Summary of the 3/2/23 School Board Meeting
ARLINGTON SCHOOL BOARD MEETING SUMMARY
March 2, 2023
Top 3 Take Aways
Summer School planning is underway with an increase in capacity.
The Proposed FY 2024 Budget includes nothing on smaller class sizes
The Office of English Learners (OEL) presented a draft Five-Year Plan with an initial comment period that ends March 7. Based on questions from the Board, more details on goals, objectives, strategies and metrics would be helpful.
Meeting Open (15 minutes):
Board Chair Reid Goldstein opened the meeting and immediately moved that the Board go into a closed session to discuss an employee. All five board members were in attendance and all voted to move to the closed session.
The Board reconvened 90 minutes later with the open meeting. Mr. Goldstein moved that the Board certify that only allowed matters were discussed in the closed meeting. All 5 board members voted yes to this certification.
Dr. Tyrone Byrd from Department of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) introduced the recipients of 9 full-ride 4-year scholarships going to APS seniors. Posse is providing 2 of the scholarships and Quest Bridge the other 7. The recipients will attend Columbia, Dartmouth, Lafayette College, Notre Dame, Stanford, U Penn and University of Virginia.
Consent Agenda: Ms. Cynthia Diaz Torres made the motion to adopt the Consent Agenda with all 5 board members voting to adopt it.
Dr. Byrd was appointed interim Chief of DEI effective March 21. The current chief, Dr. Jason Ottley, will be honored at the March 16th Board meeting.
APS merged a number of financial management policies into a category now simply called Financial Management Budget. This will better align to the Strategic Plan and Board Priorities plus replace revenue sharing specifics with a reference to revenue sharing policies agreed to by APS and Arlington County.
Approved establishment of the Dual Language Sub Sub-Committee
Announcements/Questions/Comments (30 minutes 10 minutes on summer school):
Chair Announcements (2 minute)
Honored Citizen nominations accepted through March 13, 2023
Upcoming Board Meetings including Budget Work Sessions #2 and #3 at 6:30 on March 7 and 14, respectively. March 16th is the next regularly scheduled Board Meeting.
School Liaison & Other Announcements:
Ms. Diaz Torres thanked those who helped facilitate the establishment of the Dual Language Sub Sub-Committee.
Mr. Reid thanked those who helped build a shed at Abingdon.
Mr. Reid also indicated poor word choice in an article about the problems APS has been having with drug/opioid use. He noted that while APS “has a role to play . . . this opioid problem is a community problem.” He noted that everyone has a role to play.
Ms. Kadera learned so much at a presentation by Jenny Sexton (Substance Abuse Counselor shared by Kenmore and Williamsburg Middle Schools) at Kenmore Middle School.
Superintendent Announcements
Recognitions include:
March is Women’s History Month, Arts in the Schools Month, National Developmental Disabilities Awareness Month.
March 2 is Read Across America Day, March 5-11 is National Foreign Language Week, National School Social Work Week, National School Breakfast Week. March 21 is World Down Syndrome Day.
Dr. Duran’s Every Student Counts video was “Social Work Break Barriers”.
Substance Use and Opioid Education and Prevention update. Emphasized that Narcan is not the solution. It is a tool and is part of a multi-tiered approach.
Registration open through May 1, 2023 for elementary school and June 2, 2023 for middle and high school.
There are nine cluster sites with 7 for elementary school and 1 each for middle and high school.
For K-7 the program will be to build math and/or literacy skills for identified students plus a STEM-focused hands-on learning program.
For middle and high school there are virtual opportunities, credit recovery courses and advanced courses.
There are a number of other summer school opportunities.
Ms. Sutton had a question about the numbers. These are being firmed up right now with the numbers expected to be up from last year which was 1,536 for elementary school, 392 for middle school and 632 for high school. Ms. Kadera wanted to confirm that the curriculum chosen was a 5-day model and really liked that it was hands-on. Mr. Priddy underscored his support for Outdoor Lab. Mr. Goldstein ask Dr. Duran about efforts to find staff since that has been a road-block in the past.
FY 2024 Budget Dates including March 23 and April 25 public hearings.
Bright Spot – Choral Pyramid Concerts
Public Comment (23 minutes):
Public comment began, as always, with a review of the public comment rules.
There were 9 speakers in person with no call-in speakers. Speakers included 2 teachers, 1 student who spoke on behalf of his father who is a teacher, president of the Arlington Education Association, 2 bus drivers, and 3 parents.
One parent spoke on improving APS substance abuse curriculum and the 2 bus drivers spoke on promotion issues within the transportation department.
The remaining speakers’ comments all were related to budget issues including class size, teacher compensation and inequities between student-facing positions and central office staff. As one speaker said “If we want to be excellent again, what we need are more teachers – not to address enrollment but to address class size.” There were many numbers included in the comments with highlights being the APS proposed FY 2024 budget is up by $54 million with many funding requests for intervention and tutoring going unfulfilled. However, central staffing request increased by 14 non-student facing position. Additionally, to return class sizes to historic levels, it would mean adding 200 teachers across all grade levels and would cost $26 million, which is 3.2% of the current budget.
Monitoring Item – Office of English Learners (OEL) Monitoring Report (63 minutes):
Terri Murphy, Director of English Learners Office made this presentation and she was introduced by Dr. Gerald Mann, Chief Academic Officer.
Update on OEL Activities
DOJ settlement: goals to reach compliance.
There is a Sheltered training requirement and Onsite Application of training requirement. All Sheltered Training has been met. There are 135 hours of Onsite application to go. This naturally follows Sheltered and should be completed by April.
More challenging is making sure students are receiving instructional blocks which are basically class periods. In this category, the number of EL students with disabilities not receiving the right amount of support is a concern. APS has submitted an action plan with the DOJ to improve this metric.
OEL five-year plan
Developed since the fall with may stakeholders and now have a draft that is posted for public comment on February 13 and ends on March 7.
Next steps will be to gather feedback and develop a revision with March 20 target date. After that will be implementation.
This will focus their work and hold them accountable. It will implement a monitoring structure.
American Institutes for Research (AIR) has worked with APS to develop this plan. An AIR representative spoke virtually.
OEL Supports
Curriculum work with ELA teams including demonstration lessons, developing tools to allow better access to assessments for ELA assessment for ELs, developing CKLA guides for ELs and purchased Lexia English for elementary levels 1 and 2. Each of these will be expanded as next steps.
Increased amount of work on increasing access to grade level science content.
Other supports include 55 walk-throughs at Tier 2 & 3 schools, ongoing professional learning opportunities, EL data locker support and consultations with EL leads and department chairs.
World-Class Instructional Design and Assessment (WIDA) ACCESS – assesses English language proficiency levels in listening, speaking, reading and writing.
Assessments are being given and preliminary results received in May-June.
ELs experience same type of assessment decline seen at APS post- virtual school. In the past % of ELs achieving progress has been 54%-59% with a drop to 39.1% in Spring 2021. It rebounded to 54.1% in Spring 2022 and the VDOE has a 56% target. Also % of ELs reaching proficiency was 14.5% and 14.6% in 2019 and 2020, respectively. This dropped to 11.2% in 2021 and 10.2% in 2022.
Native Language Assessments – many are available in Spanish with other languages more problematic.
Questions: All five members of the Board asked questions with most of the questions centered around the 5-Year Plan. Ms. Sutton led off by stating that in reading through the draft, she saw some broad outcomes with lots of goals but suggested a concise articulation of the 16 broad goals. After asking for an overview of the now the 5-year plan was put in place, Mr. Goldstein suggested that they follow strategic planning principals so that in its final version it provides goals, strategies, objectives and metrics. In response to some of Mr. Goldstein’s questions, Dr. Duran indicated that this plan was not something that would get a Board vote. Ms. Kadera suggested that APS use some short videos in both English and Spanish to help inform parents about the 5-year plan since the draft is large. Ms. Diaz Torres indicated that although she felt the draft reflected what it is like being an EL within APS, “it is a lot” and said she was not surprised they had not gotten much feedback since it is very technical. Other areas of questions included discussion of supports once DOJ settlement ends, the training being provided by APS, how the training is allocated given different schools have different EL demographics and how OEL is ensuring APS meets DOJ goals by the end of the extension year.
Action Item - School and Police Relations (8 minutes):
With regard to a request from CCPTA: a previously reported change was updated to “Require building principals to notify the Superintendent of any police activity, including interrogations or investigations, within 24 hours of being notified.” Previously it was just arrests.
Not included in the recommendation was the CCPTA request that no search or interrogation of a student be allowed in the presence of a ACPD officer unless done by request of the ACPD so as to trigger legal, constitutional, and parental notification requirements. This question has been referred to the MOU revision process which is beginning. There will be an opportunity for community input.
Questions:
Ms. Kadera commented that the 2nd request by the CCPTA might be better put in the MOU vs. policy since the MOU gets into more details so easier to update.
Mr. Goldstein clarified that the police cannot be required to notify the principal if someone who is not a student is questioned on school property. This could be part of the MOU between APS and ACPD. That said, MOU might not be the right place since it is about APS students. It was clarified that APS does get notification about things that happen on school properties outside school hours.
Ms. Kadera moved that the Board adopt this modification. It passes 5-0.
Action Item - Campbell Elementary School Kitchen and Entrance Renovations Construction Contract Award (2 minutes):
Previously presented at February 16, 2023 meeting; no changes to this item.
Mr. Priddy moved that the Board approve a $3.26 million contract as part of a $4.82 million total budget to come from the Kitchen and Entrance/Security Vestibule Renovation Program funding. Vote was 5-0.
Information Item – Montessori Public School of Arlington Playground Relocation (12 minutes):
This must be relocated as part of the new Arlington Career Center (ACC).
It needs to be done over the summer and is all around the current building. The equipment was selected so that it can be relocated when MPSA moves. It would be installed summer 2023.
It is part of the $182.42 million ACC funding but because it is over $500,000 it has to come before the Board. 2023 meeting; no changes to this item.
Staff recommends a contract for $716,239.40.
Questions: Mr. Priddy asked about where it is going and also asked if it was a good value. Ms. Sutton also asked about the location and fencing. Mr. Goldstein asked about re-using the equipment if/when MPSA has to move and it is part of ACC project. It is from the financing from the ACC and has been vetted
To see our Scorecard for this meeting, click here.
