability and support. uh that that last part around communication just tools so that all of our stakeholders have the information uh is just very consistent with the work that I know the pre the board the 431 04:19:06.880 --> 04:19:23.279 previous board the new board members the work that we are doing um just breeding transparency uh and the last word that I think you said superintendent Conway was just around innovation um and I just kept thinking >> thank you to the team but also thank you 432 04:19:23.279 --> 04:19:38.000 to Superintendent Conway who has led this work um and just continue to be excited to see how this transfers not just to our littlest learners but to all of our learners across the state. So thank you for your leadership. Um with 433 04:19:38.000 --> 04:19:54.239 that I think we are time for at least a break or some snacks. Is that right? We don't get a nap but we can at least get >> Yes. >> They turn the lights off. They got the temperature. We got the cats. Great team. Again, 434 04:19:54.239 --> 04:20:10.000 thank you so much for your presentation. We are going to uh break now for lunch and reconvene. >> Are we are we reconvening or do you want to do a quick >> Okay, great. Well, I'll turn it back to the superintendent for stretch break. No, 435 04:20:10.000 --> 04:20:26.560 >> stretch. You want to go? >> Okay, good. We're going to jump into a final update. Thank you. On listening tours, which is exciting. >> I know. And I know that uh uh chief of staff boy is excited to follow that group. >> Full disclosure, I do not have any brain 436 04:20:26.560 --> 04:20:43.199 slides. So hopefully this will be an easier transition to lunch. Um I just need the slides to come back. Well, good afternoon, President Ashton, uh members of the board, and Superintendent Conway. Uh my name is 437 04:20:43.199 --> 04:20:59.920 Holly Koy. I have the honor of serving as chief of staff at the DOE. And this afternoon, I'm going to provide you with an update about the Commonwealth listening tour, which the superintendent and our secretary of education, Dr. Jeffrey Smith, have been leading over the last few months. Um, so I will share 438 04:20:59.920 --> 04:21:21.279 a bit about the genesis of the tour, the types of feedback and engagement opportunities that were created, some of the common themes in the feedback, and how we anticipate the input will inform our work together. There we go. Thank you. Um on her so on 439 04:21:21.279 --> 04:21:36.159 her first day in office, Governor Spanberger signed Executive Order 4 about strengthening public education in the Commonwealth. And at the heart of that charge um was a request that Secretary Smith and Superintendent Conway and the teams um begin by 440 04:21:36.159 --> 04:21:52.000 spending the first weeks and months in office in meaningful conversations with students, teachers, school leaders, and families around the state. So the incredible team at DOE got to work. Uh they built out weeks worth of visits, roundtable conversations, and 441 04:21:52.000 --> 04:22:07.199 public input sessions. They created online forums to collect feedback uh and created virtual sessions for different groups as well. We reached out to divisions, associations, professional groups, and partners all across the Commonwealth to identify and design 442 04:22:07.199 --> 04:22:24.720 opportunities for these conversations and to ensure that a wide range of stakeholders were invited and included in the design of these sessions. Uh so the foundation of the tour was a dayong visit in each of the eight superintendence regions in the state. uh 443 04:22:24.720 --> 04:22:39.600 between March 4th and April 8th at a grueling pace uh the secretary and the superintendent and their teams visited each of the eight superintendent regions. Um so typically these stops included school visits, a roundt with 10 444 04:22:39.600 --> 04:22:56.479 to 15 students um and invited discussion with 20 to 25 different individuals um usually within the division. So this included teachers, school division, central office staff. Sometimes it included community members. We had schoolboard members, board of 445 04:22:56.479 --> 04:23:13.359 supervisors members, mayors, sheriffs, uh parents, PTA leaders, uh really a wide- ranging group of individuals in these invited smaller group discussions. Um and then after that often the students in the culinary programs uh 446 04:23:13.359 --> 04:23:29.279 provided dinner and were gracious enough to feed the teams. Before then um those stops all included an evening session that was open to the public both in that particular school division uh and um the surrounding communities. Often 447 04:23:29.279 --> 04:23:44.319 superintendents from divisions nearby came and joined and some of you joined us as well for those evening sessions. um our DOE team captured notes at the table conversations um to inform um our final report and feedback. 448 04:23:44.319 --> 04:24:00.239 So just a few highlights along the way depending on the community um the schedule and the interest from our partners. Each of these visits was slightly different. Uh so the tour kicked off in Hampton with the governor. Um Hampton City Schools is home to 449 04:24:00.239 --> 04:24:16.960 Secretary Smith and his lasting impact can be seen in the remarkable opportunities that students have there in the Hamptonmies. Um we had dinner with nearly all the region 7 superintendents during our time in Smith. Um and we had breakfast with all of the superintendents and 450 04:24:16.960 --> 04:24:31.680 schoolboard chairs in region 4 up in Northern Virginia. Uh we put on hard hats and tooured an active constructive construction site uh for a new CTE center in Renault County. We did experience a cadaavver lab with some 451 04:24:31.680 --> 04:24:48.800 high school students at uh the Heels Lab School in Marian and no one passed out. Um and we had a session just for our early childhood providers in Alexandria. So our hosts who were often but not always school divisions were incredibly gracious uh with their time, their 452 04:24:48.800 --> 04:25:03.680 space, their staff. Um and it was a real pleasure to work with them to get a flavor of the things in their communities that they are proud of, excited to show off um as well as have conversation about the challenges. Um so a little bit about the feedback by the 453 04:25:03.680 --> 04:25:19.600 numbers. So in total dduplicated we had by best tally that we could muster uh 2,282 different individuals providing feedback in some form or fashion over the last few months. Um so an online survey was 454 04:25:19.600 --> 04:25:36.960 launched in early March. It received nearly a thousand responses. Um there were virtual sessions um each for a different uh and specific group of partners. So this included business and community principles, teachers, parents, and families. Um, and then DOE staff 455 04:25:36.960 --> 04:25:52.319 worked with various associations to partner and identify events already on the calendar that might lend themselves to meaningful input for the secretary and the superintendent. So for example, DOE staff already attending conferences um and professional learning events were 456 04:25:52.319 --> 04:26:08.960 able to gather feedback from middle school math teachers or special education administrators um middle school administrators. uh the UVA K12 advisory council and other existing partners and events. So what did we hear? Um so in each of 457 04:26:08.960 --> 04:26:24.479 our conversations we sought to focus with the uh to to start the conversation with a focus on the strengths and successes of any particular division, school or community. The most common themes that we heard were about the dedication of our educators going above 458 04:26:24.479 --> 04:26:39.840 and beyond for our students every day. Everyone had a story to share about the impact of a phenomenal teacher, aid or school staff person and the impact they had on the students. Similarly, we heard about transformational strong principles 459 04:26:39.840 --> 04:26:56.479 who are supporting those educators and leading instruction um and creating welcoming environments for students and staff alike. In addition to that, we heard about some really positive impacts that recent state policy changes have had on classrooms. So, this included fewer 460 04:26:56.479 --> 04:27:12.399 distractions with limited access to cell phones, strong student results from the implementation of the Virginia Literacy Act and its many components. Um, we heard also about really strong community collaborations to expand pathways to post-secary 461 04:27:12.399 --> 04:27:29.359 opportunities, including career exploration for all ages, um, renewed commitments to CTE, the academy high school models, and the power of dual enrollment. Um, we also heard a lot about the benefits of recent investments in tutoring and the impact of that high 462 04:27:29.359 --> 04:27:44.560 dosage small group tutoring on the success of our students. And from that place of strength and success, we then invited our partners to share with us areas of challenge and opportunities to improve. And they did 463 04:27:44.560 --> 04:28:00.640 not hold back. Um, we heard a clear and strong desire for stronger relationships, transparency, and support from the department with our school division partners. We heard school leaders articulate a desire to see some refinements to the state accountability 464 04:28:00.640 --> 04:28:17.840 system SPSF uh largely by addressing the JARK recommendations um but also related to ensuring that results and then the corresponding supports are made available in a um more timely fashion so as to have more lasting impact. 465 04:28:17.840 --> 04:28:35.279 Uh throughout the state, we also heard a lot about increasing needs for behavioral and mental health supports for our students uh so that they can ultimately be successful in the classroom. Concerns continue to linger about the educator pipeline and the need for additional pathways into the profession. 466 04:28:35.279 --> 04:28:52.960 Um various stakeholders across lots of different um types of of um participants raised concerns about number and type of assessments that our students take over the course of their entire academic career. Um and there was interest in in additional conversation there. Uh not 467 04:28:52.960 --> 04:29:09.359 surprisingly, we heard frustrations about unfunded mandates and concerns about the timing of state budget resolution, which is particularly timing this week here in Richmond. um and the needs uh funding needs of our divisions both to address new challenges but also 468 04:29:09.359 --> 04:29:26.640 to sustain progress and some of the things that have yielded results for students like that high dosage tutoring. Um and so with uh the conclusion just this very week of the virtual listening sessions uh the DOE team is now busy 469 04:29:26.640 --> 04:29:42.640 compiling feedback analyzing the trends and themes and preparing a final report on everything that we have heard and we anticipate this will be published on our website next week. Um even as that report is being finalized um it it what we have received to date is already 470 04:29:42.640 --> 04:29:59.520 informing actions big and small as an agency. With regard to accountability uh the feedback has contributed to um a simultaneous afteraction report uh that we did as an agency on the 2025 res 471 04:29:59.520 --> 04:30:16.000 release of our results. Um and and that is already informing our planning for the fall of 26 roll out. Um, this is also informing how we're prep preparing to bring accountability considerations forward for both stakeholder review and ultimately for 472 04:30:16.000 --> 04:30:30.880 your consideration. So, as you know, tomorrow we'll begin this work with accountability policy decision points that will apply to the 2526 school year that we're currently in. Um, and then as we work our way into the summer, we will then bring forward preliminary 473 04:30:30.880 --> 04:30:47.040 discussion points for your consideration related to policy decision points for the 2627 school year and beyond. Um, I will note too that EO4 also called for the expanded membership of the math task force, the innovative assessment 474 04:30:47.040 --> 04:31:02.880 workg group and our literacy committee. And so the feedback from the listening tour will be shared with those groups as well to ensure alignment with their final recommendations as they move that work forward. In the long term, I think it is very safe to say that the feedback 475 04:31:02.880 --> 04:31:18.720 will also inform um the strategic planning work of the agency and how we bring topics forward for your consideration. Um and perhaps most important um but aside from any one topic, we hope that the most lasting impact of this tour has been to open 476 04:31:18.720 --> 04:31:34.640 these channels of communication in the spirit of partnership as we engage in this work together. So with that uh very brief uh presentation as compared to the last, I will just end by saying thank you to the 477 04:31:34.640 --> 04:31:50.800 incredible team um both at DOE and in our divisions um and with all the partners who hosted us over the last many months. Um their their impact uh was lasting as they open their doors to these conversations. Um and to also 478 04:31:50.800 --> 04:32:07.359 thank all the participants who were willing to share candidly with us uh where they they see hope and where uh they had very candid feedback for us about where we could improve and how we might partner in the conversations to um improve the system together. So with 479 04:32:07.359 --> 04:32:23.279 that, I'm happy to answer any questions that you all may have. >> Superintendent Conway, what you >> Yes. I just want to thank you. Thank you, Chief Hoy. And I just um what a privilege this was. Uh a thank you also uh to my spouse um who uh had a lot more 480 04:32:23.279 --> 04:32:39.600 kid duty uh in in the last um six weeks. Um but it was uh truly a privilege to with our team who did an incredible amount of work to get every one of these organized to have staff at every table. 481 04:32:39.600 --> 04:32:55.520 um to capture every last comment. Um to drive many many many miles um uh but to hear from people and to know uh in some ways without uh trying to intimidate anybody on this body. Uh you all do such 482 04:32:55.520 --> 04:33:13.039 important work because people care so passionately about our early childhood and K12 education in the Commonwealth. And that came across loud and clear from the folks who got there early um and were at their tables, you know, 25 minutes before it began to just hearing 483 04:33:13.039 --> 04:33:29.199 from students in particular our very reflective seniors and that senior spring as they look back about what an opportunity. I had a senior um out in Gloucester who was like I mean it's amazing this is all free like this is 484 04:33:29.199 --> 04:33:46.561 just like you know in this way that you know as we talk about early childhood where you have to pay or you talk about college where you have to pay but you know he was like I mean I just now realized right as a 18-year-old I mean all these classes all these teachers and it was all free like nothing is free um 485 04:33:46.561 --> 04:34:04.160 except for this um just it you know there's it's probably the most competitive board to be on, but because people care so much uh about this and because it is truly owned by every single one of our 131 uh uh school 486 04:34:04.160 --> 04:34:21.279 divisions and communities. Um and we felt that uh they are very different uh across the state, but there is truly more that unites us than divides us. Um, and so I'm just I am also uh as Chief Koi noted, incredibly incredibly 487 04:34:21.279 --> 04:34:38.959 grateful to everybody who helped make this possible. >> Great. Thank you, Superintendent. Thank you, Chief Koi. Um, any other questions about the listing tour? >> Yes, Dr. Bridges. >> Thank you, Holly. Um can you say more 488 04:34:38.959 --> 04:34:56.320 about um the technology and ed and the agency division relations and I know I know it you don't have all the nuance data but th those are such broad categories were there areas >> uh in in how VDE could help that you kind that kind of bubbled up and then 489 04:34:56.320 --> 04:35:12.959 when when folks were talking about technology and ed was it more of a >> we need more we need less you know there's a lot of uh literature coming out about you know h how our NAPE score correl uh not correlates that the rel relationship between the declines we've 490 04:35:12.959 --> 04:35:29.600 seen nationally and onetoone initiatives for example. So I'm just curious kind of what the thrust of those two were. >> Those are great questions. I'll start with the second one um by saying it was both right. We we heard some about the use of AI and how that is informing both 491 04:35:29.600 --> 04:35:46.480 instructional practices and student experiences. But I think we heard even more both from students and from educators and from families about the over reliance on on technology and some of the downsides to that. Um and so that was really 492 04:35:46.480 --> 04:36:01.600 interesting um to hear that from so many different perspectives in so many corners of the state. When it comes to the relationships, I think there was a desire uh from many corners of the state again uh from our 493 04:36:01.600 --> 04:36:17.840 school division partners for um an easier and more consistent ability to engage in conversation with the department for some additional transparency around wide variety of topics. um but but some frustration about being able to get clear and 494 04:36:17.840 --> 04:36:35.600 consistent answers um from us and and perhaps that is oversimplifying, but I think at the heart of that was a desire um for uh the agency to be able to be responsive, for it to be easy for division partners to figure out who to ask within the agency about uh topics 495 04:36:35.600 --> 04:36:51.600 where they they may need guidance or can't find what they're looking for or having trouble on a particular topic. um a and that they um have those channels of communication both formally and informally with us. 496 04:36:51.600 --> 04:37:08.400 >> Can I ask is the 2025 um afteraction report is that something that's been publicly available? It >> has not. No. >> Is that something the board has the ability to see at some point? >> Not I don't or is that an internal >> document? Right now it's just an internal document but we can certainly 497 04:37:08.400 --> 04:37:23.840 take a look at it. Thank you. I think the other um piece to kind of look at the sort of what was said versus what would be the potential root causes is uh how might we get in a place and we 498 04:37:23.840 --> 04:37:40.879 have lots of folks who care which is both our strength and our challenge. But if you look at this body and the important work it does and makes decision on. If you look at the gubanatorial initiatives and if you look at what comes out of the general assembly, it felt like a lot of things 499 04:37:40.879 --> 04:37:57.439 coming at folks in recent years. And you know, again, not pointing fingers at any one of of those entities in any way, shape, or form, but like thinking about um could we all uh you lay out what the 500 04:37:57.439 --> 04:38:13.840 priorities were and kind of give a road map to 2030, if we're just going to use the kind of the the the benchmark of a of a gubanatorial administration and work back there backwards from there so that there could be a little bit more time for planning. 501 04:38:13.840 --> 04:38:30.639 for shifting um um and for supporting the implementers who are our divisions. And I know you know you obviously you saw that in some of the >> early childhood work where it was as Holly described it was one I I can't get to you. I can't answer my questions but 502 04:38:30.639 --> 04:38:45.359 it was also like and then I just I just felt like it just kept coming and uh I don't think that just giving two weeks advanced notice about massive change would be enough to sort of to to to strengthen the relationship. but also is around getting that scope, sequence, 503 04:38:45.359 --> 04:39:02.080 cadence, and prioritization um to a a uh you know a slightly more measured pace. Largely recognizing that some of the very important and good things that this board did related to literacy, related to standards, related 504 04:39:02.080 --> 04:39:18.561 to accountability, they they believe in it. It's just we got to get that that right support and right pace of implementation. And so it's really loud and clear across the board like please do not go 180 degrees in the other direction like we we can't do that right 505 04:39:18.561 --> 04:39:34.799 but let's sort of think through how to take the strengths of what was recently kind of implemented across the board the GA and the and the gov and think about a kind of a reasonable pacing and how do we ultimately do a better job of using 506 04:39:34.799 --> 04:39:50.240 our Virginia data to then inform the kind of implementation over time. >> Yeah, absolutely. Thank you. Are there any question other questions from board members? Okay, Chief Koi, thank you for your brief presentation. Um, with that we 507 04:39:50.240 --> 04:40:00.760 will break for lunch and for the day. >> Yes, we are breaking for lunch and for today. We thank you all and turn off your buttons.