Mr Pama here Mr Petrino here Mr rort here Mrs Smith here miss zuer here Mr do here Dr M here Mr briser here M pel
here America meeting law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend meetings for public bodies at which any business affecting their interests is discussed or acted upon in accordance with the provision of the ACT mon Township Board of provided a public notice of this
meeting which included the time date and location that was posted at the mville Township Municipal Building all Mel Public Schools the mill Public Library The Mill Township Board of Education administrative office building the district website and advertised in the
Daily Record and the monville tap into the board's official newspapers on February 7th 2025 High School hello everyone uh I hope everyone is nice has been going well so as normal we're going to start off with the uh
past for the school and uh we're going to start off with the sports so the vary boys basketball team has a record of 18 and five they have two more regular season games left to play before they go to uh States the varsity girls basketball team now has a record of 9
and 14 with one game left to go for their season The Varsity wrestling team has a final record of 20-6 and lastly the boys swim team went 5 and8 throughout the season while the girls stent team went 1 and 12 on to the
school related subjects the make a wish Club hosted a fundraiser night at Columbia Inn on Wednesday February 12th from 5:00 to 8:00 p.m. all of the proceeds from this night went to the Make A Wish Foundation for all the seniors the local scholarships have been uploaded to
schooly for them to take a look at and start filling out the class of 2027 has held a fundraiser for candy grams for Valentine's Day students got to got to choose and send friends the uh little bags of candy with not and also could
remain anonymous now we're going to move on to pres so recently Mel forensics attended the Liberty Bell classic at the University of Pennsylvania there were many winners in both speech and the datat in Duo interpretation monia mad
and AA Joi won first place in novice Lincoln Douglas debate St Buell made it to the quarterfinals Sophia esal made it to the quarterfinals in O Vivian Way made it to the semifinals for humorous interpretation for novice public forum
Tyler Zen and Vidant Aurora made it to double Opa finals and for Varsity public forum Amy Zen Jenny Wang sesar trinas and R Shem sudin also made it to double OA finals the team is currently
competing in a tournament on at Harvard University for the future on March 7th mths will be hosting a college fair which will be an exciting opportunity for students to explore opportunities for their future that's all we have for today thank
you about big fish come on give us got Musical that you got a musical coming up come on plug it we don't have that in the um thing I believe said it last time I don't really
remember what the dates were for that one um okay so Mark 6 to 9th yeah 6 to 9th MTX MTS theater company will perform his big fish okay tickets are I believe they
15 15 for adults and 12 for seniors and students 18 and 15 at the door and the reason I mentioned is because last week I went to the C committee meeting and I encouraged the town to come to because again all the Productions at the high
school are fantastic I encourage people to come to them they really are very good and excellent quality I heard people talk okay uh yes so we're going to go right into the presentations so we have a lot of special guests here so I'm going to ask William Mason to come on up
here the court Mr you want to talk to us there a mic right there if you want to grave and just introduce what you're doing here [Applause] good evening and uh thank you for having us this evening uh my name is Brandon fromal I am to teach Orchestra chorus
and general music at William ason Elementary School um select students and I have prepared a song in honor of Black History Month FAS uh I talked to my students about the importance of some of the music in our lives and asked if one of them would
write an introduction so I would like to introduce C to read our introduction for tonight dear ladies and gentlemen my name is Tiani and today I want to share the importance of an amazing song called
we shall overcome this song is not just a Melody it holds a message of Hope and unity which is very important for our students to learn we shall overcome got popular during the Civil Rights Movement when African-Americans were fighting for
equal rights and equality as a whole they sang this song to show they believed in a better future even when things were really tough it became a way for people to work together into support each other the lyrics We Shall Overcome show us that we can solve any challenges
if we stick together and work as a team This song reminds us that we should always stand up for what is right and hope others in need just like in our school when we see someone being treated unfairly we can be an upstander and speak up as me and my fellow peers
perform this song I hope you feel inspired to be the best version of yourself and try to get through any obstacles you may face thank you for your time [Music]
We Shall Overcome we shall over we shall over [Music] Som oh deep in my
heart I do we we shall over [Music] Som somay we shall overc shall live in
peace we shall live in peace we shall live in [Music] peace all
deep in my heart deep in my heart I to believe I believe that we shall [Music] open we walk
in in hand will hand in hand in we'll walk in hand [Music] to oh deep in my
heart I do believe we shall overcome [Music] we shall long [Music]
[Applause] so wonderful thank you so much for that production right there and it just shows you the quality that we have here at the elementary level and then we just talk about big fish with the Productions that
do at the high school level this is what leads up to this provides the foundation for our students and they do wonderful productions for people that just came for that uh show you're you're allowed to leave you know I'm saying appreciate it we we love your support though
does it look like all the time like this way everybody leaves good evening I'm thrilled to be here once again to present our shop right stars for the second Market period of the 2024 2025 school year tonight Stars members five different categories and
the winners were selected by administrative Committee in addition to the recognition of these wonderful students sumarized shop R generous $1,000 in the class5 please join me in congratulating each of us Stars even in the field of academics congratulations to Julia
Des Julia was described by staff as a curious learner someone who truly values gathering information in order to gain a better understanding of the world around her as Julia gained more knowledge she grew more confident forward to the challenges of advanced level courses in particular for example Julia took three
honors level classes during her nth and 10th grade school year uh then three AP classes in 11th grade by her senior year this year Julia was taking a fully rigorous course C of four AP classes in addition to an advanced French class American sign language which is only
offered for the first time this year it is exceedingly rare for a student to take courses in two different languages over the course of their entire High School career let alone a single year but this example Julia's passion for and dedication to learning in her classes
Julia asks questions often and spends a lot of time uh attending extra help sessions occasionally just to enjoy the additional dialogue with your teacher about the topic of Interest Julia also serves regularly as a resource for her classmates and takes time to ensure that those around her at the same level
comprehension that she does Julia has proudly maintained a 4.2 plus GPA is the recipient of a prestigious AP scholar award and was inducted into the French Aral Society Julie is also a very talented artist her paintings titled self-portrait in sunlight was exhibited
in the fresh prospective installation of The Morris Museum only recently in the fall Julia will attend TCNJ and major in biology again [Applause]
congratulations in the field of Athletics congratulations Tamina unit [Applause] Mia is one of the captains on our girls volleyball team and the key reason that
the team has Jo enjoyed so much success over the course of the past four years for example the team won the state sectional Championship during rea's sophomore and Junior years they were the Morris County tournament winners during her sophomore and Senior years and earned a conference title in her sophomore year individual has
demonstrated tremendous growth as evidence by the fact that she earned second Team all in Jack All Conference last year and was first team all conference this year L's personal career stats include 103 kills 63 BLX 243 digs
915 assists and 100 Aces additionally NJ Power Rankings identified Lena as first team All State and because of her 446 assists in group two Play N Jack identified her as the 10th best Setter in the entire State as impressive as
these statistics are l even more respected by peers and staff because of her kindness leadership ability and dedication to academics specifically factoring in all first semester grades lenina has maintained a 4.3 plus GPA scored above three on three AP exams
last year and was an AP scholar andw winner in 2024 in the fall Lena will attend the physician assistant program at se Hall University again congratulations in the field of the Arts congratulations of Jules Za Joya because of an unmatched dedication
and passion for music and the Arts Jules joined uh as many musical ensembles as time would allow including the marching band symphonic band chamber choir flute choir percussion Ensemble and many smaller groups among friends in several
of these groups Jules was assigned to leadership rules such as woodwi Captain or Secretary of the tri and uh music Honor Society at the end of her sophomore year jwes auditioned for a prestigious program called the county Pathways project that is based at Montclair State University which is
available for students who aspire to go into musical studies after being accepted jwes took and still takes weekly flute lessons at Monclair and this past spring uh performed in a concert at the MTZ Recital Hall as a soloist along with auditioning for this Jules
was awarded the underclassman awards for English language arts and Performing Arts in sophomore year and receiv received both of those Awards again in junior year in addition to a foreign language award uh and also an award for participation in the Muse where she serves currently as the editor despite
the time constraints and commitments dedicated to musics Jules has been able to maintain a 4.2 plus GPA throughout her High School career and challenged herself with an increasingly rigorous course culminating in AP classes this year jwes is still applying to colleges
and recently audition to attend Montclair State University to pursue a major in career music education I know your audition was recent um again congratulations in the field of community service congratulations to world down
here lauro is a dedicated selfish and compassionate leader who has made a significant impact on our community through her extensive involvement in a number of service initiatives much of Mor's community service exper experience stems from her passionate involvement with her local church St Pas she is
described as the heart and soul of the youth ministry serving as an office assistant teacher and also member of the youth leadership team worldl organizes Community Service events at St Pas including spending one week each summer in Appalachia serving those in Need by helping to repair their homes and also
creating a Giving Tree to help sort gifts to children who fer care during the holiday season in addition to community service Lao is also a member of the Key Club and the field hockey team and also keeps stats for the basketball team impressively Laura is able to manage all of this while also
working two part-time jobs and maintaining a rigorous schedule including taking an AP course for the very first time in her High School Community world's ability to balance her commitments while also making a positive impact on our community is a testament to her character and dedication world still applying to colleges with plans to
major in political science on a pre-law track again [Applause] congratulations okay in the field of leadership congratulations to sippi Ohan
[Applause] cpio is one of the most brilliant and academically accomplished students that we've had at mfil over the course of the past decade in addition to being an exceptionally talented student however CIO is also true leader in and out of
the classroom in extracurricular cpio is a leader of the science olpad and has overseen its recent Resurgence uh in addition to serving as a guide and role model and mention to students in the club for example um the club uh just earned Place uh the the the
U the team just earned fifth place in in the region in the wind power event cpio also spends time tutoring peers as the treasur treasurer of the National Honor Society and helps organize events for students as the treasurer of the Spanish H Society since freshman year CIO has
also served uh in student government and it's the treasurer of the class of 2025 helping to ensure that the various events that we have for seniors including bank and prom are organized and affordable another way that cpio has been able to to demonstrate his leadership skills is through Tab and
also the Lunar New Year celebration which would not have run as efficiently without it it should be noted that cio's leadership of our celebration of the Chinese New Year occurred without him even being a member of or a student of our mentoring program he simply enjoys
teaching others about the importance of inclusivity of all backgrounds and celebrating diverse cultures lastly sepia was named the section leader for violin 2 last year chamber orchestra and occasionally conducts in Orchestra class sepio is still applying to many top colleges but plans to pursue a major in
mathematics in the fall again congratulations cpio and to all of our shoppr stars second look at me parents will have a second after me look at me love okay parents you can take your
picture I got congratulations congratulations congratulations girls congratulations congratulations congratul congratulations good evening
Dr check two here we go I have to turn some pages so I'll just Dr members Board of Education I'm in Flight supervis arur mon to Public Schools uh the New Jersey Department of Education identifies five subject areas
of the Arts these are music visual the dance and V arts in 2020 20 in 2021 the new New Jersey Department of Education conducted a visual performing art survey of every District that survey asked does your District have a comprehensive Arts education plan while our school district
and board by annual goals there is no specific written plan for the Performing Arts to address this I formed the district Arts education program evaluation committee a second and equally important reason that iook this is that it's valuable from time to time to conduct overview of our program to
identify strengths challenges and recommendations forward uh by the way for purposes of the audience here a full report has been provided to the board this is essentially a slideshow which summarizes all that so the purposes and goals I just mentioned we we committee broke
this review down to five topics of Investigation review of our current program analysis of program District data survey of parents and students collecting and analyzing that survey enrollment and demographic data and finally committee
recommendations for purposes of a quick overview of our current program description at the elementary level we have General music Five band and Orchestra Garden grade four and five and we have plays at least at one of our elementary schools and occasionally some other elementary schools to some plays
in the springtime as well as well at Lazar we have curricular classes that meet every day of band Orchestra and choir as well as a grade six music exploration class and a robust theater club that vs on a fall play and spring Musical and Broadway
nights at mths C we have band Orchestra choir music theory AP music theory music technology and also a very robust theater Club that's in the process as Dr Mo mentioned of putting on our screen musical fall play and other nights as
well the first thing we did was we dug into Data available to us in Genesis the committee looked at uh a seven-year look from 1819 to the current school year in elected such as the Arts it's Finly important to track how we're doing uh we wanted to count for the variable of
covid so we looked at pre-co years Co years and uh postco years uh we were happy to see that enrollment grades 4 and five band orch increased from 57% in 1819 is up to almost 70% uh this school year enrolling in the middle school and
all music courses has increased from 40% in 1819 to 53% in 2425 school year and these are percentages of the total student body so for example at Lazar over half the students at Lazar are involved in woman arts program en roll the high school increased from about 19%
in 1819 to 21% in the 24 25 school year we then wanted to look into see who's in our program the committee then sought to dig into the enrollment numbers further and ask the question are we reaching all of our students the data in Genesis was studied
determine what percentage of students in Performing Arts belong to various demographic groups such as special education free and reduced lunch Hispanic African-American and Asian students and that's all in the full report but I'm going to try to summarize a lot of that data which is a lot uh
here right now some of our key takeaways are we saw that about 12% of all special education students at mths and 20% 7% of all special education students at Lazar participate in Performing Arts % of all free and reduced lunch students at the
high school and 42% of all free and reduced lunch students at LSR participate in the Performing Arts the complete report includes data for Hispanic African-American and Asian students as well we also uh dug in into a little bit of uh Ms or what we used to
call ESL students but a lot of that data was um tough to find actually uh some of is because the designations have changed over the years so we need to do a little more investigation into that ultimately I would say that the data supported there's a diverse group of students in the forming arts program there are a
number of variables that could affect percentage of students in these groups participating therefore the committee shares the data it has and recommends that we this REM might require some further investigation so after we looked at all that data which is included in the full report we then felt it was very very
important to survey parents and students obtaining parent student input is vital to the validity of any program evaluation a survey was put out to parents and students questions were asked about attitudes and Bel Poli quality of instruction course offerings and Facilities again the complete report
is in on pages 16 to 22 of the full survey also there's a full appendix and sorry the full report uh there's an appendix of both the complete parent survey and a complete student survey but for purpos of the presentation tonight I'm going to summarize this
quickly happily we saw that we asked parents about how they felt about their child's participation in Performing Arts a lot of which we saw tonight 80 to 90% of Elementary Middle School and High School parents felt that their were child's participation in coing arts improves their General wellbeing 60 to
7% felt their participates in po Arts improves their child's performance in other acend classes are we being culturally inclusive 40 to 50% of all respondents parents at the elementary middle school and high school level felt that mtps Performing Arts stries to be
cultur inclusive we then asked about theater and dance while we these are part of a co-curricular we don't have curricular classes in these 50 1% of high school and 56% of Middle School respondents voice interest in a curricular theater class 40% voice interest in a curricular dance class
finally we asked about facilities numerous open-ended responses voices desire for improved performance spaces at thear in the high school those were from the parents and we wanted to see what the students thought often times in our administrative and teacher conversations
we all to talk about obviously what's best for our students but we want to hear directly from the students and we found was interesting soon to parents students felt that the participation in Performing Arts improves their General well-being and academic performance 42% of all our grade six years fell students stated that participation in Performing
Arts is very important in their lives 55% felt it was at least somewhat important in their lives we ask them to agree with the statement or disagree Montville school's Performing Arts strives to include all cultures 40% of our students agree with the statement 42 strongly agreed 37% of ofar high school
students express interest in curricular theater class 25 expressed interest in a curricular dance class and 16% expressed interest in a co-curricular dance club and also uh students as well expressed uh open-ended numerous open-ended
responses which I'm reading the forward report a desire for improved performance space at Lazar in the high school like for example interesting enough a lot of students commented all of our Lazar Concepts here at the high school which we're happy to have have occur on the nice big stage here at high school but a
lot of students would ask these honest questions like why come we can't perform at our Middle School why do we have to go to the high school and of course we know why because the theater's here but it's just interesting that they voice some of these opinions so after doing all the survey
we know that we've are the proofs in the pudding we've had a lot of success in our Performing Arts programs um this year we had one student M high school region band we have eight high school students admitted to high school region choir four of those students placed first or second resp respective
voice part it's not a competition like sports but they get scored and four the students who are like the top scores in their respective voice parts we had 12 Lazar vocal students admitted to intermediate region choir uh we as as we all know we have numerous successful plays in music schools that are well
received by the community and we've been named uh National Association for music merchandisers best community for music education 9 years in a row so having looked at all that data uh the committee then finally wanted to make some recommendations the recommendations from the committee are that in terms of
enrollment to maintain or increase Staffing at the elementary level due to increase class sizes we looked at the middle school some sections of middle school music exceed 50 students per period exploring staff options or increasing staff three class licenses there another thing the committee
recommended is at the middle school we have a a we have a full-time ban orch choir teacher we have a second band teacher who rotates over from Cedar Hill to help out with lessons we don't have that in band and we assly don't have an orchestra so it's a little bit of an echy there and we would like to address
that finally to address the uh feedback we got from the parent student survey as far as facilities go explore ways to if possible expand lar gym stage um numerous student survey responses regarding need for better performance in classroom space and finally a
recommendation to renovate the Mt Stafford theater the last section of recommendations to do with curricular uh we looked at setting a target a goal of 20 to 25% of uh the total student population the high school uh survey
responses did indicate interest for a dance or theater class program we explore the possibility of creating that and uh lastly in the parent survey uh 80% of respondents felt that the cost of renting insance was not a barrier however that means 20% feels it could be
a barer that's two out of 10 families so we can explore ways to maybe address that with a inventory of school owned instruments so what does this all mean the foreign arts program evaluation served to study the current program and make recommendations for the future and examining the Roma data and student
heent surveys glaring deficiencies did not become apparent which is good the survey indicated that the poring arts program is in general moving in the right direction but for historical perspective it's important to know that during the 2012 13th school year a report on District news adults was conducted the goal of that report was to
understand why there was a large decline at that time in participation in the music program at the high school level to stand that decline many recommendations have been implemented and new initiatives and programs have been instituted however
the quality of any educational program can diminish without careful attention and advocacy therefore the ultimate recommendation of the committee is to continue to be intentional in maintaining the quality of the program this is accomplished by maintaining Staffing levels and hiring the most quity teachers maintaining and improving
classroom and performance facilities access to adequate inventory of instruments and continuing to remain Vigilant regarding populations that may be under represented or underserved this presentation I give you tonight is in essence a summary of the full report I urge all board members to read the full
report and contact me with any questions if do allow have little time for questions now but before we do I also want to acknowledge members of our committee who are here tonight um Mr step fit are General music and instrumental teacher at Hill cannot be here we have Mr Ken Coalition
instrumental band teacher at Lazar Jordan green choir teacher at Lazar Thomas Sone instrumental music teacher at Zer Hill and Lazar and Ellis J NOA High School um instrumental teacher theyes gentlemen I'm very proud of the work we did we met many times over the course of our two years to compile this
report are there any questions think knew that was coming right first of all I could have listened to another half hour of this so um yeah thank you for all you did thank you for everybody who worked on the committee as well and I just you know want to just have a couple of comments I talked about
increasing the Staffing of both Lazar and yeah had the middle SCH band and Orchestra and I I just think it's absolutely essential to have at least full two full-time band directors of Lazard considering these size of that program and we having what 94 kids in
the sixth grade band at Lazar um and also whatever needs to be done to have you know small group instruction and Orchestra Lazar too because I understand right now they're just kind of doing on a voluntary basis so um I cly agree with
that um talk about the facilities that lar with the aor I I don't know if I'm being a Debbie down here here or not I'd love to see a nice Department Lazar as much as anybody but I think you've got a bigger priority than the auditorium the
performance BAS and that's the rehearsal space I mean I think especially if we're going to put more money into an auditorium at the high school which I think is in the referendum I mean right now I'm not sure the size of the music rooms at laar is sufficient to
how we have I'd like I'd like to take that money for the tour and see and just put a wrecking Bolt the sides of those rooms and the side of those AR just put those rooms out 20 feet so we could have I mean it would accomplish a couple things we wouldn't have to split the class is up so
much and maybe there'd be some room for some pull out instruction during class instead of having to have like two periods of sixth grade band and three periods of seventh and eth which to me is not an optimal thing I mean if coach Deon was here right now for the football team I'd like to ask him you know coach
how would you feel if we took a third of the kids practicing at 3 o'clock a third at four o'clock a third at five o'clock then just throw it all together on Friday night but um you obviously there's restrictions to what we have here um and the the last thing I want to say is as far
as um money spent I think with the amount of kids we have especially at thear there needs to be a major initiative toward improving and bringing more instruments into the schools I don't think what we have
is quite adequate especially I look at the balance we have 91 kids in the sixth grade band which is wonderful but you know when 84 of them play either flute B flat clarinet Alto saxone trumpet or drums it's not the balance you want I'd like to see a lot more opportunities for kids to Branch out with things like
double reads French horns low breasts and things like that but I'm really so proud of the program we have going on right now it's just absolutely insane to see a middle school that has over half the kids in band chorus or orchestra or
combination thereof and again next you're getting a big class at Lazar hopefully it's going to continue that way so really it's it's an embarrassment of riches and like David was telling about the um the high school High School Musical I certainly intend to see it I hope everyone else will too they're
always phenomenal we have some just absolutely phenomenal programs here and lazar's being a great feeder into the high school so again thanks for doing what you did I'm really interested to see how we go from here and uh just keep up the good work everyone
thank you Mr Brama you know I would like to Echo a lot of that um over the years I've been here in town and been on the board I've been truly impressed by not just the Performing Arts but the whole arts department that you've managed to put together you've done a wonderful job
there and I appreciate the report um as far as getting some of these recommendations implemented those are obviously discussions that Administration is going to have to take the lead on but um it you know I would also encourage more kids to participate
oh and also I just want to say I know it's not part of the performing arts program I don't think but the movement class you have in Lazar that is really a spectacular addition to the curriculum because it really helps the kids get out and
socialize when they go to the bar mitzvah B Mitzvah the sweet 16s I mean some of you haven't seen it yet but you can always tell them mville kids because they're the ones up having a great time time while all the other kids are off are off to the side so thank you for
that as well thank you Dr modra uh Mr Mr fman You know despite your successes and the fact that for ninth year in a row we're best community for music education you nevertheless wanted to make us
better by conducting the survey at risk to you uh so I commend you for that effort in in in it's in really feeling the passion to uh continue to improve our programming thank you I appreciate
that we we always want to strive to be better um of course I want to Echo the appreciation we have for the amazing program we have the amazing staff and how and how you lead it it really is um something that we're all very proud of and thank you to you and the committee for doing this I'd be interested because
I think you had a lot of interesting recommendations and as David said the um you know it has to when we're talking finances um I'd be interested in it was a big list have you thought of prioritizing that list amongst the committee like talking through the committee and really coming up with if
you had you know a wish list what you guys would priority prioritize after you've done that's an excellent helpful thing to do that's an excellent suggestion yeah we I think we've done it a little bit but again that that would require a little further looking at for sure and I'm sure there has to be some prioritizing because no one gets
whatever they want so I'm glad got to got a smile from Dr Gorman on that one okay I just like to thank the board for listen thing and again I thank my colleagues for being here and I thank you for your kind comments and I also want to say I'm very very proud of our staff uh here in monville they work very
hard for example Mr FAL who was here tonight he also happens to be our uh set construction adviser and he's building the set for the spring musical so we have a lot of talented folks here and I'm grateful they're here thank you for your time I appreciate it [Applause]
no yeah yes please so that no that's exactly good point you made I mean we have people from all different levels ele middle and high school and they all works very closely together you have great music teachers here you see them at the concerts you see them involved in the plays and uh this is just uh you
know confirming that what we knew uh and then parents are appreciating so we that's wonderful to see and we will be talking about how we can improve things in the future so thank you for that and thank you to the committee all right um that's it with that so now I have two reports to go uh yeah I got
yeah I'm sorry it's a report night so uh just real quick just an update on our district goals so District goal number one was uh to continue to implement enhance and evaluate ways to address mental health issues as necessary uh we did youth
Mental Health First Aid training and that was continued for all our staff there were 21 participants across all levels and positions we brought in David Deo who was a for a parent program about bias and Prejudice we held a district Hib meeting which is a harassment
intimidation and bullying uh in January and we talked about all the uh anti-bullying uh programming and things we want to do and best practices with that um we also have been continuing with our child study team members our counselors and and other staff members
to talk about mental health issues throughout the district most recently we just added Gaggle we put that out to the community last week and we've been implementing that since just the end of last week uh and uh to try and help us identify students that may be in need
District goal number two was to explore and evaluate Innovative learning programs for all students and uh at the elementary level we have teachers that are continuing to meet their monthly grade level peers to discuss uh in and implement the amplify system which is
our English language arts curricular program at the elementary level uh we have uh outside Consultants meeting with our special education teachers about the Amplified program to really work with them to have this implemented well we have elementary students that are
completing their c c second Benchmark uh of ass assessment for amplify uh so that information is coming in and now the administrators will be uh looking at that we have administrators and supervisors is meeting with the assistant superintendent to discuss and
improve our schedule for next year and many more things going on with our curriculum at those levels the Third District goal will continue to evaluate the Safety and Security Protocols of the district so again Gaggle was one of them because we do identify students that
could be self Haring by looking up uh certain websites and that those websites get red flagged and then we're able to uh intervene when appropriate we have monthly meetings that are occur with the police to discuss security for the district and we are going to be voting
on a new s which is a special law enforcement officer tonight for the elementary levels so if that approves we'll have one individual who's a retired police officer and he'll be going back and forth between the five schools and we're constantly working on
cyber security our technology department is doing a great job with that and constantly fighting all the different people that are trying to infiltrate our systems the last District goal is to look at our construction projects and our long range facility program and uh
we'll be talking about that tonight a little bit and uh that's part of our long range facility plan we'll be talking about that during our budget process but just some highlights we're upgrading the electrical fire system here at the high school the security vestule at Valley View was installed and
we're upgrading some of our univ ventilators at Lazar middle school just to hit to some of the highlights so a lot of progress in one quarter right there and that's my report for that any questions on the goals or anything okay uh your next report all
right so you're gonna have to slide over what Ed just did all right so this is just to give you a quick update of where we are with our Capital Improvements and the fac and the enrollment projections so uh and what happened to the
uh she's running because we're talking about Capital reserves all right so Capital reserves real quick that's the the money that's uh been put it's like a bank account so all the money that you know at the end of the year that was say leftover uh it goes into the capital reserves and we can only do this for
certain projects so it can't go to salaries it can't go to medical expenses and things like that can only go to the facilities buildings and other things that we have to do so just looking at some of the stuff that we started to do this year and completed roof roof Replacements in the High School uh HVAC
at Lazar uh Cedar Hill we did the new Park parking lot and the Landscaping there and the security VES Valley View and you can see the items that are there in the First Column the First Column shows that these items were not in the referendum so you had about $2.2 million
not in the referendum that came out of the capital reserves but there was also the HVAC which is the air conditioning ventilation and Heating units that was originally in the referendum um that uh would have received some more money from the state to help offset some of those
costs so so far this year we're about $4.7 million doar in trying to up trade and keep our facilities Uh current now in 2025 like so right now going into the summer so some of these projects are underway and will be
completed hopefully by the end of the summer but again as I just mentioned the high school with the electrical fire systems at the elementary and Lazar we have Replacements of doors and hardware hildale has a a facade that we're going to try and work on that was the one uh
school that was not uh redone over the past couple of years and received a face lift uh we have Landscaping at Woodmont and hildale security vegetables going on at the high school Woodmont and Willie Mason that'll be covering this summer we're looking at a canopy to help the
kids that are in the rain to uh protect them from the inclement weather at Willie Mason two boilers need to be replaced at the high school the removal of asbestos for in the security vesle at Woodmont and hbac for half of the building in uh hildale again you look
down the columns you can see the totals of the items that were not in the ref referendum and then the items that were originally in the referendum uh a little over a year ago so that total that we're going to be spending this year is about another $5.7
million moving ahead and this it gets a little bit grayer as we move forward into the future but this is what we have planned for right now so in 2026 we're looking at the HVAC in the High School uh also some portions of Cedar Hill
Valley View and then when you're looking at the sth grade Wing hbac at Lazar and then also at the other elementary schools all those items were in the referendum and you can look at that that's $3.7 million that we're looking to spend in two years same thing looking
at 2027 we're looking at another million dollar for HVAC at Willam Mason and trying to replace some of the ceiling titles here at the high school that'll be another million 1.1 million dollar as we move forward getting a little further out
again hva big big items that we have to be looking at so looking at Lazar again so obviously we've been doing this in three phases that's another 1.1 uh $1.5 million and then moving into 2029 which dubet Tales nicely with what Mr fleshman
was just talking about is the auditorium Renovations unfortunately we're not able to address them in the past two years so this is getting put off for a few more years because now HVAC is a little bit more the the priority but you're looking at almost $4 million there for the auditorium res Renovations it is the
Premier um place for all our plays concerts and everything the middle school high school come up there and it's used in many many other occasions for all our district needs the other area that we tap into is our maintenance maintenance is also
another Reserve Bank account that we have and similar to the capital reserves you can only use this money for certain things so for instance at the elementary schools seing coding the roofs uh that was part of the rod grants we have at the Valley View Cedar Hill at the middle
school and the high school interior painting that's an ongoing project that we started this year Valley View Park parking lot extension we did that this year these items were not in the referendum that's $2.6 million coming out of just that Reserve plan and then
moving forward we want to continue the painting painting is badly needed at many of the uh schools and it's just something that we have to address this just gives you a quick overview of the capital reserve so right now in 2025
we have 8.2 million in capital reserves and based on the expenditures I just told you about if everything goes as according to plan we'll have about $2.5 million left now each year we continue to contribute to it we try to put more
money into it and try to keep that going but as you can see we're really spending a lot of this money in larger chunks than we could replenish it going down to the maintenance reserves you have $2.2 million right now and then that'll come down to just a half a million dollar but notice the asteris the asteris is what's
most concerning right there and that if you start going below those numbers 2.5 for Capital reserves and under a half a million that could impact our bond rating so that's something to be cognizant of you don't want to go down to zero because then we we could get
hurt with in the future with our bonds so you want to stay with that amount in the reserves so that we're still healthy but we're still trying to get these projects done so it's something we have to keep an eye on as we move forward but you see how quickly several million dollars goes over a couple of years and
I'm going to pause right there because that's just the financial aspect and I'll open that up to questions to ctin and then maybe me mic pleas what happens is that below a certain
uh threshold thank you um are essentially what they're looking at is how large is our operation and how much money have we put away in savings so right now we have about 10% put aside as savings that number is is healthy and
as that number begins to drop down to 7% F 5% in this case 3% um that's when we start to get into the range of them looking at us and saying from the perspective of SNP
supporting a certain Bond rating on us they do not feel comfortable at those Reserve levels to feel that that we have enough savings for the rainy day so to speak um to Warrant the rating that we've gotten now we actually had this
happen to us when uh we went out for referendum in 17 we got through I want to say maybe 19 2019 somewhere in that range it definitely was before covid we had S&P come out and
say that your reserve levels are considered to be low and that we would be looking at lowering your bond rating unless you can show that you're going start building them up and for finance and Facilities you may remember Renee and I coming to you and saying we're
going to start implementing this plan where we're going to start building up and intentionally putting money towards the reserves in order to prevent that potential reduction in our rating thank you so it seems like it's a
combination then of the dollar amount in there and the percentage and how big we are at the time yes Karen and the numbers may seem big to perhaps folks that don't see these
numbers all the time but we have seven buildings to maintain five elementary schools and middle school and in the high school which is our Flagship school um and so you know it it just like your house it
takes takes funds to maintain uh them in good working order and Beyond we all want to be proud of our facilities and I think we have a right right now to be proud of those facilities that's a good point I mean on every single day you have over 4,000
people coming and going through our buildings and then on the weekends so they take a lot of abuse and their buildings are over 50 years old so it's you gota you got to show them a little love yeah and I mean in terms of the HVAC systems alone the most of those
univen at s particularly in the elementary levels those are original to the building you're talking about univ ventilators that have seen 50 years worth of students come and go that's a it's impressive that those units are even still functioning um and that was part of those
HVAC uh notations that you saw going through capital reserve and us not really being able to wait any longer to replace them so we've been doing it slowly as much as we can do every single year and just I'm sorry one one more
comment and that is uh the esteric which could impact our bond rating uh is completely under our control at this point because that was projected out to the year 2029 so I don't see us risking a bond
rating especially with the Acumen of our business department they're not going to let that happen correct we would stop spending before we got there correct and that's the whole thing is trying to find that balance between how much work can you do on the hvac's and the other needs of the district not spend it all the way
down so you get into this trouble but on the other hand how else are you going to start um you know taking care of our facilities and so not that I didn't hear what Mr fleschman said in terms of the need for us to improve our facilities
related to the auditorium the problem is that we get into a situation where we have to weigh things and decide what's the most important thing right now that needs repair and needs to be addressed and there's been a strong feeling that we need to look at the security
vestibules that that's an important thing in terms of Safety and Security First and as I said with the HVAC systems on the verge of failing those came first so the idea of the intentionality of just keep it on the list keep it on the list we'll keep
moving towards that goal is sort of the way we've been doing it up through this process um Michelle so I mean I know we say it a lot but thank you to ctin in the business office because it's obvious the work that you've done that's enabled us to be where we are as a district you
know financially all these years and and for all the years I've been on the board um I've had the utmost confidence in that and have been impressed how you truly have balanced it all and we're able to you know build up our reserves and use them I think in in a wise way um
I think presentations like this are very important for the community because um you know we know all know what happened with the last referendum and there was um you know obviously concerns about enrollment that prompted it and looking for additional class space but there was also the desire to maintain our
facilities to a manner that I think that we all would agree at at least basic level that our district deserves our community would want so I think that continually doing presentations like
this and showing um you know the impacts of those Reserves really going down we're going to be at a point where we can't do the things we want to do when is that these projects as we know take lead time and you know contracts and
planning and years so um we need to be have the foresight to understand these long-term applications and and for the community to understand and what is the point where we're going to need to think of other Alternatives so I I appreciate
you doing this at this level and I think this conversation on on a continual basis for the board and for the community is very important any other questions okay well thank you and no no no that's part one oh man
sorry um and just just going forward I'm sorry this last slide just moving forward and this is way into the future but just talking about some of the things we just talked about you know 2030 we're looking at you know some of the ideas we wanted to do was a softball Dugout in the turf field uh HVAC for
against Cedar Hill replacing exterior windows and repair to William Mason that alone these are just like you know wish list items that we've talked about but that's $9 million right now and then other items we're looking at at Future projects mostly at the middle school the
construction of the auditorium is about 7 million uh Transportation turnabout parking lot parking lot which means you could go around uh Lazar uh with transportation and then maybe turn the parking lot of where the teachers are right now into a field Athletic program
and then put more parking in the back uh of the school you can see with those prices 7 million 4.2 and 5.5 so we haven't forgotten about those projects but they're not in our you know perview right now with what's going on real
quick though um the re the exterior windows in the elementaries uh why are they on that list because they're 50 years old are they cack no but they aren't very energy efficient they're not energy and they're
beginning to see the wear aren aren't there opportunities for some kind of Grants fory cly that would be one of the things that we would look into um as I said we're doing a hierarchy and of the hierarchy that's not the highest on the
list but we do know that the windows and doors are going to eventually need to be replaced and yes certainly we would then seek things like eips we've already done two eips we could go and look into an esip to do that type of work and that's why I put these projects on the another
slide it's just these are still out there that we haven't forgotten about them but they're uh ideas to consider in the future and and probably should also point out that your office actively looks for Grants to help out all the time not just once in a while but not
when you have just one project but you keep an eye open all the time uh Dr Gorman mentioned the rod grants right the beginning of the presentation that what the rod grants are is their monies that we received from the state we applied for it and we there were certain projects that the state was willing to
provide funding for and so what happened was it worked the same way as the referendum would work we pay 60 they pay 40 so it significantly reduced the cost of the projects because we were getting State money for those projects that that just piggybacks on the fiscal
responsibility looking for ways to save money while getting you know the most done that we can I'm sorry keep going wait wait on that I was gonna save this question but since we're kind of talking about it I mean the back half of this presentation is on enrollment and you know what the future
holds our referendum last year didn't pass I think a big reason of it was we combined these two things together and I think it's important I think that was a mistake and I think we should bifurcate them and if there's 40% dollars out there if we go out for referendum just
these Capital Improvements I think that makes a lot of sense thank you one of the big differences in terms of funding is that when it's a renovation to an existing building we can grab 40% of the cost
from the state when it's a new construction and if for those who were here for that conversation when it was a new construction we weren't able to grab that then it's a it's a dollar amount per square foot and that dollar amount is significantly lower than what you can actually build that square foot of space
four okay all right enrollment so just to give you uh as we just said we'll be looking at the five-year long range facilities plans and continue the discussions with the board so the current enrollment um right now is where we're
at so you can see uh for each of the schools you know the the enrollment number is right there and the number on the right hand side is the over capacity so the over capacity of each School based on the formulas that the architect works with the uh with the State numbers
of where we should be so currently we're over capacity in all the schools except for Lazar but with the bubble of the students coming in you're going to see us over capacity at Lazar come next Fall so that just gives you a little U you know snapshot of where we are
today this is the uh slide that just get into a little bit more detail of everything I I put it in colors for green being the two projects that have been built so mil Creek and Avalon Bay we don't have the exact numbers the last
time we got some numbers they were about 2/3 full um I'm guessing they're going to be a little bit higher right now you can see how many units are in each one so if you go down to the bottom there you see that 44 students out of the predicted 52 uh from the demographer uh
are have already enrolled in our school and then eight of the 25 and six of the 26 and so forth for Avalon you can see the same numbers 34 students have enrolled at Woodmont out of the 58th of the demographer predicted and so on so looking down at the bottom with the
asteris you'll see that of the predicted numbers of the statistical fores casting which is a demographer he predicted that 100 uh sorry 214 students would be coming out of those two developments in the green and so far we've seen 109 so he's about
51% of what he was predicting and we know that the units still not are not 100% full the developers on the other hand predicted that uh only 106 kids would come out of those units and we already at 109 students so we're already
over what the developers predicted so we've you know so you you make them what you can of that juv is the other in the yellow that's by seab Breeze those students will primarily be going to Cedar Hill the walls are up on those
units and I'm expecting just by the pace of seeing what the other units did you might be able to see some students enrolling this fall so that's moving pretty quickly right now and then the red is nothing's been going on with the Sterling which is the harragan property
right now so that and then you have to the right the growth increase that's with the number of people so if grandparents move out that's that's two people moving out but a family of five move in you have an increase of three you have some new building going on so that's the growth increase that was
predicted by the demographer and just seeing where the projections are going in 2728 and then where we're going to be with overc capacity in the different schools so that's where we're at right now in the snapshot um and every day we're getting more students coming in
from the the two green developments so with that said what have we been doing uh we we removed all the classes that were in the hallways we should not have had them there uh we put them back into the classrooms we Consolidated prek pre kindergarten at Valley View we moved
some special ed programs from to Valley View in Cedar Hill and that brought us some space at Willie Mason so we were able to alleviate some of the crunch there uh that's still only going to be you know temporary uh updating the long range facility plan and and we've been
increasing the class sizes everywhere as these kids come in and some of the board members you've SE you've seen the emails that we've been getting of some people that have been noticing the rise in the class sizes but that's all that we've uh predicted along the way so um that's it for that and I'll just leave it for open
for discussion okay anyone have any mic a clarification question on the the two greens the you said is it's like Woodmont is is 44 kids have currently enrolled correct
from there and the 52 is that what the demographer predicted was going to come in predicted for 65% is that already that's for 100% yeah so he's predicting we're gonna get uh eight more
students coming to Woodmont from Mil Creek right but if we have 44 out of 2/3 so it's likely we're going to go over what he predicted if the statistics hold true right it's a it's a the problem is
we don't have uh the direct numbers from those developments I don't know what's filled already or what's not and what's available mean like three bedrooms versus one bedroom correct yeah so it's still a little bit of an art okay right thank you okay just again at
Woodmont we had I guess 366 now 20 2728 also 3 66 but the growth increase is 54 so I mean how do how do those numbers work right so you're have in the the growth
increase so uh right so we have more kids moving in from the developments and you had a decline so um how' that work exactly so you have more kids moving in um so that's what 40 so you're going to have over 10 and something and you have
some other people that are moving out but it's it's going to be a negative 54 at the end of the day when you take a look at everything so like the 54 you have all these um there's not going to be a lot
of movement right in Woodmont right there's not a lot of is all in the development not in the actual housing units do that make sense Woodmont doesn't have a lot of it's an area where it's not turning over so the problem is
that you're graduating larger classes without assume that we had no construction you would be graduating larger classes going up to Lazar than you're bringing in as kindergarteners and you're not seeing the type of
turnover like for example in William Mason you're seeing a lot of older couples who are selling their home to younger families that kind of turnover is not seen at the same rate in the Woodmont area per the de the um
statistical forecasting um and so as a result that because you're not refilling from houses turning over the classes that are graduating are bigger than the classes coming in so I guess what you're kind of saying is that you're getting we're getting more kids from the
apartments but that neutralized by the fact they're getting fewer kids from the houses exactly that's exactly right and for whatever reason they just aren't turning over in that area yeah and and the only thing I'm going to crush on that as you do that you're going to increase the percentage of kids who are
from the units where there doesn't tend to be a lot of stability with regard to long-term housing there and you're going to go back to having this very high student Mobility thing at Woodmont which I think is not a good thing and I I've said all along I don't think it's fair
that once school's bearing the burnt of all the student Mobility you know when I came on the board W had Woodmont had a 28% Mobility rate I I don't want to see it go back to that that any other any other questions no okay okay uh business Minister's report
anything else you want to add no report no report okay um let's move on to committees and Liaisons uh Finance Karen uh we had a meeting just prior to this
meeting and uh began the budget process even though it felt like we just finished the budget process yeah it's always we started it again um that's basically what we did okay thank you uh curriculum
Michelle I'm working with Miss Woodring to set up a meeting I'll be reaching out to the committee okay John policy we met last week February 11th we discussed uh 10 policy changes from our third party company Strauss May
esme's um recommendations uh most of which were fairly standard just changing policies uh in accordance with Law changes uh many about half of them were due to the memoranda between education and law
forment of law enforcement officials uh the two big toote items one was changing our uh tuition costs for people who move in mid year we were traditionally able to just you know wave that that tuition but now the the
seemingly the law seemingly changes that they require a tuition and Tom and and Casey are going to the Morris County Board to see what the county will accept as a reasonable tuition rate uh if it if you know for example if we wanted to
make our policy charge them $1 would the county upset that they could reject that potentially yeah we have that meeting tomorrow um and and then the other one was cell phone use which uh you know we we had an ample discussion principal Doug
Stanford uh commented uh uh we had a nice discussion and I'm actually going to open that up in the new business tonight for the board's General discussion yeah we'll hold off until then okay uh Joe Communications we have one coming up yep we have a meeting next
Wednesday to go over a couple items okay and I know we have a Safety Committee coming up uh next week if I'm not mistaken tomorrow it's tomorrow yeah right it's right Communications is next week safety is tomorrow okay uh delegate leaz on New
Jersey school board Karen uh it's a lengthy report a lot has happened in the past uh two weeks since our last meeting so I'm going to hold off till our next meeting okay uh Mike rafport Morris County School boards yes we met uh February 5th
um Karen Christine and Joe from the board also uh joined joined the meeting um I'm glad Mr fleshman is still here uh yes you just perked up um they opened the meeting with uh music uh with Rec pre-recorded music from the Copeland
Middle School a little Jazz and a little woodwind and I thought that was was very good because not we can't always have U uh the students here live in person um but if if uh if that all possible it works out to pre-record a little a
little uh music from one of the schools and we can play it in the beginning of our meetings to open it up I really like that and I thought it was a that was a great idea um they are uh MCS SBA is looking for a new slate of board of directors uh
there's 14 open positions if anyone's interested U the applications are du to March 1st um they also introduced uh a path full uh program that is it's a k to2
program uh that they're helping to U uh it's to uh introduce kids to to work and and help kids to with the transition to a work environment so what they do is they help uh find local um Executives
who are with willing to come in and talk to the kids or or talk by Zoom or uh otherwise interact with a classroom um and since they're do working from K through 12 it it will be age appropriate depending on on on the grade level and
to have meaningful conversations of what it's like to be in a work environment as opposed to a classroom type environment to help them understand a bit more about what it's like to to to work versus
versus being in a in a classroom and um a lot of people said it was a very nice thing as some of the other board members who who've worked with the program and it's it's a very nice thing is if possible to take a look at if it's something useful or or valuable for for
our district as well um then Charlene Peterson spoke and she said she's retiring May 1st uh so we'll have a new rep May 2nd um her uh uh big update besides
retirement is uh that board goals will now be part of the evaluation process every year it's going to be part of the electronic evaluation process like we do the district goals and and the superintendent evaluation uh board goals will now be available electronically so
we can uh update it and and uh keep track of it just like we do the district goals um they also talked a lot about how to get board members uh more comfortable especially when they just
start in January and uh Charlene was saying that it takes like two years for a board member to really get comfortable and that's most of the first term so what can the uh uh School boards do to
help board members get more comfortable faster so they can be more productive faster and they're looking at various different programs and educational things uh presentations whatever else may be to help overcome that Gap and shorten that cycle of getting someone up to speed
who's who's brand new to uh to a board of education uh just a all you have to do is go to the website and you'll find the programming um in fact this weekend there's going to be the second weekend uh training for new school board
members and you don't have to be a new school board member to attend and that's a very intensive class but there're also programs there are podcasts there's online um so be happy to help anyone
that uh would be interested and then they finished it with two breakout rooms about uh how governance can help school board members and U committee structures how committee structure cont contributes to board
culture um and so they had small uh small room discussions on on those topics ICS and and that was uh the meeting oh and Karen gave gave her update uh from New Jersey school boards to Morris County as well can't forget that which you won't repeat right now
I'm not thank you it's going to be what she gives next week a little concerned about getting kids in K and you know first and second grade used to the work environment I thought we got you know we got away from that small child
employment issue we used to have here but as I said age appropriate grade level appropriate level stuff um Joe why don't we go to you with Morris County Educational Services so we met last uh last Wednesday uh currently they're undergoing their annual audit and
they're also developing the budget for next year what about drug awareness they met last Tuesday and they formed a subcommittee who will be meeting with the administration to discuss a potential pilot program for elementary school um Elementary School students on
life skills okay John uh Montville athletic boosters anything uh nope first meeting's in April April man they don't meet much okay Karen Cedar Hill uh no report there
has there has not been a meeting I think one is coming up in March okay uh um hildale Christine's not here Caitlyn Valley View no report okay John William Mason no report Mike pal
Woodmont I'm told there's going to be a meeting in March at a date to be decided in the near future okay Michelle Lazar March 13th the next meeting March 13 okay Mike rafport High School no report
okay like to now open it up to the public for any comments about items on the agenda if you want to make any comments about items on the agenda please come forward to the microphone seeing none we'll just move on to uh motion for a consent resolution
for items I through n so moved second thank you questions on the minutes okay what about questions on uh section J uh I would just like to thank Administration for adding to this agenda
recognition of that January is New Jersey school board's recognition month was was oh you want me to read that okay rehear we did I forgot about that okay so let me go ahead and read that
one uh whereas the New Jersey school board what sorry what no okay whereas the New Jersey state board of education has established rigorous standards through its prom promation promation promulgation
whatever of the New Jersey School New Jersey student learning standards which set the expectations of academic achievement for nearly 1.4 million public school children and whereas New Jersey's locally elected and appointed Boards of Education play a vital role in
ensuring that their local school districts meet the state standards and adhere to state and federal education statute and regulations with a goal of preparing all students for college and the workplace thereby enabling them to compete in a global economy and whereas
New Jersey's 5,000 nonpartisan local Board of Education members and Charter School trustees are public servants who dedicate their time without pay or benefit to the oversight of School District Operations through sound
financial practices and comprehensive policies on curriculum Staffing and other areas to ensure the well-being and academic achievement of all students in their district and whereas local Boards of Education in conjunction with State education officials and local Educators
have built a foundation of success success that has led to New Jersey's status as a leader in student achievement as evidenced by the national assessment of Education progress scores and whereas the New Jersey School Board Association has declared January 2025 to
be Schoolboard recognition month now therefore let it be resolved that the New Jersey state board of education and the acting Commissioner of Education recognize the contributions of our state's local Boards of Education to the academic success of its public public
school students and express its sincere and appreciation to local Board of Education members for their continued focus on the achievement of children throughout New Jersey and further be it resolved that the New Jersey state board
of education and the acting Commissioner of Education encourage qualified New Jersey citizens to consider serving as members of their local school boards thank you okay any other com comments on Section
J okay uh section K facilities Finance any questions just K7 I just want to point out that's what we were talking about the uh officer the retired officer the sleo that will be for the elementary schools and when does that uh if you approve him tonight he'll start tomorrow
morning excellent okay Personnel you have something yes we have a retirement we have cherylyn teresi she's a 25-year veteran at uh mville public Township Schools and she serves as a fifth grade special education inclusion teacher at the
Woodmont elementary schools she was instrumental in bringing mindfulness practices into the building and responsible for the creation of meditation and mindfulness rooms for the faculty and students this talented educator taught multiple grades over her career and will be remembered for her
warmth and commitment to the staff mental health we wish her well in retirement okay thank you uh no further questions and section m curriculum any questions comments policy
um we have no actions here okay uh section o the vote uh roll call vote please miss suckerman yes Mr Palama yes Dr calino
yes Mr Petrino yes Mr Rapaport yes Mrs Smith abstain section I yes to everything else Mr doy yes Dr modra yes okay no uh closed session
announcement we'll now move on to Old business General board comments and new business um John you wanted to talk about cell phon so we'll start with you if you want to just give us a run through real quick about yes some of the
discussion couple key points I guess that Doug made that I'll share with everyone that you know one uh you know uh Tom and Casey went through the school and and they reported that during the lunch periods there wasn't that much
cell phone use or as much as they would expect at least and that Doug was fearful that if we took cell phone use away completely kids that you know maybe were not as socially involved with others you know the loner types you know
needed that cell phone as comfort during that period I thought that was uh an interesting comment to make um I I personally was you know wanted to be more restrictive on our policy and and was considering the idea of complete
Banning of cell phones check them at the door um based on some of the other comments you know the amount of cell phone usage that teachers um you use cell phones in the room you made me reconsider that
position and you know at this point I would like to see you know cell phones be mandated to be checked in the door and then if a teacher wants to allow a classroom to allow their cell phone use you know the teacher can allow it but
the default policy be you know check it in at the classroom but students be allowed to bring them and use them on the premises otherwise that would just be my position and I'd like to open it up for a discussion can I just um I'll
go next but um I tend to be someone who believes that yes we should limit the use of cell phones in the schools um if a teacher again wants it thinks that it would be useful for the class okay but I
do agree that I believe like John that the default policy should be check them at the door keep them off as much as possible but that's the way I feel you want to go Mike yeah I mean I tend to think there's a lot more than people want to acknowledge of kids just texting
each other during class not paying attention to the teacher but I'd what I'd really like to know is have has the administration given any thought to surveying the teachers I'm just curious to know what the teachers think about this if you ask the teacher just confidentially between me and you what's going on with the phones whether the
teacher would say yeah I know half the kids in the class are texting during class or no I don't think that's the case I mean the teach teachers know what's going on probably better than any of us or even maybe the administration why don't we ask the teachers what they think
okay any other comments um I am not opposed to having the pocket style cubby for cell phone uh in the classroom and of course the teacher has the discretion whether she wants the the
students to use the cell phone or not um um it's just it's interesting to me that or I I feel better knowing that students are not using their cell phones as much as we may have thought during uh their
lunch because I was thinking that that would be the prime time for them to be using their cell phones as opposed to socializing with each other talking to each other you know instead they're on their phones that's my experience with
my own children when you try and go out to dinner um and and so um I agree with my colleagues I I think frankly I think our policy is pretty good um I was wondering
if there was some way to create a cell phone free zone during lunch in other words a place where kids can go who want to be with each other and no cell phones in that in that lunch period because I
think that's where kids are most vulnerable during lunch not necessarily texting each other during class I'm not so sure that you really even need that I mean they want to put their phone away they there's no policy says they have to have their phone out right but this would be a location where are you
talking about lunch period or you're saying a cell phone free area yeah they can always just put it away anytime they want but are you Miss Missing the point the point would be this would be a design it's like you know no smoking area this would be a designated area
where cell phones are not to be used because they're choosing to be in that space well I don't know I I was always struck by not they're not using it as much as we would have expected but I'm not sure what that
is yeah and I'm not I'm not I'm not I agree I'm not sure how you can measure that well I think also the and I hate to cut in but the it was offered now to the board to do some other walkthroughs and and some surveys and additional research so I I I
that's on the table and I think a lot of us would take advantage of that you know okay um I have a few thoughts on it um I worry that if we lock up phones all day and the only time they have access to their phones is during lunch then you're
going to see a 180 on that and lunch is going to become everybody's heads in their phones because that's their only opportunity to go on it not that I'm saying they should be able to scroll and do whatever they want on their phones during their
classes but I also think high school kids have different relationship with their phones than any of us probably do because we didn't grow up with these and they essentially have
so it's not um as foreign to them to have their phone with them and to use them for various purposes um I would be interested to have a survey from directly from the teachers to see how disruptive they
think the phones are in class how useful they think they are and if they would prefer it coming from a board policy as opposed to I happen to agree with Karen I think our policy is fine I think it becomes more of a classroom management
slash building specific spefic policy rather than a general board policy because I do think there's so many different levels of phone usage that could be acceptable in different areas and in different
classes so I think it's hard to make a general policy of banning or not Banning or locking up and I know some teachers probably feel like well if it's not all for one one for all then I don't want to be the mean teacher that says you have to lock it up but I
think that's where a building level tier of rules would come into place instead of like a steadfast General policy you mean like uh Lazar has their policy which is pretty strict yeah like whereas and that's the other
thing too we go from very strict cell phone policy dress code policy at Lazar to free-for-all essentially at the high school with in regards to those two things so maybe there needs to be a way to bridge that Gap um but I do think and
I mentioned this in our meeting that I think these kids having their cell phones in high school is a fact of their life and it's something that when you are in the workplace you have your cell phone on you constantly
when you're in meetings you have your cell phone on you constantly and it's almost a way that they need to learn how to be responsible with it and to have it there and not be a distraction and also I was saying that um if you lock up the
cell phones if they're bringing in their own MacBooks they're texting on that anyway so locking up isn't going to eliminate everything that you think it's going to I it's not going to get rid of it and again I know if they're on our
Wi-Fi you know then certain websites will be blocked on their computers if they're bringing in their home devices but they're savvy if their cell phone is locked in a cubby in their door they can log into their phone as a hotspot and they can go on whatever websites they
want so they're not going to be stopped by our district Wi-Fi controls if that's what they think of to do so I just think locking up and banning isn't necessarily going to solve any of the problems that people are concerned about in regards to
cell phone use during classes I think a better approach is to give them life skills in using it and focusing on work and being able to get it done sort of like junk food they're exposed to junk food and you have to teach them so
that's sort of like cell phones are like a junk food kind of thing I think in anything in life when you set very strict restrictions it makes you want to binge on it when you have it and it's it's a learning process as long as they're not binging when they're
supposed to be paying attention to the teachers right but also to uh were you here for who was the woman who came by forget her name spoke to us about cell phones yeah the parent she's in town but she presents a lot of she presents a
very compelling case for at least limiting the use of cell phones beyond what it is now so we should probably think about that yeah Mike um I think it would help if we kind of reframe the question a little bit um because there's
there's lots of different opinions about how cell phon should be locked up or used or whatever so if you dig down to what is the the underlying really the underlying question under question is not should their kids have cell phones or not the underlying questions are is
it disturbing to the class so okay if one child has a cell phone is it disturbing to the child nearby and that child can't learn that's a question we need need to to figure out
also are the cell phones contributing a significant percentage to bullying or or HIV or those types ofal negative negative behavioral aspects and the third thing I I was thinking of is
just learning outcome for the student who's who has the cell phone if you have the cell phone in your hand most likely your learning learning outcome is going to be a little lower than if the cell phone is put away um so I think those
are the questions we need to answer where we want to improve or where where in our district or what grade level these three issues are a problem and then we can address it sort of from that perspective
because that might might help us answer the cell phone should get locked up or not get locked up for a particular classroom or not if those three things get impacted other questions comments yeah sure have we also considered the impact that the
parents might have as well if we tell them that we're making a policy that we're going to be limiting cell phone use especially at the high school how they want to be always in contact with their kids in event of emergency or whatnot so maybe we might want to consider putting that out there like we're going to possibly look at a policy
or recommendation just to get feedback from the parents remember when you were in I think when you were in school they didn't have cell phones right they had cell phones they had cell phones when you were in school wow maybe not when you were in school when I was in school you you had payones
you know those things we had something called a telephone that we had to actually go down to the nurse's office and call home if there was an emergency there are ways to get a hold of your parents even without a cell phone so I mean you know email being one of them
yeah email but you need your phone no not your computer but but I just I just wanted to clarify a couple things one the the what I was suggesting was to not check them at the door of the high school when you walk in was to check him at each classroom and give the teacher that you know you know autonomy but but
having a policy and and another comment that was made was that you know it would be tough for you know teachers don't want to police it because they want to be you know the good guy the guy that relates to the to the student and if we made a policy that you know took took
that good guy away from them you know it would make us the bad guy and allow the teachers to you know not have a a say in that matter um that that was just something that was discussed as well yeah the default being you check the cell phones and if the teacher says take
them out for a specific purpose then you then the student takes them out for that purpose so they're not locked away they the student still has access to them if they need them but it's up to the teacher to affirm that they need the cell phones in order to use it couple
quick things um for many things like this lately we have done surveys of stakeholders and I'm kind of hearing that you know what do teachers think what a parents think what do students think I mean obviously what do we think what administration think so it might be worth similar to the exam you know
questions that that we we might want to thoughtfully design some type of of feedback and see where our community really feels um you know I was debating even saying this but like I don't know I think I guess it wouldn't be even an like an equity issue because I hear oh they use them in the classroom we issue
every student a Chromebook so we know that every student has a device but conceivably not every student has a cell phone I would think that we we'd want to rely if they're using technology on what we have some control over and what we've
issued and know every student equitably has so I just I don't know why we would need to think that they're pulling that out educationally when when it's not something that we know is Equitable know that they H you know have the control over so I I don't but I'm not saying we should not
have them necessarily um I I'm not sure actually where I fall on all this because I see arguments on all sides uh and so I think more information and more feedback would be helpful if we do have surveys though I would recommend that we also not just get a student and parent
and teacher perspective but also scientific data that delves into the relationship of the student to their phone and their mental health and their productivity and their learning abilities um some of those studies are
more objective and might be more informative one of the things I thought was interesting that Mr Sanford said on the call was um there are classes where either in an art class or in a class where there's independent work time teachers will
allow kids to put their headphones on and listen to a music playlist from their phones so whereas I think at at one point kids were using it to research or whatever which I think you're right now they obviously have the
computers they can do it that way I think one of the other uses is having music to listen to during their independent time um he said a lot of kids enjoy that and rely on it especially in like the arts classes well
again I I think that's getting back to it that's an affirmative position of the teacher the teacher says you can take it out for this purpose otherwise the default would be back yes I do think teacher classroom
management is a huge part of it and you know engaging the students to the point where they don't want to use their phones as a distraction is comes into play and policies as we've talked about other things some policies are there to
provide guard rail to provide guidance for the staff as well as the students and sometimes that's beneficial um does anyone else have any other com just one one final thought and you know maybe because I don't have
teenagers I I'm missing the point here but um my understanding was that the use of cell phones during the school day in inhibits face-to-face socialization and um you know that kids
who are marginalized are catching the brunt on their cell phones and on social media so I thought it was really to limit exposure to social media even though I know that's impossible but uh and to and for the students to engage
more in face-to-face conversation um yeah okay so then Tom what do you want to do so what I'm hearing what the board would like me to do is uh uh so I I'll talk to Mr Sanford
and we'll look into this we'll look into some surveys I'll uh probably organize some uh field trips for you to come and see what's going on at lunch and you know we can even visit some other schools if you want to uh I have some research articles if anybody else comes across some articles we'll start sharing
them amongst ourselves and we'll continue to look at this yeah I was going to say not only the high school but also Lazar and now that elementary school kids are getting cell phones at an early age I mean I see kids standing on the bus stop and their third grade and they're on their phone practicing
their little Tik Tock dances or whatever yeah I mean well they you know k through eight they're they're not used in school so would you want me to have them out then right so all right we we'll we'll start talking about this yeah okay thank you thank thank you John thanks for
bringing this up I know when I go into a meeting it's if it's of any importance I take my cell phone I silence it and I put it in my bag not to be seen yeah okay does anybody else have any other new business old business General board
comments um I I did attend the uh uh Chinese New Year the northern New Jersey Chinese Association Chinese School celebration of uh Chinese New Year uh on the 9th I think it was uh yeah the
ninth uh and as usual it was a wonderful event they were very happy to have um you know members from a member from the Board of Education it was a solemn rather solemn in the beginning because we honored U Margaret lamb and and David
Yen her husband um who just passed away months apart from each other um but it was it it always is is uh a fun event so I was happy to attend and I just wanted to point out um the
recent uh uh talk that the school district funded and put on uh Timothy Shoemaker uh he spoke about protecting against predators on social media for our for our students and I I understand
it was successful not always very well attended but a successful program uh anyway and so I want to thank the administration for um you know putting on that program thank you any other General board comments no then I would
open it up for the second public participation section uh come on up cpio um uh anyone else that wants to come up can come up as well just please use the microphone tell us your name address and
what you have to say about go yeah it's just I think it's just through the Google translate that's uh the the software that we have just uses that to convert everything that we do it's just
General it's not something that we do ourselves correct to it seemed to come a little and when ites to scho like want a
lot self being able it's main a matter of in this Contex okay thank you we appreciate that we appreciate hearing from a student about that thank you okay have a good
night uh June sure thing oh wait your name address please and microphone is it on is yeah you put it close enough okay better
yeah uh June witty 11 Long View Drive too um so I just had a question on the budget did you say that you were at at 3% or 10% in in the um
the the snd part for the for the for your uh rate bonding Bing are are they the S&P bonding um they we are currently at 10% when we had originally been
approached back in I think it was 2019 we were down closer to the 3% Mark and that was when they were concerned I'm going to assume not that they gave me enough number that the magic number is somewhere between 3% and 10% I just don't know what it is they didn't really
tell us okay and then I just had a comment on the cell phones also because I think the um the the whole reason that the conversation and schools are adopting cell phone policies was because of the mental health with the studies that were
done with kids actually having so being so absorbed by their phones and not being able to communicate or socialize or have a conversation or even spell something completely because of all the abbreviations so um just wanted to make
that comment I I I've I've worked in the district you know uh cell phones were a big part of the kids lives here um I have a position where I don't look at my cell phone or use my cell phone on the job I'm a nurse I can't carry it with me
and uh function so uh there are there are jobs out there where you can't have your cell phone I know when I attend a meeting I don't have my cell phone because I I think it's rude when people are on their cell phone or looking at their cell phone even when you're
presenting or speaking so just want to pass that along or whatever I I think it's it's best to include the teachers in the decision since that's going to be a battle that they'll be fighting okay thank you okay thank you
very much uh any other public comments seeing none we'll close that and I ask for a motion to adjourn the meeting I'll make a motion second thank you all in favor I anyone
opposed okay we're out of here see