##VIDEO ID:R91OCHBlhd8## it's w did yeah [Music] shot everything hello everyone thank you for coming out tonight so nice to see so many people here if we could all oh wait I need to get a motion in a second come out of executive session motion all in favor any opposed abstain all right thank you at this time if we could all rise for the flag salute flag of the United States of America and to the repic for stands under indivisible andice for all again thank you all for coming out we appreciate it we like night so we can recognize people so I'm going to turn the meeting over to our superintendent to recognize the teacher and support staff members of the Year thank you very much and I am going to introduce the folks that are going to make those presentations so we can also so highlight them and if I could ask first that we have the Middle School principal and Elementary School principal come up and also Mr wear if you would join us up here they will actually make the presentations and introduce their people first Jean Gallagher come on [Applause] down congratulations Jean is actively involved in the school and the community and is a valuable member of my staff what I admire most about Jean is how she treats students whether they're new to the district new to her class she treats students with respect beginning of the year she takes the time to establish expectations regarding how we treat peers how we treat teachers how we treat staff she emphasizes the importance of hard work and commitment while she may speak in a soft voice she is mindful to emphasize that her class is a community of Learners who work collaboratively to reach ACC academic and social emotional HS thank you J [Applause] Mrs kogal come on down [Applause] I refer to mallerie as my rightand woman she is extremely committed to all areas of her responsibilities and I depend on her every day she conducts classroom lessons in all grades she provides counseling to many children she has supervisory duties and she uses the time to observe students especially those those students who are solitary in the lunchroom or on the playground she's an extremely hard worker who can be counted on to assist whenever a call is made for a student in need mallerie I'm so happy and I don't know what I do [Applause] sorry it's okay go for it no introduce M Maris our Middle School principal to make a presentation you're up coming Mrs [Applause] H I started thinking about what was I going to write I kept writing the same thing I had already written so I'm just going to read what I had already written just a bit to the state of New Jersey about Mrs H so this every year when we do this is a whole process but then it culminates we send a letter of recommendation to the state of New Jersey to the educator of the year commission endorsing the Whoever has been um nominated and selected by our district so this is what I wrote for Kristen it is with great pleasure that I endorse Mrs Kristen Hol as mikica Township Middle School educator of the Year Mrs hold exemplifies all the characteristics desired in an educator however what sets her head above many is her true passion for reaching challenging and reluctant Learners Mrs Hol joined our medal our Mica school middle school our mikica Middle School team as an eighth grade and class support teacher after transferring from our elementary school I didn't put this she will step up to any challenge we put in front of her you want the littles I have a big kids for you have fun with that um this was a major change in assignment and one that was not expected to be easy for anyone from the very beginning it was evident that Mrs Hol was an asset to our school and more importantly to our Learners in the classroom Mrs Hol strives to meet both the academic and emotional needs of her very diverse Learners in her tenure in our school she has successfully made connections with our most behaviorally challenging students she leverages that connection to promote their academic confidence and their independence under her care students flourish as an advocate for her Learners Mrs H is actively evolved in communication with families often engaging in difficult but necessary conversations about student performance attitude behavior and ability as a colleague Mrs H hold is always willing to assist her fellow Educators she's willing to provide guidance and coaching to early service teachers and Veteran teammates her insights into how students learn and the VAR support they need for Success are valued by everyone's privileged to work with her as often happens in education assignments vary from year to year in each of this whole teaching she has excelled in the classroom her determination to reach and Inspire every learner is evident in her diligence and passion for teaching for these reasons and more I wholeheartedly endorse Mrs Kristen Hol as Mullan Township Middle School educator of the year on top of that she's just an amazing human being who really cares about all those kids I'm glad I can count her not just as an amazing employee but as a friend thank you for all you do every single day [Applause] I ask where to come up who is our supervisor of facility me and custodial facilities your key and anything else we ask those oh everybody gets for those of you who haven't met Henry this is Henry lzada he's been with us three years now he's got a lot of experience before that he worked in hospitals he worked in other schools his specialty is made the floor is shiny most of you have noticed it some of the Improvement we have a a great team here the facilities Department you know all our all our workers strive for excellence and provide a safe clean school for the for the kids every morning uh so I I was thinking to myself what's different about Henry you know why am I why am I giving Henry this award Henry does it with a smile so he's always Pleasant his sections right in the front of the building and that's really something that we could all work on so in terms of an employee and as a friend I couldn't ask for somebody better than Henry congrats [Music] now we we had a retirement this year Charmaine [Applause] Gallagher was with the district for more than 10 years she came from was it black for regional before that she dedicated a long part of her life to making schools prepared for children again to be safe and home when they come in uh while she was here I found her to be like my secret weapon I could always send her you know if I had an area where I noticed a problem or needed a little extra attention she never gave me any push back when I said go take care of it I knew it would be done properly so for that uh you certainly deserve our respect and you deserve to have a wonderful prot [Applause] [Applause] our Middle School also had a retirement that we're honoring this evening Miss come on up recognizing Mrs paulini for 15 years and three months of service that every month counts honey the service to our district in the time that I've worked with Paula she has been a dedicated member of our team her diligence and care for the students that she serves is admirable and will be is already very much missed retirement seeks you in en every moment of it thank you for all that you [Applause] do now we have one more presentation so Steve where you come back [Music] always you're only receiving into this one so uh a lot of times stuff like this flies into the radar especially things that have to do with the business office getting more money people love to hear that but um a lot of times it trickles down to the small things that people do and I think Steve said something just a minute ago about the facility staff creating a safe and clean environment for the kids and uh that's hugely important you know um I think it gets overlooked a lot and uh one of the specific things um so before I say that though I'll say I'm giving this to Steve but I will say and I know he would he would say this as well it goes to the whole facility Department you know their their ability to keep this school clean and safe um has really impressed me I've only been here a year um Steve's a a number one facility director um and I've worked with with a number of them so this in particular though I'm just going to read it because it kind of summarizes what this is for it's in recognition of outstanding efforts in the area of facility Safety Management for the mica Township School District resulting in Elite 2 status and $4,500 in incentives for the board of education so what that is is uh the insurance company that we work with provides incentives for schools that that reach these certain Elite status and so so Steve and the facility staff have reached the Elite 2 status and that gives us $4,500 back in the pockets of the board so that we can spend on the students and so we thought that should be recognized really [Applause] appreciate this is not just uh for me and facilities team uh Todd does a lot of the work all of administration does a lot of work and all the staff in the building uh it really goes into a climate of safety here and everybody at M does a very good job that [Applause] I thank you all effort and service of not only the of educ all our students St and the residence of the community um it's a great place to be wonderful people to work with and we do have a team effort going on and it's it's it makes me feel really good to see it all happening thank you also very much for your service I was just going to say I Echo that I all it the board again thank you for coming out we love seeing everybody and getting to recognize so many people for such wonderful things so thank you for all that you're doing for our have one more presentation we do and uh I'm going to our photographer for the evening also has other hats here she is also our supervisor of curriculum and instruction she had some no no she will be by the time I get done you didn't know that sorry she's very Sur because she actually does student services special education and uh along with that she also does fundraisers at times yeah and she has two presentations for this evening and the first one is in regards to H child diabetes so I'm gon to save the diabetes one second so we can make that a nice big presentation and end on that um good evening I'm Janine jini I'm the supervisor of special education and student services that's right um when I was asked to do this presentation initially it was regarding an amazing fundraiser that we did this year for the first time and raised the most money of any fundraiser we had but I also wanted to take this opportunity to showcase our marvelous special education department and what we've and student services department and what we've been doing over the last few months of being in school and some things that we are looking forward for to implementing now we don't have a clicker so I have to hit my button um so last year we started with community- based instruction trips for some of our special education students and our self-contained classrooms we um went on two trips last year that were funded by um donations from small businesses in the area this year I was able to budget for them in my budget and we planned for four trips this year our first trip we went to the funny farm with our Middle School um students and some of our elementary school students when we went to the funny farm they were put to work so these are trips that we put together to bring the students out in the community and learn life skills and teach them how to um wait take a turn um if something doesn't go your way we don't have a behavior explosion so they said they were going to have the children rake so they went to this shed and there were about 50 rakes in a shed and they all grabbed one without a grunt without a cry without a moan and they went to work they raped the whole front area for the staff they actually even went into some of the animal pens and raped in there as well this picture's a little blurry but you can see like all the kids were they had a ball it was a really really good experience for them and these are just some of our other friends that we took along so they had they had a really good time um the second event that I would like to Showcase um is that we did celebrate diabetes Awareness Month in the month of November um we did a fundraiser where um three different fundraisers actually all into one we did a penny wars contest from preschool all the way up to 8th grade every class room had a bucket and they were asked to bring in as many coins as they can they were raising U money to raise awareness for diabetes we have a couple of students in our school that have diabetes and I'll go into that a little bit more afterwards the winners for the and whatever class raised the most money they get a Class party so miss Alfonso's class one for primary and Miss R's Home Room one for the Middle School um we also did a staff t-shirt fundraising and we also sold scented pencils so here are some photos of the students this is Emily pipina she's here with us tonight and we're going to honor her and her family for bringing this awesome and worthy calls to our attention and mik this is her these are her classmates Miss Selena was an imperative intergral part and played a bigger role in this um than I did essentially but we worked together um and we were able to bring a whole new light to of another you know medical diagnosis that most people don't think about but it's very important that we're aware of it and all of our friends participated students from kindergarten and preschool all the way through 8th grade it was a really really great event these are some of our preschool friends they were talking about it all right the third event that I wanted to talk about tonight is our second community- based instruction trip that we went on in December so we took our Middle School self-contained students as well as some of our elementary students to Target Michaels and then we went and had pizza at Godfather's Pizza in me Landing um so our younger students went to Michaels and they bought items to make a Christmas craft and our older students went to Target and they bought um Essentials like toothpaste toothbrushes mouthwash deodorant things that a middle school student needs to start doing those life skills so that's where we went and they had a fantastic time the teachers attended as well as our related service providers this is our occupational therapist Caitlyn Tweed Alison Bell our um speech therapist and finally I wanted to Showcase this wasn't really a community- based instruction trip as much as an experience that I wanted to provide to our youngest friends so students in our preschool classrooms were doing a unit on lights and when I met with two of the special education uh teachers I said what an awesome idea if we could actually take them to Donado down the street where they have the train ride and all of the lights and make that an experience for them so with a little bit of donation money and help from our friends we were able to do that so it was our two preschool classrooms as well as one of our ele um primary school self-contained classrooms so this is just some of our staff some of our students they all have their pictures taken individually look at that face he so sweet and like the this is this was the point of the whole experience just go look on her face and looking at the lights giving them an opportunity and an experience that maybe they would not have been able to have um if they did not you know go on the trip and then of course there was Santa and I have to say that um I know who who came for I know Santa and Santa reached out to me later that day as well as um Christina Dylan who was part of Deon ERS and said I don't know if they were parents that attended but the adults that went on that trip were amazing and they were so professional and so helping for the student students and that the students were extremely well Beed so it was really nice to get that feedback from them okay that's it so now diabetes awareness so we have a couple of students in our school who do have diabetes and um one family in particular the silip family wanted to advocate for their child and for the other children that have um this medical condition and bring bring us up to speed with what to do if there's an emergency what the signs are because they are a family that did not know that this was happening to their to their child until it actually happened so I would like to ask the Sila family to come on up [Applause] hi guys hi I'm G around so this is our family um they have advocated for their daughter in a way that I have not seen before and I admire and respect you guys for that um we are now providing professional development also to all of our staff on diabetes and the different signs that families can look for or teachers and staff can look for in their students if they see that maybe there's possibly something going on um we raised a lot of money I don't think you really know how much Mone I was wondering why you wouldn't tell me so I'd also like to um introduce this is Shandy Perez he is with breakthrough um t1d and that is the organization that we are donating our money too so come on up Shandy so obviously this is not the real CH I can't go to the bank with I don't know unless has but we raised $2,516 51 I just want to thank everybody for their participation and it was really really a nice a nice thing to do for our school Community um I was unaware of a lot of things I know Miss Selenas was also it was a learning experience for both of us and we look forward to doing it again and I want to thank you guys so much for putting it all together sort of working with me to be able to give you guys the information that's needed and be able to experience what um you know National diabetes awaren this month looks like um specifically for our families and for our kids who live with this every single day so I appreciate all of your efforts um especially Tara who um you know coordinated all of this together and bringing this together so thank you guys for you know really started planning this in September so it's a big it's it was a big event and it it was very much worth it so thank [Applause] you all right one more go this way I'm that person sorry thank you so much you're welcome I have literature that I'm going to pass out to that Mr okay uh thank I just want to say thank you so much to our staff and our community for being so generous that's fantastic to have raised so much money um thank you to everyone who worked to put that together um so our next presentation is about the audit the school audit now I know all of you are excited to hear that but if for some reason you can't stay we're GNA take a couple minute break you can grab some snacks and cookies on your way out and then we'll start with the a in a few minutes you so apprciate just me conratulations [Laughter] great yeah appreciate you're welcome like here no he wears one of those like Kristen check once in a while [Laughter] it's br can okay see you see you [Music] is he cute man had UniFi year they don't get any work and they're so help with us and it makes everything's ready organized St always some of the operational issues year not issues but we noted increases expenditures over last year construction cost te Transportation health insurance We Do 50 school boards at this point and everyone um able to offset with some of that with inc5000 this year one thing we did have this year is about $600,000 decrease in state um and because of that our fund balance went down about $600,000 this has a couple of effects um nor we have a little bit left over to kind of bump up our reserves again so we didn't have that ability this year so our maintenance Reserve is down about $200,000 or so and we've been using that for um the upgrades that we've been doing on the facil here that's why money put back in um our excess Surplus is usually about $900,000 which is what we use to offset the tax increase for the following year this year it's um down about 150,000 about $768,000 this year so that's down a little bit as is our refund balance last year we had a couple St AIDs that came in that we didn't have to reserve in the excess so that fell into our freund balance so that went from about $490,000 and about 281 so the budget process is going to be a little tighter this year as all our costs increase our budgets get Tighter and Tighter so again that's across the board we don't have as much left over every year that's need to happen um I don't know if you all had a chance to go through it you go through it um anybody has any questions get thank you thank you thank all right uh at this time the meeting will be open to the public for comments on agenda items only if your comments pertain to students Personnel litigation or negotiations we' ask that you see the superintendent after the meeting since the board does not generally discuss such items in public does anyone want to make a uh any old business new business I put two things on for new business actually had opportunity today to go through and look at everyone's training requirements and um so in each each calendar year the Board needs to do new training requirements so you should have received an email and Link if you in fact are required um to do training not everybody is so if you have a question about that or you think maybe you were supposed to do something you didn't get a link today feel free to reach out to me but U but those are all done and U like I said questions um the ethics filing that we have to do every year that season begins February 1st so by February 1 I have to put everybody on the list and then those emails will get generated and you'll have to do that Financial ethics disclosure form I'm just alerting to that that'll happen in the next few weeks for the next get thank you any correspondence okay committee reports um for curriculum we talked about committee dates um for this year the sixth grade trip shop rooms we approve them and then do the background check they're on the agenda tonight we talked about calendars um both the snow day makeup day for this year and the 2025 26 Calendar for the next year um and then we talked about some curriculum items in regards to the 2526 process thank you uh Finance yeah so we got an update about the HVAC uh we're an update on the audit completion uh we discussed uh recognizing Steve's efforts for jip award um and we began uh to discuss the 2526 U budget and what we're potentially looking at um we also discussed uh the field refurbishment parking signs and the drop off issues that been brought to our attention thank you um for personnel negotiations Kathy's not here so I'll just go with what I've got um we talked about how the budget relates to salary and Personnel items and we are negotiating with the principles and supervisors this time um so regular and executive session I need a motion and a second to approve the November 20th 2024 Board of Education regular meeting minutes and executive meeting minutes Mo second well she uh all in favor any opposed you obain because I wasn't no you're just saying that the minutes are in accurate presentation so that's fine uh item seven is monthly reports so that's informational items uh number eight can I get a motion in a second to approve uh Township Board of Education upon recommendation of the superintendent approve items 8B through 8K with a change to AI to strike the words sidebar because we used to have a sidebar but now it's part of the contract so we don't need the word sidebar can I get a motion and a second off any discussion okay then can I get a roll call Mr Goo yes Mr CTS yes Mr roner yes yes bottom yes but obain from 8 e wild yes own uh yes but abstain from 8 H yes thank you uh at this time can I get a motion and a second for the Mulla Township Board of Education on recommendation of the superintendent approve items 9B through 9 I we're going to add an I which I will read to everyone so that we all know what I motion okay so if I can get a motion in a second and then I will read item I so second uh item I says uh affirm the harassment intimidation and bullying incident case number ms24 d25 3 described in the executive session portion of the January 22nd 2025 Board of Education meeting by the superintendent of schools as resolved by the building principal or design I.E The Bullying coordinator any discussion um I just like to say I'm really happy to see the field trips list and I'm excited and thankful that the teachers put that together for the kids and we're still able to do it because I think it's really important for kids any other discussion okay can I get a roll call yes Mr K yes M CTS yes yes Mr rer yes Mr stal yes yes from 96 wild yes yes uh this time can I get a motion in a second for the Mulla Township Board of Education upon recommendation of the superintendent approv items it says 10 B and C but there's nothing under B so it's just 10 second any discussion we get a roll yes yes yes yes yes yes wild yes yes uh at this time can I get a motion in a second the mullika Township Board of Education upon recommendation of the business administrator approve items 11b through 11 I second any discussion so it was noticed that well there were two things so what happened was we we already approved this back in the fall and then we had to do amendments as part of the approval process and then right before we went away for break they made us go in and approve it again and I wanted there to be a second approval in there because I was noting that the board was going to approve this after you know after we had made those changes so I felt I thought it was through done but I just thought any other discussion all right can I get a roll call yes yes yes obain from 11 Mr R yes on 11d yes bottom yes wild yes yes uh at this time the meeting will be open to the public for comments if your comments pertain to students Personnel litigation or negotiation we'd ask that you see the superintendent after the meeting since the board does not generally discuss such items in comments okay uh our next meeting date is February 26th 2025 at 6:30 p.m. for executive session and 7:00 p.m. for public session well actually going to be 5:00 p.m. for executive session for non-conflicted members 6:30 for the rest and then 700 p.m for the public I do have a p upate second um the PTA update the mikica PTA is grateful to all the volunteers who helped make our December book fair holiday night first trimester treat and Hol shop funds successful events PTA is excited to help the mtea at their literacy night on February 27 we will see you there at our meeting in January they voted in a new VP Rachel Jordan and a new Treasurer Kelly hefley they are excited to have Kelly Step Up into this role lastly the PTA is actively planning their primary fundraiser the nth annual wow n years already nth annual handbag Bingo and basket raffle on April 4th 20125 they are actively looking for local businesses community members and mikica families to sponsor the event and or contribute to the basket raffle if you saw an email sent out tonight the body of the email was omitted they will work with their admin to address it but please help spread the word both for the handbag Bingo event and to help them gather donations and sponsors thank you so much I one meeting talk about I in touch with each other and they're supposed I don't know what the update I have as long as you made the connection thank you all right do we have any mtef updates any information okay all right then it looks like we are done so if I can get a motion and a second to adj the meeting motion second all in favor any oppose any thank you everyone 6:30 I get through the woods as long as not to I'm 35 I have to go some pleas [Music] I didn't get that only