Va. Beach School Board members clash over training video
Tempers flared during a nearly nine-hour meeting this week as the Virginia Beach School Board debated whether member Victoria Manning inappropriately obtained and shared a staff training video.
In the meeting, which started Tuesday and went into Wednesday morning, school board members Trenace Riggs, Sharon Felton and Beverly Anderson called for an investigation into whether Manning gained unauthorized access to the video by using her son’s computer and then publicly shared it. They said it put the Virginia Beach teachers in the video at risk.
“We know a board member used her child’s school-issued Chromebook to access a closed group of training for literacy coaches,” said board member Kim Melnyk. “We know that screenshots of teachers’ names, faces and personal reflections were taken and shared.”
Manning, through tears, denied the claims, saying she and her son had been slandered. She said a teacher who had concerns about the training shared it with her. As the meeting neared midnight, she said she planned to call her attorney first thing in the morning.
“The attacks against me tonight, by teachers, administrators and school board members are a prime example of why teachers won’t speak up,” she said.
Board members Laura Hughes and Carolyn Weems came to her defense, calling other board members’ actions shameful and embarrassing. Weems called it the lowest moment for the board during her 20-year tenure.
It’s unclear how exactly an investigation would proceed or who would conduct it. The board took formal no action.
Tension between Manning and other board members — and the overall dysfunction of the group — has been a long-running issue.
In the video, which spread on social media weeks ago, staff members were told “of course you are racist.” That clip — as well as Manning’s appearance on a conservative radio show — sparked a significant response on social media and at the board meeting Tuesday night, with nearly 60 speakers signing up to talk.
The video shared just a small segment of an hours-long training and was taken out of context, Superintendent Aaron Spence said Tuesday. He said he would not have chosen that video to be used for staff training if he had reviewed it, though.