Regular School Board Meeting

Carolyn Pitchesgood evening ladies and gentlemen today is monday december 1st of 2025 and this is the regular meeting of the city of fairfax school board please stand for the pledge of allegiance

Speaker 3I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and 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 the agenda this evening and there are no announcements, so we will move to the adoption of our agenda. May I have a motion, please?

Sarah KelseyMadam Chair. Ms. Kelsey. City of Fairfax adopt the agenda as written and distributed.

Carolyn PitchesThank you. May I have a second? Second. Thank you, Ms. Bartlemay. Okay. Ms. Kelsey has moved and Ms. Bartlemay has seconded. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. No members are opposed. The adoption passes unanimously. Okay. And this is what everybody is here for. We are going to now move to the oath for our new superintendent, Dr. Dustin Wright. And so I'd like to invite Dr. Wright and Mr. Chris Falcon, the clerk of the Fairfax County Circuit Court down front.

Speaker 5Sir, can you please raise your right hand and repeat after me. I, Dustin Patrick Wright, do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the that I will support the Constitution

Dustin Wrightstaffof the United States of America, and the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Virginia, and the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Virginia,

Speaker 5and that I will faithfully and impartially,

Dustin Wrightstaffand I will faithfully and impartially,

Speaker 5discharge all the duties, discharge all the duties, incumbent upon me, incumbent upon me, as superintendent for the city of Fairfax School Board, as superintendent for the city of Fairfax School Board, according to the best of my abilities, so Congratulations, sir.

Carolyn PitchesThank you. Dr. Wright, would you like to say a few words? You can do here, you can do there, wherever you're most comfortable.

Dustin WrightstaffWe'll try this. Before I start, I want to let you know that I was promised during the interview process that at every board meeting there would be a reception beforehand, and there would be a crowd just like this. So on the first Monday of every month, I look forward to seeing all of you. But it's great to be here this evening. I want to say good evening to the members of the school board. our educators and staff, our city and county leaders, the families and community members who support our four amazing schools, and most importantly, to the students of the City of Fairfax schools. It's a privilege to be with you. My name is Dustin Wright, and I'm deeply honored to be the next superintendent here in the City of Fairfax.

I have a few remarks to share with all of you, but before I begin, I want to share a few words of gratitude. First, to the City of Fairfax School Board, Thank you for your trust, your confidence, and for giving me the opportunity to serve in this incredible community. I'm deeply honored to partner with you in leading the city of Fairfax schools and advancing the vision and priorities you

Speaker 5have set for our students and families. Are we

Dustin Wrightstaffgood here? I also want to extend my sincere appreciation to Dr. Phyllis Pajardo for her leadership in guiding this search process. her steady

Speaker 5hand thoughtful facilitation

Dustin Wrightstaffand deep understanding of this division ensured a process rooted in reflection engagement and care to our city school staff dan phillips carrie dorsey and barb king thank you for your professionalism your grace and your constant support throughout this transition you're the backbone of this organization and i look forward to working alongside you every day and it's also my pleasure to thank all the honored guests that are here this evening. I'm extremely grateful that you are here tonight to show your support for the city of Fairfax schools. And I'll take one moment of privilege. I can't name everyone who's here, and if I tried to, I would certainly miss someone. But I would like to point out one person, one shout out. She's not here tonight, and hopefully barring some type of

technical difficulty, she's able to watch at home. But my grandmother, Marie Buchanan, is hopefully watching. Everybody calls her Mimi, and if you get to know me, you'll get to know that Mimi and her late husband, Thomas Buchanan, were one of the biggest influences of my life, and I think they'd be tickled pink to see me up here tonight. And it's an early birthday present because Mimi's 97th birthday is tomorrow. So hello and happy birthday to Mimi. But most importantly, I want to say thank you to the students of the city of Fairfax Schools. Thank you for everything that you do. Thank you for being here. You're the reason we are all here. Your curiosity, your energy, and your potential are what drives us to do this work.

Every decision I make as a superintendent will be centered on what is best for you. I want to continue by saying how proud I am to be a part of this community and how excited I am to begin serving the city in this role. I'm going to come back to that idea of pride a few times, but I also want to tell you what I'm most proud of, and that's my family. I'm extremely grateful to them for all their support for me over the years. In the crowd tonight is my wife, Monique, who's a teacher as well, and our three children, Emmett, Hank, and Charlotte. We have been residents of the city of Fairfax for 17 years, and we're so proud to be a part of this community. Like so many of the parents here, I see every day the difference our teachers and staff make in the lives of young people like my children,

and that perspective keeps me grounded on what truly matters. During our brief time together this evening, it's important to me that I share three things with you that will guide my work as your next superintendent. First, our students must remain at the center of all we do. Every decision we make, every challenge we navigate, and every success we celebrate should begin and end with what is best for them. Second, we must continue to support and empower our amazing staff, the teachers, the leaders, and support professionals who make this division truly exceptional. That means providing the resources, encouragement, and trust they need to take risks, to innovate, and to continue creating powerful learning experiences for all students.

And finally, we must continue to strengthen the connections between our schools and our community. Our partnership between the City of Fairfax Schools, the City of Fairfax Government, Fairfax County Public Schools and the Fairfax County government is a powerful example of this type of connection combining the personal touches of a small city with the opportunities and resources of one of the largest districts in the nation. Together we can continue to make partnerships like this in our community even stronger ensuring that every student in the city of Fairfax has access to the very best opportunities available. In the weeks and months ahead there will be many opportunities for me to continue to learn about each

my first priority during this time is to listen I want to hear from our students our staff our families and community members about what makes the city of Fairfax schools so special where we are strong and where we can continue to grow together listening is the foundation of understanding and I'm committed to this approach throughout my tenure as your superintendent in closing I want to come back to that idea of pride I'm proud to call this city home and to raise my family here. I'm proud to join a division and partner with another division that so clearly puts students first. And I'm proud to work alongside people who care deeply about one another and about what public education can be at its very best.

Speaker 5We have every reason

Dustin Wrightstaffto be proud of who we are. A small city with big aspirations, a community that invests deeply in its schools, and a partnership that gives our students opportunities found nowhere else. It's an honor to join this team. I'm excited for the work ahead. I'm inspired by the people I get to work and learn alongside, and I'm ready to build a bright future together for every student in our city. Thank you very much.

Carolyn Pitchesthank you Dr. Wright so we have a request we would like four very specific pictures one with you and your family one with you and Dr. Reed and then one with you well I guess yeah four because one with you and all the the superintendents from the past who have all come tonight to support you and then one with our school board so we're going to start with your family if that's okay Dr. A, will you come on down?

Kristina CecereI was asking Nancy if I had cheese meat.

Speaker 3She said,

Lauren BartelmeSorry, Jeff.

Carolyn PitchesI can say that's open.

Lauren BartelmeI can say that's open.

Speaker 3I can say that's open. I can say that's open. I can say that's open. I can say that's open. I can say that's open. I can say that's open. I can say that's open. I can say that's open. I can say that's

Carolyn Pitchesopen. I can say that's open. Dr. Nunez, Dr. Giardo, everybody I've kind of started with Ann. Peter.

Speaker 3Thank you.

Lauren BartelmeOkay.

Carolyn PitchesI will take a recess though if anybody wants to leave.

Speaker 3I'm coming with you.

Carolyn PitchesI don't know if the people are going to be here. I don't know if they're going to be here. I don't know if they're going to be here. Thank you.

Speaker 9Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Speaker 8Thank you. Like the beat, beat, beat of the tom-tom when the jungle shadows fall. Like the tick, tick, tock of the stately clock as it stands against the wall. Like the drip, drip, drip of the raindrops when the summer shower is through. So a voice within me keeps repeating you, you, you, night and day. You are the one. Only you beneath the moon and under the sun. Whether near to me or far It's no matter, darling Where you are, I think of you Night and day

Speaker 3Day and

Speaker 8night Why?

Carolyn PitchesShoot, I didn't say Stacy

Speaker 3I didn't

Carolyn PitchesStacy had texted and asked if they could get a picture with Dustin. Oh,

Speaker 3they did. Okay. Well, that's it. Okay.

Carolyn PitchesOkay. Welcome back, everyone. Okay. We got our new superintendent up here on the dais. Dan's very happily taking his... He's like, I'm right back in the seat I want to be in. Okay, we're going to continue with our presentations to the, oh, wait. Yes, presentations to the board. We don't have anybody signed up for citizen participation. And we'll have our student representative report at Miss Abby Lucas. Miss Lucas.

StudentEverybody's gone. Good evening and happy December. As 2025 draws to close, Fairfax City Schools are filled with holiday cheer and positive energy. our students, staff, and families are embracing the season with enthusiasm and a strong sense of community spirit. Here's a look at some of the wonderful moments from November across our schools. In Fairfax High School, the annual Feed the Den food drive, sponsored by DACA, collected canned goods and donations to support Fairfax families in need this holiday season. On November 7th, Principal Dr. A hosted the Principal Coffee in the Career Center, chance to connect with school's leadership in a relaxed setting. Winter sports are on full swing, basketball, swim and dive, wrestling, gymnastics, and indoor track. Teams held tryouts with the

basketball team already playing its first exciting games of the season. The theater department hosted Matilda the Musical and had a standing performance in a fantastic community turnout. The baseball team kicked off its popular Christmas tree sale on November 29th, opened the weekends from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. and the weekdays 5 30 to 9 p.m. with all proceeds supporting Fairfax baseball. In Katherine Johnson, students enjoyed annual career day complete with guest speakers and unforgettable Fairfax County police helicopter landing on the athletic field. On November 21st, a newsletter shared updates about family engagement events and reminded families about advanced academics programs screening for students new to STPS

starting January 1st, 2025. At Daniel's Run, families gathered for an informative community meeting and upcoming school renovations, offering valuable updates and a chance to provide feedback. November's Family Engagement Month featured a school-wide activity celebrating parents' winter weather readiness resources and joyful community meal nights. In Providence, Math and Avid Night brought families together for dinner, from the AVID program to boost learning at home. And throughout the month, Providence celebrated family engagement in its Title I programs, proudly highlighting its EcoSchools USA status and hands-on STEM lab experiences. Wishing everyone a joyful holiday season and a happy, healthy new year.

Here's to closing 2025 with a great year.

Carolyn PitchesThank you, Ms. Lucas. Does anybody have any questions for

Speaker 3Ms. Lucas?

Carolyn PitchesOkay. Okay, so next we have Ms. Sonia Ahmed, Senior Manager 3, Reporting and Analytics, and Ms. Janine Lassina, am I pronouncing that right? Okay, great. Thank you. Student Information Analyst with FCPS's Department of Information Technology.

Speaker 9I have to admit I'm very glad the

Carolyn Pitchesroom

Speaker 9cleared out. That was

Sarah Kelseysurprising.

Speaker 9So thank you for having us here tonight. This is probably my third or fourth year presenting to the board. This is a very quick sort of summary look at City of Fairfax certified membership. We're going to look at the data in the report is the September 30th snapshot for the year and we'll look at some trends going back for some of the data points. I just want to see. Okay. So we're going to look at five pieces of information. We're going to look at overall certified membership by level, overall and by level. We're going to look at ethnicity, and then we're going to look at two types of transfers, so city of Fairfax residents who go to a county school, sorry, And then county students who attend a city of Fairfax school.

And then the last thing we're going to look at is free and reduced meal status as a measure of economic disadvantage. Okay, so overall, probably not surprising to anyone, is enrollment has decreased. across the board so for for city of fairfax membership and the division um the not the first column but the left three most columns that's the city of fairfax information and then the right three columns you can see the division membership so overall both have enrollment has dropped across both for the division across levels it's dropped for elementary middle and high for the city of Fairfax elementary and middle has gone down high school has gone up by 65 so not a lot but that has gone up but the trend if you look at percent the percent change for across city of

Fairfax compared to the division it's almost identical so it's 1.8 percent for division and 1.7 percent change for the Fairfax so the trend is identical and the the chart on the bottom just shows a trend over time this is an ethnicity summary for the city of membership sorry city of Fairfax membership my the copy My laptop is kind of going crazy. So just these are percentages. Oh, the other thing I wanted to note that's different for this year, any Ns that are below 10 this year, you'll see N less than 10, just to make sure that our data remains unidentifiable. and I will confirm this with Sonia but I think if just because this is it is made public this report we wouldn't share that but we can probably share a report

with the actual information should you want to see that so these are these are percentages so this just looks at 21 22 through 25 26 and you can see the of each group the trend is pretty much the same there really hasn't been any significant differences for this and here's just a more detailed look this looks at the city of Fairfax distribution over time compared to the division and And again, there's not really many differences, many notable differences anyway. All right. Does anyone have any questions so far? Feel free at any point to ask some questions. This is our, the next piece of information is the city to county student transfers. You can see most of the transfers come from elementary school, which is pretty similar

to what we've seen in the past. And then here we have a breakdown of some of the reasons why. So again, here you'll start to see the N less than 10 counts. But you can, and again, not really much different than in the past. AAP Center is really the biggest reason why students go to attend a county school versus a city school. Special education program and language immersion are the two next most common reasons. the next piece of information is the reverse so the county to city transfers and here we'll see a little bit more of an even distribution from elementary school to high school but middle school it makes sense middle school would be lower because there's fewer students but the distribution between elementary

school and high school is pretty similar and that's similar to prior years and then here we'll have the reasons why students attend the county attend the city school an employee is one of their parents is an employee at a school but most common in terms of in terms of school programs of why a student would attend oh and I did want to say just going back let me go back to the city to county transfers just so I could at least speak to a question that we had last year was the which percentage of school of resident which percentage of elementary schools go to Mosaic? I guess it's a pretty common question. So most of the students that are supposed to go to Daniel's Run or could go to Daniel's Run based on their address, it's like a 77 to 23% split.

That was a big question last year, so I wanted to make sure that I brought that to you. Okay, so here we get to the free and reduced meal status. Yes. So this is just a school-specific breakdown of the percentage at each school. Nothing really different there from prior years. you can see a more detailed look in our last chart. And just one thing I want to point out here, so this is the only piece of information that does not follow the September 30th snapshot. This comes from the mark, our spring data. Just it's been found to be a more reliable measure of free and reduced meal status compared to the September 30th counts. So here we get to just see a little bit more information and in our pre-meeting with Dan,

he pointed out some of the questions come in the comparison between the schools with the division free and reduced meal status. And there are some pretty big differences, both across years and then just within each year across schools. I CAN GIVE YOU A SECOND TO LOOK AT THAT AND LET ME KNOW IF YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS.

Carolyn PitchesCAN YOU CLARIFY FOR THE FREE AND REDUCED MEALS PERCENTAGES, THE NUMBER OF STUDENTS WHO QUALIFY OR THE NUMBER OF STUDENTS WHO PARTICIPATE ACTUALLY TAKE ADVANTAGE OF IT?

Speaker 9ACTUALLY TAKE ADVANTAGE OF IT.

Carolyn PitchesOKAY. Ms. Bartlemay, do you have any questions?

Lauren BartelmeI'm still digesting.

Carolyn PitchesOkay. I can come back.

Sarah KelseyMs. Kelsey? I'm just kind of curious on the city to county student transfers and the county to city. Why middle school is so much lower? because is there we have more programs in our middle school that we don't like I mean obviously I know the AAP for elementary but when you take the AAP out of that you know that's still a hundred kids around in elementary and then it goes down to 11

Speaker 9for city to county my guess is it's just this year numbers it's two elementary schools first one middle school but

Sarah Kelseythey all would go to Catherine Johnson still.

Speaker 9So you, are you, sorry, are you talking about the city to county?

Sarah KelseyYeah, the city to county, well, like, yeah, the city to county because it's 150 about to 11. And, you know, even if you take the AAP center out that we do know they go to, that's still a dramatic drop, I would think. Because

Carolyn Pitcheswe have a center probably at the middle school, so they would come back from elementary

Sarah Kelseyschool. But then it goes back up in high school more and it's like.

Carolyn PitchesBecause yeah well that also and also but the high school the there's double the amount of kids in high school that are in that actually more than double the number of students in high school that are in the middle school and in middle school and high school that tends to be sort of where kids might leave to go to an IV program or some like leave for maybe a language Well,

Sarah KelseyI'm just looking, too, because when you go to the county to city, it's still also a drop of, you know, 30 kids. I think it's just a numbers game. It's just because it's middle school. But I'm just curious because I do know we do have different programs in our middle school, the special ed programs that we don't have in our elementaries. And I'm just wondering if there's other programs like that that we do have in our middle school that we maybe need to look at for our elementaries to see if that's also, you know, or if it's in high school like that, too. Do you see what I'm saying? Okay. Mr. Phillips is shaking his head. He got me. I'm just kidding, because that seems still like a big dramatic drop.

I understand there's other grades and all that, but to me, I wonder when you're looking at the programs, if it is also a program rather than just the AAP.

Speaker 9So I do think program is part of it, because as you mentioned, the AAP Center, but then special education, the language immersion, too, is a big program that's taking, I don't know if taking is the right term, but is the reason why kids might be going to a county school. But I don't think those programs are necessarily a thing in middle school.

Sarah KelseyYeah. Well, and we're also looking at K through 6th and then just the 2. But when you're talking, what is it, 58, you know, 3 through 6th grade, that's not a big bulk of kids, you know, because that would be going to the middle school the next year. And so that's just kind of, I know. That's someone's car. so yeah that was just it's just interesting to see how big a drop that number is and to kind of figure out you got that damn for me I

Michael Mulloystaffdon't have it right now another just another thought some elementary students who go to school where their parents teach probably return back to the middle school to finish middle school through high school so okay that that plays into that's another one just a AP and special education

Sarah Kelseyokay thank you

Carolyn PitchesYeah, it's a Honda. I think it's a Honda. It might be you. Okay. Ms. Hickman, do you have any questions?

Amit HickmanI don't have any questions. I did want to kind of piggyback on what you said. I appreciate you coming back with the information about Providence versus Daniel's run and the AAP centers. And I do think that's something for us to look into as a board and as a city, what the difference is between the programs and are there things that we can do to strengthen, be strengthened or encourage or educate or whatever it might be about the program at Daniel's Run to be able to provide what families need at Daniel's Run instead of leaving to go to a county school. So I would ask that we kind of start mulling over that a little bit.

Carolyn PitchesI would agree. Ms. Cessary.

Kristina CecereThank you. I do agree with Ms. Hickman as well. I have a couple questions. When it comes to the city-county student transfers, I don't see Academy per se. Is that listed as something else on the page six of that graphic? So that would be, is that like, not the alternative schools, but like program opportunity? Would that be classified as that?

Dustin WrightstaffMs. Cessary, if I may, I believe we have the experts in the room, but I'm not sure that they're considering our academy students as official transfers. Dr. Michael A. That's right. Dr. Michael A. The students that fall in this data would be ones that are spending 100% of their day and are officially changing their placement from their base school to one of these schools.

Kristina CecereDr. Michael A. Yeah. I didn't know if there was any students who came into our school. I'm just curious, like 62 students, it seems like a lot of students that go kind of to Ms. Kelsey's point, you know, you go from 11 students in middle school, then you go to 62 students who are city to county transfer. and I see we have 13 that go into the IB program so roughly about 49 students who are in other programming city to county I'm just curious about those I mean I know that's such a small percentage of our roughly 2500 students at the high school I'm just curious as to what would be sort of rationale I'm curious if I could get this graphic in sort of a breakdown by elementary middle and high school just sort of to see the rationale those demographics so yeah

really helpful

Speaker 9yeah um we can certainly provide it I just want can I just ask a question about so you're interested to know why city students would attend an academy outside of the city

Kristina Cecereyeah we have 49 students who are it's not clear as to what would be the rationale why and then I noticed that you have listed other admin placement one and other admin placements I see two as well My eyes are getting older, so I apologize. I might have just... It was on the other one, wasn't it? Yeah. I was curious what the... Is there any difference between those two? Or is it just more you're designated between city to county than county to city? Is that that designation there? Is that what's happening with that? Sorry. So on page six, it says... Gosh. Other admin placement one, which I know is less than 10, And then on page eight, you have other admin placement to.

Speaker 9So it's just the order of the footnote. Okay. Actually, it should be reversed. Oh, there's a footnote. My apologies.

Kristina CecereThank you.

Speaker 9No, that's okay. You're right, because it should be. Okay. It should say one, but it's the same thing for both. Yes. It's the same thing. Okay.

Kristina CecereAnd if I may have a third question. On page nine, you list other schools as part of that city of Fairfax membership. just makes up about 22.4. That's what's reflective on page five, right? Like that's number of students who go from city to county. Is that that? Yes. Okay. Thank you for clarifying that.

Carolyn PitchesThank you, Ms. Sessori. Dr. Wright, do you have any comments or questions?

Dustin WrightstaffNo questions at this time. Just a big thank you to our partners with the Fairfax County Department of Information and Technology and the effort they put in to bring this information to us. We really appreciate it.

Carolyn PitchesMs. Lucas, do you have any questions?

StudentNot. No? No, I don't. I haven't thought about it. No.

Carolyn Pitchesokay mr. Murray you have any questions okay

Speaker 9it's also fine if you know I'm just later to sorry to just you know pass them through

Carolyn Pitchesthank you so much I would

Speaker 9like

Carolyn Pitchesto oh I did not go back to you

Lauren BartelmeI have two questions I know you shared the AP numbers specifically with Daniels run but I was wondering what

Speaker 9If you give me a second, I have it up. I ran them right before. So like the specific count? Is that what you mean? Or the percentage that go to Mosaic versus stay at Providence? So 23% for Providence and 77% for Daniel's run? Okay. Thank you.

Lauren BartelmeAnd I had a question. I know that this data is only counting students that transfer full-time for the academy classes, but I was wondering if we have data on what percentage of the courses are utilized by city residents versus county residents.

Speaker 9So that data does exist. It's not typically a part of this, but if there's a specific thing that you'd like to look at, I'm sure we could run it for you.

Lauren BartelmeIt was just curious.

Speaker 9Yeah, thank you. Yeah, of course.

Carolyn PitchesOkay, any more go-backs? Ms. Essary, you look like you have one.

Kristina CecereOh, no, I'm just going to affirm Ms. Brottle-May's request there as well. I think it's helpful to understand program capacity when it comes to city versus county a little bit. So, absolutely. Thank you.

Carolyn PitchesSo you specifically, you guys.

Kristina CecereI would love that data. You

Carolyn Pitcheswant the data on the number of.

Kristina Cecerenumber of students who as what mr. only say just uses the parts using that programming city versus county I recognize that when they go into the school buildings that they're not you know principal see them as all students teachers see them as all students no one is seen as by resident but I think for sometimes maybe our conversations it's helpful to understand how we can target better um so i agree with this part of me

Carolyn Pitchesokay so everybody's clear what we're asking for okay just want to make sure all right thank you very much welcome have a great evening okay um next um and we have mr michael mulloy thank you for coming mr mulloy Government Relations Rep for FCPS.

Michael MulloystaffSo good evening, Madam Chair, Dr. Wright, members of the board. It's always, I'm always happy to come over and see you. I always know it's the holiday season when I get my invitation from Mrs. King. It's like, okay, great. I start to put up the Christmas lights because I've got my invitation to go to see the city school board. I really do appreciate you all inviting me. I think I know everyone. If you haven't met me, I am Director of Government Relations for the Fairfax County Schools. It's a very fancy title for lobbyist and policy director for the schools. My office is the interface between everything that happens in Richmond, everything that happens on Capitol Hill. and obviously you are all very, very well aware

that what happens at Capitol Hill, what happens in Richmond has a fairly profound impact upon the school system, on our students, on our employees, and on our communities. So happy to come and give you a bit of a preview of coming attractions, kind of what's on the horizon. I submitted some documents that we don't need to necessarily get into, but my board is finalizing their legislative program night. So they're going to take their final votes. You have the draft of that. You have the draft of all the changes that were made between 2025 and the 2026 version when that's finally adopted. So you have all of that kind of background information. But in terms of what's going on on the ground right now and what we kind of see coming forward, you know,

obviously you've read the newspapers. You know there was an election. You know, it's fairly significant potential impact in Virginia, new governor, new lieutenant governor, new attorney general. They are all in the process of going through transition. They are putting together their transition teams. They are pulling together in all the different issue areas including education, groups of people who are going to guide the new administration as they come into office. You also had an election for the House of Delegates. All 100 members of the House of Delegates were up for election. The current configuration of the Virginia House of Delegates is 51 Democrats, 49 Republicans. When we come into session

on January 4, 2026. There will be 64 Democrats and 36 Republicans. All Fairfax County and city incumbents returned to office. So everybody that we've worked with over the last several years all came back into office. The Senate of Virginia did not have an election. Those are four-year long terms. That's a 21-19 split, although technically because the Lieutenant Lieutenant Governor-elect is a sitting member of the Senate. She will have to resign her seat and they will have to hold a special election. So for, at least it's theoretically possible that for a time that 21-19 split will actually be a 20-19 split in the Senate of Virginia, just depending on when the special election is scheduled. The other thing that matters to us in the education world is that the Lieutenant Governor-elect

is a chairman of the Senate Education and Health Committee. So there will be a new chair of the Senate Education and Health Committee when we come back to Richmond in January. The General Assembly, even though they meet, this is a 60-day session, so it's a long session. A long session is where they set the biennial budget. Even though they are considered a part-time legislature, they meet all year round. There's stuff that's going on in Richmond with General Assembly meetings, studies, commissions that go on all year round. This is the time of year where we start to see or we get kind of the results of those committees or those commissions that will turn into legislation come January. Pre-filing, as it's known in Richmond, is the process where legislators start to put

in legislation to be ready for the January session. There already are several bills that are pre-filed in public that we're able to see. Technically speaking, about three hours ago was the deadline for members to submit their drafting requests. So over the next month or so, the Virginia Division of Legislative Services is going incredibly busy drafting legislation for all the members that was requested. We won't know everything that's being proposed for session until really technically the first week or two of session because members can put in pre-filed bills all the way up until the first day of session but they still have a small group of bills that they can introduce even after session has started.

Plus, you also have the additional factor this year of an incoming governor, so they'll have their own priorities. So that'll generate some additional legislation, and also it has an impact on the budget. We will get the official proposed budget for the next biennium on December 17th. Virginia has an odd system where it's actually the outgoing governor that proposes the budget for the next biennium, even though they're leaving. So Governor Youngkin on December 17th will present the next biennium budget for the General Assembly to consider. And then when the new governor is sworn in and inaugurated on January 17th, she'll kind of take over stewardship of that and put her own spin on things. and the General Assembly will put their own spin on things, but we will see kind

of the first initial look at what the budget might be like as we go into the next session here in the next couple weeks. Last, I guess two weeks ago, Senate Finance and House Appropriations had their annual retreats. We got a preview of coming attractions from that. A couple of things that I think were noteworthy Those meetings, they kind of set the fiscal agenda for the year, so they give an idea of what revenues might look like. They give an idea of what projected expenditures might look like. And the bottom line for both Senate and House, at least right now, is that between education funding, re-benchmarking, which I'll explain here in a second, and some of the new demands that are placed on Virginia for things like Medicaid and other health care-related services,

between those two kind of new demands on revenue, that basically wipes out and basically takes up any new revenue that might be anticipated from the Commonwealth. The good news is that it doesn't create a deficit situation, but it does mean that any new revenues are already kind of spoken for just from those two pots of money. So I mentioned re-benchmarking. Several of you have heard my spiel on rebenchmarking before, but just to remind you, as part of the biennial budget process, education funding is primarily driven by formulas. So there's a whole bunch of formulas, standards of quality formulas that look at a number of different factors. Every two years, the data in those formulas gets updated.

So student enrollment, inflation, the cost of bus fuel, sales tax revenues, and other factors like that, that data gets updated in those formulas, which historically has created kind of a stair-step effect for public education funding. So every two years when they update that data, that typically means that there's going to be more money coming in for public education, particularly that first year of Obinium. Now, it's important to know that re-benchmarking doesn't change policy at all. It's literally just updating the costs of doing things exactly the way we're doing them now. No new policies, no new programs, no new anything. It's just here's what providing public education costs now as opposed to 18, 24 months ago.

So it's incredibly important for us that that re-benchmarking is calculated correctly and is fully funded because technically speaking, you all, my board, are paying those updated costs right now. because those costs, those invoices come in on a regular basis for us so the state actually lags behind in terms of their contribution to public education since it is a split between state funding and local funding. So it's incredibly helpful for us at the local level to get that rebenchmark put in place because that helps to catch up some of the things that we're having to, we've been having to spend money on over the last couple of years and it kind of brings in the state share of that. One other factor that I think is going to be important is that one component of rebenchmarking

is our retirement cost rates. So for the Virginia retirement system, they update those every two years as well. It looks like at least the VRS actuary is proposing a decrease in those rates. A decrease in those rates will actually mean lower costs for localities, lower costs for the state, so that could help stave money on both sides of the ledger. That is, however, a policy decision that's made by the General Assembly. Some years the General Assembly accepts the actuary rates as they're proposed. Some years they deviate. The last several years they've actually kept the rates higher in order to make sure that the VRS system was funded appropriately and continued to move closer and closer to 100%

funded status. So nothing is guaranteed, but that's at least a possibility that there may be some cost shifting or cost savings based on those VRS rates. So that's kind of the budget horizon. And in terms of policy, you know, obviously you all watch the campaign, so you know there's, you know, there were some fairly significant policy differences between the outgoing governor and the incoming governor. So that'll be a big part of the conversation. Also, several pieces of legislation in the last couple of years have passed through both chambers of the General Assembly, but were subsequently vetoed by the governor. It is very likely that those pieces of legislation will return. that the outcomes on those legislation,

those pieces of legislation will be different, things like minimum wage, family medical leave, collective bargaining, we're already doing collective bargaining up here in Northern Virginia and other jurisdictions. Thought we had avoided that, but it has returned to us. So that, you can kind of read the tea leaves in terms of what policy is gonna look like just from those changes. One last thing I want to kind of leave you with, as I said, I provided all of my board's information about their legislative program, but I wanted to highlight their legislative priorities because it just kind of gives a window in terms of what they're thinking of, what they're focused on, and also it's anticipating things that are going to be done during the

next general assembly session. Already talked at length about state funding. making sure that the biennial rebenchmark is fully funded is really important. We've talked in years past about the report from the Joint Legislative Audit Review Commission in terms of its findings that education funding, that the state lags behind in terms of how much they provide for public education, leaving a lot of the burden to localities. Some really good progress has been made on some of those JLR recommendations, but there are still a lot of are outstanding. So we'd love to see some continued discussion about some of those. Accountability and assessments. As you have seen the last several months or even years, very significant changes coming down from the state both in terms of how

school accountability is measured and how our schools we rated and what factors go into that and also some fairly significant changes in terms of how students are going to be assessed. Both in terms of the actual score that a student is going to have to achieve to be considered passing on an assessment, but also a number of kind of administrative and mechanical changes in terms of how those assessments are actually administered, when they're administered, who they're administered to, a number of things that happened legislatively last year don't go into effect for another year. So we are coming back this session to try and have a further conversation about some of those changes. Just for context, one of the changes requires all SOLs to be given in the last two weeks

of school. Another ties student grades to SOL results. There's a component of a student grade that's attached to an SOL. There's changes in terms of you're familiar with the fact that students have to verify a certain number of their credits for graduation by passing SOL tests. There's a new provision that says that if any student has to do that and has to take that test in a class that all students who are taking that class, even if they don't need the verified credit, would have to take the SOL so that you got a picture of what that entire class was doing and not just the few students that needed the class that those assessments for verification. So those are, again, very significant potential changes.

A lot of those come from the Virginia Board of Education as opposed to the General Assembly. the Virginia Board of Education is appointed by the governor appointed to staggered terms so every year the governor gets a couple of appointments to that board so at least initially that board will remain majority current governor appointees over time it will become a majority of the new governor's appointees but you will still have a board that's dominated by appointees from the current governor And that'll kind of color the conversation about some of those factors. A few other items that are on kind of our priority list. Last year there was some legislation that was passed about doing inspections at least every four years for HVAC systems.

So you're heating ventilation systems in schools, requiring reports of remediation, things that need to be changed, it fixed but there was really no resources that were put behind that so it was identifying problems but not necessarily providing any resources to fix any of the issues so that's i think something that that we're interested in pursuing is some status assistance because if not that just falls entirely on the on the local level school meals uh you know we we know we know just from data how successful providing universal free meals was during the COVID, during COVID, when we were getting the enhanced funding from the federal government, and how many more students participated in both breakfast and lunch. I think there's already pre-filed legislation for student

breakfasts, so that'll be part of the conversation this year in the General Assembly. A couple of issues around the Freedom of Information Act in particular, you all have five members on your board, so public meeting rules say that two of you can meet. When it becomes three of you, then it becomes a public meeting. Well two of you meeting is 40% of your board. My board has 12 members. They can also have only two members meet. and if it's more than two members, it's considered a public meeting. That's 16% of the board. So there's some really significant disparities in terms of how public meeting laws are structured. They don't adjust for board size at all. And FOIA also hasn't kept up with kind of the explosion of information

that we all face, email, electronic communications, electronic data, and everything else. Just in terms of the timelines we have for compliance and everything, that system has not kept up with the realities of the volume of data that we have to deal with. At least a study of modernizing some of the FOIA rules around some of those data points would be incredibly helpful. Then finally, educational governance. You've seen conversations I mentioned the State Board of Education but also at the college level with the college boards of visitors, there's a real need for some stability in terms of how those boards are appointed and ensuring that they remain student focused and student centered. So I'm sure you're going to see some conversations about that going forward into the next General

Assembly session. I will stop there, partially because I'm losing my voice a little bit, but also just to leave some time for questions. I'm more than happy to answer anything you all have.

Carolyn PitchesI will start with you, Ms. Sessori.

Kristina CecereI have one question for right now and I might have a go back. So I recognize first of all I want to just thank the Fairfax County School Board for advocating some of these things. I watched the most recent work session and especially seeing some of the advocacy around the public service loan forgiveness getting that restored so our teachers and hopefully future teachers can't afford to go to college and still serve in public spaces. I want to focus on accountability and assessments. One of the things that really does concern me is the shift that sort of, with the pendulum swinging back of sorts. I remember when I started teaching that if a kid took a class that was an SOL class, they took the SOL, regardless if they needed it for verified credit or not.

And it created a lot of over-testing. about six years ago, seeing the pendulum swinging away from over-testing and really focusing on what kids need and letting them invest more. And I know Fairfax, the school board stands behind sort of focusing on other assessment opportunities rather than just a standardized test. Do you see, here's my question, do you see, I recognize that a lot of that is in the control of the Board of Education. do you see any kind of rumblings with the General Assembly as to advocating for maybe pulling that pendulum back to where it's our kids are not being over tested?

Michael MulloystaffIt's always difficult to prognosticate. They're definitely some of the reason why you have the pendulum swinging back is actually General Assembly action. It's not just the state board. So there are avenues that the General Assembly can use. I can tell you that one impetus or one rationale for swinging the pendulum back and having every student tested is there's a concern because student testing is so intimately connected with school accountability that if you start to kind of narrow the population that's taking tests, it skews results in terms of how schools are viewed. viewed. Not to say that that's right or wrong, but that's just kind of the argument that's floating around of why there's some pressure and some

move to kind of pull back to increasing the amount of testing just so there's a better picture of school performance, student performance. That said, it's certainly something that my board is interested in trying to kind of come back to that balance of not over testing students and figuring out different ways. There's even been some discussion, I don't know where it will go, but there's even been some discussion about decoupling, verifying credits and student testing. If you were to do that, that would have a huge impact both in terms of the student experience, in terms of how schools are measured, because a lot of our structure is predicated on making sure that students are able to pass those tests so that they're able to verify their

credits so that they're able to graduate. But it'll definitely be a significant conversation this year.

Carolyn PitchesDo you have any more questions? Okay. Okay. Ms. Hickman.

Amit HickmanThank you for this information. It was very helpful. And I, along with Ms. Hussery, really appreciate the work that the county school board is doing on a lot of these issues with the advocacy. Again, I really have some concerns about the SOLs in particular and how it's being used for grading and the changes of dates and all those things. So I'm very glad that we're working with the team that's talking about that. With your magic ball, the same question I think we've asked a long time, Any rumblings about the 1% sales tax and will that be brought back up again?

Michael MulloystaffSo the 1% sales tax is actually one of the bills that I alluded to earlier which has passed both chambers of the General Assembly but was vetoed by the governor. The current governor has it as part of her platform that she is supportive of it. It is impossible to say that the exact same outcome will happen but that definitely gives that definitely gives some impetus to the idea that that may have a better chance of passage now than it did last year or previous years, just because she's signaled the willingness to be open to that. And I think the General Assembly, I think the same people who have championed it before are still in the General Assembly, so it would be kind of a surprise if it didn't come back

again. In fact, I think there may already be a pre-filed bill about it. But yeah, I think the environment is much more favorable to its potential passage.

Amit HickmanGreat. That's wonderful. Would be wonderful news for the city, for sure, if we could continue on that path. Thank you.

Carolyn PitchesThank you, Ms. Eggman. Ms. Kelsey?

Sarah KelseyYeah, I'm looking at one of the sheets you sent us, the funding challenges. Yes.

Speaker 9The one page,

Sarah Kelseywell,

Speaker 9two-pager, I

Sarah Kelseyguess. It looks two pages. It's one page because it's from back. I get it. One of the things you put on there about the IDEA and the preschool funding on there, you're listing that the federal government is committed to 40% of the excessive cost for special education. I know the county and the city, we've talked in the past more about trying to get preschool more accessible for all. Is that including the preschool funding, or is that just special education?

Michael Mulloystaffthat's just related to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, which is IDEA, the federal legislation. 1975, that legislation passed, placed a significant number of mandates on school divisions with the promise that, oh, the federal government will pick up 40% of the cost. They've never come, I think they've come close to 20%, but right now it's under 10%. So all of that funding burden falls on the state and localities to be able to make up So that's what we're highlighting there with that.

Sarah KelseyYeah, I was just double-checking because in the bold it said and preschool funding, and that's why I was kind of like, wait, does that include that or not?

Michael MulloystaffOkay.

Sarah KelseyHas there been talk in the state about giving more additional preschool funding? Last

Michael Mulloystaffcouple of years there have been some changes. I think the focus at the state level is more on mixed delivery, so not just public options but public and private it and making sure that private providers are of high quality and are involved in the system as well. I don't know if that will shift with the new administration, if there will be a shift in focus. I know Delegate Bulova has put in several pieces of legislation related to early childhood, strengthening the program. They made some reforms in terms of how money is allocated for the Virginia Preschool initiative, making sure that money is not left on the table when jurisdictions can't take advantage of their entire allocation. That money doesn't just get swept back into the general budget.

That actually gets reallocated to jurisdictions that have waiting lists and those types of things. So there have been some positive changes at the state level. I would anticipate that conversation would continue. again with the caveat of resources right is knowing what what the resource picture looks like

Sarah Kelseythank

Carolyn Pitchesyou thank you miss Bartlemy

Lauren Bartelmethank you for all this information it's very interesting I wanted to kind of echo the concerns brought up earlier about some of the grading in the SOLs in particular I'm concerned about the grades for SOLs counting for grades in high school classes especially when you look at you know students in a general education test as students in an honors or an AP class and having the grades count equally despite waiting in honors and AP classes. So I guess I'm curious if some of those discussions are happening and what the advocacy from FCPS looks like with the grading in particular.

Michael MulloystaffThat was kind of front and center in terms of once the legislation passed and people had a chance to digest it after the session, that was one of the issues that bubbled right up to the top. One thing that is happening in parallel to all of these changes is that the state's assessment contract has actually expired. It's expired multiple times and been renewed, but they're actually to a point where they are going back out to vendors to rebid the testing contract. As part of that process, there was a lot of discussion about potential reforms within the SOLs themselves. So when they're going out to vendors, they're saying, hey, would you be able to provide us with more performance-based assessments?

Would you be able to provide things outside of the world of just standardized testing, standardized multiple choice types of things? Would you be able to provide, like most states in the country do, content level assessments in a student's native language? So, you know, for some of our multilingual learners, the ability to take a content, a math test or something, you know, in a language that they're more familiar with so that they're not just sitting there with a translation dictionary during their assessment. I think that the intention of that process is to improve the SOLs, and if the SOLs are improved and become more educationally valuable, become more pedagogically valuable to teachers,

that that conversation about the 10% of the student's grade can kind of shift, right? Because if it's a more valuable test and it's more useful for teachers, then maybe there are accommodations that are made on the instructional practices side that some things that teachers are having to do now, they don't need to do because the SOL test can kind of serve that purpose. You see a bit of an example of that. The Virginia Growth Assessment, which is a test that was adopted a couple of years ago, the intention of which was to provide a growth measure for students. So there's a kind of a pre-test, a mid-year test, and an end-of-year test. That test has really never lived up to its promise. And a lot of school divisions, Fairfax included, have a waiver from that testing requirement

to use a different assessment, to use a different vendor's assessment, which does provide much more instructionally valuable information for teachers. And I think you're going to see that kind of conversation happening. So yes, there will be conversation about the 10% and tying it into the grades. But I think the intention is also to have that conversation about just making the SOLs a better tool and a better assessment, which can shift that conversation.

Lauren BartelmeI guess a follow-up question to that. Do you know if there's conversation then about kind of the problems with making the changes to the test when there's not samples out there and students and teachers don't know what to expect when they're first being graded on it?

Michael MulloystaffYeah, I think our board is adding some language to the legislative program about having sufficient lead time anytime there's a change, whether it be an accountability system on assessment side or anything. Having a sufficient amount of lead time and a sufficient amount of kind of pretesting. The standard in Virginia has historically been when there's changes in assessments, there's usually a kind of a year's transition where you get to know the test and you learn a little bit about it, but it doesn't count towards, you know, school's accreditation or student outcomes. We bypass that system this time around is that we went straight into, made significant changes to the test, and then the tests themselves counted right out of the gate.

The new administration may have a different approach to that. And I know there's an interest in having a different approach to that is making sure that lead time on the testing side but also on the school accountability side so that we can make adjustments in how students are put into classes and our staffing and things like that that need to happen and just don't happen automatically to give us that time to adjust so that we can be successful and we can make sure our students are successful.

Carolyn PitchesMs. Sessori.

Kristina CecereI have two questions. I'll start my easy one or at least I think it's easy. That is not my car by the way. The so the work session I thought I heard Dr. Anderson talk about how sometimes your office and I know you have a lot of work under your belt. Sometimes they receive like a one pager of legislative just kind of a summary for any legislators that may come into our school building so we can hand off. So that's something that did I understand that correctly is that something that we could also receive to on our board. when we have, say, Delegate Boulava or Senator Salim come in, we can at least, people have that.

Michael MulloystaffSo you already have one. So the challenges document that you mentioned earlier, that's one example of some of the materials that we're at. This lovely thing right here. Awesome. Yeah, and we do create handouts for different things. During session, we'll be doing talking points on kind of major pieces of legislation. We do weekly reports. So we kind of highlight what the big issues are. We're going to be changing some of those around so they're hopefully more user friendly and get you better information. And also highlight not just what's important but also tries to highlight why it's important, what the potential impact is, what work we're trying to do in terms of making adjustments or supporting or being concerned.

So that is all available. Most of it gets posted to our website, but not all of it. But I can discuss with my board in terms of making sure that you all are linked in on that as well.

Kristina CecereI appreciate that. Even if it's a Region 5 piece or whatever is easiest for your office, because I recognize that's covering the number of schools there. The other question I have, and this is a little bit of a heavier question, all the things that are happening with the federal government, particularly the Department of Education, and looking at the funding that's coming to that, this is obviously fantastic priorities number of pieces that need to be funded, Title I, IDEA, federal meals, all kinds of things that our schools utilize, absolutely. The one thing that's near and dear to my heart is a 21st Century grant, block grant specifically when it comes from federal government to state governments and then dispersed to

school districts for things like after school programming and such. And I'm curious if there's any conversation or if you're in your crystal ball, let's pull that back out if we could, just rethinking what that funding structure might be and maybe just something to kind of, like, you're the expert in this field, something that we should be keeping an eye on as not just these federal priorities, but even some things like that in the next, in 2026.

Michael MulloystaffSo I think that the degree of expertise that people bring to that conversation in terms of what's happening in the federal government dramatically. Just in terms of understanding exactly what's happening, how things are structured, it's been incredibly difficult from a policy standpoint to kind of follow because we're so far outside of what the historical norms have been in terms of how things are funded and we've had situations where Congress has appropriated funding and then that funding has been drawn back and that historically hasn't happened. We the venue for a lot of education programs, moving them into different agencies, it's really difficult to tell what the impact of that is going to be.

You know, the vast majority of the federal government function is to kind of administer those grants. You know, 21st century schools, Title II for teacher quality, Title III for English language learners, Perkins for CTE, E-rate for technology. There's just a whole list of things in addition to the big pots of money or Title I for students, low income students, IDEA for special education students, and then food and nutrition services. Those are the biggest pots of money, but those smaller pots of money are important. I mean, they run incredibly important programs, but our visibility on it has just become so unbelievably clouded. It's hard to know. You know, we're in a position where we're kind of we're still receiving federal funding.

You've seen the conversations in the news media about some of our situation with federal funding and grants. But it's kind of a reimbursement basis. So we're actually submitting invoices and we're getting funding back. We're not being forward funded the way that we had been in the past. So it's hard to say with any degree of certainty what that picture is going to look like going forward and we're just trying to,

Dustin Wrightstaffyou know,

Michael Mulloystaffpay attention to it as best we can and then adjust as we can and that's why we're doing things like that one pager which highlights all of the breadth of programs that are involved. It's not just the kind of the few title programs that people are familiar with. It does impact a lot of different areas.

Kristina CecereI really appreciate you guys monitoring that.

Carolyn PitchesI just have some questions about FOIA but I think I'm just going to email them to you. They're pretty specific. And then about the number of school board members because I know that I think the state average is six board members. So it really is Fairfax County, Loudoun County and probably Prince William who

Michael Mulloystaff70% of all boards have five members. Yeah. So you're right. The average is right about six. But 70% of all boards have five members on their board. We are definitely an outlier. We're the only 12-member board. I think there's one 11-member board. Loudoun's nine. Yeah. And there's at least one 10-member board as well. I think there are a few nine-member boards. But then it just goes down precipitously from that point.

Carolyn PitchesOkay. Thank you. We won't keep you any longer. Have a great night, Michael.

Michael MulloystaffThank you so much.

StudentOh, sorry. I do, I do. Hold the phone. I was wondering, with new administration and everything, how fast or when would it impact the students, like in the year 2026, or would it go into 2027 when we'd see change?

Michael MulloystaffSo, General Assembly Session begins January 14th. They will meet for 60 days, so they'll be done in the middle of March. legislation that passes during that session if it ends up being signed by the governor actually goes into effect July 1 of 2026 so that would be kind of the first point at which you would see on the legislative side changes that would impact students potentially would be for the what is it coming up the next school year 26 27 but it would be for the 26 27 school year is that right I I don't know. I can't tell what date it is anymore. So that's on the legislative side. On the administrative side, the State Board of Education meets every month, most every month. So their changes don't follow that kind of same pattern.

They can happen more quickly. They can happen more slowly. But really, the first real impacts you would see of the new configuration and the new governor would be for the next school year, if there are changes that are made.

Carolyn PitchesMr. Murray, do you have any questions? Okay. Sorry. Sue, I'm going to skip anybody. Okay. Thank you, Michael.

Michael MulloystaffOf course. Thank you.

Carolyn PitchesOkay. We have no public hearings this evening, so we will move on to our action items, which is the approval of the November 3rd, 2025 meeting minutes. Clerk has provided these minutes. Is there a motion?

Kristina CecereMadam Chair?

Carolyn PitchesYes.

Kristina CecereI move that the City of Fairfax School Board approve the minutes of the November 3rd, 2025 school board regular meeting as printed and distributed.

Carolyn PitchesThank you, Ms. Sessori. May I have a second?

Kristina CecereSecond.

Carolyn PitchesOkay. Ms. Sessori has moved and Ms. Hickman has seconded that the City of Fairfax School Board approve the minutes of the November 3rd, 2025 regular school board meeting minutes as printed and distributed. Are there any changes, modifications, or additions? All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Aye. The motion passes unanimously. Okay. We will move on to superintendents matters. This is Dr. Wright's first go at this. So how about it?

Dustin WrightstaffThank you, Chair Pitches, and I'll do my best. So I have four quick items for the board and the public. First is, again, I just want to reiterate my excitement about being in this position to be joining the City of Fairfax as the next superintendent. Second, I'd be remiss without sharing all of our appreciation on behalf of the board, the city staff, all of our city schools for Mr. Phillips for serving as our acting superintendent for the last four months. He's done an amazing job and we're all very, very grateful for those efforts. So a big thank you to Mr. Phillips and well done as the acting superintendent here in the City of Fairfax. Third, I was able to start acting out some of the things that you heard in my opening

remarks about how our students and our schools are the most important thing that we do and where I want to spend as much time as possible. Today, I was able to visit Daniels Run Elementary School and Catherine Johnson Middle School. So a big thank you to Ms. Mullins and Mr. Smith for hosting me. We were able to see classrooms, meet students, and it was wonderful. And I'm looking forward to visiting Fairfax High School and Providence tomorrow. So a great way to start the time here in the city is to be in our schools and be with our students. And then finally, for everyone, just to give some broad strokes about how I hope to spend these first few months on the job, is really spending a lot of time doing some listening and learning.

And then I'll start trying to take the themes that I've heard from all of those sessions. and there's going to be lots of different formats for that. Just start making some sense of it and aligning our work as a division. And then that last phase of the entry plan will just really focus on reporting out what we've heard, sharing it with the public, and starting to act on some of those themes, some of those big areas that we know we need to work on, and some of those areas that we want to continue to build on as our strengths. following board approval. I hope to share some details about that after the winter break, what that will look like, and be able to share on a regular basis with the public and the board on the progress we're making

towards that entry plan. So excited about that. And with that, that concludes my first superintendent's matter. So I hope that went okay. You did great. All right.

Carolyn PitchesOkay, we'll move on to board

Lauren Bartelmematters. Ms. Bartlemay. I just wanted to welcome you, Dr. Wright. We're really glad to have you on board. And I'm very excited to see what's coming. And also I wanted to second the thank you. I think you kept things going seamlessly and that was a hard task. So thank you. It's very appreciated

Sarah Kelseymiss Kelsey I would also like to welcome dr. Wright and I know one thing that I did say in the interviews was that we wanted our superintendent to be seen and I will say tonight I was already told that you were at Katherine Johnson today before this ever happened and they knew that you were coming so you have already met one of those expectations you were seen by students And so I appreciate that, stepping in right there on day one and getting your feet wet. And also, Mr. Phillips, thank you. You stepped in, and you made a lot of great changes that blew us away. And I really appreciate that and all your hard work. And so I know the two of you will make a great team, along with Carrie and Barb, obviously.

but I would also like to say that I'm looking forward to a bunch of the winter concerts that are coming up and I hope that everybody has a safe winter break coming up. Ms. Hickman.

Amit HickmanMs. I just wanted to say I had the opportunity to attend the BSBA conference this, I guess, two weeks ago, almost two weeks ago now. It feels like time is flying. And, you know, meet some other school board members and hear some different programs that and also Cessary and I got to attend a VHSL presentation, which was really enlightening, and I'm glad I had the opportunity to do so. I want to say good luck to all the students and teachers in the last few weeks before winter break. I know it's a hard time for everybody sometimes, and also very exciting time, so I wish everyone the best. I'm looking forward to the joint FCPS meeting that we are having. 16th. 16th, that was gonna say. And really having a chance to have some discussions

counterparts on the FCPS school board. Welcome, Dr. Wright. You only had a couple pictures, just wait. Four was nothing. And thank you, Mr. Phillips. You have done, I think the word seamless was a great one. You essentially did the role with Ms. King and Ms. Dorsey of four people easily. You guys, you at least made it look like it was no big deal. You know, really appreciate everything you've done. I'm looking forward to a happy and healthy winter season for all.

Carolyn PitchesMs. Seth Murray.

Kristina CecereThank you. Dr. Wright, welcome. It's great to have you up here on the dais. Mr. Phillips, you have just truly, like, was part of my ego, but there's no perfect word, more perfect word than seamless. Like, it truly has been a pleasure to have you as our acting superintendent, and I'm glad you're sticking around too. So everything that you do, you do with heart and whatnot. So thank you. Can I ask a question in my board? I know. Is that in my lab? I don't think a

Carolyn Pitchesboard member has

Kristina Cecereever done that. You may ask questions on my agenda. Ms. Hickman. I think you

Carolyn Pitcheshave been surpassed, Ms. Hickman.

Kristina CecereMs. Hickman reminded me of the VSBA conference we attended less than two weeks ago and the VHSL. and I first want to just give a shout out to Dr. A for working so hard to get get our things are happening with the high school football overturned so the kids could play in the playoffs this year and they work so hard for that not just the football team but every kid who comes out and cheers on the team is just really grateful to see that and I know it didn't work out in the end but you know we got through one game which I love seeing too but my question if I may if I'm allowed by Robert's rolls

Carolyn Pitchesyeah who are you asking a question of

Kristina Cecereuh maybe Dr. Wright maybe Mr. Phillips maybe you um so my question is do we have an update on the report coming from FCPS on everything that's been happening with the high school we've been quite patient with that and I know it's supposed to be coming around this time of year um is there a present under my Christmas tree that's coming up

Dustin Wrightstaffyeah thank you miss Essary um don't have an update on that at this time in but that's something we can definitely reach out and then get back to the board once we have that update.

Kristina CecereI appreciate that a lot. And just one thing I will say I learned from the conference, I was a little surprised by that the Virginia High School, High School League, I believe that's VHSL, that they don't have necessarily training through them, that they require a lot of the schools to have the training on proselytizing, which I did not know that term until last year. So I'm curious as to what that report and the findings might be, know as our board and whatnot and I can't speak for y'all but I would love to be able to advocate for just more transparent training for parents students and staff particularly that so that way we're not in that same situation we were like this year so anyway I'm gonna put a pin in that and just wish everybody a

wonderful winter break I know you guys are counting down 20 days right so thank you all so much

Carolyn PitchesI just want to thank everybody who came this evening to celebrate Dr. Wright and welcome Dr. Wright. I would like to thank Dan for being a fantastic partner the last how many months has it been? Four long months. You did a phenomenal job. Which will make Dr. Wright's job a little easier. I would like to congratulate the football team. I think they did a great job. And I'm glad that everything worked out and they were able to play in the postseason. And I agree with the accessory. VHSL has some work to do. I think specifically around student athlete education. Because ultimately if we're going to make them responsible for consequences, then they need to understand what the ‑‑ what those infractions are and the consequences of them.

But I'm going to end on a happier note. I hope everybody has a safe and happy holiday season. And we will see everybody back in January. So if there's nothing else before the board, Ms. Essary, I am going to adjourn this meeting at 8.03.