--------- Good evening everybody. Written advanced notice of this meeting was provided at least 48 hours ago. Such notice provided the time, date, and location of this meeting and included the agenda to the extent it was known at the time. Notice of this meeting has been given in accordance with law. Minutes are being kept by the board
secretary and will be made available promptly to any to any public requesting them from the board secretary at 25A Lesson Lane, Heightstown, New Jersey. Minutes will be provided at cost and in accordance with board policy. The inperson portion of this meeting
will be held in the cafeteria of the Heightstown High School at 7 p.m. 25 L Heightstown. Um, sorry. Are there any board members present who believe this meeting to be in violation
of the Open Public Meeting Act? There being none, we may proceed. In compliance with the fire code of the state of New Jersey, I call your attention to the emergency exits for this room which are located to my right, left, and over there.
Um, at this point, uh, please stand for the pledge of allegiance. [Music] [Music] You didn't But you didn't say item D. I was waiting for you to say it.
Item D. Having read the materials received, I move the agenda be approved as submitted. Pull the board, please. Second. Pull the board. Pull the board, please. Miss Pulli,
yes. Miss Conpsion, yes. Miss Laruso, yes. Mr. Lyd, yes. Mr. Weeks, yes. [Music] Item E. Be it resolved that the East Windsor
Regional School District may hold two closed sessions at this meeting. These sessions concern personnel negotiations update perk agreement update. Minutes of these closed sessions will be made being available to the public when the need for confident confidentiality no longer
exists. Second. Pull the board, please. Mr. Poli, yes. Miss Conpsion, yes. Miss Laruso, yes. Mr. Ly, yes. Mr. Weeks,
yes. Uh, we do not have a student representative report tonight. I'll be moving into presentations. Uh, first we'll have the uh high school cell phone guidelines. Yeah, go.
So, good evening. Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you tonight. So, the high school team, uh, myself, I'm Dennis Vincson, high school principal, and my assistant principal. I want to kind of present a couple of ideas that we've been talking about for about, I would say, a good year. This past year, we've been entertaining uh personal
devices and looking at how we set up our guidelines. And just give a little brief background. 12 years ago at the high school, we adopted uh a policy regarding cell phones was at teacher discretion. Cell phones would be allowed to be used.
At that time, we did not have onetoone devices. And we saw the cell phones enhancing the instructional time because students did not have their own devices. and we brought the cell phones in to kind of leverage the new technology that was being developed. Since that time
obviously um we are now a onetoone school. So over the last I would say year and a half we started to really entertain looking at um the pitfalls. You know there's pros and cons of teacher discretion and tonight we're just going to talk a little bit about some of the recommendations that we are
going to have moving forward to start the year with kind of enhancing learning um in our instructional spaces. So, I'm going to turn it over to um sorry, next slide.
There we go. So, basically, each assistant principal is going to kind of present one of the four and I'm going to turn it over to Michael. He's going to take us over. Good evening. Uh Michael Siki. I'm the 10th grade assistant principal at Heightstown High School. Uh before we brought about any change, we sent out a
survey to our staff. Um, one of the most staggering numbers in the survey, 98% of Heightstown High School staff members support stronger cell phone restrictions. Um, and of the 2% just said they were unsure. Didn't say no,
just said they were unsure. Uh, some of our current challenges, uh, cell phones contribute to classroom disruptions. There's some concerns about academic integrity, including cheating, testing security. Um, and when we gave
the autonomy to teachers to enforce these rules, we created some confusion, some resistance. Some teachers who allowed uh cell phones to occur in their classrooms and some that didn't, and it created some disparities amongst our staff. Some of our solutions include
clear buildingwide guidelines um and an enforcement policy that refers to all personal devices amongst all classrooms. Um allowing students to use school issued Chromebooks under the teacher direction only. And then having unified staff expectation uh for phones,
personal devices across all classrooms. [Music] Hi everyone, Jen Ricky, 12th grade assistant principal. So currently there are approximately uh 19 states across the country with um cell phone guidelines and they range um the
restrictions um and how comprehensive they are. Uh recently Governor Murphy has also addressed the need for limiting cell phone use during the school day in an effort to just reduce distractions and promote student engagement. Good evening everyone. My name is Rose
Brown, ninth grade assistant principal, and I'm going to discuss the cell phone guideline procedure. So, basically, I'm going to summarize this. We already have the student code of conduct, which we use when students violate the student code of conduct. We're going to uphold it in the same way, but sort of like a
tier level of first defense, meaning that we want to give teachers autonomy in the classroom. We want to make sure that students are aware that they can be in control of themselves and their devices. So the first line of defense would be teacher reminds the student to put it away and teacher emails parent as
well as the administrator and as you see it would just escalate if it continually goes on just like any other thing with the student code of conduct. Um in terms of no exceptions that's not meant to be a negative thing. It's more inclusive and equitable in the sense that we want
to make sure that we're consistent and doing it across the board throughout the school for all students. Obviously any special circumstances we'll address at that time. In terms of the parent role, we're just asking parents to join with us and having a conversation with their
children to let them know that this is actually going to happen and why. And the biggest thing is we're just saying not during instructional time. We want to make sure that students are maximizing their ability to learn why they are in the classroom. Um, like I said previously, there are consequences
if the code of conduct is violated. I know parents have concerns about how do I get in contact with my child if my child cannot have their phone. Your child can have his or her phone um during lunchtime. And if there's an emergency, as always, call any house
office. We'll make sure that parents are able to get in contact with their children. If you want to know when your child has lunch and when those non-instructional times are, you can view your child's schedule. Good evening everyone. Um, my name is
Jeff Sodto. I am the 11th grade assistant principal. Um, and we just kind of overview and highlight daily student expectations. um including what you know what they should be doing in terms of you know powering it down keeping it um out of sight essentially
within the instructional uh classroom setting. Um they there are different you know styles in terms of ste teachers that might have like voluntary storage if they want to you know store their phones during class. Um but the primary
goal is to maximize instructional time. uh and you know that was a huge purpose of our 1:1 Chromebook so they can maximize the technology that we are providing them. Uh so expected benefits and things that we will be monitoring throughout the school year. Um, our hope
is from a holistic level to increase the academic benefits, right? In improving uh the peer-to-peer interactions, classroom dialogue, social interactions um and kind of reducing a little bit of of sometimes the stress stress and the barriers that uh can come with
technology and phones um so that we can kind of start to focus a little bit more on um just instructional time with the students. uh that is our goal and what we will be monitoring throughout the school year. So just the last slide tonight uh just
to if you have a senior if you know a senior our seniors have the option to read the anxious generation and during the course of this past year my visited classes when they were discussing this and some of the feedback um our 12th graders expressed we put in here is the
idea that the texts in our students actually talked about fractured attention friendships reduced and one of the feedback that we heard from the seniors in our English classes that read the anxious generation and also in some of our focus groups were um they kind of
wish that we put a little bit more of an emphasis during the instructional time not to allow them to be on it because often our students the feedback we received is they need a little bit more structure and the temptation is is often great. So, um, students are obviously
reluctant to change some things, but when you have when we had these small group conversations, they were pretty honest that they saw the direction that we were going in and they saw the benefits of having the um the ability to be focused during instructional time. So, I'm going to have my team take a
seat and that's our presentation of kind of where we're going. You take that, Jeff. So, I can if there's any questions, Mr. Daniels. Okay. I do have a question. Can I certainly? All right. So, my first question is,
does this only apply to cell phones or is it personal devices? Because, you know, they have watches and they have rings and the glasses and everything else that can talk to them and they can, you know. So, yeah. Yeah, that's a great question. We're talking about um personal devices.
We really do not see um a lot of the glasses. the the watches is is an area of concern that we look at. It would be tied with the earbuds. Um but we're really focusing we are saying personal devices. Um so we would address that as all personal devices during the
instructional time. Okay. And then my second question is um how how are we going like what is the plan to to get this information to the students? Because you know like the
students that were in 10th grade last year or ninth grade last year, right? They have to do something new in September. So how are they going to be told? So this is the timing of this is like the perfect time to do it. We talked about, you know, over the summer for the start of the year. We know
starting the year off will be a critical we review a lot of um guidelines, policies. So this would be something we would roll out at the start. To go back for a second, we did survey our students in February. um regarding using cell phones in
instructional space. So that started the conversation in February. So they heard about it um and we were just collecting that information. We surveyed as Michael spoke about we um surveyed the staff recently so they've heard about this um again you go back to senior English it's
being you know read about students are having discussions but we would take just like we do every start of the year we would dedicate time during the first three days of school where we do a lot of the rules and policies and regulations. So we'll run all eight
periods for Thursday, Friday, our first days. We will have a town hall meeting which will be discussed at the town hall meeting which is grade level focused and we'll have an activity period where we would then go over um very similar to what Jeff spoke about is the daily
expectation and procedure. So we would do that right at the start. Thank you so much. You're welcome. Dennis, didn't you also we had talked about actually getting something out post tonight to families and students regarding where we are so therefore when they they kind of have a
feel for it prior to school beginning. Yeah. Abs. Absolutely. So we thought it was really important we spoke this we spoke we got fe we received feedback from our staff um regarding our handbook at the end of the year um in general code of conduct. So this was part of that so staff kind of knows where we're
going. Um we sent the survey out which we got really great turnout. It was 98% um in the favor of the you know limiting it during instruction time but we had a really good turnout of the percent of teachers. We had probably over 80% of our teachers um kind of heard about
that. So our goal would be like after tonight we would like to share we have a we have a draft memo to the families and students which is a little bit more substantial than what you saw here but for the most part today's tonight's presentation is mirrored off the memo. I
would prior sending it to them I would like to send one we would like to send a formal letter to our staff just kind of having that they've kind of or they know they know what's coming. Um so we have communication this presentation um would be attached to a letter very soon to go
out we timing couldn't be better also we have freshman orientation um so all the freshman parents who are coming in Thursday night and again we have to start so absolutely if we we see fit that we're ready to go with communicating that out
I have a couple questions so in terms of what's going to happen so each teacher will say you have to put it in your backpack, you have to put it in the phone home. Is that how it's going to work? Yes. So, what we would say is when you enter into your instructional space and we had that in there, it' be like
there's options um where you would store it. You can keep it in your bag. You could keep it in we have we bought boxes this past year. So, there was there's individual foam boxes in every classroom. Some teachers have from previous time as
teacher discretion they had pouches that hung over their door. So there's different options. Um whatever a student would feel comfortable doing, we would give them the option to do it. Here's my other question.
Um I agree that the phone should not be out during class. I agree with that. I think there are times though that I've heard I do have a few kids in school. I have heard that there are instances when their Chromebook is dead and they are
not allowed to ask to charge it and they go on their phone. Um, I don't know how to word this, and I know this doesn't have to do with cell phones, and I appreciate that a student should be responsible enough to have their Chromebook charged or have a charger, but I will say that I do lose
my laptop charger for work from time to time. It just happens. It disappears. Um, do you think that maybe we could provide some extra chargers for classrooms in case that does happen? So we because I hear it a lot I've heard it a
lot and not just from mine that you're uh you're absolutely accurate that and because we you know up until now because we had the ability to if your Chromebook was not working or not charged you could go on your phone. So that was not inappropriate to do. We allowed that to happen. We already
talked about that. we will have more loaners because right now we at the high school most of the loaners go out when it's broken not when it's not charged. So we already we've already talked to technology will have additional Chromebooks um to use if there's like a short term like you said it's not
charged or they forget something and we would have more additional chargers to use. So that would not be a reason that you would have to go on your personal device and they would be allowed to use it at lunch. non-instructional time they could use it.
What about study hall? Does that That's instructional time. Suppose they have no assignment. They should have assignments to do. There's always work they could be working on. Hypothetically. Okay. In theory, they could. Yes,
I have a question. The policy in question uh 2363 student use of privately owned technology is open-ended on use of it in a classroom in instructional spaces. It's pretty much based on what was being
described earlier as a teacher's discretion to give permission or not for the use of a private device in the classroom. So, and that was adopted exactly a year ago. Um, so I guess what we're saying is we don't
need to change the policy. We're just across the board teachers going to deny permission for classroom use or instructional space use of uh personal device. No, good question. So we looked at the policy and um, you know, the high school's the only school in the district
where there's classroom um, permitted use of personal devices to that extent. So the elementary I mean this policy covers the entire district. Currently, the elementary interpretation is that the cell phone is not in the classroom. The middle school interpretation is also the same. So, we're really just
indicating it's a schoolwide um approach and really it's in line with where the other school levels are in the district. So, we did not feel the need to actually change the policy at this point. But the guideline expectation is that um the the we're kind of limiting part of the
challenge as the high school administration just shared is that part of the issue regarding discretion has created some inconsistencies as it relates to expectations within the school and we're just trying to create some some consistency and choosing the instructional space uh as the um as the
area for a common expectation. That's really interpretation. Thank you. Thank you, High School. Uh, up next we have the access data presentation. Good evening. Um although the access data is a mandated presentation from the
state, the two supervisors and myself are happy to share our findings with you. So we're hoping that you're going to see some of the successes that we've seen in the district. And just so in case anybody doesn't remember, Renee Fowler is our K5 ESL world language and
Monik Feliciano is our 612 ESL world language. So we're going to just start with going through talking a little bit about what access is. Okay. Okay. So access for our multilingual
learners is an exam that they get every year in the spring. Um it measures uh what they know when it comes to language and what they can do with language across the four domains of listening, speaking, reading and writing. It provides a a a snapshot of how well the
student can understand and produce language across all content areas as the test incorporates content within um its questionings. Uh the individual student report shows a proficiency level and a scale score for each student in the four language domains. And all this is shared
with parents, mailed home for them so that they can see um their students progress as well as shared with teachers um to help guide instruction. Our access scores, so proficiency levels and interpretive scores um are based on scale scores um but they are not the
same and Renee will go into further detail about that. Um what I would like to highlight here is the different levels um that our students score into from level one entering to uh level six reaching. Um the proficiency levels that we use to schedule students determining
where they are and what supports are needed for them um are very much based on the whole number decimal um that you see here. So students uh who are exited from our program uh which would be the level four expanding um they
exited a 4.5. So what that means is they are entering general education classrooms um still needing supports um as you can see we go all the way up to reaching level six in our continuum. Proficiency level scores. We use the
proficiency level scores to make comparisons across domains but not across grades. We use the proficiency level scores with the weed to can do descriptors to devel to develop student specific language skill portraits. And
we use the proficiency level scores as one of our multiple criteria to excellent students from our ESL program. We use our scaled scores to make comparisons across grade levels but not across domains. And it's important for
us to recognize that the scaled scores of say 355 in listening is not the same as a scaled score for a student with 355 in speaking. We use the scale score to monitor student growth over time within
a domain. So in going back to the scale score that Renee spoke about, scale score is something that our teachers are very familiar with because it is also part of what we do with our star testing and that is able to show the longitudinal growth from the very first time a student takes the assessment to the
finally when they're able to exit. This slide in front of us next is our overall district data which has a lot of numbers but we wanted to be able to display this in for with everything from K through 12. And really what you're going to see is similar to what Monica and Renee brought up is that the number
of students in each grade level as well as the total in the district that exited the program this year. Those students that are in level five, which as Monica shared are those students who still have ESL, however, they will be in the general ed education program. our level
fours and that what you're going to see within our level one students as we do a little bit more you're going to see we break our level ones into a level one B and a level 1A because there really is a big difference between those who are starting and those who are almost
reaching the level two. So the very first thing that we try to see is well are we advancing are we falling back in any given year. So when we look at the overall comparison in the district as to the number of students that exited um the number of students
are in level five and the number of students that are in level 1A what we see is that we're very comparable to where we were last year which means what we are doing is progressing our students forward which is a nice way for us to be able to say here's what's working and
here's what needs some tweaking. I'm going to take you now through the K2 grade band. And if you look, you can see that level one and two is where the majority of our students fall, which makes sense because those students are the newest learners to our district. And as multilingual learners, we are
beginning to expose them to English, but this is the beginning of their language journey. What I just talked about is now also depicted here in a pie chart. if it if you prefer to see it from that vantage point.
When we look at the 35 grade band, we can see that the numbers are distributed a little bit differently. Whereas the majority of the students were in level one and two for K2. For those students who have been with us since the kindergarten, you can see that they are moving up in proficiency level, which is
exactly what we want our students to be able to do. And again here is the representation with the pie chart. Okay. So I'm going to talk about grade 68. Um as you can see we have um quite a
larger group in our middle level three and four. Um oftentimes our students coming in have a good foundation from the elementary school if they have not already exited. and are uh way way ahead of the curve when it comes to learning
the language. We also have students who are entering um level one uh in this area and so it does still reflect 13% of the total population. Um we do have uh 18 exits so nine 9.9% of um our total 68
exited uh this year. So that's that's a nice number pie chart depicted there for our visual learners. Okay. For 912, we have a large number of students who start at 912. And when they
come in and and are tested are placed in either level one or level two. Um what you can see here is that last year we had a lot of students who were um at a level one and they started they move on to level two. uh level three and four,
we have a big population. Uh we're working towards growing that number so they continue to progress. Um we've had 10 exits over um the course of the year uh in grades 912. Um this is pretty standard. Um the grade uh the grade band
the exam gets more difficult as the years progress. So you start to see a little less uh of exiting students especially if they've started the program um in secondary. So and one of the things that if you remember our last presentation with the
NJGPA we spoke about the number of students who enter our district in high school. Um, we're going to do a little bit more of that in our next presentation with NJSLA when it's districtwide because as students are coming to us, even though they're in ninth grade or sixth grade, they're not
coming with us with the EWRSD background. And so, we've taken some liberties to be able to go through and talk about those students who have been with us for uh, three or more years with some data and those students who are new to district that we need a couple years to be able to move them forward. So
though we showed you the number of exits and the level fives, level ones, what we needed to do for ourselves to find out whether our programs are working is what is the growth. So if a student started in level one, they're not expected to go to a level five in one year. So we go through and create this chart for
ourselves to say if you look in the column that says the 23 24 score, you would see that in level 1A um for first grade we had 34 students and then this past year of testing you will see that one student moved to a
level four, two students moved to a level three, 18 moved to a level two, 13 moved to a level 1B. So all of the students at that point who tested in level 1A moved or advanced in their programming. What you will see if you
look at the level three um you will notice that two of those six students moved back moved back to a level two. So that becomes a concern for us. So those things that are in red are those students that we have to take a deeper look at and say what happened with the
program or is this an attendance issue? Is this something that we need to revi redo our program? Those that are in black are those students that have stagnated a little bit. Anyone in green are those students that have shown some growth. And you will see this for each of the grade levels that Renee and
Monica will talk about. [Music] In grade one, we had 73% of our students increase one proficiency level. In grade two, 54% of the grade two students increased one proficiency
level. In grade three, 57% of the grade three students increased one proficiency level. Grade four, 90% of our students increased one proficiency level. And
we're really excited by that. And that is also an expectation for us for those students who began with us in kindergarten. Fourth grade is what we call the sweet spot for students to really make
tremendous growth because it takes five to seven years to really acquire another language. And these students by the time that they began with us in the kindergarten they are now in our program for five full years. And that's why we
see that 90%. And 79% of our fifth grade students increased in proficiency level. Sixth grade 11% of uh grade six increase in proficiency level. I'm going to stop here and just highlight this a little
bit. Uh this is not traditional uh year-toear. Usually sixth grade shows um more growth throughout the year. Um, so this is something that's given us pause. We're looking at the data to see how we
can adjust things for this upcoming school year. Um, and move this needle more. Um, you'll see that as I go to seventh grade, our numbers drastically increase. 55% of grade six increase in proficiency level. So, um, this sort of
highlights that there there's something a little off with the sixth grade. And, uh, we're really proud of the growth of the seventh grade. And then it continues on. Eighth grade, 60% of the students in grade 8 increased in proficiency level. Um, again, I'm going to piggyback off of
what Renee said about uh, acquiring a language. If students are entering in the middle school, they are taking um a test that's grade band has increased in rigor and uh starting off it becomes a little bit more difficult for them. Again, research has shown that students
um children after the age of 13, it becomes way more difficult for them to acquire another language. So, they have to put in much more effort um at that point. Um so, it's something to consider as we move into nth grade. uh 60% of the
students in grade nine increased in proficiency level. We had um six exits in nth grade. Um that shows the foundation that they were receiving from the eighth grade year in their transition year.
10th grade 69% of grade 10 increase in proficiency level. 30 the numbers start to decrease because the size of the class starts to decrease. So 37% of the grade 11 increased in proficiency level and similarly 10% of grade 12 increased
in proficiency level. So as Monica shared with you is that you will notice that the numbers especially in grades 11 and 12 the number of students decreases along with the proficiency level growth. And some of
that is because some of these students now are eight years in the program and something's not quite working for them. So those are the students that haven't quite gotten there yet. Um the other students have either exited or in a level five. So one of the things we wanted to end with is what is the growth
summary over the pockets. So in our grade 1 two as Rene shared with you as a total we're at a 63% growth um grades through five at 74% and in grades 68 and 912 we're at 44% if you're
looking at the totality. So though some of those numbers may not look great for our English language learners, they're really good results to be able to say that we are moving our students to be able to have the grasp of the English language so that they are successful in
their classes and then in life in general. Any questions? I just have a quick question for the 12th grade. Are you if you haven't exited the program, you're still able to graduate. you've met all the
graduation requirements provided you just said Nicole provided you have um met all the graduation requirements which would be your NJ GPA in both EOA and math or an equivalent to that as well as passing all of your coursework. Yes.
Could we get numbers on that just on how many kids have who haven't exited the program were able to graduate and met the requirements? I was going to say because GPA we talked about it but we did not put these students in there. So yes, we can do that. Anyone else?
Yes. A question on the um levels four and five. You said they exit the um program the in how do you describe it? The self-contained program or some kind of intensive program. So
the general ed population after 4 and a half. So in this 612 and soon to be 512 world, we do what we call the sheltered approach, which would be the content level teacher would be the teacher um
teaching the content and an ESL support teacher would be a push-in support for language acquisition and they work as a co-eing model to provide support and that's for our level one through fours and that's in math, science, and social studies. currently in ELA, which is what
we call our sheltered English instruction for our multilingual learners. It is a single taught class from the ESL teacher. This year in the high school, we're trying to do some modifications to make that a co-eing as well. Um, so as soon as they reach that
level five, which is that 4.5 that you spoke about, Bob, they go into the general ed classroom. So they will not have that ESL support. However, they do have an ESL class to be able to have additional language acquisition. Anything else, Monica, you say with
that? So, we level it a little differently. Okay. So, yes, you see levels uh 1A to level five. So, when we are placing students um in level five, it's when they've reached a 4.0, we're giving them
more time uh to in program to get ESL, transitioning them into the mainstream. go. If they're between a 4.0 and a 4.5, they will receive supports with an ESL level five class, but they're in the content mainstream classes, general ed
classes. Once they get that composite score of 4.5, they no longer get the ESL leveled class supports. They're completely in content general ed classes. Yeah. Sorry, I just said that. Okay. Just just for illustrative
purposes, could you go back to grade 11? So you had five students who were level five last year um or two years ago, I should say, and they were in grade 10, correct? Yes. So they were level
So this group here would be the coming 12th graders. So this was based on last year's 11th grade. Correct. So as 10th graders, they were five that were in that band. Yes. Right. They took the test as 10th graders. They were level five and then
so they're certainly at that level in a main uh general ed classroom and probably without support. Correct. They would well no they would have got it's back and forth. If they were not two years in a row in a level five
Oh, two years. They would have they could have in that 10th grade been in a sheltered class and then for their 11th grade gone into the general education classroom, but what you will notice with those particular five that you're referring to, they went down a level to
level four, which should automatically put them back in the sheltered. But this is when it comes down to is that for this particular um grade levels, Monik and I go through every individual child, look at their entire um program and see is it a specific day that there was an
issue with because sometimes pulling a child back into the sheltered program is more of um not difficulty, but it's a more of a hindrance for the child's growth than it is trying to give them additional supports. So, we would not necessarily move them back into the sheltered unless
their all of their coursework sees that that we can go through seeing that there is an issue that they need that additional support. If that makes sense. It does. Thanks. Just logged out. Anything else? Excuse me. No,
that's I'm ignoring this group here. I do have a question though. um the growth summary. Um and then the at the bottom of each of the slides where it talks about like 10% of uh grade 12 increased. Um the numbers
are different. Why are the numbers different? Is it that the growth summary is like a overall of all the the levels? Yes. Um so for some reason it just logged me off here so I can't put it back up. So what we're talking about is
that entire band of students in the K2 world. So the percentages and we looked at the growth. So when you looked at the percentages on the one just talked about the percentage of students who went into a level five or went into a level four. We talked about those students who grew
which is in that green that I was going through talking about. It should be down here somehow. It lost it in there. Okay. Okay. Does that make sense? So that's was it's a little bit of a um trick thing looking at it. It's okay. All right. Thank you. Anyone else?
Good. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Up next, we have the Mark Superintendent report. Okay. Thank you. Good evening everyone. Uh just a few updates tonight as we kind
of come to the conclusion of the summer. So, just to rewind time a little bit, uh reminding families that August 22nd, Friday, this past Friday, at 9:00 a.m., uh parents should have received access to the parent portal. On that portal,
you should be able to see if you're an elementary parent, your child's teachers teacher, uh for the upcoming school year. Uh if you're a secondary, middle school, high school uh parent, you should be able to see your child's schedules. Um, I'd say from a secondary standpoint, if you have any questions
obviously regarding your child's schedule, uh, reach out to either a counselor or an administrator at at the middle school high school. Um, in addition to that, bus passes were also made available, uh, via the portal. Um, quick highlight. So, today we had
new teacher orientation um, started the first of three days and uh, it's a an annual uh, right of passage for our new hires. So, Uh we had about 41 new certificated staff members, slightly smaller cohort this year. Um since I've
been in the district, we've ranged from about say 50 to 70. So I actually think this is a positive sign. I like to think that our, you know, we're moving more of our non-tenure staff members towards tenure. And uh one could argue that it speaks to some level of and not even
just non-tenured, you know, reducing um those tenur staff members who may be moving on. So, uh definitely a reduced number of the cohort. [Music] Part: 2
our newest standing in terms of the the students that they are obligated to serve. It also serves as an opportunity for them to get to know each other a little bit. They did have a bus tour today uh just to get a feel for the community. Uh so we look forward to the two remaining
days. Productive day today. We're looking forward to two remaining productive days this week. I want to share a little good news regarding I shared this with the board uh this weekend in the weekly update, but I'll I'll articulate it now. We um
um we received some positive news from S&P Global ratings um really to give us some feedback regarding our financial status uh and health uh within the school district. So, it did uh upgraded our district's rating from a uh double A
negative to a double A rating uh which is an upgrade and it really focused on um you know referencing the stable outlook uh talked about healthy reserves uh uh positive financial operations and with some strong economic indicators. Um
the upgrade is supported by consistent general fund surpluses uh leading to about 20% available reserves during the 2024 fiscal year. So um it also highlighted the fact that there was some um outstanding practices as it relates
to uh kind of managing the financial um stability of the school district. So, I just want to commend Paul Todd and the business office um for for this highlight and um I think it serves we've been fortunate in recent years in terms of some increased state aid, but I think
we manage and also ARP ESSA funds as well, but I think we've been um you know somewhat cautious as it relates to how we've we've uh allocated those funds recognizing that some of those were not going to continue forever. So, I just thought it's something to highlight uh
where we are financially connected to good news. Um this was you may have received this as a press release also shared this with with the board for the past couple of weeks. So, tomorrow August 26 at 10:00 a.m. Gene we
are doing a ribbon cutting ceremony for uh the the electric buses, the EV buses. So, this has really been in the works for a couple of years. Uh obviously the the district pursued a grant uh that was available through the environmental protection agency. So uh it's the the
clean school bus grant program. So we do have four buses EV1, EV2, EV3, EV4. We may have to give them some some different names, right? So but we do have four electric buses. Um obviously it's a a healthy initiative. We believe it'll be a quieter cleaner ride for
students. Um we'll see where this goes. This is a pilot, right? Um, you know, fortunately we took advantage of the grant to uh offset the cost that will be associated with these buses, but we do have a ribbon cutting ceremony tomorrow. So, um, hopefully folks can make it.
And, uh, we kind of look forward to getting these buses on the road. We are going to assign each bus to an elementary school and and try to kind of rotate that bus through those routes so students at the elementary level can have the opportunity to uh, ride on one of these EVs.
Quick update regarding the high school principal. If you recall at the last meeting, I was um being optimistic and I wanted to be able to announce or recommend a principal for the high school tonight. That's not happening. Um but but I do still feel optimistic and I
believe at the September 8th meeting uh there should be a candidate uh recommended for the board um to move forward with leadership of the high school. Uh quick update regarding I'll jump jump
around a little bit. So I mentioned this at the at the last meeting. So we have we had the summerbridge program. We had two dates. We had a July 17th date I believe and we have uh the second portion or second session I should say uh scheduled to take place this week
August 28th. and that's a morning session that's really to acclimate uh our ninth grade students um to some of the inner workings of the high school. In addition to that, we have kind of the ninth grade the incoming 9th grade barbecue and orientation that's for all
students uh entering the high school, all 9th graders. That'll occur on August 28th as well. And that'll be from 5 to 7 pm. Um and a lot of that will occur in this cafeteria space, but other uh cafeteria spaces within high school. Um
orientation will kind of focus on, if it hasn't already, some Chromebook distribution, obviously printed schedule, student led tours, meet and greet with club advisors and coaches. There'll be a parental uh information session, and as I said, uh it's open to all 9th graders. This is the 5 to7
session, and also new students. and there'll be uh a tasty barbecue dinner to conclude the event in terms of uh some summer facilities updates. So, as we uh look to wrap up the summer, I get a little bit of um I'm
a little stressed sometimes just in terms of ensuring that some of these summer facility projects uh are scheduled to be completed in a timely manner. We didn't we don't have too much happening this summer, but um we still we still do have some things in the
works. So, I'll just say in terms of updates, uh we are making progress on the Academy Street property that will be the registration services and buildings and grounds um home. Um we have a new prek playground. If you drive down Stockton
Street, you would see uh the new prek playground being constructed. They're moving pretty quickly uh with that. Uh obviously age appropriate inclusive playground equipment. Uh EMK, we had talked about replacing that blacktop, resurfacing that blacktop, putting up a
new basketball court on that playground area. That project is moving along nicely. Um the MHK renovation, um this is something that we talked about where we have our maintenance department kind of upgrade certain sections of the building. this summer they focus as a backup though we do have some uh
portable air conditioning units big huge large space uh air conditioning units in the auditorium just in case there may be a slight delay but I'm hoping that we will not be in that predicament in addition to that outside of the auditorium uh we are in the process of
finalizing uh really just kind of a facelift of sorts to the commons area so it's a um really kind of a a wall replacement, some paint, uh some lighting, uh upgrades, some LED
lighting, also some new fixtures, and kind of just reconfiguring how we're looking to display, uh some athletic recognition there, but also recognition for the arts, the way we envision it. Uh we're going to kind of use the wall connected to the auditorium for more arts recognition and then we'll use the
wall that's on the other side of the hallway closer to the gymnasium for for more athletic uh recognition and things like Hall of Fame and so forth. So definitely excited about that. Paul and I had a chance to look at that earlier today and uh definitely in good shape and it looks looks really clean and and
upgraded. Uh we will have our flags. There were flags there. We're getting new flags and slightly different flag design uh reflecting um kind of the the countries connected to Heisttown High School will definitely have the flags that will be reinstalled.
Last thing connected to facilities, the uh high school scoreboard replacement project um looked like the actual installation of the scoreboard appeared to be uh somewhat finalized today. I know they have to actually connect it. That'll occur either Tuesday or Wednesday of this week. We have a home
football game on Friday. Um, so we anticipate that the scoreboard should be activated. Obviously, the scoreboard is not just for football. Any any, you know, all of our sports that participate on the turf uh will benefit from that scoreboard. Let me just back up for a minute. This
may have um this kind of quietly hit the inbox about a week and a half ago. Um just in terms of some new statewide assessments. Uh, I'm not sure you should be aware of the fact that the New Jersey Department of Education,
um, had a long-standing relationship with Pearson, the company that provided the, uh, platform for the New Jersey Student Learning Assessment, NJSLA, and actually preceded the NJSLA, but that was the newest version. And, um,
contract ran out. So, the state put it out to bid and they went with a different company. I'm not really here to promote companies tonight apart from the East Windsor Regional School District. That's all I'm here to promote. But there is a new company and there's a new style of uh assessment uh and it's an adaptive assessment. So
the belief is that you know as students are completing the assessment it will adjust to the students particular level. The belief is that students will then have more sustainability in terms of completing that assessment and it should be limiting their level of frustration
u when something may be too challenging. They believe that this gives us a more authentic sense of where a students showing readiness as it relates to um assessing the standards. Um so the the interesting part about this and I and I can't argue with that. I can't argue
with an adaptive assessment. The part that I guess I can have some concern about is that this appear to just kind of like not really have a lot of runway to it and the conversation has been occurring, but as as a district, we didn't really get a heads up apart from
maybe a week and a half ago indicating that this would occur this upcoming school year. Uh starting with a field test uh that will happen uh in the fall between October 27th and November 14th. we had we did not have that on the
calendar at all. So, we have a field test for this new assessment. The belief is that the field test will occur in the fall. Uh the DOE will then assess or work out some of the kinks and then um these new assessments will
take effect during the typical spring assessment window, spring 2026, which typically feels quick for us. Typically, if you're going to do a field test, that would occur during a school year. they'd gather the feedback, they'd make some adjustments, they'd course correct, and then the following year, you would
usually kind of roll out the the the refined version of that. So, for me, selfishly, when I hear field test, I hear, you know, new training that needs to occur, it just speaks to interruptions for me. And um and especially when we didn't really have an opportunity to really prepare for that.
Getting that information in mid August was not not the best timing. Uh but we'll embrace it as we always do, but uh we'll have some communication going out to families in terms of where we are. Typical grade levels in terms of that we would assess typically grades four
through 10 for ELA, uh grades fourth through high school, math, and then obviously our NJGPA tested grades 11th and 12th if necessary. Uh so stay tuned for that. Okay, that that's um that's going to take up some bandwidth in the
next few weeks. Um, I think I'm going to probably end on that note and I'll just remind everyone that, you know, we are looking forward to the first day of school, uh, Thursday, September 4th, brand new school year. And, uh, that concludes my
report. Thank you. >> Any comment on the testing? >> So, NJSLA replaced park, right? It just seems like, and I know that there's nothing that we could do, it just seems like every few years whenever the contract runs out, we get a new
testing and then we have to spend all our time preparing the kids for the test that ranks them to tell us how they're doing. And each test changes and now they're going to rush this one. So, no one's going to be able to fully prepare.
And then we're supposed to use that data to to judge the kids and how they've grown in their growth. And would that be also be used for graduation requirement? >> The NJGPA >> that's separate >> is a form of a graduation requirement, but there's there's ways to work around
that. So So the first thing is conceptually the standards are the standards, right? This assessment is is determining how students are acquiring those standards. You're right though, it's a different
testing platform. standards theoretically apart from the standards that have been updated and adjusted are the standards. But you're right, it's a different test format that one could argue that this year will serve as a baseline yet to some degree. I'm not sure because it's not going to be a
applesto apples comparison because you do have two different testing platforms. Um so those are some of the things we need to work through. uh I think for students to be to be honest with you I mean students are pretty adaptable and let's be honest that we will need to make and the the one piece I will say is
feedback regarding adaptive assessments is is is usually positive in terms of a testing platform so uh I'll leave some optimism where I'd say if we believe that's a better testing environment that can actually
show us a a clearer picture of how students are progressing and where they're still gaps. I'm open to that. It's just that my issue right now is the roll out. It's just it feels abrupt and um you know, we didn't really have the opportunity to prep to prepare our
teachers for this in terms of what to expect. U obviously we have testing coordinators within each of our schools. We have a district testing coordinator and we'll roll with it. But it's just it would have been helpful if we concluded the school year anticipating some of these changes. So, it just feels a
little bit of a um like I said, a bit of a difficult time to begin adapting to that. >> I think it's ridiculous. >> You should say that. That's fine. >> Huh? >> I agree. I I I don't disagree. >> I just think it's absolutely ridiculous. They knew their contract was running
out. It's just another thing that now the teachers have to spend time to learn the new test and prepare the kids for the new test and then we'll all get used to it and then when the contract runs out, we'll get a new one. That's just my opinion. >> Yeah. And just just my slight editorial. I mean, I think what happened Pearson,
not to make this a company conversation, but I guess one of the I don't know pleasant surprises is that I actually thought that the relationship with Pearson would always be a relationship. So, I think that was one of the interesting takeaways that that the contract was not
renewed. And apparently I you know what was shared is that is because this the DOE was seeking more a different style more adaptive assessment. But that part that was a surprise to me but um you know we're going to have
um if we're going to receive state aid and the state receives money from the federal government we are we are going to have some level of standardized assessment to determine our students readiness and their mastery of those standards. I mean, it's always going to be. So, if it's not this, it'll be
something else as we move forward. >> Hello. All right. So, first off, tomorrow's exciting day. Ribbon cutting. I like it. Um, second thing is, um, and it it wasn't part of the report, but I was
wondering the, uh, app, right, that just came out. um is there a way to see as far as how many people downloaded it and are um active on there and also um are
they able to get on to like the parent portal or the student portal like how interactive is the actual app? >> So the first thing we can give you data regarding downloads so I'll follow up with that.
um in terms of uh access. So the app there's a few different things that it can do. Uh it it serves as a conduit directly to the website. So in terms of um to answer your question, yes, you can
access the portal. Um the the difference with this particular app which is connected to uh apt to the platform for the website the proprietary software that they use
is a platform called thrillshare. It's all the same company but the thrillshare platform it syncs so many different things. So, for example, from a social media standpoint, if we're pushing content out, like you're at a concert, it's very
user friendly. So, if from a staff member perspective, you're at a concert and you you capture a picture, awesome performance tonight. You just push that one time and it hits all of our social media platforms. You can hit all your parents at the same time. Um, so there
there's some conveniences there. you as a parent or member of the community in terms of your feed, there's some benefits to the feed and some ease with the feed. So, um, when we were looking at potentially making an adjustment from Edio, that was the selling point, the
thrillshare component. That's going to take some time for us. And actually now with the school year beginning, it's perfect where we can begin to we believe be a little bit more interactive as it relates to just sharing the narrative and sharing good news uh that's happening whether it's from a classroom
to a school to the district. So we do believe that that will be some um some benefits and you know we may need to we're pushing out some advertising connected to it when we're going to be you know having our weekly updates and so forth. But we may as when the school year begins, and I'll talk with Alisa
about this some more, we may engage in some, you know, just periodic larger marketing campaigns just to make sure people have an awareness as it relates to taking advantage of of the app because for some people, if they can just go on to the website, then they don't really feel the need to get the
app. So, that's one of the things we just kind of need to highlight some of the the benefits of accessing the app. But we'll get some data and some analytics regarding um who's who's downloading and utilizing it. >> Thank you.
>> Um okay, at this time first opportunity for uh board member comments. I just wanted to say thank you so much for the presentations. They were insightful and some of them I Yeah, it was a lot. It was a lot of information and I enjoyed hearing about
it. So, thank you. >> Seconded on that. Thank you very much, guys. Uh first opportunity for public comment. There being none, we will move into executive session.
How about how long do you think? >> This should be um 20 minutes maybe. Not even that. >> We'll resume in 20 minutes. Thank you. Okay. Uh, welcome back. Um,
old business, uh, committee meetings. Any updates? I think we have anything to do. >> I have I will do the, uh, the update on our curriculum meeting from earlier. I can do that now. Right. >> But no other updates. >> No other updates. Um the curriculum
curriculum committee met this evening. Uh went over um updates for the upcoming school year. Uh we have a number of curriculum documents to approve on the agenda. Uh going over updates for 6 through 12
math and science. Uh in the high school, we have C coming in. um as our new programming language. Uh it'll be focusing on event- driven and object-oriented programming with app development
and uh a final project incorporating some student choice. Um this an update to saber metrics to incorporate prior learning and integrate relevant standards. Um physical science is shifting the
focus to both standards and disciplinary core ideas. trying to think I don't want to read all the notes in full. So for the middle school grades six, seven, and eight science were shifting focus to
standards and relevant disciplinary core ideas. Um STEM units have been embedded into the five core curriculum units rather than standing independently. uh for 6 through 12 visual and performing arts. Um the high school is uh this is our first full year welcoming
the orchestra to the high school continuing program uh over from middle school. Um there's a new course for broadcasting uh sports news and entertainment. It's a full year level two course expanding on the foundational skills uh from video
production one. Um so that's that's a new addition. We also have advanced rock band coming in which is the um follow-up class to the rock band course which was introduced last year.
Um this will continue and help to develop students understanding of rehearsing, staging and performing in a rock band. Uh middle school will have a change in schedule for um sixth grade art, music, theater, and dance will be aligned with marking
periods. Uh and seventh grade art, music, theater, and dance will be aligned with semesters. Um and then D, we are still waiting on the curriculum documents for dance six and seven. We should have those in the September board meeting.
Um the revised world language curriculum uh is currently ready for approval but for um Spanish 2 through 4, Spanish for native speakers and German are being updated
for September um due to staffing limitations and providing updated uh um updated curriculum documents. U MHK German, French, Spanish, and Spanish for native speakers. The curriculum has been
modified to address the change in schedule and they were updated to align with the new resources we approved at the last meeting. uh for K through5 library technology and STEM.
The um previous curriculum documents were written for grade bands and this summer they work to define it at each grade level and develop units to support the increase of learning across the grades
with a focus on creating more cohesive programs for each of the areas um throughout the elementary school experience. Uh, kindergarten writing h has now is now pushing in with a heavy emphasis on genre writing uh slowing
down the pathway to writing. So the foundation is more strongly developed. The revis revised curriculum is designed to meet the developmental progression of young writers with uh the addition of adding drawing and um and basically
speaking and telling the story and then conveying that through the writing process. Um, STEM 6 through 12 uh is moving into was it 24 days for sixth grade uh
over over the course of the year or of the session uh sorry. Um, and then for seventh grade, they're increasing that up to 45 days focusing on STEM. And then in eighth grade, they're moving up to 90 days.
I think we're adding in a history elective for intro to philosophy, which builds on uh what was a very popular component of was it intro?
Um they had there was a really good response to one of the intro intro to philosophy segments of a class. Uh so they're rolling that out as a full elective which is refreshed from an earlier one that was focused more on traditional philosophy. And this is more
on applying ethical reasoning to contemporary issues, developing critical thinking, argumentation, and reflection. I've got a new business course for intro to financial literacy
um and a revision to intro to business which um that it didn't say specifically it was revised. Um, and then grade 8 comprehensive ELA, uh,
they revise the sources and the there's a tighter skills progression to strengthen reading, writing, and discussion skills. Um, I think that's it. AA, did I miss anything?
>> Okay. >> Yeah. No, you did good. >> Um, yeah, it was a lot. And I know they talked about um it's all part of a three-year plan. So, they've been working the three-year plan. And they also talked about a broadcasting class in high school. Um Sandy, do you mind
just explaining that because I know that was a a point of concern like a a meeting or two ago. >> Let me let me save Sandy for a second because that broadcasting class, this is kind of old new for old news for us. The board approved this course the uh sports
news and uh media. The issue that we had in the spring was honors broadcasting. Honors broadcasting was not running next year. We um we developed this new course. Uh so the board approved the course. This is the curriculum that supports the course. This is a level two
course. We wanted to make sure that that we wanted this course to expand the pool of students who potentially could be fed into honors broadcasting. So, this this is really the the curriculum connected to the course that was approved in the spring.
>> All right. Thank you. >> Um, >> sorry about this. >> We have on old business. Uh, any follow-ups to the NJGPA update? Did anybody have any follow-up questions? And then um board retreat dates, we
are looking um potentially at either September 13th or October 4th. So, um, would everybody prefer an email be sent out individually just to confirm availability on one of one or both of
those dates? Or do you want to >> how how long is is that part of a board meeting? Is it a separate thing? And how like how long are we talking of a retreat? Do we have any idea? >> Five hours. >> Oh, just five. Okay. I was hoping you
were going to say five, six. I don't I think Maryanne is >> Oh, Maryanne's gonna come >> facilitating. So, she's going to be I would imagine kind of determine what the agenda will be. So, I don't even know what the time is. >> An open session, right?
>> If you have a quorum. Yeah. Well, you have to advertise it, >> but we still have to do it out here. recorded, right? >> No, >> no, >> no, >> no. There's nothing that's requiring us
to live stream the board meetings. >> Oh, >> all right. >> Okay, >> those dates are on weekends. They're on Saturdays, the 13th and the 4th. >> Saturday, >> is it not? >> Yeah.
Here's what here's what I'm going to suggest we do. I'm gonna I'm gonna talk to Michael and Tina and maybe have Maryanne provide an kind of a summary overview of a board retreat and some of the outcomes that
that can be accomplished and what that may look like. >> I think that would be good because I have to say some of the other board retreats I've been to haven't really been all that beneficial or helpful. I mean, they were fine, but it wasn't really anything that was lifealtering and it didn't really change much with
the board members, at least for the ones that I participated. >> No, I think it would be helpful for Maryanne to do that. So, um, because I had suggested that someone from school boards kind of serve as a facilitator just to kind of navigate that. Um, so I
can reach out to her and um, I think that will hopefully give folks kind of like a clear picture in terms of possibilities regarding the the retreat and then they can make a determination in terms of how you want to shape it. >> Okay.
>> Yeah, that'd be great if we could have like expectations like is it going to Yeah. >> Yeah. I think knowing the approximate length is probably a good starting question. >> Yeah. and just the kinds of things that we'll be that we're thinking of discussing and what the outcome is is
supposed to be of the retreat. >> And and I think I think Tina I don't want to speak I don't want to speak for Tina but I know I believe she had some preliminary discussions with Maryanne and I know that when she had sent out a few months ago there was some suggested areas talking points but I just don't know in terms of refining that but I
know she did share but we can revisit that and get get that back out to the board. Um, I think that concludes old business. Uh, second opportunity for board member comments. No. Okay. Um, uh, second opportunity for
public comments. There being none, um, moving on to our approvals. Having read the materials received, I move that the board approve the routine agenda items as submitted. A. Staffing 82525.
B. Job description. C. Ewa sidebars. D. Approval of agreement. E. Approve travel and related expenses. F. Approved curriculum documents new and revised. G. Technology recycling batch number 60 and
61. H. E SJ Master Special Education Tuition Agreement I. Out of district placement, J. Professional Services for Students K. Mercer County Technical School tuition agreement shared and full-time. L Approval of HHS Auditorium
HVAC Vener renovation change order number two. M. Transportation quotes and transportation jointers. O. Minute approval. P. report of the board secretary and financial report June 2025. Q expense and transfer reports of
school monies report for June 2025 and our bill list of August 25, 2025. >> Second second pull, please. >> Question question the uh item B the No,
I'm sorry. the the agreement, the attachment with the amounts with all the members names, are those the calculated amounts that the association said were overpaid by their
members or is that the 70% settlement amount? Just want to be sure what we're voting on in terms of that. >> That's the entire amount. >> That's the entire amount. >> Yeah, that's not the 70%. >> That's what they were basing the claim on. >> Correct. Okay. So, we're voting on an
agreement that says 70% of those amounts. >> Correct. 75. >> Correct. Got it. Thanks. Any other questions? Paul, pull aboard. Miss Poleioli. >> Yes. >> Miss Conpsion. >> Yes.
>> Miss Laruso. >> Yes. >> Mr. Lavy. >> Yes. >> Mr. Weeks. >> Yes. >> Uh there is no current need for a second executive session. And we can now adjourn.