The School Board of Escambia County, Florida, convened in Special Workshop Meeting at 9:03 a.m., in the Board Room at the Administrative Building, 215 West Garden Street, with the following present:

Chairman: Dr. Elmer Jenkins

Vice Chairman: Dr. John DeWitt

Members:

Mr. Jim C. Bailey

Mrs. Barbara Morris

Mrs. Vanette Webb

Superintendent of Schools: Mr. Jim May

I. CALL TO ORDER

The meeting was called to order at 9:03 a.m. by Chairman Jenkins. He called for a moment of silence in memory of four children and a teacher who died as a result of gunfire in an ambush earlier this week at Westside Middle School in Jonesboro, Arkansas. The invocation was given by Chairman Jenkins.

II. COMMENTS FROM SUPERINTENDENT

1. PTA PRESENTATION

Mr. May advised that Ms. Sally Lee was present to give a video presentation concerning a statewide movement from the PTA to require seat belts on buses.

Ms. Sally Lee, 2645 Samora Drive, Pensacola, Florida, 32503, stated that she serves as the Legislation Chairman for Florida PTA, as well as Escambia County Council Legislation Chair. She stated that the safety of children is priority, and at their last convention, the PTA voted to adopt a position to seek legislation to require seat belts on all new school buses. She presented a brief video documentary by CNN addressing safety concerns and how seat belts could play a factor in preventing injuries due to school bus accidents. She stated she was not asking the Board to take any action, but wanted to help convey why parents are becoming so concerned about this and why the County Council voted to support the legislation that is currently pending, including Senate Bill 1882 and House Bill 3593. They have also been working with the Florida School Board Association to address liability concerns; i.e., what happens if seat belts are on the school bus and children do not wear them, that the School Board should not incur any additional liability, so they are asking for amended language to help meet those concerns, as well as an amendment that would add the requirement for high back seats. They believe that the combination of high back seats and seat belts is most effective. Cost concerns are also a factor. It was noted that Escambia County buses already have high back seats, so instead of $1,600, the cost would be approximately $1,100 to add seat belts for buses that are already equipped with high back seats.

Mrs. Morris asked if there were current studies on safety factors of lap seat belts versus shoulder belts. Ms. Lee stated they are not looking at shoulder belts, probably because of the cost. There are also concerns with lap seat belts that an abdominal injury or internal injury may occur, but doctors have indicated that would not be as serious as a head injury or spinal injury. She stated she will provide additional information based on studies that have been done. Upon inquiry from Mrs. Webb, Ms. Lee stated that she will provide information as to how long the State of New Jersey has had mandatory seat belt requirements. Chairman Jenkins thanked Ms. Lee for making the presentation, and he stated that the Board will give it serious consideration.

Mr. Mike Connors, Director of Transportation, commented that the video which was done by CNN has caused concern in the school bus industry. He referenced a national publication called the School Bus Director, which cited information that the National Security Council had provided incorrect data for the video, and may cause parents needless worry over putting their children on school buses. He stated that school buses are four times safer than passenger cars, and it may send a message to parents that they need to transport their children to school in their own vehicles rather than a school bus. He stated that his number one priority is safe transportation of children in this District.

Mr. May stated that the issue should be looked at closely as to whether children would be safer with seat belts on school buses, and research is being done in that regard. Mr. Connors said there are no statistics available that prove seat belts are safer on school buses. He stated he did not want to dissuade the Board, but would hope that the message is to do what is best for students.

Upon inquiry from Mrs. Webb, Mr. Gerald Caine, Director of Operations, reported that the only delay on implementing "bus call" has to do with the cellular or the local telephone providers who want to be sure there will be enough subscribers to make it profitable for them.

2. TITLE I PRESENTATION

Mrs. Annette McArthur, Director of Elementary Education, provided handouts with information about Title I and its related activities. Title I is under Curriculum and Instruction and is not only an elementary program, but encompasses pre-school children, K-12, adult literacy, reaching dropouts, and ESE students. Title I was originally implemented by federal legislation in 1965, and was called Chapter I in the past. Every five years it is re-authorized and it was re-authorized in 1994 under the Approving America's Schools Act, with the purpose to help disadvantaged students to meet high standards, no matter what schools they are in, no matter what kind of problems or backgrounds they have. In the past, the focus of Title I or Chapter I was just to remediate students, but now the emphasis is on helping all students meet high standards. We now have school-wide project schools, which means that for schools with high concentration of low-income students, we can serve all of the students in that school. Every child in a school-wide project school can be served and not just those that are identified as low-income students. Title I funds are divided by law into four major projects or categories. Part A is the basic allocation, and these funds are determined by the U.S. census estimate of how many low-income children are living in Escambia County. The District received $9,788,130 in the current year under Part A. The funding is $126,000 for Part B, which is the Even Start Family Literacy Program, which reaches adults as well as young children. We get these dollars through writing a competitive grant. Part C funding is for children of migrants, and in Escambia County, these are mostly Asian fisher people. Those funds are basically used for pre-school classes. Part D funding is for neglected and delinquent children, serving children who are adjudicated and who are in places like Juvenile Justice, county jail, Boys Base, Outward Bound, and Lakeview Center. The total budget for the 1997-1998 school year is $10,153,908.

Mr. Wayne Odom, Director of Title I, advised that the major expenditure in Title I is to find programs and activities in school-wide projects for 28 schools, including elementary and secondary. A Title I Pre-Kindergarten was also funded in the amount of $1,500,000 and runs in concert with the early intervention Pre-K, which is funded by state lottery dollars. There are three classes for the migrant Pre-Kindergarten program, including two at McMillan and one at Judy Andrews. We also fund, by our own local initiative, a program called FRAME (Family Research Activities Model for Early Education) which serves children through age 3 and their families in the schools with the highest concentration of poverty. This is a home visiting program, as well as a parent education program. With Title I, we fund two parent resource centers, one at Sid Nelson, and parent involvement programs. It combines a resource for parents to have instructional materials they can check out and use for their children at home, and we operate programs to educate parents to increase their capacity for student involvement. The requirement of the Statute in Title I is to increase parent capacity. Mainly through the efforts of the parent resource center, we held the Promoting Parent Power Workshop on February 28, 1998, at Washington High School, and we hope to do that annually and run it parallel with PTA Leadership Development Seminars. We also have Even Start and related family literacy programs. The District has combined the oversight administration of Even Start and Florida First Start program under one administration so that those programs can be closely coordinated, working with the various Pre-K programs, including Title I at McMillan Center, Pensacola Village, and Escambia Arms. We have neighborhood learning centers that operate at 16 sites around the District, some of which are school-based and some are based in community centers, serving 550 to 600 children a week (2 and 3 days a week) for one-on-one and small group tutorial work. The programs for neglected and delinquent children are funded separately for students in residential programs and for students who are adjudicated and assigned to a residential corrections program. We also serve, and are required to allocate money, to certain non-public students. Each year we survey every private school in the District to determine if they are interested in participating in Title I. We then do a head count of students who live in eligible Title I attendance areas and those who meet the income requirements, and in those cases, the schools are allocated the same per-student allocation that any public school would get for qualifying students. Lastly, we have a major emphasis on technology resources and programs. We have a staff member, Mr. Ed Sikes, who supports Title I schools in terms of implementing technology in the curriculum, as well as planning and delivery of in-service programs, staff development, and use of technology. This will be our third summer of operating Title I technology summer camp, which will be at Navy Point Elementary in June.

Mr. Odom advised that to request approval to operate as a school-wide project school, the school has to submit an individual school plan and meet the statutory requirements. The schools are required to submit a preliminary plan, and the final plan is submitted along with the school improvement plan.

Mrs. Morris discussed concerns as to the direction that legislation is taking. She commented that we are requesting that our schools do a preliminary plan and we are incorporating Pre-Kindergarten programs in with this and yet in legislation this year, they are planning to take Pre-Kindergarten out from public schools and put them in private agencies. Mrs. McArthur said we are hoping that does not happen. We are aware of this and are trying to do some lobbying and letter writing. Mr. May commented that many times when bills are passed, legislators do not seem to realize the impact of requiring such a quick turnaround. If this does happen, it would affect employees and this service would be lost for children. There are employees who have many years of experience and training in early childhood development, and the Legislature is proposing to turn Pre-K over to Children and Family Services, which is already overworked.

Mrs. McArthur expressed that there is longitudinal data showing that our program is effective, and children do make the progress they need to make and they are basically ready to start kindergarten when they have gone through our pre-K program.

Following brief discussion, Mr. Odom commented that in terms of high student achievement, success is also measured on how many students made gains, as well as meeting the special needs of students.

Dr. Kathy Evans, Principal, Montclair Elementary School, provided a handout and gave a brief overview on Project CHILD (Computers Helping Instruction and Learning Development), which was implemented at Montclair Elementary about three years ago. This is an instructional delivery program that focuses on full curriculum including reading, math, and language arts and uses technology with a type of self-directed learning approach to teaching the core subjects. They found out about the program at the Florida Educational Technology Conference, which several of their teachers attended; in addition, they visited some sites in Florida and went through training for teachers and administrators. They created four teams of three teachers each, called cluster teams, and Montclair is the only school doing ESE units with CHILD.

Ms. Deborah Dorough, second grade teacher at Montclair Elementary, reported that the operation of Project CHILD involves three expert teachers, including one in reading, one in language arts, and one in math. She noted she is the math teacher for her cluster team. In the classrooms, learning stations are set up, which provide hands-on activities. The children spend an hour in each of three disciplines. During that hour, the first half hour is spent in group instruction just as in a traditional classroom. The second half hour is for hands-on activities. The older children have a page for writing down what they did at each station. At the end of six weeks, they take their information "passport" home, and both they and their parents have a record of the activities in which they participated. The children are provided a list of five or six goals and they choose two that they want to accomplish during each grading period, and at the end, both teacher and student evaluate whether or not they met those goals.

Mrs. Webb commented that she particularly liked the element where the children write down (at the computer station) what they did and the skills they accomplished. She stated she would like to see that implemented in other schools, even those that do not have Project CHILD.

Dr. Evans noted that the first year of the program cost about $1,700, but they combined Title I money and Tech money, and the ESE Department paid for their component to be able to do this. She stated that attendance problems in the CHILD classroom are almost non-existent, and the children really do learn time management. She said this is a good program, which provides a choice of learning environments with very high standards for children. She said she could not say as to whether Montclair would do it again next year, and that decision will be made after evaluating personnel factors.

3. PERFORMANCE CONTRACTING PRESENTATION

Dr. David Epperson, Assistant Superintendent for Facilities Planning and Maintenance, stated that the District has been involved in upgrading air conditioning systems over the years, and that the PTA has spent a lot of money putting in window air conditioners. The District has also found that we have maintenance issues as far as how to repair and deal with the ongoing use of all

the facilities. One issue with preventative maintenance is the lack of up front dollars that would allow the District to obtain the type of full-fledged preventative maintenance programs needed. This presents a problem of resources because we do not have enough funding to provide the dollars up front to obtain an effective energy system and performance maintenance system. Performance contracting is a method allowed by the state and involves a contract for energy-related capital improvements and service agreements to be paid for by guaranteed utilities cost savings. The first advantage of performance contracting is that the District makes no initial investment up front; in addition, energy savings are guaranteed by a contractor, at least at a level to fund the project. The technical and financial risks are shifted from the District to the contractor. This is not debt. It is a municipal lease agreement. We have a conservative estimate that the District spends in excess of $5,000,000 on annual energy expenditures. Performance contracting could provide about $7,000,000 the first year to fund energy-related projects, and that would result in expected annual energy savings of $1,250,000. Mr. Ted Kirchharr, Director of Facilities Planning, emphasized that if we are currently spending $5,000,000 on the energy budget, we would spend no more than that $5,000,000. We would have an agreement with the contractor that he would provide the money up front for the District to invest in the capital projects and that investment would result in the savings that will be used to pay for those projects over the life of the agreement.

Dr. Epperson advised that projections on the PECO money coming in appear to be $3,000,000 in PECO maintenance money, and about $2,000,000 in PECO new construction; however, that money has to be spread out over all of the other needs within the District for maintenance and construction. The major work performed by contractors currently totals about $500,000 annually on contracts dealing with energy-related work. Based on that, it would take about 13 years to complete the performance contract projects that we could do in the initial year of a performance contract system. The total project would allow some 20 schools to receive new lighting and chilled water systems; 14 schools would receive chilled water replacement; 3 schools would have a total system overhaul; 6 schools would receive minor overhaul repairs, and would include a service agreement for routine preventative maintenance for the chilled water system. The energy service contractor would pay the difference between the guaranteed energy savings and the actual savings and this is a reconciliation that is done on an annual basis. If there were any disputes, it would go to arbitration if we were unable to settle.

Performance contracting is about a ten year process and the energy savings will continue. At the end of that period of time, we can choose to negotiate new contracts or end that contract completely, but the savings are accrued to the District and continue to accrue under that process. The savings result from use of more efficient equipment, and not changing the operation of the equipment. There are 22 Districts in Florida that are already under contracts and there are 17 Districts that are in various stages of entering into the contracts. The selection process involves an RFQ with written proposals to be submitted which we would evaluate, and a short list of firms would be set up. The firms would do a walk-through energy audit, which would involve giving two or three contractors one facility to evaluate, such as Washington High School, where they would conduct a preliminary audit. The three competing firms would come back to us with recommendations on such things as lighting and chiller replacement. Any contracts would be brought to the Board for approval.

Mr. Kirchharr stated that input was needed from the Board as to pursuing this project. He noted the selection process alone will take 3 or 4 months because this is a long term agreement and we want to select the contractor we feel

comfortable working with for a period of time. The new lighting and chillers in 20 schools could be taken care of in one year, and it would be the contractor's responsibility to conduct those projects. This is not considered privatization and would not affect our employees.

Mrs. Webb left the workshop at 11:04 a.m.

Upon inquiry from Mrs. Morris, Dr. Epperson advised that this process is sanctioned by the State of Florida, and there is enabling legislation that allows the Districts to enter into these types of contracts. Staff has contacted other Districts around the state and gotten feedback about their success in the program, including Seminole, Alachua, Leon, Osceola, and Broward Counties. Mr. Kirchharr said he will provide a list of the counties involved in the program.

Upon inquiry from Mr. Bailey, staff advised that after soliciting proposals under the RFQ (Request for Qualifications) selection process, there will be a committee to review those qualifications and develop a short list of probably two or three firms and proceed with the walk-through audit. One school would be chosen, merely to illustrate their method of work. The contractor selected will visit every facility and will be given certain needs to address and parameters to go by. There will be a series of regular meetings with the contractor to address and resolve any potential disputes early and try to iron them out, and the contractor will give a monthly report. Typically, the type of firms would be national companies with local offices, such as Honeywell and others.

Upon inquiry from Dr. DeWitt, Dr. Epperson stated that there are efficiencies we can gain by putting in better equipment with more energy conservation, and by putting this equipment in the buildings on such a large scale with the dollars up front, it allows us to pick up the energy savings. This would be a municipal lease agreement and we would pay them back out of those savings.

Chairman Jenkins advised that he had a form from a speaker who wished to address the Board. Mrs. Morris commented that there was not a public forum on the agenda. Following brief discussion, Chairman Jenkins said he would allow the speaker one minute. Mr. Hal Mason addressed the Board in support of this program.

Mr. May expressed appreciation to staff for coming up with the suggestions on ways to do things more effectively and efficiently in order to provide a better learning

environment for students, by providing better lighting and better climate control, which will improve student achievement. He requested that this matter be placed on the agenda for vote by the Board at the April Board meeting.

III. ADJOURNMENT

There being no further business to come before the Board, the workshop adjourned at 11:10 p.m.

Attest:

Approved: