Okay. Uh, opening the meeting public and open the meeting for a hall. So, I just read the little statement first. >> Right. I just need read the little thing. The New Jersey open public meetings law was enacted to ensure the right of the
public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of public bodies at which any business is affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon. In accordance with the provisions of the act, the Hopewell Valley Regional Board of Education has caused notice of this
meeting to be published and by having the date, time, and place thereof communicated to the Hopewell Valley News and the Times on January 7th, 2025. This meeting notice was also sent to Comcast Cable and Verizon FiOS. The
board reserves the right to enter into executive session during all meetings of the board of education. The meeting is being recorded for the purpose of board review, future reference, preparation of the meetings and viewing on YouTube, Bull TV, and the school district
website, www.hvbrsd.org. Um, members of the public who attend who intend to participate in public comment, we ask that you sign in prior to speaking. This will assist us with our recordkeeping. Okay. So, where am I?
>> Flag salute. Let's all stand for the flag salute, please. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and
justice for all. Okay. I need a resolution to approve the minutes of October 13th, our regular meeting. >> Motion. Second.
>> All those in favor? I. Any opposing? Abstaining. Minutes are approved. We will start the meeting with a report from our student representative. Hello, Dustin. Perfect. Okay. So, as we
wrap up the first marking period and begin to settle into schedules while entering the winter, we are proud to highlight students achievements and efforts that have been thriving in all domains. Our fall sports teams all wrapped up wonderful seasons with senior day celebrations and performances in CVC as well as state tournaments with many
players gaining recognition through Trentonians, unsung heroes, and capital division commendations. Girls cost crunchies junior Ciney Young participated at the meet of champions and the team will attend regionals on November 22nd. Many student athletes were also chosen to attend the CBC
sportsmanship summit out of 300 others from 14 Mercy County high schools representing the Hobo Valley ideals we foster in teams. In the arts, our theater department put on an amazing performance of the play The Crucible this weekend on the 14th and 15th after their past three months of dedicated
work. Our Hubble Valley Marching Black and Gold similarly had a stellar performance at the US Bands competition. Looking ahead, the choir program will be hosting a cabaret in the Blackbox Theater this Saturday, the 22nd, with tickets supporting their Italy trip. State testing was administered alongside
student parent teacher conferences from November 3rd to the 5th as we start the first full week of the second marking period starting today. Our school's unified club also hosted a warm and filling Friendsgiving feast last week with donations made to the Hopel Valley Food Pantry. Currently, we are holding
fundraisers in the spirit of giving with both a food drive for the Chubbies project by our robotics team and a diaper drive by our Black Student Union. Finally, the class of 2026 is currently planning their annual and final Flop Tracks with Frosty fundraisers set to be on December 6th from 10 to 12:00 a.m.
Thank you. >> Awesome. Thank you so much. Any questions or comments from the board? >> No. Fantastic. Thank you so much. Um, next is the report from the board president. Um, our board president is
under the weather tonight and so we're going to forego that report and go to the superintendent's report. Thank you. I am also going to keep my comments brief because I'm I've actually invited our one of our architects to give us a timeline on the referendum. I want to
say thank you to the community uh for supporting and for those who weren't weren't necessarily in support of the referendum. you certainly went out and learned about it and made your decision based on the information we put out there and we're so grateful for that and your feedback that you offered us along the way. Um we're very excited to move
forward with our project. So we'll be hearing from from one of our architects today who happens to be also a member of our school community. Um so he has a lot at stake here to also make sure that we get these things done timely timely and knowing that there is a process that we need to go through. Um so we'll share
that overview for you as well. Um, in addition to that, I just wanted to make a statement that we are still um, we've had our um, presentation by our demographers. That information and the video from that presentation is online for for anyone who wasn't able to attend. You can go right to our website
and there there is actually a button there where you can click and you can see that presentation and see the slide deck separately if you just want to go through and look at the projections. We continue to work with our municipalities on any projects that are still on the horizon. We met with Hopewell Burl today
who shared some information about some development they're looking um to work with the developer on to quite frankly take care of uh an area that that has you know a a old factory sitting on it. Something needs to happen with that factory. It needs to be at least at a minimum knocked down. So it's a great
opportunity to get rid of rid of a hazard in the community to take care of a brown uh space that needs to be rehabbed for the factory being there and then also to bring some housing in. that's that's kind of out in the horizon horizon too. Uh what I want to say is thank you to the bureau for reaching out
to us up front and for working with us to make sure that as as we invite new me community members in that we're all working to make sure that we have a plan for that as we move forward. And we continue to have those conversations with the township as well in terms of of the pilot and and um the effects on the district and how they can support us in
that. So, with that being said, I would I'd like to pass it off to um the board secretary and the and the vice president to continue the meeting. >> Great. Thank you so much. U next it is our pleasure to invite I'm assuming Miss
Riley up to celebrate some of our students. >> Good evening. Thank you so much for having me this evening. The National Merit Scholarship Program is an academic competition for recognition and scholarships that began in 1955.
High school students enter the National Merit Program by taking the preliminary SAT, the National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, a test which serves as an initial screen of approximately 1.6 million entrance each year.
Of the 1.6 6 million entrance, roughly 50,000 students with the highest PSAT selection index scores qualify for recognition in the National Merit Scholarship Program. About 34,000 of those 50,000
receive letters of commendation in recognition of their outstanding academic promise. Commended students are named on the basis of a nationally applied selection index score that varies from year to year. This year we have 19 commended scholars at HBCHS.
About 16,000 students or approximately a third of the 50,000 high scorers are notified that they have qualified as semi- finalists to ensure that the academically talented young people from all parts of the United States are included in this talent pool. Semi-finalists are designated on a state
representational basis. They are the highest scoring entrance in each state. And this year we have three National Merit semi- finalists at HBCHS. So tonight, out of the 1.6 million entrance from across the country, we are
recognizing 22 students who scored in the top 3% in the country and have earned the designation of commended scholar or semi- finalist. The individuals we are recognizing tonight are scholars of merit in many senses. Obviously, their test scores are
excellent. From an academic perspective, they are truly exceptional. However, beyond the classroom, they are remarkable in many other ways. They are award-winning artists, varsity athletes, community activists, talented musicians,
leaders in our school, board representatives, and many other things. As you know from previous years though, I think it's important for you to learn more about them than just their test scores. So, they are each going to introduce themselves, whether they're a
commended scholar or a semi- finalist, and they're also going to share a fun fact about themselves. Quick disclaimer. The fun facts haven't been preapproved. I'm not sure what you're going to get. Also, a disclaimer, next year I need to
make sure that we schedule this when it is not the first night of swimming or the first night of hockey. Winter sports have officially begun um because we do have a number of students with conflicts this evening, but I am excited to be able to recognize the ones that are here tonight. So, with all of that in mind, it is my pleasure to introduce to you
these incredible young men and women from the class of 2026. Come on up. [Applause] Fun fact. >> Um, my name is Manis Sha. I am a
commended scholar. And a fun fact about me is that I am a part of the boys tennis team at our high school. >> My name's Elle. Sullivan. I'm a commended scholar and my fun fact is I've been playing guitar for about 10 years now. >> I'm Eileen Zang. I'm a semi-finalist and
my fun fact is I've milked a yak before. >> Um my name is Sean and I'm a I'm a commended scholar and my favorite subject is math. >> I'm Trevor. Um, I'm a commended scholar and I've memorized 37 digits of pi.
>> Um, my name is August. Um, I'm a semi finalist and I made hummus yesterday. Was pretty good, but I put like too much garlic in. [Applause]
Dr. >> Absolutely. >> All right. Thank you. >> So, we'll take a quick intermission so we can get a quick photo. >> Awesome. Congratulations. [Applause] I need help here.
>> Yeah, look. It's right there. So cool. >> Yeah. Yeah, we do. See, this is why >> I told them not to put me in charge tonight. I haven't slept in days. So, >> we're doing it.
Who's here? >> That's okay. >> Anita, >> I mean, I'll let it go. >> What is this? raise your hand. >> Okay. What the heck is this thing? Public hearing and special opportunity
for public comment. >> Okay. Okay. So, I'm introducing just the thing and then I read this thing. No. >> Okay. Okay. We good? Okay.
Okay. Okay. So, next we're going to go into our student safety data systems report for the year. >> Great. Uh well, good evening. Uh this is the annual presentation on the findings from the 2425 school year periods one
and two. So you may remember that Corey and I presented in March but that was just on period one which was the first half of the year. So this report is on the entirety of last school year. Next one. So this is an example of the
student safety data systems form that's reported to the state. Any Hib reports are also reported on the same form. The second page includes any restraints or seclusion that is needed. Uh Pette has discussed this with the board in
past meetings. The following figures represent the total number of times in school suspension or out of school suspension was given across the entire district. These statistics encompass all suspensions, including those resulting from harassment, intimidation, and
bullying cases, as well as other conduct violations. A total of 74 incidents led to these disciplinary actions. So, if you can read the small print there, you can see that um one incident may result in two types of suspensions. So if a student
maybe there's um a theft in the cafeteria that student might get both ISS and OSS and that is what is counted in this section. Our approach clearly favors ISS across all of our buildings. This suggests a core philosophical focus
on managing behavior internally and maintaining instructional access for our students rather than immediately resorting to out of school suspension. Here's the three-year comparison of discipline incidents. In reviewing the data, we see
that there are a number of second offenses, particularly involving drug, vaping, and weapon violations at the high school. This pattern indicates the initial dis disciplinary measures may not be sufficiently deterring some students from repeating these serious
behaviors. In response, the high school has increased the required sessions with the student assistance counselor and implemented more comprehensive substance abuse awareness programming to be completed during suspension time. At the middle school, a significant number of
suspensions were related to repeated instances of physical altercations amongst the same group of students. These students received extensive counseling, participated in conflict resolution sessions, and engaged in meetings designed to help them develop healthier strategies for managing
disputes. These are the categories that are used to define SSDs incidents. So, you can see these. I'm not going to read them to you, but you can see them all up here. Other incidents of removal that are included in those ISS and OSS
numbers do include inappropriate conduct or behavior, profanity, smoking, vaping, open defiance, but they are not listed as an SSDS report. This is a breakdown of SSDS incident types by building. Please, you can see
across the top is the type the incident and on the left hand side is the building. Please note that the last two columns are not included in the incident totals. However, they are reported to the state. As I've stated before, what we consider violence in Hopewell is
often not even reported in other districts. We do take things very seriously. So, the incidents that you see here were involving altercations between students. The weapons situations were brought to the board's attention last year, and those involved pocket knives.
In addition, you can see the behavioral threat assessments that were done last year. Um, these are not reported to the state at this time, but the board had said in previous meetings that they would like me to report out on it. Um, we have spoken about those individual situations when they occurred last year
in executive session. Here is the three-year trend of incidents. Uh you are already aware of the HIV issues at TMS last year, particularly those involving racist language or symbols. You may recall there was a lot of discussion where the middle school
held uh parent nights. They had informational sessions. They went into every single classroom during pack sessions. Um they've expanded their use of restorative circles. So not only to address bias related incidents, but as I was saying before, there were a lot of
physical altercations. So now they're looking to encompass a broader range of conflicts. The school has also placed a greater emphasis on positive character development through daily morning announcements and reminders, weekly character education lessons, and the implementation of Wolfpack standards,
which highlight a specific character theme each week. The one good piece of information that I took from this is we continue to see the overall substance numbers decrease, which is a positive. All right, at this point I'm going to turn it over for Corey for the
programming. Um, so according to the framework for safe and successful school environments, a joint statement by groups including the National Association of School Psychologists, the American School Counselor Association, the National Association of School Resource Officers,
and more. Um there are several best practices related to creating safe school environments. They include strong school community connection, proactive teaching of social emotional skills, access to mental health support, and preventative as well as responsive
efforts to things that impact student safety such as drugs or alcohol use, violence, or bullying behaviors. HVRSD has a lot to be proud of in these areas. Some of the highlights within each of these best practices are listed
on the slide projected above. I'll just take a moment to highlight some of them. Under community connectedness, obviously we have a great partnership with the Hopewell Valley Municipal Alliance, partnership with Detective Marlon Webb, who um helps us with restorative circle
practices and training. uh parent university. Um that's a twice a year event. As a matter of fact, tomorrow evening at 7 pm, we'll be hosting another parent university. This is a Zoom uh webinar um where Samantha
Aadala, our on-site Ruters behavioral health clinician, uh will discuss the importance of childhood and key events in our children's healthy development. Um, under proactively teaching social emotional skills, um, we offer character
strong K through8 daily morning meetings at the elementary level. And as Tiana just mentioned, um, TMS does um several things. I won't I won't repeat uh what she just said. Uh, this year we are
piloting Character Strong Tier 2 in each of the elementary schools. um recognizing the need that some students need more support in these areas. And this is one of the several ways that we are attempting and beginning to collect
data and use data um to analyze the effectiveness of what we're doing. So um data is collected uh specifically in relation to tier 2 character strong counselors also proactively push into classrooms and deliver lessons and
problem solving, conflict resolution and emotional vocabulary among others. And then last thing I'll mention here is Hope Squad, which is an evidence-based suicide prevention and intervention um program uh that's in its second year in our district that has also been shown
to improve climate in schools. Uh under the mental health supports category, we have a number of school counselors, school psychologists. We have the air dogs, uh the BAT team, which could be another example of community involvement. So that is the behavioral health uh team where we have clinicians
from the local area come in and volunteer their time to assist students and then as I mentioned before the Ruckers University behavioral health clinician on site uh under preventative and responsive safety programming Alice safeting safety training it's an
optionsbased approach to emergency situations we have behavioral health uh behavioral threat assessment teams uh district recognition of suicide prevention month a week of respect and we have ABS's in other words
anti-bullying specialists in each school building we also have a district committee committee meeting next slide and lastly uh these are just some additional uh things that we do to focus on this
area. Um we have leadership core that focuses on self-awareness, self-management, uh including time management, um relationship skills, self-awareness. Uh the Panda Club is a group of high school students who do preventative
lessons in the middle school related to drug and alcohol use and a mentorship program for elementary students. Our counselors this year have received professional development in an appro in a counseling approach called solution focused brief counseling. Additionally,
although some of the approaches that one might see used in a therapeutic setting are also used by our student assistance counselors, for instance, motivational interviewing and some be um cognitive behavioral techniques. Actual therapy is outside the scope of the practice of a
school counselor. Um and of course we help uh connect families and students with those resources. And lastly uh we have implemented best practices related to bullying response including discipline counseling, restorative practices and skill building for
offenders and victims. >> Thank you. >> Does the board have any questions? >> I have a question. Thank you so much for this presentation, Mr. Red. I really appreciate this. Um, I touched on this briefly last time, but now seeing the numbers, it's it's begging the question
again. We're just we're doing so much, yet our hip numbers continue to rise. And what was interesting looking at that data is that in every other category, the incidents have either remained stable or decreased except hips. And so I guess I'm just curious from your
perspective if there's any components that are missing from our programming or as we see these tier 2 character strong activities roll out. Do you expect that that might move the dial on these HIP reports? >> Um
>> or both. >> Yeah. So I'll take the the second part the second question your second question first. Um I certainly hope that we see that. I think uh it may be a while before we can really determine um the
effectiveness of that program. However, as I mentioned before, we are uh collecting data related specifically to that program through pre-est and um post-intervention um testing. So, I am hopeful that that will help. um related
to I guess my suspicions why about why the HIP numbers continue to increase um there's just only so much we can do in the school building to discourage and educate and um I feel that although
there's always room for improvement I feel that we do do a very good job in that area I think it is related and um there are many books and authors who um who would second this. It's it's related to the use of social media quite
frequently. Um and so um you know we are doing things like we have done at TMS and are are considering in other areas like removing phone you know having students put phones away. Of course we can't control what they do outside of school but that's one of the reasons
that we do try to offer parent events and education and um things of that nature. So, I can only suspect I do know that digital wellness is part of the um and I I will obviously defer to Dr. Trice on this, but it's one of the the
main areas of focus this year. >> Yes. And and it has been for some time now. That's why the committee was created. Um but again, it is it is tough and the kids behavior trends and matches what's going on in the greater community. >> So, and social media causes that. what
they see they repeat. So, we're continuing to try to limit their access to phones here and we've certainly done a great job at the middle school, but you'll see, you know, as as we dig into these things. Um, a lot of this is happening at home and then the fallout's the next day and we're dealing with it.
So, and I know parents are doing their best, but it's hard to know what they're kind of talking about online until it bubbles up to a crisis or or a conflict. And we do report everything. So, that is another difference. I know it may seem like a lot, but a suspension is
technically say uh somebody is having uh a meltdown in class or a tantrum and we sit them in the office for a period. That's in effect an inschool suspension. You have to count that as they've been excluded from their learning. Um some districts may not report that. We do. We take all of that seriously. any
interruption in their learning as a result of them being removed. We account for that because we want to see that we can you know what what's really happening and we need to know how we can do better. >> And I I want to say one more thing about the fights that happen in Hopewell having worked in other districts. Um a
fight is tantamount mostly here. I know. Um I was like that's a fight? Okay. Um so like you know me and uh Jackie aren't getting along and I shove her and she shoves me back. That's a fight. So that's a hope well fight. That's not what fights look like elsewhere. So I know when people see that they think about the rolling around on the ground.
That's that rarely happens here as Mr. Kabadia can attest to. Okay. So not that you were in any of those. Okay. Thank you. >> I know. >> Okay. Any other questions? No. Okay. We're going to go into uh
public comment just on the student safety data systems report. So members of the public are invited to address the Hopewell Valley Board of Education on the 2023 24 periods one and two student
safety uh data systems report for a maximum of three minutes. During this portion of the meeting, you're asked to state your name, address, and the mun municipality. In response to your comments, the board of education may
respond or direct the superintendent of schools to do so. The board of education may also opt to take the matter up at a future meeting so that the matter is researched by district administration. Members of the public who intend to participate in public comment, we ask
that you sign in prior to speaking. This will assist us with our recordkeeping and tonight uh Dr. Lston is our timekeeper. So So as Jackie said, um Dr. Jennzy said,
right, we'll have three minutes for public comment. When you reach two and a half minutes, I will put up the yellow sign and then once you meet reach three minutes, I will put up the red sign. Public comment is now open. Emil back is hop. I just had one quick
question. So, um, going back to the slides with the trends in the data, uh, I noticed that, uh, some of the numbers specifically for substances were down, uh, substantially. And I was just curious, um, that I know
I have seen, you know, students, classmates of mine that will end up in a detention as opposed to a suspension for something that may be drugrelated. And I was just curious um I didn't think that detentions were were uh brought in on
that on that graph and I was just wondering are the decreases in substance uh related offenses actually because there are less offenses or more that they're more so just detentions now rather than uh um suspensions. Thank
you. Okay, if there are no other questions, um I'm not sure who wants to address them. Um >> public comment is now closed. >> I'm looking right at at Miss Penelli who's shaking her head that um Oh my
gosh, why that is so weird. I have no idea why I even said that. uh Miss Riley um that uh that is not part of the student code of conduct to give detentions for anything drugrelated. So I'm not sure that that is 100% accurate. Maybe there was something else involved
that was not drugrelated uh as to why students would get detentions for those situations. >> Yes. As as a person who sees all the suspensions, not for a drug offense. No, we're consistent on that. But just for a quick clarification,
um, regardless of the consequence, if it was a substance use related incident, it would still show up here in the graph. Correct. >> Correct. >> Yeah. Okay. >> Okay. Thank you for that clarification. We are going to move Oh. Oh, sorry. Um,
we need a motion to um accept the attached report. >> Can I get a motion and a second? >> Second. >> Awesome. Okay. Um, all in favor?
>> I. >> Any opposed or abstaining? Motion passes. Okay. Now we will move on to the referendum timeline presentation. So uh what I'd like to do is introduce
uh from our architect firm fair vice uh Hopkins Duthy Dan Scaton. He will be uh taking over uh as our existing architect. George uh is retiring at the end of the year. Dan has been training, not training. Dan has been working with
the district for the past several years um and is up to speed on everything regarding this referendum and actually did uh most of the work on getting it prepared for us. Um he did he also worked on the uh the town hall. Um so let me introduce Dan and have him walk
through uh the timeline for the referendum that was approved by voters a few weeks back. Dan. Thank you. Good evening. We're going to go over a preliminary timeline. And the reason we say preliminary, as things develop, as the phases and the planning that we go through, we're planning for a myriad of
things, nothing less than agency reviews, equipment lead times, phases to the school district. So, what you're looking at here is a preliminary layout of phasing and then the timing of the work. And we're taking those things into account. So, on the next slide here, you can see we're for those who don't know, congratulations on your past referendum.
By the way, the work now starts for bidding packages. So, the actual design work and the engineering work will now take place and then those are subject to public bidding law that will happen. There's agency reviews that have to be taken into account and those timelines can be extended depending on the review
period, but we plan for those now in the timeline. And then when we go out to bid and we follow the public bidding law, you will award to the lowest uh price of the qualified bidder. So, and that's mandated by state law. So, if you want to go to the next slide, we'll look at the first round of projects that we are
hitting the ground running on. Uh, roofing right now is something we can prepare for. The things, as you see that we go through these slides, the things that we prepare for are timing of the year for bids to make sure we get interested contractors and a lot of uh potential biders. We look at the timing
of the work and how fast it can be taken off. So, what you're looking at on this screen here is the first round of roofing at these three schools for Hope Valley, the high school, you got Timberlane, and then Stony Brook. Those are summer projects of 2026. So, we're hitting the ground running now and designing that work right now. The next
round of roofing you'll see is in 2027. So, those are the next round of warranties that fall off this year and some of the other work at Bear Tavern, Hope Elementary, and Tollgate. Again, phasing those over a couple of summers. As we go into the next round of renovations in summer of 2027, you're
going to start to see things phase such as uh equipment lead times. For instance, HVAC work. There are some pieces of equipment that are 40 plus weeks out. We plan for that now for deliveries. Um when you go through construction, there will be some things that are going to affect the school day.
We work around that. We try to make sure your school operations and safety are paramount. So while things are going on, we work those into the specifications and the project requirements. Everybody knows ahead of time what will be impacted. We will be meeting ongoing with your administration and key stakeholders and staff and teachers for
instance to make sure that we know what the impact is and where that timing happens. So for anything that closes down or has to shift, that will be taken into account. So the first you have a few rounds of renovations here. You have summer of 2027, you'll have pavement and restoration at Hopewell High Central
High School. You'll have the 400 wing HVAC units. And then we have some work at Timberlane. We have exterior doors, an auxiliary gym and restroom improvements. And then also an additional sister well at Timberlane. Renovations for summer 2027 going into Bear Tavern Elementary. This is not the
addition. This is the renovation portion of the work. We have exterior doors. We have interior door replacement as well. There's some again toilet room and bathroom renovations, additional well again pumping stations, and then also your cafeteria at Bear Tavern. Rounding out the renovation portion of the work
in 2027, ADA accessible bathrooms at Hopewell Elementary and there's also interior and exterior doors like the other schools. Stony Brook has drainage improvements to the exterior and we also have pavement restoration at Tollgate. The long lead times that I mentioned are really for
HVAC where we see most of that. Um, for instance, switch gears, electrical switch gears or chillers are 40 to 50 plus weeks. Um, we have all of your HVC work at all the schools. We're phasing that over two years depending on the type of unit and timing of the bids and when we can get that done.
The expansion work for the building expansions at Bear Tavern and at Tollgate, you're going to see two year. You're going to see 2026, end of 2027. That work is starting now as far as agency reviews, design timelines, those kinds of things. We're starting that now. The bidding period will take place
later in 2026. We break ground hopefully in 2026, let's say in the summer or spring. And at that point, that will run. Those projects will run, I'm going to say, in the background, but they will run the whole time while we're doing other projects in the summers. So, those will be while kids are in session, there'll be a construction site will be
cordoned off. Again, safety, egress, access, all limited. Um, these things, we we do this a lot with school construction. We're very well aware of the impact. Um, I can't say there's going to be no impact. There's obviously going to be things you have to watch out for to your school district, but again, those things are taken into account with
the timing and the safety. So, if you have any other questions um for me or for any any of the administrators, there's information for contact and we'd be happy to help you out. So, thank you. >> Any questions from the board? Okay, >> thank you and look forward to working
with all of you. >> Um, this is just one of u many reports the community will be getting. I wanted to give you some timeline so that you can know you know what to expect moving forward. Of course, as as um Mr. Scaton shared there well there will be shifts
and changes to this as we try to acquire equipment as we try to get through the the permitting and the and the all the the um approvals that we need. Um there may be some changes in this timeline, but I'll be communicating with you frequently, parents. Um you can expect to see updates in my newsletter. I will
work with the um architecture firm. They can provide us pictures and videos as things are happening. And then we'll also do that in local um publications like Mercer um Hopewell Express for those who do not have students and aren't on my my uh list serve to receive my emails. I want to make sure that you all are are kept a breast on what's
going on so that you can see uh the the the evidence of the work that you've approved for us. Uh when bids come in lower than um the lowest bid, we take a lower bid and we leave money on the table, Bob, that we don't spend because we we were able to come in cheaper than we thought. Could you explain to the
taxpayer what happens with those? Because I know some folks think that we sort of can take that money and spend it on something else. >> So, um part yes and part no. So um the projects that were bid the entire of the 80 plus million dollars all goes towards
the project. So in the case of let's say some roofing bids coming in under budget that money gets set aside and if say some of the HVAC work comes in over budget that money is then can cover those costs at the end of the projects.
If we are under budget then that money is returned to the taxpayer. we can't take it and use it for uh at the athletic department or you know other things operationally with the schools. It goes back as tax relief. In fact, um we'll be talking to the finance
committee um next month in December to talk about the previous 2016 referendum which believe it or not is finally closed out. All all of it's done. And we'll be will yeah we will be returning money to the public over a three or four year period. Why are we not doing it all
at once? Because if you do it all at once, you get a big discount in the first year and then subsequent years you get a big hit. So by spacing it out over time, we are we will returning money to the to the communities over that period of time. So it does go back if it's not
spent. Um we're hoping we're going to get low bids on everything and we'll come in way under budget, but again money is set set aside if it's not spent in the in the beginning to cover things that may happen at the end. Awesome. Thank you. Okay. And now we are moving
on to our budget discussion. Okay. I'm call I'm going to call to the uh the lect turn our presenter. As you all know um each year during um the uh end of the summer
and into the fall we start with budget presentations to kind of give an idea of um the the major cost drivers to our budget. We had uh Dr. Plit has talk about the CNI budget and and and her goals and plans for the coming year. Uh we had Miss Dinardo speak about her
plans um and and how special ed is driving our budget. Um we had this discussion and with finance facilities a month or so ago. Um as you've heard me say at several board meetings now, a major cost driver um in our budget for this year and and next year um is health
benefits. um we wanted to get out in front of it to in front of all the board members and the public that health benefits is is um exceptionally uh volatile this year. We're going to have uh Robert Magcguire from our consulting firm of Integrity Consulting walk you
through the reasons why u health benefit costs are so volatile at this point. >> Great. Good evening everyone. Thank you again. My name is Robert Magcguire from Integrity Consulting Group and I am your health benefits consultant. uh doing a real quick presentation of what we're seeing in terms of what's going to take place in 2026 in terms of our
preliminary health benefits renewal and we wanted to have a discussion on some of the trends that are happening that we're seeing in the marketplace um over this last year and will continue for the next year or so. The fir next slide. So what we're seeing is greater and more intense utilization of health care
services. So we really consider this a postcoid trend. We're seeing that a lot of people in 2020 and 2021 did not get services done. We saw that um the health insurance companies had their greatest profits in 2020 and 2021 and a lot of
people delayed seeing their doctors going and getting elective s uh services and surgeries. And what we're seeing is definitely just greater and more intense utilization. So we're seeing more people going to the doctor now than in years past. Part of it is to make up for them not going to the doctors in years past
and now coming in with more intense uh utilization. So, for example, we have one of our other clients uh needed to get a hip replacement surgery uh back in 20121. They never got it done and now they're getting it done next month. So, we're just seeing things happen now that should have happened a couple of years
ago. Next slide. So we're seeing fre more frequent amount of higher cost claims as well as greater claims costs for out of network providers. So what we mean by that is we're seeing um again the higher
utilization but also much more I'm going to say serious medical conditions. So we usually when we take a look at our book of business when we have groups over a th a thousand employees so that's about 2500 members. What we see is that on average, you have about 15 to 20 of
those members that have about $100,000 or more in claims, which is pretty much average year-over-year. What we're seeing now and in the last year is that that number has doubled to about 30 to 40 people. So, we're seeing much more intense, much more costly medical care and also with the out of network
providers. So, what we're seeing here is we're getting more and more individuals going out of network for services. And what happened was in 2022 we had something called the no surprises act which is a federal legislation that says that uh if a member goes out of network they cannot be surprised with what the
bill is. They have to know upfront what the bill cost is. The problem that we see is that there is now an independent dispute resolution team that these out of network doctors can go to a third party appeal their reimbursement and what happens is 85% of the time the
settlement is in favor of the providers. So that means more reimbursement more money for the providers and now members are going out of network more because they're not seeing the balance billing that we saw in the past. Next. Okay. As everyone knows, we have
that explosive growth of GLP1s. So that is your OMIC, WGO, Zeppbound, and MANO. We're seeing that this is now 30% of your total prescription cost when 5 years ago it basically didn't exist. Okay. So, we're seeing a lot of weight
loss medications. We're seeing that 30% of pharmacy costs. And what we're also seeing is that in New Jersey, we're one of the few states where the state plan allows it to be covered. Okay, so that's another big thing.
Perfect. Last one is providers are now consolidating. We're seeing a lot of hospital systems combined with their provider networks and we're seeing less and less hospitals. Um, you know, when I started at Blue Cross 25 years ago, we
had about 60 to 65 hospitals. Now we're seeing like seven or eight because they've all conglomerated. And what we're also seeing is that the providers are also joining the hospitals. So, we're seeing that as well. You go to the next one, Bob.
So what happened with the state plan this year, the school employees health benefits program is that they had an increase this year of 25% on the medical for the educators plan. Did a 32% increase for the legacy plans and a 58%
increase on the prescription. Now luckily we are not in the state plan. We are on our own self-insured. So we feel we're in the best spot. But you could see what's happening in the marketplace is that the people that are in the state plan got this enormous increase and I'm not sure how they can pay for it. So you
can see the numbers are just staggering. Okay. And then what we're seeing with the state plan is that the groups that are running well getting their experience getting quotes outside the state. So the good groups are leaving the state and
the bad groups wind up staying in the state. So we don't see this being corrected anytime soon unfortunately. So I thank you for the time but if there's any questions please board is there any questions >> if you don't have these numbers that's
fine but I'm just curious in terms of projections for next year what we're expecting in terms of costs for healthcare. >> Um so what we do is we survey the marketplace in the winter. So, we're going to start that process in January. Trend, right now, if you ask an
insurance carrier what their trends are, they're going to say they're about 11 to 13 on the medical and they're going to be somewhere 18 to 20 on the prescription. Now, again, that's their just their trend numbers. So, what they believe on the prescription is that the same prescriptions this year could be 18
to 20% higher next year on average. >> Welcome. So, I'm assuming that we are still saving money being self-insured at like how close are we to that tipping point of Sure. >> That's a good question. So, we are
definitely we believe you're in the best spot primarily because what you've done is you're self-insured, which means you pay the claims. So that means you're taking away I'm going to just say a lack of the profitability of the insurance carrier because when we run well when
we're fully insured we get a good renewal but they get to pocket a lot of the money. When we're self-insured we're paying for our services. So they're just getting a small admin fee. So we we believe we're in the best spot. With that being said you know it is a much more difficult time. We are seeing
claims up across the board with all of our clients. um you know but we believe we're in the best spot and again we survey the marketplace to make sure and you know when we look at what we spend on our health benefits here we are now much lower than the state plan because
of that huge increase that they received. >> So just to kind of piggy back off that Robert talked at the beginning of the presentation about how um in during the co time that 2021 period where other folks were paying into it and they were making record profits. Well, we
benefited from that because we weren't paying premiums. We pocketed that money and we were able to fully fund our reserve fund. There's a reserve fund called an IBNR. It's incurred but not reported. You have to keep um a certain amount of claims set aside for if you roll out of self-insured. So, whenever
we would if we were to leave it, there's a claims that you already have that roll out and we have that reserve covered. And we also have a marketplace um reserve set aside in case something happens like increased claims. Now the last last year, the year before last
year, we ran very well. Last year we ran right around budget, maybe a little bit more, maybe $400 or $500,000 over budget. So we've been doing much better than the state. This year we're having what I would consider a bad year. We're probably
million and a half dollars over budget right now, but it's early and we do have rebates that are coming to us through our our prescription carriers every quarter. Um, and claims are typically higher in the summer months when folks have a chance to go to the doctor. So, we're hoping that the trend will start
to reduce itself as the year passes along. Now, remember, we do have a reserve fund if things go south. Um, so again, I think we are in a better spot than if we were going to have to, you know, take a 33% renewal come January
1st like the state. Um, but it is a it's a constant sort of of worry for me and stress and I'm always calling Robert saying, "What's, you know, what's going on with this or what's going on with that?" Dr. Trice comes in my office and says, "What's the matter?" We're spending somewhere in the area of $2
million a month right now. Like, put that in your in your kind of back of your mind. $2 million a month in health benefit costs claims. >> So when we say that and I we're doing better than the state and we're doing well and we're in the best position, we're in the best position for a bad
situation in healthcare in this country and and specifically in the way that um we're kind of forced into certain health care plans. We can't negotiate this right now with the kind of plans that we offer. Um, so that puts us in a in a
tough spot and most of our budget is tied up again in our staffing and benefits. So this drives when we go to strike a budget and decide, you know, what class size is. I know that keeps coming up. Class size also is tied to this, right? And so we have to be able
to afford to pay for all this and cover the benefits for those staff uh members per their contract. And we can't negotiate it. This is something that's um at least like this until for another year before we can negotiate. And then beyond that for us because we just um settled contracts um with two of our
bargaining units, two of our largest. >> What we're also noticing um is that folks uh are bringing are coming into our plan um more than they had in the past. So we are picking up, you know, Mrs. Jones is a teacher here, had
benefits through her husband's company. They're now dropping that plan and they're joining our plan. We're seeing a lot more of that. Um, so again, it's something we're watching. We feel we're in a good position strategically, but it's very, it's the mark is very
volatile. Um, and you know, it's something we're just going to have to continue to monitor. >> I want to commend you for bringing this to um, Dr. Smith, the former superintendent, because the other superintendent, you were saying you don't know how they're going to do this. They don't know how they're going to do this either. This is really scary for
them, those that are still in the state plan. So, um I thank you for having the foresight to to push us into self-insuring and um we'll keep monitoring this and keep you up to um up to speed on how that's going as we as we move through the budget process.
>> Dr. Trice, can you just talk a few sentences? You kind of hinted on this, but where kind of some of the limitations or differences are for us as a school district in terms of choice around health care provision and plans versus, let's say, a for-profit company and and how that looks slightly
different. I'm gonna let um Bob talk about that. You could talk about the how this came to be. >> So um and Robert feel free to jump in. I certainly will. >> Um years ago uh we were able to negotiate the health
benefit package that all of our all of our employees got and it would be part of Tana and my job. You know, we would go in and we would discuss salary uh you know, work hours, stipens, all that kind of thing. and also the health benefits. And you could dis you could discuss
things such as co-pays, um you know, uh deductibles, you know, we had a a legacy plan of a a $10 co-ay plan. Then we went to a $15 co-pay plan. And when we finished, the last time we were able to negotiate health benefits, we had a we
had forced everybody into a $20 co-pay plan for basic and $30 plan for um specialists. We could also do the same thing with prescription. Instead of having a $0 co-pay for a, you know, a mail order or a pharmacy visit, it went
to $5 for a for a generic $10. Then it went to 10 to 15 and 15 to 20. Um, and we did a good job with that. We were way ahead of the curve with the state as far as other districts in the state on getting a significant contribution from our employees.
that uh come 2020 2020 >> um they introduced a a uh policy called chapters 44 and chapter 44 said all new employees every single new employee in the district must be enrolled if they
want in the NJHP state educators health benefit plan or the NJGSP which was the garden state plan which is essentially the same as the EHP except you can't go outside the state of New Jersey. So, all your providers must be in network in the
state of New Jersey. Um, the truth be told about the SEBP plan, it's a Cadillac plan. It's the most expensive plan we have. Um, and the the the hit to us was that the contribution on that plan, we had the legacy plans
that were a less benefit where they paid more money. This is a better benefit and they pay less money for it. >> Yeah. So they've taken the cost control measures that we implemented and they took them away from us even though we went to them and said, "Hey, we're doing better than this
>> as a district and we have cost containment measures in place. They put it in place and it doesn't sunset until 2027. So we're stuck with it until that." So whereas Dr. Shu was talking, we don't have the opportunity to say in a bargaining session, hey, we're going
to eliminate, we would like to eliminate the $15 co-ay plan. we want to bring it to a $25 co-pay plan and we'll give you, you know, more salary dollars here, but we need to control costs in our health benefits. We've lost that ability, as has every other district in the state.
>> So, what happened was basically uh prior to 2020, we had chapter 78, which tied uh a staff member's um contribution to health benefits to the premium of the plan. So as your premiums went up, their contribution went up. With chapter 44,
with the educators plan and the garden state plan, it became a percentage of their salary. So if the health benefits went up 15%, their contribution didn't go up 15%. If their st salary remained the same or in the the buckets, because they do have different buckets based on their salary
of the percentage they pay, they didn't have an increase. Um, so that's why you're seeing, you know, it's tough to get to the table when they're not feeling the pain of the contributions and the increases in our health benefits. Um, with that being said, the
other uh thing we're coming across is that we can't really negotiate the educators plan, the garden state plan because of the fact that it was state. It's a state law. They are going to review it in 2027. Um but again, we don't know what they're going to do in
2027. A lot's gonna happen between now and then. >> Yeah. So, just to clarify, come 2026, the assembly could say, "Oh, we think this is a good idea and we're going to pass it and it 2027 becomes 2029." Like, that's a that's a potential. >> It's there's all options are on the
table. Um we're not, you know, we don't know. you know, they did do a look back a couple years ago to see how it was going and their report said the, you know, the educators playing the Garnay plan was doing wonderful. Um, you know, so we don't know what is going to happen now. Again, we have a new governor
coming into place. We have, so we're going to see what's going to happen, but and we're going to keep a close eye on it, but we're really right now handcuffed until we find out what they're going to do, if anything. Um, I do know that the state workers in the state plan, so that's different than the
school employees health benefits program. The state workers did do some uh benefit tweaking. Uh, they don't have chapter 44, but they were able to get some benefits done on the state level with state workers. So, we're hoping that trickles down and assists with
maybe trying to get either the educators plan, the chapter 44 plans, maybe uh revise some benefits in that regard. But, you know, we're we're handcuffed until we see what they do. >> Yeah. And the and the hard part, Mark, becomes um that when it sunsets, it
doesn't go away. We have they forced that they implemented it, right? It sunsets that we can negotiate it, but they get to keep it until we negotiate it out. And when you try to negotiate something out, you wind up paying for it. So, it's really it it there were
certain some there were certain districts that were way behind the curve on this and and chapter 44 did bring additional monies into their districts, but it didn't work that way here because we, you know, we had a good relationship with all of our collecting bargaining groups and we negotiated in good faith
and got to cost savings factors to increase wages and we had done that collaboratively and not through, you know, the the iron pen from the state. This was this was not good for us. It just wasn't good. >> Yeah, we handle about 50 school districts. We believe one school
district out of the 50 did well with chapter 44 >> one. So, we just wanted to bring this to to all your attentions as we begin in earnest developing this budget that this is a you know, we're not in years past
like when I would work with Robert and his group, you know, we would say it's like let's try to get a 3% 4% increase and we'll be happy. like that's, you know, that doesn't happen anymore. It's not happening right now. Um, we're just we're going to have to anticipate the growth in health benefits
and hope that there's some relief coming in some fashion from the state. >> I have a quick question. Thank you for sharing this and I think it's really important for the board to see. We we got a preview in finance and facilities. So, thank you for coming back again. >> Absolutely. Um, what is the field's
current thinking about when some of these costs related to deferred care are going to begin to stabilize or are we just going to be seeing this forever because people delayed cancer treatments and things like that? >> So, we we are seeing that. We believe that will eventually fade because again
people will catch up. But what what we saw is that to your exact point, if someone delayed care during those two years and god forbid or something terrible happened where they got cancer diagnosis instead of it being one, you know, it was stage four or stage three,
you know what I mean? So by delaying that care, by not getting your annual physical, by not going to the doctor for a year and not being able to even see the doctor because the doctor wasn't seeing anybody, um, you know, those kinds of things will dissipate. Um, I'm
concerned about the GLP1s to be quite honest with you. Um, just for the explosive costs and the explosive growth of the GLP1s. Um, and in 2026 they are going to come out with a pill form because right now you do have to inject yourself and a lot of people do not like
injecting injecting themselves. But once the pill comes out, I think we're going to see another spike. And one of the things I always hear is, "Oh, well the pill's going to be much much cheaper." We don't believe so. We don't believe so. >> One one more quick question for you.
>> Sure. >> That's okay. >> So, knowing the statistic that you just provided, which is of the 50 districts or so you work with, one has come out on the good side of this, can you share about any sort of dialogue that's being had at a state level?
>> Um, I know >> to share that. uh I know what's what's being talked about at the state level which is basically you know we're seeing the facts. I mean I'm just going to use the school employee health benefit program as an example. So AON does their
report usually right around July and they recommend a number and they recommended the 25% on the EHP uh chapter 44 plans, the 32 on the legacy plans and 58 on the prescription. Every other year and I've been doing this like 30 years now. We've always seen them,
you know, they start off with a higher number and they always come down lower. They work their magic. They get something a little more um that people can digest. This was really the first year where they had those numbers and they took them, you know. So that's, you
know, that was one of the surprising things because when this originally came out, we're like, "Ah, they'll they'll come down. It'll be like 15 or something like that." And they accepted the numbers. Um, so you know, >> it's like let's let's think about the the the craziness of all this. I think
it was less than two years ago that they state gave all of their employees who were in the state health benefits plan a um rate continuence, right? >> Premium holiday >> for one month. >> For one month. It was February, I believe, of 21. >> So they felt that they were in such a
good position in February of what? >> February of 21 >> 21 that they gave all their school districts a holiday. they didn't pay and that backfired. >> I also just want to clarify we're having a discussion out loud right now. I don't I'm personally going to speak for myself though I'm not questioning the need or
the desire to give good benefits. I'm just questioning the the way by which it was gone about and the fact that this feedback loop is clearly not resonating in Trenton because if it was right I think that your answer probably would have been more along the lines of yeah
we've got 14 assembly members who are like lining up wanting to have this discussion and uh for those who hear me talk about this I'll just go back to it that we've got a Trenton issue again on another major cost factor for the district. Yeah. >> Thank you.
Okay. >> Okay. Thank you. This was a great conversation and great information. We appreciate it. >> And we're always available. So, please don't hesitate to reach out to us because we're here to help. So, >> we're part of >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you. You >> Thank you.
>> Okay. We are going to move into our first open public comment on any items of interest. So members of the public are invited to address the board on any matter for a maximum of three minutes during this portion of the meeting.
You're asked to state your name, address, and municipality. In response to your comments, the board of education may respond or direct the superintendent to do so. The board may also opt to take the matter up at a future meeting so that the matter is researched by the
district administration. We have our timekeeper. As a reminder, I am a timekeeper. You will have 3 minutes. At 2 minutes and 30 seconds, I'll hold up the yellow sign. And then at 3 minutes, I'll hold up the red sign. Public comment is now open.
Public comment is now closed. Okay. Any items of old business? I actually have one item of old business. This came up, I think, two meetings ago, but it was the board self-evaluation. When is that going to be distributed to
the board members? I I I believe right now your president is working on that and you should be getting an email from uh NG NJSBA any day now. It it's all done online. So once you get
the email, you log in through your NJSBA account and you complete the uh it's a lot of um kind of uh one to 10 kind of scores and then there's room for uh a narrative if you want to make a narrative. We hope to we would hope to
have the results by the end of the the uh board meeting in December. >> Any other old business? No. Okay, we're going to move into our consent agenda. Can I have a motion to accept the items
on the consent agenda? >> Motion. >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Abstaining. Motion passes. We'll move into our committee reports.
We have finance and facilities. >> Okay. Good. Good evening, not afternoon. Good evening, everybody. All right, so we met as a uh committee um like we typically do, which is early on in the month, uh prior to the board meeting. Uh we usually get a nice readout on both
facilities updates and what's happening as well as just some other general items related to finance. Um this last update that we had a readout from was from Tom, who I think many may know is retiring. So again, congratulations to him. um he updated us on some of the projects that him and his team are taking care of
internally as we obviously wait for the referendum to come about. So, we learned about a leak project. We learned about the well tanks being in a bear tavern. Uh we talked a little bit about the Bear Tavern uh playground. Um that was a lot to do with the donations from the foundation as well as some folks in town. So, thank you again for those don
donations. Still some work to be done there, but we feel like we're making some really nice progress. We talked a little bit about our administrative building and there being some leaks on the roof there and some emergency pairing and patching that was happening. Um that by the way that leak could have forced the boilers to be unusable. So
that was a very uh serious situation as we think about uh the benefits of this referendum passing and what we can do to help support it. Uh we also talked a little bit about the toll in toll gate. There were some bad wiring um with the communication equipment on top of the building and we're able to address that as well internally which is great. The
second big item we talked about was the dem the demographers report, excuse me. I know we already had a public session to talk about that. Um I would just say just as a comment as the finance chair that I would encourage everyone to spend the time to read through that. Uh it's extremely enlightening for our community
to think about the impact of these pilot programs and uh not necessarily the high and low end but the sheer velocity of the impact uh which I think is a really important way for us to think about this right now especially as we're only about a quarter of the way through. Um we also
spent some time with that group talking a little bit about some of the impact on that. Dr. Trice mentioned that we had a really good meeting with Hope Burough today and we're really really excited that they wanted to get us to a meeting early which is fantastic. Uh and then the last item that we talked about was just the 2026 budget. Um as uh Bob and
Rosetta and the team have talked for the past three or four meetings now, this is going to be a really important budget uh uh discussion and process over the next couple months and we're looking forward to doing that uh with with the community involved. Last thing I would like to say is just a thank you to everybody who
participated in the referendum. Um it goes without saying this is probably a very impactful year and a half of folks on all sides of the issue coming about. But I think what makes me really excited is the fact that we had a lot of people get involved and that's part of community, right? We need to be able to
get involved, disagree, agree, and be in a room and talk about it. And I think that uh I'm really happy that Rosetta and the rest of the administration is excited about continuing these discussions with the community when it comes to the budgetary piece. And I commend her and I commend Bob and the rest of the administration for
continuing to be transparent about it. So, thank you to everybody who's involved and looking forward to keeping the discussions going. >> I need a uh Yep. You got it. >> Like a motion. >> Yeah, I need a motion, right? Is that what it is? A motion. Okay. >> The the donation.
>> Oh, the donation. >> Yes. >> So, you do need a motion. >> Yeah, we need a motion to accept this awesome donation from the STEM teachers of New York City for some climate change uh education work that uh Mr. McGrath is going to be doing.
>> Motion. >> All those in favor? I. Any opposed or abstaining? No. Motion passes. Okay. Personnel. >> Hello again. Okay. This is going to be
real quick. Um so uh we typically meet uh just a reminder for the community right before this meeting. Uh we spend 30 to 40 minutes talking about all the items uh from Miss Smith and we spent some time today talking about two primary items which are the extracurricular appointments as well as the personnel actions. I'd like to just
point out we had another uh retirement u somebody who's been here since 2008. Uh Patricia Jasco, thank you. Uh really really appreciate everything she's done over at the Tollgate community and we are definitely going to miss her when that goes into effect in July. So thank you very much for your service. Um, you'll
also see just some of the roll call items there that we're going to approve now for the extracurricular appointments and it was a relatively short meeting. So, any questions? >> Okay, I need a roll call. Motion for a roll call, please. >> Motion.
>> Mr. Kapatia. >> Yes. >> Dr. Lil. >> Yes. >> Mr. Peters. Yes, >> Mr. Slottman. >> Yes, >> Dr. Stelliano. >> Yes, >> Dr. Wilson. >> Dr. Genevacy. >> Yes.
>> Motion carries. >> Okay. Education program. >> Hi everybody. Um so we met on November 10th. Um and so we had Jeff Loch who is involved with um educational technology and we also had Ailen Zang our um
student representative there. Um and so as a district we the the first item was to talk about our AI policy review. And so the district has identified common link can you hear me? >> Okay. So the district has identified
common language of 11 different ways that AI could be utilized in the classroom. And so based on conversations with supervisors and teachers, the default is AI unless it is is is not permitted unless it's specified by the
teacher. Um and so we as a way to make sure that our messaging was consistent, recitate videos were created by our edtech coaches and those were shared during recitation with the students. Um and there have been various professional developments around AI offered to the
faculty throughout last year and uh this year. Um, and so we also are planning to do that in the spring as well and re-evaluate whether this is the way that we want to continue where it's a default that they're not allowed these 11
different tech um um ways or if we want to do something a little bit different. I'm not I'm honestly not sure where that's going to go. Um but Ailen also shared that um from the students mostly we're using they're using it for test
prep such as creating study guides and that more support could be used on generating prompts and AI bias. We also um met had James Cleat who is a local farmer from fairground farms come and he discussed opportunities for
collaboration through the farm-to-school grant which aims to build stronger and more sustainable partnerships between local agriculture and school districts. Um he emphasized the importance of making this in initiative more than just a single event by incorporating ongoing educational components such as field
trips to the farm in school activities and then eventually possibly integrating it into our curriculum. Uh the initiative also includes a fresh produce component through a farm share program designed to function as a self- sustaining fundraiser with 10% of the
proceeds benefiting the school. Uh the grant application is due in early December and the goal is to create a district-wide initiative that reaches all of our schools within the district. Um so hopefully more to come on that. And then finally um the statement of assurances which we talked about in the
October meeting. Um we have a final draft created and that is posted on board docs for all the board members to view. >> I had a quick question. So I just want to understand the the AI policy correctly. So by default it's permitted.
It's prohibited unless >> prohibited. >> Okay. It's prohibited by default unless a teacher indicates on an assignment. >> Correct. And so it to in order for consistency. So if you all if all the teachers who teach algebra one on that current assignment, they all have to be the the same in terms of what would be
permitted for in terms of AI for that one assignment. But it can change by assignment. It can change by department, but right now it's just that teachers who teach the same course have to be consistent. >> Okay. >> And another piece that when students are
permitted to use AI, we're asking that they use the uh Gemini AI, we're asking that, you know, we're not we're saying that being very specific about the platform we want them to use um and the expectation of how they can use it. So the teachers are are working through that. I know that today in in the high school there was a faculty meeting
specifically about that and departments are working together on that as departments. So you're sort of not getting one science teacher doing one thing and another not. You know has there been any exploration of looking at chat bots that are regulated by either
our school district or by like a broader um third-party education context. I know that's something that a lot of universities have been doing and some high schools are starting to do across the country where they're using specific chatbots that won't, you know, just give you the answer. For example, it'll help
you think through a problem. >> We're not at that point yet, but we do have a group of teachers and our media specialists too who that is their specialty. Dr. G here at the high school and doc Dr. Mccardi at the middle school. They are exploring all of those opportunities. And yes, you know, that is one of the things we're interested
in. We're not that far along yet to where the universities are. >> Yeah, I I kind of second that. I I attended several sessions at the board workshop in October. Um, and I think we're doing a disservice not really
embracing AI with our students or at least seriously debating both sides and how it can, you know, both the environmental part of it. We know we just approved the climate change money. So, we've got, you know,
the evils of AI or, you know, some of the parts of it that are not so great that we need to solve. Um, but also that it is going to be the future and we're going to put our students at a disadvantage if they don't know how to
use it in some ways. So, I'm I'm glad we're having these conversations. >> And I just wanted to say thank Ailen for coming. I hope that that was worthwhile for you. We because I really enjoyed um your your thoughts. Yeah, and I I just wanted to second that. I wanted to thank Miss Sang because I think it really
enriched the conversation having the student perspective and um I think you you really represented that so well. So really appreciate you you attending. Thank you. >> Awesome. >> Okay. Uh community relations.
>> Sure. Thank you. I guess before I get into my report, I just wanted to echo what what Mr. Peters and Dr. Trice had said about community engagement as it relates to the referendum. It was it was really awesome to just see how many folks were out there and really engaged
on the discussion. And and I I I'll say, you know, uh publicly here. Dr. Trice was everywhere providing information, answering every possible question. Mr. Kit and everybody else was is I don't want to leave you out as well, but Dr.
was did a real yman's job to make sure that the community was fully educated on everything there was in there. So just you know publicly wanted to commend you for all your work on that. Thank you. From a community relations committee perspective, we met last week and I know
part of this discussion I know we'll I'll defer to I know uh the policy committee also had some discussion on some of the committees moving forward. main thing we talked about obviously was the you know the referendum taking a look at the communications plan and how
that went and you know sort of a post-mortem of that that was you know obviously part of the discussion also you know there was a referendum communications committee meeting as you may know we put together Dr. Trees put together a group to sort of, you know,
help guide us through some of that, you know, purveyance of information, if you will, over the course of the last, you know, nine or 10 months or a year and had a chance to kind of reather with that group afterwards and and and hear the presentation about the timeline and everything else. Obviously, it was a
very interested uh group of folks. And lastly, we heard a little bit about a joint committee hearing that was happening up in Trenton, a joint education committee hearing, which was uh as as far as I knew, very rarely meets. That's the first time I'd ever,
you know, noticed that that committee had had put something together. So, I know Dr. Trice had a chance to be up there and and uh and hear from folks on a particular topic. But I think that was the gist of our meeting. I know there's going to be more discussion about sort of the committee issues here moving
forward. And I know Dr. Genevvescy, Mr. Kapatia were both there. If there's anything I missed, please please jump in. >> Thank you. >> Okay, if there are no questions, we'll move on to
um which is my committee. U a lot of what was in our report, uh was mentioned in the SSDs report. Um, but I'm just going to highlight a couple of things just so that people hear it again. Um,
tomorrow night, November 18th, is our uh Rucker Clinician talk around uh it's entitled Inside the Child's Mind: How Emotions and Behaviors Evolve. It should be a great talk. It's at 700 p.m. Um,
and I believe it is Zoom, so please join us for that. Um, we're also looking um at a uh viewing of the elementary screen aers and that uh
should be in February of 2026 and it will be in most likely the pack but stay tuned for that. Um, and I just want to highlight our district seal committee. Um there's about 20 teachers
and administrators districtwide that work on a lot of the SEAL programming that we do. They're a very active group um that meet monthly and help develop a lot of the different programs that you see throughout the district in all of
the different schools. And I just want to congratulate um our students at Tollgate um for November 13th, which was World Kindness Day. They decorated Starbucks
sleeves um on the Starbucks on Route 31st. Uh there might still be some sleeves left um and handed those out for World Kindness Day. So that's some of the SEAL events that are taking place
throughout the district. Um and next is government relations. Awesome. Um, so the government relations committee met on October 27th to continue uh pushing forward on some of
our work relating to municipal, county, um, and state engagement uh, w with some of the government entities that we have here in Mercer County and more broadly. Um, firstly starting with the county desegregation initiative. We've talked a lot about this in the past few months.
Um, I really want to give credit to Dr. trees, who's been uh spearheading a lot of the outreach to neighboring districts um on this uh specific event. Uh just as a refresher, what we're hoping to do is scale um a pre-existing event that many Mercer County schools have already been
running um which is uh a collaboration with a Mercer County based nonprofit called Young Audiences, which hosts these cultural musical education performances across school districts, particularly in elementary schools. Um, so far the plan is to uh schedule a
joint event in June at the end of the academic year uh in collaboration with the Mercer County Executives Office. Um we specifically have completed outreach to Euing, Lawrence, and Robinsville who have all expressed interest um in in holding a joint event for our fourth
graders um which were extremely excited about. And right now we're in the process of engaging with the Mercer County Executive's Office um to to get their buyin and hopefully some some funding and support uh for locking down a location for the event. >> So I can pro uh provide an update. Just as of today, I've been put in contact
with um a person up in uh Executive Benson's office. He is working with me and the war memorial to um and also the state to cover the cost and see what they can do with helping us cover the cost of that. Um we have gotten a confirmation from the artist. So now we
just need confirmation for more memorial so that they can work on logistics for sound and all of that. And then transportation is the next piece we're starting to plan. But um all three superintendents are on board for fourth grade for June 3rd. We already have a date and everything. So hopefully things are the ball's moving. So the community
will have more information about that. >> Awesome. Thank you so much. Um and I think it's a thousand students was what it was,29 roughly. people. Very excited. >> Awesome. Thank you for all of your work
on that front. Um, moving to the state um, advocate, state level advocacy that the government relations committee has been engaged in. Um, as we've mentioned last year, we had a successful uh, push to secure state funding through the annual uh, budget. We're looking to have
another ask this year for the FY27 state budget. Um, similar to last year, we want to um, make sure we're identifying funding for a high impact project. And so, as we've indicated in previous meetings, we're working towards um, coming up with an ask for additional funding for mental health services and
programming here in the district. Um, both myself and Dr. Trice are working to get some of those resources compiled um, so we can submit a similar proposal to to what we had done last year. Um, and we'll have more specifics on how much we want to ask for, what we specifically
want to target with those dollars, but we're in a good spot compared to last year, and it's always a great time to to start thinking about when we can uh engage in that outreach because, uh, most legislators will end up starting to take meetings for a state budget ask in early 2026. So, we've got some time and,
uh, we'll be prepared for it this year as well as well as we were last year. Uh, moving to municipal level advocacy. Um, we've talked a lot about this in over the course of the last year for government relations. Um, something I'm particularly passionate about is pushing um for 16 and 17 year olds to have the
right to vote in schoolboard elections. Um, we had talked last month about how we didn't want to start surveying students on this idea if there wasn't a willingness to engage on the issue from our mayors. Um, and so in the last month, um, Dr. Dr. Shre had conducted
some informal outreach to the mayors of Hopewell Township, Hopeboro, and Pennington Burough to see if they would be interested in this particular policy um and actually enforcing the change if we did, you know, get the student support and the student will to to move it. And they were interested. So now
we're in the process of engaging with our student community through the youth advisory council and other student entities to see um if they're interested in taking up this task. We we don't want it to be a top- down policy push. We want this to be something that the students are interested in and engaged
in. And if they are not, then we don't want to move forward with something that they're not going to take advantage of. Um, but we we hope that this is something that students would be engaged with and and are interested in in, you know, expanding their their right to vote. >> And I just wanted to amend the mayors did show some interest, but they also
had to go to their committees and talk to them. So, I will be following up with them to see how those conversations are going now that we're post elections and everything's in place um for them. I'll go back and see how that went. Thank you. Um and the last piece is about
formalizing the committee. Um it's we're we're approaching the end of 2025 and something that we had written in the establishment of the government relations committee as an ad hoc committee was that it was set to sunset by the end of 2025. Um and in that we had to ensure that we would provide a
recommendation to the board president on how we could potentially formalize this committee. Um so I in collaboration with Mr. Slottman, Dr. Trees, President Williams Galliano, uh the policy committee have uh proposed formal language to amend policy 0155,
which would establish a standing government and community relations committee beginning in 2026. Um, so I do want to note that this committee would mark a pretty significant shift in uh how standing committees have operated on our board. Um, this would be the first
time that we're actually merging not only the government relations and community relations committee into one entity, but we're also pushing to move uh to to merge the SEAL and education program committee. Dr. Lilison will talk more about that in the policy committee report out. But I just wanted to ensure
um that the folks understood that the government relations committee will become a standing committee and it will also have a dual mandate with the community relations uh committee. So they're both joining to be one standing committee. We will now have five committees that all board members uh will have you know distributed staffing
on. Um, and I I really do want to stress that the fundamental goals of the community relations committee, which are goals of transparent communication, um, community engagement, listening to our neighbors, all of those responsibilities are going to be enshrined in the language of this standing committee. Um,
so even though it's merged and it's one, you know, large mandate, it's still going to have both elements of government outreach as well as community outreach. Um, I also want to take a second to acknowledge that this is the first committee of this nature in the state of New Jersey. Uh, when we reached
out to the New Jersey School Boards Association last year to find out about the constitutionality and legality of these committees, they really had not seen or heard of something in similar structure. Um, and what we're actually seeing is after our successful push to create this committee and secure state
funding, uh, there are several districts throughout the state that are starting to look towards us and are mirroring, uh, the government relations committee format, mission, and structure. Um, so, you know, another win for Hope Valley being at the forefront of political change and policy change. Uh, so I just
wanted to take a second to to acknowledge that shift and to give credit to our administration and our board for will being willing to to make this substantial change in in board governance >> and I would like to acknowledge Mr. Kapatia's foresight in helping us to do
that is appreciated. Any questions? Okay. Um, climate action. Um, I unfortunately missed the climate action meeting. Um, however, they have great notes for us. So, I just wanted to highlight some of the things that
happened at the meeting. Um, they established a calendar for meetings for the year. They're going to meet every other month. Um, they had their October meeting. There will be a December, March, and May meeting. and they're establishing working groups for their different focused areas which are
education, transportation, food and waste resilience and facilities. And so the working groups will meet in between those meetings to get some of the work done and then the overall um committees will report out on that work. So um the
climate action committee um is moving forward with their work as they always do. Um, and so I'll be sure to update everyone at uh future meetings for that. Any questions?
Okay, we'll move into policy and governance. Okay, so the policy committee actually met twice this past month. We had a part one and a part two. Um, and we were joined by Mr. return ball for part one and then Miss Riley for for both of the
the committee meetings. That was really helpful. Um so we have one policy, one regulation and two bylaws up for first reading tonight as well as one policy up for first read abolishment. So, can I please have a motion and a second to
bring policy and regulation 5516 use of electronic communication bylaw 0155 board committees bylaw 0141.3 board member number and term regional school district for first reading as
well as policy 0141 for first reading abolishment >> motion. Okay. So, we're going to touch first on policy and regulation 5516, which is related to use of electronic
communication. Um, so this really addresses students personal use of electronic communication devices. So, things like cell phones, smartwatches, and tablets during the school day. Um there's currently no statute or administrative code uh within the state
that addresses student use of electronic communication devices in schools. So we as a board do have the ability to revise this policy and regulation to meet our district needs. Uh this was last revised by the board of education in 2017
and the regulation is new to the school district. So we've had the policy but the regulation's new. Um, so the committee had uh a pretty lively and in-depth conversation about this policy. Um, and as I said, we heard from Mr. Turnbull about his experiences in the
middle school as well as Miss Riley about her experiences with the high school in this area. Um so by way of background the current practice regarding electronic communication devices in the middle school is that students place their devices in yonder
pouches which are locked and unlocked as they leave and enter the school during the day um such that the pouches are inaccessible um during the school day when students are on school grounds. For the high school the current practice is a little bit different. So, in each
classroom, there's a designated location where students drop off and pick up their cell phones during class time, but students do currently have access to their cell phones and other devices um at different times of the day. So, for example, in the hallways or in
recitation um or in study hall and lunch. Um, also by way of background, the New Jersey Department of Education has recently issued updated guidance um, around cell phone use in schools and has really been pushing districts, including
financially, towards adoption of bell-to-bell cell phone policies in which cell phones or other electronic devices cannot be used at all during the school day. So those policies look really similar to what we have in the middle school now in Timberlane. And again, you know, as many of us know
here, this is really based on a growing body of research that has shown that stricter cell phone use policies in general are helping to improve academic performance in schools and have the potential to reduce things like cyber bullying, social media use, and also
improve student mental health. Um, so I think the the general gist of the committee's conversation was we agreed that we wanted to move towards a bell-to-bell policy in the high school similar to what we currently have in the middle school. Um but with input from Miss Riley um related to some of the
sort of logistical and cultural challenges surrounding that um you know we discussed potentially taking more of an incremental approach to this with sort of the longer term goal of implementing this policy from bell-to bell. So under regulation 5516
you see a n number of sort of choices about when cell phones can be used in school. And so we've indicated that in addition to during class time, cell phones cannot be used in study hall or in recitation. So we're starting to kind of limit the places where students can
use their cell phones. Um for now, we're recommending that phones can still be allowed during lunch and then in the transitions between classes um while the district begins making a plan for implementation of the bell-to-bell policy. Um, so I'll stop there and see
if my fellow committee members have anything to add. Um, I do want to share that Dr. Resnik reached out because he was not able to attend this meeting and um, his opinion was that we should limit the use of cell phones during the transition between
classes. So I wanted to make sure to to give that feedback to the group. So he felt that that was another area where we should say we feel this should be prohibited. So, does anybody not on the committee have any questions or thoughts about this quiet group? Okay, we'll move on to the
next one. Um, so next up we have bylaw 0155, board committees. So, you actually got a a sneak peek from Mr. Kapadia. Um, so this bylaw lays out the committee structure for our board of education. Um, as you all know, right, we currently have six committees. Education program,
finance and facilities, personnel policy, community relations, and social emotional learning. Um, this bylaw was last revised in December 2021. And prior to the reorganization meeting in January, we wanted to review um
review this bylaw and see if we wanted to make any revisions based on the addition of government relations this year. um and also some other areas where we we felt that we could um leverage some similarities and overlap between committees. Um so in terms of revisions
to this policy, we are recommending that government relations uh which was introduced as an ad hoc committee this year and has been quite successful um be added as a standing board committee and combined with the community relations
committee. Again, the intent is not to lose uh any of the the the goals or the objectives of either of those committees. Um but because there's substantial overlap between um the two committees and we feel that there's some opportunities for streamlining um we
felt that it would be helpful to sort of combine them into one committee. I think similarly um along the same lines here, we're suggesting combining the committee with the ed program committee. So those are also two committees that do de see
substantial overlap in terms of content and presentations. Um and so we believe that this change will sort of better harmonize um the work of these two committees while again not losing sight of the goals of either of them. So I'll stop there and see if anybody
has anything to add or any questions or concerns about the committee structure that we're proposing moving forward. Um I just wanted to highlight with the accommodation of the education committee that it will be co-chared.
Thank you. >> Um just to ensure that we're not losing any issues or challenges or you know benefits and we're also not losing any of our educational.
So that I think that's important to note that there >> and Dr. Dr. Janovi, I believe that it's also going to have co-administrative leas li le li le li le li le li le li le li le li le li le li leaison right is that correct so just clarifying there that it would be both Dr. Blitzis and um Mr. Yes,
>> exactly. >> That way we're we're ensured that both committees have strong representation. >> Yeah. Exactly. >> So just from a so we're looking right now we have six right official
committees and we'll be going down to five. Is that right? And we have I'm just doing a math exercise in my head here. So right now every We're all on two committees, I think. >> Two. Two to three. Two.
>> I'm on three. Yeah, I think. >> Oh, you're on three. Okay. I've just I just want to make sure everyone's, you know, I'm just thinking from around the table that everybody still has an opportunity because I know if you're combining and educ those will be the same people. Government relations, community relations, those will be the
same people, right? So, you're already looking at those folks are kind of serving. I'm just from a mathematics perspective. I know historically obviously the the board president serves on all the committees. I didn't read that. Is that in the policy or is that something that we've done from a and is
there an opportunity maybe if if there have additional you know folks serve you know we could change it to four if somebody's really interested in particular issue? I I I didn't know if that was something that was sort of you know set by tradition or by actual regulation. >> I don't know that the board president
has to to serve on every committee. Um we deferring to the board secretary. I don't believe they have to. >> No, they don't have to. Um they're offered the exeicio on every committee. Um but they don't have to. They don't have to to they don't have to.
I was just thinking, you know, obviously we all have we all have our own strengths and expertise and interests, you know, so just I was just thinking out loud that might be an opportunity that we might consider that if there are, you know, four people that wanted to serve on something that maybe there
might be a chance that we might be able to work with folks on that. just just from a >> reducing by one just thinking from a numbers perspective make sure that you know everyone has the opportunity to to serve the best possible capacity with those committees. >> No I I think that's a really good point
and for folks who are maybe here or watching online right we have limits on how many number the number of people who can be in a committee at one time and so I think John is rightly pointing out that um people will have fewer of opportunities to serve on committees when we combine them. So, it's something
important to think about. Yeah. Any other questions or comments about that one? No. Okay. Um, so all in favor say I. >> I. >> Any opposed or abstaining? >> Okay. Um, so next up is second reading.
So, can I have a motion and a second to move policy and regulation 5530, substance use, regulation 56000, student discipline code of conduct, and policy 95 uh 955 educational research projects for
second reading, please? >> Motion. >> Okay. Um, so we received no revisions from the board um to these policies that uh were up for first reading last month. Um, and we discussed them at length last month, so I'll save you from the
summaries. Um, but are there any additional questions or comments about any of these from the board just to connect the dots here really briefly, as Dr. Plitus mentioned one of the efforts we've been working on at on ed program is really operationalizing
this committee uh this um policy related to educational research projects. Right? So we've come up with a statement of asurances that essentially puts the policy into into asurances that the researchers need to sign off on. So we've already begun to sort of put that in practice.
>> Okay. Do you have a question or comment? Um, really quick and it's not that important, but I'm just noticing so you use the term substance use. >> It looks like the policy is titled substance abuse. I don't know like in the substance use field, use would be
the term that is now used, but I don't know if we if that is a state requirement that we continue to use substance abuse. So, if that change if we're able to change it to use, I think that would follow the language in the field. And if not, you know, it's not a big deal. also follow the language in
the policy because we actually updated I did I went through and did a find find replace and updated it such that substance abuse is replaced with substance use throughout the actual policy language now the name of the policy Bob I'm going to defer to you on
this are we able to change the name of the policy to substance use or is that regulated by a state code >> that's a good question we have to talk to we can talk talk to our policy people, okay, to see if if it can be changed.
>> Typically, it's written the policies mirror the law. >> Yeah. And they're standardized across school districts generally. And so that's why I'm a little unsure about changing the actual title of the policy, >> but let's let's check because I think that's reasonable, especially considering that we've changed that
language in the policy itself. So, um Okay. Um, okay. Any other questions or comments from the board? >> Okay. Um, Bob, you want to do a roll call vote?
>> Mr. Peters, >> yes. >> Mr. Slottman, >> I. >> Dr. Stilliano, >> yes. >> Dr. Wilson, >> Dr. Genevacy, >> yes. >> Mr. Kapadia, >> yes.
>> Dr. Lilliston, >> yes. Motion carries. the abolishment. Yeah. >> Oh, okay. Okay. So, then we are calendars.
Can I get a motion to approve calendars? >> Motion. >> Second. >> So, so we've got personnel December 15, six o'clock. We we superseded you this time.
>> What? 6 o'clock. Finance facilities set uh to meet the auditor. We have to meet the auditor and the bond council on December 8th at 8 a.m. program. >> Um I I was thinking the week of December
8th. Um, I know 8 a.m. works for many of you. Is there a specific day that's better? >> Where is that? >> Right. >> Okay. Okay. Okay. So, let's do uh 8 am on the 11th.
We're not policy relations. >> We're not going to do any first readings in December because you don't >> you don't leave a policy in midapproval before the board. >> So, we won't necessarily need a meeting, but I will need to follow up you on with the use and any any other revisions that
I need to follow up about. >> Well, there was Dr. Resnik's comment about limiting cell phone use on during transitions between classes, but I don't know that we need a meeting to discuss that comment, right? I think we could go over email. >> Yeah. Okay,
>> Drew, we'll go to you since you've got probably finals and coming up. Uh, does Monday, December 1st at around 12 pm work? >> Uh, Monday, December 1st at 12 p.m. It
can probably be a 30-minute meeting. I don't think it has to be the full hour. Jackie, Dr. Jack. >> Yeah, you can do that. Please defer to your calendar. Any anytime that works for you, we'll make work.
>> Oh, okay then. Uh I'm fine. December the week of December 8th. I forget what was already taken. [Music] 11. >> Could you do the 9th at 8 a.m. Maybe? I
don't know. >> Dr. Genevi D. I don't know. >> Yeah, I can make that work. >> Okay, perfect. Leaves, but um Paul's not here. >> Want to meet offline? Set that date.
>> Yeah, let's do that. Great. Sorry, I'm just adding my calendars. Okay. Okay. So, all in favor of our board. >> Any opposed? No stating. Okay. Any new
business? No. Okay. So, we will have our last public comment. Members of the public are invited to address the board on any matter for a maximum of three minutes. During this portion of the meeting, you are asked to state your name, address, and
municipality. In response to your comments, the board of education, excuse me, may respond or direct the superintendent to do so. The board may also opt to take the matter up at a future meeting so
that the matter is researched by the district administration. Public comment is now open. >> As a reminder, you have three minutes. I'm the timekeeper. So, I'll put up the yellow when two minutes and 30 minute 2 minutes 30 seconds has passed and then
the red at 3 minutes. >> A meal back is hope. Um I know a little bit earlier uh there was conversations on sort of increasing phone regulations in the high school. I have a couple of initial concerns on that. Um the first
one being when it comes to recitation and study hall. I think one of the biggest um sort of uh components of being a high school student is not only you know learning academics but learning other sort of life skills like time
management and I come to I just think limiting phone use during break periods it kind of a as adults we will have access to our phones and devices and the temptations of those and to kind of
prepare for us for sort of a false um step into the world of managing our time and things that need to get done. I I just don't see that. Um I think also during recitation especially uh it becomes sort of a place of communication
between students maybe for group projects or for uh classes things like that and to eliminate uh cell phone use during that period. It just eliminates the the ability for students to maybe know what's coming up later in their day from students that had that class
earlier or to work with students that are not in the same recitation on group projects without meeting at a third location. >> Um and then finally, I know Dr. Resnick's not here, but he touched on um transition periods, and I think that that's an interesting um sort of uh time
to bring up, especially when you guys at the district have just this year um put out all of the um QR codes for uh when teachers are absent. Uh we we obviously need our our phones to access those. So, if you're not familiar, we have got QR codes all throughout the school
building. Um if you have an absent teacher, you scan the QR code, you see where you'll be for that period. That happens during transition periods. And so, um I think that that's that's just an interesting point um with, uh getting rid of phones in transition periods. Uh
those are my initial concerns. Thank you. Okay, seeing no one else, we will close public comment. Dr. >> I want to thank Mr. Blackus for his um feedback. Um part of the the um reason
why uh the policy committee as they had a very robust conversation about this and Miss Principal Riley was there is that uh we really uh while we do want to look at the instructional time which in recitation is still considered construction uh instructional time for you to study and connect with your
teachers and that sort of thing. We understand the importance of having the students involved in this conversation. So we didn't want to sort of pass a bell-to-bell policy without just what you did have giving us feedback on like we didn't know about the QR codes for example that that would really cause a
problem. So as as we go down this road we're not going to do anything without involving students voice in that process. So thank you for your feedback and certainly that's going to be something we're going to be asking for moving forward. >> Okay. So we are going to now enter into
executive session um to discuss uh HIVs and um no no action will be taken. >> Oh motion. Can I get a motion to >> motion?
All in favor? >> Awesome.