Former Student reflects on past School Board Member Patience Nave

Posted on August 2nd, 2016 by

Former Student reflects on past School Board Member Patience Nave

385954_542184682493494_192941749_nPlease read this outstanding commentary by Cortney Stewart about a wonderful lady, former Citrus County School Board Member, the Honorable Patience Nave.  I had the great pleasure of having a private lunch with Ms. Nave as a young first time candidate in early 2010.  Ms. Nave was one of two former Board Members that graced me with some of their knowledge.  Ms. Nave was a great inspiration and I will never forget one of the best pieces of advice that she shared with me.  Ms. Nave said, “there will be days when you get frustrated, you will feel like some people are not listening and you will be discouraged.  That is the most important time to be with students.  Go over to any school and walk through the door and just hang out.  Being around the kids will bring everything back into prospective and give you the strength to continue.”  That very advice I have used over and over since being in office and I am indebted to Ms. Nave. God bless her family as they temporarily say goodbye.  But Ms. Nave would share with us that it is only temporary.

Excerpt from the Citrus Chronicle’s story, ‘Saying goodbye to a hero‘ by Cortney Stewart

I said goodbye to one of my heroes this week.

On Thursday, July 28, 2016, former Citrus County School Board member Patience Nave took her final breath in this world and her first in eternity. She died in Richmond, Kentucky, surrounded by her three daughters.

A saint is finally home. 

From 1996 to 2004, Patience served the students and the educators of Citrus County with fervor and passion. You could disagree with some of her politics, and many people did, but you couldn’t disagree with the intensity with which she fought for the students of our community to have the very best education that could be offered them. 

It was in that sphere that I met Patience. I was 14. She was 68. I was a freshman in high school. She was a retired educator in her second career. 

At the time I was a newbie on the staff of the Lecanto High School newspaper, trying to make my mark as a journalist. So I decided to cover the real news happening in the world and not what was considered news at the school itself — like the student outcry for more pizza options at lunch and different dress code regulations. 

Please follow this link to read the complete story: http://goo.gl/m5Fz4t

 

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Millage & TRIM

Posted on July 28th, 2016 by

Millage & TRIM

July 26, 2016 Board Workshop Presentation

At our July 26, 2016, School Board Public Hearing Meeting, the School Board adopted the tentative budget and millage rate for the 2016-2017 year as required by law.  The district’s tentative budget comes in at $208,304,509. The board approved a required local effort rate of 4.677 mills set by the Florida Department of Education and the Florida Legislature, which would raise $40,741,612. That is a decrease from the 2015 rate of 4.9410 mills. The board approved a discretionary rate of .7480 mill, unchanged from last year, which would raise $6,515,870. Its capital outlay rate was set at 1.500, unchanged from last year, which would raise $13,066,585.  Total millage rate approved 6.925 mills, which would levy a total local school taxes of $62,837,570, which is estimated to be $413,635 less in local school taxes compared to last year.

Following the public Hearing the school board had a Workshop that included a presentation by Tammy Wilson, Director of Finance on ‘Millage and TRIM’ to share with the public information on what millage rates and TRIM notices are.  I wanted to share this valuable presentation.

Click Here to Download Presentation or view below

[slideshow_deploy id=’7970′]

Historical Millage & Local School Taxes Levied

Total School Millage compared to Total School Taxes

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Youth job fair and expo slated for Tuesday

Posted on July 21st, 2016 by

Youth job fair and expo slated for Tuesday

Untitled-2Citrus Chronicle Shares

High school graduates who do not yet know what they’re going to do once summer fades are invited to get some answers at the inaugural Citrus County Youth Career Expo and Job Fair, Tuesday, July 26th, 2016 9:00 AM – 1:00 PM.

The career expo and job fair is exclusively for ages 18 to 24. It will be from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Tuesday at the College of Central Florida’s Citrus campus, 3800 County Road 491 in Lecanto. There is no charge to attend.

Sponsored by CareerSource Citrus Levy Marion and its youth services provider, Eckerd Workforce Development, the career expo and job fair connects older youth and young adults with local employers with jobs to fill, education partners and employment specialists.

“Summer doesn’t last forever. When it ends, many but not all who recently graduated from high school move on to other things, whether it’s college or getting a job,” said Frank Calascione, CareerSource CLM’s business development manager for Citrus County. “But not everyone is interested in, or able to, go straight to college after high school.”

Participants will receive the following benefits:

  • Ability to meet with employers with jobs and internships for high school graduates up to age 24.
  • Availability of opportunities for short-term training and/or training in targeted occupations at the College of Central Florida, Withlacoochee Technical College and others. Financial assistance is available to eligible students.
  • Work readiness training that focuses on resume preparation, interview skills, soft skills and more.

Calascione said that all interested participants will be able to schedule a subsequent meeting to be matched with their own personal career coach.

While participation isn’t limited to those from the Class of 2016, Calascione emphasized that the cut-off to attend is age 24. In addition, he said proper attire is required. Anyone wearing flip-flops/casual sandals, T-shirts, shorts, jeans with holes or rips and/or anything too revealing will not be admitted.

Call 352-249-3278 or 800-434-JOBS.

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Lies, damned lies, and statistics

Posted on July 6th, 2016 by

Lies, damned lies, and statistics

House_ReportRecently the School District Fix Capital Outlay Funding report by the House Education Appropriations subcommittee has been making its rounds on social media. This questionable report has undoubtedly been shared in hopes of proving that the Citrus School Board has not been a good steward of taxpayers’ money.  This report being shared is highly suspect and many news reports questioned its credibility. (see http://www.tampabay.com/news/education/k12/incoming-speaker-corcoran-says-bill-that-would-benefit-his-wifes-charter/2271194 and http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article59914131.html).

In February I blogged about this very subject post and how misleading this report was: (https://thomastalks.org/2016/02/06/rep-fresen-battles-with-superintendents-over-construction-costs-then-files-bill/)

To recap:  the School District Fix Capital Outlay Funding report’s purpose was to show that schools did not use their capital dollars responsibly.  It reported that Citrus spent $249,652 per student station. That would be true IF you divided the $5 million whole school renovation project by 18 student stations.  However, the project encompassed more than 18 student stations.  It also included a new media center, a new cafeteria, a new multipurpose room, a new stage, a new covered play area, and other related areas all sized to meet the needs of the entire school. Rep. Fresen said that because the state requires that student station costs not exceed $18,000 per student, Citrus was an example of exceeding the student station limit.  However, had just the area of the student station cost been in the report, and not the additional items mentioned, the actual cost would have been well under the $18,000 per student station cost. Furthermore, the project received prior approval from the Florida Department of Education.

What made this report even more suspect was that the authors, Rep. Fresen and Rep. Corcoran, have a clear ethic concern as this report was published to make a case to provide more capital funding to Charter schools of which both of these Representatives have personal strong business connections. (see http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article59914131.html and http://www.tampabay.com/news/education/k12/incoming-speaker-corcoran-says-bill-that-would-benefit-his-wifes-charter/2271194)

If that wasn’t enough, as a result of this report the Florida House– on the last day of session– approved the controversial “train bill” HB 7029 which added new sanctions to school districts that violated projects over the set per student station cap.  This educational bill included forced local opened enrollment for out of county students and a new state law that allows students to opt out of   standing for the Pledge of Allegiance.  I personally do not agree with this new law or much of anything else found in the approved HB 7029. (see http://www.dailycommercial.com/news/article_3b185194-a5b4-5a9b-a231-647f1ba2bd73.html and Overview of HB 7029 Relating to Education , DOE Memo with Summary of Key HB 7029 Provisions , FHSAA Analysis of HB 7029 Provisions on Athletics)

Please learn the facts!

I would encourage you to study these links below on this School Capital Outlay Report Report: (below are linkable)

FADSS FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
FADSS Response to Capital Outlay Report, 2/1/16

Related news articles:

Schools superintendents rebut Florida legislators’ claim of wasteful construction spending , Miami Herald, 2/3/16

Local Florida districts offer specifics to counter lawmaker school construction cost claims , Gradebook, Tampa Bay Times, 2/2/16

Florida superintendents strike back against lawmakers’ claims on construction costs , Tampa Bay Times, 2/1/16

District Capital Outlay letters:

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Chronicle: District continue sustained excellence

Posted on June 24th, 2016 by

35299-14Chronicle Proclaims: “District continue sustained excellence”

“We applaud the student achievement and recognize we are fortunate to have leaders in place who place a high value on education and fiscal conservatism.”

Thank you to the Citrus County Chronicle for their Editorial Board’s column in Friday, June 24th, 2016 edition, “District continue sustained excellence”.  In their editorial they praise the Citrus School District, “These types of performances do not happen by accident. District and school leaders set a high bar for staff and students and are never satisfied with status quo achievement. The entire district is focused on continuously improving, seeking the improbable, if not impossible: perfection.”  They go on to say, “District leaders not only stress high achievement, they do it why practicing fiscally conservative policy. They rarely take on high debt service and thus the dollars they do have available are spent on the true needs of educating students.”

I am grateful to be part of a group of education and policy leaders that put students first, and whose results lead to a better community for today and tomorrow.

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Well Done Citrus

Posted on June 21st, 2016 by

Well Done Citrus

These successful results do not happen by accident.

Scores-SPRING-2016-Press-Release-6_13_16-1

Last week the Florida Department of Education released the Spring 2016 Statewide English Language Arts, Math, Science and End-of-Course Test Results.  Once again Citrus County students outperformed the state in all subject areas!

These are most encouraging results and I am so proud of our students’ results, and our teachers, staff and administrators, who worked so hard to prepare and encourage our students to be successful. These successful results do not happen by accident.

Most noteworthy were the proficiency ratings in 5th grade Science where Citrus County scored 11% higher than the state and ranked 5th out of 67 counties, in 3rd-8th grade Mathematics where Citrus County scored 8% higher than the state, and in Algebra 1 where Citrus County scored 7% higher than the state.

Many Citrus schools made significant gains over last year which contributed to the district’s overall achievements.

  • Floral City Elementary School’s 4th grade ELA scores improved 29%
  • Forest Ridge Elementary School’s 4th grade Math scores improved 15%
  • Crystal River High School’s Algebra 1 scores improved 20%
  • Lecanto High School’s Algebra 2 scores improved 19%
  • Inverness Middle School’s Civics scores improved 19%
  • Crystal River Middle School’s 8th grade Science scores improved 14%
  • Crystal River Primary School’s 5th grade Science scores improved 24%.

Florida Commissioner of Education, Pam Stewart, applauded Citrus County for their continued success and in particular for improvements in Algebra 2, Civics, and Algebra 1.

  • Increased seven percentage points in both Algebra 2 and Civics.
  • Improved by six percentage points for students younger than high school age in Algebra 1, with 91 percent of students scoring Level 3 or higher.
  • Increased five percentage points for high school students in Algebra 1.

For a detailed report on state results visit: http://fldoe.org/accountability/assessments/k-12-student-assessment/results/2016.stml

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