 Well, good afternoon and thank you everyone for being here today. Last week we concluded the interview for the next Secretary of Education and I'm pleased to introduce Dan French as our finalist. Dan started his career in education as a high school social studies teacher, moved to K through 12 principal, and then superintendent in Canaan, Vermont. After living and working in the Northeast Kingdom for 15 years, he moved south to serve as a superintendent of the Bennington-Rotland Supervisory Union from 2007 to 2016. In 2009, Dan was named Vermont Superintendent of the Year and served as president of the Vermont Superintendent's Association from 2010 to 2012. Since 2016, he has been the coordinator of the school leadership graduate program at St. Michael's College where he taught graduate courses in leadership, the legal and financial management of schools, and using data to improve schools. He's the right person with the right experience at the right time, and I want to thank Krista Hewling and the State Board of Education for their diligence and urgency in sending me three highly qualified candidates. We're fortunate to have someone with his expertise in this critically important post because this is a pivotal moment in the history of public education in Vermont. We spend about $1.7 billion every year funding education. It's the single largest investment and expenditure we make as a state, and the fact is, like many other areas, the education system is being weakened by our challenging and changing demographics in an increasingly inefficient system that's diverting budget dollars away from the kids. As most Vermonters know, the K-12 system was built to educate more than 100,000 kids. Today we're educating fewer than 80,000, that's 27,000 fewer than 20 years ago, and the declines continue at a rate of about three students per day. Our student to staff ratio is decreased from about six kids for every one employee to about four to one. Even since Act 46 of 2015, which streamlines school governance costs grew by more than $60 million, while the number of students has continued to decrease by about 2,000. These trends have contributed significantly to the affordability crisis we face as a state and many families face as well. They have caused inequality between districts and inefficiencies that divert millions of dollars away from our kids. To be very clear, my focus is not on cutting spending. Everything we have done and everything we will do in this area is all about spending money far better than we do today, so we can do more for our kids and make our education system the very best in the country. Think of it this way, we are now spending more than $1.7 billion to educate fewer students. According to the National Education Association, we have the largest per student investment in the country, spending twice the national average. And while we have a good graduation rate, our student test scores are only two percentage points higher than the national average. Unfortunately, despite the spending, we are not making substantial gains in improving outcomes for disadvantaged students, and only about half of our high school graduates go on to receive a technical or trade credential or earn a college degree. Outcomes in funding from school to school also remain unequal. We have some offering a wide range of foreign languages, environmental studies, planning-edge science, technology and engineering programs, and we have other schools that can't offer any of these opportunities. The fact is, it's time to have the courage to admit we can achieve better outcomes for kids and attract more families, and that is why I am appointing Dan to be our very next Secretary of Education. Dan sees the opportunity and the necessity to transform our system from good to great, and he has the expertise to work with districts and local education leaders to re-center the entire system's focus on expanding opportunities and improving outcomes within available resources and at a cost we can afford. Finally, I want to thank Acting Secretary Heather Boucher for her leadership and all the staff at the Agency of Education for their hard work through this transition. Over the last four months, Heather has been a valuable and relentlessly positive member of my cabinet and has worked closely with the staff to manage the day-to-day operations at the Agency without interruption. We are so very fortunate to have had Heather at the Agency of Education for during this transition and will continue into the future. With that, I would like to turn it over to our new Secretary of Education, Dan French. I want to thank Governor Scott for the opportunity to serve as Remind's next Secretary of Education. Although we have challenges in our education system, we are fortunate to have significant talent and capacity for innovation at all levels. Because of this capacity, I'm optimistic about our future. Many of our challenges in education could be seen as systems or organizational challenges. Act 46 has been very successful in moving us down a path towards right-sizing our governance structure. I believe now we must consider how we can leverage this work to transform our system into a world-class education system, a system that offers expanded learning opportunities for every Vermonner, and a system that can serve as a catalyst for the broader social and economic development of our state. I'm excited about this work and the opportunity to help modernize our education system to better meet the future needs of our students, their families, and our state. Thank you. I'd now like to invite Krista Huling, our Chair of the State Board, up, say a few words, as well as Cora, class of 2034. 2034. That's right. So we want to be a family-friendly state. Here we go, with a press conference quickly. So I just want to, this whole process has really thanked the Governor for going through it. It was our pleasure as a State Board to put forward three highly qualified candidates. I think the tough job as the Governor was picking them on the three, and he did a great job. We are very lucky in the State of Vermont to have Dan French in his experience. I'm very excited as a State Board member and Chair to have the experience going into Act 46 in his perspective and looking forward to working with him. And I hope, you know, really building, you want to touch the flag, building an education system for her and all of her classmates. So I can't wait to start that good work. Yeah. You just want to touch the flag. It's very exciting. Thank you very much. Yeah. Thank you. With that, we'd be happy to answer any questions you might have. Mr. French, how old are you and where is your brother? Almost 55 years old. I live in Manchester, Southern Vermont. Okay. 54. Yes, that's correct. Are you going to move to Vermont for zero? Yeah, I'm going to figure out a way to certainly work from the area, so, yeah. And what's your most recent professional? Recently, the coordinator of school leadership program at St. Michael's College. I've been there for two years. Prior to that, I was a superintendent for nine years in Manchester. One of the philosophical struggles you walk into here is this disagreement between the governor and a lot of lawmakers over how forceful a hand a Montpelier should have spending at the local level. Do you think that the legislature, the executive branch, should be doing more to get a handle on school spending than they've done to date? Yeah, it's a complicated issue, and as the governor said, I've been involved on the other end as a school leader at the local level for a number of years, going back to the inception of Act 60. So I've been around Act 60, Act 68, Act 130, with Union High School funding, and now with Act 46. I think, you know, through all that experience and time, we've had to struggle, you know, trying to figure out a way to control our spending. I think spending is an issue as well as figuring out how to pay for it. But I think it's something, I have some experience working with the legislature. I think I'm fairly well known to them as well. So I'm hoping we can partner to find a solution to its very complex situation, but we have to do so rather urgently because many of our ideals that we hope for outcomes for kids aren't going to be possible unless we figure out a way to make a more sustainable system. The governor, did he answer your question? The governor put forward a five-year education plan headed a number of activities. Can you say you 100% back everything in that plan? Yes, I mean, I threw the, as Krista said, through the search process. I mean, that's one of the things I had to check on. And I'm very attracted to strategic nature of the governor's plan. I think it's something I've very consistently tried to work as my local level as a school district leader is to try to evolve the system. I'm very concerned about modernizing our system, but making it more relevant for students. And I think there's a lot we can do around efficiency and particularly use of technology to make our infrastructure more responsive to the public. Do you think we should not have had any property tax rate increase this year? Well, that gets down the weeds a bit on that. You're the wheat man now. Yeah, I was, I will be on August 13th, but not back three months ago. So I think, yeah, ask me that next year and I'll tell you how it goes. I mean, this is a pretty big statewide debate. Sure. You've been following and you're taking over, so. Right. I mean, was that the way to go? Was the governor's no property taxes? Yeah, I wouldn't say taking over. I think it's important to acknowledge that we have a partnership with local decision makers on that. And that's something, what I hope to bring to the table is an understanding of school governance practices. And I think we are a local control state. Yes, the state's ultimately responsible, but we delegate a lot of authority to local decision makers and we need school boards to be effective in their governance practice. A lot of the consulting work I do with boards is around that issue. It's for them to use their policy more forcefully to measure for student outcomes on an incremental basis. So we don't wait just to the end of the year to find out how we did. And also to really work hard on superintendent evaluation to ensure the superintendents are being evaluated on those student outcomes incrementally. I think of the idea that there needs to be a higher staff to child ratio. Yeah, I think it's symptomatic of the overarching system. I think it's, you know, it's going to be a question, are we treating the symptoms versus the underlying causes? I think it's a great bellwether and it's something that should be of concern and has been a concern for the professional associations in the state for a number of years. It's something we're going to have to address. Governor, I'm sure you all tell us who the other two finalists were, but were they both from Vermont or were any of them from elsewhere? Again, you know, it's a human resources issue and we're not going to divulge any of the circumstances. There were three finalists sent to you. Three finalists. What was the total pool of the board of education in your national search? I, yeah, I believe it was a national search. Maybe Christa would be able to tell us that. What's your game plan in terms of pursuing education reform over the next year, criticized by some people in the legislature for not coming to the table on January 1st with fully formed, ready-to-go legislative proposals? What happens between now and January in terms of preparations for the next round of debate in the legislature? I'll first have to get through this little election that's going on in August and then in November. But suffice it to say, we'll try a different approach. We've tried two different approaches. They didn't work out quite as well as we had hoped. We'll continue to work on an initiative that we feel would be in keeping with our goals to grow the economy, make Vermont more affordable, as well as grow our workforce. So from all those standpoints, we'll be moving forward with a different initiative to work with the legislature because we all should have the same goals. We need to provide for an education system that is sustainable, spending that is sustainable for Vermont so that we can attract more people into Vermont and keep more businesses here as well. What did you turn to for advice or guidance as you worked through these three names and figured out who you would select? Well, again, three very highly qualified names and we're very fortunate to have the state board forward those names to us. But I look at every interview, every time that I'm looking, seeking to add a member to my team, I go through those four C's that I talk about a lot and character means a lot to me as well as competence and commitment. But chemistry is probably one of the most important and being able to work with a team of the common goal and putting the team ahead of their own egos and Dan fit all those buckets. Were there any outside people you turned to though for advice? No, I mean we worked together. Again, I believe in a team approach. So we had many cabinet members involved in this process as well. So it's what we saw with the fit that we needed for the team. How much talk was there about your approach to education reform, education finance reform? Did you ask the candidates? Yeah, we didn't get into the specifics in terms of what my goals are other than that we have a system that I believe is inefficient, that we need to transform to something, think outside the box, have the courage to think about that as well. So there was no litmus test of any sort. It was just trying to get a flavor of where their stance were and what their commitment was to the process. I would say we've had them for the last month, maybe? I've heard about two months and I was just wondering why two months? Well, two things. It's an important decision, first of all. Secondly, I need to get through the legislative session. We had a very, very, we had a very competent person as acting secretary leaving the agency as well as working with us. So at that point in time there just wasn't any rush in doing so. I'd like to ask Mr. French, I assume you'll be a key part of the team that will be developing the governor's approach for next year. What are you thinking about? How would you approach these issues around funding and quality? Well, right now I'm just looking forward to getting into the agency on August 13th and certainly reviewing their work. There's a number of priorities that emerged in the last session, particularly special ed funding, and certainly working with the state board on the statewide governance plan. So there's a couple things in motion right now that are pretty significant, but I intend to enjoy going through that organization and seeing what's going on and get ready for the legislative session. How does your experience working in local schools informed? I think it'll inform. Like I said earlier, my inclination right now is to really put some emphasis, I think, on working with school boards in particular. That's where I've done a lot of my consulting work. Act 46 has really taken a lot of energy on their part, so they're spending a lot of their local capacity just in the act of merging itself. So I think what we need to start to do is to turn that corner and say, okay, now we've merged, now what? See if we can realize new opportunities and get better organizational performance. I think that's probably based on my experience where I look forward the most to making an impact. Any ideas about new initiatives, do you think? School districts might want to look at after merging. You know, it's a little premature. I think I'll wait until I finish that assessment with the agency and get my team organized there and try to make sense of that. We received the list from the State Board for the NFA.