Good evening everyone. Welcome. We have a long wonderful meeting ahead of us starting with performers. So, um, I'm going to read the statement of public notice to get us all started. This is a regular meeting of
the board of education of Bernard's Township. Notice of the time and place of this meeting was provided and copies of that resolution were forwarded to the official newspapers as designated by the board of education and to the township clerk and a copy of the notice was posted on bulletin board of the board of
education or offices. For those members of the public who cannot attend our meeting in person, a live stream link to the meeting is posted at www. Bernardbo.com. We very much welcome input from the public. There are two times during regular meetings that the
public is invited to speak. One time is early in the meeting before the board votes when you may speak about any item that's listed on tonight's agenda. Towards the end of the meeting, there's another public forum to address any matter of public concern related to the schools. When you approach the microphone, please state your name and
address. And each statement made by a participant shall be limited to three minutes duration. No participant may speak more than once during a given public comment session. The first public comment session will be limited to 30 minutes and the second will be unlimited. In order to run efficient
meetings and to allow maximum opportunity for members of the public to speak, the board reserves the right to set a different time limit for individual comments and the overall time limit for the public comments portion of the agenda. All statements shall be directed to the presiding officer. No
participant may address or question board members individually. Um public comment on the agenda. No public comments will be accepted before seven or after um item 20. Public comment to the agenda ends. Please
understand that public comment portions of our agendas are not structured as question and answer sessions but are offered as opportunities to share your thoughts with the board. The board administration will respond to public comments to the extent possible. Any board responses to public comments will generally be addressed during board
forum or committee reports. However, all comments are considered and will be investigated and addressed as appropriate. Please be courteous and mindful of the rights of others when speaking. Comments may not be abusive, obscene, threatening, or irrelevant. Please understand that students and employees have specific legal and
privacy protections. The board is not permitted to respond in public to comments about students and employees. Please also understand that the board will not be responsible for the content of comments made by members of the public. Members of the public are cautioned that they are speaking at their own risk and any personally
directed statements they make may subject them to legal liability to the affected individual. If it's necessary for the board to go into exact session at the end of the meeting, we will provide an estimated length of time for the session and whether any action is anticipated to
be taken upon returning to the public session. Um, we did our flag salute in exact session. So, can we have a roll call, Miss White? Yes, Dr. Mun. Yes, Mr. Molinari. Yes, Mr. Am. Yes, Miss Chip.
Miss Curado. Yes, here. Mr. Shaw, yes. Mr. Talbot, yes. Mr. Alan, yes. Uh, that brings us to our student representative report. Joseph, what do you have for us? Thank you, Mrs. White. Good evening, everyone. Uh it's been
nearly a month since our last meeting and as always there's been plenty going on at Ridge. So I'll start with a quick rundown of our spring sports now that they're into the full swing of things. So both our boys and girls lacrosse teams have been battling hard and off to a strong start. The boys are five and
four and riding a three-game win streak and in my opinion they're looking sharper each time they step on the field. The girls are two- one in the Raridan division and building great momentum with a young squad as underassmen are giving a lot of great contributions. On the track, our boys
team hosted the Somerset County Relay Championships, beating Hillsboro, our arch rival, by over 30 points on April 5th, even though we were missing a serious amount of varsity athletes due to illness and injuries. And I'd say we were considered pretty heavy underdogs. We've carried that momentum ever since
qualifying for the Penn Relays Championship of America Distance Medley Relay, which invites 15 of the fastest teams in the nation to compete. Uh on the baseball diamond, our boys baseball team are 7-2 and they're ranked 14th in the state by NJ.com and we just swept
Ruckers Prep and Pingry in a double header this weekend. Junior Jake Dolan is on fire, batting 500, which if you're not familiar with baseball is unheard of. Um, for softball, the team is six six and three overall and five-2 within the conference and they're playing with
a lot of confidence and really coming together as a group. Uh, the boys golf team is seven- one and ranked 19th in the state. The girls are six- one and they've won four in a row and are undefeated in away matches. So, in my opinion, it's safe to say Ridge is
swinging pretty strong. As for the tennis courts, the boys are currently three and four. And the team had tough down to the wire losses this week against Dell Barton and Montgomery. Both decided by 32 scores with tiebreakers making the difference in the final point. Despite that, Ridge is still
ranked 12th in the state and ended the week strong with a win over Hillsboro. Outside of sports, our Hello Project is still going strong and our administration has added something new, the topic of the week. This week's focus is happiness, and students received a
list of 15 questions in their emails this morning to help spark meaningful conversations and reflections on what happiness means to them in school and home and just in life in general. Our counseling department continues to do an amazing job connecting students with
professionals in various industries through the spring career rep visits. Tomorrow, we'll be hosting Miss Xi, a director at MKin Company. And on April 29th, Mr. Colin McGiffny, a senior associate at McGnney, Kuger, Clark, and
Into Tosha, uh he will be visiting as well. And as I mentioned last meeting, these sessions have been just a fantastic way for students to explore different career paths and ask real world questions and the senior internship application just closed today as well. Additionally, the class of 2026
is running their parking spot raffle this week and the lucky winners will get to park in the spots of Dr. Lazik and five other administrators for a week or two, all to raise funds for the junior class and their prom. And our senior class did the same thing last year, and I do hope it becomes a tradition for
years to come because students seem to really like it. The jazz band held their spring concert on April 2nd, and it was an awesome night showcasing a lot of talent and just the dedication of our musicians. And on April 16th, we hosted the Ridge Activities Fair for all of our
middle schoolers in the new gym from 78. and rising freshmen had the chance to meet club adviserss, sports coaches, and student leaders to get a feel for all the amazing opportunities that await them at Ridge. It was a very strong turnout and a great introduction for our
school community. And the track team that same night also hosted hosted the night of miles, having 700 plus athletes compete. And I can personally attest to the packed parking lot from both the activities fair and the night of miles that night. And lastly, the Ridge Dems
Club hosted Nadine Spirman, co-leader of the Raren Valley chapter of the Citizens Climate Lobby, and she gave a powerful presentation on lobbying, bipartisanship, and the influence of grassroots efforts on climate policy, sparking some really thoughtful questions from students within the club.
As always, it was a pleasure to present for you tonight, and I eagerly look forward to giving you more updates with sports and our school as the spring continues. So, thank you. Thanks, Joseph. And I also think you're a little bit too modest to say that I believe you did set a record this past
weekend. Would you like to tell us what you did? Sure. Uh, this past weekend, our track team went to East Strasburg University in Pennsylvania. And, uh, Jared Rashio broke the long jump record that had stood for multiple decades. And I also
broke the 300 hurdle school record um, in a time of 39 seconds. Thank you. Well, congratulations and thank you for everything you share with us. We are all going to go down now to sit in the audience and watch the
performances. Is that on? Yes. Okay, good. Thank you so much. We uh here at Cedar Hill, we are really excited to showcase our amazing coral department under the guidance of Taylor Curaloo and we will be singing the national anthem. We ask that you please rise.
So proud bright. And the [Music] rock was still there. [Music] Just wanted to say thank you so much um for spotlighting our beautiful music,
our gifted and talented students. I am so proud and honored to be a coral director in this district. And I mean we put this together super quickly and what two rehearsals, three rehearsals. Just so proud of them. So thank you so much
for having us and budding musicians we have Good evening. My name is Pam Lawrence. I'm the assistant principal at Liberty Corner School. And tonight I'm going to have Mrs. Ryan talk about our uh fifth grade quest program and a fun project
that they've been doing. But before I do that, I want to talk about more opportunities that Mrs. Ryan has brought to our school. She's our Quest teacher and she started at the end of last year and she enriches our school with meaningful experiences
um for all of our students. She is involved in our KFC program. Our KFC program stands for Kids for Character and they are model fifth graders who um who show good character and one of their
responsibilities is to perform and um create assemblies that um teach our character education program. They also put on morning announcements. They record their announcements in the morning and it's just a creative way to start the day
off. Mrs. Ryan has also organized and brought STEM day to our school which is actually this week. Career week is coming up next week and she is also going to be the host of a coding miniun in the spring. So there's a lot to look
forward to and we're so grateful that she brings um the science, the technology, the engineering and the mathematics to our school. So I'm going to pass it over to Mrs. Brian so she can um have her Quest fifth grade students share a project that they're very proud
to be a part of. Thank you. Thank you so much, Miss Lawrence. Um I'm first off, let me just say how grateful I am to be a part of this district, be a part of Liberty Corner. Um and Miss Lawrence and Dr. Oliver are just outstanding leaders in our school. Um but speaking of outstanding leaders, I
need to talk about the amazing eight fifth graders standing beside me up here today. if you could click to the next slide. Um, these fifth graders have done a great job of choosing type three community service projects that best align with sustainable New Jersey, which is a resolution that the board of education actually passed in January of
2025. Um, Sustainable New Jersey helps schools implement programs, initiatives like energy reduction, outdoor learning, and community engagement. I would love to keep talking about how amazing these eight students are. We are a small but very mighty team, but I'm going to let them tell you how fantastic they are and
what great work they've done in our school so far. Hi, I'm Aubrey and this past year and I worked on building a garden in front of our school. We wanted to make the school look more beautiful and also help the environment by planting flowers that support pollinators like bees and
butterflies. We learned which kinds of flowers could survive with very little care, especially during the hot summer when school is closed. We picked four strong flowers that could make it through the season on their own. After that, we got the supplies and
started organizing the garden. It was really cool seeing our design come to life, and it made us feel very proud to create something that students and teachers could enjoy every day. One thing I learned is that even small changes like adding a garden can make a
big difference in how space feels and how we treat our planet. Hi, I'm K and I worked together to design and hang up flyers for animal shelter donation drive. We wanted to encourage students and their families to donate and help animals in need.
Hi, my name is Kian Batia and I'm a fifth grader at LCS. In the quest program, my friend Yaja and I worked on flyers for the animal shelter. One thing I learned about graphic design is how much of an impact colors, layout, and spacing can
have on whether people stop actually stop to read a flyer. If it's too crowded or dull, people might walk right by. We also learned how to create a QR code and added it to our flyer so people could easily scan it with their phones to get
more information easily. It was cool to see how design choices can really change how people respond. After we printed everything, we posted our flyers all over the school in hallways, classrooms, and on bulletin boards. It was exciting to know that our
designs could help spread kindness. Hi, my name's Jin Wu and and if you scan the QR code on Jot and Keon's flyers, it brings you to my website. I learned to use Google Sites to answer questions and give information for people wanting to
donate to the drive. Hi, I'm Matthew. With Cooper and Tyler, we help launch the animal donation drive project. We wanted to get everyone in our school excited about helping animals. We chose to support St. Hubert's Animal Shelter because it's a
no kill shelter. That means that it doesn't give up on an animal just because it hasn't been adopted right away. It keeps working to find them a loving home. Did you know that 48% of the animal shelters in the United States are kill shelters? That really shocked us.
We wanted to do that helps the animals with that helps them with care and respect no matter how long it takes. We also want to expand our projects by getting local businesses
involved. The more people that donate to drive, the bigger impact we can have for animals who really need it. Working on this project taught us that when a group of people care about something and action. It could really
make a difference in the world. Thank you guys so much. Take a bow, guys. Good evening. I'm Joanne Hosen. I'm the principal of Mount Prospect School. As part of the other elementary spotlight, you're going to hear from all four elementary schools. And so, we've heard some chorus, we've seen some STEM, and
we representing uh band and orchestra here at Mount Prospect School. Of course, it's in all four schools, but we have 14 of some of our fourth and fifth grade students under the direction of Kate Whitley and Mrs. Kathy Kovaleeski. They will be praying a small snippet of spring by Vivaldi. So, let's have a
round of applause for our future. [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music]
Heat. Heat.
[Music]
[Applause] Hello everyone. Um, I'm here to introduce some highlights from Oak
Street School's production of 101 Dalmatians that will be airing on May 7th and 8th. So, hope you'll join us, but if you can't, here's some highlights. And Jennifer Ramos, the director, will do a little further introductions. [Applause]
Hi everybody. Thank you so much for inviting us here. Um, we have three small snippets from our show to present to you guys tonight and I hope you enjoy. [Applause]
[Music] scare ice children's [Music] At first you think
[Music] after locked And the Welcome back to [Music]
[Applause] [Music] needs another time. [Music]
What's she talking about? [Music] [Music] What's a bag or 10? I [Music]
can get it. The puppies are supposed to stay safe inside. But how can they resist once they hear their favorite song? Row, row, row your boat. Happy birthday to you. No, no, no, you
don't. Hello. Delicious. La [Music] delicious crunchy crunchy crunchy crunchies.
[Applause] Who [Music] ever completely awful? [Music] You do not believe That looks good.
[Music]
[Applause] You guys were amazing. Um, so this was
our pieces of 1001 Dalmatian. And I hope everybody can come see the rest of the show if you enjoyed tonight. This is just a little part, but there's lots more with all these and lots more Oak Street students. We hope to see
[Applause] you. All right. Uh, a big thanks. How about one more round of applause for all the staff and students tonight. Thanks very much. We're going to take a quick minute. We'll have the board
members head back up onto the stage and uh we'll rearrange a little furniture. I want to thank everyone once again and uh certainly you if you want to stay for the rest of the meeting, you can, but I imagine some of these kiddos will be heading home, so we'll we'll make a few minutes for that. Thanks again for
coming tonight and supporting the kids. It's okay. Well, that was wonderful. Thank you all to parents who came and the students who performed. We always love when we get to actually see what's going on in all the different schools. Um, we are now up to the
superintendence report. So, I will turn this over to Mr. Marcarian. Okay. Well, good evening everyone. Thanks for coming tonight. And just to echo Miss White's comments, it's great to have uh our staff and students share a little bit about what they're
doing in the schools and showcase some of the things that are being worked on. And a big shout out to our families who obviously uh helped with transportation and bringing kids out tonight. So, that was really appreciated and very much enjoyed. So, I just wanted to open
tonight a little bit to talk about budget. Um, as I explained in this week's SOS Express on the agenda tonight, we have to make some personnel uh arrangements to make our budget work for next year. It's always a challenge
when you have to do something like this. Obviously, if you have been paying attention, you know that in our preliminary budget presentation, we talked about the need to reduce personnel expenditure by about $2.5 million. Uh, that's no small undertaking. Uh it's been a long process
to try to get to the point of making recommendations tonight to to get there. Um certainly not easy. Uh but here we are. I wanted to give everybody a little bit of background uh just so that they understand that um in many cases um
people might not really understand how it works in public schools when you are making uh reductions in force as they say or reductions in staff. Um so you have to look at the certificates that the teaching staff have and then within those teaching certificates you have to
consider non-tenured staff versus tenur staff. The the statutes really describe how this process takes place. There's not any latitude in terms of um how it works. Uh let's say for example the certificate is X maybe it's uh in math
and people hold a teaching certificate in math. When you have to make reductions in math, first you have to look at the non-tenured staff. If you have no non-tenured staff to reduce, then you have to look at tenured staff. Tenure staff have what's called seniority, which basically means years
of service. And those staff that have the least seniority or the least years of service uh have to be the ones that are are let go first. Um certainly nothing that anyone relishes but as I said in our case we really needed to make reductions to get
our budget to work. Um something else that I think it's important for people to understand is that it really has nothing to do with performance. Right? These reductions have zero to do with performance. Um, we can't obviously speak about individual staff members as Miss White explained in the statement of
public notice, but I can say that these reductions are about reasons of economy in order to make the budget work, not about the performance or or how we feel uh about how valued an individual may be. Um, we value all of our employees
and we recognize how difficult this is. Um, so we'd like to work with our staff making sure they're well supported uh in their search for future employment by doing recommendations and other things to help support them uh to secure new employment. Uh that being said, um I
think we're up to public comment. Do we need to do the two items under superintendent report though? Thank you. So uh two items under superintendent report are the HIV report for this month
uh and also the postsecondary report. Um this is a report that we have already reviewed the contents of uh in committee and we are officially providing it to the board and public. Can I get a motion? Moral Larry. Mr.
Shaw. Roll call. Miss White. Yes. Dr. Mchu. Yes, Mr. Molinari. Yes, Mr. Am. Yes, Miss Curado. Yes, Mr. Shaw. Yes, Mr. Talbot. Yes. And
Mr. Yes. Now we're up to public comment. So, when you come forward, please sign in at the clipboard below and then state your name and address. Thank you. Hi, good evening. My name is Jamie Fiori
Higgins and I live at 64 Atlas Road. I have lived here for my entire life and I have four children at the elementary, middle, and high school levels. I am commenting on a few positions that I have heard are being eliminated. I think
it's a shame that this wasn't publicized in advance. So, I'm going to speak on some of the ones I have heard about regarding the William Annen Middle School Coral Director. I cringe when I think about who you will choose to fill
this gap. If you are intending to make the high school coral director fill this void, it's going to vastly affect the entire Ridge Coral program. things like caroling, which the entire town loves, participation at Rockefeller Center,
different coral festivals, and other opportunities, they may be eliminated. The Ridge Choir program won't be the same. This program has been instrumental in my high school sophomores experience. It has created a mini community within
the larger Ridge community that has given her encouragement, love, and support. This is a program that the district loves to brag about and as a person who has lived here all her life, it's been a pillar of the community for the last 40 years. If you wanted to
continue in this manner, you cannot make these changes. Secondly, regarding the Cedar Hill school art teacher, the rumor is she is being replaced by another non-tenure teacher at the middle school who makes more money than she does,
which makes no sense to me. As the superintendent just said, these decisions are based on reasons of economy. If this were strictly about money, the Cedar Hill teacher wouldn't be touched. It's bad enough that an art
teacher at Ann is getting let go, causing those students to get upset. Why would you then move her and let go our teacher at Cedar Hill and upset all those additional kids? The Cedar Hill art teacher is a beloved part of our school. The kids adore her. I know you
must make a tough decision, but if you were really thinking of the kids and really cared about them, you would keep the Cedar Hill art teacher in her place. Cedar Hill is busting at the seeds. We are the ones that cause the specials drop schedule because we have so many
kids. We deal with larger class sizes and our special areas teachers get no preps, which the other elementary schools special teachers have. To my knowledge, the other elementary schools are not being asked to let go of specialists teachers. Why does Cedar Hill always bear the brunt of these
situations? And finally, regarding riffs in general, are there any at the administrative level? There should be. They're paid more than the teachers. And if the purpose of our school district is to serve the kids, we need to protect our teachers. These are the people who actually know our kids' names. These are
the people who care about their emotional and social well-being. These are the people who make a difference each and every day. If you truly care about the kids, you will keep this in mind as you are making your headcount decisions. Thank you. Thank you, Mrs. Higgins.
Hi, my name is Hannah Higgins. I live at 64 Atlas Road and I'm a fourth grader at Cedar Hill School. Today I want to first talk about our beloved art teacher at Cedar Hill. I started at Cedar Hill in first grade and she's been my art teacher the entire time. She's an amazing teacher. She works so well with
us kids. And anytime it's art, me and my friends love walking into the room and seeing her. Her directions are so clear that we can all understand her no matter what level of art we are at. When my friends hear that she's going to be fired that we will be all be so
devastated. Also, I'm going to be a fifth grader next year, and I would hate to finish out elementary school with a different art teacher. I know I'm speaking for all the students when I say, "Please, please, please let her stay. We are, we really need her." The other thing I want to talk about is the
elimination of third grade orchestra and choir program. I remember when I was in third grade and I was excited to learn strings and join the chorus. It was an amazing experience to sing songs and play instruments with my friends. We learned so much from our teachers that
year and I'd feel so badly um knowing that the next generation of third graders might miss that opportunity. Thank you. Thank you, Hannah. Hi there. My name is Adam Marshall. I live at 38 Gerard Avenue.
Um, sorry. I have a seventh grader at William Annen. I have a fourth grader at Cedar Hill. Um, and I'm here to talk about the merits of the arts program as you all are making some tough decisions as the superintendent spoke about. Um, you all saw the amazing
performances, so I don't think I could speak better than those. So, thank you all for that. Um, but I'll go ahead and try. I wanted to talk about my family's experiences. Um, I've seen just off the charts dedication to all these arts programs. um dedications to the programs
and to these students. Starting with the elementary art, strings, band, and chorus programs. My children will look back on their elementary elementary education and fondly identify where their love and passion began. It came from their Cedar Hill art, chorus, band,
and music teachers. To my knowledge, over 50% of the students in grades three through five at Cedar Hill are in the chorus program. More than 30% are in band and 30% in orchestra. So, I urge you to think about that when you think about cuts being made to such a widely
attended program. Moving on to chorus and band programs in the middle school um both in school and perhaps more significantly the extracurricular. My seventh grader I'll just share with you a little story if you don't mind. My seventh grader struggled socially in sixth grade as many middle schoolers do.
I kept reassuring him, you know, uh you'll find your people. Give it time. Give it time. Middle school is tough. You'll find your people. um as any parent would be. It was very stressful. Um he ended up in chamber choir. They went on a trip to Six Flags at the end of the school year and he texted me from
the bus on the way home and said, "Mom, I found my people." And I think that illustrates uh the importance of the music program, not just for learning chords and songs, but for finding their people. For the over a 100 middle school students involved in Frozen the musical,
um which is over 10% of the WHAM students by my calculations, this opportunity to find your people is invaluable. In a world where parents and schools struggle to support the ever growing mental health crisis, I think we can all agree that providing a place where kids find their people is a good start with lasting impact. The NIH
report um from 2019 that synthesized over 900 publications talked about how arts engagement can also help to reduce the risk of developing mental illness such as depression in adolescence and an older age. Participating in arts activities can build self-esteem, self-acceptance, confidence, and
self-worth. We have found that this opportunity exists in our township schools to provide a haven of protection from mental illness. How could we in good conscience take that away? Also talking about cuts, um, what I do know is that when my son learned that
all of his elective choices for eighth grade had been eliminated due to budget cuts, he said, "Mom, that makes no sense. They put new TVs in the cafeteria that show the weather and no one even looks at them." So, we're both here to learn more about the actual line items, actually, where budgets were cut from and maybe could be cut from instead of
these salaries of these teachers. But our question is, how can we continue to attract the best teachers across all subjects if we keep sending the message that shiny new weather TVs are more important than preserving the jobs of our passionate, devoted teachers? Thank
you. Thank you, Miss. Hi, I'm Jen Shuffman. Um, I'm at 174 Spencer Road, Basking Ridge. Um, I have two children. um one of which is out of the school system but has worked her way through the entire school system here and I have another one who's currently a
junior at Ridge. Um they are both very very involved in the music program. They have been involved in the music program all the way from elementary, middle, and high school. Um I can't begin to tell you the impact that the music programs have had on both my kids. My daughter
continued to pursue music in college. um she actually heads a huge orchestra um a video game orchestra um out at UC Davis and she got that inspiration from being here in the school system with the amazing music teachers that we have. So I'm really really worried about the cuts
that are being proposed to the third grade uh choir programs, string programs, things along those lines. Um there are a myriad of highly respected scientific studies showing that music has mental, physical and emotional benefits. It reduces anxiety and depression, improves memory and fosters
creativity. Um, I moved to Baskin Ridge 11 years ago specifically because of the phenomenal music program and the high level of academics. Both of my children have been involved all the way through um, the music program and I can't tell you how much it has meant to them and the incredibly positive effect it has
had on them as individuals. It taught them discipline, empathy, creativity. They've developed intense long-term friendships through the music community at school. They have found a sense of belonging which was already spoken about. Um music has served as a source of inspiration for them and most of all music has served to provide joy and
comfort and a sense of balance during times of stress and anxiety. And I will tell you that this is a very stressful school system for many of our students. And so probably the single most important thing that I can convey here is that music is a community for so many
of our students, hundreds of our students. It's a place where they can find balance in an otherwise very stressful environment. It's a place where they can find happiness. It's a place where they can calm their anxiety and reduce their mental stress. And I
know that we all talk about, you know, ways to reduce mental anxiety. But this is probably the single most important and easiest way to do it is to keep the arts in our school systems all the way through. It makes no sense when we talk about mental awareness and trying to
reduce anxiety and worrying about suicide or or things like that. Why would we want to eliminate something that's proven to reduce anxiety and to give our students a sense of community and a sense of belonging? Um, you know, imagine if music reduced anxiety, just
the the benefits of this to all the kids. Um, even if it just helped prevent one child from getting into alcohol or drugs or it prevented one child from becoming severely depressed, that's enough of a reason for me to want to say you should be keeping music at all levels. And if we eliminate music in
third grade, there's a trickle effect. It goes all the way through into the middle school, into the high school. We lose students. We lose kids who are going to, you know, foster that that sense of belonging all the way through, that joy for music, that joy in the community. and our groups get smaller
then as you move through. Um, so it's super important your time is up. Okay. Well, I think it's super important to keep all of that music in our elementary schools. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Hi, my name is Paulina Schilchkovski. I
live at 76 Spencer Road. Um, I'm a student at Ridge. I would like to begin by sharing a personal anecdote regarding my experience with the third grade string program and orchestra overall. Um I was born into a very musical family. My father plays four instruments and my f my mother was a folk dancer in her
adolescence. In his pre-teen years, my brother sang at the Metropolitan Opera House. However, in my early years of childhood, I showed absolutely no inclination towards any genre in music except perhaps very heavy rock. Um it seemed that music was not the path for me until one day in third grade at Oakry
School, our music conductor, Mrs. Kovalevki introduced us to the wonderful world of stringed instruments and offered us the opportunity to learn how to play one. And I chose the violin. My mom watched with amusement as I would clumsily pluck at the strings to produce a a very questionable rendition of
Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star. Uh she did not expect much to come out of this plucking think thinking she would have to return my rental violin within the year due to my supposed lack of interest. On the contrary, she had to buy another one so that I would have one for practicing at home in school and one for performing. Nine years later, I have
not stopped playing the violin. Throughout elementary, middle, and high school, I have been part of every core string program available. From Oak Street Chamber to Whamsville Harmonia to finally Bridge Symphony Orchestra. The fact that there was such a program at every step of the way made the transfer process from school to school so much
more comfortable. I will admit that there are people who have discarded their string instruments, perhaps even within the first year of learning how to play. But what is vital is that they were given the opportunity to learn as early as possible. They were given this opportunity at a time when they still had time to learn. In fact, this is one
of the merry reasons that families move into this district and pay higher taxes. They do so with the belief that their children will receive countless opportunities and the best education possible. Some of these families cannot afford music education outside of school. Early exposure to the beautiful,
diverse world of orchestra broadens students horizons, enriches their education experience, teaches them the value of discipline and teamwork, helps them overcome the inescapable trials of stage fright, and provides them with a way to express themselves and their emotions in a unique way. In my opinion, the strength program should be
introduced even earlier than it is rather than later. In a world where time is of the essence, where it seems as if the time to learn, grow, develop, change is ever shrinking, you should not be limiting your future students potentials, you should not be sacrificing the third grade strings program when budget cuts could be made
elsewhere, such as on the unnecessary TV screens located throughout the building at Ridge as well, not just at Whims. That mainly serve to inform us what rotation day it is, or an updated teachers lounge. I hope you will take notice of my plea to save the third grade strings program and all music
programs and to provide the future generations of students at this district the same amazing opportunity that I was offered. Thank you. Thank you for your passionate comments. I'll just hold this. Hello, my name is Benjamin Hughes
and I'm in the fifth grade at Liberty Corner School. I love to sing and I try to participate in as much musical activity as possible. I've been doing choir and orchestra at my school since I was in the third grade. It makes me oh so sad to think that the upcoming third
grade students will not be able to play in the orchestra or sing in the choir. Something that when I was going to third grade, I was so so excited to do. That program has been around since my mom was a student in Basking Ridge. my
mom. What does it say about this school district that the district is willing to get rid of programs that have changed people's lives and and have been around forever? Thank you for having and have a good evening. Thank you, Benjamin.
Hi, my name is Lillian Fer. My address is 445 Mount Airy Road. I'm a student at Whams in seventh grade. I've done the Wham show both of my years here. The arts and theater programs here mean so much to me. I know for many students,
they rely on theater and arts programs to make friends, meet new people, and find a community they feel appreciated in. In addition, I know that for some kids, they rely on programs like theater or dance as their only after school
activity. For me, theater means so much. It's a space where I've met so many new people, learned so many new things like proper vocal techniques, dance moves, and more. I have concerns about budget cuts to things like the arts programs and the effect it will have on theater
and music programs. The effect I also am concerned about the effect it will have on the teachers who love and support these programs. Art, theater, music, dance, and other programs are what make whams whams. They're what make whims
unique. Thank you. Thank you, William. Hello everyone. I'm Cole Marshall from 38 Gerard Avenue, Basking Ridge, a student at Willie Mannon Middle School, and I truly believe that our school district thrives because of music and
the arts. These programs aren't just electives or extracurriculars. They're essential. They shape who we are, help us find our place, and give us confidence to keep moving forward every day. I've been a part of music programs since elementary school, and I can honestly say that they've changed my
life. My Cedar Hill chorus teacher, who directed chorus, you saw perform earlier tonight, um, is one of the most inspiring teachers I've ever had. She brought me so much joy and encouragement at every choir rehearsal. and singing in
the morning with her wasn't just fun, it gave me a sense of belonging. I also loved learning from the Cedar Hill orchestra teacher in third grade and witnessing her battle against Zoom during CO really taught me the basics. Um, and I thought that was really
essential to what I do right now. Um, my Cedar Hill band teacher had this amazing way of making instruments feel exciting and approachable even when it was hard. She taught us to play with confidence and to enjoy every step of the process. These teachers didn't just teach music.
They built communities. They helped us find our voices literally and figuratively. And when I moved into middle school, this sense of community became even more important. Like lots of students, I wasn't socially confident coming into sixth grade. But music gave me direction. I joined choir and band
again and later chamber choir and wind ensemble groups that pushed me to grow and connect me and connected me with the people that share my passion. Chamber choir was like one big family to me and this year I really couldn't ask for a better chorus teacher. Without her, I
don't know what would happen to our phenomenal community. In seventh grade, I joined the cast of Frozen and was blown away. The acting teacher, the chorus teacher, and the dance teacher made us feel like professionals and were caring and supportive beyond
description. Sorry. This process brought us together and gave us something bigger than ourselves to be proud of. Our performances were truly gratifying for me and the rest of the cast. And that's the point. Music and the arts creates magic. They lift us up, every student up, whether they realize it or not. It
helps us feel seen, capable, and valued. When we don't support arts education, we risk so much more than lost performances. We risk students losing their confidence, their creative spark, the spaces where they truly come alive and their future. These programs helped me find myself. They gave me the courage
to speak, perform, stand here today, and believe that I have something worth sharing with the world. I know money doesn't grow on trees, but I do know that most of the students from K to2 across our town have stories just like mine. So, let's make sure these opportunities stay alive for every
student who hasn't found their voice yet. Thank you. Thank you. Hello, my name is Benjamin Chuckman. Um, I'm a junior at Ridge High School and I live at 174 Spencer Road. Um, currently, um, I'm a double bass player in the Richfield orchestra. I'm the principal
double bass player. I'm also officer that leads the Ridge High School Triumph Music Honor Society and represents over 80 of the most passionate music students at Ridge High School throughout the choir, band, and orchestra programs. Currently, I perform in all three band, choir, and orchestra programs at Ridge
High School. Outside of school, I perform in the New York Youth Symphony, one of the most prestigious youth symphonies across the country, and will pursue double bass in college and professionally afterwards. Therefore, music means a big part of my life. However, it didn't start from nowhere.
Though my family was somewhat musical, the third grade string program established my love for music at a very young age. Therefore, I ask you to clarify how eliminating the third grade string program helps solve the budget problem that the Burnish Township is in.
I failed to recognize how eliminating the program without any staff reductions or um budget reductions regarding the program helps the budget crisis since the program materials will be still needed for the fourth and fifth grade string program. Additionally, by
eliminating the program, it will reduce the high quality of music that we promote at Ridge High School in the orchestra, band, and choir programs. Thank you. Thank you. Hi everyone, my name is Sanja Murley and I live at 22 Hampton Court and I have
been part of the Bernard's Township Orchestra program since I was in third grade and I picked up a viola and since that moment I knew that music was my first love and is and my forever love. So honestly, I don't come from a very musical family and we don't have a strong background in really any type of
music and I I was probably the first one to ex exhibit any sign of like musical inclination. And like the third grade string program was probably one of the first and most impactful ways that I was able to grow and develop my skill as a musician and find other like-minded
people who loved music just as much as I did. And honestly, third grade strings is something so impactful because it helped set up that whole community that went together all the way through middle school through Williamsville harmonic all the way to Richidge High School
chamber and symphony orchestras. We form such an amazing bond and truly one of the most magical things about my entire school experience in Bernards Township has been watching the culture in all the orchestra rooms that I've gone through. us eating lunch together, us having rehearsal together, jamming together,
all of us having fun, being able to explore ourselves through music and connect with others through music. So this year I had the wonderful opportunity to manage the pit orchestra of Ridge High School and al and wholeheartedly I can say that music gave
me that one first opportunity to be a leader, learn how to connect with people and also develop the ability to just focus on who I am rather than worrying about what anyone else thinks about me. And truly the music program here is one of the best parts about living in this
town. I know other schools have their own music pro programs, but truly this town is known for having one of the strongest. And I know that's one of the reasons that my parents and I still talk about today that we stay in this district because the music program is so amazing despite
all the academic stress that still exists here. So, specifically third grade strings, it would seem that cutting just one grade level wouldn't really have much of an impact. But truly, like many before me today mentioned, it does have a trickle effect
into the middle school and high school orchestras. And in addition, having orchestra and chorus as well made available at the same time as band in a way limits the students ability to explore and gives them slightly more pressure to choose
one of the three options in one year. And allowing the students to explore strings in third grade first, even if they decide to choose other areas like band or chorus as a fourth grader, still allows them to connect with music at an earlier age, and allows them to
experience the benefits of playing an instrument, learn the virtues of patience, dedication, and overall develop their love for music. So overall, I think that the third grade string program is so important because it just sets up that amazing community
for us as we go forward through our school experience and become such an integral sorry integral part of our experience going through this district. And I think that if we are going to make any other budget cuts, that should be one of the last things to go due to all
the benefits that it provides us finding our sense of self as well as our community. Thank you very much. Thank you. Sorry, I'm not as familiar with the microphones as they are. Barbara Gary, 66 Dryen Road. I will begin by saying this is not personal when I mention job
titles and does not reflect the individual. I was expecting the administration, the board to use the 4.4 million shortfall and restructure the administration side of our district. When companies have financial troubles, the last people they want to affect are those with direct access to our clients
and change the services that the clients receive. Obviously, the students are the clients. Instead of restructuring the administration side, such as reconfiguring the two assistant superintendent positions, combining supervisor roles, secretarial jobs, and eliminating the instructional coaching
team, which may benefit our teacher, it should not outweigh having smaller classes for our sixth to 12th graders and eliminating the flexibility in the master schedule for our high school students. The SOS did not address the changes in the eighth grade class cycles, such as removing photography,
creative writing, TED talks, and fully year woods. Removing these class options, but keeping a full-time drama teacher on staff at the high school does not benefit the majority. Most districts have a drama director for the high school play, saving a district salary and benefits. What is the number
of students who take the drama class at the high school that are not already involved in the theater program compared to the number of students who have plan on taking the eliminated cycles? What analysis of students and classes went into these decisions? I know Yearlong Woods has historically been in
demand. Also in demand are math classes at the high school, which will have two fewer teachers next year. So they will have significantly more students per class. A couple of years ago, there was a proposal to combine the assistant position role, the assistant principal
role at the elementary level, which would have saved the district significant money along with being a pilot program for its feasibility. Instead, you listen to those who yelled the loudest, forcing the assistant principal to an assistant principal from the high school to juggle a middle
school grade and the 12th graders. The workload wasn't distributed properly and the and this program and this failed. The seventh graders went out, the seventh graders went without an assistant principal. The local the workload was distributed to the two
assistant principles at W. Is that more feasible position to have two assistant principles at WHAMS versus three? Would the how would that impact the students and teachers? Does each grade level 6 to 12 need an assistant principal? Could a
supervisor with a part-time classwork load also work? Did any consideration go into reconstructing reconstructuring our topheavy school district? Everyone knows a topheavy organization will topple over. Your choices to eliminate teaching
staff, increase class sizes, and reduce class options are miscalculated decisions that do not address the issues that are directly affect the students, your clients. This solves this year's budget issue. Considering this solves this year's budget issue without
considering a sustainable solution for the future, we will have budget issues moving forward. the staff. You cannot cons continually do staff reductions, larger class sizes, and exceeding the 2% budget cap. That is not sustainable. I'm asking the board to advise the
administration to resolve the budget gap with a sustainable plan that will impact our teachers and students the lease and therefore reject item one on the personnel report. Thank you. Thank you for Hi, my name is Maline Bellard and I'm a graduate of Ridge High School,
class of 2015. I live at 529 West 25th Street in Houston, Texas, and just happened to be here for this critical meeting. I'm not speaking to you today as a student, faculty member, or parent, but as someone who was fun whose life was fundamentally shaped by Ridge's art department, an art department since
third grade when I entered the education system here. Since graduating, I've built a career in marketing. Creativity is a core of everything that I do. And that creative foundation was built in the photography classrooms at Ridge, nurtured by the teachers who believed in me and helped me grow. The arts are not
extracurricular. They are essential. and they are just as critical to our students future success as STEM and core curriculum subjects. And beyond career preparation, the arts offer something even more urgent, a lifeline. During my sophomore year, I struggled with a
debilitating anxiety disorder that kept me out of school for weeks. The only reason I was able to return to Ridge and stay was my photography class. It was my one safe place at Ridge where I could create, decompress, succeed academically, and experience a sense of
accomplishment that everything else when everything else felt overwhelming. This is not unique to me. Arts classrooms are safe places for countless students navigating the pressures of adolescence. They are where students process their stress, find their voice, and build self-confidence.
To cut the art department staff in half at Ridge, reducing it from eight educators to four, is not a neutral budget decision. It is a profound loss of student support and access. Let me be clear. I'm not suggesting that our art teachers shoulder their role of mental
health professionals, but I am saying that their classrooms often function as a stabilizing force for students who are quietly struggling. And that matters when making decisions about faculty at Ridge. Honestly, I'm deeply disappointed as an alumni to learn that dedicated
teachers are being let go or reassigned across the district as a result of these decisions. These are individuals who have invested their careers into guiding students who, like myself, are forever impacted by their mentorship and expertise. Seeing their commitment met
with uncertainty or dismissal is a step in the wrong direction for Ridge. We cannot expect the remaining teachers to absorb doubled workloads, manage bloated class sizes, and continue delivering the same quality of instruction and individualized support. That expectation
is not only unrealistic, it's irresponsible. And so I ask, at what point do we stop cutting the arts? When the last program is gone, when the last teacher is let go. The arts are often the first on the chopping block, but they should be the
last. Because what we lose with each cut is not just a class. We lose a support system, a creative outlet, and in many cases, a student's reason to show up at all. I understand the financial challenges the district is facing, but I urge you to look elsewhere for your
solutions. Your students and their futures depend on it. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Good evening everyone and board members. My name is Hos. I lived in 13 Battalion Drive by Nich. I have seventh grader in
William and Mini school and the first grader in Mount Pros pro P prospect school. Both of both of them are member of orchestra. Praying in orchestra is the most favorite part of their life. And I'm here today not only as a parent but as a someone who deeply values the
role of the music in education. I was saddened to hear about the budget cuts affecting our school orchestra program. Music is not just extracurricular activity. It's an important part of a well-rounded education. So the orchestra
teaches sorry orchestra teaches our children discipline, teamwork, creativity. These are what we want to encourage for our kids. I have confidence they they they've gained by
performing the apprenticeships they they made and the joy they feel after the successful concert. So I would I would respectfully ask you to find another way to preserve the third grade orchestra program. Thank you so much.
Thank you. But I'm just going to interject for one minute because um we're getting very close to the 30 minutes of the first public comment, but I want to make sure that all the students who are here get to speak. We will be able to come back. We've got other business to do, but then you'll be able to speak again at um the second
public comment, but I do want to get to the students because I know some of them may need to leave and get home and get work done. So, can we ask that the students who would like to speak come down and then we'll move on and then we'll after we finish business. We'll
get to the second public comment and and the rest of you will be able to make statements. Good evening. Good evening everybody. My name is Yaf Sheth and I live on 40 Kinder Drive. Um I'm an eighth grader at William Middle School and I'm standing here because I believe that our high middle and elementary school classes as
well as extracurriculars are more than just periods on a schedule. They're where we discover our passions and what we love to do. As someone who loves the art department and especially the teachers, I am truly frightened that the students ahead of me won't have the chance to really explore and express themselves if the teachers in classes are cut out. If we lose classes, we lose
opportunities. We lose the chance to reach that one student who might find their passion in a class that almost didn't exist before. If we lose teachers, we lose guidance, experience, and hope to maybe one day pursue something we never thought we would have pursued otherwise. In my three years at Whams, my teachers like my eighth grade language arts teacher, my eighth grade
science teacher, my chorus teacher, dance teacher, musical director, art teachers, and Spanish teachers, and so many others have shaped the way I view the world and have helped me grow so much. As a part of the Williams frozen play, I absolutely love acting, singing, and dancing and art. And my teachers are
such an inspiration to me. Taking away these classes would destroy so many students passions and restrict their talents. One of our own previous students was an orchestra player before she found the William and Middle School musical theater program where she found her passion for theater in the Wham's musical Mulan. Now she's in her 20s and
is starring in multiple Broadway shows as well as has built a large name for herself. Still today, she credits William Manon for starting her passion. Cutting back isn't about removing classes or reducing costs. It's about limiting our own futures. It's about telling students that their dreams
aren't worth the investment. And I refuse to believe that that's who we are. We have a choice tonight. A choice to stand up for our students, for our teachers, and for our community's future. Let's fight to keep every class open, and all of our teachers with us. Thank you. Thank you. Hi, my name is Nora Hughes. I live at
434 Lions Road. I'm in eighth grade at Willie Manon. I have been a part of music programs in our district since third grade. My favorite part of choir has always been the fall into choir night held at Ridge each year where I've gotten to meet so many people and make so many new friends and meet all of the
music teachers from each school. The teachers at the schools give their students a place to be themselves and that is the most important thing for any student. I was very disappointed to learn that music and the arts in general are being cut back. I think it is unfair to the younger grades of kids who are looking forward to those things and now
they won't have the opportunity opportunity to participate to learn that our district no longer have a music and fine arts supervisor after this school year was very interesting to learn and shows people how much you don't care about the arts in our district. I understand that our district has to make us, but I think that there are other
things that could be cut back on. Thank you for your time. Have a good evening. Thank you. Hi, my name is Naomi Lynn. I'm an eighth grader at Whams. I've been in the arts for the past five years. I've been in orchestra since third grade and choir
since fifth. And this year, I've gotten the chance to be in the latter two, as well as chamber choir, concert choir, and our latest play, Frozen. These classes have been such an amazing experience for me, with most of my best memories and some of my closest friends being from these
classes. The wonderfully fun and accepting communities made by these programs are only made possible by the amazing teachers. When my sixth and seventh choir teacher, who always made me and everyone else in the choir feel loved and accepted, uh left to teach at another school, I
was worried um the community and the feeling of acceptance the choir brought to me and many other people would be ruined. But when um our current choir teacher came, uh she only built us up as a stronger community. As well as this, the play was one of the best experiences
of my eighth grade year and it was really fun and it was widely loved by many others as well. Three soldout nights proved that. And I've auditioned for the play before. I didn't get in last year, but this year I got in and it helped me discover my passion for acting
and dancing as well as my passion for singing. And to think that uh the younger grades won't get the same experience with the teachers being cut um makes me deeply troubled. Thank you for your time.
Hello, my name is Emily Grove and my address is 53 Lerline Drive. I'm in seventh grade and have been attending William Manon for two years now. Over those two years, I have fallen in love with all of the arts programs provided here. I would like to specifically mention the drama club and the woodshop
programs. When I came to this school last year, I did not know who I who I was or who I wanted to be. When time came around to sign up for the drama club, I knew that's what I wanted. From the from there, I only fell in love with it more. The drama club
gave me an overwhelming sense of community that I'd never felt before. It made me feel like I belong to something bigger than myself. I wish any and all new students attending William Ann could feel that same community through this program, but I fear that will not be the
same if we lose funding and teachers who have made it all possible. I feel equally as strong for woodworking. I have been looking forward to a year-long advanced woodworking elective provided to 8th grade students for the past few years,
which due to recent budget cuts has been removed. There is such an outstanding this is such an outstanding program here that it greatly stands out from other schools. The idea of having that taken away from us as a school and as a student makes me feel that this school
which once stood out at for the amazing programs provided will lose much of what sets our school apart from other schools in other districts. To lose any program, no matter how big or small, would greatly impact the importance of this school and the overall morale of all
students at this school. I hope you see how important these programs are to me and all of the students here. Thank you. Thank you so much. Hi, my name is Ellie Pate. I live at 45 Dryden Road and I am an eighth grader here at Rams and I've been
involved in the performing arts program for the past three years. I don't have a music family, but I have found my passion for playing music and singing through school since I could write. I moved here in fifth grade, and my previous school didn't have the
strongest m music program, and I am so grateful to have the opportunity to be in this amazing community. Having a strong music program is key to sparking passion. Music gave me a sense of belonging. I, like many others, love to act, dance, and sing. The teachers that
have guided me through these programs are fantastic and have helped me lots through the years. I thank my voice coach, my band teachers, my art teachers, and my choir teachers. These teachers I know love what they do. They spark passion in young minds and they
help to grow us as people. Many others love these educators and programs such as art, choir, band, orchestra, dance, and drama. Just think there are a dozen of young There are dozens of young minds and hearts who are passionate about these programs such as the elementary
performances earlier in this meeting. I know that the people would be devastated to see them go. We thrive on our art programs and it brings lots of joy to people. The coral director at Whams has worked so hard this past year. She's
doing an amazing job and all of the students love her and I know that many fellow students would love to have her for another year and for more years to come. Although she doesn't have a 10 years of experience, she's working really hard and everyone needs to start
somewhere. She's doing a fantastic job. I hope that we keep the performing arts program strong. Thank you for listening and we hope you recognize the talent and passion us students have. Thanks Ellie. Are there any other students that are here to speak because
we're going to close public comment for the first session since we've hit the 30 minutes and then we won't you'll be able to come back for the second public comment. I just want to ask if you're going to vote before the second public comment because I would really like the chance to speak if you are.
I won't even be three minutes. We We are going to be voting on on Can I just please My name is Cara Cooper. I'm from Mayflower Drive. I just am trying to make heads and tails of this agenda. I am trying I've only been here for 5 years. I'm trying to follow along as
best I can. I remember that. Um I I just want to obviously discuss the personnel committee report. If you're going to be voting on how you're reorganizing this for our budget, I really would like you to vote no and reorganize it differently. I remember a finance guy on
the committee and a lot of finance people, I'm sorry, on the board here have been talking about cutting administrators. That was horrible at the time. I think cutting staff and teachers is even more horrible. And I would like to keep our class sizes smaller. I would
like you to please vote no on this and go back to the drawing boards and reorganize it in a different way. You have seven positions cut in special education. You have a beautiful, thriving arts program being cut. I I don't understand how any of this makes
sense. You're a board full of teachers and you're trying to cut teachers. I think you need to think about this differently. Perhaps cut administrators. I don't know. It's a horrible situation. Either way, I urge you to please vote no and think it over again. Can I ask anybody who I know you may
have signed in, but just if you haven't signed in for the students, you just sign in on the clipboard. Thank you. All right, we are up to the approval of minutes. I get a motion, Mr. Shaw, Mr.
Molinari, and roll call. Uh, Miss White. Yes, Dr. Mun. Yes, Mr. Molinari. Yes, Mr. Am. Yes, Miss Curado. Yes, Mr. Shaw. Yes, Mr. Talbot. Yes, and Mr. Malanic. Yes. Okay. So, uh thanks for the public
comment. Um, we certainly appreciate uh everything that some of our residents and students shared. Um, I I just wanted to to highlight a couple things from the agenda itself. Um, you know, you can't
reduce your expenses by $2.5 million and not have an impact. So, I really appreciate that people are noticing it because that is the reality, right? It's not possible to have a $4 million budget
deficit and expect to close that gap without having a noticeable impact. If you recall last year, we were able to create a significant savings for many uh years to come by restructuring our school start times and by restructuring
how we were doing transportation. um that that was um the last significant uh non-personnel adjustment that we can think to make. Um when it comes to a
school budget, it is as someone pointed out vastly u based on providing services for people in the form of teachers and other staff. Right? So our budget is 75%ish.
um related to our staffing and the benefits for those staff. Um so when you need to make a significant budget cut, you're trying to do everything you can with your non-s salary accounts, but you get to the point where there are limits and you're left with salary accounts.
And that's where we are. Um, in terms of some of the comments, I do want to point out that um, we have had declining enrollment over the last several years. That enrollment decline is roughly a thousand students from our high water
mark. That gives us some room to make adjustments without having um, unreasonable class sizes. And therefore, that's why you see the ability to do this with some positions. Other folks noted uh, administration. We are reducing administration by two
certificated administrators in this agenda item. Uh we also have an administrative assistant that uh is not being replaced. So there are adjustments to administration. There was a question about job coaching. We're reducing the number of instructional coaches from two
down to one. So there there is a lot of things um involved here that are not strictly about the music program. Notably, there is one music position listed in this reduction in force. So, understandably, I certainly appreciate
the passion. I appreciate the passion of the students. Uh I I just I need to emphasize that when you've got $2.5 million in staff, 33.1 full-time equivalents, there's going to be an impact. It's impossible to avoid. We're
trying to do the best we can to minimize that impact. and and and this is where where it comes down to. So, I I appreciate the passion. I thank you for the support of the programs and staff. A lot of thought has gone into trying to minimize the impact and and not have
increases in class sizes in places that we don't want to see like in elementary general education classes. We are protecting those class sizes. We're looking at a lot of things um that some of the students mentioned u were related to electives. And I can appreciate the
fact that there's a little confusion because you see reductions and you don't always know like, well, what what's caused by what, right? Every year, even if you have no reductions, you're going to have some classes that run and some classes that don't run. And sometimes that's just a function of what students are choosing when they're putting in
their requests. You also have adjustments that get made from year to year in order to try to make the schedule work better. So some changes are simply about making the schedule work and having flexibility in the schedule and they have nothing to do with reductions in staff. So I there
there's a lot that goes on every year and I can appreciate that it can be a little unclear as to what's caused by what, but in terms of the music program, it's one staff person on this uh agenda item. Thank you
for the clarification. Um we are up to finance and uh I don't believe that there's a report. No report this week. Um we have a meeting coming up. So okay, there [Music]
are how many items? Uh 15 items. Is that correct? Yeah. So just for the items on the list for finance this week, they're pretty standard. Most of them are annual. Um any of the The ones that aren't annual are all very small. So,
can I get a motion? Robin Mike. And roll call. Miss White, yes. Dr. McHune, yes. Mr. Molinari, yes. Mr. Yes. Miss Curado,
yes. Mr. Shaw, yes. Mr. Talbot, yes. And Mr. Omalic, yes. That brings us to personnel. Um we have a report. Sure. Um the personnel committee um minutes are actually from two different meetings, March 6 and 21st. Um
the majority of the discussions um at those two personnel meetings were about staffing issues that I cannot report out and negotiations um with the teachers union. There is one item I can report out on. Um so the um committee um
listened to a recommendation to um create a stipend for a fitness center coordinator at Ridge High School. Right now the fitness center is being staffed by um various um different staff members. Um this coordinator would add consistency and be able to oversee more
individualized plans for athletes. Um so the committee supports this recommendation. It would be a small cost savings from how we're doing it now and we think it would provide more consistency in the fitness center. That's it. Uh there are 18 items. May I
get a motion? Well, uh Janice and Brett, any anybody have any comments that they want to make? Uh just to expand on that a little bit along with the savings, the anticipation is not just for student athletes to be able to access the
fitness center, but it is for all the students through increased supervisor hours at the center as well as I believe there's some kind of fitness tracking app that they're looking to implement as well. So trying to expand the opportunities there for students to utilize it as a student body as a whole and not just student athletes.
Anyone else? Can I comment now on some of the staff reductions? Is that okay? So, first I just wanted to say I agree with everyone that was speaking out today. I think it was great that you spoke out. Um, this also impacts my
family as well. My first grader will be devastated when she can't do chorus in a couple years. Um, I saw this train coming down the track a few years ago, which is why I decided to run for the board. I saw that costs were going up
greater than our revenue was, and I knew this was coming, and that's why I started to in the first place. Um, my goal has always been to try to cut everything that won't impact the students. That's been the goal, I think, of the whole board was try to find
whatever we can cut. That's why we did buses. That's why we looked at um so many different areas, whether it was um instructional aids or um technology, and we've cut all those things. We've taken it to the bare bones. So, now we're at a
wall, and the question is, what do we do next? And the problem is we can only raise revenue so much. There's limits to that. So now we have to make very tough decisions and the administration went through all the different scenarios that you're talking about. They went through
it line by line, employee by employee and they made tough decisions and they came to us with what they think is the best solution. Uh it is not great. I am not happy with it but it is where we are. What I wanted to make clear though is
the problem is even with these cuts, this doesn't go away. Next year costs are going up greater than revenues. This is going to continue to be a problem. So what I encourage everyone out here to do is keep speaking out. Keep coming here. Come to us with ideas. If you have ways
that we can cut costs, come up here and tell us about it. Call us. Send us emails because we're going to have trouble next year, the year after. I encourage you run for the board. If if you have ideas, we're happy to get those ideas, but I know this has been a tough
decision and it's a tough vote, but thank you for being here. Um, I agree. Thank you for coming out tonight and speaking. It's important that we all get to hear from you, um, students and parents and other community members. I I do want to put this in some
perspective though. Um this is not just a Bernard's Township situation. This is going on throughout the state of New Jersey and there are schools in the southern part of the state that are closing complete schools. They are
selling buildings. This is a a problem that is very severe and I I have faith in our administration and in our teachers and in the community
that we can work together to try to make the best decisions that we can. Sometimes those decisions are very tough decisions. Um, as Dave said, none of us is happy, no one here is happy to do these kinds of of uh changes, but we
need to face the reality of the budget situation. And we're trying to make decisions that affect the least number of students that is possible. So, we please, you know, understand we we appreciate your support, but we need to
deal with the situation at hand. So I don't know if I can really add on to anything that Sean and Miss Grar has already said, but yeah, I I I have two children in school as well, fourth grade and seventh grade. My seventh grader thinks I am solely responsible for her
not being able to have her two top electives next year. So we hear everywhere. Um, and it's also great that I hear it from my kids, but I hear it from the students down here in the front, everyone else that spoke, everyone that sent emails uh to the board voicing
their concerns. It is awesome that we have an engaged community that is really invested in our schools. Um, decisions are really tough here. I don't think anyone on this board really wants to cut anyone's positions whether it be
teachers, administrators, programs, whatever it is. I do want to say that it wasn't made in a vacuum these decisions. You know, when these were when this was brought to us through the various committees, the administration had already gone to each school and the supervisors to see what would have the
least impact on their schools and their classes. So, this wasn't made in a void. This is made with a lot of input, a lot of thought over months. This is not a a shotgun approach to trying to fill a a budget gap here. Um, everything was on
the table and reviewed and this is the not a great outcome, but really the best one that has the least impact on the students. I'll I'll be brief because I agree with what Dave um Brett and Janet said. I
also agree with a lot of the speakers. I was very vocal a couple of years ago about trying to get our costs in line and as Dave said, this was something that we we saw coming and it it it is um tough to do. But in this case, the
administration has been very thorough. They didn't focus on one area. It wasn't just arts. There's cuts in administration. There's cuts in special ed. There's cuts in general ed. There's cuts in academic or class sizes
are going up. I I think to a lot of people they feel the impact that directly impacts them. But the administration was very careful to see where the least amount of impact would be. Even though when it impacts you
directly, I understand and everybody here I think understands it's tough. But I I think as Dave said, if there are suggestions on what to cut, I think there's always room and and there will be more cuts coming next year and the
year after. So I think we do have to find a way to be more efficient and have the least impact on on our on our students because that's what everybody here is trying to maintain. I think
there was some comment made that if the board or or the administration cared about students then X or Y. I can say that's probably not worded the best because I think that's the only consideration that that everybody is having in in making these difficult
decisions. Thank you. Um I'm not just going to echo. I want to add to what my colleagues have set up here. Um, first of all, other school districts are going through the same thing. And I believe it was Middletown had to close some schools altogether. So, it's it's all over the
state. Um, nothing was going to completely alleviate what's coming down right now. But I have said this along with Mr. Mean two years ago, I do believe that uh proper and very diligent personnel management could have alleviated some of this over the years. Our district has shrunk. Mr. Karen
mentioned that when a district shrinks, I think when you have positions that you need to backfill, when people leave or retire, it's really incumbent upon us to look closely what are those positions have to be have to be backfilled with with a shrinking district because as we're finding out right now, it's much
easier not to fill an open position than it is to let somebody go. Nobody wants to do that. But there we are. Um there are certain things that are driving our costs that were bound by law that we can't do anything about. Um health insurance. Um you have to pay your people. People have to get raises. I
think we have to pay our people well, but we have to make sure we have the right amount of people to do the job. Also, as a district gets smaller, as we have, we're going to inherently have less offerings. I mean, third grade strings is an example. Um eighth grade
photography. It doesn't mean the overall quality of the district is less. What it means is we have to focus on what we are keeping and make sure that continues the excellence that we've always had here. We may not have the complete diner menu anymore. What we still have on the menu is going to be very good. So we have to
keep that in mind and it is true we're going to run up into this in future years as well. So we want to look in my view we want to look very closely when somebody retires or leaves a district whether you want to back fill that position. We had this discussion two years ago and there was a lot of let's
say heated back and forth about whether certain and there was at the time administrative positions should be filled. Well, now we are where we are and it's not a matter of not backfilling. It's a matter of reducing enforce. So, let's keep that in mind next time that we have these discussions
about whether we should back fill a position. And again, it wouldn't have alleviated what came down right now, but it might have eased it a little bit. I just want to say first I really appreciate everybody coming here today. I especially students. I know it's late for you guys. Um you know realize we are
listening to what you say. It's just because we're not responding it doesn't mean we're ignoring you guys. Um but you know I'm not going to repeat everything that everyone else said but you know I'm a school teacher and my district is going through the same thing. Uh you know it's all over the state. uh you
know that there's prices are going up so we have to make cuts and it's really uh a difficult decision. You know, my daughter is not happy with with me particularly. She blames uh she's in seventh grade. She didn't get her first choice for elected. She thinks it's my fault personally. But, you know, I think
it's important that what we do is we try to make cuts that will have the least impact. And unfortunately, you know, this is going to be a problem for years. I don't see prices coming down and I think you know it's important that everybody does come out and give us their ideas and we do listen and we do take into consideration but you know we
try to do what will be the best for the district and unfortunately you know we've had to do cuts and u I know it's not easy decisions we don't like doing it but there's just sometimes not a huge amount of options but thank you um before we vote. I just want to say um
we've heard everything that you said and I just want you to know that this is very painful to all of us too. Um as somebody who has had four children and I've been here a long time and I've had
programs cut, programs come back, programs cut, programs come back. My kids have had different things. I I totally understand where you're coming from. I also am a huge huge huge proponent of the arts because it is
something that is very important in my household. But I also recognize that we have a $2.5 million shortfall. And when we asked the
administration to figure out the best way to come up with this, we one of the things we asked was spread it out so that it's not just one area. And I'm
very appreciative that that's what they did. So there are there are cuts in administration. There are cuts in teachers. There are cuts at all four elementary schools. There are cuts to special education. There are cuts to gen
education. There's cuts at WAMS. There cuts at Ridge. It's not just one building. We're all feeling the pain. But in my opinion, that's the way it needed to be as opposed to just saying only one school is going to be hit. And I'm sure as a parent when
you're thinking about what's being cut from your school, you're passionate about that because that is what affects you the most. But we have to look at everything, every program, gened, special education,
preschool through 12th grade. And we have to make the hard decisions because ultimately we need to ensure that our students are getting the very best possible education. And we also need to ensure that our
talented, extremely dedicated teachers have as much tools that they possibly need to teach our kids with all these cuts that we've had to make. And I have no doubt
that they will be able to do that because we do have the best of the best in this district. And that does not mean that we're happy. It doesn't mean that we don't have concerns. It doesn't mean that we're we don't share the same worries as you. But this is where we
are. We have no control about the state aid. We got less state aid. Guess what? We're probably going to get less state aid next year. We have no control about the rising costs of insurance. We just have to take
that hit and figure it out. So, keeping that in mind, we've come up with what we hope is going to have the least impact on the students. Does that mean that
there going to be some kids that are sad because there's some programs that they can't have? Absolutely. Do we hope that if things change, we'll be able to bring some things back? Absolutely. But the harsh reality is that this is where we are right now. And
it's not because we're not listening. And it's not because we don't care. And it is because we care that so much time was spent to figure this out. And I know a lot of people like to use the word transparent. This was an extremely
transparent process. I so appreciate that Mr. Mararyian met we meet if not monthly every other month with the PTO presidents and he spelled out to them exactly what was going to have to happen. He expelled out to them just
like he did tonight what it means in terms of tenure, not tenure, when you can keep somebody, when you can't keep somebody. That it's not about who is the most favored administrator or teacher. It comes down to what we are legally able
to do when we are reducing in force. And so that being said, I am sad. I'm very sad. But I still still have hope that our district will remain as wonderful as it is and we will continue
in the next year to try to come up with ways to maintain the best of the best. But you have to know in full transparency we have hard times ahead of us. That's just the
reality. So with that, I'm going to ask for a roll call. Miss White, yes. Dr. McHune, yes. Mr. Molinari, yes. Mr. Yes. Miss Curado, yes. Mr. Shaw, yes. Mr. Talbot, yes. Mr.
Omalak, yes, we're up to policy. Um, and, uh, we have a report. So, we uh met on April 2nd and, uh, the county superintendent approved our policy for eligibility of resident n resident students proposed uh uniform
tuition rates. Uh we noted that the uniform rates for children non-resident staff only applies to full-time staff. Um we talked about the AI plan coming out of the work done working with Wong Hills Regional School District. uh we
are working on a plan uh to come up with and that's going to be reviewed at the May policy committee meeting coming and um we also expect to finalize recommendations for the high school policy regarding personal technology uh devices you know smartphones and such
when Dr. comes to the May policy committee meeting to present data on uh phone free pilot which we've been doing and uh we'll have more information the next meeting. Okay. And there is one one item um can I get a
motion Brett and Janice a roll call. Miss White yes Dr. Mun yes Mr. Molinari yes Mr. Am yes Miss Curado yes Mr. Shaw yes Mr. Yes. And Mr.
Malanic. Yes. We're to curriculum and leave a report. Yeah. So, curriculum met on April 4th. Uh, first up was a new textbook, comprehensive health skills for middle school, the fourth edition. Uh, Jennifer Balder, uh, Baldiseri,
excuse me, spoke about the great body shop, which is the health curriculum core resource that's currently being used. Uh, the feeling is that is a bit too simplistic and the multiple sources it utilizes throughout Whams. Uh the WH's curriculum makes visibility to parents more challenging. So the staff
feels the new textbook is more rigorous. It has more real world examples including more topical subjects for example vaping, body positivity, health health insurance, social media. Um the book will be kept in school. It will not be taken home. Uh and all lessons from
the text will be available online for parental review. Uh curriculum itself is unchanged. This is just a new resource supporting that curriculum. U moving to the is also a cost savings because a great body shop came with a 9k annual cost. This cost is for six years. Um
renewing online access after six years will be 2k annually. Um digital access is currently being shared with board members. I'm in the middle of reading the book right now and the physical textbook is in the board office if any public wants to review it. Uh Character
Education um scope and sequence. Let me just scroll down here a little bit. Okay. Okay. Uh Dana Romano presented this. Uh this is character education would be two times per month. This does not displace any existing coursework. It really just standardizes what teachers are already doing across the grades. Uh
the full scope and sequence is linked in the minutes. Um discussion items. We talked about summer curriculum projects. Uh overall summer curriculum projects were reduced reduced by one half due to budgetary reasons. Uh curriculum projects are also linked in the minutes. One question that was asked is what will
be missed during the school year due to curriculum writing cuts that will affect the students. Uh there was a good amount of discussion regarding that as well. Uh AI for education debrief critical AI literacy also linked in the minutes. Uh Miss Fox discusses the uh discussed the AI form at Watch Hills. She detailed the
AI workshop. AI for education is consolidating feedback and will be presenting an AI plan for us to consider. There was extensive discussion among the committee regarding the uses of AI and results will be brought to the staff and the policy committee for review. Uh there was a struct uh discru
discussion excuse me on the strategic plan. Scroll down again and Miss Fox provided a review of the strategic plan academic program discussion. There were two discussions one at 10 a.m. and one at 7 p.m. She presented the PowerPoint uh used to guide the public discussion that's also
linked in the minutes. Um, one thing to consider coming out of discussion is how to balance the philosophies of student acceleration versus not overstressing the student population. There was a good amount of discussion on that topic. Uh, budget reduction program impact. So,
elementary as as you all probably know at this point, scroll down again. Elementary Spanish and third grade uh strings of course are being eliminated. Eighth grade photography is being eliminated, but the photography program at the high school is going to be unaffected. Uh there will be a reduction
in cycles, for example, from six to five cycles, and some semester electives will be cut due to uh low enrollment. And that's it. We'll meet again on May 2nd. Uh we're up to wellness. The committee met on March 27th. Um the
first item of business was meeting with the student government of Cedar Hill. Um, students commented that they are happy that there's always an adult they can turn to if they're having a problem. Um, they also appreciate having the option to meet with the guidance
counselor in a private setting. Um, students describe their teachers as compassionate, funny, friendly, and sensitive to students needs. Uh, they like that the teachers use a variety of instructional techniques and that they take the time to make sure each student
understands lesson. The fifth grade students like the platooning model and feel it helps them prepare for middle school. They feel that there's a good balance of work time and social time at Cedar Hill. They also had some suggestions to consider. Families would
like regular reminders of scheduled early morning band and chorus. They would like more opportunities for outdoor fizz and more sports training in PE classes. Um they also requested healthier cafeteria offerings especially
vegetarian options. Um some students express the need for additional practice in managing time, materials, workload and extracurricular activities. Um we also had an update on
the hello project. Um Joseph spoke about that earlier so I won't add much to that. um that just that families receive a weekly email with the topic and 15 questions that will be discussed in school among uh students and staff and
that families are encouraged to have those conversations at home as well. Um the goal is that teachers will make connections with students and that every student at Ridge will have at least two adults that they can turn to during the school day. The cell phone pilot is
going well. teachers are following the new policy and fewer than 10 phones are confiscated each day and that's as of last month. So I'm sure there's improvement in that. We also had a post-secary report uh presentation from
Mrs. Smith. Um this provided statistics for both college admissions and career education. The full report is available on the district website. And um just some highlights about that. For
college admissions, 438 students graduated in the class of 2024. 91% indicated that they would attend a four-year school after graduation. 4% said a two-year school and 5% had other post-secary plans or were undecided. The
college acceptance rates were similar to those reported in 2023. Um, Breers, the University of Pittsburgh, New York University, and Northeastern remain among the schools with the highest number of ridge
applications. As far as career education, a goal of the counseling department has been to increase opportunities for students to become more aware of post-secary pathways other than two and four-year college programs. These include a full- internship and a
May June internship, which Joseph also spoke about. during senior year. Um, also school to work opportunities and early college credit. Sophomore students and families were invited to a presentation on Navvian and an
introduction to career resources. A dedicated Pathways website resource and site catalog is now available to help interested students find internship sites. Seniors involved in the Pathways program are meeting with a variety of
student and parent groups to present the program opportunities and to answer questions. They will also present at an upcoming board of education meeting. Um that uh presentation Mr. Mararyian mentioned is also available on the district website. The next wellness
committee meeting is scheduled for Thursday, April 24th. Does anybody have any questions for Mr. Okay, we are up to facilities and operations. Okay, so facilities and ops met on
Thursday, April 3rd. Uh the first item discussed was the status of work orders. It was noted that there were several work orders that were older than 90 days. Uh keep in mind this was on April 3rd. So a lot of those older work orders were planned for completion over uh the
spring break. So we'll have to see how that went at our next meeting. Uh there were a bunch as well uh that were older than uh 90 days specifically in HVAC that we kind of tracked separately. Um a lot of those are related to air conditioning and we're waiting for the
warmer weather to be able to test the equipment and uh line up the necessary repairs on those particular H air conditioning units. Um, we also talked about uh continuing continuing to moni monitor weekly counts
of new work orders uh entered against uh those closed in the same time period as a as a tracking mechanism. So, we'll continue to do that. Um, we talked about uh potentially lighting the uh varsity field that we're hoping to be able to
have uh converted from natural grass to artificial turf. Um, so our business administrator, Mr. Row, uh, did a little research and shared the visual effects of different types of lighting systems on fields to highlight the difference
between old flood lamps and modern field lighting. Um, we talked about construction project updates with respect to the Mount Prospect roof and direct install projects. Um, the Mount Prospect roof uh is scheduled to have sub substantial
completion uh on or about August 22nd. Uh, and we're still pursuing direct install projects for Cedar Hill and Oak Street elementary schools, but they are not yet fully approved. Uh we talked about the status of the Lee Field track, some maintenance repairs that have been
uh ongoing on it and the need to do some cing uh of the track surface in uh preparation for the next time we need to replace that surface. Uh we also looked at the uh history of
findable lates for our transportation companies meeting our bus routes uh comparing 232 uh 2324 last school year to the current school year 2425 uh and noticing a extremely good
improvement uh on the number of findable lates meaning that this year's service has been much much better and has had uh much fewer uh findable lads compared to last year. Uh I think that was the result of the rebidding and the new
vendors. Um we talked about status of transportation renewals for next year with our different busing vendors. Uh two of them are renewing at uh CPI, which is the standard renewal rate uh in the transportation contracts. Uh and one
of our other uh biders we're going to have to rebid because they're not renewing. Uh, and some of our routes have to be rebid anyway just by the nature of um, the bids from last time through the bidding process. Uh, finally, we talked about the cafeteria
food service uh, bid renewal. Uh, and um, we talked about the pros and cons of the requirement in the food service bid specification to try to improve the food quality and menu selections, especially at the elementary
school level. uh and the committee agreed that um that should be a priority in terms of the structure of the bid documents and the award. So I think that's out to bid Jim and supposed to come back May 1st. May 1st. Okay. So the bid
is out and we'll have those results uh on about well on May 1st. Uh the next meeting for facilities and ops uh we're working out. We don't have a date set yet. There will not be a U meeting in May, but we will have a meeting in June. We're trying to work out the date.
Thanks. Does anybody have any questions? Um I I can just almost anticipate this the thought of wait you're looking into turfing and you're looking into Leaf Field and you've just told us that you know you don't have money in the budget.
So I just maybe I'm gonna toss this over to you to Dave to just explain that there's a difference between capital reserve and the rod grants because I don't want people walking out of here thinking oh they do have money because they are able to do those things because they they are very different. So maybe
can you just quickly explain so people understand that I see Jim's about to push. Why don't you Jim he's the expert. Yeah. Uh that's correct. For for example the roof prospect and mount prospect is is funded uh from capital reserve. These are funds that are ring fenced
specifically for capital projects that are on the district's long range facility plan, which is a state approved application. All the districts are required to maintain a five-year long range facility plan that outlines important capital projects. You are uh
allowed to use capital reserve funds for those projects, but you can't use them for any other purposes. You can't use them for supplies. You can't use them for recurring costs such as salaries or any sort of consumable um type of service. They are strictly uh reserved
by statute for capital projects. Just to add on to that a little bit, school districts are very different than the rest of the world how it works. We have rules that we have to follow. So there are separate funds. You have to follow those rules. Similar with
how we talked about um medical costs. There are specific rules that we have to follow. How cut staff. There are rules how we what we have to follow. So, it's very different that what most people are used to and how we have to make cuts. We don't have choices in a lot of these areas. So, we can't just take funds from
one place and use it in another. It's just not possible. It's not allowed. And just to add to that also, you know, we have to keep in mind the nature of our facilities and the need to maintain them. We have some great facilities, but you know, when you've got 800,000 plus square feet, it's it's a huge
undertaking to maintain all that. Not to mention all the grounds in the athletic fields. And as we know from our research on our um inventory and our facility needs assessment, we've got many, many, many millions of dollars of projects to try to address over the next several
years. So, it's not as though the funds in capital reserve are even enough to deal with all that. Thanks. Uh we are up to leazison reports. Does anybody have one? Again with the municipal alliance um you
know we met last uh week and right the goal is you know to prevent and reduce the use of alcohol, tobacco and other drugs. Just want to announce uh again that the big 5K challenge the 35th anniversary is coming up uh on June 1st uh Sunday. So try to get your kids to
run is for a very good cause. Making my kids run, they don't have a choice. Thank you. I also have a couple of items. Um, one is an update from Bernard's Peek and CPAC. They have two virtual events coming up next week on
Tuesday, April 29th from 7 to 8:30 p.m. There's um a session on college ready strategies for success inside and outside the classroom. This is a presentation by Dr. Mary Heert who is the director of
Fairley Dickinson University's regional center for learning disabilities and she is going to discuss academic and non-academic skills, executive functioning, self- advocacy, the power of strengths and life skills. Um, and
that's great for uh high school students who are considering um going to college. There's also another uh event that's uh being sponsored by PEC and SPAN which is New Jerseys statewide parent educ ad
advoc advocacy network. Um this is on family engagement in the IEP process, your rights and your role. That date is April 30th at 700 p.m. Um you can check the Burner PEC Facebook page or website
for more information on that. Um, I also have an update from Somerset County Educational Services Commission. The board of directors met on April 2nd. Um, they approved items related to finance, transportation, personnel, and
policy. Superintendent Harold Dunavavage provided a tour of the building and trades workshop, which is located in the career center. Um, it was established nine years ago to help meet the needs of students with IEP or 504 plans who did
not qualify for admission to Somerset County Votech. During their cycle in building and trades, students learn practical hands-on skills in framing, siding, plumbing, electrical, tiling, decking, and wallpapering. The goal is
for students to be able to apply for good paying assistant jobs upon graduation. The career center administrators are looking into possibly expanding the program to provide Saturday courses. Is that it?
Thanks. Anybody else? Dave, um I went to the township committee meeting um and the big topic was affordable housing. So I know Keith was there as well and I know a few members of the board also listened in and the administration. um
followed. So, the the biggest takeaways from that are they're adding they're they're going to start building two more communities um housing. The one that really impacts us is Westgate. Um it will be a lot more students coming in. We don't know exactly how many and the
impact yet, but we will continue to um study that, make sure we understand the impact, and we'll um report back to you in the future on that. Thank you. We are now up to public comment. You may come down, sign in on the clipboard, and
anything you would like to share, now is the time. Good evening, Pamela Havland, 153 Canterbury Way. I know that you all have seen my face here year after year after year. you know that I follow very closely the board of education and I
appreciate all that the board does and the administration does and I appreciate how incredibly difficult these decisions are. I just want to know if someone can please explain to me how knowing what was coming down the line, why did the
board just a couple years ago do a 7% and then the following year a point a 0% tax increase when the state allows you to go to 2%. While I'm no fan of paying more taxes, if you knew this was coming, couldn't you have collected the
revenue? And could it have helped in the situation we are in now? The township committee, I believe, never went with a 0% tax increase. Why would the board of ed? You said that you saw this coming. You said you went over everything with a
fine tooth comb. Even with lower enrollment, you knew the price of everything would be going up. You knew insurance would be going up. You knew utilities would be going up. Everything. Everything. Now, I can appreciate that you were keeping in mind citizens who
are on tight budgets. But wouldn't it be prudent to keep a steady 2% increase every year instead of 0% one year and then the almost 4% we'll have this year? And we still are going to feel the pain. Now, thinking outside the box, is there
a way to survey the community and see if they'd be willing to do a payto-play for certain programs? I remember paying for middle school sports for all three of my kids. I didn't mind doing it. I understood there was not money in the budget for middle school sports, and I
was happy to pay for my kids to play. I appreciate fiscal responsibility, but I'm sure everyone here would moved into town for our great schools and our extraordinary real estate values reflect that great
reputation. As people pay even more for a home here in Basking Ridge than they would a comparable home elsewhere, since it's going to be painful for years going forward, let's think outside the box. Let's see what the community is willing
to do to save the programs they love. Thank you very much. Thank you for all that you do. Thank you, Miss Good evening. My name is Julen Pen. Um I live in 21 Raleigh. I have a uh eighth grader
and 11th grader. Both of them are um in orchestra. I having fun and meet good friends in orchestra. They cannot make it here today. So they wants me to uh come here to speak for them. Uh uh they are already in middle school. They
already in high schools but uh I still we um uh uh um really um proud of our music program. I brought the uh CJMA central regional music program. Uh in
chamber group there are 44 people uh in uh uh willing and we have uh uh seven people out of 44. So there are about like a 15 middle 1,500 middle school. We
take like uh 15 or 16% in uh the uh chamber group program. So we we are like number one here. But uh we work so hard, we uh practice so hard, parents support, uh teachers support, but when we look
back uh we don't have support. Well, we we look like a cutting down of the music program and the music program is not like oh we cut down to this year we come back next year you did you stop practicing you will come back you have
to start from 101. So uh I I just want to ask if you like the Frozen performance like you just see if you see the uh high school Cinderella you will know that without pay orchestra it's
incomplete but the music especially string you have to start very early have little tiny like instrument so you can start very early but if you pass the prime time let let me say if you pass like third grade it will be a little bit
too blade because your body already stiff. You cannot like standing. You cannot hold the uh valing with your shoulder and chin. I actually I spend uh quality time with my kids practice valing it. I I'm pretty sure that it
will be their lifelong uh hobby. So just please leave the budget here with a doll and give our children music, art and soul. Thank you. Thank you. Can you please make sure you're signed in also?
Thank you. Hi. Um my name is Raf Shaf. I spoke before and I would just like to say um how um the music department um kids who start music early on, they have um they keep these skills with them lifelong. um starting earlier helps them develop better skills and um by restricting
their um music learning till much later in life, it restricts their um ability to perform. Um also I would like to say if we're cutting teachers now um and we keep cutting teachers down the line as a student who still has four years left in this district, how am I going to have to
um perform with um how if we keep cutting teachers down every single year, are there going to be any teachers left to teach us? And um when there's classes are so packed, am I going to get the same attention from the teacher that I do now? So um thank you. Thank you.
Hi Lindseay Ponucci, 146 Lynden Drive. Um first, as nice as it was to see the elementary school pre performances at the beginning of this meeting, it was honestly also really difficult to watch. um because many of us here know that a lot of those programs won't be around
next year. So, it was great to see what all the elementary school students are capable of, but it was also really difficult in my personal opinion. Um so, I have a few questions about the agenda and what's happening in the district due
to the budget cuts. Um first, I'm wondering if there was a retirement package um that we considered offering to our teachers. I know that with this happening across the state and many many districts having to make cuts, I do know that Milbour created a retirement
package um to entice staff that's paid on the higher pay scale. So, I was wondering if we looked into that. Um secondly, most of us here tonight are hoping to learn more information um because pretty much we're all operating on what we've heard through the
grapevine. Um, for example, on the agenda, the reduction in force list I find to be extremely vague. Uh, special education grades K to 5 is listed for four positions. Special education grades 9 to 12, one position, special education
grades 6 to 8, two positions. What are these positions? Are these teachers, support staff, BCBAS, occupational therapists, speech therapists, physical therapists? Is the abolishment of the special education supervisor for K to 5 and six to 12 included in these seven
riffs or are these an additional seven? Um also when will we learn what more about where these riffs are specifically whether they're um in the above teacher support staff therapist column. Um,
based on this agenda, I can see that Kathleen Ducepout, I don't know if I'm saying her name right, uh, has been assigned to be the assistant principal at Cedar Hill for next year. So, that answers my question about if we're going to lose Sarah Thompson as our vice principal. Um, but Miss Cody isn't
listed anywhere on the agenda. So, when will we know definitively if she's being replaced? Will there be a list posted or will parents just have to hear by word of mouth? Third, you keep saying that you saw this coming, which a few other people have commented on. I'm confused
why there was a six-day rotation cycle created for this year at the elementary schools introducing Spanish and an exploratory period. If we saw this coming, why didn't we just hold off on that, keep the five days, not introduce Spanish so we weren't giving and then
taking away? And then I'm sure that would have also saved moving forward to this year to roll over. Um, finally, it's been hard to hear all of you say, it's it's been a very glum picture
that's been painted. Um, you've all in your comments stated that this is going to happen again next year and the year after that. And last year, you know, the district had to address a multi-million dollar deficit and then again this year, we're having the same conversation. So, what I'm asking all of you is to please
figure out how we don't have to have this conversation next year. Thank you for your time. Thanks, Mucci. Hi, Barbara Giri, 66 Dryen Road. Um, I spoke earlier and I am disappointed that you approved the list of riffs that were listed on the board um on the agenda
without thoroughly looking further into the administration side of our district. You keep saying that our district is losing population, but we still have the same me number of assistant principles throughout the district. Is there a way to combined
reduce it to a supervisor so we don't have to have more teachers? If this is going to be consistent and our district is keep shrinking, you've per the agenda there's four teachers in English that were were received re were received
notification. That's significant. Math, two teachers in high school. So what are we talking about? We're changing a class size from 25 to 30. That's not sustainable for a teacher. That's not sustainable for the district. We need a sustainable plan.
What can be done to fix it without affecting the students? It's not cutting teachers. Something else has to be done. This district will continue to topple over if you don't look at the administration side. And um there's one more thing I wanted
to say and I that's okay. Thank you very much. Thank you. Anukica Forzani Dawn Drive. Um see just a couple of comments. Um I I was also a little concerned a few years ago
uh when the board had approved a 0% tax increase uh when we again knew this was coming and in fact that year we had added even an extra 500,000 in extra security officers and I do recall at least one board member sitting there
saying well would like to at least increase um taxes to cover that and she was overruled unfortunately. So, it just it is concerning that this wasn't really uh considered when that 0% tax increase
was was put in play. And I know that was I believe around the time Mr. Shaw that you were running and you said I remember being in a meeting where you said you are concerned about this. You see this coming down the pike. Um, I know you have a lot of financial experience and that was one of the reasons that you had
run and you wanted to see, you know, what you could do to have least impact as you I understand you have young kids in the district as well. Um, one thing that again I'm not a financial expert so I'm and maybe I'm naive about this but when I was trying to understand this I
see that the district has six years remaining of $6 million per year debt um which is about 5% of the budget which is similar to other districts but is also a big portion of what we're trying to cover right now and so I guess I'm just
wondering if it was considered to do like debt refinancing or something so that instead of several years down the road where it goes to nothing um that maybe we can have some alleviation on budget cuts this year. I know that's what a lot of companies do. I don't know if this was considered again I'm not a
finance expert but just um something that kind of popped into my mind that I didn't quite understand why we would not consider that at least. Um the other thing as far as the arts, um I'm also a huge supporter of the arts. So I completely get everything that people
said here and I know there are hard decisions. I know a lot of people on the board had people also kids very involved in the arts. Um myself as well and I will say that I go pretty much to every orchestra, band, choir concert, um the plays and they're absolutely phenomenal.
Um, I often feel when I leave that I've seen something that's almost equivalent to a New York City production except for that it would took me only five minutes to get here and it was either free or a nominal cost. And um I think that's something we need to spread the word in
the community even people who don't have kids that this is free. This is free to the seniors. this is free. Um any little tax increase or you know the tax increases um that could come this year are probably the equivalent of you know
maybe not even one trip into the New York City to see a concert. And so I think we really need to get the word out that these are absolutely amazing performances and really to increase support of the arts in the community at large even those who don't have kids in the school district. Um so just a couple
thoughts I had. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Pani. Hi, Nicole Pavlin, 54 Beachwood Road. Um, I came here also in support of the arts and music programs and um, you know, I loved seeing the uh, performances earlier and um, all the
engagement, the students leaving right now. Thank you so much for speaking up and keep keep speaking up. It's it's so important to be engaged for the whole community. I know everybody here cares so much and I appreciate all your comments as well. Everybody who spoke tonight, it's so important to to have
this public conversation and I'm wondering if there's a way that we can continue this, you know, that we can work together. I saw I heard some great ideas, you know, from from both sides. you know, there's there's a way we can go together. And I'm wondering if the
board can have um I don't know a series of um thought exchanges where we can talk about creative solutions kind of out of the box thinking where we can come up with some solutions that we um can can have some of these programs and
some ways to to keep um these really important um programs for our kids to keep them going in some ways. You know, I I know there's a lot coming ahead with the way things are going um finances and and politics and everything, but you know,
we're a strong community that has a lot of um potential and you know, our our community is very engaged and let's keep that up. I think it's really important. But I do I did want to um just speak to um my my own personal
experience with the the arts and music programs for my kids because I I just like it to be on the record at this point and I think it's such a special district for especially the arts and the music programs. Both of my children um
started their musical journey in the district in third grade. My son, he learned cello from Mrs. Kovaleeski in third grade at Oak Street School. Uh my daughter participated in she did violin third grade uh with Mrs. Kovaleeski as
well and um she also did chorus in third grade. We're a big musical family. We've been very big supporters of the arts and and music. And um you know I think the younger the better as people said earlier the younger the better for many
many different reasons. Um, it's such a it's such a a big part of, you know, who we are and it it's it's really just important to keep that going. And my son is still doing cello. You know, he's going all through whams with Mr. McGowan and um he's going to go
with Miss Curran in the high school and um he he's he has a love of music. We've taken him to New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, Brook orchestra. You know, it's it's something that we're all very passionate about and and we would like to see this excellent program continue.
And like I said, it's important for it to start early. And um just on a personal note as well, you never know where it's going to take you. I actually just I had surgery a few weeks ago and my surgeon told me um playing a musical
instrument helps him to u practice with this hand sewing. So you you never know where things like that bring you. And um you heard from the students how you know socially um it helps with anxiety and uh it brings people together. So just in
general I know programs may come and go but you've heard from so many of us how important the music and art programs are and as things come and go you know please consider that this district is very passionate about having having um a
strong arts programs for our kid for our kids. Thank you. Thank you. [Applause] Anyone else for public comment? Okay, close public comment. Does anybody have anything for board
forum? Yeah, I would just like to address a little bit of um clarity on on the tax increases from a couple of years ago. What that does is allows us to save money during those years, but it would have affected our budget last year or
this year because of the ability to use what's called and maybe Jim you can correct me or Nick um banking the any tax savings that we had allows us to actually increase the budget more this year and last year by using that banked
savings. Uh so I just want to clarify that. Um that was it. Go ahead, Jim. It's not often I get to talk about budgetary legislation, but yes, um Mr.'s point is is correct. When you don't go
to 2%, the state budgeting uh statutes do allow you to bank that cap, that unused uh taxation authority to for use in subsequent years. And um you know, at that time when you had the the ESSER funds, um the district had a lot
fibility and so one of one of the options was that the board was aware of at the time was that use of banked cap could be available. However, um if you don't generate bank cap, it runs out. And and I think some of the things that we've talked about in in finance
committee is that um bank cap is running out. And next year, next budget, not this budget that we're we'll have to vote on in May 5th, but the budget after will be the last year that there's any bank cap to use. So, it's those
circumstances that um looking, you know, a year two budgets out that are going to be very challenging. You want to weigh in on the debt service and when we're allowed to do stuff with the debt service in terms of
refinancing. Uh right. Yeah. So, as as far as the debt service goes, the uh board has already passed I think two authorizations to refinance the bonds and um as I understand it, the market conditions are not um hitting the
trigger point. there's a statutory trigger point where there's a a calculation of how much savings the refinancing uh if it if it will generate x of savings you know the board is obligated to refinance so the board has passed those resolutions but it's
now dependent on market conditions so interest rates have to drop to the point where refinancing triggers the savings so um the board's done everything that that it can do in terms of refinancing And um yeah, typically uh as the speaker
commented that towards the end of a a debt service schedule, the board will have to look usually two to three years prior to it, they will have to look at um you know what are the needs in the district and and what sort of things uh you know maybe a debt service eligible
project to accomplish. Thanks Jim. So um just in terms of some of the other comments about um you know how people can get involved and share ideas um we have been running meetings regarding our strategic plan which obviously is setting up you know goals
for the long term in terms of uh district operations and a variety of other things. So th those opportunities have been presented um and so certainly people are encouraged to take advantage of those and and reading the SOS express to understand when those opportunities are available. We'll probably uh present
a draft strategic plan I would say uh I think I had scheduled it for the second meeting in May for some discussion on that. Um so there's an opportunity to get involved uh on that particular project. Uh the other thing I wanted to mention was in terms of class size and A
lot of these decisions, we do analyze this on a on a yearly basis with the class- size report that we prepare for the board, which is specifically designed to look at where there there's opportunity to navigate um staffing situations. And we do that in the winter in preparation for the for the budget in
spring so that we understand where we are. And um you know, when we talk about these class size adjustments, we're not talking about pushing average class size to 30 at the 612 level. We're not talking about doing that. It's probably more like in the 24 25 range. Um I can
certainly remember times when many of our classes at Ridge were pushing 30 or 31 students. So um I think we'll be and still in a very reasonable place with the schedule for next year. Um as far as you know long term u I think Mr. Mean
and and Mr. Row accurately captured what's going on with bank cap. um you know and and in terms of this idea of foreseeing the future um you know it's difficult to foresee the future in in budget projections uh it's a little bit
of we joke budget Nostradamus u but the the truth of the matter is you know we didn't know that we were going to have a 20 plus% increase in our health benefit costs um nobody predicted that um that wasn't known and you know
you're talking millions of dollars in anticipated um need in the budget and and that can happen from year to year. Um you know, and and it happens to every district where sometimes they have a tough year with health benefits and there's a major um adjustment to the
baseline. Uh and that's kind of what we're experiencing this this budget cycle. Um hopefully that trend doesn't continue uh and and the next cycle is is better than this time around. We we haven't seen an increase like this in quite some time. We've been really fortunate. Um, overall the staff has
been really healthy, which has been wonderful. And and you know, we had a a tough 18month run. Uh, hopefully that settles down and we don't see another spike uh again in the next cycle. But those are things that you can't necessarily predict. Um, you know,
inflation is what it is. We've been seeing high rates for a little while. um that seems to be settling down a little bit. But the the truth is, you know, the entire state, as many of the board members have shared, is struggling with this issue. And and the struggle is
because costs don't go up 2%. They go up more than 2%. So when your levy is limited to 2%, it really becomes extremely challenging, especially in years where other unforeseeable costs
really spike. Uh and And that's just the tough reality of it. Um, and so all districts are are struggling with this. You know, what do you do when when costs go up on a on a year-to-year basis anywhere from four to 6% on average? Um,
and and your your levy goes up 2%. Well, that's great. In other years, your other some of your other revenues go down. So, when that happens, you you have some really difficult situations. And we kind of ran into a perfect storm going into
26 27, right? We had um s surprise upticks in certain expense areas and um significant downturn in in revenue in other areas. So those two things together have have kind of created this
situation. So um difficult I know. Um but I I think that as I as I wrote to someone today in in an email who shared concerns about the budget. Um, we have a great staff here and I am 100% confident
that our kids are going to have a good experience again next year. We're we're not in any kind of dire situation. There are pain points, no question. Um, and we'll have to adjust, but we will have an excellent year again in
2627. Excuse me, 2526. 2627. We'll see. rather. Um, so just to do on what what Mr. Markerian just said, um, I have a kind of unique perspective because I've been on the board for so many millions of years that I remember when we had um,
budget cuts um, a number of years ago that were really extreme. We lost our state aid. We lost we the state took our surplus. They put the 2% cap in and we lost a whole lot of state aid all at the same time. And we had to make massive cuts. I mean, elect tons of classes,
honors classes, electives at Ridge High School. My older kids had 30 kids in their classes. We cut a lot of things at the elementary school. We, you know, we had large class sizes across the board. Um, and so over the next bunch of years, you know, we were under the 2% cap, you
know, increasing taxes 2% each year trying to get to the point where we could bring back some of the things that got cut. And really, the only reason that a lot of them were put back in is because we did start having decreasing enrollment from our peak. So, we did add back. So, it's like a a perspective like
yeah, we s we kind of um didn't downsize as much as we could have if you looked at just the enrollment going down. But part of that was because we were trying to add back a lot of the things that were cut because we had some pretty severe cuts. And if you remember back in the day, like we almost lost, you know, we almost went to half day kindergarten instead of full day kindergarten. We
almost lost an entire period of instruction at the high school and kids would have had one less class to choose from. So, um, you know, I feel like like during all of that, my kids, regardless of what age they were and what got cut, they all got an amazing education anyway because our staff is amazing and our
district is very strong. So, I agree with Mr. Markarian that um I I feel confident that our children, you know, are going to have an amazing experience. And I totally understand because I've lived through it, you know, with my own family like how upsetting it is when something that you really care about. We have, you know, in the past we lost lots
of clubs and activities. We had to do pay to play at the middle school for sports like we had a lot of things. We lost inter murals. They used to have inter murals at the middle school. Some of the things never came back. Um so it I guess school budgets like like um Mr. Shaw said it's is so different than um
in the private sector and there's so many you know restrictions on what we can do and what we can't do and how it all works. Um it's confusing to the public because we we are under all these different um restrictions. We can't just do whatever we want to get better healthare costs. We've done everything we can. we went self-insured. We tried
and then the state passes a new law and ends up, you know, slamming our district who was trying to do the right thing and, you know, was containing costs um in in the first place. So, I guess I'm going to go back to what we kept telling people when we had all those things in the past was you have to reach out to
your legislators. There's things that New Jersey has done that have hurt us like Chapter 44. Um, you know, you might believe that it's good to have a 2% cap on taxes because you don't want your property taxes to go crazy. So it's not like everyone has to agree what they think they want to tell you know to the
state and um you know I think there are there are avenues that the parents in our district if they see that our district is being hurt by things that are out of our control you know at the state level people can write letters they can you know lobby in Trenton for some things that might help us. So
that's my plug. Sorry just real quick I didn't know if Nick or Sean want to address the question about about um the riffs and who what we what we're allowed to present out to. Sure. So, we can't we can't obviously talk about individual positions or people and I appreciate
that there there is um you know some ambiguity and and honestly the the ultimate impact will not be known until we finish the details of next year's schedule. And so that that's part of the reason for that. Um, we know based on class size, we know based on our
conversations with um, the administrative team where there's room, what the final details will look like. We really honestly don't know every detail at this point. We just know where we can make space. Um, and so honestly, that that's really going to be part of what happens in the scheduling process
all the way through the summer. Yeah. So, I remember when they were talking about getting rid of kindergarten as well, and I remember um, some of our elderly residents coming up and saying if you raise taxes this much I'm not going to be able to stay in this town and I had kindergarten kids at the
time so I was very much in favor of keeping full day kindergarten but that did kind of stick with me and it sticks with me now so our mandate is to give these children the best education that the community can afford and I think that second half of it isn't getting addressed enough because I'm pretty sure
almost everybody in this room right now I could be wrong maybe it's an assumption can afford a couple hundred bucks in our property taxes there is a a good amount of seniors in this town who that's a big head for and I think when we talk about what we're going to reduce on or what we're going to raise taxes on
we we need to keep that in mind they're paying taxes into this system too they have invested interest in this system system too so that's one thing you want to keep in mind too as we're trying to balance tax increases versus reductions because as Robin said even when the school went through the district went
through some lean years this was an excellent school system. It's one of the best school systems in the state. It will be that. It will continue to be that whether our offerings are as expansive as they are now or they're just fewer, like I said before, like fewer options on the menu.
So, yes, we want to provide our children with every opportunity, but we also have to keep in mind that segment of the community where tax uh tax hikes are not just an inconvenience, they are a real real problem. So when we had an opportunity like we did a couple years ago to offer a 0% tax hike and bank the
cap when we might need it, that's what we did. It's incumbent upon us to offer the community relief when we can and raise taxes when we must. And I think that should be operating philosophy. That's my two cents on it. Anybody else?
Okay. I get a motion to adjourn. Dave, thank you everyone.