Do you notice that this meeting has been provided to the retrospective oh sorry to the retrospective as of September 30th 2025 to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it
stands one nation under God indivisibley and justice for all. >> All right call and Mr. C >> here. Mr. Kle >> here
is absent >> here. >> All right, moving to section three, our minutes. Can I get a motion to approve item 3.1 for session region? >> All in favor? I >> All right, moving to section four,
correspondence. Mrs. Bald, do we have any? >> No, we do not. >> All right, moving to section five, public comment. This is our first public comment section of the evening. This is for comments from members of the public for the board of educational items included on tonight's agenda. You have a
comment, please state your name, the street that you live on, and move your arms to three minutes. Seeing none, we'll move to section six, superintendent. Okay, >> great. Thanks for everybody showing up tonight. It's good to see everybody. Happy uh November and free Thanksgiving.
Uh tonight, we're going to go in a little bit of a different order uh because our newest student board representative has joined us tonight. I'd like to introduce Luke Walni. Uh Luke's application uh to be a board rep
uh here tonight is outstanding. Uh he's super motivated to participate and contribute and I've got the opportunity along with Mr. Shorter to get to know Luke uh and look forward to his contributions throughout the school year. Uh Luke, the board's excited to greet you and uh you're going to be
first because I know that you have to go back to the football bank tonight. Uh so you the very top of the agenda, introduce yourself to the board and provide your uh monthly report, monthly update from the schools.
Hi, senior hats high school. As mentioned, I have a football game where I just came from. uh as my monthly report and I will be covering mainly events that be happening in the winter and how kind of break that in. So my first report solely focus on basketball games and how
towards like the latter half the season attendance for those students actually parents can start the game up that can encourage students to come and the first way is at halftime a lot of schools have cheerleaders and the dance team have some sort of performance. We have an AC
that can definitely be another performance. It's additionally musical that they could have occasional halftime games. So if they have soccer games, they could come to basketball court and they could dance which will then allow parents to come and go to their parents. Second one is student activities. So
it's like fun contest to have or some sort of activity at the half. So we should have come out to the snacks and that momentum and that drive game. it would happen. They're going to engage fun cheer on their classmates once the
second half starts. And finally, I came up with a raffle idea just to get some people that otherwise wouldn't come to come. And then my second thing regarding student winter is that for seniors especially as winter
rolls around and that feeling of like the new school year and fall schools and all falls starts to fade a lot of stress as they start wondering where am I going to go to college? What am I going to do? How do I focus on my grades? So definitely I believe the things we can do in that January March period to focus on student mental health wellbeing and
breaking out that stress. And the first one we definitely do more extra events. We've had a lot of tournaments like spike ball tournaments and nutrition tournaments and do ball tournaments. We can definitely keep doing that and add more work just to keep students especially students engaged because
there's not much before me and my buddies getting a dog playing some class. Another thing we can do is just occasionally have some new fun or some new fruits or some candies just during the school day as well. not the
same thing every day to get up there. I know I think especially seniors, it's an occasional movie night in the cafeteria or somewhere where seniors especially as we're coming to the end of our high school year in our school here in Hannah Township can give us memories
and make us a lot closer. You know, everyone's love and watching and as you walk that stage at graduation, that's something reflect on. I really appreciate how you were able to get so much closer to school rather than having to do outside school.
>> Any questions about those ideas for >> first of all, I think they're great ideas. Second of all, I think you should probably loop the younger kids too for the basketball. Have them have like a a small like, you know, two on two, three on three game. That way those kids are coming in. But I think that's great. I think
>> this is this is what we want. like this is like that type of feedback is like we need to hear more things that are like you guys are thinking all in that regard because it helps right I mean we know as a good school district we get that but the things that help us move the needle are your comments right there they're
incredibly helpful so whatever we can do to help you support you guys we will try to do so I think the challenge with some of the stuff you're saying is trying to get shop so that's the that's the big like after hour stuff so we have to kind of figure that but we can work on that
so Luke, how's the injury? I know you got a football game next Wednesday night. How's how's the injury coming along? So, the collar is still separated. It's what happened was it's called a TP fracture where it's like this. >> So, I don't need surgery or anything
Monday. They're going to be now emergency a lot. But I I'm going to do all the precautions actually have any stuff. There are some risk with it like a severe breakage. We cause surgery loss
on. But I have one game left. I think if I've gone through three years of football, the other one you can play back to the bank now. We're going to see you at 557. Whether you're in full pads and uniform or not, 57,
we're going to have a living cutting ceremony right before the game. >> All right. >> All right, Lily and Ariel, it's your turn for your student report and welcome back. Um, so something that I've noticed is students are starting to participate in
more activities, which was really like a struggle at the beginning of the year. Um, we had the spirit dance and there were very few I think I touched on that a little bit, but there were very few students that came to it and so we were like it made us nervous for the rest of the year because nobody got the first
thing like months of the school year left. And so this month we have two bigger things. We have Crazy Olympics, which is just like a bunch of like activities that we do after school. And then we have Powder Puff, which is where all the girls play
football. And um so far for the Olympics, since I'm part of Studio Co, I get to see like um we sell shirts, so I can see like the numbers of how many people are uh participating. And so far with Crazy Organics, it's going to be on Monday. And all the senior and junior
shirts are totally sold out. and sophomore and freshman are they're a little less being a little bit more nervous to join new things, but they are still um Miss Shaker compared the but she's the speed director. She compared the numbers to last year and it's looking better than it was last year
which is just really exciting cuz almost about 2 months ago there was nobody not near that many people coming to the spirit dance. And then for power class same thing um Mr. George, he ordered 120 shirts to keep them at like $25 a shirt. And they're they were all sold out.
People were asking him like, "How do we get a shirt?" Like the the originally when they sent out Google form for the shirts. Um they said it was going to close on Tuesday at 3:00. They had to close it a day early cuz they were already sold out. So everyone was like, "Oh, they're not really sure. I thought the form was still open." So that's
already 120 people, which is way more people than the spirit band. Um, so it's just we're really excited because we also have our homecoming dance coming up which is the beginning of December and when we see numbers we're really excited that people are still like participating and we're excited to see people at all
these events. >> Thank you. >> All right. So I want to start off with sports. Uh I want to say congratulations to all the sports teams uh tennis, field hockey, cross country. cross country
last week finished their like I think it was like state finals and stuff like that and they did fantastic field camp or two ago season in the playoffs a really good year especially the new coaches
fantastic and then tennis team we won semi we only made the semi-finals for our conference got beat up by um your daughter not going to lie. Tough loss, but congratul. And um because of that um we had our
allstars um SJTC and awards which is just basically um every tennis group um they meet a certain criteria banquet and uh both of our varsity doubles won off doubles and our first singles Ellie
Smith and our second singles Christian Town won a bunch of awards so it was a really great night and speaking of great nights our boys and girls soccer team both won their conference titles. They had a fantastic season. Unfortunately,
it was a backto-back loss for the Southeast State uh titles, but but I'm not we're not on to keep playing. We have amazing athletes on that team. We have amazing school spirit. I made I don't know if I made the other day, but um we were there at
the boys and girls game. I don't think I've ever seen that many kids there before. Like we had we had a good season last year were very good last year especially the boys but we we had fun there's people that I don't even see go out of the house other than school there
and it was a great surprise cuz you see them there like oh my god what's going on so it was it was a really fun time I feel like because of how successful our sports team are they really like boost them around and everyone you see people like alumni like
I saw graduate 2024 for like people that take my mom's class there. So, it was it was really it was really nice to see it. It brings the three of you together and locker rooms are finally open. Personally, I can't speak for the boys cuz I'm a girl
locker room. But, um the girls locker rooms are fantastic. I They're beautiful. I've only heard things. We have so many bathroom stalls. It's fantastic. It's It's so great. We have running stakes. It's It's fantastic.
It's It's great. Going from Shock toilets to now this. I'm I'm not one to complain. I I love it. And then your football field, which obviously we're going to be doing the unveiling, but a few gym classes have been able to like play on, walk around, and it's
beautiful. People are so excited, especially like mentioned our powder cup game. We're all so excited to be like the first first people to play. You mean football player? >> Do you guys want to talk a word about what happened last year for last year's
Power Puff game and make any predictions for this year's game? >> Well, we talked and we beat the uh seniors that graduated last year. There's no way we're losing. >> Was it a guaranteed victory? >> Yes, especially um >> so we know Draft Kings. It's a lot.
>> Yeah. Be very proud to share with you guys his 60 slide playbook that he and he doesn't love that we tried to narrow it down to lesson. We are hopefully going to get all of
that in. He's he's really he's really good. I appreciate it. cuz this is one of the things that I feel like um like adults don't really like get involved involved with like they usually don't go to the games but us as students were very very competitive about it
especially like juniors usually like the whole point of it is that like oh it's seniors r like they like it's your senior year for winning there's no doubt about it you don't you don't have you don't have to be anything like that junior for whatever
All right. Thank you, girls. Excellent job. Uh before I forget, I just want to remind the community and the board and our guests and whoever's watching uh on live stream that the football game first of all, we are going to be selling tickets via QR code. Uh so, and those
tickets can be available in advance or at the at the door. Uh so, we're expecting probably the largest crowd ever as long as the weather's not too cold or rainy. for uh a really great. All right, next on the agenda, moving to
some more serious business. Uh I want to uh acknowledge um that we're appointing a new high school principal tonight, effect of February 1st, 2026.
Uh and that principal is going to be Mr. Kevin Greeway. I have worked with uh Kevin each year in town. Kevin's been with us eight, but he has more institutional memory than just the last 8 years
because Kevin was also a graduate at High School. He is the perfect leader for this position. I am ready for you to be able to step into this job and not only honor all of our past and future visions, but also to uh have the
foresight and the this the skill set to lead us into the future. I couldn't couldn't be more excited. This is a welldeserved, well-earned no-brainer decision as far as I'm concerned. Um and it's my uh to present to you Mr. Freeway
for tonight's agenda. And he's here tonight and he'd like to say a few words. All right. So, I just want to start by first and foremost thanking everybody in this room, Dr. Zero, Miss Shorter, Miss Paul, the entire board of education, and the
entire high community for trusting me with this position. Uh, Dr. Vicaro said, I was a product of this fantastic community. I grew up here. I grew up as both a student and also as an educator. I taught here for 5 years and then I
began my career as an administrator here. So, this has really been my place to grow up in so many ways. And I'm really grateful to all the people that have made Haden Township High School and Had Township School District such an
amazing place. and I'm honored to continue that tradition, but also to to lead the school as the community and the district continues to change into the future. Uh I want to thank my family. Unfortunately, my family wanted to be here tonight. I have a sixth fourth
grader at home. Wash your hands everybody. It's going around. Um and then my wife's home with her and then my seventh grader and my younger son. My seventh grader is at basketball practice and her coach would not let her leave. even though the coach actually left. I'm
the coach. So, I want to thank them because obviously they're my family and they're my priority, but as anybody knows, the high school is also my family and I my family is my priority, but my immediate family knows that I'm going to have to
spend a lot of time at school. So, I'm very grateful to them for allowing me to do this. Uh, I've spent a lot of time at the middle school over the past few months and I've really enjoyed it and I've enjoyed getting to know those kids and seeing how the building works. It's
even expanded my understanding of all the runningings of the school. It's it's been so long when the high school and middle school are connected, but you know, we we talk a lot and I work really well with Andrew, but just being there gave me so much knowledge. Uh, so I'm really appreciative of the middle school. But having said that, I'm I'm
really excited to come back to the high school as well. Um, it's where I started. I built a lot of relationships there and I'm just really excited to come back to first and foremost the students. Um, I it's why I get into this. It's why I coach youth basketball.
It's why I became a teacher is to work with the students and our students are fantastic. And I want each of them to know that I see them. I I will listen to them and I'm really really excited to get to work with them because they're amazing. So, I'm really really excited.
I want to thank everybody and I'm excited to get started eventually. Most excited to go back to middle school tomorrow. So, thanks for >> congratulations.
>> You earned it. Right. There's a saying that uh you know we're always standing on the shoulders of those who came before us and I I have had the pleasure or the opportunity to follow five superintendent who when when
I was came into this role. Um I was still pretty frequent contact all past superintendent who were willing to to help me as I got started. And um you know there's no stronger foundation uh
than uh Mr. O'Brien Gary O'Brien who uh is leaving a tremendous legacy at the uh at the high school as a uh many many decade leader Gary's been a role model. His his work ethic has been second to none. He cares deeply about our school
district, our school and um and that's the foundation that uh will will build on and we're excited to to welcome Kevin but also tell us the wonderful work that Mr. O'Brien has done in his life's career, his life's work, his
professional life at high school. Um right next to Gary is a longtime science educator, Mr. Tommy Mulligan who's also retiring uh in February. Tommy has been with us for uh
three decades uh as a you know not only a science teacher but he's done everything we've asked him to do. Tom has he's coached multiple teams. He drives the school bus for us. We we catch him back in the school like 9:00
at night running the hallways when they're not right. Um he he's got the most energy and he's I don't know what he's going to do himself in retirement. Uh but this is a tireless worker and and I can call him a friend now because it's
been a pleasure getting to know Coach Bull and over the past uh several years as well. Some acknowledgements at our middle school. We have we have a wonderful tradition at our middle school called one book one school that I probably have
to acknowledge a novel for the last few years and tremendous kind of work tech with the middle school administration they select the novel all together it's an immersion into all best practices regarding all the the
literary devices author visit it uh visits gives an assembly there's a lunch in just an outstanding program took graduation started middle school and I stirred from one public school another year another successful year with that
program and then hot off the press um and we knew this was a high group of sixth grade math scholars that came came into the middle school um magna math math program is running a competition across the country with 900 schools uh
and right now our sixth grade miniw week class for uh Miss Valley. Uh they appear to be in second place out of 900 schools. Uh it's coming down to the wires. However, it turns out it's a tremendous one, two or whatever they finish at this
point. We're really proud of them. The most important thing is they're motivated to do that, think critically, solve hard problems, and um you know, get great results from the engagement standpoint right now with that program.
Next, our partners in education, Hag Township Education Foundation. Walt is here as the call to serve in that organization. He's going to present us with what is now known as the big check and uh thank you all for coming out.
>> Thank you. Appreciate it very much. Um these dollars were given 11,51. Uh we we're going to fund um 12 total grants that are going to touch pretty much every school in the district. I think there 18 applications. We are closing in on $250,000 raised. I only a
little off the high numbers. Um we've given we just raised $25,000 for a golfer which has been much growing every year. We also have an application for $1,500 for some emergency uh snap issues. Um so we're going to support the district with that effort. So these are
dollars from the community of of adults to the community of students. So it is an absolute joy and privilege and and honor to uh raise these dollars to get back to school. So thank you for all your the great work you guys give the last piece right so it's it's
it's a competition amongst the schools. So you can go online. So it's all over Facebook and whatnot and you can you know make a donation and mention your school and then which school gets a $500 grant um to the principal to be used as a so I think the sixth or seventh year
we give um so we ask your support there as well. So thank you selfishly not. Okay, last but certainly not least, this person to the left, Kelly, our board president, is continuing to be uh a
state leader and advocate when it comes to uh school funding. Um I ask her to speak on behalf of the school funding collector which she leads and uh it's not a direct, you know, correlation with
the with the school board, her role, but it's a separate role. uh but she's doing this work specifically to help our school district receive funding entitled to and other school districts like arts. So um she's done an amazing job in that role and we're going to have she
recently had an online meeting and we're help uh happy to share. So we did an update on Tuesday. It was really meant to be a follow-up to the session that was done at workshop, which is the uh schoolboard
conference. It happened in October, but we had a lot of attendees who were not actually at that session. And so we reframed it to focus on uh the New Jersey Department of Education survey that came out uh few weeks ago. It closed on the 14th. And in that, the
Department of Education really laid out their funding priorities and the areas where they are open to potential changes when it comes to the funding formula and the way funds are allocated. Uh, and so it was really like a preview of the thinking and what may be going into the
funding formula and the decisions that our new governor is going to be making when it comes to the budget for this year. So, we talked through the elements of that survey, the focus areas around our local wealth measures. Um, so the local fair share, how that's calculated, how special education, transportation,
extraordinary aid, all of those areas are calculated. And then we talked about some legislation to watch that exist right now. There are a few bills that are in the legislature that if you talk to some folks who are in the legislature themselves, they'll tell you to keep an eye on these bills because they have the
most potential moving. So there's one that's really focused on um logistics and transparency around the funding formula. There's uh another one that is focused on regionalization of school districts and consolidating school districts. It was named that's a brand
new bill. It was named that one is much more about starting conversation rather than pushing that legislation forward. So I don't want folks to get too concerned about that, but it's really to continue a dialogue uh around that. And so it was great conversation. a lot of school districts, a lot of school board
members were on uh happy to see folks who are interested in advocacy efforts now that the election has happened. We have a chance now that we know for sure who our elected officials are uh to go back and start engaging more in trending with those folks as well around what's
possible for this year and future years. at this point and again when we governor there may not be a ton of changes that can happen in this short period of time for this year's budget but uh future budgets are still up in the air
I knew Kristen was on too I was listening to you knew I was on >> while driving I was listening to you did a very nice job and the team of people that were communicating were very interesting.
>> Yeah. >> And including you, Kristen, you know, so I applaud you for that effort and thank you for taking your time to delve into that. It's nice you mark
pushing that. Thank you. >> Yes. And we have several of our board members who are really involved in that. Mr. Cook are definitely part of those ongoing efforts as well as our own administrative team. That's all I have for my superintendent.
We're going to have you right in to introduce you our presenter for tonight. Please. >> Okay. All right. So, save the best for last here. The most important for last. I think throughout the last 18 months or so, we have heard from just about all of
our administrative team. I don't think Mr. Georgia, but I think for pretty much all of our schools and uh technology facilitator is here elementary school principal and uh Dana Connor is our
supervisor special services. She does a remarkable job. She hands down has the most complex uh roles on the administrative team overall special services. Um it it's complex and delivering
services and the management of the services and uh I welcome all of your work and dedication to our school district. share with the board state of the union as it pertains to special education. >> Thank you very much.
All right. So, I'm going to uh share just a very brief uh summary of our special education services. Um I as Dr. Cara said, I think that you touch me session. I've been here for 18 years. Um, but I've been working in special
education for probably 38 years at this point. Um, which is a great way to start a presentation to share how old I am with all of this. But um, I could talk about special education and my students and and the students that we support um,
at so I'm going to try to focus on some very clear data so that you guys have a very basic overview of what is the status of our special education services right now at Haden Township. I'm going to focus a little bit on our adult
district um uh supports and how how we are looking at that and some of our new programs that we've implemented within the district as well. So um just because those are some of the things that do come up as far as when we have our so make sure that you are getting all of
the information that I can share. Um just overall just starting with some of the goals of my department for this year. We have a lot of goals we work on over time just as we work with our students. But um we are really focusing on that specific data evidence to inform our practices and our programs. I'm
going to share a little my thought process as we start new programs in the district tonight. How we use the data to um make those decisions. Um, we're also continuing to try to be proactive with our communication with colle students and our families, making sure that we are giving more updates on pro progress
and how our students are moving forward with their skills. And then um there's been a lot of new state level mandates uh for special education this year. specifically some with the area of notice of no of meetings. Um some in the
area of um uh the way we are looking at um our classification and how we classify students with specific learning disabilities and also a lot of humanities with regard to student graduation and transition into postsecary uh programs. So we are doing
a lot of PD and deep diving and how we can change some of our practices in those areas. We are also looking to um incorporate some new assessments. We use assessment tools uh that are national norms. Uh when we are looking at classification evaluation of our
students for some reason this year three of them have come up with new versions. So we are needing to do a lot of new uh professional development regarding that and make sure that we are really using the most upto-date and and valid instruments when we are evaluating our
students. And then as ongoing, we're always looking for how we can look at alternate supports and how we can support counseling and mental health and then behavior challenge and emotional regulation um needs of our students with that is something in in both of those
areas. We've seen an increase in uh needs of our students, whether it's school refusal, school anxiety, emotional regulation, significant behavior challenges over the last 5 to six years. and we really need to be um really out of the box of how we are
looking to support our kids um in their uh mental health. So, I'm going to talk just kind of the nuts and bolts of things over the last few years. Um you can look at our total classification uh numbers. This is how many students have been classified by
the end of the school year each year. I do have our data for this year currently is at 389 students in district are students who are classified. Um as you can tell it's slowly been creeping up. Um that midyear number we are
anticipating will definitely be rising. We anticipate will probably be over 400 by the end of the school year. Our similar rates are going. We are currently classif uh working on evaluation of approximately 15 students and that is usually about our number that we have at all times is around 15
students in our evaluation process. Um looking at the out of district numbers we do have kind of a similar number of students over time. Um some of our um uh reasons why we have we're a little uh lower than we might have been is because
we have implemented some new programs in districts. So I will talk about that as we move forward. Um we are also this year having a big class of students that are going to be graduating. So either they are ready and they've met their goals that are going to move on or they
are going to be reaching the age of 21 in which um they will no longer eligible for our school services. So we have a big emphasis this year on really supporting those students to make sure that their parents, their families are ready for this transition. Um, and we
have we do a lot of stuff for our kids across um across uh their school uh programs over the years in order to help make sure that parents and are really ready when um especially our students with more significant needs are ready for that adult services time. Um for
example, we have um later the next two weeks in two weeks we have a lunch and learn session with the developmental disabilities with developmental disabilities uh for some of our families who might want to meet and talk about how we register and how to be a part of the DVD process
as well as um what services as DVD is opening up a bit more into um our students before they're 21 and providing services as well. So we are looking at making sure our parents are aware of that and taking advantage of that. Um so that's really more for our high school
age students. We are starting to um get make sure that our parents are getting that information. Uh in addition, we have our um case managers at the high school level who are trying to reach out to college programs, especially as our kids get accepted into programs, reaching out to those programs and
talking to them about what is needed as far as ensuring they can receive some supports at the college level or their area of disability whether it's a 504 plan or access to learning services. So we continue to support that. Um just looking at our eligibility
across classification category. One of the nice things that has happened in the state hall over the last five years is that we have moved from language from um uh our classification language to a more student centered uh standpoint. One of the biggest areas of that is well for
example communication impairment used to be communication disabled or disability emotional regulation impairment which is more descriptive used to be emotionally disturbing. So the wording was just really not something that was very positive and really s you know really
symbolized what was happening with our our kids and what their needs were. So that's been positive. But as you can see most of our students um in district are students with specific learning disabilities. Um our other students uh might have other health impairment. Most
students with other health impairment are usually students that have attention deficit disorder or another medical diagnosis which qualifies them for services eligible for speech and language services or students that might not need special education programming but may support them with speech
therapists for articulation or fluency needs. Um we have students with autism communication impairments, our preschoolers with disabilities, students with multiple disabilities and our emotional regulation impairment. And while preschool, multiple disabilities, and the emotional regulation impairment
categories are kind of about on the lower end here, there actually are three categories that have increased the most over our numbers increasing most over the last 5 years. Um, emotional regulation impairment really looking at our students that are having a hard time with controlling their emotions, may
have some explosive behavior or significant anxiety is impacting their ability to perform in school and access their school. We have a definite big increase in our preschool population as well. So, um, our preschool classes and our inclusion classes in the district
are full. I know we added another section two years ago. Um, we really have a lot of of preschoolers in our really wonderful preschool programs. Looking at just classification by school level, it makes a little bit of a sense
that we have more classified students at the elementary school. There's more grade levels there. just getting that information overall. And then when we talk about our students with uh their different classifications and their different needs, we have a range of continuum of services that we
do provide for our students based on what that student's need is. The goal is always to be as close to the general education class as possible, which we call the least restrictive environment. We always want to be pushing towards that. Um but uh we have students that have different needs and they need more
than that. So we have our general education, we have our inclusion classes or inclusion sections um which uh includes a special education teacher and a general education teacher co-eing together in order to support students in the general education class. We have our
resource classes which might be students that need to leave the class for a period of time to work on specific skills or have a um a class at the high school level which might be an alternate um curriculum and a placement so that they can learn in a small group setting
and work on individual goals. We have special class programs, our self-contained classes. We've actually seen a big increase in our need and our our population in our self-contained classes which is why we have looked at starting some new programs there. We have students that are in out of district programs but with our attending
in a public school setting so they may be we have students that are in or have in the past and had colleas valley where they have programs in some of the bigger school settings um that meet the needs of our students. And what
is nice about that is when we can have our students placed close to us, um when they are going out and needing to do things in the community or in um work settings, they are doing it here within their local community. So um they're not too far away in another private school.
So the private school placement really is our our programs that have a lot of intensity. They are very um expert at how to support students that have the multiple different needs. um different schools focus on different things. So, we've always making sure that we're
finding the right fit for our our kids um and the and families as well in those out of district placements. And then we do have some kids that might need home instruction. In talking about those programs, this is our numbers right now is that um we have
about 26 students in our preschool or in our self-contained preschool classes. Um we have 36 students in a self-contained language and learning class or multiple disabilities class. Again, those are the two programs that have increased a great
deal in district for us. We have um 236 students. Most of our students are in those inclusion or in the small group pull out classes and in general education for most of their day. Um we have students that are in out of district public school settings like I said and out of district private school
settings. And then our students I've talked a lot about numbers right now about our general special education population. Are there any questions this morning? >> We do want to couple questions in that one slide when you have the classifications.
>> Can you be is it is it just like can you be in multiple classifications as one student? So if you are if your classification is because you have different needs in different areas, you typically are falling under the multiple disabilities classification. However, um
we do have students that have a reading disability and attention deficit disorder, but the reading disability is the most significant thing and they're going to be under the specific learning disability. >> And if you do, if you qualify, can you can you test out not much? So once you
are a special education student, we basically um every year we do an annual review of the uh program for student or we do it more often than needed to determine is the placement program where you are is appropriate or what are we recommending for next year based on the progress you've made. Like I said, we're
always working towards that general education piece. But then every three years at a minimum or more often at least every 3 years we need to meet and redetermine eligibility for every student. So every student is kind of being close to us one of our out of
district students who we met and we said okay you know do we need to do more testing but should we re-evaluate and look at um your needs where they are now to determine are you still eligible for special education services or do you need any changes program based on where
where your car is. So it's something that we have to do at least every three years. We do it on a a on an individual basis every year annually to talk about programming but at least every year we have to say are you still eligible to work on and we determine not necessarily
eligible for if you're not meeting the criteria and you're not meeting special education services anymore say you guys do a great job. You have a challenging situation here. >> Yes. It's a challenging job and uh pull
your staff. >> I will say that I will I could talk your ear off about how great our kids are and how great our staff is and that is really what makes all of those challenges worth it. Um we're going to talk a little bit about out of district. We do have one of our students here. Um
I know we talk a lot about the augmented communication systems. This is actually a student who is in her wheelchair. She does have her authentic device that is uh supported there with um a that we have approved in the past to purchase. Um but that keeps her device there so
she can talk while she is um engaged in the community. So I'm going to focus a little bit on out of district data. All right. So right now currently if we're looking at the school level uh we have one preschool student who's out of district
currently um most of our students are in the high school 18 to 21 range. Um our services are from 3 to 21. So most of our kids are there and as I mentioned we have 5 to six kids that are graduating this year um from our programs.
If we look at our district data by classification, most of the students um who are in our out of district programs are in the multiple disability or mild uh intellectual disability that term um or students with regulation pair. uh
students with autism. Uh the students that are really needing that really intensive specialized programming that while we say that we do a great job here, we love our kids and we really try to keep them to be here in Hatton Township, there are times where they need a broader set of resources and
specialization. So when I'm looking at each year um I'm looking at our different uh district costs um that we have some challenges. We are looking at um cost increases that might be more than 2% every year which
is what our tax increase would be. Um not so much in tuition and although that does happen at times it's in the related services component where the cost of 101 a cost of a speech service or the cost of equipment that we may need to purchase. Those are things that are
definitely have increased much more. So it's really hard to put a percentage on it because we so vary all the different types of things. But we also look at um the type of placement. So we are looking at in general for student we are always trying to work on again the least restrictive
environment. We want to we feel like we cannot program our student here in district. We're going to look at other public school settings that are local. Do they have programs here that have our students still in public school settings give them much more testing that they need that we may not have programs in
township but they may have had ice or may have had fields and we're going to look there um if that is not what is needed and we need to look at a um more extensive program than we are doing that our case managers are going out to the families so that we can tour places make
sure that we're asking questions about what are the needs how are you going to be able to provide the services how are you going to be able to look at progress for our students. Um, and we still are the case managers for those students even though they are attending the program. So, we are out visiting doing
modulation. We are handling the IEP process. We are calling to make sure we get the progress reports and everything else. So, we're making sure that progress is being made. But some of the other parts of that is we have had five students return to district in the last two years. um which
is really a testament to our wonderful staff and our teaching teams and everybody else who's been wonderful about trying to help incorporate students back into their home community. Um we've had two students that were when they moved into district were already out of district and had never set foot
in touch school building and we went out observed them got to know them and said you know what we can educate you here and help them back. It's very challenging as you guys know the students know it's very challenging when you have new people come in and try to integrate and I will say our students and our staff have just been phenomenal
about making sure that kids are in programs with the after school programs and doing what is needed. Um we have al also opened three new programs in district three years. We have the uh multiple disabilities program at uh the elementary school van sky. We have a um
new language and learning disabilities classroom at advanced scatter as well that we had a few open this year for um increased number of kindergarten students that we have had that need and we just opened a new uh multiple disabilities classroom at the middle
school we talked about previously as well. So when we're making our thought, one of our other great kids, but when we are looking at our thoughts of how is it time to start a program in district, we really want to look at do we have a
cohort of students? Do we have a few students that have similar needs that we feel we're going to be able to um leave as much as possible? This is great. Um but do we have a a program a need for a group of students that aren't really going to have similarities needs and how
we do that here in the district? between space is another part. Space has been a challenge for us as well. Do we have then a potential need for this program over time? Um, so if I start a new program here in middle school, I want to make sure, do we have a potential lead for this moving forward with some of our
kids that may be coming up to our self-pay classes and as we've been keeping and starting new programs at the elementary level, it is making sense that we are needing a program at the middle school level now and in three years a supporting our least restrictive
environment, but we also need to look at the increased level of support. If we're bringing kids back, if we are keeping our kids in district, are we able to provide services that are going to help them progress? Are we going to be able to use a bunch of resources? Can we do that within our setting? Can we have the
right speech therapy, the behavior uh supports, the right equipment? Um, and you know, whenever we're starting a new program, these are all things we have to consider to make sure, can we do this and do it with fidelity so that we are really making sure our kids are going to make progress. Any questions about that
so far? >> I have real quick. How does it like so? >> Yeah. >> Are they there programs that are specialized like they create their own and then they because they have to come
have to keep the kids in that program, right? So if I create something, they don't want to dissolve something. So they have to come. >> Yeah. I always find that um taking tuition students like you were student there you would pay tuition >> tuition is it is it I know when I see our tuition rate is that tuition rate
different because it's is it a higher tuition rate >> no within another district um typically is lower but it is it just depends like because our private and our our bigger school programs are more intensive and they really have they need to see a lower ratio they need a lot of services
they need specialized equipment they need all of the there. So if you're sending a student to another public school setting, they may need some of those things, but maybe not the same as >> if you create a program, would you look to other districts to kind of help support that?
>> Yeah. When I was mentioning that I met with Hill yesterday, you know, that's what a lot of talked about is what do you have coming out? You know, I said, "Hey, I just started a program for middle school and he has said the other day they have a program at the age 21 level." I'm like, "Fantastic." So now we
need to look at how can we keep our kids maybe not so you know if we can't keep them close >> and um what do you think of that? So we're going to have a student that uh may need job training skills or maybe um support there and we're going to have to
go out into the community if they're attending a program in another another place then that's more challenging to find you know to find generalized facts at home. if you know they're going to be in heights, they're looking at working in communities and going to restaurants that are major here. So, that's always
our goal. Um, you know, the challenge is that some of our really specialized programs in Austin like we have uh county special services or we have the case program or Bangkok, you know, really wonderful programs um unfortunately are a little farther away.
So, that you know, those are um some of the challenges we have, but they are really great programs for our kids. Okay. All right. So, talking quickly about our middle school uh multiple disabilities program. I'm going to highlight that program. That's one of our preview new
classes that we started in September of 2025. We did have students who return to district for this program because we felt we were able to meet their needs here and um most parents are very happy to have their kids um be within their
local school district. Um, we had students that may have needed to go out because we didn't have the program that were able to stay with us to stay and had. Um, right now most of our students are in sixth grade, but it is going to likely be able to be ready over time next year. We may have some students
that uh are going to move into the program and we will then have sixth and seventh graders and then sixth and seventh and eth. So that is our process. Again, the least restrictive environment. This really does help promote that diverse population of students that we
want in district so that um our kids all of our families can benefit from um being part of that protective diverse community. Um I will say that the support from staff and administration has been incredible. Um everybody's part
as well. Um just you know there's a lot of challenges when you are bringing in students that really learn differently and need different routines and different curriculum and um the staff has been so welcoming coming up with really great ideas of things and we have a really great teacher who's helping as
well. Um so the program features it is continuing their academic instruction and the rigor that they were getting when they were in our elementary school programs or their out of district programs. They're doing reading instruction, math instruction. We are definitely still working on reading math. They are sixth grade students. They need to progress. Uh we do have a
special class program in which the students are working with a general education science teacher to do similar projects um with a lot of modification. So when there is a um experiment that's happening in the sixth grade classroom,
our kids in the program are working with that special ed that general education teacher to do those same projects. Um we have al potential for alternative routines. Those are things we had to think about. What are we doing? You know, we have a student that really can't handle being in a class in a group
of 50 middle school gym class, you know, those those classes are loud. Um, how about the lunchroom, which is also very loud and, you know, may have challenges for sensory needs. Um, what are we doing like art and music? And then how about the arrival and departure supports, you
know, so that our our students that may have a challenge on the larger buses or are walking in, how do you make sure that they're getting in safely? Um we also started a life skills and premocational classes in which we are looking at uh instruction in those areas of need for some of our kids. When I
talk about prevocational we are not teaching them job skills directly. They are sixth grade students but we are teaching them um how to take responsibility for u making sure that you're watering the plant every day or that you're you know doing your job within the classroom. Are you able to
sustain attention to complete a task over time without having to have someone support you and talk to you the entire time? So, we are looking at some of those skills. Um, and then being able to then work on the community and apply projects. For example, we are very uh
fortunate here at Htown Sciences room at the greenhouse. The kids um are just started a greenhouse unit. So they are going over to the greenhouse and starting to work on um understanding the life cycle of the plants and then actually doing that in in very hands-on project based pieces.
Um they also just finished their restaurant and just to go over a little bit of that. The kids um did uh math related to menus. They did a lot of money identification um practicing handing in money and making the right
amount of change. They also worked on social skills related to ordering using the right tone of voice. You'll communicate your wants and needs appropriately. Um, and how to look at menu and select what you want from a menu and then how to really show the appropriate etiquette when you're
sitting in the restaurant. So, our kids then after they practice all of that, had a walking trip earlier this week over to Joe's and they did their ordering. they were able to have a really great meal and um it went very well with them, but they're practicing those skills within the setting which
again is going to go to their parents at some point, you know, in order to help increase their influence. Um our goal later on is we do have the beverage cart. Um we had a beverage card actually through the HDF which already provided that grant for us um with using um
beverage card a system um different things in order for kids to make beverages and then practice going around taking orders uh selling um you know coffee and uh tea to the adults in the building students coffee but being able to do
that also snacks like popcorn and everything else. So it was something that they are working towards right now as well. So um we're very excited about that program. So, I have to say that overall um the staff has been just incredible about you
know starting a new program like this with all the challenges and differences um with our students that are staying in district because of our new programs do have a lot of behavioral needs and behavior challenges and our um special education teachers are really just and
our general education teachers play in there as well have just been really really great. Any other questions? >> And I have a question. So are they do they have the potential to be part of different clubs and things as well?
>> Are there they are in a tabletop gaming club? They are in music program. Um yeah, absolutely. We'll support them very closely over the years. you're a wealth of re wealth of knowledge for parents and I would just say as a
parent seeing how you do transition once they leave the district and go on um that is that is really something that I've observed hasn't happened with a lot of um kids when they get into college they're not as prepared maybe to advocate for themselves or as a parent
to be as prepared so I would just say that that you guys are doing the Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Mrs. All right, moving into section 8, finance and
facilities. Uh we have a couple of items that we're going to exclude from the vote for this. We have a couple of questions on um three of the contracts tonight. So, we're not going to go over those items. Those are 8.15, 8.16, and 8.19.
Um but can I get a motion to approve items 8.1 through 8.18 for the exception in those numbers of 8.15, 8.16? >> Second. >> Any questions about any of the items in the section?
Roll call. >> Mr. Cook, >> yes. >> Mr. Desi, >> yes. >> Mr. Kendall, >> yes. Mr. >> Lex, >> yes. >> Mr. Ser, >> yes. >> Miss Williams, >> yes. >> Yes. Moving on to section. Yeah. Moving on to section 9, instruction program.
Can I get a motion to approve item 9.1? >> So that's it. >> Any questions? Mr. Mesi, >> yes. >> Mr. Kendall, >> yes. >> Mr. Lex, >> yes. Mr. >> S, >> yes.
>> Yes. >> Moving on to section 10, personnel. Can I get a motion to approve items 10.1 through 10.16? Second. >> Any questions? Mrs. Mrs. Williams
Mr. Cook. >> Yes. >> M Desi. >> Yes. >> Mr. Kendall. >> Yes. >> Mr. L. >> Yes. >> Ser. >> Yes. >> Yes. Before you move on, I'm going to turn it over for the reading of a couple of resolutions. So, Mrs. Start with me.
>> This resolution is for Mr. So, whereas uh Mr. Dr. Thomas Welligan has for the past 34 years dedicated his career to the students of Hatton Township and has served as a dedicated professional educator endeavoring to
provide the best possible education for our students. And whereas the city Mr. Mulligan has a represented the Hen Township Board of Education in his role as a elementary teacher from 1992 to 1997.
a high school science teacher from 1997 to 2003, a middle school science teacher since 2003 to 2026, and has served as a coach and bus driver. Now therefore, be it resolved
that the Hen Township Board of Education recognize the excellent service that has rendered the said Township of Penn and the said board of education as well as the service rendered to the many students over the past 34 years in the
field of education and that the board of education does sincerely appreciate his efforts in their behalf and also in behalf of all the students in Hen Township and therefore It further resolves that a copy of this resolution be spread upon the minutes of this
meeting and a copy be presented to Mr. Mullin and Mr. >> Yes. Uh resolution whereas Mr. Mr. Gary O'Brien has for 32 years dedicated his
career to the students of Haden Township and has served as a dedicated professional endeavoring to provide the best possible education to our students. And whereas thus said, Mr. Mr. O'Brien
has aly represented the Hatton Township Board of Education in his role as a special education teacher since 1994 to 2001, assistant high school principal from
2001 to 2006, and as high school principal from 2006 to January 30, 2026 whereas the said Mr. O'Brien has served
capably and willingly now therefore be it resolved that the Hatton Township Board of Education recognize the excellent service that Mr. O'Brien has rendered the set township of Haven and
the set board of education as well as the service rendered to the many students over these 32 years of service and that the board of education does sincerely appreciate his efforts in
their behalf and also in behalf of all of the students in Hatton Township. Therefore, be it resolved that a copy of this resolution be spread upon the minutes of this meeting and a copy be
presented to Mr. O'Brien at Township Board of Education. >> Mr. Kendall, we are grateful to Mr. Mulligan and to Principal O'Brien for many, many years of dedicated service well and over time.
All right, moving into section 11, student services and activities. Can I get a motion to approve items 11.11? >> Second. >> Any questions? >> Roll callers. Mr. Cook, >> yes. >> Miss Desi, >> yes. >> Mr. Kendall, >> yes.
>> Mr. Lex, >> yes. >> M. >> Yes. All right, moving to section 12 policy. Can I get a motion to approve item 12.2? >> So move second. >> Any questions?
>> Roll call. >> Mr. >> Yes. >> M. Yes. >> Mr. Kendall. >> Yes. >> Mr. L. >> Yes. >> Yes. >> William, >> yes. >> All right. Moving into section 13. This is our final public comment section of the evening. This is for comments from
members of the public for the board of education on any topic whether or not it's on tonight's agenda. If you have a comment, please state your name, the street you live on, and limit your remarks to three minutes. All right, seeing none, we will move on. One thing I would like to say, we have
one additional thing to take care of, but I did want to congratulate Mr. Cook for finally receiving his official certification for a master board member from the University of School Boards Association. It was earned a while ago. It takes them a little bit of time on the
administrative end to have that come through, but it is finally truly official. So, congratulations. It's a lot of work to earn that certification. We appreciate your dedication. >> Thank you, Mr. Uh, okay. I would recommend at this time that the board
executive session for not a long not a long period of time. I do need to talk to the board about residency issue and uh it's going to require probably about 10 minutes 15 minutes max. >> Yes. So we will um go into executive
session. When we come out of executive session, we will immediately adjourn there. There will be no additional action taken this evening as a result of the content of that executive session. And so folks are welcome to go. We will not, as I said, be taking any additional action. We will just be officially
closing out the meeting after that executive session. And please, I just wanted to talk about uh Broadway night as that. We held that in the middle school with all the the change with the construction and it went very very well.
It was highly attended. Um people were so amazed at our students, but um Maryanne McKenzie came back to speak about what the night actually started out out as because we now have had a whole generation of students that have
gone through since Shannon has been here and it it was actually very touching and a lot of people did not realize the purpose of it and what the new family does and where that money goes. So it was very wonderful to be there for that.
Um we raised over $5,600 that night. So um it was a huge effort by a lot of people for food and adjusting to the the different space, but I wanted to thank her for
so and she is my new secretary in the office. So, I just wanted to introduce her to the board members. This is who you be speaking to. She'll sign you up for your um programs and stuff like that. So, you can put down the name that is Brianna. So, she's been with us since
August. She's been wonderful. >> If you visit the middle school, okay, most likely >> Oh, right. Right. >> So, you will not see Rihanna there. Uh but she does have a twin sister.
Uh school. So, uh I'm still >> any other comments uh from the board or administrators before we head into the second. >> I just have one I do want to in December talking before about the school climate
survey which has been in the works for a long time. to talk about what we're going to do, but I do want to get with Ariana sometime before our next regularly scheduled meeting with Mr. Sher because I want to get your input into what questions we should be asking students.
I got Bob Brown, former president asked a question about the lights, the track, will they be on all the time? Have we set that policy yet? So we know when the lights are going to
no during athletic events >> only during athletic events or whenever we're our affiliated field he runs with an impaired visually impaired runner. So he was he wasn't sure if they were happy
long. Somebody reached out to me on concerns with crossing guards because they actually witnessed an incident two weeks ago on Huffford and Merrick um and reached out to Chad and it was it wasn't the person wasn't hit but his concerns
are that our crossing guards are putting themselves at huge risk especially on comfort um because people are not slowing down and she convinced you to have a car there um this week couple and they did stop quite a few people who
went through the crosswalks and stuff. So, um, he was curious as to what we can do to help promote some things maybe through I don't know what technically is considered as county road, but yeah, like can we somehow get like those
flashing signs that say 20 anything that help can help mitigate the people speeding through or even getting those those little stick things that >> specifically on customer. >> Yeah. just because he walks his dog all
the time and and is happens to be there a lot of times when kids are crossing and stuff and he just has concerns and and likely so I know crossing just to go for that because the mayor was walking
across two weeks ago was just not paying any attention. But I think a lot of it is they're coming downhill from the >> car regarding the press. >> Thank you. >> Anyone else?
>> Uh I think we can turn in our electronics as well cuz we don't need them for this. >> Were you going to say something? Can I say one more thing? I'm sorry. Crossing bar um update. So, um we do Jen and I um got some flowers for the
crossing guard. So, and she did a personal visit with um >> Mr. He's doing very well. Much better. So, so you know coming back told me his
Very nice. Can I get a motion to move into executive session? >> All in favor?