I believe we have quorum, so we will begin our meeting. Good evening. This is our caucus meeting of 11/13/2025. Let's stand first with the pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the Republic for which we stand, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty, and justice for all. Again, thank you all for coming in.
Miss McKenzie, please roll call. Good evening. This meeting is being held in conformity with the Open Public Meetings Act, NJSA 10 colon four dash six, etcetera. Proper public notice of the meeting was caused to be sent to the El Diario La Penza newspapers and posted on the district's official website. Public notice was also delivered to those persons requesting that such notice be given to them. The public also has been advised that the board meeting may be viewed live via the district website at www.jcboe.org.
We will now, I will now take the roll call. Trustee Blunt? I am present. Trustee Ioffe? Here. Trustee Morris? Trustee Mohammed. Present. Trustee Patel. Present. Trustee Visabella. Here. Trustee Schneider. Present. Vice President Tisdale. Here. President Velasquez? Here. We have a quorum. Thank you. Again, I wanna thank everyone for coming in to for joining us this evening. We will start with our reports, committee reports. Who is ready?
Okay. Trustee Natalia Ioffe, please. Thank you, Board President. I will begin with the finance and the facilities report. Meeting took place on November 4. During the finance portion of the meeting, the BA doctor Luce informed the committee that the district's budget planning process has begun and the business office is scheduling meetings with the principals to determine school based budgets for the coming school year. Doctor Luce also noted that the special education audit will be delivered to the board members no later than November 7 and will be presented to the public at the November general meeting,
which is tonight. The audit is included in the agenda board docs under 10.13. Additionally, the committee was informed that an RFP has gone out for the district building at 70 Bright Street, and all interested parties can apply with the results expected to be presented to the board at the December general meeting. Items to note in a standard recurring items, 10 o one through ten twelve, are as follows. Board secretary's report and bank reconciliation reports as well as monthly certification of funds are provided for the months of July and August. The monthly payroll is provided for October.
The New Jersey state contract purchases over bid threshold list, only one vendor. School specialty for classroom supplies. The school specialty for classroom supplies. The co op purchasing program purchases over bid threshold list two vendors, CDWG for various projects at Snyder High School and Hogan Security for replacement of doors at primary prep. Remaining finance items are the approval and cancellation of various transportation routes as needed. In the facilities, the facilities agenda has five items for board approval, which are as follows. The district has received, SDA, which is school development authority funding in the amount of 3,700,000.0,
which is a grant, the purpose of which is to offset district costs associated with the replacement or repair of walk in refrigerators or freezers, as well as repairs of electrical equipment used for serving school meals. The district has to provide the list of projects to the SDA for approval. There is also a monthly payment to DCO Energy and CHA that is paid through Wilmington Trust as part of the energy savings improvement plan at no cost to the district. District also received $4,000,000 in additional state aid to be earmarked strictly for capital improvements in the school year
02/2526. There is a temporary boiler replacement for Lincoln High School. While the bid for the permanent boiler replacement has gone out, the district is providing a temporary portable boiler to ensure that there are no laps in heating of the school. And finally, last item is to approve the cleaning of the air ducts at the Central Office Floors 567, And 8. And if it's okay with you, I can proceed to the policy report. That was it for the finance and the facility, unless someone has any questions while I'm looking for it.
Any questions, for finance? Okay. Thank you. You can proceed. Policy committee met on November 6. The committee discussed JCBOE policy 164, which is the conduct of board meeting, and 167, which is the public participation in board meetings. Specifically, any revisions necessitated if the board is to move forward with a monthly in person caucus meeting. The second and final reading on this item will take place at the November of general meeting, which is tonight. The committee recommended reinstating the language regarding the total time of public comment for caucus
no more than thirty minutes in total with the discretion of the chair as to the time management. Housekeeping item to note, even though there's only one more meeting left in the calendar year, the board may be asked to adopt a new resolution regarding the calendar of meetings. Additionally, additional item was the Freedom to Read Act. On 08/13/2025, New Jersey Department of Education published guidance titled Development of Model Policies for Library Material Curation and Review under the Freedom to Read Act. The NJDOE released this guidance to assist districts in implementing the provisions of the Freedom
to Read Act, which requires districts to adopt a policy and procedure that provides standards for the curation of the library material, establish criteria for removal of existing library material, and provide protection against any attempts to censor school library material. This freedom to read act is effective on 12/09/2025. Accordingly, a new mandated policy and regulation will be drafted by the district's general counsel for the coming meetings. Additional discussion included as follows. Doctor Schneider inquired about the AI policy and its current status and developments in our
district. Doctor Fernandez explained that the district has been piloting different programs and reached out to the Department of Innovation at the DOE for ideas and input. The Jersey City Public Schools are also in communication with other districts such as Newark that is currently also working with the State Department of Innovation sharing ideas. Doctor Schneider suggested having periodic updates about how the teachers are working with AI and doctor Fernandez confirmed that a request will be made to the curriculum department for such an update. The committee also agreed that it could be a good idea to create an advisory
board on the AI slash technology. Final point of discussion by the committee was the board's self evaluation, which is not a requirement but a best practice for school boards recommended by the NJSBA. The committee recommends that if all trustees can complete self evaluations no later than November 24, the results can be discussed during the remaining December meetings. And that is it for me. Okay. Thank you, trustee Iofe. Any questions with regards to the policy? Through the chair? Yes. Thank you. Trustee? I just wanna make sure I understood. It says the committee recommended reinstating the language regarding the total time of public comment
no more than thirty minutes in total. That would mean that the public comments were reduced to thirty Yes. Minutes, which would give us a amount of 10 speakers in total? No. No. Because no one speaks for 10. No. No. Oh, you mean with the three minutes? Three minutes. What if if there's more, if there's many speakers and we think it's gonna go, beyond the thirty minutes, then instead of three minutes, we'll cut that to even one minute if necessary. That has been protocol previously. That is the caucus meeting.
We usually don't get many people in the caucus meeting because this is not televised. No one can put on a show. But, you know, we it's up to it's up to, the the board president. Okay? And and I will that's the way that I would work it out. If we have more, people, we'd like to hear from everyone, but we will cut the time. Okay. Perfect. But this only is for the caucus? Only for the caucus. Absolutely. We the this, the voting is only for the caucus anyway. Okay? Understand. Thank you. Is there any question with regards to the committee that,
that, miss Ioffe was talking about, the forming a committee with the AI? So And the reason that I'm asking is because I don't know if every everyone understands what that committee would entail and what I understood it as more of an advisory committee, but I'll let doctor Schneider elaborate or Yes. Doctor Fernandez, how that would work out within the district. Sure. I mean, I'm just thinking it's with AI, as it's quickly evolving technology as we all understand it, here in the community, making sure we are engaging our,
the the community to really understand what's going on. We have a lot of people, working at firms that are, you know, adopting it very quickly. So making sure we understand what's going on in the work world and and bringing that back into the classroom so they can help guide us, maybe suggest tools or ideas or just even demo days or who knows what could come, but it would be a good way to engage, the community and and get some feedback in this rapidly evolving field. Okay. Thank you. Is there clarity for everyone now? We understand it. Okay. Thank you so much,
and thank you for that. Miss Afaf, are you okay. Please go ahead. So I have the, student life and, personnel services committee report that was held on Tuesday, November 4 at, 11AM. And we reviewed cluster two, which is Morning Stars in Casper. Mhmm. Supervisor Danielle Dimas shared a presentation reviewing cluster two of the student life and personnel services department after school program, for education and recreation, also known as Casper, and Morning Stars. Casper is tailored to students in pre k to fifth grade.
Topics that were highlighted were Morning Stars enrollment for the twenty twenty four, twenty twenty five school year. We had 604 students, to for 2025. 2026 school year, enrollment is at 708 students to date. The program sites are, schools three, five, six, eleven, sixteen, 16 annex, seventeen, twenty, twenty two, 25, 26, 27, 28, thirty, thirty three, thirty seven, thirty eight. And the program is available by request from schools with 10 or more students enrolled. Casper enrollment for twenty twenty four,
twenty five school years are, to date is 2385 for the 2025, '20 schools, school year is oh, wait. Yeah. School year is 2573. And the program sites are all the elementary schools listed and, the Danforth Early Childhood Center. The presentation review of CASPer mission statement and hours of operation, which is 02:55PM to 06:00PM. The staff handbook, which is available on community pass district website and with facilitators at each site.
You read the the daily schedule. The start time and homework time can be extended to fit the needs of the student. Late pickup fees, programs, teachers, and activities are determined by survey at each building, parent engagement, safety and well-being. CPR trainings are available for staff who need certification, behavior expectations, protocols for nursing, community partnerships, urban link update updates with no new contracts, payment and registration available on community pass. Trustee Apa Patel inquired about information she shared about a chess league for students,
and director Kakarra will follow-up. For the good of the order, professional development for October 20, staff was given, multi tier, services and IR and S one on one handbook training with Michael McSheehan from Evolve Effect for school counselors, the Trauma Responsive Leadership Institute, Dialectical Dialectical Behavior Therapy or DBT skills for resilience counselors, title four for anti bullying specialists, prepare crisis training for crisis intervention teachers.
And the department of student life and services team and director Candace Cucaro presented a group session entitled Resilient Minds, a trauma informed multi, tiered, system of support approach to school based mental health and wellness during the New Jersey School Board Association's twenty twenty five workshop. This session was well attended by 50 attendees and request for the team to present at other districts. The hipster influencer, New Jersey anti bullying poster contest winners. Congratulations to, student k r in grade eight at Martin Luther King p s eleven,
recipient of the $500 hipster influence anti bullying scholarship for 2025, and students SS in second grade at Nicholas Copernicus p s twenty five who placed second as hipster influencer and anti bullying for 2025. For Ruby Bridges Day, which is tomorrow on November 14, students can celebrate Ruby Bridges Day by walking to school instead of taking the bus or being driven. And there will be extra safety patrol on walking routes. Operation spread out of each year for twenty twenty five,
twenty six. The department is requesting principals and vice principals to submit one to two unhoused students' names who could benefit from holiday cheer to receive a toiletry set bag, toys, and clothing by Monday, December 1. HIB update for October is forty four forty four total, 13 founded, 28 unfounded, two inconclusive, and one some founded. That is for this, student liking personnel. Thank you. Any questions, anyone? Through the chair. I just Yes. Sorry. Go ahead. Go ahead. I have a question.
It's related to student life, but it's not related to the agenda. I just wanna ask the appropriate time to ask that question if it's not agenda related. It it didn't like Does it have anything to do with the report that was No. That's why I said it's not agenda related. Might want to bring it up later or maybe even Right after you finish with the The reports. Okay? Thank you. Yes. Absolutely. There are no questions, but I do want to I heard that that the presentation at, and and JSBA was real successful. And and so we wanna take this opportunity to thank,
miss Cacaro and her people and the people that the staff that worked with you. Thank you for, you know, getting out there, putting us on the map, and making us look great again. Thank you. Good job. Anyone else? We can move on. Thank you. Report for special education, which is held on November 4 Tuesday, 11/04/2025 at 12PM. And, we started with the action items with Karen Gales, director Colin Karen Gales. We have nine point o one,
approval for Visenade Inc contract. Nine point o two, approval for payment of tuition. Nine point o three, approval for payment of tuition. We review the NJSBHS year to date. On 11/16/2025, Jersey City Public Schools Education Department speech therapist Linda Miller will be featured as New York Giants educator of the week at the New York Giants game. And for, Tracy Pettifor announced for the charter schools. Currently, 28 students will receive back in district from charter schools,
allowing students to receive the educational supports they need in a least restrictive environment, while saving the district $85,000 per student. Megan Costigan shared photos from the regional day trunk or treat and announced the Thanksgiving, food drive goal is to provide a 150 families from each school across the district. The goal for the twenty twenty four, twenty five school year was 125, reaching a 132 families. The coat drive, four families from each school will be chosen by the principal.
And we also, reviewed the dynamic learning map assessment with, Danielle Gitlin. And her presentation shared information on the updated DLM participant guidelines, reviewed a sample test, and sample education guidelines. The, the child the child study team hired two speech therapists, one monolingual and one bilingual, and hired one new intern, counselor. And for the good of the order, the CPAC meeting will be held on 11/09/2025, and the agenda topic is related services.
Could you please repeat the child study team? They did they hired Two speech therapists Okay. Which is one monolingual and one bilingual, and then one new intern counselor. Thank you. Is that it? That's all for the special education. Okay. Thank you very much. Do you have another one? Or No. Oh, okay. So you have all these papers. It seems like you have another committee. Okay. Thank you very much for taking care of that. Yes, doctor doctor Chisdale, please. Okay. So I have the report for the ed programs. We'll start with agenda item eight zero two,
which is the saddest job embedded professional development for your implementation for grades six through 12. It's continued job embedded PD to help teachers with new resources. Agenda eight zero three, NJCU CTE articulation program for the twenty five, twenty six school year partnership, to support Korean technical education, not to exceed $26,640 two twenty three ROTC students across three high schools will earn college and high school credit concurrently. Agenda eight zero four,
start a new job research platform for Liberty High School, provides career exploration and job search platform for juniors and seniors. No cost to the district. Agenda item eight zero five, US Soccer Foundation, source soccer for success program. The greatest $43,000 awarded to the public schools, provides 1,500 soccer balls to various schools, 20 to 40 each. Agenda items, eight zero six to eight eleven. Our donations and grants for PS 28, Durham Donors Choose, PS 28, also Map and the Memoir for Project 21,
books and resource materials for literacy instruction. PS number five, Center for Prevention and Counseling grant, dollars 8,000. PS 34, MOA with Center for Prevention and Counseling, dollars 6,000. PSA DonorsChoose, 10,000, 10 student headphones and learning games, and, agenda items That that was last month's report. Yes. Yes. It was. But if we'll give you, a few minutes to get it together. And then at this point, we will listen to your well, he needs to get himself together. So if you don't mind,
go ahead. Thank you. Do you need do you need the report? I do. Okay. Just ask. Yes. And let me see. I can open it. I'm open. It's the same one? Okay. But it's the same one. Let me show it to you. Okay. So we can always resubmit it next that's okay. Okay. Doctor Tisdale will resubmit, that report, Debbie, for next month, and he will then present I'm sorry. He will submit it for next month, and then he will then report on on both. Okay? Do we have any concerns with that regard?
Do we all agree that that'll be the best thing right now? Yes. Thank you so much. Yes. Mister, just based on the agenda items, if there are any questions relative to what's in the book, Maybe the trustees can pose it now. Yeah. I guess the one of the big big items that I saw in the book on education was the NJQSAC. I just would like to just, get a quick overview of that process. It looks like this the district has performed their assessment, and now it's going up excuse me. It's going to the county. So if someone could just educate me a little more on that.
Miss Ruhain, if you could explain and go into the details, please. What number is that? 801. 801. 801, please. 2 chair. Good evening. Good evening. So Trustee Schneider, in response to your inquiry about the CUSAC, the CUSAC is the shortened name for the New Jersey Quality Single Accountability Continuing. It's required by administrative code and it's a comprehensive accountability system intended to evaluate and
monitoring all public schools in the state. As part of the CUSAC, one of the first steps is for each of the five areas and its instruction and program, personnel, fiscal management, operations, and governance. Each of the leads in those departments self assess. They self assess themselves. Monica Tone works with instruction and programs, and Melissa Pierce oversees the other four areas. So each department self assess. And if you look on the, statement of assurance, four of the departments have given themselves 100 points out of 100 points.
In May, or in the spring and later on later on in the spring, Melissa Pierce will begin to sit with those departments so they can validate the information that they're giving themselves 100 points on. For instruction additional 60 points is populated with our state assessments and the county office is the one who populates. So we have no control over that. So we are asking the board tonight to accept and approve the district performance review
commonly known as the DPR, and that authorizes the then authorizes doctor Fernandez to submit this to the county office. Thank you. Very helpful. Thank you're welcome. So Any other questions with because I know we all have our books, and we've looked at at our report. Any other question with regards to the curriculum department? Yes. To the curriculum department? Yes. To see here. I just 802, if we could review that one as well, for these. I I don't understand what, this 802? Yes.
8O2. The bilingual waiver request. 802 is the waiver. We currently offer bilingual programs in Spanish, Arabic, and some, in Gujarati, I believe. But there are languages we where we do not have a full time bilingual teacher, meaning that there is first instruction in that language. We use ESL services. So this is a waiver that we submit when there is not a full bilingual
program in those other languages. Doctor Fernandez, this waiver is submitted to the state? Yes, president Velasquez. Thank you for any other questions. Yes. Through the chair. I guess according to that, we said we do have it for Arabic, but I did notice that some schools still have a waiver for Arabic and quite large numbers. I'm just curious about that versus having maybe centralized programs or something. It's Arabic. It's in some schools. Some parents choose not to be in a bilingual program. Mhmm.
They rather have a more, immersive type of program. Those students are provided with ESL services instead of bilingual. Bilingual is where they're taught to literacy, mathematics, all the content area in their native language. But parents always have the chart the the choice to participate or, ask to be, exempt from the program. But, is it okay? Doctor Fernandez, just for clarification, although the students may be taught those subject matters in their native language,
they also get ESL? Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. They also receive ESL, and they all have to take all the state assessments Exactly. As well as an English proficiency assessment. Any other questions? That to the chair, I just will have one more. That's okay. For a, 8.17, I noticed this is for Apple grant. This is from the previous Apple grant. Correct? Correct. Okay. Is it doctor Tisdale? That's it? Thank you. Thank you very much. Now, then trustee, Bracebala, you
good at the order. We're going to, yeah, listen to what you your concern. No concern. I just had I just was looking for a little clarity for, as you said, director Kakarra did a amazing job in Atlantic City, but I had a couple of questions regarding our student code of conduct. I know that it's provided in the beginning of the year. In our last previous committee meeting we discussed, the parents had signed it. It. I just wanted clarity on what happens when a student I'm sorry. I'm going back to the email that I received. Engages in more than one of those tier one infractions in one day?
And how does that restorative justice work if the practices the restorative practices in that tier one, they don't have that opportunity because they create more than one infraction in that one day. So how do we move with the consequences for that tier one infraction that they engaged in? And how does it get to a suspension during that first tier one Well, it may be a tier one infraction,
but each incident is taken separately. Thank you, president Velasquez, for forwarding that email, and that will be investigated tomorrow. It came today towards the end of the day. So we will look into it. But each incident is, evaluated separately based on what happened and the severity. So there are interventions. The optimal, situation is where a student does something incorrect that needs to be corrected, and we have restorative practices and address it.
Sometimes the incidents are so severe that it may be the first one, but it's so severe that it warrants a suspension. So each incident has to be evaluated separately. Doctor Gallano will be following up on that email tomorrow. Okay. I'm just looking for clarity for all parents at this point, including myself, to ensure that when we do have those tier one infractions happening, that that restorative practice is able to take it. Because I know we have Saturday rejuvenation, and we're we're hoping that our students aren't spending unnecessary time out of the classroom
for those tier one. So just for my own clarity as well as a parent, ensuring that there is that restorative practice in between before we continue to gear up Absolutely. So so they take time with the school counselor, with the, CIT, the the restorative practices take place. Sometimes the consequences may be a Saturday rejuvenation so that, you know and it depends on the severity and the number of incidents. K. Okay. Any other questions? Any clarity with regards to that?
Thank you. Thank you very much, doctor Fernandez, for clarifying that as well. And if we have any other concerns, we could probably speak, in an executive meeting. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Okay. If there's no other question, we can I'll take motion to close for now, and then we'll be back at 06:30. So move. Second. Second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? No. Meeting is closed. We have a quorum, so we're going to get started while our other members find their way.
It's impressive. I'm sorry? Yes. Doctor Fernando. Doctor Fernando mentioned his letter. Yes. Thank you, doc. Okay. Good evening, everyone. Today is Thursday, 11/13/2025, and we're now going to, start our regular board meeting. We will begin by the pledge doctor Fernandez, are you We do have the presentation of colors. Okay. If everyone would rise and remain standing. Veteran. I don't see it.
I'm saying. Let's pretend. Gary, don't. War, work. Work. As we celebrated this week, Veterans Day, I would like to thank all the veterans for their service to our nation. Their dedication and sacrifice and commitment to protecting our freedoms are the bedrock upon which our nation and the future of our students stands. Thank you, veterans. Now to lead us in the flag salute will be president Velasquez.
Okay. I pledge allegiance 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. And we also have Mikaela Gomez, six eighth grader from PS thirty eight to sing the national anthem for us. Oh, say can you see by the dawn through the light what so proudly
we held at the twilight's last gleaming, whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight. Over the parts we watched were so gallantly streaming. And the rockets red glare, the Oh, say does that star's fangled banner yet wave? O'er the land of the free Thank you, Mikaela. That was lovely.
That's good luck. March. Thank you McNaira academic for presenting the colors. You may be seated. Thank you. Miss McKenzie, could you please Good evening. I'm sorry. Do sunshine and roll call. Just letting them get to go. Good evening. This meeting is being held in conformity with the Open Public Meetings Act, NJSA 10 colon four dash six, etcetera. Proper public notice of the meeting was caused to be sent to the El Diario La Prinza newspaper and posted it on the district's official website.
Public notice was also delivered to those persons requesting that such notice be given to them. The public has been advised that the board meeting may be viewed live via the district website at www.jcb0e.org. I will now take the roll call. Trustee Blunt? Present. Trustee Iofe? She had to step out. Trustee Morris? Trustee Mohammed? Present. Trustee Patel? Present. Trustee Rezaibullah? Present. Trustee Snyder? Present. Vice president Tisdale? Here. President Velasquez?
Present. And our student rep is not here. We have a quorum. Thank you so much. Before we begin, I'm gonna ask, doctor Fernandez to say a few words. One of our former, board members, just experienced probably the worst the worst pain that anyone and especially if you are a mother can experience. And, we we stand by her in prayer, but I'd like doctor Fern and I'm sorry. It was trustee Paula, Jones.
I'll have doctor Fernandez speak on that, please. Thank you. Thank you, president Velasquez. This month, a couple a week ago, we were very deeply saddened by the unexpected passing of our valued colleague and friend, Teresa Jones Tucker, lovingly known as Terry, a dedicated member of the Lincoln High School family for many years as a student and as a staff member. Terry is also the daughter of our former trustee,
Paula and Jones, and will be remembered for her smiles, collaborative spirit, unwavering dedication, and just positive attitude. She always had a permanent smile for everyone she encounter. To honor Terry's memory, I ask that we hold a moment of silence or reflection upon her loss and her memory. Thank you. Thank you, everyone. Thank you, doctor Fernandez. You can then continue with your report,
please, doctor Fernandez. Okay. I will give mine after. Very good. Thank you. Thank you, president Velasquez. Mhmm. As I share every month, attendance is such an important component for student achievement. Students must be in school to be able to learn. So the mastery of those standards is acquired through in person classes. If someone's ill, they can make up the work, but it is always very important that students attend on a regular basis.
This month, we celebrate two schools. We celebrate Rafael de Cordero Public School number 37 for their attendance award. And we also are going to recognize James j Farris High School for their attendance. At this time, I'd like to ask Cordero to please come to the center to accept your award. Trustees, if you would join me in acknowledging their accomplishment. Congratulations. Congratulations.
Thank you. James j Farris, if you would come up now. I think there are a lot of people in the house from James j Ferris. Please don't anybody leave yet. Students, schools, please don't anyone leave yet. We have, a very special presentation this evening. Where did I put it? That's oh, I'm in the wrong. Room. Everybody is going. What a day. Okay. Yes. We have a very special presentation this evening. Miss Garcia and miss Wallace, please, would you come up to the podium?
Are you eating Miss Garcia and miss Wallace. Eating up. Out there. Okay. And these teachers from number 27 have a very special presentation this evening for our superintendent, the outstanding superintendent award. Okay. Yes. Okay. We're here. Hello. Hi. My name is Yvonne Garcia. I'm the PTA president, for Alfred E Zampella and also the NJ PTA representative. I'm here with Nancy Wallace who was the press wait. Come here. Okay. This way?
Here? Okay. Alright. So let's do this again. Perhaps if doctor Fernandez can just stand up there, she knows she'll guide you where to stand. You're gonna tell her. Come on. So on behalf of Alfred Zampella and, New Jersey PTA, we would like to recognize, doctor Fernandez with the outstanding superintendent recognition award for the twenty twenty four, twenty twenty five school year. Wow. Wow. And the best part of the award is opening up this box. Oh, that's beautiful. It's a it's a crystal apple that you can have. Wow. Very nice.
Congratulations. Thank you so much. It means a world to me. It means a world to me as a former teacher and yes, please, before I drop something, especially from PS twenty seven when I was a kindergarten teacher there. So, it it really is very meaningful because of everything that we do, and we can't do this job. I can't, and none of our teachers or educators can do the job without you,
parents. You make it possible. We need you on our team, and we're very grateful for it. We'll always be here for you. Thank you. If all the board members will come up for this picture with the superintendent Here. Here you go. Miss Iannatelli is the principal of the school. Thank you. Let's let me put a picture. Those are you want chips? You want one? Yes. I give you a meal. Thank you. Thank you. You did one. Thank you. I don't see my mommy. You see the bill Congratulations, doctor Fernandez. That'll be good.
Getting awards is always Right here. Very meaningful. But when it comes from the parents, I know that really it touches the heart, but it also speaks volume of the work that you do, throughout the district. So we as the board are very proud of you, and we're glad that they are recognizing all of your efforts. And hopefully, that'll get in the newspaper. Thank you, president Velasquez. Do you have anything else? Yes. Do you have a Is that it? No. Not for me. Okay.
Go ahead. We we have the presenters and then the few presentations. So Okay. Okay. So it's yours now. Thank you, president Velasquez. In recognition of Native American Heritage Month, the Jersey City Public School District proudly honors the 2025 national theme, Weaving Together Our Past, present, and future. This observance reflects our ongoing commitment to celebrating the histories, cultures, and enduring contribution of Native American people.
Tonight's presentation is led by district supervisors, mister Frankie Maldonado, k a social studies supervisor, miss Valerie Craig Indi, health and physics and physical education, miss Teresita Elrich, world language supervisor, and miss Manisha Shah, k to 12 science supervisor. Together, they will highlight how our curriculum continues to honor indigenous voices while inspiring students to build bridges between history, culture, and the future. Mister Maldonado,
if you please. Thank you, doctor. Thank you. Doctor Fernandez. Good evening, doctor Fernandez, president Noemi Velasquez, vice president doctor Christopher Tisdale, board trustees, miss Ruane, SLT, parents, students, and the viewing public. My name is Frankie Maldonado, k to eight social studies supervisor, and I'm honored to be here this evening alongside my colleagues, miss Valerie Craig, NDI, health and physical education supervisor, miss Teresita Eldridge, world languages supervisor, and miss Manisha Shaw, k 12 science supervisor. To honor the history, heritage, and enduring contribution of Native Americans and indigenous peoples from 11/01/2025 to 11/30/2025,
the curriculum and instruction department has shared with the schools a resource booklet for students to learn, reflect, and celebrate the rich traditions of resilience and influence of Native American communities within our nation and local community. Before we hear from our two talented schools students from doctor Ronald E. McNair academic high school and infinity institute, who will recite a poem and a narrative, let's recognize the schools that have worked to recognize the Native American contributions.
If you would play please pay attention to the screen. Across the district, schools enthusiastically embrace the Native American Heritage Month booklet, using it as an essential guide to deepen students' understanding of indigenous history, culture, and perspectives. Classrooms transform into vibrant learning spaces as students engage in hands on, inquiry based projects inspired by the booklet's lessons. Students created detailed dioramas that brought historical scenes and native landscapes to life, crafted intricate dream catchers that reflected both artistry and cultural symbolism,
and developed interactive displays, posters, and research presentations that explore the traditions, contributions, and contemporary native voices. These projects showcase not only students creativity and academic curiosity, but also their respect for the diverse native nation whose stories are central to American history. The work produced across our schools stands as a powerful testament to culturally responsive teaching and the meaningful learning that took place throughout Native American Heritage Month.
Thank you. I would like to now call miss Manisha Shaw to introduce our next speaker. To help us reflect on the lasting impact of indigenous cultures across The Americas, Ritwik Mohanty from Infinity Institute will share a narrative titled Honoring Native American Peoples. This reading highlights the deep connection between people, land, and tradition and reminds us that that indigenous heritage continues to guide and inspire future
generations. We also welcome mister Robin Tapia Vasquez, a world language teacher from PS thirty, who proudly wears the Inka Pachat Kutech to support rhetoric's narrative. Please join me in welcoming mister Tapia Vasquez and retreat Mohanti to the podium. Tonight, as we celebrate Native American Heritage Month, we take a moment to honor the nations across The Americas. People whose histories, cultures, and innovations continue to shape our world. Today,
there are over 5,000,000 native Americans in The US, about 80% of whom live outside reservations. Long before Europeans arrived, communities such as the Lenape, Navajo, Cherokee, and Iroquois Confederacy existed in what is now The United States. They created systems of government, trade networks, art, advanced agriculture, and scientific knowledge. Native Americans have given the world many gifts. They taught ideas about democracy and shared governance, principles that inspired parts of the US Constitution.
They introduced crops like corn, potatoes, beans, squash, and cacao, foods that now nourish millions worldwide. Native Americans demonstrated to us how to care for the environment, practicing sustainability, crop rotation, and respect for the land and water. And their knowledge of plants and healing laid the foundation for modern medicines, including what became Aspirin. Beyond that, their art, storytelling, and culture, their songs, dances, and traditions continue to inspire creativity and pride across generations.
The past of Native Americans is not just history. It is a lie in our present and guides our future. So as we reflect this month, let us honor the resilience, creativity, and ongoing contributions to our communities and to our world. Mesoamerica, home to the Olmec, Maya, and Aztec, to the soaring peaks of the Andes where the Inca Empire flourished. Across these lands, indigenous people developed advanced systems of writing, astronomy, medicine, architecture, and agriculture that continue to shape the world today.
42,000,000 indigenous people live in Latin America. The Inca emperor, Atu Alpa, represented here by mister Tapia Vasquez, who ruled the talented Tsuyu stretched across parts of modern day Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, and Chile. The Inca built one of the most remarkable empires in history guided by a profound connection to nature and the cosmos. Central to their belief system was Inti, the sun god, symbolizing life, power, and renewal. The sun was honored as the source of warmth and fertility,
and gold, known as the sweat of the sun, was used in temples and sacred ceremonies to reflect a divine light. The Intiraimi, literally sun festival in Quechua, started in 1430, and it was banned by the Spanish in 1535. However, the Cusco locals reenacted the festival at Saksivaman in 1944, and it is still celebrated each June in the Cusco state paying tribute to this enduring reverence. It is characterized by dancing, colorful costumes, and long processions.
Native nations remain integral to the America, preserving heritage, shaping discussions, and contributing to a diverse cultural future. These living cultures remind us the indigenous heritage of The Americas is not only a story of the past, but a radiant thread connecting the past, present, and future. Thank you. He was wonderful. I just have to say, young man, kudos to you for pronouncing those Spanish names correctly. As we continue to honor Native American Heritage Month, we take a moment to reflect on deep connections between the past,
present, and future that shape indigenous identity and resilience. The following poem, Weaving Seasons, beautifully captures the spirit of continuity, celebrating the strength, wisdom, and hope passed down through generations. Please join me in welcoming Ariana Kuran from McNair Academic High School, who will read Weaving Season, an anonymous poem that reminds us that as long as we keep weaving our stories, the spirit of our people will remain unbroken. Good afternoon. Threads of dawn in the elders hands,
woven from the stories carried by the wind. Footprints on the earth that remembers our names. Songs in the rivers where the journeys begin. The past is a fire glowing in a circle. Its embers whisper of courage and pain. Drums echo, voices no longer seen, yet their heartbeat still flows in our veins. The presence is a path beneath our feet, soft with cedar,
firm with stone, where children listen, eyes wide and bright, learning they walk not alone. The future is a basket yet unformed, waiting for careful, patient dread. Hope died in sunset and morning light, dreams of generations ahead. So we weave together strong. Past, present, and tomorrow entwined like cedar roots beneath the soil,
invisible, sacred, aligned. For we are the keepers of memory and sky, carriers of language, a flame of drum. And as long as our hands keep weaving the story, the spirit of our people will never be undone. Thank you. Thank you. As of late twenty twenty five, we proudly honor the two surviving Navajo code talkers, Peter McDonald, age 97, and Thomas h Begay, age 101.
These remarkable World War two veterans stand as living testaments to courage and and ingenuity and the enduring strength of the Navajo people. Using their sacred language, they helped create an unbreakable code that safeguarded US military communications in the Pacific Theater. Turning words into weapons of victory, their service not only contributed to the allied triumph, but also preserved the power and beauty of their culture and heritage. We honor Peter McDonald and Thomas h Begay for their extraordinary legacy as warriors,
patriots, keepers of language who changed the course of history. This concludes the evening's readings. The committee is grateful to all the administrators, teachers, parents, and students whose contributions have made this celebration of Native American Heritage Month possible. We thank you PS thirty, Doctor Ronald E. McNair Academic High School, and Infinity Institute for your participation in tonight's event. We would also like to acknowledge the Native American Heritage Month Committee for their work on the resource booklet which was shared on the district website and provided to all
schools. Additional student engagement with Native American Heritage Month celebration can be viewed on the Jersey City Public Schools website under curriculum and instruction diversity calendar. Thank you to miss Raine for your support and guidance given to this committee throughout the month. We want to acknowledge the following administrators who were in attendance this evening. Doctor Dooley, principal of McNair academic, miss Aya Nateli, principal of twenty seventh school, Alfred Zampella, mister Sidhio, Cabrera, principal of PS thirty seven, miss Baldora, assistant principal of PS thirty seven,
miss Alfred Burke, principal of Ferris High School, Ms. Braswell, adult day school principal, Doctor. Wingard, principal of PS eleven, and Ms. Lisa Santiago, assistant principal of PS eleven. We invite the student leaders to the front of the stage for a photograph with our senior leadership team and board of education members. Thank you thank you all for being part of this meaningful evening. Good night. Students, come on. Come on. This way. Come around this way. Thank you for those lovely presentations. And to the parents, thank you for coming and bringing him.
It's great to share students at the board meeting. At this time, I'd like to invite our citywide student council representative, Jay Patel, assistant to the president from Dickinson High School to address the board. Thank you. Good evening, superintendent doctor Fernandez, assistant superintendents, directors, and school board members and community members. My name is Jay Patel, and I'm a proud student at William L. Fickinton High School. I was born and raised here in Jersey City where I spent my whole life
learning, growing, and being a part of this community. I've attended PS twenty five for elementary school and MS seven for middle school, and now I'm proud to represent Dickinson High School. Today, I serve as the assistant to president on the citywide student council. I grew up in a 3% household with my mother and brother. My father passed away when I was young and that experience shaped a lot of who I am today. My mother and brother taught me to stay focused, work hard, and appreciate every opportunity. They showed me that even when life gets tough, you keep moving forward and stay consistent with your goals. My biggest goal is to enter the medical field and become a heart surgeon.
That dream keeps me motivated every single day. I know it takes years of dedication and sacrifice, but helping others is what drives me. Medicine is about precision, patience, and care. Those are three qualities I've learned to value through school and leadership. At William L. Dickinson High School, I've been active in both the student council and the journalism club. Through them, I've worked to bring students together and build school pride. One of my proudest accomplishments was co authoring cookbook that was recognized by a college institution and featured on its website. I also raised over $1,500
for the Jersey City Medical Center to support pediatric patients. Seeing how our efforts made an impact reminded me why giving back matters. Another event I helped organize is our school's annual multicultural celebration where students proudly highlight the elements of their culture. Our multicultural event motivates all students to participate in an opportunity to celebrate their cultures together in one place. It captures the spirit of William L. Dickinson High School students and the diversity of our school district. This annual event reminds me why I'm proud to be a part of this prestigious
community. My educational journey in student council started in eighth grade at MS seven with mister Moleski. Later in my sophomore year, I joined student council at William L. Dickinson High School in Miss Bluejohn. The leadership experience helped me grow more confident and compassionate as a leader and gave me a gave me a greater understanding of what it meant to serve others. Being selected for the citywide student council now feels like the next step onto that path, but on a larger scale. It's an honor to represent not only William L Dickinson High School, but students all across Jersey City.
As assistant to president of citywide student council, I will work to help strengthen communication between schools and create more unity across the district. This year, we're planning a district wide cultural event that will bring together schools from all over the city. I'm excited to make that happen because events like this show what teamwork can achieve when everyone feels included. I've been fortunate to have strong mentors who continue to guide me. My school advisor, miss Bujom, has a play has played a big role in my in shaping my leadership. She's taught me how to state how to balance responsibility with empathy and and how
to lead with purpose, not pressure. Miss Williams, our citywide student council adviser, challenges us to think beyond our schools and look at the bigger picture of how our work impacts students across the district. They both have shown me that leadership isn't about control. It's about helping others grow along with yourself. I also wanted to thank my principal, Mr. Casillas. He constantly encourages student involvement and make sure our voices are heard. His support for student leadership has made Dickinson a place where ideas can turn into action. Having a principal who values student input motivates us to keep improving our school and
community. Being a student in Jersey City public schools means means learning from people for of every background. We share classrooms, stories, and experiences that shape us for the real world. That's what makes this district special. And not it not only teaches academics, but it also teaches perspective. Looking ahead, my goal to become a heart surgeon remains a driving force for me. I know it won't be easy, but I'm ready for the work it takes. My dream is to make a difference in people's lives and bring the same dedication to medicine that I've learned to bring to leadership. Thank you to everyone who supported me so far,
to my mentors, my school, and my community. And thank you all for giving students like me the chance to grow, lead, and make a difference. I look forward to continuing this work and helping our schools strong grow stronger, more connected, and full of opportunity for every student. Thank you. Thank you, young man. You are a testament that our student our schools are working. Thank you so much. Godspeed. Thank you. Thank you, Jay. We look forward to the multicultural event this year. I truly enjoyed myself last June,
and I'm looking forward to this year's event. So you may wanna share with your principal that we're looking forward to the invitation. Okay? No pressure. Not whatsoever. But thank you so much. President Velasquez, do you want any other, comments from the trustees? Members, if you have any comments with regards to our presentations today, the students were phenomenal. You may all want to say a few accolades to them. Not all at once, though. Okay. Anyone? Okay. Yes.
So, yes, I mean, I felt the poetry was phenomenal. The the little, history lesson essay, great. I mean, just really top of top of class. Really appreciate all the hard work. You on this you guys on the student council. I really appreciate all your efforts for working on behalf of the students. So, again, thank you for for everything that you guys are doing. I echo that same sentiment. I always look forward to what doctor Hernandez brings us. Very talented group of people. It shows that our education system is working. Thank you so much.
Thank you. Anyone else? To the chair. Yes. I wanna congratulate the students with their attendance. I know waking up in the morning is really hard. I know I didn't enjoy doing it when I was in school, but, you know, to have that effort put in, you know, just showing up and and, investing in yourself is important to, having a bright future for yourself and for society because you're gonna be the ones that are supporting us when we're old, and we need health care and heart surgeries. You know, hopefully, we don't have to go that far, but, you know,
we'll know that somebody that we help support is there in in the medical field. Keep stay focused, sir. And it was fun. And you have a good team right there. Also, I appreciate the priest the presentation of the Native American, heritage month. I'm very, like, you know, I like to see a lot of action. So I was looking forward to action this time. But I think that it's it's a growing, topic right now. We haven't really dived into it for many years. It's been hidden. And, we are here. Native Americans, indigenous people are here in the Latin community and and and the black community as
well. So I'm just looking forward to seeing more progress in that area. And, just I'm glad to see that there was a handbook that was put together to god give guidance on the culture. There's a lot more. I would have liked to have heard more about the dream catchers and understanding for people to understand because you see those all the time on people's cars, but it's an it's it's an important piece in in indigenous culture. Mhmm. And, the poetry was beautiful. The speech that the young boy did, young man did, thank you for that.
And also for the t shirt to come in his, tribal wear to show how it, looks, I I think that I I'm thankful to see that too. So Anyone else? Yes. Martina. I wanted to speak out to Ritvik in specific because I was his mentor last year at infinity. I wanna say I wanna say that you have grown so much. Like, you went from this very shy and quiet student to this very confident child. Like president, Velasquez mentioned, you pronounce every single name perfectly.
Like Yes. You are going to go far, Ritvik. I have very high hopes for you. You did a really great job. And then to the student from McNair, I believe her name is Ariana. I really love how she spoke with emotion like you really kept the audience's attention. I also believe that you are going to go off and do great things. Great job guys. Spoken like a true future leader. Actually, you are one already. You have a mentee. We need to find you one. You did so well. Anyone else? Thank you all and, yes, as as Afaf,
trustee Mohammed was saying, it it is really great to see that it we've included in the curriculum Native American culture, which, you know, is sometimes lost. We we feel that, you know, it's no long it's it there's no place for it. But, you know, not only is it here in the Mainland, but as you were saying, trustee, it's, South And Central America and all of the islands, you know. We celebrate our Native American culture.
And I say Native American because even if you're in the islands or in South And Central whatever, America is the continent and we all belong in it. Thank you so much. You guys were fabulous. Fabulous and and, we do expect great things from each and every one of you. Hopefully, we will be reading your books, reading, about you in very good ways in the future. As I said before, thank you and Godspeed. Doctor Fernandez. Thank you, president Velasquez. This evening,
the district will be presenting the New Jersey student learning standard results as, set forth by the New Jersey Department of Education. The NJSLA scores for English Language Arts, ELA, mathematics and science are one of the several important measures we use to assess how well our students are meeting the New Jersey student learning standards. These results provide a valuable snapshot of student proficiency at a given time and help
us identify where we are succeeding, where more strategic support is necessary, and the resources necessary. For parents, the data gives you an objective measure of your child's academic mastery in relation to that your child's grade level standards. I strongly encourage parents to use the individual student reports to have detailed productive conversations with your student's teacher.
For the district, the aggregated data is vital for our curriculum planning, professional development, and resources and allocations. It drives our continuous improvement cycle, helping us refine instruction to prepare all students for college and career. But most importantly, we will discuss the specific action plans we are implementing in response to the data to ensure growth and equitable outcomes for all students.
At this time, I would like to call miss Ellen Ruane, assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction, to provide the presentation. Trustees, you have a copy students need to leave, you can do so now as miss Ruane is, finding her way to the podium. You can stay. I'm saying if you need to leave. Okay. It's right. Good evening, doctor Fernandez, president Velasquez, vice president doctor Tisdale, board members, senior staff, colleagues, and the viewing public. Please excuse my back.
This evening, I will be presenting the results of the spring two thousand twenty five MJSLA scores as well as our AP test results. Please move to the next slide. Assessments. The New Jersey student learning assessments were administered April through May 2025. Individual student reports were forwarded to the schools and then in turn disseminated to each of the parents and guardians according to the timeline set by the administrative code.
The district is in compliance in the timelines reporting to the board. The AP results that I will be presenting are not mandated by the state. However, we will share them with the board members and the viewing public. The NJDOE reports the New Jersey student learning assessments and science results in terms of proficiency levels. Five in ELA in math and four levels for science. If you look at the screen or at your booklets, there are five colors of purple.
That's the five levels for the ELA and math. And there are four colors in blue reporting the science. These are the same colors that the NJDOE reports in. The scale score ranges for ELA and math are 650 to 850 with the cut score for meeting expectations at 750. Please note meeting expectations and exceeding expectations. The cut score for exceeding or exceeding expectations differ for every subject for each subject
in different grades. The scale score for science is 100 to 300 and that cut score for proficiency is 200. The proficiency bands for comparison, and you'll see on the screen it says 2,024, 2,025, do not directly compare the same student populations. The comparison is with the overall district population from 224 to the two test takers in 02/2025. So let's take a look at how we are reporting the scores.
For example, let's take a look at the 2,025 exceeded expectation bands for math. That would be the top purple box. In 2025, there were 1,159 students representing 10% 10.2% of the district tested population in the content area of mathematics. This represents an increase of 1.9% over the 2024 population of students scoring exceeded expectations.
So if you take a minute to look at the documents you have or to look at the screen, you can see the difference between 2024 and 2025, whether the district showed an increase or the district Now let's take a look at the highlights that are noted. 4,246 students increased in ELA scale score from 2024 to 2025. Remember the scale scores are six fifty to eight fifty.
4001 hun excuse me. 6,513 students remains at or increased in ELA levels from 2024. Okay. 3,207 students met or exceeded expectations in both ELA and math, an increase of 205 students over 2024. And there were 185 perfect scores in ELA,
111 perfect scores in math. Also, it should be noted that there were 35 students in the district who had perfect scores in both ELA and mathematics. And kudos to a fifth grader from PS twenty six who last year had perfect scores in all three content areas. Wow. We are happy to report that this student is still with us in one of our middle schools. Wow. Now we'll take a look at the information in the third arrow.
1,378 students increased in science scale score from 2,022. When looking at the information regarding science, it's important to note that the scale score comparison is for students testing in grades eight and eleven who tested in grades five and eight in 2022. This is the first year in which a comparison can be made to previous tests
as there was no NJSLA testing in 2021. If we move to the next slide, this slide shows the breakdown of proficiency levels. Again, the purple for the ELA and math and the blue for the science by subgroups in ELA, math, and science. Note that our multilingual learners, students with disabilities, and economically disadvantaged students, the first three phrases on this chart are duplicated counts, meaning that their scores can be represented in multiple subgroup counts.
Moving on to the next slide. Now we're back to speaking about our ELA results. This chart represents the number of students as well as the percentage of the total population in each proficiency level for the ELA grade level tests. It should be noted that grade three, the district surpassed the state proficiency rate, which was 44.9. Additionally, we had an increase in grades four and seven from the 2024 results.
Moving on to the next slide. This chart represents the proficiency rate in ELA based on the accountable schools for all students. A student's accountable school is defined as the school according to district lines. However, if students are not in their home school due to participation in an ESL, bilingual, or special education program, their scores are reported to their home school. And I will give you an example of this for clarification. If a student whose home school is PS twenty three but is enrolled in a
bilingual program at MS seven, their scores are reported with PS twenty three scores. The scores listed on the chart are ordered by the overall proficiency rate, including the growth that has been demonstrated over demonstrated over last year's performance. Let's take a look at a few schools. If you look at and you're looking at the orange circles or the goldenrod circles, and the pink circles are last year's scores. So let's take a look at p s 30.
P s 30 showed a 5.1 increase in students who met or exceeded expectations, I e reaching proficiency from last year. The pink circle to the left represents the twenty twenty four proficiency rate, which would be 17.9 in this case. Although the seventeen seventeen point nine is not listed, the difference can be calculated for all of these schools by subtracting the percentage of growth from the current rate.
Conversely, a pink circle to the right of the yellow represents a decrease in scores. Let's look at the highlights. 23 elementary schools achieved an increase in students who met or exceeded expectations compared to twenty twenty four. Two high schools, Liberty and Snyder, achieved an increase in students who met or exceeded expectations compared to 2024. 12 schools have shown growth for two successive years.
And I'm going to read those scores because it lists those schools. They deserve the recognition. We are talking about PS fourteen, PS 24, thirty, twenty three, twenty two, twenty, thirty three, thirty eight, twenty five, three, four, and Liberty High School. Infinity has maintained their 100% proficiency in ELA, and McNair has retained their 99% proficiency from the previous year. Now we are going to turn, and we're going to speak about the math.
If you look at the screen next slide, please similar to the ELA results, you have the listing of the grades, and you have the percentage of the total population in each proficiency level for the math grade level tests and end of course tests. It should be noted that grades three, grades four, grades five, grades seven, and algebra two showed growth from 2024 to 2025.
The next chart represents the proficiency rate in math similar to the one that you just saw in the LA. If you look at the yellow, that's the percentage of improvement for this year, and the pink shows last year's. Kudos to 17 elementary schools who have demonstrated two years of growth in their math results. But if we look at the highlights, we have 26 elementary schools who achieved an increase in students that met or exceeded
expectations compared to 2024. Five high schools achieved an increase in students who met or exceeded expectations compared to 2024. We're talking about McNair Innovation, Lincoln High School, Snyder High High School, and Dickerson High School. 17 schools, as I mentioned before, has demonstrated two years of growth. We'll talk in math. Fifteen, fourteen, 39, 34, 24, four, thirty eight, 23, 28,
eleven, twenty two, twenty, thirty three, three, twenty five, four, five, and six. And the following schools have shown two years of growth both in ELA and math, p s fourteen, twenty four, 23, 22, twenty, thirty three, 38, 25, three, and four. Moving on to the last content area of science, this chart represents the number of students as well as the percentage of the total population in each proficiency level for the science grade level test.
It should be noted that grades five and eleven showed increases from 2024 to twenty twenty five. We had a 4.2 increase in grade five, and we had a 4.5 increase. Last month, trustee Snyder had asked, how do we know that the increase for the consultants in Sabas, how do we know it was working? Here is an indication that it is working when we're talking about the growth in science course. Then we're going to move to the science proficiency rate in every school.
This chart represents the proficiency rate. Now remember, in science, it's called proficient and advanced proficient based on the accountable schools for all students. Let's take a look at the highlights. 20 elementary schools achieved an increase in students who scored proficient or advanced proficient compared to twenty twenty four. Recognition needs to be given to PS number six, who showed an 18.5 increase in proficiency, and PS 11,
who showed an 11.2 increase in science. Six high schools achieved an increase in science proficiency. Notable is Liberty High School, which achieved a 28.3%, and innovation high school with a 21.1 increase. As you can see from the the data that we shared with you, schools are improving. However, we still continue to challenge ourselves, and we still are expecting to do better when our mission is go for the
gold at all times. So what are we doing both at the district level, in the schools, and working collaboratively, the district and the schools? In other words, how are the schools using the data to enhance the data from the test results to enhance instructional practices and to improve student learning outcomes. I have given four broad areas. And for the board members, you also have an additional packet. Your additional packet gives you specific information on how these four areas are being implemented
in the schools. Number one, the professional learning communities. Number two, vertical and horizontal instructional alignments, multi layer multilevel systems of support, and continuous professional development. By integrating focused standards, collaborative professional development, and targeted school student support, teachers are creating a robust framework for improving instructional practices. This strategic approach sets clear expectations for academic growth and fosters an environment that enables
teachers to thrive, ultimately benefiting student learning outcomes and success. Now we are going to move on to our AP performance. The college board's advanced placement program is a collaborative community of AP teachers, students, states, districts, schools, colleges, and universities committed to the daily work of improving college level knowledge and skills. The program consists of college level courses developed by College Board,
the AP program, that high schools, our high schools, choose to offer and corresponding exams that are administered once a year. Please note that every student enrolled in any of our AP courses are expected to take the AP exams. In 2025, 1,010 students across our high schools completed 2,027 AP tests, also including 20 students from PS twenty eight who participated in the AP Spanish language
assessment. There was an increase of 7.4 over the previous years in students scoring a three, four, or five on the AP exams. The three, four, and five are known as qualifying scores. If you take a look at our district results, next slide, the 2027 exams were administered, and there were 1,000, as I said, 541 scores of three or higher, which represents 76.2 attaining a qualifying score.
Attention should be given to the shades of blue that represent the qualifying scores, the threes, the fours, the fives. The first two boxes are the ones and the twos that do not represent a qualifying score. So let's take a look at one of the schools. As an example, we'll use Snyder High School. Snyder High School had fifty two point two percent of the students who sat for an exam achieve a three, four, or a five. And our last slide
our last slide illustrates all of the AP courses that we offer in our schools. Please note it does not represent all of the all of those courses are not offered in all of our schools, but they're offered in some of our schools. Please note that every student has an opportunity to take the exam if the school doesn't offer the course or the school does offer a course, but because of the student's schedule,
they're unable to take it. And that's what is known as self study. So if you look down, you can see, for example, the Japanese language and culture exam was taken as a self study. And if you look at some of the lower numbers, the ones, the twos, most of them are self study that the students took that the students took. That ends my presentation on the New Jersey student learning assessment results for 2025 and also our AP results.
Thank you, miss Doreen. President Velasquez? Yes. Thank you, miss Doreen. Is there any questions? Through the chair? That that's what she said. So thank you, miss Lorraine, first and foremost for the presentation. I do wanna say that it is nice to see the increases across many of the schools. I do I am interested to understand that, like, you know, you talked about how the schools are tracking the data. But what specifically are the individual schools and principals doing in order to measure the growth across the student groups? Okay.
So if you reference if you reference the four page addendum to the presentation, Please. Right here. Right? If you look, do you have it? Yes. Linda. So let me let me qualify. So for instance, when we talk about an increase in test scores, and I'll just use third grade for it as an example. We talk about an increase in test scores across the district for grade three. Mhmm. The students who sat for the test last year in grade three are now our current fourth graders. So I'm more interested to see the correlation between last year's third graders and fourth
graders as opposed to what each individual school did because that'll give us an a clear measure of what the third graders from last year did as opposed to this year, if that makes any sense. Right? It'll show the exact increase and decrease. And then it would also be I think the report would be a lot better if we looked at it from the percentage of, like like I just presented, here's the overall, but here's what we did in third our third graders last year did this this year. Right?
And we'll be able to really see where the deficit is or where the growth is with the subgroups of students. Because when we talk about increases from one grade to the next, even in the same school, we're not talking about the same group of students. And so we're not looking exactly at the group of students to be able to measure really where they're falling in in line with the test or what their actual deficiencies might be. Does that make sense? To the cohorts. Yes. Yes. And I can assure you that every school has that information.
Because of all the work that they are doing. However, we can compile that data. I I just think it'll it'll help, the board also to see, you know, what where we are and so on and so forth. It'll also give, I think, the district, a clear perspective on which schools I mean, we probably already know that, but which schools need the most support. And so when we're hiring and providing resources and those support mechanisms, we know where to put that that support. Thank you. You're welcome.
And on that note, I I'd like to also add, do we follow the students that, because, you know, some of our children are transient, as you know, that go from one school to the other, like the third graders that may move from 16, let's say, to 17, whatever. Are are they tracked so that we know their their what they did in 16 and what they're doing now at 17, in the fourth grade? Is there a possibility of that? I don't know that we do exactly what you just asked for.
I do know that when the building leadership is sitting with the data and then they start to work with the professional learning communities, they're looking at every student that they currently have in their school. So if you have a fourth grade student and they're looking to see how to improve, they can look and find out the information where they came from last year. I mean, that information is available. I will have to say that it's important to remember, and I did it for Visa when I spoke about accountable schools,
because schools will have scores of students that they never taught. Right. They never taught. But because the state is looking at accountable schools and the example was if you had a student from 23 school who attends the bilingual program at seven, the school was the child was educated at seven, administered the test at seven, the results go back to 23 school even though those teachers never educated that student. Right.
Mhmm. Yes. The difference between the countable schools and attendance. And attendance. Okay. To the chair. To the chair. Miss Ruhan, first of all, your report is very, very well done. Thank you so much. What my question would be, have we first of all, is there any incentives for instructors or individual schools to to, you know, attain this kind of growth, this kind of, development? That's one question I would like to know. And have we compared ourselves to other districts? We have not compared ourselves to other districts even though we could probably get that
information. And when you're talking about the incentives, I will tell you the main incentive for every instructional leader in this district is following the mission go for the gold at all times. So every school is sincerely interested in making sure students are doing better. Each school, though, has their own set of incentives and prizes and rewards and assembly programs to consistently recognize the children, not only in their achievement of test scores,
but in everything they do during the year. To the chair? Any other question? To the chair? Oh, yes. I'm sorry. My my question is, based off what you previously mentioned, about the children not being taught in this specific school, but then test is administered there. Does this also apply for students who, have become incarcerated, but still are they tested as well on on these tests? No. The schools that where we have students that are incarcerated, they're not tested in our schools. What was that? Okay. Any other question?
Yes. Missus Abella. On the 2025 in JSLA math results, we see algebra one with, like, a considerable amount of students taking it, but we drop off in geometry and algebra two to it looks sparse. Is there a reason? And then how does that translate into science when those students get to chemistry, physics? Or is Okay. No. Let me reference. Let me find the page you're referencing. Yeah. You're talking about the last three lines, the algebra one, the geometry, and the algebra two.
So if you what happens is there's very few students that are taking the algebra two for that year. And because there's such a low amount of students, because they've already taken it, then this is where we they show a decrease in our scores. Are we all clear on this now? Can we move ahead? Mister Wayne, thank you very much for, I'm sorry. I just have one question. Yeah. Yeah. Go ahead. Yeah. So I guess very good. I'm glad to see. I mean, I think we're making tremendous progress.
It's great to see. What surprised me is some of the outliers where you're seeing a 20, 20 to 30 jump in scores. So I'm wondering if you could comment on any of that, it's like the ELA proficiency with all the schools, and then you'd have the same thing on the math. We have two high schools that have some there's significant jumps in in some increases and some declines. And I'm just curious why that we would expect that. Schools you're speaking about. I will take the positive, schools when we're talking about Liberty High School that showed a 28.1%
growth in math, and excuse me, in science and innovation also showed an impressive growth. So what happened is when schools now science, remember, is giving grades five, grade eight, and then grade 11. So it's not until junior year that most of them take the test. However, these are schools that concentrate on teaching to the standards, and we've had a very robust science, staff development, professional development over the years with the Saba science program.
And the schools have really partnered with central office in supporting the teachers in making sure they are teaching to the standards because this is what this is about. It's all about teaching to this New Jersey student learning standards. I also know, and I'm I can think of one of the high schools in particularly that took a double digit drop in ELA. And I cannot explain why that happened. However, I'm assuming, with the help of director Morales,
that he's working with that school to find out exactly what happened, that they had such a drop in the ninth grade, the ninth graders taking that test, and what they have to do, and what tier one, two, and three interventions they have to put in place to make sure it doesn't happen again. Thank you. You're welcome. To the chair? Yes. Just for clarification, miss Rene, you said that those two schools are specifically focused on teaching to the standards, which suggests to me, unless I'm reading or hearing you wrong, that all the other schools are not necessarily the ones that are not
may gaining the same level of an increase are not teaching to the standard. So what who's responsible or what are we doing to ensure that they are getting done? I heard you mention you were working with the director Morales. But in addition go ahead. So I need to tell you, I'm so glad you said that because even though I referenced two schools, that's not me. My my recognition of the two schools is not indictments of the schools that did not show that growth.
I can tell you there's a lot of factors why it happens. One of them, especially in the area of science, we still have suffered over the last few years from not having science teachers in some of our high schools. That does affect how the t these students are being taught. And, also, it it does not it does not mean that the schools aren't working. Some schools are meeting with greater success. And I'm what we try to do now, especially in science with our Science Learning Lab cohort,
we have teachers, very proficient, competent teachers, that are working with the other schools to help raise the scores of the schools that didn't do well and need additional professional development in helping them to teach to the standards. But thank you for your comments. Okay. Are we okay? Thank you, miss Raine, for the thorough presentation and also, you know, your coherent style of presenting. Thank you so much. Okay. Thank you. And, at this time, we are going to call mister Bliss from the accounting firm to present the spent
the completed part of the special education audit. Mister Bliss, thank you for coming. Hopefully, we all brought Thank you, doctor. Good evening, board members. I'm here tonight to, give you a summarized version of the findings related, to our review of student classifications, purchasing procedures, and financial transactions associated with the child study team and special education program course for the, period 07/01/2022 through 06/30/2023.
The purpose, of our engagement was to assist the district in determining whether procedures are in place to ensure that programs and services required in students' individual education plans or IEPs were provided as detailed in those respective I IEPs developed by the child study team. We held discussions and met with many, district employees, who detailed, the certain procedures the district follows regarding student classifications,
procurement of services in relation to the implementation of a student's IEP. The first thing, we did was calculate what the average cost per pupil of a special education student was for the 2223 school year. For the 2223 school year, we noted there was 3,936 classified students. 3,144 of those students were approximately 80% were serviced in district,
out of average cost of approximately $29,847 per student. There was another 792 students that were placed out of district, at an average cost of $43,886 on an average. Part of our engagement, we also reviewed how the population of special education students has changed over the, five year period beginning in, 02/1819 through 2223.
In 02/1819, there were approximately 4,412 classified students, and in 2223, there was three thousand nine thirty six or 476 students left. Less, 11% decrease. However, the cost to, educate those students actually went up about 1,400,000.0. We reviewed a sample of vendor payments charged to special education tuition lines, and compared what was invoiced to the district,
to attendance and enrollment records, as well as student IEPs. The first out of district school, we audited. We reviewed five invoices from September 22 to January '23. And we noted that there were no enrollment records or attendance records attached to those invoices for that five month period, which in the contract with that added district, school, was a requirement of that contract. We subsequently received those enrollment records and attendance records and determined that the estimated billings
for those months were overstated. The number of students, resulting in an overbilling by that district for that five month period of approximately a $160,000. We went further and reviewed the remaining five months of that year for that out of district, play, school. And again, there were no attendance records or enrollment reports provided. We noted that the final bill from this particular Addis,
District School, was not adjusted for the actual enrollments, which they were required to do, per their contract. We went further and noted that no future bills did the district receive credits for the, difference in enrollments, or did they receive any refunds from that school regarding the, difference in special education enrollment? In reviewing students' IEPs, we noted, several instances where the enrollment dates indicated on the invoices did not always agree to the,
enrollment dates. This one? Thank you. We also reviewed a another, out of school district where, we received an invoice for two special education students where the invoice only indicated the students by initials, did not indicate the name of the students. And in going through the district records, there were no records indicating, that these students were Jersey City district students. The district paid about 43,000 to that district, and there's no support,
in district to say these students that we were billed for were Jersey City students. We noted one instance, at an out of district school where ESY services were required in the student's IEP. The invoice came in with that student on there. Someone in the district crossed that student out, that they weren't receiving no service. There was no indication in the student's IEP why they didn't receive those services, for the month, for that, summer. We also noted one,
invoice from an added district, school where the district paid $66,000 for a student that we could not locate, in the district's ed plan system. On further re review, it was discovered that the student was attending a charter school and was not a resident student in district. The district paid for this student's, special education tuition, and the charter school should have paid it, not the district.
66,000. We also went through and reviewed, invoices of service providers providing various related services and extraordinary services, such as speech language services, OTPT services. In reviewing those invoices, we noted that in many instances and and and sometimes in all instances, invoices did not detail the specific dates and times services were provided to students. In some instances, the there was a list provided of students,
and, we eventually got schedules from that, service provider, of the, the services that were provided, but you could not verify from those schedules what was being invoiced to the to the district. The invoices were not detailed enough, and the therapist schedules in, many cases did not detail a start or end time that the services were provided. That particular vendor repaid over, dollars 900,000. The district did provide us, with supporting documentation of students provided these speech language services by this particular service provider.
However, the dates and times, that the district records said these students were serviced did not meet and did not match the service provider's, therapist schedules. They were all different. We requested timesheets from the service provider to to support the invoices that we paid. No no timesheets were provided by the service provider. Only a weekly schedule that was a weekly schedule of five days that was for the whole year. There was no changes to it.
There was no weekly schedule each week. It was one weekly schedule for the entire year. We were unable to determine if what you were being billed agreed to that schedule. We also reviewed a service provider who provided OT PT services. This particular service provider's invoices did indicate the dates and the therapist hours, but never detailed the students provided services or the times service were provided to those specific, students. We did request from that particular,
vendor, specific time periods that the students were provided and the services, and and the type of services and the services that were provided. In reviewing some of the invoices, we noted that services were, billed for, reviews and evaluations of special education students. But in reviewing the district IEPs of those students, there was no notations that such services took place, for those particular students. We noted, students who received OTPT services that had no IEP
or a four zero one plan in effect. Therefore, services were being provided that, per the IEP were not required. We also noted in reviewing these OTPT, service provider invoices, that students invoiced were invoiced for services for different types of services, than indicated in the student's IEP. Meaning, their IEP would say they should get OTPT services in a group setting, but they were receiving OTPs OT PT services in an individual setting,
which is, more costly, and not required if the IEP indicated it was a group setting. In almost all the instances, the students received a more higher level of service than the IEP required. We also noted for the LTPT services that certain students would invoice for frequency of services that different different from their IEP, meaning, OTPT services three times a week for thirty minutes versus two times a week for
thirty minutes. 27 of those students received more services on a on a frequent basis than required in their a a IEP, but we also noted, approximately 90 students that received less frequency of services than their IEP. The only issue there was that when reviewing the service provider's schedules, the schedules only indicated who was provided services, not who was scheduled to provide services and if the student was absent that day.
So it it's possible those students were absent on the weeks that we reviewed, because in reviewing those schedules, there were weeks where kids had makeups, for absences. We also, review services, speech services that were provided in district by district employees. We requested attendant logs for, several employees. One of them was not provided to us. We noted on these attendance logs that the frequency of speech services provided to students exceeded the frequency of services indicated in the,
students' IEP. So they, were receiving more services than required for their IEP. We also noted speech services provided, by district employees for students that had no IEP or had no five zero four plan indicated on the, the logs, the employee attendance logs. We also reviewed, extraordinary services. Those are basically one on one aid services, that were provided. One student that we reviewed on an invoice, was paid for a one on one service that,
that one on one aid was not required in this IEP. So the student was receiving services of a one to one aid. District was paying for those services, but the IEP did not indicated that that service was required. We also, we've requested, we also reviewed, one to one services provided by district employees. We selected five employees and asked them for the student names, traced their students to the IEPs to make sure that those services required were required
by those district employees. Of the five employees, we were provided four names. All four students required the services of the one to one aide, in their IEP. The fifth employee we noted was not a one to one aide. He was actually a classroom aide and should have not been charged to the extraordinary services budget line account, which represents, one to one aides. We also reviewed the special education transportation, records. We reviewed, five vendors, 21 routes.
We requested the, special education, transportation logs. We traced the transportation logs, students to their IUPs. What we noted is that the special ed education, route lists were not revised in the automated public transportation system for changes made during year. So if a student was declassified, the log was not changed in this in the, in the system. We did note there were manual changes made during the year,
but there was not no changes made in the initial login of the special ed route list in the in the district system. We noted, several students that were included on the special education routes that did not have transportation services required in their IEP. They were certainly classified students, but they did not require, transportation services, nor did they meet, the remote mileage requirement to receive, were being transported, although they were required to be per their IEP and the fact that they didn't
meet the remote mileage requirements. We also noted, other students that were on the special education transportation route list list that did not did not have IEPs or were subsequently disclassified, but were we're still receiving, those services. We also noted, payments for special ed transportation service services for regular education students that were, charged to special education budget, in certain instances.
Also, as part of our engagement, we reviewed the district's extraordinary aid application. This is an application the district files with the state to get certain special education cost reimbursed, by the state. The state reimburses a portion of special ed course that exceed a certain level. In reviewing that application, we reviewed the students' IEPs to the app the information reported on the application.
In one instance is, a student was reported as receiving intensive related services for a one to one nursing serve, aid for one to one nursing services. However, there was no support to back up the amount requested for reimbursement. And the amount requested for reimbursement was clearly understated as the student was to receive, five and a half hours of nursing services so many days a week, and the application only put down $2,677
for reimbursement, which clearly was, extremely understated. We also, noted in one, student requested for, intensive related service reimbursement, that their IEP did not require the services that was being, requested for reimbursement. Thank you. So this is a lot of information. I don't know if the trustees had an opportunity to digest all of it. And some of this, as you were saying, involves state applications, and you're stating that it doesn't have support. That's a little broad, and I just for the rest of the presentation, if there's information that's regarding applications,
forms, anything else that could be suggested that something wasn't done properly and lead to further consequences, I think the trustees would like an opportunity to review all of that. Has this all been previously submitted? This all I have, like, two minutes left to finish. You have one? I have, like, one more area to cover. Okay. So I just that's fine. But I just wanna be clear. So this is though for any applications or anything you're stating about the state submissions. These are based on your findings, and it's what you're we're seeing in your report, not a other entity. No. It's certainly a lot to digest.
Yeah. It's a very detailed, report. I thought the board had an opportunity to review the report. No. They did. I just it's it's a lot that's you that's being said right now, though. And I wanna say for the framing, though, of what the purposes of applications and information that could have consequences, you know, later on. I wanna be clear on what the informations that you're relying on and make sure that all of that is supported. Alright. Do you should I finish or just No. You can. Alright. So the last area we reviewed was, the special education Medicaid incentive program, the semi program where the district requests reimbursement from the federal go government for certain
related services it provides. We noted, there were district employees who were providing speech language services, who were not semi qualified and, therefore, were not eligible for reimbursement. We also noted a service provider who was providing OTPT services that the services they provided were not included on the semilogues, therefore, you didn't get reimbursed for those services. And then finally, on one of your service providers, they did not provide semi logs,
and it was indicated to us by district personnel that was because those that service provider, did not have qualified semi qualified, personnel. Therefore, they were ineligible for reimbursement. That is the entire report. I know it's tremendous amount of information. I I've wanna first thank you for such a thorough, piece here. We did receive it, with ample time to review it, and we have. However, in your explanation, we have a lot more questions. Although the questions will be,
referred to the district, please stay at the podium in case you we need to ask you. Yes. Okay? Yes. Thank you. Starting. Through the chair? Yes. So I I really only have one question. Most of what I have to say is a statement. Thank you first and foremost. And I know you can't really answer the why, the when, the how, and so on and so forth because your job is to just review the information. I'm just just gonna be very direct. When we listen to stuff like this, it all the wonderful things that go on in the district are negated because of all of what appears to be so many inefficiencies.
This is so egregious. What I do wanna know is this report says this is for the school year of July '23. Why are we just hearing this in November '25? Well, it took took about a good nine months to do. You know, it was very detailed. So when did you start? We started in '20, I would say we probably started in October '24. Okay. So the reason I asked that question is because, you know, we pay really well, I think, our administrators, and we're all for people receiving the proper compensation that they should receive.
But what what I just heard is a whole bunch of checks and balances that are not checking and balancing. And it's multiple departments involved in this situation because this is cross departmental. And so what it sounds to me like is when I'm listening to this is failure to properly monitor and oversee multiple departments. And just what was going on here is we're just sitting here passing the buck, giving out yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Whereas if we had some of this information a little earlier, our votes would have been different.
Yeah. I just wanna correct. I think we started in March '23. Now in March '23, took about nine months. We were also doing another, non public school special ed audit that we have not completed, and we had to see how that affected this. And once we realized that didn't affect this, it was determined that this should be released. Well, I appreciate that. So my suggestion again is and this is for the district, and I know some of our departments are working on it. It is essential that as you move forward,
each one of the departments needs standard operating procedures for how you're gonna operate as a department and how you're gonna work with each other's departments so that this type of stuff doesn't happen. Because when we sit here as board members and we listen to the parents scream in the audience, this, this, and that, and we get emails left and right and back and forth, and we're trying to support the initiatives that are happening here. This makes it very difficult. And then when you only see six people come up to the microphone, the question then becomes, are they the six who are just bold enough to tell us what's really going
on? This is not okay. Through the chair. So in April '25, April, we received the financial management audit from your firm. At the end, we received 20 different recommendations that clearly stipulated what needed to occur. At the end of this audit, it says that you conducted it, but you don't want to give an opinion. And I have to say to the attorney's credit, we did receive this in enough time, but why was it not outlined in the same way that the financial management audit
was? Because Because this Again, after take this ended June 2023. And if it did take nine months to finish, why is there not, a bullet pointed explanation of where the the hiccups went wrong because you gave it to us in that financial management back in April. Right. So this type of engagement, which is called an agreed upon procedure engagement, is a report of strictly findings. We are the requirement is is that we do procedures, and we tell you this is what we found. We don't give an opinion on why.
We don't give a conclusion on why. We just tell you, this is what we the management agreed for us to do, and this is what we found when we did it. And and that's the type of engagement it is. Okay. Understood. So through the chair, what you're saying is for the financial management audit, you guys were given the okay to come back with those recommendations. But But for this particular, the job was just to show the findings but not give those same recommendations that you previously did on other audits.
Correct. Why is that? This type of engagement, you are you're you're not supposed to give conclusions. You're not supposed to give an opinion. You're not supposed to give, recommendations. Okay. It's this is all this professional standards when you're doing this type of engagement. What is the difference between the financial one that you did in April 25 and this one? Why is that audit, it's okay to give recommendations, but for this one, it is not okay to bullet point and give the same strategic recommendations? A financial audit,
you were giving an opinion on the financial statements. Are they fairly stated? And you're addressing, findings related to financial issues and and recommendations on which should be corrected. That's and you give an opinion. And there is a conclusion. Under professional standards, this type of engagement, you don't do that. You just sit with management. You say, okay. What procedures do you want us to perform? Where it's targeted to specific areas? And unfortunately,
under the standards, we can't give conclusions and recommendations, in the report. So you said do something outside the report and say in a memo, you know, based on this, this is the recommendations, but it can't be part of this report. Okay. So you're saying that at some point throughout your review or findings, you sat with management and you communicated anything? We set we first sit with management and go over what we're expected to do. Mhmm. And how we're gonna do it.
And do you agree that the way we do this, are you in agreement with that and these are the records we're gonna look at? And that has to happen first. An audit, we don't sit with management and say, okay. How do you want us to do the audit? We Absolutely not. We understand that. We this is a this is it's different. This was targeted to a specific area for a specific purpose. And it's usually when management is concerned in a specific area. They wanna know what's what are the finding?
What what's going on? Madam chair? Yes. I I just have a couple of questions. I did I heard, the vice president say that there were many departments, some across, departmental. What departments did you sit with to make these conclusions? We sat with the, the supervisor of special ed, transportation department, finance department, It's pretty much it. And who was management that gave We sat with, at the time was, doctor Dennis, I believe. I think even doctor Luce may have been at the meeting.
I know doctor Fernandez was not at the meeting, but I believe she was communicated on what we were gonna do. And we spoke to, the supervisor of special ed, Karen Gallease. Alright. Gallease. I just have, two more, questions. Obviously, we're we're talking about severe misappropriation of funds, through these departments. You said in your, reading about the over budget, in your, investigation, did we find where the money actually went? You said, that there were certain instances where,
there was over budgeting. Did we find where the money actually went if it didn't go for where it was supposed to be originally? What I said was that we were overbilled, and we overpaid for certain services. Okay. So that means That the vendor has them. The vendor got paid. Alright. So we overpaid the vendor for a was an invoice provided? Yes. The invoice, was based on an estimated number of students. But when we, reviewed the attendance and enrollment records, the estimated number of the students was high.
And when we recalculated it based on the actual enrollment, we overpaid them in a five month period, 161,000. Alright. My final question. Obviously, because of the misappropriation of funds, whether it's over budgeted, under budgeted, or, receipts not accounted for, I'm not sure if this was part of your, investigation, but is there a subtotal of exactly how much money the district lost, because of this misappropriation? Not in total. There's specific instances, where we know how much you paid for service
that we could not support through your records. It was Do you have that figure? Well, it was the $1.60 in Where's the page? What happens? I think it was 47,000. So about a half a million dollars. At the at the lowest know, we didn't calculate you you know, if if students receive services they weren't supposed to, you know, you paid for services the student received, it's not like you didn't get the service. That's that's different. I mean, we could calculate that. We could calculate, how much we paid for services that were not required,
then we could do it. But we did not do that. Got it. Any other question? Yes. No. Go ahead. I'm sorry. I guess I'm still fuzzy on the timeline. When did we first realize that there was a, some major issues here, you know, and why is it it just it feels like it's this is so late coming to the board's attention. I I I don't recall the exact date. I think that's a distant question. Through the chair? Yes. We contracted doctor Dennis contacted and spoke to you at the time. It was the '23,
I believe. Well, I think '24. '24. I'm sorry. '24. '24 because this is 2223. Yeah. In the '24, to conduct the the audit of the special ed department. We did an audit, human resources. We conducted an audit of the CASPER program, and then special ed was the last one. When this report, this some of these these findings came back and the firm provided it was the
'24. '24. '4. '24. Correct. Okay. At that point, I said, this is incomplete because it does not include any of the non public schools, chapter one ninety two, one ninety three. We can't present this because it's incomplete. Mhmm. Mister Bliss, you know, the firm, please complete. And you have been working on the second on the non public schools. Second phase. Yes. So some of these findings became apparent from the initial conversation,
and some of these root problems have been addressed. When we talk about after reading this, the one of the root problems is poor or incomplete record keeping as well as a lack of practices to make sure it doesn't happen again. And many of these poor practices have been remedied. In the past, we had a contract. The district had a contract with a at a district school that uses one of
our buildings that we send a good number of students. That has been in effect for decades. The old contract that we held with them was to pay a flat tuition rate without attendance that was done by three superintendents ago with a different board, and they agreed to do a flat x amount of money Mhmm. Divided by ten months, and you get this percentage each month.
And we were not on time in paying any of those, which was a very common practice at that time in our district. In 2025, we said, no. This cannot continue. You must submit time sheets and attendance. And when we renegotiated that MOU, that correct MOA, the correct language is now included in the new contract to they must provide attendance reports, and it's part of the record keeping going forward.
This is all the information that helped us create better systems going forward. If you'd like to hear some of the things that have been done, I'll be more than happy to share them. Through the chair. Go ahead. I'll I'll talk. This ended June 2023. So it's the at the end when we discussed the Harry Moore school year is 2324. The total paid to the vendor, $23.24, was $6.05. It says that a certain amount of students were enrolled,
and there's invoices, but there's no enrollment or attendance reports. Mhmm. So how do we know how much of that $6.05 is overbilled or if this was enrollment and attendance reports were provided. Because as I shared earlier, there was not part of the old contract to document the number of students on a monthly basis with tuitions, with attendance to be paid. The agreement was that the district would you have 75 students there. We're going to pay you for 75 students or whatever the number was.
That old contract did not include attendance or enrollment. That was a contract that was negotiated when the portico fell and and and the school was gonna close, but that's the way the old contract was written, and it was rectified. At the end of that contract, we know we reached an agreement that now we separated. We no longer hold the principal for that school or anything.
We just do business with them with a new contract, with certain amount of students who are going there, who are now filled with attendance and all the required paperwork. Okay. So we don't know how much of that $6.05 was an overpayment because of the way that the old contract worked. Correct. Do we have any opportunity to find out now that we're no longer under that and retro act? Also, the remediation that has taken place in 2025,
is it possible that the board receive that written so that we can understand what the remediation process looks like and what the oversight and what tools have been put in place, the corrective action in order to prevent this from continuing. Because we're going from June 2023 audit, but it's 2025. And I don't understand did you have this information between June 2023 and '25 to start the remediation, or are we just all finding this out to together? If I may,
through the chair, the first indication I had was the '24 when the first part of this audit came out. So starting in January '25, December December '24, starting January '25, we've instituted the new contract did not the language in the old contract did not allow did not require all this documentation, which is the standard contract with out of district schools,
that that is the standard. It's how it should be done. However, it was not the way it was done for many, many years. This department, doctor Fernandez, is humongous. It it's humongous in personnel, and, it seems like a lot a a lot of, of of the staff was, negligent, falling by the wayside. Something happened here. What have have you had meetings with the staff with regards to this? Do you know any well, we don't want names here.
I know. But do you know what staff was engaged and in probably overlooking what the job that they should have been doing and how do we take care of that? You know, I know you say you you there are systems in place, but there's a lot of money. What do we do? What we are have been doing is demanding and putting, individuals and titles. You are responsible for this, and you are responsible for that.
Because when you have an effective, action plan to mitigate a problem is assigning tasks to individuals and accountability and deadlines. And this is due on this state. And the child study team is responsible for this and this group and that group. So all that is part. And, miss Rosabella, thank you for bringing up. We'll be more than happy to present the action, action, a corrective action plan because that's really where we learn and how we get better.
Unfortunately, I've become the cleaning superintendent for a lot of systems that part of it is antiquated. Exactly. We transitioned from paper and pencil. This audit happened coming out of the pandemic and people working remotely and people on quarantine and all all that happened with that, change of administration, many, many issues. But why it doesn't. It's not worth our time to say why. But what needs to change,
and how is it going to change? And what has taken place and will continue to take place going forward? And it is about accountability. And part of that accountability has made some people unhappy, but it is our resources are limited, and they need to be used efficiently. If a student received more services than they were entitled to, I'm glad for that student because the more we can give, the better it is. However, resources have to be I'm sorry. Resources have to be shared,
and accountability is important. So we will continue to clean up, and we will present a corrective action plan for the board. Madam president? I'm sorry. It seems that, you know, students in in writing, okay, were getting extra, assistance, but definitely in in in reality, they were not. Yet we were paying, you know, so we need to find out where this went, why it went there, and if in any way we can recuperate any of it,
you know, it's important. Can we do that? Is that feasible? Where can we go from here? Because, I mean, I think we were all shot by including yourself by this report. And I know that it didn't start the other day. This has been something that's been going on for years, but, who took care of those finance? Was it the the the VA's department? Was it, the the the department itself, the special ed department itself? Who took care? Who signed that? Those
vouchers, checks, whatever necessary to pay. Who who's responsible? The department generates all the action forms, the purchase orders, all the paperwork. One of the, interventions that had been placed, few months ago, and I can't remember. I think it was at the towards the end of the of last school year, we assigned an accountant to the special ed department to ensure better systems. So it's continuing. We invested in a new IEP tracking system because in many times,
these IUPs were not being updated in a timely fashion. They would provide the service and then never update it. And I get it. We noticed that a child needs a service, and we say, hey. I need a one on one aid. Okay. Sure. Let's give them the one on one aid. But It's the individuals responsible need to go back and make sure that the paperwork is there. That's why I said the a root problem of this is poor or incomplete record
keeping. And it goes from this desk to that desk to this clerk to that clerk. Somebody's on maternity leave, on vacation, and it just sits there, and it can't be. So as an automated systems, this is part of the corrective action plan. Madam president? Yes. And this you know, all of the departments have those same issues of pregnancy and leaves and whatever, but it seems that this department just was on its own. Yes. Madam president,
you know, we can we can sit here and be polite about the, situation all we want, but we just have to call a spade a spade. It's a reflection of poor leadership. And, ultimately, madam madam, superintendent, I spoke about this last year, and the public, didn't understand why I kept saying this, that you inherited a lot. Mhmm. And you are we're cleaning up or were, we discussed you, starting to clean up a lot of the, years of corruption that landed on your desk. So ultimately, you're the superintendent. It it it's gonna fall on you because you're everybody's boss.
But, with you being the superintendent, you also have a cabinet. You also have people whom have been trusted Mhmm. To run the department as a representation of the superintendent for the board of education. And we can sit here and say that it's because of people going on leave or or whatever. But at the end of the day, a leader, an executive, when you know that there's a void, you fill that void so the job can still be done. We should not have to deal with this type of nonsense publicly, you know, humiliation publicly Mhmm.
Because of lack of leadership, and and and and poor, training. You said that it's good, for students to receive, over, what was it, training or over, services, but not when you have unqualified teachers doing it. How can you put an unqualified teacher over such a sensitive matter and think that that's okay? When you come to these committee meetings and they give an outline of everything, that they're doing, none of this stuff was brought, to the forefront in regards to, shortage of staff and and how we, place, different people, who are not qualified in that particular position to be over these particular students.
You know, it ultimately and I heard the the president say, have we designated who these individuals are from these various departments? My recommendation, my strong recommendation is and I'm sure that you've you're already doing this, but my strong recommendation is that we identify who these people are and do not allow them to hold the position. Because at the end of the day, if they're costing us millions of dollars, taxpayer dollars and my email last year and this year has exploded with people complaining about x, y, and z. They're complaining about something that we didn't have answers to because this report wasn't submitted
yet. So our job ultimately is to the board of education, and we can't give legitimate answers to the public because we were unaware of some of the things that were going on in this department. The leadership needs to be held accountable. I understand that, you know, we have and I'm I'm closing. I know. Yes. Okay. I understand that we have, people, supervisors, directors, and Mhmm. And different divisions. But, ultimately, it is the person who is in charge responsibility to make sure that we have not only the personnel, not only the the the the proper,
teachers, in these places, but we hold we have to hold them accountable. And I know the person who was responsible for that is no longer here. But moving forward, I hope moving forward, I hope and I trust madam superintendent because you are a professional, and and I know that you've been doing, the rooting out. Personally, I know that because I sat there and and observed you do it. But I just hope that when we decide to replace this this this department head, that we look at all of these aspects and qualities that we're looking for in a leader to make sure that they not only hold themselves accountable,
but also the people who work for them because ultimately, it's a reflection on you. And when it's reflection on you, it then becomes a reflection on us. And I don't like being in a position like this. So at the end of the day, you know, obviously, we're glad that that position has been vacated. And, I believe that a further investigation needs to take place because some of the stuff that I'm reading looks borderline criminal. Mhmm. And I think that we need to take that into consideration moving forward. Thank you, madam president. Yes. You're welcome. However, I I also just to end this, I have one other question. I'm sorry?
I'm sorry. You're downstairs. Oh, okay. I have one other question. I know this came out maybe a couple of months ago, and then they were cleaning it up and whatever. Can this be, the reason of the exits of, the leadership and others in that department? Could this be the door you know, what opened the door? I'm not gonna make assumptions. I will. Yes. Thank you very much. I don't think he'll get in trouble for that. Thank you. Any other questions? I this is really serious. It really is. I think we really need to,
madam superintendent, we really need to, talk about it thoroughly, maybe in our session downstairs and come up with more, resources and more solutions and strong solutions, okay, to make sure that it doesn't happen again, but that people are placed in positions and someone is monitoring their job. And this is really embarrassing. And I know it has nothing to do with you like you said. And like we've all said,
you've come here and you've cleaned up a lot of stuff. Okay? No one said anything about the years that this has been happening or who was the superintendent at that time. Nonetheless, you know, it's now affecting us, this board, this superintendent. So I think, collaboratively, we need to discuss this and and and bring it to closure. I just have one final question. Serious closure. There's I have one Hold on one second. I I know you said that we could discuss it a little bit later, but I just wanted the attorney's recommendation.
Sure. So we did have more, and I know that people have questions because of articles that have come out that reference this as well. So I would I wanted to know, specifically, what is the right venue to address it based on the fact that it is an article and it's not part of our agenda. Can we discuss it up here, or do we wait and and discuss an executive session? Are you speaking of specifically about question more questions about the reports? So we had articles that came out regarding that reference the audit. I wanna know what the the correct venue is to discuss that,
if we can discuss that downstairs or if that's, She she's referring to doctor Fonafo's memo that he sent to this to the trustees. Yes. But I don't know where where the best if we're allowed to discuss that in exec I'm asking for It's already in the press. If it's something that's already in the public, it can be discussed here. If it's something about personnel, future litigation, it and I'll if it is future litigation or pending litigation, then it should be discussed downstairs. But if it's overall the contents of an article that's already been released, then that should be discussed up here. Okay. Great. Thank you. So my question is,
in the article, it states he specifically states in his internal memo and I wasn't on the board then, so I did not receive that internal memo. But he specifically states that he was consistently told to make these payments despite his objections. That's at least what I got from it. I would like to know if that's the case because, again, I did not lay my eyes on that internal memo. But, specifically, he says that he was told to make payments despite proper documentation and without board approval.
So I would just like a little light shed on that part. I would say, unless there's someone who has first hand knowledge or something otherwise that they'd be able to share that I would not assume or make any, if it's like something you don't know directly of what he's saying. So sorry. I had to hear what the question was of, you know, specifically about the article. But for that, I'd say, I don't know if anyone here could speak to that. I don't know if that's something that would then, you know I don't wanna say hearsay, but it's just not something that I'll be able to speak to directly who's on
here. Well, through the chair, if I may. Yes. A couple of observations. First of all, that was a confidential memo that someone obviously leaked to the education reporter for the Jersey City Times. Doctor Dennis is no longer here. He hasn't been here for a year, so he can't comment on an internal memo that was not supposed to be released to the public. And, so there are issues of concern there. You know, whether or not, and I certainly wouldn't suggest that anyone assume that the article is correct because we've
had issues with incorrect articles from the Jersey City Times as recently as September 23 regarding the Herald verdict in Superior Court. So this is somewhat of an unusual situation. And my suggestion would be, in fairness to yourselves and in fairness to the superintendent, and I'm sure she has concerns with the article, that the matter, that she'd been given be afforded the appropriate amount of time to review and consider that article, to review and consider,
doctor Dennis' internal memo, and, respond to that, at a later date, and certainly not do that at a public board meeting, I think would be inappropriate. Thank you. Through the chair, I asked, previous to asking the question, if this was the appropriate venue. Correct? Yeah. You did. Okay. So Through the chair. Well, let her finish. I understand. Thank you. The my recommendation, it is not, at this time the appropriate venue. Okay. So it wasn't the That's what you're saying. Right? That's my recommendation to the board. We could discuss it further in closed session.
But, again, this is a highly unusual situation where we have a leaked confidential memo that's over a year old. The the individual who authored that is no longer employed as the acting school business administrator. And, there are more things that I could say about that, but I and but I don't think this is the appropriate setting for me to go any further at this time. That's my, recommendation, this evening. Mister Bliss, you can sit down. Oh. Thank you. I'm so sorry. Alright. So I just have a question, madam president. Is it appropriate or is it not appropriate?
Because we have the superintendent's attorney saying that it's inappropriate, and our attorney is saying that it is appropriate. So I just wanna, answer. Yeah. Sure. And to, board member, as well as your your question before of whether it's right venue, I think it's just depending on the question, right, of what you're asking from the article. And my recommendation is if it has something to do with, as I said, pending litigation, personnel, or something else that would be safe for executive discussion that's appropriate. But also if it's something that is part of no one on here could speak to, I would caution and say, I do not recommend someone answering if they are hearing and they don't know it
themselves, and it's something that they cannot speak to personally that involves them. So it would be, I would say, dependent on your question. So the what you just asked, I would say if no one here has anything to respond to that they've known were directly involved in, that it wouldn't be appropriate for them to answer that at this time. Thank you. So no one here was directly involved. So I mean, I'm I'm not I'm not gonna lie. Sorry. What is the I'm sorry. What is the question? This one is inappropriate to talk about Okay. Well, madam president, can I just, interrupt? Like, the the memo was provided to as as mister Pritchnick said,
the memo was provided to the trustees in closed session that the No. No. It was closed sec before closed session that was reported in the Jersey City, the education what's the name of the paper? Mhmm. Yeah. Jersey Times. I see the Jersey City Times. So we're aware of the article, but the validity of it, I believe what mister Pritchnick is saying, needs to be clarified. It's questionable. It's questionable. However, because the article has been made public and our emails have almost exploded about it,
it is, it is appropriate to address the validity of it, in a in a public session without I mean, in a public session without mentioning any names. Because ultimately, a lot of what was reported or what was in that private memo is reflective to this report that just we just received publicly. So, and and I do know that there was some slanderous, information in there that I don't believe was true about certain individuals. However, the premise of the memorandum, is relevant. And because it's because it's relevant and because,
obviously, the press is not going to, publish something that is not well, I hope not, that that is that is fictitious. I think that we need to clarify the validity of the mem of the memorandum because it did come from the sitting business administrator. However, I believe that certain individuals that were named in there, that there is slanderous things, and we can avoid talking about that. But in regards to the, the numbers and things, that's why I think that it is it is appropriate for a public, hearing since it's already in the public. Yes. So that, I think, ties back to what my initial answer is. If it's part of the public,
if it's something that is not pending litigation, if it's not personnel or fall into those categories, if it's something that someone here has knowledge of that they can speak to directly, that is a matter of the pub within the public realm, then they can speak to it. If they are not privy to that information and they can't speak to it, then I would not make any I'm I wouldn't say anything that's, again, an assumption or based upon what they've heard otherwise. Okay. And, obviously, I'm I'm taking this a little personal because it happened under my presidency. So that's one of the reasons why I'm making for certain, that, we need to make sure that we solidify the validity of,
of the memorandum coupled with the report that we received to make sure that the accusations in that particular memorandum was actually accurate, in comparisons to, the report that we just received. So in regards to what trustee Venabella asked, if we were privy to it, the answer, because I'm not gonna lie, yes. We were privy to the memorandum. Yes. We did receive the memorandum. Yes. We did read the memorandum. Yes. We were aware of it. Due to chair. Yes. Privy to it in the terms of it came at a time where there was
whatever going on. Okay? So doctor Fernandez is the one we take recommendations from. Okay? There was a disagreement. We got this notice. Things happen. Now in terms of how the memo was written, feelings are high and so on and so forth. How true the allegations were? We don't know. Right? Exactly. Because what we can say is it was written at a time where someone was really upset and feeling a certain way. So could could the tech context have been exact? Maybe. Could it have been exaggerated?
That may also be plausible. But what we do know is that we got this notice. We talked about it downstairs Mhmm. And we moved on. But I do wanna make this point, right, in terms of what we do here as a board, as an administration, and so on and so forth. We have to understand that, you know, the reporter is just reporting information that she gets or he gets or whoever it is. We can't be upset because we don't like the material that goes into the our, the newspaper. If we don't want things out there that don't make us look a certain way,
then we have to be careful about how we're moving forward, how we're proceeding, how the public is viewing us, how we're actually doing things. We can't arbitrarily and capriciously do things, and then when somebody says something, we're upset. Oh, well, that was this person. That was that person. No. We did that. Now let's move forward and correct it. Doctor. If I may, through the board. So within that memo, there's a a whole bunch of stuff. But you asked about payments. Yes. I am. That and that I, so Right. This this is not So the tuition to this school was budgeted in the previous
year, and it was paid for services rendered to our most vulnerable students. The contract that was in effect at that time did not require the verification and the attendance. So at that time, that institution had never submitted that paperwork. So it was June, and half a year or a year was not paid. It had to be paid. Our students were there. They received services.
And so I said we have to pay. We owed the money. We had to pay. What I did going forward is we made a new contract that has the appropriate language, so it doesn't happen again. But we have to pay our bills, especially for services rendered to our students. I cannot turn around and tell those parents I don't have a school for you next year. So Okay. Through through the chair. Thank you very much because that was the answer to my question.
He stated he was told to pay it. You said I did. That the school needed to be paid. I don't know what was in the internal memo. I don't know if he was having a bad day. I particularly do not care. It was never about slander. It was never about allegations. It was why did he state this? Thank you. The school needed to be paid. And that was the end of the answer. I think this was the appropriate venue to to have that conversation. Thank you. Okay. And I think that the superintendent made an appropriate decision when she did that. When it That's neither here nor there for me. The only question was why,
and she answered it. Okay. So, being that there are no more questions with this regard, we're going to move on, and we're going to thank you, and thank you, mister Bliss, for this painful yet thorough, report. Thank you so much for the work you do. Okay? Good night. Okay. Good night. And now we will move on to the public, speakers before yeah. Please read your statement before we go we move on. All speakers must adhere to the three minute speaking rule. The clock shall not be stopped.
Speakers will be called to the microphone to speak in the order that the request is received. All statements or comments shall be directed to the chair. It is an expectation of the board that comments will remain positive and focused around the best interest of the students and the district as a whole. The board will not condone comments that can be perceived as harassing, insulting, threatening, or lacking in respect or civility. The chair reserves a right to, a, interrupt, warn, and or terminate a participant statement or comment when it's too lengthy, b, interrupt and or warn a participant when the statement or comment is abusive,
obscene, or maybe defamatory, c, request any person to leave the meeting when that person does not observe reasonable decorum or presents themselves as a danger to others in the building. D, request the assistance of law enforcement officers in the removal of a disorderly person when that person prevents or disrupts a meeting with an act that obstructs or interferes with the meeting, including threats by words, actions, or objects. E, call a recess or an adjournment to another time when the lack of public decorum interferes with the orderly conduct of a meeting. And f, waive these rules when necessary for the protection of privacy or to maintain an orderly
operation of the board meeting. At the at the discretion of the president, the order of a speaker may be changed. Okay. Thank you very much. Miss McKenzie, please call. Our first speaker is Darren Martin, Amina Pack. Good evening. My name is Amina Pack. I, I live at 6 Middle Avenue. My child is a student at p s forty one. I am here tonight because I wanna talk about our principal, miss Resideo. I was very happy today when I heard she was going to be our regular
principal. Resideo is our outside every morning, be in the students when when they go when they get to school. My child is happy to go to school. I I like that we are now community school because, her bringing it to the families. She is doing a great a great job. Thank you. Thank you. Emily Emily Pico? Bless you. Hi. My name is Emily Peko. I'm the parent of a child with disabilities, and I am a taxpayer in Jersey City. I came here tonight to hear the findings of the special education report,
audit report, which I called for back in 2018 along with Jersey City Together. I am also here to speak about the serious concerns revealed and call for next steps. Thank you for finally releasing this report. I appreciate that we have information now. The findings are distressing to say the least. The numbers tell a story, and that story is of general and financial mismanagement under doctor Chris Aveeno and his department administrators and other leadership within the district. These results speak to the toxic and negligent culture within the special ed department and other departments.
Chris Anino may be gone, but this was a cascade of failures among several tiers of administrators. You sit at the said you didn't know what was happening in the department. You did know what was happening in the department. Parents, teachers, staff have all given impassioned and specific anecdotal evidence for years. I have stood here many times, not just on behalf of my daughter, on behalf of all of the students in this district. I've been here listening to everything and trying to rejigger what I wanted to say, so forgive me if this is a little rambling. The audit revealed that we don't actually know whether students receive what they need and
are entitled to by law, which the district has paid for, apparently. Without knowing which students receive services when and for how long, we have no way to know whether a child is getting what they need, like speech and OT services. And then there are apparently students that are getting more than what they need, which we can go into that, whatever that means. Point being, it's a mess and it's been a mess, and you've known it's been a mess. We've been saying it's a mess. This what this should not be a surprise, and this took way too long, way too long. We also don't know which students have IEPs,
who seek services. If we can't track these things, how can we ensure any child is getting what they need? Where is the disconnect here? Because parents are coming here and saying their children are getting what they need, that, you know, that they're sitting through these horrible IEP meetings being personally insulted, being told we can't do this, we can't give you that, and yet money is being spent on what? On top of all that, we have some students who are double billed through both the district and charter school funding, which is a whole other issue that parents have known about at least for a
long time anecdotally. These are just some of the troubling issues revealed. Even more distressing, doctor Dennis's, memo showed that higher up administrators were offered significant and underserved raises amid the clear financial problems. What is that? Now that we have these distressing findings, it's time Thank you very much. Yes. But we are. Thank you. Turn that off. No. You are done. Three minutes, everybody gets. Thank you. She can leave. Thank you. I'm waiting for a selfie. Yes. Get her out. She's done.
I will be back. You failed. You have failed. Goodbye. Mark Brown. What, Ralph? Okay. If you don't do something Mark Brown. What's he doing walking around like a peacock? He needs to move out. Good evening, everyone. This is pretty intense. I'm gonna be done in forty five seconds. I was asked a month ago from Glenn Corbin to advocate, really thank anyone that's involved. My dad's name is, supposed to be on the court at Lincoln High School. I just wanna thank my dad is Charles Brown. Oh, no. Charlie Brown.
He's, I'm I'm the head men's basketball coach and assistant athletic director at NJCU. He was a he he coached Lincoln High School boys basketball for sixteen years NJSU for twenty five. And he wasn't just a basketball coach, but he also was principal, vice principal, teacher. So whoever's involved in this decision to, bless the court of Lincoln High School, my dad's name, Thank you. Have a good night, everybody. Thank you, mister Brown. We remember your dad fondly. Julieta Zemla, Zoe Williams. Hi, everyone. My My name is Zoe, William,
and I live at, 70 Boswick, Avenue. And I have two, children that are students at, at p f p f forty one. I'm here tonight to support missus, Resideo being the principal officially. Since she has taken over our school, she has been very, helpful to all of the parents and the students. She has made the school very very beautiful as well. She is a kind person who is who is very, supportive.
And, so, so I would like to thank the board for, actually making her our new, principal. I can't wait to see, how much more that the school will grow, in the future with her and our, principal. Thank you. Timothy Brown. Good evening, everyone. Good evening. It's been a long night. I first wanna say that I do feel for, these parents for the loss of money that happened. I I came here to speak about, as a representative of two two six two
and to speak about the violations of our contract. I'm a start by introducing myself. Again, my name is Timothy Brown, and I'm a union rep for local two two six two. I came to ask the members of the board to table any transfers for morning shift until pending grievances are finalized because these transfers are in direct violation of our contract. The district is violating article 28 of seniority, which states that those with seniority, seniority, will be given preference in cases of shift assignments,
building assignments, vacation schedules, and other situations where substantial employee financial advantages or disadvantages are concerned. As it stands now in the maintenance department, those that have seniority have been working several years at night in their building and are skipped over and are not asked if they would like the morning shift, which should be taking place. And the position at night should be posted. Or if there is no one interested in the morning shift in that building that works at night, then the morning shift I mean, the morning position should be posted.
We have Dana Chatham from PS twenty four and Melody Griffin from the central office, who both had seniority at their location, but instead, the school in the central office hired custodians from outside the building who had way less time. Again, I asked, that the board no longer vote on any transfers for morning shift coming from another building until the district adheres to our contract, or the current grievances are finalized.
Thank you. Thank you. Elizabeth Perry. Good evening, everyone. Good evening. This is I heard that y'all have some new rules, so please bear with me. We don't get two times to speak anymore. We speak one time, three minutes. Wow. Okay. So on twelve point three, which is compensation and overtime, you guys be saying that you don't know this, but we this is why we come here, to bring it to your attention. So when the state when I contacted, Wage and Hour, they said, yes. You do owe this category of workers time and a half.
You even had the state mandated poster in human resources showing that you're supposed to pay time and a half. But you guys tried to change the language, so you gave the workers you don't wanna give time and a half to a new title for the overtime hours. That is not legal. You cannot have a clerk work in the after in the after, after hour programs and then tell them, oh, for these two hours, you are a teacher's, aide, and then pay them a flat rate. And the sad thing is those are some of your most
they make the least money. You pay the teachers $45 an hour over time, but when it come to the clerks, you want to pay them a flat rate instead of giving them their true hour and a half. Okay. I gotta go to the next one. And I have another complaint in with wage and hour because you are doing these kind of crazy things. The other thing. Did that one? So you guys are saying you didn't know or you don't remember being told. Here's a, an example for y'all. It's a true example. I got docked a day's pay.
So I got a pay stub. It said you're docked. It gave me an amount. I called payroll and said, hey. What day am I being docked for? What is this? Why can't you use the rest of the language that is on the pay stub to say you're docked on this day for this many hours, blah blah blah. Y'all don't use those kind of resources. So that's why when they come up here now and somebody says, oh, your audits are not coming out right or your paperwork is not coming out right because y'all be shortcutting. When I asked the lady upstairs,
I said, can you tell me about this? She said, listen, miss Perry. You get two hundred and fifty days a year. We take your annual salary, and we divide that by two hundred and fifty, and that's how we dock you. I said, and what if I took, like, one fourth of a day? I came in late, like, one third of a day or something. She said, stop playing. That means she don't know if she would have to break the fractions down beyond the one day. I'm telling y'all, a lot of things are not being done business wise. Talk to you on the next one. Thank you.
Sylvia Charles. Good evening, superintendent and trustees. I'm here to speak in solidarity with the parents and I'm here to specifically speak to mister Tisdale as you've said. It is true that parents are at home and we are upset, and we do notice the things that are going on. We cannot come to these meetings. And when public comment is not allowed on Zoom or by phone and it's only three minutes, we don't even have time to tell you what's going on.
And I'm here to comment on, specifically screen time, but then the article that came out and the things that I heard from other parents. And just tonight listening to the the way that of of course, the evidence is circumstantial, but the way that the leadership responds in this room to what is being said is criminal. It's criminal. And to have parents who are concerned about their children coming here to try to tell you not to hurt you as mister Tisdale pointed out.
These are not to hurt you. They're to help our children. And there's a dichotomy going on where anything somebody says is perceived as an attack on the district and not as a move to aid our children and to aid the schools. Even these ladies who come in here, I've been watching the board meetings for so long. They come here calling attention to wrongdoing that is happening within our district, and they're treated like nothing. Like, they're not even saying anything. Like, they're not even calling attention to real problems that are going on.
I only have a minute left. I just I mean, I'm gonna go back to my comments, but, just things that I've heard from people, do an audit of the IEPs, compare with the actual services, proactive versus reactive service reactive services, stop have tonight an opportunity for the board members. There is learned helplessness going on in our district where people will not step up because they're seeing that there's no benefit in stepping up. There's no benefit to tell the truth.
And tonight, you have a chance to vote no to the special education. Tonight, you have a chance to say no. We're not going any further without things being done properly. And I know doctor Fernandez personally. I've spoken with her. I like her on a Thank you very much. But I hope Okay. We were done. Call the next person, please. Vanessa Rodriguez. Vanessa Rodriguez. Good evening. Over the past several months, I've completed a detailed review of my salary history. After comparing my actual salaries to the contractual percentage increases that were supposed to be
applied, I discovered that I have been underpaid by approximately $12,236. These losses come from two separate contracts, the twenty fourteen to twenty seventeen contract and the twenty twenty four to twenty twenty eight contract, where the full percentages were never added to my base pay. A major cause of this problem is the district use of payroll pool. Instead of applying the exact negotiated percentage to each employee's base salary, raise money is spread across the entire bargaining unit. When that happens, some employees receive more than the negotiated percentage and others receive far less.
I am one of the employees who has constantly received less than what the contract requires. This payroll pool system undermines collective bargaining, and it contradicts the clear language of the contract. A salary increase of 3.75 should mean 3.75 added to my base salary. Not a diluted amount based on a pool that gives some employees more and short change others. This impact will continue into my pension, overtime rate, and all future raises unless it is corrected. Second, I want to address the issue of vacation days. In my twenty two years of service as a full time ten month employee,
I have never received a single vacation day. Even though our contract book states that we are entitled to vacation leave, more importantly, New Jersey civil service law states the same thing. Under the New Jersey administrative code four a semicolon six dash 1.2. The law does not exclude ten month school district employees. The district practice of denying vacation days is not compliant with civil service regulations, and it has deprived me of two decades of earned time and the financial value
that comes with it. Four hundred and sixty five days to be exact. These failed practices cause financial hardship towards ten month employees. Every summer, we are left with no income for two months. As a result, many staff members, including myself, have to borrow from our pensions just to survive the summer months. No dedicated public employee should be forced into pension loans simply to make it through the year. The combination of the payroll pool reducing our raises raises, the denial of legally mandated vacation days has created a severe financial burden on employees
who have committed their careers to this district. Tonight, I am respectfully requesting that the board direct HR, payroll, and the business office to conduct a full audit of my salary history, correct the underpayments totaling approximately $12,236, Bring the district vacation practice into compliance with the New Jersey administrative code four a semicolon six dash 1.2. Thank you. Jermaine Border. Madonna Morris Chisholm, Good evening, doctor Fernandez and board trustees.
My name is Madonna Marsh Chisholm and I've worked for the district for twenty four years and I'm also the leadership of the ESA union. My journey has taken me through the human resources department and I'm currently in the ed department where I continue to dedicate myself to this to the success of the students. Recently, I sat down for yet another promotional civil service exam for the administrative analyst. I placed number two out of three candidates. I am here tonight to express that I have concerns about how this list will
also be handled. Too often, interviews are used opportunities and tools to punish employees and not highlight the merit. These tools are used to displace deserving employees from promotions. Civil service exists to ensure fairness and merit based advancement. This is the very purpose that these examples and why we are required to take and pass these tests. I want to share that I am already I have already contacted civil service,
the certification department, and we do have three positions available. One in the business office, one in division a, and one in division, b. The openings are ready for three candidates. This issue does not really have to become a problem. There are solutions. So what I am really asking right now is transparency is important to me, and I always try to do what's right. I don't care what anybody says. I am an ally, and I'm committed to do what's right each and every time.
I'm willing to stand up. But the question I have for you all tonight is I want to leave you with this thought. When fairness is within reach for all of you, when solutions are this clear. The real question is not can we do the right thing is are you willing to do the right thing? Thank you. Thank you. Sabrina Harrell. Good evening. I hope everyone is having a very wonderful evening. I wow.
I actually came this evening to speak on, the special ed department. And yes, you know, that is, the subject matter. And after, you know, listening to, the audit report that was presented this evening, it is truly, truly, truly concerning. There is a couple of questions that I would like to address to, the board trustees directly. Because if you recall, the years that I've come up here, I would say you all are elected officials, and you have an obligation and responsibility as elected officials
to be accountable and be transparent, to the public. And one of my concerns that I have for you all is you all vote on these items, and I always said that you have to be careful on what you're voting on. And my concern is listening to that audit and remembering some of the history of some of the meetings, how many of these items did you all vote on? How many of you had yes votes on these items? Because it can ultimately come back and be a problem for each and every one
of you who were here prior to 2025. So I think, solutions wise, I I I was glad to hear that, there are going to be solutions and SOPs and the same old thing that we've been hearing for years and years and years that that need to be put in place that still hasn't really been implemented. However, it is crucial because hundreds of thousands to almost millions of dollars are being funneled through that special education department. And when we have an auditor come up here and say numbers like $900,000,
there's invoice the invoice is not reflecting accurate information for a $900,000 invoice. That is very troubling because we do have QPAs. We have a a purchasing department. There's supposed to be prop, proper policies and procedures in place because by state law, if you are purchasing agent and you're and you're producing and you're handling purchase orders and invoice Because there's laws, period, that you have to abide by before you could deal with internal. So what are we doing here?
And the accountability, I always say it starts from the top. The top sets the tone, and unfortunately for doctor Fernandez, you're in that seat right now, so you're having to deal with the brunt of all of this. So, yeah, things happened. There's there's always history, but then Thank you very much. Cheryl Mays. Yes. I see Jim Nelson. Good evening. I just want to address subjects that were brought to the board member's attention last month, and I understand it's futile and should never rectify anything. Recommendations.
Principles don't make recommendations. They make requests, and the HR director, whomever that is, will post a position on AppleTrack to be filled. But it should be done in a way that doesn't violate contrast. That's the process, period. Let's not play with one another. And we're holding the board limits accountable because every time you vote to pass these violations that breach contracts and violate people's rights, you condone this behavior. So, of course, they're going they're not going to stop. A woman came here two months in a row and requested that her rights under
the contract are honored, and she was very respectful. But that did not mean but that meant nothing because the board voted to pass the violation in spite of her attitude in the contract. But I will encourage her to go to the EEOC because her rights as a protected person may have been violated as well. And in addition to naming district school officials district and the school level admin I'm sorry. And in addition to naming district and school level administrators in her in her complaint, she will include board trustees according to how you voted.
Hard to believe the district recently settled 14 lawsuits, but there was no particular let's discuss about that one. All this has to be the epitome of gluttony for punishment, and then you have zero respect for taxpayers. Now I just have one question. When you did the budget, was 15.5 added in for the salaries as per February MOA? Because if it was, then the budget was padded. Plain and simple. My salary, if it is not corrected for the life of this contract, you would have cheated me out of $10,000,
which means you cheated my bloodline too. So I'm a fight tooth and nail for that money. Understand I'm coming for my money. Now board members, when people vote for you, they vote for you to sit in them chairs with the hopes that you do the right thing, with the hopes that you vote from your conscience and your heart. Not that you abstain because to me, honestly, and I mean no disrespect, abstaining is a coward move. So we don't vote for you to go in the corner and cower like a little mouse. We vote for you to stand up for the right thing. My god. Stand up for the right thing. You will have a blessed night. Peace. Jim Nelson. Let me see if you can write.
Lorenzo Richardson. Good evening. There are some things that I that came to my mind this evening, but I I think I'm gonna have to say them because, it's the truth. So fact, doctor Fernandez has been running the district since 2019 under mister Walker. Under mister Walker. So passing the buck on anything at this juncture is not appropriate. The board president, those things that we heard tonight, the board president have to sign off on all of those special education contracts.
Why isn't the board president at the time being questioned? And why was Trustee Ioffe walking in at 08:19 coming in from a political event and not at this board meeting? You do not have a cost estimate. The guy was up here half hour, almost an hour. No cost estimate of how much money was misappropriated, overspent, or other. Who is responsible for the people who operated outside of those standard procedures? What are you going to do to hold the people responsible who did not go
for the gold or even the copper or tinfoil for as far as I can see? During this time frame is when the president, vice president, superintendent, and president of the JCEA was focusing on removing board members who were holding the district accountable when this stuff came out with that audit. 2023, Go back to the meeting. And let's not forget that a special education audit was prevented in 2019 after we did a comprehensive operations efficiency audit of the district.
And when you look at this time frame as well, trustee Ioffe was the finance chair during this period in question. Does she have anything to say? Have a good night. That concludes the list that I have for speakers this evening. Thank you very much, and thank you to all the speakers. And now we have an opportunity. Let's take this into consideration, team. It's twenty to ten. I I I think we all need to, if we have to speak, speak what we may. However, let's be, be, cognizant of the time.
Thank you. Anyone? What did you Yes. I just wanted to be general in my statement. Sure. So as far as the special education goes, as parents' concerns, we do have parent, special education meeting coming up, and I would like for that to be extremely publicized so that parents can be aware and and attend that meeting for the, special education meeting that's coming up that has been put together after parents came, last month to make a statement about that. So if we could just make sure that is very publicized on the district website
even with flyers in the schools or however it needs to be done so that they can come in and and voice their concerns aside from here at the meeting because it's more of an intimate, conversation that they can have. As far as, the complaints of old wages, there are many outside entities that are in place for those specific reasons, and the board can't move on. Like, we can't go into and do investigations. We're not investigators. Those outside entities are Department of Labor.
If you have a issue with wages, they should use those resources, come back with the information, give it to the district, let it be moved on by that. And then if it's not, then you come to the board. Thank you. Anyone else? Are you sure, miss Iofe, you don't wanna answer? I just wanna point out that I was not on the board in 2019 when the special audit presumably was thwarted. But he was. I yes. Okay. But he was. Thank you. I just have a question. Maybe and maybe our attorney can, regarding the, contract, information that was provided by, some of the public speakers,
Would should we talk about that in closed session, or is it okay to talk about it now? If we're talking about contract negotiations Not particularly naming anybody by date, but just a generalized question. Yeah. Can I hear the question, and then I'll let you know if it's not? So I just have a question, for doctor Fernandez, and I know you have an answer for it. If a contract or if a policy is in place and it has, specific, wording in it, is there a way so that we can make sure that the employees as well
as the, administration, Is there a way that we can possibly translate that? So or or break it down so it's a better understanding of what it is? Because we have the public saying, employees saying one thing about, contracts, and then we have, the administration saying another thing, about the writing of, of it, meaning of what it means. Certain people are saying that they're owed certain wages, because of, issues that, are pertaining to language. The administration is saying that we are holding our stance because the language says x, y, and z. Is there some type of equal meaning where we can have an understanding about
Alright. I can answer that for the district. Okay. If that's okay. So really, that would be for them if they have an issue with how the contract is being distributed and fine to handle that with their union represent representative. And if there's an issue with how the the district is handling something, then they would file a grievance and pursue that through the channels, which would be PERC and going through the contract. But the admit doctor Fernandez and anyone in the administration, it wouldn't be appropriate for them to go and start speaking directly about the contract. That should come from the union.
Yeah. That that that's why I just I wanna make sure we're clear on that. So as it pertains to some of the complaints regarding, the wording of the contract, and and how the administration understands it opposed to how the public understands it. But in the mid in the in in the middle, there's a complaint of loss of wages, and then the district can send that they don't owe. And then they're saying that the board trustees are responsible for making sure that x y z is paid, but we're being advised by attorneys and administration that this is one way when they're
saying the other. And then they're coming to the public mic saying that we're not doing our job when in all actuality in closed session, we are asking these questions and we're being told that the language is x y and z. And we're being told that the language is x, y, and z, but then they're not understanding it to mean that. Yeah. And I would recommend if they have it, they should file a grievance, and there's a there's a mediator and a neutral who would decide that. That's not for the board member to then weigh in on for in in this setting. That wouldn't be appropriate. I just wanted to wanted to put that on the record because I wanted, the public who, is coming up to speak about this to understand that when we go to closed
session, we ask these questions, we're given certain answers, and we can't speak about it because it is a personnel issue. So we can't publicly speak about it. So at the end of the day, you know, I understand, that you're furious about it, but there are different, like trustee Mohammed said, there are different avenues that you can go to make sure, that this has happened. We we have heard you, which is why we instituted the investigation, that's gonna be taking place. So we're gonna get to the bottom of everything, whether it's in favor of you or in favor of administration. We're gonna find out exactly what's going on.
There are methods in which we are allowed to do, to get the answers to these questions. As it pertains to, some of the comments, related to, the special education, issues. Listen. We ask questions. We have committee meetings. We're given answers, and we are not allowed the trustee is not allowed to admit we're not allowed to administrate. If we if we find out I can't go into the BA's office, or I can't go into the special education department and say, hey. You have to do x, y, and z. You have to realize that there are policies and procedures in place where trustees are
not allowed to do that. Then we'll have the administration trying to hold us accountable with ethics charges if we did that. There are policy and procedures in which we have to follow, and we're doing that through our attorneys, and we're making sure of that. So to come to the mic and say, hey. You know, you're obligated to do this. We're bringing awareness to it. If you guys were, you know, listening to some of our meetings that we have, we've recommended investigations. Trustee Tisdale has recommended certain investigations, and we're actually going to conduct an investigation in one of in one of the departments to get clarity on exactly what's taking place.
So we're just asking for a little bit of patience until we can get the findings of that investigation. Anyone else? Anyone else? Okay. Doctor Fernandez? No. Thank you, madam president. Oh, okay. So you don't have any questions? No. I have no motion. Oh, okay. Motion. And oh, the the student. Second? Oh. I'm sorry. You don't have any okay. She also doesn't have any comments for today. Thank you. And motion to adjourn second. All in are you gonna call Ro? So I need to please do my thing. Pursuant to the open public public meetings act NJSA 10 colon four dash 12,
the Jersey City Board of Education will now be going into closed session for the purpose of discussing matters where confidentiality is essential. In particular, one or more of the following to protect the confidentiality of individual privacy rights or a matter involving a lease or acquisition of property or pending or anticipated litigation. The matters discussed in this closed session can be made public at the time that the need for confidentiality no longer exists. It is now 09:50. Yeah. How long? So we should be back. Oh, lord. Okay.
11:11 fifteen, no later than 11:15. Hopefully, we can, do everything before within that time. All in favor Aye. Going into closed session? Yes. Okay. Trustee Blunt? Here. Trustee Ioffe? Trustee Morris? Present. Trustee Rizabella? Here. Trustee Schneider? Here. Vice president Tisdale? I'm here. President Velasquez? Here. We have a quorum. Thank you. Okay. So we made it back in time. That's great. Okay. We're going to start our,
voting. Number seven, adoption of minutes, seven point o one. Motion. Motion? Second. Second. Any discussion on that? Colorado. Trustee Reza Bella? Seven. 7.4. Yes. Trustee Schneider? Yes. Trustee Mohammed? Yes. Trustee Belant? Yes. Trustee Ioffe? Yes. Trustee Morris? Yes. Vice president Tisdale? Yes. President Velasquez? Yes. Motion passed. Thank you. Eight eight zero 8.01 to 8.21
motion. Motion. Second. Question? Discussion? Call the roll, please. Trustee Morris? Yes. Trustee Schneider? Yes. Trust yes. Trustee Blunt? Yes. Trustee Ioffe? Oh, she stepped out. She'll do it. Oh, she stepped out. Trustee Mohammed? Yes. Vice president Tisdale? Yes. President Velasquez? Yes. Motion passed. Although we didn't hear, anything in the report today. Yes. Oh, I was supposed to laugh. Yes. You were. Anyway, the nines, special ed, 9.01 to 9.03.
Motion. Second. Discussion. Call the vote, please. Mhmm. Trustee Blank? Yes. Trustee Ioffe? Trustee Morris? Yes. Trustee Mohammed? Yes. Trustee Isabella? No. Wait. What was that for? 9. 9. 9. Special ed. Okay? Okay. I'm good. Okay. Trustee Schneider? Yes on 901. No on 90203. No on 03? Yes. No on 902 and 903. Okay. Vice president Tisdale? No. And president Velasquez? Yes. Motion passed. Number 10,
finance, 10.01 to 10.13. Motion. Motion. Second. Call the vote, please. Trustee Schneider? Yes and all. Trustee Patel? Yes. Trustee Morris? Yes and all. Trustee Mohammed? Yes. Trustee Ioffe? Yes. Trustee Visabella? Yes To, 10.01 to 10.12 and then no on 10.13. Trustee Blank? Yes. Vice president Tisdale? I'm abstaining on 10:03 and ten o four. I'm voting no to ten thirteen.
And president Velez Oh, yeah. And then I can say yes to the rest. Okay. Okay. President Velasquez. Yes to all. 11 facilities, that's 11 o one to 11 o five. Motion. Motion. Second. Second. Discussion. Call the vote. Trustee Visabella? Yes. Trustee Ioffe? Yes. Trustee Schneider? Yes. Trustee Mohammed? Yes. Trustee Patel? Yes. Trustee Blunt? Yes. Trustee Morris? Yes. Uh-huh. Vice president Tisdale? Yes. Yes. Motion passed.
Thank you. 12 personnel, 12.01 to 12.14. Motion? Yes. Motion. I have second. Second. Discussion. Call the vote, please. Trustee Mohammed. Yes. Trustee Ioffe. Yes. Trustee Isabella. I'm sorry. I'm trying to find out which ones I'm saying no on. We can come back to you. Oh, thank you. I appreciate it. Trustee Blunt? Yes. Trustee Patel? Yes. Trustee Morris? No on 12:05. No on 12:11. Yes on the rest. Trustee Schneider?
So bear with me. +1, yes. +1, yes. +1, yes. +1, yes. +1, yes. +1, yes on +1 2061, abstain on +1 2062, yes on +1, yes on 12 yes on +1. I'm gonna say no on +1. I'm sorry. Epstein on which one? I'm sorry. Epstein on +1 20602. Point 2. Okay. So, +1, I'm gonna say no on,
maintenance, +1, and, +1 21112, and then, yes on the rest. And then, promotions, no on all 12/2012. That'd be no. Mhmm. And then +1 and +1 are yes. Did you get that? Yeah. I got it. Vice president is there. +1 201 through +1 204. Yes. Okay. No to +1 205 and 6. Okay. No to +1 208. No +1 211 and 12. Mhmm. Yes to 7. Mhmm. Yes to 9. Yes to 13.
Yes to 14. Okay. Okay. Doctor Isabella, are you ready? Yes. What what doctor, Tissell said as well. What happened? To make it easier. Alrighty. I need to I need to go go no on 12:01 as well. 12:01? Yeah. I mean, which which one was the maintenance one? One? Which one's the maintenance one that I didn't want? +1 21212. Yeah. That one. +1 212. +1 212. I was +1 211. +1 211. +1 211? +1 211. Mhmm. He said 12 he said no 11211. He did the one thing. It's one of the things Right. Okay. Trustee,
Did you I'm just I told her it would be easier to follow doc I'll vote the same way doctor Tisdale did in order to keep You're gonna do what? I'm sorry. I'm gonna do exactly what doctor Tisdale did in order well, trustee Tisdale did in order to make it easier. Okay. But for the record, I think we should hear it. Okay. Thank you. So let's go through it. I know. Yes to +1 201. No. I respect yes to 12, 001. Yes to +1. Yes to +1. Mhmm. Yes to +1. No to +1.
Mhmm. No to 12 +1 20602. Yes to +1. There's nothing at +1 207. Uh-huh. So that's a yes. +1? +1. There's nothing there. Oh, okay. Oh, okay. No to +1. Yes to +1. Yes to +1. No to +1. No to +1. Yes to +1. Yes to +1.
Okay. President Velasquez? Okay. +1. There's no submission Right. As well as, +1. 13. Okay. Yes and all. Okay. Thank you for pointing it out. +1, 234. Thank you. Okay. Illegal Motion passed. Yeah. Motion passed. Okay. Legal? Motion. Second. 13 o one to 13 o three. Discussion. Please call the vote. Trustee Ioffe? Yes. Trustee Schneider? Yes. Trustee Isabella? Discuss this. The first party.
Trustee Isabella? She's she's good. I'm sorry. No to 13. No to +1, yes to +1 302-1303. Okay. Trustee Mohammed? Yes. Trustee Patel? Yes. Trustee Blunt? Yes. Trustee Morris? Yes. Vice president Tisdale? Yes. President Velasquez? Yes. And all. Motion passed. Okay. Policy fourteen, fourteen point o one. Motion. Motion. Second. Second. Discussion. Call the vote, please. Trustee No. Trustee Trustee Trustee Trustee Trustee Trustee Trustee Ioffee?
Yes. Trustee Morris? This is for the, second meeting? Yes. It is. No. Okay. Thank you. Trustee Patel? Trustee Schneider. Yes. Vice President Tisdale. No. President Velasquez. Yes. I changed my vote now. Oh, let's Yeah. He's changing his boat? No. Still doesn't pass. It still passes. Fifth. Yes. See y'all next week, next month. Next month. Okay. I'm sorry. And, Matt? Where are we? 15 hold on. Hold on, please. I'm sorry. Motion. Yes. Second. Second? Yes. Discussion? Okay. Call the vote,
please. Trustee Mohammed? Yes. Trustee Patel? Yes. Trustee Schneider? Yes. Trustee Blunt? Yes. Trustee Morris? Yes. Trustee Rosabella? Yes. Sixteen one. Yes. Vice president Tisdale? Yes. President Velasquez? Yes. Motion passed. Okay. We don't do the sixteens. However, if there is any discussion on anything right now, I know are we okay? Then I will take motion for to adjourn. No. Motion. Second. All in favor? Aye. Abstain?
No. Meeting is closed. Thank you.