School Board Regular Meeting

Carolyn Pitchesgood evening ladies and gentlemen it is Monday May 4th of 2026 and this is the regular meeting of the city of Fairfax school board please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance

Speaker 8and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Carolyn PitchesOkay, we have no changes to our agenda this evening. I'd like to welcome, we have Susan Mullins from Daniels Run Elementary and our principal, Dr. Georgina A. from Fairfax High School. We have our region superintendent, Ms. Becky Bainig and Gordon Stokes, principal for our region welcome and thank you for coming this evening our next item is the adoption of our agenda may I have a motion please madam

Sarah Kelseychair

Carolyn Pitchesmiss Kelsey I

Sarah Kelseymove that the city of Fairfax school board adopt the agenda as written and distributed may

Carolyn Pitcheshave a second second miss Kelsey moved miss Bartle may seconded all those in favor signify by saying aye aye I none of the agenda passes unanimously next we'd like to recognize and invite mr. Joaquin Perez forward on behalf of the city of Fairfax school board we are proud to recognize mr. Joaquin Perez he he is the Fairfax high school ESOL teacher he is being named new teacher of the year for FCPS region 5 Joaquin's His story is especially meaningful because he is a Fairfax High School graduate. He has returned to his alma mater to serve as a teacher, a leader, advocate, and inspiration for today's students. His nomination packet describes a teacher who leads with empathy, builds a classroom

where students feel seen and valued, and brings both academic rigor and deep personal care to his work with multi-language learners. whether he's supporting students in the classroom connecting with families celebrating with colleagues or helping students celebrate their cultures through LUSA and school-wide events Joaquin represents the very best of Fairfax High School and the city of Fairfax school community we are so proud of this well-deserved honor and grateful for the difference he is making for our students every day mr. Perez is now one of only six teachers who are under consideration for FCPS Secondary New Teacher of the Year and we wish him the best of luck and our deepest appreciation for returning to Fairfax

High School.

Speaker 8Thank you. Thank you.

Carolyn PitchesOkay, next we have our Arbor Day Poetry Contest winners. I'd like to invite Emerson Harvey from Daniels Run Elementary School, Eileen Johanna Camacho-Ortiz from Providence Elementary School, Clara Cofford from Catherine Johnson Middle School, Valentina A from Fairfax High School and Ms. Alam to come forward and read your the poems and we will present them with a certificate and an award. Welcome.

Speaker 3I would just like to good evening everyone this Arbor Day Poetry Contest was a very very passionate event for all of us as educators and for the city as well I'm also part of the Environmental Sustainability of Ex City, and this poetry contest has been started by ESC, and for all the four city schools to participate in it, more than 35 poetry were submitted. It was a hard judging, very, very hard, but we had to pick four. I was not part of the judging, so I was excluded because I saw all the poetries in the names, so I excluded myself, but all the ESC members, there were a lot of people from FCPS who were were part of this so it's been a pleasure these guys had decided it on the Arbor Day and planted some trees along with it so that was pretty neat

and thank you to the school board for supporting this it would not have been possible to recognize them the way you guys do thank you so much so we'll start with Eileen

StudentLast night I dreamed that a tree was suffering in silence, and this morning I woke up with the desire to be a tree because if every tree I would be the, if every tree I would, I would be Because if I write tree, I would give more food to feed humanity and the creatures of the forest. If I retreat, I would be the home of the birds. If I retreat, I would let the season paint my leaf in a thousand colors. If I retreat, I whisper to the wind stories of the year. Today I feel an emptiness in my heart. And so I ask you, let us stop pollution. Let us plant more life. Let us care for nature. Because if we do not, that damage with the environment will have no forgiveness. Wow. Wow.

Speaker 3Awesome. That was great. Thank you. Come stand. We'll call Emerson now from Daniels Run Middle School.

StudentBeautiful survival. As I walk through new beginnings, old wood and new leaves, when I was here last, it was cold and dead. Now it is a million shades of green. It's intimidating, seeing the ones who have fallen before in the beautiful time of survival. Where hundreds could fall at once, but we stay inside, and all have nowhere else to go. But we sit not giving a thought, but only to the outside world. Where we burn them to stay warm, we chop down miracles of nature. But now the ones who survive rejoice, where they feast on the light above, letting their young climb up from below, but only until the next jail.

Speaker 3Thank you, Emerson. I'll call Clara Cofford now from Katherine Johnson.

StudentOh, what wonder all around has in this world been made to feel the grass and hear the sound of birdsong rise and fade. See what beauty and what grace has blessed this earthly realm to bask in sunlight on your face, between your toes feel alone. the sun shines bright to brighten all the land, to gaze at stars that glow at night and lie in warming sand. And even when light rests after day, the world still has such color, for nature in its joyful way cannot be any duller. Why can we not protect such love that every day is made? We fog the sky once seen above, cut down each forest glade. Let us change to use our power to help the earth to grow and then we will not have to scar to find what once was known what joy will we all

then express and laugh in happy song for all of us will pass the test earth with people get along then will next generation see the wonder of this place to live and grow eternally hope given through human race

Speaker 3thank you clara beautiful words valentina

StudentTime is a funny thing, is it not? Time is the beginning and end of everything. I've witnessed it all. The first trip of a newborn baby bird, the last breath of a man on his deathbed as I look through the window. I've seen wars, peace, and new beginnings. I have been there since the seed was planted. Lovers sit beneath my branches. Children climb and play their games. My branches may fall, but I am never broken. Parents grieve as they bury their own. Man evolves and oceans expand. Cities build, roads, and wonders reaching higher than ever before. I am still standing firm and serving purpose more. I've seen man destroy, furs, forests burnt and cut away, animals hunted, owned for sport. And now I am rooted deep in commitment.

I have seen life, felt reincarnation. Birds touch my branches, baby buds emerge from my core. last of my kind, carrying the dreams and memories of many fading with the earth, but I will be reborn again and again and again.

Carolyn PitchesThank you.

Speaker 8Thank you.

Carolyn Pitchesokay next on the agenda we're going to move on to our student recognition so So I'm gonna turn this over to Ms. Dorsey.

Ms. DorseystaffHi everyone, we are so excited you're here. We know this is easily one of our favorite nights of the year where we get to celebrate and we get to brag and we get to just really appreciate what these great kids are doing. So for those of you that are at home watching and saying maybe I got an award, we are doing this actually in two parts. We're trying to get as many high school kids here because we know especially our seniors get a little busy starting in June and they're hard to track down. splitting this into two we're going to do some in June as well we are going to call you up by groups and then we'll take a picture parents you are more than welcome to take a picture then we'll talk a little bit about each award and

then those pictures will be available on Facebook on our city of schools Facebook page hopefully tomorrow maybe by Wednesday our first recognition we'd like to do is Adele and Tristan they can come up please Before we bring the board down,

StudentI'm

Ms. Dorseystaffgoing to brag a little bit about Tristan and Adele. Tristan and Adele are part of the Fairfax High School Science Olympiad team. They are, and this is important, two-time state champions in the electric vehicle category. For those of you that don't know a lot about Science Olympiad, the best description is kind of like it's a track meet where they do different events but then there's also a team award Fairfax High School actually won third place behind TJ and Oakton this year which is really impressive but Tristan and Adele won first place two times in a row in the electric vehicle where they built a vehicle at before and then they went to the competition and then they had a pretty big lead which they told me not too long ago and so we're just really

proud of both of them so congratulations Tristan and Adele Let's leave the board, yeah. Why don't you guys all stay up here and we'll let the kids. The next we're going to do is All-Virginia Chorus. Beth Coffert. Yuko Keener and Nelson Dahl, are you here? Beth, you get to represent by yourself. So Beth was elected to the All-Virginia Chorus. This is one of the most prestigious, obviously, chorus awards. Virginia Choral Directors Association. Beth had to pass a rigorous audition, making all-district course. She went to a three-day festival in April in Richmond. Is that right? Yeah. Congratulations to Beth. Thank you. Nelson and Alliance are you here? They didn't think so. Okay. So we'll bring up Lillian and Isabella.

Lillian and Isabella are ninth graders and they were elected to the American Choral Region Honors Choir which is a compilation of 11 states. In March they got to travel to Tennessee where they were part of a four-day, they did rehearsals for days and then they did the concert. Over 1,500 students applied for this with selections based on their musical excellence. So congratulations to Lillian and Isabella.

Carolyn PitchesAre

Ms. DorseystaffAaron or Kaylee here? No.

Carolyn PitchesOkay, double check.

Ms. DorseystaffWhat about Carrie, Heather, or Akshara? No. Okay. All right. Rohan, Elias, Michael. All right, Henry, it's just you representing all of the fair. Oh, Nathan? Is Nathan you here? So Henry Mann is going to represent all of our national merit winners, finalists. I can brag a little bit about Henry and himself. He just came from baseball practice where last week they beat Lake Braddock. but these five representatives from Fairfax High School are national merit finalists. Virginia actually has one of the highest thresholds for national merit, so comparing with California, some other New York, so it is really even more impressive what Henry's achieved. You begin your junior year with your PSATs, and you have high academics, SA, school sponsorship.

Just an overall really impressive feat. Henry next year will be going to UVA, and wish him well. We're also going to wish Henry well tomorrow. He's taking the AP government test. AP Government, you got it? He assured me that he's okay when I offered to have him go first. Is Sadie Buckley here? No. All right, Cross. Then Cross Cassidy is going to represent all of our athletes tonight. Cross Cassidy is a three-time Virginia State Champion in wrestling, representing... We're also going to ask Coach Q to come down after he takes his pictures. We will recognize Coach Q too who was named the Patriot District Coach of the Year. Cross, though, let's brag about Cross just a little bit. Again like I said, he's a three-time state champion.

He has been named the National High School Association three-time All-American. Not only was he state champion, he was district region and state champion for three years in a row. He's been ranked third in the country. Next year, Cross will attend George Mason to study and to wrestle. A little brag about Coach Leo as well. Since Coach Leo has taken over, he's had five years straight of a state champion. The past four years, he's been ranked in the top eight in the state from eighth, fourth, and sixth place. So his team also even most impressively had a 3.92 GPA. That's it.

Speaker 8Congratulations to all of our students.

Carolyn PitchesWe're going to take a five minute recess so for those families and students who would free to go. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. okay welcome back everyone we are going to begin with our presentations to the signed up for citizen participation this evening. So we are gonna go on to the student representative report. We have Kevin Murray in today for Miss Abby Lucas. Welcome Kevin.

StudentGood evening everyone and happy May. As we move into the final full month of the 25-26 school year, Fairfax City Schools are focused, energized, and busy with end of year academics, testing, performances, and celebrations. Students and staff are working hard to finish the year strong, while also taking time to recognize achievements and milestones grade levels. At Fairfax High School AP exam and SOL season is underway with students participating in major assessments across multiple subjects. Spring athletics are in postseason play with teams competing in district and regional competitions. Senior events are in full swing including decision celebrations, award recognitions, and graduation preparations. End of year

activities and final exams are beginning to ramp up across all levels as well. At Katherine Johnson Middle School students are completing SOL testing with teachers and review sessions. Clubs and extracurricular activities are finishing final projects and wrapping up the school year. Counselors are assisting students with course planning and transition activities for next year. At Daniels Run Elementary School students are participating in final assessments and review activities and reading and math. Field trips and class celebrations are helping mark the end of the year and end of the year performances and classroom showcases are taking place across grade levels. At Providence Elementary School students are engaged in end of the year learning

projects and academic review activities. They're focused on literacy growth, math skills, and hands-on classroom learning and family engagement events and classroom celebrations helping close out the year. As May continues, students across Fairfax City Schools are focused on finishing assessments, celebrating accomplishments, and preparing for transitions into summer and the next school year. I'd also like to wish all the teachers here a happy Teacher Appreciation Week. So anyone watching, happy Teacher Appreciation Week. And I'd like to wish everyone a strong finish to the school year and a happy, successful end-of-the-year season.

Carolyn PitchesThank you, Kevin. Okay, next we have a presentation from our Catherine Johnson Middle School students. Claire Ahn, Mohana Amani, Halima Shinwari, Adele Wiseman, Henry Street, Kamala Michal. I apologize if I mispronounce anybody's name and Milana Kamela on city redevelopment applause

Speaker 3applause applause applause So there are two projects. We are thankful to Fairfax City's zoning office. It's really been a collaboration with being part of the city schools. This is the third project in third and the fourth. First one was Camp Washington. in 2016 and then two years ago we had done Fairfax Circle redevelopment plan presented the same way to all the bodies here this is a great opportunity for our students to apply what they have learned so this year we collaborated even further we took the zoning office from thanks to Paul and Amy from there they brought the maps to the school and we use the leadership class of Miss Conley to kind of take this to the next level and students work there so there are two

groups here the first the north facts is going to present and then the courthouse plaza

Speaker 15good evening school board members and superintendent i'm claire i'm mohana and

Studenti'm halima

Speaker 15and we're here to talk about the redevelopment proposal for north facts So here we have like two maps here and on the left side is the outline for Northfax. So Northfax sits on road 123 and has Fairfax Boulevard going through the middle of it. And on the right side is the same duplicated map but you might be like wondering what are these like brown spots on the map. Well these are spots that are not going to redevelop. These sites include Assisted Living, Mazda's dealership, a motel, Amazon Fresh, and office buildings. So the Mazda dealership has currently, like, they recently redeveloped, so they will not be redeveloping. And the Amazon Fresh, they recently closed down, so we'll be putting something else in its place that we will talk about in a few slides.

Speaker 14As we can see, we need to dream big, set goals, and take action. There's three environmental issues here to address. First, we have stormwater management. As we can see on this map, there's too much concrete here. Impervious surfaces can lead to runoff and flooding, polluting our waters, heat island effect, which I'll be talking about in the next slide. Second, we have car-centered designs. As I mentioned, there's too much roads here. This can increase carbon emission and also runoff. It's also difficult for people to walk safely walk safely and try to feel safe. Third we have lack of greenery. Lack of greenery leads to heat exposure, lack of carbon absorption, and lack of calm environment for everybody. As we can see on this region there's different colors here

and you may ask what is this? This is a heat island. A heat island is when there's too much concrete and asphalt and this causes the sun's heat to be absorbed into the ground. In the yellow region it's hot, in the orange region it's hot, but it's the hottest, but the dark region is like really hot. Since the shopping center takes place near the dark red region, we know that there's a lot of large roads surrounding that place. When that heat gets absorbed into the ground. Who breathes the air?

Speaker 15Us.

Speaker 14So you may ask, what is urban planning and zoning and why is it so important for us? Urban planning basically decides where buildings, roads, and land go. It also helps us organize where transportation can go. Urban planning basically keeps the city growth organized and efficient for everybody here. For us, and also protects the green spaces and grasses here. It also reduces traffic, supports the local economy, and also keeps it community friendly and safe for everybody. So how do we manage stormwater? We need to use more green infrastructures, like rain gardens, bioswills, green roofs, and permeable pavement. These green spaces reduce flooding and also stops the runoff before it reaches the stream.

In this picture, this is an example of a bioswale. We can also plant more trees which will reduce erosion and also cools the area down generally. How can we improve pedestrian safety for our people? We can add proper sidewalks so people feel safe, shared use paths with bike lanes, improve crosswalks and intersections, slow down vehicle traffic and enhance traffic calming, better lighting and signage especially at night, ADA access for people who need it, and also increasing community awareness and enforcement. Lastly, how can we facilitate a strong local economy? We need to promote a mixed-use development plan that involves residential units, commercial sites and offices for people who work, dining venues for people to relax and eat, network

that is walk friendly for people who prefer walking or don't have, sorry, don't have their own transportation, underground parking, and also promoting a small and locally owned business.

Speaker 15So now we're going to talk about our idea. So this is what North Facts looks like. You saw it on the map earlier. So here we want to add more pervious surfaces, bring the stream above the ground, add more greenery to the area and definitely add solar panels. So bringing the stream above the ground, there's an example picture on the right, that's San Antonio, Texas, where they brought up the stream above the ground. And I would assume they added like cafes or restaurants where people can like chill and hang out and have fun. We would like to bring that kind of like inspiration into North Facts. So currently the stream is underground. If you can see in the picture on the left, the dark underground and we want to bring that up.

Speaker 14So here's the residential

Speaker 15area. Here we want to add a gym like fitness, a park, 24 essential store, maybe something like 7-11, wellness office for adults, lots of trees, and a service where cars can also pass on. So I'ma go talk through the list. So the gym and the fitness or like both technically the same thing can be connected with the wellness office for like adults so if you want to like work out you guys you can go to the gym but then if you want to like work out and do like unfinished tasks maybe you have for work then you can go to the wellness office um the park will be open for everyone um the so it'll be this is where the stream comes into it'll be there'll also be a fence in between so the top part will be used for like

kids families if you guys want to like chill and like have a walk in the park you know and the will be for like pets like dogs or if you want to maybe like walk your cat you can do that too um there will be lots of trees obviously to keep the heat islands away and the sidewalks where also cars can pass on that would be pervious surface so it's like the picture below this example picture that i drew and it's the previous surface parking lot which reduces runoff and heat and um lastly the 24 essential store so currently there is an essential store there I think it's like Shell or something there's one there we could either break it down and make it better and newer or break it down and add like a ton of essential sources so like there's like a variety so this is the Amazon

Fresh area like I said earlier Amazon Fresh has currently closed down they have moved their focus to Whole Foods, so we were wondering if we could add the Whole Foods there, and coffee and dessert shops, restaurants, and definitely the previous parking, because this is the area where the Heat Island was the darkest. So the restaurants would be maybe like a food court, like three to four different types of restaurants, so that people can enjoy a variety, and the dessert shops can either be like one big one, or it can be like three to four like the food court, so then people can enjoy different type of desserts. This is the green space area. Here we would like to add a smoothie bar, board game cafe, yoga, art studio, salad or sandwich spot, bookstore, and obviously

the grass area. This is more like a chill area where people can enjoy their free time. Maybe if, because there's also office buildings nearby, maybe when they're taking a break they buy some food from the salad or sancho splotch or get like a smoothie from the smoothie bar and it's pretty self-explanatory it's an area that people can you know hang out and chill and have lots of fun

Studentso this is our second proposal for bringing the water on surface we would like to add a sushi restaurant right next to the mazda as you guys can see those photos these are from Japan and we don't have a sushi restaurant around here looking like this we do have sushi restaurant but they don't look like this so we would like to bring a have one like this where there's a river and water flowing through and it would be like really interesting it will like keep the place more appealing a lot of people want to visit and I am pretty sure we all will love it So, no fire should be for people, not just cars. Right now it's too loud and hard to get around. We can fix this by adding more trees for shade, adding more light so people can see at night,

and clearly marking the crosswalks so we can cross the street safely. Adding real bike lanes will help kids and family away from fast traffic. will make Nurfax a place where we actually want to shop, walk, and relax and spend time together. Bus shelters. We want to add bus shelters with solar panels on top of it. So bus shelters will be a place while it's raining outside you can go and it will be a dry place to sit in and wait for the bus. Fewer cars will reduce carbon emission. Traffic flows very good when there's less cars. Streets will feel more like a community, less like a parking lot. Energy from solar panels will generate power to the area. Solar panels. We think solar panels are beneficial

for both residential and commercial. So for residential, it will lower the bills. You can keep the money instead of giving it to the utility company and it will higher the value of your property. You will have backup power even when the grid is down. And for commercial, it will lower the costs. Same thing like residential. And green branding attracts eco-conscious customers who love green shops. Tax break. of big government incentive and write-offs.

Speaker 15Okay, so these are our global connections or sustainable development goals. So we have three goals that tie into our project. They are goal 11, 13, and 7. Their targets are sustainable cities and communities, climate action, and affordable and clean energy. So I'm going to talk about how they are addressed in our project. Planning sustainable urbanization, building safe, inclusive, and accessible green public spaces. For goal 13, we're reducing global warming like reducing the heat islands as mentioned earlier. For goal 7, we are providing clean and efficient energy by installing the solar panels. Civic Action and Ask. Reduce your carbon footprint. We ask that you please require green infrastructure standards in redevelopment,

like enforcing the green building policy which exists but has never been enforced. Prioritizing walkable bike safe design elements and increasing tree canopy. Please establish youth consultation requirements which do not exist currently before project approval. We bring essential lived experience and we are the future. Civic engagement. We have outreach to authorities in power, planning commission who we already have talked to, city school board which is you guys who manage the four city schools, the city mayor and council members because they are the final decision makers. Bringing our voice to the redevelopment process is a good thing so you don't have to waste money, taxes or time on implementing small site based fixes later.

We are the youth, we are the future.

StudentThank you for your time. Many, many thanks to Ms. Colleen, Ms. Alam, and Ms. Denny.

Speaker 14Now that it's finished, we appreciate any feedback and questions you may have.

Lauren BartelmeOkay. Thank you.

Carolyn PitchesMs. Bartlemay, do you have any questions or comments?

Lauren BartelmeYou guys did a great job, and I love the stream idea.

Carolyn PitchesThank you. Ms. Kelsey?

Sarah Kelseyno I think that was an awesome presentation as well you guys have put in a lot of thought into a lot of this I'd be curious to see and I know this is probably not part of your assignment how much some of this would cost but that's for the planning department to figure out later so good job

Carolyn PitchesMs. Hickman.

Amit HickmanThank you so much for your presentation. I thought not only were your ideas really thought out, but you are all very passionate about it. It was really great to see and it kept us very interested in wanting to, you know, if I could have funded this, I would be happy to do so. And I'm all in on that sushi restaurant. It was great.

Carolyn PitchesMs. Sessori.

Kristina CecereYou guys did such a great job. Thank you for coming tonight. I absolutely love the idea of bringing in Whole Foods into the

Lauren Bartelmecity.

Kristina Cecereanyone in the planning commission um and i absolutely love the idea of bus shelters mixing that solar use panel just a great job of incorporating like greens uh thinking of tree use and all that stuff but i'm just reducing that um what is it called the with the the heat dome right like that's such a big thing when we talk about like making green spaces and whatnot so thank you so much

Carolyn Pitchesit was a great presentation i would be curious what did the city council what was their feedback did they give you guys any yeah we have you haven't done the city council just planning yeah what what was their um feedback well

Studentthey loved it yeah yeah um their feedback was they were asking uh how we would like how much time we spend yeah

Speaker 14and how like the stores would connect with the teenagers and the people around the area yeah good

Carolyn Pitchesquestions well you know you should always you should look into um jobs at or in the uh economic department and urban planning in the city thank you very much you guys

Speaker 3All right, I guess they're waiting for an invitation. Courthouse Plaza, please.

StudentThis is reimagining Fairfax Courthouse Plaza.

StudentI'm Adel Weisman.

StudentI'm Henry Street.

StudentAnd I'm Milana Camilla.

StudentSo this is just the table of contents, everything we're going to be going through today. This is the Courthouse Plaza Shopping Center. It's a big empty space. It's a lot of parking space. There's a lot of asphalt in the area and there's a few, like, little shops, nothing really relevant. It's pretty empty most of the time. As you can see, there's very few cars. Only the people that work here really come to this area, and we'd like to change that. We want to make a place where people can come together, have fun, and create communities.

StudentSo what is urban planning? Urban planning is the process of designing and rebuilding areas to create enjoyable places for people. So, builders have to take in a lot of consideration with this. They have to, for example, they have to take in land use, transportation, environmental concerns, and just things like that.

StudentIn our top left corner over here of this slide, you're going to see our land value legend. Land value just essentially means how much or how little a certain piece of land is worth. And you see the courthouse plaza happens to be in the red, which is less than 20%, keep into consideration not putting too many high-end businesses while redeveloping. That also doesn't mean that we have to put too many low-end businesses either we just have to find a nice middle ground.

StudentZoning. Zoning is basically a set of rules of what can be built in certain places. For an example you will not want your house next to a factory because houses are for residential use and factories are for commercial use. The zoning for courthouse plaza is commercial use

Studentyou're gonna see in some of our designs that we're gonna be proposing later on that there's gonna be no sort of housing so no apartments or anything and that's because courthouse plaza already has apartments very close by and it's also for commercial use not residential use so we would have no need to admin anyways um

Studentwe took a lot of inspiration from buildings in Fairfax. One of them is from Kenya. So the first one is the Mosaic District. It's a huge shopping center. I love going there. It's like the perfect equal of kind of fancy high-end and family-inclusive areas. Tyson's Corner has almost every shop that I can think of. It's a great place to go for back-to-school shopping or clothing shopping for birthdays, It's just a great place to be. It's very high energy and fun. Fairfax Corner is a smaller shopping center, but I love it there. My sister works there currently, and I love going there to watch movies and hang out, and I do really love the grass area. And I lived in Kenya overseas for two years, and we lived in a neighborhood called The Grove.

And in The Grove, one of their main goals was to have pervious surfaces. So in this photo you can see that most of the tiles were replaced with grass. So we never really had problems with flooding and it was really earthy and nice to be around while I lived there. We also have to put some issues into consideration when we were thinking about our project. For example, stormwater and runoff. So we want to have underground parking because it helps stop stormwater issues by creating space below the surface and we want to add stormwater to slowly capture, release, and store runoff. The pervious sidewalks would also help with flooding because the grass would consume the water. For pedestrian safety, we want it to be that the only way to get to the shopping center

would be through elevators from the parking garage, so no cars would be in the shopping center. We found in studies that when there are cars next to people, they feel more stressed and less comfortable, so we want to make it that this does not happen in the shopping center. And lastly, we really want to work on facilitating a strong local economy. So we want to focus on hosting community-centered events, creating partnerships with local businesses, as you will see in our designs, and we want to create a vibrant, walkable, and accessible environment for everybody that comes. The biggest issues we faced were environmental concerns. The big concerns that we have are the impervious surfaces and lack of green space.

surface surfaces, it leads to heat island effects, excessive heat, air pollution, stormwater runoff, and causes flooding. For lack of green space, it leads to heat island effect, excessive heat, lack of carbon absorption, stormwater runoff, and it causes flooding and erosion.

StudentAlright, so the last group elaborated on this a little bit, but I'm going to just talk a little bit more about it. The heat island effect is essentially just when there's like concrete or asphalt which are darker colors darker colors absorb heat so when the Sun hits it it absorbs the heat and that heat rises into the air and pollutes the air which is very bad for us to breathe in so in Courthouse Plaza it's level red due to the large amount of impervious surfaces that we currently have there so just concrete and asphalt and a lack of trees and grass in the area so within redeveloping we want to add more trees and grass because it will make it look better and also be healthier overall. We had to focus on some eco-friendly solutions that we could implement within our redesigning

of Courthouse Plaza. We had to take into account how we're managing stormwater and runoff as the area redevelops, adding more pervious areas, how we're improving pedestrian safety. We just wanted to put an emphasis on the fact that there's a green building solutions policy in place that the government put in place. That just means that whoever's going to be rebuilding a certain area, so in this case it's Cornhouse Plaza, the more green solutions they add, such as solar panels and things of that sort, that we'll get some incentives such as tax reductions. So rebuilding and making it a greener space is good for that reason, but it's also good for the reason of reducing emissions overall. We also wanted

to say that Fairfax is already part of Green Tree USA, which is a term that just means that it's a very eco-friendly green area, and we wanted to add to it by making Courtenay House Plaza very green as well. In the bottom right of the slide, you're going to see the amount of pervious versus impervious surfaces in Fairfax. It's just a map of that, and Courtenay House Plaza is very, very gray, meaning impervious, and that's obviously not a good thing, as I've said before, so we want to change that. sustainable solutions that we had in mind were solar panels because there's a lot of wasted space on roofs and it's a nice green energy some pervious surfaces to soak up storm water and just be healthier for us to breathe in and storm water and run off detention systems so that there's

no flooding and it just stores the storm water instead of just letting it flood

Studentthis is our first design please keep in mind that all of these shops are ideas things that off of based on the land value but I just well we just put together as many shops as we could think of and we tried to equal everything out we wanted to include all age groups interests in this so for the adults or people who live in the area we wanted to keep the Safeway that is already in place in the area because it's very useful to have a nice grocery store near your area and we wouldn't want to take that away from the people that live here, especially since a lot of students attending George Mason live there. Added onto that for teens and people in college, we wanted to have Capital One Cafe. It's a great studying cafe. I've been there before. They have lots of rooms. They have

outlets. They have seating. And it's a really nice place to be to study. And obviously, there's a cafe. I love to eat. It's great. And there's also a bank on the side, so if people want to teach their children about banking, they can do it right there. For food, we have Raisin Canes. There's currently no Raisin Canes in the area. If I want to get it, I have to go on at least an hour drive to get to the closest one. There's also Share Tea, which there is only one shop around my area. It's really tasty, and I love it. For teens, we wanted to add lots of clothing stores. Over the years, these brands have become very popular, and they always get a lot of foot traffic. So Aerie, PacSun, Addicted, and Brandy Melville have gotten a lot of fame over the past few months,

and I love going there. It's really nice. For young adults, a lot of them are getting into health and wellness. So Club Pilates is a, I'm pretty sure it's a local shop and a lot of people go there. So it's really nice for kids. There's Skate and Fun Zone. I went there when I was a kid. It was great. There's laser tag, there's rollerblading, and there's an arcade. Super duper fun, great for birthdays and hangouts. And of course there's Ted's Bulletin. Love Ted's Bulletin. It's a nice area for families to go to. It's not too fancy, but at the same time it has great food and it's very large. For local shops, we have Bard's Alley, which is a cute little bookstore. It's got lots of variety of books and the Fairfax Surf Shop,

which Kim is going to go into more detail about.

StudentSo the Fairfax Surf Shop is a place that I would definitely want to keep while redeveloping and reimagining Courthouse Plaza. Not only is it a great center for community, for especially the skateboarding community in Fairfax, it's also been there for a very long time. In fact, my dad, when he would skate and he lived here when he was younger, he would go there to get skate equipment. I go there to get my skate equipment currently, and it's just overall a very nice place that we would not want to take away.

StudentWe also have a green area in the middle for kids and adults to hang out. Kids can run around, they can play, maybe even Club Pilates could do some stuff in the green area. And around there is greenery. We want to add maybe even a little community garden next to the shopping center, something to keep the community together, and maybe even a street art wall. I thought that it'd be cool if we could have local artists work on the wall so that when people drive by they don't just see a boring old wall, they see community and amazing art. Some more ideas we want to go more into depth on is shuttle stops for the people that live close in the area. This would reduce the gas emission and it'd just be nice for them to not have to use their

cars, especially if they can't afford them. It's really nice to have a shuttle stop instead of maybe walking or biking. We want solar panels on top of shops or shuttle stops because it's green energy and we really want to try to help with the greenery in the area and we want to have healthy energy. We want community gardens on all sides of the parking garage and we want water fountains drinking and visual. Henry will get more into the visual but we do want to make sure that during the hot summer people have stuff to drink.

StudentOne of the things we wanted to focus on when reimagining Courthouse Plaza is how we can facilitate a strong local economy, and these are the three main points that we focused on. First, a strong sense of community, which we could do by adding more DIY or independent small businesses so that a larger amount of the money we're spending is being spent by residents, staying in the community, benefiting our local businesses. Two, we need more diverse businesses because there's a lot of different kinds of people in Fairfax, and no matter who you are, you should have a place to go. So three, more job opportunities. Fairfax has a wide range of ages, especially in our age category of teenagers and young adults.

So we want to create job opportunities that would benefit everybody. Here are some developments I would like to see as a 14-year-old living in Fairfax currently. First, maybe a music venue. A lot of people really like music, and we also have some very talented school bands and orchestras nearby, like Fairfax High School and George Mason University. And a small venue for artists to play something to do, keeping them out of trouble. We could use our own art and perform that for our community. We could have artists from out of town perform it for our community. It could be very fun. Some inspirational places to keep in mind if we decide to do this would be the Black Cat in D.C., which is a venue I really like.

I've been there a lot. And Jam and Java, which is a cafe by morning and a music venue by night. It's in Vienna, Virginia. I'm actually going to a show there tomorrow. It's really awesome. And then also a youth center could keep Fairfax youth out of trouble and help with creating that further sense of community, get us off our phones. And also there's a lot of different kinds of people in Fairfax, as I said before, and the youth center isn't really about a certain interest. It's just a place to hang out with your friends.

Speaker 6This is our second design. Another idea I had was named after Lord Fairfax, one of the founders of the area. and also because people might have a negative connotation with Courthouse Plaza. Like, oh, it's a parking lot. Wow, love hanging out in parking lots. Really fun. It would kind of bring a new experience to the area. Over on the left would be more of a restaurant area. It would have public seating, more sit-down meals, more fast food. There would be pervy surfaces with maybe hexagonal bricks and then grass in between mud and grass. There would be tables with umbrellas and chairs for families who may want to sit outside and enjoy the outdoors. Maybe a Chick-fil-A because it's a very popular restaurant.

Love the chicken sandwich. Over here is the pre-existing Safeway because, as mentioned before, it's a great place to go shopping, especially for the apartments nearby. It's also one of the main revenue generators for Courthouse Plaza. On the right there would be a bit of a unique area. It would be kind of a room with a bunch of little booths or tents that small businesses could rent out. For example, if I make art and I want to share my art, sell it, but I don't have enough money yet for a storefront, then I could start here, maybe move up to a storefront at some point. And then over here would be kind of like a strip mall area of actual storefronts for clothing stores, maybe if you move up to a storefront, all

kinds of stuff. An example is a Nike store that has shoes, clothing, sports equipment, all those. Over here are elevators leading up from the underground parking. They have not only trees around them and benches, but they would be glass all the way down because it's really cool to see the ground as you go up. In the middle there would be a green space, maybe have a picnic, have your kids run around, there'd be a fountain in the middle, looks nice, and along the side there would be mini trees. And over on the bottom left there would be a bioretention pond, but instead of a normal bioretention pond, which is just fenced off, got some water, doesn't look too nice, this one would have boardwalks over

It would be a much quieter, chill area. You could just kind of walk around, go to the pavilion in the middle, a covered pavilion with benches and tables. You could bring a board game to play with your family. You could check out a book from the library next door and read on a bench. And to the right there would be a fountain, which not only looks and sounds nice, but it helps to keep the water moving, which helps to fight against mosquitoes and things that like to lay eggs in stagnant water.

StudentWe incorporated a lot of goals from the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. We used Goal 11, Goal 13, and Goal 7, the same goals that the group before us used. For sustainable cities and communities target, we are building safe, inclusive, and accessible green public spaces. for targeting climate action. We want to reduce the heat island by planting green cities, planting more trees and making it a walkable place with low carbon emission and we want to target affordable and clean energy by installing solar panels. This is our civic ask for change. We ask to increase the tree canopy, add shaded seeding areas, inclusion for green infrastructure and pervious surfaces, and want a safe area to walk and bike. Why? Students are daily users of this public space. We want to

bring essential lived experience to redevelopment decisions. Youth participation in all future planning approval processes would be great. We love this area and we will probably live in this area for a pretty long time and these are developments that we would love to see and we would love to be part of decision making. The decision makers we have already talked to are planning commission members. Now we're talking to you, city school board, and we are going to talk of Courthouse Plaza and the city mayor and council members. We want to strengthen civic clarity by presenting to above authorities as we want to influence for change. We were also in the Fairfax Independent News article. If you want to, you can check out the website.

I really like that they added in our designs. It's really cool to see and we love that we're making a change. Thank you. And now we're free to any questions. Thank

Carolyn Pitchesyou. Ms. Bartlemay.

Lauren BartelmeYou all did a great job. I really liked how you took into account lots of different age groups in your designs, and you had some great ideas of businesses to bring in, and I agree that we need a Raising Cane. And I really liked the murals on the outside wall. I think that's a great idea and I liked the boardwalk and the rentable booth idea is cool Thank you Thank

Carolyn Pitchesyou Miss Kelsey,

Sarah KelseyI feel like you read my mind because I was thinking basically the same thing about a lot of it I do agree with Raising Cane's though and I know my daughter Would be very happy to have one of those closer to us but I do like the idea of the um rentable tents kind of thing because we do that around the holidays but we don't really give that option to people other than like farmers markets that are open one once in a blue moon you know um so i think that's a great idea of something that

Studentyou know

Sarah Kelseymaybe we haven't thought of at this point um sometimes it takes younger minds to think of some of those innovative ideas that we haven't thought of yet so great job guys this

Carolyn Pitcheswas

Amit Hickmanall great my son is actually one of those people who does hang out at that parking lot in the Safeway I don't know his friends love that place there's not many other places they can go right that are close by so like the idea of more activities I think we're all in the same mindset that this rentable booth idea is really cool we have some awesome local artists here in the city a lot of different things to offer and so it would be neat to have a place for that. And I would love to call Pilates, so please make that happen.

Kristina CecereMiss Thessary. There we go. This is so timely, considering the conversations happening around Coriolis Plaza, so great choice here. I also just want to say how thoughtful your design is. I can absolutely picture my younger self with my children when they were younger playing in these spaces and whatnot and going to the different places and whatnot. So really very nice. And then I just want to I absolutely love the mix of community gardens into like the parking lots it's actually one of my favorite features of Nats Park if you ever go into Nats Park there's a community garden right over and if you're in like the 200 level anyways so baseball fans might see them anyway and just thank y'all this is great thank you

Studentthank you

Carolyn PitchesDr. Wright would you like to say a few words?

Dr. WrightstaffI would love to. Thank you, Chair Pitches. Students, amazing job for both groups. I was extremely impressed. I'd like to say three quick thank yous. First, and the first group touched on this, but a big thank you to all the staff members who supported you throughout this process and just the ones who've supported you to get to this spot. A big thank you to your families for all they've done to raise some awesome kiddos. and then a big thank you to you. This is super impressive and the type of things that we're proud of our City of Fairfax students doing each and every day. I think your suggestions are great. You may know this. I live in the City of Fairfax and so I've spent a lot of time at Courthouse Plaza,

a lot of time at North Fax area. For my 16th birthday, I got a Fairfax Surf Shop hoodie. It's red. It's awesome. And I still have it. The sleeves are cut off, and it's all covered in paint. But it's one of my favorite things because I would come visit my grandma, and where I lived, there was no surf shops. And so she lives in Vienna, and I'd come visit her, and I'd always go to the surf shop to check out the skateboards and surfboards. So love seeing that in there. But you're also giving us some really great suggestions as we look at, in the city of Fairfax, we're about to do a significant amount of work on our elementary schools and our high schools to renovate them and redevelop them. And so a lot of the things that you're talking about that are

important to you as students, that are important for the sustainability of our community, and then most importantly, to incorporate student voice, I think are great things for us to think about. I'd like to just call out before I close the wonderful skills that you showed in terms of knowledge about urban planning and zoning and redevelopment, but just also call out the skills that you needed to be able to do what you just did over the last 20 minutes. You were communicators. You were collaborators. You were problem solving. You were creative. It was amazing. I talk on microphones for a living, and I still get nervous every single time I do it. And you guys, it was like no sweat. It was so impressive.

So congratulations to both groups on that. And then you guys shared a lot of statistics tonight. So I would share one for all of you. And both of you kind of touched on this, both groups. The school-age children, they make up about 27% of our population across the globe. but those school-age children are 100% of our future, right? And so I am super confident that our future is going to be very bright with leaders like all of you giving us great ideas. So a big thank you and super impressive. Thank you so much.

Georgina AstaffThank you.

Carolyn PitchesSo I will close by saying please keep being inspired and developing your ideas into plans because we need, we are, as we grow older, We oftentimes can't see those creative ideas, so we need the younger generations to keep us moving forward and progressing. So thank you very much.

StudentThank you. Have a great night, you guys. Thank you.

Carolyn PitchesOkay, so next on the agenda is our Fairfax High School State of the Schools presentation. So we'd like to welcome Dr. Georgina A, our principal from Fairfax High School.

Georgina AstaffWelcome, Dr. A. That was just awesome. I mean, I saw our future deck of diamonds. I saw geospatial analysis enrollees. I saw our business marketing and planning students. I saw the government in there. I saw get to green in there. I was like, well, the future is promising. And it's always exciting when you can see the skills that they're going to be bringing into the high school. So that was very exciting to see. All right. Let's get started. So our Lions lead. I think the number one thing that we really try to emphasize for our students is finding space and place for them to lead. And in this presentation tonight, kind of talking about the that students have voiced and created, that staff has opened and created,

and as a school community, we've opened and created for students to really rise to that challenge and perform when those spaces are open and for them to be able to step into who they are truly intended to be. So we'll talk here about our school, and there's our school demographic information, and just some possum facts to get started. So this year to date, we recognize 285 students for being Lions that take the lead in our community, recognize them whether that's academically, whether that's showing character, whether that's showing empathy, so have multiple entry points where they can be nominated for things that they have done within the community to really show that they are exhibiting those

leadership skills. I have our quarter of honorable recognitions there, so as students continue to work, that third quarter was rough with the cut down and the snow, right, but we know they're bouncing right back in that fourth quarter. I think one that we're most proud of is three years ago we were AP bronze honor roll and we've been AP gold honor roll for the past two years so that really talks about students not only having access and exposure to those classes but performing when they take those assessments as well so that college readiness that we really intend for them and that rigorous exposure. The other one that I'll talk more about is just having the second highest SPSF growth of any high school or secondary school in Fairfax County so really looking at

how we are scored on the state indicator system and some of the work we did for that and then as always we double down on that passion push so really finding that honors dual enrollment or AP space for students to continue to grow and take the lead or challenge themselves in and those numbers continue to climb so students are taking that challenge and feel comfortable in the spaces we're creating for them. Always doubling down on our mission that we are champions and cheerleaders of an inclusive and innovative community and really focusing on the equity excellence and accountability of our students to make sure that 62 countries and 14 voices can be heard in our space and really embracing that for our students.

StudentThere is

Georgina Astaffour SPSS indicator. If you'll know a year ago we were at like 80.6 barely on track when we got this data and found out the new accountability system and we found that out in fall and we snapped into action and so within one year we found multiple entry points to be able to make sure that students had the opportunities to demonstrate proficiency and advanced proficiency to have opportunities finish that CTE class and take the certification exam, to take that ASVAB opportunity to really focus on on-time graduation elements to get students across that finish line. So just being very intentional in making sure students had all the opportunities that they had. And I always say, hear while you're at school,

and then is there something for you when you leave school? So what are you walking across the stage to when you get that diploma in your hand, and do you have that purpose and that goal? Here is our current course enrollment, and we know this will shift a little bit, but here you see again dual enrollment and AP classes have increased, and then we're not finished actually with fine tuning and transitioning honors. We're doing a lot of intentional counseling with students. We're looking at both maps, literacy and numeracy data. We're looking at their performances in their current classes and really kind of using we get ABLE foundation data as well to look at how many students are enrolled in advanced coursework

and where they're challenging themselves or where are great spaces for them to challenge themselves and kind of pulling students in and saying, hey, you have a schedule. You picked your classes. Where on here could you push yourself if we don't see you choosing to push yourself? And really saying, you know, it's great if you've been an A student in standard English. it's time to go to honors if you're an A student in standard English as you continue to move through that might be a space you do great your teacher says you're ready let's push ourselves a little bit you know and then hope with that hope being an honors and then going to an AP we have world and US history DE now we piloted last year they are both they both have seen huge increases

we've added astronomy for next year and we have 30 students excited for that we have our electrical CTE program that is coming to Fairfax I'll share some more in a little bit. We've added AP Economics that now counts for an EPF course so students can take that in lieu of EPF and then we are also piloting AP Governance being a 10th grade option so we're looking at the sequencing of classes as well because some of them may make a little more logical sense so we're piloting that next year as well as an option for our rising ninth graders. WIDA best. So I say that for looking at our WIDA scores as we continue to push through. So there you can see that we almost doubled our WIDA growth just in the past year just with a lot of

intentionality in staff training and supporting our staff and what those scores mean and what instruction needs to look like in the classroom. But then also a lot of conversations with kids about what that growth can mean for them as well, and the goal that we hope that as they move through our multilingual learner ELD pathway courses, that they do phase out of needing those classes and exhibit that growth as well upon graduation. Discipline and positivity trends. So this just kind of gives you an idea of referral data. So just really looking at where we were last year and then where we're down now about 40% in student referrals, just supporting the community, and then even looking at suspensions and the 63% reduction in out-of-school suspensions,

right? So really leveraging our PBIS system, our restorative circles and restorative justice system, and more of a repairable discipline system. So yes, there are still consequences, but how do we also use behavior solutions to actually improve your behavior and address versus just the consequence of the action. Access and opportunities, college fair, it's actually now 36 schools as of today that are committed to come to our onsite college fair. So that'll be happening on May 13th. Really focused on avid exposure and our avid field trips and collaboration between both the elementary, middle and high school. So we continue to support that program and did some fun activities for national decision day.

And then also on May 13th, high school national decision day so that's when students will come up on stage we'll play their fight songs they'll get their t-shirts they'll sign their commitment everybody's cheering underclassmen can come and the college fair is going on as well so it's really just a lot of that idea of post-secondary community but we also have trade programs the military there as well so lots of options for students to explore we just hosted our job fair on site which was a really great opportunity we had 16 vendors there students had the opportunity to interview and actually talk with employers, sign up for interviews. Some of them were interviewed on site and then we also had trade

programs and the service industries there as well so that was a really great opportunity. We did that, we always say there's something going on at the school, we did that at the same time as our rising ninth graders came over and we were doing tours and they were doing a club fair and we had a student panel so there was a lot of activity but some of the feedback from at least our middle cool you can like go out like during your advisor and get a job like you know that can happen right here at the school but a lot of our underclassmen really enjoyed having that opportunity to talk as well um to employers here in the city so i think that's a great partnership that has an opportunity to grow and something we can bring to them right because you know sometimes it's hard for them

or even like some of them we prepped them um with just some social skills of how do you go up and approach you know what kind of work would i be doing at this job if i sign up you know those conversations they can have and then we added this year our senior experience and so our senior experience was actually a born out of two students who looked at some of the local other FCPS schools that have this senior experience and opportunity where they can leave for two weeks and actually go out and do an internship or work on site or have employment and actually create this project versus finals where they can actually culminate a lot of the portrait of a graduate skills and all those opportunities and have that on the job

experience. So we have students that are going to nonprofits, local businesses, public law agencies, working with the government and even working in our local schools and several businesses as well. So we have students going, we have a student going to Korea and we have one actually going to California to do this project as well. So they're really taking advantage of that two-week experience. So I think this is just a great opportunity to pair, to really connect community again. One of the beautiful things of the city, right, is and the sense of community, so really growing this to have that opportunity for our students to get out there and people to see them in action and what they've learned and their skills as well.

And then I think the seniors were excited because this was a pretty quick turnaround, but we were able to get, I think 40 of them are going out this year and we only hope to grow it. Professional development opportunities, thanks to the city, we're actually able to still provide professional development opportunities to our staff, which has been extremely helpful. to send our academy teacher to the Broadway Academy Theater on Broadway in New York every year to kind of fine-tune their training. There is no training around here for someone of that caliber of craft or talent, right? So we're able to give them that experience for them to bring back that energy and that talent to the students that we have where they actually have 150 kids so

they're benefiting from that. We did AP seminar training. We were able to actually twofold send two teachers to AP seminar training to expand the but then also able to send to other teachers to present on like the success of AP research and grading and some of the things they had been doing. So they actually presented at the College Board Conference and we were able to do that both actually as they represented Fairfax High School. We continue to provide AVID training for our staff. So really offering them that opportunity and the AVID skills. So even if it's not in the class, how do we bring some of those great executive functioning skills and study skills to the classroom to advisory so that other students can begin.

And then our guiding coalition, they focus on a book study, so we really talked a lot about PLC opportunities with a focus on universal design. And then we also had several standards-based rolling grade book consultations with an outside consultant to really talk about the full adoption of the SCPS rolling grade book, but how do we do it in an informative way, in the right way that it's skills, evidence, or standards parents are informed and students better understand what they know, what they are good at, and what their strengths and weaknesses are in those spaces. It's electric 100 registrants in the program. 80 wait listed right now. Yes. So that just kind of goes to show the need for programs

access and opportunity. This was also something that the kids had kind of come forward and asked and advocated for, was like where can there be another trade opportunity where we could leave work and actually go into the field or into journeyman or programming and you know make great money but maybe college isn't what exactly what I'm thinking of right now and so we worked with on the CTE office and with the city once again we were able to secure the funding to to get the lab and so they're working on that now and we will start next year with actually elective one two and three students yeah so that is very exciting. AVID enrollment continues to increase so we on the city also supports us with that AVID support and so really looking at how do we offer that access

and opportunity and really college exposure to some that maybe don't see themselves in that space. We were also able to offer college field trips and even this year we did it a little differently and actually brought like some externships back on site as well to spend a lot of time talking about the and the post-secondary experience, we're able to provide staff training and then of course the college fair but then also there is no cost affiliated with it but also just able to promote a college-going culture so whether they're painting pumpkins or they're doing events we're able to kind of supplement and get them excited about that t-shirts you know with college research they're able to really have some opportunities to lean into those experiences to

promote that college experience. Peer mentoring, Lions on the Rise and our Freshman Academy. So Lions on the Rise is another great opportunity that the city helps support us with and also they help support us with peer mentoring as well. So I'll talk about peer mentoring first. 100 junior and senior mentors are trained by an agency called Core Trainings. They actually come in, they do a phenomenal job. They train our juniors and seniors on how to mentor our freshmen. Then the mentors push into freshmen classes and deliver lessons on social emotional topics and school transition. So really I know somebody older in the school. I have somebody I'm connected to now, somebody that I could ask questions to. Through reflection we realized that the

kids actually, the upperclassmen and the underclassmen were asking for more time or authentic ways to connect with the mentors. So next year, the mentors will just be a full-time part of the freshman advisory. So during that first line time A session, when they're doing the lessons or the activities, the upperclassmen will be in the space as well to offer their insight to engage in recess, develop relationships with them so that there is a more organic relationship than maybe I just come in every six weeks and I don't know you that well, right? So they're actually gonna be a part of that community. We're really excited about that. And then we have Freshman Freeway, which is part of our freshman academy where we kind

of relocated the majority of our freshman classes down the center of the building. I will say, like, location is everything. It has our freshmen are killing it. They have the best attendance. They have the least tardies. And the referral data is the lowest it's been in four years for freshmen, which sometimes can be challenging for them with transition. And I think part of that is because the teachers are on teams and they're working together, that maybe are struggling so that we're able to have earlier intervention or conversations and then so we we love that and then we have our Lions on the Rise which last year was the highest attendees that we had for that and that was 250 Lions that came so we're already promoting that again now with our eighth

graders to go ahead and sign up it's a great experience a great opportunity for them to connect with the students to get to know the teachers it's lighthearted than fun and even when we surveyed kids after students that came to this said they were not as anxiety ridden or as stressed about starting school they actually felt a lot more comfortable with what they were doing and a little more prepared in navigating um you know and also they felt i think a little bit like they had a leg up um you know against their peers because they already had their laptops they already knew some people they knew some teachers you know they they had that comfort level that we want them to have as they're coming in.

We are a Lighthouse school. So we are in the second cohort of Lighthouse and we are working closely with our teachers on the role of AI in school and talking about, one, teaching teachers more about how they can use AI to enhance their own practices and finding patterns of where class may need the most assistance. and then thinking about how AI could help students in the future, whether it's a student with an IEP, looking at Lexile data or reading levels, looking at WIDA supports that artificial intelligence could provide them. And then we are also, as an administrative team, and even with our technology team, evaluating and implementing better practices for ourselves. So I think AI has helped us develop three apps for grade tracking, for attendance, and for other things

great entry points into really helping to manage data and be more responsive and look at trends and be on top of them quickly, right, with suggestions. So working with our community to better understand the role that we'll play. Our World Language Camp, we love this and the city helps us sponsor that. It just provides that exposure to a variety of languages. And we know that language exposure can lead to an advanced diploma as well. So really encouraging kids to stick with the language be consistent with that in the space and opportunity that it can provide for them as a learner and then also just really creates like authentic cultural experiences amongst the community and also deepens their language and learning

skills and we come back to that core of language being reading writing speaking and listening which are core authentic skills that you're going to use in any classroom and our language teachers really do a great job of building that the inclusion revolution so as we continue to embrace inclusion inclusive really want to look at spaces and places where we can meet their needs in a more inclusive environment and be responsive to what they're learning and still meet the goals of their intended IEPs. So we, if you look here, the goal is for, as we move to full adoption of the revolution is for 80% of students to really move to a space where they are in fully inclusive classes. in last year we were at 52 percent right now we are at 61 percent we forecast that by next year

we'll be at 69 percent so really making intentional moves to team taught experiences that we are offering special supports that we can have available for students to make sure that once again as we push you feel supported and it doesn't feel overwhelming but you're still getting what you need and we're meeting your goals. Learning Lounge and Saturday School, we have our Saturday School academic sessions that provide one-on-one student teacher support. Students actually will use our Saturday School as well for attendance opportunities. We know that life happens and sometimes students do have to miss school or their events or instances so that three-hour opportunity will actually help with IP fit and buying hours back to help support students who

may be chronically absent but the bigger part of that is they're getting the that they missed in the classes as well. We currently average about 20 students every Saturday, and then as we come in, I'd say those last three Saturdays at the end of the quarter, it almost quadruples to between 80 and 100 students that we will average there. So we know to beef up support so that we have people that can support every student. And then in the Learning Lounge, we average between 45 and 100 students who need strategic supports on Wednesdays and Thursdays after school. And that's just those that are attending the Learning Lounge, that's just not all the kids that are staying after school to meet well those are these are just the students that are going to the learning

lounge and getting support there from someone in literacy or numeracy or science and then super successful was our SAT prep program we offered three sessions in three week cycles they were three hour sessions and we had 80 students each that attended so we were able to give 240 students free SAT prep that was another student requested then that they actually brought to me and said why can't we have SAT prep it's really a barrier Kaplan courses cost a many of us cannot afford the opportunity so we had teachers that had experience in it and we leaned into it and we were able to offer that opportunity with the support of you guys as well to the students and they have really benefited from that our on-time graduation systems of support so really focused on making

sure that every student that comes in in ninth grade can graduate on time in four years so we have specific Wednesday Thursday after school academic support on time or on cohort for their graduation we also have separate sessions in Saturday school for those students we leverage credit recovery opportunities for those students and every teacher work day we have our building filled with students that may need to take an Edmentum course or get additional tutoring support so we invite the students back in and have a team of teachers that are working with them to make sure they can recover that support we have structured line time advisories that have strategic teachers in there that can help support students. SOL

remediation, attendance and MTSS support and just a lot of frequency and there's a dedicated staff person to communicate with families around this so constantly giving updates to the families in the community and constantly meeting the children as well to just make sure we're communicating their progress to also make sure they are benchmarking and goal-setting to make sure that they are they are achieving and getting across that stage as well goal. We have a behavior solutions innovator. So we have a motivation behavior academy that over 500 students have attended at Fairfax High School and you could find yourself in a motivation academy because you may be tardy or you may not be engaged in class or failing to participate so there are certain lists

of behaviors that the teacher may refer or flag you to and so then we have a line time lunch bunch and these students actually work with our behavior innovator to work on skills, to set goals, to look at their calendar, to really talk about some behavioral changes that they can make to be on time. Now they really, really enjoy these sessions and talking about how to improve their behavior. I think because there's an intentionality that just talks about not so much like, oh, well, there's been a challenge, so you found yourself in this place, but it really talks about let's not talk so much about the challenge. let's talk about how we can move forward and get you to a better place, right? And that's the intention of that.

So we do have a lot of success with students coming to that. And we also have a technology behavior academy. So we have students that have been referred to us that maybe are misusing phones or have multiple phone violations, are misusing their laptops, or have found themselves using AI to supplement their own critical thinking skills. So we will refer them to the technology academy and it follows the same model where we actually talk tech and and how they can do better. And so as we also continue talking about just school-wide behavior solutions, we have our restorative justice model that we are using where we have 40 staff members that are currently trained in restorative justice and the ability to do circles.

And then really focus on how we use those circles to actually repair and rebuild culture. So creating community spaces to talk about maybe challenges in a certain classroom, challenges in environment, peers, challenges teacher to student, we actually use that model to really help repair and restore the relationships so that everybody can reenter and feel good and feel welcome when they do reenter after something maybe unpleasant has happened. And then continue to support our PBIS initiatives, so really looking at positive behaviors, and to date we've given out 1,123 positive recognitions for student behavior based on teacher referrals. So really continuing to lean the whole class referrals or individual referrals really continuing to celebrate promoting empathy

being accountable for actions working hard and self-advocating for ourselves that's all i got

Carolyn Pitcheswell wow there's a lot of positive progress going on at fairfax high school um i'll start with miss bartolmay well

Lauren Bartelmethank you i just wanted to say i learned a lot of new stuff even from last year's presentations, a lot of good new information. I was curious about the AP government for 10th graders and kind of what that means for the history trajectory for students.

Georgina AstaffSo I think it just changes it a little bit. I think you may have a student that's doing AP hug, and then they do AP government, and then they do AP US, and then they do AP world. It's not been approved yet, but I mean, on the governor's desk now is also AP African American will now count as one of the histories, right? So then that's another pathway. students are really going to begin to have multiple options to meet that history requirement. So it really depends on what I think students are interested in. I think it also for me, having, you know, really as you begin to analyze like College Board and do that work, also I think if you look at stamina, like AP Hug, AP Government, AP US and AP World make sense to me only because we know students are taking other AP classes

as well we think about the literacy intensiveness of both AP US and AP world history so I think some of them as you as you're building the stamina and the study skills in those classes can make make logical sense and then when you throw when you put an AP African American as a choice as well I mean that's a great class but also very project-based learning and problem-solving on like historical implications right so it's a whole different type of class that students would be taking to earn that so I think that well I think we'll see right but there's a lot of schools now in 10th grade and then even in Maryland it's a 10th grade class AP government so thank

Lauren Bartelmeyou

Sarah Kelseymiss Kelsey

Carolyn PitchesI

Sarah Kelseyknow it's a good problem to have as there are so many options for the kids you know at the high school and I applaud you for going forward with trying to find more and more things to offer our students becoming a first year high school parent next year though my mind is like blown so I understand a lot of it but but no so yeah I it's a great problem to have obviously for these kids that there's so many things they want to choose one of my questions though is for the senior experience and I may have miss how are they how do they apply for this how do they sign up is it they go find where they're interested do you guys have those like

Georgina Astaffyeah so it was it was two it was twofold this year and it happened so quickly a lot of them had already come with an idea or someone that they were already working and in partnership with we had you know one young man who'd been working the past three years at the housing development so he was like I'm definitely want to spend two weeks at the housing development and I just need to talk to do it another young lady who's been working she's been doing the work here in the states with an orphanage in korea right and then they were like you can come over here if you can get the time right so she she reached out got the approval showed us the you know showed us the letter and she's like okay like they've approved me to come over here and do the work like in this orphanage

but we've also had conversations with you know rotary i think even with you know fairfax city business association that moving forward will have options and an option menu as well for students to be able to say, hey, what are you interested in? Let's go out and find someone that we can directly match you to so that you do have this authentic experience. And that did happen for two kids, right? We were able to kind of quickly reach out and get some businesses that were like, yes, we want some kids. So one is doing something very similar, like some urban planning with someone, and then the other one is doing marketing, but they're doing it at a real estate agency, right, and taking over their social media marketing for two weeks, right, and kind of putting a new age on that, right?

and you probably know more about this than we do, so that would be a great take. So trying to match them. But the idea would be that we'll have a full database for the kids to be able to choose from if they don't already have an experience.

Sarah KelseyAwesome. I love that, especially right before they go to college and start paying for this degree that they think they want to do and then have never experienced, and sometimes people don't realize that. I will say the World Language Camp, I do love. has done it for two years and I will say it has come in handy because when her brother was trying to pick his world language this year for next year it was one of those oh I know this teacher and she's really you know and so it was really great I don't know if there's other classes that we could do something like that but not to put more on your plate or anything because you don't have enough but that it would just be interesting to see if there's

something like that I know world languages obviously is easier to kind of if there was something else like that. would be kind of fun to do

Georgina Astaffwith the youngers. Yeah, and we're trying to lean into that next year to do a sampling. Our theater program has a lot of success with their teacher workday theater, you know, their theater camps that they do. So we're trying to see if we can do a CTE one. That would give kids exposure to maybe four to six CTE pathways in the same day if performing arts is not your thing. But maybe you want to go and make fresh bagels in the facts class auto shop and change a tire right there's like some things some experiences we could give you as well that are CTE programs so we are really kind of exploring that for next year oh

Sarah Kelseythat'd be awesome I was gonna say because those experiences make the biggest impact I think on the kids so

Carolyn Pitchesthank you so

Amit HickmanI am really into this electrical CTE here so you said that there's going to be a level two and level three how are students qualifying for those if this is the first time it's being

Georgina AstaffThere is only one electrical program in the county, and that is at Edison. They have an extensive wait list of students that sometimes can't even get into the upper level two and three. This will actually be an opportunity to bring them to Fairfax and let them actually finish the program. We have secured seats for our students in the program, and then there will also be academy students as well there in the program.

Amit HickmanAnd what kind of teacher, I don't know if you've hired someone yet, or who do

Georgina Astaffyou hire?

Amit HickmanWhat are you looking for for this teacher?

Georgina AstaffWell, they are, of course, like a certified electrician, right, that has that experience. Often your IDOL candidates sometimes you find is somebody who has a strong sustainable business that they're ready to kind of step away from, or someone that has kind of retired, or someone that has had a lot of success coming out of the program recently and really enjoyed the teaching aspect of it as well. We're exploring all avenues right now as we look for a teacher that is excited to teach all the 15-year-olds about the future career path and what all it entails. Okay. Very

Amit Hickmannice. I think from what I took away from that student panel, I guess only a couple weeks ago, from my timeline at this point, was really the conversation about AI and being able to use AI in a healthy manner in a way that benefits them. I love seeing what you are already doing and I look forward to kind of seeing how that continues to progress to be used in different areas. Because clearly the students are finding it important and they want to learn to use it correctly.

Georgina AstaffYes. And so next year, which is I'm excited about, our librarians are actually taking it over and we're calling it artificial intelligence literacy, like very similar to digital literacy, right? And so they're actually going to do a series of sessions with all of the students as they all come up through the library. does where does this fit in our world and not to replace your thoughts but it could be your assistant or maybe your partner in thinking but it isn't you and your thinking and your thoughts right so

Carolyn Pitchesnecessary thank

Kristina Cecereyou as always just really amazing things happening at Fairfax High School and really just you know that's that's truly your you and your team's leadership so just truly and inclusion revolution like I love that so much especially when you talk about your two-week kids right or often feeling kind of out of place where things are so that just sounds so cool though in even to miss Hickman's point to with I'm glad to hear about AI and the librarians taking that on that was actually a conversation at our PSLN meeting on Friday with superintendents of school board so that was really cool to hear that coming into Fairfax next year it's and timely moment. I do have questions around dual enrollment in APs because

that you know it's a phenomenal see how many students are increasing in these courses and the opportunity and just opening opening those opportunities and reducing barriers as

Lauren Bartelmemuch as

Kristina Cecerepossible right. Curious like what what how long does it take staff to get ready to teach at the dual enrollment because I know there's more barriers than AP with that

Georgina Astaffso staff for dual enrollment is really Nova sets the criteria for for staff members so it is different for every subject but if they don't have a certain amount of credits or post history and that say it's AP US history then they are not able to teach it and they either have to take classes and we will support them in doing that right to become certified to be able to offer those options but they have a pretty pretty stringent vetting policy to make sure that they have the same requirements you would have to have to be a professor at NOVA.

Kristina CecereAnd that's something that Fairfax County provides support for funding and such. Wonderful. Okay. And then thinking about, like, that shift in sequence, AP government. Like, I'm old school. I remember it just always being the 12th grade class that kids take and the field trip to the Capitol Hill and stuff like that. What determines that shift from moving a course, say, like AP seminar, which was traditionally 11th grade to 10th grade, or government from 12th to 10th? and even thinking about you know what traditionally is a student's schedule because now we're looking at 10th graders taking AP gov AP seminar science fair you know that traditional not not that only traditional kids but now you're opening the door for so many other students who may not be used to

such academic rigor so what what kind of goes into that conversation so

Georgina Astaffthis that would the reason that with it you were piloting it is to kind of see how students do with it so it's you know we emailed out all of the rising 10th graders and said here is an opportunity for you let's see who has interest and let's pilot it and there'll be a group of kids that are sectioned together right so kind of more us doing some some case study kind of with both the teacher and student reflection to see how they feel about the experience and how they feel about the class and then maybe seeing if as we continue to offer more opportunities to complete the pathway, sequencing may just look different in general, right? And I think we were talking about, like, can we be open to that, right?

And is that okay, right, if a student is going to take some of those different paths? AP, we've had a lot of students that have struggled in AP world and AP US as well, right? And so a lot of our 10th graders were taking the AP world and kind of shared feedback that this is a pretty intense course. It's challenging, right? It's very literacy-rich. It's a challenging class. opportunity or option is a nice segue into as you continue to to ramp up and build your literacy skills and we continue to work with you we also if you are taking AP seminar are going to work a lot on that research and that presentation component right that also might lend itself a little better to those two classes as they matriculate so those were a lot of the conversations

we were having is just kind of looking at the skills that are required and seeing if maybe this is I don't want to say easier but maybe more logical right and you as you're growing as a student as well

Speaker 16what

Kristina Cecerewhat schools the county

Speaker 16all

Kristina Cecerethe IB schools that typically governments and the whole state of

Georgina AstaffMaryland

Kristina Cecereokay and then and then I know that the county I'm assuming countywide when it comes to those AP and dorm opportunities those are typically auto enrolled right for for students or no not always okay sorry I was hearing from some families talking about like how their kids were auto enrolled so I will hold back on that question there I do have one last one

Carolyn Pitchesokay my

Kristina Cecerelast one I promise so I love hearing all about Abbott too and we have such an amazing opportunity of added in the city from elementary to middle to high school I think I don't think there's really many schools in the county that offer that opportunity and that's part to the city funding right are there opportunities at the high school to see there's a bit skills in places that may not be like able to take that traditional course for Avid. Is there opportunities in line time or after school or anything like that?

Georgina AstaffYes, so there are line time lessons that will highlight some of those skills. But what we've really tried to do is work with our content teams to come up with more commonality in their own contents of using a common annotation system. So we're not annotating six different ways. So looking at some of the different ways that Avid shows that you can annotate and know that it's a proven best practice and saying how can we make this more universal like in the classroom So this is the anchor chart and this is how we annotate same thing with notes Like if we're going to use focus notes, let's all look at the focus notes template and let's practice using some of those skills It was probably the most prevalent in the freshman academy because they adopted a lot of skills in general

You know, we had the color-coded paper the students all have binders We did you just a lot of organizational systems in general We don't have 580 kids in AVID right, but we did AVID-ize them a little bit right to just say hey know that organization can be really challenging for you you know as you are transitioning so we continue to look for those those spaces and entry points to take them larger school wide

Kristina Cecerethank you so much for all that amazing work too sorry yeah

Dr. Wrightstaffno and I would just chime in to add on to what dr. A is saying that at all four of our schools they do a nice job of dr. A used the word of AVID-izing things, right, of incorporating some of the key tenets of the AVID program throughout all curriculum areas and throughout the school experience. You know, the AVID has a set of strategies. They're called the Wicker Strategies, which is writing, inquiry, collaboration, organization, and reading. That can happen in any subject, right? Cornell notes and a lot of these things can happen in any subject. So just having that school-wide approach to these are the type of skills our students need to be successful in any subject is really on display in our schools.

Carolyn PitchesMr. Murray do you have any questions? So before I throw it to Dr. Wright I just want to on behalf of our board and the city of Fairfax school community I just want to thank you for reimagining the student experience at Fairfax High School and just providing our students with supports and unique learning experiences it's I have been here a while and I this Fairfax High School has come a long way in your tenure so we

Lauren Bartelmegreatly

Dr. Wrightstaffappreciate your work

Carolyn Pitchesdr. Wright

Dr. Wrightstaffthank you chair pitches and a great job to dr. a and thank you miss Anderson for being here as well just a wonderful presentation that talks about a lot of things that are happening at Fairfax that were incredibly proud of I would chime in on one point that both Ms. Essary and Ms. Hickman brought up, the idea of find, when we think about we want to prepare our students for what they're going to encounter in the world outside of our schools. We need electrical classes, we need dual enrollment classes, and so finding the right people for that is extremely challenging. So Dr. A and her team do a great job, but we still need to advocate as school boards like this one are in Fairfax County. Most dual

enrollment teachers need 18 credits of master's level coursework to be able to teach a class and a lot of that's yeah specifically in that content area and so we might have an amazing history teacher that's completely the right fit to deliver a dual enrollment class in our school to our students but if they don't have that master's coursework it prevents them from doing that and a lot of that's related to college accreditation processes but same thing happens with trying to licensure issues to try and find someone who has the right prerequisites, the right core classes, even if they're the exact type of person that we're looking to interact with our students. So we want to continue to advocate for that to make

sure that we can have all these offerings at our school. But I just a few closing comments. I think what you heard tonight is a really great example of what we're trying to do in the city of Fairfax students for all of our students, but it's also a really great example of the strong partnership that we have public schools and the resources that allows all of our students to have access to so big thank you to miss Bayonig and mr. Stokes for the region 5 team for supporting that work along with dr. a and her team I'd like to shout out for this board and the public that that SPSF the school performance and support framework which is the state's accountability new system not only shout out the achievement that we saw at Fairfax High School to reach that

distinguished level but the amount of growth we saw in a relatively short amount of time is very impressive and I think that goes to the next point of I never heard during this presentation Dr. A say our physics department is working on this our English department is working on this what you're seeing is tireless efforts across the school so that idea of collaboration and what's departments across the school I think is really impressive. The last two things I would just say is that you heard also great evidence tonight that at Fairfax High School and I think across all of our schools were relentlessly focused on preparing our students for what they're gonna encounter and trying to give them the opportunities that they they need to go out and be successful and then the

last thing I would just say is I you know it's my you know I think we see this all four of our schools. I think we see it in our schools across our partnership with Fairfax County. I think you see it in schools everywhere we go where the educators, the staff members believe in what our students can do. But I don't know that I go into a building where I see it happening more than at Fairfax High School where they believe in every single student can be successful. And I think you heard a lot of that coming through tonight in the presentation. So just a big thank you to Dr. A and her team and for all the hard work. And we're looking forward to a strong finish of the school year.

Georgina AstaffYeah, and then I would just like to end with a thank you, too. Like, I think thank you to our staff that works tirelessly and believes in the glitter, the sparkle, and the shine inside of every child. Whether they don't wear it on the outside like I do, I think they truly have – they truly believe that the students can do this They're working hard to make sure that we have access and opportunity for all. And they're in the classrooms doing that work every day. So I am blessed and fortunate to be surrounded by colleagues like that that are committed to the excellence for our students. I thank the school board. Your support allows us to offer additional opportunities for students, and you allow

that innovation and imagination to take place, right? And I think my support system here with my supervisors as well also kind of also helping support some of the out-of-the-box thinking because we're not meant to stand inside of it, you know, as I tell kids. And also just our families as well for also kind of believing. And even when there's that hesitancy to say, no, we've got your kids, they can do this, right? And we're going to figure out a way and we're going to support them because it's really about community, right? community commitment and support, then you aren't able to do like what we are doing at Fairfax High School. And we are distinguished and we are amazing and we should own that.

I mean, we should every day, right? And the kids should feel it and our family should feel it and everyone should be proud of it because it is a joyful place to be.

Carolyn PitchesWell, thank you for spending your evening with us. you're going to be our last you guys may go now too and we will finish up alone okay we have no public hearings this evening so we'll move on to action items and the first action item is the approval of the April 6th 2026 meeting minutes may I have a motion please Madam

Amit HickmanChair that the city of fairfax school board approved the minutes of the april 6 2026 school board regular meeting as printed and distributed

Carolyn Pitchesmay have a second second miss hickman moved and miss sessori seconded city of fairfax school board approved the minutes from the april 6 2026 regular school board meeting as printed and distributed are there any changes modifications or discussion okay being none all those in favor signify by saying aye aye aye none opposed the motion passes unanimously next item is the approval of the april 13 2026 um special meeting minutes uh clerk has provided these minutes may will somebody give me a motion please yes miss sessori i

Kristina Ceceremove that the city of fairfax school board approve the minutes of the april 13 2026 school board special meeting as printed and distributed okay may have a second second

Carolyn Pitchesthe sess removed miss bartle may seconded City of Fairfax School Board approved the minutes of our special meeting on April 13, 2026 as printed and distributed.

Kristina CecereAny changes or modifications or discussion?

Carolyn PitchesOkay. Being none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Aye. And then opposed,

Lauren Bartelmethe motion

Kristina Cecerepasses

Carolyn Pitchesunanimously. Okay. I'll hand it back over to Dr. Wright for superintendent matters.

Dr. WrightstaffThank you. Thank you, Chair Pitches. I would like to share a few brief updates and reflections. as we bring our evening to a close. First, we want to provide an update on where we are in the budget process in the City of Fairfax. Tomorrow evening, the City Council will have a special budget adoption meeting, so we'll have some final updates on that tomorrow evening. I would say on the state level, it's also important to note for this board and the public that the state has not yet adopted a budget, and there are significant impacts on schools and localities. so we're hoping that there'll be some decisions made in Richmond soon that will help give us direction on where we can go a brief update on some of our

capital projects here in the city of Fairfax school system following direction provided by this board at their April 20th work session our architecture and design teams have moved into the next phase of our projects that Daniels run and Providence Elementary School this phase is known as schematic design and will continue throughout the summer we're really excited to be moving The superintendent's advisory team, which is a really powerful group made of community members, staff members, and most importantly, students, will convene again on May 12th. We're following up a session that we had in March where we asked three really important questions. What makes our schools strong? Where do you see opportunities for growth?

And what hopes do you have for the future of our schools? And then we asked them to brainstorm ideas about strong, inclusive, ongoing community engagement in the city of Fairfax. We'll really kind of narrow down those ideas and try and get into the nuts and bolts of how that could occur at our next convening and then some of our students will come to our June 1st school board meeting to present a recommendation around that. A big focus of what I've been trying to do in these first five or six months on the job is maintain visibility, connection, and momentum in our schools and a big way of doing that is being in our schools, being in our buildings, participating in events, and it has been a busy time of year.

One of the best parts about the spring is there's a lot going on, so it's been exciting and a whirlwind of amazing student performances and staff interactions and connecting with our community. At Providence, we had a great renovation design community meeting and staff meetings about the upcoming work at the school. and then on Friday there was an AVID principal collaborative for the Mid Atlantic and southern states areas and I'll talk about that at the end. Daniel's Run we also had that renovation design community meeting and we'll have a staff meeting this week. There were three music concerts in the last week the strings the band and the chorus all performed on individual nights and did a great job

and then no one told me before I became a superintendent but you get to go to lots of things with delicious food so I was at the PTA ice cream scoop night at and it was a really great event that was paired with their book fair. Catherine Johnson Middle School has hosted some really great events in the last month. They hosted, for all of the city of Fairfax and Fairfax County, they hosted the Battle of the Books competition, and then they also hosted the Civics Bee, and a big thank you goes to Jennifer Rose from the Central Fairfax Chamber of Commerce for sponsoring that. And then I hope that all of you are able to see the wonderful performance of Moana Jr., the musical at Katherine Johnson. It was excellent. I told the cast and crew thank you at the end,

and then they said, you're welcome, which is a Moana joke. Anybody? Okay. All right. All right. And then at Fairfax High School, I was able to see a girls varsity tennis match, a boys lacrosse game, and then the Fairfax High School Players musical is ongoing at this point. They're putting on an amazing performance of something rotten and their shows this weekend and I would encourage all of you to go you heard a little bit about our auto program from dr. a they had an auto show in April of a car show that was at right on route 50 and 123 and a big thank you to McKay Chevrolet for donating the space and it was amazing to see what was going on it was all student run which was was which was really powerful and then several members of this board and myself were

able to participate in the auto programs advisory council and dinner and then a few division-wide or events and activities that applied to all of our schools earlier last week I was able to attend the state superintendent's conference in Roanoke there were two really great convenings at the higher ed level I'm a member of a UVA's k-12 advisory council and then GMU has an Alliance that brings together superintendents and professors and staff members and they have a similar focus of what you've heard on this evening on AI and specifically what teacher preparation looks like so how can we prepare our teachers to be successful in this new environment last week was the FCPS retirement ceremony and Stacy Green from Providence Elementary School

and Sonia Calderon-Turon from KJ were recognized so a big congratulations to them and then a few other events around our city the Fairfax Pyramid Art Show the Arbor Day event where you heard our amazing poets they also did that those recitations on a Saturday morning on Arbor Day with the tree planting and then another shout out for Jennifer Rose she does a civics civic connections group which is kind of like a class you take and learn all about all the different things in the city and miss Dorsey and I were able to present at that event and meet lots of really excited and interested constituents here in the city of Fairfax. The last thing I would say is about that AVID principal collaboration. It took place on

Friday at Providence Elementary School and it was sponsored by the National AVID Organization and it was a convening for the mid-Atlantic and southern states and group and they put principals, they put administrators, they put central office workers in a room together to talk about what AVID looks like at all of their schools and then also to show off what's happening at Providence and included classroom tours that were all student-led and included panels and lots of great discussion about how AVID can impact our schools. Providence did an outstanding job of serving as the host for this site and it was a great opportunity to showcase the strength of what's happening in our schools. As you heard from Dr. A, our AVID programs are possible because of the city's

continued investment in this across and it happens in all four of our buildings and in in the city of Fairfax Fairfax County region there are four elementary schools that have AVID two of them are in the city of Fairfax where we have them at both Providence and Daniels run and I think the power of AVID when we talk a lot about we want to give our students durable skills we want to set them up to be successful in the future AVID is a lot of the how right that's how how we give those students those skills the content is always going to be important but it's going to give them those thinking skills and it's just it's just really impressive to see the engagement collaboration and shared commitment

across our schools I will take mr. Murray's lead and also wish a happy teacher and staff appreciation week to all of our amazing educators across the city of Fairfax schools and with that chair pitches this concludes the superintendent matters report

Carolyn Pitchesthank you we will move on to board matters and I with this part on my

Lauren BartelmeI just want to echo happy teacher appreciation week I think that the teachers are really the backbone of our system and I just wanted to say thank you for everything you do and I also wanted to wish our students good luck on all of their EP exams and final exams and SOL exams as we wrap up the school year

Carolyn Pitchesthank you miss Kelsey

Sarah KelseyI would like to say I actually unfortunately couldn't attend the Arbor Day event because I was at the Fairfax Little League day and I want to actually thank the Fairfax High School JV and varsity players because they were there in their uniforms on a Saturday morning creating like a tunnel for these little leaguers to walk through they were giving them so much energy and they even stuck around to watch some of the games so thank you guys for that because that meant a lot to those kids just you showing up and showing that where their future was going in baseball some of them I also would like to thank our teachers just let you know that your impact does reach far beyond the classroom what you are doing every day

and it's deeply appreciated so happy teacher appreciation week to all of you and also ditto on the assessments because I know there's a lot coming up

Amit Hickmanagain just really grateful and thankful to all of our teachers and all of our schools and then everywhere in all of our lives who put in so much time and effort into every day of everything that they do and we could see that tonight with the students who came from Catherine Johnson to present and the things that Dr. Ray was presenting to us, how much none of that takes place without the teachers. And so thank you. I'm very grateful to all of you and for all the hard work you do.

Kristina CecereMs. Sessori. Just want to iterate how excited I am to see something rotten this weekend. I didn't realize that very few schools actually do two weekends of shows. So very special that we have that at Fairfax High School. Also, good luck to students. to see the finish line with exams, whether it's AP or SOLs and all that good stuff. And, of course, I want to iterate what other people said, that happy teacher appreciation to all those out there. I know there's many businesses offering free sandwiches and drinks and whatnot, and, you know, we are currently in budget season both in the city and the county, so I hope that we consider that with teacher appreciation. deserve way more than than what is currently scheduled so um that's it that's all i got

thank you miss sessori um mr okay um

Carolyn Pitchesi will just end by i'm gonna just what everybody said was

Speaker 8wonderful and i

Carolyn Pitchesecho all of that and thank you again to dr a and miss anderson for coming this evening and presenting all the wonderful things that are happening at fairfax high school and to and Gordon for their support as well so if there is nothing before else before the board I will adjourn this meeting at 838 Thank you.