Do it. Good evening, everybody. I'd like to call this meeting of the Board of Education to order. Everybody, please make sure. It's Dr. Morton. I don't mean to tell on him, but I am. Welcome, everybody, to this meeting of the Board of Education. Mr. Schimp, can you please call the roll? Mr. Fain?
Here. Ms. Cummings. Here. Dr. Dreisen? Here, Mr. Greenbaum. Here. Ms. Manzano? Here. Ms. Stern? Here. Ms. Winters. Here, thank you. Public notice of this meeting pursuant to the open public meetings act has been given by the Board Secretary on April 9, 2026 in the following manner. Posted notice on the school bulletin board of the administration building posted on the board's official website transmitted to the clerk of Cherry Hill Township. Please rise and join me in saying the Pledge of Allegiance.
I pledge allegiance 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. Please be advised that this meeting is being recorded and livestreamed. We are starting with my favorite thing, which is board recognition. It is Jewish American Heritage Month, and I'd like to call out Miss Dermer to give us information about the essay and poster contest winners.
Hi, everybody. My name is Alan Moldoff. I am board president of the Jewish Community Relations Council, the JCRC. I'm with Susan Derma, who is Vice President of the JCRC. For those of you who don't know, the JCRC is an agency of the Jewish Federation whose, I guess, twin goal, or one of its twin goals, is to help advocate for Jewish interest, and at the same time to help promote good community relations with our neighbors. I want to thank the school board for giving us the opportunity tonight to give out some awards, as you've mentioned, this is Jewish American Heritage Month. It's the 250th.
anniversary of this country, the liberty and freedom of this country. And so we, um, put out a contest for the community. Um, in which students, we ask students from this community and other communities to write essays on a Jewish American, um, who they may have learned about, read about. who inspired them in some one way or another. So, uh, we have the award… many of the awardees are here, and again, I want to thank the board for giving us this opportunity, and, um… Susan Derma will.
Present the awards. Thank you very much. Good evening. When I call your name, can you please? If you could please rise and and come up to the podium. All right, we're going to start with our third or fifth grade students. Clark Stell from Thomas Payne.
Exelard from Woodcrest. Did I pronounce it right? Now, on to our 6th to 8th grade nominee participants. We have. Did I pronounce that right?
Benjamin Seidman from sixth grade back. Sounds good. Sure. And then Maya, you're sorry. Rosa, sixth grade. Jeffrey Yang, Rosa, 6th grade.
Maya Lagan. Vivian Murray. Rosa. Luke links light stone a great fact. Allie Farsak, 8th grade, Rosa.
And Spencer Axelrod, 8th grade Rosa. On to our 9th to 10th grade. We have Addison Livestone East 9th grade. Eden Klein, East, 10th grade. Valerie Herman East, 11th grade.
Alexis Rover East, 12th grade. Andrew Lew, East, 11th grade. And Daniel… Daniel Kramer, East 11th grade. Congratulations! Congratulations to all of you. We'd like to thank all of you for having us. Also, we want to invite you to our, um…
We also hope that you're going to join us for… for our Jamfest Sunday from 12 to 4 p.m. For a fun community celebration with activities, music, food trucks, and more. It's free and open to the community. If you'd like to learn more. You can look into our website, jcrc of Southern New Jersey. for any information and details. We have a link that you can register there tonight. Registration does close tonight, so if you do plan on registering, please go on and register.
Thank you very much. Can all our awardees come outside for a picture? Congratulations to everybody. Thanks for being here tonight.
All right, I see next on our agenda student reps, but I think you guys are actually next time. I am getting the hang of this now that it's almost June. So our next thing on the agenda is a community engagement review by Ms. Baradi.
Okay, hi Happy Tuesday. Right, we'll get started. I'm just kind of highlighting last time I made a presentation to the Board of Education was December. So this is kind of an overview of not just the entire school year because it's hard to believe we're almost done, but also highlighting the last six months First, just to review some of the goals that we keep in mind hitting both the strategic plan goals as well as the communications audit that was done a couple of years ago. You'll see these are some of the priorities that I'd like to highlight today, and a lot of the
goals from the communications audit They're actually pretty similar to this, so it was easy to follow both throughout the past couple of months. Some of the highlights include creating educational materials to inform the community of the budgeting process, as with the budget clarity Hub and district milestones that have been highlighted everywhere throughout the past year And boosting workplace recognition specifically that's coming up now with the newly rolled out this year superintendent Spotlight.
With the communications audit, that's something that I'm continuously reviewing throughout the year. Here are several action steps. There's been quite a few that we've been able to cross off the list, most specifically a huge one was the development and the rollout of the new district website that was done last year. So these are again some of the action steps that come from that audit that again match it. One of the biggest action steps that I always keep in mind with everything that we do is just making sure that information is easier to consume for all of our stakeholders.
Here's an example of some of the informational resources that we have rolled out this year. The Budget Clarity Hub, as you know, it was pretty much published everywhere I could find it on our website, social media, all of our principal s'mores, as well as our chips weekly elementary enrollment balancing was another big information resource that After, you know, hearing from the public and seeing, hearing feedback from students, staff, parents, these were two big categories that we wanted to make sure we had transparent information, easy to access information, most importantly, these two buttons have been living on the home page since we started talking about them
The other two informational resources I do want to point out as well, we have the Chipspot, the new AI chatbot, and there was, I know, some questions about this when it first rolled out. The AI chatbot pulls things specifically from the district website I will give you an example. I can see the questions somebody asked, why are bananas yellow or why is lettuce green or something like that. And they weren't able to answer that question because it's not available on our website. When they ask what's for lunch today, they can find that. So that's… it is working, and that is a tool that we've seen a lot of people get a lot of use out of. The community bulletin board is another informational resource I'd like to draw attention to
If you hover over community on our district website, that's under there. This is a spot that's not just for the district, for district partners, township events, different festivals and things that go on. A lot of things that may impact our community, specifically our students Cub Scouts enrichment type programs. When we get emails and information, hey, can you share this with our kids and communities? This is kind of where a lot of the information lives as well, so it's easy to access for anybody in the community to find this information. So just a couple extra informational resources I wanted to point out.
So going back to the Budget Clarity Hub, this is a big undertaking that we did when we, you know this is a big budget was an important topic this year. I mean, it's important every year, but with what we were dealing with this year, we wanted to make sure and we got questions from the community for the past couple of months, just asking for transparency and asking for as much information surrounding the budget. So this was something that Mr. Schimp, Dr. Morton, and I really worked for quite a few weeks on to make sure we got information out for different questions. The top
graphic that you see, that was the chips weekly special edition that goes out to families and staff members that, as you can see that those views change daily as people go back. If they haven't opened that email, they go back, that view goes up. We had more than 17,000 views as of last week The web page, that specific button of people clicking on it, it had more than 23,000 event counts as of last week as well. An event count is a click, a scroll, a visit from another page. So that just shows we have thousands of people looking at this information
I know analytics is very important for us too to make sure that we are engaging throughout every outlet that we can. This is an example of the website. Again, the website, we had the new website that was launched January 1st of last year So you can see in the top the event count again, which is a click, a scroll, any type of interaction with the page at all. The website as of 2025 from January through end of December of last year, that was around 13 million interactions, 4.3 million views
to the homepage of people clicking, opening from a new computer the chart on your right that's from the past 6 months. So we're already up to 5.4 event counts and 1.9 views, so people are using the website as a resource and a place just to find all the information that they can. I'm trying to get this bar out of the way Okay, I don't know how to get that far. So this, you can't see it's kind of cut off. This is our Instagram page I'm sorry, I skipped one. This is Facebook. Can you get rid of that? Oh, thank you.
I don't have that on my end. Nope. Sorry. I'll just read it out loud. So this is the Facebook analytics. So this was from, again, the reason I tracked this from January 1st to December 31st of last year was the start for it. I began in November of 2024. So January 1st was kind of I rolled out my own way of doing social media for the district
So that's why I measure analytics this way. So from January of last year, the 2025, and we kind of talked about this a little bit, I believe this time last year, the year to year, I think it's a more accurate representation of how many people are interacting and looking at our social media pages And again, social media is only one of several communication tools that we use to meet our community where they're at. So for last year, our Facebook page hit 1.4 million views. Some of those top posts that you can see there include the we are hiring post, community records notice from the Office of Special Education
And, the elementary enrollment balance and committee meeting dates. As for this year, the past six months from January 1 through last week, our total views was 779,000. Again, we are hiring our always popular posts because they get shared among community groups all over We have the letter from Dr. Warren and Mrs. Winters on state aid funding that was published in March, and the school closure also was a very popular post this year. And if you look at Instagram, especially at the bottom, the past six months, the school clothes and the two hour delays were the biggest, the most popular posts online. The reason why there's a big gap in that top view, Instagram changed the way that they measure analytics last year
So that's what I have access for was, I believe it was I think it started in August on. So that's gonna… those… that information will be more detailed next year. But you can see to Instagram, we have, you know, more than 5,000 followers now, and again, the top posts from this year so far has been about the snow-related Weather closures Some highlights of what we've been doing. We're always looking to highlight all the positive things going on in the district. And social media is a wonderful tool. Chips Weekly is a great tool, but sometimes it only captures a very, very small snapshot of what's going on around our district. So these are, we have 19 schools, we have a lot to highlight. I try my best to make sure we're highlighting and showing
all the wonderful things going on in all of our schools. But I can't fly yet. So stay tuned. But we this is some examples that what we've done on the website between Cherry Hole West, the kids shining at the science fair. We had the math counts at Beck, Our seniors a couple weeks ago that were making their senior internship presentations So we always try and find different ways and different avenues just to make sure, no matter where people are visiting us digitally, they're able to see our students' success.
Additionally, staff recognition, this is a big part of our strategic plan. We every single month as we have the different recognition days, this list or this month we had recognizing our school nurses, our teachers, our principals. We make sure that we're always shouting them out on social media and on LinkedIn We just last week started our new superintendent spotlight. This year we had students nominate staff members this year. We have staff members from all over the district, and I'm so excited for you guys to see some of these videos we have coming out. The kids did a really great job. So, we have these videos airing now every Friday
at 4 PM through the rest of the school year, and that one on the bottom, too, that was our recent… some of our Sac students at Johnson giving a big thank you for their staff there. So it's been a busy couple months for recognition and community engagement, but this is way where we are at right now. Do you have any questions? Board member questions for Ms. Baradi. I have a question about engagement with the AI bot on the website. You said people are using it? Like, can you give me an example? I… this is how I know that I'm old, because… No, you're fine. I would never talk to an AI bot, I would just look for it, but… Yeah, I think it's… it's definitely been a very helpful tool with the AI bot will come, no matter what
if you're on a school page, or if you're on the main district page, the AI bot still comes up, so we kind of, on our end, we're able to kind of flip through and see what kids at pain are saying, what kids at… I assume that their kids based on some of the questions, but adults might be too. So we're able to kind of flip through and use that. People have asked What's for lunch today is actually really very popular one. Contact information for staff members, phone numbers, that kind of thing. It's kind of an easy place that they can it pops up on the homepage. They're able to type in a question. A lot of the what happens if the AI bot cannot find the answer
My email is usually the one that comes up, and I've actually seen a little bit of a… not a ton, but a little bit of an increase of different questions that I've been getting through the public information box. I had one yesterday, a parent was asking about how can I get some spirit gear for my school? So there's definitely, you know, it's helping connect not just via the website with the AI bot, but helping people also, if they don't get the answer, they can go right to me and I can help answer it as well. Calendar. Also a lot of people looking for the calendar So it's really there's a lot. That's really cool. Thank you so much. Any other board member questions from Ms. Barani?
Well, thank you so much. I'm looking forward to seeing all the superintendent spotlights. Those are always really fun. I'm excited for you guys to see them. Thank you. All right, believe it or not We are at first public comment. So there will be two opportunities for public comment this evening. This first public comment session is for board action items only. If you wish to speak on any topic other than what appears on the agenda, you may speak during the second public comment and speakers must provide their name and municipality.
Students may comment on any topic during first public comment by identifying themselves as a student online. That means putting an S after your name. We alternate between speakers in the room and those wishing to comment online. Each speaker has 3 minutes to speak, and the timer on the screen will indicate the amount of time remaining. All statements, questions, and comments should be addressed to the chair, and your inquiry may or may not be addressed by administration at the close of the session. So I'm now going to open first public comment. Is there anyone in the room who would like to make first public comment this evening? If you're a student, you can come right up to the microphone. You'll go first.
Hello, my name is Kiana Apostoli. I'm a fourth grader from Kingston Elementary School. Now I gotcha, honey. Thank you. Hello, I'm Kiera Postolate, and I'm a fourth grader from Kingston Elementary School. I'm here tonight to give a shout out to my principal, Dr. Marble. On Friday, our school found out that Dr. Marble would not be our principal next year
Dr. Narvo has been my principal since kindergarten, and I am sad to see him go. He attends just about every school event and always has a smile on his face. He is kind, and he knows just about everybody's name in the school. And There's a name that's hard to pronounce like mine. He will do his very best to learn your name. When Dr. Barba went on leave earlier this year, our school was not the same. My brother and I were very happy when he returned. I also want you to know Kingston will be a very different place next year. I hope our next principal will be just as kind and as awesome
And just as memorable as Dr. Marble. Thank you. Thank you so much, and we thank Dr. Marble's pretty great too. Give me one minute, everybody. I do see somebody online. It's phone number ending in 788. Please unmute and give us your name and municipality and the action item on which you are commenting.
My name is Jeff Podowitz. I live in Charlotte, New Jersey. There is a resolution on 19.6 that you're voting on today So, resolution or approving extension of competitive contracts. Please vote no. All right. Dr. Podowicz, I don't think that's an action item tonight. That's in our board work session, so that'll be up for a vote in two weeks. Thank you. Okay, then let's go to 26.4. Food service management That's 26.4. Food service management. Appointment of food service management company
All right. Note The cost of the contract is$ 3,328,226. All right? The money that we received back from that contract is$ 275,000. We are talking about approximately a$ 3 million loss. That's 3 million bucks How come All right, between money collected from the students, because we… are we collecting money
All right, and money we're collecting from state and federal government For the free and reduced lunch, alright, we should be receiving back a lot more than 273 to$ 5,000 Okay, I mean, that makes no sense to me that it's costing us $ 3 million. What's the reason for that? In 2019, our administration made national news over a debt of$ 20,000. Not 3 million,$ 20,000. Please see the article from the New York Times
All right, first the tuna fish badge of shame. Next banned from the prom, November 7th, 2019. It's important to To look at that article. But now we're not talking about$ 20,000 of an expense to the district. We're talking about$ 3 million. What is the reason for this? That's my question. Is it the state of New Jersey? They're not giving us money They're not providing us with funds that we should be getting? Is it preschool
Because we got… do we have to pay for preschool, breakfast and snacks To preschool students And if we have 1,000 preschool students We're talking about a$ 20… maybe$ 20,000 a day or$ 100,000 A week to a five-day week And over a year, that could be$ 2.5 million for just a thousand preschool students. What is the reason that we're incurring a loss
Of close to$ 3 million! It makes no sense now. Can you explain to us? Are we providing free meals? Is that what you want to do? Provide free meals to every student? Is that what the state wants to do? What is going on? So vote no on that, because that makes no sense. All we get back is 275,000 That makes our expense close to 3 million
For food service That's our expense totally for food service. We're not getting any money back. We're not being reimbursed. What is going on? Where is our money going? You know, think about how many teachers you can get from that. Just think about that. Thank you, Dr. Podowicz. Dr. Podowitz, thank you for your comment. Going back to the room, is there anyone else in the room who would like to make first public comment? Are there any students in the room who would like to make first public comment? I'm just double checking. Well, a lifelong student as well.
Come on up. I try. Anne Einhorn, Cherry Hill, New Jersey. I do have concerns about 26.4 myself. It seems to be a very lopsided contract that truly favors Aramark, which I know is a business. We don't seem to be getting much benefit from this business in the school district that doesn't have a lot of money currently. 26.3 and 26.8. I do not see a not to exceed dollar amount, and also for the 26-27 budget, what is the dollar amount
budget for substitute positions. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Going back to the line, I don't see anyone else. The hand raise or first public comment going back to the room. Is there anyone else who would like to make first public comment this evening and an action item. Seeing no one in the room and no one online, I'm going to close first public comment for tonight. And turn it over to Mr. Schimp. Is there any correspondence to share with the board this evening? Nothing to share. Thank you so much. We'll move on to Superintendent's report. Dr. Morton, do you have any reports this evening
Yes, I do, Ms. Winters, and thank you for the opportunity to provide a few updates. I'd just like to start just by congratulating the winners of the Jewish American Heritage Month essay and poster contest. It's always wonderful to see the exuberance and enthusiasm of the kids As they are recognized, it's definitely a pleasure. Thank you to Ms. Barati for the great presentation as well. We know over the last several years, communications and improvement in communications has been a concerted focus for the administration, for the board, and for the district
And Ms. Barade's done a great job in reaching out to our community in diverse ways. Most importantly, we continue to impact and implement the recommendations that have come from that communications audit that was done two years ago, three years ago now, right? Three years ago, so now, but nonetheless, great job. Also want to just share our gratitude to our community for lending their voices and unity around fair funding as it relates to telling the Cherry Hill story. Please keep it up. Please keep advocating on behalf of the district. This week and last week, or actually the last couple of weeks, we've been immersed in testing, NJSLA testing at all levels. AP testing as well at the high school level as well as well
These gentlemen right here, their faces tell the story of what AP testing is all about. It's going great. Absolutely. Yes, and just one last update as well, just May 25th will be closed for Memorial Day. We recognize, you know, all of our servicemen and women who have made sacrifice on behalf on behalf of our country. Thank you. Thank you. Moving on to old business. Do any board members have old business this evening?
I have old business this evening. I want to give an update to the community about fair funding and what happened between the budget meeting and tonight's meeting, and what next steps are. So, at our last meeting, which was the budget meeting, we had a lot of community feedback. There were almost 500 people between those attending online and those in the room interested in the budget There was a lot of conversation and The board ask the community to please advocate for Cherry Hill at
the state level, because a lot of the problems that we see with the budget, a lot of the costs and concerns can't be solved here at the local school district level. There are things that are completely out of our control. So I want to say how proud and thankful I am to members of the community that they clearly understood the assignment and inundated Majority Leader Greenwald and Senator Beach and Assemblywoman Kane's offices with their passionate phone calls and emails. Your voices were definitely heard. When I went into the meeting at the majority leader's office that Friday after the budget, the first thing they said was, we heard Cherry Hill
I do not think that the meeting would have been nearly as productive or effective if I didn't walk in without the community voices behind me, because as we've said before. Board members saying it, administration saying it, that's one thing. What legislators really care about is community voice. So You really move the needle. And I can't thank you enough The meeting was great. It was attended by me and other representatives of school districts from South Jersey. I was there representing Cherry Hill, but also from Board of Education.
We had superintendents there from Eastern Regional. We had a superintendent from Washington Township, we had the business administrator from Collingswood in Oakland, and we had a board member, board president from Pittman, and our fearless leader was Ms. Kelly Hinkle, who's the board president in Haddon Township She's the organizer of all this, and I can't thank her enough for her leadership, because I think by pulling us all together, we were able to really make an impact. She sent something out to the group that I thought was really interesting. I had posited that I felt that part of the issue with the formula was regional. It had to do with South Jersey. She did the analysis. So, in the state, only 28% of school district… sorry, only 28 school districts, which is 5% across the state, received cuts
In 24, 25, 25, 26, and 2627. Of those of the districts who received cuts the past three years, 57% of them were in South Jersey. So I continue to really think that a lot of this has to do with the geographic cost adjustment that's embedded in the formula. In other ways, the formula is skewed against South Jersey and what we need. So in the meeting, we talked about a lot of different things. We talked about short-term and long-term solutions to the problem, and we talked about a continual push for fair funding that will not just end with the budget that will be a year-round push with a campaign in the fall
for all the South Jersey districts to continue to move forward. So it was extremely productive. So that was that meeting. Coming up in the future, there will be a meeting on Monday that I will be attending along with Mr. Greenbaum, Mr. Schimp, and Dr. Morton, that that meeting is being put forward by Senator Beach, who is our senator, who also heard you very loud and clear. Thank you to all of you who called Senator Beach's office. We appreciate you, and the Commissioner of Education will also be in that meeting. So I am Increasingly optimistic that we will see real action. The mood in the majority leader's office was something now and something later, and the later is not too much later. The later is a new funding formula by budget next year.
I think that's in a very, very aggressive timeline for the legislature. They generally move as slow as they possibly can. Funding formulas are really hard to do. They have never enacted a funding formula other than when they've been forced to by the court. And the current funding formula that we're all complaining about is the only one that's ever been found constitutional. It's a big hill to climb. But the good news is that I think With Cherry Hill being a third of the legislative district that we currently live in, the fact that Cherry Hill got loud
really made the argument more salient for them and relevant An imminent. So just to anybody who's out there listening, keep it up. Do not stop. And the place to effectively focus your advocacy is definitely our legislators. The majority leader, Greenwald, Assemblywoman Kane, and Senator Beach. They were very clear in the meeting that calling other legislators, it doesn't have as big of an impact. We work on our local representatives. If there is legislation that's introduced that will benefit Cherry Hill. You will know, because I will give that information to Miss Alana Yaris. She of the fair funding to blast that out. If there's legislation that would impact us in a positive way
That we would want to support here from Cherry Hill. And I will just continue to keep everybody posted. Alana Yaris and fair funding continue to be the point people for getting information out to the community, so we'll continue to coordinate with them. And in other partnerships on Thursday CHEA, our teachers union, is going to lobby at the Senate Budget and Appropriations hearing, the one where the new commissioner will be there to present. I am going with CHEA in support of our teachers and in support of Cherry Hill, so thank you to Dr. Batista for reaching out
All board members are invited to join me if you're available on Thursday morning and want to take a ride up to Trenton, we will be there in with a full presence representing Cherry Hill, and I really do thank Dr. Batista for her partnership in this, because it's got to be all of us together. There's absolutely no way we can get this done if it's just one group of people. It has to be one Cherry Hill. So thank you to everybody. And do any board members have questions. Ms. Stern. So the percentage that you're referring to, how we represent 50… and you said 5
57% of the districts in New Jersey who have lost funding over the past three years are South Jersey districts. And yet we represent what percentage of the entire state of just 20% are schools or 20% of? So what I was saying is Cherry Hill Township, as a part of Legislative District 6 We're about one third of the legislative district. Yes, you talked about what pers… I guess, what percentage, I think, lost funding, maybe 5% Thank you. So only 5% of districts in the entire state received cuts for the past three years. And we were 57, but South Jersey is 57% of the 5%. So has that
Has that data been shared back with Majority Leader Greenwald's office? Okay. Kelly Henkel is a force to be reckoned with. She is a she is an amazing board president, and she was really the one who said that rather than each individual district Working on its own, we should combine together. And I also think she was brilliant in having the representation from board presidents and superintendents and Bas in the meeting, because it's all different perspectives. And the business administrator from Collingswood and Oakland was very clear about what's happening in her district. They're selling buildings, and that there's really nowhere else for them to go
Well, will you guys be coordinating again, both on Monday and Thursday as well? Is that the South Jersey districts that are working together? Is that going to be happening? So the… the meeting… so Thursday was organized by CHEA, so that's our teachers union organized that The Monday meeting reached out to Dr. Morton directly due to the advocacy of our community, but we are all working together. So as each thing with Cherry Hill is because we are so big We can sometimes get attention in a way that some of these smaller districts who are struggling mightily, like it's not the same. So
But I'm not, in my opinion, I think These issues are statewide issues. They're funding formula issues. They're not issues that Cherry Hill can solve on its own. So my vision and all of our vision is to work together towards a funding formula that's fair and benefits all students. And that's the goal. Thank you Other board member question. Thank you for doing what you're doing. It's a heavy lift and I feel like You know having dealt… done fair funding stuff years ago, it's… it's a lot of time and effort, and it's a lot of
Energy. So thank you. It is, but I also feel like this is an inflection point. I feel like I just happen to be the one sitting in the seat right now, and if not now, then when? This is the moment where we can really make a difference. This is the year that the community, you know, was outraged, and rightfully so, at what happens with our budget. I saw everybody's letters. A lot of people copied me on the letters, or I saw them posted on posts on Facebook and screenshotted and sent to me. I know a lot of… Alana saw a lot of the letters
People wrote really passionate Well researched, informed, amazing emails to the majority leader and they kept going and they kept following up and persisting. And that's honestly what got the door opened to begin having these really difficult conversations. So I just again want to give credit to the community We're all angry, but it takes a lot to take that next step and turn that anger into action. And I really appreciate that because they're not just going to listen to me complain. It's when all of us get loud together that they listen.
Any other board member questions? All right, well, I will keep you posted. I will be in Trenton with our teachers supporting them. At Senate Budget on Thursday. And then we will have our meeting on Monday, and I'll report back to the board if there's anything else that anybody wants to contribute, I'll continue sending out information And yeah, I think that's where we are right now. But again, I'm always cautiously optimistic, but I really am cautiously optimistic right now. I think that If there is an opportunity for supplemental funding like we got two years ago.
We'll probably know by the end of May because the legislature will receive the updated budget numbers. I believe it's on May 19th They'll get an updated revenue report from Legislative Services, and that will tell them whether the revenue picture looks what they thought it was going to be rosier than they thought or not as good as they thought If there's additional money, the conversations that are being had are the first thing that would be restored would be additional funding to our schools. But the governor's also talking about the fact that they have a$ 3 billion structural deficit. So
Take that for what it's worth. I don't think it's impossible I don't think it's exceedingly likely. I think it's a toss-up, and we just have to keep pushing. Any other questions? Anybody else have old business? Thank you guys for indulging me on that, but I thought it was important to just articulate back to everybody what their advocacy did that it it did work and it continues to work Okay, so now we are at, oh, it's me talking again, guys. It's committee reports, and I'm first.
We're now in our board work session, so this will be report outs from and discussion from all the committees. So CNI committee met And thank you to Ms. Staffen for her thorough report, as always. May 4th at 7 PM. There are basically two halves to the meeting. The first half of the meeting was Mr. Guy presenting on warm demands or pedagogy as a culturally responsive practice, which was fascinating It aligns with priority three of our strategic plan about serving our students, and it was… and Mr
This is our guy here no he's online. Hi, Mr. Guy, you're online. You can interrupt me if I get it all wrong. But really, it was about culturally responsive teaching and working with students To help them get what they need in order to achieve, and to especially work with students who are having challenges in the classroom, and the way that staff and administrators can build that report and trust with them and understanding of the needs of the students have in order to help them be more successful in the classroom. Do any committee members have anything they want to talk about with respect to
that presentation or the following discussion. See anything. Do any other board members have questions about it? Mr. Guy did a fabulous job And just so everybody knows the full presentations are on the district website if you click under board presentations and May, all of our presentations are posted so everybody can see them. So if there's no questions about that, the second half of the meeting was the benchmark marking period 3 data, which was given to us by the CNI team. And I highly, highly recommend everybody who's interested in academic achievement in the district to take a look
Because I think there's a lot of people say a lot of things about what's going on in the district, but the numbers don't lie, and they tell a wonderful story. I was especially impressed with our data around social studies It was excellent. Our ELA data looks great. Our science data looks wonderful, and I'm really hoping that the scores that we see on our science benchmarks then become reflected in our science NJSLA because that's something I know that we're working towards. The one thing that the committee continues to ask about is math, which is not just a Cherry Hill problem, but it's been a nationwide problem, especially since the pandemic.
And the questions that we asked were around Ms. Staffen presented the way that the coaches are working with the data to work with our teachers to help our students and the committee's questions were more around, well, when is that happening in the building? Is there a ways that we can make sure that All of this good work that's being done by our coaches and the CNI staff and with our teachers are impacting the students that need help. So that was kind of the that discussion in the meeting. Ms. Staffen, do you want to add anything, or do any other committee members have anything? Mr. Fain.
I think it's just worth noting that we also discussed the changes in the middle schools and everything that went into that. And just as a follow up that we haven't stopped the discussion on that. I think it's just worth noting that we did have a discussion on the middle school The junior high model and how that's going and you know We just discussed some options to try to give the teachers some more you know more space with each other to help some of the trends that we're seeing in math and things like that. But
The committee, the district committees are actively working that, and I believe Ms. Staffen was saying they're looking at how things work at a high school level, and seeing how they can kind of mimic that in the middle level to be a little bit more, successful with getting the teachers that time Yeah, definitely. I think that the Change the Junior high model this year was definitely it's different and that's different is always hard. Change is challenging and I think that this is only the first year of implementation, so we continue to look at it and see where we can adjust as needed.
To make sure that our students are getting what they need. Anything else from other committee members, Ms. Cummings, we were thrilled that you could join us. It's always a pleasure to be part of CNI. I know. Thank you. I mean, I always say it's the best comedian. No, just kidding. But it was a really great meeting, and I do want to say that I think that the benchmark data information that we're getting is really helpful for the committee to see Over time, looking through the year, how our students are doing and get a real sense of that rather than just waiting for the NJSLA data to drop
in the fall, but that data was actually for so much earlier. It's really hard to think about. By the time we get that data, and we want to take action to change things or support things, it's almost like that data is old already. So the benchmark data's been really helpful, and that's something that's coming out of what we did with strategic plan when we looked at priority one, linking things to the benchmark data. So I think that's actually been really effective for the committees understanding of how our kids are doing. And they're doing really well, which is wonderful to know. We also had a presentation of a senior capstone project
We had an update on the AI guidelines, which are coming along. We talked about the books that we reviewed for middle school. There were three graphic novels. They were all approved And Yeah, I think that was pretty much it. There was public comment. Regarding structured literacy. I think that was it. Do any other committee members have anything they want to add about the meeting or board members have questions about what CNI worked on? All right, well then I am going to conclude the CNI report and pass it along to Mr. Greenbaum for BNF.
Thank you very much. So for maize BNF committee The discussion was all about student transportation. None of these were new discussions, but we talked about all the topics that keep coming up, the various forms of transportation costs efficiencies, things of that nature Thank you, Mr. Fain, for joining us this month for these discussions. And I do want to make sure I state that the information that was presented for discussion was presented just for discussion and planning purposes. There were no recommendations made, no decisions made. This was simply
To continue these discussions for possible future planning. So the first topic we looked at was courtesy busing. This is busing that we do beyond the statutory required radius for transporting our students, and the discussion focused mostly on elementary and middle schools Miss Linda King joined us to provide some data, and it was based on this year's enrollment information and routes. But there's little changes year to year, but you have to use something to
To figure these things out. And we looked at what would happen if we increased courtesy busing distance to the statutory distance, which is 1 mile. We currently provide busing, significantly smaller radius. There are some potential savings from this, and this is why this comes up in budget season every year It's estimated to be around$ 680,000 a year. It also has a very significant impact. Using this year's numbers, it would impact about 660 students across elementary and middle schools by eliminating 17 routes
And that impact varies from school to school. Some schools would see little or no impact because everybody are already walkers. They're smaller neighborhood schools. Some would not be impacted just because of hazardous routes. For example, Rosa Middle School has no safe walking routes Creston's a very busy road. Browning has no sidewalks and some schools would be significantly impacted one or two schools would lose all transportation, which would create new challenges with drop-off and pickup logistics. Imagine having 300 families all trying to do drop-off in the morning.
At schools that currently have busing We looked at preschool as well. The catch with preschool is all of the providers except the two in district, Malberg and Kilmer, only have hazardous routes. So there's no significant savings looking there. But whatever changes we make at the elementary level need to be done at preschool But the discussion on preschool transportation will be ongoing. It remains a challenge for gen ed preschool. It's a conversation we've had ever since the start, and will continue looking for efficiencies there.
There's some conversation around infrastructure related considerations as well. Potential sidewalk improvements, working with the township or the county, pedestrian safety enhancements, possibly looking at things like additional crossing guards and working with the township and CHPD for things like that Proposed signaling upgrades, places where there are not safe places to cross. Could they be made safe walking routes? And again, this is not a new discussion. There's no recommendations at this time. There are some potential savings, which is why this has been a discussion year to year. But with such a significant impact to families, it may be something to consider at a later date
But there is a… there is a trade-off there. And again, preschool transportation's been an ongoing discussion, and we'll continue to be as we look for efficiencies and opportunities for savings there. The other transportation discussion had to do with late bus utilization at middle and high school levels, we have late buses for students in athletics, clubs, and other extracurriculars. We had asked Mrs. King to take a look at utilization for a few weeks to have an estimate of how much they're used. At the middle school level, those routes have moderate utilization. They're pretty significant. None of those kids are old enough to drive yet
So not a lot of opportunities for savings there. They are pretty significantly used. But at the high school level, there's a different story. Utilization varies, but is generally very low, averaging 5 to 8 students a day per route The exception are routes that go to west from the east side and that go to east from the west side. Those tend to have significantly higher utilization. Ridership varies by student participation and after schoolool activities depending on what the activity is, what time they get out
And it's recommended to do some additional monitoring to understand utilization during winter months. There might be a lot of people that might be prone to walk, or parents who would let their kids drive, but not so much in adverse weather when there's snow on the ground when it's cold outside So, it's something to keep an eye on, because there are some opportunities for savings there. We also need to understand the impact. Some routes are used more than others. Additional data to understand seasonal utilization, as I just mentioned, and we certainly want to consider equity issues. Those who utilize the service may be the ones who who need it the most
Right? We certainly don't want somebody to not be able to participate in an activity because we take away their way to get to and from. Just like the last item, there's no recommendations at this time, but low utilization on some routes suggest an opportunity for future savings Additional monitoring will help better understand utilization and impact for future discussions. And once again, thank you very much to Mrs. King for providing this data and analysis and joining the board for these discussions. And with that, do any committee members have any questions, comments, anything to add?
Any board members Okay, thank you very much. It means you did a great job. Moving on to HR, Ms. Stern. Well, typically we can't talk very much about what we talk about in HR because of their personnel issues, but I am happy to talk about the job description that is on our agenda tonight. So when we met in HR, we actually had our Director of Special Education, Ms. Mallory, come in
And she talked about a proposed position, this job description that she wanted us to understand why, why would we even consider adding one position in a year where for the next school year, where we are, you know dealing with all the budget challenges and some position, you know, challenges to our… the number of positions we have. And so she talked pretty in-depth about the position. This is a transition coach, so that is someone whose job is that it would be
a teacher-level position, and that's someone whose job it would be to specifically help our high school and middle school or secondary level students who, are, have special needs, specifically, focused on our ASD populations, those students, as they transition, from middle to high school, and also working together to plan their transition plan throughout their time in high school for what they're going to do after high school
So why now and why this position? Well, a few reasons. First of all, and I'm going to kind of use our time machine and go back a few years. I want to say, I think it was four years, four or five years ago was the first time we ever in my time Being involved added special education to our annual district goals. We realized that the special education community and our students and their families. We wanted to make sure they were represented and called out specifically in our goals
So, we added them, and part of that was starting to… we interviewed families and got feedback. Quite a number of families and multiple board members participated at the time, along with the superintendent and Ms. Mallory was involved, and what we found was that one of the main challenges families called out at every level was, challenges with transitioning, which we know is a particular challenge for students with special needs
transitioning from mostly level to level. So since then, that's really been a focus in our goals every year, and we've incorporated that into our strategic plan and our goals. Priority 1 and Priority 3, specifically Aim 1… Aim 1D and AIM 3B, put the glasses on to make sure I can get it right. Those are focused on expanding inclusion opportunities and least restrictive environment for our student with students with special needs, as well
Our overarching goals about experiential learning and post-secondary experiences. So this person, this job position, would focus on all of those. And why now? Well. As we've expanded, as our special ed community has continued to ask, you know, having local programs for our own students rather than as much movement from, you know, across town, different schools
We have tried to put as many programs and as many local schools as possible. So what that has meant specifically for our autism ASD, I'm like autism or autism. What is spectrum disorder classrooms. I'm sorry, I would think I was thinking it was a different our autism spectrum disorder class that those programs, those classes, we've expanded that to high school East And now that we have students, we have a large number of students transitioning from middle school into high school into that program, so that program is growing. And part of that is recognition of, well, what if you're going to support a program, rather, you know, if you don't have the right supports in place, these students are not going to get their needs met
We're not going to be compliant with least restrictive environment. And eventually, if they're not getting their needs met in our schools, their families are going to say our student… our kids are not getting their needs met, we need to go somewhere where they can get them at Which could lead to out of district or the request for out of district or discussions about a district placement. So the best way that we can serve all of our students is to make sure we do as much as we can to have what they need in our own district. So this position
Specifically, is intended to kind of bridge that gap. We have that link from helping with transitions and also from again, middle school to high school and then beyond high school and making sure we are providing a very appropriately required, well-rounded program for these students. So very long winded explanation for why we are adding a position, but I think it deserves the attention for a number of reasons. First of all, it is absolutely part of our strategic plan is absolutely our commitment to our students with special needs and their families and our district to provide what they need
And and to do so in a very fiscally responsible way and adding one position to support all of these students is the way that we're going to do that. So that is what that's about That was a big part of our discussion. We also discussed in the meeting A few other personnel topics, as you can imagine, which I cannot go into because they are confidential. And we also are continuing to We have some of our collective bargaining unit
contracts that are continuing to be discussed, and that's, you know, part of what we're always making sure we're keeping in focus. So That's it for HR This is Libra, did I leave anything out? Too much. Too much, too little. Okay, perfect. All right. Members who were in the committee meeting, any, any input, anything to add, questions, comments? Okay, other board members who are not in the committee meeting. Any questions, comments? Okay, there we go.
Thank you. And now I'm going to turn it back to Mr. Greenbaum for P&L tonight because Ms. Palmer can't be with us. Thank you. Ms. Palmer's out sick this evening, so I'll provide the report out for P&L. It's a pretty short meeting this month. We only had a few topics to cover. First item was Once again, first reading of Policy 2363, student use of wireless communication devices. This is our student cell phone policy. This will remain on first reading at least another month.
We're waiting for guidance from Strauss Esme about how the states new law on the cell phone use in schools would what that would look like and we received guidance from Stroz Esme, who we get our policy guidance from, and There's a discrepancy in the legislation between the legislation and the intent of the law. Apparently it's supposed to be a lot more like our existing policy, which is not necessarily start to finish, but just not during classroom time unless it's part of
part of the classroom experience. So, for now, the existing district policy appears to be closely aligned with the original intent. We're going to wait for further guidance from Strauss Esme, and the committee will discuss further in June, and likely move forward with recommendations for Minor changes to streamline the existing policy. There's also first reading of Policy 2340, which has to do with field trips. There's a minor change having to do with adding an additional stakeholder for who evaluates field trips prior to approval to include the school nurse. This aligns with existing district practices
Our school nurses are already highly involved in field trip planning, particularly with medication management. This is a change that just made sense. Just a minor change that aligns with what the district already does. There are 2 topics for future discussion. One has to do with going through board bylaws which fall under district policy, looking at any bylaws that aren't already on the annual update list. It's just good practice to regularly review and update as needed
So we look forward to some of these discussions summer of 2026. The bylaws will go through P&L first, and then be referred to governance for further review. And then lastly, technology, use of technology and associated policies in June It's a very… it'll be a very timely discussion. Conversations are happening a lot in the news. Other districts are starting to look at this. Soon June, we plan to begin work on policies around technology in the classroom. This will include discussions of
time on devices, appropriate use of technology at various levels of education, pre-K through high school, and managing access to websites and applications. The tech package will be a joint effort between P&L and CNI, and again, we could look forward to that starting in June. All right, and with that, are there any questions or comments from other committee members from the full board? Okay, well, thank you very much, and thank you to — oh, I'm sorry. Dr. Dreisen. Just a comment on that to echo. I would just point out for board members, if you're not aware, you can follow even what's happening not so far in Lower Marriott
This is a topic of conversation right now about technology and it's hitting the school boards. So interesting topic for June for sure. Yes, thank you very much. It was actually their P&L committee that was on the hot seat. So I sent that to Bridget, but I didn't realize she wasn't feeling well today. Probably didn't make her feel any better. But no, it's time. It's we've been talking about this for a long time. Summer's a good time to dive into something like this, so it'll be a joint effort between CNI and P&L to move something forward. We've been kind of waiting for the cell phone policy updates that we could do it all together, but at this point
If there is not a definitive answer out of the DOE about the cell phone policy, I think we need to move forward with the technology conversation anyway, because September will be here before we know it. All right, governance. Any report from governance this evening? We have not met since the last meeting. Okay. And additional committee and delegate reports. These are committees that are our ad hoc committees, or if you attended something as a representative of the board.
Mr. Fain. So just an update on elementary rebalancing. We met this week for what will potentially be the last meeting for, you know, at least the foreseeable future. We revisited the discussion, I think 2 meetings ago, or maybe even last meeting. We requested some additional information from Dr. Morton, in which he provided for us to review proactively for this meeting, and we look through some of the numbers of the students. Particularly, we are focused on Barton, but we were… because the original recommendation was for building classrooms at Barton, so we wanted to revisit what the numbers look like
for those students that are being… that should be going to BART and that were being sent other places in the district. So we combed through some of those numbers. Another thing that we had asked Dr. Morton was to touch base with the township on some of the new housing units that are being built And based off of that information, the new recommendation to pause building on Barton until we have a better understanding of what is going to Who will be in those units in the future.
That was pretty much the bulk of our conversation. So the new units over in the Woodcrest area, forget the name of that structure that was built, but the new units over there are not seeing an uptick in children coming into the district So the thought is now the as the committee discussed this with Dr. Morton and Mr. Guy. It's it would be the recommendation to wait to see if there is an influx of children coming into those. So particularly, they're also the timeline from the district that was originally given to us is no longer the timeline. Specifically, if I have these correct, the Hampton Road build is not going to be live until this December
Well, if you said to the end of this year, like winter 2627, and then the three executive campus, which that is a three-year. We're 3 years out from that. So there's still a lot to be understood and determined by what is going to be what those housing units will be utilized for, and the types of families potential people or families moving into that. So we kind of dissected that recommendation to pause. We also discussed the impact of spending that money that we have from the bond interest on
this project, and we discussed that it would probably be in our best interest to hold on to that for, you know, to see what we would potentially need that for in the future. I think Yes, so we're not seeing right now we're not seeing the urgency that we originally understood for building at BART. Also after dissecting those numbers that were given to us, it did not look like that would alleviate the that need indefinitely with building onto Barton. So ultimately we as a committee, came to the decision that we would move forward with Dr. Morton's recommendation to pause further
pause right now for building onto Barton. And we are anticipating no longer needing to meet, at least for now, and then revisiting this after the new year if new board leadership determines that we need to free up this committee or start to once, maybe once we start getting some data of who is moving into those housing units, we can revisit the discussion at that point in time. So, I don't know if any other Committee members have anything to add?
Does anybody non-committee members have any questions? Yes, Mr. If you'll indulge me for a moment, one of the things that I wanted to share, because we've We've had this discussion very piecemeal. And one of the things Dr. Morton shared with the board was just kind of a more complete picture of the different recommendations that were that were made and considered. I want to take just a moment to share just a few very brief items. One of the things that was initially looked at was redrawing district lines
what was found through those analyses was it pushed everybody further east where the space was. And the problem with doing that is it disrupts a lot of people, sometimes taking them away from their neighborhood schools, pushing them to where there's room a little bit further east And ultimately creates a lot more complications for transportation, increases transportation costs, and that's why that solution was not initially recommended. The recommendation to build at Barton was based not just on where the projected growth was, but where the challenges are now. Barton is bursting at the seams. All of the new housing units, I think 1,200 out of 1,700, are all projected to be enrolled at Barton.
So that recommendation made sense to me, and I think to a lot of us, because it doesn't just solve a future problem, it solves a current challenge. As Mr. Fain said, one of the reasons for deferring the decision and the main reason is Because now we're a couple years into those projections, and as some of these housing units have come online, we can see that enrollment increases have not met those projected increases yet. They've been fairly minimal. But there's also a lot of housing units that haven't come online yet
Particularly including affordable housing units, which are more likely to include families with more children, right? When you have a two-bedroom luxury condo, for$ 600,000, that's probably not going to include a family of five. But when you have affordable units, more bedrooms district could some of these schools. That's where you're probably going to see more enrollment growth. Most of those have not been built yet, and that's why it made sense to wait a year and revisit And I appreciate you giving me a moment just to share some of that. Like I said, all of these conversations have happened somewhere, but not in one central place, and I keep getting a lot of these questions every time I engage with the community. So I thought having something all in one place, just talking about where the recommendations were and why
made sense. you know these decisions are always data driven and reflect community input where the community, what the community valued, and what enrollment data says we need to do So, thank you very much for chairing the committee and I look forward to revisiting this next year Yeah, thank you, Dr. Treisen. Yeah, I appreciate your comments there, Mr. Greenbelt, because first, thank you to you and the committee, because a tremendous amount of work. I think this recommendation certainly makes sense. I do think it's important to recognize that if I'm sitting from the community's perspective, this is a bit of whiplash happening tonight, because
I think we just need to recognize as a board, we communicated a sense of urgency with this, with a number of the town halls that you helped convene, and so I just think we as a board can just, you know. try to identify whatever learning opportunities there are. I mean, certainly more data came out and we're following, you know where the where the building plans are. But I think we should at least acknowledge that, I mean, this caused angst for the community As we discuss this, and it will cause angst again and we just need to keep that in mind in our communications.
Thank you, and I think it's also that is the lesson to be learned, at least for myself in this too, is, like I had mentioned, so just to clarify, which I think I was clear, but We are not going to be recommending anything for a vote at this time, and the committee itself will be on pause until further notice. But I think that it is important to recognize that if there is a sense of let's reopen this discussion later on, that will We as a committee or whoever will be on that committee at the time. We'll make sure that we're being very intentional about the direction of that conversation, given that
We've had this experience. Anybody else? Okay, that's it. Thank you. Any other committee delegate reports? Ms. Stern. Yes, so just a special ed committee report. We met on the 5th of May, and we discussed a number of topics. Again, we… we did talk about the proposed position that we're going to be voting on tonight
We also talked about The importance of having all of our students continue to have and our special ed students again access to kind of focusing on more help with developing their post-secondary plans. So sometimes people say, well, why do our administrators and our staff, why do they go to conferences? What do they get out of that, you know, besides a day out of district, you know
Well, you know, Ms. Mallory shared about her experience specifically at a conference learning about a platform that she's now looking into that she believes can be leveraged to help us And our students have some with support and also self-guided exploration for post-secondary opportunities. And it's a very… she's very, always… Ms. Mallory's always very budget conscious, and fiscally responsible about it, so she said, you know, it's a very extremely inexpensive. She said she
learned all about it, and she I've been exploring it. So, you know she's really got her eye on that, and we talked also about this year we approved two new positions, or we had restructured positions, for our director and supervisor, and the guidance department, so we're hoping, you know, those This will align really nicely with what we're trying to accomplish for all of our students, including our special education students to really kind of
support more, you know, them and their families and with staff guidance, you know, preparing for post-secondary. We talked a little bit about an update for CPAG. Again, you know, the district is not responsible specifically for CPAG. They're an independent parent organization But we certainly want to partner with them and support their efforts in supporting families in the district. We talked about and had a very candid conversation about some of our areas in special education throughout our district, where there are challenges
We refer to it as a heat map sometimes. Where's our heat map? Where are our hot spots? Where are we having challenges? What can we do to intervene? What can the board do to support the interventions that Superintendent is recommending to ensure that we are supporting our special education students as much as we possibly can, and providing for what they need. And we had some, you know Very helpful updates. We talked specifically also about a topic that's been coming up a lot, which is classroom evacuations. When is that used? What are some of the best practices? What are some of the ways in which we see opportunities for improvement
regarding evacuation, so we had a really, really good and robust conversation about that. And we also talked about the incredible benefits of The level of expertise, especially in administration, that we have throughout the district in addressing our students with special needs and their families, those needs. And you know how kind of leaning into the best you know, the best that we have, and leaning into their skills, and helping, you know, develop those areas as much as possible, because leadership, you know, at the district level, at the building level, you know, really makes a difference when it comes to special education.
And Let me see talked a little about data collection. We talked about, again, with the classroom evacuations, what are some of the areas that we could… that… not we, but really Dr. Morton will work with is working with Miss Mallory on just having some I guess, more looking at it a little bit closer, making sure that we're doing
When we see some areas of challenge, how do we improve them? So we talked a little bit about how we did that with Previously with the S12, we used to call it S12 with students who had challenges with their own safety or safety towards others. You know, we had a really good committee that met several years ago with great input from building level folks and district-level folks to improve that process. And we were talking about that regarding classroom evacuations. How could, you know, similarly, how could we
have that, you know, improve. I think I just wanted to clarify, Ms. Stern, the District Transition Coach is not up for a vote this evening. It's in our board work session I'm sorry. Did I say that was up for vote. It's a first, right? This is our first read, our first thank you for clarifying. I just didn't want people to be confused. So that's under board work session under HR for tonight and then the vote will be at the next meeting, which is May 26th I think I was thinking it was already May 26th. That might have been
We all want it to be Memorial Day weekend. I think my mind is a little too on Memorial Day weekend also. My sons will be home from college by that point, so I think I might be thinking. Thank you. Thank you for the clarification. And I think that was it. Anything else from our special education Members who are present. Any comments, questions from board members at large All right, I got everything Miss Mallory's online. I don't know if any Ms. Mallory's anything to add?
I'm not seeing any hands. All right, I think that's everything. Thank you. Thank you so much. Any other committee delegate reports? Anything you attended as a board member on behalf of board? All right, seeing none, we are going to move on to our action agenda, where we will vote this evening. We're going to start with CNI. Superintendent recommends and I move the following agenda items 25.1 through 25.4 inclusive. Do I have a second?
Mr. Fain, are there any questions on CNI this evening? Mr. Schimp, please open the vote. Motion carries. Thank you, Mr. Greenbaum, please move the BNF agenda. Thank you. The superintendent recommends and I move the following action agenda items 26.2 through 26.8 as presented. Do I have a second?
Mr. Chairfang? Any questions or discussion? Yes, Mr. Payne. Mr. Greenbaum, or maybe Mr. Schimp, would you be able to just explain a little bit about 26.4 and what we're looking at there, and what each of those items mean. Sure. So this is just the renewal of the contract we have with our mark, who provides food service throughout the district. So the numbers you see there on the type of contract we have
With Aramark is the food service company provides a guarantee to the district, meaning they guarantee that throughout the operation of the year that we are to receive$ 257,000 to go into the net assets of that food service program. I'll also just add that all of the funds contained within this food service operation can only be used for exactly that, the food service operation. In addition to that the food service operation, because it is subsidized at the state and federal level, can only maintain a fund balance up to 3.5
times what it's… or I'm sorry. It's average expenditures over the last three and a half operating months. So any addition or proceeds above that, that would typically require or trigger something like reducing lunch prices, because it's not supposed to necessarily be profit-making, it's just supposed to support the program So the only other piece, I think what maybe some are getting confused with is the total cost of the contract is what Aramark intends to fully spend, meaning the cost of all of their employees, the cost of the food
the cost of operating, essentially. So at the end of the day, the district is guaranteed a return of the 257, whereas Aramark will will receive a management cost fee of that$ 237,000 375 for providing those services This is super putting you on the spot, so I'm sorry if you don't know the answer to this question because I know you were not here at the time. But if I remember correctly, the way that we choose these contracts is typically the lowest bidding contract, and I know we've changed… we adjusted the terms for one year. There was a lot that went into this, but
If correct me if I'm wrong, typically when those contracts are awarded, it's to the lowest bidder for that service. This is actually competitive contracting, so it's lowest cost plus other factors considered. Okay, thank you. Yep, and you may recall we did put it out to bid. I want to say 2 years ago Yeah, it was a while back we wanted to see, can we do better? Can we get different offerings? Can we change our structure? And ultimately, we ended up staying with Aramark, but changed our cost structure, which actually eliminated some of the audit findings where we were not spending enough
We're keeping more cash on hand than we were supposed to, because we were very limited under that cost structure. how much we could spend it on. So we ended up staying with Aramark. They ended up being the best benefit to the district, but We did put it out to bid several years ago and are still with him or Thank you. Are there any other questions or comments? Okay, seeing none, Mr. Schemp, please open the voting
Mr. Schimp, I need to abstain from the payment to Rutgers on bill list one due to a conflict of interest. Mr. Schmidt, I'm recusing myself from Bill List 3, the payments to Cooper Health Systems. Mr. Shimp, I'm going to recuse from Bill List 3. There's a couple items on there to avoid a conflict of interest. I'll recuse from the entire bill list.
3, yes, but we still… I wish just that single payment to Cooper Health Systems Motion carries. Counting to five is the key skill you need to be a board member. I would have modified it if need be, if that was… We're necessary. Stern, can you please move the HR agenda this evening? Superintendent recommends, and I move the following
27.1 to 27.12 inclusive. Hopefully, I got that right Do I have a second? Mrs. Winters, are there any questions? Seeing none, Mr. Shim, please call the vote. Not on the new job description.
That is wonderful, because with that vote, we have approved Mr. Reginald Meadows to be the new principal of Rosa Middle School. Yes, I'm gonna ask Mr. Meadows to come up to the microphone to share a few words, and as he makes his way up, just to tell you a little bit about this extraordinary gentleman here, uh, for the past couple decades, he's served the, uh, Pennsbury High School community in the past 5 years as campus principal.
Prior to that, 5 years as co-principal at Pinsbury High. He was an assistant principal for 11 years at Pennsbury High, social studies teacher at Pittsbury High, and also at Apsgami High School for about 8 years or so. Graduate of TCNJ. and also a graduate of Ryder University as well. And I have to tell you, Mr. Meadows, today, Miss Stafford and I were in a meeting over at one of our high schools, and one of our teachers told her… told us. That community members from Pennsbury are bemoaning your departure and just talking about how awesome you are, and they're so upset that you're leaving, but their loss is our game. So, with that, Mr. Meadows. Just thank you very much. My name is Reggie Meadows. I'm just incredibly excited and honored to be here.
I just really want to start off with thanking the school board for your trust in me and for Dr. Moore and Dr. Birdie, who's been ever since I started interviewing here. Just, I'm just very excited to, uh, to be here. Throughout my career, I've just always I've known Cherry Hill School District. I've admired the work here, and I'm just so incredibly grateful to be a part of this now. Um, throughout the interview process, I was just able to meet with lots of different students, teachers, staff members, district leaders, and everything else, and really, they had the same passion for education that I do, and it just became very evident this was a natural fit, um, just in terms of.
professionally and personally, so just something that really connected as I started to go through. As Dr. Morton said, I want to thank the school district of Pennsbury. That's really where I got my start as a teacher, really built a foundation for being an educational leader and just. you know, the passion I have for education was cultivated there. I'm always going to be grateful for my time at Pennsylbury, but I'm just very excited for this new chapter. Also, I want to thank my family. They came here to support me tonight, my wife, Megan, my son Carter, and my son Tommy Carter is in high school. Tommy's in middle school, and.
Um, so they, they've supported me through this journey, the ups and the downs that goes along with being a school principal. Uh, they really supported me, even sitting through their first school board meeting, so that's, uh, that's true love there. But overall, I'm just excited to get started. I'm excited to learn from the Cherry Hill community and just become a part of the Rosa Middle School community, just getting to know the students, the staff, and the parents. I just cannot wait to get started in July. And just thank you again for this opportunity, and not going to let you down.
Thank you so much. We are thrilled you are here. You are going to love Rosa. It's a fun community. All right, moving on to P. And L. That'll be Mr. Greenbaum tonight. Thank you, the superintendent recommends, and I move the following action agenda items. 28.2 through 28.4 as presented. Do I have a second? Ms. Stern. Any discussion or questions? Yes, Miss Winters. I make a motion to table agenda item 28.3 until our next meeting.
Is there a second? Manzano. All those in favor of tabling item 28.3 to the next meeting. It's unanimous. The item is tabled. Thank you. Any other questions, comments, discussion. Seeing none, Mr. Schimp, please open the voting for items 28.2 and 28.4.
Mr. Schump, I need to abstain from 28.2 as I was absent. or I guess recused, actually. Absent for that. Motion carries. Thank you. Nothing under governance this evening. So we are going to move on to new business. Is there any new business for the board to consider? Ms. Chafain?
So it's going to wait because Miss Palmer is not here tonight, but being inspired by all of this discussion that we're having about needs in the special education community and the new job description that we are considering back during budget season, I had presented some ideas for future planning in the district. And in spirit of my president and talking about, let's be proactive for next year, I would like to formally ask the P. And L Committee. So I guess, Mr. Greenbaum, can you please on.
behalf of Miss Palmer document this, I guess I guess you're the representative tonight for P&L. Um, I would like us as a board to look at Policy 5460, the graduation requirements, um, specifically, I think it's section… Oh, geez, hold on. I had it up. So I think it's so I actually think we also need to look at this because I think the numbering is off unless I'm looking at this wrong. But Section A. 1. DE, I think, if I'm reading this correctly, it might be A2D. The requirement for all 9th and 10th graders to take the African American studies class, I think, in the spirit of.
are unfortunate budget situation every single year. I think it would be very important for us to weigh the options of things that are not State regulations that we require for graduation, and maybe do some consideration on what that looks like. That class can still be offered as an elective to students, so we wouldn't be getting rid of it entirely. through some discussions I've had with Dr. Morton, it sounds like we've always had a class like this available to the district that has always been treated as an elective. So I would like to formally, um.
recommend that to Pnl for discussion on the potential of maybe adjusting our policy to of the requirement for graduation on that. Mr. Chair, you're making a motion to have it referred to the P&L Committee, correct? If that is what I need to do, then yes. Okay. So I'm making a motion to refer that to P&L. There's a motion on the floor to refer policy number 5460 for high school graduation to the P&L committee. Is there a second?
Clarification. Sure. Do these things require motions? Because I've requested topics go to P&L before, and we haven't done motions like this. So this is a specific policy for a specific purpose. So I don't… I think there's a general conversations that. matters go to a P&L committee. Mr. Fain has a specific question that she wants the P&L committee to consider. Sure, so this is just a motion requesting a P&L consider a topic that a board member is interested in. That the… The policy specifically be referred to P&L for investigation and action if necessary. Sure, so I'll second that.
There's a motion and a second on the floor. discussion. Is there any discussion? Ms. Stern. Yes, I'm curious about. I guess why specifically, you know, you talked about kind of the budget. by specifically this class. We have a lot of courses that we offer that are. not only… they're not necessarily mandated by the state, but they are.
usually, typically, in our students' schedule, for instance, 2 years of foreign language. That's standard at the high school level in Cherry Hill, but that actually doesn't meet the standard for the State. And so I'm just kind of curious about why specifically that class versus something like that, or some of the other courses that we offer that have highly enrolled, but are not. But are far beyond what is average and, like, you know, throughout the state.
Sure, so my reasoning for questioning that class comes entirely for. I believe the figure… I guess if you're going to ask specific to the world language, I don't know enough to speak to the world language requirement, to be honest, but in my understanding of what's in this policy, which is why I like to open it for discussion, and even maybe attend the P. And L Committee, if it's going to there. um, is to better understand. How, like, the data that we're seeing and the impact that that has on students, if we're this year cutting teachers and certain programmatic requirements, that seems to me to be the only requirement in this policy that's limiting the district to make decisions.
on on that programming. So when we're we're talking about adding crucial positions that are going to directly impact, because we've seen, you know, you said the increase in special education. Um, or I guess specific to the autism spectrum disorder program. There's an increased need there, and clearly, I'm sure there's tons of needs elsewhere in the district. So to be proactive in next year setting us up for. I would I mean I don't know how far I can go with this discussion at this moment, but knowing that that will eliminating that requirement will impact our budget.
directly. I would like to open discussion to see what the direct impact to our students is of requiring that that class, because I saw I looked back, and it's been 5 years since this policy has been changed to include that, and so I'd like us to start looking at the data to see the impact that that has as a requirement for graduation. Like I said, it'll still be, I would imagine that we would still offer it as an elective. I'm not recommending getting rid of it. I'm just asking if we can look at the direct impact to students on making that a requirement for graduation, because when I look at this policy, it seems like.
I mean, I don't know, maybe every half of this policy is not a state requirement, so maybe I will learn something, too. But I, to my understanding, we don't have any data to show the direct impact on the students, and knowing that we have high needs elsewhere, that we might need to add position. Well, we will need, because we're about to do it next meeting. to add positions, then I'd like to at least start the discussion. Dr. Dreisen. Yeah, two things. First, I would echo M. Stern's comment. I would just broaden the aperture of the P&L requests just to review the graduation requirements and see for anything that's not.
required by the state, just to see what the cost savings might be. And that leads to the second, because it sounds like that's where you're going with it, like, what is the… I wonder if this needs to be paired with BNF as well, though. If it's not just P. And L, because we just are trying to identify in a tech budgetary environment. what the options are. So I agree to not make it specific to one class, but just look at graduation requirements overall, and what's not what is choosing to do differently, and maybe rightly so, but just know what what the cost is of that.
Of that choice. So that would be my suggestion. Any other board member discussion? Ms. Stern. I mean, I… it sounds to me more like, actually, this belongs more in CNI because if you're if we're talking about like the impact of the learning and the courses we offer, I think that's a more I mean, I would think that's more of a CNI. Um, and… And I mean, I think there are a lot of courses we offer. For instance, multivariable calculus, right? We offer multivariable calculus. There are very few, we are in the minority in the state to offer that. We are proud of that class. We offer that to students who want to be very challenged mathematically.
But it's, you know, there is a cost to that. And is it necessary? I could kind of go on and on and on about how many courses we probably offer. We do it for the point of enriching our students and broadening them and making them kind of whole people, um, and being prepared for, you know, kind of all of the. learning experiences, so I think… I guess I… I guess, again, kind of I just feel like it's very… it's very narrow, and I that's the part I don't I mean, I understand budgetary wise, but like.
you know, we could kind of start cutting a lot of… I mean, to be honest with you, I mean, that's kind of the whole budget season, so yeah. So that's just… I'm just kind of… it's just curious. Mr. Fang. So again, to clarify, it was about the specific the reason why I brought it to P. And L, because it's an actual policy. So I would imagine that it's probably maybe even every single. We're seeing every committee will have to lay eyes on it. But it's about the specific requirement for graduation. So I know that we offer a lot of classes, but based off of actual I'm going to get the terminology wrong course scheduling. It's something else.
Sectioning, thank you, I couldn't think of that word. It's because of sectioning, that determines what classes we actually offer for the new year, or the upcoming school year. So if multivariable calculus, which I would absolutely enroll myself in, only… if I was one of two people, we wouldn't… I've already read the textbook. We would not move forward with a class that doesn't have the enrollment that we need, but when we require it in policy for students to take it, I believe the figure I was given is roughly around 800 students have to be educated in that if it's written in policy every single year. So it's something that we are requiring every year. I think we should just… and I would.
So thank you, because I just assumed maybe that the rest of this stuff was… based in statute, so maybe it's not, so I appreciate Dr. Dryson's point that maybe we look at everything, because there might be stuff in there that we are requiring for graduation that we don't need to require, and we just leave it up to sectioning on what actually takes place next year. Because, like I'd mentioned in my discussion with Dr. Morton, it could be a moot point because we could potentially open it up and then we have more people enrolling and you have the entire school that we have to educate. So sorry in advance. But I think that it would just be worth us if we're talking about being proactive with budgeting to look at the things that.
The district is limited on making decisions about, because it's in policy that we are stating. So it also goes to our goal with looking at policies that we as a board have in place. So it's it's not about offering the class. It's about requiring it. other board member comments, Miss Stern. No, I think, and I appreciate your point about saying, like, looking at this, it's kind of… because it is less familiar to you, um, you know, that it's making you think about… but, like.
And again, I know sometimes when we have these conversations, I don't want to create a sense of stress amongst our staff, because sometimes when we have these very specific conversations about. You know, the education we're delivering and we're not, you know, we take the recommendations of the superintendent. But I, for instance, there's another course that's listed on here that. We do… are required to teach, we're not necessarily required to teach it as a class, but it… but we teach it as a class, and it's listed on here. So I think… Again, I feel like that starts to veer into the expertise of our educators that are recommending these and putting this together that they came from that. I think maybe understanding why some of these came about. Maybe there's background that needs to happen even before.
But, um, but, you know, I think it's… You know, it's fair to look at the whole list, right? So. Other board members, Dr. Dreisen. And just to reiterate, from my understanding, is all we're doing is referring to… for exactly that, I think, or whichever one we're deciding, whether it's CNI or Bnf. We're just trying to… that's why I… I mean, I think we can have that discussion to get all better informed. Any other board member questions or comments? I would just like to say that, you know.
for me. Policy is an expression of. what the community expects of educating its students, and the board enacts those policies right? So this was enacted five years ago by a board. It was brought to the board by the students. the African American Studies course. They came to the board, and they said this was a need in our community, and that board. agreed, and all the other things that we have. the courses that we teach, they're because that's what the community.
that this policy would not have been enacted without student… students bringing it forward and then community support. So… I understand we're in a tight budget, but I also think that. Our role is to support. Cherry Hill Public Schools education, which may be different than the needs in other districts, and I'm sure other districts have district-specific things that they do as well. So… I understand that with a tight budget, but I also think that we have a responsibility as a board.
to educate our children and the things the community thinks are important. That's just my opinion as one of nine. Other board members. Seeing no other board members, there's a motion on the floor and a second. Mr. Champagne, please call a roll call vote for referring this policy to the P&L Committee for consideration. Mr. Fain. Yes. Ms. Cummings? No.
Dr. Dreisa. Yes, to consider all requirements for graduation. That is not the motion on the floor. Dr. Driesen. The motion was to take the… it was her motion. I modified my second… I modified it when I did. It's not your motion to modify. So in in order to modify motion, you would have had to make the motion. So right now, understand. I mean I understand your point. But right now the motion being voted upon is simply restricted to.
What Ms. Cherpain has indicated. So some feedback is I feel like this could have been correct in advance. I'm just feeling unprepared on this discussion. Ms. Sure. Can I comment on it? So am I allowed to adjust my motion or no? you are. You are also… capable if you want to, um… maybe withdraw the motion. It was raised in new business. If you want to have consideration at the next meeting of a motion to refer it.
You could do that as well, but you are certainly able to withdraw your motion and posit a new motion that would require a second. Okay, for sake of everybody feeling prepared and understanding the dynamics of this situation, I will withdraw my motion for the time being. Okay. Okay, the motion is withdrawn. Any other new business?
All right, we are now at Dr. Dreisen. Just point of personal order, so I apologize about it. Um, I unfortunately have to go to a work-related flight, so I'm going to depart at this point in time, but I'm going to listen to public comment via Youtube. So thank you for all the public comments in advance. So thank you. Thank you, and safe flight, Dr. Jason. All right, we are going to move to second public comment. Although now my board docs. thrown me out.
Public comment is an opportunity for members of the community to provide input to the Board of Education on educational issues. The board welcomes diverse opinions on relevant matters. However, statements that are abusive, obscene, or which demeanor are defamatory to any individual or any group of individuals will not be tolerated. Such comments are disruptive to the orderly operation of this meeting. Speakers wishing to provide the board with information which is not relevant to the district's operations may communicate directly with the superintendent and the board president via email or other alternative means. So we're now going to open second public comment.
By custom, we start in the room. Is there anyone who would like to make second public comment this evening? I am being told there's a student online, Miss Jocelyn. I am sorry. I did not have my Zoom. I'm switching back and forth between different windows, and so I do apologize, but I'm going to let the student go first. Oliver Neary, you are a student. You may go first. You can unmute and give us your name. Hi, I'm Oliver Neary, and I go to Chair Hill East.
a municipality, and you'll have 3 minutes. um, board and Dr. Morton, I know my parents have emailed you a lot, and even given you an alert from my doctor, and nothing has changed. Maybe if I ask you in front of the whole community, you will finally get Dr. Burry to finally leave me alone so I can feel safe at school? If you know it's harming me, please just make it stop, and don't just say a misunderstanding because of my disability. He can do his job without coming into my classroom, disrupting and talking to me and my friends at lunch just to interact. And I actually go to school and feel safe and not worry about being ambushed and forced into a situation where I cannot escape.
and leave and be put into an intimidating presence. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Going back to the room. Now, Miss Joslin. Sarah Jocelyn, Cherry Hill. We had a discussion about pausing the building plan for Barton, but there was no comment about the Rosa plan. Um, I'm believing that the Rosa plan was also, uh, paused since there was no discussion.
I was very pleased to attend the internship presentations. I was unfortunately unable to attend all of them, but those that I did hear were excellent, and I wanted to congratulate the students on their preparation. I recall last year that there was a large effort to try to encourage parents to register early because if you have any new students coming into the district because of the amount of time that it takes.
to complete all the registration questions. I think that's something that should be discussed and, or at least presented in June. Because we do not want any children not to be able to start on time because they have not completed the registration process. I would remind people that this year, the. The summer reading is on archaeology, and of course we have a number of archaeology sites that are local, including at our own crop farm.
I think that's very important. New Jersey's the crossroads of the American Revolution, and I think that's a very important topic to talk about this year. I would say that we are going to be reviewing many of the curriculum that require to be reviewed and assessed for changes to the state standards coming up, which would include social studies, American history, and maybe there's some opportunities there. I strongly believe that we need to have a discussion about African American studies through our social studies or in a separate.
class as part of our requirements. I… my understanding is that the opportunity is for you to take it in 9th or 10th. Not that you have to take it twice, but that you take it once for one semester. World Languages is a requirement, two years of a foreign language are required by the state, and all those things do need to be reviewed. I do thank the board for their diligence and their their.
their work on being prepared for the next time that we go around in the review. And I thank the progress that we have made on our strategic plans this year. I'm looking forward, with hopes of my fingers crossed, that we'll get additional state funding. Thank you for the pause on the building spending on building construction until there's a need and that you have additional data. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Going back to the line. The next person is Alana Yaris.
Please unmute. You'll have three minutes. Alana Eris, Cherry Hill, chair of the Fair Funding Committee, a division of Zone PTA. I'm just calling to say that our last fair funding meeting of the school year will be next Thursday, May 21st, 7 Pm. Zoom only. Um, please get involved. Email cherryhill Fairfunding chps@gmail.com to be included on email updates. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram. And have your voice heard so that you're not scrambling at the.
last minute for budget concerns, and we're working all year through FAIR funding for Cherry Hill. And tomorrow, uh, Thursday, Cherry Hill will be sending a contingency up to, um, speak about. the Senate budget hearing on education and SEA. So please join us and look for details in your email and social media soon. Thank you for your comment. Going back to the room. Is there anyone who would like to make second public comment?
Could we put the time up? Because… It's very confusing. I didn't start yet, Mr. Shimp. I'm sorry, Miss Einhorn, it's on my screen. I didn't realize it wasn't behind me. I apologize. Can we go back to the beginning, please? Thank you for your consideration. And I know Chair of New Jersey. I definitely agree, though I'm not happy, but about the district transaction coach, because I have a special needs student in my practice who was totally ignored.
When he graduated from high school in being able to move forward. Um, I even took it upon myself to email the principal of the school. That child is still floundering, there's a language barrier issue, and I am ashamed that this young man is floundering at this stage of life. Um, the thing about Aramark, with that budget, do we still cost cover the costs of any replacement equipment like we've had to in the past? I'd like to talk about communication. It's great, but let me just tell you, people come here time after time and ask a question and never get an answer. And I do believe I have requested this before in that if the public is asking questions somewhere on your website.
You need to be responsible and answer the questions. Your private emails are one thing, but when people come to this mic and don't get a response, it really causes a sense of distrust. So, I would strongly suggest that somewhere along the line. We do something about getting answers to questions. I do have a question about policy. I don't know where it is, but at one time when employees of the district wanted to bring their children to our schools, even though they live in Cherry Hill, there was a.
some type of payment schedule. Are we still doing that? And if so, is that considered revenue in the existing budget? The Kingston School is going to get a new principal. I sincerely hope you give them the certain courtesy that you gave Rosa, and that community members are involved. A couple of the high-end students that really know what to articulate what they want. It's very diverse school, and. Over the years, Dr. Marble has been very sensitive to that, and we definitely need that in school.
Um, so sorry, I have too way too many notes. I would like to thank Linda King for her excellent reports. I actually emailed her. I hadn't seen her in a long time, but no one could have been more thorough with our dollars and taking care of our children. Um, the one thing I didn't hear in the report tonight was you're also researching the impact of east to west and west to east buses. Sorry. One has two buses, and I believe the other number, Adam, correct me, is 11 buses.
Going from west to east, if I'm wrong, you please correct me. Um, because I didn't bring my other notes. Thank you, Mr. Fain. I believe that you need to look at all your electives and all your your curriculum items. I don't think next year is going to be any easier than this year. And I agree with you. If it's… if it's a mandate fine. But let's look at all the courses. Thank you for your comment.
Thank you. Going back to the line. The next person is a caller with the number ending in 7, 8, 8. Please unmute and give us your name and municipality. You have 3 min. Dr. Potowitz, please unmute. Thank you. My name is Jeff. My name is Jeff Broderwitz, and I live in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. Wow. 1946, it's a resolution approving extension of.
of great… of great minds, and of course, some great minds development and coaching is $3,900. Per full day. Leah Greena writes curriculum, and her full day course. $2,800. And then, um, there's another $325 an hour if you want to try something, one thing, or $2.50 an hour. Don't we have anyone. In district who can do either of those things, and save some money, and maybe… and do something, and that's an example of how, when you look at things.
Yeah, I mean, no, I would say vote no on whatever it's gonna be, but you won't. You're okay with that. But $3,900 is a lot of money for a day. And so is… So it was 2800. Uh, you know, there's things like, this is what you spend money on. To be honest with you, um… I don't… I don't know. I asked you a specific question about, uh. about food service. Are we paying? For snacks, lunch.
And breakfast for all preschool students. I haven't gotten an answer from what I read from the state, the answer is yes, and that's expensive. So, are we paying for that? Maybe in district or not, but out of district we are. Need to know. I do know. That one thing that is wanted… Is that… is that we pay for food for everyone.
And that will go into the millions of dollars if we, using our property taxes, pay for breakfast and lunch for every student in the school district. It's going to cost a fortune. Money that should go to education. Um, I'm almost done. But, um, yeah, this idea of South Jersey being cheated has been around for 30 years. This is nothing new, and nothing has changed. I'm not optimistic. And I've even mentioned it here.
Over the last 10 years, and 5 years, and 2 years, and 1 year. So, no. That's not new at all, and I'm not optimistic, especially with what I've read. Anyway, thank you very much. Thank you, Dr. Padowicz. Going back to the room. Is there anyone else who would like to make second public comment? Bye. I figured I'd ask. Going back to the line, the next person is Laura Pendergast. Please unmute. You have three minutes.
All right. Hi! I am calling. I'm Laura Pendergast Cherry Hill. I am calling tonight solely on behalf of myself and not speaking for any organization. Um, and I wanted to just speak briefly about the African American Studies course. Um, so first, Cherry Hill was the first district in New Jersey to require an African American studies course. Um, and in doing that, we set a precedent for prioritizing cultural competence.
Why do we need that course? Because cultural competence is an essential skill. We live in an increasingly diverse society, and students have to be able to engage with different perspectives. Um, the African American Studies course provides a strong foundation for that, uh, for students to understand diversity through a well-defined academic lens. And as someone who personally has taught diversity and multicultural courses at the undergraduate and graduate level. Once students develop the ability to understand that from one lens, from, for example, the African American Studies lens.
They're much more well equipped to apply it to other contexts and other minoritized groups. Um, so, I think that it's a really important course that will prepare students for college and career, um, by teaching them this essential skill. Um, and the other reason that I think before we make any changes to this. Our students demanded it, and they specifically demanded it as a required course because they saw a need in their lives.
Um, if we're talking about changing this, I would really urge everyone to go back and listen to their voices, and listen to those videos when they passionately. shared how important it was for them, and how important it was for it to be a required course. Um, I think we need to go back and listen to those voices before thinking, uh, making any further considerations on that. Um, that's all I have to say for tonight. Thank you so much for your consideration. Thank you for your comment. don't see anybody else in the room, I don't think, so I'm going to stick online. The next caller is Meredith. Please unmute and give us your name and your municipality.
Hi, my name is Meredith Levin. I live in Cherry Hill. Tonight I am talking as one of the executive leadership of the CPAG. I want to thank wholeheartedly the board and Caitlin and Caitlin's team. for accomplishing one of the goals that we have established over the last several years through the CPAG, we… one of our goals has always been to work on transitions. It had been a complaint from the inception, and.
It has always been on the radar. We've made small movements, but to approve, and I understand it's not until next week, I mean next meeting, but to improve, uh, approve this transition coach is a huge. win for the special ed community, for our kids, going from middle school to high school and high school and beyond. Um, so we just want to thank you from the bottom of our hearts for really working with us, hearing us, hearing the parents who come to us and, um, you know, advocating and loving the special education community. Thank you very, very much.
Thank you for your comment. The next person, it says iPhone, please unmute and give us your full name and municipality. Hello, this is Rick Short from Cherry Hill. Can you hear me? We can. Okay, excellent. First off, give out a huge shout out to that third grader that called in tonight. What an excellent speaker. Dang. Really great speaker. Next thing is just following along some things that were said tonight. Mr. Greenbaugh mentioned about safety and I can't be more excited to hear that. Uh, one of the questions I do have is, is there any schools in Cherry Hill that don't have sidewalks out front? Is that… Is that what I heard? That some of… one of some of our schools don't have sidewalks out front? And if they don't have sidewalks out front, then who's responsible? Is it the township's responsibility?
Or is it the schools responsibility? And we have plenty of. money for our parking projects. And then to jump back to what Miss Stern mentioned about evacuations, I really wish and this is kind of like, you know. When you talk about mental health, if you know anything that happens during certain lockdowns, you're basically scaring the heck out of our children and the procedures that are done. There were some rumors about that the police control this. No, no, no.
They would accept what's called an ALICE program. An ALICE program is a lot less stressful and a lot less mentally, um, what do you call it? Damaging. I can't really imagine 2, 3, you know. first or second graders, you know, doing what they do, and they would turn out, I think, better, better in the long run if we all practice the ALICE program. Now to move on to what was said at the previous school board meeting.
Um, is it normal that our school board, um, doesn't know, or… I don't really, you know, Mr. Schiff mentioned that there was 1.5 million from capital reserves, uh, at $90,000. That's about. 17 teachers. So are there things you're voting on for capital project or I mean three meetings ago, the district was crying the blues that we didn't have any capital reserves, but then somehow or another we just. We just learned, it was kind of shocking, that we used 1.5 of the $5.5 million for the West workout gym. It's going to have to be one heck of a workout, Jim, for 5.5. I can't wait to see that one.
But I really, like I said, um… Please, you know… For the mental health of our children, of our 10,000-some children. Please consider the ALICE program. Um, it's really, really a lot less stressful. And I hope we, uh… and that planning that Mr. Greenbaum was talking about. I really wish we could put some bullards up, especially on these curves. Thank you for your comment, Mr. Short. Thank you. Nobody else in the room. So I'm going to stay online right now. There are no. There's nobody with their hand raised. I'm going to give it a minute.
Seeing nobody else in the room and seeing nobody online, I'm going to close second public comment and move to board member activities. We also get 3 min to talk about all the wonderful things we see in the district. I'm going to start on the left with Miss Cummings. Is that okay? Or do you want to throw the ball to Mr. Fame? Um… All right, so let's see, I need my glasses too. I had to take a little bit of time off while I recuperated.
But on May 6th. which was Wednesday or Thursday of last week, along with Miss Manzano. We attended the NJSBA Camden and Gloucester County monthly meeting. It was a great presentation and it was nice to be there to represent Cherry Hill. They went through their different recognitions, and two of those recognitions were for Teachers of the Year.
um, Sandy Fitzpatrick was the Teacher of the Year in Gloucester County, and she's a kindergarten teacher. Um, but Heidi Kowalski was the Camden County Teacher of the Year, and again, she also gave a fantastic presentation. very moving, very touching, and she called out that she was indeed a Cherry Hill East graduate. It was very fun to be in the room for that. And then on May 8th, I attended the NJSBA Spring Education Conference, where we got to attend. It was a virtual conference, so it was, you know, all online, and we virtually attended.
different sessions. So I attended conflict resolution, board governance, leading with purpose, which was by far one of the best ones that of the day, and career, the career focused student as well as creating orientation for new board members. So that's what I did last week. Thank you. Thank you. Ms. Turn. I have nothing to report. Mr. Greenbaum.
nothing to report this week, but I will be joining the Cooper Pta meeting this week, and Woodcrest PTA next week, along with several of my fellow board members, and looking forward to meeting with families. I can't wait. I will be at Payne next week. Some of us will… you'll be at pain with me, right, Mr. Fain? And then, Mr. And you will be at Woodcrest? Pta meetings are always fun. If there are any PTAs out there who would like to have a board member invite us over. Um, I was virtual for the Camden County SBA meeting. I couldn't make it because my sister was having a baby that night, so that was a good excuse. I did mean to be there, but I couldn't. But I did attend the High School East Instrumental Music Concert, which was held at West, which was actually.
A lot of fun. The kids were amazing, as always. Shout out to all the music teachers who make it happen, who work so hard all year. It's always great to see the kids perform and spend some time with the East Music community. A lot of fun. Miss Manzano. Just to echo what some of my fellow board members have already said, uh, Ms. Cummings and I attended the, uh, Gloucester and Camden County NJSBA meeting, which was very fun to be in person at Adelphia's with other members of different boards.
Um, so that was kind of cool. I also attended the spring conference on Friday. Six really, really interesting sessions that I was able to attend. I'll be with Mr. Greenbaum on tomorrow. At Cooper, Cooper's PTA meeting, and I will be with Ms. Who am I going to be? Mr. Greenbaum and Miss Stern at Woodcress next week. So unfortunately, I had to cancel a couple events because of the EACH and chasp negotiations. However, on April 29, th I was able to attend the internship night at that is.
I went last year. Last year was my first year in this year, and I guess I didn't appreciate that this year there's more cross district internships, because there was so many more people there, and they almost didn't get a seat, but, um, and it was… it was long. It was a two-hour event, which I also didn't plan for. But it was awesome. And I really… cannot stress how amazing it is to watch high school kids be so professional and present the work that they did. Most of them were healthcare and hospital based, but this year there was one at a farm that was really cool.
Oh my gosh, there's so many, and I can't do justice to all of the the opportunities that they had. There's our environmental services. I know the company that we go through. I think it's ERI. They host an intern. Many at some 3 of our elementary schools hosted interns. There was just so many. The program was a lot bigger this year, and it was really exciting. And just a absolute shout out to Miss Castellani for all of the work that she pretty much single-handedly does herself. And it's incredible. And I know from experience that she rounds on every single one of the students in her intern, in their internships.
Um, twice throughout the year, and that programming has grown so much, and I know that we're pretty selective with who the students are, but it sounds like the students are even finding their own internships now and setting things up on their own, which is really cool, and they're all expected to do presentations. And it's funny to watch some of them last for a good 5 to 10 minutes, and they're very serious, and they hit every detail, and others are clearly not into public speaking as much, so they're very, very short and sweet, but they get the point across, and I just.
I think that if there's… I'm not even sure if it's open to the public, but for next year, I highly recommend, if it is, it is open, I highly recommend everyone going to it, because it's a lot of fun to watch, um, the students be really excited for their futures and have a better understanding of. their career aspirations and the things that it seemed like this year, actually, they were… it seems like everything was reinforced. Last year, a couple of them were like, I did this, and I now know I don't want to do this anymore, which is also the purpose of that internship. And I can appreciate that a lot, but it seems like this year.
The students chose a good path for themselves. So that's all I got to do, but it was very worth it, and I can't wait for a next year or two, if I'll be there at least as a public community member. Thank you so much for that report. I really wanted to go, but I couldn't, and I'm really excited to continue. We may need a bigger venue. As our… college, career, internships, all those things that we put in strategic plan. It's so amazing. It's year one. year one of the strategic plan as we watch it grow to meet our goals in 2030, I think it's going to be amazing to just watch it bloom. So I'm really excited about that.
Superintendent's comments. Dr. Morton. Thank you. Thank you, Miss Winters. Just two quick comments. In reference to building-based administrators, building principles, you know, there's an expectation that our building principles are present, that they are interacting with the school communities, that they are moving about their buildings on an ongoing basis. Uh, we don't sanction or sequester our building-based administrators or principals to any one area of the building.
you know, it's just that that presence is critically important for us. I spent some time at East today and had an opportunity to interact and see Dr. Birdie. I don't think he had the boombox in hand today, uh, but many students, actually dozens of students, have told me just how much they appreciate the warm welcome to the building every day. And also the positive goodbye that's shared as well. So thank you, Dr. Birdie, and thank you to all of our principals who maintain that active presence in their buildings. Just one other thing. Answers the question, so any questions that, you know, come forward, please.
direct those questions to administration. And all opportunities where possible. We do have a chain of command, a chain of communication that's available on the website where we list information so you have an idea of who to go to to have information or. questions answered quickly. Uh, with that, I will say, have a great night, everyone. Thank you, Dr. Morton. I'd like to make a motion to adjourn. Is there a second? Miss Manzano, all those in favor? Meeting