to open. Public move. I have a second. All in favor? I notice. This regular meeting of the Pitman Board of Education was advertised in the South Jersey Ties posted up for a hall on a copy thereof delivered to all PIN schools to be posted and posted on the district's website. Further notice
was posted and file as required required by law seeing that the board would be to meet in close session at 6 pm in the Pitman High School Media Center. The president shall entertain any objections with supporting reasons to the content of this meeting on the grounds that it violates the open public meeting act. See none. Good evening and welcome to tonight's board of education meeting.
Please join me in a moment of silence. Thank you. Please join me in a salute the flag. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and
justice for all. Mr. Miles, will you please call roll? Mrs. Bolton here. Mrs. Farrell here. Mr. Gman, present. Mrs. Mrs. Higgby Iono here. Mrs. Miller here. Mrs. Papalardo here. Mrs. Pope here. We have a quorum
70. Okay. Could bring us this evening's presentations. Um I will turn it over to Mrs. Stewart. Are you We can do it now. I was thinking we'd do it after the committee meetings. Okay. So, no presentations. No presentations. Okay. So, good. All right. It's going to bring
us to our first public comment. The Pivot Public School Board recognizes the value of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to express themselves on school matters of community interest. This is the first of two public comments we will have tonight. The first public hearing is on agenda items only. This is public comment and not a dialogue between the
board and the public. You will have three minutes to speak and is your opportunity to comment or ask questions. In accordance with board policy number 0167, we ask that you state your name, municipality of residence, and group affiliation if applicable. Be recognized to speak. Please stand at the podium located to my left and speak clearly into the microphone.
Okay, seeing no one, that will take us to correspondence. Mr. Riley, any correspondence? We have no correspondence. All right, I will now move to accept a motion for the minutes of the Pitman Board of Education as held on the dates listed below are approved as printed and reading dispensed with. May I have a
second? Second. Pavo. All in favor? I. Any objections? Any abstensions? Okay, seeing none, it's going to take us to the presence report. I'm going to turn it over to Mrs. Bolton. Um she was our delegate assembly representative. All right. On May 10th
um of this year, I attended the NJSDA delegate assembly at Mercer County Community College. The meeting lasted about three hours. Leadership gave some opening comments on the improvements they were making on the website. They highlighted some events hosted such as
the eighth grade dialect which we hosted last year. Um and then they went over the rules for voting and the resolutions. There were three resolutions um this year. The first one was sponsored by Woodbury
uh school district and this resolution would change the NJSBA policy to include esports as a varsity awarded sport and intercolastic competition. Uh that resolution passed
90% to 10%. Resolution two uh was sponsored by Franklin Township in Warren County and the resolution would change the requirements needed to be a school nurse to acknowledge the shortages of the position across the state. That
resolution passed 51% to 49%. And then resolution three was North Jersey school. How do you say that? Kittatini. Kittini. Kittin Kittatin, right? Um
there's North Jersey schools. It's like another state up there, right? The resolution would allow students a limited number of excused absences to attend events associated with trades and future employment besides the military and colleges that are already approved.
That one also passed 96 to 4%. Uh the minute the meeting closed shortly after voting. That's it. Thank you. We have a pretty short president's report. I want to thank Mrs. Higgyiono. She has um made an effort this year to
attend all the extra and co-curricular events at our school. So, it's been really nice to have her kind of report back for all of us that aren't able to attend and um let us know kind of what's going on. She's the plays, the concerts, all the sports events. She's kind of
done it all. She would you would if they allow. I think our superintendent could get the ninthole. We only have people at the regular matches. I didn't I didn't get either
winter track. Next year. Next year. on her truck. Yeah, that's my sister's fault. No, no, no. All right. So, at the we had the Glosser and Cammy County School Board Association meeting. Uh, Mrs. Pope was recognized for her new boardmanship
boardmanship certification. Mr. Gman and Miss Papalardo were recognized as certified board members. I was recognized as the master board member. We also had our annual or I'm sorry, our election that we hold every two years for the Gloucester County School Board Association. Um and so Mrs. Higgby Iona
was in a hotly contested race. She's our new VP of legislative um relations for uh Gloucester County and I'm our new Glouester County president. So our hope is to kind of take an opportunity and look at some of the meeting format and educate ourselves that we met with the
vice president who was elected. We'll both be we'll all be sworn in um over the summer. Our term starts July one and have some planning meetings so that we can talk about the format for the Boston and Camden County uh meetings. So my next hope is to reach out to the Camden
County representatives and sit down with them so we can kind of all be on the same page in advance. Um and then I also wanted to thank Mrs. Papalardo. She organized our teacher appreciation cupcakes for the board. So we really appreciate Mrs. Pabardo is like the superstar of always making sure that we
have something to thank all of our staff and does all of the work and carries all the cakes and does it all. So, we really appreciate that she does that for the board of education members. And I'm going to go ahead and turn it over to Dr. Preston. Yes. Thanks, Mrs. Miller. Um, yeah, Pitman well represented.
Congratulations to you guys on your on your appointments there. That's uh impressive. I know that's the the talk of the town is that Pitman is well represented throughout the county. Um happy to report we had one rep uh one reported Hib one confirmed HI uh for the
month. Um this is statutory as you see on the superintendent report there the HIP self- assessment grades for 2324. To my right is Mr. Calabiano. Um he is our HIP coordinator for the district. So he he's done a really good job this year. This is from the 2324 report self-scored
report from the schools. you can see some areas of strength obviously um you know some robust programs, character programs, some areas to build on um and some things that you've already taken action on. I I want to report uh obviously we've had Mr. Long come in and speak to our HIP staff. I appreciate you
doing that. You're welcome. It's a it's a tricky law, the Hib law. A lot of nuance to it, timelines, all that. And he Mr. Long does a really good job distilling that, making it black and white. And um I thought it was great. There was really good feedback from that from our our hood specialists at each of
the buildings. Um, just last month, I think you recall, we brought in a a character firm called Citrus. Uh, uh, they actually have some Pitman ties. They a lot of them live in Pitman. They work they're a Philadelphia based firm, but they uh Citrus stands for uh
character, integrity. Um, I'm drawing a blank on the acronym, but the equals results and success. Um and and the idea is that we you really build a strong character program. They're they're tightly affiliated with National Schools of Character uh character.org. And so that's that's a
push we're doing as well. Um certainly character app lessons that are happening at PEES are all part of this kind of HIP preventative HIPS. We we want to get to net zero and um I think that the group and the teachers are doing a great job of that. So that's my report for the HIP self- assessment grades for 23 24. I do
want to mention um two two of our top five sitting here. I was uh uh able to go and and and Mrs. Miller also attended um our top five. We honored this superintendent group in the county honored the top five of each school district. Um Miss Misola and Miss Yordy
were were part of that along with Miss Armenino. Miss other Megan Misola. Um and um it was great to see you know everybody come out there. Matty Peak. Yes. Yes. Thank you very much. Yeah, Matty Peak was there as well. All the families came. It was it was a really nice evening. You should probably saw
the the social media post up recently as well. Um, in a little bit I'm going to have Miss Stewart introduce our new uh leadership at uh our new leadership team that she's assembling at the high school. Uh, Miss Christina Scaines and uh, Miss Caitlyn Hess. I'll let her read their bios and and she she said, "Can I
can I do I said, "Yeah, you can steal my thunder for the night." So, but really it's it really they emerged out of an impressive uh, group. 81 applicants total for those two positions combined. There was some overlap. um we're really seeing a an up uptick in that. We have a
for for in for instance at the pees fourth grade position there's a fourth grade opening we have 174 applicants at this time. Um and so really impressive to see a lot of people really wanting to come to Pitman. So we're really happy about that and that's really a testament to you know certainly your work as a
board and and changing the narratives um you know people on the referendum committee and um you know Pitman's here to stay and so really kind of getting that message out. So really appreciate just the the community, the civic support here is is tremendous. So thank you so much. And that concludes my report. Thank you. That's going to bring
us to our super let's get it. I'll get it here. Student representative report. Um Pivot Elementary School and Memorial School do not have a report for this evening, but we'll for the junior high school, the students got to attend their spring luau dance at
the beginning of May. Everyone had a great time dancing, playing games, and participating in the limbo contest. Juniors and seniors were given the opportunity to attend prom last week. The event started off with Prominade where everyone was given the opportunity to showcase their outfits for the big night. Students then headed over to
Pinland's golf club to enjoy good food, dance, and enjoy time with their classmates. The class of 2025 is currently prepping for the end of their senior year. There are many events coming up such as the senior awards banquet, senior dinner, the all sports banquet, cap decorating, and graduation as the hundth class from Pitman. So many
exciting events to include their high school experiences. Thank you. All right, that's going to take us to finance and facilities. I'll turn it over to our committee chairman, Mr. Gman. Quite ready for that. Fin Thank you. Finance and Facilities
Committee met via teams meeting on Wednesday 5:14 at 3:30 p.m. and lasted 1 hour. We adjourned at 4:30 p.m. And attendance along with myself were April Miller, Rebecca Higgiono, Dr. Preston, and Rob Miles. Topics discussed included
the approval of a $2,000 donation from Oceans First for the replacement of the scoreboard at the soccer field at Alcion Park, a joint replacement effort between the school district and the Barrow, splitting the cost 50/50. We thank Oceans First for their generosity in this most important endeavor. Rob Miles
is working with the burrow CFO to obtain a schedule of when tax payments will be made to the district and we anticipate that schedule to be ironed out by July 1st of this year. Also discussed were the bids or loan bid for the referendum project at the track and field and the drainage
situation. Boy, I typed those in there in front of the auditorium. The bid is slightly higher than anticipated, but this vendor is widely regarded as being a prominent provider for quality track and field layouts and renovations. We compared the overcost of the savings initiatives we've already seen from
other projects and we've agreed uh to the most cost responsible and necessary layout of the three versions of the bid that were proposed. We are still deciding. I don't know if Rob, do we get the answer back on the color? We did get an answer back. So, um, red, we can do
red or black. Red is slightly less expensive. Um, so we have the option. That's something that we can we can do. We'll have to let them Okay, we'll have to let them know in the next within the next probably two months. Black looks better to Yeah, let's we'll do it in discussion.
Go ahead. We are still deciding if the colors should be red or black for the track. Both are the two colors with the longest UV protection against sunfading. Rob will follow up if there's a cost adjustment in that area. Uh just so you know, Pitman orange and blue were also discussed and research turned us away
from those as they are known to fade faster than red or black surfaces will. The ring garden is under construction at Memorial School, a project that was 100% funded through donations and enhances our school's appearance as well as a learning point for the students at Memorial.
And we'll leave the last part off for next month. more to follow up on a Chromebook policy for next month. We'll table that for now. That concludes my report. And with that, I make a motion to move I do. So, you do one
through 24, right? Just put it in there. Motions 1 through 24 on the agenda and and a walk on motion item 25. Walk on item number 25 authorizing the submission of other
capital project documents to the New Jersey Department of Education for the security vestibial entrance at Pitman Elementary School. May I get a second or any discussion? Wait, let's get a second. May I have a second? Second, vote. Discussion. So, one of the we Mr.
Gman kind of summarized the conversation that we had about the red or black for the track. Our primary concern was durability and we just wanted to find out if there was a cost differential because I'm always trying to eek out every penny. Maybe we could have our new assistant principal of athlet athletics weigh in. She would. Oh, I love it.
Yeah. Let's not put anybody on the side at all. Right. She's I just want to know if it's like red red or like we have now pressure red's cheaper. It's black fades the least. They both work.
Those had the best UV protection. I want I like pit and orange. They said that was terrible on the side. It wasn't considerably cheaper because that was my primary concern. One was cheaper than the other. The black would look great the first six months. The
black looks Yeah, but black gets char. All right. Well, I I think you're right. We're not going to reach an agreement. And that's not what the motion says. We'll go ahead and take the vote. Thank you. And we will we'll wait for or we'll let some experts weigh in like the draft code. Sounds like a good summer project.
Yeah. All the above. All right. I apologize. M should be read. Please. Mrs. Bolton. Mrs. Farrell. Yes. Mr. Grossman. Yes. Mrs. Higgbyono. Yes. Mrs. Papalardo. Yes. Mrs. Pope. Yes. Mrs.
Miller. Yes. Motion carried. take us to curriculum instruction. I'll turn it over to our committee chairman, Mr. Okay. The curriculum curriculum and instruction committee met on May 14th, 2025 at 4:30 p.m. and the meeting lasted a little less than an hour. In
attendance were Dr. Preston, Mrs. Miller, Mrs. Pot, and myself. We discussed some of the items on the agenda tonight. It was a pretty slow month. Uh number seven was the school calendar. We just went over a few events uh that need to work with some of the
dates off and things like that. Number 17 is the approval of our new VA um who is here tonight. Um we also talked about insurance on the Chromebooks uh that we lend to students each year and the need
for families to purchase it. Uh so policy policy committee will have to get that um together so that we can get a policy in place for that as well. But we will cap it off per family um if people are concerned and have multiple kids like
myself. Um the council of churches met and asked about possibly starting a balorate service up again. It's a little late for this year um but we'll keep it in mind for the future and see if we can work something out with them as well.
And then last thing, due to conflicts in scheduling, we we will be moving the June and July uh board of ed meetings not on our normal meeting weeks. And that was it. So with that, I'll make a motion to approve items 2 through
24 as written. I have a second. Second. Okay. Any discussion? Okay. See, M. Please call the vote. Mrs. Bolton, yes. Mrs. Farrell, yes. Mr. Gman, yes. Mrs.
Higgby, Iono, yes. Mrs. Papalardo, yes. Mrs. Poe, yes. Mrs. Miller, yes. Motion carried. Thank you. Okay. Communication policy. I'll turn it over. Yes. Thank you. Yes, please. I will. Yes, please. Stewart, if you'd like. I
apologize. Thank you. at the podium. Yeah, podium's good. I love the podium. I do too. Um, I just want to take a minute and thank everyone for their support of these two positions and Mr. who will
never get the two full days he had to spend with me and back. Um, I think we have two great candidates. So, I'm going to introduce first I'll take Mrs. Gaines come on up. So, she'll be taking on the position of assistant principal for
grades seven through nine and academic services. So I'm gonna read it's gonna be awkward. So I'm read about you stand next to Christina SK is honored to be returning to Pitman public schools in the position of assistant principal for grades seven to nine and academic
services with over 15 years of experience. She brings a deep commitment to student success, equity, and academic excellence to Pitman Junior Senior High School. After serving as a dedicated school counselor in Pitman for nine years, she became the director of student personnel
services for Paulsboro public schools. As a district level leader, she oversaw all standardized testing, including NJSLA, NJGPA, SATs, PSATs, AP testing, ACUPPLACER. Mrs. Scain spearheaded
several key initiatives aimed at enhancing school safety, inclusion, access, and student opportunities. Most notable are the successful restructures of the PSboro Junior Senior High's master schedule, crisis and safety management, assessment procedures, as
well as graduation tracking. Mrs. Gaines has delivered professional development on best practices for deescalation in addition to academic, behavioral, and social emotional interventions. Not only did her efforts improve academic engagement, it bolstered staff confidence, consistency, and school
culture. Mrs. Skains holds master's degrees in both school counseling and school leadership. Her leadership philosophy centers on eliminating barriers to access and working collaborative collaboratively with staff, students, and families to create meaningful educational opportunities.
She's excited to bring her passion, expertise, and new experience back to Pitman Junior Senior High School and looks forward to fostering previous relationships while also cultivating new ones. Thank you. All
right, next we have Caitlyn Hess. She will be our assistant principal for grades 10 through 12 and our athletic director. Caitlyn brings 14 years of experience as a teacher of biological sciences at Kingsway Regional High
School, where she taught a diverse array of courses and levels. She introduced forensics as an elective in the district and has delivered professional development on various topics including pedagogical practices, equity, curriculum development, and educational technology. As the high school science
department chair, she leads a team of nearly 30 teachers and has mentored numerous new educators throughout her tenure. Caitlyn has actively participated in several committees, including district's data team and the high the high school safety and climate team. Her contributions have been
recognized with the prestigious Dragon Award at the high school and the distinguished service award from the district. In addition to teaching, department chair, and committee roles, Caitlyn has coached throughout her tenure at Kingsway. She is currently serving as the head coach for girls cross country, boys and girls winter
track and field, and girls spring track and field. Her teams have achieved success at the state, regional, and national levels. Most notably, her girls cross country team was the first in South Jersey history to qualify for the Nike nationals in Portland, Oregon. An
honor awarded to only 20 high school teams nationwide every year. They won five consecutive South Jersey Group Four Championships and held the overall South Jersey record for team average at the championship course for several years. Kaylin has coached 11 state championship
teams during her time at Kingsway, most recently as head coach for boys winner track and field. During that season, her boys sprint medley relay won the national championship. She has been recognized as a South Jersey track coaches association coach of the year as
well as a three-time South Jersey Times coach of the year. Caitlyn is honored at the opportunity to use her years of experience in education and athletics to serve our Pitman community. She is committed to making a positive impact in the lives of students and helping them achieve their goals both inside the
classroom and on the field. Thank you. And um take some pictures and stuff to the website. So probably about a 5 minute recess. Black. No. started
call myself on the agenda just reoping our policies and bylaws the board First reading to 91. The purpose of the revisions are
just to clarify the guidelines for the operation of the various organizations that support our district programs. So with that I adopt it one and two
Mrs. Yes. Mrs. Farrell Mr. Mrs. Mrs. Yes. Mrs. Yes. Mrs. Miller. Yes. Motion carried. Please stand to go back into executive session
for a personel matter no action when we return. Um, so may I have a motion to enter into executive session, please? Any board members that are unable to
say you are sorry. Oh yeah yeah yeah. All right. Thank you so much. You're welcome. We'll come back shortly, a couple