uh good evening I'd like to call the meeting to order will the secretary please call the RO Anna Brun here Timothy Cummings here Jamie Falco here Lis Figaroa here Lorie herck here Lee wuhong here Lori LAX Wilbur pan here
Heather gloss here please rise for the pledge I pledge alance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all good evening the New Jersey open
public meetings law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend meetings of the public bodies at 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
by having the date time and place thereof posted at the Board of Education offices written notice was also provided to The Sentinel the Newark Star Ledger the home news and Tribune and 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 all right 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 meetings act and are permitted to be discussed in closed
session pursuant to njsa 104-112 B and whereas the Board of Education intends to discuss matters as follows items listed on the agenda whereas the length of the closed session is estimated to be 1 hour after which the public meeting of the board
shall reconvene and action will be taken can I have a motion Please Mr P Pam Leu all in favor opposed abstentions all right we are enclosed we will be
back in one hour thank you all right hello welcome back we are sorry for the delay um but certain things just need the attention that they need so we are back and Dr veski is not with us this evening um his father recently passed away and he is uh with
family this evening but Dr bully is here for the superintendent report yes thank you good evening the artwork on display in the boardroom this evening was created by students from East Brunswick High School the art teachers of these talented students are Megan Buckley Lisa
gbus Ashley hananiah Felix Martinez Matilda Jonathan Shala and saing Yu Dr Edward bushore is the principal Wednesday February 19th marked the H 100th day of school and our
elementary students and staff celebr ated this Milestone Warren Storer International night is a yearly event sponsored by the PTA where students and families volunteer to host a table representing a country and culture from around the
world it is amazing to see the students parents and teachers come together to celebrate community and culture the event features food music dancing and presentations from countries around the world that reflect the wonderful
diversity found in their school Hammer's PTA International night attracted over 300 attendees suggesting a potential for an even greater event next year for many students this may have been their first exposure to
cultures beyond their immediate Community the evening offered a chance to taste unfamiliar Foods hear different languages see traditional clothing and witness cultural dances this unique experience can spark curiosity and a
lifelong interest in global awareness in Sports East Brunswick High Schools football program had a double victory at the bill Denny High School football awards lunch in senior Felix M Munos was our bill Denny High School
recipient and the team was awarded the bill Denny sportsmanship award head coach Zach Gaga proudly attended the March 2nd event at the Pines matter Junior Matt Mula broke East the
East Brunswick boys basketball scoring record which was 1,311 on Friday February 21st he broke the record previously held by Rob Uka wuba class of 2013 Rob was able to
attend and pass the torch to Matt [Applause] nice the arts department has some fantastic musical Productions to see during the month of March the hamers drama club presents Finding Nemo kids on
Wednesday March 5th and Thursday March 6th beginning at 700 p.m. tickets are available at hu. booktix.com East Brunswick High School presents mam Mia on Friday March 14th Saturday March
15th Friday March 21st and Saturday March 22nd beginning at 7 p.m. on Sunday March 16th the production will begin at 3 p.m. tickets are available at ebhs book ticks.com
Churchill Junior High School presents 13 junior on Wednesday March 26th Thursday March 27th and Friday March 28th beginning at 7 p.m. tickets can be purchased at cjhs bookbook ticks.com
our next parent University will be held Wednesday March 12th at 700 p.m. in the JM pack at hamers Upper Elementary School Dr Reggie Wright Jr will present attitude versus ability a powerful
presentation designed to help parents support their children in achieving academic success and strong character development and just a reminder on Tuesday March 11th and Wednesday March 12th our 11th grade students will be
taking the New Jersey graduation proficiency assessment these two days will be single session days for the high school only students in grades 10 and 12 will follow their regular single session Day
schedule prepackaged grab and go meals will be offered for lunch immediately following dismissal thank you thank you all right and this brings us to one of my favorite Parts about being a board member uh tonight will be filled with
difficult discussion later but right now it is wonderful to have the high school student council here for learning across the district because you are a wonderful reminder that you are the reason that we are here so I will turn it over to Rishi
fantastic hello everyone um my name is Rishi kundin I am the president of student council and I'm also representative for the Board of Education usually uh I'm sitting over there but today I'll be standing up here joining with my five uh four amazing uh executive officers and uh we're going to be talking to you a little bit about what we do at the high school and at the
student council um just a quick overview what we'll be talking about our mission uh student Stu school spirit supporting Community with creativity our national and State student council and then recent Awards and recognition and so at the high school we
uh operate underneath the national student council Association and their overall mission is to empower students through leadership um Serv voice and engagement and at high school we strive to uphold those standards in everything we do and so here's Miss here's the some of the um language taken from our high
school Amendment which was adopted in June of 2020 and you can take a quick scan through we do things like B aform for student opinion uh we cooperate between faculty and students and we develop a culture that Fosters leadership um I'll pass it on to um
Liza hi everyone my name is Lisa pekovich and I am a sophomore representative at the high school student council so one of the main things that we do at student council is promote school spirit and one of the main ways we do this is
through homecoming homecoming is a greata is a great tradition and a great great way to kick off the year with a lot of school spirit and building Community this year our homecoming had a Disney theme which set the theme for the rest of the events that took place that week the whole week was a spirit week
planned by the student council that all of the students got to partip partipate in and then our class councils were able to pick a Disney movie to set the basis for their hallway decorating contest where they each got to decorate a section of our terminal then the main
attraction the homecoming dance was completely planned by the student council where we chose the decorations that were also themed we found a DJ got the food and we made homecoming crowns because the homecoming court is always announced at the dance following that
the day of the actual homecoming game was our spirit rally where student council gets to work with class councils and athletic teams to celebrate our fall athletes and have some contests in which um students get to have a great time have fun and it really just builds
school spirit and Community very early in the year and then later in the year next slide L later in the year we have our winter door decorating contest which is when the student council gets to decorate the main office and
administrative doors and then we provide home rooms with supplies and we encourage them to decorate their own doors and it becomes a contest and the winners get bragging rights and breakfast and then students really just
work hard with their home room teachers they coordinate together they even stay after school to decorate the school environment to have a great time and paired with alumni day before winter break and our winter spirit W winter spirit week this is a great way to build
community and have a great time in the Drey winter mons hello my name is Nikita Shaw I'm a junior and I'm a treasur at East brns K school um so along with these Traditions that we've had for so many years we've also adapted new events from the student
from the njasc the state's Association of student council through various events help hosted at the student Council we promote growth and connection for our student body one example is our holiday market through this event students and faculty members had the ability to sell and sell products and
services that they own uh along with this it wasn't only clubs who had the ability to sell their products and services it was also individual um it was also individual businesses like for one example is one of our students had her own business her own
bakery business and she sold out at her Holiday Market along with with that a faculty member was able to sell a game that she created some some clubs also held creative cre creative events like our school like a school's gift and Thrift where I was able to purchase a really nice sweater along with the
holiday market the student council holds student bonding events like our escape room and movie night here students had the chance to interact outside of the school environment and de-stress and relax after a long day of school after a long week of school these events are essential to building and strengthening
the community here at ebhs all these events come from listening to students and from ideas that we get from other student councils like I mentioned before from our njasc here you can bring our ideas back and just integrate them into our community good evening everyone my name
is klin doose I am a sophomore and I am the njasc liaison at our e sprunk student council so clearly we're able to highlight our amazing leadership events and community service through Statewide and National initiatives these are known as the New Jersey Association of student
councils and the national student council both we've been active members of since 2019 along with highlighting our leadership we're also able to take resources from these organizations to improve and also highlight our student council such as taking resources from the national student council to creating
our constitution in 2020 along with this we attend Nation New Jersey Association of student council events which include their fall conference winter convention and spring Awards award ceremony where we highlight our own events through workshops and encourage our student leaders to connect with other student
leaders across the state and then continue to allow East Brunswick High School to be a dynamic place by bringing other ideas to our student council and highlighting what they'd like to bring here finally we've had two off state officers serve for the New Jersey Association of student councils our first one in 20123 and I am your second
one this year in 2025 Alana is your first New Jersey Board of Education student student representative we truly do Focus not only with taking these agendas but also our own on highlighting advocacy and student leaders hi my name is Jane Godwin I'm vice president of events and I'm a
junior at the high school so with all of our amazing projects and community building activities we have earned since adopting our constitution 5 years ago and joining the njac 4 years ago we have earned a number of awards WS we have our community Smiles award for projects that
make a positive impact on our community as well as our top 10 projects for escape room and our movie night and our honor School award for beating meeting the basic njasc requirements and not to top it off but last year we earned the Council of Excellence award and councils
can only qualify for this award every five years so we are extremely grateful and proud that we've earned this award and it involves an extensive series of self- evaluation peer evaluation and on ongoing activities that reflect how we meet very high standards required by njc
we repaired with Bay High School and not only worked hard with them throughout the process but made great friends we are very proud to have earned the Council of [Applause] Excellence um thank you all for the opportunity to talk about what we do at the high school um and what we do at
student council um we could do any any of these things that we do without the support of our amazing advisers Mrs lege and Miss Benard who uh have a thankless job at times but they really allow us to be the best student leaders possible um our amazing uh Administration Dr bashore
and the rest of the supervisor of the high school and of course you guys and on that note we have something for each of you here um they were made by our Arts AR societies and they were a big hit at our holiday market which talked about um we hope that they remind you of all the hard work that um you guys do as
well as what you're doing all this for which is us and our students at the high school so we thank you all for um allowing us opportunity to speak once again and um thank you if you have any questions please feel free to ask thank [Applause]
you and as always go Bears thank you um I do want to say as somebody who just brazenly watches your Instagram um I I I can I can justify this my one son just graduated my daughter's a senior I I have good reason
besides the board to be there but I really enjoy if you have the opportunity to just cruise through the Instagram for the student council it's amazing the events I was deeply invested in the them for hoko before it happened I was very very excited to see the Disney go up as
as the rest of my household um but they just do amazing things all year long while maintaining just such high academic excellence and they're so so well represented they represent us so well in so many ways so we're very grateful to have you here um we're going
to go to rishi's student representative report and then we're going to have a brief recess to allow our students to go home if they would like all right reishi different chair
same suit I'm sure you guys are probably tired of me talking at this point so I'm going to make it uh make it brief um it's been a whole month since we last met uh and at time there's been plenty of exciting news um tonight both the boys and girls basketball teams play in their second round of States facing tough opponents both teams after an
excellent start to their state tournament um are prepared to give it to give it their all tonight boys basketball face Montgomery at 600 and girls basketball face Hillsboro at 5:30 as basketball inches towards the end of the season wrestling swimming and winter track have all concluded our winter
athletes have faced especially cold weather tough opponents and grueling workouts but they have persevered through these challenges and can now celebrate at their banquet at the end of the season um where they'll celebrate both their seniors and their amazing Seasons um two weeks ago the social studies H Society hosted its annual
trivia night designed to test the knowledge of its members in the entire School Community students enjoyed F food music and of course intense questions provided by the ebhs academic team with over 200 participants this year's event was one of the most successful in history and the competition remained
Fierce throughout the night senior and president of R Kappa at at you day she stated trivia night was amazing I'm so grateful for everyone who attended we had another great year in terms of Club participation and fun and it was wonderful to see all our dedicated and engaged members passionately competing last Friday the ebhs
international Club hosted its annual culturama which Drew over 300 attendees eager to learn about about and share diverse cultures from around the world participating participating students created posters with relevant information about their chosen countries along with interactive activities students presenting on Brazil brought a
soccer ball and goal allowing participants to take penalty kicks while those representing Germany introduced a creative rition of a popular cow theme game the cafeteria was lined with over 100 posters each detailing unique facts from different corners of the world in addition to interactive activities many attendees brought ethnic foods from
their respective countries that night I had the opportunity to try lumpia from the Philippines um Afghan race from Afghanistan and much much more it felt like a 15 course meal all within the high school cafeteria which is uh something I don't think everyone can say um the night culminated in a series of
dancing and singing performances that highlighted the the diverse backgrounds of our students um senior and president of the international Club shes loanda stated the energy was full of energy showcasing diverse dances music and posters that brought everyone closer to
cultural exchange the ebhs black student union hosted its annual Harlem Renaissance night featuring a fashion show and a series of performances from talented individuals within our within our school this event marking the conclusion of Black History Month was open to all ebhs families and friends
attendees enjoyed powerful powerful performances amazing food and stunning fashion all gaining deeper insight into black history and culture Jane Godwin a junior and vice president of BC remarked the annual Harlem Renaissance event was filled with Talent and immersed enthusiasm for sharing our cultures this
year we also showcased various black designers in an amazing fashion show with the Harlem Renaissance event wrapping up a fantastic series of celebrations from the past month we now look forward to the exciting events planned for March the ebhs drama club will be putting on its annual spring
production performing Mama Mia starting on March 14th senior and drama club president Mia rosin says the drama club cast and crew have worked so hard to put put together this production of Mama Mia after many long rehearsals and Stage builds they are ready to put on a fantastic show if you're free next
weekend I encourage encourage you to come out and support many of these hardworking students finally the Ebe fsa's annual volleyball tournament will take place this Thursday in the main gym teams representing various clubs from the high school will compete for $100 Grant towards their Club this exciting
competition will be filled with fun and friendly rivalry and is sure to be a great time so please come out and support and uh as we transition from winter sports and school events into spring we look forward to much warmer weather and the continuation of all the amazing work being done at the high
school so far um thank you all right without any of you looking back at Dr bushore I do have one question no looking at him the Hawaiian shirt thing has that caught oners that is an amazingly wellp put
answer thank you so much all right we are going to have a brief recess I asked that the board just stay because we're going to be that quick to allow our students to go home if they wish to we appreciate their presence but we know it's a long night
thank you for being here having our students here but still all important all right we are moving on to the good of the cause for the public excuse me 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's secretary I would just request that when you step up to the podium you state your name and address unless you are a student then if you just your name and your school is there anyone wishing to address the board this
evening Dr zii good evening Dana ziki president of the East brunic Education Association so I'm speaking to you tonight because I'm deeply disappointed and concerned approximately two weeks ago a
current Board of Education member made a choice to post a social media posting regarding the budget in that post it was alleged that the budget crisis rest on the backs of the teachers and support
staff as it was stated our current budget crisis is due to contractual raises and health care premiums as they make up the vast majority of the budget the post went on to scold past board board members who voted in favor
of these contracts I was deeply troubled by these comments and frankly I find them unacceptable and potentially a violation of board ethics while the post was quickly deleted many screenshots circulated my
office blew up that day the 1,400 members of the East Brunswick Education Association are outraged and disappointed and I want to make a few points very clear we do not manufacture products we enrich enrich lives
education is a people centered profession and in New Jersey Approximately 80% of the budget school budget should be allocated to salaries and benefits this is a standard practice our current contract is a 5-year
agreement the long-term contract provides the board with a clear salary data for 5 years ensuring actual accurate Financial Planning and the next thing blaming Educators for a budget crisis is
completely misguided the reality is that the average teacher in East Brunswick cannot even afford to live here if they don't have a spouse or a roommate our salaries and benefits are in line with averages of the county we are definitely not the problem negotiations are handled
with Integrity the process between the board and EA is rigorous and it's thorough and it's something that I've always respected in fact I'm already preparing the next negotiation cycle right now we're getting ready our
contract runs through June 2026 and when a contract is presented for ratification it comes after extensive discussions data analysis and countless hours of meetings on both
sides looking at this current board only one one member has ever participated in a small group negotiations and then two total 10 seconds have voted on ebaa bargaining agreement this raises serious concerns because we're getting ready to go into a
negotiation session and I only hope that the voice of this one person is not the voice of this entire group and it would be wrong of me not to bring this to you on behalf of the members of our
association we should never be blamed for earning Fair wages time and aligning our health benefits and wages with the county standard period I do have more to say I know thank you I'll send it to you
in [Applause] [Applause] any is there anyone else wishing to speak to the board tonight please um hello my name is uh Muhammad Shala I'm an eighth grade student for church H junior high school and I would
just like to talk about like the sports and how they're going to be taken away for us and I just really disagree on it and how like I do eighth and seventh grade sports for junior high school and I just do not agree at all with the takeaway of it um I've bonded so much
with people that I've done the support with for my school and I think it's just so much more different than wck after a win on that school bus it's just like it's something that you will never ever like imagine like anything else or like that's like something that you talk
about with your kids and I just I really disagree with it like the coaches I see my coach every day in the school and I talk to him still about this day about my season and I feel like if it wasn't for school and the teacher talking about me with it I would never get into
wrestling and yesterday I was in my first tney ever and I got third place and if it wasn't for and if it wasn't for my teacher in the school talking about it I would never like really be doing something
after school so I just like really disagree on like the takeaway of it and that's it thank you thank you Mohammad good evening Dom scani to Morgan place um I wasn't planning on speaking tonight but I saw mention of rauka wuba
and he he is a family friend of mine I've known him since I was that big um he and and and let me tell you he he's a professional basketball player he plays overseas and everything so for him to come back back and and have mad Mula
and congratulate him it's it's he he's a Class Act he's a great guy um but he he played eighth grade basketball and I'm I'm assuming Matt Mula also played eighth grade basketball so just
remember that when you are planning on making these cuts and everything that the two alltime scorers of Beast Brunswick boys basketball played eighth grade and
that's where they got their start that's where they found the love of the game man and it can be said you know congrats on getting third place that's amazing I still talk to my coaches I still talk about the the stuff we would
uh joke around about in practice I would still talk about how I made that sack it's in here that's keeps these memories so just remember that remember that your the
future of your sports programs are from eth and Ninth Grade Sports and um it that would not they would not that would not have happened if they didn't play eighth grade Sports they would not have been the
all-time scores there wouldn't just wouldn't have happened so I implore you to really think about these cuts and everything and I know I know you're going to say the money has to come from somewhere money
has comeing from somewhere um just I implore you really think about it really think about the impact this will have on the athletic programs will we ever have someone ever break Matt moka's record who knows but I
bet you if someone did they played eighth grade Sports [Applause] thank you Dom good evening board Jeff Winston fresh puns Roy Brunswick my condolences to Dr veski never easy losing a father
uh probably one of the hardest things anybody can go through so on on the back of uh Dr ziki I think there's some more context that could be added uh back in January uh I did hear this board uh given a uh annual lesson from
board attorney Mr giobi on what the dos and don'ts of social media use and one of the things that were mentioned in there is that if you are going to post and use your First Amendment right which I'm a firm believer in is that you have disclaim it as your own opinion and not necessarily
shared of those of the board when that phrasing is not put one has default that it is this board of education that believes that the problem with this budget is the teachers once again it's not my fault
back in this board the exact quote contractual raises and health care cost premiums are the vast majority of our deficit people who may have quit the board I was one of those people uh are on the same are the same people who voted yes to these what what Miss Falco
forgot is that all nine members of this board voted on it and all nine members of this board voted yes because Dr zii and her team student negotiators give a 5-year contract which is very unusual but it's called negotiating a good faith
never to come back and bite somebody poor poor board membership I'll leave that there and I do hope that this board comes clean is is that your feeling as a board because your board member represents you without
that disclaimer it is my belief and I'm waiting to be told otherwise that this whole board May in fact believe that it's the teachers fault the teachers who do a great job educating in the system the best in the world and you blamed them and you blamed
them that is so weak lastly there was recently an ad hoc committee is what it's been called or community action committee of some sort of a committee formed with Dr veski from somebody in that group I was told that the meeting was essentially about trying to justify
Dr ves's Visionary approach to this District uh that was not an ad hoc committee that was a committee uh uh an action committee and that would fall under policy 9140 that says for board approval I've
looked through the minutes and I can't find it president gu I don't know when that was motioned in and approved I don't know if when the board goes back to an old argument is are you the board Bernie might be the board but you can't just just do things without
motioning it in but in 9140 you clear thank you 9140 you clearly states that any committee formed like that should have a charter and should be available Bernie has been opened on that by another individual and it was rejected we deserve to see what that was and why
that meeting uh why that group was formed thank you very much I'm sorry to over on time thank you Joe is there any anyone else wishing to address the board hi Lisa noppenberger a kindergarten teacher at waren doer and the EA secretary um I just want to add a
positive possible vibe to some of the things happening um the teachers and support staff in our district do a lot of really wonderful things that along the lines of it was planned before this month way but um on our own time that we don't get paid for that do
get recognized and we do get thank yous and pats on the back for but when you do talk about our livelihood and our money and what we do or don't I think it's important to remember that also um for example just yesterday the EB uh
Orchestra Symphony worked together and they did an amazing fundraiser over at the community art center to raise money for an ebaa scholarship that we award and to raise money for the symphony as well and that again all the practices and the time put into that was on their own time but supporting the schools the
students and the programs that we have here um this week is read Across America it's big in the elementary schools um although we haven't really gone the doctor Su out there's still a lot of work put into that um a lot of grant writing teachers write books they write
programs they get together they plan amazing programs I know right now at Warren software we're doing it's a March Madness theme where they're kind of competing and reading and voting on the different books for each level a lot of that is supporting the curriculum and the
programs we have but the creativity comes from the collaboration that all the different programs have in our buildings and District it goes from talking to Churchill we have Churchill students coming on Friday to read to our students their favorite childhood
picture books and then we have questions and answers set up so right these things are done on everybody's free time because we love what we do and sometimes when we're discussed on social media we do feel as though we're just Pawns in a game of people going back and forth when
it really shouldn't be that way because we're doing these things because we love them the last thing that we have is our prom shop is again this year and we are open on Tuesdays March 4th and 11th from 3:30 to 5:00 P p.m. and March 8th from
the 22nd uh March 8th and 22nd from 11:00 a.m. to 2: p.m. at 575 Cranberry Road a huge thank you to Joanne Mariani for being the glue to organize this event it allows our students to come and get prom dresses uh tuxedos
jewelry uh ties cumber buns everything that they could use to feel at that though they look like their peers at prom who can't always necessarily afford the same things that their class the um so
there are just some awesome things that we're doing and I also sometimes Community when you're speaking about us like we see that time thank you lisel is there anyone wishing anyone else wishing to address
the board Tatiana Jordan 27 North Drive I would like to extend my gratitude to the board members who posed insightful questions about the Ila curriculum though we have only begun to explore the issues complexities I also want to thank the teachers who presented at the last
meeting for sharing their strategies and expertise however it is important to acknowledge that the presentation given by administrators appeared to be more of an effort to manage perceptions rather than provide a fully transparent assessment it seemed designed to present a polished narrative to the board and
public rather than accurately reflecting the challenges that are truly taking place first and foremost let us reflect on the teacher survey that was mentioned by administrators this survey was a result of parents advocating for Teacher input it's important to clarify that when administrators were initially asked
about teachers opinions on the Ila curriculum their response was quote unquote teachers love this curriculum as an educator myself I questioned that claim only to be told there was no funding to bring teachers together across the district to gather their input there has been no initiative
taken by the administration before this to gather teacher feedback which in itself is quite alarming in response my husband proposed a cost-effective way to do so through a teacher survey I sincerely hope that the teacher surveys will be shared with you in their entirety without alterations or
selective reporting transparency is crucial and it's essential that you receive the full picture rather than a curated version of the feedback secondly we must take a critical look at their Tier 1 interventions while they claim that 80% of their students are adequately supported at this level my own child was
classified as tier one despite clearly needing more targeted intervention support that we as parents had to fight for but how many other students also labeled as tier one are struggling under this curriculum how many require more intensive instruction that simply cannot be effectively provided through a small
group instruction or ineffective strategies in reading and writing workshops while I recognize the benefits of independent reading for building stamina I do not believe this approach is appropriate for K to2 students when fun foundational literacy instruction is critical leaving struggling readers to
navigate the process on their own is a recipe for failure their confidence declines frustration builds and many eventually give up or resort to pretending to engage in independent reading without proper support we are RIS we risk setting these students up for long-term academic struggles the
portrayal at the last meeting needs to be critically examined we refuse to be sold to Lemon by us car salesman trying to hide its defects thank [Applause] you thank you Tatiana is there anyone
else wishing to address the board hi Michelle Bethy five watang Road I'm also here to share some questions about the language arts curriculum um I also wanted to thank the teachers that shared what they do in their classrooms last week um I also wanted to make it clear that none of this is about the
teachers it's about the purchase of the newly package curriculum Moss flower even with all the information out there about it being ineffective and harmful the curriculum clearly states units of study as you know the reading workshop model follows a 15-minute mini lesson
students are then left to read their level text on their own for 20 to 30 minutes while the teacher is in small group Reading More Level text there's a stop and share moment and then closure phonics is not mentioned morphology is not mentioned what we also didn't hear
about is the use of a universal dyslexia screener that is used to identify kids at risk which is legally required to be given to all students K to 3 you are legally required to screen any student who is displaying one or more characteristics of Dyslexia a screener
such as Dibbles gives a teacher so much useful information the phonics inventory that was mentioned is by heinan a Lucy ckins publisher which is not evidence-based we also didn't hear about an assessment that is given such as the core phonic survey or quick phonic
screener after using a dyslexia screener to then drive instruction learning disabilities don't just suddenly appear in third grade actually researchers have shown that this achievement Gap is evident as early as first grade leaving so many students
to struggle for so many years without being identified intervention that is being done is by teachers who are IMD trained not certified um while imsd may be strong in phonics and decoding it's not as in-depth in morphology syntax and
language comprehension what about grammar if we don't explicitly teach students sentence structure how can you expect them to write paragraphs what about access to grade level text if if you have kids reading level texts this is going to limit their
vocabulary what are we doing then to develop vocabulary and build students background knowledge this would support comprehension not just focusing on one skill or strategy every week the current Ila curriculum is hurting children please listen to the stories that have
been shared people who have been negatively impacted by this for years and years and years it's a lot of advocating and I just wish it we're better thank you thank you Michelle
is there anyone else all right seeing none I'm going to close the public portion which leads us to the agenda I would like to combine the entire agenda this in no way limits the
discussion of any individual items so can I have a motion for the full one one just clarification um the minutes are pulled from the agenda and under business support operations item
two um will be discussed um after the second CL uh during the second Clos session and action will take place after okay with those amendments can I have a motion for the full agenda so moved Miss second and Dr
pan uh discussion all right seeing none this is a roll call Vote Yes Anna Brawn yes Timothy Cummings yes Jamie Falco yes with exension on item
two under special education and student services noted uh Lis figeroa yes Lori herck yes leeu Hong yes with abstention of HR agenda number one noted
wolver pan yes he GL yes all right motions carry all right committee reports information items and for the good of the cause for the board we are going to begin with the finance committee of the whole financial year
2026 budget discussion that is you sir yes be with me a moment we get set up 464 okay okay so um we'll begin uh this evening with uh first a reminder on uh what has
happened up until now and where we are headed over the next uh several weeks and a couple of months so first as everyone probably knows the governor delivered his budget message uh last week on February 25th uh and that was followed by the release of state aid on
February 27th we are having a special meeting this evening to be able to engage in those uh discussions as a result of that uh information on state aid uh March 20th is the date that is scheduled for tenative budget
adoption however the state has moved the final day for Budget adoption to March 19th so we will need to move our board meeting one day earlier public hearing is currently scheduled
for April 24th and just as a reminder as the board adopts a tenative budget the operative word is tenative there's opportunity to make changes up until um the tenative
budget is adopted so uh that would be the final opportunity uh for any revisions and a final adoption is scheduled for May 8th so back in January January 30th board meeting uh we had a presentation
regarding where we were in terms of the uh budget bottom line uh estimated Revenue Appropriations and the estimated shortfall and there were two scenarios one was based on flat Aid being or state aid being flat and the other was with a
a reduction in state aid uh approximately equal to the reduction that we saw in the prior year this chart shows uh what the variances are in our state aid as well as uh the variance in the charter school
so um I believe it was at the last board meeting uh we had talked a little bit about uh an announcement that had come out of the Department of Education talking about potentially a 3% reduction in state Aid and in fact that's exactly
what occurred uh for East Brunswick and not only East Brunswick but that also occurred uh for any of the other uh highly performing school districts uh the school districts that benefited from state aid increases uh were those that
were not within the high performing group stabilization Aid uh we received stabilization Aid la for the current fiscal year uh that was after a final budget had been adopted that was only for one year
the state is did not repeat uh the provision of stabilization Aid and so that's not on the table uh either so that's a full reduction so our total reduction in state aid is about 4.47%
1.7 U plus million Charter Schools uh went up so while our state aid was going down Charter Schools went up and not because of enrollment um and we have not delved into uh the details of the calculation
as yet but Charter Schools requiring us to budget an additional $668,000 where the state is requiring us to budget uh that additional uh increase so that has an impact upon uh the bottom
line uh just some updates regarding uh selected budget impacts so salary and benefits yes they are the majority of of our budget um uh salaries going up 4.06% uh cumulatively that includes the
impact of breakage so that is uh for employees that are retiring and uh being replaced with new employees who come in at a lower salary health benefits um I had indicated previously that um we have
budgeted at 7% % um and that our broker was advising that we should budget at 10% um most recently and this is as of a couple of days ago um I have confirmed with our broker that uh we will be able
to maintain at the 7% increase uh not the 10% now you might ask well why is that 7.96 per uh and that's because there are some changes as a result of some additional positions that are NE necessary um and it's also impacted by
the amount of um employee contributions uh to health benefits out of District tuition uh at our last uh back in January uh the increase was not uh as significant as this uh this is showing an increase of
uh over $1 million or uh 23.82 so um during this period of time we have had uh new movein new individuals new families that have moved into district with children that are
bringing their IEPs with them uh and are already in out of District placements and that has driven uh part of this um as well as uh receiving additional information regarding what the rates are uh estimated tuition rates are uh from
uh out of District placements for next year so that's pretty sign significant impact there electricity um electricity uh we have um had that budgeted at a $3 um $10,000 uh increase just based on um
just based on our utilization we received and it's not included in this number but it will be part of our discussion shortly we received notification from one of the utilities that services our schools uh to plan for a 19
.1% increase beginning in June uh that impact will be uh an additional roughly $400,000 on the budget custodial Services increasing
$180,000 Charter Schools I already had um had that on the other sheet but we're looking at an 11.45% increase on charter schools and then some other factors um place health benefit uh deductions uh what their contributions
are excuse me to um to the U offset the health benefit costs Property and Casualty Insurance is estimated we do not have uh final information on that and as of my last inquiry uh over the
weekend I received a response today that that information is unlikely to be available until May uh one of the things that was on here uh at the last presentation was workers compensation workers compensation uh is
now uh pretty much locked in so that's reflected in the bottom line of the budget um and that has also um had an increase and uh currently our tax Lev is being maximized um including the use of
$1 million in banked cap so that's uh comes out to approximately $3.9 million on the revenue side or a 2.72% increase so where are we as of today uh
our Appropriations are at 25.4 million that's a $7.2 million increase over the current Uh current fiscal year it's a 3.66% increase where are our revenues 197
.7 million so our shortfall is approximately $7.7 million we have offsets for discussion this evening um totaling uh just under 8.4
million so with that um we will now move into discussion on the details of what those offsets are there are certain of those off offsets we will not be discussing here in the open session
because they involve uh specific identifiable uh individuals positions and so we'll do that in close session setting um so if you just bear with me a moment going to
distribute you had one these documents are advisory consultative and deliberative and they remain as such until we actually have the final budget can I ask a quick question while
these are being passed out the uh special ed um Aid is that b that's based on the number of students that we um so um quite honestly in the days that we've had those state budget reports we are going through and analyzing what those
what the state did in changing calculations because if you if you noted um Equalization Aid the very first item on that Revenue screen decreased substantially yep from I believe it was $26 million down to $18 million MH and
then there were increases in special education Aid Transportation Aid and security Aid I can't tell you specifically what drove that not today I will be able to okay uh we have a uh um conference call there's
a conference call with um all business administrators tomorrow uh going through the changes in the formula because there were changes in in the formula so we'll be able to speak to that in more depth uh at at the next meeting but uh notably
when you see that change uh in the equalization Aid I think that that is really the writing on the wall because I think what we're going to be looking at is as a higher performing School District as I said they the state
took money away from higher performing school districts and and move that money over to other districts um I think we'd be looking at 3% and this uh down the road another 3% next year maybe another 3% the year after the state uh formula
is um looks very much at adequacy um and uh as I've said I think adequacy really equates to mediocrity yep down the road um so those are some things that we have to keep an eye on um
and what that impact is going to be uh as we move forward and and the other thing you probably don't have the answer to this question either uh but if you could look into it is my understanding is that we should expect um aid from the the state for our special education
student population um for a given dollar amount per student I'd like to know if that's changed and what that number would be for this particular we'll go through that thanks um board president president gu um I
think one of the things that we will need because um as we move forward through this list remember we have a tenative budget that is going to need to be adopted uh March 19th uh that's only a couple of weeks
out so uh as we go through it's going to be helpful to know whether we have consensus uh on the item or not um and remember this is for a tenative budget uh there'll be opportunity to make revisions but we need to be able to
start getting this data into the state's budget system which has built into it calculations that we can't possibly project so we need to start moving on that and um and seeing where that where that takes us so just want to bring that
to everyone's attention as we move forward and um we'll start on page one uh page page one the first item and and this first grouping and I'll let you know when we uh when this changes but this first grouping we had um gone
through at the last board meeting so there's nothing new in the first grouping and I'll let you know where that break is um this first page deals with um uh closing schools elementary schools will not be open beyond 615 p.m.
meaning that um they'll close we will not need to have security cut coverage in those buildings because the buildings will close um and um if there is a need first of all uh any any uh school-based
activities let's say a PTA meeting or a Scouts meeting so forth um they will be able to have uh their meetings at one of the other three schools could be hamers Churchill the high school certainly those will be available uh with no
problem if there's uh an uh an absolute requirement to to have to have it at one of the elementary schools uh during this time when the building would normally no longer have um or be closed to public use uh then the uh costs associated with
security would uh be borne uh by the requestor so uh there are for the elementary schools each of the elementary schools is a savings of $3,841 so that is um and you'll see on the left hand side of your report uh the row
number so that's row four 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 then on row 12 one more item under security this is um um a um a position
retirement uh that will allow us uh one additional savings um at one of the schools so I would ask at this point if there are any questions all right do we have questions because we're going to do consensus sort of one section at a time all right I just had a little bit
for the public we had discussed this last year as well yes and Our Hope was to keep the buildings open especially for groups like the PTA that do so to serve the community to allow them to meet in the buildings where their children are um where they're doing so
much good work and we were able to do that last year but this year in an effort to find places to save money this seems this seems like a very simple answer to move to a more centralized
location so we all appreciate that the PTA I'm a PTA mom we all appreciate that the ptas would like to be in their home schools but this is one way to help our budget all right do we have consensus for
this is every all in favor of the first 12 those no one's in favor of the first yes all in favor of the first 12 Ros are we okay with this for the tenative yes we have one two
three just to clarify these are all the items Mark security yes okay yeah four five yes we have five there two three four L say no five oh we is not here no I didn't know when he
left um okay so we have six uh no Lou was saying you were saying no right to me yes okay um um that LE six okay okay okay moving on uh page
three uh we have row 13 14 15 16 uh are all related to um position reductions tied to
enrollments um some of this is uh at the elementaries um actually they're all at um uh at Hammer so uh the savings for each of those uh this is for four positions [Music] $95,600
for each of the uh four positions all right this is one of the ones that would be difficult to ask questions on here right well this is all um driven by a decrease in enrollment so decreases in in enrollment typically uh
would be reduced we would we would reduce the positions to go along with those decreases question uh in terms of this part of this is a special education cuts no no thank you this is um I arose 13 14
15 and 16 thank you I have a question just as a if if I may just as AER ER so um the and I I believe we talked about this at the last meeting but um the uh recommendations have all made their way
up through um the admin administrators uh school-based uh principles assistant principles supervisors um in some cases there are things that have come from various administrators uh at central office level so this was a um a collaborative
process um AC across the board you had a question yeah my question please um what kind of impact would this have on uh class sizes with the reduction of these four classes um have we looked into that at all these
positions should not have an impact on class size thank you just a clarification on the previous uh Point can you um uh tell us the lowest level um position that would have generated the uh proposals that we're
seeing here so so I mean you you listed you know a a bunch of roles in the in the administration like how far how far down does that go in terms of it would have been uh assistant principls principls
supervisors okay um all of those uh positions uh the um principles and supervisors Association worked uh as a group uh they broke down into committees um at various level s and brought back
recommendations and then there were um collaborative efforts between uh some of those uh individuals and uh we have um with a special ed uh director of special education director of secondary education director of Elementary
Education Human Resources so there were many people that were involved in even some of the other discussions you'll see as we go forward that there are discussions that impact on um class size and so um some of the
central office team were involved in those discussions with the individual schools that are affected okay and and and just this is mainly so we're on this the same page um so the assistant principal would have been the lowest ranking yes position on that okay great
thanks so any um additional questions on rows 13 through 16 just one other quick question do we uh tend to see increases in enrollment uh over the summer prior to the new Academic Year starting we see changes in enrollment
and just um and I'll explain how how enrollments are projected we do uh basically a straight line projection so the number of students that we have um in a grade level uh today get let's say
at grade um two rolls forward to grade three those currently in grade three roll forward to grade four and so forth um we see changes in enrollment almost every day there are those coming in and
then also students that are leaving um and that's held pretty pretty steady um so getting to what might change in the summer we may u the these enrollments are not all really not off from uh what the projections were from
uh our last demographic report although that those numbers are a little soft at this point um so I don't think that that should be problem a problem for us going forward all right seeking consensus all right I'm looking for
agreement and consensus on lines 13 through 16 yes we're in agreement for that okay yes and yes everyone okay everyone okay okay next uh let's look at rows 17
18 19 and 20 um these are also um uh um 17 and 18 are uh due to changes in IEPs and student needs so these POS
position there are two positions one for um in class resource resource and one for lldd uh these two position reductions are um based on uh the number of students we have in those programs so there is room just like uh we just
discussed on the um enrollment uh changes uh there's room here uh for uh those reductions uh there's also um a position a reduction as a result of combining uh programs ER with life
skills or combining a position uh from 2 to one and then um another uh resource position uh due to IEPs and uh student needs for the two positions who are
going to be combined are we sure that's not going to be um too much of a workload for the person that takes on the combined position who wants to take that so it would stay within the contract of the teacher so the workload would be the the programs change as the students move
up so what we have at Church Hill kind of a mix what was at hamers years prior so that's that position so it would be one teaching position but those students that are coming up we need less support for them okay just another quick
question on the special ed piece uh all IEP recommendations will be upheld based on this won't be any Chang any students police restri environment we've over thank you anyone
else all right which lines were those again those are 17 through 20 all right line 17 through 20 do we have consensus on this for the tentative to move forward to my left to my right yes yes we have consensus there
okay all right um lines uh rows 21 and 22 so um this uh would be to replace uh two contracted speech services individuals with two uh East
Brunswick Public School District speech therapist positions so basically going from an outsourced service to bringing it inhouse and by doing so uh this results in a savings so just to make
note uh the contracted Services go down by 28,33 and the cost for the two positions would be 19876 so that's uh pretty significant savings there um without um providing
Without Really risking services that are necessary in fact I think even improving services and without impact to our staff no no impact to our staff all right questions on that consensus we're okay here we're okay
there yes thank you and we appreciate we appreciate your patience with this process it's like this when we do it when we've done it in the past in committee it is long and arduous and we are trying to do this in the public for more transparency um but it is just like this
no matter where we do it so thank you for hanging in so next uh rows 23 and 24 these are stiens and this is uh the elimination of the summer ESL program oh sorry I thought we were a page ahead and uh just
um this was being reinstated um we did not have this last year was I believe it was all paid out of title funds so this was not something that was in the budget uh last year uh we were trying to uh provide this
service again uh for next year but just could not sustain that as you can see from the bottom line so this is to eliminate that program for the summer question um is there any alternative for those kids is there anything we can do um resources we can
look at seeing what funds are available for tutoring okay thank you Dr B how many students are participating in this program uh they usually invite the the basic beginners and the beginners so I don't know off the top of my head how many students are a level one or a level
two but I'd say maybe 100 okay okay all right consensus oh sorry and this is 100 across all grades or who would be invited to participate yeah across all grains okay thanks all right but this was not
something that was a part of our budget last year because it was funded separate okay right thank you consensus to move this forward on the tenative yes yes all right we have that thank you uh on page four row 25 these are
stiens this is uh the abolishment of Saturday detentions at the high school uh this is a recommendation that came from the high school because um it doesn't work correct Dr bushore pretty much yeah I felt like that would be one where
we would still want our high school students to hear question any questions about that um and maybe Dr bashor you can answer this uh so instead of the Saturday detention I'm assuming ISS is we can look at different options whether it is
ISS or lunch detentions see what the DAT in the building because getting the on Saturday tedious thank you thank you all right any other questions all right consensus
on line 25 over here yeah in here okay we're good on 25 okay okay um rows 26 27 and 28 are all related to fair viiew and this is the elimination
of the Fairview trip that is um um I apologize I just want to note what the amounts were so uh for transportation costs $55,000 uh for the um fees Associated uh
with with the destination $119,000 and um the offsetting um revenue for um student payments that was 72,500 any questions besides that this one sad yeah
uh just a so so this means complete we're taking the whole the whole thing away it's not even a day trip at this point yes is that um and again this is unfair to ask but I'm hoping that the future we can reconsider um at least putting in a day
program at some point you know and I think there's been um correct me if I'm wrong but um I think there's been discussion where um PTA has looked at uh potentially doing fundraising to be able to run the program so that would be
outside of the budget okay so I don't think that um removing this at this point means that it's dead altogether and that's my question right I but I I think it's too premature okay to say what that may be I would like to add to
it though that even for the ptas that is a very substantial ask I I think it is out of from from a PTA mom perspective I think it is out of the range of um what even the most aggressive PTA could
do um n none of us should have to do any of this but all right have question any other questions about about fair viiew or at least can we find some other type of experience maybe something closer maybe um just trying to figure out figure out
something else for them maybe not within this year's budget but the following year I don't know if that's that I can't answer that yes why is the transportation $55,000 that seems pretty
steep oh you're they we Charter bus up kids in groups so it's multiple charter bus trips over the course of go up in three I think three separate groups that go up so it's not just one group of students going it's three separate trips
so break that up to each of those trips you start coming up with that number we can't do that in our own buses no no our buses are already committed it's during the it's during the school week during the school day having gone to Fairview twice is a lot
of buses it is a lot of buses just uh so just on the same vein and I think uh Lori your idea is is fantastic but also maybe we can work with the town at some point try to figure out what we can maybe do with uh with the town um
because it would just seem to be a shame that these students upcoming students don't get an opportunity to do anything like that I mean I think for those who've been there it's tremendous you know and I know we all agree on that but I just want to keep that door open if we could for the future so thank you okay
I have one more thing please um in removing the Fairview trip from the budget does that give us more leeway to find these alternate Revenue sources to fund the trip um if nonprofits were to make donations PTA fundraising does that
change the scope of fundraising for us I don't think it changes the um the potential for fundraising but um it's a matter of how
much yeah I mean that that's as was already pointed out so it it's a significant amount of money yeah to follow up with that my understanding is donations to the district may not necessarily uh be able to be earmarked depending on their nature however if this were not on our budget that was
kind of my but I could be mistaken as well well um so um I don't like to use donations because um if someone is let's say granting funds to the district usually um the party would like to have
a tax benefit for that we're not a nonprofit organization so there's no tax benefit what folks have done and we've recommended is make that donation to the foundation and channel it through the foundation for what whatever it might be
and then and the foundation being a 501c3 can then the individual can then get the uh tax benefit exactly where I was going with it but I didn't want to make assumptions about organizations thank you just just for context um our last
budget crisis back in around 2010 or so uh do we have examples of programs that we lost at that time that they that we then brought back Elementary World Language oh oh that we brought back um sorry I jump too soon on that one yeah
um I nothing's jumping out at me right now okay you know it's it's um it's difficult and I think based on the the Outlook I think it's very
difficult to um commit to well we'll bring it back next year right um I certainly we would would want to keep it on the list but I think as you'll see as we get further on the list there were items that were put back
last year M that are on the list to take out okay but but then the fact that there were items on the year on the list last year that were put back says that it is possible that's basically what I'm looking for last year was stabilization
or no no we'll get there oh okay we got there I don't want to EXC I don't want to jump okay ahead um it's anything is possible but then if we we can talk about the probabilities and that's a whole other
issue um I do want to make a note just um when I had the slides up earlier so if you look to the last page of the document you know where we are on the bottom line so and you know I want to make sure that
everyone understands this so um the offsets that we have for discussion are more than the um the the Gap that we have to close right now so they're going to be choices that can be
made um but I would just recommend that let's get through the the list and then um we don't have to do it tonight but um some food for thought in terms of you know what we might want to uh
restore make sense and that actually gives us the opportunity we go through tonight but when we have a little bit of give it gives us time to go home digest and consider where the priorities need to be for the
kids so uh for rows 26 27 and 28 consensus I just want to say I I know the Fairview trip is very emotional for a lot of families um you know two of my children will have gotten to go one of my children under this will not get to
go um but it's it's a luxury item and there are things that I want to make sure we have in the classrooms for our kids besides that but that's just my point of view I'm one of nine uh consensus over here for the
temporary or the tenative here yes begrudgingly I think all of us yes okay um row 29 um this is a recommendation that came from hamers shold the elimination of student agenda
purchases that's uh $474 yeah over here and over here okay yes we have consensus for that thank you um row 30 31 and 32 these are uh non-personnel
um row 30 is the elimination of of the Naviance program for hamers shold it's not being utilized at hamers no need for it to be utilized at hamers shold that's $8,600 uh row um 31 is the elimination
of access to Naviance at Churchill um that's $9,500 and then row 32 is the elimination of um a component in canvas which is a training portal portal that um we can do without and that's
$3,700 can you clarify the difference between limiting the navian program and eliminating navian access is that really the same thing yeah great same thing same thing it's just written differently in the two R program access to the program so there
would at the high school got it I have a question yes um for the navian since we have ninth grade at Churchill yeah do we know how much they use they access or use the navian uh I mean we could definitely
look and see I don't have that miss amiro is confident that she could give that up in ninth grade and start that in 10th Grade yeah all right do we have consensus on 30 31 and 32 okay over here we're okay over here
all right yes thank you okay um so now um rows 33 34 35 36 37 and 38 these are uh
reductions in full and part-time uh teaching staff in uh grade K to four these are for elementary teacher uh specials and this is um uh possible through Revision in Elementry schedules uh that
is so I'll go through what what these uh savings are um 95603 95603 95603 32125 9 5603 and
64250 will that have can I ask Will that have impact on the students access to those classes will that change their schedule what what will change is that the uh special period now the children are getting an hour and now they will
get 45 minutes of instruction instead so that can maximize the schedule um for the the staff involved so they'll still be getting the same programming it'll just be 45 minute period instead of an hour is line
38 um it says part-time but then it says one two part-time positions oh two got it can um just as a reminder the specials is it one per day that they get
that they rotate through yes so that's basically we cutting like 15 minutes off one of the times that they get to actually not learn so they're learning no I know I know creative creatively learning yes but I feel like it's
um you know it's it's a break that I think some kids need I you know I think it's tough any other questions comments sorry um what would we do with that additional time how would that be utilized to
enrich our students they'd be with their their classroom teacher okay so that would be discretionary of the teacher to use that time thank you would that be I don't see would that be okay within the teacher schedules it fits within the teacher's
contract yet okay that's what I'm asking all right thank you anybody else did you have a question I'm sorry I feel like I cut you off okay answered the question all right all right not a fan of this one consensus over
here just hesitant I mean I think it's something that maybe we put out the riting evil it is evil over here yes us at the end the question is saying yes now
doesn't commit us at the end no it's just getting us to a tenative budget say yes yes beg begrudgingly again I feel the same way about this one yeah okay
okay I've lost with track okay we're on um now uh rows 39 and 40 uh this is the abolish of a 7th grade Science teaching position uh due to retirement and replacing position with
uh six period stiens um so the savings on the uh position is 95,3 uh incurring the six period stiens comes out to
43,4 so that's approximately a 52,000 plus um net savings do the non- teers that and and uh just to clarify this this is a position that's being uh where where someone's
retiring and we're just not refilling okay um but by creating the the sixth period it also stops us from incurring health benefits on new right new stff um it it also just the the teachers
teaching the sixth period also will get additional remuneration for doing that extra work so your existing stuff will actually make more money they'll have to work at extra period than they get paid for that sure um does uh the educational experience at for science at sth grade
suffer from that no it's current staff who would be teaching okay consensus over here okay over here yes well you okay with that one yeah
okay yes okay thank you row 41 uh this is um eliminating uh co- teaching model and honors music classes resulting in reductions in six period stiens this is at Churchill uh this is a value of
17,25 so this is not reduction of a not a staff member it's just the stien position extra period okay question all right consensus over here yes y over here we're okay with this one
okay uh row 42 um this is a double the late in and early out option for eligible 12th grader and 12th grade seniors which results in a reduction of three six period stiens the value is 2,884 I'm trying to figure out how that works
that's the reduction of offering of some electives yes yes okay sorry Hi I know based on senior schedules eligible seniors have already met all their graduation requirements and they're most likely taking additional electives by
having the double early out or late in it opens up seats for underclass so Poss at least so Dr bour I hate to put you on the spot but I invite you to come and take a seat up front because I'm sure
there will be other questions on other items that you may have to uh help with responses that's not [Laughter] upfront as always we need to move the
Bears thank you okay do we have a consensus on that I'm sorry a consensus on that yes over here says like getting rid of Saturday detention seniors everywhere feel
happy okay um so this next I'll take the um rows 43 44 and 45 together um these are all six period
stiens the first one is the elimination of six period stiens for elective classes for core content areas uh which would be Ela Math Science History unless it's absolutely needed in order to optimize scheduling
that's at the high school well all of these are at the high school that uh dollar amount is $69,500 908 but that's no reduction in staff positions just the sixth period okay any questions about that what are the
Spanish electives currently that would be dropped I know this go for it I'm going to assume they're the senior Spanish electives for people that aren't choosing to take the advanced placement class which would be Spanish for medicine and Spanish for business Dr
bash thank you if I can I just want to commend the district for offering things like that um Having learned Spanish and using it daily because of the skills I learned here um it's great that we have language and um this one really hurts me
too consensus all right I'm still being amazed that I knew something about Spanish but consensus over here yes okay over here all right we are moving along all right uh next uh rows 46 47
and 48 now this is the elimination of ninth grade Athletic program ninth grade not Middle School sports doesn't matter I'm I'm so 66,800
for coaches $896 for The related officials fees and $36,800 for transportation so to put this in terms
that I can understand um uh this means we won't have freshman sports teams but we will still have JV and and varsity teams ninth grade would um participate in JV they would try out for teams and be able to participate at that l so just
basically no separate freshman correct yeah thanks right so I have a question um so before we had talked about taking navian away from the Freshman understand if the supervisor of
guidance feels that's appropriate that's fine uh at this point now we're looking at taking away all freshman Sports now for those kids in order for those multitude and I do believe we're
talking about hundreds of kids for those kids to to go to the high school they're going to need Transportation has that been factored into here as well transportation we already have shuttles buils into the budg into the budet not for enough for all those kids to go because I know in the past we haven't always had enough I'm pretty sure but
we'll double check do we know how many ninth graders currently play sports this on the Freshman teams yeah how many play sports like on freshman like how many are like how many do we have on freshman teams Malta is not here tonight but I would say it's in the
hundreds I would say very good percentage of our kids at least try out and they use freshman Sports as they do middle school to see if they like something and we have phenomenal coaches and uh a principal who welcomes the after school activity that's there uh
and it's really made it uh kind of like what you see at the high school where you see kids hanging out because they want to be there after school in the posit and I know you I think you and I have had had many discussions on you know I'm I don't know if there's anything else I can say I think this is a hard
one do we know the competition like are there other that's what I was going to ask I I know having had uh freshman athletes that not every school Field's a freshman team but I don't know how deep that goes exent excellent point we don't
have a problem Fielding any freshman team right but they don't always always have competition when we there's enough competition in the county that we can have a schedule so as some of us recommend Ed reduce the schedule but continue to have all these Sports so instead of playing 25 games maybe you
play 15 or 20 but you're still with your coach every day you're still with your program you're still being supervised and you still get a chance to do what you love is there a possibility for a reduced schedule could that be something that's on been recommended A reduced
ninth grade sports schedule also or capping teams like I hate to say that but maybe capping teams like I I I know them we're set it like the same like we want to give everybody the opportunity I I I totally agree but what if like what
other thoughts can we think of outside the box to kind of be like how do we sustain this right because then we have to think about sustainability because we say okay it's not on the table this year but we know going forward that we're going to be cut possibly three up to 3% again next year so how do we look at
sustainability to keep these teams or anything that's not always comes up up on the chopping block and we're in the same way so maybe if it's not um you know like you said condensed you know schedule when it comes to teams um maybe
they participate at the same and I'm I just know like JV and varsity a lot of times they travel together to their games JB goes and then the varsity goes after so is there the opportunity I know them were're extending nights but what are other thoughts or options regarding
this well when we add the Freshman we we add the number of buses we add the number of buses I mean if you look at the cost here and I'm looking at it too I I'm a big Sports parent so this one is difficult for me um but it's the
transportation is a large number the officials is not a terribly large number you know one of the things that we've talked about 46 is and the coaching is the big number yeah well we've also talked about
possibly raising fees for athletics um we haven't gotten there yet it's on the list I just want to make sure that that's also part of any conversation with cutting any sport it's on the list or activities thank you is there a freshman sport for every sport that's at
the jvan varsity level no no no okay all right I don't know that we have consensus on this one I don't think that we do no this is no okay I I would prefer
that I would say no and I would like to go in further with what L said and see if there's any way we can um you know do a reduction in the number of games to keep something for the kids I I understand
that I do think when you when you look at the numbers and I do not wish to get rid of freshman sports but when you look at the numbers the largest amount there is for coaching right which doesn't change I think um I think you know the coaching stiens
are going to be paid regardless so the the potential would be um uh reduction in transportation cost by reducing the number of game games away games not home games so it I I mean
maybe the stiens are different from when I was working but they they were uh some of them were based on the number of hours so if if there was a a stipend that you know instead of a 40-hour stipend or what you know if it was cut
down to a 20 hour stien I I don't know if we have our Union pres are not the same as what I wasn't sure for the advisers they're not the same it's different okay another recommendation that also kind of of feeds into this is a a recommendation
was made that we Tred to host more games which would also take away some of some of our competitors don't have as good of you know fields that we have or or you know um facilities so to have potentially request and I I think Mr
Malta um would probably have no problem doing this asking some of those schools if they'd like to come to see us so maybe if we reduce schedule to 15 to 20 games and you can get 12 of those games at home there's another big reduction on on Transportation coaching sell you know
and again I I don't want to get too far into this these people put so much more time in they get paid we can't there's no way to reduce to reduce any of this is almost a slap in the face and I appreciate listen I get where you're coming from and I thank you Dr BR um but
I I would just hate to see us give them even less money for doing so much for our community yeah it doesn't that when you look at the coaching stiens for the hours it's insane as it is the amount of heart and effort they
put in there y all right sorry I I just want to go back to um a question I asked a while ago again just for the sake of clarity and transparency this proposition came from Churchill given that it's the ninth grade correct this came from the suggest yeah yeah this
came from the um from The Churchill team uh and the athletic director right so so it went through the athletic director as well before it got to us all right okay so let me just clarify that if I can um I would assume that we approached the
school and the athletic director and asked for cuts that had to be made and I would guess that you were probably told I would only think just from all these discussions we've had for many years that if we had to cut something which is a bad way to start a conversation so I
think if you said if you had to cut something ninth grade would be on the table I still disagree with it all right we do not have consensus on Ninth Grade Sports so okay um rows 49 and
50 uh this is Graduation transportation um students uh and their parents would be responsible for getting students to graduation um and the same thing same would hold true for staff having to get themselves over to graduation so the transportation
graduation is 34,500 U that would be offset by having to pay mileage for staff to get themselves to and fro and that's approximately $2,600 I have a question on this um what is the fee that we pay for the
arena that we are in for the three hours we're there about approximately I know it's it's I'm not again I don't mean to put you on the spot Mr Juliana but I'm just trying to a second trying to figure it I recall last year you guys looked at the cost of setting it up outside it it cost
more to do it it cost more to do it here R all the chairs chairs are that expensive wanted to do that to do it at the stadium was more when we got into the costs to do it here so um covered
stage um you need protect on the field because you can't just put the chairs on the field um rental the chairs it all came out to a significant amount more than uh it did to continue to go to the
arena so can may I just make a a recommendation then for the future um maybe we look at a different Outlets I know ruter does graduations I don't know again some of these the schools that are already probably already going there have the premium dates but I do think if
we're talking about um you know saving money on graduation we want our kids to have a great experience um you know that's why I thought doing it at home is is it was you know very nice a couple years ago but I know weather and all that has to come into it as well but if it's a cost savings if there's any way we can at
least have it on paper somewhere that says well we've looked at these other places and we're getting the best deal best bang for our buck that's all I'm looking for graduation facility $199,000 okay all right do we have consensus just about the Graduation
transportation yeah yes okay thank you okay um rows 51 52 and 53 uh these are uh discontinuing lake buses at Churchill $199,300
discontinuing late late buses at the high school $181,800 so I'll clarify that this because I I think people will hear that and get concerned this is not the activity buses to the high school no these are just
leate buses yes okay and I think um there's conversation regarding um at hamers shold moving uh those clubs and activities to the morning so that kids would be able to participate in those in the morning rather than not do anything
at the end of the day if the late buses weren't there how many kids do we think this may impact I don't have that number off the top of my head um do we we have any opportunity for alternate Transportation then for families who may have need
because I know that this is a valuable resource for working parents not that we would provide no and this this was there last year um I I appreciate the movement of activities at
hammeri to the morning um I personally struggle a great deal with discontinuing late buses at the high school in Churchill and I would ask that that be something that's like a last resort because I think it's um it creates inequity and access to clubs and
activities for some children but that's just me any other questions thoughts there is there room to uh uh any cost savings by um reducing the number of uh buses I'm
relatively sure not come all packed um or combining routs so that one bus cover I mean it would be a longer trip for the kids but could cut back on a number of buses that way we've divided the the town into six zones um just to try and
and we've done this for a number of years and that's to make sure that students get close to home in a reasonable amount of time this is not door-to-door Service uh there are key areas where students are uh dro dropped off
um I I I I don't know I can't speak to you know dividing up you know going from six zones to to five to four to three um I think we take that cost and and just divide it up and I don't know that we're
necessarily going to get anything out of that uh to president gu's Point um I do think that does um especially at the High School level may lead to some um opportunities lost for some of our
kids that that may need clubs or activities to put on their resumés for college so I I would hope we can um factor that one out while we're voting I would like to see the the high school um late
buses potentially not be on this chopping block at this point just for those kids who may need those extra components for their uh for their colleges and for the point of just the public in general this is not about Athletics the students that
are playing sports are not riding these late buses they get out much later as a sports mom much later this is just clubs and activities they they sure do um I mean I'm in the same place I was last year I
I voted with a great hesitation to put that as a reduction on the tentative budget because it is a very large amount of money that is not cutting people from the classrooms for our students but it was one of my
priorities personally to get back when we had the opportunity to try to bring back but that's my point of view Justin looking at the numbers uh the difference of the offsets of discussion and shortfall are approximately 600 almost 600
$70,000 this busing we're discussing is over 400,000 just to give relative perspective of how much wiggle room we have I'm not saying I agree or disagree it's just a statement of numbers all right do we have consensus on
this I mean I I would be more willing to uh eliminate buses at the do we want to do a grade by grade that would that would just fit me me personally have consensus on Hughes yes okay we have consensus on
Hughes to have consensus on Church Hill hold on I'm sorry all right that was hammerel consensus was a that was a yes yes thank you do to a consensus on Churchill yes to yes yes okay we have consensus on
Church do we have consensus on the high school no we do not have a consensus on the high school I'm just keeping a little tally here on the side so I mean obviously these are hard hard decisions hard
discussions and hard decisions I really appreciate the thoroughness of the discussion here because this has always been well we haven't always had to do this but last year this was horrible but this is even harder in this format so um you know we have as I said
earlier we have a little bit of a buffer um that was about $669,000 um so far we've taken almost half of that so just so everyone's aware okay okay um 54 row
54 um 54 is a reduction to bus driver schedules from 8 hours to 7 hours a day and we said that didn't have any impact on the actual bus routes no for the students does that affect um they're still considered fulltime employees
fulltime with benefits with Benefits okay but it would be salaries would be based on a 7h hour day and that is um $264,400 [Music] routes are based on our buses okay uh
but we should still be able to do that thank you or I should say that because the consensus was to reduce but it's not that's extra it's extra on their schedules so so in theory and again I
I'm not I don't want to pin you down but we were talking about the high school and having still continuation of buses there the the but the you there are no us they're contracted services but they don't have to be if we're not the Ed the buses that would go to use don't go to
use anymore right because those are our buses depends on the schedule gotcha all right I just want to make sure that the hamers schedule is different than the high school buses are over for the drivers so that would mean we couldn't red well I get it's beyond beyond beyond
the regular work day so that would be a different number and right and the high school lake buses run when elementary students are being bused home so we can't use our drivers to do that right that that's understandable okay thank
you so 54 54 do we have consensus on reducing the length of the day yes yes we are good for that yes okay all right uh row 55 and well we'll keep take them
individually row 55 is um discontinuing uh absorbing the credit card fees for online payments uh so that would um that fee would be incurred by the credit card
holder that's worth about $120,000 are parents able to come in and pay with a check rather than paying online with a credit card the registration all has to be done online okay can you use a debit card I think if you use a debit card there's no fee it's
a lower transactional Fe okay there still but there's still a fee okay okay how long has the district been absorbing that fee a number of years long time since we put in the online community
pass all right questions or consensus on that lots of restaurants have enough charge yeah consensus sadly yes okay um next one will not be a popular one but um this is also uh related to fees this is is increasing
the fees for clubs uh activities in athletics uh to uh $30 and $125 respectively um and that is um that calculates out to
$191,700 you share the current rates current rates currently Athletics are $50 yeah yeah and clubs are are 15 and how long has it been that those years about 15 years so when you look at
it that way it does seem like there's there's some room one other concern that has come up before is families with multiple children um and I think maybe at some point we could talk about capping we we tried looking at that and it it doesn't work but we can talk further about all right I'd like to talk
a little bit further about that's thank you and then um how much like if you were to raise these fees how much then would it cover of the stiens for these a after school clubs would you raise the number of kids necessary to be enrolled
in a club in order to run a club no no it's the same um the same numbers we haven't looked at raising the number of students that need to participate in each of those um this is based off of um the participation rates that um uh that
we've been able to document is there a um opportunity for people who don't meet a certain income threshold yes uh we we already have free and reduced uh and those uh students do not pay okay all
right sorry I'm taking the deep breath on that number as you with multiple children playing in multiple Seasons that's a lot but I understand the need 15 years with no increase is a very long time do you have consensus on this side for
this Wilber are you okay with this one I'm just looking up something really quick we'll be back to Wilbur in a moment over here consensus all right back to Wilbur yes okay all right
[Music] um row 57 and 58 are non-personnel non-transportation non-athletic uh these are um elimination of a uh the staff management portion of Genesis uh the Genesis contract that's
worth $562 uh we're going to uh look at doing that in an alternate means correct and um the uh next one is the elimination of the Oracle licensing fees
that is uh the database and we're going to do that through a different database process inh house that's $2,431 so are we okay with that over here that should be an easy one yes we feel that is an
easy one next one's L okay um row 59 we'll take that one on its own um the budget had um the budget bottom line has included in it uh two
new um bcba positions that were requested from the special ed Department um the department has come back and said that the department can remain in compliance with only one of those and that the second one can be
removed from the budget so this is removing the second one from the budget uh that's worth $99,500 it's it's it's good that compliance is being maintained how about the workload well this is right now we have two this is going up an additional position so
actually more kids will be serviced next year okay yeah so instead of four we'll have three but it's still one more than we have this year correct okay just want to make sure the math fits for everybody that's a big deal that's the only reason why I'm saying yes to yes absolutely yeah but we've been Outsourcing some of
the going through like another budget line because we've had so many but we're still able to do that with the third vcda and then hopefully down the line you know we would to go back and all right consensus on this okay
with this okay with this we're good with that okay okay row 60 61 62 and 63 so I'm going to start out with row 60 but let me get through row 63 before
there's any reaction okay um so row 60 is the elimination of contracted therapeutic Mental Health Services that would be replaced with three dedicated 10mon
Student Assistance specialist positions uh this has come from the administrators who are boots on the ground with this so the reduction in the contracted uh services is
$472,500 and then each of the three uh positions that would be created to provide this service um would come in at 102,000
863 the saving about7 saving yeah saving about7 are are the positions being eliminated those are outsourced position outour okay and the and the replacement is that inhouse or it would be inhouse we'd be filling those positions with new people all for inh housing things
whenever possible yeah especially with our own people um which is what we used to do is that correct before we contracted out not with the mental health services so with this particular move um I just want to make sure so you're eliminating the positions from
the contracted now in terms normally the contracted uh services are more stringent in terms of how many kids that they can service and we have a little more flexibility but we still want to make sure we do the job so
I want to make sure that this will handle the student because I I'm not and I know none of us here want to see any mental health reduction but when you say our own people that makes me very excited about the possibilities this should actually improve that's what I
want because um one of the issues that um that the district has experienced is that we seem to have become a training ground for the contracted services so the people come in they train they learn what they're doing and then they leave
so uh we have this revolving door yeah um Hiring Our Own staff should eliminate that revolving door issue and be able to provide addition a better level of service continuity of care would is far better in these situations than getting
the Dock of the day and I always believe in our own staff more than outside in terms of licensure it's it's an equal trade the people coming in would have the same level of lure as the ones going out social workers they have different types of licenses that they're
hiring through the um outside the contractor providers and they're brand new so the ones that they're bringing to interview with us they're you know wet behind the ears and we start giving them scenarios and they're having a very difficult time answering the questions that we're giving them and our people
you know are a little more seasoned you you don't get better than know employee that's so it sounds like addition by subtraction yeah and again the continuity of care outweighs the licensing thing I can tell you that absolutely thank
you all right consensus on that we're good yes we're good we are good there okay line 64 so um we can take let's take 64 and
65 okay uh 64 is um affects uh grade seven to eight band in Orchestra and 65 is grades 5 through six band and Orchestra uh this is the elimination of the co- teing model model uh in both
instances uh these are positions and the dollar value is for the first $223,300 will be no effect to students other than the fact that there'll be bigger classes to deal with which is a which is a
factor right you know I mean that is definitely a concern yeah what's the um maximum number of students a teacher can have by themselves well currently our policy is 25 okay that's also
SOI it's not codified in the law it's not codified in the law well unless you're talking about like room space which we're not talking the only thing that's cified excuse me the only thing that's cified in terms of students is uh self-contained special education okay
okay because just realize I mean obviously I'm biased because I taught at Churchill I taught Churchill Orchestra um you know and I had classes of over 40 I think I had a class of 50 now I can't imagine how in the world one
teacher could handle a class of 50 and I want you to to think about this too um you're talking about 500 kids at hamers shold who are in the Bandon Orchestra program and the same at Churchill about
500 kids in Bandon Orchestra so that's an awful lot of kids for one sta or you know two staff members to handle I don't I don't see how that is possible knowing the program can I ask can we get numbers
on these class prospective numbers in other words um how much how many kids are in these classes now and if the similar number will be in those classes next year if we can do that at some point making a note of that I think that would help us to make any decisions on
the co- teing model because I do understand and agree with you it's difficult at I mean I I went to their concerts so I saw I count you know because I'm always a numbers person I counted up how many kids are participating I mean a great program it's amazing right 500 kids got love it
in one school and this really does tie into I know you said we were're going to stop at 65 but this also ties into 66 which is eliminating fourth grade band and Orchestra and again you're talking um you know off the top of my
head 475 475 kids participating in that program in fourth grade that's like the size of an elementary school now instead of throwing out the baby with the bath water which is kind
of what this looks like was there any thought given to eliminating some of the after school stiens I mean I know it's not the same but you do have a District Band concert which involves teacher stiens you have a district Orchestra
which involves a number of stiens um and then the corresponding concerts um you know you have after school uh band in Orchestra and jazz band at Hughes and at Church Hill um at the high school there
are after school um you have an after school jazz band you have you know various Coral programs instead of eliminating teacher positions where you're you're basically
destroying a program by eliminating that many staff members I would rather see um the stipended positions uh eliminated or reduced um to at least accommodate the
children during the school day this I'm a devil's advocate a little bit sure the and I'm sorry because we were trying to stay with just 64 and 65 but if you look at the final column the numbers on those three rows in that final column just and
it's not a just but on the orchestra programs alone would more than eat the entire little bit of wiggle room that we have that would that would be all of it so Orchestra would mean it would be impossible to try to work with busing
for more access for other children or sports that people are saying is a priority it would be a very focusing of just one priority and I I do believe in music for children um I think it's a developmental part of
the brain that they need to have access to but we're not talking about getting rid of fifth and sixth and seventh and eth grade it it is a change in staff but stipended positions aren't going to also eliminate health benefits which is I mean that's that final column that's a
lot of money there just to put in perspective those three items are 800 about $87,000 this stiens and I I I understand um what what you're saying but stiens wouldn't come to I they wouldn't come to
a tenth of of that but the seven fifth and sixth and seventh and eth is not to get rid of the program it it definitely will create challenges but it's trying to maintain the program right so it would you would go from well I again I'm just because I
just did did it adding in you would go from to from the elementary you would go from 13 and a half staff down to five did I do that math right you go from 13 this is church uh Churchill
hamers shold and Elementary music which is for teaching positions so 13.5 teachers currently to five and you're servicing approximately 1,500 kids now with five teachers
I I don't see how that's possible well I guess with the fourth grade elimination that the the students wouldn't be serviced it would be oh yeah you're right so you you currently have a thousand
students between Churchill and hamers because there's about 500 in each here talk about that all right can we work to try to separate them a little bit can we work on 64 and 65 before we get to 66 I just have one remark actually about
uh 64 and 65 um there were no co-teachers when I was in the orchestra here in the 9s when did we uh bring in the co- teing model for the orchestra because I remember maybe 10 years ago it's not hasn't even been that long the the
reason that we ended up with two teachers and this CA this was uh when I was teaching because I had over 40 kids in a class and you know by the I mean you think about it 40 I think the highest I had was 52 something
ridiculous like that by myself which is you know impossible to manage which is why these extra positions were added and you think about the fact that these are elective classes they're servicing an awful lot of kids you have to have someplace for the kids to go for
electives and here you're able to accommodate that many um you know 500 and hamers shold between the band and Orchestra and the same thing at Churchill so that's that's a place where I don't think you could you could run I don't see how you could run the program
with the numbers that we currently have and the large the uh number of I mean the the class sizes you know and at Churchill they run orchestras every single period so just again if if we can get
numbers on what currently is is being done because I want to make sure we're not looking at 50 in one class and 35 and another I mean presently no I know and then also what the projections would be because I agree with you Dr Brown I mean I I don't understand you know how
we can would be able to really service all of our kids you're looking at the ratios current to proposed yes that's what we need all right thank you I'm just surprised that you didn't have those that like you didn't have those numbers I'm gonna ask where did
those numbers or these recommendations these came up from that department I'm not okay I'm sorry there's a list somewhere with notes of who gave what but I don't have it in okay all right on 64 and 65 do we have
consent on this then over here we are waiting I think we are waiting for more information I'm looking see if I have um if I have that information okay if I do I'm happy to share it with you if I
don't uh no I do not I have to go back to some other notes I mean I do have the orchestra numbers do you want me to read them off um or would you prefer to get them yeah let us do that okay perfect okay so uh where did we stand on this
one uh no consensus on 64 and 65 okay uh row 66 is uh the elimination of uh four teaching positions related to fourth grade Orchestra and band uh this was originally slated for reduction in the fiscal 25 budget uh but received a
one-year reprieve uh this item is $382,400 so just in terms of the number of students that participate in fourth grade um uh m music um last time I checked it was 75% of the students is that still true okay um so we've been
talking and and I'm not trying to pit one program against another but we've been talking about the number of kids serviced by these programs I found it very hard to justify eliminating a program that um 34s of the fourth grade participate in um in addition from a
developmental standpoint getting music in at this age is critical if these kids are going to have any um any chance at um PS pursuing this long term you can't just push this off to fifth uh fifth grade it doesn't work it doesn't work
that way um so I have a hard time with this one may I also just so I would like to know that I know you mentioned 75% I want to know what the number of students total um not the percentage the number
of total and if we can get it breakdown by each school um I think we need to look at this one again this This concerns me as well I think this is the you know the beginning of the love of of learning music and I get it listen I know these are all tough
but I I mean if these are our babies and I just think we we need to do better and then of course the other issue is the way that the program works is that when they're going up into fifth grade they have an elective class so that's where
you're getting you know 30 I I think my classroom I could fit 39 kids um in my classroom when I was at hamers shold um so you can't have 39 beginners it at one time so the whole
idea is when they're starting in fourth grade you're they're learning in small groups it's pullout program so that they play for a year before they get to hamers shold and this is please just because I I don't know the answer so I'm
asking so this is all happening during the school day yes okay now has there been okay oh I'm so sorry no I mean there's an after school component okay um because what happens is you have kids from all eight elementary schools all
the orchestra kids rehearse for um I don't remember how many weeks so 10 weeks all fourth grade all the fourth grade get together do that fill the stage may I for a moment I've seen them perform I just didn't know what may I just for a moment if we are looking
at as a group not touching 64 65 and 66 we are not making the budget we are just not um if we are looking at the costs we talked about earlier keeping for
sports which was 101,000 this was so right now um we've had no consensus uh on the n9th grade Athletics um and then the um High School
uh late buses okay so if we were going to keep our no consensus on Ninth Grade Athletics and the high school late buses which allows our students to have equal access or more greater access and if we were willing to do the
reduction on seventh and eighth grade band staff and fifth and sixth grade Bandon Orchestra staff then potentially we would be able to keep fourth grade Orchestra correct so
but we cannot even even if we get rid of if we say fine get rid of ninth grade Sports get rid of late buses I don't think we have the wiggle room to keep all three of these and make our budget at all so that's what I this
is just yeah and I I love these programs because these are rich and these have developed over the years but we can't just that one block of all those orchestras we can't keep it the way it is so what I'm asking um president gooss
is if we can look to modify but not you know take him out is what I guess I'm I'm asking and I don't that's why you know if you're telling me the kids go every day to a class is there a way to not have it be every day every other day so maybe that even helps us
maybe reducing it kind of like what I said with sports if we can reduce the program but not eliminate it still saving some money and and maybe have you know traveling teachers to the different schools and instead of having it every other day well that's the way the elective program works so it would be
whatever think out of the box what I'm saying with these numbers though is if we were willing to have consensus on for the tentative eliminating the co- teing model at fifth and sixth and seventh and eth it would stop us from being able to save anything
else moving forward but we could keep fourth grade Orchestra so okay um so that would be line 6465 you're saying 6465 we would need to have consensus on uh and then 66 can potentially come off
so so basically what I'm hearing is that we would not be reducing program then but we would be making class size quite large which could would be a problem I mean there are times when it will be an issue but we're would be able to save fourth grade but we'd be able to save
fourth grade potentially and and and the thing is I mean you really need those numbers without the numbers in front of you you know maybe you could get away with two you know one and a half teachers I don't know I mean you have to look at those numbers but you the way it
is right now yeah for um eliminating the the code teaching model do we actually lose teachers yeah yeah yeah of course you're you're losing 8.5 teachers if you look at I'm leaving out the uh grade four just just five six seven eight
that's so that's four and a half teachers yeah four and a half teachers I would I would just ask if we could possibly revisit this after we get all the numbers in because I do agree with Dr Brown I think we need the numbers um and if we can potentially be Crea
we can make sure we can you know keep programs and it may mean that class sizes were going to be big but it's possible that the bigger class sizes maybe can get some kind of relief I'm not sure but we'd have to look at everything just my concern is that the board understands that if we are not
willing to do anything with line 64 65 and 66 that we are making a decision that everything else in here that says it has to be cut being cut has to be cut and we have to go find something else to cut because that puts us over the wiggle
room that we had which means getting rid of busing getting rid of like we're you know you're trading and it's a painful trade but we're talking about if we want to save all of this Orchestra exactly as it is getting rid of ninth grade
Athletics just like that well I think what we're saying I I know I'm saying is I'd like to see all the numbers before we make a decision on any of those programs um with the understanding that if if it has to get to the point where they're bigger class sizes but we can possibly save fourth grade I think
that's can I make a reasonable yes please so since you know ultimately we've got to get all this data into the budget system and our next meeting is the tenative budget adoption can I make a suggestion that we
take a consensus reverse a consensus on 6465 for the time being doesn't mean it's done but it allows us to at least get the budget in a tentative place for approval and then we can in the meantime
we'll gather the data that that has been requested and additional conversations can take place because they continue to work on the numbers every time I talk to them they are still working on the numbers that evolves every day but if we if we don't come to some
consensus here understood we have no ten bu understand all right so again let us go back to 64 and 65 can I have consensus just on 64 and 65 are we yes discuss later more yes yep
and over here okay no no no okay well let me ask a question first okay um quick calculation um the music program is going to save us a total with the proposals that are here the music
program is going to save us close to $900,000 right I don't see any other sector of the budget giving up that saving us that much so why is it that we're looking at the music program to S to save us an outsized chunk of of
budget money well we were just talking about just now only 64 and 65 sure but I but I'd like to know how how Okay so 64 and 65 combined that's uh what 420,000 again that that seems like an
outsized number compared to um the the other uh areas that we've been looking at in the budget because you're looking at positions I understand we're looking at I understand we're looking at positions but it we still have another page go the
other page has some very large numbers on it that are taking can we come back can we come back to this only because you know it's I'm looking at this it's like a blood bath you know how many more staff are we losing right in the other areas could
could we just table this temporarily and come back all right why don't we move on um we can do that we can do that and uh we'll come back to 64 through 66 67 so 67 uh reduction of one PE teacher
at hamers this is due to enrollment questions no consensus over here over here yeah okay 68 this is the reduction of six period assignments associated with increased
class sizes in social studies math English and science this is at Churchill this came from uh Churchill Junior High School the administration this is not a reduction in staff this is a reduction
in the sixth period stif and it's uh increases in class size I do not recall what the what the Benchmark was for that um 28 26 to 28 where is it currently 26 no the range
would be from 26 to 282 22 24 is right now I'm gonna say as a as an English teacher who's done that kind of increase you feel it you absolutely feel it but
at the same time those increases save staff and I want to save staff all right we're good over here we're okay over here okay okay all right um
69 69 is for hamers shold and it's revising the hamers shold school schedule to align with the K4 model this results in the reduction of 10 teaching positions $956,000 could you explain a little bit more um
how that would work and and excuse me could you please keep the conversation down if you need to have a conversation take it outside because it's distracting as we're trying to talk up here thank you um this proposal would uh mimic the
K to4 schedule so um in K four the children have one special a day so that would be the model at hamers shold um it would eliminate the A and B Day schedule it would just
be you know the one regular schedule the language arts and social studies teacher would have the children half the day the math science teacher would have them the other half the day they would have a lunch period and they would have a special period uh with this all of the cycle
topic and most of the elective topics will be maintained and they will be the specials it also um reduces the um World Language offering so that the children would select their World Language and
start level one in seventh grade now we've heard a lot from parents that their children for graduation requirements are having to take higher and higher and higher levels once they're in high school and um it's very rigorous for them also we've heard about
the transition to hamers shold and you know mimicking what they're experiencing in elementary school could ease that transition uh for the students um so again the the students would have
that one prep a day that one special area a day like they have in fourth grade that's what the fifth graders would have and we would keep the cycle so the topics of the Cycles so they'd have two pees a week as mandated they'd have
the stem for half the year and the computers in the classroom for half the year they'd have French or Spanish say one day a week music and movement and art half of the year half of the Year sixth graders would have two pees a stem
half the year coating half the year of Spanish French one day a week and then the theater and family consumer science for half the year so so I just have a quick question on that and I appreciate Dr bully your your um giving us that uh so what are
they losing basically if you said what's what's the main difference for the public to say okay if we were to say yes to this what's the main difference and and and and then I want to piggyback that on asking because you mentioned how the transition would be easier from elementary to the Upper Elementary but
how will that affect transition from from upper Elementary to Churchill so now the children have um a cycle and an elective so one day on a day they have their cycle on b day they have their elective and they also have to commit to
a world language in fifth grade so by the time they get to you know most colleges want to see three years of the same language so by the time they get to 9th 10th 11th grade they're in level six and we've heard a lot of complaints from parents about the rigor of that um so so
in elementary school the children have one special a day they go to Art they go to music they have PE so this would mimic that schedule and make it an easier transition for them coming in and also they would have more of a an exposure to World Language they wouldn't
be committing to their World Language until seventh grade so that would level down a little bit the rigor of high school for that okay so um but then their transition may be a little bit harder going into Churchill because they're so used to the elementary model
when they hit seventh grade well perhaps they would have that opportunity for that elective in the T when they're in the TCU which is a self-contained environment um for now for now right um more mature yeah they are and I would
say the programming is could be maintained in this structure you know this the courses that are being offered are pretty much identical to what is offered now um if wouldn't be the full year it would be half a year half a year to have that
exposure um okay thank you Dr BDI appreciate that okay so just just so that I understand so you're eliminating electives like like you can have a a a f Year Art elective that
wouldn't happen anymore because you would have to have a cycle it would be half a year it would be it would be linked with the music and movement so half a year they would have that and the other half of the year they would have the art and where would I'm just throwing it out where would band and
Orchestra fall how would that work I guess it would it would look like the fourth grade model which is which is pull out so there would be no band and Orchestra
elective anymore at Hughes just to broaden that can you be more specific as to which 10 positions I mean I know we're not talking about people but departments or can we not get there in Open Session I would
hesitate right only because it can be easy violates rights that's not okay how many days a week are children currently um in that fifth and sixth grade receiving foreign language instruction um every other day Okay um I
the reason I ask is because there is a critical learning opportunity for language um and having children commit later will delay their ability to learn fluency in my opinion thank you any other
questions I have one more question if we did not uh revise for um the item if we did not go with a K4 model um to reduce the teaching positions have we explored alternate means of um how having electives which may reduce less
positions less offerings yes less offerings but we still maintain some of the Educators um so that there is proper support for our teachers and um students have their best opportunities inad of cyes but that's
theing issue is who wants what right in an effort to maximize uh staff schedules when the students have so many you know five choices of word languages five Cho you know multiple choices of electives sure some of the classes are small so in an
effort to maximize scheduling this model was looked at please at Church Hill um you're in mixed grade levels right so if an elective is being offered three grade levels worth of children can go in there so it's pretty easy to fill class at
Hammer really the electives have been grade level specific so if you're thinking about one particular elective that students are choosing across a variety of them we've had a difficult time kind of filling those class too many offerings significant imbalance in
how big those class sizes are compared to the you know everywhere else really in the schools so reducing then the course offerings um and streamlining this it as opposed to an All or Nothing is that something that still can be
explored it's just a matter of where you would put it in the schedule so that's what we have now is we could do electives instead of Cycles right we could do one or the other um but you're not going to reduce this number ofers because you want to have a lot of options for them so you're not forcing
them into something that they don't want to take for the entire understood sorry thank you anyone else have more questions or thoughts I I've kind of lost track um Mr Juliana can you give me like an exact
number of teaching staff positions that you're looking to cut on all of these Pages What's the total number I don't have the total I don't have the total struck on this document I can do that after yeah I'm it seems like an awful
lot it is I mean that's crazy not just does it seem it is yeah I'm not seeing and maybe that maybe it's not on here because of um you know rice I'm not seeing any administrative
Cuts I'm not seeing any you know salary freezes administratively it's all everything is coming from the teachers union I just want to make sure I'm reading this correctly we can't
discuss yeah I know we can't discuss Personnel issues here we have more of the budget that we have to discuss in close Okay so he can't answer that question without violating anyone's rights well but I think the the issue is
there are additional cuts that could be made that are administrative that we just aren't going to be able to talk about here in public right but they're not is part of right they are part of the overall list and they are reflected in that total
that I provided early on included in that this number includes things that will be discussed and closed I think it's important public the things that we will discuss are not an additional it's not a buffer buffer to
this it's with this anyone else questions well for purposes of attentative budget we're going to need to have consensus on the remainder of these items um because otherwise we don't have uh we won't have be even close to a balanced budget so just a
reminder that um that further conversations can be had on anything um this is not the end um and we have questions that you know additional information uh will need to be forthcoming and look I acknowledge
none of this is right anything that anybody would want to be looking at so I think the important part of this is that if we uh agree tonight it's agreement but with the understanding we want to look more into it but we do need to do
something towards closing the Gap yeah he's keeping up there's a list that's been evolving over here on the pad in front of me of questions that we're asking for more information on that's not just getting brushed aside we just can't get that right now all right I
need to ask for number 69 do we have consensus on this is a very large item Jamie how are we doing I I can't say yes if it's cutting foreign language but I understand that then our math is over
so I don't know that I have a choice but to say yes for further consideration but with the hopes that we can find a solution see over here I feel the same I I think this is another one that is is very difficult
because you're talking about reducing teacher positions and we're talking about again affecting cues which we've yeah try to Y stay away from affecting that although I do think that there's points to where this could be a better
transition model because yes we we hear repeatedly about the transition to use um I think it's it's still a lot yeah it sounds like maybe if I heard you correctly this has implications on programming that would then be
eradicated as well right like I'm I'm I mean just on this page I'm looking at 28 teaching staff can we stay focused on the line please really because we have other things to go through and sorry if we discuss the budget all over the place
um it it will legitimately be Tuesday okay sor sorry I it's we're sorry this is this is the way it is when we have cuts and there's I mean except for looking at things where
it's like okay can we get rid of this computer program how much do we need it it's it's real it's real children and it's real people and it's real opportunities that we're changing and it's it's always awful but we kind of
need to get consensus and figure out what we're doing here I think it's also important to remember that um like these aren't C any any of us want to said up and make but we run the issue of if we can't come to an agreement on something and at some
point submit a balanced budget then we're basically telling the county and the state that they then have authority over that and I you know I don't want that to like I just think that we need to think shortterm of yes we're here
tonight we have questions and we want to get answers to those questions and also thinking in the long term um you know there have been other districts that have not been able to produce a balanced budget and then um you know we're we're providing other people the opportunity
that have no um you know no nothing at stake in our community to come in and decide what gets cut and so I think while we think of the shortterm we have to think of the long term too these are all difficult cuts um nothing sits well and I I think many of us last year felt
the same how do you pick one over the other and I think that's what we're sitting here fac with and it's such a moral dilemma um and I know that we're not alone um so you know countless other schools have continued to go through this over the years um and as we talk
about like adequacy and mediocracy that's like this is what we're pced with yeah at the moment I I have concerns because the state right now is not rewarding Excellence it feels with the budget system that the state is is penalizing excellence and there is a hard push on schools that are exhibiting
Excellence to be cut so I have no confidence that if we don't balance our own budget that anyone higher up is going to look at it and go please preserve the Excellence of their programs I think that it would be
disastrous just to put in you know put in perspective um and yes you know thinking about the impact of state aid but between the state aid reduction and the increase to Charter
Schools which I believe comes out to roughly $2.1 million that is row 69 and those other rows that we're going to go back to regarding music they really are pushing very hard
towards mediocrity at best which is not what we want for our children but we need to get to some kind of tentative budget to move forward with so I had consensus but unhappy over here
I am consensus but unhappy here over here okay everybody's unhappy and that's understandably so I know but we have a very we have a very new board and so this process is it's not that it
gets easier but it is shocking to the system to do at all and with this new of a board I'm actually appreciative of everybody's movement together okay next row is 70 uh this is a reduction of nine six period
assignments due uh related to increasing class sizes this is at the high school uh this is um worth 77 $1,652 so we broke open new sections to decrease class sizes and created Point
TW is that what I'm understanding or with this increase class Siz inreasing increasing class sizes but that's not getting rid of Staff that's getting rid of the extra period right okay questions about that and that's an impact to the high school for those of us that are
watching which levels are getting and there's Dr bour on here sorry we talking about the high school he'll be turning around and going right back out that door questions all right
consensus and consensus okay uh row 71 is uh reduction of these are three uh positions Eng one English one practical Arts one social studies um related to increases in class
sizes at the high school this is 286 $689 questions besides the horror of that one all right consensus over here consensus over here okay row 72 is
the reduction of One Fine Arts position at the this is a position that is um I believe shared between hammerel and the high school uh and this is uh related to increasing class sizes this is worth $95,600
consensus over here wilver yes over here okay row 73 uh this is increasing fees for ELA after school and early morning programs uh this is um worth $168,500
[Music] [Music] can we hear when are these fees normally increased every couple years or yep so as a matter of fact the board had approved uh an increase to these fees uh
fairly recently um and we need to if we're going to balance the budget we're going to potentially look at a supplemental increase uh and consider what we had just had approved that was tentative and I think for the future as we approve
those fees those rates um early on to get registrations going I think we have to be very specific in saying it's a tentative until after the budget is finalized thank you how close are our fees compared to the um private sector
very competitive Evena is much less right even even with the increase um uh and I'll get that additional information for the board but even with um this additional increase we're still
competitive to being out with any other provider true is there room to push that up then higher I I think that would be risky I know but we're also talking about we're also
we're also talk we're also talking about cutting teacher positions so there's that you're not going to make up that much on this okay any other questions on this one all right consensus over
here over here y all right okay um grade 74 and 75 uh go together uh this is uh increasing class size cap uh for K through four uh which means reduction in
sections so um I think in this instance um it's worth looking at a picture so you can see what we're talking about in terms of class sizes so yes you already prompted I'm going to put a um a worksheet up there we're
going to look at each of the grade levels um just so that you can see um where that change resulting in the uh eduction in in these positions where that's coming from and what that is
doing to uh class sizes okay so um in board members if you have difficulty seeing this you may want to um relocate just for a couple of moments but so this is um this is the analysis
that that we do uh looking at what our enrollment is given a particular point in time and what does that do going forward uh this is each grade level and each elementary school
so uh the green shaded area is what the enrollment Uh current enrollment is this was is a snapshot as of January 13th and then the blue highlighted area is what is that projection for next year and it's a straight line
projection um what you see in the last row of the blue highlighted area average class size is providing what is the average class size based on the number of sections which is
is in the row right above and this this case in kindergarten at Lawrence Brook it was originally factored at four sections that's been revised to three sections bringing average class sizes to
21 that was the only place where that was possible across the kindergartens because if we made any changes to any of the others and first of all bound Monroe is an anomaly because there are two sections there average of 13 but if you
look what happens if we just make that one section that puts it up to 25 that's beyond I think where where we want to go uh similarly uh if we look at Central for example where the average
class sizes are currently 16 and there's um based on three three sections if we change that to two that puts the class sizes up to 24 so I'm not sure that that that's necessarily what we want to do
across the board in the elementary level but there are positions are sections where we can uh we believe we can make reductions uh that give us the seven positions that are listed here and so I just want to go through that so
kindergarten is one area uh grade one you see at Frost and it's in the Golden Rod um highlighted field uh Frost cross um at grade one was originally four sections uh bringing that down to three
it's the numbers are still reasonable across the board when we look at grade two um that would be um a reduction uh at bound a reduction at Irwin and a
reduction at warn Storer uh affecting um the class uh size averages as as you see here still not out of the out of the ballpark still reasonable at grade
three and in each of these cases it's a one section reduction in that golden rotted field um in grade three it would be a reduction at chick and a reduction at Lawrence Brook and at grade
four uh no changes any change to um any of those projected classes you can see what those averages are now so if we make any kind of changes there those numbers would just be um off the off the
wall so that's specifically what uh rows 74 and 75 are related to consensus all right are there questions all right then I'm coming this way consensus question um yeah um not that
this will help for this year but um if we did districtwide um redistricting could that also help with with with this approach um I'm not sure I understand
what so so um um maybe I'm misunderstanding this but what I'm seeing here is that we're taking schools with a particular grade um where we can reduce the number uh increase a class size reducing a position and we're do
and it seems to me we're doing this peace meal across the various schools looking for opportunities if we did the same if we took a districtwide approach to this um would that uh and again I know this isn't going to be for this year and this is going to be very
long-term um uh long-term project but um would that um would that be an argument for redistricting this sort of approach well I think we'd have to see what those numbers are but just to be clear this what what I just put up that's not a peace meal approach it's actually
looking at yeah that that's probably the wrong wrong word but yeah but it's looking at you know what are the class sizes overall and where is there room to tighten up a little bit and I those selected areas those selected classes um
within each of the schools was to tighten that up y so it's not optimal but it's not horrible right so um and we didn't want we didn't want to venture into the horrible in the K4 level yeah so so maybe better way of putting uh this is that this is looking for
opportunities where we can with looking at our our district as a whole and redistricting across the board provide more opportunities like this it it could it could so that this could be an argument for looking at this again not for this year I don't and not even
knowing the timeline of this sort of thing maybe not even for next year but we wouldn't have time I mean based on where we are and and the schedule that we have to deal with um I don't believe we would have the time to implement a
redistricting in an appropriate way for September yeah yeah I'm not even thinking about September R districting really wouldn't create Equity across every grade it's it wouldn't evenly spread across street right it's not it's
going to depend on what the ultimate enrollments end up at um in each of the buildings so um could it provide opportunities it could mhm but that would remain to be seen once we actually see the numbers I'm just looking for another tool to use for when we're in
the same situation next year all right do we have consensus here yes yes okay okay row 76 um I mentioned earlier the notification from the uh electrical service
provider um 19.1% rate increase so we have to um budget uh additional funds in electricity that's uh that 19.1% comes to $396,500 [Music]
down during like after 6:15 7:00 is there any way to to kind of shut down some of the lights and the action that might be going on a building that's not being used so um the lights are already uh LED lights so they're not really utilizing much energy right um our
energy drivers are going to be running the heating systems and running the air conditioning we can't shut those down no right I mean we bring in the evening for uh heating we bring the temperatures down a bit but you know the challenge then becomes if we bring them down too
far having to reheat the building for the next morning becomes problematic and it also challenges our systems um air conditioning we can't shut the air conditioning off during the warmer months because what that does is it simply promotes um the potential for
mold you know moisture and that become that raises a whole bunch of other problems for us so you know we're pretty mindful in terms of how we run our our um HVAC systems uh as it is we keep them
within certain temperature points um and you know do regular filter changes and all those things that help to keep it more efficient but um I I I don't know that we would be able to do anything that's really going to reduce the cost on
this and then just a question also please um I do understand that we have um solar panels on buildings yes and have would that would the addition of additional solar panels make any difference in our budget considering we
also have the cost of implementing them there's a cost of implementing um we we opportunity the opportunities that we took at the time that we had them installed a few years ago uh they were on the new
roofs putting them on an old roof that is going to need to be replaced is problematic because we'd have to pay to have them removed then have them reinstalled that becomes a real problem um one of the uh so there is opportunity
I think in a couple of years um and I say a couple of years because we have one Elementary School that uh is planned to have a new roof done on it um should the funding get
approved um um and so uh that becomes uh an opportunity to potentially put um solar panels on it um but that's easily to start that process it would probably be two years down the road because I
would see a roof that roof won't be done this summer it would end up being done the following summer so there's time lost and there's no additional properties that the district holds that we create create solar farms and have panels um I saw I saw a whole field
outside of Piscataway magnet school it's the only reason I asked thank you sorry I wish yeah do we own our solar panels or is this one of those Le lease agreements it's one of those agreements
okay anyone else all right consensus on accepting the fact that our utility bill is going higher no to the utility company but yet yes on consensus I would like to not but
so okay and then row 77 this is the last row but certainly not insignificant uh this is um based on the revised Elementary schedules um and decreases in uh class sections based on what we were just
looking at uh this is a reduction in special areas because the schedule don't warrant it or will not warrant them so this is um two in PE two in art two in music and one in media uh this is a
total uh value on this of are the two music positions outside of the fourth grade yes okay anyone else all right consensus on this one
yes over here all right have to go back to page 10 back to page 10 back to page 10 okay um row 64 and 65 so so I'm going to express the same concern that I had before that it appears to me that the loss of teaching
positions cross the music programs is disproportionately high to the other loss of teaching positions I've seen from from um the other items that we've just discussed it could just be my perception because they're all clumped together
um but uh you know we're looking at um yeah uh uh but I think that needs to be taken in account when we're looking at our music programs I'm all for the concept of shared sacrifice it's not clear to me
that that's happening here to piggy back on what Wilbur said um I do agree I really feel that this is an important program have we considered a um rotation similar to how we would proposing foreign
language of once a week exposures which would reduce Staffing but still allow for some positions to be retained I can't answer that question we look at can we explore that please or you would requ like you would require all the kids to go to band for the on
Mondays is that teachers travel you know on Tuesday yeah maybe have two teachers traveling instead of four um and less exposures you know instead of multiple times a week once a week um I would be curious to see it is once a
week Elementary it's once a week so it would be once every other week is that what you're thinking I me we can explore it yeah I I would just like to know what opportunities exist to save the program as opposed to a hard stop on losing it if we can even come up with Solutions or ideas and then maybe have a little more
insight before a final decision I would be really grateful for that information so my my thought is to send this back um to the schools um see what sort of alternative solution they can come up with and I would be willing
to vote Yes on a consensus for the items here with the understanding that if these items stay in place that's going to be a no vote for me on the budget I I'm listening to the we are having a
lot of conversation about music um I also want to point out though that in the richness of what we offer we don't have large visual arts groups outside of the classes you know there is no Visual Arts
Orchestra right um we don't have those things at well we don't have that anywhere aside from Sports I don't think there is any other department that is so large outside the classroom
so I I'm understanding The Sensation that we're discussing music a lot but aside from inside the classroom it it's music and sports are the things that are outside of the the core areas right
unfortunately we have fantastic programs and I understand that that's not supported right now by the state yep all right so we're on 64 and 65 yep all right consensus for the sake of the
tentative on 64 and 65 for the sake of yes with the caveat that I mentioned before and the same for six 6 second we're still on 64 I'm sorry I thought I thought you were already passed it I'm
okay with 64 65 Tim Anna I don't see any other I don't see any choice I think that's how we all feel I mean very truthfully all right moving on to 66 66 uh just as a reminder I mean on
66 um I mean there's I think room to not have this be part of it so we don't have to have a consensus on this one um but just keep in mind
that you know we're we're at the limit then at that point how do we feel about that I I personally would like to use that as part of our wiggle room to keep if I mean if we have that wiggle
room what little bit that it is that's something that I think we should really consider using for it I agree and I also would love to see if we can explore any prating opportunities at all anything
that's everywhere I'm basically I I'm against consensus I am not I am not agreeing to 66 okay good I'm not I'm sorry I saw your face I'm not agreeing to 66 would anybody else like to not agree with me I'm not agreeing yeah I think you've got
that across okay yeah okay everybody's not agreeing with me all right um we are not finished we are for the for this portion uh in the open session but um we do have more to do then we go to close session um and I thank you for all right
if everyone could pass this down because these are still works in progress and confidential just so you know we got one extra it's coming back oh okay thank you I thought you were saying you have one extra down there I'm like no no no
no shouldn't be long is that all of it oh if they could hold that back door open for just a second it's I'm never hot folks the meeting is still all right still in process
here and we would really like to get into closed and no we would really not like to but we would really like to get to more of this all right finally we are on uh board member reports on committees Andor information
items um two two things if I might um so over the weekend I had the real pleasure along with many of the other board members to um go to the Buddy ball uh tournament um the resource fair at the mall and the EB EA
strings uh concert all three were excellent events um and I'll quote Jack levit who said um if you if anyone wants to know what East Brunswick is about just go to these events and you'll uh see that the other I just want to uh
check the way I've been framing our budget our fun funding situation would it be appropriate for me to mention that now because I think it would be good for the public yeah I think yeah the thing that I okay great
so um I I'm I'm I'm uh I I've been thinking about the budget a lot um since the beginning of since the beginning of the year and the issue I I think that many people have including me is that the numbers we're throwing around here
are very hard to conceptualize so I've come up for myself because I'm not a numbers person to frame what our funding and budget situation are and I've figured out that these are the rules and I've pressure tested it you know my my
analogy and it seems to hold up but if our school district was a household here in East Brunswick with two parents both working and two kids bringing in $100,000 a year combined and their job
is to remain financially solvent here are the rules that they're given they're only allowed to keep $2,000 in the bank for emergencies that's it if they go through a year and they're not allowed and they don't touch that money they're not allowed to add on to that $2,000 at
all okay they can ask their boss for a raise but that raise at maximum is going to be 2% and their boss is going to be extremely upset if they get that raise that's the taxes the you they have friends and
relatives that can give them money but they're also not allowed to save that money at all um and that money has to go out the door so those are the rules and then you make inflation at 4.95% which is what it's been for the past 5 years you put all that together
and the funding rules that the school district is bound to play by is a setup for failure and I've been thinking a lot about this because the and and I've been thinking about well you know why is it happening now well these rules actually made sense
in the mid-2010s when inflation was around 2% or less right you can you can get by under those situations things are much different now and this is not just us this is all the entire you know School District situation across the
state so these cuts are awful I'm going to go home and throw up yep yep right right and the reason I've been trying to figure this out is because I need a story for myself as to how we got
oursel into this position now there is a narrative in town that we're in this position because of misspending I don't see it the rules are the much more straightforward reason why we're in the situation that we're in and
I can imagine that after this meeting and the meetings over the next few weeks that narrative is going to pop up again and until someone shows me data uh otherwise I'm going to assume that uh that the narrative that this is because
of misspending is a complete fabrication um what this means in terms of a solution is that we have to change the rules we have to change the rules by which school districts across the state are funded um that's going to take a long
time that's going to take a lot of energy but I'm good at playing the long game um and in the short run what people can do that will help is if you hear chatter about the misspending that the
school district is doing put a stop to it because we need breathing room to figure this stuff out and that sort of chatter just takes the oxygen away that's all thanks
anyone else M her um I also want to piggyback off of Wilbur um this weekend was really a lot of community activities and I'd also like to thank Karen and Janet for coming to the resource fair and representing east east brunic Public Schools as long as parents as well as
parents from the special education parent advisory group because it was really great um to see them represented along with a vast other um community events um or organizations and um also I know that
you know for quite a few weeks now many of us have been watching um you know s397 which although didn't change the funding formula was going to add um you know some other caveats to um making our funding more transparent and looking at
maybe stopping the loss at 2% um but as many people know that is still in um committee and actually I was on a call with um the coal Garden State Coalition of schools and one uh legislative rep was on there and she
said that it's not even up for their uh for their discussion yet so that um you know a lot of us on New Jersey school board's legislative committee have a meeting in the upcoming weeks and um we have questions that will be asking as to why we've been advocating for close to a
year for at least some transparency or changing in some formulas or you know as well as like special education Aid um and asking like why now are we not seeing any progress like why has this kind of stalled in the past two months um when we had a a bill on the table
that again it didn't take care of the funding formula per se but it offered other caveats to make things more transparent and um you know some other things that we did want to see um so we'll we'll stay updated um on that but I also urge people to reach out to your
legislators um you know talk to people um that you know about school funding and and writing um you know always like be we always want to be our kids Advocate we can be our school's Advocates too so I think it's really important um you know if you have a
question especially like um Dr pan said if it comes to money or mismanagement or you just have a question uh about how this process is working or what you can do please call I I I do know that Dr veski um will you know the wonderful
ladies in his office they will guide you they will give you information like we want to see people out there like with us and helping us and I think it's going to take um you know it's going to take a community for us to be like we don't want our our school systems to be just
uh you know mediocre we we excelled for many years and we want to continue doing that by offering great programs to our students and to and resources to our families because you know I think that's one of the things that East Brunswick a lot of people moved here for and I don't
want to see those continue to get taken away knowing that every year for the next few years we'll probably be one of those districts who sees a 2% to a 3% decrease because we will be in the same situation every year sitting here thinking what are we going to cut now
and it's it's it's very unfortunate that's it president gu I just have two quick things first of all thank you to the folks who stayed all night who don't have to be here appreciate it it's it's a tough tough meeting glad that everybody was here um to see the process
I think it's important and especially um it's a fairly new process in in terms of letting this come out to the public and and the public getting a chance to talk about some things um and I think it really worked and I appreciate the the
uh chance to have this tonight second of all I just want to also mention and I know Wilbur you you talked about it briefly it was a great weekend in East brunsli but I have to say fast break uh Mr Neil Shaw you're back there thank you so much that was a phenomenal day that the whole event the
kids the families out there it's it's exciting I think you've done done that for what 16 years now is it or I mean it's unbelievable so if if folks if you if you don't have it on your schedule for uh for next time please put it on there thank you uh Mr Shaw and and fast
break for just a great day and it was really terrific so thank you and how Alexander um no it was a great weekend in EAS Brun I I will say that like many parents of small children I missed almost all of it due to a little bit of
viral activity that seem to run through the elementary schools um I I watched a lot of those great events happening online from in my house with my child who just couldn't seem to nail down 24 hours of fever-free not for anything um
I also want to thank the people that stayed and I want to thank the people that watch this video all the way to the end because it is hard um this Pro moving this process into the public is difficult because we know how
actually we don't know it is ridiculously hard to imagine what it's like for you to listen to us talk about line items that you cannot see what the line item is um that's kudos to you for sitting because that is hard um but this is what the process looks like I I recently had a conversation where
someone said that there's a great deal of not just misinformation but just a lack of information about what happens in closed session um that it seemed mysterious and secretive and there's a large effort on the part of this board for greater transparency or to just
answer those questions so to that end this is what the finance committee looked like in the closed when it was a smaller committee and was not in the hole um and it is a long difficult process the rest of it that has to take place in closed takes place because
people have the right to privacy um when their own individual job are being discussed where it would be identifiable and people also asked what else we do inclosed and it's things that have to do with individual students or people that want to speak to the board
individually and those things are confidential and have to be respected um to the end also of people have inquired what else are we doing regarding our relationships nearby so I have spoken to assemblyman Stanley uh
twice in recent weeks once this past week and uh once I met with him with Dr veski a few weeks prior again talking about the budget and current bills that are up and what it is that we can possibly do to try to help our town um
last last week I'm sorry with a child with with a small person who doesn't sleep at night I have to tell you it's becoming a little blurry but last week I believe it was I met with Mayor Cohen for well over two hours to disc discuss the relationship between the board and
the schools and the township um I think it was worth the time and the effort and also to the end of transparency there was a great deal of commentary about a committee meeting um I'm I'm new to the presidency but I made sure I got a lot
of advice for this and I had asked the board the first week in February enclosed because I I believe my understanding with checking with our attorney was that if I was forming an ad hoc committee I had to inform the board
which I did during Clos but I formed an ad hoc committee we had a few board members not enough to require it we were not a quorum and two people from the administration and a few people from the
community because the idea behind this ad hoc committee was to share accurate information and also answer some questions um and to talk about topics academic programs budget not asking for
Budget ideas but to answer questions about how the board operates um and we're trying to avoid misinformation or a lack of clarity that can create confusion um missed opportunities
unnecessary concerns and so what we were basically looking to do and I think we accomplished in a very small group setting was talking about how the board could better communicate with the public how we could be not just more transparent but how we could get the
information out to more people and I think the wisest thing I heard was that someone said they hadn't realized that the board doesn't know what the board doesn't know and conversations with stakeholders are important um we have
had further discussion amongst ourselves in small groups and at this committee as well about the need for holding small town Halls small group discussions where the public can come out and engage in the same kind of questions um but we
want to keep the communication going with the public if you've been paying attention to the school district's Facebook it's becoming more active we want to get the news out there where people can see it easily and we're just working as much as we can to bring more information answer more questions and
for greater transparency I didn't report out at on the last board meeting because I had asked the people that were there if they they could send me any feedback they had and I was waiting for that um and I received a lot to reflect on but I think that's about where we are does
anyone else have anything else for the good of the cause yeah the human relations Council met last Monday and I just want to express well wishes for a peaceful Ramadan to our neighbors who celebrate oh and I should also report on
that I was at the rpab meeting although virtually because I was driving home from college lacrosse um and again I thanks to Howe Alexander and Buddy ball and um there's a great deal that the township does to support our students specifically
through Athletics and it is deeply appreciated that the hours that they put in are phenomenal all right at that point can I have a oh do I have to read the I have to read the Clos session resolution again I'm so sorry all right we have a need for a second Clos session
whereas the Board of Education must discuss matters which not appropriate for discussion in a public meeting and whereas these subjects are within the exception to the open public meetings act and are permitted to be discussed in closed session pursuant to njsa 104-112
B and whereas the Board of Education intends to discuss matters as follows items listed on the agenda do we have a length for this closed I don't have that um hopefully less than an hour hopefully okay I we don't usually write that but
we're ask the length of the closed session is estimated to be hopefully less than one hour um after which the public meeting of the board shall reconvene and action will be taken action will be taken that's what I thought all right can I have a motion
please all right Wilbur Jamie all right discussion all in favor I opposed abstentions thank you so much we are inclosed all right we are back welcome to Tuesday all
right I don't even know where we're going for which item number are we voting on we are voting on um it was in the uh business uh section of the agenda item two all right can I have a motion for business item two all right Wilbur
Jamie any discussion all in FA is it it's not a roll call right uh no okay all in favor I opposed extensions motion
carries okay righty and now you're free to adjourn all right can I have a motion to adjourn all right Jamie then wolver any discussion happy Tuesday everybody all right all in
favor I opposed no all right abstentions all right we are done thank you everyone