Picture this: You’re normally just going to your first period class after homeroom. You walk through the doors of Julia Landon. You go to class, see your teachers, and use the materials provided by your school. But have you ever wondered who decides what happens behind those doors? Like those action movies where there’s one evil mastermind group behind everything… Well, the Duval County School Board is your answer. Now, don’t get me wrong: the Duval School Board is not an evil mastermind group, but they do have to make important financial decisions. Any one of these decisions, no matter how big or small, can affect Julia Landon as a whole. School funding is one of those decisions that has a big impact on students and teachers at our school. So… Are you ready to find out what happens behind the scenes at your school? Let’s dive in!
 
To start things off, as you read above, the Duval County Board can make big decisions that can impact many schools, including ours. But what else does the Duval County School Board actually do? Well, as I said before, it makes very important decisions for public schools throughout the county. One of its biggest responsibilities is deciding how the district’s money will be used. The budget helps provide money for things like teachers and staff, academic materials for students to use, school safety items, and more. For the 2026 to 2027 school year, the district’s budget included funding for academic achievement, school safety (which now every middle school has a walk-through weapons detection system), teacher recruitment, and instructional materials. These decisions can determine how much funding each school needs and how much is available for each school. These decisions can affect all schools throughout Duval County, which means that they can eventually affect students and teachers at the schools that this school board serves. Overall, the school board makes decisions about money and helps determine what schools in Duval County can provide for their students and teachers.
 
To continue, if the School Board actually makes a decision, how can the decision affect our school, Julia Landon?  As I’ve already said before, Julia Landon Middle School is part of the Duval County Public School District, so decisions about district funding can affect our school.  The decision can help pay for more teachers, academic programs, school resources, and other things we use, or the exact opposite depending on what the decision is. If the district changes how money is spent, our school may have different amounts of funding for our needs. The Julia Landon School Advisory Council also discusses the school budget, school improvement, academic programs, and staffing. This shows that money is an important part of planning for our school. Funding decisions can also affect resources available to our teachers and our students. They can also affect which programs and improvements our school is able to support. Because of this, decisions about district funding can have a real effect on what students and teachers experience at our school. So, to summarize, if this school board makes a decision about money, our school could be affected in ways that can increase or decrease the experience.
 
Finally, you might be wondering, “Well, have there been any decisions that have actually affected our school?” Well, there was a very recent decision that did affect Julia Landon (don’t worry, it was in a positive way!) and other schools in Duval County. The School Board made a decision to put a 1-mill property-tax measure on the ballot that will be happening on November 3^rd, 2026. If you didn’t know, a mill is a way of collecting property taxes, and the money earned from this will be used for Duval County schools. The district was also asking voters whether they wanted to continue doing this for the next four years. This money will be used to pay for teachers, security, and other staff. It will also support academic programs, art programs, athletics, and other student activities. Now all of this is all for the whole district, but you might be wondering, “How does our school play a part in this?” Well, our school has recently shared information about the 1-mill within the school community because the funding has already helped support teachers and students. This means that the decision could also fund some of our students’ activities at Landon. The voters will make their final decisions, showing how a small decision about money can connect to what happens in Landon and the 197 schools in the district. This is an example of “Small things, big effect!”
 
To conclude, the Duval County School Board makes decisions about money and other things that can affect how many schools operate in our district. Our school (Landon) can be affected positively or negatively depending on the decision made by the School Board, and Landon has already been affected (and will be affected) positively because of the recent School Board decision that includes putting a 1-mill property-tax measure on ballots for the November election. Although we won’t be able to control these decisions, we can understand them to help make our school better and help each other!

Sources:
Duval County Public Schools – “What You Need to Know About the 2026-27 Budget”.
Duval County Public Schools- “School Board of Duval County Resolution 2026-14″.
Julia Landon, College Preparatory Middle School – Official School Website.
Duval County Public Schools – Official Website.