One year into a 5-year strategic plan, the Hernando County School Board heard about the progress made in two areas of priority.
A presentation at the Oct. 22 workshop in front of the School Board focused on the second and third priorities in the 2023-28 plan, covering talent management as well as a safe and healthy learning environment. Overall, the numbers are moving in the right direction.
The goal of Priority 2: Talent Management is to “Create a culture that attracts, develops and retains quality employees passionate about supporting student success.”
The presentation was broken down into three strategies for achieving that goal and the first essentially comes down to increasing employment opportunities. One measure was to increase the number of Associate Teachers Substitutes (ATS), which rose from 34 in 2023-24 to 56 in the current school year. The amount of vacancies for the first day of school and the beginning of the second semester has also shrunk from 99 to 59.
The idea of the ATS program is to turn substitute teachers with associate degrees into full-time teachers with bachelor’s degrees.
“We’ve worked very hard to keep this program going. It’s been very successful in reducing our classroom vacancies,” Matt Goldrick, the district’s director of human resources, said. “Putting instead of just an average daily substitute in those classrooms, someone that has the goal of earning their bachelor’s degree and becoming a fully certified teacher that will be with us hopefully for the next 20-30 years.”
Another strategy was to provide an opportunity for continued professional growth. There has been a rise in participation in apprenticeship programs, from 40 last school year to 64 this year.
The district has decreased the number of teachers identified as out of the field for ESOL and gifted. There were 31 teachers flagged for ESOL, down from 38. For gifted, six teachers were flagged, which is actually up from two in 2023-24.
According to an employee survey, 78 percent believe district training is helping them do their job, a rise from 73 percent last year, while 81 percent said PD (professional development) exists at their site to help with their jobs, up from 79 percent.
Also, the district was able to retain 24 out of 27 teachers who were on temporary certificates. Goldrick pointed to the Board’s lobbying the state to change the temporary certificates to go from three years to five.
“I think that was very useful to us and helpful to retaining those temporary certified teachers,” Goldrick said.
The percentage of new teachers retained stayed virtually the same, with 141 out of 185 (76 percent) compared to 156 out of 202 (77 percent).
Priority 3 looked to enhance and strengthen a safe and healthy learning environment, and the first strategy examined food and nutrition. There have been increases across the board in students participating in the National School Lunch Program and a considerable rise in participation in the Seamless Summer program by increasing the number of mobile feeding sites.
“I think a lot of that is based on the marketing and their commitment to providing those high quality, visually appealing meals at the cafeteria,” Lisa Crawley, executive director of student support programs, said.
As far as safety, there was an emphasis on preparing staff and students to respond to critical incidents. That includes drills, training, conducting an Annual Safety Summit and monthly meetings with principals and assistant principals. A parent survey said 90 percent agree or strongly agree that their child is safe at school. That question will be added to the 2025 student and staff surveys in order to receive more data.
Students referred to the pre-expulsion process due to drug offenses have reduced from 72 in 2022-2023 to 51 in the 2023-2024 school year. Using millage funds, the district has assigned a social worker to each school in an effort to improve mental health support and increased the number of substance use/abuse counseling personnel to six.
“It’s a multi-tiered approach that we have to take in order to combat this,” Crawley said. “We’re really excited about that.”
More students are participating in tobacco/drug awareness training, from 253 to 329, but parents in the program went down from 237 to 196 (comparing the ’22-’23 school year to ’23-’24). There is a plan to offer online classes for parents.
There was a slight decline in the number of students with 90 percent or better average daily attendance, going from 62.7 percent to 59 percent (comparing the ’22-’23 school year to ’23-’24). Part of the effort in addressing this issue has been a social media marketing campaign promoting the importance of good attendance.
The district did, however, maintain 80 percent compliance with Youth Mental Health First Aid certification, with 88 percent of staff trained. When it comes to mental health, the district is making extra efforts to monitor early warning data.
In transportation, the number of at-fault accidents was reduced from 35 to 31 and on-time arrivals increased from 82 percent to 88 percent (comparing the ’22-’23 school year to ’23-’24). “That’s still 12 percent of our busses not getting to school on time and as you heard last year from many schools, that was definitely an issue,” Crawley said. “We have a new bell schedule for this year so we’re really excited to see what that data is going to look like next year.”
Finally, in improving campus cleanliness, the district is attempting to increase the number of Environmental Service Technicians in training. Some schools are also using an app called Crowd Comfort to track inspections.
