Yes, ma'am. Okay. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us. Happy May 6. The New Jersey Open Public Meetings Act will is enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meeting of public bodies at which business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon. In accordance with the provisions of this act, the State Board of Education has caused notice of this meeting to be published by having the date, time, and place thereof posted in the Department of Education, secretary of state's office, and notice has been given
to the state house press corps, the governor's office, and the state board agenda subscribers. And as a quorum is present, this meeting shall now come to order. May I please have a motion? So moved. Thank you very much, doctor Butcher. May I please have a second? Thank you very much, miss Bennett. All in favor of calling this meeting to order, please say aye. Aye. Thank you. Any opposition? Any abstentions? This motion is approved. Whereas in order to protect the personal privacy and to avoid situations wherein the public
interest might be deserved, the open public meetings that permits public bodies to exclude the public from that portion of the meeting at which certain matters are discussed. Now, therefore, be it resolved that consistent with the provision of NJSA 10 colon four dash 12 b, the State Board of Education will now adjourn to executive session to discuss personnel and legal matters. May I please have a motion? Thank you very much. Board member Pena, may I please have a second? Second.
Thank you very much. Board member Shehada, All in favor of adjourning to executive session, please say aye. Aye. Any opposition, please say nay. Any abstention, the motion is approved. We will be back, I'm thinking, in thirty five, forty minutes. Thank you very much. Remember that teacher who changed your life? You could be that teacher. New Jersey has some of the best public schools in the country with competitive salaries and valuable benefits. Be that teacher. Visit teachinspire.mj.gov. Remember that teacher who changed your life?
You could be that teacher in New Jersey. You'll help shape the next generation alongside a dedicated community of educators. New Jersey has some of the best public schools in the country with competitive salaries, valuable benefits, and a solid pension plan. So be that teacher. Make an impact. Teach. Inspire. New Jersey. To learn more, visit teachinspire.nj.gov. If you're a teacher, you've had students tell you how much you mean to them. And for everyone who does, more feel that way but may not say it. Remember that teacher who changed your life?
You're that teacher to a lot of people. Teach, inspire, New Jersey. If you're a teacher, you've probably had students tell you how much you mean to them. And for everyone who does, there are more who feel that way but may not say it. You can't know how many, but it's more than you think because you've done more than teach. You've inspired. Remember that teacher who changed your life? You're that teacher to a lot of people. Teach. Inspire. New Jersey. Remember that teacher who changed your life? You could be that teacher. New Jersey has some of the best public schools in the country with competitive salaries
and valuable benefits. Be that teacher. Visit teachinspire.nj.gov. Remember that teacher who changed your life? You could be that teacher in New Jersey. You'll help shape the next generation alongside a dedicated community of educators. New Jersey has some of the best public schools in the country with competitive salaries, valuable benefits, and a solid pension plan. So be that teacher. Make an impact. Teach. Inspire. New Jersey. To learn more, visit teachinspire.nj.gov. If you're a teacher, you've had students tell you how much you mean to them.
And for everyone who does, more feel that way but may not say it. Remember that teacher who changed your life? You're that teacher to a lot of people. Teach, Inspire, New Jersey. If you're a teacher, you've probably had students tell you how much you mean to them. And for everyone who does, there are more who feel that way but may not say it. You can't know how many, but it's more than you think because you've done more than teach. You've inspired. Remember that teacher who changed your life? You're that teacher to a lot of people.
Teach. Inspire. New Jersey. Remember that teacher who changed your life? You could be that teacher. New Jersey has some of the best public schools in the country with competitive salaries and valuable benefits. Be that teacher. Visit teachinspire.nj.gov. Remember that teacher who changed your life? You could be that teacher in New Jersey. You'll help shape the next generation alongside a dedicated community of educators. New Jersey has some of the best public schools in the country with competitive salaries, valuable benefits, and a solid pension plan. So be that teacher.
Make an impact. Teach. Inspire. New Jersey. To learn more, visit teachinspire.nj.gov. Cheeser. Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Thank you very much for coming and attending. I'd like to resume our public portion of our meeting at this time. Whereas whereas consistent with the provision of NJSA 10 colon four dash 12 b, The state board will now adjourn from executive session to resume the open session portion of our of this meeting.
So may I please have a motion? Thank you very much. Board member Barry, may I please have a second? Thank you very much, board member Bennett. All in favor of resuming the public portion of our meeting, please say aye. Aye. Thank you. Any opposition, please say nay. Any abstentions? The motion is approved. And doctor Butcher, would you like to lead us in the pledge of allegiance? Thank you, doctor Butcher. My pleasure. Excuse me. As our state board meetings are accessible to the public for viewing one second. Reviewing on the YouTube channel, I would like to advise that YouTube provides readily accessible
language translation options for closed captioning. If you're viewing so sorry. If you're viewing our simulcast currently, you can use the settings option in the YouTube for information about subtitles, auto translations, and closed captioning in multiple languages. We had our last meeting on April 8. Is there is there a motion to approve the minutes for the April meeting of
the State Board of Education? Thank you very much, doctor Keenan. May I have a second, please? Thank you. I believe board member was first. So sorry. All I'm favored of approving I know. Of approving the minutes, please say aye. Is there any opposition? Please say nay. Are there any abstentions? Hearing none, the motion is approved. So we will hold open topic public testimony today, meaning that registered members of the
public may speak on any educational topic of choice. The testimony will begin thirty minutes after the conclusion of this meeting. State board members, Jeanette Pena, Ron Butcher, Ahmed Shahada, Marybeth Berry, and I are scheduled for public testimony. I believe that James will Williams has kindly stepped in as an alternate to also here today. Thank you. State board members who are unable to sit for public testimony are asked. Please reach out to, to the alternates for next month also if you're not available
to speak or to hold office for this part of it. For the month of June, actually, we will not hold public testimony. We do not have our permanent student representative, Kailene DeRose, today as she is taking a p test. So for our report, we'll have to wait till next month. So sorry. At this time, I would like to announce members of the state board nominating committee. Jeanette Pena will serve as chairperson and state board members, doctor Keenan and Ahmed Shahada
will serve on the committee. The state board nominating committee will present the slate of officers for 2026, February at our 06/03/2026 meeting. In accordance with our bylaws, the elections for the state board leadership will be held after June 30. Our state board calendar Included in our agenda is the proposed list of state board meeting dates and public testimony scheduled for 02/2027.
Please share your thoughts. The state board will vote on this resolution of the dates on 06/03/2026 at the monthly public meeting. If you have conflicts or thoughts about this, please email me and please email director Schoener. Thank you. Petition for rulemaking. The state board received a petition for rulemaking from Jennifer Dollinger Woods on 02/24/2026. The petitioner requested the state board amend NJAC six a colon 14 dash three point
five and three point six to change the criteria for eligibility for special ed and related services for students with communication impairments. Commissioner Locks and I have reviewed this petition and recommend the petition be denied as outlined on the notice of action. The notice of action is posted on the Department of Education's web page for anyone who would like to read the specific details. And now we'll continue with our committee reports. Vice President Johnson is the chairperson for instruction policy committee and is not here today.
So I would like to read The instructional policy committee met on 04/28/2026 to discuss the 2024, 2025 school performance reports and graduation data. We also discussed the school performance report redesign, college and career readiness highlights, and attendance and discipline highlights. Since this presentation will be on today's agenda, I will forego any further discussion at this time about the committee meeting. And I would like to also announce our school visits last month.
This month, they are this past month. Excuse me. State board members once again have had the opportunity to accompany commissioner locks on her many visits to schools across our state. I would like to again offer my thanks to commissioner locks for the invitations. And I would also like to thank the hosting school districts, the Union Township, Elizabeth, and Union City. We were warmly welcomed into the schools to observe the wonderful opportunities provided for our students. I would also like to thank state board members, Mary Bennett and Jeanette Pena for
joining us. Then on top of that, we had commissioner locks had many more meetings than that. These are the ones we accompanied with the state board members. Mary Bennett, Mary Mary Berry, Jeanette Keenan. I'm sorry. Claudine Keenan, Jeanette Pena and Vice President Johnson and I had the opportunity to also visit various continuing tech ed programs across the state and see wonderful opportunities they've been offered to our students. I wanna offer my gratitude to the host schools of Union County Technical, County Vocational
Technical School, Cape May Vocational Technical School, also for warmly welcoming us and to Jackie Burke and Ann Nicholas for the New Jersey Council of County Vocational Technical Schools and serving as liaisons. Are the schools and the assisting state board office were wonderful in helping us set this up. So thank you to all. And now, luckily for my voice, I'm turning it over to our commissioner. Thank you for putting up with my voice. Thank you. Good morning, everyone.
I'm incredibly excited about this next agenda item. So this week is national teacher appreciation week, and it's especially fitting that we get to pay tribute to an outstanding teacher today as the Milken National Educator Award recipient recognizing the extraordinary impact that teachers have on their students, schools, and communities. The Milken Family Foundation developed the awards program in 1987 to provide public recognition and unrestricted financial awards of $25,000 each to honor outstanding educators. Since then, the Milken Family Foundation has awarded more than $76,000,000 to more than 3,000
distinguished educators from across the country. Milken recipients are exceptional educators whose work reflects the highest standards of teaching and learning. Widely regarded as one of the nation's most prestigious honors for k twelve educators and often referred to as the Oscars of teaching, the Milken Educator Award recognizes outstanding teachers who demonstrate exemplary instructional practice and strong student learning results. Educators selected for this award serve as models of excellence for the profession. They're chosen in early to mid stages of their careers for both their accomplishments and
their potential for continued impact. Recipients are inspiring leaders whose dedication and engaging presence motivates their students, colleagues, and school communities. So each year, New Jersey is proud to count one of its outstanding educators among the recipients of this prestigious national recognition. On 10/15/2025, the New Jersey Department of Education had the pleasure of surprising Jennifer Capritti, an exceptional seventh grade language arts teacher at Lawrence Middle School in the Lawrence Township School District, with the news that she'd been selected as the recipient of the Milken Educator Award.
As with all of these honorees, Janet did not apply for the award and had no idea that it was coming, making the moment of recognition even more meaningful for her students, colleagues, and school community. So we're now gonna get to watch a quick video that Just now, a Just now, a gym full of middle school students stood on their feet to thank English teacher, Jeanette Caprini.
At the Milken Foundation, we believe educators have the most important job in our country because they have the responsibility of preparing all of you for a bright future. Think for a moment of your favorite teachers. Maybe it's here at Lawrence Middle. Maybe it was elementary. The good teachers make a difference. And before we leave, a teacher at LMS is gonna receive this national award And the Milken award, it's so prestigious, they call it the Oscars of teaching. The Milken educator award goes to Jeanette Caprini.
I'm looking around and I'm so excited because I have wonderful colleagues. I'm thinking who can it be. And then they say my name and I I don't really remember much after that. Today, we saw students that had this teacher the prior year erupting because they love that teacher. And that's even the the students that have just started with this teacher this school year already have fully embraced what she's doing. And that she's amazing. And that came through today from everybody in the room and, not only from the
students, but our colleagues as well. I loved middle school aged kids because they are simultaneously silly and goofy and yet able to really impress you with their critical thinking and the depth of thought they bring to conversations. And so it was kind of the best of both worlds. I have a blast every single day, and I go home in awe of what we've been able to accomplish together. It's just the best being in her class. She deserves this award so much. She is one of my favorite teachers. She makes it really fun. But, yeah, that's what happened this morning.
Oh my god. Congratulations. Thank you. Miss Caprini is just a really, really good teacher, and I love her. Obviously, very exciting and very exciting we get to continue the celebration. State board member Bennett, I know you had the pleasure of being at that surprise assembly. I don't know if you wanna say anything briefly. Ending sessions like that. So what's really nice about being in the state board because you get invited to go. And to see the students, as the teacher was struck, the kids were just beyond containable. They were like, oh my god. Our teacher. Our teacher. And teachers make a major difference in the lives of the children that they serve.
So congratulations again, and I was so glad to be there to see it in person. Yeah. We're excited to continue this celebration, not only for, Jeanette, but for the entire community that's been impacted by her dedication and leadership. So very excited that we get to continue the celebration publicly, and I'm gonna ask, doctor Jordan Shipp, associate assistant commissioner of the division of teaching and learning services to tell you a little bit more and as do this recognition. Thank you, commissioner Locks. I am privileged to be here today. It is an honor to recognize the outstanding contributions of this year's Milken National Educator
Award recipient. Today's tribute is about saying to our recipient that we recognize you, we value you, and we thank you. First, I would like to acknowledge our Milken program partners for their dedication to the program. I will be reading, a full list as some may be watching virtually. If you are, attending in person, I ask that you please stand to be recognized when your name is called. First, Tina Dare, secretary, treasurer of the New Jersey Education Association. Vincent Delucia, former director of special projects at the New Jersey School Boards Association, Vicki
Duff, coordinator of professional learning at the New Jersey Principles and Supervisors Association, Colleen Eskow, senior director public policy at the New Jersey Children's Foundation, Virginia Fasulo, the twenty twenty three Milken recipient and the supervisor of career and technical education in the Lodi Public School District, Catherine Malone, chief development officer at Junior Achievement USA, Sharon Roseborough, president of the New Jersey Parent and Teacher Association, and Melanie Schultz, director of government relations at
the New Jersey Association for School Administrators. Thank you for your continued support of the Milken National Educators Program. Let's give them a big round of applause. Now that we've introduced our panel, we turn to recognizing the New Jersey Milken educator family, an inspiring community that welcomes, supports, and mentors each new recipient. As part of this distinguished network, our newest honoree joins a group of outstanding New Jersey educators who continue to make a meaningful impact at both the state and national levels. Today, we have two Milken awardees in the audience.
First, Tanya Breeland, twenty o six, Milken recipient, and Taylor Trost, the 2023 Milken awardee. Thank you to our panel and to the past recipients of the Milken Award for your dedication and leadership. And now without further ado, it is time to honor the newest Milken National Educator Award recipient just announced by commissioner Locks. Jeanette Capritti, an English language arts teacher at the Lawrence Middle School in the Lawrence
Township School District. Jeanette, where are you? Janette. Okay. So just for a second. I'm sorry. I wanna say some great things about you first, if you don't mind. We'll be inviting Janette to come forward to accept her award with her county office of education officials, district superintendent, and principal. Let's take a few moments to learn more why to learn about more why she is so deserving of this recognition. Jeanette Capritti leads with excellence, purpose, and heart. Known for her magnetic energy and instructional creativity, she creates a classroom environment where students
are inspired to think deeply, write authentically, and grow both academically and personally. Her innovative teaching includes immersive experience Such as transforming her classroom into a science fiction landscape experience, complete with lighting, costumes, music, and inquiry based activities that draw students into the genre alongside student led storytelling that fosters voice, structure, and identity. Jeanette's efforts to foster critical thinking, student ownership, and meaningful engagement have led to measurable
success. Her students consistently demonstrate significant growth in reading and writing with exceptional student achievement results. Beyond the classroom, Jeanette devotes lunch periods to tutoring students, volunteering to chaperone student dances, and teachers' literacy to at risk students in the summer destinations program to enhance academic success. She has led the development of a writing two point o elective course to strengthen student writing skills, designated grade level or design grade level common assessments and curriculum, and
leads professional development in her district on best practices in writing instruction, which are carefully designed to be cross curricular and accessible for teachers in any content area. Jeanette also mentors student teachers from Rider University and is a guest lecturer at the College of New Jersey where she inspires preservice educators with her knowledge, passion, and experience. Her leadership and curriculum care for students and teachers report makes her a trusted and respected voice in her school and district.
Please join me in congratulating her as I invite Janette Caprini to come up to accept her her Milken National Educator Award from the state, board president Goldberg and commissioner Locks and have her photo taken along with Mercer executive county superintendent Daryl Meinez Benson, Lawrence Township school district superintendent Robin Klin, and her Lawrence Middle School principal, Minnie Malofsky. Let's give Jeanette a big round of applause. Come on.
Pretty good. Thanks, Jeanette. I wanna congratulate you once again on winning this prestigious award and your continued success. At this time, I would like to open it up to the, the floor to any board members who would like to add any comments and recognize Jeanette at this time. Madam president. Thank you. Thank you so much. I, am so impressed and hearing how you go above and be hearing how you go above and beyond and meet with students in the summer during lunch, all the different things that you provide beyond that, I'm sure.
Thank you for what you bring. I wish I'd had you as a teacher in middle school too, but it's just incredible what you bring to every student who gets to have the lucky ability to be with you. So thank you sincerely. Anybody else? Doctor Butcher. I'm gonna piggyback on a couple of comments that were made. You want you wanna stand up again? You demonstrated your enthusiasm when you took five feet, and we both looked and said, boy, how excited she looks. Are you are you really that excited? And it obviously shows. Congratulations.
Yeah. You know, I I had the pleasure to be at the, at Lawrence Middle School when you were recognized. It was truly electric that the the kids, the staff, it was an absolutely wonderful experience. I'm so honored and privileged to be a a small part in your journey. This now concludes the Milken Family Foundation National Educator Award presentation. I would like to thank once again, Jeanette Capritti, as well as all of the rest of the outstanding teachers in New Jersey for what you do for your students each and every day, especially as we celebrate teacher appreciation week.
Your dedication, passion, and unwavering commitment to supporting and inspiring in our students truly makes a difference in classrooms and communities across our state. Let's give one big round of applause. Alright. Well, that's hard to follow. We get to stay on the celebration train a little bit. So today, I am also honored to ask the state board to recognize five districts for their exceptional commitment to dual language immersion and world languages education. So this recognition is a celebration of our shared dedication to students, families, and communities across New Jersey and to the belief that linguistic and cultural diversity is a strength
to be affirmed and cultivated. These model programs reflect what's possible when schools center students' identities, value families' home languages, and work intentionally to measure meaningful, high quality educational opportunities for every learner. Together, these districts serve families from a wide range of backgrounds and exemplify excellence in second language education. This recognition is also grounded in a strong and growing body of research. We know that early and sustained engagement in a second language supports academic achievement while fostering bilingual and multilingual competence, cross cultural understanding, and the communication skills that students need
to thrive in an increasingly complex interconnected world. Students engaged in a language learning experience benefits far beyond those proficiency pieces, including enhanced literacy, cognitive flexibility, and a deeper ability to engage thoughtfully with others. So to the district's educators, school leaders, and families represented here today, your work truly embodies what can happen when thoughtful policy, research based practices, and community commitment come together. You're creating learning environments where students' languages are affirmed, families' cultural knowledge is honored, and multilingualism is nurtured as a lifelong asset.
So I'm gonna welcome doctor Shipp back to the podium and who will introduce our deserving school districts and acknowledge their achievements. Thank you again, commissioner. Before introducing the districts that we're honoring today, I would like to underscore the significance of this recognition program. These designations represent not only a strong program design, but years of deliberate effort, instructional leadership, and collaboration with educators, families, and communities. The New Jersey Department of Education is proud to recognize districts whose work reflects research based practices, high expectations for all learners, and a clear commitment to multilingualism as a
powerful academic and social asset. It is now my distinct honor to recognize the awardees in the category of dual language immersion programs. First, we have Hoboken dual language charter school. Let's give them a big round of applause. Jennifer? Jennifer Sargent, executive director, is here today to accept the designation as a New Jersey Department of Education dual language immersion model program for grades for grades k through eight Spanish one way immersion. Congratulations, miss Sargent. Please come up. Yes.
Please come up. I think we have certificates also. They're right behind Let's hear it again for Hoboken dual language charter.
Our next recipient is North Plainfield School District. It's here for North Plainfield. Doctor Michelle Aquino, superintendent, is here to accept the designation as a New Jersey Department of Education dual language immersion model program for two programs, grades k through four Spanish one way immersion and for k through four Spanish two way immersion. Doctor Aquino, congratulations. Please come up. Success. North Plainfield, everyone. Our final recipient in the category of dual language immersion programs is West Windsor Plainsboro Regional School District. Accepting this award designation as a New Jersey Department of Education dual language immersion model
program for two programs is chief executive chief academic officer, doctor Barbara Gould. Barbara? Hi, Barbara. Her recognition is for grades k through five Spanish two way immersion and for grades k through five Chinese two way immersion. Congratulations, doctor Gould. West Windsor, Plainsboro, everyone. Now turning our attention now to a different category. This is the world language model programs.
I'd like to acknowledge our first recipient, Egg Harbor Township School District. Egg Harbor. It's accepting this designation as a New Jersey Department of Education world language model program for their heritage speaking program is doctor Michelle Schreiner, supervisor of multilingual learners and world languages. Doctor Schreiner, congratulations. Egg Harbor Schools, everyone. Our next recipient is the Summit Public School District. Summit. Here with us is Anna Votenzo, supervisor of world languages in k and ESL k through 12 to accept the designation as New Jersey Department of Education world language model
program for grades k through five. Congratulations, missus Kintosa. Semi public schools, everyone. Finally, we welcome up once again doctor Gould from West Windsor Plainsboro Regional School District to accept the designation as New Jersey Department of Education's world language model program for grades two through 12. Doctor Gould, once again, congratulations. Congratulations to each of these districts, and thank you for your continued leadership and service to New Jersey's students and families. We are grateful for your commitment and proud to recognize your work today. Let's give a great big round of applause to all of the model proven, for
world language and dual language engagement. Thank you, commissioner. Thank you, madam president. We, are very excited to hopefully welcome all of our awardees to stay for the whole meeting, but we also know some may wanna step out. We're gonna do a quick pause to give people a chance to shuffle seats. We'll just sixty seconds, and we'll get started again. Okay. We'll keep it going. Obviously, lots to celebrate, but plenty more agenda items ahead. So, the next item, less celebratory, but still some things to celebrate, we are going to have a chance to talk about the 2024, 2025 school performance reports, which will be released later this month.
So these school performance reports reflect the department's commitment to providing parents, students, and school communities with a wide variety of information about each school and district. So the department encourages administrators, parents, teachers, and stakeholders to use these reports to learn more, start conversations, and engage. So I'm excited to welcome up, doctor Kim Murray, acting assistant commissioner of the division of educational services, and miss Jessica Merville, director of the office of performance management, to present the information about the upcoming release of the twenty four twenty five reports.
And they'll share data highlights from this year's reports, including 2025 graduation rates, and respond to your questions. Jessica, I'll turn it to you. Okay. I know. Good morning, and thank you, commissioner. Thank you, president Goldenberg, vice president Johnson, and members of the board. We are pleased to be here today to present provide you with an overview of the 2425 school performance reports and graduation data. Under title one of the elementary and secondary education act, states are required to publish state and local report cards. Report cards must include information on the state overall and each public school district and
school in the state. New Jersey also had states two requiring reports for each school in the state. New Jersey satisfies both of these requirements through the publication of our annual school performance report. The performance reports are an important resource for districts, parents, and other stakeholders as they can be used to understand the school's challenges and successes. Information from the performance reports can be utilized to have targeted conversations about school performance and empower parents to be informed partners in their child's education. We encourage school communities to, again, use these reports to learn more, start conversations, and
engage to understand where schools are doing well and where they can improve. The school performance reports provide a wide variety of data on each school and district, as well as the state across 10 different categories. This slide shows a small summary of all the data available in their reports. There are about a 100 different data tables and visuals in the school performance reports. Many of the data elements are acquired under either ESSA or our state report card statute. However, other data elements have been added in response to state initiatives or stakeholder feedback over the years. We work with offices across the department and stakeholders to expand and improve improve our
reporting each year. Over the last few years, we've been working to add more data by student group and expand trend data where available. Today, we'd like to give you updates on the timeline for the release of the 2425 reports. At today's meeting, we'll be sharing some state level outcomes that will be included in the twenty four twenty five reports. Each year, we provide local education agencies or LEAs with an opportunity to preview the reports before the public release. That embargoed preview will start next Monday, May 11, and then the department plans to publicly release the reports following that preview period on May 21.
The public release will include state, district, and school level reports, downloadable databases that include all the data in the reports, and supporting resource documents. For the 2526 school year, the department has transitioned to its new data system, the New Jersey Statewide Longitudinal Educated Data Educator Education Data System or NJ SLEDS. Along with the transition of our data collection for the state, the department has also created a new school performance report web page last fall on our department web page. This transition has given the department an opportunity to completely redesign the reports starting with
the 2425 reports. While our previous reports featured mostly static data tables, the new reports are now dashboard based with more visual presentations of data and dynamic options to filter data and view data in different ways. On this slide, we show an example of how we've updated how we report our chronic absenteeism rates. The image on the left shows our data table from the twenty three twenty four reports, and the image on the right shows how we've updated the reporting for 2425 to show the data, more visually so you can more easily see the chronic absenteeism rates.
The new reports will make it easier to compare data across groups visually. For example, in this case, it's very easy to see which groups have the highest and lowest rates of chronic absenteeism within a school or district. Another way we've been able to update the way we present data in this year's reports is to add filter options within the reports. For example, this slide shows an example of how we reported on performance on the NJSLA ELA assessments in prior year reports. We would have had seven similar static data tables to show the performance data for each grade level assessment for grades three through nine.
In this year's reports, we have one visual for NJSLA ELA performance by test that includes a test filter where you can switch to any grade level to see the performance in one place. We've also have student group filters added that allow you to filter to review a selected set of student groups or add district or state comparisons. And as you can see, we've also updated the way we present the data to show the performance level data visually, again, allowing easier comparisons across groups within a school. Another feature that we've included in some of our visuals this year is an option to toggle between visual or tabular presentation of the data.
Visuals that have this option will have a table and graph icon at the top that allows you to switch back and forth between looking at the data in a table or in a visual. Since some people wanna look at a table, some people wanna look at a visual. And these changes are really just a starting point. The department now has greater flexibility and capacity to make updates each year or even between yearly releases. In future years, we hope to explore releasing data earlier in the year, continuing to expand the data we report and make it easier to compare data across schools and districts. We are also working closely with our NJ SLEDS team to build out reports in
our systems for districts to make it easier for them to view their data as they are reporting it in the system. Any questions on the redesign of the reports or release before we move on to sharing any of the data? Sorry. It's really nice that you've updated this so that it helps people who do wanna visualize a graph versus the the statistics and the numbers. I think it really helps people understand what we're trying to get across, so thank you for that update. It's incredible. Thank you. And we hope to collect a lot of feedback with the release and make even
more improvements as we move forward. Thank you. Anybody else at this time? Please I'll take your questions later. About the data? Yeah. Yeah. No? Okay. Okay. So now we're gonna, move into covering some high level summaries of data that will appear in the 2425 reports. First, we will start with some data included in our college and career readiness section of the reports, which includes data on PSAT, SAT, and ACT participation and performance, course participation, and career and technical education. First, we will look at advanced placement or AP and international baccalaureate or IB participation
and performance. In the school performance reports, we report on participation in these advanced courses for each school, district, and the state, and we also report it by student group. We report out the percentage of students taking exams and meeting benchmarks on those exams, and we also report out for each school and district the individual AP and IB courses offered. The first set of bars on this slide show the percentage of eleventh and twelfth graders who are enrolled in one or more AP or IB courses for each of the last five years. And you can see that we've had, a 1.6 increase in participation for twenty four, '25, and we've had increases each year for the
last, three years. As noted, we do report this participation by student group in our school performance reports. And while we have seen overall increases, there are still significant gaps in participation across student groups with, for example, only 11% of multilingual learners participating in AP courses. The middle set of bars shows the percentage of eleventh and twelfth graders who took AP or IB exams during the school year. Our rates have continued to increase each year with 32 of students taking an exam in 2425. In terms of performance, the last set of bars in this chart shows the percentage
of all eleventh and twelfth graders, not just the percentage of testers who have met a benchmark on these exams, which is a score of three or higher on an AP exam or four or higher on an IB exam. These numbers have also continued to increase over the last several years, and we now have over a quarter of our eleventh and twelfth graders meeting benchmarks. If you were to look at just the percentage of testers who met benchmarks on New Jersey, seventy nine point seven percent of our testers met at least one benchmark on assessments in 2025. We would also like to take this opportunity to highlight the 2025 AP results that
were released by College Board in March. New Jersey ranked number one in the country for AP course offerings available in high schools with 93.5% of public high schools offering at least one AP course and 86.2% of high schools offering five or more AP courses. New Jersey ranked number three in the country for percentage of public high schools graduates scoring three or higher on at least one AP exam with 33.2% of class of twenty twenty five students scoring a three or higher during high school. We also ranked number three in the ten year percentage point increase for students scoring
three or higher. And finally, New Jersey ranked number six in the nation for ten year increases in the percentage of black or African American and Hispanic or Latino students taking AP exams while in high school. New Jersey also had 44% of eligible schools earning AP school honor roll recognition compared to 36% across The United States and Canada. The school performance reports also include participation in dual enrollment courses, which are courses where students can simultaneously earn high school and college credits. National research shows that students who participate in dual enrollment are more likely to earn
higher grades in high school, graduate from high school, attend an institution of higher education, and successfully earn a post secondary degree. The New Jersey school performance reports include overall participation rates and rates by student group. These slides, this slide shows statewide dual enrollment course participation for the last five years, and you can see it has increased to 30% of eleventh and twelfth graders for 2425. Like AP and IB courses, we do continue to see gaps in participation across student groups. For example, only 23% of economically disadvantaged students participated in 2425.
Next, we will move on to PSAT and SAT data. The school performance reports include participation and performance on the PSAT, SAT, and ACT assessments. While most New Jersey public school students take the PSAT or SAT while in high school, fewer than 10% of students take the ACT. So today, I'm just going to focus on PSAT and ACT, but not that, SAT, but the ACT data is available in our reports. While our PSAT participant by increased for 2425 to eighty two point one percent of tenth and eleventh grade the PSAT, we did see a decrease in the percentage of
students who took the SAT while in high school for the class of 2025. As we reported in prior years, it's hard to say exactly why those SAT participation rates may have decreased. However, it's worth noting that most public universities in New Jersey are test optional, including Rutgers, Montclair, and Rowan, and that certainly may be part of the reason for the lower participation rates. This slide shows performance on the PSAT and SAT assessments for math and re math and reading and writing, and it shows the percentage of students meeting PSAT and SAT
benchmarks for the last four years. In 2425, performance either remained the same or increased compared to 2324. For the last several years, for the SAT, New Jersey students have outperformed the national average and had higher percentage of students meeting benchmarks. Good. Could you just share out what is the national average? I don't have it in front of me, but we can get it for you. Okay. Thanks. The New Jersey State Seal of Biliteracy recognizes graduating high school students who have demonstrated proficiency in at least one language in addition to English. Students must take a world language assessment to demonstrate proficiency in world languages between January
of their junior year and February of their senior year. The school performance reports include the number of seals earned by language for each school and district and the percentage of twelfth graders who earn seals. We've expanded our reporting for 2425 to include five years of trend data for the number of seals earned and the percentage of students earning seals of biliteracy by student group across race, ethnicity, gender, and our other major student groups. The number of graduates earning seals have continued to increase. And in 2025, over 12,000 graduates earned a seal, which is 11.1
of all twelfth graders. In 2025, we also saw 26.7% of our current and former multilingual learners earning a seal of biliteracy, and our preliminary data for 2026 suggests that those numbers will continue to increase again in 2026. Some of the work that the department has done to help increase numbers are partnerships with Rutgers to provide free, hybrid multi tiered professional learning series for educators and administrators to support student seal of biliteracy, updates to our state seal of biliteracy web page to highlight the benefits for students who earn the seal and improve the way we
communicate and share information with our districts throughout the process. The school performance reports include data on participation and approved career and technical education or CTE programs across the state. They include data on participation, both overall and by student group, participation in work based learning, and industry valid credentials earned by students. Industry valued credentials are defined as recognized degrees, diplomas, certificates, or certifications awarded for an occupation. Industry valued credentials are valued and demanded by employers. They're portable, meaning that the skills learned are transferable and provide broader opportunities.
They're stackable, meaning skills may lead to opportunities for continuous or advanced training and education, and they can lead to higher wages, career advancement, and increased job security. This chart shows the number of students who earned one or more industry value credentials for the last five years. We've seen the number of students earning credentials increase in each of the last several years. And in 2025, students earned more than 12,700 industry value credentials. The increases we've seen over the last few years may be due in part to Perkins five state plan requirements that all CTE programs must end in an industry credential,
college credit, or apprenticeship. Additionally, in partnership with the New Jersey Department of Labor and the credential review board, the department has continued to expand the number of credential options available contributing to these increases. The department now recognizes 132 industry valued credentials across 15 career clusters. Some significant updates for 2026 include the inclusion of an AI credential, allowing the state seal of biliteracy to serve as a tier one credential and recognizing JROTC as a credential, which will further increase the number of students who can earn these credentials in
New Jersey. We'll now move on to sharing some data from our climate environment section. Do we wanna pause and go any questions on that section before we move on to new data? Keep going? Okay. So chronic absenteeism is defined as being absent for 10% or more of the days enrolled during the school year. The department includes chronic absenteeism absenteeism as one of our school quality indicators under our ESSA accountability system. In the school performance reports, we report on chronic absenteeism rates by student group and grade level. We've expanded our reporting for 2025 to include four year trends for the state and
each school and district, and we expect to expand that to five years next year. This slide shows the statewide chronic absenteeism rates for New Jersey in blue, and we've also included national rates from FutureEd. The 2425 rate is estimated, in the yellow bars on this slide. As you can see in New Jersey, our rates have decreased over the last three years down to fourteen point four percent for 2425. But we our rates still remain higher than they were in twenty eighteen nineteen when ten point six percent of students were chronically absent. Each school with a chronic absenteeism rate of ten percent or higher is required to
develop a corrective action plan to improve absenteeism rates. In 2025, over sixty percent of schools had a chronic absenteeism rate of ten percent or higher compared to only thirty two percent in twenty eighteen, nineteen. Part of this corrective action plan is identifying problems and barriers to school attendance and developing recommendations to address them. We see the highest rates of chronic absenteeism among students experiencing homelessness, students in foster care, economically disadvantaged students, and students with disabilities. Most student groups, though, did show small decreases for 2025 compared to last year.
The trends in New Jersey seem to follow the data reported so far. FutureEd has estimated that the national chronic absenteeism rate is approximately twenty two percent for 2425 based on states that have reported so far, and most states follow the same trend in New Jersey with the highest rates in 2122 and decreases over the last three years. Based on states that have reported so far, New Jersey has the second lowest chronic absenteeism rate in the nation. Last year, we updated our reporting to more clearly show the breakdown of the percentage of days that students were absent during the year.
This slide shows the statewide percentage of days that students were absent during the 2425 school year, and the data is available for every school and district in the state and in New Jersey school performance reports. The color is not showing up great on the screen, but the light light blue, bars represent students who are not chronically absent, and the gold bars represent, students who are chronically absent. And we can see that about two thirds of students missed zero to 7% of days during the year, which for a typical one hundred and eighty school year, hundred eighty day school year would be fewer than thirteen days during the year.
The three yellow bars on the slide represent students who are chronically absent and missed 10% or more of days during the year. We see that less than 3% of students missed 20% or more of days, and almost half of the students who were chronically absent in 2425 were absent between 10 to 13% of days, which is about eighteen to twenty three days for a typical one hundred and eight day year. The decreases we saw in 2425 are mostly out of those first two buckets, the 10 to 13 and the 13 to 20% with the greater than 20% remaining constant. This breakdown can help districts monitor how much the school year students are missing and
whether it's improving each year. Over the last two years, the department has implemented a comprehensive and multi pronged initiative to encourage regular attendance in New Jersey schools. We released a resource hub, which houses resources for educators and families or caregivers supporting students in grades pre k to 12. This hub also serves as our one stop shop for attendance awareness campaign materials and outreach for families and caregivers, inclusive of items to assist in surveying families. We've also updated guidance materials that we've been able to get directly to our superintendents, and these materials are supportive of database decision making at large.
We've also made updates to our New Jersey CUSAC, and we've worked closely with county offices to ensure consistent and ongoing two way communications. And it's clear that the work we're doing is positively impacting students and schools over New Jersey. Over the next year, we will be offering no cost asynchronous and synchronous professional learning opportunities to increase district and school capacity in implementing strategies that promote regular attendance. Our discipline section of the reports include data on the number of violence, vandalism, harassment, intimidation, and bullying or HIV and substance offenses, HIV investigations, as well as information on
disciplinary removals, police notifications, and student arrests. On this slide, we show the total number of violence, vandalism, HIV, and substance offenses for the last four years, as well as the number of students with suspensions, both overall and broken down by in school and out of schools counts. In 2425, there was a decrease in the number of incidents, but numbers remain slightly higher than it when they were in twenty eighteen nineteen, when there were just over 28,000 incidents reported. The number of students who received any type of suspension decreased as well for 2025
with also of seeing decreases in both in school and out of school suspensions. The data demonstrates that while numbers are improving, it's essential that we continue to support district efforts to improve school climate, implement positive behavioral support, and ensure all students are safe and supported in our schools. And finally, we will move on sharing our 2025 graduation data. Before we jump into the data, though, I do wanna give a quick background on graduation requirements and the types of graduation rates that we report. In order to meet state graduation requirements and receive a state endorsed diploma, students must
first meet all state course requirements, local attendance requirements, and the state graduation assessment requirements. Graduates in the class of 2025 are required to meet all the graduation assessment requirements in both ELA and mathematics through one of three pathways. First is to demonstrate proficiency on the New Jersey graduation proficiency assessment or NJGPA. Second pathway is to meet the designated cut score on one of the assessments on the menu of substitute competency tests, which includes SAT, PSAT, and ACT. And the third pathway is to demonstrate proficiency through a student portfolio appeal. It's important to note that to address the needs of a small percentage of students
with disabilities with more complex needs, New Jersey regulations provide flexibility for individualized education program or IEP teams to determine which graduation requirements a student with disabilities will meet to receive a diploma. State regulations provide that these students still receive a state endorsed diploma and are included as graduates in our state graduation rates. In 2019, the department was monitored for its compliance with the Every Student Succeeds Act or ESSA by The US Department Of Education. As a result of that monitoring, USED issued a corrective action plan, which required New
Jersey to change the way it calculates our federal graduation rate. The The federal graduation rate is the rate that is reported to the US Department of Education as used for federal accountability purposes. It is a measure of all the students in a particular cohort who have graduated and met all state graduation requirements and compare it to the total number of eligible students in that cohort. As a result of the monitoring, the department was required beginning in 2021 to exclude students with disabilities who did not meet all of the graduation requirements because of a modification or exemption in their IEPs from the numerator of the federal calculation.
To be clear, these changes were only made for the purposes of ESSA implementation and other federal requirements. Then NJDweed now reports on two versions of the graduation rate in our reports, the state version, which includes all students who earn a state endorsed diploma, and the federal version, which aligns with these federal requirements. This slide shows the four year federal graduation rates for the last four years with a comparison to the state version of the graduation rate. As a reminder, the federal graduation rate does not include students with disabilities who did not meet either the course, attendance, or graduation assessment requirements due to modifications or exemptions
in their IEP as graduates, which is the numerator of the rate. Both calculations use the same cohort count, which means the federal rate is always equal to or lower than the state rate. There are no there were no graduation assessment requirements in place for the class of 2023 due to a law in 2022 that required the NJGPA to be administered as a field assessment in spring twenty twenty two. However, students in classes of 2022, 2024, and 2025 are required to meet the graduation assessment requirements. That's why on this slide, we have the federal rate for 2023 grayed out.
It's not directly comparable to the other rates. As you can see, we've seen increases in the federal rate from cohort 2022 to 2024 and again in 2025, where we have a federal rate of 88.9. We've sent seen increases each year in the number of students with disabilities meeting the graduation assessment requirements through the portfolio appeals process and decreases in the number of students with disabilities who have not met the course or attendance requirements due to modifications or exemptions in their IEPs, which has led to closing that gap between the state and the federal rates.
This slide shows the statewide four year, five year, and six year graduation rate. These are the state calculation of the graduation rate, which means they include all students who received a state endorsed diploma. The four year rate for cohort 2025 was ninety one point eight percent, and the five year rate for cohort 2024 was ninety two point nine percent, which are both the highest four year and five year graduation rates New Jersey had seen since implementing the adjusted cohort rate graduation calculation in 2011. The cohort 2023 six year rate is ninety three point two percent, which remains consistent
with six year rates for the last several years. In our graduation section of the report, we report five years of graduation rates for four year, five year, and six year rates both overall and by student group. This includes rates by race, ethnicity, gender, and additional student groups. Today, we wanted to highlight some student groups with significant increases in their four year graduation rates. The four year graduation rates for both economically disadvantaged students and students with disabilities increased over bat look. I'm sorry. Increased over both of the last two years. The cohort 2025 rates represent the highest four year rate since 2011 for both of
these groups. And while the four year rate for multilingual learners remained at seventy eight point nine percent for the second year, that also remains the highest four year rate for that group. Now we can open it up for questions. Doctor Butcher. Basically, I have two. So let's start with the ones about absenteeism, the other's about graduation rates. So let's start with the easy one on page 27. I don't have the I think you're going forward. 20 that's yeah. Go ahead. Is it this is the one? The crack. 2727. I know. But I yeah. 27. Okay. Better on Did you want to assume it says the final?
It on the bottom right of your Oh, Bottom right is where the page numbers are. Okay. There you go. Yeah. It's tough for us to take a a real good look at what we're doing versus federal when we have such deviation and what data is being presented. How difficult would it be for us to do three columns instead of two, basically? One that's the state rate based on our criteria, one that extracts those items and is in is compatible then with the federal rate calculation.
So can you take out the IEPs, course attendance, graduation assessment requirements? How tough is that to extract so that we can see three? I'd like I'd like to know using the same variables, how we're comparing with the federal standards. Okay. I I I I can work with you to try to figure out what makes the most sense. It is it's the same students. It's the same, group of students. It's just which students can be counted as graduates in the two comparisons. Right. Right. If you took those students out Okay. That we put in because of IEP Mhmm.
Because of attendance to be between graduation, it would make that data more compatible with what the federal rate looks like. Jessica, I'll just jump in. This federal rate is actually that calculation. It's not a generic federal rate. So this actually is the New Jersey calculation using the federal calculation standard. Sorry. Go. Alright. Sorry. Poor labeling on my part. Explains a lot. Okay. Let's go back to So let's do that. Federal version of our New Jersey rate. Yes, sir. Let's go back to page seven. Seven? Seven. K. Huddl's exam example of updated reports.
Sorry. Yeah. I can see the I can see the numbers. They're down on the right hand corner. Yeah. I just it was blocked. 987. Yeah. 80. Yep. Okay. So I know we can't solve poverty. I wish we could. In my words, a plague. It affects the educational system. It affects our economic development situation, but yet it's still there. And it's been very notable in education system for years and years, even if we go back to Jonathan Kozel and all the reports he wrote on Camden.
What can we do to make this look even better? I mean, you look at the distribution, economically disadvantaged students, the percentages, the students with disabilities, and the multilingual learners. We can't solve those problems. I understand, but we can have an impact. What's our strategy to improve this situation even more than, you know, we've been working on it, and it looks good. But in my mind, I'd like to see it better. And one of the things that keeps coming back to me goes back to the
old community schools movement. Are there any interagency initiatives to help deal with that, or are we just dealing with it on our own, like, the Department of Human Services, children, youth, etcetera, etcetera? Well, I can add one thing is that some of the resources we've provided are helping districts try to identify what the problems and issues are within each school and district because it's not a one one, answer. Right? Every school, every group of students might have a different issue causing attendance issues. And so what we have been doing is trying to support and provide all the
tools district needs to try to identify the problems that are going on within their schools and how they can possibly address them using data driven And I'll strategy. If I could interrupt there. And a lot of those problems are not school based. They're home based. Yeah. And the department is taking a a very comprehensive approach to looking at chronic absenteeism. We have a very robust, internal group from different offices within the department. So the office of early childhood, the office of special education, the office of, student
support services, which deals with student well-being, mental health, who does a lot of that chronic absenteeism work, as well as the, office of comprehensive support, which works with our lowest performing title one schools, which often are, children from poverty. And so those annual school plans have to address chronic absenteeism. Internally, we have been working to provide guidance to school districts, to individual schools, to
teachers, to administrators. How do you look at your data? What are are you doing a root cause analysis? Are you identifying where those gaps are and developing a plan that addresses those gaps? We've seen in the special ed side of the world, we've seen a lot of school refusal. So that office has done targeted training and technical assistance to support schools in getting those students back to school. It's not easy work, but it is a very intentional, comprehensive approach to getting, more
students in school. And to piggyback on your comment then, as this assessment occurs, if the issues and problems that they've identified are basically those that fall outside the traditional parameters of what a school district can do, but instead are problems that are home based, community based, whatever it might be, what efforts are made to bring the other agencies in that do have that within their area of responsibility? Have some great community based school models, and we do have some partnerships both with
DCF and, DHS and other things. So we can certainly bring some examples, but I think as the team mentioned, we know there are places where we're trying to help expand those models, but it's not a one size fits all. And continuing to figure out in a local community how we come together to look at chronic absenteeism is very important. Thank you. How long we've been dealing? We've been dealing with it long before I came on this board, and it's been a long time. It just you know, it keeps hovering, and it goes up, it goes down. It's glad to see we're on the right path here, but I think there would hopefully be some more we could do to help alleviate these problems.
That's it. Thank you. Mister Williams, do you have a comment? Yes. So the the student experiencing homelessness, I mean, that's that seems to be percentage wise. That's one of the largest, categories, and I I don't see it broken out. I'd love to see, what what characteristics are you using to identify, students that are experiencing homelessness just, because I think to, to doctor Butcher's point and I I'm certain that, that doctor Lux, you know, alluded to this.
Like, are there opportunities to have some, interagency collaborations, offices of homelessness prevention, DCA, places like that that specialize in mitigating, those types of issues. And even more with the, economically disadvantaged students. I'd love to see, you know, how how you're identifying those students, and are there opportunities for, interagency collaborations? Because to doctor Butch's points, if these are home based or family based, issues, I think, you know, we need to, you know, work with those other agencies that may
be able to provide those specialized services to the family, with a hope that that will mitigate the issues that we're seeing, with the children because, attendance is the you know, being present is the first part. So, this homelessness piece is, and having worked in housing for for some years, that piece is really, really alarmed me. And when you look on on seven and you look at the, the the bar chart, that is just kind of glaringly, out there much further than than every other
category. So I'd really love love to know what what we're seeing in terms of are these students unhoused? Are we talking about housing and security? Are they bouncing around from house to house? Like, those are a lot of different categories and things that we'd have to look into, and they all, require specialized mitigation techniques for each and each and every one of those. Right? So, not not pressing, but I'd I'd love to know how you're identifying a student that has, that is homeless or economically disadvantaged and then, work with, doctor Lux on
those interagency collaborations that we could, utilize to to help to help these students out a little bit more. Absolutely. In the office of supplementary educational programs, that is where McKinney Vento sits, which, those are the federal dollars to support students who are experiencing homelessness. Those funds are used to to, create three regional centers where we for in each part of the Central and South that help school districts and families when students are
unhoused. I'm excited to say that this year, we launched, a case management system. It's brand new, so we are piloting it to collect more robust data on the students who are experiencing homelessness. So it's I'm hoping that the next time we have this conversation, we'll have a year's worth of data, But, certainly, we can go back and get that information that you're looking for. Any other questions or comments at this time? Mary Bennett. So to compile the data, you're getting information directly from the districts, and it comes
in categorically, does it not? Some of the data comes from districts reported through our data systems. Some of it comes directly from vendors. So we got our assessment data directly from our assessment vendors. We get data from college board, from AP, from ACT. So it comes in from a lot of a lot of the data is district reported. Yeah. I I'm so when we were getting information from the districts Mhmm. I believe that that's a start point to doctor Butch's concern and to, board member William's concern about what is behind the data. It's also to the commissioner's, statement about agency work because the districts are the first
line of defense. Kids don't not come to school in Trenton. They don't come to school where they are living or not living, the community in which they exist. And so what are those communities already doing to before we get to the regional, what is the local district doing? How do we get kids to school? And once they get to school, what are the social services in the buildings, and how do those loop back into the communities? So To create a wrap around scenario, everybody's got to be working together and in concert
to get the kids to school and to try to get them housed, to get them fed so that then we can chip away later on at the performance problem. But if I don't have a place to stay and I don't have food to eat, school is not going to be the place that I necessarily think I have to come for academics. I'm gonna come for food because there is some there, but I have to go home after 03:00. So starting with how the districts are collecting and already interacting with the agencies there might be a place to see if you can bolster the support.
And I would add, right now, we collect attendance date at the end of the school year. We encourage districts to keep that up and monitor it throughout the school year. I know we are in discussions of how we can get data more, updated throughout the school year again so we can see that. And I I believe it's part of CUESEC how they're working with districts to make sure they're looking at it throughout the year and seeing who's at risk of being chronically absent and monitoring that information throughout the year. So thank you. Yes, ma'am. Board member Pena. I I just wanted to add. I think this is a very important conversation that we're having.
Absolutely. We want our students to be in school. Most, if not every single day, unless, you know, with with the school nurse, you have a fever, you have to go back home. So So we want those kids in school. And I I think it's important and fair to say there's probably more resources at this point in time in in the DOE's history of supporting our students in a very black and white way just looking at the data. We were doing pretty good up until the pandemic. Everyone stayed home, and we see this not only in schools, but we see this
also in private industry where people are rework are working remotely. There's a comfort to that. There's a convenience to that. I'm making that point because it is important to to try to understand why are students not coming to school. We have policies in place where students we we can follow a, b, c, and d if they are not coming to school. We're trying to gather that data. We know that, there's different issues affecting different students, but at the end of the day, I just I'm I'm saying all this because I think it's important to recognize
the department's efforts in ensuring that students are we're trying to get everyone to school. But there's limitations to what you can do. You can call DCPMP to say, listen. We have documented all these interventions and attempts to get a child to come to school. And you know what they say? It's not considered it's considered neglect. There's nothing we can do. So there are limitations to what a school can do. I think that that conversation should be driven. We should continue to try to establish that communication with the partner, with the parents,
but we don't know what everyone is going through at their home until you sit in their home. So continuing those conversations will be helpful to the to the families, to the students, and will give us greater information to be able to support them. But this is it's it's a very nuanced response, I think. Just my my very humble opinion. It's it's not for lack of effort. It's not for lack of trying. I I've never seen so many services offered between the mental health grants that we
have where we provide services to students after school and their families. It's just McKinney Vento. What you do, ensuring having students that maybe are in foster care forty five minutes an hour away and because they were in sixth grade and they had their friends in that school. You know what? We're gonna have a school bus pick them up and make sure that they make it to school. And I kinda question sometimes. I'm like, is it better to be on a bus for two hours a day? But, yeah, you know, they have those conversations, and the kids have that continuity of academics or at least one part of their lives, there's some continuity.
So I wanna say thank you for what is being done because the truth is there's a lot behind the scenes. I know we can always get better, but we're doing a lot. So thank you. Thank you, Jeanette. So when when we when we lift up interagency, like, collaboration and and forgive me for a roomful of educators of of kind of expounding. Right? Like, one of the the the key examples that we learned from, from nine eleven outside of, like, the horrific act was the lack of communication from the the federal agencies. Right? If they had just talked, there were many things that would have been, mitigated, during
that that situation. So when we talk about housing insecurities, if Mercer County has vouchers available for, for housing assistance, the the student wouldn't be the recipient of that information. Right? That's the parent. So how are we bringing DCA to the table with with DOE to say, okay. We have students that are showing housing insecurities. Have any of these parents applied for housing assistance? Because if not, maybe we can start some outreach. So that's when I talk about those interagency collaborations. I recognize the efforts that we do, but there's there's a there's a cliff to
what I know the Department of Education can do. So, you know, how do how are we, not particularly you, but, you know, the DOE, how are we bringing those interagency kind of task force, if you will, together where, doctor Lux is meeting with, Jacqueline Suarez over at DCA or meeting with, you know, the attorney general's office or, you know, maybe there's an issue of discrimination, and that's what's causing, like, these these insecurities. So how are we really utilizing those interagency's collaboration? So I I I do wanna lift up the the efforts that you're doing, and
just not more or less a charge, but an encouragement of how to the, you know, to the commissioner she can use, you know, where she sits on the on the state org chart to reach out to her counterparts to have those those those kind of meetings because there will be a point where all of your efforts will kind of be predicated towards the child. And if there are things that the parents need to be involved in, how do we get those other agencies that are the best facilitator of the resources to get that involved? Because we we can't have hand I'm going we're being repetitive. Forgive me.
Hand a housing voucher to, like, a 16 year old. Right? That needs to go to the parents with now that they can pay their rent. So, you know, those are the kind of collaborations that I'm that I'm really referring to. And I think every single one of us here is we are champions for children. We are advocates for students, and we wanna make sure that everybody gets what they need, gets to school, gets to have that education that's going to help them be whatever it is they wanna be. And it is that sort of alignment and that sort of collaboration that I think
doctor Lux is bringing to the department. How are we aligning our efforts? How are we maximizing maximizing what we do to help students? So those those are great ideas and, always looking for continuous improvement. And, doctor Butcher, Jonathan Kozel, Savage Inequalities, life changing book for me. So I know of what you you speak, and thank you for sharing. Doctor doctor, just would you like to I well, this is where the grand stage
goes on the stage. I came to New Jersey in the nineteen seventies. They brought me to the state because we were experimenting through the Mott Foundation with community schools. If you go back and look into the seventies, I I would encourage anybody, if you wanna look, I've got files down in my basement. The Atlantic City Westside Complex was built on identically what he just talked about and what's being talked about here. An individual school building built on the fact that it's not just education.
It's a public service building. And within that public service building was an information and referral service that had different agencies that could take that data, look at it, and refer it. And some of those actual services, because they're all government paid for, the building that Department of Human Services pays for, the building that Parks and Recreation pays for, the building that we pay for are all public dollars. Why are they in separate facilities doing their own little thing?
And and take it to a very simplistic situation. What are the problems? Here we are, fifty years later. What's happened? Kids can go to school now pretty much and get get get breakfast. That was one of the issues, and it's worked pretty well. Kids can go after school and participate in recreation programs. Not all paid for by the depart by the municipality, though. They tend to be federal funds or education funds. What's the municipality's parks and recreation doing? Then you go to health and social services.
What's the correlation between the problems we're experimenting or we're experiencing with what's happening. Where's the connection? We need to do more, I think. Alright? We even had a bond issue that back then was a $100,000,000 to create community schools as opposed to regular schools bent around a really simplistic idea. The problems are turf, tradition, and trust. Okay? How do you deal with that? You get people in, you get them interested, and you get them involved.
And how do you do that? Communication, coordination, and collaboration. By the way, they wrote an $8,000,000 grant on that, and people love it. But it just can't it just can't get past the barriers. We need to take a harder look. And that's not to say we're not doing everything we can do. It's not to say the kudos to what we're doing. It's just we're not we've got the blinders on when it comes to making this a community problem instead of just this little prop.
Jump in and, both thank the board for the conversation, and we can definitely bring this particular topic back and some updates on what's happening with that work, both with community schools and interagency collaboration. Just I know this slide in particular was an example of the updated reports, and so thank you to our team who's been working on data just nonstop. So, also, I appreciate you also going in on those conversations and questions. Hopefully, when you see these reports, there's a lot more to dig into with this data. And as Jessica mentioned, you know, districts are gonna get an opportunity to look at their data, and the stories can look very different district to district.
So just encouraging, folks, here and the districts that as these come out to really dig in and see what we can do, and I think it's the right conversation. The so what is why we look at this data, and so appreciate the rich conversation on it. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Good. Thank you, So yeah. Yes. We can continue. Okay. I'm gonna keep the next item very short just because we have such a full agenda. We talked briefly about doing literacy updates each month, and this month, we're gonna keep it very short and not a formal presentation, but we will be diving into literacy in more detail next month at the board meeting.
This month, just to follow-up from what we shared at the previous meeting, the literacy screener data for the midyear so to see, we saw the baseline at last month's meeting. Now looking at the midyear data is coming in now, and we're also in process of getting some of the reports from the grants that you heard about that are supporting literacy coaching and other pieces. So all of that's coming in here at the end of the school year, and so we look forward to having more of a conversation about it next month, but just wanted to give that quick update, on literacy for this month to keep it going. Great. Alright. I'm gonna keep going to those set of items.
Yeah. We'll move forward on that. Thank you. Great. So now in our items for consideration, our first one is also nothing. I have no personnel recommendations to make this month, so we will move on to the next. In the next, since the April 2026 state board meeting, the executive county superintendents have finalized 21 NJCUSAC interim reviews for school districts implementing district improvement plans in one or more of the five areas of school district effectiveness in accordance with chapter 30. I recommend 14 of those school districts for certification. Mister Robert Gregory, executive director of the division of field support and services, is here
to share the list of districts and respond to your questions. And I did see assistant commissioner Duckett. He's welcome to come up if he snuck in. I know he was celebrating one of our employees, today before this. Okay. We have this recommended paperwork, certification, guiding all students, guiding all students of neuro We're
here to answer any questions should you have any. And these 14 districts represent six counties across the state. I always feel it's important for the public to hear the districts that have been approved, if you don't mind Sure. Relaying that. Thank you. Not a problem. In Bergen County, we have Little Ferry Public School District. In Cape May County, we have Upper Township School District, Wildwood Crestborough School District, and
Gloucester County, we we have Delsea Regional High School District, township of Franklin School District, South Harrison Township School District. In Middlesex County, we have Dunnellan Public School District, Milltown School District, Old Bridge Township School District, Spotswoods Public School District, Woodbridge Township School District, and Morris County, Rockaway Township School District, and in Sussex County, Andover Regional School District, and Newton Public School District.
Thank you. No problem. So they work so hard for that. Are there any comments at this time? Hearing none, may I please have a motion to accept the 14 districts that were mentioned by name? Thank you so much, board member Pena. May I please have a second? Second. Thank you. I believe, board member Bennett was second on that first. Are there any other questions at this time or comments? Hearing none, all those in favor of accepting the 14 districts, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed?
Any abstentions due to conflict? Hearing none. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Alright. Are you Okay. Great. Great. Yes. Thank you. There you go. Yeah. They're gonna stay because I explained the next item. So the next one, we're on the religious holidays calendar resolution. And so today, I present for adoption a resolution incorporating the list of religious holidays permitting student absence from the school for the 2627 school year. So this resolution acknowledges that some dates may vary due to differences in the Lunar, Gregorian, and Julian calendars. And once adopted, the list of religious holidays will be distributed to school districts and
charter schools and will be posted on the department's website. Since the list of religious holidays was first presented for discussion in March, the department has not received comments from the public or amended the resolution. So mister Robert Gregory and mister Ambrose Duckett, our field support services, are here to respond to your questions. Thank you. Seeing no questions at this time and way too many holidays to ask you to be. I get it. May I please have a motion to accept these holidays? Thank you so much. Appreciate it. May I please have a second? Thank you, sir.
Any discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Any opposed, please signify by saying nay. Any abstentions? Motion carries unanimously. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I would like to please ask if, we have no items at this time for work session. But if there's any new business to discuss, would you please bring it up at this time? K. Hearing nothing, may I please have a motion to adjourn? Thank you very much, board member Pena. May I have a second, doctor Butcher? I sorry.
I heard him first. Sorry. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion I won't ask for abstentions. Motion carries. Thank you so much.