Thank you. Good evening everyone. Welcome to this public meeting of the Princeton Board of Education. The board is an elected unpaid group of 10 citizens who set policy and make decisions on educational, financial, and personnel matters for the Princeton public schools on behalf of all residents. We are always pleased when
members of the community attend our meetings. The board and school district operate under applicable New Jersey laws and under regulations of the New Jersey State Board of Education. Each meeting includes an opportunity for those attending to comment on items on the public agenda or other matters of
interest to them. The board reserves the right to limit the time allotted to public participation. Law limits discussion of individual personnel and confidential matters. We hope our meetings provide a useful opportunity for communication between the board and the community. Thank you for attending.
>> As required under the open public meetings act NJSA 104-6, adequate notice was given for calling this meeting. It was authorized by the board of education and forward it to the municipal clerk, Princeton packet and the times on January 9th, 2025 and distributed to the other schools to the schools and others
on the standard distribution list. The board reserves the right to enter into executive session during all meetings of the board of education. Board policy 0168, recording devices, requires that we inform those attending this in-person meeting that the proceedings are being recorded. This meeting is being livereamed. A representative of the
sending district is authorized to vote on such matters that affect sending district students or affect the governance of the Princeton public schools as more specifically designated in NJSA18A38-8.1. Sending district votes pertaining to personnel actions refer to high school, central administrative, and district-wide staff only. Votes
otherwise are considered extensions. In the event that NJSA18A 38-8.1 is amended, the law shall take precedence over this bylaw. Roll call. >> Yes, please. >> Uh, Beth Baron. Adam Beerman >> here.
>> Mara Francheski >> here. >> Elellanar Hubard >> here. >> Katherine Lara >> here. >> Ariel >> here. >> Christopher Centurio >> here. >> Erica Snder >> here. >> Susan Caner >> here. >> Jeff McKendel >> here.
>> We have qu. >> Thank you, Mr. Harris. Uh, can I get a motion for the adoption of the minutes for January 27th, 2026? Ari second. Eleanor. >> All right. Adam Beerman, >> yes. >> Mara Francheski, >> yes.
>> Elellanar Hubard, >> yes. >> Katherine Lara, >> yes. >> Ariel, >> yes. >> Christopher Centarpio, >> yes. >> Erica Snider, >> yes. >> Susan Caner, >> yes. >> D Mckendle, >> yes. Motion carries. >> Thank you. All right. Good evening
everyone. Uh welcome to the meeting. Um we're continuing on with the district business even though there wasn't any school today, but we're going to have school tomorrow. >> We are. Uh as long as more snow does not a lot of snow doesn't fall from the sky.
Um but first I I wanted I don't control the weather. Um I wanted to thank our um facilities and maintenance staff for the um excellent job they did. Um they were working since yesterday. Um the Valley Road uh building was all ready for our meeting
today and so we just want to thank them for working through uh the copious amounts of snow that were all over the place. So thank you. Um the first thing on our agenda is recognition for um the outstanding achievements of the Princeton High School girls cheerleading
team. uh they were supposed to join us tonight. Um however, due to the weather uh they weren't able to make it. Um but we are very uh proud of um the students that are part of the high school girls cheerleading team. Dr. Lusa, myself, and
some other board members will be attending um Tiger Time to meet with them on Thursday this week um to share the following resolution with them. Um and I guess we'll bring the cake then too, right? Yes. Um so
we wanted to uh you know recognize them. Whereas the board of education of the Princeton public schools takes great pride in recognizing the exemplary achievements of its student athletes who demonstrate dedication, teamwork and excellence. And whereas the Princeton High School girls cheerleading team has
demonstrated an unparalle unparalleled level of commitment and athletic prowess throughout the 2526 season. And whereas through rigorous training and unwavering school spirit, the team had unprecedented unprecedented success and qualified for the universal universal
cheerleader cheerleaders national championship. Whereas the success of this team is a testament to the leadership of the coaches, Coach Callahan, Coach Foreman, and Coach Williams. And whereas these students have served as distinguished ambassadors for Princeton High School, embodying the values of sportsmanship, resilience, and
community pride. Now therefore, be it resolved that the Princeton Board of Education hereby formally recognizes and commends the Princeton High School cheer girls cheerleading team for their accomplishment, and be it further resolved that a copy of this resolution be presented to the team and permanently recorded in the official minutes of the
board as a tribute to their hard work and success. And if they had um been able to attend the meeting tonight, we would have them uh come up and we would shake their hands. So, uh please join me in a round of APPLAUSE FOR THEM. AND WE ALWAYS LOVE TO CELEBRATE the
achievements of our kids. So hopefully we'll have a lot more of that in the spring. I believe uh some of our teams are has done very well and continue to do very well. And that's all I have and I'll turn it over to you. >> Thank you, Miss Kendall. I have only one item under my uh report. I'll get to
that in one second. But I just do want to mention with the snow, um I know our uh a subset of our maintenance crew arrived here yesterday at 3:00 a.m. That's when they started. So they drove in the teeth of the storm to try to stay ahead a little bit of um the the
accumulations and then they worked throughout the day yesterday. Uh it may seem like we could have had school today perhaps, but we still had to get to our uh bus fleet, which is right outside those windows there. And if you think about removing 10 or 15 inches of snow
off of your car, um, a bus is very tall and long. And so they actually have to pull the buses out of their spots, then plow the area in between the buses where the snow is accumulated. Use a certain type of tool, and we don't have like 10 of those. They're not like the ones you
get at at Walmart to scrape off your car to get the snow cleared off the roof. Then you have to move the buses again and plow all the snow that has been removed from the buses. So, it's a lengthy process, time consuming. Uh, but the guys really worked hard yesterday um to to make sure we were in a good place
and then came back today for more. So, we're set to open up on time tomorrow and I just want to echo your sentiments. Uh, in terms of the snow days themselves, we have two days built in that are currently uh not student uh instruction days around Memorial Day
weekend. we're going to need to recapture those uh because of these snow days. If we have more inclement weather and we need to close school again, then we will have to make uh a more difficult modification, which will be one of three things. Either have school on a fra uh Saturday, excuse me, have school during
spring break, or uh extend the school year, which is problematic. So, uh, none of those are good options, but if we if we, um, need another day, and hopefully we won't, then we will have to have a discussion about, um, the least bad
path. And as a reminder for everyone, in New Jersey, there's no such thing as remote instruction. Uh, the only circumstance in which school districts can provide remote instruction if they want, is if they're closed for three consecutive days because of some emergency. and then on the fourth day
with permission from the county superintendent, can they uh potentially turn to remote instruction? So, that's not an option for us at the current time and we'll have to make the best decision we can uh depending on what happens, which is hopefully nothing. Um,
>> so can I ask you a question? So, if there is another uh day of inclement weather, which it seems it's every Monday now, um will you will we discuss it at a board meeting before you make because we're the t the days are far
enough in advance that there would be time for >> discussion before a choice is made. >> Yep. >> Okay. Yes. Thank you. >> That would be a adjustment to the board the the school calendar. So, yes. And with that, um, we'll turn it over to
Max Act, our principal at Riverside, and, uh, his faithful, uh, PTO compatriots. They've been working for the past several months on, um, zeroing in on on the center of the school, which is a courtyard, um, that had could use some updating probably.
and they've had a vision I think for uh converting that space into one that's a little bit more use user friendly and a little bit more uh learning oriented uh compared to what it is now. So uh our PTO has been extremely generous and I turn it over to them to talk about the
plans they've been up to. >> I'll kick us off. So, Max and Michelle Baxter. >> Hi. >> I'm Michelle Baxter and I'm here with Chef um Kaufman as well, our my co-president. I'm the incoming um co-president at the Riverside School. I've been a parent there for seven
years. Um we're very grateful now to have a consistent principal because for those of you who who have a history with Riverside, there was a very um well-loved principal for many many many years and a lot of really beautiful um programs have come out of of his tenure. And then we had many many years several
five years maybe we had maybe four or five different principles. So we're thrilled now Max has been in the role for maybe three years and so we're able to do big things and so um I am I have the honor of coming in as the incoming co-president and we're in a unique situation. Yeah.
>> Oh okay. this for next week. >> So the the the type is very small. Um but what I was starting to say is that we're in a unique position and that we're able to do what I would call a cornerstone project as the PTO. So, um the uh the the notion is that we're
going to take this existing space um which had a very um unique history as a turtle garden um many many years ago with this former leadership team and restore that space um to its former glory and use it in a way that uh the
teachers have shared that they would love to utilize this. As you can see, it is the center in the upper right hand corner there. It is the center of our camp of our our school campus. Um, and it it's uniquely accessed. So, I'm gonna have uh Max comment a bit about how we'll use it and that or how the
teachers would like to use it and then I'll talk a little bit about the future state and the the the program we're using with Ruters in partnership with Ruters to to do this. >> Thank you, Michelle. >> Yeah. >> Hi, I'm Max Octtop, principal of Riverside School. Good evening, everybody. U yeah, so as Michelle mentioned, if you walk into Riverside School, uh as soon as you walk in, if
you go in about maybe 10 steps on your left, you get to our gallery of lightwalk. On the left is our uh courtyard. Um those pictures on the left is what it looks like right now. It is not used at all. Um there's a lot of debris. There's a lot of it just isn't used by staff or students. So uh we were
talking the PTO teacher, staff, uh some students as well and said it's such a beautiful space in the middle of our building. Let's use this space. Let's do something with it. Let's do it, you know, for our kids and community. Uh and then we started talking and there's we have a small committee now of teachers um doing some student feedback. But
basically, from my understanding, as Michelle mentioned, years ago, it used to be a turtle garden. There used to be a pond. Uh, a lot of those things have been removed. A lot of um it's very overgrown now. Uh teachers have said that they'd like to bring their classes out there, you know, as a space for tranquility. Uh be able to do some
instruction. Used to be a decking area where classes would go out um for some meditation, self-care, uh you know, just various things. Uh we were uh some teachers were talking about having a sensory walk. We talked to our teachers in our special education program and autism for various things. A sensory
sandbox um sensory walks, a mural. We're thinking about doing uh that also can be student created. So, uh a lot of potential there. Uh we're starting to start small though because it's you know like all things we can't do everything at once, but uh we would like to just make it a very viable learning space for
our community and one that we can also use PTO events or after school or you know we have our moving on ceremony and things like that. It's a beautiful space in the middle of the building. So, we have some ideas. We're still kicking around ideas, but I think working together hopefully will >> Yeah. will come to fruition.
>> So, we've partnered with Ruckers. We have a wonderful um actually a a a parent, not a Riverside parent, but a community park parent, Princeton parent, um that runs the landscape architecture department at Ruckers. And so, she's built a curriculum with us around our program. So, this is one of three
concepts that are going to be presented this week. Um and what you see there are some visuals. Um what we're talking about is taking this largely barren um slashnon plant sort of space and clearing some of the area on the right there and then on the left leaving some
of the pine trees and putting tables um and chairs so that teachers can use this space to gather without students and that students can use it with cl and that teachers can use with their classrooms as well. So you'll notice a variety of different ways that the space could be utilized. And I'll just show
one more slide. And then here are some um AI generated images of the types of um features that we would have. So if you remember what it looked like before, um the idea is that we'll have uh raised beds with native plants and pollinators. One of
the things our steam teacher would like is to have nature cams. So this idea of nature cams um that can be out there and and used. So, it'll be sort of a next level garden, but more of a more of a tranquility space. I love that our steam teacher called it a tranquility space. This is not a playground. This is a
place that our our classes, especially our autism classes, will be able to take advantage of. So, um the for all these reasons, it was a perfect project for the PTO to um come in on very much like the amphitheater years ago at JP. Sort of something special and unique for our
autism community and for our Riverside community. So, that's it. Thanks for the extra time. >> Thanks everybody. >> Questions? >> Any questions? >> I have a question. So, how much money did you raise? >> So, it's interesting. We had a um a
fundraising an interesting uh paradigm. We had a fundraising sort of dip because we didn't have as many families buying party words, which is traditionally the elementary school way of raising funds or paying dues. Um and so we started charging money for clubs. So we have
over more more sorry more for our clubs. Um this is such a hot and in demand program. We these are weight listed programs for all the elementary schools have this phenomenon. So because of that and we still do give scholarships to clubs. We have over $65,000 earmarked
for this project. Um maybe even more. So we wanted to do something meaningful um with that money and that's how this project came to be. >> That's incredible. Um, how much do you charge for clubs and how long do they run? Just wondering. >> They're right around $200, but Chef can comment more six sessions.
>> Yeah, a >> little less than $200. >> Okay, good. >> I'm going from memory because I'm not on the clubs committee anymore, but uh generally the clubs I would say actually the average is around 150 to 175 depending on the club. >> Uh, some have been as low as 30 or zero.
Um, but and then the sessions are usually about seven weeks, some can be six. It depends on the time of year, days of the week, things like that. Like, and then we usually try to leave like we do. We have a week for uh makeup days because of snow. We'll get some of that in. But yeah, that's our average.
>> And how how many sessions do you run? >> Club sessions? >> Yeah, two or three. >> We we now run three. We didn't used to, but we now try to do all trimesters. >> Okay. Well, thank you. Thank you, Chef, and uh Michelle, for all your hard work on behalf of uh
>> Sure. I I would I would add one thing on the budget front here. Part of the reason we have the cash is because there was there was an intended use last year that did not happen and so we have rollover funds that we need to use. Yeah. To fulfill our role. So that is one of the reasons for this project as
well as some others. >> Secondar's question. >> Thank you. It sounds >> I was wondering whether you have a plan for who will take care of maintenance. >> Yeah. Um, I gotten to Andrew's office and we have um we had some asks of the district to help maintain the gardens.
Um, a big issue we've had in this space in the past has been the maintenance of the plants. And so we've got, if you noticed in the designs, um, uh, basically the plantings will be in raised beds so that we'll have them cordoned off and we'll have to allocate funding for that um, over time. So
there's been money earmarked in the past for maintenance of courtyards like when the Bill Serillo gift u but that was really small just for painting the bear and that kind of thing. So we'll have to have a mechanism for maintaining because yeah it's a and we wouldn't have our garden team sort of get involved in having to maintain this as well because our garden at Riverside as you know is
already over its sort of capacity for the public schools to kind of maintain and fund. So yeah it's that's a maintenance is a big consideration in all the designs. Yeah. >> And I I just want to add that um there are trees that have to be taken down and I think everyone who lives in Princeton
knows how expensive it is to take a tree down and the PTO is taking on that expense as well. >> We are very grateful for that. So, thank you for that. >> Sure. We appreciate it. >> Thanks. >> And I should mention that Tony is not here tonight, but Tony on Andrew's team is a is sort of our arm and arm with us
on all of this. We're not working without the district's complete partnership. So, >> well, we appreciate it and let us please come back and update us on the progress. and come visit the career. >> All right, take care. Thank you. >> All right, Dr. Lusa, did you have anything else?
>> That's it for me. >> That's it. Okay. >> Um, let me see where we are. Oh, student board members report. Hello, Ash and Elie. Uh, no school today, but you came too. >> Fortunately, >> did you want to come out of the house?
>> No. >> I had work before this, so I had to be out. >> Well, it's nice to see you. It's nice to see you guys as well. So, we're back again to talk about well, I'm back again to talk about AI. Um, so based on a survey of the students, um, which we
ran, I'll just include a couple data points. So, on a scale of one to five, when students asked how much they thought AI has improved their writing skills, oh, zero to five, sorry, improve their writing skills, they give it a 2.4. And then 50% or 57% of students
think they completely understand the AI policy in their classes. So those sort of two things we were looking for in terms of like if students understand the AI policy. Um >> could you go back to the first one on um improving? >> Yeah. So on a scale of 0 to five students think that using AI has
improved their writing skills like as a 2.4 on a scale of zero to five. >> Okay. >> Right. So um we were looking at you know if they think it's making them a better student or if they don't understand the policy but generally from the surveys we've ran with the students they have a
positive view of AI. So, we're looking to see we're right now we're surving teachers um and asking them how AI is used in their classroom and also if they use AI when creating assignments or grading and things like that um to see if they have a different experience with
students using AI than the students are reporting obviously and also how um AI usage is impacting not only students in the classroom but also teachers and how they go about teaching. Um yeah. >> All right. And for the arts and culture update, last Thursday, the Princeton
High School choir performed a gospel festival with the special guest Bishop Chantel Wright from NYU. The K to2 art exhibition is now open at the New Mina New Mina Gallery at PHS where students from all the visual arts classes at every Princeton public school um will
have their work featured and it's open until February 27th. The PHS mock trial team has advanced to the final round of the Mercer County mock trial competition. Uh PHS's E ethics bowl team won their regional tournament and the Northeast tournament. So now they will
move on to nationals where they will compete at the University of North Carolina in April. PHS's musical Legally Blonde will be performed March 12th to 14th where the and their tickets are now available to purchase in advance. And last but not least, the girls varsity basketball team has won the first CBC
championship in the entire program's history um on Saturday versus they played against Notre Dame and they won 57 to 52. >> Oh, I forgot to add you should come see the middle school musical which will be on March 6th. Uh my sister will be Elsa, so you guys should come see.
>> Well, actually a bunch of us are headed over there on the 5th though. >> Yeah. >> Oh, she's not in that cast. >> Sorry. But I'm sure some will be back on the 6th. We're looking forward to it. All right. Thank you very much. And uh we hope uh how many kids responded to the
>> Yeah, so we had a thousand response. A lot. Well, okay. What we saw with the responses is that many students um were had a positive response, but there were some there was probably like 10% of students, I would say, who like were very anti-AII integration. And we had
like a text box at the end, and almost everybody who responded in the text box, there's probably like 150 responses. um almost all of them were like we can't have AI integration like it's terrible. So I would say that it's definitely a polarizing issue among the students. Um
and the students who are against AI it's not only for them they definitely see problems with it outside of their classes but that's just from like the anecdotal evidence that we get. >> So it be interesting to see what the teachers say. Right. >> All right. Thank you. Thanks and thanks for joining us tonight. All right. We're
moving on now uh public forum. If anyone here has any comment and yep, come on up. Just say your name, the street you live on. >> My name is Vincent Viola. I live on Duffield Place. So, I want to recognize the significant care and effort that's gone into establishing a dual language
program within PPS. I know the logistics of planning and operationalizing such a program are challenging to say the least, but it is an exceptional opportunity for some families and a proud differentiator for the district. Tonight, however, in the spirit of continuous improvement, I'm here to raise concern about how placement into
this unique program is communicated and applied, particularly for families establishing residency in Princeton for the first time. In early summer 25, my family purchased the home and community park boundary zone so that our children could attend the DLI program. And making that decision, we spoke directly with
district representatives about the process and reviewed the district's published enrollment materials. Based on that information, we understood that inzone residency and prior Spanish skills meaningfully affected placement priority and that while a lottery for open seats would be held that May, a
limited number of seats would remain available for families relocating into CP between May and September. So, we moved. However, after relocating to Princeton and enrolling in PPS, we learned that all of the DLI kindergarten seats have been assigned at time of lottery. We were reassured, however,
after reviewing public information on the website that while we may have to wait a year, the program admitted new students in both kindergarten and first grade. However, we've subsequently learned that neither inzone residency nor Spanish language background will
affect the first grade entry priority. Instead, it will be the kindergarten weight list that carries forward unchanged, which will be used to determine availability of seats for the first grade class. As a result, families who establish
residency with NCP after May are effectively excluded from the DLI program, not just for one year, but indefinitely. This outcome is not clearly communicated in the district's public materials, and it does not align with the expectations those materials reasonably create for
families making the very significant decision to live in Princeton. More broadly, this exclusion issue is not unique to my family. Given the length of the wait list, demand clearly exceeds available capacity. Yet, the current process both limits access and creates the perception of opportunity that does
not in practice exist for incoming families. I respectfully ask the district to review both its public-f facing language and its placement practices to ensure they accurately reflect realistic access pathways to the program and where appropriate to consider whether adjustments to capacity
or enrollment processes are warranted so that access expectations and program designs are better aligned. Thanks for your time and I appreciate this being entered into the public record. >> Thank you. >> If you just hold on one minute, we appreciate you coming out tonight. Um
Dr. two or Dr. Lassusa um I think can respond or provide some information. >> I'll I will defer to Dr. too. But this question also came up at one of the information sessions uh with parents that I attended. And if my memory
serves, the principal at the time reinforced that the weight list is not reshuffled. That the weight list created upon entry into kindergarten remains the same weight list into first grade and then they proceed down the list and anyone who's joined the district after
the initial weight list is created is just put at the end of the weight list. Um I can look sort of more carefully at all the documentation that has gone out and that's forward facing. I don't know if Dr. Tu has any other information that I don't
>> Yes. I I'm sorry. I don't know your specific case um but I can talk to our registar and make sure that everything is being communicated accurately um both in this district office as well as at community park and making sure that any documentation as you said is clear as as
possible. So I appreciate the feedback. All right. Thank you. Is there anyone else for public comment? No. All right. Uh moving on. Now we have our board committee reports and we're starting long-term planning with Susan Caner. >> Hi. I'll be doing the first two uh
committee reports. So the first one was long-term planning. We met February 16th at 1 p.m. on Zoom. Uh our we opened with discussing uh the fact that preconstruction meetings have been scheduled for two projects set to begin this summer. uh project 567,
the PMS HVAC replacements, and project 5559A, the site upgrades at um certain elementary schools. Um these projects were very exciting to report. We'll move now to operations as they'll be off the long-term planning and move to actual
projects on board. um on deck for next month's meeting. Our approvals for for the PMS middle school additions, the CP um renovation additions, and the admin team is still working through resolving any issues before placing them on the
agenda. Upcoming bids to be received include uh the Littlebrook part of our referendum as well as the PHS renovations and the PHS HVAC renovations. And we're very excited as we reported last meeting that um we have
an RFP out for solar energy for all of our buildings and uh those that probably will not be on an agenda till April if we receive successful bids. We then had um a discussion to begin planning for future demographic studies in
preparation for potential future redistricting. Uh those discussions will continue and next uh month we will meet uh on March 10th at 1 pm in close session. >> Right. Thank you Susan. Next up is personnel with Chris. >> You want to do operations? >> I'm I thought that was operations too. I
thought you said you were shifting. >> No. >> Sorry, Susan. Operations. >> Operations. We began with >> operations. We began with what uh the updates from long-term planning. Then in sustainability, um Jenny Ledmer
indicated that she's working on a summary of sustainable projects throughout the district. Uh we thank als we also thank sustainable Princeton for their efforts on the RFP for the solar project out now. And the district also will receive two $2,000 grants to assist
with gardens at CP and Littlebrook. The operations part of the agenda, we discussed the Riverside project that we all got an update on before. um and HVAC issues the staff has been working on repairing um and also work the district
is doing to improve staffing for our custodial staff. Uh finance, we received an update of our referendum balances, our monthly transfers, and the work being done in preparation to put together the budget for the next calendar year. Tonight we'll be wart
awarding two contracts uh one for rounding software and one for GPS and radios for buses. Um that contract will be for 5 years. Um in technology we got a successful report on the PHS cafeteria HV project and it's receiving excellent
reviews and they are beginning to work on the PA system upgrade in all schools. Um and that will be done over the next several months. Uh we're still finalizing the date of our next operations meeting, so stay tuned. >> All right. Thank you. Um before we move
on, um our next board meeting is March 17th, uh where you're going to present the preliminary budget. However, um I don't know if you could speak to the delays with the state and how that will impact us and what the plan is.
>> Yes. So, originally, uh, Governor Cheryl was slated to deliver her, uh, budget address today, actually, and then state law requires that school districts are not notified of all their state aid notices within 48 hours, which would have meant that Thursday we would have
received our um our notices. The budget address is being delayed by two weeks. Uh, so we will not receive our state aid notices for two weeks from this Thursday. Uh however the published calendar that the department of
education adopts every year and disseminates has our uh final the final date or deadline of our preliminary budget submitt occurring on or before March 19th. So, as of this moment, um we
expect our state aid figures on March 12th, and then we need to have a final preliminary budget ready by uh March 19th, which would happen at our March 17th board meeting. So, we haven't had any uh notification yet from the DOE. Obviously, it's been an unusual week
with the storm. Uh but it's possible that the DOE will prolong um our uh window for for approving a preliminary budget. And if that happens, the board could hypothetically change the date of the March 17th board meeting to a later
date to afford us a little bit more time than the five days that we anticipate right now between March 12th and March 17th for developing the budget and presenting it. So there's been no determination made, but that is something and I know that a couple of board members would have a a problem
potentially with um either the final week in March, which is our spring break, or the week before. Uh I think at least one person is traveling. So, we'll have to work that out. >> So, do you have a are you waiting for the numbers to work on the budget or are
you working on the budget? >> No, we're working on the budget, of course, furiously. Um, but we can't make any we can't adopt a preliminary budget without state aid notifications. And there's a lot of speculation this year that there could be more variability than there's been in the past seven years with S2 being implemented uh this
current time. >> And what is S2? S2 uh was um a bill enacted in 2017, I think, or 18 that essentially returned New Jersey to Cifra, which is
the state funding formula. Under Governor Christie, the state had veered away from the funding formula, which created dramatic imbalances in how much aid state uh districts were supposed to receive. So, there was a seven-year ramp up. Six of those seven years, Princeton received more aid than it had the prior
year. Last year was the first year in seven that Princeton received less aid with a reduction of about 3%. And this year there's anticipation given some of uh the language that >> coming out of the current administration >> that there's going to be uh further
reductions or volatility in state aid allocations >> like plus or up or down if you had to down >> flat or down. >> Okay. So, if you had to guess >> one or the other, >> I'm hoping for flat.
>> Okay. >> And we're basing our our base scenario as flat. Um, but I I don't want to get I'll get into the weeds at the next meeting. Last year, what happened was uh the commissioner and the governor in
this in the budget address uh they they they implemented a procedural maneuver which is that they in the budget address they put um limits to how much districts
could lose or gain in state aid. that had that is not part of S2 and it had not been done in the prior seven years and that was a something that happened in the budget but was not legislated. So that goes away. >> Princeton would should have lost more
than 3% of its state aid last year. >> It didn't because there was a cap. And the the problem and the reason why doing what they did last year was somewhat unsustainable is now the imbalances are greater than they otherwise would would have been. So districts couldn't receive
more than 6%. Districts couldn't receive less than three. If you only received if you received a haircut of 3%, that haircut is anticipated to be greater this year because you have to catch up for what you didn't lose last year.
>> All right. Well, I'm just going to go on the record and say that it's going to be flat because it would be very stinky for the state to give us 5 days notice that they're going to cut our funding by more than 6%. So, I'm just gonna go on the record with that. >> Agreed. >> Yeah. Thank you.
>> Well, we have to remember that with S2, there were districts that were losing 25% of their there are districts that have lost 60% of their state aid over the last seven years and they didn't have any extra notification. They had the typical the typical, you know, timeline. And that's why you've got some
districts that are in a world of hurt. One of the reasons there are many. Well, if we're worried about impacts to children, uh again, it would be stinky for the state to reduce our state aid by any percentage with so little notice. It
is February 24th. So anyway, let's hope that doesn't happen. >> We hope it doesn't happen. There are other you know that there are we'll get into the weeds next meeting but you know the Murphy administration also has made a center had made a centerpiece of their
entire uh administration the roll out of uh prek and universal prek. There's a lot of money in prek. Uh we this district in Princeton we were able to dramatically expand prek uh access as a result of that funding. I mean that was
that's exclusive pea as it's known funding pre preschool education expansion uh act and that's another place that some people wonder does this governor have the same level of commitment as the prior governor >> hopefully she does
>> hope let's hope all right well so anyway stay tuned uh and stay tuned >> we'll uh update any change to the board meeting on the website okay all All right, moving on now to personnel with Chris.
>> We held a personnel meeting on February 3rd. We discussed procedures on the upcoming non-tenured staff uh renewals. We also discussed other confidential personal matters. And our next meeting is March 10th at 9:00
a.m. And just a quick congratulatory uh for 26 years of service here at PPS to Dr. Ciso Stance. And we should have had a cake, but >> well, we have to put Dr. Lassusa on in front of the cake. All right. In charge
of the cake. Anyway, next up is policy and I'm guessing REI. >> Uh, the policy committee met virtually on February 10th. We approved first reads for policy and regulation 2535 library material, a new policy required by the Freedom to Read Act, as well as several items from policy alert 236,
revised policies on nepotism and superintendent employment, a new consolidated sexual harassment, staff policy and regulation, and the abolishment of the separate teaching staff and support staff sexual harassment policies and regulations that the new consolidated policy replaces. We also approve four second reads for board
vote tonight. resource material, public complaints, school district travel, and the abolishment of the public complaints regulations. The committee also discussed cell phone and technology policy, content monitoring, and field trip policy, and we'll continue those conversations at our next meeting on March 3rd.
>> All right. Thank you, Ari. Next up is Eleanor with Student Achievement. >> Thank you. Um, SAC met on February 12th at 1:00. Uh, and first, uh, we had several field trip improvements. um one for the the choir Kantis uh and then
three language trips that will take place next year um for Latin uh Spanish and Japanese and all those field trips are up on the agenda for approval tonight. Um then we went into close session and we discussed various topics including uh proposed improvements to
the PMS exploratory program where the hope is eventually to provide some kind of choice for eighth graders. Uh we also discussed anou with fairground farms. Um this is this would be a community supported agriculture program that would
uh uh hopefully result in uh resources for our food education and nutrition programs and that then we use on the agenda. Uh and we also examined the financial protocols for our summer courses um in sort of math and and
science and those are on the agenda as well. Uh the next SAC meeting I'm not sure if it's on the 16th or the 17th. >> Have we decided? >> It was in the update. I think we haven't decided. >> It's pending. It is pending and it will be updated on the website when Right.
It'll be on the website. >> Yeah. But we'll update the website for the meeting. Can I ask you Are you done? >> Yeah. >> Can I ask you a great report? Can I ask you a question about um Oh, I just could you go back? >> Is it about field? Oh, no. The summer
the summer No, the summer um course policy. What are we changing? >> Uh we're changing uh um the dates at which people would have to uh drop out of the program to receive refunds. um in
the past that the refund policy has been extremely generous uh and people have gotten you know full or pretty full refunds after remaining in those courses for a fair amount of time and this presents a difficulty for the district because by that point all the expenses u
have already been incurred. So we you know people are still able to get refunds if they um make up their minds early enough. Um but we think that the new um the new process makes more sense. >> So it was like you could go through half the summer, right?
>> Yeah, it was it was pretty extreme. >> And so now we're just the first week if it's not going to work out. Is that right? The first break. Bless you. >> Okay. Thank you for that. I appreciate >> my school administration was um thankful for the board's feedback about you know having very clear guidelines about that.
So that will be coming out probably next month. >> Okay. Thank you. Just want to make sure we highlight that so people are aware and we will I guess on any communication indicate what the policy is. >> Yeah, there's like a calendar like a chart says. >> Fantastic. >> You know, by Memorial Day full refund kind of thing.
>> Excellent. Thank you so much. >> And now going back to Susan for trifecta uh with equity. >> Hi. Uh we met February 10th at 6 PM in the evening. We received a report from our family liaison uh and they discussed
the needs that they work uh that they support with our 580 free and reduced lunch families. Uh they discussed um how um the needs differ from each student and how language can often be a barrier
for families to access the services that are available. And we ended with a discussion of um how our district can better serve these families and how our community partners can also maybe step up and and help support these families. Uh we have not set yet a date for our
next meeting. We'll keep you posted. >> Okay. Thank you. Um thank you all for your great reports tonight. Um moving on now to the business part of the agenda. Just stop me if you have any comments or want to discuss. Uh but we're going to
um 10 A which is policy first and second readings that already mentioned. Then moving on to B personnel. We have uh B1 we don't have any retirements. B2 resignation, B3 appointments. B4
transfer reassignment, B5 personnel item. B6 leave of absence. B7 substitute student placements. B8 curriculum and instruction. B9 student services. B10 athletics. B11 six period compensation and B12 grievance
resolution. Moving on to curriculum and instruction. C1 student ordinary trips that Elanor mentioned. C2 memor memorandum of understanding which Elanor mentioned and C3 summer programs. Uh D1 is out of district tuition. And then we
have um E the business finance plant transportation operations. We have E1 contracts. E2 financial reports. Need a motion please. Uh re second. Mara. >> Um, Adam Beerman. >> Yes. >> Mara Francheski.
>> Yes. >> Elanor Hubard. >> Yes. >> Captain Lara. >> Question. There are some that are high school related, others that are not. Do I have to abstain specifically with the ones or just say vote and then you guys decide? >> I would say vote and
>> Yeah. Got it. Because Yeah. Yeah, because it says that whatever your vote doesn't pertain to, it doesn't count. >> Got it. >> So, yes. >> Thank you. Ariel, >> yes. >> Christopher Centarpio, >> yes. >> Erica Snider, >> yes. >> Susan Caner, >> yes. >> D Kendall, >> abstain.
>> Motion carries. >> Thank you, Mr. Harris. Uh, moving on to E3, fire and evacuation drills. E4, funds transfer. E5, registration and travel agenda. And, uh, are we what are we on? E6 uh request for
proposal uh that Susan mentioned. And now we're moving on to our second public comment and uh there's only one member of the public here who's a reporter who does not wish to make a public comment. Am I is that correct? >> Correct. >> All right. So now we'll move on to the consent vote. Can I please have a
motion? Chris second. Ari starting with Adam Beerman. >> Yes. >> Mara Franchesky. >> Yes. >> Ellen Hubert. Yes. >> Katherine Lara. >> Yes. >> Mari Meiselle. >> Yes. >> Christopher Centarpio. >> Yes. >> Erica Snder. >> Yes. >> Susan Caner. >> Yes. >> Daff. >> Yes.
>> Motion carries. >> Thank you, Mr. Harris. Um, so this is the end of our meeting and uh 7:57. We had a late start. Um, our next meeting will not be this short. Uh, and any updates to the meeting will be on the website uh as as soon as uh we get some
guidance from the state. Um, so with that, uh, wish you all good night. Uh, drive home safely. The roads are a little icy. Just got an alert. >> Motion to adjurnn. >> I wasn't doing I was going to I was I wanted to make sure everyone No, no, I am. I am. Can I get a motion to adjurnn?
Chris second. Mara. All in favor? >> All right. We're ajourned. Thank you.