Updates on the Fight for Quality Public Education in Brevard County, FL
0:30 (upbeat music)
1:00 (upbeat music continues)
2:10 (upbeat music)
2:30 (upbeat music continues)
2:40 - Good evening.
2:41 The July 28th, 2022 tentative budget hearing
2:43 and board meeting is now in order.
2:45 I’m happy to welcome my fellow board members and the public.
2:48 I would like to take this opportunity to remind the public
2:50 that the appropriate place for public participation
2:52 in the meeting is during
2:53 your individual public comment opportunity
2:56 as identified in the agenda.
2:58 Outside of your individual public comment opportunity,
3:00 your role in the meeting is as an observer.
3:03 Mr. Gibbs, roll call please.
3:05 - Ms. Belford.
3:06 - Present.
3:07 - Ms. McDougall.
3:07 - Present.
3:08 - Mr. Susan.
3:09 - Present.
3:10 - Ms. Jenkins.
3:11 - Present.
3:12 - Ms. Campbell.
3:12 - Present.
3:13 - The board will now hold a moment of silent reflection
3:15 and invite the audience to join.
3:28 (silence)
3:39 Thank you.
3:41 Please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.
3:48 - I pledge allegiance to the flag
3:50 of the United States of America
3:52 and to the republic for which it stands,
3:55 one nation, under God, indivisible,
3:58 with liberty and justice for all.
4:03 - All right, at this time I’d like to offer
4:05 my fellow board members and Dr. Mullins
4:06 an opportunity to recognize students, staff,
4:09 or members of the community
4:10 who would like to kick us off this evening.
4:14 Ms. Campbell.
4:16 - Well, I wanted to, on tonight’s agenda,
4:20 we are gonna be voting on revised contracts
4:25 for all of our benefits, you know,
4:27 insurance, FSA, dental, all those things,
4:31 and to reduce the amount of time
4:34 that new employees have to wait
4:37 before those benefits kick in from 45 days to 15 days.
4:40 And I know that that was a Herculean effort
4:42 put forth by Dr. Thet and her team,
4:45 Ms. Cipio, all of the benefits staff,
4:47 procurement, legal, I know.
4:50 So I just, I think this is super awesome
4:52 that we can put this out there as we’re recruiting.
4:55 And so it’s exciting and we’ll happily vote yes,
5:00 but I just wanna thank all the people
5:01 who did the hard work behind the scenes
5:04 to make it happen and to make it happen quickly
5:06 so that all of our new employees will be able,
5:08 once we pass it tonight,
5:09 will be able to be benefits eligible,
5:11 like after 15 days.
5:13 It’s very exciting, good work that was done.
5:17 (applauding)
5:22 - I just had to echo that because the staff,
5:25 Dr. Thet and her staff have just worked
5:27 so tremendously hard to make that happen
5:30 in such a quick turnaround.
5:31 So I had to add to the acknowledgement, thank you.
5:34 - Thank you, Dr. Mullen.
5:35 Ms. McDougall.
5:38 - So I do have a couple of shout-outs for our staff.
5:41 And the first is I wanna give a shout-out
5:42 to Kevin Thornton and the Food Services Department.
5:45 I was able to go to their cafeteria manager’s kickoff,
5:49 and the slogan or the mantra for this year
5:52 is serving healthy meals, fueling student success.
5:57 And I just wanna say,
6:00 we have an amazing Food Services Department,
6:03 and they have served so many meals.
6:05 I don’t know the number, but you probably do.
6:09 - Over 100,000 just this summer.
6:11 - Yeah.
6:12 So I just wanna thank them all for all the hard work
6:14 and how much their role is so important
6:18 to our student success.
6:19 So I wanted to give a shout-out to Kevin and his team
6:21 and the Food Services Department.
6:23 I am wearing their shirt,
6:25 which has this slogan on the back, it’s really very cute.
6:28 So thank you again to Food Services.
6:31 Then I also wanna give a shout-out to,
6:33 there’s so many departments here.
6:35 We’ve been having job fairs this whole week,
6:38 and probably before this whole week,
6:42 where staff from across all departments,
6:45 we’re talking HR, facilities, custodial, transportation.
6:51 I’m forgetting, facilities, transportation, food services.
6:55 Am I forgetting somebody, Dr. Thetting?
6:59 Thank you.
7:00 Mrs.
7:04 And they’ve worked as a team, and I was able to go to two,
7:07 Titusville and two here yesterday.
7:09 And we are getting people.
7:12 I’m very excited, thank goodness.
7:14 And I wanna thank everyone
7:15 who has worked longer than their normal hours.
7:19 People stayed here till seven o’clock or until it was done.
7:22 So thank you for all the departments
7:24 and everybody who showed up
7:25 and made a difference to help get people on board.
7:28 So thank you so very much.
7:37 - Mr. Suzy.
7:39 - Well, I did wanna say thank you to Kevin Thornton
7:42 for the great program that Kevin puts together.
7:45 We’re very blessed.
7:46 There’s been some misinformation in the news
7:48 that said that the federal government is cutting programs
7:51 to the kids that are receiving free and reduced lunch
7:54 and all that stuff, and it’s just not true.
7:56 What it is is they’re ending the COVID free lunch
7:59 that they give these children.
8:00 And that’s a big shout out goes to the federal government
8:03 for doing that because we were one of the leading districts
8:05 in the state of Florida to take advantage of that,
8:07 delivering, you know what I mean?
8:09 Two different locations of low income homes during civil,
8:11 I mean, he has knocked it out of the park
8:14 and I’m just really proud of Kevin for all of his efforts.
8:17 I wanted to shadow your comments.
8:19 I wanted to say thank you to everybody who’s here,
8:22 who comes in.
8:23 We love having you guys ‘cause you’re ready to go
8:25 and everybody gives the greatest speeches
8:26 when you guys come in here and talk about
8:28 what you’re gonna do next year.
8:29 And it’s nice to have that because that’s the next step
8:32 is to get in that excitement.
8:34 And I really appreciate that you actually brought flowers
8:37 for your significant other, and that’s a very smart man.
8:40 If I did that more often,
8:42 I probably wouldn’t be in as much trouble.
8:43 So congratulations and thank you.
8:45 And all you guys that brought the kids,
8:46 you know what I mean?
8:47 That’s our next generation.
8:49 So thank you for being here today.
8:51 I also wanted to say that I just got off the phone
8:53 with the home builders and contractors
8:55 and the associated builders and contractors,
8:57 the plugins and plate fitters today.
8:59 And we’re gonna hold kind of a round table summit
9:01 to figure out how we can identify the children
9:03 that graduated last year and let them know
9:06 what apprenticeships are being lent out this year.
9:08 So I had a lot of family members that contacted me and said,
9:11 “Hey, we saw you on the trades.
9:13 “What can I do for my kid?
9:14 “He’s flipping burgers at McDonald’s.
9:16 “He’s on my couch,” you know, all these things.
9:18 And I said, “Well, let me give the guys a call.”
9:20 So I’m good friends with associated builders and contractors,
9:22 home builders and all those guys.
9:23 So let’s just get together.
9:24 Let’s talk about what we can do to notify to say,
9:27 “Hey, there’s a lot of post-secondary programs
9:31 “that are career and technical programs
9:33 “from the college and universities
9:34 “to all the associations.
9:36 “So we’re gonna get that together
9:37 “and I’ll come talk to you about it.”
9:39 I love making announcements
9:40 before Dr. Mullins actually knows what I’m doing.
9:42 The other thing is, is that the–
9:44 - It’s so rare.
9:45 (laughing)
9:47 - I made an entire career out of asking for forgiveness
9:50 as a teacher rather than permission, just so you know.
9:53 So it’s just been with me my whole life.
9:56 The other thing is, is the Brevard Athletic Association
9:58 is a loose knit of athletes that,
10:00 former athletes that were gonna come together.
10:03 We’ve officially kind of coined, we got the teams.
10:06 And what’s gonna happen is, is football,
10:08 baseball, track, volleyball, all of them
10:11 have sort of sub-associations inside the school,
10:14 inside the county.
10:15 I’m gonna pull them all together and do best practices.
10:17 And what that means is, right now you have,
10:22 say in football, you have a football coach
10:23 at the high school level.
10:24 And then you have these coaches at the Little League level.
10:27 So many of the coaches that are Little League level
10:29 are guys that just said, “I wanna coach my kid.”
10:31 But they don’t know what best practices are.
10:33 They don’t know how a kid should tackle.
10:35 They don’t know how a kid should do these things.
10:37 And it’s not their fault, right?
10:38 So we wanna create a vertical alignment of programs
10:41 to where the coaches at the top
10:42 are speaking to the ones at the bottom.
10:44 And they give, not so much like,
10:45 “Here’s how you run an offense.”
10:47 But, “Here’s how you run a practice, man.”
10:48 Like, how do you keep the kids engaged?
10:51 How do you keep moving throughout the practice?
10:53 And then bring in, contact the FHSAA of all people.
10:56 Yeah, my friend’s over there.
10:58 And they, anyways, the FHSAA agreed to send in
11:01 the new referee or the head of the FHSAA
11:04 to talk to the coaches about what the new changes
11:07 and rules are and everything else.
11:08 Worst case scenario is when you’re a coach out on the field
11:11 and all of a sudden you realize a rule change
11:14 that you didn’t pay attention to.
11:16 So that’s, it’s a really good thing.
11:17 So, and they’re gonna host some combines
11:19 and stuff like that.
11:20 It’s gonna be a cool thing.
11:22 And then I wanted to tell you, hooray,
11:25 many kids’ parents don’t know their kids
11:27 are not registered to vote.
11:29 And you don’t realize that until you start knocking doors
11:32 as a political candidate.
11:33 And you knock it and they’re like,
11:34 I said, hey, you know, you know,
11:37 they say, oh, we’ll get my son to sign it.
11:39 And I’m like, no, kid’s not registered.
11:41 And I don’t know if you guys know,
11:42 but a lot of our kids in this next generation
11:44 are pretty lazy and they haven’t even gotten
11:45 their driver’s license.
11:47 So a lot of them don’t go out and get their driver’s licenses
11:49 which is one of the precursors to get voting registration.
11:51 And then they just kind of roll.
11:52 So what I did was I requested the voter,
11:55 I requested every kid that’s gonna turn 18
11:57 before this November election,
12:00 got their parents’ numbers and stuff like that.
12:01 And I’m gonna pen a letter to their house.
12:03 I got the voter registration office to say,
12:05 hey, the legal way, because gosh knows
12:08 if you do it the wrong way,
12:09 they’re gonna haul you down to jail.
12:11 But we’re gonna send a letter out
12:13 to each one of those families and say,
12:14 hey, your child is not registered yet.
12:16 Here’s the way you can do it.
12:17 Here’s a QR code.
12:18 Just click it, fill it out and go.
12:20 And if you don’t have a driver’s license,
12:21 then here’s how you can do that.
12:23 Great program.
12:24 You’re gonna try to drive the voter registration.
12:25 And that comes from when I was a teacher years ago.
12:28 As Katie Delaney probably remembers,
12:30 we had big voter registration drives.
12:34 There’s a lot of politicians up in Titusville
12:36 that got elected because we drove the students
12:39 at our schools.
12:40 We had about three, 400 votes that actually voted for them.
12:43 So it’s a big project.
12:44 And I just wanted to let you guys know about it.
12:45 And if there’s anybody that wants to help with it,
12:48 I’m more than willing to work with you guys.
12:50 Come on in.
12:50 It’s not a voting thing, so we can do it.
12:52 Right, Paul?
12:54 Yeah, see?
12:54 That’s the first time he said yes
12:57 since I’ve been on the board.
12:58 He didn’t even hear what I said.
12:59 He’s getting, he’s, yep, all right.
13:01 All right, man.
13:04 Yep, all right, I’m done.
13:05 Thank you.
13:07 Thank you, Mr. Susan.
13:08 Ms. Jenkins?
13:10 All right, so bear with me here.
13:13 It’ll be a few minutes.
13:15 I’ve had a secret for the past four years
13:20 that I have not been allowed to share.
13:21 I’ve sworn to secrecy.
13:24 And I have officially been given permission
13:26 to let the cat out of the bag.
13:28 And I am super excited for the tiger.
13:30 I don’t know.
13:32 So bear with me.
13:33 I’m gonna take my time here.
13:35 I’ve got notes because I don’t wanna mess this up.
13:37 So for people who are listening who may not understand,
13:41 our athletic programs are minimally funded by the state.
13:44 And that leaves districts like us
13:47 to spread a little bit of money
13:49 across a lot of different organizations and schools.
13:52 This means our schools have to rely on their booster clubs,
13:55 fundraisers, PTOs, sometimes outside businesses
14:00 and organizations to help support those programs.
14:02 But it also exasperates a discrepancy
14:05 between many of our communities.
14:06 We’ve got some communities that are able
14:08 to heavily fund their programs
14:10 and we have others that are really struggling.
14:12 So the city of Cocoa has a medium household income
14:16 of $39,000.
14:18 They support their school with pride and service,
14:23 but they struggle to financially support
14:25 their athletic programs.
14:27 They are not able to keep up
14:28 at some of the rate of our other schools.
14:31 A prime example of pride and service
14:33 is they have an assistant coach.
14:34 His name is Mr. James Falston.
14:36 He is a former NFL player.
14:38 He volunteers his time to coach their football team.
14:41 He refuses to take a salary.
14:43 He donates financial assistance to the team
14:47 over and over again.
14:48 And he donates his time outside
14:50 of the football field and training as well.
14:54 They have a team that has mastered conditioning
14:57 of football players.
14:57 So let me give you some information here.
15:00 They won 16 consistent years of regional championships.
15:03 They have four state championships.
15:05 And one year, they had the most NFL drafts
15:07 in the entire nation in one single year.
15:10 Cocoa High School.
15:12 Pretty awesome.
15:13 Just in the last four years,
15:15 they’ve got some pretty notable players
15:16 who made it to the Super Bowl.
15:17 They’ve got Jamal Dean with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers,
15:19 C.J. Gardner-Johnson with the New Orleans Saints,
15:22 Javion Hawkins with the Los Angeles Rams.
15:24 And again, two of them were in the Super Bowl
15:27 the past few years.
15:28 Just last week, somebody sent me an article.
15:30 We’ve got a student right now currently
15:31 at Cocoa High School, Mr. Cedric Hawkins.
15:34 He was featured in the news as an incredible athlete
15:36 that’s up and coming outside of Cocoa High School
15:38 who is currently being scouted for Ohio State.
15:40 It sounded like he made his decision in that article,
15:43 but I’m pretty sure there’s gonna be
15:43 some other schools scouting him out.
15:46 So for anyone who knows me,
15:48 I am absolutely not a sports guru.
15:50 I was a drum major of a competitive marching band
15:52 that didn’t even go to football games.
15:55 But this is important to me because it’s important
15:56 to our kids.
15:57 So when their environment doesn’t reflect their worth,
16:03 I am concerned we send messages that they aren’t worthy.
16:05 And I know that’s not how we feel here.
16:07 I know that’s not how Cocoa High School feels.
16:09 I absolutely know that’s not how their community
16:10 feels about those kids.
16:12 So I believe it’s time that Cocoa Junior Senior High School
16:16 athletics facility reflects the quality of student athletes
16:18 that it serves.
16:20 So now I’m gonna share the fun thing
16:22 that I wasn’t allowed to talk about for months.
16:24 I had invited somebody to be here.
16:26 I knew that they may not be able to make it,
16:28 and I don’t see him.
16:29 And if you’re here, please pop up and tell me you’re here.
16:33 But back in January,
16:34 I got a call from a Cocoa City Councilman.
16:36 His name is Alex Goins.
16:38 He coaches our track team at Cocoa High School.
16:41 He reached out to me to complain
16:43 about the track a little bit.
16:45 And then he also started having a conversation with me
16:47 about their weight room.
16:48 And this is not something that was new to me.
16:49 I had heard about it over and over again,
16:51 but I never made my way up there.
16:52 So I did.
16:53 I met Alex up there.
16:54 I met some of the coaches up there.
16:56 And quite frankly, I was appalled by what I saw.
17:00 The conditions of that weight room were crazy.
17:03 They were unsafe.
17:04 They were absolutely not equitable.
17:06 They were missing pads.
17:08 It was dangerous.
17:08 There was rusted equipment.
17:10 I actually just took a visit there yesterday
17:11 with Dr. Mullins,
17:12 and we were told that one of the bars
17:13 literally snapped in half
17:14 when some of the students were using them.
17:16 So Alex and I began brainstorming.
17:18 What can we do?
17:20 So I reached out to a former satellite high school graduate.
17:24 He is a good friend of my husband’s.
17:25 He works for ESPN for college game day.
17:28 And I actually just asked him to connect me
17:30 with those recent players.
17:32 I wanted to do a fundraiser of some sort to help out.
17:35 But what happened over the next six months
17:37 is pretty incredible.
17:39 So I pitched him a story,
17:41 told him the history of the program,
17:42 the history of the school, the community pride,
17:44 the amazing Mr. Fulston that is there himself helping out.
17:47 And I’m officially allowed to announce that this week,
17:52 over $75,000 of brand new equipment
17:56 was donated by Academy Sports to Cocoa High School
18:00 to completely refurbish their entire weight room.
18:03 They are not missing a single item at all.
18:07 And I just have to say,
18:09 this was not just me at all.
18:12 This started with a phone call from a city councilman
18:15 who cares about his community, cares about those kids,
18:18 and genuinely wanted something done,
18:20 wanted action to be taken place.
18:21 And so I thank you, Mr. Goins, I wish you could be here.
18:26 I thank you for making that phone call
18:28 because this was so heartwarming.
18:31 I worked with Mr. Wilson, I worked with now Denise Stewart.
18:35 Everyone is excited, the coaches are psyched.
18:37 The kids don’t really know about it.
18:39 The only kids who know about it
18:40 are the kids that have kind of been in their summer training.
18:42 They’re piled up in boxes right now.
18:44 Academy Sports is gonna come together,
18:46 put all the equipment together, empty the room,
18:48 put the room back together for them.
18:51 It’s pretty cool, it’s pretty incredible.
18:53 And I have to say, shout out to our facilities department,
18:56 because the second I got confirmation
18:57 that that stuff landed on our campus,
19:00 I said, “We need flooring.
19:01 “We can’t put this new equipment in with terrible flooring.”
19:05 And Suhan pulled that off and reallocated those funds
19:08 that they already had designated for that school
19:10 to make it happen.
19:11 So hopefully that’ll get done as well
19:13 before all that new equipment is in there.
19:16 I just wanna say one more thing that Alex had said to me
19:18 over and over again in our conversations over six months,
19:20 we were like, “We gotta do this, it’s gotta come together.”
19:24 And he said over and over again,
19:26 when good people come together to do good things
19:28 for the right reasons, they’re gonna happen.
19:30 They’re absolutely going to happen
19:32 because they have to happen, and man, they sure did.
19:34 So thank you again to Alex, thank you to ESPN,
19:37 thank you to Academy Sports.
19:38 We’re not done.
19:39 There’s another secret that I’m not allowed to talk about.
19:43 But when they give me the thumbs up to talk about it,
19:44 I absolutely will.
19:46 And lastly, when the official date is set
19:49 for them to come and build that weight room for us,
19:51 I’m gonna be reaching out to all of the BPS community,
19:54 but also COCO, because we really wanted this
19:56 to be a COCO community event.
19:57 So we’re gonna have community members come in,
20:00 paint that weight room together,
20:01 build some community and support and joy around these kids,
20:05 give it a fresh look.
20:07 We’re in talks with some muralists
20:08 to put a really sweet tiger on the wall,
20:10 so I’m probably gonna be posting a fundraiser
20:12 to help pay for that as well.
20:14 So I’m reaching out to everybody.
20:16 Let’s give a little love to our tiger.
20:18 Thank you.
20:19 (audience applauding)
20:26 - Awesome stuff.
20:28 Dr. Mullins.
20:30 - Thank you, Mrs. Belford.
20:31 I wanna give a couple shout outs this evening.
20:34 One to a teacher who we have recognized before,
20:38 Mr. Bill McGinnish.
20:39 He is our career and technical education teacher
20:42 at O’Gally High School for the aircraft
20:46 and aerospace assembly program at O’Gally High School.
20:49 He was recently awarded the Florida Teacher of the Year
20:52 for 2022 by the Florida Region
20:55 of Air and Space Forces Association, or the AFA.
20:58 So not a surprise that he is being acknowledged
21:03 and recognized, but we wanna give a shout out to him again
21:05 for his continued devotion and dedication
21:08 to an amazing program.
21:09 He is a game changer for kids.
21:12 He has 100% placement in the aviation industry
21:16 for the last two years for his graduating students.
21:19 I have to tell you that Embry Air is first in line
21:24 every year to tap our kids that are coming out
21:26 of that program, and that’s pretty amazing.
21:30 And then second, I want to recognize one of our very own
21:34 that’s always in the room with us in the evening,
21:37 kind of a silent hero behind the scenes,
21:40 Mr. Russell Cheatham, our assistant superintendent
21:44 of educational technology, our CIO,
21:47 has been elected for the 2022-23 school year
21:53 as chairman of the board for FAMIS,
21:55 or Florida’s Association on Management Information Systems.
21:59 This organization brings together the collection of CIOs
22:02 across the state, technology leaders, as well as the DOE,
22:07 and helps chart the path for the vision,
22:11 the future of technology across our schools.
22:14 So Russell, not a surprise.
22:17 You are a leader among leaders.
22:18 Congratulations. (audience applauds)
22:20 Thank you for representing Brevard.
22:25 - Thank you, Dr. Mullins.
22:27 I have two pretty quick ones, I think.
22:30 One, just wanna say a huge thank you to Dr. Mullins
22:33 and all of his team that put together
22:34 the Superintendent Summit.
22:37 My days are all jumbled at this point.
22:39 I think it was last week that we went, right?
22:43 But really just a great day of focusing and energizing
22:49 and getting ready for the upcoming year.
22:50 And thanks to all of our school-based teams
22:52 and district staff that attended as well,
22:56 directors and assistant superintendents,
22:58 the whole team that was there, the energy was great.
23:00 It was phenomenal and really a great way
23:02 to kick off the year.
23:03 So Dr. Mullins, thank you for your vision on that.
23:06 And thank you to your team for all the hard work
23:08 to make it come together.
23:09 Much appreciated.
23:10 And then the last one that I have is just a,
23:14 you know, I talk all the time about the way
23:16 that our community comes around our schools.
23:17 And we have so many back-to-school events
23:20 that are going on this weekend, next week.
23:23 I know the supply zone, I think, is Saturday morning
23:26 or Saturday, early part of the day.
23:29 I know we’ve got a couple up on the north end as well
23:32 that are community groups that are coming around
23:34 to provide school supplies and haircuts and shoes
23:38 and just you name it.
23:40 And so just wanna thank everyone in our community
23:42 that’s working on those types of activities
23:44 for wrapping your arms around our kids.
23:49 And making sure that they can start the year
23:51 on a good footing.
23:53 So much appreciated.
23:56 All right, I believe that is going to bring us
23:59 to the adoption of the agenda.
24:00 Dr. Mullins.
24:01 - Mrs. Belford and members of the board
24:03 on this evening’s agenda,
24:04 we have administrative staff recommendations,
24:06 the tentative budget hearing, which includes a presentation,
24:09 time for public comments, and three items for board action.
24:13 In addition to two presentations,
24:15 then 12 consent items and two action items.
24:18 Changes made to the agenda since release to the public
24:21 include the addition of items D13 at Ballora-Millage update,
24:25 D14 recruitment update.
24:28 Also revisions were made to items A7,
24:30 administrative staff recommendations,
24:32 A8, tentative budget hearing presentation,
24:35 A10, adopt proposed 2022-23 millage rates,
24:40 A11, adopt proposed 2022-23 tentative budget,
24:45 A12, authorize the superintendent
24:48 to take the following action,
24:50 H29, department school initiate agreements,
24:53 and H30, procurement solicitations.
24:55 - What are the wishes of the board?
24:56 - Move to approve.
24:57 - Second.
24:58 - Moved by Mr. Suesen, seconded by Ms. McDougal.
25:00 Is there any discussion?
25:02 All in favor, please signify by saying aye.
25:04 - Aye.
25:04 - Any opposed?
25:05 Same sign.
25:06 Motion passes, five-zero.
25:08 Dr. Mullins, will you please let us know
25:10 about the administrative staff recommendations?
25:13 - Madam Chair, members of the board,
25:14 there are six items for your consideration.
25:16 - What are the wishes of the board?
25:17 - Move to approve.
25:18 - Second.
25:20 - Moved by Mr. Suesen, seconded by Ms. McDougal.
25:24 Any discussion?
25:26 All in favor, please signify by saying aye.
25:28 - Aye.
25:29 - Any opposed?
25:30 Same sign.
25:31 Motion passes, five-zero.
25:32 Dr. Mullins.
25:33 - Well, I would like to echo
25:35 some of Mr. Suesen’s earlier comments.
25:37 We have three administrative promotions
25:40 to recognize and congratulate this evening.
25:44 So I’d like to start with Mr. James Sanders,
25:46 who is reclassed from the position of teacher
25:49 at Oak Park Elementary School
25:51 to the position of assistant principal,
25:53 10 month at Titusville High School,
25:55 effective August 2nd, 2022.
25:58 Congratulations, Mr. Sanders.
26:00 (audience applauds)
26:06 - Good evening to Dr. Mullins, school board members.
26:10 I’m truly grateful for this opportunity.
26:13 To Ms. Gonzalez and the numerous mentors
26:15 that I’ve had since I’ve been here before, thank you guys.
26:19 Last but not least, I would like to thank my wife, Felicia,
26:22 for 30 years of putting up with me and supporting me.
26:24 (audience laughs)
26:25 Thank you, and thank you all.
26:28 (audience applauds)
26:33 - Next, I’d like us to join in congratulating Ms. Liesl.
26:37 I’m gonna try Patchlow.
26:38 I practiced too, and hopefully I got close.
26:43 Reclassed from the position of certified school counselor
26:46 at Anderson Elementary School
26:48 to now the position of assistant principal
26:50 at Fairglen Elementary School, effective August 2nd, 2022.
26:56 Please feel free to correct me.
26:57 (audience applauds)
27:01 - Good evening, everyone.
27:02 My name is Liesl Patrillo.
27:05 Dr. Mullins, school board members,
27:06 thank you so much for appointing me
27:09 to be the new assistant principal
27:10 at Fairglen Elementary School.
27:12 I am very excited, and I can’t wait to meet all the students
27:16 and to work with the faculty for a great year of learning.
27:20 I wouldn’t be here without the help
27:23 and support of a lot of people.
27:25 I’m not gonna list everyone,
27:27 but I am gonna start by thanking God
27:29 for all his grace and mercies towards me
27:32 and all my family and my friends that have supported me,
27:36 my mom, my daughter, and my husband,
27:39 for their sacrifice and their encouragement.
27:43 To my former principal, Mrs. Harris,
27:46 for all the opportunities she gave me for leadership.
27:50 To Kristi Meres, principal of Fairglen
27:53 and the interviewing committee,
27:55 thank you for choosing me to help lead Fairglen.
27:59 And to Candy Jones, my former assistant principal,
28:02 now principal of Audubon,
28:05 especially because she saw leadership potential in me
28:09 and encouraged me to pursue an administrator role,
28:14 and here I am today.
28:15 So thank you all very much.
28:18 I am truly excited.
28:20 Go Indians!
28:21 (audience applauds)
28:26 - And last, but certainly not least,
28:29 I wanna congratulate Ms. Tammy Harvey,
28:31 reclass from the position of Title I teacher
28:33 at Rivier Elementary School,
28:35 now to the position of assistant principal
28:37 at Rivier Elementary School, effective August 2nd, 2022.
28:41 Congratulations.
28:43 (audience applauds)
28:48 - First of all, thank you to everyone on the board
28:49 and Dr. Mullins.
28:51 I have to say, this has been a long journey for me,
28:53 but today I feel truly blessed.
28:56 I’m blessed to be able to begin this journey
28:58 at a school I already love
29:00 and to be able to work under a principal
29:03 that I truly admire.
29:04 So I feel very blessed also because of the amazing family
29:08 I have sitting in front of me.
29:11 So I just wanna say thank you.
29:12 I am so excited to be working at a school
29:15 that I truly believe I belong at.
29:17 So I’m really excited for the next year
29:18 and thank you everyone.
29:20 (audience applauds)
29:27 - Again, congratulations.
29:29 And my thanks and appreciation to the extended families
29:33 of these men and women who will be serving
29:35 in the ranks of administrator
29:37 and continuing to give themselves, their hearts,
29:40 their lives to serving the children of Brevard.
29:43 We know that it’s a demanding responsibility
29:46 and it has impacts on the family
29:48 and we don’t take lightly the support that you have
29:50 back at your home.
29:51 So thank you for your continued devotion and dedication
29:54 to our kids and to the families that support you at home.
30:02 - All right, we are going to be moving
30:05 into our tentative budget hearing.
30:07 For those of you who joined us tonight
30:09 for the recognitions of promotion,
30:11 please don’t feel like you have to stay
30:12 for the remainder of the meeting.
30:14 I know you have a lot of work to do on your plate.
30:16 If you would like to stay, you’re welcome.
30:18 I don’t want you to think I’m throwing you out,
30:19 but we certainly understand if you have other places
30:22 that you need to be at the moment.
30:49 (indistinct chatter)
31:01 - Some of them just didn’t show up.
31:03 Is that what it was?
31:05 ‘Cause there’s only three that went.
31:06 There’s like six on here.
31:10 No, I mean, I understood.
31:15 Maybe some of them were not promotions.
31:19 (indistinct chatter)
31:39 - All right, we are now at the tentative budget hearing
31:43 portion of the agenda.
31:45 Dr. Mullen.
31:46 - Thank you, Madam Chair.
31:48 First, Ms. Cindy Luscinski, our chief financial officer,
31:51 will provide a presentation on the proposed
31:54 2022, 2023 millage levy and budget.
31:59 Ms. Luscinski.
32:01 - Good evening, Madam Chair, members of the board.
32:04 This is the first public hearing out of two
32:09 to decide the proposed millage
32:12 or approve the proposed millage rates
32:13 and the tentative budget for FY 23.
32:17 The tentative budget was built
32:19 on our four guiding principles in mind,
32:21 protection of an excellent education,
32:24 protection of an effective workforce,
32:27 maintain the fiscal strength of the district,
32:30 and protection of the taxpayer interest.
32:38 So tonight’s public hearing will include
32:40 presentation of proposed millage and budget,
32:44 an opportunity for public comment,
32:46 and board member discussion,
32:48 a request that you adopt the resolution
32:51 setting the proposed total millage levy
32:54 that was set by the state
32:56 to support the FY 23 tentative budget,
32:59 a request that you adopt resolutions
33:02 approving the FY 23 tentative budget as presented,
33:07 request authorizing the superintendent and staff
33:12 to perform all necessary actions
33:14 to comply with truth and millage requirements,
33:18 and then we will announce the date
33:19 of the final public hearing to adopt the budget for FY 23.
33:27 The truth and millage legislation was enacted in 1980
33:31 to redirect taxpayers’ concern over rising taxes
33:34 from the property appraisers
33:36 who do not control the levying of taxes
33:39 toward the government taxing authorities
33:41 that set the tax rates.
33:43 The truth and millage legislation requirements
33:47 are detailed under Florida statute.
33:50 TRMM timelines are very prescriptive in law,
33:53 and the clock started on July 1st.
33:56 The total timeline to budget adoption is 80 days.
34:00 The statute dictates the order of business
34:02 during the budget hearings
34:04 as laid out in the previous slide,
34:06 and TRMM requires two public hearings
34:09 for open discussion of millage rates
34:11 and the proposed budget.
34:13 Millage is a term that represents the tax rate levied
34:19 on real estate or property.
34:21 One mill is equivalent to $1 in taxes per $1,000
34:26 in taxable value.
34:28 If your home has a taxable value of $100,000
34:33 and you’re assessed a mill tax rate,
34:36 you will pay $100 in taxes.
34:43 The Florida Education Finance Program
34:45 is the mechanism by which state and local funds
34:48 are allocated to Florida school districts.
34:52 The Florida legislature sets
34:53 the required local effort millage rates,
34:56 and the school districts receive their rate
34:59 no later than July 19th in the FEFP second calculation.
35:05 The school board must levy
35:06 the required local effort millage rates
35:09 in order to receive any state funding
35:12 under the Florida Education Finance Program.
35:21 The total proposed millage related to school funding
35:24 for FY 23 school year totals 5.495 mills.
35:30 This millage rate will generate revenue
35:32 for the general operating and capital outlay funds.
35:36 The required local effort rate adjusts year to year
35:40 while the discretionary and local capital remain fixed.
35:52 When you compare the FY 22 required local effort
35:56 to the proposed FY 23 required local effort millage rate,
36:01 there is a decrease of 0.355 mills.
36:04 Therefore, the proposed total millage rate
36:07 related to school funding of 5.495 mills
36:13 represents a decrease of 0.355 mills
36:18 when compared to last year’s rate.
36:23 This reduction in the required local effort
36:26 from 3.602 to 3.247 mills equates to reduced local tax levy
36:33 of $7 million when applied to the current tax roll.
36:42 This slide depicts the historic millage rates
36:45 over the last 13 years.
36:47 FY 12 is the high watermark.
36:50 Millage rates have continued to decline each year
36:54 as our property values continue to increase in the county.
37:04 As required by TRMM, we must compare
37:07 the proposed millage rate to the rollback rate.
37:10 When property values rise,
37:12 property taxes generate more revenue.
37:15 For the total revenue generated to stay the same
37:19 as the prior year, the tax rate must decrease.
37:23 So the rollback rate rolls back the rate
37:26 as property values increase.
37:28 It represents what the rate would be
37:31 in order to levy the same amount of tax dollars
37:34 as the prior year.
37:36 Under TRMM, the rollback rate is the basis
37:39 for determining if tax rates have increased or decreased.
37:43 The rollback rate is normally less
37:46 than the proposed tentative rate
37:48 because maintaining revenue at the same level
37:52 as the previous year does not provide
37:54 for funding new student growth
37:56 or basic inflationary cost increases.
38:01 When the rollback rate is less
38:02 than the proposed millage rate set by the state,
38:05 we must advertise a tax increase.
38:08 For Brevard Public Schools, the proposed millage rate
38:11 is higher than the rollback rate.
38:13 The notice of proposed tax increase
38:15 was advertised in the Florida Today on July 25th.
38:26 This slide depicts the annual certified
38:28 school property tax values.
38:30 Going back 15 years.
38:32 FY 2009 was the highest annual tax roll
38:36 prior to the Great Recession.
38:38 Property values continue to increase each year
38:41 since FY 13 with the most significant change this year.
38:54 The required local effort and discretionary millage
38:57 makes up the district’s local operating funds
39:00 at 240.1 million dollars.
39:06 And on the capital side,
39:08 the local capital improvement millage
39:10 generates 90.2 million dollars at a 96% collection rate.
39:18 As stated in the prior slides,
39:20 the board must levy the required local effort
39:23 in order to receive BPS’s total FY 23
39:29 school operating funding from the state.
39:32 As the total FEFP calculation from the state
39:36 is 610.8 million dollars.
39:41 The discretionary local effort millage
39:43 will garner 45 million dollars.
39:45 When combined with the RLE or the required local effort,
39:51 we get the district’s local portion of 240.1 million dollars
39:56 which is 40% of our FY 23 FEFP school operating fund.
40:03 When a school district receives a .748 mills
40:08 or the discretionary local effort
40:11 and it generates an amount of funds per FTE
40:15 that is less than the state average of 719 dollars
40:19 and 62 cents, the school district will receive
40:24 a discretionary millage compression supplement
40:28 that will bring the district up to the state average.
40:31 In the case of Brevard, our .748 mills
40:34 generates 596 dollars and 62 cents per FTE.
40:42 In order to get to the state average,
40:44 the state provided an additional 123 dollars per FTE
40:49 which equates to 9.3 million dollars.
40:55 The local capital improvement millage or LCI
40:58 will provide the district 90.1 million dollars.
41:06 37.6 comes off the top and is used to pay
41:10 the district’s debt service which covers principal
41:14 and interest payments for previous bonded debt
41:17 that was issued primarily between the years
41:20 of 1996 and 2008 to build schools
41:25 and provide for major renovations at our older schools.
41:31 LCI contributes 10.3 million towards maintenance costs
41:35 for labor, LCI also pays for the district’s
41:39 property insurance which leaves 36.2 million
41:43 for capital project needs throughout the district.
41:47 So, I taught my daughter last night
42:00 how to calculate school taxes using this example
42:03 of a homesteaded home with an assessed value
42:06 of 100,000 dollars.
42:08 As a reminder, when someone owns property
42:13 that makes it a permanent resident,
42:16 the property owner may be eligible to receive
42:18 a homestead exemption and up to 50,000 dollar exemption.
42:25 The first 25,000 applies to all property taxes
42:28 including school district taxes.
42:31 The additional exemption up to 25,000
42:34 does not include school district taxes.
42:37 So, back to Madison, she subtracted 25,000
42:41 from the assessed value of 100,000 dollars
42:44 leaving a taxable value of 75,000 dollars.
42:49 Next, I said, okay, if one mill equals one dollar
42:53 for every taxable thousand dollars,
42:55 how much would be paid in taxes?
42:57 She’s like, oh, that’s easy, 75 dollars.
42:59 Then I asked Madison to give me two strategies
43:02 to check her work.
43:04 She divided the taxable value by 1,000 to get the 75
43:09 and she’s still working on the second.
43:14 Now, since the millage rate is 5.495,
43:18 she multiplied 775 by the 5.495 mills
43:25 which equates to 412 dollars and 13 cents.
43:31 And she’s my mathlete.
43:40 So, this slide illustrates the changes in school
43:45 related property taxes for a homeowner
43:48 over a seven year span.
43:51 In this example, we started with a home valued
43:54 at 200,000 dollars in 2016
43:58 and increased the assessed value by 3% each year,
44:02 the maximum allowable under Save Our Homes.
44:05 In 2016, the home would have generated
44:08 roughly 1,210 dollars in school related property tax.
44:13 If the owner qualified for Save Our Homes
44:16 by 2022 school year, the assessed value of the same home
44:21 would be 2,238,810.
44:30 Based on the valuation, the school related property tax
44:34 would be 1,174 dollars, 89 cents.
44:39 This is actually a decrease of 35 dollars and 18 cents
44:43 from the 2021 tax year.
44:46 And across five years, the total decrease is 35 dollars
44:50 and 41 cents.
44:57 So, what does this mean for families?
45:02 You can see that three dollars and 21 cents a day
45:06 is critical in serving our children’s education.
45:12 It’s less than the cost of a fancy Starbucks
45:15 or not so fancy Starbucks drink per day
45:18 and it would pay for a tutor once a week
45:23 for one hour for a struggling reader.
45:32 So, in the last several years we faced much uncertainty
45:42 about the economy and how life after the pandemic
45:45 would look like in the county, state, nation, and globally.
45:50 Early 2022 has been challenging with massive
45:53 supply disruptions resulting from the ongoing pandemic
45:59 and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
46:02 Additionally, the conflict was a major driver
46:05 in increased oil and food prices.
46:07 Job openings across the nation are at an all time high
46:12 which we are all very aware as we prepare to open our doors
46:15 for this coming school year.
46:18 This is a long way of saying our proposed budget
46:21 is our best estimate of revenue against expenses
46:25 and not money in the bank.
46:28 We are optimistic about our enrollment
46:30 and we will continue to monitor and make
46:32 every adjustment required to ensure we have
46:36 resources available to meet the needs of every student.
46:42 This is a district’s total proposed budget in summary form.
46:47 The general fund is where most operating expenses are paid.
46:52 That service fund is used to pay for the outstanding bonds
46:57 of the district.
47:03 Capital projects funds accounts for major construction
47:07 and renovation projects.
47:09 Special revenue fund consists of food service,
47:12 federal grants such as Title I, IDA, ARP, ESSER,
47:17 and school’s internal accounts.
47:20 Internal service fund includes the district’s
47:22 health insurance, property casualty,
47:25 and workers’ compensation programs,
47:28 and the enterprise fund is our
47:30 bivarred before and after school program.
47:34 We recommend that the board adopt the proposed FY 23 budget.
47:42 - Thank you so much, Ms. Lisinski.
47:43 Any board members have any questions?
47:46 Ms. Jenkins.
47:48 - So the final public hearing on the FY 23 millage
47:53 and budget will be held on Thursday, September 8th, 2022
47:57 at 5.30 at the Education Service Facility, right here.
48:04 And this concludes my briefing.
48:07 - Thank you, Ms. Lisinski.
48:08 I apologize for getting ahead of you there.
48:11 Ms. Jenkins, you had a question?
48:12 - Yeah, so I actually don’t have a question.
48:15 Thank you for everything that you did.
48:16 I love that you put real concrete examples for families
48:19 to see how it would impact them directly.
48:21 Of course, it’s just kind of a rough estimate
48:23 and I appreciate that.
48:24 I just wanna reiterate to people who are listening at home
48:26 or watching these slides that your assessed home value
48:30 is not equal to your market value.
48:33 So I know sometimes people are gonna panic
48:34 when they hear that.
48:36 And so just to give an example,
48:38 my home beachside is worth probably double in this market
48:42 than when it’s actually assessed by the property appraiser.
48:44 So if you’re curious about what your house is assessed at,
48:48 you can go to the property appraiser’s website
48:50 to get a real accurate number there.
48:52 And then I also just wanna double down.
48:55 You said it, but I wanna say it one more time.
48:57 That proposed budget includes federal funds from COVID.
49:02 And that is not a reoccurring fund.
49:05 We only have it for a certain amount of time.
49:07 We have a certain amount of time to spend that money.
49:08 So just wanna double down on that as well.
49:10 And I know you said it,
49:11 but I just wanna say it one more time, but thank you.
49:14 - Thank you, Ms. Jenkins.
49:15 Anyone else?
49:17 - Yeah, I wanted to say thank you.
49:20 And I think one of the things that we’re not noticing is,
49:22 is that every single person in this district
49:26 who owns their home, not so much anything else,
49:30 their taxes from the school district
49:32 are actually gonna go down, period.
49:34 And so when I did mine, I did my assessed value on my house,
49:38 I would be paying less this year
49:41 than I would have last year,
49:43 even though, and on top of that,
49:45 the amount of money that, this is incredible.
49:47 So last year, I paid $2,925 to taxes.
49:53 This year, even though my property increased
49:56 with the Save Your Homes Up,
49:57 I now am paying less at $2,820.
50:01 And just so everybody knows, many people are like,
50:04 “Well, wait a minute, the total assessed value,
50:05 “your mill goes up, how the heck does that happen?”
50:08 Had I not bought that house, because when I bought it,
50:11 it went from 300,000 to 500,000.
50:14 When I did that, they were paying $1,600.
50:17 So my house, had I not purchased it,
50:19 would pay into the tax at 1,600,
50:22 but now that I purchased it and it set it up top,
50:24 it’s now paying 2,800, but it’s still less.
50:26 So like the message across to everybody is,
50:29 you’re paying less taxes this year
50:32 than you did last year for the taxes
50:33 for the school district.
50:34 And we don’t tell enough people that.
50:36 Like everybody’s like, “Oh, it’s taxes.”
50:38 You’re literally paying less.
50:39 In the middle of a recession,
50:41 in the middle of us trying to cover costs
50:42 for things that we’re doing,
50:43 and they’re paying less, just so they know.
50:46 It doesn’t go out there enough.
50:47 So thank you, Ms. Lisinski.
50:49 And the other thing, I want everybody to know
50:53 that the reason we are harbored by this debt
50:55 is because past administrations, not this one,
50:58 not a single person on this board has raised
51:00 any kind of bonds or anything while we’ve been on here,
51:04 but it’s the past administration from 2008
51:07 that really handcuffed us in.
51:09 And they hit a recession.
51:10 Instead of really doing drastic cuts,
51:12 they decided to debt finance a lot of what they were losing.
51:14 So they were building schools in the middle of a recession.
51:18 So I think that that may not have been the smartest thing,
51:21 and we’re handcuffed by it in our capital outlay.
51:23 Thank gosh for the half-pennies in sales tax.
51:24 But I just wanted to let everybody know,
51:26 if you own your home, you are paying less this year
51:29 than you did last year for school taxes, period.
51:32 That’s huge.
51:33 So thank you.
51:35 And I don’t like those other board members
51:37 that voted in all this debt on us, just so you know.
51:39 I know who they are.
51:41 - Just to follow up on that.
51:43 And we did have explosive growth during those years,
51:46 so I can’t throw them all under the bus.
51:49 - What?
51:50 - But I know–
51:51 - What do they need to be thrown under the bus?
51:52 We’re handled with $39 million today.
51:53 - No, I understand.
51:56 When we get our annual financial report in the fall,
52:01 you usually have updates on where our debt stands.
52:04 I know when we first got on the board, it was 400 million,
52:06 but we’ve made those payments steadily.
52:08 Do you know off the top of your head
52:10 where we are right now, 300 million-ish?
52:16 - Not off the top of my head.
52:17 I can get that to you.
52:18 - Would you guys this week sometimes send us an update
52:20 on where we are right now as those payments have gone?
52:22 ‘Cause I know the last time I looked,
52:23 I want to say it was 330.
52:24 - I think they said 330.
52:25 - Yeah, just where we are right now
52:27 with whatever the last payment were that we made.
52:29 - Okay, thank you.
52:32 - Anybody else?
52:34 - I will just, to piggyback on what you said, Mr. Susan,
52:37 if you go back to the slide
52:38 on how will my taxes change that show like 2016 through 2022,
52:44 this is actually the lowest tax rate in that entire chart.
52:48 So not only is it less this year than it was last year,
52:51 but it’s been some time
52:54 since we’ve seen a tax rate this low.
52:56 And then the other thing that I will point out,
52:58 and as I’ve been having this conversation
53:00 and I don’t mean to mix issues, but I’m gonna point it out.
53:05 If you look at the slide that had our historical millage
53:09 rates, we talked about the fact that the state continues
53:12 to roll back our millage rate
53:15 to ensure that people aren’t paying more in taxes.
53:19 When they started rolling this back,
53:21 in addition to them taking away the 0.5 mil
53:24 for capital years ago,
53:27 but when they started rolling this back,
53:29 if you look at the peak of 2013 of 8.096,
53:34 and now we’re down to 5.4,
53:37 had they not rolled back even half
53:40 of what they rolled back in that timeframe,
53:43 we wouldn’t be talking about a millage rate.
53:46 So I just think that’s an important record.
53:51 - And just so everybody understands a flat line,
53:54 all of our ability to raise anything.
53:59 It’s a good year.
54:01 We’re not charging more taxes though.
54:03 And but that’s a bad year because we need that revenue for.
54:09 - And then finally, I will just say once again,
54:12 Ms. Lisinski, thank you for always having
54:13 such a student centered focus on,
54:16 sometimes you can get lost in the numbers of all of this,
54:19 but you constantly keep it top of mind for us,
54:22 what all of these numbers mean to our daily functioning.
54:25 So thank you, we appreciate it.
54:27 - And we should also point out that Madison is
54:29 how many years old?
54:30 - He’s gonna be 10 on the sixth of August.
54:33 - I think that’s awesome and happy birthday.
54:37 - And tell her we nominate her
54:38 to be Math Lead of the Year, okay.
54:42 - She’ll love that actually.
54:44 - Do you need interns in finance?
54:45 ‘Cause it sounds like she’s ready to go.
54:48 - I’m sorry?
54:49 - I said, do you need interns in finance?
54:50 ‘Cause it sounds like she’s ready to go.
54:52 - She is, especially budget ‘cause they have candy.
54:55 (all laughing)
54:59 - I didn’t know that.
55:00 - Absolutely, thank you.
55:02 - I don’t wanna go there.
55:07 - All right, the hearing is now open for public comments.
55:09 We will, in accordance with Florida law,
55:11 accept the speakers in the following order.
55:13 The 2022-2023 proposed millage levy,
55:17 followed by the 2022-2023 tentative budget.
55:22 Is there any individual who would like to address
55:24 the 2022-2023 proposed millage levy?
55:29 Mr. Hochman?
55:32 - Good evening, board members and superintendent.
55:46 First, I’m not sure if I can go down this road or not,
55:48 so just stop me if I can with the millage.
55:50 - Stop.
55:50 - All right, I’m cool with that, you know.
55:53 For the millage, my, hang on, I missed me on that.
55:57 For the millage, what I would have the conversation
56:01 start going on to is what entities can receive the millage.
56:06 So what I was thinking of,
56:07 and I’ve been thinking about this for a while actually,
56:10 for example, the first one would be separate day schools.
56:12 And hopefully you understand the reason why
56:14 maybe for the separate day schools,
56:15 because of the situation that we’re in right now,
56:17 because of that.
56:19 Because when you think of separate day schools,
56:20 whether to profit, nonprofit, they will say to you
56:24 they have to have a certain number of students
56:26 in order to basically be level with their finances,
56:29 et cetera, et cetera.
56:31 And we can’t always go by that because it’s unlawful
56:34 and it’s unethical.
56:35 We can’t say there’s gonna be a certain number of students
56:37 at a separate day school.
56:39 But there’s things that we can do.
56:40 For example, talking to those state legislatures,
56:43 having those conversations about can separate day schools
56:46 receive the millage, okay,
56:48 and also the sales tax eventually.
56:50 Can they receive funding for that?
56:52 ‘Cause currently they cannot right now, okay?
56:55 So can they receive that?
56:56 That’s one of those things I was interested in
56:59 talking about eventually with the millage.
57:01 And the second one,
57:02 which is gonna be more probably controversial,
57:05 but is private schools.
57:09 Now I understand implications of what I’m saying
57:11 and what the consequences could be for that.
57:14 But the reason I brought up bringing up private schools
57:17 and having those initial conversations
57:19 is thinking about how they can support our students.
57:24 Because when I look at it, some of these kids,
57:27 honestly, they need, and I’m not a religious person at all,
57:31 from any means, but some of these kids
57:34 might need the support of a faith-based program, okay?
57:38 But I also think if they do that,
57:39 that private schools should be able to,
57:42 if they choose to receive those funds
57:45 from a millage or a sales tax also.
57:48 And some people can say, well, there’s,
57:51 you wanna keep it perch and separate, et cetera, et cetera.
57:55 We did the pledge, we had God in it.
57:56 We have faith-based groups come into our schools.
58:00 We’ve had schools actually have on Sundays,
58:03 let them have faith-based church on Sundays, you know?
58:08 So that’s the reason I was kind of thinking that,
58:11 ‘cause some of these kids just need that support.
58:13 And we might have to look,
58:15 like I know there’s the whole thing with co-parent,
58:17 we don’t wanna co-parent with the government,
58:19 but some of our parents and some of our families
58:21 might wanna co-parent with God, and they might need that.
58:24 Okay, so I’m just throwing out there having those
58:26 initial conversations, you know,
58:29 and eventually lobbying for it.
58:30 Thank you very much.
58:31 - Thank you, Mr. Hochman.
58:33 - Yeah, he might wanna, hey, Mr. Hochman,
58:34 you might wanna go check with Ms. Sullivan.
58:36 She understands the rules and regulations
58:38 behind all of the ins and outs of faith-based versus,
58:41 you know what I mean?
58:42 She’s one of the most in-depth.
58:43 She carries around the rules and regulations
58:45 for the Department of Education in a book.
58:48 So you can check with her.
58:49 I’d have a long conversation with her.
58:52 - Is there any individual who would like to address
58:54 the 2022-2023 proposed millage levy?
58:59 Is there any individual who would like to address
59:01 the 2022-2023 proposed millage levy?
59:06 All right, is there any individual
59:08 who would like to address the 2022-2023 tentative budget?
59:14 Is there any individual who would like to address
59:16 the 2022-2023 tentative budget?
59:20 Celine?
59:29 - Again, I would just ask you for the way
59:32 that the budget is presented to the public to be changed.
59:35 We don’t know where any of the money is going.
59:38 There’s just groups of where the money is going,
59:43 and that doesn’t tell us anything.
59:44 It doesn’t tell us where there may be waste,
59:46 where there may be things that we’re paying for
59:49 that possibly don’t line up with legislation.
59:54 So we just need more transparency, more accountability,
59:57 and it’s just not there.
1:00:00 Like I said at the last board meeting,
1:00:02 I was going to be charged almost $400
1:00:04 for a public records request
1:00:07 for a relatively small amount of information
1:00:12 from the budget, and that’s just not right.
1:00:15 This is all public knowledge.
1:00:17 It should be public knowledge, and it should be
1:00:19 easily accessible by the public.
1:00:22 You cannot access invoices from anything
1:00:26 that the board has presented to the public, so thank you.
1:00:31 - Thank you, Ms. Delaney.
1:00:33 Is there any individual who would like to address
1:00:35 the 2022-2023 tentative budget?
1:00:38 Ms. Merski?
1:00:47 - Good evening, Madam Chair and board.
1:00:52 My name is Sarah Merski.
1:00:53 I’m a wife, mother of two children in BPS,
1:00:56 college student, registered voter, taxpayer, constituent,
1:00:59 and I live in District Two for school board.
1:01:03 As I brought my concerns to this board in the past
1:01:06 about the millage issues, either a decrease or an increase,
1:01:11 I still have many questions and concerns.
1:01:14 One thing that I brought to the board back in November
1:01:17 was about the inflation at the gas pump and grocery stores,
1:01:20 and now we are experiencing hyperinflation.
1:01:23 Today, with the, again, with GDP shrinking
1:01:29 in the second quarter, we are now in recession.
1:01:34 Also, something that I was told wasn’t,
1:01:37 this board told me wasn’t happening,
1:01:38 but then had to admit that it was happening
1:01:41 was declining enrollment.
1:01:44 So I just, you know, I echo what Ms. Delaney shared earlier.
1:01:49 We need more transparency in the budget.
1:01:52 I’ve asked for specific, for bids on specific contracts.
1:01:58 I haven’t gotten that.
1:01:59 I’m not paying $400 as a taxpayer
1:02:01 to get that information, and taxpayers shouldn’t have to.
1:02:07 What, I feel this board is completely out of touch
1:02:11 with the everyday person, especially with people
1:02:14 who do not have, who are living below the poverty line.
1:02:19 We’re asking them, we’re asking everybody for more money.
1:02:22 This isn’t a left or right issue.
1:02:25 This is a bipartisan issue.
1:02:27 This is our tax money,
1:02:28 and we don’t know where our tax money is going.
1:02:30 I voted for a millage increase in Seminole County.
1:02:33 I had no problems doing that.
1:02:34 I had no problems where the money was going.
1:02:36 I saw children well-educated and well-taken care of.
1:02:40 I will be not for the November millage increase.
1:02:49 You know, if we have state level issues
1:02:52 where we need to talk with our legislatures more about
1:02:55 where the money is going, if we need to fund our schools,
1:02:58 that is an issue I’d be willing to advocate for you guys on.
1:03:02 However, you have lost the public trust in many ways,
1:03:06 and I suggest if our children really need that,
1:03:09 if our schools really need this money,
1:03:11 please work with us and be transparent with us.
1:03:14 Thank you.
1:03:15 - Thank you, Ms. Marcy.
1:03:17 Is there any individual who would like to address
1:03:19 the 2022-2023 tentative budget?
1:03:24 Okay, the public comment portion of the hearing
1:03:26 is now closed.
1:03:30 That brings us to the recommendations
1:03:32 for the adoption of the proposed millage rates
1:03:33 and tentative budget.
1:03:34 Dr. Mullins.
1:03:35 - School board members,
1:03:36 there are a total of three separate motions
1:03:38 for the board to consider.
1:03:39 I will read each of these recommendations
1:03:41 into the record and request board action.
1:03:45 The first is to adopt the proposed 2022-2023
1:03:49 millage rates for operating fund required local effort 3.247.
1:03:57 Local discretionary, 0.748.
1:04:01 Capital outlay, 1.50.
1:04:05 Total, 5.495.
1:04:09 - What are the wishes of the board?
1:04:12 Moved by Ms. McDougall, seconded by Ms. Campbell.
1:04:14 Is there any discussion?
1:04:16 All in favor, please signify by saying aye.
1:04:18 - Aye.
1:04:19 - Any opposed, same sign.
1:04:20 Motion passes, five-zero.
1:04:23 The next item is to, oh, Dr. Mullins, sorry.
1:04:26 - That’s all right.
1:04:27 The next item is to adopt the proposed 2022-2023
1:04:31 tentative budget.
1:04:32 General, $679,332,076.
1:04:40 Special revenue, $257,474,573.
1:04:46 Debt service, $38,002,926.
1:04:51 Capital outlay, $337,587,689.
1:04:58 Enterprise, $1,492,287.
1:05:04 And internal service, $83,435,888.
1:05:10 For a total budget of $1,397,325,439.
1:05:18 - What are the wishes of the board?
1:05:19 - Moved by Ms. McDougall, seconded by Ms. Campbell.
1:05:25 Is there any discussion?
1:05:27 All in favor, please signify by saying aye.
1:05:29 - Aye.
1:05:30 - Any opposed, same sign.
1:05:32 Motion passes, five-zero.
1:05:34 Dr. Mullins.
1:05:35 - And the last item is to authorize the superintendent
1:05:37 to take the following actions,
1:05:40 which are three separate actions.
1:05:42 Notify both the property appraiser and the tax collector
1:05:46 of the proposed 2022-2023 millage
1:05:50 and the following rollback rates.
1:05:52 Required local effort, 3.0520.
1:05:56 Local discretionary, 0.6338.
1:06:00 Capital outlay, 1.2710.
1:06:03 For a total rollback rate of 4.9568.
1:06:08 Second, notify both the property appraiser
1:06:10 and tax collector of the final public hearing
1:06:13 on September 8, 2022, at 5.30 p.m.
1:06:17 at the educational services facility, Vieira.
1:06:21 And third, adjust the revenues and expenditures
1:06:23 if necessary prior to the final public hearing.
1:06:26 - What are the wishes of the board?
1:06:27 - Move to.
1:06:29 - Moved by Mr. Susan, seconded by Ms. McDougall.
1:06:31 Is there any discussion?
1:06:33 All in favor, please signify by saying aye.
1:06:35 - Aye.
1:06:36 - Any opposed, same sign.
1:06:37 Motion passes, five-zero.
1:06:41 Prior to the adjournment of this hearing,
1:06:43 I must read the following statement.
1:06:45 The proposed 2022-2023 millage rate necessary
1:06:49 to fund the tentative budget exceeds the rollback rate
1:06:53 by 10.86%.
1:06:56 This public hearing is now adjourned.
1:06:59 All right, we are now moving on to presentations.
1:07:02 Dr. Mullins.
1:07:03 - Thank you, Mrs. Belford.
1:07:05 Yes, the first presentation will be from,
1:07:08 actually, I’m going to, before our budget folks leave,
1:07:12 I, Mr. Susan, I did miss recognizing someone
1:07:15 who received an advancement or a promotion this evening.
1:07:19 And it wasn’t in the script, but I have gotten some notes.
1:07:22 Ms. Lichtenstein, forgive me,
1:07:23 at least I know how to pronounce your last name correctly.
1:07:28 But congratulations to Ms. Diane Lichtenstein
1:07:33 from the position of Assistant Director of Budgeting,
1:07:35 Cost Accounting, and FTE, to the position of Director
1:07:39 of Budgeting, Cost Accounting, and FTE
1:07:41 on an annual contract effective July 29th, 2022.
1:07:45 Congratulations, Mrs. Lichtenstein, please forgive me
1:07:48 for not recognizing you when we had the masses here.
1:07:52 But we know you two are a leader behind the scenes,
1:07:55 helping us be our best, and we thank you
1:07:58 and appreciate you taking on this new responsibility
1:08:00 and role, congratulations.
1:08:02 (audience applauding)
1:08:06 - I think Dr. Mullins owes you a lunch or dinner.
1:08:09 - Ms. Lichtenstein, would you like to say a few words?
1:08:10 I think Mr. Brin’s bringing you the mic.
1:08:12 We didn’t want to skip that opportunity for you.
1:08:15 - Now she’s really mad at me.
1:08:17 - I was hoping you’d make a recommendation
1:08:19 to get rid of the armored car.
1:08:20 That’s what we were waiting on.
1:08:22 - No.
1:08:23 Oh, I hate that.
1:08:27 - All right, now, thank you, Board.
1:08:30 The first presentation, I’ve asked Dr. Theddy
1:08:31 to provide a very brief update, but reference
1:08:35 to the Ad Valorem millage that will be
1:08:38 on the November 8th ballot, followed
1:08:40 by a recruitment update.
1:08:42 Dr. Theddy, Deputy Superintendent,
1:08:44 Chief Human Resources Officer, will present both in seconds.
1:08:48 Thank you, Dr. Theddy.
1:08:49 - Thank you, good evening.
1:08:50 Thank you for the opportunity to provide
1:08:52 some brief information about the millage referendum
1:08:55 and thanking Ms. Belford, Board members, and Dr. Mullins.
1:09:07 On April 26th, Dr. Mullins recommended
1:09:09 and the Board approved the Ad Valorem millage resolution
1:09:12 to forward to the Brevard County Commission
1:09:14 for approval and placement
1:09:15 on the November general election ballot.
1:09:18 That approval from Brevard County Commission
1:09:20 was given on May 19th to forward
1:09:22 to the Supervisor of Elections.
1:09:24 The term is one mill for four years
1:09:26 with initial revenue received
1:09:27 in the November-December timeframe, 2023.
1:09:30 It is limited to operating expenses
1:09:32 of the school district as described in the resolution,
1:09:35 and it is also shared with charter schools
1:09:37 based on enrollment pursuant to section 1011.71
1:09:42 for statutes.
1:09:44 The resolution also calls for an oversight committee
1:09:46 of independent citizens appointed by the school board
1:09:49 that will include annual reporting
1:09:50 of the status of our funded priorities,
1:09:53 which will be shared in just a moment.
1:09:57 As you will see in my next presentation,
1:09:59 not this one, but my next one,
1:10:01 recruitment and retention of all staff is a priority,
1:10:03 and the proposed allocation of the potential millage funds
1:10:06 with 80% to compensation and benefits
1:10:08 shows our commitment to that priority.
1:10:11 Our priorities include recruitment and retention
1:10:14 of all staff with competitive salaries,
1:10:17 expanding staffing in early childhood,
1:10:19 maintaining and expanding career and technical programs,
1:10:23 enhancement of art, music, and athletic programs,
1:10:26 expanded access to educational programs,
1:10:29 and the modernization
1:10:31 of classroom technology learning environments.
1:10:33 It’s also really important to note
1:10:35 that our initiatives align with our strategic plan.
1:10:38 The alignment, I wanna take a moment
1:10:39 and talk about that alignment.
1:10:41 For goal one, academic excellence,
1:10:43 to provide every student a learning environment
1:10:45 that empowers them to reach their full potential,
1:10:48 objective A2 aligns in ensuring every student
1:10:51 is taught by certified skilled teachers
1:10:53 who hold high expectations for all learners.
1:10:56 For goal two, exceptional workforce,
1:10:59 to attract, develop, and retain exceptional talent
1:11:02 to impact academic excellence.
1:11:05 Objective E1, recruit, objective E3, retain,
1:11:08 and objective E4, to develop and provide
1:11:11 long-term compensation and benefits packages
1:11:14 for our employees.
1:11:16 For goal four, operational sustainability,
1:11:18 ensure sustainable district operations
1:11:21 that contribute to the success of the academic mission.
1:11:24 Objective O1, provide safe, healthy,
1:11:26 and fully equipped working and learning environments.
1:11:29 And back to the staff for just a moment,
1:11:31 as you know, Brevard Public Schools is currently,
1:11:33 we have one of the most experienced teacher workforces
1:11:37 in the state of Florida,
1:11:38 who consistently provide high quality learning experiences
1:11:42 and opportunities for our students.
1:11:44 However, national, regional, and local labor shortages
1:11:47 are affecting Brevard’s ability to serve students
1:11:50 as critical, instructional, and support positions
1:11:53 remain vacant, which you’ll hear a little bit later.
1:11:55 Funding is needed to increase teacher and staff compensation
1:11:58 to recruit and retain highly qualified workforce,
1:12:00 which ultimately benefits our community and our students.
1:12:06 Some next steps.
1:12:07 We know a high quality education system
1:12:09 benefits all residents of Brevard County,
1:12:11 whether they have children in the school system or not.
1:12:14 To that end, we are working now to prepare
1:12:16 should the referendum be successful.
1:12:18 Compensation and benefits for all employee groups
1:12:20 must be negotiated, as you know,
1:12:22 and will require development and refinement of plans.
1:12:24 Given our focus on early childhood education,
1:12:27 expanding staffing of early childhood classrooms
1:12:30 is paramount, as is maintaining and expanding
1:12:32 our CTE programs, enhancing art, music,
1:12:34 and athletic programs, as well as the access for students
1:12:38 to modern technology in our classrooms.
1:12:40 These plans are being developed,
1:12:42 as is the charter for the Citizens’ Oversight Committee.
1:12:46 Thank you so much for your time tonight
1:12:48 to present this really brief overview
1:12:50 of the proposed millage plans.
1:12:52 I’m available if you have any questions.
1:12:56 - Ms. Jenkins. - Yeah.
1:12:58 So again, you stated this, but I just want to reiterate it,
1:13:01 and then I’m gonna kind of ask a follow-up question.
1:13:05 So this will have a proportionate share
1:13:08 for our charter schools, correct?
1:13:10 - It will, yes.
1:13:11 - So if you send your child to a charter school,
1:13:14 if you work at a charter school,
1:13:15 if you own a charter school,
1:13:17 this doesn’t only impact Brevard Public Schools,
1:13:19 it impacts you as well.
1:13:20 And I know we had estimates of the proposal
1:13:23 of what we might see.
1:13:25 I’m gonna give a blanket broad number here
1:13:27 if I’m way off base, somebody correct me,
1:13:28 but I think charter schools can see an increase
1:13:31 of five to seven million dollars
1:13:32 within the first year of that fitting,
1:13:34 which is a significant amount of money
1:13:36 for those schools as well.
1:13:37 So I would love all of the public
1:13:39 to hear that loud and clear,
1:13:41 because this impacts all of our students
1:13:43 across many different learning environments.
1:13:45 And so then my follow-up question,
1:13:47 ‘cause we did have a speaker bring it up,
1:13:48 and I don’t want to be wrong here,
1:13:50 our sales tax initiative,
1:13:53 are we sharing that with charter schools as well?
1:13:57 - I can answer that, yes.
1:13:58 Our sales tax that was just renewed two years ago
1:14:02 by statute required charter schools
1:14:04 to receive their proportional share.
1:14:06 - Thank you.
1:14:07 - Again, I felt pretty confident in that,
1:14:09 but I didn’t want to make a statement without clarifying it.
1:14:11 So again, these things don’t just help BPS.
1:14:13 We’re definitely not getting raises up here.
1:14:16 It’s helping students across
1:14:17 all different learning environments, so thank you.
1:14:20 - Anyone else?
1:14:21 Questions, comments?
1:14:24 Ms. Campbell.
1:14:25 - So when we, I know we’re gonna get into the details later,
1:14:27 but when you talked about that early childhood part of,
1:14:35 staffing in early childhood.
1:14:36 - Right, staffing in early childhood.
1:14:38 And if I recall, we had talked about before as a board,
1:14:40 we were kind of thinking what would we use this for.
1:14:43 That would, to add like instructional assistance
1:14:46 in our early childhood, those younger, or those early years.
1:14:50 Is that still kind of the idea that we’re looking at?
1:14:54 - Yeah, yeah.
1:14:56 I’ll jump in.
1:14:56 Yes, we’re still considering that,
1:14:58 but to be honest with you,
1:15:00 not necessarily making any commitments at this point
1:15:03 because of the workforce situation we’re in.
1:15:05 We need to be relevant and mindful of
1:15:08 where we are today or what we want today
1:15:11 may not be where we’re at when,
1:15:15 we’re talking about a year from now at the earliest.
1:15:18 - No, I understand.
1:15:19 So I mean, just to kind of put that in layman’s terms.
1:15:21 In other words, right now, if we’re sitting at,
1:15:23 with 60 vacancies for instructional assistance,
1:15:26 we’d wanna add another 60 instructional assistant jobs
1:15:29 to be in our primary grades.
1:15:32 - But the parameters of the referendum, the resolution
1:15:39 provides for additional staffing.
1:15:40 So we’ll have flexibility.
1:15:43 It won’t, there won’t be flexibility that
1:15:44 it has to be for additional staffing,
1:15:46 but we’ll have some flexibility in terms of
1:15:48 where does that end up being most relevant
1:15:50 and most appropriate when we get closer to the time
1:15:53 that that revenue will be available for staffing,
1:15:56 which could potentially be not this next school year
1:16:00 because we wouldn’t receive revenue until December of ‘23.
1:16:04 And we’ve already done our staffing,
1:16:06 so it may be delayed a year.
1:16:07 - Right.
1:16:08 And I’ll touch on that in just a second.
1:16:10 Just a couple more comments just to wrap up.
1:16:12 You know, the Classroom of the Future initiative,
1:16:14 you know, we’ve got a couple,
1:16:15 we’ve got one new elementary school in the elementary,
1:16:19 which you guys have been in there, you know,
1:16:21 just pretty amazing to walk into.
1:16:24 And then we have a few of our elementary schools
1:16:26 that have had some pretty serious renovations.
1:16:29 Saturn, I believe, was one of the ones that,
1:16:32 you know, through our sales tax initiatives
1:16:34 and capital funding or whatever.
1:16:36 I think, you know, of course the technology side of things,
1:16:39 we have some sales tax things
1:16:40 and Mr. Cheatham’s department is working on that,
1:16:42 but the difference between one school and another school
1:16:46 is pretty stark if you were to walk into one
1:16:51 and then go down the street and walk into another.
1:16:53 And so just the opportunity to have
1:16:55 those same kinds of resources, classrooms,
1:16:59 honestly, just the way it looks.
1:17:00 ‘Cause you guys know when we walk,
1:17:01 when you walk into an environment that is, you know,
1:17:05 people say, “Oh, well, that’s where I went to school.”
1:17:06 Well, it looks exactly like it did
1:17:08 when you went to school there.
1:17:09 You know, if you’re a parent,
1:17:10 so maybe your kids are going to the same school.
1:17:11 Some of them it’s the same, you know,
1:17:13 we’ve been able to tackle some of that,
1:17:15 but some of them it’s very similar.
1:17:16 So I think that’s really important to think about.
1:17:19 We’re getting all those schools
1:17:20 that have kind of been left behind in the technology
1:17:23 because they’re hitting the 30 or 40 or 50 or 60 year,
1:17:26 and I think you said something yesterday.
1:17:28 - We’ll be hitting some of our schools 70 years.
1:17:31 - Very soon, right.
1:17:32 So, I mean, that’s, it makes a huge difference.
1:17:35 I know we want the best for all of our students.
1:17:38 - And it really accelerates the implementation of that
1:17:42 and provides a more equitable response across our district.
1:17:45 ‘Cause right now we have schools
1:17:47 that are using their own funds that they’ve raised
1:17:51 or in the community among parents and so on
1:17:53 to kind of inch forward
1:17:55 in the classroom of the future initiative,
1:17:58 which kudos to our ET department
1:18:00 for really doing a great job researching
1:18:02 and defining what that is.
1:18:03 So we know what we’re working toward,
1:18:06 but we want to make sure
1:18:08 that we have an equitable implementation of that initiative.
1:18:15 - Just my last comment would be
1:18:17 really about the timing of all this,
1:18:18 because one of the things that has been brought up
1:18:21 in public discussion of the millage vote
1:18:24 is that this is not the time, right?
1:18:28 The economy, the inflation and all of that.
1:18:31 But I just want to point out, it was mentioned tonight,
1:18:33 but I don’t know that it was really clear
1:18:34 and we had our conversations back in April.
1:18:36 ‘Cause honestly, I had to wrap my brain around it.
1:18:38 We’re talking about not, I mean, if we vote,
1:18:40 if it passes, if the voters pass it in November,
1:18:42 it doesn’t mean that your bill that you usually get
1:18:45 in the middle of November is going to have that additional.
1:18:47 That’s not gonna come until the bill
1:18:48 that we will all receive in November of 2023,
1:18:53 which is not due until March, if you wait,
1:18:56 and don’t get the discount, but until March of 2024.
1:19:01 So we’re talking about an impact to our community.
1:19:04 And I’m an optimist.
1:19:05 I like to say we’re all gonna be in a better place
1:19:08 with everything.
1:19:09 I know optimists don’t always get their way,
1:19:13 but we’re gonna be at a better place then too.
1:19:15 But in the meantime, our employees are also dealing
1:19:19 with the impacts of all those things,
1:19:21 the recession, the home prices, inflation,
1:19:24 the gas, groceries, all that.
1:19:26 But I just wanted to make sure it’s really clear
1:19:28 with the public, hear me say this,
1:19:31 the impact of the millage, whether we pass it,
1:19:33 if it’s passed, is something that we will not really receive
1:19:39 until a year and a half from now, really.
1:19:43 And it’s likely, Mr. Susan mentioned
1:19:45 that this year’s taxes are actually going down, right?
1:19:48 A little bit at least for everyone.
1:19:49 It’s likely because the legislature does it every year
1:19:51 that they’ll do it again.
1:19:52 And so all of that, the impact of that is yet to be seen.
1:19:57 I always wanna make sure that the right information
1:19:59 is out there, the truth is out there,
1:20:01 and not just what everybody’s running away with
1:20:02 ‘cause we’re getting a panic.
1:20:05 - Can I just back off the technology conversation real quick?
1:20:09 So I also, I appreciate you bringing that up,
1:20:12 the discrepancies between some of our schools.
1:20:14 And I just wanna put this out there too,
1:20:15 ‘cause we do have some families that are probably listening
1:20:17 and feel like, well, we have this at our school.
1:20:20 But there’s a lot of amazing community partnerships
1:20:23 that have done an incredible amount of service
1:20:26 providing some of that technology to our schools
1:20:28 or donating money so that technology can be purchased.
1:20:31 But there’s something else we have to think about.
1:20:33 We have to think about replenishing that technology.
1:20:35 The lifespan of this technology
1:20:37 is like six years maybe nowadays.
1:20:40 They don’t make ‘em like they used to.
1:20:42 So that’s something we really need to think about.
1:20:44 That’s a big, huge impact on schools
1:20:45 that they can’t take over that load on their own.
1:20:48 And another thing, it’s not just great for the students.
1:20:51 It’s also really great for recruitment
1:20:53 and retainment of staff.
1:20:55 Because if you’re a new college grad
1:20:57 who came out of college learning all these amazing ways
1:21:01 to engage your students
1:21:02 with all these different kinds of technologies,
1:21:04 and then you come to a school
1:21:05 that still has a whiteboard on the board,
1:21:07 or God forbid, a chalkboard,
1:21:11 you’re not gonna wanna go work for that district.
1:21:13 You’re gonna wanna go work for another district
1:21:15 that has innovation and technology
1:21:16 that you’ve been experiencing over the past four years.
1:21:18 So there’s just many different things to think about
1:21:21 when it comes to technology improvements
1:21:22 within the school system.
1:21:23 It’s not just for kids to put their hands on iPads.
1:21:26 So thank you.
1:21:29 - Good observation, Ms. Jenkins.
1:21:30 And if I can just tag off
1:21:32 of what you and Ms. Campbell both said,
1:21:35 obviously it’s that time of year
1:21:37 where we’re out speaking to a lot of people.
1:21:39 And I had the opportunity last week,
1:21:42 not this past week and the weekend before,
1:21:44 to speak with one of our former teachers.
1:21:47 And she’s a young teacher,
1:21:49 and she left Brevard County and she went to Orange County.
1:21:52 And she said one of the big things is
1:21:55 they have one-to-one technology,
1:21:56 and it makes it so much,
1:21:59 it just takes a lot of stress off of the teaching
1:22:03 and the classroom management and so many different things.
1:22:05 And so I echo we need to do what we can
1:22:10 to make the jobs easier,
1:22:11 ‘cause they definitely are uphill, challenging jobs
1:22:15 each and every day.
1:22:16 And then to your point, Ms. Campbell,
1:22:17 I think it’s also important to point out,
1:22:20 we’ve talked over the years significantly
1:22:22 about how the way that the school looks
1:22:25 impacts the way that the students feel about their school.
1:22:28 the pride they feel in their school,
1:22:30 and the same thing for teachers, walking into a nice building.
1:22:33 But I think we also have to be honest with ourselves
1:22:35 in that if you’re a company looking
1:22:38 to come to Brevard County, and you drive around
1:22:40 our neighborhoods and look at our schools,
1:22:43 it doesn’t look like a really enticing place all the time
1:22:45 for you to bring your employees.
1:22:48 And so I think there’s benefit to the overall enhancement
1:22:51 of the condition of our schools.
1:22:53 So I just didn’t wanna let that go unrecognized.
1:22:59 Anyone else have anything for Dr. Theddy
1:23:01 or Dr. Mullins on this one?
1:23:04 All right, thank you, Dr. Theddy.
1:23:06 - Just to give a preempt to Dr. Theddy’s presentation next,
1:23:10 I thought it appropriate to provide to the board
1:23:12 and even to our community, just a update on where we are
1:23:15 with our workforce situation as it is first of mind
1:23:19 for all of us as we soon open our doors,
1:23:24 but also open our hearts to our kids coming back
1:23:27 in a couple weeks.
1:23:28 So I asked Dr. Theddy to provide an update
1:23:30 and kind of make sure we keep things in perspective
1:23:33 as we manage some vacancies and moving forward.
1:23:36 So Dr. Theddy, please.
1:23:38 - Thank you, and thank you for this opportunity
1:23:40 to give an update on what we’ve been doing,
1:23:42 not just in HR, but really district-wide.
1:23:44 This is not an effort that can be taken
1:23:47 just by human resources.
1:23:49 It is a cooperative effort of everybody
1:23:52 in this school district.
1:23:53 And we have seen that over the last,
1:23:55 especially four days with our career fairs,
1:23:58 the coming together of people has been amazing
1:24:00 and it has reaped rewards.
1:24:05 So I’m gonna start with what’s driving our work,
1:24:08 what is driving us to have another presentation
1:24:11 about recruitment, because we did just talk about this,
1:24:13 I wanna say two weeks ago or three weeks ago
1:24:15 at the last board meeting.
1:24:16 We do have persistent vacancies
1:24:18 and we have a desire obviously to ensure
1:24:20 that every single classroom in our school district
1:24:23 is staffed with a fully qualified teacher.
1:24:25 And not only every classroom,
1:24:27 but every school and department is also fully staffed
1:24:29 with the ancillary support personnel
1:24:31 that drive achievement as well.
1:24:34 While the numbers really look daunting on the screen,
1:24:37 and they are, there are targeted schools
1:24:39 where we are and have been providing concentrated efforts
1:24:45 to staff that account for the greatest number of vacancies.
1:24:47 You know, we talk about priority two
1:24:48 and priority three schools.
1:24:50 We look at those schools in particular,
1:24:52 and then look at the schools
1:24:54 that have the highest vacancies.
1:24:55 And two of our schools have high vacancies
1:24:57 and they’re not a priority two or priority three,
1:24:59 but they are targeted raised schools
1:25:01 as part of the state definition of raising achievement.
1:25:04 So you’ll hear about those schools a little bit later,
1:25:07 but you have to know that the efforts have been intentional.
1:25:10 And it’s also important to note that none of this is new.
1:25:13 We didn’t just decide last week
1:25:15 that we need to have career fairs.
1:25:17 We’ve been doing them.
1:25:18 We’ve been doing them prior, even during COVID,
1:25:20 we were handling them, handling them virtually,
1:25:23 not with the greatest of success through that method,
1:25:25 but we’ve been for the last three years that I’ve been in HR,
1:25:29 we’ve been really hitting the career fairs hard.
1:25:32 It’s not the only thing we’re doing.
1:25:33 So I’m gonna take you through some other things.
1:25:35 Team HR has been working with all departments and divisions
1:25:39 in the school district to address vacancies
1:25:41 for the last several years, as I said.
1:25:44 There was a time when we really focused primarily
1:25:47 on teacher recruitment and teacher retention
1:25:50 and teacher fairs.
1:25:51 And we realized that we needed to do a lot more outreach
1:25:54 to our support personnel as well.
1:25:56 And we have a wonderful support team,
1:25:58 food nutrition services, transportation,
1:26:00 custodial and facilities.
1:26:02 I’m probably gonna leave somebody out
1:26:03 and I hate to do that,
1:26:04 but they are on board for everything we want to do.
1:26:07 And we’ve been working closely with them
1:26:09 to facilitate career fairs as well over the last few years.
1:26:14 So I do wanna note that when you look at these vacancies,
1:26:17 we actually have 59 schools that have zero,
1:26:20 one or two classroom vacancies.
1:26:23 I’m talking classrooms with kids.
1:26:25 We do have some non-classroom vacancies in those schools,
1:26:27 but they 59 of them as of Saturday,
1:26:30 July 23rd when I pulled the data from the most recent survey
1:26:33 had zero, one or two vacancies.
1:26:36 Six schools have three vacancies
1:26:37 and there are 15 priority schools
1:26:39 that have between four and 14 vacancies as of Saturday.
1:26:43 We actually have made some movement
1:26:44 with a couple of those schools last four nights.
1:26:47 I don’t have all the updated information,
1:26:49 but we are very hopeful and our principals are very hopeful
1:26:52 that they’ve been able to attract some quality candidates
1:26:54 at our most recent fairs.
1:26:58 In anticipation of a growing need for staff
1:27:01 of all classifications in school district,
1:27:04 we began targeted recruiting efforts last summer,
1:27:06 going back to actually last, not last spring,
1:27:09 but the spring of ‘21 with custodial food services,
1:27:13 substitutes and bus driver fairs
1:27:15 that have continued over this school year.
1:27:18 In fact, transportation, if you didn’t know it,
1:27:19 they run pretty much open hiring fairs
1:27:22 at all of their transportation depots.
1:27:26 They provide beacon support, they will help people.
1:27:29 You’ve seen their advertisements everywhere.
1:27:33 Food service does the same thing.
1:27:35 They participate in the fairs that we facilitate,
1:27:37 but then they also participate in community job fairs
1:27:40 as well.
1:27:42 Our staff in HR participates also in teacher fairs
1:27:46 that are sponsored by colleges of education
1:27:48 and universities.
1:27:50 We’ve also made a lot of changes this year
1:27:52 to remove some barriers to people applying for jobs.
1:27:56 We have removed barriers for hiring managers
1:28:00 and some of that’s included in an initial entry pathway.
1:28:03 Instead of everybody being the same,
1:28:05 we recognize some positions are really
1:28:08 initial entry kinds of positions.
1:28:09 So we have made some updates
1:28:11 and you guys all approved those updates in February,
1:28:13 the February board meeting.
1:28:15 We updated policies and procedures.
1:28:17 We put a process in place so that resumes
1:28:20 can be uploaded into beacon for those positions
1:28:23 that require resumes so that hiring managers
1:28:25 don’t have to solicit that information
1:28:28 from the employee through email
1:28:29 and it makes it easier for everybody.
1:28:32 We removed the email response from previous employers
1:28:35 regarding, oh my gosh, lost my train of thought, I’m sorry,
1:28:40 regarding references and we’ve put in a process
1:28:43 where they put the contact information
1:28:45 for their previous employers so that we can call them
1:28:48 and we being the hiring manager can call them.
1:28:50 That was a barrier for a lot of people.
1:28:52 They would send out the email to their previous employer
1:28:55 and their previous employer would not respond
1:28:58 and that would hold up their application
1:28:59 in HR for quite some time.
1:29:01 So we have eliminated those barriers.
1:29:03 We’ve updated job descriptions for clerical
1:29:06 and other classifications to bring the requirements
1:29:08 more into the job that we have now
1:29:10 rather than the job that existed
1:29:11 when the job description was created
1:29:14 and that’s made a big difference
1:29:15 for our hiring managers too.
1:29:18 I won’t go through all of the fairs.
1:29:20 I think you guys know the fairs
1:29:22 but I wanted to just make sure you knew
1:29:23 that we’ve been conducting these all throughout the year,
1:29:26 different venues, different locations, different modalities.
1:29:29 Some are virtual, some are hybrid, some are face-to-face.
1:29:33 It has made a difference.
1:29:35 Not the big difference we want yet
1:29:36 but it has made a difference.
1:29:39 I think something that’s really important to mention too
1:29:40 is we believe in the concept of growing our own
1:29:43 and IAs are one classification of employee
1:29:45 where we really focused on growing our own.
1:29:48 We also have developed career pathways
1:29:50 for other classifications of employees
1:29:53 so that even if they’re not on a trajectory
1:29:55 potentially to become a teacher,
1:29:57 they do have a path that they can advance
1:29:59 in their own career and they can see advancement
1:30:02 opportunities within Brevard Public Schools.
1:30:05 The IA to teacher pathway and I have the spoiler alert,
1:30:08 I just have to tell you over the last two years,
1:30:10 97 IAs have become teachers in Brevard Public Schools.
1:30:13 That’s a pretty big number.
1:30:16 We did an event this past year that was really,
1:30:19 I really want to take a minute and talk about it.
1:30:21 We’ve done a lot of outreach with IAs
1:30:23 but the event that we did starting in December
1:30:25 that culminated in a session with IAs in February,
1:30:29 we gave all the principals postcards to give to their IAs,
1:30:32 inviting them specifically to this event
1:30:35 and it was an IA to teacher pathway event.
1:30:37 Some of our principals took a step further
1:30:40 and they wrote personal notes on these cards
1:30:42 and the impact that that had
1:30:44 on those instructional assistants
1:30:46 that came to our meeting that night was impressive.
1:30:49 I heard a lot about that and I wanted to mention that
1:30:52 because that’s a little thing we can do
1:30:53 that doesn’t cost any money.
1:30:55 That means a lot to people and it was really critical.
1:30:59 So we’ve reached out, I’ve emailed the IAs
1:31:01 that came to our sessions, provided them additional support.
1:31:04 I’ve connected them with the right staff
1:31:07 and we have people working on their degrees.
1:31:10 We have people that are attending college.
1:31:13 We have Eastern Florida
1:31:14 and University of Central Florida there as well to assist
1:31:18 and it has made a big difference for our IAs.
1:31:21 We’ve conducted Zoom sessions on how to become a teacher.
1:31:24 We’ve talked about certification.
1:31:25 We’ve worked through the PDCP program with them
1:31:28 and I feel like that is an untapped resource
1:31:31 because we have such high quality staff in our schools
1:31:35 that are aspiring to be teachers
1:31:37 and providing that little nudge of support
1:31:38 has made a big difference.
1:31:40 I’ll say that number again, 97.
1:31:42 That’s pretty good. (laughing)
1:31:44 Some other recruitment efforts.
1:31:45 I won’t read them all.
1:31:46 You heard this in the last presentation.
1:31:48 We are working with the NAACP
1:31:51 and the Brevard Alliance of Black School Educators
1:31:54 to promote our hiring events
1:31:56 and to promote our openings and vacancies
1:31:58 through their social media platforms.
1:32:00 Our partners in GCR have been great
1:32:02 at sending out Blackboard messages to parents
1:32:05 who invite them to hiring events
1:32:06 because that’s an important resource too.
1:32:09 People may not realize that we have opportunities
1:32:12 that don’t always include full-time work.
1:32:14 Some people don’t want full-time work.
1:32:16 We can accommodate substitute work.
1:32:18 We have part-time positions.
1:32:19 So we think that’s also an untapped resource.
1:32:22 We’re also working with our military partners,
1:32:25 the DoD SkillBridge.
1:32:26 We’ve been analyzing the new legislation
1:32:28 related to military veterans
1:32:30 and we actually have somebody in the pipeline right now
1:32:32 on that process.
1:32:35 So to this week,
1:32:37 we did a large scale recruitment effort
1:32:42 that we haven’t previously done.
1:32:43 Previously, we’ve been at ESF.
1:32:46 There’s a huge barrier to having career fairs
1:32:49 at ESF and that’s transportation.
1:32:51 So we took our show on the road
1:32:53 and I’m gonna show you at the end of the presentation
1:32:56 how many people it took to make that work.
1:32:58 And I’m talking about human resources,
1:33:01 secondary and elementary leading and learning,
1:33:03 student services, educational technology, finance, GCR.
1:33:09 I’ll look back there and make sure I didn’t hit anybody.
1:33:13 Operations, the whole operations division.
1:33:16 It took a whole village to make this happen.
1:33:19 But I do also want to say that as of 5.40 this afternoon,
1:33:23 the last time I got an update,
1:33:25 and I don’t have another update on my phone right now,
1:33:26 but as of 5.40, we are tonight at Clear Lake and at Bayside
1:33:31 and the numbers at 5.40 this afternoon for the whole week
1:33:35 were 211 prospective employees.
1:33:38 That’s pretty impressive given our success with other fairs.
1:33:41 That’s pretty impressive.
1:33:43 Not only did we have staff at these hiring events
1:33:48 to work with Beacon
1:33:49 and to make sure people got their applications,
1:33:51 we had principals and assistant principals interviewing.
1:33:54 We had directors doing substitute interviews.
1:33:57 We talked to people who just came in and said,
1:33:59 “I don’t know what you have to offer.”
1:34:00 We talked to them, told them what we had to offer,
1:34:02 looked at their interests,
1:34:04 tried to connect them with principals
1:34:05 that could best help them.
1:34:08 We focused on priority schools, I will say that.
1:34:10 For this week, that was our focus.
1:34:12 We only invited those schools who were tier two
1:34:14 and tier three priority schools
1:34:16 because we need to fill their vacancies.
1:34:20 I was at Titusville High School one night this week.
1:34:22 I don’t remember which night.
1:34:23 And we stayed pretty late working with a young graduate
1:34:27 who wasn’t sure what he wanted to do.
1:34:29 And at the end of the day,
1:34:30 he decided he was going to take a certification test
1:34:33 so he could teach at cocaine elementary school.
1:34:37 Ms. Lovelace was really excited.
1:34:39 She sent me a picture the next day.
1:34:40 He came in to do his paperwork and she was really excited.
1:34:43 Even though he has to start out as a substitute,
1:34:45 we have the supports in place to help him out
1:34:48 as he goes along.
1:34:50 I do have to take a moment though.
1:34:52 And since I have the microphone,
1:34:53 I don’t know what Dr. Mullins will say about this,
1:34:55 but I have to give a shout out
1:34:58 and offer my sincere gratitude to my HR team.
1:35:00 Because I will tell you, I’ve cleaned out HR.
1:35:02 Every single one of them has been working these fairs,
1:35:06 but we haven’t shut down our operations and human resources.
1:35:09 We’ve had key staff stay behind.
1:35:11 I had April in the front counter today,
1:35:15 sitting there tonight,
1:35:16 working through clearing beacon applications
1:35:18 while she was on the phone with staff I have
1:35:20 at the hiring fairs,
1:35:21 making sure we’re getting everybody cleared
1:35:23 as they come through.
1:35:25 I have to just take that moment
1:35:27 because they really came together
1:35:30 and dropped everything and made this happen.
1:35:33 But I also need to take the opportunity
1:35:35 to thank my colleagues in the back of the room,
1:35:37 because they also offered staff.
1:35:39 They themselves came to the hiring events.
1:35:42 We had board members at the hiring events as well,
1:35:45 but they offered their staff to come
1:35:46 and do onboarding paperwork and to help people with beacon.
1:35:50 They offered translators for speakers of other languages.
1:35:55 It really was a cooperative effort.
1:35:57 And I’m really grateful for the entire BPS team
1:36:00 and how they came together, especially this week.
1:36:03 This has been a tough week.
1:36:04 It’s pre pre-planning for schools.
1:36:07 Principals were more than happy
1:36:08 to open their buildings to us.
1:36:10 Satellite High School hosted a fair this week,
1:36:13 and they hosted both new teacher academies
1:36:15 this week as well.
1:36:17 I’m just really thankful.
1:36:18 And I wanted you to know that
1:36:20 because it was a cooperative effort.
1:36:23 Something else that we’re trying,
1:36:25 back in March, I think it was March or April,
1:36:27 we were at a United Way Education Forum.
1:36:29 And I connected with some community members
1:36:32 who wanted us to come into their churches
1:36:35 to talk about opportunities.
1:36:36 So we are doing that.
1:36:40 I don’t know how many people,
1:36:41 we haven’t taken the data on how many people
1:36:43 we’re going to end up impacting with this,
1:36:45 but I took an opportunity, especially this past Sunday,
1:36:48 to not just talk to people about employment opportunities,
1:36:53 but to also talk about other ways
1:36:55 they can support Brevard Public Schools.
1:36:56 ‘Cause like I said, not everybody’s looking for a job,
1:36:59 but I can tell you everybody’s looking
1:37:00 for a way to support.
1:37:02 And that was really a positive affirmation
1:37:04 of how invested our community is in our schools.
1:37:08 So we are working through that.
1:37:10 The community outreach has been positive and valuable.
1:37:13 And this has been something that’s been on my radar screen
1:37:15 for quite some time,
1:37:16 just was a little bit slow in getting together.
1:37:18 So we’ve got some other events planned
1:37:20 and some of the different faith-based churches
1:37:24 are willing to let us put advertisements in their bulletins.
1:37:28 They’re willing to have us come speak
1:37:29 and others are just willing to let us man the table
1:37:31 and anything is fine with us.
1:37:34 You all know about social media, you’re reading everything.
1:37:37 You can see the things that GCR has put out.
1:37:40 You can see the things that HR has put out.
1:37:42 We are, the schools are doing a fabulous job
1:37:45 of putting out their advertisements as well.
1:37:48 And we are sending them out to the wider network,
1:37:51 trying to make sure that we can attract
1:37:53 as many qualified candidates as we can.
1:37:55 We’ve even gone to some paid social media ads
1:37:58 because that does get a broader audience.
1:38:04 So before I go on to this one,
1:38:06 I just wanted to tell you something else
1:38:07 that I have to brag on with HR,
1:38:09 just because I have a mic.
1:38:11 Our conversations in HR revolve around priority schools
1:38:15 and they revolve around assisting principals and secretaries.
1:38:18 We’re not perfect, by no means are we perfect,
1:38:21 but we’ve made a lot of progress in clearing candidates
1:38:24 as expeditiously as possible.
1:38:26 I have provided HR staff opportunities
1:38:29 to substitute in schools,
1:38:31 to attend field trips like the Moore Center Field Trips
1:38:33 this year and to Proctor FSA,
1:38:34 because I really believe it’s important for all of us
1:38:37 to remain connected to our mission.
1:38:39 And sometimes it’s easy in the role we’re in
1:38:42 in human resources to not be as connected
1:38:44 because we don’t see the day-to-day operations.
1:38:47 And so I’m happy to say that my school, my staff,
1:38:50 my HR staff has availed themselves of those opportunities.
1:38:53 And we have made sure it’s not been at any cost
1:38:55 of service to schools.
1:38:57 But I really appreciate that the work never stops,
1:39:01 but they are connected to our mission.
1:39:03 And that is really important.
1:39:06 So Eastern Florida, we had a list of AA graduates
1:39:09 and BA/BS graduates, and we have reached out
1:39:14 via constant contact with the AA graduates
1:39:17 because there are 2100 of those
1:39:19 and we don’t have the staff to call all of them,
1:39:21 but we did phone all of the BA/BS graduates
1:39:25 from Eastern Florida.
1:39:27 But before I go there, I’ll talk about the AAs.
1:39:29 We’ve had Zoom meetings with them.
1:39:30 We have another one set up.
1:39:31 I believe it’s tomorrow at three or 3.30
1:39:33 for anybody who’s interested
1:39:35 in any of the opportunities that we have.
1:39:37 If they’re interested in talking about a pathway
1:39:39 to a career with BPS, we’re talking with them about that.
1:39:44 It has made, that has made a difference.
1:39:46 With the BA/BS, again, this was a cooperative effort.
1:39:50 My staff couldn’t make all of these phone calls.
1:39:53 People sitting along the wall back here,
1:39:55 they allowed staff to help us make those phone calls.
1:39:58 We developed a script for them.
1:39:59 And we actually had, at last count,
1:40:02 67 of our Eastern Florida graduates
1:40:06 who wanted to participate in some webinars
1:40:09 about being a teacher in Brevard County.
1:40:11 And so we have one set up tomorrow,
1:40:13 and then I believe we have another one
1:40:14 coming up in August 4th.
1:40:17 And then we also had one already
1:40:19 for people that responded to our email.
1:40:21 We had 12 graduates on that particular call.
1:40:24 It was very engaging.
1:40:25 We had certification.
1:40:27 We had professional learning and development,
1:40:29 our recruiters, I was on the call.
1:40:32 It made a big difference for those people
1:40:34 because they had a connection.
1:40:35 They had, even though it was virtual,
1:40:36 they had a connection with us.
1:40:40 We’re working on former eligible BPS teachers
1:40:43 that have left the system for whatever reason.
1:40:46 There are lots of reasons people leave,
1:40:49 but they were not yet vested with FRS,
1:40:51 but with another year or two or three, they could be vested.
1:40:54 So we’re working through that.
1:40:56 The level of data’s a little bit problematic
1:40:58 because we just have the home addresses,
1:40:59 so we’re mailing information to them,
1:41:02 and we’ve set up a meeting with them on August 4th.
1:41:10 We’ve already talked about this.
1:41:11 Pending approval, the waiting period
1:41:14 for insurance for new hires will be reduced
1:41:16 from 45 to 15 days.
1:41:18 This is really critical in my mind
1:41:19 because I have heard this as a barrier for people.
1:41:22 When they say I have to wait 45 days
1:41:24 and I’m coming here with the family,
1:41:26 and they may not have availability of any other coverage,
1:41:29 that has been a barrier for some.
1:41:31 And so eliminating this barrier is pretty exciting to me.
1:41:35 You know healthcare is vital,
1:41:36 and connecting our employees with our wellness programs
1:41:39 and providing them benefits
1:41:40 in a little more expedient manner
1:41:42 I think will make a difference as well.
1:41:46 Substitutes.
1:41:48 All substitutes have been made aware
1:41:50 multiple, multiple times through multiple modalities
1:41:52 about the new pay rates for subs.
1:41:54 And I can tell you we’ve got a lot of feedback about that.
1:41:57 All positive, all positive.
1:41:59 We have it in all of our promotional materials.
1:42:01 We have it posted on our website.
1:42:03 We have a new substitute program.
1:42:05 It’s called Red Rover.
1:42:06 It is a whole lot easier to use than SmartFind was.
1:42:10 Even I can use it, and I have it on my phone,
1:42:12 and teachers can leave lesson plans
1:42:14 just using their phones.
1:42:16 Substitutes can pick up jobs.
1:42:17 I can monitor fill rates right from my phone.
1:42:20 So we’re really excited about that.
1:42:21 And actually we saw a few substitutes
1:42:23 come through our career fairs who said,
1:42:26 I’ve already signed up on Red Rover.
1:42:28 I can’t wait.
1:42:28 I just wanted to hear what else I can do.
1:42:30 Again, in addition to substituting.
1:42:33 We are making phone calls also
1:42:35 to all 1100 active substitutes.
1:42:37 And we’re starting with our most prolific substitutes.
1:42:40 We have some substitutes who work for us every single day.
1:42:42 We’re making sure they have picked up jobs
1:42:44 for the beginning of school.
1:42:46 And we are, I have done robo call for lack of a better term,
1:42:49 but a welcoming call to all of our substitutes.
1:42:52 I’m going to follow that up next week with another call.
1:42:55 And then finally, right before school starts,
1:42:57 the night of August 9th, I’m gonna send out another call,
1:43:00 just thanking them so much for their participation
1:43:02 and their assistance with the first day of school.
1:43:06 Let’s see, there’s a lot we’ve done there.
1:43:08 So I’m not gonna go into it
1:43:09 because I feel I might be getting the hook.
1:43:11 So I will go into everything with substitutes,
1:43:14 but we are giving them a differential.
1:43:15 They’re in a priority school, $20 a day for tier two
1:43:18 and $25 a day for tier three.
1:43:20 That made a difference last year.
1:43:22 So we’re doing that again.
1:43:24 I do wanna take a brief moment and talk about orientation.
1:43:27 Orientation is not just a recruitment technique,
1:43:30 but it is a retention technique.
1:43:32 And we’ve gotten tons of positive feedback from everybody.
1:43:35 I open every single orientation session every single week.
1:43:39 Mr. Gibbs participates, Student Services participates,
1:43:44 Labor Relations, Benefits, Retirement, GCR,
1:43:47 Customer Care, Financial Services.
1:43:49 We take them from hire to retire in four hours.
1:43:54 And the feedback has been amazing.
1:43:56 I just want everybody to know it is not lost on me
1:43:59 how much effort that takes on the part of staff
1:44:01 to make that happen.
1:44:02 But it was a dream of mine
1:44:04 that we would have face-to-face orientation
1:44:05 and we’d be able to connect with our employees in that way.
1:44:08 And it came to reality in October.
1:44:10 So I’m excited, we’ve changed it from Fridays to Wednesdays,
1:44:14 but we are going to continue.
1:44:16 And just so you know, we have had, just since June,
1:44:20 we had orientation like the second or third week of June
1:44:23 through now, we’ve had 208 teachers
1:44:26 and 93 support staff attend just in that timeframe.
1:44:30 And then going out to the New Teacher Academy this morning,
1:44:33 and I know Dr. Mullins was at it yesterday,
1:44:35 welcoming all of those new teachers
1:44:37 was invigorating and exciting too.
1:44:40 I won’t spend a lot of time talking about this.
1:44:42 We have ongoing efforts.
1:44:43 You heard about them a couple of weeks ago,
1:44:45 but just so you know, I do have staff that reach out
1:44:48 to people who have incomplete beacon applications.
1:44:50 I have staff who monitor and target schools
1:44:55 and send people who meet requirements
1:44:58 to those schools to interview.
1:45:00 They work with the principals.
1:45:01 They reach out to different colleges and universities
1:45:05 and places to find employees
1:45:07 and they vet them for the priority schools.
1:45:10 They don’t vet for everybody,
1:45:11 but they vet for priority schools
1:45:14 to monitor and assist our schools
1:45:16 with getting high quality employees.
1:45:19 So this is the, there’s three slides here.
1:45:22 And these three slides are all about Team HR and Team BPS.
1:45:29 This is the group of people that made this week happen.
1:45:32 And I have everybody’s name on here
1:45:33 and I want to give everybody due consideration.
1:45:37 So this, it’s not in any particular order,
1:45:39 but this includes school staff, principals, secretaries,
1:45:43 cafeteria managers, custodians, assistant principals.
1:45:49 It includes district staff from all of the divisions.
1:45:53 I, it’s a huge shout out to the power of the team.
1:45:58 I do have to give those specific shout out
1:46:01 to a couple of people.
1:46:03 Katie Benny, Mike Alba, Tory Huss, Susan Kirk, Lisa Hyam,
1:46:08 and Elizabeth Torres are really the ones
1:46:10 who coordinated the entire process.
1:46:12 They were responsible for finding the schools,
1:46:14 for making sure all the tables were set up,
1:46:16 for making sure we had all the equipment we needed,
1:46:19 we had all of the computers we needed
1:46:20 so that we could do the beacon applications with people.
1:46:23 So I want to give them a special shout out.
1:46:26 It was one of those events where I said,
1:46:28 “Wouldn’t it be nice if we did this?”
1:46:29 And they said, “Oh, wouldn’t it be nice?”
1:46:31 And yes, we’re doing it.
1:46:32 They were very excited
1:46:33 and they have been working really hard.
1:46:38 I think this is my third slide.
1:46:40 But you can see the number of people
1:46:42 that participated in these fairs.
1:46:44 And I just wanted to tell all of them
1:46:46 how much I appreciate them.
1:46:50 I think that’s it.
1:46:50 So thank you very much.
1:46:51 I appreciate your time tonight.
1:46:53 It was a little longer than I had anticipated,
1:46:55 but I just want you to know we are on it.
1:46:57 We are working together as a team and we will persevere
1:47:01 and we will have a great school year.
1:47:03 I’m confident.
1:47:04 - Can I ask a question?
1:47:06 So one of the things we spoke about before,
1:47:09 Dr. Thede, was the Eastern Florida State College pipeline
1:47:13 from teachers into our program
1:47:15 that keeps getting cut by UCF, right?
1:47:19 UCF has said, like I said before,
1:47:22 they have vetoed every time we’ve had an application.
1:47:24 And I was thinking the other day, I was like,
1:47:26 “Why are we still dealing with this?”
1:47:28 And you said that they’re going to reach out
1:47:29 and they’re going to do another application.
1:47:31 Is that what you said?
1:47:32 - Eastern Florida’s always lucky to expand their education.
1:47:34 - So they’re going to put in another application
1:47:36 to expand it?
1:47:37 - I don’t know what they’re,
1:47:38 I don’t know, I don’t want to overstate it.
1:47:40 - Sure.
1:47:41 We’re losing them to Orange County.
1:47:44 I’m looking up here at the trends of the enrollment for UCF.
1:47:47 It’s increased thousands over the last 10 years.
1:47:49 They are not decreasing, they are increasing.
1:47:52 There’s no reason why they would veto
1:47:55 because of regional effects, our stuff,
1:47:57 other than they just want our kids.
1:47:59 So I think I got really mad because I’m just like,
1:48:03 we just keep coming back to the situation
1:48:05 and it may have helped a little bit
1:48:06 had I made been a little bit more forceful two years ago.
1:48:09 So I would really, I’m going to work with you, Dr. Mullins,
1:48:11 and I really want to try to push them
1:48:13 to try to make an application because we got kids coming.
1:48:15 I started the program, I was one of the five teachers
1:48:17 that started the program in 2008, I think it was,
1:48:20 at Space Coast for the teaching program.
1:48:23 And it was one of the ones that were on the wheel.
1:48:25 And I started it because I believed in it.
1:48:26 And then I see the kids going, and then they go to college,
1:48:29 and then they go to their first year,
1:48:31 and then they finish up over UCF and then they go over there.
1:48:34 So it’s not just me saying this
1:48:35 because of the current crisis,
1:48:36 it’s just been happening since, you know.
1:48:39 So I just think it’s something that we need to address.
1:48:41 So I wanted to say that.
1:48:42 The other thing is, okay, we got, we’re doing all this stuff
1:48:46 and you are way out ahead of other districts.
1:48:48 I was in Pasco County today and Pinellas County today
1:48:51 with some of their school board members
1:48:52 and they have numbers that are worse than ours, okay?
1:48:56 I have a lady who came to visit me,
1:48:57 one of my close friends from Africa.
1:49:00 She teaches overseas and they have the exact same problem.
1:49:06 And I applaud all of those efforts.
1:49:09 My question is, is what do we do in the event
1:49:12 that we still have 50 vacancies at the end of the whole thing?
1:49:16 What is the plan?
1:49:17 Are we deploying people from ESF to cover?
1:49:20 Like what are we gonna do?
1:49:23 - So we are working through all of that
1:49:24 and we met as a team and we generated some solutions.
1:49:28 Some of them we have to work with others
1:49:29 in order to implement.
1:49:31 We have already, to address part of what you said,
1:49:35 we’ve already allowed substitutes to pick up vacant jobs.
1:49:38 We put them all in there instead of waiting.
1:49:40 We put them all in Red Rover and that was my first call.
1:49:43 Please pick up jobs at our schools.
1:49:44 Not that we want, we want to have the teacher
1:49:47 in the classroom, but if we don’t, we have that plan.
1:49:50 We do have a pretty decent fill rate already
1:49:52 two weeks before school starts, so that’s impressive.
1:49:55 We do have some other plans in the works
1:49:57 related to classes, class sizes, and working with our schools
1:50:03 to mitigate the problem.
1:50:06 And I know Dr. Sullivan has been working closely
1:50:09 with her elementary team and Jane Klein, Tara,
1:50:11 I’m sorry, with her secondary team.
1:50:13 Sorry about that, you just got transferred.
1:50:16 There, Jane Klein and Tara Harris also have been working
1:50:19 with the elementary team to look at what the staffing is
1:50:22 in the school because sometimes we’re sitting on units
1:50:25 that we don’t need to sit on or we have classes
1:50:27 that are really small that we can combine
1:50:29 before kids even get here.
1:50:30 So we’re working through those too.
1:50:32 - That’s great.
1:50:33 One of the things, I know you want to jump
1:50:35 at the opportunity there, Dr. Mullins.
1:50:37 One of the problems we have with discipline
1:50:39 is that if we have students that come in
1:50:40 and they don’t have a classroom, right,
1:50:43 then those students regularly, if you’re,
1:50:46 when you have a person that’s inside there
1:50:48 that’s not a full-time teacher or whatever it is,
1:50:49 it makes it difficult for the teachers
1:50:51 that are in the next classroom.
1:50:53 So like if you have one for discipline issues, right,
1:50:56 when we have our principals coming in
1:50:58 to cover some of the classes,
1:51:00 then you have the breakdown of that piece, right?
1:51:01 So I applaud everything you’re doing, Dr. Thetter.
1:51:04 You guys are amazing.
1:51:05 Like what you’re doing is far above
1:51:07 what everybody else is doing across the state.
1:51:10 And I just hope everybody understands
1:51:11 that it’s gonna be all hands on deck
1:51:13 when that happens because of the, you know,
1:51:16 we don’t fill in what happens, Dr. Mullins.
1:51:18 - Yeah, I would just not just say that is the case,
1:51:22 that we have an example of that.
1:51:24 If we remember this time a year ago,
1:51:27 we had more vacancies than we had ever experienced
1:51:30 going into the school year.
1:51:32 And we were confronted with hundreds
1:51:34 in the employment ranks of quarantines.
1:51:38 And what did this organization do?
1:51:41 We rallied, it was all hands on deck
1:51:43 and we filled where the needs were.
1:51:45 And that will be the case again this year.
1:51:48 And we’re in pre-conversations about how to do that
1:51:51 effectively and proactively.
1:51:53 And we’re working closely with, you know,
1:51:56 primarily the schools that have,
1:51:58 I think Dr. Thede may have understated the impact.
1:52:02 When you look at the big number, it can be rather ominous.
1:52:06 But we’re talking, we have 15 schools
1:52:07 who are probably in the most critical range of vacancies.
1:52:10 And that’s where we’re focusing our efforts
1:52:13 and prioritizing district time and staff to address those.
1:52:17 And not to neglect the other schools,
1:52:20 we’re gonna keep working with them as well.
1:52:21 But that’s where we’re prioritizing our efforts.
1:52:24 So I’m confident that as we have in the past,
1:52:27 we will once again stand in the gap for our schools.
1:52:30 I will echo, I personally spoke to at least two
1:52:34 superintendents of like-sized districts.
1:52:37 And no less than 50 more just teacher vacancies
1:52:44 and as many as 150 more teacher vacancies
1:52:48 in those districts as of less than two weeks ago.
1:52:51 So I attribute the effort and the work of Team HR
1:52:55 and Team BPS to make the reality
1:52:58 that we’re not where we wanna be,
1:53:00 but we’re a lot better where we could be,
1:53:02 particularly in terms of where other districts are,
1:53:04 you know, they’re facing the same struggles.
1:53:06 So my congratulations and sincere appreciation
1:53:09 to the team as well.
1:53:11 - Mrs. Belford, if I can just add two thoughts on that.
1:53:13 First of all, it’s okay that you took this much time
1:53:16 because considering that we’re 13 days away
1:53:18 from the first day of school and this is,
1:53:20 and we’re in crisis mode,
1:53:21 this is the most important thing that we have to focus on.
1:53:24 So we needed to hear that update.
1:53:26 The community needed to hear that update.
1:53:28 And what I would add to the pages and pages of names
1:53:32 of all the people that help is all of Team BPS
1:53:37 can be part of that.
1:53:39 When we have conversations with people who, you know,
1:53:42 don’t look like they have anything better to do
1:53:43 with their lives, we can say, hey, I know somebody.
1:53:47 Would you like a job?
1:53:48 I’ve been doing it pretty regularly myself,
1:53:50 but we’re all, all of Team BPS can be a part of that.
1:53:54 Recruiting your mother-in-law or your whatever,
1:53:57 you know, your neighbor to come be a sub
1:53:59 to consider being a bus driver to, you know,
1:54:02 whatever it may be, we all need to be a part of that.
1:54:05 And now I’m just gonna add, and sorry for the sermon,
1:54:07 I sometimes, sometimes we’re our own worst enemy
1:54:11 when we have people who are part of our organization
1:54:14 who, for whatever reason, are disgruntled.
1:54:16 When we make that, especially social media,
1:54:18 I see it regularly.
1:54:20 Oh, BPS is a horrible place to work from.
1:54:22 First of all, I think that is the small minority,
1:54:25 and we have the exit interviews to prove it.
1:54:30 But we’re doing ourselves harm.
1:54:33 Are we a perfect place to work for?
1:54:36 Maybe not.
1:54:36 Do we have our problems?
1:54:37 Yes, we do.
1:54:39 But there are some really great opportunities,
1:54:41 and we have got to be, everybody in this organization,
1:54:44 I believe, needs to be a recruiter.
1:54:46 Because we’re, you know, a teacher who’s recruiting
1:54:49 other teachers is really helping themselves,
1:54:51 helping their building, because if they have fewer vacancies
1:54:55 in their building, then they have less classes
1:54:56 they’re gonna have to cover.
1:54:58 And they’re gonna have better discipline behavior
1:55:02 in the building, because they’re not gonna be working
1:55:05 with a classroom that has a different teacher every day,
1:55:09 ‘cause it has to be filled by a sub, and all of that.
1:55:11 So I just challenge all of Team BPS, they’re really,
1:55:15 and I’m so thankful for our churches
1:55:16 and our nonprofit organizations that are helping us
1:55:19 with these efforts, but we all have to be on this effort
1:55:24 so that we can get there, and I’m really proud of you guys,
1:55:27 but I just want to add to those pages and pages
1:55:29 more people who are really jumping on the effort.
1:55:31 So thank you for what you’re doing.
1:55:37 I’m gonna be super quick, I just wanna do a shout out
1:55:41 to our substitutes who are stepping it up.
1:55:42 Like you said, you and I had a conversation
1:55:44 about how they’re already filling those vacancies
1:55:45 so that most of our schools are gonna have
1:55:47 some kind of support system in the first days of school
1:55:50 this year, which is really comforting to know.
1:55:53 And of course, we want a certified classroom teacher
1:55:56 in all of our classrooms, but I’ve also been speaking
1:55:59 to some principals that have already locked down
1:56:01 some long-term subs for those vacancies
1:56:03 that they just feel really confident are very likely
1:56:05 gonna be difficult to fill, and they have amazing substitutes
1:56:08 who have already stepped up saying,
1:56:09 “I’ll be a consistent person for these kiddos.”
1:56:12 So hats off to those substitutes
1:56:14 who are already making that commitment,
1:56:15 I really appreciate it, and just throwing it out there
1:56:17 for people who might wanna consider that as well.
1:56:19 And I just wanna say, job well done at those hiring fairs,
1:56:22 I appreciated being there, I personally appreciated
1:56:25 talking with staff members I’ve never met before,
1:56:26 that was fun for me, but also my own father
1:56:30 stopped by one of those job fairs,
1:56:31 ‘cause he’s technically challenged,
1:56:33 and he is transitioning from one position
1:56:35 to just go back to substituting,
1:56:37 and he really, really needed that support
1:56:39 with Beacon and everything and all the paperwork,
1:56:41 and he had nothing but positive things to say,
1:56:43 he said it was really smooth and he was so happy
1:56:45 and pleased with how kind everybody was to him,
1:56:47 so thank you for that and thank you
1:56:48 for everyone that participated.
1:56:55 - Dr. Tedes, I think you know what I’m gonna say,
1:56:57 but when I was at the job fairs,
1:57:00 the energy in the room was really exciting,
1:57:04 and again, I can’t thank the whole staff
1:57:07 who showed up and stayed late for all the work they did
1:57:11 to help us be the best that we can be,
1:57:13 so thank you to the whole team, Team BTS, thank you.
1:57:24 - One thing that you mentioned,
1:57:25 which I think is really important,
1:57:26 was the personal notes from the principals,
1:57:28 and we heard tonight when we were promoting
1:57:30 our assistant principals, there was a comment that,
1:57:35 and we hear it just about every time, right,
1:57:37 that so-and-so encouraged me to go
1:57:40 into an administrative path, so-and-so encouraged me,
1:57:43 and I think that is so critically important
1:57:46 that as Ms. Campbell said, we can all be recruiters,
1:57:49 and so the fact that our folks are looking
1:57:54 for those opportunities to encourage people
1:57:55 to take a path, whether it be going into teaching
1:57:59 or becoming a substitute or all of those things,
1:58:01 I think sometimes we get in our head
1:58:03 that this is our path until somebody says,
1:58:05 “Hey, I’d like for you to think about doing this,” right?
1:58:07 So I think that’s super important.
1:58:10 - And then one, I guess, kind of question for you,
1:58:13 Dr. Thutty, you mentioned the substitutes
1:58:17 and the things that we have done around that,
1:58:19 and that the one new graduate was becoming a substitute
1:58:24 at Coquina with the hopes of becoming a teacher.
1:58:26 So we’ve talked about the IA to teacher pipeline,
1:58:29 but we haven’t really talked about what are our options
1:58:31 for our substitutes to potentially become classroom teachers?
1:58:36 - So that’s a great question.
1:58:37 It’s actually something I had in my notes that I skipped.
1:58:40 We do have a process.
1:58:41 When we do those substitute interviews,
1:58:43 my Lisa Haim, as she watches those interviews
1:58:46 and gets the feedback from the people
1:58:47 who help her do those interviews,
1:58:49 if they have a bachelor’s degree,
1:58:50 she reaches out directly to them,
1:58:52 and she works with them, connects them with our recruiters,
1:58:54 and tries to work them through that pathway.
1:58:57 Not everybody’s interested, and that’s okay.
1:59:00 We’re happy that they want to be subs,
1:59:01 but that is one pathway.
1:59:03 We have had some different virtual programs
1:59:06 for our substitutes, but we haven’t done a concerted,
1:59:11 you have a bachelor’s degree, we want you teaching,
1:59:13 other than our reach out when we do those interviews.
1:59:17 And you’ve all mentioned word of mouth.
1:59:20 Shockingly, that’s really important.
1:59:22 The word of mouth is really important.
1:59:24 I’ve heard from more people that they got a phone call
1:59:26 or their neighbor was talking up BPS
1:59:29 and they wanted to come by and see what it was like.
1:59:31 It really is important.
1:59:32 So thank you all for mentioning that.
1:59:34 But substitutes are an invaluable resource.
1:59:37 And I’ll tell you the other invaluable resource
1:59:39 are our principals.
1:59:40 I don’t think I gave them enough shout outs
1:59:42 in this presentation.
1:59:44 They are rock stars.
1:59:45 We didn’t tell them to write personal notes.
1:59:47 Some of them did.
1:59:49 And so I appreciate that.
1:59:51 - Yeah, absolutely.
1:59:53 And I’ll just close with echoing the sentiment.
1:59:57 Having been around for a while,
1:59:59 and so I’ve seen this trend multiple times, right,
2:00:05 of the start of the school year
2:00:06 and our gaps and all of that stuff.
2:00:08 And I know you’re obviously thankful to all of Team BPS,
2:00:14 but I am confident in saying that this would not have
2:00:16 happened without your leadership.
2:00:18 So we are incredibly appreciative of that leadership
2:00:23 along with all the people that come alongside you
2:00:25 to make those things happen.
2:00:27 So thank you.
2:00:30 - All right, we are moving into public comments.
2:00:34 Board members, do we need to take a comfort break
2:00:36 before we, so I have a request.
2:00:40 We’ll take about a 10 minute recess
2:00:42 and then we’ll come back.
2:00:59 (upbeat music)
2:01:29 (upbeat music continues)
2:13:34 - All right, we are now at the public comment portion
2:13:36 of the meeting on agenda items.
2:13:39 We have two speakers signed up for agenda items,
2:13:41 although I believe Ms. Marski left.
2:13:43 So we have one speaker signed up for agenda items.
2:13:47 Ms. Delaney, if you would like to go ahead and approach.
2:13:57 - Good evening.
2:13:58 I would like to speak about the proposed millage
2:14:02 and the way that it was brought through
2:14:04 the County Commission.
2:14:06 It was snuck onto a zoning meeting
2:14:08 and the public had no knowledge.
2:14:14 So that was pretty crappy.
2:14:16 - Ms. Delaney, hold for just one moment.
2:14:22 Mr. Gipps.
2:14:26 - We talked about the millage inside the presentation.
2:14:29 - Yeah.
2:14:29 (indistinct)
2:14:31 - The millage update.
2:14:32 - Okay, just wanted to make sure.
2:14:35 Go ahead.
2:14:36 - So, and even though it goes to charter schools,
2:14:42 until we see a transparent budget,
2:14:46 I don’t believe you should be asking the taxpayers
2:14:48 for more money.
2:14:51 I have to leave.
2:14:53 So I’m just going to finish what I wanna talk about.
2:14:57 I was at the superintendent meeting on Tuesday
2:15:03 and this board decided to cancel the final meeting
2:15:12 for the second and have it and hold it
2:15:15 after the superintendent meeting on Tuesday.
2:15:21 One of your board members was not notified, was not called.
2:15:25 The public was not notified or called.
2:15:29 Sunshine means something.
2:15:32 These things deserve to be in the sunshine.
2:15:36 And I’ve asked previously that these evaluations be recorded
2:15:43 because nobody knows about it.
2:15:45 The board evaluation, nobody knew about that.
2:15:47 Superintendent evaluation, nobody knows about that.
2:15:51 Mr. Gibbs evaluation, nobody knows about that.
2:15:55 The only reason why some of it is known
2:15:57 is because I went and recorded it.
2:16:01 Please be transparent.
2:16:02 Thank you.
2:16:03 - Thank you, Ms. Delaney.
2:16:14 Yeah, so just to clarify for those who were not present,
2:16:19 we actually started the superintendent’s meeting
2:16:22 with the superintendent’s evaluation meeting
2:16:25 with the statement that there was a conflict
2:16:28 on our second date and that the intention was
2:16:30 to complete the superintendent’s evaluation on that day.
2:16:34 And if we were able to get through it,
2:16:35 to deliver it to him that afternoon
2:16:38 or whenever we finished going through the evaluation.
2:16:41 So that is, I believe, in the minutes of the meeting
2:16:47 that we’re taking that day with Miss, with Jamie.
2:16:52 And we were all there except Mr. Susan did have to leave
2:16:55 and there was a miscommunication
2:16:58 that Mr. Susan apparently thought
2:16:59 that he was going to be called.
2:17:00 And I, my understanding was that he was fine
2:17:05 with not being there for that portion.
2:17:07 So which I have apologized to Mr. Susan
2:17:09 for that miscommunication.
2:17:11 - It’s not and I told, I just told Gibbs,
2:17:13 I said, hey, next time it happens,
2:17:15 we just have a process in place
2:17:16 that if there’s not a board member there,
2:17:17 just give him a call.
2:17:18 And there was, it was at the beginning of the meeting,
2:17:21 we did say if there’s an opportunity
2:17:23 to call Dr. Mullins back, you know what I mean?
2:17:25 And I did say that I had a hard stop at 11, 11.30.
2:17:28 The only thing was is that I only had 30 minutes meeting
2:17:31 and then I could have come back.
2:17:32 I didn’t know you guys were going.
2:17:33 I was calling Mullins and I was like,
2:17:35 hey, I didn’t know what was going on.
2:17:36 So we’ve got it corrected and I think we’re in a good place.
2:17:39 - Super.
2:17:41 All right, that is going to move us
2:17:42 into the consent agenda, Dr. Mullins.
2:17:45 - There are 12 agenda items under the consent agenda.
2:17:48 - Does any board member wish to pull any item from consent?
2:17:52 Hearing none, I will entertain a motion
2:17:53 to approve the consent agenda as presented.
2:17:56 - Move to approve.
2:17:57 - Second.
2:17:58 - Moved by Mr. Susan, seconded by Ms. Campbell.
2:18:00 Is there any discussion?
2:18:04 All in favor, please signify by saying aye.
2:18:06 - Aye.
2:18:07 - Any opposed?
2:18:08 Same sign.
2:18:09 Motion passes five, zero.
2:18:12 Dr. Mullins, will you please let us know
2:18:14 about the items under the action portion of today’s agenda?
2:18:16 - Oh my gosh.
2:18:18 - The first item is H-29,
2:18:20 Department School Initiated Agreements.
2:18:21 - What are the wishes of the board?
2:18:22 - Move to approve.
2:18:24 - Second.
2:18:25 - Moved by Mr. Susan, seconded by Ms. Campbell.
2:18:27 Is there any discussion?
2:18:29 All in favor, please signify by saying aye.
2:18:30 - Aye.
2:18:31 - Any opposed?
2:18:32 Same sign.
2:18:33 Motion passes five, zero.
2:18:35 Dr. Mullins?
2:18:40 The next item on the agenda is H-30,
2:18:42 procurement solicitations.
2:18:46 - That’s good.
2:18:46 - That’s totally lost.
2:18:47 Thank you.
2:18:49 - What are the wishes of the board?
2:18:50 - That is correct, H-30, procurement.
2:18:52 - Hear a motion?
2:18:53 - Move to approve.
2:18:54 - Second.
2:18:55 - Moved by Ms. McDougall, seconded by Mr. Susan.
2:18:56 Is there any discussion?
2:18:58 All in favor, please signify by saying aye.
2:19:00 - Aye.
2:19:01 - Any opposed?
2:19:01 Same sign.
2:19:02 Motion passes five, zero.
2:19:04 We are now at board member reports,
2:19:05 and I have a note here from Mr. Susan
2:19:08 that he has three topics.
2:19:10 Does anyone else have any–
2:19:11 - Click.
2:19:12 - All right, so Mr. Susan, the floor is yours.
2:19:17 - All right, so there’s a couple of things.
2:19:19 Last minute today, it just came on.
2:19:20 So the FHSA decided that they are going to take
2:19:25 and make girls and boys wrestling separate, okay?
2:19:30 Now, as a former wrestling coach,
2:19:32 I will tell you that it’s very rare
2:19:34 that every team has a female wrestler.
2:19:37 And so in order to give the girls,
2:19:39 and women, and in many cases strong women
2:19:43 who beat the boys, an opportunity to wrestle,
2:19:46 they would wrestle the boys.
2:19:48 And it’s such a high lightweight class
2:19:50 that it’s a pretty good matchup sometimes
2:19:52 because they’re in like the 110s, 103s,
2:19:55 and I’ll be honest with you,
2:19:58 my year that I was coaching in 2008,
2:20:00 we took the team undefeated, I had a female wrestler.
2:20:03 And she came with me and I would put her in
2:20:05 and have her wrestle all the time up against the boys.
2:20:07 And then at the end of the year,
2:20:09 there’s a female tournament,
2:20:11 she ended up winning states, right?
2:20:13 So she would never have been the student
2:20:17 or the wrestler had she not had that opportunity.
2:20:20 And so what we ended up doing is FHSA separated them
2:20:23 for whatever reason, but we did not,
2:20:25 because of the last minute,
2:20:26 because they’re part of the Good Idea Fairy Club,
2:20:30 they did not let us know in enough time
2:20:32 so that we could let our bargaining unit
2:20:34 put together a stipend for them.
2:20:37 And so I was just gonna let you guys know
2:20:39 that I’m gonna ask Dr. Mullins if there’s a way
2:20:42 that there’s only four schools that have a female wrestler.
2:20:44 And I would hate to have a situation
2:20:46 where they’re inhibited because they are not a part
2:20:50 of having their own team, if that makes sense.
2:20:52 Because what happens, just so you know,
2:20:54 is that everybody’s like,
2:20:56 “Well, they’re all wrestling together.”
2:20:57 Yeah, you can practice together,
2:20:58 but when it comes down to a meet,
2:21:00 if they can’t practice to wrestle each other
2:21:03 and you’re going up against a school
2:21:04 that doesn’t have a female wrestler,
2:21:06 and maybe they’re not even in the same weight class,
2:21:08 then you can’t, she won’t wrestle.
2:21:10 And that’s just really not fair to our girls.
2:21:12 And then it’s also not fair to the team
2:21:14 to have boys, say your head coach and your assistant coach,
2:21:18 one of them leave to go coach, ‘cause now the boys team,
2:21:21 and there’s a serious security risk with wrestling
2:21:23 because they wrestle and then they go off
2:21:25 and tournaments are like, you know what I mean?
2:21:26 You have to have all hands on deck.
2:21:28 You should have two teams there.
2:21:30 So the idea is that if there’s a school there
2:21:31 that I’ll just talk to Dr. Mullins,
2:21:33 what can we creatively do to fill that stipend gap
2:21:36 until we can come back and negotiate it?
2:21:38 That’s all.
2:21:39 So I’m gonna mention it to him, that’s all.
2:21:41 I don’t need board approval or anything.
2:21:43 You guys can object to it.
2:21:44 I don’t think you would.
2:21:45 - I kind of heard ramblings of this.
2:21:47 What was the impetus behind separating them out?
2:21:51 And why do they have to be,
2:21:52 is the reason for the separate events
2:21:53 because there aren’t enough girls
2:21:55 at any one particular tournament
2:21:56 and they’re not gonna let them wrestle?
2:21:58 - If you are asking me what the thought process
2:22:00 of the FHSAA is, I will tell you
2:22:03 from decades of knowledge of there being none sometimes
2:22:06 that that’s it, but it’s probably along those lines.
2:22:12 I’ll be honest with you,
2:22:13 I think there’s just a need there.
2:22:14 We only have four of them,
2:22:16 and I don’t want our girls to not have an ability
2:22:18 to go do that.
2:22:19 And I have a great story.
2:22:22 She ended up going into the Marines
2:22:24 and she was pretty bad, you know what?
2:22:26 So yeah, she was like G.I. Jane, she was tough.
2:22:31 - I can see Dr. Mullins, he’s leaning in.
2:22:33 - Oh, what do you got here?
2:22:35 Wait a minute, wait a minute.
2:22:36 This is, now Paul said yes to something
2:22:38 and now I see a smile on one of my requests here, Dr. Mullins.
2:22:41 - Well, I don’t think there’ll be an ability
2:22:43 for us to say no because my understanding
2:22:45 is that Title IX will require us
2:22:47 to provide a coach to girl wrestling teams.
2:22:50 So that’s, so we’ll have to work on that and get there, so.
2:22:55 - What is work on there and get there, Dr. Mullins?
2:22:57 - Well, if Title IX requires it,
2:22:58 we’ll have to provide a coach.
2:23:00 So I think I’ve addressed your–
2:23:01 - So do we have to go back to talk to somebody,
2:23:04 another group and get that through the stipend?
2:23:07 - Through bargaining? - Yeah.
2:23:08 - I would suspect, probably eventually,
2:23:11 but Title IX is a federal regulation.
2:23:14 I mean, it’s a requirement.
2:23:15 - And wrestling season doesn’t start until November.
2:23:18 - Correct. - Just so you guys know.
2:23:19 So there’s time.
2:23:20 - So I have a silly question.
2:23:22 Well, I have two silly questions.
2:23:24 One is– - It’s getting really weird now.
2:23:26 He says yes, he’s on board, you say something silly.
2:23:28 - Is the stipend broken down in the general?
2:23:30 It probably isn’t, right?
2:23:31 - Well, that was my first question, is do we,
2:23:34 does the bargaining language just list wrestling
2:23:37 and a stipend, or does it list male wrestling?
2:23:42 - It just says head coach, assistant coach.
2:23:44 So when we were wrestling,
2:23:45 we would have them wrestle with us.
2:23:46 So we’ve coached both.
2:23:47 - So I think Dr. Mullins’ point is,
2:23:49 we’re going to have to appoint a female wrestling coach
2:23:51 and it would automatically fall
2:23:53 under the current bargaining language.
2:23:54 - Perfect. - Right?
2:23:56 - So then my other question is,
2:23:58 is FHSAA mandating that they be split?
2:24:02 So they can no longer, it can no longer be a–
2:24:04 - Not a lot of wrestle each other.
2:24:06 - Wow, okay.
2:24:08 - Yeah, which, I will tell you that it would,
2:24:11 it is that the female wrestlers do better
2:24:16 with wrestling with boys, right?
2:24:18 And they’re just not gonna have enough.
2:24:20 Like, I don’t even know how they’re gonna do it.
2:24:21 The four teams that actually have it
2:24:23 are gonna have to travel. - How far do they have to go
2:24:24 to get in the–
2:24:26 - They usually do them like poinsettia, hold one,
2:24:28 and they’ll be able to work it out.
2:24:29 There’s something probably brewing.
2:24:31 By then, they can have the four of them in Brevard
2:24:35 and I don’t know, they’ll figure it out.
2:24:37 Coaches are good.
2:24:37 I just wanted to be able to address it
2:24:39 before it became an issue, that’s all.
2:24:41 - I just, I’m a little, I mean, when Galen wrestled,
2:24:44 there were females that were wrestling at the tournaments
2:24:47 against the boys, it was a non-issue, so–
2:24:49 - It’s never been an issue.
2:24:51 I mean, it’s honestly, it’s,
2:24:53 and the wrestlers are collegial about it.
2:24:55 It’s a great thing, you know what I mean?
2:24:57 They use the separate bathrooms.
2:24:59 It’s not an issue there.
2:25:00 It’s legit, like, it’s kinda sad.
2:25:03 But they’re doing some other things that I don’t agree with.
2:25:05 I mean, you know, whatever, it’s the FHSA.
2:25:08 - Dr. Mullins, I think you were looking like
2:25:10 you wanted to say something.
2:25:11 - I was just gonna say I had a solution
2:25:14 to one of Mr. Susan’s problems
2:25:16 before he brought it to me as a problem.
2:25:19 I think that, you know.
2:25:20 - You’re just pointing it out?
2:25:21 - Yeah. - You’re saying it wasn’t–
2:25:22 - For the record.
2:25:23 (all laughing)
2:25:26 - All right, good.
2:25:27 - All right. - What do you got next?
2:25:29 What do you got next? - Good idea, fairies.
2:25:30 - Oh, good idea, fairies.
2:25:31 Okay, so everybody knows that many of our teachers
2:25:34 are the paperwork, the requirements.
2:25:39 Up in Tallahassee, every year they add another series
2:25:43 of requirements to our people,
2:25:44 whether that’s students with disabilities paperwork,
2:25:48 whether that’s expulsions, whether that’s bully packets,
2:25:51 whether that’s all that stuff, right?
2:25:53 And it’s just, it’s enough’s enough.
2:25:56 Because what’s happening is, is that there was a debate.
2:25:58 There was a serious debate a couple years ago
2:26:01 where they were saying, well, if we have too much recess,
2:26:04 then we’re gonna reduce the amount of time
2:26:06 that the teachers have to teach in the classroom.
2:26:08 But then when the same mentality comes,
2:26:10 when they’re trying to put together all these requirements
2:26:12 on our teachers, they forget that the more
2:26:13 that they have to fill out all of these forms
2:26:16 and all of these things the way they are,
2:26:18 it reduces the amount of time the kids are in the education,
2:26:21 which is being taught, which is the sanctity of our system.
2:26:25 So what I’m going to do is I’m going to literally
2:26:28 start trying to look at everything
2:26:29 to see if there’s a way that we can reduce it.
2:26:31 Because I feel like we could get a huge win
2:26:33 by making a recommendation to the legislature
2:26:36 to put more time in the classroom
2:26:37 by reducing some of the things.
2:26:39 There might be changes to the bully packet
2:26:41 that we can make recommendations to.
2:26:42 There might be this, there might be that.
2:26:44 I say we go there.
2:26:45 And like, God knows, I mean, how many school fires
2:26:48 have there been, but then we have how many
2:26:50 of these fire drills, right?
2:26:51 And think about those days that we lose.
2:26:53 Think about the disruption that occurs because of that.
2:26:55 And then trying to get the kids back on track.
2:26:57 And then it’s just, you know, that’s all.
2:26:59 So I’m going to go there.
2:27:01 That’s all.
2:27:02 Letting you guys know.
2:27:02 Awesome.
2:27:03 What’s my last one?
2:27:04 Next, let us know how you can help.
2:27:05 403(b) 401(k)
2:27:06 403(b) 401(k)s.
2:27:07 All right.
2:27:08 And just so you guys know, I’m looking at,
2:27:10 I only have about two years left on my term.
2:27:12 So I’m like, I got to start getting stuff done, right?
2:27:14 That’s why you keep hearing about the armored car,
2:27:15 because I’m going to keep trying to go at it.
2:27:16 But here’s the thing.
2:27:18 401(k) 403(b) 457s.
2:27:21 We have 22 providers right now, OK?
2:27:24 So here’s what happens.
2:27:25 I’m a teacher.
2:27:26 I start out.
2:27:26 I’m 22 years old.
2:27:27 I come in.
2:27:28 And what ends up happening, I get a valid guy comes in.
2:27:30 And he says, and this has been something
2:27:31 that I brought up before and went through.
2:27:33 And I kind of let it go.
2:27:34 But I’m done with that now.
2:27:37 He goes and he gives.
2:27:37 And the teacher says, yeah, I’m going to invest in you.
2:27:39 So they start putting $50 away with this valid account.
2:27:42 And they still do it.
2:27:43 Then teacher gets a couple of raises.
2:27:45 And then all of a sudden, the Lincoln financial guy
2:27:47 comes over and says, hey, you should invest with us.
2:27:50 And he’s like, oh, I can put another $50 over there.
2:27:52 We have many teachers, including my wife,
2:27:54 who has multiple finance accounts that are not combined
2:27:59 and are actually losing money compared
2:28:02 to what they were combined, right?
2:28:04 There’s another thing that goes on.
2:28:06 All of those 22 403(b)s and 457s are all at different point
2:28:12 structures.
2:28:13 So some of them are one point.
2:28:15 Some of them are half points.
2:28:16 Some of them are all that stuff.
2:28:17 So what I would like to do is just–
2:28:20 I’m going– I don’t have to–
2:28:22 I’m just going to request it.
2:28:23 I just want to let you guys know.
2:28:24 I’m going to request what the investment–
2:28:27 what the basic commissions are on every one of them.
2:28:30 And then I’m going to pull that.
2:28:31 And then I’m going to look at trying
2:28:33 to make a recommendation to you guys
2:28:34 to reduce that down to five and possibly one.
2:28:37 Because what ends up happening is that if you do that,
2:28:41 then they will lower the amount of points
2:28:42 that they charge with the larger percentage.
2:28:45 It’s just like we do with anything else.
2:28:47 And we have this whole other system
2:28:49 that goes against what I’m saying.
2:28:50 And I’m going to take it on.
2:28:51 So all right?
2:28:53 We good?
2:28:54 OK.
2:28:54 Anybody else have anything?
2:28:55 That’s it.
2:28:56 Just combine all those 401(k)s and 403(b)s.
2:28:59 Dr. Mullins?
2:29:00 I do want to provide the board the assurance
2:29:04 and the reassurance and the listening community.
2:29:08 There was a reference made to our submission of an agenda
2:29:11 item to the county commission agenda.
2:29:16 I am 100% confident it was submitted as appropriate
2:29:22 according to the county commission rules and guidelines.
2:29:26 I personally spoke with county commissioners, all of them,
2:29:29 prior to that meeting and the submission of the agenda item.
2:29:32 And know for a fact that they all
2:29:34 knew that our resolution was going to be on the agenda
2:29:37 that it was going to be on.
2:29:39 So I don’t want there to be any suggestion or belief
2:29:44 that we didn’t submit an agenda item appropriately.
2:29:49 Their legal team, Mr. Gibbs, can affirm
2:29:52 that their legal team is the gatekeeper to their agenda
2:29:57 and validated that we went through all
2:30:01 of the appropriate processes.
2:30:03 What the county commission’s notification to the public
2:30:06 is about their meetings, that’s their process.
2:30:09 We don’t have any influence on that whatsoever.
2:30:12 And I would not begin to know what their requirements are.
2:30:16 But I know for a fact we submitted the agenda item
2:30:20 long before the due date for the anticipated meeting
2:30:23 and that it was not a last minute agenda item, not even
2:30:27 a correction to the agenda like we have to do periodically.
2:30:31 It was regularly notified and published.
2:30:33 So I just want to provide the board that assurance as well
2:30:35 as the listening community related
2:30:38 to the resolution that had to go through the county commission.
2:30:40 Thank you.
2:30:41 Thank you, Dr. Mullins.
2:30:42 I just want to say, too, I personally saw it
2:30:45 on their website on the agenda.
2:30:47 I don’t know when they posted it because they
2:30:49 have a whole different system than we do.
2:30:51 But it was absolutely on there, 100%.
2:30:54 Thank you.
2:30:55 Anyone else?
2:30:56 Anything before I move into final public comment?
2:30:59 All right, we are down to four speakers for non-agenda items.
2:31:03 So each speaker will get three minutes.
2:31:05 We have a clock in front of me to help you keep track
2:31:07 of your time.
2:31:07 When your time is over, you’ll be asked to stop and allow
2:31:09 the next speaker his or her turn.
2:31:11 We’ll hear from the speakers in order in which they signed up.
2:31:14 As stated earlier, reasonable decorum–
2:31:16 actually, I don’t think I stated it because we had only one
2:31:18 speaker.
2:31:18 But reasonable decorum is expected at all times
2:31:20 and your statement should be directed to the board chair.
2:31:22 Should audience participation interfere
2:31:24 with the speakers being heard or hearing me,
2:31:25 I’ll be forced to clear the room.
2:31:26 I don’t think that’s going to be an issue this evening.
2:31:29 When I call your name, please line up along the east wall.
2:31:31 Since we only have four, I’m just
2:31:32 going to go ahead and call all four of you,
2:31:34 if you don’t mind.
2:31:35 Michelle Beavers, Christina Brown, Rebecca Makalinen,
2:31:41 and Carrie.
2:31:47 Michelle, whenever you’re ready.
2:31:48 OK.
2:31:49 I sent an email to all of you on the 19th of this month
2:31:52 and hadn’t received a response from anybody yet.
2:31:55 In my email, I have three problems
2:31:57 that I have a solution for and I hadn’t
2:32:00 gotten any feedback at all.
2:32:02 The first one is gender queer, which you all agree
2:32:04 was not a good book for our schools.
2:32:06 There is not a do not buy list that we
2:32:08 have in our schools yet.
2:32:09 So how do any librarians coming into the position
2:32:13 or any librarians that are out there who
2:32:14 don’t know that you don’t want to buy this book,
2:32:16 how is that going to work if they don’t have a list of books
2:32:20 that should not be bought?
2:32:22 Also, this book is gay.
2:32:25 That was only in one of your libraries and was lost.
2:32:27 It was talking about how to get proper blowjobs
2:32:29 and how to go on an app to find people locally
2:32:31 that you can have sex with.
2:32:33 I would assume that we don’t want that book in our library.
2:32:35 Why is that not on a do not buy list also?
2:32:38 You have that information because I sent it to you last time
2:32:41 what that book’s all about.
2:32:43 The next thing was it’s going to take seven to eight years
2:32:47 probably to get through the list I gave you of nine
2:32:49 official submitted books.
2:32:52 I think that’s a long time for those books
2:32:54 to be on shelves if they’re bad.
2:32:56 So other counties have taken their books
2:32:58 and put them at least behind the librarians
2:33:00 so that they have to opt in to check them out.
2:33:03 I don’t think that’s an unreasonable thing for us to do.
2:33:04 If you want to keep the books in the library for any reason
2:33:07 until you get around to vetting them,
2:33:09 why not put them at least behind the librarian shelf
2:33:12 and have parents decide if they want
2:33:13 their child to read those books?
2:33:15 And that way, they’re not still out and causing damage
2:33:18 to children seven and eight years down the line
2:33:20 when you know that there’s probably a problem.
2:33:24 Librarians get about $3,400 a librarian
2:33:27 to buy these books with.
2:33:29 I would like to ask that you have some kind of system where
2:33:32 you publicly post what these librarians are
2:33:35 going to be buying before they purchase them.
2:33:37 Give us a chance in these sunshine laws
2:33:39 to see what they’re going to be purchasing.
2:33:40 And if we have any issues, give us 2 and 1/2 weeks to decide,
2:33:44 hey, this really book needs to be on that list
2:33:47 or we have a concern about it instead
2:33:49 of just having these books circulate back
2:33:50 into our libraries because you have no list of do not buy.
2:33:53 And you have– and your current guidelines
2:33:56 of telling the librarians what to pick
2:33:58 didn’t work so well with some of these books.
2:34:00 Some of these books found their ways into our libraries anyway.
2:34:03 They can’t possibly read them all, I understand that.
2:34:05 But we have parents willing to make sure
2:34:07 that some of these books don’t get on our shelves
2:34:09 and to at least alert you and let
2:34:11 you know these books are bad or have concerns about them.
2:34:15 And I have not heard from anybody–
2:34:17 Mr. Mullins, all the board members.
2:34:20 Nobody has bothered to respond to this email about solutions
2:34:23 and how we could work this out.
2:34:25 And I’m kind of disappointed that nobody’s
2:34:26 even bothered to say anything about it.
2:34:29 Thank you.
2:34:30 Thank you, Michelle.
2:34:32 Christina?
2:34:33 [INAUDIBLE]
2:34:37 Not that I’ve seen the–
2:34:38 Hello, my name is Christina Brown.
2:34:40 Thank you for letting me speak.
2:34:42 I am a graduate of Astronaut High School.
2:34:45 I am obviously a former Brevard County student.
2:34:49 Went to UF afterwards.
2:34:51 And then now I’m a business owner
2:34:53 of two brick and mortar businesses here in Brevard.
2:34:56 So I want to tell you guys thank you for the work
2:34:58 that this board, even the previous board,
2:35:01 the one that spent all the money while I was in school,
2:35:04 which it was very overcrowded.
2:35:06 Not so much astronaut, but at Titusville.
2:35:08 So I appreciate the work that you guys
2:35:11 do that is very difficult, especially
2:35:14 in the face of a very small but very vocal and loud group
2:35:18 that sometimes is not speaking for the whole community.
2:35:22 And as a business owner in this county,
2:35:24 I appreciate the work that you do to ensure that our community
2:35:29 is forward thinking and that we will
2:35:33 try to stay out of the news as one of the book banning
2:35:36 counties.
2:35:37 So I would appreciate if you continue
2:35:39 to stand strong against some of these other groups.
2:35:43 And I truly hope that some of the trouble that we’ve
2:35:47 had in the legislature that has filtered down
2:35:50 to be an issue in our county, where we’re
2:35:54 looking at banning classroom libraries and our book fairs,
2:36:01 that we can find some legal loopholes to be
2:36:03 able to still have those.
2:36:05 Because I feel that teachers in the classroom,
2:36:09 they love their teaching, and they curate those libraries.
2:36:13 And they’re a labor of love.
2:36:15 And I know when I was in school, I always
2:36:17 appreciated, because I always finished early,
2:36:20 being able to go and grab a book off the shelf.
2:36:22 It also helped all the kids that were kind of troublemakers.
2:36:25 The teacher could say, go get a book.
2:36:28 And so not only were they staying out of trouble,
2:36:31 but they were also increasing their reading level.
2:36:36 Because I don’t care what book you read,
2:36:38 even if it’s one that you consider trashy,
2:36:41 you’re still increasing your reading level,
2:36:43 which will translate later into greater skills,
2:36:47 and able to read technical things.
2:36:50 Every word that you read in school will help you, whether
2:36:52 it’s a very high level book or a low level book.
2:36:55 It all increases it.
2:36:56 And as an employer, I know I need all of my employees
2:36:59 to be able to read well.
2:37:00 And I know that as we continue to bring
2:37:03 in these high level employees in the tech companies,
2:37:07 they are looking at our schools.
2:37:09 And they are not going to want schools that have book bans.
2:37:12 So I encourage you to continue to fight back against those
2:37:15 and find creative solutions so that we don’t have those.
2:37:18 Thank you for your time.
2:37:19 Thank you, Christina.
2:37:20 Rebecca?
2:37:29 Well, I didn’t plan on piggybacking on hers.
2:37:32 But I’ve spoken to you before about this.
2:37:35 My name’s Becky McElhenan.
2:37:36 I’m a native of Brevard County and a product of Brevard County
2:37:39 Public Schools, as well as my children and my husband.
2:37:44 My granddaughter starts kindergarten this year.
2:37:46 I’ve spent hundreds and hundreds of hours in classrooms,
2:37:49 almost 30 years worth, both here in Brevard as a volunteer
2:37:52 and instructional assistant, classroom teacher substitute,
2:37:55 as well as schools around the world as an Air Force family.
2:37:58 I’ve worked in almost every area of the school
2:38:00 except the cafeteria.
2:38:02 I’d like to take a moment to speak about the assumed
2:38:05 unintended consequences of recent legislation pushed down
2:38:08 to school boards across our state.
2:38:09 Currently, there’s a lot of discussion
2:38:11 about books in classrooms and schools.
2:38:13 A well-funded national political organization
2:38:16 has been promoting the lie that our schools are teaching
2:38:19 pornography.
2:38:20 In my nearly 30 years in classrooms,
2:38:22 I have never ever seen a teacher say, OK, kids, circle time.
2:38:26 Mary’s going to do the weather.
2:38:27 Joey’s going to do the calendar.
2:38:28 And after that, we’ll continue our in-depth discussion
2:38:31 and reading of “Fifty Shades of Grey.”
2:38:33 It just doesn’t happen in any shape, form, or plan.
2:38:37 No teacher wants to have any kind of discussion like that.
2:38:40 The books that are being targeted are not only not
2:38:43 taught in classrooms, they’re rarely even checked out
2:38:47 or available in the majority of our schools.
2:38:49 But this new narrative that there’s some newly uncovered
2:38:52 ideology of porn and grooming has taken hold and made
2:38:56 teachers fearful of the very likely and proven backlash
2:39:01 from this vocal angry group of parents
2:39:03 who espouse freedom and liberty while threatening our schools
2:39:06 and fueling fires that only exist
2:39:08 in their circle of influence.
2:39:10 Whether it is rumored or true–
2:39:11 and I hope it’s a rumor that there won’t be any book fairs–
2:39:15 can we imagine for a moment what a book fair free school
2:39:18 system would look like?
2:39:20 Do these liberty people realize they’re literally
2:39:22 taking funding from classrooms and schools
2:39:24 with their continual ranting about pornography and book
2:39:26 censorship?
2:39:28 Are they aware that thousands of dollars
2:39:29 will not be available to classrooms and schools
2:39:31 without this beneficial event?
2:39:33 Do they consider the students who will get a new book
2:39:35 at the book fair, and it literally
2:39:37 may be the only new book they receive all year?
2:39:40 Do they care?
2:39:42 I don’t think they do.
2:39:43 Do they know that a well-read student is a successful
2:39:45 adult?
2:39:46 Did they forget that reading is imperative in every area
2:39:49 of school and beyond?
2:39:50 Do they understand even a tradesman must be able to read?
2:39:54 Do they not grasp that tearing down the very establishments
2:39:57 that provide a community’s education
2:39:59 is like burning down the garage but not realizing that
2:40:02 your house would burn as well?
2:40:04 I just want to say there are plenty of parents
2:40:06 in this county that do not subscribe
2:40:08 to this ignorance of attacking books in schools.
2:40:11 We are not afraid of books.
2:40:12 We will continue to fight back and speak power
2:40:15 to the truth.
2:40:16 Schools are not partisan.
2:40:18 Teachers are not the enemy.
2:40:21 Ignorance is.
2:40:23 Thank you for your time, school board members,
2:40:25 and your willingness to serve.
2:40:27 Thank you, Rebecca.
2:40:28 Carrie?
2:40:37 Good evening, Madam Chair, board members, and Dr. Mullins.
2:40:41 My name is Carrie Gerace, and I wanted
2:40:43 to take the opportunity to introduce myself
2:40:45 as the new chair of Moms for Liberty Brevard.
2:40:49 I’m looking forward to a productive year
2:40:51 where we can work together on advocating for all children
2:40:55 while protecting parental rights.
2:40:57 I bring to this position the unique experience
2:41:00 of being a parent of three BPS graduates,
2:41:03 as well as being a former teacher here in BPS.
2:41:07 With this experience, I hope to bridge
2:41:10 many of the misconceptions, as we’ve just
2:41:12 heard with the last two speakers in this community,
2:41:16 about the mission of our organization.
2:41:19 Moms for Liberty members are moms, dads, grandparents,
2:41:22 and community members that have a desire to promote liberty
2:41:26 and stand up for parental rights at all levels of government.
2:41:30 In closing, I wish all of our teachers, administrators,
2:41:33 bus drivers, cafeteria workers, custodians, office staff,
2:41:37 all of the dedicated professionals
2:41:39 that it takes to run a fantastic school the best of luck
2:41:42 as we launch into the 2022-2023 school year.
2:41:46 Thank you for your time.
2:41:47 Thank you, Carrie, and congratulations
2:41:49 on your new position.
2:41:53 All right.
2:41:53 Ms. Belford, can you let Dr. Mullins reiterate back–
2:41:57 [AUDIO OUT]
2:42:00 –classroom libraries.
2:42:02 Can we just–
2:42:03 [AUDIO OUT]
2:42:04 –would you like to speak to that?
2:42:05 Because there seems to be, like, this thing out there.
2:42:08 Yeah, I’ll draw the board’s attention back
2:42:12 to Ms. Klein’s update I think two weeks ago.
2:42:15 It was.
2:42:15 She went all the way through it.
2:42:17 Yeah, there was misunderstanding among my understanding
2:42:21 of some elementary folks about book fairs.
2:42:25 We are continuing to evaluate that.
2:42:28 We believe that there is a reasonable opportunity for us
2:42:32 to meet our requirements of the statute
2:42:35 while still providing book fair opportunities to our schools
2:42:38 and our kids.
2:42:39 And there’s no reason for us to consider any kind of banning.
2:42:44 We will have a responsibility to review the book lists
2:42:47 that the book fair companies will
2:42:49 be bringing into our schools through our media specialists.
2:42:52 But I suspect that’s part of the process we’ve always
2:42:55 had in terms of the vendors that come forward.
2:42:59 So yes, I provide the board the reassurance in our community
2:43:02 that we don’t anticipate any reason why we can’t move
2:43:06 forward with book fairs for our students and our schools
2:43:09 as we work closely with those vendors to provide
2:43:11 the opportunity available, as well as book libraries
2:43:15 in our classrooms.
2:43:17 And I think it’s to be said that it’s not anybody’s fault
2:43:19 for being misguided.
2:43:20 There’s been a lot of social media
2:43:23 and a lot of articles that have been written
2:43:25 that aren’t completely out there that are true.
2:43:27 You know what I mean?
2:43:27 And that’s unfortunate.
2:43:28 So I want to thank Dr. Mullins for saying that just
2:43:31 to clarify that there’s some misguiding out there
2:43:34 in the community, which is driving people
2:43:36 into these frenzies and go to the other school board meeting
2:43:39 and watch it.
2:43:40 That’s all.
2:43:40 Right.
2:43:41 Yeah.
2:43:41 That’s a good point, Mr. Susan.
2:43:42 And you know what I’ve been telling people
2:43:44 is we just have to get the right process in place
2:43:45 to make sure we’re protecting our people because that’s
2:43:48 the real issue, right, is we don’t want
2:43:50 to throw them into the fire.
2:43:52 And so when you have a system this large,
2:43:55 you have to figure out a process and get it into place.
2:43:59 And so thank you, Dr. Mullins, for that clarity.
2:44:04 Anything else before I gavel us out for the night?
2:44:07 Any cat posters?
2:44:10 All right.
2:44:11 This meeting is now adjourned.
2:44:29 [MUSIC PLAYING]