On April 11, the Loudoun County School Board discussed issues in school such as safety and funding at their first meeting of the month. They started by deciding to approve and accept the Superintendent’s recommendation concerning personnel actions such as hiring new staff. 

There were also changes with the Carl D. Perkins funding grant that they passed. One change suggested the addition of a Health and Medical Sciences Resource Teacher to support the development of the Ham Radio Science Citizen Investigation (HAMSCI) programming in LCPS. The other change was based on the idea that there needs to be a title and job description for the CTE Specialist focused on Technology Education as described in the budget presentation FY24. The point of these changes was to get the school board Chairman and Division Superintendent to sign the plan and approve the funding grant. Also, the school board accepted the revisions to Policy 7304, which is a Licensed Employee Transfers and Involuntary Reassignment information item. 

According to the budget, eligible LCPS employees should expect to receive a step increase based on the current FY23 salary scale. These changes will go into effect once the state finalizes its budget as long as no further reductions are necessary to finalize LCPS’ FY24 budget.

Junior TJ Desrosiers thinks that the suggestions made for the new budget would be beneficial to the school. “I think that LCPS employees deserve a step increase on their current salary,” Desrosiers said.

In addition, the board discussed that the Office of School Nutrition Programs received over $20 million of additional funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Food, and Nutrition Service and decided to use over $1 million of funding from the Virginia Department of Education to purchase unprocessed or minimally processed food for LCPS schools.

The school board then discussed plans to protect public safety from terrorist activity and cybersecurity threats. Although they discussed funding, safety, and more during the meeting, public comment was filled with questions and inquiries about those topics, and the cheering was deafening when some people spoke about the violence against girls in schools. 

The next school board meeting will be held on April 25.