Priorities
Empowering teachers and staff
Higher pay and improved benefits
Consistent (COLA) raises
Provide paid family/parental leave
Improved and more affordable healthcare benefits, such as employee-only pharmacies
Better retirement plan matching
Small caseloads for instructional aids
As well as higher pay for these roles due to their difficulty and high turnover potential
Increased pay for planning period coverage
High school course loads should be limited to no more than two preps (unless a teacher desires more), with extra pay for additional preps above the limit of two.
Teacher Impact Statements for all new county policies and initiatives
This should be a collaborative process between teachers, staff, admin and central office
Current policies should be evaluated and removed if they can't prove that they actually impact student outcomes.
Steadier policy implementation with less whiplash and less centralization.
Instead of asking our teachers to conform to the demands of extremist agendas, school boards should empower our teachers to do what they do best: teach.
improving academic outcomes
Smaller classroom sizes (either by having fewer students per teacher or an instructional aid in each classroom) is the second strongest predictor of student success outside of parental income and education.
Work to ensure that every student in Henrico County has the opportunity to succeed, regardless of their background or circumstances. This means having a support staff in every classroom where the class-size is greater than 20 students.
Positive parental involvement can be vital to the success of our students. Encouraging parents to reach out to teachers to see how they can assist will benefit everyone.
When our schools are run well, we are clearing the way for students to succeed.
student mental and physical health
Hire more mental health professionals in school. Nurture a culture of support from kindergarten through high school graduation.
Students deserve a safe environment where they can learn and thrive; they have the freedom to walk the halls without fear or threat of violence.
Completely overhaul all school building ventilation systems that are not up to the top quality specifications for clean air turnover
Poor air quality is associated with lower student performance
High air turnover is associated with reducing communicable diseases
Parents should be invited into schools as volunteers to provide positive adult relationships for our students and be hallway monitors, lunch room monitors, bus loop aides and provide teachers with a break to go to the bathroom.
Provide paid mental health support training to teachers.
Research the feasibility of a district wide free breakfast and lunch program, for all students. It removes the stigma of some students having to pay and others not (this was the case during the pandemic and funding was discontinued).
Improve the quality of school food. Assist HCPS Nutrition in choosing food vendor partners that offer variety and balance.
Brigaid would be an excellent resource to do this (they already work with many districts)
Partner with grocery stores and restaurants to donate excess food to the schools (this would be a big tax write off for them and the county board could offer further tax incentives to accomplish this).
Have food pantries available on the weekends for families. This would help foster a sense of the schools as the center of communities.
Remove vending machines from schools and cancel contracts with vendors. The food is unhealthy and a waste of school district resources.
Our LGBTQ+ students deserve to feel loved, valued and respected, and school board members are duty-bound to ensure every student’s safety, regardless of their identity.
Promoting transparency and accountability
The School Board needs to be open, accountable and responsive to the needs of teachers, staff, students and parents.
It is essential that our school boards work with the community, engage with experts and hear from teachers, students, parents and other stakeholders about the best way to use funding to support our public schools.
We need to learn from the pandemic and ensure we are being proactive, rather than reactive, moving forward.
School boards should be supporting our teachers, providing them with the resources they need to be successful, and pushing back against divisive rhetoric that seeks to pit communities against its own educators.