good evening um I love these kind of nights when the whole room is filled with smaller people who want to show us what they're learning because that's why we're all here so tonight will be more fun ah
sorry uh I want to call this meeting to order will the secretary please call the role Anna Braun here Timothy Cummings here Jamie Falco here leis Figaroa here Lorie herck here Lee wuhong here Lorie
lak Wilbur pan here Heather gu here please stand to salute the flag I pledge aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stand one nation under God indivisible with
liy and justice for all all right for the small people in the front this is the part where I read a lot be patient we'll go fast uh the New Jersey open public meetings law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of public bodies in
which any business affecting their interest is discussed and acted upon in accordance with the provisions of this act the East brunic board of education has caused notice of this meeting to be published uh by having the day time in place thereof posted at the Board of Education offices written notice was
also provided to The Sentinel the New York Star Ledger the home News Tribune the alternative press of East Brunswick and the municipal clerk of East Brunswick all Board of Education meetings with the exception of executive session discussions are videotaped for later broadcast it is the policy of the
Board of Education that videotaped meetings are not edited for any purpose individuals who speak at the board's public meetings should be aware of these videotaping rules and now the superintendent report thank you president gu uh good evening everyone the artwork on display in the boardroom
this evening was created by students from chick Elementary School the art teachers of these talented students are felix Martinez and Alexis sisar Tana McBride is the principal on Wednesday February 5th George Scott presented at
parent University on raising healthy children as a family therapist and former middlex County director of student services and current Statewide coordinator for the traumatic loss Coalition Mr Scott shared insights on how toxic experiences can impact
children's academic success relationships and emotional well-being he emphasized the vital role parents play in fostering their children's well-being from infancy through High School presentation slides
are available on the homepage of our district website the social studies classes at hammera participated in a special activity entitled a typical ganian day know the past shape the future students
participated in a real-time webinar with instructors in Ghana where they were able to learn about a typical day for a Ganan student students communicated with the instructor of via a chat where they ask specific questions based on what they learned in the
presentation at Memorial Elementary School Christian simple's third grade class C celebrated the conclusion of their non-fiction reading unit by participating in a small group living wax museum project utilizing what they
learned about non-fiction text students research facts about one famous person in history past or present that they would like to learn more about to add to their presentation students were given the option to dress like the individual
and to bring in props as well on January 31st the students shared their speeches and slides featuring a video and photos of the individuals they chose the students were poised engaged and let their personality
shine in sports girls swimming continued their dominant winter season by winning their second state sectional title in backtack years congratulations to
them the girls wrestling team beat number six State ranked Vernon on Monday February 10th and congratulations to the girls wrestling on winning the Red Division this season and we're going to stick with girls success for a second Varsity Cheer
won the Mustang Classic on Saturday February 8th congratulations all of them second quarter report cards are now available and can be viewed online through Parent Access hard copies will be made available at the request of anyone without internet access just a few
reminders please stay updated with our latest news by following us on Facebook and schools will be closed this coming Monday February 17th for president presid day thank you thank you all right now we get to the
wonderful part see it wasn't that long all right we have learning across the district with Warren doer Elementary yes we do hi I am Kabir I'm Jan I'm Matthew and I'm
Violet we are proud students of War stor for elementary and we are here to teach you about our leg grow you might be wondering what is lcro lcro allows us to complete projects to help us become more
independent the idea is to build skills and experiences to help lower the rising rates of anxiety and kids every month we get a list of activities we can do to help us grow when we complete it we fill a reflection sheet and our teachers give us a leaf to
decorate to put on our tree I unloaded the dishwasher without my parents asking me to why I did this was because my mom was busy and I knew the dishes had to be unloaded so I unloaded them this made me and my parents very happy
I created a design to help fold clothes I created this because my parents don't like to fold clothes and I thought that this would help them with this it felt good because it was important to save time and this helps with
that I ran one mile outside in 12 minutes I did this because it allowed me to get ready for the peser test in in gym class and the ebef bear call I came in first for the Pacer test it felt good to prepare for something by myself and have it pay off I came in second in the
ebef bear CW I made a mobile for my 4-month-old baby sister I did it by myself so she had something to look at I felt proud of myself because I've never done anything like this [Applause]
before hi my name is umang and my son Kabir is in fourth grade in the wer Elementary School I'm here tonight to let you know about the powerful impact this let grow project has had on my son's uh um U development um you know as
like most kids of this age he was also very reluctant to do any of the um household chores but uh the gentle nudge that he got from the letgo project made him interested in doing those chores in the first place and he grew in Independence he grew uh his interest
went overboard he was like he wanted every month he wanted to you know he looked forward to those projects and um by the time it was the third project um which needed him to you know um help somebody outside of the family he
already had a plan in place he knew whom he wanted to uh you know contact the family friends he himself made a plan how he wanted to do it and he did everything without any assistance from my side so I feel that Not only was it a let grow project for the kids it was also a letg go moment and a pro uh
project for me as a mother I you all know that it's very difficult to let go and you know with each project when I uh you know when I held myself back and let him take the lead it was the moment which was a very powerful moment and I
actually saw him grow many folds from there so I would like to thank the East Brunswick uh Board of Education and the W stord element School principal Mr satari and all the wonderful teachers who are sitting here for giving kab the opportunity to uh participate in this
project and I sincerely hope that uh projects like these continue in the future as well thank you so much and then these were a few of our fourth grade Representatives but it is going on throughout the entire fourth grade at waren Storer so we have a
variety of projects that they can choose from or that they choose on their own from climbing a tree to baking cupcakes a lot of cooking roasting pumpkin seeds um cleaning the house and helping siblings with homework so there's a real Variety in the projects that are offered
and that they choose to do thank you you say great job everyone I would like to hire somebody to come and empty my dishwasher I was going to say I have a college senior and a high school senior and they haven't touched the dishwasher ever it probably says more about my
parenting skills than anything else but be that as it me I actually wrote that down get Kabir to come to the house well it's very good great presentation and thank you very much for
teaching us this group you know it's it's School District as the community we need grow together always at the time we're facing challenges we need grow together we need work together to bring this community to Next Level to bring
our school to Next Level so that's the lesson I learned from your presentation addition to that can you please introduce the organization let growth it only says it's a nonprofit organization is anyone of you can introduce that organization to us to the
audience or if you're not ready next time I think they're asking is he's asking me what is L grow oh it's a nonprofit organization that um gives us the curriculum to perforate to instill
in the students and we teach it and has like monthly um statements that you can open slides and we just do it once a month as our class meeting thank you this was excellent and I have to say as a parent I completely know what where'd
you go I completely know what you're talking about because it's amazing what kids can do if you just ask them to and get out of the way but it is very hard to let go and just assume they know what they're doing and school is very impactful for that because I know that I woke up to a shoveled front walk the
other day um because someone's coach told her she should shovel before I asked someone is not in elementary school but still it it's the impact of the school so thank you so much for being here today so here's what we're going to do we're going to have a very brief recess MH so
that everyone who needs to get home and relax and do homework before they go to empty the dishwasher make a quick video to send to my house about how you should empty the all of those things but we're going to have a quick recess to let them go and
we will be right back you all right and we're back if you were out in the hall and you didn't see the warst offer students were here and they were amazing um but welcome back uh this is the good of the cause for the public oh I'm sorry we did not
have the student Representatives report tonight he could not be here but we miss him and the good of the cause for the public the Board of Education recognizes the value of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to
express themselves on school matters of community interest in order to permit the fair and orderly expression of such comment the board shall provide a period for public comment at every meeting of the board residents are welcome to speak up to three minutes the timing will be kept by the board secretary I would just
request when you step up to the podium that you state your name and address unless you are a student if you're a student if you could just give your first name in the school that you go to that would be good also want to say this is your opportunity to speak to us um because we cannot answer at this part because this
is not our time to talk does not mean that we are not empathetic sympathetic frustrated or hearing what you have to say we're just glad that you're here that being said is there anyone this evening who wishes to address the board good evening Dom scani to Morgan
place I stand here today not only as a former student but as a former student athlete after hearing about the potential cut I did what I do best I created a
petition um and over 300 former EB student athletes parents and coaches have signed it I can personally say that Middle School sports played a huge part in my life because I played because I played
Middle School football it made me love the sport and I made lifelong friends because of it I enjoyed going to practice as it helped uh build my social skills and my confidence as well as keep me active if it wasn't for Middle School I probably wouldn't have played in high
school and the same is true for a lot of people Middle School sports help develop programs for the future and by eliminating them you are hurting the future of East Brunswick Sports as well as hurting students I could go on but I only have 3
minutes additionally I do not think closing bound is a good decision as redistricting has not been done in a very long time if you were to redistrict wouldn't the class sizes go up also if fifth grade was moved back to the elementary schools wouldn't that
increase the class size as well I just don't think this was really thought out I also hope you have a plan for the staff that work there because firing a whole school full of hardworking staff is just plain heartless while some of you may say well where else are we supposed to get the
money I assure you there is a way you just have to think outside the box whether that be shared services with the town fundraising applying for Grants implementing environmental measures to help save money or administrators here's an idea take a pay
cut between the events that happened last year and this year it is clear the administration does not care about the mental health students thank you thank you [Applause]
D is there anyone else hi good evening ladies and gentlemen of the board my name is David Brown 43 Tall Oaks Drive uh and my concern has to do with a special education we hear a lot of things in the news about uh cuts on the federal level
the state level and from towns in the area and uh my concern with having a a child out of district and one in an inclusion class here in East Brunswick is uh with respect to special special education we want to make sure that there's no cuts um with respect to the
funding of the kids here and I feel like this is an A A group of students where you don't hear much about and the voice isn't really heard so that's where my concern is that there's a focus on uh these kids who need special attention
and that there's no funding cuts to these kids andd like to hear from the board with respect to that issue thank you David thank you do we want people to leave their number or their information with Karen uh Mr Brown if you would like to
leave any information that you have so we could reach out to if you turn around the nice lady is Raising her hand thank you hi I'm Ashley and I go to Churchill Junior High School good evening my name is Ashley monesi
and I a seventh grade student athlete as a seventh grade student athlete this was my first year being able to play Middle School sports it is probably one of the best experiences I've had so far the winter season I was on the seventh and eighth grade girls basketball team today we wrapped out our basketball season and I have so many memories with my
teammates that I've created new friendships that I would never have before this as a seventh grader I got to play with seventh and eighth graders who became my friends and most of all I got to learn from them too I got to be with my my friends every day and it was my escape from school the stress that school would cause me went right away when I stepped in the court if we end up
getting rid of Middle School sports you were ruining myself and other student athletes ability to learn and get better upcoming seventh and eighth grade student athletes who want to enjoy the experience that I've got this year won't be able to as a multisport athlete I will lose my chance to do the other sports I love most and not get a chance
to learn from other coaches and players I already have got a year off of my being in elementary school are you really going to get rid of sports too thank you thank you [Applause] Ashley Jeff sunberg East Brunswick staff
good evening members of the Board of Education I have had the privilege of serving as a health and physical education teacher here in East Brunswick for 20 years as well as the head coach for boys cross country and girls track field I want to begin by expressing my appreciation for the dedication and the
difficult choices you are facing in addressing our School's District budget challenges I'm here tonight to speak about the vital role Middle School athletics play in the development of our students and the lasting impact these programs have on our high school athletes in recent years the administration and board have made
significant strides in supporting our programs such as adding seventh grade to Middle School sports and increasing Financial allocations for uniforms these have been meaningful improvements and I thank you for that that being said reducing F funding for our Athletics
would be one of the most detrimental cuts to our students wellbeing East brunic already allocates a lower percentage of its operating budget to Athletics than most other districts in the state as an example according to the proposed 2425 budget of the State Department of Education website East
Bruns year marked 1.2 million for athletics out of a total operating budget of 197 million in contrast Oldbridge despite having a operating budget of $28 million less than ours proposed over $400,000 more for athletics their percentage which is in
line with many other District's budget commitments to Athletics is significantly higher demonstrating the value other districts have placed on these programs at a time when we are increasingly aware of our of the harmful effects of social media and social isolation in our youth I ask is there a
more important way to support our students socially emotionally and developmental than through Middle School athletics student participation is an all-time high proving the overwhelming demand if anything we should be expanding Middle School sports not cutting them in fact the New York Times
bestselling book The anxious generation references in depth the benefit of Athletics on youth mental health and physical well-being without these programs how will our students spend their time more hours in front of screens missing out on the leadership skills character building experiences
and physical activity that Athletics provide the impact will be greatest on underprivileged students who cannot afford club sports outside of school our High School athletics programs which have been a source of Pride and success depend on the foundational skills
developed in middle school as a coach I have spoken with countless former athletes who recall their time in our programs as some of their most cherished experiences many have gone on to play Collegiate Sports and research from deoe shows that over 70% of corporate Executives were former College athletes
demonstrating the leadership skills gained through Sports as a parent of a first and fourth grader in the district I hope my children will have these same opportunities 10 seconds I urge you to consider the long-term impact of your decisions and protect this and valuable investment in our students thank you for your time and
thoughtful consideration thank you Jeff hi Tom scani two Morgan uh place East bronswick um Ashley you mind if I ask you a question it sounds like you have a lot of Joy playing on the team am I correct
okay so why would we ever think about taking Joy away from kids playing Athletics think about that this shouldn't even be a topic all right I've been coaching for five decades I've coached the division
one level in college division 3 I've coached East Brunswick High School and I currently coach St Thomas aquinus I think one of the biggest problems we're going to see here is the joy that will be taken away from
kids coach you hit it on the head you we're going to have a lot of people watching screens all of a sudden we going have people sitting at home more latchkey kids because I think some parents sometimes depend on picking up the kids at practice sometimes we work a
little later right does happen do you really want to see a kid have to go home by themselves in the house anybody here want to see that Mr scani address the board could you address the board please I am oh I didn't look at you I'm sorry thanks my fault
okay the basic whole thing in this and why are we even talking about this it's mismanagement and it's on the board this is years of mismanagement to get at this place
today so I'm hoping that you guys can figure something out because who's responsible really think about that and why we have this budget CR crunch few years back we got a lot of money from the state I think we thought
we were going to get it every year I hope you didn't think that cuz that doesn't happen my biggest thing is who suffers kids suffer if you let this happen you will hurt an awful lot of kids that love
playing Athletics coach brought up another great Point most of your leaders in this world have played Athletics so I hope that you guys are smart enough to really figure this out
because we all put you there for for a reason thank you thank [Applause] you uh good evening Jim Logan 30 Myrtle Ries Brunswick I would just like to
briefly add to my commentary from the last meeting um two things that I think are very important that I neglected to mention or I didn't think about to mention at the last uh session there's a lot as we know of Facebook and Instagram Warriors out there on any side of these
polarizing issues right but what's unfortunate is when it's not factual where they don't do their homework and have the facts correct so one of the things that's been said a lot in these various forums since the last meeting uh is that there are plenty of other
Alternatives in the township for these types of Middle School sports and I even saw the comment uh from someone in senior leadership in the town not on the board but in the town uh say you know Middle School sports is not right and there and it hasn't really existed that
long so what's the big deal I think it's beautiful to hear the young lady who spoke already I wish all of the young adults could come up here and speak about their experiences and what it means to them because that's really what's most important however and I'm speaking for baseball at the moment but
I'm advocating for all Middle School sports the the the coaches of these travel programs right these payto playay programs they finally got smart and they made a conscious decision not to play any games or do any type of
uh structured practices until at least Father's Day and the reason that they do that is because they want to honor the school programs and the School coaches expectations and not overwork the kids especially pitchers right and in many respects that's that also applies
equally to softball I'm not qualified to speak to the other sports so my point is we already have a situation where you have over just for Middle School baseball many of which are in the room I wish there were more but because of conflicting schedules they couldn't be here uh but Middle School baseball has
over 25 children who have been you know actively as I said two weeks ago coming to these indoor sessions that we're running they're enthused they're motivated you know they're willing to pay a bigger share of dues if that's what needs to happen um and just to make sure I don't come across as too biased I
don't even have a child as much as it breaks my heart I don't have a child playing anymore they're still in the district but they're not playing sports but I love these children and many of them I've known since the fourth grade and I'm proud to see The Varsity graduate this year I'm still going to be
invested in that program whether I have a child in it or not because I love this community and I love these children and it's vital that we find a way to keep the Middle School sports my last comment let's make sure we're making the decisions because obviously the money needs to come somewhere we know that right doesn't matter why we're here the
money has to come from somewhere but what we decide to cut let's make sure the decisions are based on facts and not sentiment ality right everyone is sentimental about you know a school or a different program I get it but if the money has to come somewhere business is business let's make the decisions based
on facts and not sentimentality let's not hurt these children thank you very much thank you Jim hi my name is Erica Batista 22 murder Road could you repeat your name please I'm sorry could you repeat your name please Erica Batista 22 Mur Road
I'm here on behalf of my three children giving a voice to the voic list because I think closing boundman R would be a huge mistake we came to East Brunswick 5 years ago because our goal was to live in a diverse town with a great school system just like everybody else here yeah over the past few years there's been nothing but disappointments with
their schools first my oldest son got the short end of the sck during his first and only year at Hughes then he was one of the first kids to use the trailers of Churchill which by the way is a terrible safety issue with how small and narrow those hallways are the first day I went
there I was very and extremely upset and now you want to shut down bound year after year we the people who fund this town continue to pay more and more and get less and less my youngest son who's in prek4 at bound came home with scratches at the beginning of the year
because his class had 15 toddlers between the ages of three and four and at the time they only had two teachers our wonderful principal was able to get extra AIDS after I had a conversation with her on how why this was happening and that was a solution getting more teachers so you mean to tell me that the
solution to the budget issue is to cut down on teachers less school and bigger classes less schools and bigger classes we the residents of East Brunswick deserve to understand exactly where our tax money is being allotted to and how the budget is being distributed I am
extremely disappointed and upset at the thought of closing down our school which brings me to think is it your salaries that we need to adjust just because it makes no sense to me that we continue cutting down reducing and taking away from our children versus reassessing and adjusting in other areas
it is concerning that while the budget triples over the years and my taxes continuing to go up the solution in your opinion is to take away the exact perks for which people come to live here in the first place like sports and arts I will happily pay my expensive taxes if
we're giving what we're promised East Brunswick Township has made promises they cannot keep if we the residents allow this to continue to happen it will only be the beginning to more and more Cuts resulting in a basic school system and basic town to live so I stand here today because I genuinely wholeheartedly
believe that closing bound Monro would be a huge mistake it is up to us the parents and all of you sitting here today to make sure that we're making the right decision in the best interest of the children because it is us the residents of East Brunswick that pay the
taxes that fund our schools your salaries arts and sports thank you thank you Erica hi uh John shendel uh East Brunswick staff your last name again please uh John shendel thank you uh good evening I want to thank you all for all your time and energy you put into this
District uh I've been in the district for over 10 years as a teacher and coach from middle school all the way to the high school levels East Brunswick Public Schools has been known for many great things and one of those is our Sports programs from middle school levels all the way up to the high school level levels as a group for school middle
school sports work as a vital feeder program for our Varsity programs in that they can compete for two years grade seven and eight in a competitive environment against the best in Middle sex County while growing and developing individually but more importantly as a team and a community East Brunswick
Middle School sports are known for having big numbers and it's truly the building block for athletics which is why it's important to have uh this fall we had 167 athletes on six teams uh this we had 84 athletes on three SE on on sorry on three uh three sports teams for
a total of 251 athletes in the spring it's still pending but we have over 150 athletes trying out for four Sports Middle School athletics provides the students with extracurricular activities that they look forward to every day it gives them the opportunity to try a sport they
never played before or a sport they really enjoy want to continue play in a highly competitive setting for some this is the reason they want to do well in their academics so they can be eligible and play the sport they love it gives them something to look forward to at the end of the school day Churchill Junior High School would lose the excitement
and culture for sports with it not being there in the morning announcements we get to hear about excellence and Athletics which students look forward to hearing their names and their friends names uh daily outside the gym at Church Hill we have display cases of all the success Middle School sports has had in East Brunswick and the spring track
records painted on the wall East Brunswick has been well represented in the GMC as well talking about some of the um individual sports wrestling has had seven County Champions and they were second overall in the GMC this past season girls
basketball has has had an undefeated season and a one loss season boys had a one loss season this past season uh cross country girls and boys were both second in the GMC Championship meet uh Spring Track boys were second girls were sixth in the GMC Championship meet this
past season and we also had uh three records broken uh field hockey has had an undefeated season uh girls soccer had a one loss uh this past season softball a one loss season baseball a 9 and5 season our surrounding districts all have Middle School sports just to name
some old bird South Brunswick North Brunswick Monroe Piscataway South River Spotswood miltown sville mouin middlex even St Barts and the list goes on and on all have Middle School sports we have some some sorry uh some
even have two teams which also include sixth graders the importance of schools uh sports for Shing is endless physical and mental health social skills academic performance time management confidence boosting self-esteem problem solving thank you thank you Mr
shindel hello my name is danis scani to Morgan place um I was brought to this meeting today for my brother's attention um so I mainly just want to talk about some things I made a pros and cons list
so the only Pros I could think about for 8ighth grade Sports getting taken away is hopefully that money goes to the high school sports um but I don't know where it's going to end up going and it's probably not going to go there um so
when it comes to the cons um and thinking about taking away eighth grade Sports so I am a prod alumni of East Brunswick I graduated in 2015 um when I was in school here I mean east east brunic Sports was a Powerhouse and
it sounds like there's upand cominging amazing athletes as well um I feel like taking away eighth grade Sports taking away motivation uh mainly out of the kids in elementary school and middle school right now who are looking forward to the eighth grade Sports um you guys
are increasing more moves out of East Brunswick because of this East Brunswick is known for their sports or at least back in my day it was um but you're probably increasing mental problems me mental health issues actually um when it comes to kids who cope with sports I
know I was definitely one of those and uh not wanting to even be in your house from the hours of 3:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. um and let's just face it no no parent really wants their kids in the house at that time either um but when it comes to it I I definitely think it's something
that looking at it seeing young kids talk about this issue right now I mean no matter what you're taking away brotherhoods and Sisterhood that do de develop over time and I mean I could say it for sure speaking on ash Ashley's behalf is the kids I played eighth grade
sports with are still my closest friends to this day and we achieved losing games winning games changing the the game being game changers um and that's some of the best things that I could even look back on of East brunwick um when
when it comes to it I I have so many memories of me and my teammates now and even just putting the issue on social media so many of my former teammates were shocked to even hear this issue come up um I was lucky enough when I was in eighth grade playing eighth grade
Sports my older brother was a senior at the time and seeing him and his brothers now his friends uh go about and winning and accomplishing such a big season um that's something I wanted to and you know that motivation of just one
person that's all you need to basically go about having a whole team develop that same motivation 10 seconds so um off that I I definitely think you're going to regret if you do that I think it's pretty hypocritical that you guys have young kids come in here talking about a let grow program when you want
to build the community together when you're taking away from them thank you Dana Arun aari 20 Brook Hill Road um I was here last month to talk about the installation of vaping monitors in slightly off topic uh about the installation of vaping monitors in high
school I'd like to thank the office of superintendent I got a call from the principal of the high school we had a long conversation uh exchang a lot of ideas uh apparently and obviously uh expense could be a factor in installing The Vaping monitors I
understand that but I'm I'm pretty um um Resolute about this we we still need to find a way to have the vaping monitors installed if not all at least a couple to start with I suggested to the principal to have a pilot project like start with one or two at the most in uh
most suspicious places in high school uh and uh I'm here today to because I promise my students that I will bring this up at the podium and I owe them an answer uh it's been about 3 weeks the principal called me uh I really appreciate his time we had about 45
minute call um he promised me that he would call me back so I'm waiting for his call if you guys could uh have a reminder to the principal and also thank him for his time uh spent uh and talking to me thank you very much thank you everyone
Karen Elmore 20 Hamlin Road over the past few years there's been a lot of debate over about how we should be teaching our children to read Neuroscience research has shown that leading with phonics is essential for laying a strong foundation for reading
there's one reading curriculum that's particularly criticized by this research the units of study founded by Lucy ckins the units of study has been criticized for several of its components notably the use of 3 queing 3 queing is a set of reading strategies
that encourages new readers to guess the word on a page based on context rather than explicitly sounding it out first three queing lays a foundation of bad reading habits and undermines phonic phonic instruction 11 states have banned three queuing from their Reading curriculums
New York City is phasing out units of study in all its Public Schools Columbia University's Teachers College recently dissolved A literacy organization led by Lucy calans in the face of mounting evidence against her approach her approach Excuse Me Lucy ckins has since rebranded under
the name mossflower and published an updated units of study curriculum the Moss flower curriculum claims to have added more phonics instruction but what district would trust an untested phonics curriculum developed by someone who overlooked phonics research for
decades I think most parents in East Brunswick would be surprised to find out that our school district uses units to study as its primary reading and writing curriculum East Brunswick stuck with units of study even after its recent criticism and purchased the updated
mossflower units of study in 2023 I learned about East Brunswick use East Brunswick's use of units of study last year from a fellow parent I was surprised because I had only ever heard about hegerty and Foundations from my daughter's school the website makes no
ex The Language Arts website makes no explicit mention of units of study with this knowledge that we were using it I worked with my kindergartner at home on phonic and I actively discouraged 3 queing she's doing well with her reading but I still see her slipping into
guessing words it's a difficult habit to break I know there's a lot of focus tonight on The Not So new budget concerns and so many impossible budget cuts I know a new curriculum is not cheap but I do wonder how much we could save on reading coaches if we had an
effective reading curriculum more importantly what is the cost to our children and our Township when we stick with units of study thank you thank you [Applause] Karen Tatiana Jordan 27 North Drive I
appreciate the board members who genuinely engage with and prioritize parents concerns I hope all board members demonstrate a willingness to critically examine question and hold the administration accountable for the decisions they have made continue to make and will make in the in the future recently I met with
administrators to discuss the Ila curriculum unfortunately I left the meeting neither hopeful nor convinced that this curriculum adequately meets the needs of our students particularly those who struggle with reading instead the discussion only reinforced my belief that units of study curriculum is detrimental to students academic
success I can't help but wonder when my son and so many other children be facing these challenges if there were a stronger emphasis on Phonics and phic awareness instruction rather than reading and writing workshops a core component of units of study curriculum if a different instructional approach
had been chosen would we even be in this position unconvinced by the Ila supervisor's defense of this curriculum I had my child independently assessed outside the district the results spoke volumes The Specialist confirmed that my child requires targeted explicit reading
intervention contrary to what administrators claimed during our meeting I was told that because my child was considered on grade level he was only eligible for tier one interventions within the classroom Additionally the school's reading specialist could not provide further support due to an already overwhelming case load when I
inquired about the reasons for this High case load I was given a vague response about changing demographics and a transient population the Ila supervisor insisted that my son was receiving adequate support through shared reading small group instruction within the classroom and partnered reading yet the
independent assessment revealed he struggles with phic awareness phonics coding and oral reading fluency The Specialist recommendations stated that he should not be engaging in independent or partnered reading both key components of units of study but instead receiving
targeted explicit instruction if this curriculum is as effective as claimed by the administration and I quote from my meaning by the Ila supervisor herself in regards to units of study that phonics quote unquote phonic leads this curriculum why does the district have to
supplement it with heg and Foundations why the patchwork approach why such a glaring discrepancy as evidenced by an outside assessment why is this Administration so unwilling to acknowledge that units of study simply doesn't work my son is getting what he
needs now not because of the administration but because his teacher advocated for him collaborated with colleagues and partnered with us as parents to ensure he received the necessary support we are deeply grateful for her expertise and unwavering dedication meanwhile the administration
continues to push the curriculum that is failing our children parents deserve transparency and more importantly our students deserve an education that meets their needs thank you thank you [Applause]
Tatiana hi Michelle Bethy five watch Young Road I'm here to share a parents language arts testimonial her son is a fifth grader at hamers sholds um to quote despite his best efforts he is struggling significantly particularly in Reading where he's currently
performing at a first grade level this Gap has persisted and despite multiple meetings no effective resolution has been reached throughout these meetings I've had to argue and fight every step of the way to ensure that my son's needs are properly addressed each discussion
has felt like a struggle to make progress and despite my repeated concerns about his lack of support no meaningful changes have made the academic Gap continues to widen instead of closing I am also deeply concerned about the fact that the district promotes itself as being Orton
Gillingham certified however um it appears that no one at the school is actually certified in this specialized training the district's promotion of this certification is misleading as it suggests a level of expertise and support that in reality is not being
provided given that my son's reading struggles could potentially be addressed through a proven specialized approach such as Orton Gillingham this lack of properly trained staff is unacceptable what is especially troubling is the emotional toll these struggles are having on my son he's very
aware of his academic challenges and it's affecting his self-esteem he understands that his peers are progressing at a much faster rate and this has made him feel inferior and left behind He has expressed frustration and embarrassment about his struggles which I believe is
contributing to a growing sense of isolation the gap between his reading level and that of his classmates is not just an academic issue it's deeply affecting how he sees himself creating feelings of inadequacy and frustration the school supervisors have
stated that they do not believe the Gap is severe enough to Warrant additional help but I strongly disagree the lack of support is only deepening his academic struggles and his emotional distress and it's clear that his frustration is growing this situation is taking a toll
not just on his academic performance but also on his sense of selfworth I urge the district to immediate to take immediate action to ensure that the Orton Gillingham program is implemented by properly certified staff so that students like my son can benefit from it
as intended end quote thank you thank you Michelle Allegra side 12 South Woodland Avenue on November 21st December 5th December 19th January 2nd 16th and 30th I spoke of issues with the district Tier 1 Ila curriculum you have also heard
from other parents as this remains an ongoing issue there are a few things to keep in mind number one all concerned parents have praised the teachers and advocated for their access to high quality materials and for their professional opinions to carry more weight number two we know heg and
Foundations are used used but they are supplementary materials the need for their implementation is predicated on the deficiencies of the balanced literacy products units of study and found to and penel with that foundations is not implemented with fidelity meaning the steps shown to produce the most
success are not reliably taken and what we haven't even touched on is the lack of evidence behind hegerty but there's that too number three the use of such supplements while better than nothing has some substantial documented weaknesses leveled texts with which the
district does use do not align with the scope and sequence of products like foundations resulting in minimal reinforcement of spelling and sound patterns which is essential due to this texts do not complement what has been explicitly and systematically introduced combined with the extensive independent
reading time occurring in the workshop model employed by units of study children are regularly left to struggle on their own this has been shown to cause regression and the misidentification of areas of weakness we see the enormous task teachers are faced with in compensating
for the subpar products and methodology underpinning the entire curriculum what we really wonder though is why why did East Brunswick choose to invest more money into the revised units of study in spite of the known deficiencies we've asked to see districtwide data supporting the current structure and we
have yet to see it maybe that's what we will see tonight but I somehow doubt that what I expect to hear tonight is a lot of we do this too and in my class we do this generally gloss cring over what I think we have shown is insufficient and that is not because teachers aren't
capable it's because the curriculum the base and the structure it provides are a hindrance to teachers and students alike the time wasted the poor habits created the gaps and foundational skills they all need to be compensated for and that's no small task we were given a
very basic mtss showing 80% of students being served by Tier 1 80% is the low end of the 80 to 90% you want to see being served by tier one which means there is unquestionably room for improvement but from the stories you have heard there should be a question as
to how many are actually being appropriately served in that tier versus how many are being held there to no benefit of their own a strong tier one curriculum which unud of study is not would effectively serve more students thereby decreasing the strain on Intervention resources I imploring the
board and the district to put the interest of our students over the ideological commitment to a problem atic methodology thank you thank you alra Michael msto 27 Colonial Drive good evening last week I stood before you to
express an interest in finding other ways to manage the budget without having to cut middle school or freshman Sports and possibly other programs from all the folks that have spoken last week and tonight and
probably some others I'm hoping this can all be compelling to understand that this is not the direction we should be taking to keep our schools competitive and also demonstrate the Excellence that Mrs Jen Figaroa pointed
out last week it's known that other townships who have taken this approach may not have seen the financial results they were Desiring and perhaps in some instances
may have seen other aspects of those townships regress please do understand that this impacts all of us first first and foremost it impacts our
kids and for all the kids that are out here tonight that either play freshman Middle School sports past present future can you please raise your hand first and foremost it it impacts
them but also it imp it impacts the place we live let's not let Financial challenges dictate our our future in fact let's use this as an opportunity to demonstrate
how we overcame this Challenge and be a model for other jurisdictions in New Jersey otherwise we run the risk of being another statistic of a town Chi that took what may seem to be an easy
solution which unfortunately my concern will have a negative impact on all of us in years to come thank you very much thank you [Applause]
Michael there anyone else all right seeing none I'm going to close the public portion all right which leads us to special reports we do all right we
have a report tonight by Dr buy and her team about our gifted and talented program and our um K through6 language arts program uh this is uh information for the community and the board Dr
boy good evening first I'd like to thank the board for providing us the opportunity to speak with you this evening I'd also like to state that we value and appreciate the feedback that we have received and continue to receive
and we are thoughtfully and thoroughly examining and reflecting on all aspects of it our gifted and talented program in grades 7 through 12 we have been and continue to offer a diverse
range of courses including Ives with honors and AP options various clubs and Leadership activities independent study opportunities a variety of co-curricular activities academic contests and
student-led initiatives at hamers shold we have been providing pullout instruction a diverse range of courses including an array of electives math prime individualized programs of study
adaptive technology many clubs leadership activities academic contests and student-led initiatives this year our Stu all of our students at hamers shold are receiving
tier one gifted lessons designed to promote Divergent thinking curiosity and Imagination and our pullout instruction continues for students deemed to require those services for K to four our teachers are
Masters at differentiating instruction enabling students to work at their own ability levels many of our elementary schools have and continue to provide whenn time what I need where students are grouped across classrooms in an
effort to meet their individualized needs we offer individualized programs of study for students who require such adaptive technology a range of special area courses opportunities for clubs
leadership activities academic contests student Le initiatives our fifth graders had been um engaging in passion projects uh prior to their move to hamers shold and new this year all
students in K through 4 will be receiving gifted uh tier one lessons again designed to promote Divergent thinking curiosity and Imagination our pullout instruction will
be beginning for our grades K through 4 students all of this is based on the strengthening gifted and talented Education Act which Governor Murphy signed into law in 20 20 I'd like to read the blue to you the law states that
districts need to make adjustments or modifications to instruction enabling a student who is gifted and talented to participate in benefit from and demonstrate knowledge and application of the New Jersey student learning
standards in one or more content areas at the instructional level of the student not just the students's grade level the law La mandates certain requirements for school districts the law does not
specify any specific curriculum to be used how Services must be provided or the purchase of testing materials when we speak with colleagues in other districts throughout the state
all districts seem to have their own uh take on the strengthening gifted and talented act uh earlier this year Dr Moran was at a conference and there were 30 coordinators in the room and the moderator asked them to share out what
their districts were doing in regards to providing gifted services and there of course were 30 different answers it is not a one-size fits-all in regards to using multiple measures we have been using local data to identify students unique
needs uh with um our um understanding of recent availability of Grant funds we were able to secure the nagar test uh with a lens of equity we'd like this test with the nonverbal piece that
it offers thinking that would be quite valuable for certain students with special needs as well as our multilingual Learners we will be testing kindergarten second and fourth graders this year first and third graders on demand at parent request and then those first and
third graders will be screened next year and that is an overview of our gifted and talented program questions or comments would anyone from the board like to ask anything at this time okay moving into reading for K to 6
I'd like to welcome up our wonderful language arts supervisor Miss Marl bourney as well as many of our fabulous teachers who Miss portney will introduce to you momentarily and they would like to
provide with uh for you an overview of our reading program this evening I apologize um my voice is not great tonight but thank you for allowing allowing me to be here along with representatives from many of our elementary schools to share um what we're doing to support reading
development in our um early Learners um overall um for the reading curriculum um the units of study and reading is one component of it along with that we deliver phonics through the foundations program we do our own internal orthographic mapping of high
frequency words and then we use hegerty for phic awareness and in the Upper Elementary School our students um utilize patterns of power for grammar and conventions work the unit of study and reading is what we're using as a primary resource
um the workshop format is um something that um we believe we see value in it begins with a mini lesson that is focused on different skills and strategies both related to phonics fluency as well as comprehension the mini lesson is delivered to the entire
group for a time frame of between 8 to 10 minutes and then the class moves into work time during this time some students are reading independently they're reading a combination of decodable readers um which match their phonic decoding level as well as books within
the band of text complexity that matches their reading needs and at this time the teacher is pulling small groups to do explicit reading instruction based on the needs of students and if a group is not appropriate to the data they may work with students oneon-one um during this work time there's
something called the midw workshop teaching point where the group um is paused um and an additional piece of teaching is offered sometimes it's based on what the teacher is seeing in um his or her groups or conferences or at times it's something pre-planned that might
augment or add onto what was presented in the mini lesson um and then the end of the the workshop time the students are um meeting at times for the share sometimes that is with Partners sometimes s it is in a whole group um to
kind of reinforce and review the skills and strategies that they were practicing during that time I would like to invite Kristen bubnis a fourth grade teacher at bound Monroe who will share how the units of study curriculum and the workshop model for instruction provide her with time
and and structure to support the range of readers in her room through small groups and conferences hi um my name is Kristen bubus and I've had the pleasure of teaching at Bal Monroe school for 22 years the entire time I've been in East Brunswick um in
implementing the readers workshop model using the units of study the greatest benefit that I've seen in the third and fourth grade classes that I've been in is the ability to differentiate for the needs of all the readers in my classroom in just this past week I've worked with many different small groups on a variety
of different skills and strategies whether it was a group working to understand how character motivation influences the events of a story a group reading several short texts to determine common themes or a group learning strategies for figuring out multi-
syllable words with unusual vow patterns the units of study and the reading workshop model provide me with the time and structure to make sure each student's needs are met so that they can continue to be strong readers as for the rest of the students not working with me what are
they doing well that's the best part they're doing the an work of practicing the skills and strategies that I've taught them but please don't tell them that it's work because according to them they're just sitting at their seats reading a great book Thank [Applause] you another important aspect of the
units of study and reading is the time for interactive read aloud during the interactive read aloud the teacher reads a picture book or a chapter book to their students pausing frequently to invite student thought to think aloud and to model the strategies this allows us to help our students access text that
they might not be able to read on their own and we also are proud of the Multicultural nature of the text that we utilize um for this portion in kindergarten through 2 grade we have an aspect of the read aloud that's called shared reading where a text is displayed
for all students to see to practice much of the phonic and decoding work actively with the teacher um to get exposure to instructional level texts that are a bit beyond what they could read independently I would like to invite anarie Curtis a third grade teacher at Warren staer up who will share how the
read alloud builds a class culture of reading reinforces reading skills and strategies and supports her students in their preparation for the njsla um thank you I teach third grade Amry Curtis at warnsdorfer uh Mr cumming's daughters in my class um so
this is one of our favorite times of the day because we get to huddle together we get to um meet a new friend in a book um we could talk about all the great things that are happening comprehension listening skills talking to each other having those conversations but that's
where I think the beginning of all that deep thinking really happens for our kids um the ones who are not quite up to that same reading ability or are our new students English language Learners this um removes all of that for them and it
still makes that text accessible because I'm reading it and they're listening and then they get to turn and talk and maybe they don't have a thought right then and there but now they've heard from another student and they can share that out so it gives them that other piece where they get to be a part of that reading
Community even if they couldn't read that book on their own and I think that's really important um we practice a lot of skills during read aloud um a well plan a well planned read aloud will allow me to ask different students different types of questions based on
maybe their reading goal at that time um we might focus on different tasks as the year goes on in the beginning of the year we might um be looking at vocabulary or visualizing now we're doing uh units of study where we're talking about characters so we're having a lot of trait conversations and
feelings and how our characters changing um by doing this in a shared read aloud they can then do it on their own and that's what like Kristen was talking about we're asking them to do on their own but we've done it together the first time so that they have more accessibility later on they know exactly
what I want them to do um they might turn and talk they might stop and jot we're including writing skills um I think so many skills are involved in that read aloud that we're getting together um we refer all year
long we're still talking about the very first read aloud that we read They're still talking about the characters they'll say like oh Suds is like that oh he did that oh remember chip monkey that's from September and it's still impacting the reading they're doing now when they refer back to him or they go
oh my character is just like that that's deep thinking in reading and when we use a um one size fits all we're not accessing that um having that experience together um makes it also
um I don't want to say easier but when I do small groups we're using that as an example so that we've all come from the same place and when I give them an example of something new I want them to do it's um more understandable for them because we've done a little bit of it
together um but really the best part is when we're all just huddled together listening and learning about this character and meeting a new friend there's no sounds in the room they're all super engaged you can hear a pin drop thank you thank you
[Applause] in kindergarten and first grade we utilize the hegerty phonemic awareness program phic awareness is a foundation for reading and spelling skills which allows children to identify and manipulate individual sounds within Words which is essential for decoding
and encoding words when learning to read and write fluently this was something that we brought into the district during the 2122 school year um when we acknowledge that this was some um important foundational work that our students didn't have um and this is something that is frequently used as a
supplement or addition to a Core Curriculum across both the state of New Jersey and on a larger um Nationwide level um what is great about this is that there's a large kinesthetic portion to it that's highly engaging for our students um you even see sometimes when
students are at their seats one of the activities is for short vowels let's say they were doing the word cat they go C and you see them at their seat when they're doing their writing and all the kids are doing their little roller coasters so we've definitely seen this have a positive impact on students um and it's accelerated their work within
the phonics um we utilize the foundations as our tier one phonics program in kindergarten through third grade um it works with students on their handwriting the actual formations of the letters there special paper that has lines and
queuing systems on the paper to help the students kind of know which letters go to the top like a lowercase H and which stay in the bottom for example like a lowercase a um de voting is the student's ability to read the words using the ability to sound out both individual letter sounds as well as
larger groups of sounds um their encoding is writing of The Words which eventually we think of as spelling um and then their General writing as they do write sentences as well and practice some of the rules for early conventions um I now invite Rachel Solomon the reading specialist at Warren
stuffer and a former primary teacher to provide some information about how the foundations program supports students in developing these encoding and decoding skills hi everyone my name is Rachel Solomon Warren ster reading specialist uh so the foundations program is used
with all students in tier one instruction it helps our students learn to read and spell by providing explicit instruction in phonics and phonic awareness students begin this program by learning the relationships between letters and sounds which is an essential skill for reading and spelling this
begins with very simple letter sound associations such as such as pieces p uh and continues into more complex sound structures with Blends such as diagraphs like sh vowel teams and diff thongs like oi um as students progress through this
program they are exposed to sequential lessons that Target blending and segmenting of sounds in words in isolation and within larger text by the end of third grade our students will have learned how to break apart multi slabic words add suffixes to base words and break and to notice when a part of a
word has awah vowel sound schah is like the a in away and the e in jacket um the ultimate goal of these lessons which promote the importance of reinforcement and repetition is to provide enough exposure for our students to reach a level of automaticity when reading and
spelling words with en larger text [Applause] thank the the last component of our reading um instructional program is the orthographic mapping of high frequency
words um this is something that was also um new to us I know that there's a lot of um conversation in general about kind of how high frequency words are taught and even years ago when I began as a teacher in this District it was still a lot about memorization um but research shows that that's not what's most
effective for students so within orthographic mapping um we teach students to recognize the parts of the words that are um decodable where they know the letters and sounds and then there are other parts that they need to learn by heart that's why we call it a heart word so looking at the word what
the wh is a a decodable sound that our students would have learned as is the T at the end um but the a in that word is awah as Rachel just referred to so it doesn't say a so we teach students to learn that sound by heart so that they can decode those words and apply their
knowledge there are some words that like the word run that's fully decodable and we call that a flash word because you can read it in a Flash I'd like to invite jod croll whose classroom is pictured in here a second grade teacher at Central to briefly share about her experience with this High Frequency Word instructional method
that we began utilizing districtwide in K1 during the 2223 school year and last year in second grade good evening everyone hi I'm Jody um a second grade teacher at Central and also for the record a proud alumni of
East brunic High School I'm not going to say what year a long time ago and um and my husband and I moved back here from the city and raised our three girls who are also proud alumni of East brunic High School um so that is my classroom as miss m as Miss mney sorry we're both
getting over something just mentioned to you um we I'm actually very proud of this work that we do um as as you mentioned it really is important it we know the research shows us that memorizing words
means nothing anymore and so what we do is we at least for my second grade students they've they've given me a lot of good feedback and and as I teach us like Mrs croll this makes a lot of sense and I think when things make sense to you it's a lot easier to learn and
understand so what we do is we introduce one of these heart wordss the heart wordss don't follow our regular decoding rules so we have a well-honed routine where we l literally introduce the word we say the word repeatedly we found out the word we talk about what the word
means and then we look very specifically at the parts of the word that don't make their regular sound so I'm a big fan of I think it's up there of looking at the word said um so we would look at the word said and you would hear you know we would we would
look we would say said and we would talk about what it means we would repeat it many times we would look at the syllables and then we would literally we're big choppers in second grade and we would chop apart the word for sound so s d and I would explain as we go through
sorry that s is regular makes the regular sound D makes the regular sound but AI which is a vowel team which often says the long a sound in this case my kids know we have to learn it by heart because in this case AI says a and so it makes a lot of sense and the reason the
word well is up there is it's very easily accessible it stays up there once we learn a word we it stays up all year until the very last day of school and they're welcome to use it as their reading as they writing and we also in second grade we're big on our agenda we
write down our homework and we also write each week we introduce two or three new heart words and we will be writing them in our agenda as well thank [Applause]
you as we discussed previously and as Kristen shared one of the ways that this workshop model really works for us is because there's time for us to support students based on their individual needs um we utilize a battery of Assessments beginning in kindergarten with concepts
of print which is as early as book handling skills does a student know where the title is where the spine is what to do when they finish a page we move from there into letters and sounds um then into the hegerty and the phonics as you can see the the assessments get for lack of a better term more rigorous
as we move through but each of them provides teach with meaningful data to utilize to determine how they should use that work time and what type of groups they should be planning for um on at the formative level um we have you know teacher observations when they confer um
as anarie shared sometimes they're jotting notes about their reading that's great data for teachers to review how they perform in the small group um checking their notebooks there's a lot of opportunities for us to see how students are doing and then provide targeted um support to them based on
their data um jod will join us again um this time she's going to share how she uses assessment data specifically the phonic decoding assessment um to group her students and and provide them with intentional [Laughter]
instruction um so like Merl mentioned we did start this um a few years ago and it's again I found it's been it's what I use in my class routinely um what love about it it's an ongoing assessment it's not like a oneandone I'm constantly
doing this throughout the year um it's it has 12 levels we literally start at level one for decoding it goes up through level 12 if you get to level 13 you are proficient you know it starts fairly simple like those CVC words and
it goes level 12 is more like multisilicon like about it the kids read the words to us but while they're reading the words we're also taking notes on how they're reading those words like for example is are they sounding Out Sound by sound or
are they reading by syllable are they fluently just you know sort of breezing through the word I think those anecdotal notes are especially helpful and then based on it's a set amount of words that they go through sometimes it's 12 sometimes it's 15 but based on the
percentage that they get correctly we then make a determination often it's 80% if they get 80% correct they're able to move on but again we also rely on those anecdotal notes because even if someone had a fairly good percent and I'm concerned about their fluency you know
that would might be something that I would look at but what I really like is as they're divided up into categories we're able to see right then and there that day I could make a small group and know okay that's the coding strategy that I need to work on I need to stop
here or I could move on to the next level and um it's really specific targeted instruction for decoding which I find exceedingly helpful in my classroom and just one thing to add um
that I think is that teacher appreciate about this assessment is that it has a combination of real words and nonsense words because we know that some students have just a really strong site vocabulary from just reading a lot with their family at home and in in school but some of the words are you know not
real words like the word niff um and that really tests are you able to kind of put those sounds together and apply your letter sound knowledge um into coding um and in order for a student to be proficient they would have to get some of those um words correct as well which gives us an extra indication of
their ability to really decode um I'm also going to take some time just to speak to you briefly about um some tier two and three support So as we shared um during the work time in the classroom um the students are getting targeted tier one support after the mini
lesson based on the data but for those students who need additional support beyond what can be offered in the classroom um they receive support from the school's reading specialist now most of our students who are receiving um the basic skills instructional support are
either receiving a phonics based Intervention which has to do with the decoding of words or a comprehension-based Intervention which has to do with their understanding and making meaning of a text we typically focus on ensuring that the com the phonics excuse me is um tightened up and
the students have like jod shared reached that about level 1333 on that assessment before we move into comprehension because they're still getting comprehension work in their classroom through the mini lesson through the read aloud and through the shared reading but for their intervention we want to focus on that being kind of the first part of the
hierarchy before moving into comprehension um most of our students receiving the phonics are typically our first and second graders and some point in 2 grade early 3D um students in intervention move into their work with comprehension um I'm going to invite
Rachel back again um she's going to now put on her specialist hat and talk with us about what a week of instruction might look like for students receiving either a phonics or comprehension based intervention thank you I'm back um so I was asked to share a little bit about
what the reading Specialists do all day or all week at the elementary schools so as Marl mentioned students who do not make adequate progress during our tier one instruction will receive additional support as part of our basic skills program this program is designed to ensure that every child receives the
help they need to thrive academically particularly in Reading we target specific areas of reading uh where students may be struggling which can be phonics fluency or comprehension this instruction is provided by a reading specialist where students are placed into small groups based on their
needs the goal of tier 2 support is to help students improve their reading abilities to reach grade level proficiency uh so what does that look like throughout the week so in a phonics tier 2 intervention group we reinforce previously learned Concepts while
introducing new skills as well students will practice new sounds in isolation read and spell words and sentences and have an opportunity to read into quotable text additionally we incorporate multisensory activities where students use manipulatives to assist them in identifying sounds they
hear in words as well as uh for blending and segmenting words auditorily students in a comprehension intervention group will receive additional instruction and reading strategies that will assist them in understanding text Specialists will model the use of a reading strategy and
gradually release the responsibility onto the students ultimately Ely the goal of these groups is to provide our students with the skills they need to understand text when they go back to their classroom and their reading independently for students who do not uh make adequate progress during our tier 2
reading instruction we offer tier three support as well this is the most intensive level of support goals and objectives are developed and tailored to a students's unique needs our interventions follow a familiar format allowing practice with blending sounds
segmenting words reading and writing sentences and working with decodable texts so the work we do in tier 2 and tier three instruction is intended to provide our students with the necessary support to reach a level of proficiency they need to become fluent and confident
readers um and I meant to add earlier as you see some programming listed on there so for phic awareness there's a supplemental resource to the original heger that's called hegr bridge the gap which is for students in second grade and above who will have some documented needs for fmic awareness um and then for
the phonics the Specialists kind of make a determination based on the level of the students and how much exposure if they're going to use the Oren Gillingham approach or what's called a double dose of Foundations which is a resource that comes with the foundation tier one kit that's meant to be used for students who need tier 2 um in comprehension Rachel
mentioned um strategy groups some of our other um Specialists depending on the needs also use a resource called visualizing and verbalizing which starts at the Picture level just getting students to be able to describe what's in a picture moving on to a sentence into a paragraph and eventually a passage because often the reason our
students struggle to um understand what's happening in a text you know problem and solution character is because they don't have that automatic mental movie um so that resource helps them to kind of create it for themselves so that they're able to then understand what's happening in the text they're
reading um and something that's really important for the success of all tiers of our instruction here in East Brunswick is um the support that we provide for staff um we provide professional development um in a full day format at the start of the school year um as well as um this year was in
November but another day in the year um the teachers obviously in the K4 setting teach multiple subjects so they're not only with language arts but there is targeted work for them um in language arts with myself um there's also after school meetings sometimes the focus is on Intervention like what are the
different things you can be doing in tier one during the work time to support students sometimes the teachers bring their recent data and we analyze it together with a structured protocol um to identify kind of what students need what are Trends we're seeing schoolwide districtwide grade level wide and to
plan for instruction and sometimes um the work is really to collaborate where we can take um colleagues across our eight buildings and get them together to kind of um work on those schools um another really important aspect of our um the success of our programming is um
the collaboration between the teachers the Specialists um and the administrators in their buildings because everyone really is working um to ensure that the needs of students are met and that we're doing everything we can for students um so I'd like to invite Katie meski one of the current
Hughes reading Specialists and a former instructional coach and K4 Specialists who will share how she works collaboratively with the admin team to review data and ensure the students are getting the support they need hi uh Katie meski as she said reading
specialist at Hughes um at Hughes we're constantly um monitoring student data um and as she said I previously worked at a K4 building where um we kind of operated in the same way obviously on a little bit of a smaller scale um at our leadership teaming team meetings myself
as a reading specialist along with the principal and assistant principles have a running list of students we are monitoring uh specifically we're monitoring students uh at a minimum uh of a quarterly basis but really informally much more than that uh for a
variety of reasons um that they might not be meeting Benchmark standards um we then cross check their names uh to supports we are offering these students at our school to see what they are receiving and whether or not the interventions have been successful based
on that information we make decisions on whether we will continue these supports release some of the scaffolding hopefully um or maybe have to increase um some of our supports and interventions um our team works very closely with the counseling team as well
um as the classroom teachers uh to make sure we have the whole picture and continue to support these children the best way we can thank [Applause] you we all have
a some health challenges uh okay so thank you so much ladies um so we shared an overview with you of our reading program uh in New Jersey all school districts are required to teach according to the New Jersey student
learning standards these standards um outline uh the skills and knowledge that uh we must teach the children per content area per grade level it is mandated that we teach the New Jersey
student learning standards and our curriculum is fully aligned to the New Jersey student learning standards the resources and materials that districts may choose to use to teach the standards are a local
decision so we heard about our reading program we talked a little bit about the New Jersey student learning standards next you might ask yourself well how are the children doing so again in New Jersey the children are required to take uh the state test in the springtime so uh this
test here is called the New Jersey student learning assessment the NJ njla so for language arts our last Administration in the spring looking at our students in grades 3 through n the
average and this is the general enrollment students not students in a subgroup such as uh students with learning disabilities or multilingual Learners just our general enrollment students the average in grades 3 through n was 84% proficiency and you can see
the state average of 52% as they get a little bit older in 11th grade all students are required to take the New Jersey graduation proficiency assessment all 11th graders must must
take this exam our language arts proficiency last year in 11th grade and J GPA was 92% proficiency compared to the state average of 82% our graduation rate is
96% that 4% includes students who are eligible to stay with us until they're 21 and are our students College ready 94% of our students have been accepted to and plan to attend colleges
Nationwide our students are being successful and continue to be successful in our East Brunswick Public Schools thank you questions comments thank you Dr boy thank you thank you Dr
boy before we move to comments from the board thank you for your presentation thank you so much I know it's a struggle with your voice so we appreciate you both being here and putting this together I really want to thank the teachers though for being here and um explaining what they do in the classroom
thank you all I I say all the time if you really want to know about what goes on in a school ask a principal to take you on a tour because they get passionate about their building and if you want to know what goes on in a classroom you have to ask a teacher about their room but I really want to take the teachers because I know how much energy you brought to it
really early this morning to still be here doing this now so we appreciate you any comments or questions from the board uh I I I'd also like to um thank all the teachers your passion for teaching just like completely came uh came through tonight and uh having um you know some
education experience my past I I really appreciate um that as well I have a few questions if you don't mind um in terms of the multiple parts of the Ila curriculum are there any school districts that just use one curriculum and that's what they do for everything
or is this accepted practice this sure I mean in my go ahead yeah no in my experience districts are supplementing okay um there's only one curriculum um that I know of at this time in the state of New Jersey that
doesn't require any supplementing um a lot of um other curriculum that have been um recently adopted or commonly used definitely need a phonics component with them I'll just give an example one of the popular ones Statewide is wit and wisdom
art and letters is their new one and they actually advocate for the use of Foundations as the phonics component there's very few one that I'm familiar with that has phonics built in so the pheic awareness is something that we chose to supplement because we felt like
it was a building block for the phonic but there's rarely anything that has phonic embedded um explicitly and enough of it okay thanks the one curriculum that you mentioned that which seems to cover everything is that a very popular one or are there a lot of school
districts using it the the wit and wisdom program I I'm I'm guessing that's what you're referring to oh uh some districts are and some districts are using units of study and some districts are using other programs okay um let's see in terms of
um the uh the the units of study being the primary component of the io curriculum uh do teachers um have the freedom to implement the other components as they see fit for their classroom or is there a more strict guideline in terms of what can be done
of across the school district is a scripted program yeah so um the mini lesson which is the first 8 to 12 minutes depending on the age level that comes from the core spiral resource but basically everything that happens between that and the end of the work
time is at the teacher's discretion so that's where um Kristen shared some of her examples as did jod about the different things that they're doing so there are some suggestions of here you might do a group about this if you have kids who need I'll be more specific you know you might pull a group working on
Blends if you have students in your class that need that or you might do um a lesson on character feelings if you have students that need that but if your data shows you we're good with Blends I want to do long vowels you have the um Liberty and really the empowerment to
make those decisions as long as they're backed in your data okay and and uh is this the preferred method of uh running the the reading section of uh the class for the from the teacher standpoint um what I'm asking is um uh
do the teachers like this approach actually it's funny that you mentioned that I I have we've surveyed the teachers so we're collecting those um pieces of feedback now we'll give it we'll leave that survey open a little while longer give the teachers opportunity to share their input with us
and then we will analyze that data okay um one one last question um if we were to um get rid of the units of uh study curriculum today what what what would the timeline be to replace the curriculum uh how long would it take and
how much would it cost about well that's a hard question to answer depends on what the new program that we would adopt would be and the cost and the professional development required but it would no doubt be a sign
ific Financial commitment could it be implemented by by the beginning of next school year or is that an impossible resources were available I suppose you could but I don't yeah I mean best practice with any sort of major change right of instructional methodology would
be to do some intense piloting work um so if we were to arrive at a decision that that was the next step we needed to take um we would advocate for if the you know with support of obviously the central office and the board of doing some piloting work where we got um
representative teachers from across the district um to work with the new curriculum um so that we could get feedback on it in real time with real students um and ensure that we get out you know some of the Kinks of implementation so that we can be more successful um large scale I think you
know some of the decisions that have had to been be made from a budgetary standpoint we don't have all of the supports to you know do something new effective so I think a pilot would be really critical to ensure that we're not just throwing something at teachers without the proper amount of support and
understanding of the resource um before expecting everyone to use it okay and and thanks also for coming out with the Voice issues I once had to do a Pediatric ER shift with laryngitis that was a lot of [Laughter] fun anyone else yes please um I really
appreciated the presentation tonight thank you I do have just one question about the tier 2 and tier three um opportunities for students and learning are the Educators who are doing these types of interventions they have certifications um an example Orton
Gillingham do we have um different types of um educational opportunities for these types of Educators who are working in this more specialized um type of intervention um all of the reading Specialists are Orton trained and they
do have ongoing professional development they've met with specialists in dyslexia and they um continue to keep their skills current and relevant oh we going this y okay go thank you thanks everybody and thank you Miss Curtis my my daughter's
third grade teacher so uh I'll let her know we bumped into each other this evening um thank you so much no to all the you know administrators and and individuals a part of this this it's great information um do we have a reading specialist in every school um yes we have at least one
reading specialist in all um eight Elementary buildings as well as hammmer Upper Elementary and then some of our schools based on the what the data dictates have a second or one and a half um myself along with the director of Elementary education review the data
annually to ensure that we're Staffing um properly based on the needs of the students in the school using localized assessment as as well as the result of the njsla so just as an example um we recently um were able to move a specialist from Irwin Elementary School
because the students were doing so well um with from their tier one instruction that we didn't need it and we were able to reallocate that position elsewhere where there were more students that um could benefit from support so it's pretty fluid but um the the service is available across all of our buildings
that's great thank you what what's the average ratio of reading Specialists to student the cas yeah um most reading Specialists work with about 35 students um of that I would say about 60% is like that tier
two um where they're typically seeing them three times a week and then um we do tier three um fluidly So based on how that first three days went let's say I'm doing um that blend phonic example that I shared I'm doing that Monday Tuesday Wednesday with the whole group um and
then if I see that Joyce is having some trouble as Rachel described then I I can invite Joyce to come for two more days where she's getting intensive support um Gathering more data I'm reassessing her to ensure that she's ready to move on with the rest of the group the next week that's great thank you so much and if we
if we were to look back on on the past five years with those ratios of case loads 5 to 10 years be about be pretty consistent over the over the course of the past five years yeah I mean um I this is my fourth year in this role so um what's hard is
that you know some of our new Adoption like the hegerty even changing the high frequency word instruction those small changes you know it's hard to know the impact because it simultaneously coincided with the pandemic's impact right so I would say we've been pretty consistent but um something that we're really proud of with our
interventionists is that you know the goal that um Danielle didn't know the director and I share every year is our goal is to exit kids out we want you to work you out of a job right which we know that's not the reality because some students have a range of reading needs but every month um like the meetings
like Katie described we meet with the specialist quarterly and and you know we celebrate kids who are able to exit out um meaning that they're now making that sufficient amount of progress to um to get what they need from the tier one and that allows us if if appropriate or necessary to support um other students
that maybe perhaps were not as high of a need previously thank you so much I have one final question and then I'll stop the the two and thank you so much I was waiting for that data at the end right like really want to see that the two um assess assessments those those are State
mandated at the top of the data page the okay and I'm hearing just correct me if I'm wrong that there's a lot of internal evaluation that is also done where we're really you know we're continuing to evaluate best practices and look for improvement um so I just wanted to confirm that that that was happening in
addition to those are great marks it's nice to see us above State averages that would be my expectation of this community um and I guess on that have we seen those numbers also increase over the past five years um the numbers are increasing um you
know the needs of the community of our student population are change Ever Changing um so we are um you know constantly re-evaluating our practices to make sure that we are meeting the needs of our students and as I said earlier this evening um we do value and
appreciate the feedback that has been shared with us and we are taking every piece of it under advisement go ahead and how how long is a curriculum expected to be used so you said that the current curriculum is from
2015 is that correct um we have the revised but the the the program yes right okay so how often are curriculums updated or you know reassessed and changed where we
reassess our curriculum every I'd say every five years we're constantly looking at our student data we are seeing success um the teacher feedback will be interesting uh it had not been previously shared with me so we'll be very curious to take a look at those
results the parent feedback and the parent shared experiences lived experiences had not been shared with me previously so we are all taking this very seriously and taking it all under advisement thank you anyone else yes so I want to thank
you Dr bully and your team are doing very good job the dat doesn't lie for GR 3 to9 84% for Statewide 52 which is significant difference for the
11th grader you know 92% of an 82% so very impressive I from the presentation of first of all very good presentation very informative is
you guys are doing very good job is K he mentioned that when you when the teacher provide innovention to the students students who need help you guys work with the counseling team doing this will find out why this student is falling
behind is a family change or financial or what parents change that is very good you know doing this can not just improve students reading level it else can help us find out if any potential mental
family issues that is great thank you thank you Mr and uh I have few more question about the detail so you mentioned that we have tier one tier two tier three so how many students are in
tier one no I'm sorry tier two and tier three and how long will they stay in tier two or tier three well I mean I don't have the data for every school for every grade level right here um our reading Specialists are being very successful in exiting students from
their case loadad which means they're returning down to a tier one where tier one instruction in the classroom with their general education teacher is meeting their needs um some students uh you know do go through a tier three and are still not finding success and
therefore uh may be uh recommended for a child study team evaluation um we have students being servest um who are um multilingual Learners and you know they're they're um acquisition of the English language is something that really can't be Quantified or put on a
timeline so it's very fluid and there are a lot of factors impacting uh the work okay so you know even we have 84% for Grace rate and to 92 for 11th grade
just like early this evening the war St care teach us let's grow let's get 100% thank you thank you m quick question kind of going back to gifted and talented um I know that their gifted
and talented program is evaluated as part of our qack score whether or not we're in compliance or not I know we're currently sorry undergoing our qac but in the past have we received any negative marks or anything against us for our gifted and talented and not
being in compliance no okay thank you anyone else all right thank you so much thank you everyone all right we are moving on to our agenda what I would like to do this
evening which does not in any way shorten our discussion or your questions is I would like to ask for a motion to move the entire agenda so moved miss her second and
Jamie right any discussion no one I'm assuming this is a roll call Vote Yes Anna Braun yes Timothy Cummings yes Jamie Falco yes ler gooa yes Lorie harck
yes Lee wuhong Yes Lorie LAX yes wiber pan yes P gu yes right motion carries uh we are on to committee reports information item items and for the good of the cause of the board but we are starting tonight with the financial
Committee of the whole yes thanks so um I wanted to begin with um a little bit of information uh that was uh published yesterday and in case um members of the
board or the community hadn't seen uh this headline New Jersey faces $3 billion budget hole and Trump's Federal Cuts could make things worse um and just one part of one sentence in the introductory paragraph
New Jersey is currently staring down a more than $3 billion structural deficit as Governor Phil Murphy prepares to unveil his next and final state budget proposal this month uh that proposal is uh slated for uh the end of the month I
believe it's February 25th um the interesting thing I I think and and sadly regarding a headline like this is It's kind of the preparation for what we might expect in terms of state
aid as we've been talking about not knowing what state aid will be uh this headline does not bode well so I thought that's an important thing to note um I want to share um a communication that we received from the
Department of Education just give me a moment here okay um and I'll briefly uh go over what this communication is about uh one of
the revenue sources that uh the district and all districts has have in their um general fund budget is um semi reimbursement Revenue uh semi is the special education Medicaid
initiative and uh we have um done a lot of work we do a lot of work and ually through uh the child study teams administratively in trying to maximize the amount of Revenue that we receive
back from uh the state and ultimately from the federal government um we do all the work we get the least amount of share of money and that holds true for every school district to give you a little uh bit of um uh an example uh we
generated uh in in fiscal 2023 $176,000 in Revenue uh that was a small portion in comparison to what the state gets to keep versus what the federal government keeps uh in fiscal year 2024 we generated
$122,000 in revenue and in fiscal year 2025 because of the additional efforts that we had identified necessary to increase that Revenue stream we have budgeted $331,000 in Revenue
um as a result of an analysis that was done at the state um Federal level the federal government is reducing the amount of um payment for various Services
provided so that ultimately reduces what we would be able to budget for Revenue the state uh just opened up the budget system for us for next year's budget and they populate
what that budget amount is for Revenue that number for fiscal year 2026 is $38,000 that's nearly a $300,000 reduction from what we've budgeted in
the current year for an estimated Revenue amount uh you'll see on page three of the document I dist distributed and uh this is a um overall this is a memorandum that came from the Department of Education and there has been a lot of um
a lot of activity a lot of communication happening the last couple of days uh regarding the impact this has on school districts but on page three you see uh what the uh rates are for uh paying for various services and you'll see in the
first section to the left um what are the previous payment uh structure um and you can see what this what the uh share is the federal share Federal gets 50% of the share the state gets 32.5% of the share of funds and the
district share is 17.5% but when you look at those uh amounts in the previous section versus the new amounts they're drastically less um more information to come on this but I think from a high level it's important
to note that this is a revenue area that will not bode well as we're developing this budget um so and just as a as a point of reference in terms of um how many medic uh Medicaid eligible uh students we have um
out of approximately 1,400 special education students uh 347 are Medicaid eligible um and I said earlier that we do all of the work uh for the least amount of money and that is true because the school
districts must do um a lot of the work related to validating the services that are being provided in order to be able to submit for reimbursement of Medicaid eligible costs um and that amount is going to be substantially less uh I I
would guess that the effort involved will cost more than the revenue generated for this next year and and this is something we talked about if I can add one more thing I'm sorry um it's not optional for us
right I was going to say that uh because if you look at the first page of that memorandum the third paragraph under New Jersey administrative code failure to maximize special education Medicaid initiative requires districts uh with more than 40
semi- eligible students to participate I mentioned that we have 347 Medicaid eligible students right now so we don't have a choice we must participate the consequence of failure to participate is a required corrective
action plan and if I remember correctly also impacts our Q QX scoring it does I'm sorry Dr last no I was just going to reinforce Mr Juliana what you just said but but this is one of those areas that we're learning about real time right now
sharing with the community just as we learn it and and it's a situation where it's going to at least ballparking it it could end up being a cost to the district not a revenue to the district so we just wanted to let you know that okay handing out another document
here uh one of the items that um that uh we've discussed is the potential for uh increasing uh the fees uh charged for clubs activities and athletic registrations so I'll just walk you
through um uh this document um so uh we're looking this is looking at it conducts it is an analysis of what our participation is in terms of registrations for each of the various activities for um the various seasons
including uh Athletics um The Columns are pretty self-explanatory the um gray columns reflect the value of free and reduced registrations now students that
qualify for free and reduced lunch do not pay but this information is more um to give you a a a reference point as to what that value is um if there were to be payment from those groups um when we
move across this uh worksheet when we get into uh columns I through n uh this is providing uh the calculations for what if the fee for a
club were to increase to $20 and the fee for athletics to 75 uh K goes from 25 to 100 and then m30 and 125 you'll see in the bottom of
columns I K and M what that estimated increase in Revenue would be so by increasing uh the club price to $20 and the athletic price to $75 the increases in revenue is um approximately
$3,690 by increasing the club price to $25 and Athletics to 100 The increased revenue is 127,00 and increasing clubs to 30 and Athletics to 125 uh would result in
approximately $11,000 um increase in Revenue can I ask how long have we had I mean it's been this way since I've been paying it but how long have we had the $50 registration fee for athletics and $10 for clubs I think it's been about 15 years it was it was that way when I came
to East brwi I have also a question U Mr Giuliani um Mr Juliana the uh families for more than one kid is there something that we've normally done in the past for families that that might have multiple children
um something that we've done to to ease the burden a little bit on payment even at the $50 level um I right off the top I I don't believe there is I think it's a $50 per uh student per sport so that would be something that possibly we can
incorporate into any increases we we should take a look at that we have to analyze what that impact would be yes okay um U Mr jul you're you're going to ask for these back right yes so any notes on these it's want to caution the board members if they're writing notes on these we're going to ask for these
docents back we're not ready for um this is for discussion purposes at this point um and this is on the the next document I'm going to hand out as well um what we can have discussions on these but we'll need to uh recollect them so let's see
two three can I explain a little bit yes please okay I just want to explain because the way we're doing it is different this year than in years past uh this is the first year that the finance committee has been a committee of the whole so in the past the finance committee would
meet with four board members and administrators and then there would be a second meeting with the entire board this year we've moved it to a committee of the whole which means we're doing it from the very first step in public um
and everyone working together in hopes that there's not just more transparency but the communication is more even and level across the board but we're sorry some of the documents are still confidential so um on page one and if
you're flip through the entire document uh you will note that the last two pages that would be um 11 and 12 are not included in the packet because on advice of councel uh though because the the positions that we'd be talking about are
so specific that um we really can't have the that discussion in a public setting uh however um I want to quickly go through the um the Page One summary of each of the areas um and we are
covering um covering uh adjustments to um the elementary school hours in terms of how late the schools would be
opened after 6:15 in other words right now we are open later we have access to the buildings later uh this first recommendation is that the buildings at the elementary level would close at
6:15 uh what that means is that um while typically there would be requests for use for meetings could be the scouts it could be PT and so forth um we would provide for uh access to at one of the
three upper schools to be able to have meetings at those facilities because they would remain open later um if there was an event that needed to occur at the elementary level within the the home school uh in that case uh there
would have to be a fee to be able to pay for the necessary security uh coverage uh to keep the building open um to make that change uh that results in approximately
335,000 savings uh it doesn't reduce staff um it is simply closing the buildings at 6:15 and um and then that is an item for uh consideration the next uh item on this
list um is summarize as grades 5 to six enrollment um that is um our our staffing patterns in in our schools are driven by enrollment and because of the the change in the 56 uh enrollment
projected for next year uh there is a a slight decline in that so we would automatically be able to uh reduce um four positions uh four teaching positions at hamers shold as a result and uh we we typically do this
automatically at the elementary level the budget already reflects that at the elementary K to4 level um and this is another area where uh we can um make a reduction simply because the numbers are are decreased for next year uh this
particular um uh segment is worth approximately $382,000 the next item is on special education and um this is not to reduce services this is uh related to as I
mentioned for the grades uh 56 segment uh related to uh the movement of of um our special ed enrollments and who requires services and who would not for the next year and based on the projections uh from the special
education department uh the reduction overall uh in this area is approximately uh $425 $430,000 and I just want to reinforce that is in consultation with the
director of special education I think it's important to note also that um any of the items that are are being put forth uh um we had tasked the entire Administration uh to um
collaborate and identify areas uh that were feasible to uh be able to reduce uh so these are recommendations that have come up through the administration they were there were groups of principles and
supervisors and department heads and so forth that worked collaborative in identifying uh each of the various um reductions that are being discussed at this point uh the next item is um highlighted
as stiens and if you uh go to page five just quickly um go through this the first two items relate to the summer ESL
program um we were looking to reinstitute the summer ESL for this coming this coming year um this is this would eliminate that program for the summer of 2025 uh that amount uh combined and
these are stiens page staff to uh run those programs U Dr buy I believe that's a uh five we or six week program yeah um so that is approximately 155 $156,000 and then a recommendation uh
from the high school uh is the removal of Saturday detentions um and re-evaluating the code of conduct uh to uh determine what would be a better um way to address discipline uh as opposed to having Saturday
detentions which if I recall correctly bki um was not being found to be effective no it's not effective that reduction is $2,800 I don't even know how to explain it anymore it's not it's not effective
so the total uh related to uh those areas is approximately $158,500 going to go through the um rows uh 5 through eight to begin with because those are not emotional in any way um elimination of student agenda purchases
elimination of a Naviance program for hamers shold not Naviance overall just hamers shold um a um Naviance access at Churchill um and a canvas training portal um based on the uh
recommendations that have come uh up from administrators uh those four areas uh would be eliminated the uh one item on row four is the elimination of the Fairview
trip uh right now we are running the fair viiew trip not as we had previously but uh the Fairview trip on its own is $11,500 and that would need to be a consideration for the board and also in discussion
is um parent in or at least parent advocacy to investigate fundraising for Fairview uh so I want to put that on the table too so that discussion is is ongoing because certainly there have been and I understand the value of of
students going to Fairview and having that experience uh but the the overnight experience uh versus the day out and day back experience is much more expensive uh and and almost impossible uh to uh
supervise at this at this moment in time the next uh category is Elementary specials uh this would involve the realignment of teaching assignments and restructuring of the elementary schedules um and this would result in a
reduction of uh one two three four uh full-time positions and three part-time positions uh net impact uh on this this area uh is uh just over $500,000 the next category is uh
secondary teaching uh this is um there are a variety of items uh within this segment um and I'll quickly go through what the topics are um a position
reduction uh not repl faing a retiring uh teacher uh which would um uh require the um institution of six period uh teaching assignments uh but that is uh one of the items that's on the list
eliminating the co- teing model in honors music uh double late in and early out option for eligible 12th grade seniors uh eliminating six period electives uh six periods for El classes
in core content areas which would be Ela Math Science History uh and that would be unless it's absolutely needed in order to optimize the scheduling um eliminating Spanish electives and um uh looking for ways to
optimize the General Ed study skills in total these groupings uh are in excess of $300,000 the next item is in athletics and um the recommendation uh that has come up is
for ninth grade Athletic program um to be eliminated the ninth grade Athletic program uh has uh the least amount of competition with other schools uh ninth graders would be able
to um try out for uh the J or varsity teams so there are opportunities for those students and overall the uh total uh Savings in this area would be uh just
over uh 40 uh $140,000 important to note that this is not the elimination of Middle School sports it does not eliminate Middle School sports Transportation first item on the list is
uh with regard to graduation and not providing uh buses for graduation where parents and students would be responsible for uh transport uh to and from uh graduation venue Churchill late buses are on this
list elimination of late buses lake buses and you'll hear that in a couple of other instances lake buses are offered as a courtesy they're not mandated by the state um lake buses at the high school athletic shuttle between Churchill and the high school now I'll
say that that's probably going to need to come off the list in order to enable ninth graders to be able to participate in the high school um High School athletics program uh and the hammer shold uh late
runs as well the last item is a significant uh impact but um it is on the table for discussion and that is uh reducing the hours um for full-time bus drivers from8
hours a day to 7 hours a day the total impact for the these areas is over $818,000 um just generally speaking um there are uh those couple of
areas that I can't get into the details because of the uh the positions are easily identified to individuals but um the the additional savings as a result of those and we would discuss those in another venue but the additional savings
uh resulting from those uh is uh two six uh over $760,000 so in total uh with all of these items um these come out to uh 3 million
95991 that's still short still short from uh the numbers that we had talked about um and just as a reminder when we discussed um uh the range I just want to pull up my my
worksheet from um the last board meeting but the range was between 5.8 and 7.8 million so just on the low end um and that's
presuming state aid remains unchanged just from the low end we are still uh 3.9 roughly $3.9 million short Mr Julian if I may um will the board be privy to the suggested or
recommended cuts that the administration made super I think you mentioned the supervisors and principles had made recommendations about potential possible Cuts they were all included in here yeah that's in so they all of their their recommendations are all Incorporated in
here thank you um most of what you see here came through the administrative process yeah the collaboration just just uh Dr Figo just to note though there were there are two
last pages that I recommended page 11 of 12 and 12 of 12 to not be in because they're they're more specific you guys would have to race the potentially affected employees and discuss that in close session okay
that's what I'm dat this is just but it gives you an idea of the area thank you um Mr Juliana can you restate for the public how much Bank cap is already included in this calculation yes so um
we have currently um that that uh shortfall already takes in the consideration maximizing our tax levy the 2% cap which is statutory and we have approximately $1
million in banked cap so those two amounts are already incorporated into the bottom line so even with the increase in the tax levy uh we still have uh that shorall and just as a
reminder um you know the tax levy uh doesn't cover salary benefits the increase in salary benefits uh there are without adding positions I think there were two positions um reflected in the budget uh
that were requested uh from the special ed department but um our increase in salaries and benefits right now uh without taking any of these reductions into consideration is um uh over uh $6.9
million the tax levy and the bank's cap is $3.9 million so there's a gap right there with doing nothing so this is a work in process um we are we will continue to work um we
have made um progress but we still have a ways to go and um it's getting tougher as we go um so but we wanted to update the board with where we are at this point in time we committed to doing that um being transparent with that but um as
Mr Juliana said uh in our conversations with legislators our conversations with anybody at the state level we're not getting uh any hope that we are going to see anything other at the best case
scenario uh flat funding from last year but we are fearful that that funding may be reduced we just don't know yet and we won't know until the last minute we're going to do this St M okay um without getting into uh
details but providing a a highlevel um piece of information here uh questions concerning um B Monroe and there's no we're we're still analyzing
um I'm sorry I think I gave one too many out so um what are the what's the impact of bound Monroe if bound Monroe were to be um repurposed I don't want to say closed but repurposed and the when I say
repurposed we've discussed uh the potential of reutilizing the facility to expand the ELA program uh that's the Early Learning Academy which is a revenue generator it is a revenue generator so
um based on the rough estimates of um uh opening additional Ela classes at that facility uh that would generate uh net income of uh roughly 577
$578,000 and that is only based on the waiting list that we currently have strictly the waiting list um if that if we were to be able to
maximize every seat that is available throughout the district then that has the potential will go up to $878,000 now from those amounts um we have to also net out of
that the cost associated with um having a nurse which would be paid out of that program um having a custodian for the facility and having security those costs would be paid out of that program so on
the very conservative side uh it could generate uh over $350,000 in revenue and the savings from uh certain key positions uh from the building this is
not everything but certain key positions uh is an additional uh $760,000 so in total um this is about a $1.1 million uh impact to the good for uh
bottom line on the budget and just to restate the numbers Mr Juliana stated what about the the totals did not include this analysis correct no that's correct that was not in the other summary that I provided this is addition to and still in
deliberation that's at Max Capacity um no that is not that is not at Max there is there's room for that to be more but uh I think without having even the initial experience of opening
that up it it would I think it would be U ill advised to try to budget for the maximum Revenue right and not knowing what that would be I think it's comfortable knowing that we have a waiting list and we can accommodate that waiting list and generate
$350,000 in net revenue uh to go to support the general fund budget that that would be the thing to do and if if that were the case that would mean that Ela at every other school would not exist no currently would remain it would remain this is an
addition to thank you and I I I want to say publicly too because I know the concern about providing an option about closing bound Monroe or repurposing bound Monroe is what will happen to the students what
will happen to the teachers and we're we're looking at those options right now because we we we want to make sure that we keep to the greatest extent possible those students together if we can that's
an option we we we're hoping to look at it's not our intention to spread children throughout the district I'm not saying that's not what might happen that's not our intention and so I wanted to be clear about our objective in looking at this and what we're trying to
achieve we don't have those answers yet but that's what we're working toward quick question um the last sentence where it says um if every available El see through the district is filled what's the probability of success in terms of hitting that
Mark do we think we're going to be able to hit it or is it I can't give you a statistical probability on that at this point this is I I'm not going to do that because I'll be held to it and and I'm I'm not going to do that I don't think we could even be able to guess that
number until we get we were able to do phase one and phase one would be open up the additional opportunity for the waiting list and then see what else we can Garner once the fa space is available because the word gets out if if folks know that we don't have space
they may not even be applying MH okay other option too Mr pan is that you know our community members may decide they don't want to go to bound it's not their home school so they want they want the ELA program in their home school MH so they they might choose not to fill a
seat based on that decision so okay thanks I wanted Ela in my home school and when it moved to hammeri I still went to hammeri good program could you explain um because someone had said during the good of the cause they that the idea of repurposing
Bal closing Bal would just be you firing all of the Balman row teachers could you explain I I know we discussed this also yesterday that that's not actually I I am uncomfortable with the idea of firing
or reducing jobs of any teachers um correct and I don't want to give specifics but that's not our intention uh with a with the purpose of repurposing B bound that's not the intention but I don't I'm I'm just
hesitant to give a public statement that might not be accurate um in a week or two I'm not trying to scare anybody I just don't want to give that information in public because it could be utilized
don't know what it'll be yes and and but the numbers that I just went through regarding Bal Monroe are exclusive of the K to4 teaching staff so it does not include teaching positions
so just so that we understand that so I have question doesn't include the reduction it doesn't include the reduction of K to4 teaching staff right so if a b is repurposed what kind of
impact will have to the class size we don't have that analysis complete yet Mr okay and so we wanted we wanted to share with the board that we had begun the analysis that this was not something that because we have been
challenged by members of the community that we haven't thought through this we have but we wanted to share to the point that we can what we've done so far and I want to make sure that everyone understands the board has made no decision about any of this and I think
it's important just as a reminder that um the that information will be driven by the redistricting study that's underway to give us the data related to uh numbers of students at each location
what that might look like for each of the elementary schools and also um keeping in mind that um there are at a number of our schools um classrooms that
are currently not occupied so that would we expect would be able to assist in taking on the additional students that would be redistricted out of bound we have a question when do you
expect that data to be available about the redistricting um I will I will ask to see uh what their timeline is but we're not going to have that prior to certainly not before adopting a tenative
budget okay with that is for certain um I can share with you that um I was in communication with them today providing them supplemental information regarding um our building utilization for the elementary schools so they're analyzing that
um they want to do site visits so I'm waiting to hear from them as far as um when that might be scheduled um but it is a work in progress okay um I um I have a just want to
address some other community members concerns um we hear that we should have planned for this or that we knew it was eventually coming and so my understanding um as for a school budget is that when you are provided with
funding and money for that budget year um your job is to spend that money right there's not a large percentage that could be carried over which is why we see districts who get a large sum of money right um also say there's no way
that we can spend this like I think one school um got uh one District got a lot of money that they were not expecting this year and said there's we love the money but there's how do we even begin to look at programs that are sustainable
after a year if our funding changes so there's not a lot of money right that we can carry over the point of the yearly budget is to spend down the yearly budget right so yes so a couple of points first um as a school district and that is any
school district within the state the maximum that we can maintain in our fund balance which is the it's the Emer Mercy Reserve right when everything else fails
you know it's that glass box on the wall that you break open and we don't have the latitude to Simply go utilize that money but the maximum that we can maintain is 2% of our general fund that's the maximum we can't fall
below that without permission from the state so I would never recommend that we go to that and try to utilize that money because if things really were to go some some catastrophe during the course of a year happens we would need that that
resource does that equate to well 2% our general fund if we're looking at our general fund budget is almost it's a little million yeah uh yeah a little under four million because if we're looking at about a $200 million
budget now 2% of that 194 so so um so uh my trainer thought now so so um so that's the 2% side um and now I lost the rest of my train question no don't don't
try to help me um I'll come back to it but it was uh but the but that 2% issue is is a big issue um Mr cic just ask your question again maybe it'll it'll refresh my question is does uh you know
there's obviously a community concern you knew like we knew it was coming why don't you plan but the thing is that we're not allowed to hold that money right we're given a yearly budget by the state by our federal means by the revenue that we bring in we have to spend a certain amount of that we can't
just say oh we expect to get a cut next year let's put it in the bank and and it can sit there until next year when we're cut that's not a possibility it's not a possibility um we don't have oh and the other portion that this is what I was going to talk about so we already
generate a certain amount of um revenue of from unexpended funds we know we're not going to or we hope we're not going to spend every last dollar in the budget there has to be something remaining if we're spending every last dollar then
that's a problem because there's no buffer so how do we not spend that every last dollar well you know we work on our contracts for services um we hope for uh improved health benefit uh
experience uh perhaps our workers comp costs are not as high as what might be budgeted um so there are a variety of things uh uh breakage employees who retire during the course of the year and
their Replacements come in at a lower salary amount uh folks that perhaps switch health plans from maybe a family plan to a lesser plan because of changes in circumstances on the other side we have those that go the other way where
they may have a single or a uh employee and partner plan and have grown a family and now the other side of of that coin flips but um but we generate a certain amount of Revenue each year or unspent
money that goes to support the subsequent Year's budget we've been pretty consistent with what that is um the the danger in
overestimating that amount for a subsequent year is that one if you don't generate that that money when you close out the year you already have a structural deficit in the
subsequent year second that might work for one year but then what do you do with the second subsequent year after that or the third because once if we're if we're and let's give use a hypothetical if we're
budgeting fund balance of $5 million and we say you know what we've got to close the gap let's make it 7 million so we added another 2 million first you have to be able to generate that additional to out of the out of the current budget to be able to do that but
then you've set up the budget to have to do that in every subsequent year is that even possible and chances are absolutely not that just really aggravates the structural deficit
that would be encountered down the road so thank you we don't have a piggy bank that we can put the money into okay Mrs Eric I just wanted to I'm sorry I just wanted to tell you one of the things we did um after last year's budget was when we had a position to
organically leave the district retirement resignation we started looking at every position and whether or not we needed to refill that position we went through that process all through the year to make sure that we if and
that didn't impact anybody because those people had already left but we went through that process too yes thank you I and I I do this only because I know I was not here for the public portion of last of our last meeting um and so I know that there are also questions about
you know what have we done um and I I wanted to just address that as well um many board members up here have attended um meetings with legislators we have um advocated on behalf of the kids in
our district as well as the kids um in other schools and other districts because it's happening all around us um for cuts um I did I did go to Trenton um and during one of the school funding hearings and actually at our reorg meeting on January 2nd I provided the
dates for the school funding testimony um uh as well as the date for the written comments and I said that if anybody had any questions they could reach out to Dr veski and he was more than happy um at that time he said of course uh we went over a few things that
I thought were important for people to know um regarding what else we were looking for regarding um our school funding and it's not just the changing the formula right because a lot of us that have been up here that for a few want know that with meetings through
legislators they were not looking at changing the actual School formula this year um a lot of them feel that it works for the majority of districts and that maybe there needs to be um some overall tweaks but even last week there were quite a few of us as board members that
were on a call with Senator gopal who's also somebody that you know I've spoken to before I know I'm not the only one um and you know the new bill that they're looking at s um 3917 that does not address the actual school funding formula um it kind of just looks
at more Bill transparency capping losses at 2% of the operating budget extending the budget calendar um and then eventually they'd like to see all Extraordinary special education go to the state um Senator gopal is also um
wanting to see more consolidation of districts with low enrollment and eventually look at Charter Schools but I will also say this um the funding is not something that's just here I mean I sat through hours of testimony and um some
of the towns that were brought up here I I won't repeat it but I I've watched people um from other school districts talk about how they've gotten rid of late buses they had to close schools they put the tax increase to 9.9% um last year when it was allowed um
they have cut bands they have cut out um clubs they have eliminated 250 positions they've closed school another school has closed in another town um there's a bunch of school districts that call themselves The Biggest Losers and that was South Brunswick Oldbridge Len Valley
and Scott feder talked about how they were the biggest losers and then East Brunswick and other towns were the newest losers Monroe our neighbor they don't even offer full day kindergarten they can't get a grant for preschool they had a problem with one of their schools they couldn't pay to have the
school fixed so their Town Council had had to give them money because the state wouldn't pay wouldn't help them pay um they had to replace a boiler so their Town Council voted to give the school the elementary school money to fix it they just did a high new high school
years ago and it is it was over capacity the day it opens so we have all of these districts around us and throughout the state and we do talk to them like you know as part of New Jersey school boards and our legislative committee we we talk we have meetings we have legislators
there we're trying to let them know even uh Dr veski was on last week with Senator goal and so instead of looking at the big picture of okay we're not changing the school funding formula this year what can we break it down for our district and Dr veski expressed to him
our concerns with the raising cost of out of district and how it could be the middle of the year and the district could uh the outof district school could raise the cost and we have to pay that cost and so those are barriers to us when setting a because we don't know
what you know what that raise could be um so we're trying we're advocating um and and I I I could go on and on because I know there are so many people on this board that have tried um over since our last budget to to really take it on um I
know you uh president gu you met with some of our ster sterley Stanley um and I don't want to talk for anybody else up here right like I I we all share the accolades and we all are trying to work together to fix what we can but it's
like if it's not money that's there how are how are we getting it one of the things that you mentioned was um that that proposed Bill to capping uh the loss yeah to 4% of the operating budget
2% 2% oh 2% yeah 2% of the operating budget if we're looking at our budget for next year it's $4 million right we can't afford that kind of a loss that does nothing for us that's that's
devastating absolutely devastating so that's not a help no no I'm just I'm just I'm just saying I mean you know it it may sound like you know uh as a as a talking point out there well we're going to cap the loss but when you look at
what our operating budget is at almost 200 million 2% of that is $4 million we can't sustain that we're already dealing with having to close a gap based on a loss of state aid that's nowhere near that or Flat state aid I to absolutely
agree and this is not Lorie herck saying this but this is the Senators the people that I'm talking to say well you're from East frck and if you want to continue to have the programs that you have and provide the education that you have then the residents of your town should be willing to put up that money and this is
not Lorie herck but this is but this is the fallacy but here's the in in the statement when legislators say that you should be able to put up the money right from where because because first of all
to what extent do we tax the community and the ability to do that doesn't really exist right when there's a cap a cap at 2% yes I know that that's a fallacy and and this board traditionally has been resistant not only reluctant
but resistant to raise the burden on the local taxpayers there have been there have been situations where we've been below the 2% cap in previous years I'd like to piggy back on Lor's comments about the
meeting that we had with uh Senator gal um I was on that meeting too and in the time I've been trying to figure out this funding formula thing and I ran across something that was very surprising uh to me um and that is in terms of how the
state funds special education the way the formula works is that the state assumes that every school district in the state has the same percentage of special education students a number is generated from the total um
uh uh student population and they say okay well we think you have X number of uh students and that's what generates the um uh the total amount of the uh Aid it's a is calculated on a per student uh basis East Brunswick's percentage and uh
in terms of our special uh education students is about 4% higher than what the state assumes so what and just to put this in numbers the state assumes that all school districts has about 14.7
perent special needs kids our number our numbers is around um 18 18.5 to 19% depending on which year you take a look at so what that means is that we've been given money for about 300 less special
needs kids than we actually have and that's and we're expected to use that funding to support the needs of all all of the students um I also just want to repeat a thing that Tim uh had mentioned uh La uh last meeting or or the meeting
before that in terms of the way that we're spending money on students we're in the middle of the pack for the school districts in our area that are like us North Brunswick South Brunswick um Edison Woodbridge us and Monroe we're right in the middle in terms of how much
we're spending per students so I think it's hard to make the argument that the school district has been wasting money because we're certainly not doing it based on how much we spend per student and arguably we're doing more with the money that we have given the special
needs population that we have and if you look at our um outcomes in terms of Education I'm willing to put our out comes above any of the other school districts that uh that um uh that are in our area so to me the money that we're
putting towards our school district seems to be a bit of a bargain it doesn't help the problem but I think it helps reframe the problem in terms of what we're actually looking at and what we're trying to do up here and I think it would be good to keep that th those facts in mind when we're trying to work
through this issue the other thing that I want to add and it's such a perfect segue is that the language from the state right now is not you know we talk about Excellence we want excellence in our programs and we have worked very very hard to maintain that for years and
to build um Excellence is not the language that's coming from the state the word that is repeated is adequacy um the state is not interested in maintaining our Excellence the state is interested in adequacy and there was someone today who came up and said you
know they're trying to make us into basic schools it feels like it's trying to be basic schools and I would say that's accurate from the state right now the language seems to imply that they are looking for us to achieve mediocrity that's right and that we are basically
being punished for doing better than that the other thing is that we went to the state last year about the discrepancy between our actual percentage of students in special education versus the state's estimate and ask them to look at it again we did
and there was no no change no resolution no the state wouldn't consider it all right so uh last meeting one parents question us you guys are elected what did you guys do to get money so
personally and one big challenge for the special need Student is the cost for out of District placement some student cost almost $200,000 per student per year which is very big
number for this kind of cost the service provider simply just give us the bill we have no buking power at all we have to pay required by law let's they give for 200,000 they will have to pay 200,000 if they give us
250,000 then we'll have to pay for this topic I personally talked to Senator goel last year twice I said we must have mechanism there to control this out of control charge the school district in
New Jersey has no buing power at all but I tried multiple times that nothing going to happen in short term this is big burden for school district like us we did very very good for the special need
education by doing good we got penalized because we just like magnet we're attracting people from other place to East Bron which make the situation even worse if I can piggyback on that um and
please correct me if I'm wrong uh we have looked to um provide more services in District so that um children who were typically placed out of District would come back to us I believe we've been successful that number has been lowered since last year but with inflation and
no bargaining power our costs have increased from last year is that correct that's correct thank you and um as uh Leu had stated with no negotiation power and the state has a variable
reimbursement um on these types of numbers the first 45,000 of out of District placement comes from us regardless of what the cost is past that that's always our expense right out of the gate um you know and children deserve their best opportunity
this is not a district that's going to say no this is not a district that will turn people away when they need help and I'm really proud of that um but it is a difficult reality then when we look at numbers and we look at the state and how funds are earmarked we don't have as
much ability to spread the money the way I think the public believes we do there are um very specific rules and laws about what funds um things can be spent and where and how um and I think thank everybody who stayed tonight I know it's a pretty long meeting and thank you for
allowing me to speak thank you anyone else thank you president gu um I'd like to uh tell you a good story tonight if I may um and what I'm going to say can be said for uh all of our athletic programs
at all levels including our ninth grade program two years ago a uh an Edison teacher decided that she wanted to be part of the girl's basketball program here in East Brunswick so our head coach Travis Retzloff decided to make her his middle
school basketball coach and this young lady had played went to school here um in East Brunswick was an All-Star guard for the program she had such a positive experience throughout her whole High School career that she
went on to teaching it landed a job in Edison is Raising her family here in East Brunswick and she wanted to give back to the program that meant so much to her her name is Cara katano uh she was Cara monesi when she played at the high school under the
watchful eye of head coach Travis Retzloff she took a bunch of young girls and transformed them into a winning team undefeated in their first season together similar record or second season these girls are now freshman and sophomores and they're helping the
varsity te team win games but that's not where the story ends it's where it begins these girls are part of something that they could not have attained individually they're a team they bleed
sweat laugh cry win and lose together when you watch them play you are watching you are watching resilient Warriors they're tough hardworking focused they don't have excuses they
don't make them they're leaders they win or lose they do it together they work together six days a week if not seven during the season and are playing in the offseason from seventh grade through nth grade through 12th grade these girls also run to help each other up when one
Falls and they also do that for the other team as well they're tough hardworking Focus they don't make excuses they make adjustments they're leaders caring to each other and to their opponents they
play against they do it as a team these are life skills life skills that all of us want our children to have have and they're doing this starting in seventh grade all the way up through
12th grade and this is under the leadership and direction of our head coach and the assistant coaches and staff because it is a school-based not a recreational program these girls must keep their grades up must stay away from
trouble and must go to school all things that will help them become successful in the future because of Middle School sports and high school sports these basketball players get six years of program learning
belonging and giving there are elementary students all over this town that look up to these kids and hope to be like them when they grow up that's what a program is and it's from 7th to 12th grade
these are this is a program that these girlss will remember for the rest of their lives so tonight I just want to take a moment to thank our Middle School coach coach shandelle who was here earlier freshman coach coach chup JV coach coach Warner
head coach coach retof and our volunteer coach coach Cara katano and all of our middle school high school and volunteer coaches for giving our kids and families so many great memories memories that these kids will have the rest of of
their lives thank you president gloss well that leads us to board member reports on committee and information items and that leads to my notes from during the good of the cause I do want to say that from up here you have to understand that we're trying to both
respond to what the community has asked for and and reflect um I'm a sports mom Frank Malta has given me a hard time he kept telling me that I need to just give in and admit that I'm a sports mom I have three children who play I think somewhere around the time when my son
started playing college lacrosse he looked at me and he said you are a sports mom um my daughter played for Coach sell uh my daughter who's a senior right now for most of her career has been a three- season athlete and my little one is so excited to play we are we are
sports people my children have benefited from this program we listen to people talk about how much it means to them us sitting here quiet quietly listening doesn't mean we disagree but we had promised the community that we would be transparent from the beginning about what was
happening with the budget what could happen with the budget and where the cuts might come from which gives the community an opportunity to come out and speak it gives people you know it's not a surprise at the last minute we are trying to be open transparent and
listen so I never want anyone to think that anyone up here is thinking thinking oh we don't need late buses my kids did or we don't need Middle School sports I certainly loved them my children have
benefited we are just trying to be open transparent and show you all the possible things that we may have to look at and we're trying to show you from day one instead of towards the very end when it is feels last hour for people to come out and speak and I do appreciate the
people that come out and speak it is a long line here some times and it is late after a long work week so we are appreciative anyone elsee reps yeah uh so so I have a basketball story story um earlier today
I actually went over to a churchold to take in uh the girls basketball uh game um my kids did not do Sports they um sort of inherited my interest in in love for wa watching basketball Unfortunately they fully inherited my lack of skill in
playing it so so that that's what our church will experience was like um but uh it it it was a lot of fun watching the the girls team um and this is what I saw when they were working together it was great um you know it was actually a pretty easy game for them they won by
about nine points and they were never out of you know looked like they were going to lose the lead from uh from the opening uh whistle but um these are the other things I saw there was one girl who was on a breakaway and did a beautiful like scoop layup completely unnecessary but looked awesome um but
the but I also saw occasions where um loose ball player goes for the ball another player goes for the ball they're struggling for the ball and it took them like a full five seconds before they realize they were on the same team um and one of the things that Father Tom at
St Barts I'm a parishioner at St Barts always says is if you are having an issue that you're trying to deal with look to what the kids do um and that been my experience in the 20 years that I've lived here in East Brunswick is
like watching our students because they instinctively know what to what to do and like I said when when the girls team was firing on all cylinders it was a beautiful thing to behold when they were fighting over the same ball not so much
they'll learn it's fine what does this have to do with here well we have this issue that we need to deal with and it's important to keep in mind that we are one team here the it's been pretty clear from the presentation that we have to
talk about these Cuts but the school district is doing this as a team these are coming from the ground up it's not one person from the top dictating what's going to uh what What's going going to happen I don't even want to try to make th those calls I don't have the experience uh to to do
such a thing um but the team also extends across this room here and I realize that this room is set up very badly for this metaphor because the public sits out there and we're sitting here and we're staring at each other from across the room and we got this
wall here it's it symbolically it's kind of bad although you know this is how these rooms are set up but it this is a good thing to keep in mind um that we are all trying to solve the same problem and the the and this problem requires hard decisions so it's up to us can we
work together firing on all all cylinders or do we want to fight each other over the same ball when we're wearing the same jerseys I know which one I would pick um but that was my big takeaway from uh from the game but that layup was
awesome um one um two two other quick things um it was brought up in the public comment um last meeting that um the time for public comment regarding uh budgeting had passed in the legislature and wasn't that you know bad advice that
we're giving which I continue to give which is contact your legislators about our situation and see what they can do to fix it um the reason it's not a failure is because maybe the commenting section for that bill has passed but there are other bills that are working
their way through uh we've talked about the bill that uh is looking to put a 2% cap and maybe that's not going to solve our uh problems but it's certainly a heck of a lot better than the alternative that might be out there call your Senators to try to get that bill uh through they're bills that are involving
looking at a 5year average in terms of determining School uh funding call your Senators about that um and please call your Senators about the inherently unfair way that East Brunswick has to deal with special education funding um
because I brought this up with senator kapal in that meeting first time I talked to him I'm relatively sure he thinks that I'm kind of a pain in the butt now after that one encounter but you guys are voting and you guys put the legislators in the
seats and and and I found that um hearing that from people not directly involved with the school district is often more impactful than hearing it from me you know Mr pain in the pain in the butt um just to give you an example there was a time uh when I had a kid in
the hospital and it it was a toddler and we were trying to get him down for a scan because he needed the scan and because of his age we needed an anesthesiologist for it and for the scan and it was taking forever for the anesthesiologists to free themselves up to get them down to the Radiology uh
suite and the dad and the mom were talking to me and said you know what can you do and I said I've been calling no no one really listens to me and I said but here's the number for the hospital CEO's office I never gave you this number the
parents made a phone call the kid was down in the uh Radiology Suite in like 15 minutes that's the difference between us talking to legislators and you guys talking to legislators again keep that in mind last thing I just want to bring up very short Brunswick Square mall has a resource
Fair on uh Sunday March 2nd from 1:00 to 3 p.m. um often times I uh I hear parents saying well you I need this thing for my kid and I don't know where to get it resource fairs are a great place to uh uh to get that sort of information we had one at the high
school not to to long ago um towards the end of the year these things come up over and over again please um tell your friends about about this thing because uh they can be a great source of help thanks anyone else all right I would also like to
before I forget I would like to thank the administrative team and Karen uh for all the work they're doing if you aren't following the district on Facebook please do they are pushing out a lot more information for the community um and it is nice to see the kids winning
and winning and winning play like a girl is such a good thing all right beyond that but thank you because it's awesome we have can I ask the board members to please um oh I'm sorry please those documents all the confidential no you
can keep the memo from the doe can I read while we pass oh yes absolutely okay I'm reading while we pass we have a need for a closed session whereas the Board of Education must discuss matters which are not appropriate for discussion in a public meeting and whereas these subjects are
within the exceptions to the open public meeting acts and are permitted to be discussed in closed session pursuant to njsa 104-1 12b and whereas the Board of Education intends to discuss matters as follows items listed on tonight's agenda
whereas the length of the closed session is estimated to be 1 hour after after which the public meeting of the board shall reconvene and action will be taken can I get a motion please second Falco uh discussion all in
favor opposed extensions all right thank you everybody we're inclosed have a good night