VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — Monday is the first day back to school for students at Virginia Beach City Public Schools and it will be the first time Dr. Donald Robertson will start the school year off as the division's superintendent.
"We had a really good school year last year and I'm looking forward to a really good school year this year," Robertson said.
Robertson served as interim superintendent last year and was hired for the official role back in January.
Watch: Virginia Beach City Public Schools holds orientation for new teachers
"As we enter a new school year there are always adjustments that are made," Robertson said. "At elementary and middle school we have the introduction of the Virginia Literacy Act, we've been spending probably the last seven months getting ready for the implementation of the Virginia Literacy Act."
The bill which passed in 2022 is aimed at improving literacy outcomes for Virginia's learners.
Robertson said when it comes to classrooms as of Monday the school division had 29 teacher vacancies out or roughly 5,000 teachers.
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"Last year we started our first day with 44 vacancies, a year before that it was 49," Robertson said.
He said in those 29 classrooms if there's not a qualified teacher sitting on day one it will be a sepcialist or a long term substitute teacher.
As the school year starts the Virginia Department of Education is also working to finalize its guidelines for cell phones in schools.
Virginia Beach already has its policy in place and that will not change come Monday.
For elementary students cell phones are mostly prohibited and middle school students are asked to leave them in their lockers during the day.
Watch: Cell phone policy, gifted education among topics at Virginia Beach Schools retreat
"At high school, students can have a cell phone," Robertson said. "They cannot access those cell phones during instructional time but they can use their phone during class change, they can use their phone during lunch and the time from when they arrive in the morning until the first bell starts."
While the school division waits for the final guidelines on September 16, there are concerns about how that policy differs from the school division's current policy.
For example, the drafted guidelines for high schools do not allow students to use phones during the school day.
Watch: Virginia Beach schools to reduce number of assistant principals in upcoming budget
"One thing is clear, whatever the guidelines are that come out from the state we're going to follow those guidelines what's unclear at this point is how we prepare our community for our new guidelines," Robertson said. "Right now there are some differences at the high school level that concern us because our kids are used to and have been using to for years what we do now."
The school division is telling teachers to stay the course when it comes to enforcement of the current policy.
In October and early November Robertson said the school division will speak with families on what those potential changes look like.
Over the summer the school division has also made progress on increasing training for student-athletes and coaches following a Kempsville High School baseball player being a victim of racism.
"There's no place for that," Robertson said when asked his reaction to what happened last spring.
The varsity baseball team forfeited its season last year after a black student said he was called racial slurs including the n-word.
Watch: Kempsville High School brings on new baseball head coach following racism on team
The school division's investigation confirmed these issues had been going on for years.
"If you wanna participate in extracurricular activities there's an expectation around how we treat each other that is no negotiable," Robertson said.
At the end of the school year and into the summer coaches had increased training including being required to take a two-hour course.
"What we've done is expanded that training to cover some of the areas that we uncovered over the last year and some of the things we found that ensure our coaches understand what the expectations are," Robertson said.
Coaches must also discuss with student-athletes their team expectations throughout the season.
A video presentation will also be given to families at each school sports pre-season meeting throughout the year.
"There will be a special part of that meeting where we show them the video that we created with our students around our Epic program which addresses our plan to help them understand what is expected," Robertson said.
