September 18, 2025 School Board Meeting
Meeting Open: Chair Bethany Zecher Sutton opened the meeting, which was followed by recognition of Hispanic Heritage Month.
Consent Agenda Unanimously Adopted
• Approved new appointments at APS
• Approved appointments and changes to School Board Advisory Committees
• Approved amendments to School Board Policy on the school year calendar
Board Announcements
• School Board work sessions will be on September 30th
• The policy subcommittee will meet on October 1st
• The Committee of the Whole meeting is on October 7th
• Next School Board meeting is on October 9th
• Zuraya Tapia-Hadley announced that Barrett Elementary School was celebrating its 100-year anniversary
Superintendent’s Announcements and Updates
• Dr. Durán gave an update on the appeal of the dismissal of APS’ lawsuit regarding transgender bathroom facility usage
• Every Student Counts video focused on an APS program allowing teachers to research education topics of interest
• APS has created new lessons on bullying prevention in response to the Your Voice Matters survey and community conversations
• APS is launching a Device Work Group to hear from staff and the community. Staff will present the findings in March 2026
• Back-to-School Packets should be completed by October 13th
• Calendar reminder of upcoming holidays
October 2 – No school (Yom Kippur)
October 10 – Early release for Elementary School and Middle School
October 13 – No school
October 20 – No School (Diwali)
October 29 – Early release
• APS Bright Spot: Four APS teachers were selected to attend the 2025 STEM Teacher Leadership Academy with the Air Force Office of Scientific Research
• Miranda Turner encouraged parents to provide feedback on student device usage to the School Board even if they cannot participate in the Device Work Group
• Kathleen Clark encouraged participation of parents of Students with Disabilities in the Device Work Group
Public Comment
An Arlington parent spoke in opposition to the transfer of a Kindergarten teacher from Oakridge Elementary School.
The Virginia director of the US Academic Decathlon spoke in favor of the US Academic Decathlon and APS’ support of it.
An APS elementary school band teacher spoke in opposition to how the APS school calendar has too many weeks without 5 days of school.
An Arlington parent (and spouse of an APS middle school teacher) advocated for APS to focus more on security policies and procedures.
An APS middle school teacher spoke (i) in favor of Yonder pouches and the success he has seen with them and (ii) about concerns with the HR audit.
Monitoring Item – Academic Data Update
Chief Academic Officer Dr. Gerald Mann gave the presentation regarding various academic results, such as Standards of Learning tests, NWEA-MAP academic screeners, AP classes, Career & Technical Education (CTE) completion, English Language proficiency, chronic absenteeism, etc.
Looking at Non-Economically Disadvantaged, Non-English Learners and Non-Students with Disabilities by subgroups, likely all racial subgroups have failed to reach their pre-COVID achievement numbers on SOLs, which cut score lowering was not reflected in the data presented.
On NWEA MAP screener:
For English Language Arts, APS had:
24 schools with High Growth, 22 of which hadHigh Achievement
5 schools with Low Growth and Low Achievement
For Math, APS had:
4 schools with High Growth, 3 of which had High Achievement
6 schools with Low Growth and Low Achievement
APS’ chronic absenteeism rate of 12.1% is below the state average of 14.8%, but still significantly above APS’ pre-COVID rate of 7.3%.
APS plans to:
Convene district-level consultation team meetings
Conduct detailed analysis of student performance data
Monitor and support the implementation of school-based interventions and use of district-provided resources
Provide ongoing feedback loops and progress checks
• Chair Zecher Sutton commented on how academic progress will be reported quarterly to the School Board too.
• Mary Kadera requested more granular graduation rate data and more data on economically disadvantaged students. Ms. Kadera asked how the Office of Academics understands the efficacy of different types of school supports. Dr. Mann said they are looking at everything they can to see if their methods are working.
• Ms. Kadera also asked about the High Achievement, Low Growth schools. Ms. Turner also asked how Growth is measured. Ms. Turner explained how each student gets a growth projection and growth is measured based on whether the student meets that projection. Ms. Kadera talked about for determining the Growth rate for a school, it is based on the percentage of students who met or exceed their projected growth rate.
• Ms. Turner thanked APS for their more detailed academic data in this presentation. She then asked what items that APS wants to see in a School Action Plan and how those items are monitored by the Office of Academics. She also commented about how many kids have not fully recovered academically since COVID and APS has limited time left with them in our school system. Dr. Mann discussed the various data points that the Office of Academics reviews. Ms. Turner followed up about “dose response” and what was moving the needle – instructional time, homework, etc. Dr. Mann said they’re digging into the details to identify what has been working.
• Ms. Clark asked about Students with Disabilities (SWDs), considering that there wasn’t a big change in the performance of SWDs, and whether APS has a good understanding as to the effectiveness of pull outs and push ins, and other data regarding SWDs. She also asked about how APS could provide better data to their parents for assisting those students at home. Dr. Mann said he would work on getting that data.
• Zuraya Tapia-Hadley asked whether APS teaches executive function and study skills with Middle School and High Schools students to build essential study habits. Dr. Mann said APS does not offer a class on it, but those skills are emphasized in those classes. He also said he would investigate the issue further. Ms. Tapia-Hadley asked about native language SOL assessments. Dr. Durán thanked State Senator Barbara Favola for proposing a bill on this issue atthe last legislative session, but it did not pass. Ms. Tapia-Hadley asked about possibly surveying families of English Learner students who did not meet the Growth targets.
• Ms. Zecher-Sutton asked about how APS students are performing on NWEA MAP vs. students nationally. APS students are performing high nationally on average (but the data presented does not compare Growth vs. students nationally). She also asked about chronic absenteeism and its effect on academic performance. Dr. Durán went through the stark academic data for students who are chronically absent.
• Ms. Clark asked whether more resources need to be devoted to schools with higher chronic absenteeism. Dr. Julie Crawford, Chief of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, talked about the various support staff at schools involved in combatting chronic absenteeism.
• Ms. Kadera asked why reading achievement on the SOL is lower now vs. 10+ years ago, and the relatively flat performance on the reading SOL over the past 3 years, especially considering the large reading curriculum changes at APS. Dr. Mann explained that SOL exams have changed in the past 10+ years. And Dr. Mann talked about how the NWEA MAP data shows we have High Growth at 22 schools. He said they are looking at why that is not being reflected in the SOL results in the past 3 years. Ms. Kadera also emphasized the importance of parents reading with their children, and said that screen time may be part of the problem over the 10+ year window.
• Ms. Kadera asked to what extent do students read for pleasure and have control in what they read. Dr. Mann said they’d follow up on that issue.
• Ms. Kadera also asked about the English Learner proficiency test and how APS had a dip in student performance at the Middle School level. An APS staffer explained how the data is dependent on the year of arrival of those students in Middle School. Ms. Kadera asked for disaggregated data for academic performance based on English Learner proficiency level.
• Ms. Turner asked about Math and what would be the equivalent to a Science of Reading framework. Ms. Turner cited the six recommendations in the U.S. Department of Education’s 2021 What Works Clearinghouse guide for struggling math learners. APS staffer Sarah Putnam talked about her opinions that students need to start with conceptual understanding and APS needs to further emphasize a Concrete-Representational-Abstract model to teach conceptual understanding. Ms. Turner asked if that is how APS has been teaching math the past several years. Ms. Putnam said we need to go back to teaching content to teachers via content academies. Both Ms. Turner and Dr. Durán talked about how word-heavy our math curriculum is and how much it disadvantages English Learners.
• Ms. Clark asked about High School schedules and potential changes. Dr. Durán said a Working Group will look at potential changes and any changes would likely be implemented in the 2026-27 school year. Ms. Tapia-Hadley asked Dr. Durán to also include Middle Schools in that analysis too, to which Dr. Durán agreed.
Action Item – 2025-26 Internal Audit Work Plan(Unanimously Approved)
Discussed as an Information Item at the prior School Board meeting
Audit Items
o 1) Consulting Contracts
o 2) Emergency Preparedness
o 3) Student Conduct
Other Audit items for consideration in the future
o Conduct a Risk Assessment (scope to be defined)
o Conduct investigations and follow-up for reports filed on the Waste, Fraud, and Abuse Line
o Audit Follow-up with Auditee Clients
Information Items
The School Board will be acting on these items at the next School Board meeting on October 9th.
1) Right of Way Agreement with Dominion Energy for The Grace Hopper Center
ROW required for the installation and maintenance of electrical infrastructure.
2) School Board FY 2027 Budget Direction
The School Board directs the Superintendent to prepare a budget to:
i. Align to the 2024-2030 Strategic Plan performance objectives and strategies;
ii. Prioritize recruiting, supporting, and retaining a high-quality and diverse workforce with a focus on compensation and benefits that are competitive within the regional market for specific roles;
iii. Restrict new funding requests to items that directly advance performance objectives; and
iv. Identify opportunities for cost savings.
The School Board further directs the Superintendent to:
i. Provide detailed rationale for any budget investments and reductions;
ii. Present the budget with greater accessibility for readers;
iii. Minimize the use of general reserve funds for operating expenses; and
iv. Provide three-year forecasts of revenues and expenditures to gauge long-term financial sustainability.
