good evening going to uh bring the the meeting to uh to a start now can we start Miss Spitzer with a roll call please would you to I have that after flag salute Mrs blutfield here Mrs Dugen here Mr Fowler here miss gong here Mrs Hughes what the hell so sorry can you edit that Bruce you're next up you're in okay Mrs Kell I apologize no worries Mrs Kellogg here Mrs odonnell Mrs Peterson here Mr Rhymer here and Mrs santangelo here did I get everybody I did we got it thank you I apologize all right can we all stand for a flag salute please I Ali 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 welcome to a meeting of The Hunton Central Regional High School Board of Education please be advised that this and all meetings of the board are open to the public and media consist consistent with the open public meetings act and that advanced notice required therein has been provided meeting notice was also posted in the boardroom of the upper school campus sent to The Courier News Star Ledger Express Times And The Hunton County Democrat and sent to the clerks of Delaware Township East dwell Township Flemington bur Ron Township and Readington Township the public will have an opportunity to be heard as shown on the agenda Miss gong would you mind to read our district mission statement please it' be my pleasure 100 and Central is an Innovative educational Community dedicated to the intellectual social and emotional safety and growth of all students while fostering curiosity and promoting Wellness we aspire to create powerful learning experiences establish strong Partnerships and serve as contributing members of society thank you all right we have uh two approval of minutes the first is from December 20th can I have a motion to to accept that please Some Mo second roll call please Mrs blutfield abstain I wasn't here Mrs dougen yes Mr Fowler yes Miss gong abstained since I wasn't a member of the board Miss Kellogg yes Mrs Peterson yes Mr Rymer abstain I was absent and Mrs San Angelo Oban motion C passes thank you and next we'll have an approval of the minutes from our January 4th 2024 meeting I have a motion to move that please move second roll call please before we do that sorry Robert rules uh there should be a correction do I say that now or of course all right so under the hund uh so this is where the Committees we've got the um Foundation hun in Central School foundation so just to be consistent it should be M gong sorry didn't change my last name all right any other changes thank you for catching that roll call with the changes as amended please Mrs PL Feld yes Mrs dougen yes Mr Fowler yes Miss gong yes Mrs Kellogg yes Mrs Peterson yes Mr Rymer yes and Mrs Sant Angelo yes all yes motion carries okay uh next we have correspondence received by the board um everybody should have that in their agenda I'm capturing one from December 20th accept that we don't do a motion for that okay and with those being on record I will hand it over to Dr Moore for superintendent report thank you thank you uh not too much to update on since we just met earlier in the month uh but we do have a presentation tonight from our social studies Department World languages I'm sorry social studies and family and consumer science departments uh under Mrs uh Rebecca Lucas so they'll be up in a moment I did want to just share um a couple of quick thoughts as Mission moment um thanking the board for its support as we move deeper into the new year and uh wanted to offer an OB observation from last week's um back to school night we had uh uh for the first time really opened up one of our three back to school nights to parents of rising ninth graders so parents of current eighth graders we had a good crowd here and I uh want to thank um uh Mr fer and Miss gong and Miss Peterson for joining us there and saying hello to all the parents but one of the questions that I always like to ask is how many of you as parents you know went to 100 cent and we always get a good number of hands up in the audience and Mr Fowler added how many of your parents went to 100 in central as parents your parents you know so uh and again several hands went up so it's just striking uh always strikes me that for a suburban school that's a very rare situation have such roots and uh it's a lot to be thankful for uh this school's um uh commitment to and presence within its past and its Heritage it's just a wonderful place to be uh so I wanted to note that tonight as part of um the thoughts that come to mind as we're we're hearing tonight's uh the mission statement tonight I also want to add we've had some rough weather over the past couple of weeks and I wanted to thank our transportation department and our operations department for all the work that they do on such uh such moments um I typically rise at about 4:30 on those mornings and by then um I guess Dr Butler may be on the road already to school but we'll uh but uh by then our transportation department our our maintenance crew have already done a full day's work to ensure that the campus is ready to go whether we end up with a delay or we're not here at all or we're lucky enough to have a full day now I do have to point out that we have used up the two emergency days that we had set aside for this year's calendar which means if we have any additional weather days uh delayed openings don't count against us early dismiss don't count against us but if we lose a day that's going to have to start coming out of um uh scheduled holidays so we look at uh and the calendar on the agenda tonight is is up for um adjustment because of the days that we took the calendar spells out the order by which we would go to holidays to fill in our 180 days every District must have 180 days for its students state of New Jersey has not yet uh uh given a green light to Virtual days to replace the 180 days we do have some local districts who have virtual days on their calendar but those are in addition to the 180 required we have 180 on our calendar so where I think Readington for example uh uses some virtual days here and there it's because they have more than 180 days on their calendar so just some things to be aware of there um don't want to be unless you want to start losing some holidays down the roads pieces of spring break Etc what is it pajamas Inside Out flushing the ice and the toilet whatever it is we we might not want to do that uh or else you'll start losing days down the road you've had you've had your days so it's good um but again thanks to our transportation and to our operations departments for all that they do on those days some slight indications of some weather this week but I'm not too concerned uh and we'll just watch it as it comes so with that I'll turn it over to Mrs Lucas to uh introduce her presentation tonight or Miss celosi ha are you going to introduce come on up yeah good evening I'm here to introduce Mrs Lucas and our amazing staff and students uh representative of the social studies department and the family and consumer science department I did want to re acclimate our board kind of as to the format of our presentations because we have some new members here tonight so um these presentations are designed to give you kind of a window into the classrooms and the experiences that students have um they're not the the more General um information about Department presentations we do have presentations and information available on our website though we wanted to take a look at that our program of studies is recently updated that's a little plug since we'll soon be doing scheduling but tonight you'll get a little window into our social studies Department as well as our family and consumer science department and with that I will pass it over to Mrs Lucas thanks Jess hi everyone welcome to the new board members okay okay so we're going to get started here ah thanks Mr Klein you put that nice screen saver up there for me okay so tonight um what you're going to learn about a little bit is about what happens in social studies and in family consumer science in relation to our board goals our district goals and then our particular goals in the social studies and in the family and consumer science departments so I've chosen to highlight two specific areas one in each department that um I'm going to share with you with uh Dr Butler and um Miss Weiss and some of their students so what I want to really start with is I want to share um how each of my wonderful departments uh how they work towards a lot of the goals and um the department goals and District goals that we have so what I have up on the screen right now are two of the board goals one of them is powerful learning through personalization and the other one is service within our community and what we usually do here atun and Central is supervisors will take the district goals and we will uh use those and create Department goals for our staff and and our our teachers to use to move their students forward in our in our school courses um so two of the goals that I wanted to focus on tonight are supporting personalization in learning which happens in both family and consumer science and in social studies um and we were able to do that through a variety of strategies uh through specific uh pedagogical strategies through Gathering instructional data um um and through building relationships with our kids with our students and then also the implementation of instructional practices that are in the new New Jersey student learning standards which would be um key skills and literacies for family and consumer science and social studies and then the social studies student learning standards um from 2020 and what they do is they focus really on our disciplinary habits so that would be what you would see if you took a career in family and consumer science or what you would see if you were a historian or you took a career in the social sciences which also includes geography economics sociology psychology not just history so Maria montauri I'm sure you all know who she is and what she uh what she did uh monor schools and this quote I think really exemplifies what takes place in the two areas that I want to highlight tonight so the greatest sign of success for a teacher is to be able to say the children are working as if I did not exist so I know in one way that sounds like oh they're working without a teacher but what that really means in social studies and family consumer science is that our students are so well prepared and that they're their the learning that they're doing is their own it's authentic it's real so it's personalized so what that will do for a student is they will then continue and broaden their learning experience and this the teachers are just really guiding the students um so that's what you'll see tonight okay so family and consumer science will be the first one up and I highlighted three areas here career Readiness life literacy and key skills Little Devils and early childhood and Child Development now in family and consumer science and I know you probably don't get a lot of information about uh a department that we would usually call or used to call electives um but we really try not to use that term anymore um this is a department that has a lot of career choices for students and that's why we focus on Career Readiness life literacy key skills um you as you know we have a teacher shortage in our state and in our country and this is an area where we can actually grow teachers uh we have three courses that are dual enrollment we have child development early childhood and intro to education um that our students can take in order for them to learn more about early childhood education um Child Development and then um intro to educ education where we have a teacher Cadet program Little Devils is our preschool uh it's our learning lab that our early childhood and Child Development students take part in um for a very nominal fee we have parents who bring their students here Monday Wednesday and Friday and our students practice their personalized lesson plans that they've created um with our four and five-year-old um Little Devils uh early childhood and Child Development I just really mentioned that that's powerful learning through personal ation and I will let Miss Weiss and her students talk about that so I'm going to bring Miss Weiss and Jack and Sarah up thank you hi everyone I'm Allison Weiss um I started at 100 Central just about a year ago last October and I'm very happy to be here and part of your family and Community um something that's very important to me being part of a community and our class is unique because we make great connections with the community here Flemington Maran and I know I'm not you know new to the area so I don't know all of the surrounding towns um but I know we service quite a few and then we also work within hund and centrals Community kind of looking at merging all of our departments and bringing everybody together um so one of the things that we do in this classroom is we do Project based learning so our students are not required to take tests and quizzes but they are always required at the end of every unit to present their learnings in powerful meaningful ways and so with that they are allowed to have choice they choose the way that they want to present their data they choose the way that they want to go about their research is it online is it through books is it through articles and what they're doing is really taking control of their own learning so I may introduce slightly a topic ask them to take a little bit of time on their own to figure some things out get their their own opinions then we really talk about how that connects to what is going on maybe in the world or in the teaching community and the expectations that are put on us in working with the children I like to do that so that they're not just regurgitating back to me what I tell them but really making meaningful connections to everything that they're learning in the classroom um and I think that the choice is important because I can tell you that I am not an artist I did copy this lovely drawing to utilize um using you know the board and and my little pencil there for a while um so I may not be an artists but some of my students are and so for them to be able to present their data in that way is Meaningful to their peers to themselves and really puts value in what they're doing I also find that they put more time and effort into their projects than they actually want to share what they've learned with their peers and um at home as well sorry so I have Jack gretti and Sarah Barella who are going to share a little bit about their experiences with our little Devils we do service um three four and up to five year olds right before they go to kindergarten and we have a unique setup or I think somewhat unique setup in how they run the classroom because ultimately on those days I spend the first two weeks showing them how I would implement it and then it becomes their room so this is all about them hi my name is Jack brunetti I'm part of Mr Bo to a block class for Little Devils um we work on a three-day rotation kids come Monday Wednesday and Friday first day we do observations observations are direct observations so we note down for about 10- 15 minutes about what the kids are actually doing the Motions they're doing the things they are saying and then um there is a topic question for our lesson planning that that we res Resort back to our observations and we answer that question to what the kids have done on our lesson planning days we spend the entire class writing our lesson plan in a students will be able to format we have a hook which introduces the students to what we are going to be teaching them for the day then we have our instruction which is where we teach the students our lesson and then we have our assessment which is how we we assess the success of our lesson and then we have a closure which brings our lesson to a close and ends the lesson for the students teaching the our lesson plan um we go over our introduction or where we're introducing the the little ones of what they are going to be learning that day um and then once they have figured out what they um what they were learning then would do our instruction tell them what to do and then like Sarah said we had assess them after our lesson how you assess yourself uh we assess ourself um there's um a reflection form of our lesson and we kind of answer questions based on how well it went what things we could change um yeah that's basically it go next slide and then we are we try to work with our a community as much as possible here at Central um last year we had Mr BR come in and read a book for the kids um stem activities with Miss keloy hay our op operations Department did a Santa visit which the kids very much love that that came and give candy canes out to the kids um we had sent emails out to the teachers surrounding our classroom to do a um a Halloween um trick-or-treating activity so we did that with the kids and then um I had emailed one of my old history teachers here miss voran um she did she had brought in munchkins for the little ones so that was also very exciting exciting for them um so these are just a snippet of things that we do like I have a million more pictures um we brought in baby chicks and we're looking to do that again this spring that brought people from all over the school um into to come see the baby chicks and we did a a whole science um lesson with our little ones and also just how to be kind and care for living things so it kind of was a great thing to bring everyone together and then you heard beep beep out in the hallway so everyone was jumping in to see what was going on um aside from just having Mr brand we invite guest readers um for re Across America in and we had multiple staff members I mean we had secretaries Dr Moore came in and read we had Dr staff come in so it was open to anyone within the school Community uh who had available time and wanted to come in we're really lucky because we're a class that people want to visit um we're out in the hallway playing games and doing activities ities and what our big ones learn is that that's all a part of learning for our little ones um and so our little ones learn through play I try to bring that into the big ones as well and remind them that you can enjoy yourselves um we learn about Mel hierarchy they learn about lesson planning as we tiar it um for each class level so Child Development does a very simple lesson format as you heard then it grows with them so if they take Early Childhood it goes into a more Collegiate um BAS based plan where they're doing standards and talking about how do you differentiate a lesson and then it goes on from there so we're really trying to prepare our students as best as possible she mentioned that we do students will be able to I teach our students a three-point objective so they do students will be able to buy they list their activities so that how do you know your lesson was successful that's how you then reflect on what you did well and what you might want to do again um so there's just a lot of components and I wish I could have and and honestly I would have you all in so if you're ever around and you want to come in it's the best place to be It's the Best of Both Worlds and the reality is it does become their classroom and so it's their lessons it's their plans I'm there to guide them but ultimately I always say if I didn't walk in that door especially on a preschool day they would run it you wouldn't even know I mean they take over and that three-day rotation is truly a rotation they're broken into three groups one group is observing one one is planning one is teaching and that works so that our little ones aren't overwhelmed but our big ones also are able to really make that connection with our students um so we do do a lot with the community we had the fire department come out as well we have um authors come in from the community and meet with our students we offer a really unique program that I am so excited to be a part of and I love bringing it to our students um to our community and thank you very much thank you may I make a comment or I have a question for you one I think it's it's great and uh do you ever get to go visit a montor classroom no we have not maybe a field trip one of these days that's a great idea thank you thank you um I have to tell you in September when you walk into the um Early Childhood little Devil's classroom it's it's just empty there's it's nothing and I said to Ally how come your room is it's not decorated and she says oh the students do that so she has the students set up her room um their room just as if they would if it was a preschool or early childhood so it's it's really cool to watch them take ownership of that so thank you I will point out I always say one of my lessons is building a wonderful classroom Community I just don't do it they do it because like I said it's their okay so we're going to move on to social studies so what I chose to focus on in social studies is inquiry uh because inquiry really is personalization at its best and I just kind of started the I started my slides with a few quotes from The National Council for the social studies and then um our New Jersey student learning standards our disciplinary habits uh dealing with inquiry so what I want you to take from this slide is the idea that inquiry is an approach that most social studies groups nonprofits um academics in the social studies World believe is really the key way for students to understand and learn about what's going on in our world today so it's the idea of looking at thinking creating a question doing research questioning themselves talking with their peers and their colleagues speaking with their with their teacher and then reformulating the question and then diving deeper and deeper into whatever that question or whatever that problem is or was and making connections to what's going on in the current world or what might be happening um and how that might connect to the past or the present so it's not just taking a look at what happened in the past it's con it's making those connections for our kids so some of our New Jersey um learning standards one of the practices that really I think contributes to um personalization is the idea of inquiry through developing questions and planning so um what I have on these slides and I'm not going to read them word for word it's just the idea of developing questions and how those questions will enable our students to understand the human connection or the human complexity the the idea of addressing uh real world issues the idea of incorporating questions like I said earlier it's not just history it's social science so incorporating questions from Psychology from sociology uh from economics from geography and then a lot of these inquiries what we do is they invest tigate uh the idea or the diversity of America of groups of societies and how that affects us so for this um I chose Global Studies and Dr Butler um and some of his students Kate and Ashley right no Kate Ashley and study okay yes um and the idea of Global Studies is a required course it's a graduation requirement it fulfills the world history requirement in New Jersey and it is a we don't have levels in social studies we have AP or we have college prep so this is a college prep course so you get a wide variety of students and a wide variety of student interests in here so I'm going to now hand the mic over to Dr Butler and his students so that he can share with you his inquiry project that he did in Global Studies so this is a project that um started I'm going to say the teachers atun and Central wrote a book on this called letting go um stutzman donh Hower and a former media specialist that worked here uh miss hery all wrote a book I'm going to say it was 2010 2011 and it's all about inquiry based learning so when I started doing this it was more based on summer summer classes that I took with them and learning how to do this and over the last five or six years I've just developed it more and more I've tried it in different classes Global study seems to be the one it works the best in I've tried it when I taught Holocaust and human behavior it doesn't work in an AP class because you you're on you're on a much tighter schedule so the idea is for me I set forward a standard and I'll actually oh no Jeff doesn't have access Jeff doesn't have access how do I fix that um can I just use another account I'm sorry you can but I don't want you to log in while we're live okay what if I okay cyber security very important all right I don't care that's my password is it Gmail it will be worth it I promise cyber security is so important nowadays we have a two-step verification we're trying to go through while we wait for the verification I will vouch for what Dr Butler said um Mrs Lucas and I did go into his class this past year and watch part of the discussions um that was based around inquiry it was um Dr Butler didn't have to say a word the entire class the students led the discussions in their groups and it was absolutely amazing so I will vouch he's not just playing that up see look it and I I think you're good now all right so let's see can no uh oh okay do we want no okay think you're good yes we needed that there it goes okay all right sorry about that I thought it was going to be on a different computer um so this is basically the project and and what I did was I developed a standard that I wanted them to follow and then basically outlin the essential questions and did all the stuff that they needed to do for each activity so we start with the Renaissance then we go to the Reformation then we go to the Scientific Revolution then we go to the enlightenment so throughout the project as they're doing it they're basically these are the essential questions on the top the first thing I have them do is write the standard in their own words so that way I know that they understand what they're doing because a lot of times with the jargon and everything else that's used in educational standards that it's not always a lot of times it goes over my head so I'd imagine it would go over the students's heads so first thing they do is they write the standard in their own words and then there's essential questions that they answer throughout and then each activity has essential questions that they have to answer so the idea is that as they're answering the questions they're building their their knowledge base and over the last couple years this year in particular I started coming up to the IMC to work with the media Specialists about how they about doing research so after having gone through my dissertation and doing research on my own I feel it's one of the most important aspects of going to college is knowing how to do research so they get taught how to do research in the IMC with the media Specialists going through different databases and doing all the things that they need to do in order to continue so then when they finish each activity after we finish Activity one the class develops a rubric and then I break them up into groups they develop the rubric of how they're going to be graded I li list out what's proficient and then they said they they come up with what is um what's developing and what is Advanced and then when each activity is done they sit down and they grade each other and then they get a grade based on how well they grade each other and then once they grade each other it's given back to the person who did it originally so that they can fix whatever they need to fix so that when I finally grade it they're getting the best grade they can possibly get and they're learning it after they grade it they sit and talk to each other about the activity that they did so that they can learn from each other they're not only getting the research they did they're getting the research that their fellow students did or their peers did so then as we go through it they basically do the same thing over and over again and now on at the end of each activity they have an EQ reflection and it basically asks the question how do your text and research relate to each other and the knowledge that you had going into it then the standards reflection what process have you made in order to make to reach the standard and then my favorite is the time reflection because the time reflection is asking them to be honest I gave you two blocks of class time to work on this how much time did you spend on it and how much time did you end up having to do at home so as they're doing that I tell them I don't grade that but it's not helping them if they lie because they're only lying to themselves because it's teaching them time management as well so if I'm giving you two and a half hours of class time of my class time to do this and I think it can be done in that time and you're still spending an hour at home what are you doing during class because I can walk around the classes as much as I want but if if they want to try to get away without doing work in my class there's a possibility they're going to they're going to not be able to finish it so it goes all the way through and at the end instead of giving a test they have a big score discussion where they basically talk about everything that they learned and how it how it all built on each other so this is something that just I I hope it gets better every year um Ashley and and Kate had the class last year so they have some Reflections and study is in the class in my class right now so I what do you think like what was your what was your impression going in right when I first explained this the looks on some of their faces in the size of the project I think Ashley's um final her final plan was 24 pages long with all the work that she put into it with all the comments number of course I'm impressed I'm impressed okay well Kate you're going to talk about so when we first opened up the dock it it took forever to load it was huge it was daunting um the essential question for the entire assignment just seemed like where are we going to get this answer it was Broad and it the answer just didn't seem like it was ins sight but the activities really broke down what exactly we needed to know to be able able to answer this question and we were able to answer it and do research how best fit us as students um sometimes as class we watched videos together and took notes on that and then we did individual research and if someone likes watching a video and taking notes on that that fit their learning style the best then they did that and maybe I like reading databases and taking notes on that and when we were able to meet after um after we finished the assignment we got together and we were able to fill in each other's gaps in our research um which helped us expand our knowledge on what we missed um yeah um I think just the way the doc and the whole assignment was organized was very beneficial for everybody in our class and like it kind of catered to everybody's needs and wants like we had partner discussions and then at the end of it we had a whole big group discussion with all of our findings since we did it in class like Dr B was also always a resource and always available to help us and like we had the independent work and could do our research on our own and take independent notes which like different people like different things and the more time and the more we just spent on actually learning it was it got very easy to manage and by the end of it like it was just like oh yeah we know how to do this so and I think we also learned very helpful things especially to prepare us like for college as Dr B was saying CU I wrote down like we were doing MLA citations which like I've done before past projects but like this was more in extensive I guess like it was more than just one source and so that's a very um helpful skill to learn and all of the reflections that we did on ourselves and on our our peers were was also very helpful because I enjoyed getting the feedback and I was I liked that we were able to give others feedback as well and we were using different sources and finding different research so by talking to others we were we were getting their information and it was more out of like out of our level instead of reading like a college documentary or college Source about this topic like we we could use each other to understand it more and be able to like actually grasp the information um like Ashley said uh Dr V was always there to help us but I feel like some days I walked in the door said hi and didn't say anything until you know 80 minutes later when the block was done yeah I we just did our research I mean knowing me that probably didn't happen but um but we were able to as guided as this doc was it was free and we were able to find what suits us the best and where we tend to lack in our research and our strategy for um just research in general which definitely will help us which was also helpful to manage all the other work that we had in other classes because junior year was definitely a very stressful year for myself and probably for Kate too so it it was it was like a break we had a break to do our own thing and it was more manageable and like it was a weight lifted off our shoulders I feel like one of the main things that I really enjoyed about this project was we got into a different space from the regular classroom that we're normally in and we got a chance to explore the databases and everything to help us prepare for college and I feel like that was like very helpful for the future especially and um another thing I really liked is that we kind of got to reflect with our peers and before we reached out to Mr Butler like we got to collaborate with others and we got to Greater selves and I just really thought that that's something that's like different from most classes that we normally do so I just really um felt like the collaboration was like one of the best parts and also like it was when they first introduced the project I'm going to be honest I was a little terrified because it was a lot of work and um like I thought I couldn't handle that first cuz it was like the databases and everything like you can't use like Google like you normally would like you have to kind of site all your sources and everything so I thought I couldn't do it but like the more you work and the more like time you spend on it I felt like it was a little more easier the more time you spent on it a stressful as it looked it really wasn't yeah it wasn't really that stressful and I think we all had a good grasp on what we really did learn and our discussion was our discussion was discussion the discussion between two group the two group discussion in your class went for an hour in two separate discussions in the class each went for about an hour what we learned and we all like to talk we all love to talk so thank you thanks good job thank you Dr D I felt like I should say that so it's fine I got it um so to just recap and to touch on a few things that Dr Butler forgot as the students were finishing up is the idea that our students were having these academic conversations they were filling in their own gaps they were having civil discourse they were agreeing they were disagreeing and they were learning they were learning a whole lot so um thank you thank you for sharing and that's the end of my presentation thank you very much I just unplugged it you're done right um excellent thank you thank you questions for Miss Lucas um I just wanted to say thank you to both sets of students who came out tonight to share with us because that's kind of my favorite part of these presentations is to see what you guys are doing um the preschool program looks just really cool and something I wish we had as when I was a student um and I'm positively giddy that you guys got into research so much because that's kind of my favorite thing in the world so I'm excited to hear that you guys get excited about that you guys actually started to enjoy that cuz it's really a great superpower so thank you for coming and sharing eventually it will yeah yeah so we'll have to reconfigure and reassess at that point so we've already been talking about it as what that might look like and what our what our courses might look like so yeah it's important to note that the the Red Devils is part of our sort of teacher Academy um so those students are going through a very specific set of courses in order to become uh sort of pre teachers uh and um there are certainly opportunities I guess to work with our sending k8s on how we might continue to integrate our students learning into their operations but that's uh uh there are also an awful lot of rules about the prek expansion that we would have to fit into as well so we're we're eager to continue those conversations with them we're and we're also planning on this year and if and when pre full day prek happens um we are planning to go out with our teacher Cadets to observe in school district so we may have to open that up a little more broadly um if we couldn't have our little devils in the building anymore due to the full day so and if I could just ask the the last three students stud did you use a lot of artificial intelligence uh for your research oh come on really not at all excellent thank you and I think one of the things you thank you let's give a round of applause every um this notion of inquiry which they they label in in uh social studies in English as inquiry learning I think we're hearing about it in all of the presentations not only the ones that we've started to hear this year but this is sort of the highlights of what they've shared in the past as well so it really comes down to student Choice student voice um their own efficacy in their learning and uh they're they're pretty amazing folks you guys are amazing uh so thank you thank you uh and I think with that Mr Fowler I just have a couple of quick organizational things to give a quick uh preview on and then my report is completed uh we have have our Hib and suspension report there and there are a couple of hibs for us to take action on under the organizational items um we have a it is Schoolboard recognition month so we have it it feels funny for you to vote for yourself on this but vote for the person next to I guess is what we're asking you to do and I will I will read that uh into the record when we get to the organizational items and then as I mentioned earlier we have um the calendar revision as a result of our closure uh last week so uh with that and thanks to Mrs Lucas and uh all of the folks who came out to help with the family consumer science and social studies report um I turn it back to you Mr fer with that's it thank you Dr Moore all right at this point in time I'd like to open our meeting for the first public comment of the evening this will be on any public comments to do with tonight's agenda and tonight's agenda only there'll be a later public comment for any open items so uh we'll uh provide five minutes for everybody just write your name down at the podium announce yourself and where you're from and then share your thoughts for tonight's agenda okay uh good evening uh Steve fario ran Township um I don't normally do this but I'm going to do it tonight because I want to make sure that I respect your time and and uh do not go over my time so I don't normally write stuff down I normally just go off the cuff uh um but I felt like uh this should probably something that I am able to uh read and get into the record quickly um agenda item I uh Personnel committee and section one retirements um after 28 and a half years as a full-time teacher um Steve Gibble is retiring from a place that he once loved more than anything it's actually more than 28 and a half years he began substitute teaching here at Hunter Central in 1989 uh he graduated in 1980 and uh where he was a standout wrestler and athlete went on to University of North Carolina on a wrestling scholarship um in 1989 when he came here um it's safe to say that he dedicated his entire professional life to this school and he did so with pride and this included coaching three Sports football wrestling and Lacrosse um he was inducted into the njsa coach Hall of Fame in 2008 for wrestling he served on the njsa wrestling's rules and regulations committee for four consecutive years something that I don't believe is even permitted to be done anymore but because they had thought so highly of Steve they let him do that um despite how great of a coach he was and I was one of those people I graduated in 1993 uh played uh football and uh basketball and baseball here um he coached me in football he was a better person role model for all of the kids if you were at the Board of Education meetings in the fall of 2014 when the former superintendent former principal former Board of Education attorney and select Board of Education members railroaded Mr Gibble you would have saw this place I don't know if it was this place I think it was I think it was in the other room over there there were several people in here and I mean packed house Groves of people coming in here uh to support their coach but not because he won a lot of matches or games it was because of how much of a positive impact he had on their lives I do not need to go into his accomplishments as a coach because if Steve was here he would tell you that they mean nothing what counts was his impact as a role model to these kids Mr Gibble has been defined by several news outings um even some uh television uh Publications as alleged in New Jersey high school sports and rightfully so but he is indisputably more of a wonderful father husband teacher sibling and friend um Hunter Central just lost one of the best ambassadors it ever had for this school not even realizing it a person who has been treated horribly since the fall of 2014 someone who was still fighting for his reputation all because the select few people in power had bad intentions he deserved better from this school that he loved just to give you an idea of who he is 2009 there was a wrestler on his team that didn't was very poor Mr Gibble would drive him back to his where he lived at the fountain Motel one day he went to the Fountain motel and his mother the kid the child's mother came out of the hotel room and said you can't stay here anymore said that to to his kid Mr Gibble got out of the car told the kid to go into his home Motel room collect his Gatherings and he was going to come with him stayed with Mr Gibble and Mrs Gibble they became his parents that's the type of person that was railroaded in 2014 now I hope to God that you guys are seeking information if you could just give me one minute I appreciate it got a minute I hope to God you guys are seeking information on the testimony that's occurred in this case uh it's been nine years for God's sakes okay and I think I would take particular uh interest in Miss stener's testimony just finished in December Miss blufield you'd be very interested to know her her testimony because according to her the whole taking of the Jewish holidays away was not a big deal and there was no big uh Rift with you and you caused no problems for her um I just hope I hope that you guys and I I I don't know I mean you have social studies people here he's retiring from that department the guy deserved better he's a really good person he loved this place he loved this place and I'm not sure that he's retiring because he really wants to but I think it's just he's had enough so thank you again I appreciate all your uh your volunteer here I know it's not easy um so I appreciate it thank you thank you Mr fio anyone else none yes my first meting yep and and tonight at this point in time we're going to be speaking about items on the agenda there'll be a time later if you just like to speak about anything else uh my name is if you could just write down your name right there on the pad thank you uh my name is Joseph balos I don't think anybody here knows me um my son is a sophomore at school and um perhaps one of the two hibs you're going to be discussing later pertains to my son uh my son has been bullied uh much more than I was aware of but as time goes on and I speak to his friends and his uh friends parents I learn more about what's happening in this particular class now uh we've I've never heard of the term Hib until the middle of last month uh and it is being the process is ongoing uh my son this this problem continues it has not been resolved uh I write uh Mr Ebner probably twice maybe three times a week not last week of course because we had one and two3 day of school uh but another incident occurred today um I would like this situation to be resolved my son uh every child who comes to hunt Central has this tremendous opportunity to learn I'm very impressed with everything I heard here today but it's meaningless If the child is being harassed in in an AP course that's very surprising my son has never been bullied or harassed uh we moved to Delaware Township so he could go to hunt Central because we heard it was a pretty strict School uh this has not been our experience with this case my son has my my wife uh my son's mother she's been a teacher for over over 20 years so we're a very Pro School Pro teer my sons do all their homework every night it comes before everything their education and uh my son's having a hard time coping now he's spoken with people at the school and like every teenage boy I'm fine that's what he says but he's not fine I'm not fine and you shouldn't be fine either I've spoken to lots of parents I've been really surprised how many parents have talked to their kids kids mostly from Delaware Township and they've either been bullied harassed or intimidated or they see it and I say you got to report it that's what I ended up doing I see there's seven more reports this month on the agenda I don't know if that's due to me but I'll tell you all of their children are very Lo to report anything especially the teenage boys I'm here because I want this to stop I want it to stop now I don't know what more they could do to this uh this student um I I don't know what you're doing there's a lot of privacy issues involved I understand that but if the behavior continues in the classroom I know whatever the school is doing is simply not working that's all I'd like to say thank you for your comments anyone else all right seeing and hearing none I will close open comment and we will move to our organizational items believe I passed the Baton back over to you for school board recognition yeah I just and as I said uh uh January School Board recognition month so I'm just going to read this out out for all of you with all of our thanks um so whereas the New Jersey school boards Association has declared January 2024 to be Schoolboard recognition month a time when all residents can acknowledge the contributions made by our local Schoolboard members and whereas the 100 and Central Regional High School Board of Education is one of 581 local school boards in New Jersey which sets policies and overseas operations for public school districts and whereas the 100 in central Regional High School Board of Education Embraces the goal of highquality education for all New Jersey public school students and whereas New Jersey's local school boards help determine the educational goals for approximately 1.4 million children oops it's my time's up that's it that's all you uh in Pre kindergarten through 12th grade and whereas New Jersey's 5,000 local school board members who receive no remuneration for their services act as advocates for public school students as they work with administrators teachers and parents for the betterment of public education and whereas school boards strive to provide the resources necessary to meet the needs of all students including those with special needs and whereas Boards of Education provide accountability to the public they communicate the needs of the school district to the public and they convey to school administrators The public's expectations for the schools and whereas New Jersey can take pride in its schools which rank among the nation's best in key achievement indicators such as the national assessment of educational progress scores and the preparation for college through advanced placement offerings and sat assessments now therefore be it resolved that the Hun and Central Regional High School Board of Education does hereby recognize the services of local school board members throughout New Jersey As We join communities Statewide in observing January 2024 as school board recognition month and be it further resolved that the Hunan Central Regional High School Board of Education a urges all New Jersey citizens to work with their local Boards of education and public school staffs toward the advancement of our children's education thank you Dr Moore thank you um that was a mouthful um would anybody like to make the uncomfortable Motion in supporting um this resolution not just for us but for all school board members across the state so moved second yeah okay any discussions okay vote please Mrs blutfield yes Mrs dougen yes Miss gong yes Mrs Kellogg yes Mrs Peterson yes Mr ryr yes Mrs S Angelo yes and Mr Fowler yes all yes motion carries thank you next we will uh have a motion for our calendar revision as a result of our school days that uh have been closed yes so I'll go ahead make the motion okay uh can I have a motion please so second thank you discussion yeah so what happens when we have an emergency day and so January 16th was our second emergency day as I mentioned earlier that's our last one uh when we have an emergency day like that also the end of the semester is pushed back by one day so the the early dismissal on the day of the end of the semester and then the start of the second semester have both been Advanced well well pushed you know further down down the road by one day um so those are the changes that you'll be approving tonight uh as we move forward on the rest of the calendar for the year with fingers crossed that we're done with all of that all right thank you uh so with that can we have a roll call please Mrs blutfield yes Mrs dougen yes Miss gong yes Mrs Kellogg yes Mrs Peterson yes Mr Rymer yes Mrs Sant Angelo yes and Mr Fowler yes all yes motion carries thank you and finally under organizational items we have two hibs to approve or to acknowledge um 232 24-5 and 006 as indicated on our agenda can I have a motion for those please okay uh before we go to vote I just want to confirm on our agenda it says in close session on December 27 so it should be was it not December 20th it was December 20th yes okay all right um so with that Amendment could I have a roll call vote on these please Mrs blufeld abstain Mrs dougen yes Miss gong abstain Miss Kell Mrs Kellogg yes Mrs Peterson obain Mr Rymer abstained due to absence Mrs Mrs santangelo abstained and Mr Fowler yes with three we have a majority of the Quorum the motion passes thank you Student Life Mr rer this evening we have four items to move for student life and programming and I'd like to First on behalf of the board start out by congratulating the Central dance team who qualified to attend the ESPN Wild World of Sports dance competition in Orlando Florida the first uh item is to approve an overnight field trip which will be held in Orlando at that event from January 31st to February 5th and we' like to wish them uh very good luck and if we stay tuned we we might even be lucky enough to see them on ESPN as they compete down there if they if they advance the second item is for two new clubs the 100 and holdom club which is dedicated to learning the finer points and strategies of Texas Holden poker and the second one is the biological Association um and that's geared to prepare kids to compete and qualify for the bio Olympiad so we wish them good luck as we move forward uh the third item this evening is uh two student club name changes fiddle Club will be changing its name to include more stringed instruments and their new name will be all strings attached which is quite clever I think and the second name change for this evening will be one is greater than 99 student Ministry they're going to just change that slightly to one is greater than 99 Christian Student Ministry and the fourth item tonight is for uh tuition and transportation um and that's related to Transportation contracts for the following special education students during the 23 24 school years related to Services as uh required in their individual education plans uh that amount is 46,6 75 and uh I would like to move to uh uh approve those four items for student life and programming thank you Mr rer do you have a second second thank you any discussion hearing none roll call vote please Mrs blutfield yes Mrs dougen yes Miss gong yes Mrs Kellogg yes Mrs Peterson yes Mr Rymer yes Mrs santangelo yes and Mr Fowler yes all yes motion carries thank you operations and transportation Miss dougen okay tonight we have eight items that we're going to be asked to move the first one is the financial reports for the end of November 2023 the second one is the invoices for December 2023 that's moving to um to present the payment of uh invoices in the amount of 7 million 1618 3960 we have um one thing I wanted to mention here is this number is a bit higher than it normally is and that's because we were paying some outstanding bills from the summer work that was done for our capital projects like the softball fields and baseball fields and things like that so there were quite a few in that lump sum we've got uh transfers for the end of December or for the month of December the fourth one is to um to do a memorandum for the agreement between our school and the Raritan Township Police Department this is an annual uh update the fifth is a settlement agreement that we've learned about in executive session and I think everybody knows about that the sixth is to actually approve the architect SSP Architects to start four projects that we're going to be working on for this year with our um capital budget we've got the 910 teachers room and Print Shop renovation the 1112 Locker conversions I think that's the last one it's close close to the last one the 1112 12 room one uh 801 alterations and then the fourth item is the bus maintenance garage HVAC so this is one where we have a lot of bus maintenance going on in the summertime and there is absolutely no AC in that garage and it gets very very very hot and unbearable number seven is move to accept the donations with gratitude from the following participation um participants for the corporate sponsorship program and you'll see we have different levels here we've got the gold silver bronze and red and the total donations this year uh amounted to $43,500 it's a little bit down from last year $2,700 down from last year but we would definitely like to thank all these sponsors for their generous participation and finally we have two professional contracts that we're looking to move um this is with new Pathways which is a home instruction provider and the second one is Normandy studio uh which is a photography company so with that I'd like to move operations and transportation items one through eight thank you second second thank you any discussion just had a quick question regarding the architecture piece is it related to I know on the proposed budget there were some um administrative things regarding counseling renovation teacher sweep business office addition is that part of that or is that something different I just wanted to understand that better no these four projects don't include the um house office they do include uh teachers room renovation um they don't include the business office what's also included here are the locker conversions that's the bench seating for the students out in the hallways um room 801 alteration is a um uh a mental health and counseling Suite that's going to be redone for the students and then the bus maintenance garage uh I don't recall if we had the others on a prior agenda in the budget we in the budget more when we did our budget last year and those have not come through to fruition yet so we're still working through that with the architect and design they may not come through until next year and they'll be eliminated okay I I just wanted to know I guess with the teachers room like what the need was and just understand it better so we have a a print shop that um we used to do a lot of copying so the print shop has uh closed which has opened that space now um for what's across the hall are some subpar teacher rooms that we can now move into this new space and then repurpose those spaces across the hall for various things um and uh so so this is a uh a collaborative project that we're working on with the teachers to design that space for them um I don't anticipate that uh at the end of it well we'll have to see we'll have to see what the Architects come through with with what their what their feelings are and if if it's outside of the if it's beyond the pale of what we had planned for the project then we might have to kick that down the road as well all right thank you Dr Moore it might be helpful to maybe try to take the new board of ed members on a walking tour of the campus because that helped me at least visualize what these are yeah absolutely absolutely um that's a good thought and maybe we can work that in for February maybe we'll do an earlier start or we can we also have the the two members coming in this week but I don't know if if a walking tour will be uh we have a lot of marathon meetings with you on Wednesday but if you want to take a walking tours after otherwi otherwise we can schedule one separately so long as it's not snowing or sleeing that's right Wednesday we are looking for a little ice on Wednesday right um but yeah I think a walking tour would be a fantastic idea yeah just wear good shoes thank you all right with no other discussion can I have a roll call vote please Mrs dougen so I'm going to abstain on number two but I'll say yes 1 three four five six and seven and eight Miss gong yes Mrs Peterson yes Mrs blut felds yes Mrs Kellogg yes Mr Rymer yes Mrs santangelo yes and Mr Fowler yes all yes motion carries all right thank you and Miss butfield yes um personnel has 17 items on the agenda that we are voting on tonight first one we have two retirements as Mr fario had pointed out we have our longtime social studies teacher Steven Gibble um I think he left but uh I'm glad that he pointed out many of his contributions to the district and we also have our director of special services Carol Webb with eight years of service so I'd like to thank you both for all of your contributions and wish you well in retirement we also have in number two two resignations a Spanish teacher and a security officer and then in number three under the appointments you'll see we have a replacement for the campus security officer um we also have a replacement World Language teacher and a vice principal to fill the opening that we had there we have um in items item four we have our hourly appointments for the snow removal crew and hctv technicians we are appointing chaperon and athletic event workers in five and six seven we have we're approving radio show monitors and that's for kids working after school on radio projects in eight we have two new substitute teachers nine we are appointing for curriculum writing for the Aspire study skills course Revision in 10 we are approving a boy head volleyball coach we have two robotics Volunteers in [Music] 11 some professional development in 12 and that includes a counselor attending a teenage Mental Health Training Workshop 13 we are approving a small stien for polyram and that's um for a wellness grant that was given to us by our insurance carrier we are approving an internship in counseling in 14 15 we have some policies for a second reading sick leave Examination for cause and attendance and then we are abolishing the old policies in 16 and finally in 17 we are approving a World Language teacher for child care leave so with that I will move Personnel items 1 through 17 second we have a motion in a second any discussion just want to share uh again congratulations and uh admiration for our two retirees Mr Gibble who at 28 and a half years probably started almost exactly around the same time that I did in the profession so that's uh that's something as we look back on all the ways in which the profession has changed uh and all the things that teachers have done over the past 30 years um clearly his list of contributions is long um and Dr Webb um Dr Webb has been you know by my side since I arrived and has been doing a fantastic job in the special services department uh we've been through some difficult things together but at the same time it was an honor certainly to watch the growth of your department under your Helm with uh Unified sports and our autism program and so much else so thank you for your service as well uh we will we will miss you and Mr Gibble thank you any other discussion seeing none have a roll call vote please Mrs bfield yes Mrs Cog yes Mrs santangelo yes Mrs dougen yes Miss gong yes Mrs Peterson yes Mr Rymer yes and Mr Fowler yes all yes motion carries thank you any other committee or liaison reports didn't think so no good oh yeah you can if you like yeah please yes so we had our first meeting for the superintendent search and um just to give everyone an idea of what we will be doing um we're actually doing two searches we have our most immediate need we have the interim superintendent who we need to hire before the end of March um and then the longer term search for our full-time superintendent for the interm superintendent because of the short time frame and um the pool of superintendent is actually much much smaller um I've been working with New Jersey school boards who um had some ideas of some people who she thought would uh you know our um Gwen Thorton who's our representative thought would be a good fit for our district um people who live somewhere not too too far have high school experience I mean th those are things that are are important um and then their ability and willingness to come to work which isn't always easy when you're bringing back somebody who's retired um so I'm in the process now of collecting some resumés um we'll send those out to the committee and then we will um invite maybe two I'd say three at most people to come in and interview with the entire board we will probably need to do a special uh session or have an executive session special meeting um thinking sometime in February might have to be like a Saturday morning um might be a good idea if everyone can start letting me know what their availability is I again I have no idea even if the candidates would be available but just to start figuring out when we might be able to get together for that um and then for the longer term search um for the full-time superintendent what most districts do and what I have recommended is that we hire a consultant to do that for us so the process there Heather is in in the process now of putting together an RFP she will send that out have it out for for about two to three weeks um we as a committee will go through the proposals and we will invite probably two or three of the Consultants to come and again make a presentation to the entire board um I'm thinking that may also have to be an executive session need to check that out I'm I just don't know if they would want to present in public and then their competitors are hearing their presentation so um that may be a little bit easier to do maybe um one night at at our board meeting um thinking if we do the RFP we go through that in February have them come into the March meeting and then we can appoint them by April um after they're appointed the process and process I'd like to see is we include feedback from all of our constituents so interviews surveys board members staff community members students um you you try and get uh input from everyone to get characteristics of what you're looking for in the next superintendent once you have that then the consultant can start doing the search um they'll probably you know put out the job ad so they'll get some resumés that way they might reach out out to their Network um they will do the first pass they'll go through the resumés they they might even do the first round of interviews then they will meet with the entire board again in executive session um and give us a short list so we can kind of go through talk about who we want to bring in for an interview maybe we end up bringing in like three candidates um because because this is sort of a timec consuming process and you have to um come up with time that everybody's available and bring people in for interviews we're sort of getting into the summer that could be a difficult time I'm saying best case even if we can do it in the summer and get the interviews done in July after we choose the person who we want now you have to negotiate the contract you have to get that contract approved by the executive by the um County Superintendent we're probably in September or October by the time that we are actually approving it at our meeting now somebody has to give notice 60 90 could be 120 days notice so um best case I'm thinking is January 1st that we get somebody in here um you know if we're lucky and can get somebody in sooner great but I don't think this is something that we want to rush you know we want to make sure it's done right so um any questions no questions but I'll definitely say thank you very much for uh taking the time to chase a lot of things down over the last couple of weeks put that together and present it to us I um as we've shared over the phone I think that great creates a great road map of where we're going to be headed for the next year I really appreciate your time and effort on that all right any other liaison or board comments board business hearing none we're going to open up to the second public comment this will be for general public comment doesn't look like there's too many people here tonight so we'll still provide for five minutes Dr Mo will put four minutes on the timer I'll have a minute afterward so if you hear the beep that's the warning and just a friendly reminder if you have any comments for any of the teachers Administration or board members please feel free to direct them at me and I will uh encapsulate them and and distribute them appropriately as you've heard just with the earlier public comment if you come to the podium write down your name and then state your name where you're from and let us know what you have to say good evening my name is Rob Rashard I live in R Township uh tonight I would like to address the board with a couple of concerns and questions first of all I would like to ask president Fowler to share with us his thinking behind the appointment of Rebecca Peterson as chair of the newly created policy committee you see on April 24 2023 Mr Fowler made a motion at at the board meeting stating that the board investigation of Miss Peterson identified evidence of intentional actions that eroded trust and risked the integrity and transparency of the entire board to a sufficient level to Warrant a complaint to be filed that motion passed eight to nothing with Miss Peterson abstaining consequently ethics complaints C complaints plural c66 d23 and c67 d23 were filed against Miss Peterson on behalf of the 100 and Central Board of Ed complaint c662 3 filed on September 5 2023 specifically addressed allegations of Mrs Peterson's inappropriate interactions with the district's policy vendor Strauss Esme on March 7 2023 specifically Rebecca Peterson lied to Strauss Esme pretending to be a board member of One of central sending districts and this is is not the only instance wherein Miss Peterson acted dishonestly as you know she also misrepresented herself as a fictitious parent when she corresponded with superintendent Moore while she was already on the board one may wonder what Miss Peterson's motives are or were but it seems she may have an agenda perhaps it's to do away with policies that she does not like like 5756 and 8100 that protect lgbtq and other marginalized groups against discrimination and harass harassment it is ironic I think that Miss Peterson ran for election on a platform of Integrity accountability and transparency when she has on several occasions acted dishonestly was her campaign platform just a ruse did she purposefully try to fool the public was she as purposefully dishonest in her campaign as she has been as a member of this board on January 4 2024 Mr Fowler was elected president of the board the next business item was approval of committees and appointment of committees uh Miss Peterson made a motion to create a policy committee which passed and Mr Fowler subsequently appointed her chair of that committee so here's my question to you president Fowler why would you appoint Miss Peterson to chair the policy committee when she has gone out of her way to misrepresent herself why would you put in charge of policy a person who is so duplicitous why appoint someone who you yourself claimed to have violated board ethics standards um lastly what is the status of the ethics complaint filed against Miss Peterson how much are the lawsuits she has brought against the board going to cost the taxpayers and isn't the fact that she is being represented by a law firm for which he works an inherent conflict of interest thank you thank you Mr rard um if you don't mind I'll actually answer your question I will hope to keep out of a debate but I'll be happy to answer your question um we're a team up here we're a team of individual members and we're all human I've certainly made mistakes everybody else at this table I believe has made mistakes and we're going to continue to make mistakes as human beings um anybody who's sat at this table also knows that no individual has a power above or Beyond anybody else at this table so I felt it best to put on that committee members that would bring to that committee specific skills that are beneficial to policy writing policy review and policy edits beyond that skill it takes the entire voting of this board to actually put something in place and that would be the check I felt that would keep anybody um from inappropriately exercising an agenda I still felt that people that I did put on every single committee had skills that suited and benefited those committees and that's why I made the choices that I did you're welcome thank you you I don't often get to come to these meetings because I teach as an adjunct at a college and I usually have Monday night courses and this semester I don't so you got me for the semester what's his name big your name in town you're from oh I'm sorry John McKay no problem we in Township thank you I uh was never a big advocate of Education because when I got out of high school I saw a lot of people go to college that only went to college to get out going being drafted because it was a tough time at age 49 I took my first college course at age 59 I got my bachelor's in 2015 I was uh given opportunity to take a master's program and I got my Master's after four years my masters is educational educational technology and online learning one of the courses that were contained in this master's program was how to introduce technology into schools education institutions and they said that one of the main ways is to go to the board of education and they they felt that the Board of Education should be diverse as far as where where they all come from but they have to have the same objective and that objective is the best education for everybody now I've watched the school board listen to the school board and the only analogy I can give is you know if everybody's Ro vote it it moves forward if everybody rows a different way it goes around in circles and I have the feeling the school board is going around in circles so I would ask you all to to think about it and determine that you all have the same objective and that is the best education and as a side note you're going to be sorry you're losing one of the best superintendents the school ever had thank you sir thank you for coming on your night off jof flemingon burrow um it's 2024 we made it we're here um I'm realizing that it is my 10year anniversary of graduating high school this year and I wasn't prepared for that to be honest um so I just wanted to reflect a moment on uh South Hunan's the little stepchild school to Central uh on their motto for a few minutes um it's just four simple words work hard be kind I think that the hard work part of um that motto we can see here clearly um today excellent presentations by some of your staff members here and the students I'm continually impressed by the students that show up um um to present and um also at the two um yearly board meetings where you go through the awards that your students here have won um and have earned through hard work and dedication um I also personally as a volunteer coordinator at a local nonprofit I work with some of these students you know after school hours they come in they work hard they do extra uh and they show great empathy and kindness towards others um and that continues to impress me um also the fact that hun and Central is a not just a one but a two-time blue ribbon school it's not a former Blue Ribbon School since that is not how the uh honor Works um and again I don't think that we need to worry so much about the working hard when it is obvious that your kids here are intelligent they're well smoken they take the time to learn from their teachers from the world around them from each other they've got these opportunities that I wish I had to collaborate and to own their learning and to not just say here's all the facts you need to learn cram them spit them out on that test we're good to go because that's not how the real word lurks um that's not how we create understanding and capable human beings um so I'm impressed by the the work that this school has done and the working on the working hard um but I am concerned both here and generally speaking about our world in the grand scheme about the second part about being kind I think there's a lot of people both here and all around who aren't working on working on being kind um there's a lot of niceness as long as we don't come out and say the ugly part but that's not kindness um I think a lot of big issues become hot button issues because we don't take the time to sit down and be empathetic and talk them out because a lot of these issues aren't as scary as we really think they are and we all are really here for the students because we want them to have these opportunities to grow and to learn and to have skills not just knowledge but skills critical thinking asking questions being curious not just accepting the answer but going out and understanding and being capable of changing your mind when you're presented with new information or when you discover something just brand new so I wanted to encourage everyone to think about for 2024 how we can do better on being kind because it's also worrisome to hear about the one student um but who dealing with bullying um I was not a popular kid in high school I was awkward I was nerdy it's one of those smart kids who got picked on all the time um so I know what it's like to be in that position and I don't want that to be the position of any other student here south anywhere um we've also heard over the past year at least at the meetings that I've attended some of the students especially the minority students the black and brown students the racial um the lgbtq students who are especially not being taught uh treated with kindness by their peers and by teachers and others than that is worrisome because if they are not safe in their classrooms they're not learning it doesn't matter how great the project is if they're not safe they're not learning um so again I want to encourage everyone here to really think about also how we're going to work on being kind and treating each other better um and just one last thought um this is a quote that is commonly attributed to Margaret me a famous Anthropologist and um someone I admire um that should never doubt that a small thoughtful group of citizens can change the world because indeed is the only thing that ever has thank you thank you good evening uh my name is Jim Vargas I am long-term resident of uh rton Township now resident in Mammoth Beach um I just was looking at something my calendar I realized I've been coming here for the last 19 months seems like a really long time uh but I had a good chance to see and observe and talk to people that are going on first I would like to congratulate those who have newly elected to the board I know it's really hard I know it was sometimes brutal I've talked to most of you we differ on some things we agree on some things but I do believe that everybody that joined the board is a trustworthy person trying to do the best they can and I do believe that under the new president here that this board will bring more diversity inclusion and fairness to both the students the school and the community so I thank you for that if I was coming here under different circumstances my first order asked would be is to remove the current chairman current superintendent he's leaving so we don't have to deal with that anymore and you can't tell how blessed you are that you get to not only start with a clean slate with a new board get to hire interim uh superintendent which you can work with and then hire a full intendent you really have the opportunity here to do great things for this community okay I think you have some cleanup to do uh first of all on uh Miss Pagano there was the incident with her where she was assaulted I don't think we ever got a full review and understanding of it you may not want to get into it but I ask that you really understand it document it and come up with a process and practices of how it should have been done and what you do in the future so it never happens again um number two um issues on people miss odonald and miss miss pet Miss Peterson were both had taken vocal about what they said and what they did one was chastised formerly one wasn't I think it's a matter of free speech it should be done at that close out the issue and move on because they are both people that are trying to work in this the other person that need to clean up is Paul tanko Paul tanko was a man who served the military who served Ruckers University as a police officer for over 20 years and claim here to protect people in his school in retirement and he was told in a letter from the superintendent that he put the kids in danger he did not the only thing I've seen in my 19 months here of seeing a person in danger is Nicole Patt all right moving on what I've seen two things here is one on the academic issues you guys do a great job I can't believe what I see I Hear What I Hear About the social study the different ways of approaching teaching are unbelievely great on the social issues not so much and here's some of the things I want you to kind of think about we started a couple years ago with bringing in CRT right CRT is a view of the world that we're is basically that there's racial things within the law but we talk about that and it maybe should be talked about but other things ought to be brought into it I mean you need to be able to talk about the history of slavery what the world had what is here to apply it to CRT you need to talk about the human trafficking that is going on today that is far greater than it has been in the past it not only exists in this country it exists in this state and we need to understand it those are the type of things to do it when we had the issue when George Floyd was killed there's a big massive about it everybody knows George Floyd's name and they won't forget it the people who were involved in that all got the full measure of the law yet if I asked you who Amy Whitaker was you would go huh who is she she was a woman at the same time that just said simply all lives matter and she was killed she was a single single mom and she died we ought to tell George Floyd's story but also Amy Whitaker's story when you talk about America and CRT or you talk about immigration you got to tell people that yeah we have immigration problems but this country has 50 million immigrants the closest country is Germany with 15 million immigrants that's it we have there are 195 countries in the world only 29 of them have 50 million we have more immigrants than 120 something countries in the world we are a good country we've done great things you have the opportunity here to bring that in to be fair to Tre balance into it when you're dealing with any M uh whether it's gender issues whether it's policy issues whether it's whe whether it's uh children being bullied you have the opportunity to be great here but you have to give the whole story not just one side and I will say that for the last time I've been for 19 months is on one side it's about indoctrination not education become the Board of Education thank you thank you on should be okay okay takes three people good evening first of all again to those of you who are new to the board welcome I'm sorry um name in town uh my name is Reverend Vernon Williams a Ron Township thank you so much uh I've been coming to uh to these meetings for quite some time I do appreciate how the board has conducted itself under uh the past leadership and I trust that under you president Fowler uh you will conduct yourself uh with facts that you will uh you will do your proper investigation um I want to say to Dr Moore uh thank you for what you have done during your time of service here at 100 and Central of how you have looked after all of the student each and every student it is important for you that as you talk about policy that you deal in facts that you don't deal in fantasy that you don't deal in ideology it is important because our children's lives are at stake we heard of gentleman talks about his uh child being bullied that is not something we need to take lightly I don't believe that you do but you need to be careful on how you do that be careful of how you dismiss some of these things and the treatment that our our uh students need to listen to someone who is not knowledgeable about what they are talking about I wish you would teach CRT in the school fact is you don't and it's never been taught here it is important to teach the entire history of our country it is not to be uh uh uh run from we learn through accurate teaching of our history CRT is just been made to be a bad word and all it means is critical race Theory the actual looking at laws you don't do that in this school no social studies teacher no history teacher but they do teach history and you need to continue to teach the history as we have a literary material that has been demonized across this country it is important that you before you take any action on any literary material or any action on any policy that you do your due diligence and that you should consult all of the parents not just some all of us need to be consulted there are a number of people who get up here and and believe that they have this as a megaphone they do not speak for everyone all of our kids need to be valued all of our kids have value have worked especially our kids of color and lgbtq please don't ever forget that you have their lives in your hands as you search for the you uh for the next superintendent and as you move forward as a board thank you thank [Applause] you not yes okay Sandra D'Or riton Township um I just wanted to actually piggyback off of something that Mr Varga did mention he is correct that this there has been a two-tier justice system in this school we've seen it amongst the board we've seen it amongst the students and we've seen it amongst the staff so um there was also a few other items he mentioned so and I know that we're on limited time but I do feel that Mr fer and Mrs dougen in your new leadership roles on the board that you will be able to ground the board and that you will remind the board members that their main job is to be the boss of the superintendent that is your main job you are to hold that person accountable you are to manage them and I think that's something that we have not seen over the last few years and people can actually go back to past um videos from the boards from the board meetings and see some of the onr I guess you could call it at some of our meetings and there was actually one other thing that I did want to mention I come came across an article and there was a woman her name is we watchin of the Chinese American citizen Alliance of Greater New York and this is what she had to say about education teaching students to be activists first before teaching students to think is a failure of Education if you do not respect facts and you do not respect logic you are not capable of making the decisions that are important for yourself in life and the world our schools must provide that kind of environment so you have facts and not ideology and I hope that you all remember that in your search for the next superintendent thank you thank you anyone else not seeing anyone I will close public comment and open up for board comments anybody like to make any comments tonight I do um it's unfortunate that Mr Rashard left um before any response um the word I think that is important to remember here is allegedly and I'm going to really um encourage people to remember to use that word um the where the ethics complaints are is they haven't been found to even have probable cause yet that's where they are which means it's not even found to have the basis yet of whether something is true or not and where the cases are as they're going along and the courts will figure that out and you can come here and continue to throw tomatoes at every single meeting and try to put me in my place but it has nothing to do with what this board is functioning at doing right now so I would just ask that you think about considering your speech in a way that is beneficial to both the law and to this board thank you anyone else I guess I'll take uh couple of seconds to at least acknowledge um two stories we heard that were unfortunate one was an opinion about one of our teachers that's retiring and one is about a student that's going through challenges um being a Central graduate and having family who were Central graduates um I I hold breed Devils very close to my heart so much so that I'm willing to come back here and volunteer my time to help this institution continue um so it is it is sad to hear that we have students that still challenged to experience things that quite frankly went on back in 95 when I was here and probably predated me in um what happens in these Halls um as aboard I can say um all of the people at this table um are are committed to creating a safe space because safety is the foundation for learning you can't start to learn without feeling safe and that is one of the things that we all talk about in all of our committees in all of our conversations is how do we enable students to have a safe and structured and positive learning experience at hunterton Central um that is a core Foundation I believe of this institution and um we're certainly very focused on that so we will take all of the feedback we heard um to heart and we'll continue to work with our Administration teachers and staff uh to continually refine that and improve it as best we can um than thank you all for all of your input we always welcome anybody's voice at that Podium um and look forward to Future meetings if there's no other comments I'll ask for a motion to convene to Executive session with no action items afterwards second can we do an all in favor all in favor I any exensions any notes all right thank you all have a good evening the the one over by the maker space