Mhm. >> Mhm. >> Mhm. >> Mhm. >> Mhm. >> Mhm. >> Mr. Gibbs, please read the statement of compliance. >> In compliance with the open public meeting act, public law 1975, chapter 231, notice that this meeting has been
properly advertised in the Daily Record and Suburban Trends. Its agenda has been posted at the appropriate locations and a copy has been filed with the Pequannock Township Clerk. >> Thank you. Please call the roll. >> Mr. Bloomer is absent. Mr. Sreevesi? >> Here. >> Ms. Esposito? >> Here.
>> Mr. Gittens? >> Here. >> Ms. Iacono? >> Here. >> Mr. McSweeney? >> Here. >> Mr. Mahalick is absent. Mr. Sanick? >> Here. >> And Ms. Shan? >> Here. >> We have a quorum. >> Thank you. Will everyone please stand for flag salute. All right. Good evening, everyone. Welcome to our June 22nd regular
business meeting. Tonight, the board will receive presentations on multiple topics. First, Mr. Hasler and Mr. Reiner will Reiner, sorry, will provide an update on the portion of a graduate initiative. Next, Dr. Keefe will update the board on how the district is celebrating America's 250th birthday as
well as provide an update on our hip reporting. And last, Ms. Campatello will provide an update on the universal screening used by the district for early literacy. So, we have a jam-packed night and we have lots to get to. However, before we get started, I wanted to remark on the graduation ceremonies
last week for both PV and PTHS. Both events were outside in great weather and incredibly well run. It's always inspiring and uplifting to see the joy on our kids' faces as they are being promoted or are they're graduating. It's my favorite part of the year. That being said, behind the scenes, there are
a lot of moving parts and planning to make these events run so smooth. On behalf of the board, I want to say thank you to the staff, administration, and custodians that helped make those events so special. We appreciate all your efforts and thank you. And last, I want to again congratulate our graduates and wish them well on their future
endeavors. So, for me, pass the mic to Dr. Portis. >> All right, thank you, Mr. Sanac. And before we head into the presentations, I want to first thank the presenters for being here today. Um I realize may have forced you to, but still, you're here and I'm excited to hear what
you have to say. And it's all stuff that's I think really germane to our district's progress and really celebrates what we've been accomplishing this year and what we'll look to continue to do. SSDS is a little more of an exercise in compliance, but still, we put a lot of work at least you put a lot of work into that as well. Um and then
before we get into that, I just want to um update a few things since last we met. Uh we we posted a Safe Drivers Club podcast uh and I I found the conversation remarkably edifying and and fun. And we talked about culture and it's nice too I was able to share with
the police that they got a really nice shout-out from our student rep who was part of that conversation. And I think that that's great just to see that mutual rapport and respect that the police have with our students in this district. And then as Mr. Sanac made a reference to, we we had outstanding outstanding
um end-of-year recognitions. All three elementary schools did their recognitions between Thursday the 11th and and Tuesday the 16th. Uh SJG had theirs on Monday. I can't actually see Mr. Reiner behind the podium, but it was an outstanding event which I'll add was organized pretty much entirely by
students, which is great especially when you consider these kids are between 10 and 11 years old. Um on an amusing note, it was held outside and I'd walk around with a half sunburned face for the rest of the week because only the right side of my face got sunburned. But that's just an occupational hazard. Um and then
the the PV promotion ceremony was outstanding. And then the high school graduation um went to another level beyond outstanding. And I may I may have said it to Mr. Hazler, and if I didn't, shame on me because it warrants saying that that was probably the finest high school graduation I've seen in my 29
years in this business. Um the the crowd was outstanding, the kids were respectful, engaged, speeches were were really really strong. Um and to his credit, Mr. Hasler did not get noticeably choked up over the course of
his speech, held it together brilliantly. Um and and really the audience, you could tell there's a lot of really positive interaction. I don't know if you heard, too, at one point, you're done, you said something about I didn't cry, and somebody from the audience yelled out, I did. Um so it was it was
nice, but it was just um it it was it was a wonderful night, and just um as someone who's been to a lot of these and and really cares very deeply about the district, the high school, the administrative team, the kids, the families, um it was so nice that that night just to be a part of that, and so could all
end, so. Um might be a little recency bias, but I don't think it is. That that was that was the best. Um and then just a couple other quick things, and then um we'll pass the mic over to Mr. Hasler and Mr. Reiner. Um we had a soft launch of our website.
Mr. Uh Shay has explained to me several times that a soft launch means you don't announce it to people. So, with that reinforcement, I made a point not to announce it to anybody. I don't think I did, but uh it looks great. I haven't really done a ton of navigating on it, but that that landing page looks really
good. Um it's a little more compressed, a little more user-friendly, and and um it just feels a little more dynamic. So, really appreciative of that. There's more coming down the pike that I'm not allowed to talk about, because again, he reminded me today, soft launch means not saying anything about it. And then, our
school year officially ends on June 30th, and then I'd like to wish everyone a happy New Year on July 1st, when we officially begin the 2026-2027 school year, where I hope to build on a lot of the success that we've we've had in motion for for this school year. So,
with that said, I'm going to turn the floor over to Mr. Hasler and Mr. Reiner to talk about the portrait of a graduate, which is what started as a one-year project, became a three-year project, and I'm pretty sure it's now a five-year project.
>> Sure. >> Okay, very good. That thanks for that completely completely hollow response. Appreciate it. >> Good evening, everyone. Thank you very much, and thank you for those who were able to attend the graduation or watch it online. I really it really was a special special day. I bawled my eyes
out during the clap out. I'll I'll share the picture with Dr. Porus Eagan. My son was the last one to leave, and I just absolutely lost it. So, uh it was it was something special. But, you know, thank you for the opportunity to lead the district. I really do appreciate it. It was It's one
of those once-in-a-lifetime opportunities for me. So, I'll get a second time when my daughter comes, but this was it was really special. So, Mr. Reiner, Dr. O'Keefe, and I would like to share with you an update on where we are with the profile of a graduate. We presented a few times to you,
and it really has become a labor of love at this point as we move forward because we just constantly improve on where we're going. We have some new ideas about what we want to do because you'll hear in the presentation, this is something that has kind of taken on a
mind of its own. We've looked at a lot of profile of a graduate uh examples of districts, and we just feel that ours can continue to get better. And I think that's part of the process that any school or any district wants is is when you look at these things,
there's always ways that we can improve. You know, you do it as a Board of Education as well. You know, you look at how other districts are doing things and and what fits with what we do. So, we're going to talk to you about where we are, where we were, where we are, and where we're going. So, we we thought we'd start off with where we've been just as
a quick little reminder. This is a multi-year district-wide collaborative effort to identify, align, and teach towards future-ready skills, and connect smaller pieces of work towards a unified direction for graduates at each grade level. And you're really going to see how we break that out. What was really neat about
this is that is that in our our podcast that we did with Dr. Portis, I guess it was 2 years ago now, one of the things that just came up as a in conversation and that I said was it's not one more thing, it is the thing. And it's become not just the profile of
a graduate, let's see how it fits in. This is what we should be doing. And and it could really comes down to how do we go from good to great. And as we do that, it's really about the diversity of input that we get, the sources that we're using, drawing on our community strengths, and looking at scholarship and not just what other
districts do. Uh Ramsey was one of the first to come out in New Jersey, and and we picked uh Dr. Murphy's brain, who who is is a a great resource, and we're continuing to grow on that. And you'll see where we are with that as we go. So, in year one, just quick reminder
again, the district goal formation, we formed a committee. Uh we were very task-focused. We met monthly to kind of break down our goals, where we wanted to go. We ourselves as a committee uh went through some professional learning, some research, some networking, and we developed a survey that we gave out to
the to the uh various stakeholders in our community. You'll see our district uh committee there. And we really appreciated their input. Uh it was a a really diverse group that had a lot of experience. Uh some of our teachers were alumni of the high school as well. And so, it really added to to the level of
depth that we were looking to to get to. Uh as we went into year two, we administered those surveys to a variety of stakeholders, which you see there. And then Dr. O'Keefe uh analyzed all the data. We used AI uh for some of it, but a lot of it we were, you know, looking at just going by hand and going through
and seeing what we could do. And then developed subcommittees to identify major trends, and we did that with within our district uh at the school-based level. And then in year three, which was this year, we took it upon ourselves to use that survey data and
then start to solidify competencies. We came up with um the the graphic here that you'll see uh in terms of the four C's, which are uh the the four supporting uh dispositions. And then uh structure was K to 8 by the end of We We really want to look at, okay, where are
we grade 8 by the end of whatever grade it is. And then through 9 through 12, we want to really look at the literacy by domain because once you get to the high school, students tend to break out. Classes are not grade pure. So, we really are focused on that bottom part of the paw there, that information,
data, and technology uh technology literacy. And you'll see then how the the the uh I guess toes of the paw all fit in with that. So, that's uh So, that's where we are. And uh Mr. Reiners is going to talk a little bit about where we're at.
Or Dr. Keep, too. >> All right. So, something else that we did this year, um we brought our faculty, we used our faculty into the process. Uh we used faculty meeting time. We also used grade level meeting time um to
decide exactly what, you know, what this was going to look like in a classroom, in our uh curriculum. So, uh we ended up coming up with these. Uh we have them for every grade level. Um and what you'll see here is we've
broken down what the look fors are for the staff. Um Dr. Keep, if you want to talk about this, Greg. Yeah, come on. Um so, that's what we're going to share with you right now, Dr. Keep. And then I'll take over. >> It'd be a little bit more coordinated
when we prepped this ahead of time, but that's okay. So, each grade level, like Mr. Reiners said, I'll just go back for just 1 second because there's kind of two components to this. The first piece are each of the parts of the profile of a graduate, each of the four foundational C's competencies, and then
the supporting dispositions. So, these are not meant to be read on the slide. They're microscopic just because they're screenshots. But if you look, for example, at communication in grade K, there's, for example, four bullets there. If you look at by the end of grade one, the communication box, it spirals up. So,
the the verbiage is almost I don't it's not identical, but it's aligned. So, what we can do then is look at each competency by itself, for example, communication, and you can look literally K through 12. And so, that competency, for example,
has four strands as I referenced before, four bullet points. And so, the these resources, these one-pagers, identify what that competency looks like, primary, upper elementary, middle, and high school. >> So, what is this going to look like, and
what are we doing moving forward from this point on? Well, first of all, we're going to communicate. This is already part of our branding. It's on our It's going to be on our website. Uh it's going to be in back-to-school nights. I've already shared it at our kindergarten orientation. Uh parents
were in absolute love with it. Um it's going to be common language throughout all of the schools. Uh we're going to have common posters up in schools. We're going to have common branding outside of schools. Uh and it's going to be present in every single classroom.
Then we're going to with with Genesis, with the move to Genesis, we're able to uh update our report cards. So, these competencies are going to align with our report cards because in K to 5 because they're standards-based. So, there's going to be a piece of the profile of
the graduate on our report cards there. In 6 through 12, in 6 through 12, we're going to modify those report cards as well to say if competencies have been met not yet approaching or mastered will be the uh the language that we're looking at.
And then in the curriculum documents we're adding a profile of the graduate section into our curriculum documents so that we can see how we're going to be evaluating where we are and where the students are going. >> So in terms of the in terms of the faculty work
again we're going to be looking at really a year-long study of the analysis of how these competencies do level up what expectations and rubrics need to be adjusted as we go which are on grade level we're going to take a look at at the high school particularly grade
five and grade eight have have really been doing these doing these things all along but developing and piloting defenses of learning. So in grade five you have some some examples of the TED Talks and the passion projects. They have their shark shark tank and traps that they do
in grade eight they're they're starting with their panther periods looking at interdisciplinary research. One of the things they did this year was the 75th anniversary PV. That was a great example of a variety of these skills that the kids had to work together to really do and and if you had a chance to to go
over towards the end of the of the year there really was a neat thing that they did. And then in grade 12 we're going to look at a really a multi-avenue approach. We're going to look at from a counselor perspective looking to see where students are are looking to to go in college starting in grade nine
and to see what their focus is really need to be because what we can do is we can look at our academies are send academy capstones are really the defenses of learning for them. So our seniors that are doing their projects when they do their presentation that is the culmination of all of their work in
the district. Same thing with Allied Health and our work-based learning Mr. Kopp is actually looking at for full projects for them. So, the students will be documenting and they started this year documenting what they do, taking interviews with with people,
bringing in the guest speakers that we have all becomes part of their portfolio, which will then they'll give a presentation much like the academy does on what they learned in their work-based learning program. And then in the non-academies, we we do a variety of things. We are going to again be having
AP research in in the in the program of studies, which we haven't had in a number of years. And then in the following year, it's really going to take off. So, those are students that take AP seminar in their first year and then the AP research is really the capstone diploma through the AP program.
So, we have now grade 10 students taking AP seminar as the AP English 10 course. And those students will then could move on to research if they choose to. So, in AP seminar or AP research, they could technically finish their AP their
profile of a graduate work. Also, in our post AP exam classes, we do a variety of projects already going down to teach at the elementary schools. So, those are things that we're all looking at and then our capstone courses, if you had a chance to look at our yearbook this year, it's probably
the best yearbook. I It's not probably, it is the best yearbook I've ever seen in the history of this high school. The yearbook class was just a home run in terms of of what those kids were able to do. At the end of the yearbook is actually a QR code so you can actually look at all
the pictures that didn't make the yearbook, but they also photograph the entire end of the year. So, you're talking about the cruise and and the portions of the prom, graduation videos. All of those things will be available to any student, but particularly to the seniors where that's incredibly meaningful. And that all came out of the
yearbook class and the yearbook club, which was great. And then we're looking at for 27-28 possibly integrating a profile of a graduate course at the senior level where the students would need to take it if they are not taking an academy or an AP class. Again, this is just something
that we're talking about right now, but that is what what some schools do with profile of a graduate. So, the students would take that and then pursue whatever project they would like to do. There's also an opportunity to take a look at our final exams. Uh final exams are I know they're a
product and and uh a tradition, if you will, uh to get ready for for college, but how are our students really doing on them? And so, we're going to take a look at this summer how our students did on the final exams. Is this worthwhile? Are our students studying enough for these? Uh there are some students that do very
well, but there are some students who really don't. And so, is this a way to have kind of an alternative form of assessment for the kids as they finish their high school career. So, that's really where we're heading. Uh if you're if you look at a district goal for for this coming year, when we
meet at our retreat in July, it's really going to be this part of what are the defenses of learning at every level. So, when you look at 5, 8, and 12, what are those defenses of learning going to be? And we're going to work with the staff on that. So, as Dr. Porti says, it's really uh I was a little um
slow with my response, but it really is a 5-year goal. Um and and it's going to be probably a 6-year goal, cuz those defenses of learning are going to need to be modified and adjusted as we go. But but I think we're really on track to to be one of the examples nationwide in
terms of how do you take the the idea of a profile of a graduate, continue to build on it, and really have it drive your curriculum forward, and drive your kids forward, and drive your district forward. So, I want to commend all the teachers, all the stakeholders involved in this. I want to thank Dr. O'Keefe for
a tremendous amount of work that he does. Uh Mr. Reiner and I are running around doing principal work, and he'll come in and say, "Hey, I got some competencies. You want to take a look at them based on what I was analyzing?" And then we'd sit down and we'd come up and and brainstorm brainstorm some ideas. Uh so, we really appreciate his work and
it's it's really become, as I said, a labor of love. So, thank you very much for this opportunity. We appreciate it. Uh you you're this compass is still, I think, something that's just so cool. And and really uh is really going to move forward. So. Yeah. Uh I don't know about a tattoo,
but we'll we'll see where we go. I don't like needles, so we'll have to see what happens there. But, yeah, it's uh it it I think it's a really cool thing. So, thank you for the opportunity. If you have any questions, we'd be happy to answer them. >> I got one question for you. In 27 parts. No, I'm kidding. Um
So, the state has the standard, and I guess we have to meet the standard, but we get to decide what means we get to that end. And the portrait of the graduate is going to be inserted um in some cases as a project or in some cases as a means to demonstrate that state
standard. Is that what you're saying? >> Yeah. So, in some districts it the profile of a graduate is, say, if you do it you know, do something over the course of your high school career, you meet the requirements. Some schools have the class that all the kids have to take. Having a class is great, uh but we have
some students that, you know, quite frankly, can't fit it in their schedule right now based on on a variety of things. And so, with our academy, it's our AP kids, you don't want to tie them to a a course, uh but we do have some students that really do need to work on communication skills and and public
speaking and things like that. And and a course that is not necessarily entitled profile of a graduate, but it's enti- you know, it's almost like a senior seminar class that would prepare the kids for their freshman seminar as they head to college. You know, my son has his orientation tomorrow, and he has to take a a freshman seminar class.
He doesn't know what that is. And so, to give him an opportunity in high school or give any student an opportunity in high school, I think could really be beneficial, especially at that age. Um you know, and I think that's where we're going to go, you know, moving forward. >> Can I add to it, Brian? Sorry. Um so,
the state's coming out with a new career readiness, life literacies, and key skills standards. They were done in 2020 for the first time, and now they're they come out again. They've already done an unofficial document. And they actually have key competencies now as a piece of
every K to 2, 3 to 5, 5 to 6 to 8, and 9 to 12. So, what these guys are already set up, and what we've already done has we're ahead of the curve with the shifts that the state has made in that domain that we have to infuse throughout all of our
content areas anyway. So, that's good. >> You were talking about the freshman seminar that your son has to take. Um I know that mine had to take a freshman computer class. And because we used the Chromebooks and
colleges use Apples or Macs or whatever, um it was very funny in my house to hear that this was one of the hardest classes that the entire freshman class had to take. And, you know, up nights and all this
kind of stuff and relearning, you know, um and then when they get out into the workforce, they won't be using Apples anymore, some Mac anymore. Right? So, it's be great. >> But Ryan has to get a Windows computer for his business classes, and he's like, "I don't like Windows." I said, "Well, that's what they use, so we got to get
ready for Windows, you know, whatever we're going to do." Um so, you know, it's it there's a definitely things that we can continue to improve upon, and this this will give us an avenue to do that. >> Hi. Uh first of all, this is fantastic, so thank you all for all the work. Um so,
if I understand correctly, your 1 to 3 was sort of build, 4 and 5 is implement, and then 6 is going to be refine. Right? Okay, perfect. Do you have a very detailed project plan? And I ask because there are so many moving parts in this. So, it
would be I think really helpful for us to see like what the implementation looks like. So, for example, identify rubrics needing to be updated by whatever date, have them updated by whatever date. Like, I think that would
help us sort of see this whole come together. I I If >> Yeah. Um we can add that into um with our admin meeting this summer. We can add that into the profile of graduate goal for next year. Um because we can
That's kind of the way we've been doing those goals, right? Is um you know, we've been listing you know, what we want to accomplish with the month and then what that actually looks like. And then we've been embedding, you know, when we're done with that uh that project, we've been embedding it into that sheet. So, if if that would be
okay, we could put it right into there and then you'd always have access to it. >> That sounds perfect. That'd be great. Thank you. >> Awesome. >> All right. Thank you very much. Great job. >> Thank you. >> So, this is the fun one because A, I don't I have to talk at you. Uh
and B, you know, Mr. Haser kind of ended by saying labor of love and I'm going to I'm going to steal that phrase for this. So, we all know it's the 250th coming up next month for um our country. And And at the beginning of this, you know, Ms. Shannon, you said, you know, there's a lot of moving parts. Well, in my head, I'm like, wow, there's
a lot of moving parts to get a whole district to really commemorate this momentous, really once-in-a-lifetime occasion. But the way this came together, just as you had to cut stuff out of the yearbook, we had to cut so much out of this to get it not just under 5 minutes to put really to to exemplify all the
great stuff. So, I just before we do this, and I'm not going to say a lot, there were so many hands on deck that I this is not a Dan O'Keefe moment. This is a district moment because we had such creative outpouring at all three divisions, middle elementary, middle, and high school. Uh
the things the teachers came up with this kid the things that students did, not just project-wise, but but service-wise, you're going to see a range of things. Um I think it's a little emotional, too, just because I think patriotism is inherently emotional. Uh but uh hope you all enjoy. And I
think uh Dr. Portis, I think the plan is to also kind of look at other ways we can push this out, maybe the uh town Facebook page. We talked about possibly News 12. That's that's kind of a a to be discussed. But just because we are so proud of I think what we did, we want to uh
project this out far and wide. >> To commemorate America's 250th anniversary, we studied historical global roots in AP World History. >> We analyzed the origins of our democracy, including the separation of powers, checks and balances, and citizen
representation. >> Goodbye. By spacious skies. By amber waves of grain. By purple mountain majesties. America sweet. America
you know God shed his grace on thee. I could. Yes, he did. And brotherhood from sea to
shin- shining sea. Everybody let me say this. That's sweet. America call me here on every brotherhood >> Yeah, any questions aside from what that was at the end?
>> Questions, that was I mean, I remember watching it when you sent it around in the email and like being moved by it. It is unbelievable between the kids visiting the seniors and Ray Charles just ripping it up. It was that is a great project
and the amount of diversity between the different activities and chemistry tiles. >> Yeah. >> Like thinking about how to incorporate some of the stuff with the 250th into chemistry and you're making tiles with I would imagine some kind of chemicals and you're >> sharing them in the >> I mean it's like it's just a phenomenal phenomenal effort all around.
>> Thanks. >> Great job. >> I had so many different that's what I mean, people coming up how about this, how about things I could have never thought of and that's one of the amazing things about you know, our district and the talent we have. You know, that and when you're kind of overseeing this and some of Ray Charles guy, you can kind of figure out how to end it and that was like the best you
know, possible ending I think, but no, it was um it was a great experience, I think and there's like I said, there's a a of things we didn't even get to include, so. Thank you all very much. Appreciate it. >> Just thinking about distribution, I had a couple ideas that just popped into my head sitting here. So, I know Cedar
Crest have televisions like in all of their lobbies where they have like announcements and stuff for their for their patrons, their um is residents. Thank you. I think it would First of all, they love Pequannock. I think they would be very willing to play
them this on a rotation, whether throw it in with their messages and stuff. >> Okay. >> I could totally see them doing that. I know we do like PV Park do like a movie in the summer. This could be like >> Sort of like a little pre >> Before the movie, like, you know, everyone sits and watch the previews,
this could be a preview. And I know Hillview used to do a movie too in the summertime. I don't know if they do anymore, but um I've taken a break from social media, so I'm not in touch with stuff anymore, but those are just a few things that popped into my head. It's probably really easy, quick community hits.
>> Yeah. Thank you. Appreciate that. And now I have no easy way to segue this. So, my esteemed colleague, Ms. I've I've been calling her Belledin, and now I got to get used to calling her Campatelli, so. >> [laughter] >> Thank you. >> [laughter] >> All right, good evening, everyone.
Tonight, I'm presenting on our 25-26 universal screening report for kindergarten to grade three. Um we're going to be taking a look at all three um screening windows, beginning, middle, and end, and focus on our student growth, um and also our key MTSS
um features that have supported this growth. So, what we will be looking at tonight is what our universal screener is. For a refresher who those who those for those who do not know our district wide growth are grade level reports, school level
reports, and then our key takeaways and our next steps looking into next year. So, DIBELS 8 is a dynamic indicator of basic early literacy. They are quick 1-minute subtests that assess the foundational skills including phonemic
awareness, phonics, reading fluency, and comprehension. Um these are those one-on-one tests that are given to students three times throughout the year as I mentioned at the beginning of the year in September, the middle of the year in January, and at the end of the year in June.
So, when you look at this um color coordination beautiful beautiful chart, we all love the colors. Is green is on level, right? Your blue is well above or exceeding grade level expectations. You have yellow which is
below benchmark, there might be some risk um where students will benefit from additional reading support, and then you have your well below benchmark which is um a significant risk which requires intensive intervention. Um so, our goal across every single
grade level is to move students up and out of intensive or strategic support um and obviously be at that 80% benchmark um for students across the grade level bands. So, at the end of this year, here are
numbers for students at or above benchmark. Um so, this is their composite score. With DIBELS, we look at all of the different subtests at individual scores, but they also have an overall score which is their composite. So, our kindergarten um is at 85%. They
started the year at 51%. Um our grade one is 87%. They started the year at 70%. Our grade two is 77% and our grade three is at 63%. I put the numbers below so you can see last year. Um last year we only
assessed K1 and two because it was the start of our screener, but I wanted to put that on there so that you could see the growth as well. Um so looking at just this and I think you guys probably have the same questions that I might jump into which is second
and um third grade are going to be our two grades that we're really going to focus in on. >> Mr. Sreecy. >> So yes, if you're looking at where we left off our end of the year, so you're saying our 24-25 is now our second grade, like grade one under grade one is now our grade two,
our grade two is yes. You're correct in thinking that. So we see a little dip. >> Wait. Oh, sorry. >> It's okay. >> You have to think um summer slide, Sam. >> That? >> Summer slide. Like kids will lose skills over the summer.
>> Right, but if this is done three times, then by the end of the year, Sam, you're right. >> from like the beginning of the year like the 79, the 2024-2025 79 to 70%. >> But this is end of the year benchmark.
>> So we do see Yep, so we do see a slight dip in our second and third grade. Um in terms of our curriculum, I'll talk a little bit about some of the changes that we're making moving forward to look at that because I think um as you could
see from this K and one are very very strong. Those were our two focus grades this year that we wanted to one implement Haggerty um and that was our phonemic awareness from what we found last year was our biggest struggle. And so looking to next year, second and third grade is really where um we have
to tighten up our decoding. Because you'll see on the next few charts that our fluency is actually really great. We're in the 92% like 95% for our students for oral reading fluency. But they're still struggling with their patterns, their spelling patterns, their
vowel teams, their R controlled vowels, vowel consonant e, and things like that. >> Can I just add to Sam, I know you're looking at second third, but uh Mrs. Compitello did a ton of work this year with our kindergarten and first grade teachers.
So, the strength that is shown in K and grade one is a lot to do with the as she mentioned the focus and the coaching she did where she would went into the classroom, she taught the teachers how to use the new materials we brought in Haggerty. She did a
She did a lot of work with them in the data team meetings that they met with almost monthly. Um really focusing on the kids, identifying the skills they were missing, and the growth in particular classrooms was just tremendous. So, there was a heavy focus
on those two, and as she mentioned now she's like, "Okay, what's next?" >> I have a question. Do we have other districts comparable data? And I ask because I would think that by grade three, kids are on devices more and
scrolling, and so perhaps some of the skills that they were developing younger with pattern development, etc., they're now you know. >> I don't have data from other districts right now. We do submit our data to the state, so they definitely have it all.
What I can say is at our county meetings that Mrs. Van Sickle and I attend monthly, we do get to talk to different districts at the end of our PD, and one of the things that I found in common with some of the other ELA supervisors was the second and third grade. And so,
we're having that same issue. We also know that a lot of the way that we used to teach decoding is a little bit it's a little bit different now. I think for a while we were teaching whole word reading, and we were having kids, you know, memorize their sight words, and
that wasn't helping them learn the spelling pattern. It was helping them memorize. And so, there has to be a balance between sight word work and teaching them and reading decodables and practicing their patterns and identifying them in their reading and in their writing. So, I think the lens is
shifting a little bit more. Um so, that's why we see the fluency so high, but we see the decoding. And so, that is a common trend. I'm sure if I reach out to my county colleagues, I could get that information and really see specifics. Um but for me in my mind, I wanted to see that 80% and so, I think
we achieved it um in almost three uh grade level bands, and that third grade I was pretty bummed to see that that component of that 63%, but I know exactly where we need to target. And so, um talking to the other districts, too, I'm interested to see what other,
you know, projects and curriculum switches and all that they have to see how that they can address that as well. >> This is also the first year that the state has ever collected this data. So, they're putting to I almost 100% sure they're putting together think they're
right now there's not a dashboard or anything of data for districts, but um it seems they're going that direction in order to publish results just like we do on JSLA and that type of thing. >> Yeah. And I think, too, partnered with the focus grant, which is the reason why it
even came out to begin with, right? The um early literacy grant is because they saw this need across the entire state. And so, that's why they are looking at the data and they're trying to um you know, the state has put on the DOE the LEER website has put up training videos
and so many resources that we never had before. So, I think we have now have access to more tools outside of just what our districts have. So, looking at the kindergarten data, I'm very excited. I feel like kindergarten was such a success story um
for their growth this year. They moved from 24% at the beginning of the year of students in intensive to just 7% at the end. Um so, that intensive band obviously is significantly shrunk. Um we
look at our core students and our core above students. Um you could see on the bottom part where the acronyms are LNF, PSF, those are subtests. So, letter naming fluency, phonemic segmentation fluency, nonsense
word fluency, and then that overall composite score. So, you could see the goal. I wanted to make note that the goal changes every time we assess students. So, at the beginning of the year, the goal is set, and at the middle of the year, the goal increases. So,
maybe they only needed to know 20 letters at the beginning of the year, and then it goes up to 40 and so on. So, you might see a dip sometimes in the middle of the year, etc., and that's because that goal is increasing. So, if they're not moving as quick as that goal
is increasing and not progressing as quickly, they might dip down from core to strategic uh for one of the benchmarks. Um to go along with that, something else to know is that throughout the beginning to the end of the year, if students are being flagged in that red, in that
yellow, and so forth, that's really where the progress monitoring is happening. So, it's not like we only have the data from September to you know, and then again in January. Every two two to three weeks, we are assessing kids on a particular subtest that we found is the neediest, you could say.
So, the most important and prioritizing, and that's where the teachers, myself, the building principals have been having conversations with teachers this year to really target that instruction and in small groups. So when you think about our tier two instruction and our tier three instruction,
um that's where kiddos are being put in a small group together based on that need. They're working on that. They're being progress monitored. And then for the kiddos that might need something more intensive, they're getting whole class instruction, small group instruction within the classroom and also a triple
dip of possibly working with our intervention our reading um specialist and interventionist. So grade one, um again you could see tremendous growth from the beginning of the year to the end of the year. Our letter naming fluency is very strong.
Our decoding is amazing. Um when you think about what you your model first grade of what you wanted to look like, it's exactly this. Um the one thing that we want students to have in first grade is their phonemic awareness and their
decoding of CVC words and CBCE words. Um the fact that they could tap out their sounds and blend them together and that's exactly what this data is showing us. Um from the beginning chart you could see district-wide first grade is our I
believe our strongest grade um at 87% of students at or above benchmark. And I think that um goes to the the reason why we have 87% and I think that we've shown so much growth is really
partnering or marrying the two between foundations and Hagerty. That was our missing piece to the puzzle that I think that we were doing without for a little bit, which is why our numbers were dipping. Yes. Yep. It's really Mhm. So, we can Yeah, we can we can track
exactly what students, you know, based on the reports that we're able to pull cuz we can pull individual progress reports, we pull class reports, grade level reports, and so on through Amplify our system. Um it's really interesting because when we met with the teachers at the end of the year, one of the things that we
looked at were the students who started the year in intensive, and we're like, "Where are they now?" Right? Like, are they just in strategic, or did they really move out of it? And what was amazing to see, it was like something clicked, right? Sometimes the progress is like slow and steady, and then the
light bulb goes off. And so, I think we saw a lot of our kids that were in intensive receiving reading lab now in above core instruction. So, I do think it depends on the kiddo. You're You will have those cusp kids that are like in between. Um but I think with the
consistency of small groups, with the consistency of explicit instruction, and making sure we're progress monitoring, um we really have seen maybe one or two kids that haven't shown tremendous growth. Still growth, but maybe not adequate. That might have raised some
more flags of like a reading difficulty. So, for second grade, you could see again the beginning of the year and the end of the year. Second grade had um a strong year. I think their intensive dropped from 17 to 8%. Oh, what was that? Sorry.
Um so, the one thing that that was strong here was our maze score. Our maze is our vocabulary in context. So, that's your comprehension. Um so, students had strong comprehension and their accuracy was at 94%, which is amazing. So, these
kids can read. Um they are they have strong reading behaviors. So, they're not skipping words. They have self-correction, um which is exactly what we want. Now, here is the part that I think they're struggling with. They in context can
read a book, right? And so, they might be looking at the pictures. They might be guessing because they see the first letter or the last letter. But, when they see these words isolated, right? On a sheet of paper and they have to read them off, our kiddos are struggling with that. So, that's where it comes into play of
what do we do for these students to help them segment these sounds, right? When they see them in front of them. So, it might mean a word list. It might mean um you know, practicing particular patterns with those decodables as I mentioned before. So, when you look at this data,
one thing that I think is important to also share is this data is passed along to the next grade level teacher. So, our warehouse houses all of this, but also we administer dibbles on paper copies. So, if I'm scoring it for Dan and I'm
marking my paper for him, I'm circling the patterns that he's not getting, right? So, when I go back to this paper, say at the end of the year as a teacher, I could be like, "Okay, well, you know, we worked on our controlled vowels. We worked on EE, EA." I'm passing this to the next grade level
teacher so they can see exactly what patterns that student struggled with. So, that folder, their dibbles folder, goes along with their DRA, like their reading level. So, both of those pieces of the puzzle make the reader, right? Your decoding and your comprehension. So, we have one really, really strong piece, which is their comprehension.
That decoding piece we still need to work on, and that's where we're going to start off next year with those students already flagged. Um so, grade three, uh we saw the growth along with the comprehension component again. It is
a little bit weaker with 76% of students at or above, but still not far off. Our accuracy is 73% um and like I said, that fluency piece, they are strong with that fluency, but what happens when they have strong
fluency and they need to coding work is when they get to multisyllabic words, they really struggle, right? So, that's where we need to be teaching prefixes, suffixes, morphology, and that's not just in second grade, that is in second, third, fourth grade, and so on. Um so,
that is the piece that I was able to identify based upon this data that third grade really needs to zoom in and focus more on is that morphology component. What? >> Do we only have 122 kids in our third grade?
>> So, all students are assessed in the grade level. Um so, I believe based on the numbers that I pulled, every every child, unless I pulled the wrong report, let me >> That's our smallest class. You know, I didn't know it was that >> Oh, yes. >> 40 Yes. It's 38 kids smaller than the other class.
>> only two sections in every in every school. So, yeah, that is correct. >> But I had section one. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Okay. Okay. I didn't realize it was that small. >> Yeah, that's going to be a big one next
year. Um so, also thinking about that, as I mentioned, those advanced phonics patterns are going to catch up to them, right? It might not be right now in second grade, it might not be in third grade, but as they get to fourth and fifth grade when they are reading and the pictures go away, right? When you
open a novel, it's going to get even harder. So here this data is a summary of the each school at the at kindergarten, grade one, grade two, and grade three level from the beginning of the year to the end of the year and you could see the growth
with each grade level band. Based upon this, we could see that kindergarten once again showed the strongest gains in growth across the schools. And this also was able to help me identify what school and grade level combination band needed some additional
support or targeted support based on this. The teachers were so excited to look at this data at the end of the year. So I wanted to add, when we did our end-of-the-year data meetings, we used it as a celebratory data meeting. And so
we really highlighted all the work that they put in this year through you know, talking about their students all the time, the data that they've shown, the growth that they had. And on the next slide I'll talk a little bit about the shift between the data meetings of me talking the whole time and the teachers really
taking ownership over this data. So here are some key changes that I think drove the results that we got this year. First, we had scheduled data meetings for K through 5. We had three meetings throughout the year that were aligned to our screening windows. So I wanted to just add, DIBELS was not the
only test that we discussed or the only assessment. It is one piece of the puzzle. We also have I-Ready. We look at DRAs. We look at writing samples, teacher anecdotal notes, and more. But this big piece of the puzzle, I believe
um, is the priority when you look at foundational literacy. The teachers facilitate these data meetings. So, at the beginning of the year, it was, um, more of a scaffolded approach, slow release of responsibility of, "Okay, let's see what data you have here, the
students that were flagged last year." But, this huge shift where the students uh the teachers had the investment and they were so excited that they also shared that their students are excited about their growth now and they were talking about how students started tracking their their Dibels growth. And last year, you know, "Last time we did
it, I got 20 words and this time I got 22." So, I think it's really exciting to have that shift and going into next year, um, having the teachers also have students track this, I think, is a big component of as as well. They get
competitive, they love to see, "Oh, I got 20 words, next time I'm going to shoot for more." Um, having that growth mindset, I think, is important and I also think it helps the teachers be excited about the data that they're receiving. Students who needed support got additional targeted intervention within
the classroom. This was small group instruction, it was happening every day, whether it was during reading time, writing time, or Foundations time. Um, teachers were pulling their students and it was so exciting to see. The groups were flexible, they were based on that ongoing data and it's not to say
that it was the same group after each benchmark, it shifted. That's the whole point of grouping, it should be flexible. If I progress monitor a student and they don't need vowel teams anymore, I'm not going to keep teaching them vowel teams. I'm going to move on to the next skill. So, the teachers were adjusting as they went. And like I said,
those the reading lab students did absolutely phenomenal and showed tremendous growth as well. So, our reading specialists have been working really hard with our kiddos on their explicit instruction as well. Heggerty in K and 1, as I mentioned earlier, 10 minutes explicit phonemic awareness,
um, instruction within the classroom. We see that growth in our phonemic awareness specific to our nonsense word decoding. Those are the words that are make-believe words, right? You can't necessarily they don't mean anything. Um, so it's just a bunch of letters together.
And we saw that directly um align with our our Hegarty support and the evidence of that. So when you think about the key takeaways and our strengths. So our strengths were that all four grades exceeded the end of the year composite mean goals um from DIBELS. Our
kindergarten intensive dropped from 24% to 7% and um we have 57% of our kids above benchmark in kindergarten ready for first grade. Our K1 achieved 87% at or above, which is the highest district-wide. Our oral reading fluency
district-wide is between 93 and 94% of students at or above grade level at the end of the year. And we know Hegarty drove measurable outcomes for phonemic segmentation and nonsense word fluency in K and 1. So where do we go? Well, we're going to use our beginning of the
year um data meetings to talk about early groupings. We have data right now that we can use as from day one. We're going to continue with our tier two and three supports for students that were below benchmark. We're going to continue with teacher facilitated data meetings
going into next year. Our grade three is going to be our focus. We're going to have additional explicit decoding um in grade three and grade four small groups to surround the decoding skills. So we're going to be spiraling the skills in throughout the weeks. Um I have a scope and sequence already made
ready to go for our grade four teachers of ideas that they could do in their small groups with those students that are struggling so that we don't miss that and you know further that gap. Um and our reading specialist will be pushing into grade four classrooms for additional small group instruction
support for those teachers. >> Our So I'm sorry. God. So for grade three, we're still using Foundations? >> So, we have Foundations, yes. And we also are using U-Fly. Um U-Fly is a free program, and it's um
decodable passages. Um it is additional work that students can do, practice at home, and things like that. And so, we've been doing that really for our tier two and tier three students mostly to target. >> But so, so now we're going to do Foundations
again in fourth grade for those kids that aren't reading. >> So, we're not going to do whole group Foundations in fourth grade because when you think about tier one instruction, you're hopefully meeting like 80% of students. So, to give everyone a whole 'nother year of the content,
>> Definitely understand that, but if you look at the scores, correct me if I'm wrong cuz I I I'm not feeling 100%, but North Boulevard grade level at grade level is only 53%, which means we have 47% not reading at grade level. >> Yeah, correct. >> Yeah. So, how are we going to target? I
mean, that's a lot of small group instruction. And then are we looking at Foundations and the fidelity in which it's being run, or is this the appropriate program for us to continue to use? I'm not a huge Foundations fan. I'm going to be really honest with you.
I am level one Wilson certified, so I have a good background. I don't find that Foundations is um uh super strong. Um I also don't feel that they have enough professional development, that there are other programs that have better professional
development that are more successful than Foundations. However, are we How are we going to look at the Foundations program? And I mean, 53% at grade level in third grade at North Boulevard, and I'm just That's cuz that's the one I'm remembering. I mean, now we're going to expect them
to pass the state test >> Mhm. >> again. So, how are they passing this test when they can't read. I'm more worried about them reading, than I am them passing a state test as as a teacher and as a mom, but that's kind of
concerning. I'm just going to put it out there. >> So, I think you brought up a few really great points that I want to make sure I So, if I missed anything, make sure you let me know. Um I think the first thing is when you look at grade three or level three foundations, it is very much a repeat of level two. And when I think
about that third grade, I found that it was a spiral and some of the skills I agree needed more explicit instruction. So, with foundations, I think more needs to be added. I think that it's a program that on average kids on level will get, but I think the
strugglers, the gap widens more. Um so, I 100% agree with you when it comes there. I think that's why we don't only do foundations, it's where we're also pulling small groups. I also agree with you when you shared like when 50% of the class isn't getting it, yes, that's a that's a tier one issue. That means that
yes, the entire class is going to need remediation. So, looking at where students are placed for next year, knowing where those students are is going to be important to collaborate with that grade four teacher to be like, "Okay, here are the students that were flagged last year. Here are the skills that they're missing." Um also looking at all of the third
grade skills and making the fourth grade teachers aware of those skills, too. Um and having conversations with the third grade teachers of like, "Hey, okay, we're also administering foundations tests." I was able to look at what are they struggling in foundation? Is it mirroring what they're struggling in
DIBELS? And I do think it's because foundations moves very quickly. Level two of foundations has 17 units. It's a really it's a really hard year for like a program to get through in a full year. Like I taught level two foundations and level three, also, and I
think that you're like trucking along as quick as you can, and if you're not pausing and monitoring, you're just like you're going. So, I think looking at those skills at the end of the year and knowing what they are and having our third grade teachers be aware of that,
there has to be additional supplemental resources. Foundations alone is not doing the job. >> I think you're also what she's working with the three, four, five teachers now is shifting to magnetic literacy, building in more components, the morphology piece for third and fourth
grade is something that a lot of districts don't do. We know we need to bring that in. So, I agree with both of you on the Foundations piece and what I like about what Miss Compitello is working on with the teachers is even
in third grade, shifting from that full class, whole group Foundations to the small groups based on individual needs and based on student needs. So, a small group of six kiddos could because if you look at how large the classes are in North Boulevard, they've got two two sections. A small group might be six
kids and they're working on those things, those intensive needs, but she's What's nice about having all this data now is that you can actually identify where these gaps are and then find those pieces like the Hegarty, like the UFLI and bring that in to build that
support without ripping up or pulling out Foundations, which the teachers have spent a ton of years already working on. Not that it's not that you shouldn't change a program if it's not working, but without taking out something that they're used to,
building in these the professional development she's giving them directly in the classroom as well, but putting in these supports like Hegarty, like UFLI, giving the MLSPs and the reading specialists additional support and training. Um, and then seeing how that data works
and pulling away things as we need to because we're putting in something better. I think truthfully one of the things that I see as an issue that I saw in my last district, too, and so I think I can make that connection cuz they also were using foundations is that we have been
teaching it very isolated, right? So, we teach reading, we teach phonics, and we teach writing. And that is the struggle that I see where it needs to be integrated. So, the approach of moving 3 through 5 to magnetic literacy is that it's a comprehensive program. It's all intertwined. So, I'm reading and then
I'm writing about reading, and I'm using I'm learning new vocabulary, and I'm you know, finding that definition as I'm reading. So, it's not very isolated. So, when you think about phonics, they need to know those patterns so that they could spell, right? So, they if they're struggling with their reading, they're
going to struggle with their spelling, and so on. So, you need to teach them together in unison because if you teach them separately, it doesn't roll over. It doesn't just transfer. So, how can we use opportunities to transfer that as well? But, when it comes to like fidelity of the program, I'm glad you mentioned that because that was a big piece for the principals and I this year
going into walkthroughs. We were focused on phonics. That was our thing. When we went through walkthroughs, it was are people teaching foundations when they teach foundations? Do they have their book out? Do they have their posters up? What exactly does that look like? Cuz similar to you, I was a Wilson trainer. I had to go through a very intensive
program. And so, I know where's your bell team poster? Like, you know, something's missing. And so, I think the teachers were aware of like, here's what we're looking for. I gave them, here's my look fors. Here's what I'm coming to see when I'm in your classroom, and highlighting that, too, because it's not a gotcha.
It's a okay, do you need something that you don't have? Let me help you. Or do you not know how to do a particular activity? Let me show you how to do it. Did I answer every Okay. >> Yes, I I just I mean, how are we targeting the I mean, that's a lot of small group. That's a lot of kids in a
in small groups to target 47% of kids at one school. And what it looked like and when I'm looking at the data, poverty did really support the program, which is amazing for K and K and 1, but nothing to support 2 and 3, which it
that's I have concerns about the program. I'm just going to I I've voiced these before. >> Yep. >> Um but 53% I mean that's that's a lot of I'm in classrooms. I get it. But that's a lot of small group interventions that are going to be needed to get those kids
on grade level. >> So so that grade two is only has 38 students. So if we're talking about right like about half of that. So maybe 18 or 19 and if they're split into two rooms it might be nine nine kids in a room if that many which is a lot granted. But we also are looking at how
do our MLSPs pull and do that triple dipping as well with the classroom teacher. So just to kind of put a little bit I know when those percentage numbers when we have smaller classrooms can seem really large. Um they are and we want to make sure every student is getting
there. We also want to make sure the teachers have the support in the MLSPs. Um but I just wanted to kind of put that a little bit in perspective with the numbers. >> Any other questions? >> Um I didn't know if you were finished Miss Bellardino. You finished? >> I'm all done. Yeah. >> Okay. I did I did have a couple. Well
you've been up there a while so that's right. Um I I did have a couple of thoughts. Um first of all thank you for always being so thorough. Um I have to disagree a little bit uh with um Vice President Esposito. I um I talk to Vincenzo every day about about
his classroom. Uh Vincenzo went into kindergarten and he couldn't read at all. Literally nothing. Uh Vincenzo reads every day now. Um the Foundations in conjunction with Dibbles is working wonderfully for my son. Um the whole background of Foundations and like the
science of reading I can't say that I really understood it. Um but he comes home and talks to me every day. He comes home with literally a little book every single day and reads it to me. He's so excited. Um I really agree with the repetition and the fluency piece of it. It's definitely supporting his learning. Um so
uh my kid is one of the success stories up there in the kindergarten garden class. So, um I I really um support it and I it was really nice to see like the other side of it. Um, I also want to say that I feel like it's very refreshing for you to come up here and present us with the problems you've already
identified. Like so humbling um and and amazing that you guys are really looking at data every single day as I know you are because Dr. Portis is obsessed with data. So, um I also uh really am enjoying hearing about the articulation that's going to be happening with the pass off of the data. So, thank you for
filling us in on that. That's it's really really nice. Um, and you know, overall uh I know you're I know you're really trying and you're looking at all the options. So, uh definitely trust you to to take this forward. So, thank you for being so comprehensive.
>> Thank you. >> All right. Thank you very much. We got one more, right? >> Here's some more data. >> [laughter] >> Oh my god. All right. I Is it Is this thing on? I don't even know if it's on anymore. Yeah, this is going to be Can people hear me? I don't know. Is it
If this is still on or not? There we go. All right. All right. Yes, this will be very quick. As Dr. Portis said, this is to some extent an exercise in compliance, but it is a good rosy picture because um the data is quite good every 6 months. If you don't recall the last riveting presentation I gave on our SSDS data, um
we by law have to report to you our numbers on all of these wonderful topics. I won't read them to you. They're pretty self-explanatory. Um substance abuse uh does not include tobacco. That's the one piece I just like to remind people of. So,
Trenton loves to use uh different dates for things, and so just to be clear, we are not talking about the most recent months of school. These are the This is the first half of the school year that just ended. All right. So, across the board, I hate I always
hate putting these things out in the universe uh for fear that it's not going to be the same when I come back up here the next time. These are excellent numbers. We have to remember that this is These are five buildings. Uh we're we're still in a post-COVID sort of era, but when I look at the data overall, I I tend to believe
we're we're still in a very good place. Here it is by building. Again, lot of zeros, which is what we like to see. And don't worry, I will break it down by building, so. Um trainings and programs, of course, I left my notes uh that I had with me all night on the chair next to me, but uh
when we look at things like training, these are trainings that uh involve uh myself, ABSs, other administrators, um counselors in the buildings when they'd go to turn key to other people. Programs are things like Red Ribbon Week, uh spirit weeks, the uh Pillar of Character
lessons, Caring Schools Communities, things like that. Now, there is no hard and fast definition of what counts as a training versus a program where you can double dip, etc. The laws or the the the policy is not our policy, the state policy is very vague on this. So, I
don't want people to be alarmed at a large disparity of numbers. I know that came up in the last presentation. Um I meet with the ABSs quarterly, four times a year, if not talk to them weekly individually. Um we have since calibrated for the second half of this
school year what we as a district count as a training versus a program. So, again, this is older data, beginning of the school year. Going forward, we have now We had a big long meeting about what is a training versus a program, so I think you'll see some greater parity in
the numbers going forward. So, again, this is just the period one. We're all about our longitudinal data. My I think my big contribution to this position has been going from a bar graph to a line graph. That's the one thing I remember Miss Van Sickle from third grade
math is a line graph is over time, right? So, obviously we see that immediate post-COVID jump and where versus where we are now. Specifically with acts of violence, again, just, you know, word of caution
with the shape of the graph. When we look at the total numbers there, we're still talking very low numbers. I know the propensity is to look right at the end there with that jump, but that jump is really a total of four for a district of well over a thousand kids. This is a fun-shaped graph.
>> [laughter] >> When we look at these low numbers, I shouldn't laugh. Again, I don't want to put things out in the universe and then have it come back to bite me, but again, when you're reporting zero for for six months, it's it's always a good thing. And again, substance abuse, you know,
and and especially here at the high school, I credit Miss Baslone as just really I think Mr. Hasler would echo me on this is really just been instrumental as well as the counselors at PV, just really doing a great job with the preventative piece of this.
This is always a wonderful, obviously, thing to see. Thank God we see that. Yes, Mr. Trice. Yes, that includes vaping. Yes. Yep. And just a reminder, we have vape detectors in this building and at PV. So, these are the confirmed HIBs that
we've gotten. They this does not include alleged. Don't worry, there's a separate graph for that. Again, I really if anything credit here to the ABS's it is this. We've really they've really honed in on educating kids about what is social
conflict versus what is bullying. We're also looking into possibility of maybe doing some parent academies on this if for no other reason than just to help parents have the the kind of correct vocabulary to talk to their kids about what they're bringing home from school. Now, as I promised, here's the alleged.
Um These are very unpredictable. You know, I've done a ton of investigations. I've overseen a ton of investigations, but but you never know what's going to be alleged and not alleged. So anybody can anybody can make an allegation. They can fill out the the
form anonymously. Doesn't have to be a parent, can be a student, can be a staff member, administrator. We've had almost every stakeholder do an allegation and and again, that's not that's not accusatory. It's something that we try to do to do our due
diligence. Just so that we know we're going through the correct process. Longitudinal data on all removals. And seclusion restraints. Again, just mind the the Y axis if you will. Those are graph looks big, but it's single digit
numbers. And my last thing is I just want to thank publicly the the ABS's and and the building principals and and people like Ms. Busher here at the high school. It does take a village as we know. So, happy to answer any questions. Always like to end the presentations
with a really riveting uh riveting one, but happy to answer questions. >> You should make the Y axis like 10, you know, just make it look a little >> I was thinking about how do I >> relative, you know. >> Yes. So. All right. Thank you all very much. >> Thank you.
>> Can I just say one more thing? Just to put a pin in the Dibbles one. I also wanted to thank the principals and the teachers who worked really hard this year on growing through this process with the universal screener.
It's always a It's a challenge when you take on something new like that and just everybody really dove in and I think our three elementary principals do an amazing with working with their staff with data, which is not in every district. So, I just want to give them kudos, too. >> Ms. Van Sickle, I was just thinking
um I this this kind of popped into my head when Ms. Bellagio and I was talking, but I I failed to execute on stating it out loud, but I don't know nearly as much about literacy curriculum as Mrs. Esposito. So, that's her expertise and she mentioned foundations and the lack
of PD. So, I don't know anything about that, but what I can say is if you're looking at the the um the data across the schools, there's certainly, you know, a little bit of discrepancy there. I mean, my kid was fortunate enough to have Marjorie Ann
Ochner, who's a phenomenal human, and he just made leaps and bounds. So, I I would hope that if there is a lack of PD, you guys are looking at that vertical articulation and maybe getting the teachers kindergarten teachers to, you know, maybe pop into each other's classrooms for an hour cuz obviously
there is some good things happening and if there isn't much support from foundations, maybe they can get support from each other. >> And that is happening. We have teachers visiting each other. We have teachers supporting each other and the ones who are like really comfortable with it supporting ones who are like, "How do I
do this? Can we, you know, calibrate this again?" So, yes, very much. >> Yeah, I had a a couple notes I just want to touch um before I send you guys away Um, thank you again. This was uh very well done. I I really appreciate the energy that you put forward into this,
which is very much the style side. Um, I know not many administrators are volunteering to present on the first Monday of the summer, so thank you for that. But even more important than the energy really is the preparation and substance here. Um, cuz style is one thing, it's
all you know, but if it's all glitz, it matters for nothing. Here we see a tremendous amount of substance and to the point of what um, Zakee was asking about and and I made a note here while um, Mrs. Campitello was speaking about the
data is being used as a starting point. It's a conversation starter. And to have teachers bring that to the table is so important as well because as you as you said, they own it. And it's hard as a teacher identify, well, what is the data I should be focusing on? And that's a mind mindset shift that we're really
undertaking and I'm very excited about it. But to look at you know, what's the story it's telling us? Um, what are the problems that we can then look to address. And so it's very solutions oriented, but it's no use looking for solutions if you don't know what what problem is you're trying to
solve. So, I was really excited about that. Um, you mentioned something too about the kids being aware of their own data, which is hugely important. A lot of times conversations exist above them with family members, with with teachers, with administrators. But getting the kids involved uh creates a much greater
level of ownership. So, I was excited there. And then just to get back to the presentation at the start of the portrait of a graduate, which was literally an hour ago. But um, I I have a goal that I've talked a few of you about that I really want our district to be that exemplar that
people can point to and say, I I want I want to follow their practice. And I don't care what it is. If it's universal screeners, if it's portrait of a graduate, if it's how we address him, whatever. I want to be that consistently strong and have that keen attention to
detail and I see it a lot in this portrait of a graduate. And what I'm really proud of is I've I've done very little to help you with this. This has been something that's been sustained by the team and really just they present me with their ideas and I nod my head and say that sounds great
cuz it does. And I really like the idea too from what Cara was talking about to look at how are we going to know if it's working and to to have those check-in points so that we can have that recursive exercise of looking at what we've established and how it's being implemented. Really excited about the
the ideas too for how we can present that 250th video. It is beautiful and it is moving and I love the idea too of using it as a trailer which despite the fact the word is trailer is shown at the start of a movie used to be shown at the end. But but what a great thing for the PV movie
night. Put that out there for everyone to see and and this this is this is our community and these are our kids and our staff members and to me that's just absolutely fantastic. And then no no really great summary for the SSDS but it's good to see that the numbers
that the numbers are there and something that I know um that um Mr. Sabriaski was excited about too was he felt like the new schedule that they ran um last year but also for this year has allowed for his anti-bullying specialist to be able to get into classrooms with greater
frequency and also use that panther period block. So we're starting to see that we're creating schedules that accommodate addressing student needs as well as program needs. So a lot of great things there. I really appreciate the work you guys put in. Again, the preparation and the presentation were both sensational and
a lot of things to be impressed with here. So thank you and um no one will take offense if you bolt right now. Enjoy the rest of your night. I'll see you tomorrow. >> Thank you. >> Yeah, that concludes my report. >> All right, Mr. Gibbs, do you have a report? >> Yes.
Excuse me. On tonight's board agenda there is the approval for the business administrator to acquire the health insurance experience rating from the state in an effort to get quotes from insurance carriers outside of the state's program at a cost of $2,000. It is my understanding that there are
two insurance carriers, Cigna and Aetna, that are interested in possibly providing health insurance based on the experience rating we currently have, but they need updated ratings before they will give us give the school district premium numbers. If the district is able to eliminate the use of the state's program, this may
save the school district in future premiums based on the school's independent experience rating rather than the collective rating set by the state. As you're aware, the school district put out an RFP for health insurance back in September and was denied. In your board
packet is a copy of the report from Brown & Brown, the school district's health insurance advisor, with copies of the denial letters from the health insurance carriers. In an effort to reduce health insurance premium, I'm currently working with the Fairview Insurance Agency on possibly
moving from the state's health plan to a private plan. If the board and the union are in acceptance of the new plan, which will have the same coverage or better, as as well as the numbers work for the district, the new plan would go into effect January 1st, 2027.
An update to the new board office. It is anticipated the closing on the data 494 Newark Pompton Turnpike will be Wednesday, June 24th, 2026. The RFP for an architect was advertised on June 19th. The opening of the
proposals is scheduled for July 28th, and according with state guidelines, the committee will have 20 days to review the proposals and grade them in order to make a final decision at the August 17th board meeting. With respect to the RFP for the school attorney, to date we have received two
responses and sent out two RFPs to the school potential architects. I will need from the board if you would like to interview at to find out if you would like to interview at 6:00 p.m. the night of the board meeting or choose a different date in interviewing the candidates for school attorney and
architect. I will also be sending out evaluations that the board can use as guidelines for the interview process and scoring. On the board tonight's board agenda is a [clears throat] short-term one-month contract for the school attorney as as the current contract will be up as of
June 30th, 2026. There is also a short-term 6-month contract starting July 1st and and to December 31st, 2026 for the school's architect in order to complete the new board office as well as complete the SDA grant. It is not recommended that we start the
use of a new architectural firm in September given the fact that the school district has spent a lot of money on the new board office and SDA grant. Are there any questions? >> With regards to the uh healthcare, the other
firm you're going to get a quote from that might go into effect January, when do you think that would be received where we'd be able to look at and see if it makes sense? Is there a timetable for that? >> Well, as soon as I get them the $2,000, obviously it's he said it takes about 6 weeks. So, we're not going to see something probably till September, I'm
going to say. Yeah. Any other questions? >> Nope. >> All right, thank you. >> Okay, that brings us to approval of the minutes. Mr. Gittens, would you please move the minutes? >> Yeah, I'd like to make a motion to approve the minutes from the May 26th meeting and the June 8th meeting.
>> Second. >> Question and discussion. Mr. Gibbs, please call the roll. >> Mr. Blumert, absent. Mr. Seresci? >> Yes. >> Mr. Gittens? >> Uh yes, but I'd like to abstain to the June 8th minutes and yes to May 26th. >> Ms. Ikaeo?
>> Yes. >> Mr. McSweeney? Mr. Mehalek's absent. Ms. Chenton? >> Yes. >> And Ms. Esposito? >> Yes. >> And Mr. Senak? >> Yes. >> Motion carries. All right, that brings us to public comment. Members may speak on any agenda item if there was anybody
here, but there is not, so we're going to move off of that and go into approval of our action items. And first up is PMC and I'm going to ask Mr. Seresci to please move the items under PMC. >> I would like to move PMC 231-26 through PMC 277-26.
>> Second. >> Question or discussion? Mr. Gibbs, please call the roll. Mr. Blumert's absent. Mr. Seresci? >> Yes. >> Mr. Gittens? >> Yes. >> Ms. Ikaeo? >> Yes. >> Mr. McSweeney? Mr. Mehalek is absent. Ms. Chenton? >> Yes.
>> Ms. Esposito? >> Yes. >> And Mr. Senak? >> Yes. >> Motion carries. Next up is CIS. Ms. Esposito, would you please move the items under CIS? >> I'd like to move CIS 105-26
through CIS 111-26. >> Second. >> Question or discussion? Mr. Gibbs, please call the roll. Mr. Blumert's absent. Mr. Seresci? >> Yes. >> Mr. Gittens? Ms. Ikaeo? >> Yes. >> Mr. McSweeney? >> Yes.
>> Mr. Mehalek's absent. Ms. Chenton? >> Yes. >> Ms. Esposito? >> Yes. >> And Mr. Senak? >> Yes. >> Motion carries. Next up is FFA. Uh Ms. Ikaeo, would you please move the items under FFA? >> Yes, I would like to move FFA 210-26
through FFA 250-26. >> Second. >> Questions or discussion? Mr. Gibbs, please call the roll. Mr. Blumert is absent. Mr. Seresci? >> Yes. >> Mr. Gittens? >> Yes. >> Ms. Iacono? >> Yes. >> Mr. McSweeney? >> Yes.
>> Mr. Mahalick is absent. Mrs. Shatten? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Esposito? >> Yes. >> And Mr. Zanic? >> Yes. >> Motion carries. >> I would like to just take a moment to thank the Beacon Regional Chamber of Commerce and American Legion Post 450 for their donations towards the pre-K inclusive playground. James and Ann
Marie Finnan for their instrument donation and the local Stop and Shop for their senior breakfast donation. >> All right, thank you, Ms. Iacono. Moving on, next is policy. Mr. McSweeney, would you please move the item under policy? >> Yes, I'd like to move policy of P-14-26.
>> Second. >> Questions or discussion? Mr. Gibbs, please call the roll. Mr. Blumert is absent. Mr. Seresci? >> Yes. >> Mr. Gittens? >> Yes. >> Ms. Iacono? >> Yes. >> Mr. McSweeney? >> Yes. >> Mr. Mahalick is absent. Mrs. Shatten? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Esposito?
>> Yes. >> And Mr. Zanic? >> Yes. >> Motion carries. >> Okay, uh next up is other. Ms. Shatten, would you please move the item under other? >> Yeah, I'd like to move uh other O-07-26. >> Second. >> I'm going to give it to Mr. Gittens.
Questions or discussion? Please call the roll. Mr. Blumert is absent. Mr. Seresci? >> Yeah. >> Mr. Gittens? >> Yes. >> Ms. Iacono? >> Yes. >> Mr. McSweeney? >> Abstain. >> Mr. Mahalick is absent. Mrs. Shatten? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Esposito? >> Yes. >> And Mr. Zanic? >> Yes.
>> Motion carries. >> Okay, next up is the second opportunity for public comment and it's still the same situation, so we're going to move on to unfinished business. Any board member have any unfinished business? Would any board member like to bring up any new business? >> Um I'll go. I I just want to echo I
won't get into details, but I just want to echo the sentiments that I attended graduation and it was absolutely beautiful. Um we were so lucky with the weather and everything. So um thank you guys for all your hard work and planning. It was a really nice uh jewel on the community um to end the year. Um I also wanted to give a brief
update on the shared services um committee. Uh I Mr. Gordon was nice enough to set up um and facilitate uh the use of the high school for both company one and company two uh fire departments in town. Uh they
did meet here last Monday, the 15th uh for their drill. We had quite a few members here. I think it was like 30 firefighters here. Um and Mr. Anderson uh walked them around the entire campus. Uh they talked about strategy, points of entry. He showed them all the gas shut-offs. Um they did roof
walk-throughs for solar shut-offs. Uh just like point of operations, the power from the street to the main breaker. Um all of the things our first responders would really need and love to know uh if they were responding to a real emergency here. So it was a great night. Really appreciate Gordon um setting that up for
us and Mr. Anderson, of course. Um their plan is to do one or two schools every summer so that you they can keep us like on a three-year rotation and and keep fresh eyes. I mean, we're so fortunate that we have a really prominent junior program in town. I think we have like eight juniors that are here in the high school that uh serve on one of the fire
departments. So we always have fresh eyes coming through the fire department. So um it's really good for them to have boots on the ground here. So I wanted to thank uh Mr. Gibbs for setting that up and appreciate his time. >> Thank you. Anybody else? Any board member like to make an
announcement? Okay. With that uh we do have reason to go into executive session. We will discuss the evaluation of the superintendent. No action will be taken. We will adjourn from there. And we also have to discuss student matters, and we still won't take any action, and we're going to adjourn from there. Our next meeting is going to be July
20th here at the high school. It's going to be workshop meeting. Is there a motion to go into executive session? >> Motion. Second. >> All in favor? Any opposed? Good night, everyone. Everybody have a great and safe