sounds good if you're all ready I would like to call this meeting to order this is a regular session of the Bootton Township Board of Education held for the purpose of transacting appropriate business in compliance with chapter 231 laws of 1975 the notice of this meeting was advertised in the Morris County daily record copies of the agenda of
this meeting were appropriately posted and made available to the public mrs barta here mr brainer here mrs cabana mr chen Mrs hermy here mr johnson here mrs mcbride here mr mills here mrs noika here also present mr fini uh
superintendent principal we have Christopher Ellis our representative we have a quorum great thank you please stand for the pledge of allegiance i pledge to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God
indivisible with liberty and justice for all okay we're going to rearrange our agenda slightly and have our report for student representative from Mount Lakes Mr dilly hi how are you everybody so today freshman had their field trip to Romeo
and Juliet that was really great um we have uh Christopher Ilick was Mountain Lakes 2025 unsung hero to us you're very uh well known in our perspective we have um AP testing coming up soon
spring break begins tomorrow so really not a lot of uh you know major updates really since last time now we're getting into May it's going to be very chaotic so next time I'll have a lot to report uh but I just want to like say definitely we're at this phase in April where really um end of the year is
coming by and I know obviously your eighth eighth grade are going to be soon transitioning into high school i just want to let everybody know if you guys have any questions um regarding that i can definitely work with principal man and Dr seagull to make sure that everything goes smoothly to the incoming
um class and out next high school if you guys have any questions feel free to let me know thank you thank you very much i think um Grace and I attended your ceremony and congratulations once again from the county schools association
and with that um we will not be offended if you have other things you need to do you're welcome to understand awesome thank you thank you very much yes that's right you got any Catholic yep we committed congratulations thank you take care good
luck thank you okay next we have a presentation we have some training from Charlene Pearson our New Jersey School Works Association senior field representative and be gratefully this I believe will be our last time that Charlie will be giving us a presentation it will be I will be I guess seeing you
guys whoever comes to the North County meeting to get your board certification i'll be there to give you that but yeah I am really on the countdown now but we don't look too sad no it does feel it does feel a little weird
i little fell over so yeah so this is the last you guys needed one more training right for the certification so this is um the last one and then also the board needs to complete the board self- evaluation so
that's part of the requirement too um yeah so I was saying no they already sent the letter out i'm like "Okay the letter's a little in advance but I know they're going to get it done so I'm not worried about it ordered your plaque because that takes a couple weeks for our mail rooms to make." So everything
is you know depending on the condition though that we're going to get all this done when does that have to be done though again two weeks the seventh is our uh Okay so and and I should say you know that
the board self evaluation is completely new right so um and in this new format it allows the board to evaluate the board goals so the board self-ealuation is set up so that similar now to the superintendent's evaluation where the
superintendent had to go in first to put the goals in this evaluation is set up so that the board president has to log in first and you know either say that you have goals or that you or else there's a box to check that says you don't but either way the rest of the board if you tried to log in um before
the president did it you get a error message so um so just to let you know that so um this is like I've more kind of like a conversational training almost just kind of talking about student achievement and
the the board's work in this area and how the board can help make a difference and it's really kind of the basis we changed governance three and this is um the basis of it let's see is that Am I just clicking on the plus
the right arrow on your remote the right arrow uh on the circle go maybe okay are we too far it was just too low of cash um so um
like I said we're just um going to you know so so most of the time we'll just be talking so there's not a lot of slides of information it's more conversation so this is kind of really talking about you know we always talk about how student achievement is the basis of everything that we do that what
motivates our decisions so this is essentially saying okay that that passion that inspires you to become a board member you know sometimes people feel like you know and I've heard Gord say this like sometimes it feels like all we do is vote and then go home right and that sometimes our agendas are so
linear and there's so many things that we have to approve that you don't always get the time to sit and celebrate student achievement as much as you'd like to talk about the kids talk about your goals so sometimes we really have to make a concerted effort right to make
that be part of our work um you know it we always say that anyone sitting in the audience it should be clear to them that that the focus of your meeting is based on student achievement and sometimes a lot of the things we talk about while it may not seem like we're directly talking
about student achievement it has an impact on it right so um kind of as we start this out then just kind of wanted to go around and just really kind of talk about your why kind of like what your why was for running for the board or now that you're on the board like the
decision that you make at the board table and how that is expressed like how how does that come into play when you're making decisions and you're having conversations and um so if you want if you want to start and Sure i mean I I
think I ran for the board originally because I wanted to just understand the why like why things were done the way they were around the school and also because basically having four kids in this school system K to8 for so long I just felt like it was my opportunity to
give back in a meaningful way um and yeah yeah I mean I'd probably say something similar um you know I I wanted to run for board because um three kids in the school um still have two kids in the
school and you know I saw a lot of kind of the front facing school i really want to know how it worked anything changed improved um I really liked the I went to the um five year teacher planning sessions in 2022 i think it was and that
was really exciting big room full of like parents and you know I think our teachers and you know it was really great kind everyone talking about the school doing how change like that was really exciting kind of this could be and I really kind
of wanted to bring that kind of like spirit to the word and you know I do kind of feel that quote kind of feels like a little bit times but I do try to think about Yeah I I had been in this town for several years my kids had gone to the
school we had been before lived here before they went to the school and I just wanted to see the schools and be the best it could be not that it wasn't but um you know I just felt like I I wanted to see how it worked how can I help um you know my kids were here and
you know that also is a motivating factor for just about everybody right in the room that had kids go through or to have kids go through some point um so I every decision we make I always say every negotiation we've been in or every decision it's like it it should be about
the kids the academics we brought that up numerous times and I I still feel strongly about that no matter what we do we do a lot of some bulls blocking and tackling some of it could be very you know it seems like almost boring but at the end of the day everything should be about student achievement so I do think
to me that is the most important thing that we do i'm on deck um I guess uh I I grew up in Bootin Township i went to Rockway Valley School um after I graduated college I was volunteering in our community many different ways you know other other ways and once my children became school age I
wanted to learn about what the school board did and and also be involved in in the school and I I think there was um some openings and vacancies i was interviewed for a position you know and appointed at first and then I was elected thereafter um but I thereafter
and there few there um and you know really um you know just want to you know do the best I can for our community you know and this was another way you know since my kids are in school and even though they're in high school and going on I still want to continue doing what I can for our community any way I can and you know I
enjoy it it's been it's all is all about the children you know and and you know their success and their achievement so similarly to the previous speakers my why was to um become involved in a meaningful way in the educational
process of my own two children were at that time um enrolled in the school and now I only have one child in the school and uh this is a uniquely American model from the country where I where I come from Poland parents do not
have um an option to be so intimately involved in the uh decision making that takes place at that level and um and having that opportunity here I wanted to
um to seize that opportunity and be involved in in the schooling of my own children involve the schooling of my own children in meaningful way and hopefully contribute with some of the ideas and knowledge talents that we all have um in this process
yeah similar to me so I also went to RVS and wanted I started in middle school here so I made a big move from a very large district to a small district and obviously moved back and raising my children here and I thought you know I'm
an advocate is my career in social work and I thought it was really important to be the voice for the voiceless and have equity for all children and really enhance the academic experience but also the socio emotional piece so that's
really why I came on board okay so my youngest is now in in college a freshman in college so back in the day when they were much much younger I had a number of positions on on the school association and I kind of got to the point I wanted to do something a little
bit more directly that impacted the students and similar to Barry there was an open position and I had interviewed for it and um was given the opportunity to join the board I think at that point it was like an eightmon um part of the charm that
was left and I had enjoyed it and then when a position opened up on the board I ran for that position and here I a number of years later but that's kind of what led me to this um to being a
member of the good okay I'm going to turn it over to your administrators too to have you guys tell us your why why you why you do this work um so for me I chose to to go this direction as superintendent because I feel that you know the more people that
I can have an influence on particularly kids the the better and the the greater the change you know in the world i was very hesitant to leave the classroom but my my mentor told me he said "If you think you can have a really good impact on 20 kids imagine a school of 400 in a
district of 4,000." So that really inspired me and I think by the moment it's time thank you um I've been here uh about 18 years and in this profession for about 34 years and I guess when I was in college
I never would have thought that I'd be in education um started out in the private sector um I'm I'm really a hands-on person so I enjoy projects that I could start I can see through and finish that have an impact and every day is to me it's
exciting i can see the kids running through the hallway what we do in the business office we keep things running but we also see the benefit because the kids are there if it's a if it's a building project or you know project to keep the facility running or keeping the
the staff happy through you know payroll everything else I think that's exciting but but really to start to see things start to finish um you know you can be a major corporation and be a little cog and you never really see the impact of what you do but I think when you see you
know I've had offices in schools I've had offices in separate buildings I enjoy being in school because you see what happens every day you know even when I was at a district that had several schools I always made it a point to get to every school to get to know the people um you know you had
populations of over a thousand faculty and you get to know you know each of them each of the principles and so forth but I just enjoy I've enjoyed it for so long i wouldn't be here if I didn't enjoy it good okay
right abby do you want to do it yeah i'm clicking right where she closer you can give it a go perfect okay um so this is then just saying you know as much as we talk about
student achievement and you know recognize that you know we know that it has an impact on the work that we do you know this um the Iowa lighthouse study which is almost what like 25 years ago now was kind of the first study that came out that was made a researchbased
connection between the work that the board does and the impact that it has on student achievement so in this study um they studied six board and superintendent teams and it was from the state of Georgia even though Iowa was the one conducting the study and said
because Georgia had a more extensive database so they the six districts had similar demographics but three of them were high achieving and three of them were low achieving so they said "Let's see if there's any like similarities
between those three high achieving boards or any things that distinguish them between the the the three boards that were um you know getting low achieving results and so the the the outcome was that the boards in the high
achieving districts were just distinctly different um in their knowledge in their beliefs in their actions so that was kind of then became the basis of the study and then they did kind of part two of saying okay now that we know what these things are how do we help sustain
them or how do we help other boards you know start doing those things and understanding those [Music] things that's So um so you know and it's going to come down to so these are pretty much then
those different actions are kind of the goals that the board um you know has an impact on and we'll go through each one of those but it starts with setting clear expectations um and that's probably really the basis of all of it and we'll look at that in just a minute and kind of creating those
conditions for success how are we helping um you know student achievement and our students be successful here then how do we hold the system accountable how do we make you know bring you know when you talked about strategic planning and bringing the community in like how
do we make this be important to the community as well and like say you know this is their school district so how do we help them be part of this process and then saying that we have to commit together to to learning together as a board team with your superintendent so
those were those those factors or those things then that were identified um as you know making a difference in the high achieving boards okay so this one kind of really starts with those high expectations and saying that
boards in low achieving districts made excuses about why some students or groups of students were not succeeding and in high achieving districts the boards had a no excuses attitude and said things like poverty lack of
parental involvement and other factors were described as challenges and not excuses so kind of thinking about the importance of that attitude starting at the board table and then how then that
would kind of filter have an impact on the rest of the school but it has to start here i mean I know even one board it's right in their mission statement that says like no excuses like kind of so just kind of saying like we are
making it clear that we have this board is saying that every student in this district has the right to be successful and that that's the message that we want to make sure that we're getting across and important that the board sends that message
um so this is just kind of an example in the study that came out of like saying you know sometimes we don't really think about the impact right of our words at the board table of our actions at the board table how we're saying things what we're you know accepting and kind you
know so like in in some of the examples saying well you know like some board members saying well other schools don't have the challenges we face or some kids just want to be average with average jobs um we know from day one some kids are going to walk through the door that there's not much we can do for them so
think about the difference between that attitude and kind of saying that we can't let anything stand in our way we won't take excuses everyone has the potential um you know in what was there is no status quo so when you think about
that being the difference in the attitude at the board table and with your administration um that makes an impact then throughout the entire district it seems to me that um the differences
between the high and the low groups if you would is that the high performing if I'm using the right word I've already changed the high expectations group on the right they really like reframed
whatever challenges there were and just looked at them as an opportunity they're really they could have had the same issues so just kind of as we you know so just as we're sitting here then so what are some excuses that you've heard about student
learning I know like I know I was um so like I said part of this was a little bit of governance three and so like somebody stood up in the room I did in a workshop this past year and he's like I am so tired of hearing about co you know and the impact that co had has had on
our students and said I'm tired of hearing that's an excuse like we get that that happened and we get that that made a difference but what are we doing about it instead of just blaming it and um so just kind of wondered as you think
about that um like how can the board have an impact so I don't know like you know if there's any areas you want to share that you've heard or like what can the board do in this question to take a stance against that thinking and I would say that we've done it with a
strategic plan right we identified areas of opportunity brought the our stakeholders in as a board collaborated and came up with bullet points where there were needs and not just academic needs facility needs you know
professional development needs and I think that's kind of you were through it all the our doctrine as of the last three to four I also think it's a matter of mindset because if you if you have people or board members who have that positive
mindset just like the studies show then that's going to move people teachers you look at everything like problem like oh he has a problem reading well no he doesn't have a problem teaching that kid because he has a different learning style so if you kind of like change it change that perspective a lot of people
get on board with [Music] Yeah you know it's funny i was think when you guys were going around the table and you were talking about your why and you know talking about the kids and like I was working with a board where they couldn't agree like it wasn't
enough to say anymore we're doing this for the kids because they couldn't agree on what was best for kids so like what one part of the board thought was in the students best interest another part of the board thought something else was better and so like we finally had to
figure out how to come to an agreement of okay well do we all agree that every student is right to be successful so instead of even just kind of that blanket of like as long as we do what's right for kids there's some boards that don't even agree anymore on what that is
so as much as kind of you guys were taking that I don't want to say taking it for granted but you are really all that really is what motivates you just recognize that that's not the case every [Music] um so in terms of like you know taking
meaningful actions and when boards starts discussing the need for improved results you know we talked about that mindset right that just said it can be intimidating to staff right so saying kind of like what's the board doing poking ourel in our business or am I going to get in trouble because my you
know the students are not as successful as we want them to be so how do you help staff see that we're all right that you're already responsible for this work um and that it's a shared challenge rather than an intimidation so how as a board can you help send that message i
think it's what Ken said with the mindset we don't ever look at if we we always want to achieve I think as a district to do better i think every district should want to do that right whether it's test results or seeing growth of children um but we you know we
just need to make sure that we're focused on that and and not looking at it as oh what you know so and so didn't do well this cohort didn't do well the mindset should be what can we how can we help right what can the what can we how can we help the administration how can we help the
teachers i think that's pretty much our job is how do we set policy and how do we remove obstacles to help the to help everybody achieve and welcome feedback from the staff you know you know to see you know what
they're seeing and and try to you know use that to help help you know what what can we do you know to help kind of help help them all that goes to Canada Right [Music] okay i'm just I'm just looking at the
wording though you know we always talked about board goals and district goals the how the what the why all that so if you look at the top part the top paragraph when the board starts discussing the need to improve results that's sort of the you know what needs to get done but then I'm looking at the second paragraph
what does the board what can the board do to help staff see is that kind of a cross between what the administration is having the direct impact or the direct contact with the staff versus what the board the board can direct the administration here's
what we need to have happen go do it so I think it comes down to you know I think kind of what was saying about making sure that the staff has the support they need the professional development they need um you know that when somebody comes you know say an
administrator gives you a a testing report that they feel comfortable that the board is not going to challenge them or criticize them and know that the you know when they're coming here knowing that we're all on this same team and that we're all working together to help
the students and so we're not going to do the work we're not going to tell you what work needs to be done but we're going to make sure that you have everything you need to do that work the best that you can right to help our students [Music]
so the research shows that teacher effectiveness is the single largest factor affecting academic growth so what can the board do to convey its belief in the power of instruction improve continuing education
yeah I would say the latest and greatest right uh standards are always changing um you know the the how the method that the teachers use I wouldn't begin to know and scratch the surface on everything that's changed over the last 5 10 years so yeah saying you know
courage is really important so now and how do you celebrate the work of your staff or their accomplishments could I just make one sure about that I'm finding this question here in treaty what can the board do to convey it
belief in the power of instruction ction so more specifically like what are some of the actions and words and things of that nature from board members not only to the staff but to the community about not only like saying this a different way the power of instruction but the power
of an instructor you know there's some of the things that people are doing on the board here for all very very good reasons but some of the outside people may not know it you know like you all have wonderful stories my children I went to school here my children went to school here they're not even in the
school anymore and they're still here because I really believe in the the power of the instruction in this particular building we believe in the power of these individual teachers i think that message needs to go out to the community and to the teachers and to the faculty
so again if we kind of look at those things then that um kind of demonstrate that those high performing boards are kind of how they um responded differently boards in the high achieving districts um believed and could describe the staff development
activities to support student learning and the link to district goals in the low achieving districts the board members knew there was a budget for PD it was chosen by the staff but they weren't sure if there was a plan and they questioned the value of the expense
and the time so just kind of think about like the difference and the different message that each one of those describes right in terms of you know the board supporting staff and their professional development and and the board kind of understanding and
I think that goes back to what you just said with the power of instruction right for the board to demonstrate its understanding of the power of instruction the board would have to be providing the staff the tools that they need right and understand the why
they're important [Music] so you creating professional development systems that move the needle and achievement is not easy and this kind of almost like probably maybe what we've been talking about but how can a board
send the message that learning is valued and not just confined to students [Music] i think the study you just showed right is really important by not saying no um I mean clearly if Mr
or a teacher comes and believes that they that this is something worth thinking we should listen to them and probably support them rather than question isn't for going through a process right now getting a
certain thing these are the things that he's answer sorry okay that's a better answer the faculty may not know this community may not know this even if you haven't received that certification just Yet the knowledge that you're going through this
this process to become better to be a learning community of board members that says a lot and just showing that we're continuous learners as well you know and um and you know sharing what we learn
um in Atlantic City and you know it's just like that we're investing our time and energy into the school because we value what we're learning and that um and we value our teachers and I think one effort we made I guess it was maybe two or three years ago when we started
reporting out on committees and I think that really shows the community as well with what we're doing behind the scenes and transparency and you know how we can support admins as well when we're hearing from you know different areas of opportunity in those different groups
and actually something we've discussed but we haven't put it on the agenda yet was in governance was to have an opportunity or space on the agenda for um then the governance committee yeah for the um the teachers to speak if they'd like to in Mountain Lakes they
like every once in a while they get up just sometimes just to say nice things sometimes it's it's slightly more confrontational but just just to let the board know what's going on but most of the time they're c they're celebrating each other you know and celebrating retirement and they come up and speak on
behalf of their colleagues about their return i so it's just it's it's a lovely place to share goodwill and um messaging you on things well I mean even um in one of the board
votes uh Unity Charter School like they start out their meeting with with good news and sharing and so then the or you like or in and acknowledgement so that way the board any of the board members want acknowledge staff or accomplishments or even other board members and just kind of like how do we
start this out on a positive kind of note right [Music] i think it has to have um and this is Chris and I talked about it for a minute last month like a student I know Lake studentship student could certainly give
um a quick report about what's going on with the student body i mean we wouldn't be asking questions of the student but they would sort of be an interface beet um that township does that they have an eighth grade I think that would be kind of a similar idea
great to kind of hear from a student or rotating eighth grade rep so everyone who I mean the eighth grade officers would be right but it would be I think it'd be really interesting I think also would show students that we're here what
we do and parents as well [Music] talks about some of the things that that the board can do to demonstrate its commitment to professional development saying by through policy sending a clear message that it's a priority making sure
you're providing your staff the time and the resources um be willing to bring in the healthcare staff needs um review and discuss progress regularly um keep the focus on the bottom line student to learning and be visible in
helping parents and community members understand and I think that goes back what we talked about before of you making it that fact back known outside of kind of these four walls here right of the great things that are happening and the the value that the board places
on staff and student learning [Music] so then um kind of one of the other areas then talked about setting clear and focused goals um you know so we know that we have the goal setting process that we do every year and we know that
um you starting from a strategic plan that that's the basis but just kind of saying that you know again in the lighthouse study they found that some districts either had very few things or had too many so in either case they
weren't really you know putting the level of focus that was needed um and kind of saying that they didn't have clarity about what the main student needs were um you know and it's funny one of the the superintendent on Clario used to say like Charlene the main
things got to stay the main thing and you know so it's kind of a simple thing but it's really kind of the b like the bottom line right that um because we sometimes find ourselves getting pulled in so many different directions that you have to keep remembering keep the main
thing the main thing right and um so just kind of you know in the sense you can't do everything at once so make sure that you you know that those things that you're setting as goals are those what those priorities are to help you accomplish what what you need to
accomplish at work we have a saying if you have more than three or four priorities you have none okay so otherwise it's just everything can't be a priority you need to focus narrow it no that's true yep so this was um one of the examples
in the study um this is kind of an extreme example but it's more just to set a point so it said there was a North Carolina school district that knew they had to narrow their focus so they went from multiple goals to one tightly focused goal that was a long-term goal
is that in the next five years a certain percentage their students tested would score at or above grade level in reading and math and they would be benchmarked at grades three and eight so after the five years it said they did not accomplish their goal um but they did
see a large increase so it said okay they knew it was a stretch goal but not impossible said that single goal made it clear to everyone and galvanized the school system community so that everyone was railing around it um they made sure
that's how they aligned their resources had to make any adaptations um any funding increases you know that that was where the priority was and then brought the community into the work so kind of as we think about our goals and
you know like you said you know narrowing it down to like three or four so what are those things then that um you know are that important and at the end of the day it come kind of comes down to balance right so um
saying so what can the board do and a lot of times this because there's you know so many competing priorities if you people want you to to move in different directions so what can the board do to ensure there's a strong commitment to the focus goals without losing sight of
accountability in other areas what do you guys think [Music] one of the um things that we had talked about was in in our in our committee meetings to kind of go back to the goals
and and and revisit them in our committee to make sure that like we're working towards that in our That's a great idea mountain Lake is looking to do the same thing they have their long range plan and each committee which I think is
something we could look at doing making sure how does it tie back to those long range plans so each time you meet the decisions we're making how do they impact that so it's very similar yeah yeah we had some similar conversations
at what committee was some goals specific for those committees i think it was policy or know current program that we were going to be reviewing in cycle we had like our own little goals that we were discussing good okay
so this kind of talking about data and kind of looking at it as kind of the story that it tells right or or kind of the picture it paints and said that one of the board members said that when they look at data and if it showed that one in four students they was not reading at
grade level he said I picture my daughter's fourth grade class and like wondering which one of those four you know who are those those kids that that need our help so kind of then as you look at that kind of thing what are some ways that your board puts a base or you
know how do you look at data to kind of think about it more than just numbers but to think about it as students i think because we are such a small district and our kids have all gone through the whole grades it's like it's
almost impossible to look at a grade level score and not like know who the teachers are and know what it feels like to have the kids in that class you know it's very um you know I don't know so it's kind of I feel like the base just is there it's
like you know we all know each other and teachers become like family you know so it's just uh it's meaningful when you see that data and you see like you can say so and so's brother or sister is in that class you family
very realist it's not some other school or my kid didn't go to that school and I don't know those teachers you know it's very it's personal definitely visualize each you know each grade in class you know especially when you have children going here you know
you can picture all the the kids in each grade i think we look at the NJS play results and sometimes we see cohorts that aren't performant and you can visualize that that's not fun we realize what can we do right to help the child
so you kind of picture okay what is this group how do we help this group but you're not necessarily putting a literal face to it but putting you know what does this group look like and why do they need help how can [Music]
This one kind of talks about making sure that we kind of you know kind of take this approach of like a methodical approach right it you know kind of builds off of the flywheel concept and good to great of saying that there's just not one wonderful thing that's
going to happen there's just not one magic bullet that it is kind of taking the process and just keep doing the work keep pushing the wheel right um building momentum until you finally start seeing those results that that you were hoping to see and just you know kind of not
give up on on the work instead of thinking that well if we only do this program it's going to raise our scores or if we only do this right instead of thinking that it needs to be a you know a concerted effort that builds over time so I think that's why like when you
know when they showed that one goal and they were measuring it over a fiveyear period right because you kind of need that much time that much work to go into it to be able to see those types of results and movements
[Music] so here's a couple examples of like from the study of how boards like kind of kept their focus and said there was a board that turned down a technology grant when it realized it would take up to 50% of the staff's PV time and dilute
the focus on the commitment to improving reading so think about like what a big step that would be right to turn away some money but if it is stopping you from doing that that main thing then kind of recognizing that that is how
that board kind of demonstrated right that they kept that priority um and then here's an example of you know saying if you've got some initiative that's going you don't really realize as new board members and new staff members are coming into the fold that they need to kind of
have that that same excitement and that same understanding as people that were there right when you you kicked it off so again how do you make sure then um that you're providing everyone the support that they need to help carry it
forward and make sure that they have that same focus and then just kind of the importance of celebrating successes right i thought this was a good quote that says praise what you want to raise right that just kind of a way to to just look at it and saying you know sometimes
we you know that there's short-term wins that maybe we should be acknowledging that sometimes we don't always do right and saying that instead of formal recognitions that board members think about how else can we express and sometimes it's just the language we use right the shout outs that we give it's
just you know can be all kinds of um ways that we can demonstrate that and you know also celebrate your own work like it would just sound like after the board you know gets its certification and you know there should be some acknowledgement of that
[Music] so just kind of in summary saying these are some of the habits then that emerged to boards as a result of the the research and saying to designate a time on the agenda to talk about um progress on key district initiatives um to learn
about supports for quality professional development you know to get a better understanding of that i mean I've even had some boards say like if like if the board approves the staff to go somewhere that the staff then comes back to a board meeting and tells the board okay
kind of this is what we got out of this and this is what we need that professional development that you provided for us so just kind of as a way to kind of keep everybody you know so that you are working together that the staff is you know coming back to explain
to the board how that helped make a difference um the next one you know talked about the strong commitment to our district goals knowing that you know learning data should be an ongoing conversation right not just that once a year and kind of again that that belief
that the board shows um in the ability of the staff to achieve their goals and to provide the the support that the staff needs so this is just kind of a summary then of those five things that we looked at of saying you know you get what you
expect so make sure you act on the belief that all children can learn focus on what matters most teaching causes learning so aim for instruction can't do everything at once so jumpst start success with clear measurable focus goals what gets measured gets done so
use data to drive improvement and you can't lead what you don't know is a lead as a learning team so I think that was the last one right yes okay we have to pass it to Christmas
so I don't know if anyone has any questions or any thoughts about anything we talked about do you have any I wish more people you have any thoughts about that it' be a great way to have people
know there's not many people here today i don't know is there any way you recommend getting start is there anything you recommend to or the value in kind of getting people more engaged in our process i think you know that
you pretty much hit the nail on the head right that there there's just they're just not going to come so rather than trying to figure out how you're going to get them here figure out how you can get the information to them if they're not going to come to you so you know kind of
you know they say like some boards will say "Oh nobody's here so the community must be happy and we're doing things great." Well say like don't rest on that or don't assume that you don't let that stop your responsibility to make sure that the community knows what you're doing and you know so kind of saying how
do we meet them where they are instead of making them come to where we are right so that's and you know I had talked to one lady who's a a PR person she's the PR person um in Montville and she was telling me just you know again
we hate to go back to co and excuses but she said from a PR standpoint it's really changed parents coming to things and community showing up at things and it's almost like a new reality too for her job right of how to to get the word out and how to
get other people engaged in this work so great i think it I mean I think a better job or maybe and I don't know if it's appropriate but like there is like board notes that went out like on Facebook or
you know just like things got Facebook page we could do it down the left updates or like a board newsletter be pretty dry but I like the meeting like highlight [Music]
i just go and talk to ourselves sometimes um which is fine but it'd be good to hear or understand about like a quarterly you know state yeah all right date on the goals strategic goals like once a year or twice a year
um an update like I'm looking at our board goals and we're we've pretty much hit like four of the six already that that's pretty good i mean there's one board that even just kind of like had a calendar on it and under each month like it talked about
what it did that month so then people then once you see it up there for the whole year you can kind of see all the things that the board accomplished for the year any other questions for Charlie thank you thank you
[Music] thank you very much for your guidance over years we're actually leaving in the morning for the spend Easter there yet our kids have not seen the house yet so our girls are flying back
county it is in South Work so it's kind of like in between Wilmington and Beach you might see me in a couple years but but as Chris said thank you for all your many years of doing help and support to our board
i I say all the time us through a lot of uh exciting times yes i I don't know you know I don't know like you you've just done an amazing job over the many years no matter when one calls you know you know you work five you know five days and nights a week and
weekends and I don't know when you know when you have time off but you know you're you're always there and you're there for multiple districts so I so I I'm always amazed at how you you know do your job and you do a great great job doing it so but so thank you for all your many years of help and support i I
know it's you know been invaluable valuable in valuable to me you know we're going to miss you thank you so much and I look forward to giving the board your board certification award and what day is that day seven thanks
thank you so much everyone really has been an amazing experience working with you guys thank you okay do that yep okay good night everyone it's been fun you know not only help out
but I mean you come to our group you're active with our group and it's appreciated come here or maybe thank you again we are board business
that may we have a motion for board business motion 1 through five i'll move is there a second second any questions comments or discussion if not the questions on the adoption of board business motions one through five all those in favor say I i
post say no any abstensions and that brings us to administrative report starting with the business administrator board secretary Mr murray okay just a couple of items and this is what excites me to be here every day
so the the 20 2025 2026 tenative budget remember the board had approved it um submitted to the county on March 18th still waiting for approval to advertise the budget um for the uh the public uh to to get it to the paper and the deadline for all county offices to
approve district budgets statewide is April 21st so copy our advertised budget need to get to the paper today to meet our statutory deadline to get it advertised so we're still waiting for approval um and what I do is I need to get approveof back i need to get the cost of it so we we needed to get that
ball rolling so we'll still get the approval we had to put things in place that's why there's some discussion of moving a meeting but there's statutory deadline along the way so public hearing as a reminder is on uh scheduled for April 30th um cafeteria replacement we
talked about that months ago they're scheduled for Monday the 21st to replace all the in-wall units wow um they and and not a moment too soon because they're really at the end of life so they'll be a one or two day project so hopefully you know during spring break
they can get it all done and be ready to go for the students when they come back financial disclosure statements thank you to everybody for getting those in i certified the the final uh uh reports and sent it all to ethics commission and we are now in compliance with all the
firing filing requirements uh an update on the heating system uh we're replacing a number of valves uh that are involved with HBAC and the boiler they'll be here next week to replace some valves they have to drain the entire system out um
replace some valves and uh you know fire the system back up again so at least we have the week to test to make sure there are no leaks and we'll be ready to go in case we get any uh cool weather when the children come back uh and the New Jersey schoolboard conference uh you remember
there were a number that attended last year the workshop 2025 will be Monday October 20th through Thursday October 23rd uh anybody interested let me know and uh what I will do is like we did
last year worked out very well is we uh register as a as a district we're allowed to do that for a group break so if three or four of you go decide to go in person um the whole board has access to all the documents after the conference is over so you please let me
know they u uh the first day that the uh the hotels and everything opened up they sold out a couple of hotels that were booked i think what's happening is they are um giving fewer and fewer hotel rooms a lot or blocks to school boards
so let me know i'll get you know Sorry Jeff did they open already you Yeah they open and they already did but I I already put in you know booked it for you know all the board at least place card holder so let me know and then I can I can actually you know pay for and book the rooms
all right so October 20th through the 23rd unfortunately I won't be there this year because I have another conference that's that's conflicting but as I said I register I'll register the whole board once we get on the uh uh the May agenda we'll have it to approve all board members and then just tell me as far as
who wants to go and I can do the hotel or my office can do the whole hotel uh that's all I have to report great thank you that brings us to the superintendent report mr patini thank you engineering with empathy is the focus on
the eighth grade STEM curriculum mrs carvak and the eighth graders partnered with E N A BL E enabled Noacow a California-based high school robotics team to create and assemble five custom 3D printed prosthetic arms for
recipients in Uganda one two the collaborative project focused on building gripper quu prosthetic arms for individuals living with limb differences due to congenital conditions workplace accidents and unfortunately combat
related injuries the devices will soon be shipped to Uganda where they will be life-changing tools for the recipients enable Norcal a team affiliated with the global enabling the future network coordinates the project by designing the prosthetic arms using advanced CAD computer aided design software the
designs were then shared with Rockway Valley School students who assembled the prosthetics and oversaw quality control ensuring that the devices were live were reliable durable and ready for realworld use the goal of this project was more than learning how to assemble a 3D
printed prosthetic it was an opportunity to make a real difference in the lives of the recipients the project was also a valuable hands-on experience giving students practical exposure to engineering design thinking and humanitarian outreach the students also saw that youths are capable of making a
meaningful impact the members of Enable NorCal are high school students and just to let you know also we had our visiting professor from Moner State Dr bridget Looney who is also an author she teaches STEM and has written her dissertation and a book on STEM
thank you that's fabulous exciting very exciting big props to this department thank you very much let's see you all had you all had a chance to look at the nurses report the student attendance
report the staff intense report that brings us to commendations mr pini thank you thank you i'd like to give a huge round of applause for our Brizzy Visual and Performing Arts Department for one the music in our schools month March concert for featuring preK and second grade the lower grade spring concert
with third through fifth grade the upper grade spring concert for select course and upper grade band and the amazing art show featuring every student Mrs bartell and Mrs kovart Mrs fusco you and your students really made us proud one more standing ovation for the cast
crew and creative staff of last month's Triumph Beauty and the Beast particular shout outs tireless effort to the following adults who lent their expertise and patiently shared all they know with our budding performers the set lighting designers and more larry D
rosha Harry Patrick Christian Beth Johnson Allison Looking John Gartner Heather Toto and massive thanks to the Ed Foundation for their financial support and organization thank you to the home and school association and Mrs cooper for arranging
the Jordan Sonic author day for grades 5 through8 his presentations are fascinating the eighth grade workshop was inspiring as you all know we're moving away from just strictly having assemblies we're having workshops of kids have some real tangible experience and firsthand uh workshops with the
authors um next kudos to Mrs parade and all the staff members for the wonderful literacy night um last week many stations for K through4 students were available for families to explore and on to spotlight on student work for March congratulations to in kindergarten Dylan
Casper Kieran Ramik Sammy Anakin Maddox Mckenzer Jack Bavville and Jenna Bullian first grade Valentina Burrow and Riley Winters second grade Elani Lung Colette Bardock Sarn Daffany Lowski and third
grade Daniel Zeniga Julia Ram and Alexandria Zunowski on to fourth grade flying high in fourth this certificate is awarded each month to recognize students who display a variety of outstanding character and/or achievements within the
classroom fourth graders John Olirri and Victoria Gibbons Nolan Bardac Swarn Finley Lee and Kayla Maul Lily Landau and Asher Matau and Falcons of the month for January
congratulations go to in fifth grade Alexandra Perez Bosson sixth grade Kendall Maul seventh grade Michael Vanella and eighth grade Gia Leon falcons of the months are students that exhibit a dedication to learning
leadership skills great attitude strong character traits who promote a positive school climate and that concludes the uh commendations oh thank you thank you and that brings us to correspondence which you've also had a chance to read one through four that brings us to open
session number one the first public comment period will be limited to adjunct items only the second public comment period will be open to any topic please be mindful that public comment periods are available to enable the public to give comments and feedback to the board personal matters and day-to-day operations are not appropriate subjects for board meetings
these can always be most effectively resolved with the appropriate staff members or administration administrators according to the channel command concept questions may be directed to appropriate school personnel or board from email please state your name and address for the record and all comments are limited to 5 minutes there do not appear to be anyone
here to address them at this time and that means we'll move on to our leison reports starting with the Mountain Rice Board of Education all right so we've had two meetings since so bear with me on the first one it's been a while since we had that meeting but I have to go off my notes
here um we there was a lot of student recognitions it was a great um ceremony for all the winter sports and activities they went through so um they they talked about Lake Drive the dev academic bowl i think they went to the quarterfinals uh there were winner sports recognitions i
won't list them all because they may have messed some up i don't know if I got them all but there was uh some really great uh accomplishments by by some of the folks in the winter sports um the visual performing arts recognition i think they had some folks that went to the NJSMA region one
orchestra three students um from the Sonic band wind ensemble uh they had uh seventh graders created artwork for uh the academic planner for Brier Clips that's actually on the cover which is kind of cool it went out um they they won that award um and I guess our own
Michael Sarah uh who's a RVs alum won an award for best photo show at color and contrast through a photo contest which is kind of beautiful photos they showed him um a slideshow um and there was a photo robe award winner Sabrina um the
big thing that happened in that meeting was they went over the turf presentation if you haven't heard they want to turf um the pit um they got a $1.2 $2 million grant from the state to do so uh there were just some concerns from some people that live around there about will you
put lights will it host um you know uh larger events you know like uh I'll call it varsity type sports and the answer is no it's more of a practice facility they will hold games but they'll be small games for like JV and um freshman so nothing different than probably what
happens today except and they actually think it'll improve the drainage because the turf field drain down instead of draining out so some of the they had issues in the past with water running into the folks that live behind the pit a lot of discussion in the pit um we must have spent over an hour with people
for it and against it and most people were for it uh so it was a pretty good discussion and I think the board did a really good job of explaining how they got the grant the timeline and the big issue was the town had to sign over uh half of the land uh the school district owned half of the pit and it's
affectionately known as the pit by the way and then the um the town owned the other half so the town had to sign over the other half and they had to find a title they lost the title it had changed hands 37 times um they had no idea who where it actually was they finally found
it and last night I don't know the outcome of it but they were supposedly finally going to sign over the town the land to um the district turns out the little snapshot that's at the high school school didn't own it it was actually on land owned by the town so it's very interesting how that Yeah so
they now own that whole the school now owns that whole parcel of land going up through the pit and down through the snack shack or whatever so that was most of what they talked about and then they went through the tenative budget everybody cleared out after the percept the pit discussion so it was just our board discussing the tenative budget
they had healthcare increases of $660,000 um they're actually going to increase their tax levy to 2.5% but they had a reduction of debt services of 5% so it kind of somewhat uh evens out um their total budget after all the special
revenues that they have in their tax levy is 46.3 million which is up from $43 million in 2025 um and I do have a note um when we went through everything Dr seagull was very appreciative of the collaboration on the calendar as they went through because we had approved the
calendar that um and they new policies and interesting policy on spectator behavior three strikes and you're out you can't come to mountain league sports anymore so I think you know overall there's issues not just in Mount Lakes but everywhere with parents sort of being a little too vocal so they they put a new board
policy into that um and then we we gave an upgrade update on the long range facilities uh committee i'm on it miss Hermy was on it before um so they're looking at that that long range plan is about 2027 so about a year and a halfish
from being done so they're starting to think about what's the next thing so that they can have that ready no longer plan and then I don't know what happened but all my notes from last night are gone so uh last night we talked about Charlene uh Peterson came and did a
presentation so I saw her uh conversation on Monday night two times she did an update on the superintendent evaluation process so we went through that um I'm trying to remember we had um oh an update from uh Mesi on the um new
um I think it was LA program that they're implementing on grades 3 through 5 they finally chose a new program uh they're going to have new new textbooks whole new curriculum around uh you know LA in that space so that was very informative um and they they talked
about the rankings i guess the new nj.com I think it was had the rankings of the high schools and Mount Lakes came out according to that number one um high public high schools i don't know if it was public or all because I have I don't have the subscription to nj.com so I
couldn't get to the article but uh we were told they were they were ranked number one when they looked at all the criteria that they put on the board um they did very well they they decreased their chronic absenteeism which was great so they have obviously more people attending full-time and their the
academics did come out very well um across the board both on um great younger grades up they they saw that they were basically as they passed through the different grades they're really um they're making great strides uh they're they're I forget the word
that they used but they're they're seeing the progression of the children there and then the SAT scores were excellent um that came back across the board so it's all positive news as far as the academics go over there
that's that's from memory so hopefully Yeah can I ask a question just for the whole board if there's a new three through five literacy program coordinating with you should be doing discussions with Mount Lakes about I
don't know it's first I had heard about it cuz I usually only hear about the high school stuff and I'm not on the program committee so they had the committee read out and they went through it um so we can talk about it i think it's um I I they've been discussing it i
remember I watched some old videos before I joined the board and you might remember there was one they had people come up that I don't know what the program was with the old administration they were looking at people weren't happy with that so they spent a lot of time going through it so I'll have to you know defer we don't have to discuss
it now but maybe we can discuss it with Virginia if there's a connection if they change their LA program i think it's just more the vendor they go with and materials i I don't know if it's a huge shift complete shift in curriculum is my understanding how I interpret that makes
sense we've had some conversations but I'll have to double check on that okay i didn't get the sense that they were completely revamping the whole curricul thank you very much that brings us to New Jersey School Boards Association
much shorter report and nothing to add sorry thank you thank you and that brings us to Morris County School Boards Association so Morris County school boards on April 2nd Piper Hulse was awarded our unsung hero award from our
district um was there um that happened on the 2nd the next meeting is on Wednesday May 7th this is at Mount Olive High School this is their end of year awards and
recognition um as we've discussed tonight we're going to be awarded the board will be awarded awards so it be great if everyone can make um an effort to be there and then of course Charlene for breakfast
what time you know right 6:00 to 8:30 now usually the first 45 minutes are dinner okay typically and unfortunately uh since it's not all planned for synchro traffic
yeah get there take that into consideration there's no easy way let's see that brings us to the educational services commission of Mars County i attended the meeting last Wednesday night very routine business was carried on nothing nothing you know
out of the ordinary to report and that brings us to the Hampshire special education parent advisory group all right um on March 26 Mrs greater and Mrs hayes delivered an engaging and informative presentation on speech and
language development during the early childhood childhood the session was very well received into an audience of over 15 attendees reflecting strong interest in community involvement uh CPAC's annual survey has been circulating and is and
is now nearing its close in the coming weeks CPAC will meet with the school administration to review the results and begin planning for next next year thank you very much that brings us to the Boot Township Education Foundation
heartbeat that's Jeff jeff jeff oh Jeff okay uh Jeff is not here does anyone else have any insight there's a trivia night coming up with the Ed Foundation i believe that's May 17th it just went out trying to think what else are they doing
they're in recovery mode four kids starts soon i think registering after spring break um I think they sponsor trucks as well that's right so the trucks in the fifth grade you got it
uh so HSA yes next is the Rockway Valley Open School Association yeah so the big thing that's coming up with the HSA is the Harlem Wizards Mount Lakes High School April 30th 5:30 there's still tickets available it's going to be fun
and then the large fundraiser which is uh the fun run i think that's nice but don't quote me entirely on that um all of the fundraising activity links have gone off this week and the goal is to
build a walkway around the playground a little walking truck right that new to you that's what it says on the That was an idea one of many ideas did they
broadcast that it's out there on the flyer one of the fundraisers where they talking about where you said around the playground they got back it says walking path around our school
but let's just preface it as a proposed idea proposed idea okay we just want to raise funding to help the school how's that that's awesome i have to report thank you and that brings us to the attention
of Putin as usually a bit aware but I think I I do know they had a budget hearing yes last evening and I heard it was well attended that's all I know about that uh touching okay um so we had
our regular meeting on April 4th and u there's been quite a lot of activity actually going on um I had attended the work meeting just to talk to the committee um the town committee about like all the things that the green team's been doing with the water
developing municipal water story and um we have a green fair coming up on June 4th and um and we bumped into the DPW Robo and and he shared that um over at Leonard Park there was u you guys might
have seen that on Facebook because there's some chatter but they're beautiful capitals that like that whole area was like covered in invasive weed mugwart anyway long story short is we've dug we dug up some of those and planted a few of them in front of the school
with some girl scouts so it's kind of like a nice way to like rehome some of that but um that also impacted there's a rain garden over there that is meant to um catch water and runoff and salts and stuff like that from the road and oils
and stuff so we're working on that um and yeah we're starting to work on the garden now as well the Girl Scouts also helped get sew a bunch of seeds so that was kind of fun um yeah including your daughter right did she have a good
time she did okay um let's see um so the ne our next meeting is oh uh May 2nd but more importantly we have community cleanups street cleanups um led by Alicia she's um and or organized
I should say and uh so we'll be out there i'll be out there with you picking the garbage up off the street and we're trying to rope in as many high school volunteers as we can you know service hours when is that um Saturday uh May
3rd and May 17th yeah and um and also on on behalf of the town's news that the the um rec department does the river clean up on April
20th that's right on road and you can shred Saturday I believe right if you have cleaning up oh there you go believe it's our shredding day yeah yeah the Saturday that would have been that would have I
know that would have been in the township report yep great so we put it we put it together thank Thank you and with that we had a facilities transportation the committee did meet yes um we had a meeting on April
4th and this was to kind of re uh realign on potential referendum next steps we discussed um what happened what might happen in the future and there'll be more
discussion to come but right now we're kind of revisiting the whole red great thank you that brings us to finance i don't believe the finance committee met recently but we do have finance motions 1 through 15 may I have
a motion please is there a second i'll second any questions comments or discussion if not the questions on the adoption of plans motions 1 through 15 it's a roll call mrs barta yes mr brandon yes mrs hermy yes mr johnson yes
mrs mcry yes mr mills yes mrs no wicket yes okay thank you that brings us to the personnel the personnel committee met recently as well yeah two weeks ago yes and the main things that are on the agenda tonight
are Mrs pott's maternity leave and Mrs writer's retirement is primarily what we discussed thank you and with that may I have a motion for personnel motions 1 through seven i'll move is there a second second
any questions comments or discussion just comment that we'll miss Mrs weer but she's been amazing and so we want to you know just run a
beautiful program my my son who was a junior in high school was in the preschool program and also networkked him way back then so amazing great so thank you good luck here yes thank you questions comments or discussion
because we have a motion in the second i do keep me honest good any other questions comments or discussion if not the questions on the adoption of the personal motions one through seven mr roll mr yes mr brainer yes mrs hermy yes
mr johnson yes mr mcbry yes mr mill yes mrs o yes thank you that brings us to program yeah remember you took notes and graciously offered extremely detailed notes
I did met on Monday Tuesday very recent can't Tuesday morning uh was was with Miss Wroth uh discussed a couple of topics um an
update on a few sessions we recently had Michelle Lockwood Wood from coalition for inclusive education being uh discussed with staff applying for various grants and some special development training on top of
Charlene's presentation about um human education in class resources um there's a meeting with a STEM author from Montlair State i don't have his name but believe met
with Sparbeck about STEM education samantha Negro from the Morris County office uh met with the sixth or eighth graders discuss perfect use technology as social media uh and testing we discussed the upcoming SLAs's
on May starting the 12th so all week uh and how the benchmark testing is going there's some discussion of uh possibly changing benchmark testing vendors which we discuss briefly uh computer rotation
is on May 6 there was a discussion of um possibly having climate and culture u survey for students um Vicky Wilson an intern was uh discussed came and discussed the SOAR
program some changes uh in testing evaluating gifted students including students in social emotional intelligence um and we discussed further uh anticipated changes to the upper grade math
programs that concludes the report can I ask you what you said about kindergarten kindergart orientation orientation orientation sorry apologies no problem i got you can write this up uh you know
I can do it i could have just recorded what he said and then he did like Fortunately it was recorded that way it's all It's a record of itself it's a good point yeah that was a great point thank you thank you let's do voice to
text you can watch it tomorrow or the day after exactly okay okay with that we have program motion number one may I have a motion please is there a second second any questions comments discussion i'll let
Mr murray call that time on the second uh Mr good uh any questions comments or discussion if not the questions on the adoption of program motion number one all those in favor say I i anyone post say no any extensions that brings us to
policy uh the committee has not met recently but we are attemp we are scheduling a meeting soon i believe all these policies were first reading and described at that prior meeting i'm hopeful yeah so so with that we have
policy motion number one motion please is there a second second any questions comments or discussion and if not the questions on the adoption of policy motion number one all those in favor say I i anyone post say no any abstensions we have governance we need
to have a meeting whoever's on the governance committee after the meeting let us uh put our calendars together and schedule a meeting sounds good um with that open session number two um I'm not going to read the statement
because there's no one in the public see no one in the public we're going to move on to old business is there any old business to come before the board is there any new business to come before the board i had something that I wanted to bring up um and I I talked about this
new program a little bit it's just goals um and I I really weren't able to make it but um I'd like to see if we can get the goals set up earlier um and and established before June if possible for next year and the reason being I think it'll give the administration some time
being new to like catch their breath after this year and then have the summer's plan for the goals instead of setting them in like July or you know August so maybe if we I don't know if it's next meeting i know we have um the next meeting's the um
the 14th the 14th but it's the um it's the budget meeting right or oh that's the following so we could discuss a little bit at the next meeting if we want to come with some ideas and then you know put something together maybe vote on the you know whatever it is May or June the idea would be just give the
administration some runway to get stuff done after you know I'll call it a a wonderful but chaotic start as it was you know when Ken was coming in uh fresh in in September and like the school uh year was already off and running
that's my thought if we could just give him some time I it's a little tangential to that point but um can we just clarify what we have to do in the next few months we have to do um superintendent i have I have it in my
other business they have a board self evaluation and a supernet evaluation and I mean just where just thinking about what comes first or part of that can work with goals maybe that's something I don't think the evaluation has anything to do with next year's goals no um it's
just something we have to do we evaluate can on the goals from this current year and we do our self evaluation on the current and we should also say and reflect and from that we could set the goals yeah and I'm saying really just just however we want i'm working
backwards from June is what however we want to do it and stack it and and uh sequence it but really I just thought if they had you know July and August the whole administration to kind of sit down okay this is what we're focused on now rather than if we get delayed and we wait too long it could be July and then
all of a sudden we're putting it into July and now June is too late or I mean I'd do it sooner if we could but June would be like the the last date that I think we should approve is that the like the goal setting like you do yeah the goal setting get the goal setting you got May and June coming up yeah why do
we So when we do our board evaluation we we discuss right so at that point when we we're doing a we're focused on our goals it could be that that point that we decide or make a proposal for next year's goals and we could have some kicked around so everybody can come
prepared and we can maybe put something together and we just talked about succinct kind of narrow crisp goals too so we don't need 30 goals right but we need to also I guess you know maybe we can talk in I'm not sure the personal government to Ken about that
behind the scenes about his schedule too and how that might fit in or not fit in as well what was the timing last year exactly last year was crazy last year was probably this year whoever the new rep would be but
We get an hour's worth of towards the Carol Larson yes some of them in general timing in general if you did it with their f like they've always done you not only get the goals done you have you have for the board i think we should timing yeah so
so we so after you know I had two things to bring up but I I asked for others first some of the other things two things we do have to do is a board self evaluation in order in order to get the award that is eminent from New Jersey school boards on on mea we need to
complete a board self evaluation so I'm going to go on and open open that up um I'll have to see if there's anything I did but I'm going to do it very quickly like let's say by Friday or Saturday latest and and then if and I guess I'm not even sure i've never seen this new
system they have but if you all wouldn't mind just going on there and you know between we don't have to we won't be discussing it yet before May 7th because we have you know we have a budget hearing we won't discuss it until the May meeting but we just need to complete
it yeah before the May before May 7th is that that's we get recognized we haven't had time yeah maybe I mean maybe by this so Charlene can go in and verify that we all completed it she won't be here May 1st
is it back for the recogn I assume she knows she's coming back for the recognition but I just don't think she knows how she's being recognized so there's the uh we're being oh like awarded but if that's not the Carol Lee Larson one that certification you had to
get board reertification and then you need more on top of that for the Carol yes once we get certification we are working towards Carol Larson for another 16 P number yeah it's another but John has a good point we bring school boards
back where we could for the process we can get some more towards it and just get it and I like what Christine had said like you've got um it was pendulum we had six goals this year maybe two next year um and we've done really well to your point you know grace sorry
um we've got the the pendulum that's going the other way and I think we already did four six and we're done maybe we just narrow it just narrow so yeah so we have the the the board set up evaluation that we have to do hope you know if you don't mind you know help help us out you know at least the majority of me but hopefully all of you
you know within the next two weeks after that we all have to do it yeah we to get it you know to get that completed at least an input into the system well enough for whoever's checking to to make sure we did it do you get a report yeah maybe yeah complete Barry like will you know like oh people have it or whatever
the number might There are lists okay and when's the superintendent valuation is that the next one you're going to talk about uh yes and then the other thing that's coming up is we talked we I think in our governance committee we or governance personnel we governance I believe we're talking you know it'll be uh Mr
first round of a superintendent evaluation um you know as you all know the process is you know I guess the system opens up um the district goals are placed into the system um and then the board you know evaluates you know I think there's a this is all generically
speaking um I think met didn't partially met or didn't meet is like the three categories you choose from and they they superintendent evaluation on the district goals uh first the superintendent you know puts their what they think did they meet it partially meet it or not meet it at all you and then the board goes in and there's like
um support put behind that like you know what what was done to accomplish those goals during the year you know evidence you know to support whatever conclusion was there and then you wouldn't agree or disagree with that what you think was met partially might have not met at all then there's a whole several pages of
just generic information about um about super evaluations you know different categories that you all rank you know and and also put comments in so um you know we talked about how by waiting till June it becomes interesting in June because
there is a lot of stuff going on in June graduations year end stuff and all that so we want to try to you know try our best to get done a little bit earlier than the June meeting so that you know you know Ken could get you know get his piece done and we can get our piece done
and then we still have breathing room as a board to get the results and we're supposed to come up with a summary and then we're supposed to prove the summary and then discuss it with our superintendent and often times we have all the results we we we always do it in Jim and like the whole
thing and we got the whole thing out there um you know all the the comments all the rankings and then uh in the past the board president takes their best guess on summarizing it and and seeing if this you know the summary
comments are you know to the board's linking and then they can be tweaked but they have to be completed that night and discussed that night so whatever happens that night it could be you know you know if there's tweaks and changes made it's you know very unprofessional so it's
handwritten and whatever so we're thinking of trying to get it done by May but May's coming quick may's coming really quick there's a lot going on in the next few months yeah so we'll we'll discuss that timeline but
but keep your eyes open for that you know eventually too you know when it comes out please try to Yeah do that so self evaluation superintendent yeah because is that that's a May I kept it capital by May 7th you got to get that done by
because the meeting is when a few days before at least I mean you don't want to do it right that' be a bad look but that's your goal is because you have recognition yeah may would be nice they have at least a bank so we're going to get that window yeah
the ink has to be drawn after that we do terminate yes and that will be in the works in you know in the process but while we're doing according to the school board's 12-month calendar which is what we were referring to in governance while we're working on our board self-evaluation Ken can be doing his portion absolutely and it's supposed
to be we were I think we agreed to like early April or April 1st and then in April we conference on it we do our part in May may we're in April yeah oh we're already month so guys just getting back to the board
of valium yes can we all commit to completing it by uh Sunday night May 4th so that when they come in on Monday morning yes they see it it's there and gives them two days then we're done yes and then we're done done yeah and then maybe we'll discuss it in our meeting
but at least that'll be done they can see it's done and then this is all the weekend too you can use that to do our next yes and then and and while we're doing that we could you know that would be something if if if we choose to begin setting those goals you you'll use that as your
your springboard into one of your goals to complete that certification we could check yeah but I you know I do I just want to have the goals set soon both board and
district if we could and then that way you know it kind of clears the runway for you know here's I think it's a good best practice pushed them up early on earlier yeah goal number four the New Jersey school board certification award
number three forgot what you to maintain it we have to maintain the credits maintain the credits to keep it but no one launched the Carol Ears yeah to keep the certification at that level that was a number after after that but that only lasts so long yeah we were the first one
of the first one of the first people that lacked us now so now will we be the first to get it twice or we can ask the We have to find out if we'll be the first to get it twice yes there you go hopefully locally yeah eat
from but I think once you get it as long as you keep doing credits and you maintain that level or status there yeah that was like the year when co was hitting a lot of stuff there's a lot of other stuff going that'd be good to get it back I said I'm going to do the training I mean
that's a year to keep it going four at least four things a year why don't I do this why don't I tomorrow email Charlene yeah tell her where we ask her where we are and how you know how to maintain coming full carol mean the next one yep absolutely
and how long our current one she says it's like 12 credits and we have to do what four year i think that's the advert it was like three or four year it wasn't a lot wasn't a big ass you just have to do to achieve it and then maintain and then maintain interesting about who our new
person will be as well yeah I was going to ask if you know it or I was going to ask her but I know they'd advertised for position so they may still have some open could have been her the person she was with her all right maybe you have some time that
might share they're probably going to share counties let's move on so where are we so did we cover business that was part of new business was that all new that was all new business yeah three things board indication and superintendent evaluation
is there anything other new business that come before the board if not I believe we do have close session to do and what was it the category student matters okay with that you can do close session we can do that
too yes thank you so you want you want student matters negotiations and then I can do a quick update on residency uh so you have three things okay so with that may have a motion to enter into executive session to discuss issues that warrant confidentiality as permitted in the open public meetings act chapter 231
of the laws of 1975 these matters may or may not be made public when the board reconvenes they will be made public when the confidentiality of the subject was no longer warranted we are going into we're going to discuss negotiations with the boot township educ education association student matters and student
residency and there will be no board action taken when we reconvene now may I have that motion please is there a second second all those in favor say I i and thank you it is 9:56 p.m we've just returned from our our close session there is no other
board action may I have a motion to adjurnn second is there a second all those in favor say I i thank you very much for coming and we'll see you next month