aritecture. All right, folks. We are going to get started. The North Hunteran Vorhees Regional High School District Board of Education meeting on Tuesday, January 27th, 2026 is now called to order in accordance with the requirements of the Open Public
Meeting Act and JSA 104-6 adequate notice giving the time, date, location, and to the extent known, the agenda of this meeting was sent to the Hunton County Democrat, Star Ledger, and Courier News on January 7th, 2026, and published on January 12th, 2026. In addition, notice of this meeting has
been posted at the North Hunter and High School in Vorhees High School, provided to the municipal clerks of Bethlehem Township, Califon Burough, Town of Clinton, Clinton Township, Franklin Township, Glen Gardenardner Burrow, Hampton Burrow, Hybridge Burough, Lebanon Burough, Lebanon Township, Tukesbury Township, and Union Township,
as well as other interested parties and posted in the district on the district website. Fire exits are located in the direction indicated. If alerted to fire, please move in a calm and orderly fashion to the nearest smokefree exit. Restrooms are located through the doors
behind this desk and to the right as indicated. What's the right as indicated that one? Oh. Oh, right is indicated that way. Um, at this time, please silence all cell phones. I do just want to read the mission statement before we get to our uh flag salute. Uh the North
Hun and Vorhees Regional High School District empowers all students through innovative and personalized learning to achieve their full potential, embrace lifelong learning and contribute responsibly to a changing world. So now the uh flagg of the stands nation
with all. All right, we're going to have a few folks joining us uh who are just running a little bit behind, but we will get started. Um I guess we beginning with the oath of office. So um our board secretary, Miss Blue, will administer
the oath of office to Marzakappa representing the Califon Burough Tuksbury Township. to solidly swear that I support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New Jersey and that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same and to the
governments established in the United States and in this state under the authority of the people. So help me God. I meappa do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New Jersey and that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same and to
the governments established in the United States in this state under the authority of the people. So help me God. I, Melapa, do solemnly swear that I possess the qualifications prescribed by law for the office of member of board of education and that I am not disqualified
as a voter pursuant to RS194-1, nor disqualify due to conviction of a crime or offense listed in NJSA 18A12-1 and that I will faithfully and partially and justly perform all the duties of the office according to the best of my ability. So help me God. I, Melakappa,
do solemnly swear that I possess the qualifications prescribed by for the office of member of the board of education and that I am not disqualified as a voter pursuant to RS194-1 nor disqualified due to conviction of a crime or offense listed in NJSA 18A12-1
and that I will faithfully impartially and justly perform all the duties of that office according to the best of my abilities I hope you I can get one more. >> We'll get one. >> Congratulations, >> Merryill. Thank you for stepping up and joining us and welcome to the highest
paying gig in uh in state governance. >> Thanks for having me. >> Uh all right. Uh roll call. Miss >> here. >> Mr. Chapman >> here. >> Mr. Henley >> here. >> Miss
>> running late. >> Mr. Jordy >> running late. >> Mr. Matthews >> here. >> Miss Mappa >> here. >> Mr. Morgan >> here. >> Miss Reyes >> will not be in attendance. >> Mr. Spanton >> here. Miss Stein
>> running late >> and Mr. Mc >> here. >> All right. Um I need a call for a motion and a second to approve agenda item 51 and 52. These are our minutes from December and January. Can I get a motion and a second?
>> Motion. >> Second. >> Ryan. Thank you. Um any questions or clarifications for anyone? >> We established last meeting that the people who were not on the board abstain. Uh certainly from the December
one uh but not the January one. Okay. All right. Uh any other questions or clarifications? So um >> only in regard to item five, right? That's what you're asking. >> Uh yes, five whether it's 51 or 52. So
um it's not I don't know if you wanted it's a voice vote, but I know we're going to have several folks abstaining because they >> voice is still fine. >> Okay. Uh voice vote. All in favor? >> I uh abstensions and
>> and to abstaining for 51 and any nose. Okay. Um all right. We now have the uh recognition of student achievements. So I don't know who is slated to begin first. >> All right. Dr. Cod to show you today.
as I introduce you to Brooklyn campus. Brooklyn, can you pass around our prop? So, that is an indoor shot put. And how much does that weigh, Brooklyn? >> 8.8 lb. >> 8.8 lb. Okay. So, I'm here to again introduce you to Brooklyn. Brooklyn first picked up a shot put at her
freshman year here at North Hunter High School. Don't hurt yourself. Okay. Uh, and she set a goal right at that point that she wanted to break our shot put record. And I'm here to proudly tell you that she did. So on December 12th at the St. John's Invitational indoor track
meet, and that's an indoor shot put, by the way, Brooklyn threw an incredible 36.9 ft to break our school record. This uh this was um 4T over her throw from last winter. So just to help you envision 36.9 ft as you picture that
thing, if our board president, Mr. McKisac, was to throw that shot put 36.9 ft. would land right after those first set of tables there. >> Okay. >> So, obviously we're very proud of Brooklyn as she uh makes her place here at North Hunter History as she sets our school record. Uh so, just a little bit
more about Brooklyn, she practices with our track team three times a week and trains trains every other day in the gym to maintain her strength. Beyond her own athletic success, Brooklyn work works to coach our youth track and field team, the Junior Lions. Uh and so she will
continue this spring on our spring outdoor track and field season where she will continue to throw shot put. She also plans to throw the javelin and discus as well. So she's going to have a busy spring and we'll see what she can accomplish this spring. But I wanted to obviously acknowledge the big accomp
accomplishment here of setting a new school record. After this year, Brooklyn plans to attend RVCC in the fall where she will pursue a degree in health and physical education and she will continue to coach and inspire other young athletes. So, she hopes to become a fizzed teacher one day. So, we look
forward to watching Brooklyn's continued success here at North and maybe she'll be back one day to coach or teach some fizz here. So, congratulations to Brooklyn. I'll give you this. I'll take that. I'll give you a hand. I'll give you this. I'll take that cuz we're going to do a photo. Oops. And I left my phone.
>> She's not here. Oh, you got it. Don't do this. Thank you. Okay, you're going to go right in front there. >> You need to open that up real quick. Sorry. >> There we go. Mr. Peterson. >> Good evening everybody. Um I also have
props. Um not as heavy. Um the young man who was supposed to be joining us tonight unfortunately cannot be here due to his uh busy schedule, but uh I'm here to recognize Alex Aldana. Um, what
you're going to see is a photo that Alex took. Um, it's called the Quad Tour and it was selected as a final a finalist for the Drexel University High School contest from over 2,100 entries and will be exhibited at the Antinet West College of Media Arts and Design in Philadelphia
from February 2nd to February 28th. Um, Alex is a senior and he is involved in our unified soccer team. He is also part of our photo club, students for change, unified club, key club, and ski club. Uh he has done things for the school with
his drone photography such as uh taking photos of the milk can game and uh boys soccer games and provided photos for the yearbook. Outside of school, he volunteers um at for hospice, Redmill, uh Redmill
Garden, Reefs Across America, Meals on Wheels, the Country Garden Club. um and jobs. He does embroidery and what he's doing right now as we speak is babysitting, dog sitting, lawn care, and uh reselling uh different items and then
uh he is looking to go to hopefully to TCJ in the fall. So, I wish I could say Alex Aldana everybody, but um you know, he was uh very proud to receive this and we're very proud of him in the photo and wish him all the best in his future.
Thank you. So, congratulations to Alex and Brooklyn. Good luck uh in competitions ahead. Well done. Uh okay, we are shifting to our board student representatives report. I can't
remember who went first last time. >> It's usually him. >> Okay. So, Samantha, would you like to go first? >> Okay. Um, so for anyone who doesn't know me, hi. I'm Sam or I'm the representative from Gorges and I'm going to break my report down into sports, arts, and then other clubs and
activities. So to start off with sports, I'm just going to highlight some achievements we have for each of our teams. So our boys basketball team recently defeated North 51 to 48 to begin the new year. And their coach, coach Kevin Schaefer, has exceeded the 100 win mark this season. So that was
very exciting. Boys fencing is six and one and recently placed 16th overall at Centrulos out of 50th. Our swim team is finishing up their season and most recently had two underassman place highly in their races at 101 Sussex. Our girls basketball team is 10 and three
and is sixth in the Skyland Conference. Girls fencing is 5-2 and placed 20th out of 50 at Centrulos as well. Indoor track has some very exciting things coming up. They have Skylands and sectionals in the next two weeks. And the girls sprint medley leap relay recently broke the
school record with a new time of 425. Girls wrestling, their program has grown a lot this year with four underassmen participating. Um and then we have boys wrestling with Christian Blet reaching 100 wins and that number is still going up as the season continues. And then we
have unified basketball and our unified basketball team recently attended the Special Olympics complex to participate in a skill building workshop and they said it was very productive and a lot of fun. In terms of arts, we have our annual pops concert coming up, which if you don't know what that is, it's when our orchestra and band plays music
that's like more a contemporary theme, and they also dance, and it's a lot of fun. It's going to be on February 19th at 7:00 p.m. Drama Club is prepping for their spring musical, Into the Woods, which is April 16th to 19th. Um, it's very good. I'm part of the show and it's
a lot of fun. Um, in terms of clubs and activities, we had our winter pep rally on December 23rd and we did Viking Raw, which I believe did something similar where all of the students received feeds as they came in that morning and they played rock paper scissors and then the winners faced each other at the pep
rally. We also had a pie in the face competition where at least 12 teachers were pied in order to raise money for students for change. Key Club held a successful book drive in January. The upper level Spanish classes attended the show Lagringa at the theater a theater in New York and we visited Little Spain
market in Hudson Yards and that was a ton of fun and a very um culturally educational uh performance and experience. Unifi Club held an awareness booth that taught students about Braille on World Braille Day, which was January 7th. And Model UN model UN received the
title of outstanding delegation at their conference in Hershey, PA um with three students all receiving awards. So, it's been a very productive month at Orhees and I'll have you next. >> All right. And thank you. Thank you for that breakdown too into those. >> I think it's helpful just because there's always a lot. So,
>> and I think it kind of reflects the different dimensions and and sides of achievement. >> We're a multi-talented school with multi-talented students. >> Uh, all right, Max. >> All right. A little bit hard to follow there. Um, I'm Max. For anyone who
doesn't know me, I'm the senior uh student represent for North High School. So, starting off with sports, all of our winter sports are in full swing. Don't have a lot to report there because we're mid-season, but the sports include girls and boys wrestling, girls and boys fencing, girls and boys basketball,
girls and boys swimming, girls and boys winter track, winter cheer cheerleading, ice hockey, which is a shared team between our two schools, our dance team, and our unified bowling and basketball. Boys basketball held their teacher appreciation night on Tuesday, January 20th. That is where each senior player invited their favorite teacher to the
game to come out, watch them um and appreciate these teachers. and they actually won this game against Somerville by over 20 points. The girls swimming team was recently crowned the 101 Sussex champion champions and will be moving on to the meet of champions. Meet of champions. Two of our players on
the North Hockey team became the first players in district history to reach 100 points. This past Wednesday, North and boys wrestling defeated Bridgewater in a blowout score of 42 to 28. Unified basketball and bowling are both happening right now. This week there
were two home unified basketball games, both with bleachers full of family, friends, and our own other basketball teams cheering on our unified uh team members. Um February 23rd coming up is our very popular staff versus unified basketball game. This is a really big event that our school likes to get
involved in. The National Honor Society is working to prepare for their Tribal that's happening the beginning of March, so we'll have a little bit more of that for next meeting. But um all National Honor Society members, including myself, are teaming up to make baskets right now and collecting donations from local
businesses for our drawing at the event. And um all of the money um is sent to St. Jude's Children's Hospital. We are also in the midst of our winter musical. Shrek the musical is coming up at the end of February. Um I am Shrek. Thank you so much. So if you did want to come
to that, that would be amazing. Tickets are on sale at nhto.bick.com. The INRA Club is doing a Duck Donuts fundraiser. So, this is a little message from them. We are proud to partner partner with Atlantic Health System Morristown Medical Center to help purchase a hospital delivery cart. This
will be named the Joey Car in honor of Joey Edwards, a North student who passed away two years ago. The cart will circulate throughout the hospital providing coffee, personal care items, and other comforting supplies to patients and their families. We are truly excited about this meaningful opportunity and hope you will make help
make it a success. to to kick off our fundraising efforts. We will be selling duck donuts for $25 per dozen. Sales will run through Monday, February 9th, and the donuts will be available for pickup on Wednesday, February 11th. Students can collect their donuts during the lunch in the mall or after school in
the theater. We've recently held our eighth grade orientation earlier this month. This involved all incoming freshmen from districts to come and get a tour of the school and learn about information coming to North Hunter next year. We also had all of our musical groups perform for them. So that
included on the first day our marching band um and our concert choir performing for them and then our marching band and our string orchestra performing just to give them a taste of the music department at North Hunter. The North Hunter Education Foundation is doing a Jersey Mike's fundraiser. So with $3
subs, $3 uh you spend you donate $3 go to the North Hunter Education Foundation and you get a free sub. Finally, as we all have probably seen in the news, Governor Murphy signed into law the cell phone ban for grades K through 12 starting next school year. Uh Dr. Kwell
is planning to bring this up at the next student advisory committee committee which contains all of our class officers and our student council and our national honor society and discuss with our leaders at the school the best course of action for next year. And that's all I have for you. >> All right. Well, thank you Max. I would say that was equally robust. So, uh, but
I on that last note, I mean, obviously that is an important conversation and something that all schools will have to be grappling with next year. So, it's good to hear that those conversations are happening sooner rather than later. And I didn't know when the um the leadership from each school comes
together. I believe it's a couple of time. I can't remember if it was. >> Yes, we try to do a meeting every morning period. Okay. >> So, this one will be for the third. We've had I think two meetings. Okay. >> And it has freshman through senior class officers. Yeah. And so then would that topic be part of that meeting as well?
>> That topic would be brought up and you um each student would have the ability to like say what their best >> uh suggestion was they're closest to the issue. >> Right. Right. You'll you will both be graduated. It will be the following classes that will be um
>> kind of working with that. >> Interested in hearing? >> Yeah, absolutely. the the thoughts and ideas that come out of it because I think there's some some good information there. >> All right. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> Um we have our uh board member roles and
responsibilities training. So with us tonight we have Kathy Poria who is our uh school board's field rep for Hunter County. So I'd like to welcome Kathy to come up. Uh there were a number of resources so you she'll reference the things that you have in front of you. Uh
there are extra copies if you need them at any point and then some of them we may have an electronic versions as well. So Kathy, the floor is yours. Welcome. >> Thank you for having me and congratulations to your students and your new board member. That's kind of a nice thing when I travel around to these board meetings is that I get to see all
the amazing things that are going on in your school. So great job to them. Great job to your student reps. Uh I'm happy to be here. I think I've met most of you at this point. If I haven't met you yet, my name is Kathy. I'm the field service representative for New Jersey School Boards Association. I serve Hunter and
Somerset counties. I just joined the organization in September, so I'm a little bit new to this, but I was a board member for almost nine years in Hunter County just about 20 minutes from here. And I was a board president for almost six years. And I also was the Hunter County School Boards Association
president for two years before Tara took over. And she's doing a great job. I'm sure she'll tell you about her upcoming meeting in a little while. Um, but I'm happy to be here and meet all of you. If you have any questions, we're going to talk about ethics tonight. Any questions along the way, feel free to stop me and
ask them. We really do these trainings because we want you to be successful as board members. We want your boards to succeed because that's good for your students and we don't want any of you to get caught up in an ethical violation. And I take an educational standpoint to it because I think sometimes it is easy
to inadvertently violate the code of ethics or do it without realizing it or maybe you're trying to be helpful. Um, now the school ethics commission, they do expect you to know the code of ethics and they don't take into account whether you knew or didn't know. So it's really important to familiarize yourself with
these topics. So this is our disclaimer. I am not an attorney. We are not attorneys. Uh a lot of these situations with ethics are really fact specific and facts sensitive. So if you have a specific situation that you're wondering about or
you're concerned about, we will always advise you to reach out to Brendan, reach out to your BA, um ask your board attorney and get an opinion from your board attorney about your specific situation. So the school ethics act was put in
place really to promote the public trust in what you're doing because you're making very important decisions about the welfare of children and students in your communities. So that's why it was put in place to help promote the public trust in what you do. And if you come from maybe a municipal background or a
different type of political background, you as schoolboard members are under a different set of ethics that don't apply to other elected officials, but they do apply to schoolboard members. So that's a question we get sometimes when we're going through the code of ethics is, you know, why can our other elected officials do this or that or post this
or that on social media? It's because the code of ethics applies to schoolboard members and not other elected officials. So, who enforces the act? The school ethics commission is the body that enforces the act. They're made up of uh
nine members. They have public meetings. There are minutes posted online like any other public meetings. They have five non-school officials, two school administrators. It said on there one seat is currently vacant. I think they've since appointed um a school
administrator and so maybe both those seats are filled now. But there are two schoolboard member seats that are currently vacant. So, we've been saying if you are interested in serving on the school ethics commission, they're not appointed by us. They're appointed by the governor. Reach out to your local
legislature and express your interest and uh they can help with that. But the school ethics commission is who enforces the act. So, these are the provisions. The mandatory training and the code of
ethics itself applies to schoolboard members along with the disclosure statements and the prohibited acts. The disclosure statements and the prohibited acts apply to all school officials. That would include your administrators, NGSBA
staff. I just had to do my disclosure statement. Those apply to all school officials. The ones that apply specifically to all of you are the mandatory training and the code of ethics, which we'll go through in a minute. So, what training is mandatory? If you are new to the board, which I understand
you have a number of new members this year, you need to take governance one within the first 90 days. And we have been noticing the school ethics commission taking a very strict strict stance on completing your mandatory training. Board members have actually gotten removed for not completing their
mandatory training. So, make sure you take governance one within the first 90 days if you're new. Um, if you're in your second year, you take governance two, which is finance and student achievement. By the end of the year three, you take uh policy and labor relations. And then in the first year, any reelected term, you take governance
for which are legal updates. And we have many ways that you can do your mandatory training. We make it very easy for you. You can do it online, on demand. Uh, your BA does need to register you. That's the only thing for any of the mandatory trainings, but you can do it
online. There's live virtual. If you go on our website, you can see all the live virtual dates. And then of course, we have um you can do them at workshop and we have inperson trainings as well. The online trainings this year are AI enabled with coach Carla. So if you take
an online training and you use the AI part of it, send me an email and let me know how it is. I'm interested. So financial and personal relative disclosure statements. So if you again if you are new these need to be filled out within 30 days of being sworn in. So make sure you do that because again we
are seeing the school ethics commission uh be very strict with timely filing and accurate filing of your disclosure statements. If you're a returning school official, you need to file it by April 30th. You will get emails and you will if you start getting close to the deadline, you will get numerous emails.
But if you have questions about it, reach out to your BA. And they're not asking, if you're a new board member, they're not asking your salary or what's in your bank account. They just want to know where your income is coming from, just so you can disclose any conflict of
interest you may have. So, this was a financial disclosure disclosure case example. It was a board member who didn't put a business interest that she and her husband had and they found that she should have disclos
um disclosure form and they found that it was an ethical violation with the recommendation of a reprimand. So you should get a copy. I did send a PDF copy of this to um your superintendent, your board president, and your BA. So when you get a copy of this, you can click on
some of this. You can look up all these cases. All of them are online. They're long, but if you like to read through them, you can. They're they're pretty interesting. So, and again, there were numerous financial disclosure statements that occurred in 2025 with varying pen penalties. So, just make sure you get
that done. >> Question for you. >> Sure. >> Who reviews that the the financial disclosure statement? >> So, it go they're actually all publicly available. >> It goes to you submit it. You should get a link from your BA. login, you submit
it and it goes to I guess the state. But >> you had mentioned that they want to make sure there's no conflicts or anything. Is there something? >> Yeah. So you have to >> Well, if there was I mean anybody can look them up. So say if you have a business interest and you fail to
disclose it and something comes before the board that would be a conflict with you in that business interest like this case, it could be a violation. >> Okay. >> So yeah. But Richard, I understand what you're asking. >> It's that it's a public declaration versus active review.
>> Yeah. It sounded like on the first that there was somebody like checking it for conflict or something. That doesn't seem to be the case. >> It's like it's a disclosure. So you're transparent about that. >> Makes sense. >> Yeah. And you actually they're all online. You can look Yeah.
>> any anybody's any officials up. >> So this is the actual code of ethics. So the first one's a little bit self-explanatory and how we have this set up is um the standards for someone were to file an ethics complaint they have to provide f factual evidence. So
the standards that you would need to provide of evidence is below and then the um piece of the code is above it. So the first one is I will uphold and enforce all laws, rules and regulations of the state board of education and court orders pertaining to schools. Desire changes shall be shall be brought
about only through legal and ethical procedures. So hold on. I will make decisions in terms of the educational welfare of children and will seek to develop and maintain public schools that meet the individual needs of all children regardless of their
ability, race, creed, sex, or social standing. And again, the standards are below that. Um, and obviously I think that's self-explanatory to all of you, but you have thousands of students in your school. All of them have individual needs and you need to represent all of them. Make sure that they're all being
provided with a good education. I will combine confine my board action to policym, planning, and appraisal. And I will help to frame policy and plans only after the board has consulted those who will be affected by them. So policym again, you get you probably have a
policy vendor that you use and you work with. You get policies. You can, if you want to customize them to fit the needs of your community, work with your attorney. You're a policy developing body in a policymaking body, and you approve policies. Policies sometimes sound boring, but they're actually
really, really important because when something happens or an issue comes up in your school, the first place your administration will look are your policies. They will use those as a guide and they are charged with implementing the policies that you approve. Um, planning, you probably have a strategic plan. You set goals every year. You have
a long range facilities plan that you approve. You approve your budget. You plan for finances. So that's part of your planning. And then appraisal. Your most important way of appraisal is completing the superintendent evaluation every year. That's the board's main way of
appraisal. So I will carry out my responsibility not to administer the schools, but together with my fellow board members to see that they are wellrun. If you take NJSBA trainings, you will hear over and over and over again, you don't run the
schools. You see that they are well-run. Your superintendent and his administrative staff runs the school district. I will recognize that authority rests with the board of education and will make no personal promise nor take any private action that may compromise the
board. And we'll get to examples of some of these. I will refuse to surrender my independent judgment to special interest or partisan sorry special interest or partisan political groups or to use the schools for personal gain or for the
gain of friends. I will hold confidential all matters pertaining to the schools which if disclosed would needlessly injure h sorry would needlessly injure individuals or the schools and all other matters I will provide accurate information and in
concert with my fellow board members interpret to the staff the aspirations of the community to to its for its school. Confidentiality is again something we stress all the time. It is hugely important. Any student matter that comes to the board, anything you
discuss in executive session, personnel matters, all of those are confidential. Student matters are protected under federal privacy laws, student records are highly confidential. So, I know when I used to take these trainings, my old field service rep used to say, "Tell your cat, tell your dog, but don't tell
anybody, not even your spouse and your children." And sometimes if you have teenagers or children in school, sometimes they'll know what's going on, but you can't talk about it even to them. Everything that you hear in executive session stays in executive session and it's confidential.
I will vote to appoint the best qualified personnel available after consideration of the recommendation of the chief administrative officer. That's your superintendent. Any personnel recommendation will always come from your superintendent. I will support and protect school personnel in the proper performance of
their duties. I will refer all complaints to the chief administrative officer and will act on the complaints at public meetings only after failure of an administrative solution. So this is where your chain of command comes in. often I was a board member for a long time so I understand
often community members and people will come up to you with complaints or call you text you with specific complaints about the school hoping that you can help them and the best way for you to help them is to direct them to the appropriate staff member that can help
them and to direct them to your chain of command. So if that's somebody that approaches you with an issue about your child's teach their child's teacher, you'd say, "Well, you have you talk to their teacher, refer them back to the teacher, and then if it's not solved at that level, can be taken up to a
supervisor, to administrator, superintendent, all the way up to the board, the board level. Um, but you always want to direct them to the chain of command. And also tell give your tell your superintendent so he has a heads up but direct that community member to the
appropriate person that can help them solve their problem. So ethics complaint who can file an ethics complaint? Pretty much anybody. Any person can file a complaint with the SEC. uh it has to be filed within 180
days of the occurrence and the person that files the complaint has to provide evidence and factual evidence that the com that the violation occurred. There is a $500 fine that can be impro imposed for a frivolous finding finding. They
don't find those very often um but they do have a penalty for a frivolous filing. SEC will consider whether the facts and circumstances would lead a reasonable person to believe that the act has been violated. And another thing
is with so many meetings being recorded now, anybody inside your community or outside your community can file. So somebody could be watching your meeting, see something they feel is a violation and file a complaint and use your recording as evidence. So these are this these are the
penalties that the SEC recommends. A reprimand it's uh public in the sense that all of these decisions are publicly available online and you can look them up but it's not um a penalty that's given in public. It's basically the school ethics commission saying yes you
violated the code of ethics don't do it again. Center is a little more formal. That would be a resolution that's read at a public board meeting in front of your board members. Suspension, you're barred from engaging in any activity or matter for a designated period of time,
typically 30 or 60 days. And then obviously removal from the board is the most serious. So advice of council defense. So you might want to participate in something or think something may be a conflict and you're not sure. So, you reach out to
your board attorney for an opinion and your board attorney says, "Sure, it's okay. Go right ahead and do whatever you were doing, but then somebody files an ethics complaint and the school ethics commission finds that it was a violation of the code of ethics." So, you can use the advice of council defense and say,
"Hey, I was listening to the advice of the attorney and did what I was doing." They will take that into account for the penalty that they impose, but as long as it meets all of those four prongs that are there, but they won't take that into account for whether the code was
violated or not. Because again, they don't take into account whether you knew you were violating the code or not. They look at the facts and the public perception. So, these are some code of ethics cases.
The first one, a board member um told the public that their board was prepared to reduce instructional time by 40 minutes per day after the superintendent had explicitly told her numerous times that revealing the information would hurt the board's position in union negotiations.
So that was found to be a violation of the code of ethics with the recommendation of a censure. And again, you can see the number here. If you want to take this and look it up and read through through it, you can do that. If it has a C in front of it, that means it's a code of ethics violation um case.
And if it has an A in front of it, that's an advisory opinion. We'll get to in a little while. And then the bottom one we have on here, I think it really shows how easy it can be to inver inadvertently violate the code of ethics. So, it was a board member that was involved in CPAG, which is a great
organization. and it's a special education parents advisory group and used her board member email to send an email about attending the meeting and in doing so created an impression that her objectivity was
impaired and that was found to be a violation. So if you're involved in a volunteer group or a group outside of the school district, make sure you only use your personal email for anything outside the board that you're involved in. Use your board email only for board
business and board matters. It's really important. >> Kathy, just on that because one of the conversations we're having is potentially establishing liaison from the board to various groups within the school like PTAs. Um sending district
roundts. Um I guess I know with the sending district roundt my recollection in the past was that was usually um coming a communication through some representative of the board president here to the sending districts but that was all happening among board of ed
emails I think >> so if you're appointed as a liaison then that's okay because you're appointed you're representing the board basically so if you're a boardointed liaison that's that's okay >> so even something like a PTA if board appointed liaison using that board
member email. >> That was always yeah that was always my understanding that it was okay. I mean you could always if you want to be super safe check with your attorney but if you're appointed by your board as the lies on to the group that's a little bit different when where you're a board member but you're also involved in this
other group um without being a board liaison and you're using your board email. So >> if I were emailing my town council using an email. >> Yes. So someone could say, "Well, Brendan McIac is using his official board position." Yes.
And again, with these cases, they really look at what the public's perception is rather than, you know, were you, you know, what was your intent? They look at the public's perception that your objectivity could be compromised.
So these are just a couple more cases. So this one was a board member that read another board member's text message aloud at a public meeting and provided information about a school official um that was found to be a violation with recommendation of a reprimand. And then
the bottom one we have on here because it was a 15-year board member who probably learned about the code of ethics or signed off on the code of ethics every year uh and got involved in a personnel issue and was found to be in violation of the
code of ethics and they recommended a 60-day suspension probably because taking into account that they were a 15-year board member. So, recusal versus abstension. I know there have been some questions about this. So, if you abstain for something,
so an example of when you would abstain, and you actually were just talking about it earlier, if you weren't at a meeting the previous month and you're voting on the minutes, you could abstain because you don't have the information. Abstain really is when you don't have the information you feel you need to vote on
something. Recusal is when you have a conflict. So a conflict of interest and in that case you would recuse yourself from the discussion and from voting. Um another question that has come up has been do I have to tell somebody why I
recuseed or abstain? And no you don't have to tell. You don't have to give a reason. If you want to you know I suppose you certainly can but you don't have to. So um it's up to you. And then the board council should advise on how the recusal impacts both the quorum and
the rec recording of your votes because there are certain things where you need a majority of the members present, certain things where you need a majority of the full board and certain things where you need a two-thirds majority. So your BA probably has a record of those
things. But yes, we always say, you know, have your board council advise you. So relationships can cause conflicts if you have a relative working in the district. These are just some relationship definitions of immediate family member and relative
and these um having a relative. I also gave you a chart of who is considered a relative for potential conflict of interest purposes. But um you should be mindful of how these can impact um your
um your conflicts within your district. So advisory opinions. So any school official either on behalf of themselves or somebody else or an attorney on their behalf or if they want to get an advisory opinion on another school official, you can request an advisory opinion from the SEC. They will tell you
whether what you want to do is likely to be a violation of the code of ethics. So they sometimes make these public if they feel that it would be a benefit to everybody else. They need six members if they want to vote. They need six votes
um if they want to make the opinion public, but they're all confidential. Usually the identifying information is redacted. So if there's something that you want to do and you want to get an advisory opinion, you can ask the SEC. So here's our little police officer. But
if you request an advisory opinion and they give you an opinion and you do whatever they told you would likely to be a violation was a violation anyway and then somebody files an ethics complaint, it's likely that you would be found in violation of the code of ethics. So, it's like, you know, police
officer giving you a warning not to do something, but you do it anyway. Well, probably you'll probably get a ticket or there'll be a consequence. >> Question for you. The opposite. If you receive an advisory opinion telling you it's not an ethics violation and somebody files an ethics complaint because you went ahead and acted in
accordance with that opinion, can you still be ultimately found in violation? That's actually a good question. I don't Yeah, that's a good question though. So, and they do expect that you will look at existing advisory opinions. There's a lot of them and familiarize yourself
with them. And especially if you request an advisory opinion, look at the ones that are already there and see if it might apply to your situation before requesting one. These are all the advisory well not all of them. This is one slide of the advisory opinions released in 2025.
So we don't have to go through all of these. Again, when you get the presentation, they're all there and you could look them up if there's I actually do have a little summary of every single one with me. If there's any that you're interested in, you can ask me and I could give you the summary or just reach out to me and I can talk to you about
it. So, the ones that I found kind of interesting, especially if you have parents on your board, the bottom one is, can a board member hire a district teacher to tutor their child? So, they didn't give an opinion on that because the board member had already hired the teacher to tutor their child, but they
of course had to recuse themselves from many different things that had to do with the teacher within their district. So, these are more advisory opinions that were released. So, again, if there's any that you would like to have more information about, just let me know
and I can go over it with you. >> Go over a 1225. >> Oh, can a board member advocate for their child? Yes. So, that is an interesting one, too. So, that was a board member that uni unilaterally placed their child out of the school district. And you can advocate for your
child. you retain all your rights as a parent to advocate for your child. But they found that the board member had to then recuse themsel from, I believe, anything that had to do with the director of special services. Obviously, anything that had to do with their child um on the agenda, any special education
matters on the agenda. So, there were a number of things that the board member had to recuse themselves, but you do have the right to advocate for your child. on that note. I think this might be something where >> as a parent I'm reaching out to a teacher because I have question. That's where I should really be using my
personal email, not my board email. >> Never email a staff member from your board email unless it's, you know, you're a chair of a committee or something and you're emailing the liaison to that particular committee, which is usually an administrative liaison and that's okayed by your
superintendent. Otherwise, don't ever email a staff member from your board email. Uh, but you can use your personal email to communicate with your child's teachers like any other parent in the school. Those you have all of your rights as a parent. Um, to advocate for your child. Just don't go to your child's, you know, to a conference with
your child's teacher and present as a board member or say that you're a board member. Keep try to keep them separate as much as you can. >> And what if a teacher is like, "Oh, aren't you on the board?" Do you just say yes, but I'm not hearing that? >> Yeah. Absolutely. Yes. Absolutely. You say, you know, it's a that's actually a
really good thing to do to make it very clear that you're there in your parent capacity, not as a board member. And we also, we'll get to this a little later, but we usually advise if you're visiting the school for volunteering or anything else, you let your superintendent know.
So, benefit. So, what counts as a benefit? So a definition of a benefit can be a direct or indirect advantage, a profit, a privilege or a gain. And it can be it doesn't have to be financial. It can be a personal benefit or other type of benefit. And the determinative
factor again is the perception of the public, not the school officials belief that they're able to be objective. Um so this is an example of a case here. It's a board member that spoke during their board meeting about um how he was running for general assembly and they
found he was using his position on the board to solicit support and votes for his political campaign and uh so therefore he used the schools to acquire personal benefit. There was a recommendation for a reprimand. So you can run for office as a board member. That's totally fine. You just again have
to keep it separate. You can't use your position on the board to promote your political campaign. and therefore couldn't also mention in your campaign that you're on. That's the exact same thing at all like in anything in a sense.
>> It's like it's a it's a fine line. You can't you it's if you give the perception to the public that you're using your position as a board member to promote it, but you can give factual information and accurate information to
the public. That's okay. And again, another area where if you're doing that, you might want to, you know, just u get attorney guidance. >> Question serve in public office and on board.
>> You can't cannot serve. >> You can run. >> You can Yes, you can hold You can't be mayor of your town and serve on the board. you have to pick one or the other, but you can you can run for a township committee while being seated on the board as long as you don't use your
position on the board. So, and these are just examples of prohibited prohibited acts. So you should recuse yourself if there is a benefit uh to you or your immediate family like business interest, use of your position to secure unwarranted
privileges, financial involvement that may impair objectivity, service or employment that may prejudice your independent judgment, gift favor offered with intent to influence or financial gain. And then some other considerations are when you're on the board, your priority is the board. can't represent
any other uh person or party or groups to the board. Um your priority is the board and the school. Um it's not a conflict if the gain that you have is no um it it's not a greater gain than anybody
else has. So an example I always use for this is sometimes boards approve field trips and maybe your child's going on the field trip. It's okay to vote on that because your child isn't getting a greater gain than any other student that's going on the field trip.
These are just some prohibited acts cases. So the bottom one was a respondent's child. I believe this was a interimm superintendent, but he uh participated in labor negotiations with the union of the administrator who
supervised his child. So that was found that um to be a violation of the code of ethics with the recommendation of a censure. The other one had to do with a um a board member who was getting legal repres representation in an ethics case
and then um voted to improve approve the payment of the law firm that was representing them. So that was found to be a violation with the recommendation of a centure. And you can go on again and read all of these This is just a conflict and benefit
case. Again, had to use had to do with a attorney and an ethics charge. So, I'd encourage you to just go on and read through that. And then the bottom one is a board member that was promoting their nonprofit to parents in their community as well as staff and teachers, which was
a violation. So, and this one is a longer one, but it was a board member who got involved in wanting um to replace the coach of a sports team at their school and advocated for somebody that they knew to
get the position even though there weren't the position wasn't posted. Um, so it's again just a board member going beyond their role and getting way too involved and was found to be in the violation of the code of ethics with the recommendation of a reprimand. So, and again, this is just another case
of a board member using their um board position to secure business relationships with vendors for their nonprofit. It's found to be a violation with a recommendation of a centure. So, we have a couple more conflict of interest cases here. You can go through
and read them. So, the bottom one was a little bit it was um a board member who saw something or I guess was being contacted from members of by members of her community about an item on the agenda that
um I guess was a misunderstanding and had to do with the board member spouse. and the board member contacted the board president and the superintendent about the agenda item and they found that even if the um
even though the board member thought it was a minor thing to contact the superintendent board president about it, they found it was an ethics violation and that that board member should have referred all of those complaints to the superintendent. So again, even if you think it's something minor, make sure you're referring members of the public
to the superintendent or the appropriate person. So hiring and personnel, you can have relatives in this that already if they work here already, that's okay. But uh you may not hire the
relative a board me relative of board member cannot be hired except for certain situations if it's a very hard to find position and your superintendent gets a waiver from the executive county superintendent. But if you have a relative in the district it will create
some areas where you may have to recuse yourself. So because you can't have direct authority over your relatives. So and these are some impacts on committee assignments when you have a relative that works in the district.
These are the first one's an advisory opinion. It was a board president whose child is an instructional assistant. And you can see there were many things that they couldn't do. They couldn't choose the chair committee members or be on any committees that remotely touched upon or directly related to the family member's
employment including personnel negotiations, instructional and finance committees. Um the other one is a board member whose spouse works in the technology department and they could not be involved in any matters that remotely
touched upon or directly related to the spouse's employment including personnel negotiations and finance committees. So um the last one is a board member whose domestic partner is a transportation specialist and the SEC advised that it would be prudent not to serve on the
transportation committee. So always be mindful of conflicts that you may have. So, collective bargaining, if you're entering into negotiations, this is a chart that can help you see if you can either be part of the negotiations
committee or vote to ratify the contract. So, for example, if you have a relative that works in the district, uh you cannot participate in ne negotiations or vote on the contract. Uh
but if you have a relative that works outside of the district but as a member of the union you can probably participate in negoti you can't part sorry you can't participate in negotiations but you can vote on the contract or the memorandum of agreement.
So this is a chart that can help you and again you can refer to the chart that I gave you as well. So campaigns and collective bargaining, if you received a union endorsement, it might not be a conflict per se, but if they did donate with the money to your
campaign with intent to influence, you may be conflicted from negotiations for a year. volunteering. We get a lot of questions about this because board members tend to be really active volunteers and active within their communities and their school communities, which is great. Um,
but again, when you're a volunteer, you're limited in the type of volunteering that you can do within your school district. So you can volunteer for things like if you're coaching for the township wreck soccer league and you
have students that are that you coach, that's okay because it's separate from the school. But it would probably be an issue if you were a volunteer coach for the school team because you would be providing oversight and directions to students and possibly staff. So the SEC
will look at the degree of contact you have with staff and students and you cannot direct staff or direct students because it blurs the line between board member and staff member. So other things that come up like you can help um with
sets on a school play but you probably couldn't you know volunteer to be an assistant director for the school play or things like that. They'll really look at the degree of contact you have. Are you directing staff? are you directing students? Um, and also they'll look at
the frequency which you are in the school building. So you don't want to be imshed in the school building or give the appearance that you're, you know, a staff member in the school building. So, and again, we always advise that you just let your
superintendent know anytime you're volunteering in the school. Somebody just asked me um a new board member, but they had previously and they still hold the the president of the school PTA. And so they asked me if that was So I I did a little research with
school boards, but I I would rec I would step down maybe at that point, don't you think, from the PTA or >> The PTA is the PTA is different. Like you can be a home room parent. The PTA is a bit different because and I I think there may have been an advisory opinion
on this. If I find it, I'll send it to you. Um because the PTA is separate from the school. They have their own governance. They have their own finances and budget. So usually volunteering through the PTA or my old district was called a PI. Usually that's okay because it's separate from it's not an
indistrict activity. >> Okay? So, it's not overseen, even though it's really highly affiliated with your school district, it's not overseen by the school district. Um, the one thing that we do advise is that you don't handle money in a volunteer role. >> Yeah.
>> Thanks. >> Welcome. So, and again, visiting a school, let your superintendent know when you're going to be visiting. Ref refrain from any board discussion and stay on point with the purpose of your visit. again like don't come to the
school and talk about everything that went on at the board meeting and present yourself as a board member. Present yourself as a community member, a parent, a volunteer and go and state to the purpose of your visit. >> It doesn't
>> does that include >> it doesn't >> Yeah, I know. Yeah. >> Yeah. If you're there as a parent, that's totally you're a parent first. Even if you're a board member, yeah, >> ask these questions. >> Oh, yeah. Of course. No, there ask any question. It's totally fine because these things can be a little bit
confusing sometimes. But yeah, we always say you're you're a parent first. So, go to all of your child's sporting events and even we even encourage board members to go to sporting events and plays and things like that. We encourage you to attend those things and promote your school.
It's another shark up there. >> Yes. >> Yes. So hopefully you'll see all the board members at your play. >> So social media is very tricky. So you have freedom of speech as a board member. You you do not give up your
right to freedom of speech just because you're on the board. But the school ethics commission will look at the content of your post and the issues come when it gives the impression that you are posting as a board member speaking
for your entire board or posting as in your official board capacity. So that's why we say is there a nexus between the post and your role and membership on the board. So, they do suggest that you use a
disclaimer before you post things. Um, the disclaimer is not 100%. If you use the disclaimer and then post something about a staff member, the disclaimer is unlikely to protect you. And there have been ethical violations found even when
people use the disclaimer. So this here, this is an example of someone that used, I believe, part of the disclaimer and they endorsed board candidates and advocated against a candidate and the disclaimer only indicated the opinions were his own and did not include that the views were not representative of the
board, creating the appearance the entire board endorsed certain candidates. So, especially if you use if you're posting something and you use we and it's about the board or the school district and you say we, you know, be careful with that because it could give the impression that the Wii is your
board and that you're speaking for the board. They'll look at things like that. So, and even that goes for we just had our new board member training weekend and you know the attorney that was giving the uh the ethics presentation there said you know even on your
personal page like nothing's really private. Be a little bit cynical. Someone could even if you don't think so, someone could take a screenshot of whatever you post and and send it around. So, just always be cautious about social media. remember that you have your freedom of speech rights, but
be cautious and be mindful of the ways that um social media and the code of ethics uh tie into each other. There was just a if you get the daily clips, NJSB the daily clips, it was a couple weeks ago, but there was an article in the daily clips from Spotlight News about
freedom of speech and the code of ethics. So, I encourage you to go on and read that. These are just some social media cases that went before the school ethics commission. So, and the bottom one is like I was just saying that a board member that used we to discuss board
matters and they found that the post were uh beyond the scope of her duties and had the potential to compromise the board and it was about school campaigns and endorsing candidates for school elections. Um the top one was a board
member who made comments. I think it had to do with instruction materials or books. But they found that even though the board was not currently engaged in deliberations regarding the removal or approval of history books from the school curriculum or school library at the time of the respondents post, the board had the
power and authority to review and remove books from the school library as well as to decide which books should be included in or are appropriate for the school curriculum. So they did find that to be those posts that they posted to be a violation of the code of ethics and they recommended a reprimand. But again, I'd
encourage you to go on and read all of these. So, this is important information to keep in mind. So, texting, a lot of people have their phones out. You know, it's common. I see it all the time. When I was a board member, I used to keep my phone, you know, out in case my daughter
needed me for something or one of my kids needed me. But if you are texting from the board table and somebody sees it, it could result in someone filing an Oprah request for your texts and you may be just texting your spouse to see if they fed the dog or who won the sports
team or it could be something completely unrelated to the board. But that's just something to be very mindful of. If you have your phone out at the board table, be careful about texting because somebody may think you're texting to another board member across the table about board business and file an open
request for your phone records. So, any ethics complaint needs to show a nexus between the action or the information sharing and your role as a board member. Um, we talked about parent issues earlier, but you are your child's advocate first or foremost. You are a
parent first. Do you retain all of your rights as a parent to advocate for your own child? You can take it all the way. If you're a parent, you can take it through the chain of command up to the board, up to the DOE. If you want to as a parent, you just can't bring your role as a board into it. But always be your
child's advocate first and foremost. Um, and remember when you're meeting with staff or talking to staff, um, and always make sure that you're there as a parent. Don't go in and announce that you're a board member if you're having a conference with your child's teacher. Um, refrain if you had a campaign social
media page. A lot of people do. That's okay. But we do advise that you refrain from using it once you become a board member because it will inevitably inevitably be viewed as posting on behalf of the board or in your official capacity or speaking for the board and
could create an issue. Also, if you administer a social media page, you could be linked to the content that's posted on that page. There's a case about that >> outside school related topics. Correct. I mean,
>> so if you like are the administer of like a township page or something, I guess they found that >> not like a business page like you know. >> I I think they're talking about like >> a community page or something where people are posting about topics that are
going on in your town, things like that. >> Yeah. >> Yeah, I know. I know there's a lot to think about with all of this. So, these are resources. So, the relative chart that you have as a handout is posted online. You can look
at it. There's a link here. The school ethics act, there's a link to that. All of the school ethics commission decisions for like years are posted online. You can go on and read them. um advisory opinions how to request one is there and the school ethics
commission website is there as well. So, and lastly, thank you so much for everything that you do for your community. I know I probably just told you a lot of things that you can't do or scared you from doing things, but really you can do a lot. You just have to do it
together in a certain way and follow your ethical obligations. But there are a lot of really beneficial things that you can do for your students and I see that I see you know the amazing things that you're doing at your school and I thank all of you for supporting how all of you for were part of all those amazing things through your support for
your school and the students here. So thank you and uh that's it for ethics but now I know you wanted to talk a little bit about Robert's rules >> just you shared some resources so a couple of highlights there and I think we have these materials as well.
So, I'm sorry. >> Uh, just like a brief uh few highlights and you you gave us the the booklet and the cheat sheet. >> Yes. >> So, that's So, I would recommend keeping in the very back of that booklet that I
gave you, there's a really helpful chart about motions, which motions need a second. Um, keep that with you and reference it at your board meeting. The first, so you your board follows Robert's rules. you follow it because it's in your bylaws. So, at some point,
your board decided, hey, we're going to follow Robert's rules and you voted that as part of your part of your bylaws. Uh, Robert's rules, it's really meant to run efficient meetings so that all voices are heard. There are, it's called
Robert's rules. There are many rules to it. I don't know all of them. You are not expected to know all of them. Brendan is not expected to know all of them. the people that know all of them or most of them, they study this, they take an exam and they become parliamentarians. So, it's I don't know if any I don't think any of you are
parliamentarians, but yeah, if you want to see a parliamentarian and parliamentary procedure strictly filed in action, watch the delegate assembly or attend. Hopefully, you're sending a voting delegate, >> but if you're not the voting delegate or not attending, you can watch it online. It's really interesting. You'll see a
lot about parliamentary procedure and Robert's rules, but it just it provides a fair um way of decisionmaking. It's transparent for your public. It allows the minority voice to be heard. So, and that's really important because if you some of these issues that you deal with
in schools, they're emotional. They affect children, may even are affecting your own child. they can get emotional and you may already know that you're going to be on the you know I don't want to say losing but on the side of the vote that doesn't pass or you're you know you know you're on one side of the vote and the majority is on the other
side. Robert's rules protects your opinion. So all of your voices are valuable and deserve to be heard because you're an elected member of the board and you're representing your community. So all of your voices should be heard and it really gives a way so that all those voices can be heard and then you take a vote and you move on. So, you
don't need to know all of Robert's rules. You can read through that booklet there. I gave you a cheat sheet. But basically, it's I'll give you the highlights. You know, it's the flow of the meeting. You make a motion, you have a second, your chair states the motion,
you have a discussion or debate, a vote, and then you announce the result. And really, I wrote down like six things that your school boards probably use the most, which the first one's obviously your main motion. So, somebody makes a
motion for something that you want to do. Where I see a lot of confusion is when motions, you're talking about a motion. So, you bring a motion, somebody seconds the motion. The second to the motion does not mean that you agree with the motion entirely or are planning on
voting for the motion. It means that you think that the motion is worthy of a board discussion. That's what that's what a second means. So most motions need a motion and a second. Um you're discussing it. Someone says, "Hey, I want to amend the motion."
That person can make a motion to amend the motion. Somebody would second that. And then the conversation moves to the amendment of the motion if you got and this I'm just bringing this up because I see sometimes this gets a little bit confusing. Um so the motion would move
you would talk about amending the motion vote on that and then you would go back to the main motion. Um point of order that's to correct a procedural error. It doesn't require a second. Um your chair Brendan would rule on that. uh point of
information is to request clarification. Um call to question. This one if you are going your debate is going on and on and it gets repetitive somebody can vote or make a motion or someone can call the
question and that kind of ends the debate and moves to a vote. but it does require um a second and it requires a twothirds majority and we recommend that you use it sparingly because it really does kind of end the discussion and then
you move to a vote. Um and then postpone to a time certain that's if you're not we need to vote on this at the next board meeting you can postpone it to a time. So those are like a highlight of a lot of the motions that your boards um use.
There are obviously a lot of them. They're all on your thing. Do you have any questions about any of it that you wanted to address in particular? >> Not specifically. I think Dr. good sort of overview of some of the the more common ones that are but does anybody else have any other clarification
>> that's tabled stays tabled until it's brought back off the table. >> So a motion if you table a motion it will stay tabled if it's t stays tabled through that meeting then it will it'll be done at the end of that meeting. So that's why there's like this motion
postpone to a time if you want to table if you want to move the motion to the next meeting. You don't want to table it. There's like conf I see confusion about that sometimes too. Um tableabling the motion is for that meeting like something else comes up like let's talk about this first. Let's
table this talk about this other topic that's more pressing first and then we'll address what we tabled before the end of the meeting. So otherwise the kind of like it dies. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So there's that's a good question because
>> I remember I was confused about a lot of these things myself as a board member and I've learned more about it over the years. But some boards follow Robert rules really really strictly. It helps you in a contentious meeting. Some board I came from a a small town board and we
followed parliamentary procedure kind of casually and loosely because that's what worked for our board. You have to work with you have to do what works best for your board, you know, as individuals and what issues are coming before your board. But Robert's rules will help you
through like contentious meetings by making sure all the voices are heard. You're voting in an orderly fashion. You're presenting to your public like, yeah, we don't agree on these things, but we're following this process to get to our outcomes.
Y >> um in addition to those uh very helpful comments and that wonderful presentation, uh the board and the community should be aware that number one, the law says and commissioner's decisions say that Robert's rules can
certainly be adopted by any board of education. Robert's rules cannot be used to circumvent an otherwise statutory requirement of the board. So while Robert's rules is more procedural, it may not be used to interfere with a
board member's substantive rights. And with regard to the contentious board issues that you so um articulately brought forward, I would urge board members to look at that section of Robert's rules which specifies
decorum because the rules set forth in that section uh give both the officers of the board and board members a really good sense of how best to disagree amongst ones.
amongst the board and to guarantee that uh minority viewpoints on the board can also be heard. >> Absolutely. Those are great points. >> Thank you. So, and again to your point too, when you're talking about issues, you really shouldn't be directing them. You know, say what you feel and make
your points um about the issue. Ask your questions. That's totally fine. But you should really be directing it kind of to the chair, not really towards each other. That's important, too. Not it's not a time for personal attacks. Like everybody can be heard, but don't
personally attack each other. So, any other questions? >> Thank you once again. >> Thank you. >> So, yes. So, thank you. And lastly, I did want to I know I see it on your agenda, but I wanted to mention it too before I leave. It's January school board recognition month. So, thank you
for all that you do, and it really does make a difference to your students in your school. and we are just so appreciative that you're willing to serve as board members. If you need me, I'm available to any of you, any of you can reach out. We support all board members, superintendent, BAS, board
presidents. So, um I don't we keep things confidential. Somebody calls me or talks to me, I don't run to Brendan or Tara and say, "Well, this person said this." If your superintendent calls me at the same thing, I don't run to board members and say, "Well, your superintendent said this or your BA said that." So, we keep things confidential.
We want to support your board be successful because again that's what's good for the students at your school and that's really supports our mission. So thank you for having me. Have a great meeting. Any questions, follow questions or things that you get home you say, "Oh, I should have asked this." Just reach out to me, call me, email me. So
thank you. >> Thank you. And uh Max and Sam, I want to apologize. I really should have offered you the opportunity to depart. Uh but please, you know, in all meetings going forward, I understand you have busy lives. So, uh we thank you for what
you're doing here, but um we recognize that as you need to step away, please do at your discretion. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you. >> Uh all right, so uh we're going to shift to our chief school administrator's report. Thank you, Brendan. So, I want
to talk about all the good news first. Um well I guess not old news but uh I did want to mention due to the winter storm uh that we had this weekend um today's schedule was adjusted. I think most people know that but we were originally scheduled for a half day of professional development today including an inservice with wellness activities
such as massage therapy and yoga for our staff members. Um those activities had to be cancelled because we need to call delay this morning and we can't have a delay on having the dismissal because we don't have enough time in school. So, the snow really messed up a few things for us, but we're going to uh reschedule all those activities uh for our um staff
at a later date. We are also um we also adjusted the semester date. Today was supposed to be the last day of the first semester. Um we sent the notice out on Friday. Tomorrow will now be the last day of the first semester. That gives us our semester classes enough time to have
final exams. And so, um that was important for all the teachers. make sure they saw their kids one last time because we're off on Monday. Uh I do want to mention um uh Coach Kyle Rarig um who um Sam actually already mentioned, but um he he does host a a
teacher recognition event every year, and I did want to recognize the teachers that were um recognized there. So we actually had six seniors. Each student was supposed to pick a teacher. Um two of the students chose Miss Meister. So, um, she would, so we only had five staff
members that were recognized because two students chose Miss Meister. But the other student, uh, teachers that were recognized were Mrs. Stell, uh, Mrs. Luick, Mrs. Fertugno, and Mr. Yoko. And it was a great little event where they had it. I was going to pop over to it and then come back here, but we had a board meeting last week, and it didn't
work out, um, to have all of it happen at the same time. But, um, but we thank Mr. R, Coach Ricard, for doing that every year. I think it's important to teachers. It's great for the kids to have an opportunity to recognize teachers that they appreciate throughout the year. Um we did have the eighth graders um come
up from all the sending districts to both of our schools. Uh the only thing I want to add to again what Max shared was that um they had assistant principles who spoke to them about not only academic areas but also um about athletics, clubs, activities um and those activities included poly tech. So
what their options are now as eighth graders moving into nth grade year with the full-time program. um on north campus there's other opportunities they have that they didn't have in the past but athletics and clubs and activities I know that's something this board has um talked about in the past and we really do stress all the you know we stress for
the students to get involved in something um there's a lot of things they can be involved in and it's really important for their growth as a high school students be involved beyond the classroom. Right. >> Uh again, Sam mentioned a UN delegation. Um the entire delegation received an outstanding delegation um designation.
So congratulations to them on their outing at the at Hershey. Uh I did want to congratulate uh Boris High School student Matteo Traulu who was named as the Broden's Baller top 100 NJ football players of 2025. For those of you who
Milk Game is quite a player and um so that's a well welldeserved recognition. Boris High School continues to demonstrate their excellence in mathematics. They earned a top spot in Hunter County following the New Jersey mathematics league contest number three.
As a result of the team strong showing in contest number three, they've also made an impressive climb in cumulative statewide standings and they now rank 13th in state New Jersey. So, we wish them luck in I believe there is five or six competitions all together. So, they're about halfway through.
I did want to congratulate um coach Chase Barbieri. He was named the boys soccer coach of the year by Lehigh Valley Law. And um if you know the boys soccer program at Warriors had a great year this year and coach Barbari is is a big part of that and it's great to have him recognized. Um, I also wanted to u
recognize um coach Kevin Schaefer um who reached 100 wins as a Warriors high school basketball coach. Um I also wanted to mention Sam mentioned this but he is only the second coach in history um of that program to reach 100 wins in Boris. So that's pretty big accomplishment for for coach Schaer. And
then I also want to congratulate Phoebe Lingerfield um of North Hunter. uh she was recognized by the um Clinton Sunrise Rotary for the exceptional leadership uh award. I think they do one of those a semester and um so she was the representative for the first semester
and was recognized at Sunrise Rotary and so congratulations to Phoebe. She works um a lot with our interact club and a lot with the women program. So great um ways to participate in our school. And then the girls and boys swim team. Um I think Max mentioned a little bit about this, but I'm going to mention the
actual students names. Um, Vorius High School student Mia Lake placed first overall in the 100 individual medley and the 100 breaststroke. Mia also qualified for the meet of champions meet at the end of February for the 100 breaststroke. And Elizabeth Rajooi placed fourth overall in the 100
butterfly and sixth overall in the 100 breaststroke. And Brody Keith placed 11th overall in the 100 butterfly. And so congratulations to all those students at Boris. North also um had a great year for swimming so far. They won the 101 Sussex tournament and also made it to
the meet of champions. And awesome job to um Savannah Pittinger, Kaylee Smith, Alyssa Giovanis, Phoebe Rodriguez, Mina Con, and Sasha Fish. Um they're all the team members that participated and earned that honor. I did want to mention two other things
um off the off my report about um I sent all the board members a um Google form to ask about a building tour. I received three um responses so far. So if you responded, thank you. Um if you didn't try to get that to me if you can by the end of the week, Maril, I will make sure
you get that today and then tomorrow and um make sure you're included in that as well if you want to participate. Um, and then I'll try setting those up probably for end of February, beginning of March. I just get away from some of the weather so we don't have to set something up in a reschedule again. Unless somebody needs something more urgent, let me
know. But that's the time frame I'm going to look at. And I also sent something out about our notebook LM um AI tool. And I was going to demonstrate tonight. We have a lot going on, so I didn't want to do another demonstration on the on the screen. I can do that at a future meeting if the board feels it would be beneficial. But um, play with
that tool. If you have any issues accessing it, please let me know and we'll get you some assistance. And I think it's just a great tool to look at a ton of documents and get summary information. That's really what the goal of this is for is to get you as educated as possible as quickly as possible. So, >> and I think we sort of recognized there
was an opportunity here in the spirit of onboarding that there is voluminous information and I did play with it a little bit. uh ask it questions even the sorts of things that came up tonight about whether it's procedural things uh obviously the documents are all there so you can kind of go it will reference the
source document um that it is responding to um but I think it could potentially be a nice asset um when you have a question uh you can type it in you can actually play a little podcast and listen to like a half an hour you can actually interrupt the podcast and ask
it a question and it will answer the question based on and the materials that are there. Uh some of the Robert's rules of order things I was trying out just to see how it would do. So I encourage everyone to play with it a little bit >> and the the questions you ask in the chat um they don't get saved so anybody
can see it. So you can feel free to ask anything you want of those documents and it's really for your purposes. um if there is something someone feels an important enough topic, I can create the um the chat or ask the for response and then I can post it to the notes section which we did one over there that you'll
see and that way everybody would have access to it. But um just so you know you're not it's not like you do something and everyone else is seeing what you're typing in there and asking. So okay, I did want to go over quickly uh strategic planning and give you a little update. Uh we did meet with the strategic planning advisory committee on
January 13th. Um we met at Boris High School again. We talked about some different topics. Um the first one we we had one of our members had brought to our attention a PD that they attended. Um it was based the PD was titled the whole teacher and it really focused on
six pillars of emotional safety, continuous learning, healthy workload, decision- making or being a decision maker, being a valued educator and in positive relationships. And it really fit in very well with um our district goal number one which was talk which talks about increasing staff
satisfaction with school climate because a lot of these topics were things of making sure the teachers feel like they are part of the process part of the school community and part of the decision-m process. So um it was a great discussion that we had and really um helped us really focus on that that
district goal number one for um student school climate. We also had a presentation on the AI resource library um that Rich Bron did and again that's um directly correlated to our district goal two which calls for the development of a future ready learning network or
framework um and increased use of AI tools. Um and so basically this an AI resource library I think I mentioned it um in one of my updates but it's for teachers to be able to submit resources and then other teachers to be able to use those resources.
And then we also talked about um the staff newsletter that went out. We did one in December. We're going to do another one at the end of the year. We're going to try to do this twice a year and then if we can and we might, you know, increase the um the frequency of that, but we're going to try to at least get two out a year. And that
really focuses on our multiplatform communication strategy, which is um district goal number four. And the the staff members were actually very appreciative of, you know, the fact that we asked them for some accomplishments they did and were sharing it with all their colleagues if they felt like it brought together a sense of togetherness
for them. And then finally, um we did not discuss it at our meeting, but the financial transparency um that's mentioned in our district number three, I think everyone can um appreciate last month, you know, what Katie has put together um with a
multi- presentation series. you know, a lot this month being on expenditures, next month on revenues and then we'll have the full budget presentation in March. We're trying to make sure that we're giving as much information as we can before that important vote so that everybody is well informed when they do that. So, um I just wanted to mention that because that does go towards our
district goal as well. Any questions on any of that? Then I will um we do have a report on our harassment, intimidation, bullying. So this month we had three um cases brought to us two at Borhees,
one at North and all three of them were unfounded. So it won't be anything for you to affirm next week. Uh but there is a call for a motion and second to affirm. I'll let Brandon take that one. >> Okay. So this is a call for a motion and second to affirm the determinations on the HIV incidents reported at the
December 16th, 2025 board meeting. So I need a motion and a second. So moved. >> Mo motion. Uh second Nicole. And then just again by way of clarification, folks not on the board in December, are they procedurally okay to vote on this
or is there a reason to um >> I think we talked about that last week that they procedurally they have access to the information existing board members as well. So even though it happened then, >> right, >> we're voting on it now. >> Okay. Uh any questions or
clarifications? All in favor? Hi. >> Uh, nays or abstensions? >> Stay. I didn't see the information. Right. Yeah, that makes sense. >> Uh, okay. And then the monthly reports are there for you. I I tried to review those last month. Um, you know, this
committee as a whole having a two meetings um per month, I'm going to try to limit so that I don't repeat stuff over and over again. So, if there's any questions about the monthly reports, >> all right, then as far as my report on >> I just got a question. Oh, >> is there a summary or an update that you
didn't provide regarding the uh email you you received for the wrestling team. Do >> you want to address that now or? >> Yeah, I didn't know if there was going to be uh folks in um coming to the microphone, right? >> Um so, one of the things we did receive
some correspondence regarding a questioning a question about uh the wrestling team and the competition in Atlantic City. Uh it's currently an it's an on it's a work in progress conversation. I know Dr. Burj was uh speaking with some of the folks today.
Um so that conversation is actually underway. Uh a couple of questions that I think came to the four that the district is looking into is one uh the permissibility in which districts can pay for that. Um there seem to be some potentially different opinions about
whether it's permissible for districts to pay and if so to what degree and what sorts of uh elements can be paid. That's something we'll continue to look into as we kind of get all of the information. Additionally, it potentially opens up other questions where the district may
or may not uh support andor pay for student activities. Uh so that will be sort of a follow-on question to that. I don't know if that's kind of procedurally where we are at the moment. >> I guess my question is has the district paid for it in the past? I honestly don't know. >> Yes.
>> Okay. And what changed if any if something did? >> Okay. That's a discussion I'm going to have with the parents. Um, as soon as I have something to recommend to the board, I'll bring it to your attention. >> So, no, there's been no determination either way. >> Yeah, there's no correction. >> Anything else?
Okay. Um, so, uh, January is school board recognition month as was shared with us by Kathy before. Can I get a call for a motion and second to adopt resolution, uh, 012726-3? Can I get a motion
>> to recognize our work? All right. I think Rich Morgan might have had it first and the second. Uh questions, clarifications. This is us recognizing the work that we do. >> Exactly. Reach over. Not on the back.
>> Take your let's as as recognizing the others. >> That's true. That's true. Uh all in favor? >> I opposed. Abstensions. Um, all right. Regarding our uh board representative and delegate position,
uh, Stephen did uh say that he was willing to step up to be a representative on the delegate assembly. So, thank you for that. And I know Tara is already, I believe, in communication with you uh about dates uh and then as Kathy shared procedurally um that will
be a good thing for you to experience and sort of as we potentially have things to submit for school boards to consider going forward. Yep. And you'll be the voting delegate. Um, but anybody else can attend a delegate assembly if you want to. You just can't vote, but
you can participate. And I'd say at least once in your tenure on the school board, it's worth going down to Mercer County Community College and, you know, getting involved. It's just exciting since it's school board recognition. Um, meeting up with all of the other
delegates from the whole state from Kate May all the way up to, you know, Bergen County. It's great. So, thanks for stepping up. >> My pleasure. Thanks, Steph. >> Um, separately, uh, is my school board conference report, which I went over at our last meeting last week. And once again, a reminder that if you're
interested in attending the unsung heroes awards ceremony, that our SVP needs to be in by February 4th. >> Do we have I'm just questioning because it's been they >> Okay, we were there. Okay. >> Yeah, that's a great one. It's down at um Chase School down in Flemington and
it's a fun night. Um and it's great to um you know it's K well fifth grade some five through 8th grades in the high schools but um the ASA has donated $500. So we're doing two scholarships for a
high school unsung hero and then one from the fifth sixth grade to eighth graders will be chosen randomly. So it should be a great night. Uh, and then we just have our dates for our next working session, February 17th, and our regular board meeting action session, February
24th. Um, before we shift to public comment, I do just want to second before your commendation to Mr. Rarig. Um, it's just, uh, when I was actually on the board at CPS over a decade ago, uh, I got to know Mr. Rear there and I have always known him to be just a champion
of school spirit. And so to hear that he's continuing that work is is great to hear. who was coaching here then and we were fortunate to recruit him here as a teacher and a coach now too. So >> um we now have our opportunity for public comment. During this portion of the meeting, the public is invited to address the board of education with
comments. You are requested to sign the register provided and to state your name, municipality of residents, group affiliation if applicable, and direct your comments to the school board president. While all comments will be considered by the board of education and a response may be forthcoming if and when appropriate, individual school
board members may not respond to the speakers at the time of their appearance. The public comment will be a maximum of 30 minutes in length unless there are unusual circumstances. You'll be allocated three minutes to speak and no one will be permitted to speak more than once on the same topic until all
others who wish to speak on that topic have been heard. Please keep your comments respectful and non-defamy and maintain the level of decorum appropriate for a public meeting where students may be present and in the audience. So, I'd like to open the floor to public comment at this time. If there's any folks who would like to come
forward, yes, please do. Thank you. Hi, I'm here tonight to address the school uh board about providing room and board for our wrestlers at the state tournament. >> Uh my name is Rick Fondorf.
I reside in Broadheadsville, Pennsylvania. It's about 55 miles from here. But uh because I've been involved with the school for a long long time, uh I found this to be a very important topic. Um I've coached wrestling for
over 20 years at the youth high school and the college levels. I am a two-time high school all-American coach. I'm also the proud father of Ricky Fondorf. Uh Ricky was a four-time state place
winner and a two-time champion for North Hunter High School. He's been a North Hunter High School or excuse me, he's been a North youth coach for 18 years. He wanted to be here tonight, but he couldn't be here because he had to coach
the kids. He wanted me to tell you that the most important thing he thought was that you work your whole life for this opportunity to go to the state tournament and it is really important to have the rest and recovery time that is
necessary. I'd like to speak a little bit about North Hunter. Your proficiency levels in English are 72.6% 6% math 52.5%. For that you receive blue ribbon status.
My son Ricky went to states all four years. His wrestling proficiency level was 97%. Most that qualify for states are 85% proficiency or higher. Wrestling teaches you to strive for
excellence. If you're only 52% proficient like the average math student at North Hunteran, you don't qualify for the states. Every year, North wrestlers qualify for states.
North Hunteran is one of the wealthiest communities in the state of New Jersey. Most of you board members could probably be considered wealthy. I don't expect you to understand what it is like not to be able to afford a room
in Atlantic City. Many of our wrestlers parents can't afford a room in Atlantic City. It's a fact that we have a wrestling shoe program. We hand up slightly used wrestling shoes to those in need.
I was a parent that could not afford a room in Atlantic City. I drove back and forth every day. Thankfully, North Hunter provided a room for my son. He was able to get the physical therapy,
the rest for recovery, a good diet, and the ability to check his weight before weigh-ins. My son's success at the states helped him to earn a 4-year full scholarship to Lock Haven University.
I could not afford college tuition. Most parents are not bold enough to tell you that they need help for their child to achieve success. Many of our wrestlers earn scholarships. Many would never be able to attend good
colleges without their success at the New Jersey State Tournament. Our wrestlers learn that hard work and dedication are needed for success on and off the mat. We are proud to provide the
coaching and tools to achieve that. Our team records of being the state champs and individual records of success at the state tournament are outstanding. Many of our athletes attend schools like
Lock Haven, Clarion, Ruckers, Lehi, and Cornell. Many of them have received financial aid and scholarships to make it possible. All because they had the tools to succeed.
You can decide if North Hunter is known as the school that gave their students student athletes the tools for success or you can be known as the school that denied your students athletes the tools
for success. The decision is yours. Choose success or failure. I hope you'll make the right decision. And thanks for your time. Good evening.
My name is Michael and I'm a resident of Franklin Township. I am a parent of a junior at North Hunter High School who is a member of the wrestling team as well as a parent of a North Hunter graduate who is currently wrestling at the collegiate level. I would like to
begin by acknowledging the strong and positive relationship between North Hunter High School and the wrestling community. The administration, teachers, coaches, and staff have consistently shown their support for the wrestling program, and that support is greatly
appreciated by our community. I'm here this evening to ask the board to reconsider its position regarding covering expenses incurred by North Hunter High School wrestlers and coaches while competing in this year's NJSIA high school wrestling state
championships in Atlantic City this March. Historically, these expenses have been covered by the district. It appears that a decision on this matter was made some time ago. However, however, this decision was not effectively communicated to all parties who should
have been informed. Consequently, families and supporters were unaware that these costs would need to be covered privately. There are no there are insufficient booster funds to cover this year's expenses. The use of buses was initially discussed
as a possible alternative to a hotel stay. After further consideration of the tournament's requirements, it's my understanding that this option is no longer being considered by the school. This is a prudent decision as the use of buses would present a number of
logistical and practical challenges. I appreciate that the athletic department has reserved hotel rooms in Atlantic City for wrestlers and coaches. This is an important step. The NJSIAA state championships are a unique NJSIA
sanctioned sporting event and should not be equated with other overnight trips for other student clubs or activities, particularly those that are not sanctioned by NJSIA. I respectfully ask the board to
reconsider its position and improve funding for lodging and expenses for wrestlers and coaches participating in this year's state tournament as well as for future tournaments. I look forward to a positive outcome being communicated at Friday's board meeting or February's
board meeting. Uh thank you for your time and consideration. My name is Carrie Acres. I live in Anondell, New Jersey. Um, good evening. I'm here to
also speak on the potential of the athletes not having rooms comped in Atlantic City for the tournament. My family has been involved with North Hunding wrestling since 2009. All four of my kids have gone through the the feeder program. Two of my sons wrestled
for the high school team. Um, one of my sons is a three-time state qualifier and two-time state medalist. Um, he was also part of the 2020 team that had the undefeated season and a state t team championship. I'm glad to hear that the part of my
speech about busting them back and forth is a moot point because that I've found was just atrocious as a as a concept because there's so many variables that are not controllable and once they can't get into weigh-ins, their dream is done.
They're disqualified. They can't go any further. Um, so I'm glad that that's off the table. Just to point out, New Jersey is well known throughout the country as one of the toughest state championships in the US. Many college coaches come to watch potential recruits. College
scholarships can be had with a good weekend at states. My own son's recruitment started with his first medal and he went on to wrestle at the D2 level in college. Other comparable teams locally afford their athletes and coaches lodging during this tournament. It makes sense
to be able to control as many variables as possible regarding the tournament and promote optimal rest, recovery, and nutrition while staying on target to wrestle. Having on them on site is how that happens. And while there are people that perhaps can afford it, it's not
cheap to be living in AC for 3 days, three nights, and um it would be even more inexpensive if this had been something that we had done earlier in the year. Um, so bottom line, please consider funding this. It's been
funded for as long as I've been involved with the with the program and it should be funded for for future or give the people in charge enough time to know so that they can fund raise because I've also been involved with varsity cheerleading at at the high school. I've
had four kids go through, my youngest is a senior. Um, cheerleading fundraised for everything for nationals. We paid for it ourselves, but we had the time to do it. And I think it's kind of a shame that we're scrambling at this point to
try to cover this stuff for these kids because it's it's hard. It's a long road and they deserve everything they get. Thank you. >> Any additional public comment? So, as I um had mentioned at the beginning, this is an ongoing conversation. Dr. Burgess is in
conversation with folks and will ultimately follow up with the board sort of briefing us on all of the details, logistics, and potential uh you know uh scenarios going forward, whatever they may be. But thank you for coming tonight. >> Brendan, when is determined?
>> It's in February. March February. Okay. Uh we shift now to our um other agenda items. Last week we had our curriculum instruction technology uh presentation. I'm asking for a call for
a motion and a second to approve agenda item 12.1 on home instruction. Dan motion second. >> Second. >> Second. Tara. Thank you. Uh questions or clarifications? All in favor? I
>> and then abstensions or >> Thank you. >> Um, >> I'm sorry. Was there a Rich was absent for the vote? >> Oh, okay. Uh, >> yes. >> Um, well, he was not in attendance, so I
don't know if he I guess we have to see if he's gonna Okay. Proceed and gets back. Okay. Um the second I so on to policy and school security. Um can I get a call for a motion and a second to approve agenda
item 13.1. If you recall this is our first reading of the freedom to read policy um which we were putting onto the agenda because it was something to have been addressed in December but we got the policy language late and was provided to folks last week. Um, so can
I get a motion to open that motion and a second? >> Dan, thank you. Uh, discussion, questions, clarifications. >> Can you clarify the process of this is a first reading. So then now what does that mean and what does a second reading
look like or what are the next steps? >> So first reading is we're seeing the language for the first time. Um, there's the opportunity to have discussion here um to talk about details. Sometimes it's uh if there's changes that we're looking to see, they might be proposed here. If
there's clarifications that might be sought, uh it gives administration the time to answer questions or get additional information and then it would become effective policy upon the second read and approval. of next month. >> But if there were no questions or
changes to be made, then the second um reading >> reading would be the first reading tech the same information as the first reading and then you'd vote on a second reading still at the next time, right? >> Yeah. >> Yes. Okay. >> It would be Yes, you would vote on it a second time and if that vote passes, it
is then. >> Yes. >> In addition to um giving an opportunity for board members to contemplate and deliberate, share ideas and ask questions if they have any. It's also an opportunity for our community, people
who may be affected by those policies to have input into the board between first and second reading. >> That's all. >> And if we make changes in the first reading, it's still those changes we
would be presented to us before our next meeting and second reading. We have to approve them of their changes. There's no further discussions at that point. We can't we don't make any further. It doesn't like it's not like it goes back to first reading. If we make changes tonight, >> uh if we make changes tonight, I think
the second reading becomes sort of the final draft reading at that point. That becomes the vote, >> which is the purpose of the first >> first it gives you the opportunity to draft and amend and make changes. >> So yeah, if changes are brought to you as a second reading, that's what you'd be voting on at that point. that's
generally agreed upon with the full board that these are changes that everyone supports. >> And I just wanted to make a point too that this that this is something that we need to become in compliance with state law. >> Correct. >> The state law was that this need to be
adopted by boards by December 9th of 2025. >> Right. >> Well, we didn't get it. We got the policy language at the end of our clients either technically, but just not up to date. Correct. M >> right. >> Yeah. Just to clarify again, this was a
model policy that was pres presented to us from New Jersey School Board Association based on the Freedom to Read Act and they basically came up with language based on the Freedom of Read Act so that they would give us a model policy and that's what we presented to you. >> So questions, clarifications, proposals.
Rich? >> Uh I mean I wasn't on the board at the time, but I don't know how the people that were on the board feel. one year for a subsequent challenge feels like a quick turnaround for me. >> If I can clarify that. So, the law required a minimum of one year,
>> right? >> So, we could the board could decide that they wanted a longer term. >> One year feels fast. Um I I did witness some of those meetings and it did seem like they dragged on for months. >> Uh to turn around possibly eight or nine months later and have a subsequent
challenge of the same book. Um, I I can't see what would have changed over those eight or nine months that it would be. >> Well, I think Nicole had her hand on >> I just had a question, a clarifying question. How long do book challenges
typically take? >> Um, >> I guess I'm trying to think in terms of the >> I know that we had quite the >> Yeah. months. >> Yeah. But but in general for school boards, how does that typ how long does that typically take?
>> Well, the policy itself sort of procedurally outlines the amount of time that the administration has to organize a review committee and it sort of sets the a time frame um for that committee to do its work at that time. Um, I know
the prior book challenges we had, um, and I don't remember the particulars of why they may have gone for as long as they did, but it was obviously a series of months. Uh, some of that I think was logistics in getting the committee together, preparing the report, getting
the things to the board, and then giving the board the time to sort of receive and digest and then ultimately have a discussion on that. >> Brendon, can I just add? Sure. I I do remember from that time. So the one of the things that happened was assembling that group to review it was problematic.
Getting people to volunteer to fill each of the different positions. We couldn't find someone for or or you know >> and they're all required >> and they're all required. So they it took time to actually assemble that to get someone to volunteer. So that's why it kind of dragged on initially before
they started the review process. And >> so I think my my extension of that is you know this this one year window is it from when it was initially filed or from when the decision was made >> and then it was from when it was originally filed >> file a couple months.
>> Yeah. >> So that would be prohibitive I think. >> Sure. >> Um and then this let's say it is challenged again. Let me back up. If it's challenged and the challenge is denied and it's ruled appropriate,
are is that decision based on the very specific piece that is challenged or the entire >> work? It's the work. It's always the work that gets voted on. >> Okay. >> Right. In other words, you don't you don't challenge a portion of a book. You
challenge it in its entirety and then it would potentially come up again. Brian, did you have a point as well? >> I was not on this topic. Oh, okay. I think I think you're looking for at least three months. There's no way you could do this faster than three months. I think
>> that would be very efficient. >> And that would be >> from from filing to decision. >> So, so essentially >> essentially we would have from the completion
>> if it wereall basically before another challenge would come up >> possibly >> if we stuck to the one year >> possibly. >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> I just have a procedural question. So if we do want to change the language, how how do we do that? Someone makes a motion.
>> I think that would be a motion here to amend that language in some way and I don't know going back to Rich as the as having raised the issue. Did did you have something in mind? >> I mean I me personally I feel like three years is a more appropriate timeline.
Um, but I would be open to other people's suggestions. I also, just to add to it, I think that if a book challenge was successful to where the book was removed, I think the same thing in that regard. Um, I don't know if there's a process for trying to reinstate that book, but I also think it
should be at least it should be three years for that process as well. I think it should be >> no matter which way. So that might actually you bring up a good point that that might be something that gets spelled out not necessarily here per se
possibly uh or where uh resource materials are um acquired. I just have a question kind of like where and uh going off of what Andy was saying a little bit.
>> If it's if a work is challenged and then um approved, you know, just >> retained. Yeah. Retained, right? And then rechallenged. Can the challenge does like the reason can the does the reason of the challenge need to be different than the original challenge?
Can you know what I'm saying? Like is >> my If I say I don't like this because of this, then the next person rechallenges and says the same reasons. Does their reason have to be >> different to challenge it again or can it be brought up on the same terms?
>> I think my and Phil you can certainly weigh in. My read on it was it seemed to be in the broadest sense that the title was challenged once it was deemed to be retained. Therefore, that title, regardless of the portion or reason,
probably wouldn't be challenged again until that time frame had passed. And I don't know, Phil, if that's would be your take on it as well. >> Yeah, if if I may, uh, I agree. And secondly, just another reminder to the to the board that the policy is the what
there are regulations associated with policies that ask the superintendent to promulgate the how these things can take place. So some of these comments can also be part of what could be a
regulation of the media center library policy. uh 6131. So, >> okay. >> Uh >> so, can I make a motion to >> Sure. >> to extend to change the language so that it is a three-year review period.
>> Hold on. Hold on. We have more. >> So, if you go to three years, you're essentially kneecapping parents that might not be in the district yet from challenging a book that they don't have kids in there. So, say like you have a seventh grader or eighth grader and a book was challenged. They're not in the district yet. They want to come in. They
can't challenge it for three years if they so >> if I may. >> If I may just just again >> as far as decorum and the way board meetings run, there's a motion on the table. >> We have to
>> and it has to be seconded and then it's open to uh discussion. >> So, can I get a second to Dan's motion? Okay. Now, we are talking about the potential of a three-year window. Uh Rich, would you like to finish your
>> No, I just think that if if if it's three years, you have potentially set up a situation where parents can't challenge a book when they're not even in the district yet. They might have to wait three years if they have like they can't student comes in freshman year, they want to challenge, they can't because it just came off uh a challenge
and then you have to wait till their junior maybe senior year before they could do it. I think I mean three years I think that's you're really handicapped parents. >> Do you have to be Hold on. Uh it's Nicole and then I think it was Stephen. >> Do you have to have a student in the district to challenge above?
>> Well, uh the new policy does require you to have a student in the in the district. Uh so you kind of have to have a vested interest in the district in order to put forward a challenge. >> There's a couple other you could be a staff member, >> correct? A student themselves.
>> So there are a couple of avenues to sort of uh address that. But I think Rich, your initial point is yeah, this threeyear window would put that title sort of off limits, I guess, to a to a challenge then question. >> Well, for for for that window of time
for the three years, Stephen, then Rich. >> Okay. All right. Rich and then Dan, >> that theoretical parent would have the option of not allowing their child to check the book out though. >> Yeah. Opt out for any parents that want to put their child on a list that they're not allowed to check out certain
books. I still just can't see what fundamentally would change with the book over the course of one year. That, you know, that's just my opinion. >> Dan, and then >> No, no. I was going to make the same point that this parents still have the opportunity to have their child opt out
from from taking that. Okay. >> The only thing that I could see that would fundamentally change in the course of three years is a different board. There's, you know, we wrote, so every three years there's a term. So, um, there could be new board members on that would hear the new complaint. So, that
that would be the only thing I could see in the three-year cycle >> probably in that one year >> or every year. >> Yeah, because we're always weard every four year. >> There's four of us. So, >> Brian, did you have a
>> uh other uh other points or discussion on this three-year term consideration? >> My direct question is what you think would be appropriate? That's a good question. Um, I think I I still think a year. Um,
I I think that uh keeping it at three years is really is it more I guess my question would be is that more of an administrative function for the board to bog the board down as it is opposed to trying to take a a challenge away from parents? Yeah, I
I think I'll weigh in on that because I think that's my sense of it having been on the board for one of these and having witnessed a prior the sentiment that came from the president and the board at that time was the challenges were consuming a lot of time, energy and
focus of the work of the board. Um, so in that spirit, I think it's more it's more directed towards allowing the board to focus on the the the programming of the school or the strategic plan of the school. And I feel like in the last
challenge there was that sort of clause that got added that if a parent had an issue with book in the library, the procedure was to reach out to the media specialist to ask that a note be put in the file so that their child could not take that book out which I think the feeling at that time was that was giving
an outlet to those parents who had a particular concern. But coming back to the point I would say um you know my sense was it does take a lot of time and that if it's a yearon year you could find three months of each year potentially
>> uh you know consumed with that work for for for a title and we actually did have an instance where uh one of those titles did come up twice right and and I mean the span of years might have been more than three at that point even though that wasn't in effect in the policy at
the time. So there is sort of a track record of a book coming up a second time. >> Not within a year. No. >> And I believe it does say that it's um the subsequent challenges for at least one year from the date of the board's previous determination. So it's not from
when it was first challenged, right? If I'm reading this correctly, it's from when the determination. So you are, you know, giving a a little bit of a longer cycle and you know if you stick with the one year of of saying because it's from our determination. So, the investigation
a little I don't know if we said 60 days or 90 days. There's some language in there about that, but >> you're looking at at least, you know, over a year before a book is challenged, >> right? It extends it. >> It does extend it months. >> Um, >> longer. >> So, uh, was there I thought I saw
another hand or question. Nope. >> So you're So at the minimum if we stick with one year, >> it would be a year and 3 months >> closer to that >> before another challenge came up >> per title. >> Correct.
>> But there's no say it could be one year, right? It could be two years, three years, five years, right? There's >> well the the policy. So, for example, if if the if we said the policy was going to be three years, that meant if somebody wanted to challenge that title
again, there's a three-year window that we we wouldn't take it up unless that three-year window had lapsed, then it comes up again and then we treat it as though it's a new challenge. >> Right. What I'm saying is we're not boxed into any of them. You could make it a year, two years, three years, four years. >> Correct. Right. But the discussion on
the floor right now is about changing it to three years is the conversation. Our first uh reading has it at one year and also our first reading says that the review committee shall provide its written report to the board of education no later than 60 days from the date of the next board of education meeting of
the from the receipt of the completed form. So we're looking at like a 60 maybe I don't know a 75 day window given that now we're meeting >> you know twice >> two meetings two. Yeah. So that so it's
not so 60 days is what's in the policy. So if we're talking about a different number then that's a change to the policy but >> and that's given if we can form the committee to review the >> well it says we have >> you have to reform the committee. Well, no. I mean, if we were able to form
correct committee because what it took a while to form that committee. >> Yeah. >> Other Oh, okay. >> Is that >> can the committee be proactively formed before a challenge? So, it's at the ready. >> I don't know because part of the stipulation of the staffing of the
committee is an administrator or somebody sort of familiar with the discipline area. So you would theoretically have to pre-staff, you know, a science a science person, an arts person, >> probably a good idea on who would be on the committee. So
>> once the it's received, I think there's a sense that you would assemble that team pretty quickly. >> Again, I think with the deadlines that are specified in here, we're going to have to have to move forward. I just guess my biggest concern is it kind of for two
years, three years, it kind of takes away the power from the parent to for an administrative function for the board, which I personally don't like. >> Right. Um >> but it's not it's not you're not taking the power away from the parent. You're taking it's you're >> the board process >> taking it away from No, but you're
taking it away from all parents. >> So no no I'm not saying that right. >> Yes, I agree. >> So I'm not saying that properly. that that parent always has the option to opt out. >> Right. >> Correct. >> So So the the this is you're you've if you're making this motion, I feel like I
guess you're you're trying to you're feel like you need to protect all students from this this book. Um but it so it doesn't take the per the parents the parent still has the right to opt out and keep their their child from getting this book. So,
>> right, >> you know, you you can almost say that you're taking away the rights of the other parents because now their child doesn't have access to the book if they wanted them to. >> It just limits their ability to challenge >> to a window of three years, let's say, whatever it's determined.
>> Uh, right, which in this case on the floor is the discussion of three years. Uh, there is also, and I feel like this is sort of an adjacent policy. I know our legacy policy had um it was complaints or whether it was staff complaints, materials complaints which
sort of spells out a sequence of um starting at a lower level. So for example, if there were a book in a class that a ch a parent objected to. I mean I've experienced this personally as an educator where a parent reaches out and says you know this particular book that you're doing in class um you know we we
take some issue with it. There's some things in it we don't like. And that affords the teacher at that level to say, "Okay, well, here's some alternatives that you could potentially read." Uh, and that would be a lower level solution. Uh, I think sort of in the same spirit that reaching out to the
media specialist would be a potential lower level solution to prevent that child from taking out that book, which we currently have in place. I don't know if the school board's policies on complaints because I know those speak to
staff materials and things of that sort um spell out all of that. So that might be independent of this policy something that we have to look at to see what's there. >> And this policy actually according to the law has to have some of those steps in it. Okay.
>> So it's it's sort of >> almost like a duplication. Any further questions or clarifications, Andy? >> Not that past policy should drive future policy, but did any of our previous policies have any challenge window
rechallenge window? >> No, that that's new. >> Okay, >> that's new in this this law. So, I think I'm going to call Oh, okay. So that's that's not coming from the NJSBA or it is the the window
>> is the window has to be a minimum of >> a minimum of one year is what's coming from school boards. We are discussing whether or not to change that to three years. >> So they instituted that change. >> Correct. Okay. >> There historically there was there was never a window. >> The freedom of law act instituted the
one year made it. Yeah. That's the language that the state so it's a >> um a legal we have to we can't go less than one year. >> So okay I'm sorry Rich. >> No. >> Okay. I don't know at this point if we do a voice vote or a roll call vote on
the motion to change the language to a three-year window. >> Voice vote. But if you'd like I could do a roll call. >> Um >> yeah let's go roll call vote if to change it to three instead of one year. So, the motion is to amend the policy to a three-year window. Miss,
>> yes. >> Mr. Chapman, >> yes. >> Mr. Hanley, >> yes. >> Miss Hint, >> uh, yes. >> Mr. Lord, >> no. >> Mr. Matthews, >> yes. >> Miss me? >> Yes. >> Mr. Morgan?
>> Yes. >> Mr. Spanton? >> Yes. >> Miss Stein? >> Yes. >> Mr. McKisac? Yes. >> All right. Uh any other dimensions or details on the policy? Any
other items that anybody would like to discuss or consider? >> I have a much less consequential. >> Okay. >> And it's just um I understand so what was linked in the in the agenda and that we all can see is a redline
version of our old polic with all the red, you know, text representing update that school boards uh to to get us uh to look have our the new policy look just like the school
board's policy now appended by that one change from the word one to three. >> Right. Um, on page, if you guys are all on this, on page five, there's some stuff that I'm not quite
sure, it doesn't follow from our original policy, and I'm not really sure what it's doing. >> I think Rich can speak to >> So, yeah, that was left in there just for informationational sources, that will not be part of the policy that will come up for second reading. um but because it was in the original um
>> languages for basically this is explaining some of the things that were changed up above that. >> Okay. >> So we we will take that section out if you look at page five where it says other reasons >> and recommendations um that will come out and it will just be legal references and then cross references after that.
>> Okay. Thank you. And we'll still keep the um form >> the uh what do they call exhibit. So the exhibit will be a separate document. Um and but that will be kept. Yes, that will be as it is in here. >> Okay. >> And I would say probably the only thing
to check on that is that the form as existing aligns with the new policy. >> Yeah. And well this is the form that came from school board. >> Okay. Schoolboard's actually not our legacy form. Got it. Okay. So any other items on the policy itself
because we are still within the broader motion at this time. Uh we had an amendment. We voted on the amendment changing it from one year to three. Uh so I think we're still doing a motion or a vote on the policy at large in its
entirety. Uh we'll go to a voice vote on that. All in favor? I >> opposed or abstain >> Mr. Lordy. >> Okay. >> Okay. Thank you. And then as I said, we will visit this in a second read next
month. Uh one order of business. Uh Mr. Lordy, we needed to catch a vote from you on curriculum instruction and technology. You had stepped out um on the call and motion to do the voice vote on the curriculum instruction
technology presentation in home instruction. Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> All right. So, we're moving to facilities, finance, transportation. Um, I need a call for a motion and a second to approve agenda items 141 through
1411. Can I get the motion and the second? I see the motion, Dan. The second, Tara. Thank you. Uh, questions, clarifications, details on this. Um, one thing I will just add, um, I know we pushed out some
resources, um, to new board members about how to read, um, uh, financial reports. Uh, Katie is in possession of those and she is going to work together. She's going to work on a communication that, uh, helps you navigate those
reports to answer those questions. Um, and I asked at a future meeting that she might be able to present on that, but in the interimm she's going to put together to say, um, and I can't remember what the school board guidance was, but basically you needed to be able to understand that these charges over here
match these charges over there. Um, and those documents are large and a little unwieldy and hard to understand sometimes. So, she's going to put that together for us to assist with that process. That's just a heads up. Is it possible that this LM
notebook so notebook LM >> that I don't know that's a good question >> guy doesn't know that's what I think we're really referencing is notebook tried to the one um the one document that we have in there I see this note it mentioned these the treasures report making sure it matches you know that's
the yeah I don't want to you know it it mentioned having these things reconcile and that's why they're there >> there's three items that it navigated board members to look at everyone and those are the three things that I just want to help you find so that you can have comfort in what you're approving. >> But it's not as easy as notebook Ellen
said. So that's why we're gonna have Katie explain it a little bit more. >> Well, I'm hoping that humans will always have >> Yeah. at the place. Yes, as we are all >> but this idea of being able to ask questions whenever and not leave Katie
alone might >> uh other questions or clarifications on these any of these items. >> So I miss this last meeting so if I can just get a quick recap on on the bill's
description. So something I missed I just want to get clarification on it. So, uh, Katie, I don't know. I know last month Katie did a presentation and sort of did a brief walkthrough on each item. Uh, I know one of the notes was the, uh, inclusion of
the details on the bills list. That was a prior request and are there now, but Katie, go ahead. >> I don't know if there was. >> Um, in the past, we had the descriptions. At some point during the year, it looks like those were dropped. So, I put them back onto those list. It was not a heavy lift. It's just a matter of um including the purchase order kind
of brief detail of each of the checks. So you'll see that listed. >> Okay. So that's going to be on there going forward. >> It's on there right now. >> It's on there. >> I guess I if we had known that would have created your I would have gotten
screamed at in December about it, you know, overstepping and micromanaging if it wasn't a heavy lift. I don't know why we could have could have just squashed that whole debate about asking for descriptions right then and there. the whole conversation could have been avoided if
>> well I think it was one of those things that at the time it wasn't recognized that information that historically was there >> was >> wasn't for something for >> if I understood it right it was there in the beginning of the year then there was a void >> during my absence it was ran differently
>> and then it looks like that's how it was continued to be run so we just put that information back on >> okay so it wasn't put back for the But you came back though, correct? It was not there when you were for the seven months. >> Correct.
>> Okay. >> Other questions or clarifications? >> It's very helpful. I say that >> I appreciate it's definitely helpful. I mean, again, and then we talked about it. We don't need to talk about staples and stuff, but what some of these vendors out there,
>> um, we would have no idea what they were, >> right? And those are the things you're certainly, you know, at liberty to get clarity on. >> All right. Uh so, uh voice vote. All in favor?
>> Um >> just to clarify, um >> uh on the uh training and travel, we have two members. >> I'm going to do one of them. Um uh so I think folks are in favor. I have to hold from the one for my training and travel.
Okay. >> Oh, >> so would you like to stay on >> that on that one? Yep. And then who else is potentially? >> Stephen and Nicole. Okay. >> Anybody else who had board training or travel? >> Okay. Uh and beyond that, I think we're
all in favor. >> Yes. >> We didn't do >> Oh, wait. Abstensions or notes? >> We need to >> abstain for me. >> I'm voting no on 149, 1410, and 1411. Okay.
>> So, you're voting no on 149 10. >> Correct. >> Okay. So, for the accountability rights, I do have to let the county know if you're voting no on the financial certification and the board secretary report, but I need to know why. >> Um,
I fear my comment might bleed into performance. I'd rather not go there. Is abstaining an option? >> No. >> Then perhaps we can get the comment after the board meeting that you can record.
>> All right. Uh, community relations and student affairs. Can I get a call for a motion in a second to approve agenda items 15.1, overnight field trips? Can I get a motion? >> Uh, Nicole. Thank you. Second. Second >> second. Uh Andrea. Thank you. Questions
or clarifications? >> All in favor? >> I >> opposed or abstensions? >> Mer. Thank you. Uh delegates reports. I don't think we have anything at this point. We didn't last meeting. I know you were sharing the uh upcoming session.
>> Yeah. Um not on the delegates, but for um this Thursday, it's virtual. Um and it's going to be a wonderful presentation. And um it's uh we have John Nash um from Esquire from Legal One and Gada Vogle um who's a coordinator
mental health, wellness, and law. Um and it's going to explore critical connections between HIV and student mental health. Um it'll be a lot of key legal um considerations and protocols related to addressing both mental health needs of students involved in HIV
incidents. And since HIP comes up and you know we're allowed it might be a great session for especially new board members but all board members to join in. you can ask questions and that way it'll because we have to make a determination on these, you know, month after month and um it will help clarify
some of the things um that we're voting on, but also for us as to strengthen our school climate through proactive policies, practices, and partnerships regarding um HIB and mental health initiatives in the district. So, I welcome you all and you don't have to
leave your house in the cold. >> Are those meetings recorded? >> Uh they are. Um, I'm pretty sure they're recorded or well, they're they're broadcast live because we always have the hybrid, >> right? I won't be able to tune in at that time, but I I would be interested. >> Okay. I'll see if I can get a recording
on it. Um, if not, we'll take notes for you. >> Thank you. >> All right. Uh, can I get a call for a motion and second to adopt our resolution for executive session to discuss matters reflected in the attached resolution? The board expects to be in executive session. I don't
think it's going to be 45 minutes, but and upon return to public session, action will be taken. Um, all in favor? >> Motion, I'm sorry. Motion, Dan. Second. >> Second. >> Second, Andrea. Thank you. All in favor?
>> I opposed. Extension. >> None. Okay, >> this is pretty smooth for the first I know it's pretty get in the trucks. Can I get a call? Oh, that's right. Camera. Good. Can I get a call for a
motion and second to reconvene public session? Motion was Brian. Second, Steven. Thank you. Uh, all in favor? I >> I opposed extensions. >> Now, can I get a call for a motion and a second to approve agenda items 191
through 193 and to include hand carries if provided? Can I get that motion? >> Motion. >> Motion, Dan. Second. Uh, Andrea. Thank you. Uh, questions, clarifications. All in favor?
>> I. >> Executive session December the executive minutes for December 16th. >> I'm gonna >> Oh, okay. Got it. It's coming. loose. Yes to 191 and 193 abain from 192
>> Mr. Ch. >> Yes to all >> Mr. Hley. >> Yes to one and three. Abstain two. >> Abstain from it. Mr. >> Yes. >> All three.
>> Uh, yes. All three. >> Mr. Matthews. >> Yes. To 1911 193. Abstain from 192. >> Miss Meappa. >> Mr. Morgan. >> Yes. To 1919. Abstain. 192.
>> Yes. >> Miss Stein, >> yes to all. >> Mr. Miser, >> yes to all. >> Thank you. >> All right. Under old and new business. The only thing I want to share if you recall last week I shared with the board
the feedback on uh those survey questions which included uh suggestions for liaison norms. Um I shared with you sort of a summary of the comments and and sort of a summarized
um overview of what they are. So I would ask if you could look at those uh Mel will see that we get that to you and that that's shared with you. um so that we can begin to sort of finalize some of the thinking around uh norms um the uh
the liaison that we might look to have uh and sort of how we're addressing those uh items on the agenda like the business administrator's report and those things. So sharing on those items and I want to give you know another uh bit of time for folks to look at that
summary and provide any final feedback. Okay, that's it for me. Um, any other business? Oh, all right. Brian, >> uh, a new item, I guess. Um, after we've
done this change, uh, to the the new structure, the working meeting, and today's meeting, um, I wonder if there's a way to indicate in in the action meeting, the second meeting of the month, which items
are unchanged or which items were changed specifically so that you because we went through a lot of things but and examples uh here like 14.5 the budget calendar at the working meeting it wasn't yet developed
>> right >> and now it was but everything before that had already been discussed so as I was going through the new agenda I thought well do I need to go look at everything just to see if there was a
change, you know, to an item. >> Um, >> you know, a resolution, you know, we talked about at the last meeting that we were going to approve it this time, but if it's the exact same wording, we've we've discussed it. >> If something's changed between then and now, I mean, I think when you vote for
this, you got to be saying, I understand what's on this right now. >> It really doesn't even matter what happened a week ago. It's what is on the agenda right now that I'm voting for. But it would be helpful to be able to separate into two categories completely unchanged. You've already talked about
>> Makes sense. >> Yeah. >> And either you didn't talk about this or I had to make or >> a revision >> revision was made another name was put on the personnel agenda. You know, things happen even in a week. >> Could that be done as simply as putting
like rev and a date next to an item that was updated? And >> yeah, >> that's that's just >> one thought I had that was something along those lines would be like and maybe the easiest thing would be to like asterisk >> uh agenda items that were new or or
modified hoping that most of things would not be new or modified but only a few. There'll be a few in FFT because there's going to always be and you know that we haven't yet finalized everything at the working meeting time and now it's ready to be voted on.
Anyways, I leave that to you guys to think about. >> Sure. >> Um I think as we move through this too and we get more used to the structure, you're going to see less of that. >> I Yeah, I do know like when you read them >> the stuff from last week will be exactly what we're loing up this week. >> Yeah. And and so maybe the noting
what's new and different would be fewer things than noting what hasn't changed >> because I do know like when you open it up it'll let you know if you've seen the document and then it'll let you know if there's been changes since the last time you viewed them. But that means we have
to open everything up again to see it. >> That's really that's something that happens. >> Yeah. But but to have it astray then we know that we don't have to reopen it because there's a lot to open. >> But that's also assuming it's the same source file.
>> So I was the same thing. >> But I like it the location because you like have a a folder for yesterday or last week's agenda and then a folder for >> see but this month is different because they were both public agendas. So they're both publicly available. So
yeah, exactly. In the past, it would have went from a non-public file to a public file. Now, it's a public file from the getgo. >> There's two separate public files. >> You guys perfectly understand. What I'm hoping for is a little bit >> of like, okay, check that's already
done. We talked about it and I'm mentally fine with, you know, either voting for or against it or whatever. >> Absolutely. >> Andy, did you have something more? >> All right, Phil. Not to any other new business. Just circling back on the
wrestling thing. So procedural process, is that something that superintendent's going to decide and handle or is that coming before the board for a decision? I just didn't know how that was going to play out. >> I think right now, and Rich, you can correct me if I'm wrong, there's a conversation happening to see if there's a solution. But I think any ultimate
report that comes out would speak to both the short-term solution and if there's longerterm conversations to be had as well. >> I'm handling it. >> You're handling it. So the decision is not going to be on the board. Correct. if I'm hearing that correctly. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Was the original decision of the board?
>> Yeah. Really, the only thing that the board um votes on here is whether or not they want to approve the overnight trip, >> right? That will be um coming to you regardless February. Um and again, with the wrestlers, it it determines we hope and we anticipate that there'll be wrestlers going to the state
tournament. >> That doesn't always happen, right? Sometimes they lose the districts and then they don't go. um you know, but we we have a good crop of wrestlers. They are confident that they were going to send at least, you know, five or six from North, maybe two or three from Boris. And so that's the conversations
that we're having right now is um when do we approve that and what the what action the board needs to take? >> All you need to do is approve the overnight trip. >> But so we approve the trip, but we're not getting involved in whether the school pays for it or not. >> Correct. I I think we could as a board
approach this from a policy perspective. Something like >> um it should be whatever whatever criteria are used, they should be applied across the board. >> It shouldn't matter whether you're a wrestler
>> or a jazz musician. >> I think that's what they're exploring, right? The impact. That's my that's my position that I can't speak for the board, but I would say you can't we shouldn't we should encourage the the the district to use uniform assessment
criteria. Not to say, well, hey, no, we've had great wrestlers in the past, so they're our heritage, so we're going to treat them special. >> The the the one thing I do want to point out is I want to make sure everyone has plenty of notes to be able to accommodate this. And so that's one of
the things that again >> surprises are to be avoided as well. Right. >> Absolutely. So I'm going to have that conversation with um building leadership to make sure that they are communicating now and also next year in the beginning of the year to make sure that everyone is on the same page because I think with
um some change in personnel and change in booster club leadership and things like that that's where some things fell through the cracks and I don't want to take away any opportunities for students. Obviously, that's our that's our goal here is to make sure we take care of the kids. Sometimes I take care of coaches, take care of the kids, but
that doesn't mean it has to be a perfect. >> Okay, Phil, not to box you in, but you have one minute. the board's um enactment of its new schedule of two meetings per month was
preceded by real legitimate concerns by the prior board that enacted this. And I just want to say that I think the board is like 95% of the way towards a a remarkable
um uh rolling this out in this first month where we were all anticipating some real um difficult times. We didn't want it to run six hours etc. The only suggestion I would have to go from 95%
to 100%. Is when it comes to board level discussion to wait for the board president or his design to recognize you before you speak
>> and direct all of your comments to the board president. And I get that more from there's a book called Getting to Yes, which I use in negotiations a great deal. And basically there's this real corny trit saying that says in getting
to yes be tough on the issues and soft on the people. And I would strongly say that no board member will ever come to this board meeting again with an upset stomach, nervous about what the quality
is going to be like if we follow. Everything goes through the board president. Wait to be recognized and speak to the board president. Be soft on each other and tough on the issues and and you're going to go from a remarkable
95% first month to 100%. Thank you. >> Thank you. I call for a motion and second to adjurnn. >> Nicole on the motion. Dan on the second. All in favor? >> I
>> opposed. Extensions. No. Right. That's a wrap. >> Thank you everyone.