BOARD WATCH: 1.31.2022
School Board Top Hits
New Leadership: elected at the first meeting of the year, Dr. Shonda Harris-Muhammed (6th district) is now chair and Kenya Gibson (3rd district) is now Vice Chair. Dr SHM seems very focused on governance and we are cautiously optimistic based on her running of meetings to date but only time will tell.
Last Minute Town Hall: Immediately after being elected, Dr. SHM and Rep Gibson called a Sunday evening COVID Town Hall (on MLK Jr weekend). It was an interesting meeting with many more questions than answers and we hope to have more notice in the future, but we are thankful to see Board leadership looking to get feedback from parents.
Calendar: Next year's calendar has been approved! The final approved calendar is available here and, as it turns out, the overwhelming wish of students, staff, and parents based on survey data is to stick with the most traditional of the calendar options.
Mask Mandate: With the inauguration of Governor Youngkin came a slew of Executive Orders, including EO #2, preventing School Districts from requiring students to mask. In response to this, the School Board voted 8 - 1 (Jonathan Young - 4th - was the no vote) to reaffirm RPS's mask mandate.
Lawsuit: RPS joined 6 other districts in a lawsuit attempting to block Governor Youngkin's Executive Order making masking optional. This decision was made at an emergency meeting on January 23. The majority of the meeting was in closed session, as the details of the lawsuit are confidential, but the Board voted 5 - 3 - 1 to join the lawsuit (White, Gibson, Young were the no votes; Dr. Harris-Muhammed abstained).
Meeting Recaps
Not enough info in the highlights above? We tweet every School Board meeting and here are the threads if you want all the deets:
School Board Meeting - Jan 10, 2022
COVID Town Hall - Jan 16, 2022
School Board Meeting - Jan 18, 2022
School Board Emergency Meeting - Jan 23, 2022
KidsFirst RPS Update
We're making some changes to our engagement strategy this year:
First, instead writing a BoardWatch issue after each board meeting, we'll be doing a summary issue at the end of each month
Second, as you may have seen from our two most recent emails, we're planning on, as opportunities for engagement and advocacy arise, sending out updates on ways to join in the advocacy.
Finally, we need help! Putting BoardWatch together, tweeting School Board meetings, creating the Scorecard, and finding ways to advocate are all time consuming endeavors for our (small) group of dedicated volunteers. If you're interested in helping out with any of these tasks, send an email to KidsFirstRPS@gmail.com and we'll be in touch!
