Start. >> Good evening. Third. Tonight is Thursday, October 30th, 2025, and I would like to welcome you to the meeting of the South Board of Education and to call the meeting to order. Please stand for the pledge of allegiance.
>> I pledge allegiance 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. Statement of advanced notice. The New
Jersey Open Public Meeting Act, NJSA 104-6, also known as the Sunshine Law, was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting the
interest is discussed or acted upon. The primary purpose is for board members to discuss and vote on board business. In accordance with this provision of this act, the board secretary has caused notice to this meeting 48 hours prior, including date, time, and location to be
posted in the South Brunswick public library and board office and filed with the county clerk, the township clerk, I'm sorry. It is also posted on the district website. Roll call. Mr. Palowski, >> Miss Julie Ferrara, >> here. >> Miss Alicia Khan >> here.
>> Mr. Roger Krishna, here. >> Mr. Mr. Barry Nathansson, Mr. Mike Mitchell >> present. >> Dr. Smith Raj >> here. >> Mr. Rajes Sony >> here. >> Mrs. Deep McCarthik, Miss Laura Hernandez >> here. >> We have a quorum. >> Can I have a motion in a second to
approve tonight's meeting agenda? >> So move. >> Mr. Mitchell, and Dr. Raj, >> I just need to make a quick just a quick addition. We're going to add legal matters to our executive session. >> Okay. Um, approval of board minutes and executive
session. I need approval of the board minutes and executive session for October 9th, executive session and board minutes. Can I have uh Mr. Krishna and Miss Khan? I have a second. Okay. So, I need a
motion to move into executive session. >> Okay. And we're going again. We're going in exact session again. >> Dr. Raj second. >> Um, >> this is Ma >> Mitchell. >> Mr. Mitchell. Okay. Motion to executive mention be it resolved that the board of
education of the township of South Brunswick hereby moves into executive session in accordance with the sunshine law chapter 231 of the public laws of 1975 NJSA 104-21 for the discussion of personnel matters
and legal matters. Be it further resolved that the discussion conducted in executive session can be disclosed to the public at any such time as the matters have been resolved. Formal action may be taken at any meeting. >> And let's go.
>> Let's go. >> Do you need a selfie over here? >> Okay. Okay, I'm going to call the meeting back to order. Can I get a motion in a second to return from executive Miss Ferrar? Motion, Miss Khan. Second. Okay, with
that being is our student our student rep is not here tonight. That means I'm up. Okay, so the report of there's our administrative team again. We're seeing the administrative team. Yay. There's Pete.
Um the report of the president. Um so one of the things I wanted to talk about with the board which I actually and this is totally for us is here. >> Oh wait, the student rep's here. Okay, good. Back up. We'll have the report of the student rep first. I'll give her one
second to sit down. Hi everyone. Sorry for the delay. Um I hope you're having a great evening. So let's kick things off with some school news from the high school. So on October 16th, we celebrated our homecoming football game alongside the Think Pink lunch event for breast cancer awareness.
Both were a huge success. Our student government councils created a float for the SBHS Disney Adventure theme. It was a close race, but the senior class was awarded the spirit cup. McKenna Cafrey was crowned homecoming queen and Aush Chabolu was crowned homecoming king. On
October 23rd, members of the student advisory board, which focuses on student concerns, met with Mr. Varela. Together, we addressed concerns raised by student senators during the October Senate meeting, as well as input from our Viking Leadership Alliance members.
Looking ahead, November is dedicated to honoring our veterans. Student council is decorating doors and creating other displays as a way of saying thank you to our staff veterans. November 11th is red, white, and blue day in honor of Veterans Day. School clubs has also officially started and we're looking
forward to an exciting school year. Now, let's move on to athletics where our teams are doing amazing. The girls tennis team wrapped up their season with an impressive 13-4 record and placed second overall in the GMC tournament. Both the boys and girls cross country
teams won the red division championship as well as the GMC cross country championships. The girls gymnastics team plays fourth at the GMC Championship meet and also hosted a fundraiser to support the Jackie Pang fund which raises awareness for dementia through t-shirt sales. Special recognition also
goes out to Morgan Anderson Thomas, Carmen Greywall, Kayla Herrera, and Nitia Warrior of the girls soccer team. They all received the all-white division honors this season, which is a major achievement, highlighting them as among the 22 top players in the division or
across the GMC's. The girls volleyball team also has exciting news. Sha Devi and Reagan Winkler have been nominated for the Ahite division team and head coach KC Kelly earned her hundth career win when the Vikings defeated North Brunswick. That wraps up all the updates
I have for you today. Thank you so much for listening and enjoy the rest of your evening. Thank you so much for your report, honey. Okay, so I just have one really quick thing. At our last regular meeting, not Monday nights, but our last regular meeting, there was something on
our consent agenda that um I just totally overpassed uh because to be honest, I was focused on Monday night's meeting and and getting our new superintendent in here. So, I need to give honor where honor is due. So, one of the things that was on
our agenda to vote on, our consent agenda, was the resignation of our assistant superintendent, Dr. Evelyn Mammon. So, I did not want that to go unnoticed and I wanted to thank her for all of her hard work. Um, and we will
miss you and East Brunswick is in for a treat and we wish you the best and we know you're going to do great things for those kids. >> Thank you. >> So, thank you so much. But with that being said, thank you.
[Music] You deserve it. And that ends my report for tonight. So, on to the superintendence report. >> So, uh quick report this evening. Up first, I have our education foundation.
Uh Marty and Bobby are here to talk a little bit about the education foundation and our 5K onem uh excursion through South Brunswick. There she comes. There she goes. Flash. That That was just practice
because I didn't say on your mark, get set, go. >> Yeah, I >> forgot about that part. Do I have your attention? >> You do. >> Um Bobby Vinder. Oh, yeah. Got to wipe that sweat off. Um Bobby Vinder, and I'm here to let you know about the 5K and onem fun run they were having this
Sunday, November 2nd, at the high school. Thank you, Mr. Pilaski, and the board for giving me a couple of minutes to speak to you tonight. Here's what you need to know. You can register online at efsb.org
until we say >> go >> at the starting line. Pretty much at the starting line until we are there. Registration is open. The cost is $15 for the onem run and $40 for the 5k.
What time, you may ask? 8:00 a.m. is when registration begins. 9:10 is when the one mile fun run and walk begins and at 10:00 am we have the 5K. Remember we do turn our clocks back
so you get an extra hour of sleep so you get lots of energy to come and do the fun run and the 5K. New this year awards for top male and female South Brunswick district staff members. All of you.
So I hope to see many of you out walking or running on Sunday. The weather's looking good for outdoor running, so I hope to see you all there this Sunday, November 2nd. Whether you walk or run, it's sure to be a lot of fun. Thank you. >> Thank you.
[Applause] >> Also up, we have our parent. Well, not here this evening, but we have an apparent academy uh happening Wednesday, November 12th at 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at Crossroads North Middle School. Please, parents, if you're in the audience or
out there listening in the worldwide web world, uh you're invited to an evening where we're exploring AI in teaching and learning. Uh we have a project project graduation um South Brunswick High School craft show Saturday, November 15th, uh from 10:00 a.m. to 400 p.m. at
the high school. So, a couple of things happening in the education world. Uh we have a state testing uh field testing that's begun for the new state assessment for students in grades four through high school. Uh this includes an adaptive version of the NJSLA and NJPGA.
Um they added an A acronym at the end of those uh NJSLA and the NJ GPA. And the A reflects a transition to an adaptive format beginning with the official spring administration which provides a detailed students performance
report. um that we typically receive. So the state's also transitioned to a new assessment provider called Cambium uh for these tests and the current field testing does not generate student scores. Instead, it ensures that both the state and the district are fully prepared and that the spring assessment
is reliable and runs smoothly. Uh like all districts in the state of New Jersey, we're learning through the process. will have um we've have encountered both statewide and local challenges, but the team is working quickly to resolve them and strengthening our readiness uh for spring administration.
So, the next piece I have real quick uh for the board is a little item on redistricting. So, as you know, our school district's been working to address our enrollment challenges that are coming our way currently as a result of some of the new construction in our township. the committee uh leading this
work uh will be at a board meeting in November, our next board meeting with more comprehensive update. But in the meantime, just a quick review of where things stand and provide you with a timeline for where we're heading forward. Around the start of the school year, we learned of some limitations
with our transportation software. While we were not imp while it was not impossible but the challenges complicated the work with the committee and the process of vetting models uh and solutions became more labor intensive requiring manual calculations the the
team working on this has been absolutely at it night and day. Uh in addition to the changes in the both my seat, superintendent seat, assistant superintendent, curriculum instruction moving forward, um uh Evelyn moving on, uh we've considered an timeline and some
planning efforts and we've been working diligently behind the scenes to keep us on track with a timeline, but with these changes, everything kind of floating around, um it it's kind of put a little monkey wrench in all of our little uh project here. So, our progress is being
made steadily and and we're a quick overview here of what's happening in November. So, our core team's going to reconvene. Our community stakeholder meeting will be held and in November, we're going to update and we're going to give the BOE um the board of ed a meeting on November 20th. A good update.
In December, the core team meeting is going to meet again, reconvene. our community stakeholder team will again come together and we're going to continue in preparation for a recommendation to the board be made by our targeted date of January of 2026.
So the challenges due to growth and the ongoing budget constraints remain significant. You know, we're still in an S2 world. So we're trying to figure out exactly which model best uh provides the best educational environment while at the same time creating efficiencies if
any can be found. I'd just like to remind everyone that there's a link uh to our previous communications on the district website and there'll be more to come at our next board uh meeting next month in November. And that would conclude my update. >> All righty.
Okay. So, um next up we have the our district goals and our assessment results that are going to be presented to us and that will be presented by Miss Suzanne Luckorn and Mr. Pierre Ratine. Come on down. So, good evening everyone. I'm happy to
be here tonight with Mr. Peter Ratine, who is our director of special projects, but one of his responsibilities is oversight of our statemandated assessments. There you are. So annually we are required within
receipt of our student individual scores reporting out publicly to the board of education and our public. And so that is what we aim to do this evening while we are together recognizing that um not everyone is as familiar with all of the different
assessments. We're going to provide you with a quick overview and then we are going to share with you the results that we have compiled as a result of some of our analytics behind the scenes of what was provided by the New Jersey Department of Education.
So I think important to note is that there are four standardized assessments given over the course of the school year and they vary by grade level and by measure. First is the access for ELLL which is for our students who are new to
the country andor learning English as a second language. They are assessed if they are in kindergarten through 12th grade and participating in that program. Online assessment, some of it is paper in some of the younger grades. The DLM, dynamic learning maps, you'll see
results for that. that is administered to our students in the special education program. But a very small percentage of students are eligible for that test and the New Jersey student learning assessment which assesses the New Jersey
student learning standards in English language arts and mathematics. You can see the grade levels tested here on this chart. Important to note that in 10th and 11th grade, it varies a little bit depending on which course the student is enrolled in at our high school. And
finally, the NJSLA science is a culmination of science standards at those think of those as those pivotal transition marks. It's at the end of grade 5, 8, and 11. I think important to note um for all of you is that while the
assessments here allow us to look at how we're doing trends within our curriculum, our delivery um of instruction, it is not the only measure that we rely on in South Brunswick for making decisions about students. We use
multiple measures here. Not only these standardized, but we have our own district assessments and other screeners we use to garner the whole picture of student performance. Important to note at this time, while we're required to report out, the state
of New Jersey has not yet released subgroup data, meaning race or program participation that we can compare to tonight. So, what you're going to see is what we were provided and able to report out on. that includes um students in
South Brunswick by grade level, by their race or ethnicity, and by program participation. So, the first one we're reporting out on tonight, as I said, was this WEDA access for our multil- language learners. Um,
and I think important for you to know is that South Brunswick's number continues to increase. This year we have 344 well spring of 25 we had 344 students participate in that test in the K12
band. A hundred of those students were with us for less than a year. So these students might have enrolled in September, they tested in February. If they arrived in December or January, they tested in February. So they were with us for a
very short amount of time. 44 of those students, so 44 of the 344 students achieved a score of 4.5 or higher, which means they are expanding their language acquisition and eligible to exit the
program. So just to acclimate you here, we are required to show two things when we report out publicly. one the N the number of students that participated in the test administration and then we're required to report out on their
proficiency levels how did they perform. So this slide shows you the past five years of enrollment and you can see that we have steadily increased um on the far left the 2020 2021 school year that 284
to the present day 344 when this test was administered. There are several domains that our students need to demonstrate their understanding of the English language and some of those domains are then combined to show us the students
literacy score, their oral language score. And as you can see here, our students this past year had a number of students in those developing, expanding, bridging, and reaching bands. The next thing we're required to report
out on is the race of the students. One of the things that you all need to know is that if there are fewer than 10 students in a group, we aren't allowed to publicly report that because it would be identifiable of individual students possibly. So you can see here, this is
students in grades K through five. We've chose to present elementary and then 612. So you see K5 here. You see in the chart to the to the right of the chart the number of students that participated from those specific groups that were
able to report out on. And again you can see their proficiency there on the chart. We are also required to report out on the program enrollment of our students. So, we are required to report out on if
they are part of special education services, if they are part of an economically disadvantaged group of students, or if they are in general education. So, you can see here that we've shared those graphics for you. Um the far left is our um special education
with the middle being the economically disadvantaged for those of you that are sitting near the back. So the n is the number in the chart and then on the graph that is the percentage in each of those bands. For those of you watching at home, these
slides will be made available on our district website for you to refer back to if you wanted to take a closer look. >> Let's wait until we get through all of them, but we'll remember that you have one on the ELLL. Okay, 612.
This is the breakdown for our students by race as you can see here. Um, same races were reported out. You can see white we did report because it was above that threshold of 10 students. You can see that some of our students
are not yet at expanding or bridging here. But I think important to note is that in the progression of when a student comes in learning our English language, it takes several years for them to become proficient. It is very rare that a student comes in and exit is
exits the program within that first year. This is again that same slide showing grades 6 through 12 and their program enrollment. Important to note, fewer students in the 612 in comparison to the
K5. We have more students in the elementary school that are part of our multilingual program. One of the things that we often get asked that has been a question the board will ask from time to time when we present annually is about, okay, those
scores are great, but how did the same students do over time? And so with our data warehouse, Linkit, which is fairly new here in South Brunswick, um we are able to really drill down our data that
we receive on our students. And so this graphic here takes all of the students who were part of our ELLL program in the 2324 school year who again tested in the 2425 which
meant they continued in the program. They were with us for two consecutive years and you can see their progress over time. While they were tested in a different grade level content, you are still able to see that we are seeing
more students entering that expanding um and the developing bands of the chart. And important to note, if you are a 4.5 in that expanding, that is where you might be considered eligible to exit
our program. I want to thank Mr. Decker who is our world language supervisor and our supervisor of the ML program. He works with his team of educators to support students in targeted intervention over
the course of the year. His teachers are responsible for administering that assessment. Um they begin as early as February. Their window is a little bit quicker than the NJSLA window. So that concludes the access for L's
results that we wanted to share with you and we're going to move on to the DM which is the dynamic learning map and as I said earlier this is an alternate assessment to the NJSLA. This is for a very small group of
students who need to participate in an alternate measure to show their proficiency. our special education teachers with the special education supervisors work on preparing students um and administering
this assessment over the course of the school year. It is technology- based and it focuses on some essential elements related to those areas of English, math, and science. So this chart isn't percentages. This
represents the number of students in each of these areas. We have students can range here from emerging to advance. We want to see our students at the target or advanced of course, but
approaching shows us that they're making progress to where they need to be. Again, the numbers for science are less because this is only administered in grades 5, 8, and 11.
And you can see here that we had um a few more students in the area of um each subject with the the bands there. Um 13 and 13 are approaching the target. We had more in ELA at the target as you can
see there. So, we're going to move on to the NJSLA and I'm going to turn this over to Mr. Ratine so that he can share with you these results as these are the tests that he has direct oversight in working with the schools on. >> Hi, good evening. Uh before I get into
sharing the results, I wanted to share some of the people that are behind making sure that this state assessment which is large in terms of number of students and staff that are involved in it uh those that really play a large role in this. Uh the largest group is
our school test coordinators. I would say that most of them, if not all of them are in the back over there and are really responsible for making sure that every student who needs to test tests, that a schedule is formed. And they'll probably be the ones to say that that
might be the biggest challenge is changing schedules in a building to accommodate testing in a multitude of ways. and then doing things like makeup testing, making sure devices are ready and a whole slew of other things including communications to families and
so on. So, I want to thank all of them as well as our tech department because this is all done electronically except for a handful of students who may do paperbased uh to make sure our devices are ready. So, thank you to all our test coordinators in the back over there. Um, if you could just give a wave. I know you don't like standing. None of us do.
Just give a wave if you're a school test coordinator. Thank you. [Applause] I'm going to start off with the English language arts part of NJSLA. The um this slide here uh we're going to start by showing you the number of tested
students. Uh from left to right is the grade level. Then the number of students tested in the spring of 2024, number of students tested in spring of 2025, and the difference between those two with the decline in enrollment. uh the difference was predicted and there can
also be some other factors that account for that as well. As you can see, students in grades 3 through 9 are assessed in English language arts for NJSLA. I'll leave this up for just a moment. I'm going to transition into our first
set of data. Uh this is specifically for elementary grades. So grades three, four, and five. These are all of our students who tested in those grade levels in the district. So on the left side, you're looking at all of third grade for English language arts. And
then you follow across to the right, fourth grade and fifth grade. And this type of chart again you'll see throughout uh my part of the presentation from the bottom up you'll notice that those are the um the levels that they're referring to. So I won't
read them all but you could see starting with not meeting on the bottom which is red all the way up to exceeding on the top. When we see green uh we are pretty comfortable with that. Yellow we certainly want to look into but certainly the orange and the red is where we want to spend a lot of our time
and effort. I want to take a moment to show you something that we do with this data. And we're not going to show a slide like this every time that we go through. This is an example um of what the management software can do that Suzanne was talking about link it. So this is an example of
work that happens at the building level with building leadership and our content supervisors. Here we are tracking a cohort of students first as they assess as third graders and then following the following year as fourth graders.
Then you can easily narrow in on specific students from here. And this is what happens often at the building level and again with supervisors. This slide in particular kind of like Suzanne's before represents students who were in both. So they were with us in third
grade and fourth grade and tested. So it is the same group of students. Going to shift over to middle school and show you the results there. So again, same like elementary school on the bottom. You'll see the grade levels six, seven, and eight going across. So these are all of the students in middle school
for ELA who tested. And I'll just leave this up for a moment as it is similar to the elementary one as well as the color coding for the different levels. So, just to clarify, these are different students. This was last year's group of
students in the spring in those grade levels, not following students along each year. And then our um ninth graders for English language arts. I'll leave this up for a moment so that you can see uh their levels as well in terms of proficiency.
All right. So, here come a lot of numbers, but I know it's sometimes the the interesting ones, too, to see a little bit of a comparison. So there's going to be two slides back to back just because um if we tried to fit it all in one slide, it would just be so small to look at. So we're going to show you a
comparison of South Brunswick to itself over two years as well as South Brunswick to the state. This is overall uh in the two years as well. So grades three through nine. Again, those are the ones that test in ELA for NJSLA. And this slide shows levels one and two.
That was the lower two on that bar. Um, so that was not meeting and then partially meeting. So if you just follow across, um, because we'll have a few of these and I'll just explain it on this one. Again, after grade level on that far left column, we're looking at 2024.
So not the last spring, the one before it, you could see district results there for the grade level in ELA. And then you can see the state results in ELA that year. Then you follow along to the next one where we're looking at 2025 for the
same thing, not meeting level one. And you'll see the district percentage of students who did not meet and you'll see the state percentage of students who do not did not meet. And then you follow that along for the 2024 again in level 20 in level two, excuse me. And then
again 2025 for level two. I know there's a lot of data up there, so I'll just leave it for a moment so you can digest it. But again you're seeing the 24 25 comparison both you can compare state and district
So I know I mentioned that these are the um the not meeting and partially meeting. So these are where we want to see our lowest percentages whenever we can here in these two these are the remaining three levels approaching meeting and exceeding. So,
I'm not going to walk you through all of the columns because they match what the previous slide was. There's just an additional set because we have three levels showing on this screen. So, again, from left to right, you have 24, 25, and they keep repeating with level three, then level four, then level five
for all of the grades. I know it's a lot of data and sometimes summing them up and such is what you're doing in your head. Again, this will be online for everyone to review. I do want to point out a little point of pride here if you're back there or anyone here from the middle school. Uh seventh
graders, point of pride here. 82% of our seventh graders met or exceeded in ELA. Pretty impressive. I'm going to move on to our um to our subgroup and and look at that.
So our first one here is looking staying with ELA. Uh just like Suzanne had said in terms of reporting out reporting by race year. So this is for all of grades three through nine. the entire district how we performed by each group that has at least 10 students uh that we report
out or more. So if you follow from left to right, you see we have five groups that we are able to report out on. And we're following the same five levels um from not meeting all the way to exceeding bottom not exceeding not
meeting to top exceeding on those bars. And then the next is our um report out by program. Same thing. This is all students that tested in ELA grades three through nine. All right. I'm going to share the mathematics results next. Uh this
concludes the ELA part. So it's going to be similar. So might go a little bit quicker because I won't have to explain some of the way that we formatted. So as we transition into the math results, going to start off by showing the participation numbers to begin with.
So if you're a numbers person and you saw uh the N for ELA, let me explain why they're not the same. Some students can be exempt. In addition, in middle school in particular, students are taking end of course math. For example, if a student in 8th grade
is in algebra 1, they are going to take the algebra 1 NJSLA and not be counted in the grade 8 math NJSLA. Math assesses the course you are currently enrolled in. And ELA is always
associated with your current grade level irrelevant of the course you are in. So this is third through 8th. And then you'll see now our next one goes a little bit more into what I was just saying about we have students in middle school and then of course in high school
taking some of the algebra and geometry courses here. So this shows uh our participation numbers here. Uh we did expect some changes due to enrollment. Uh the other reason is that in 2024 with compliance requirements, we
ensure that every high school student had a state attempt on record. We made some slight adjustments to enable to to enable us to be a little bit more strategic with that this year as well. Uh sorry, spring of 2024 25 as well.
And same as ELA, I'm going to show you by uh levels in general. Math will be a little bit different when we get to middle and high school, but for elementary, grades three through five, uh you'll see all of elementary here by grade level going across. And again, their percentage of proficiency in the
entire grade for math. going to transition over to our sixth, seventh, and eighth grade math. So, this is our middle school performance. Now, here we start to see some changes in seventh and eighth grade, notably uh math performance. And again, with a number of those students, uh they are
enrolled in um and test beyond their grade level math class. And again, they may be in algebra or geometry, which is why they wouldn't be testing in grade eight math at that point. That'll be shown on the next slide.
So this next slide here will show a little bit of what I was just saying. So here are specifically our middle school students who are beyond eighth grade math and in algebra 1 or geometry. And if you follow across, you'll see eighth
graders algebra 1, then seventh graders algebra 1, and then eighth graders who are in geometry. So you can probably start to gather that seventh grader algebra 1 is a little bit, you know, in an advanced track when
you look at it in that um in that way. And I'm going to switch over to the high school. And the high school has a little bit different as well, just because of some of again some of what happens in the middle school. So if you follow across here, ninth graders in algebra 1, then we have ninth graders in geometry,
ninth graders in algebra 2. And again, because of all of those things that happen in middle school, that's why there's so many different nth grade uh students in those different courses. And then we are showing 10th grade geometry and then 10th grade algebra. Students in high school have to test in at least one
of their uh math classes when it's basically considered their first math class um for either algebra 1, geometry or algebra 2 when they are in high school regardless of what they took in middle school. All right, here come the uh a lot of
numbers again. So, just again want to be able to show you there's two slides for this. This is level one students uh percentage of students not meeting in then partially meeting and this is the two-year lookout for South Brunswick and for the state. And you can compare both
ways. Want to be clear that when we look at these we are not following students on these. We are just following the overall group and then the levels three, four and
five. And then looking at our district by race in grades 3 through 10, all of math by race for the N of at least 10 or for and then by program. All right, this concludes the math
portion of the reporting of NJSLA results. We're in the homestretch of NJSLA results. Science. So, our science results is what I am going to uh share as our final NJSLA results. The first I'll start with like I did before is the
overall participation where again like Suzanne had mentioned on the second slide grades five, eight and 11 uh are participating in NJSLA science. And in terms of results, here are the results by grade, not by level like math
and ELA since only three grades in the district are assessed in science. So unlike ELA and math, science has four levels of proficiency instead of five. Red is below, orange is near, the lighter green is proficient and darker green is advanced proficient.
Do want to make something clear to everyone. The assessment occurs at the high school pretty much at the same time that AP exams are taking place. So in terms of AP exams, 50% 57% just to
give you an idea of jun of the junior class is taking AP exams at the same time they're taking the NJSLA science. So just keep that in consideration. And then gonna uh show it by race. This one's a little bit different. Uh just going to show you uh we wanted to do
this on purpose so that you could see again what link it is able to provide and just kind of break it down by grade level. It's very small. I understand those of you in the back may not be able to see. So on the bottom is by race, Asian for the first three and it's by each three, black, Hispanic,
multi-racial, and white. And then within each of those groups, the first one is fifth grade, the second one is eighth grade, and the final one is 11th grade. Again, bottom is below proficiency and the top
darker green is advanced proficiency. And we want to show you this again just to give you a little bit of the idea of what we use link it for. And we can uh disagregate it even more um from here, but this gives you an idea. And then by program uh simply looking at
um ELLL free and reduced lunch and special education. Free and reduced lunch is also um the the other way we say economically disadvantaged. That concludes the reporting out of our NJSLA results. I'm going to turn it back
to Miss Luckorn. So, one of the things I wanted to make mention of is that we do have our leadership team in attendance this evening and those that weren't able or watching from the live stream. The team
here uses this information to facilitate conversations at the building level in supporting their students so that we can start to move that needle from those students that you were seeing in the red. We're not happy with kids in the
red. We want to see all of our students meeting those grade level expectations. So we are tasked with drilling down further to see who is that student, what do we know about that student, how are we programming for that student, and what are we doing to target instruction
or interventions to meet that individual students needs. And that is the work of the leadership team facilitating those conversations with the classroom teachers to work with those particular students. And really link it has been a
gamecher for us in the sense that um at the elementary level we have instructional coaches who facilitate conversations with grade level teams to kind of look at that information and say what does that mean and what can I do instructionally to support students. It
allows us not only as a tool to look at those standardized metrics that we presented tonight, but it allows us to look at benchmarks that are measured up against specific standards so that we can really hone in on where a student may need additional support. Conversely,
when you talk about our students who are meeting or exceeding, we have conversations about what are we doing to keep those students challenged and engaged in the educational program. And that is something that um we always have our eyes on as we're working with our
students. So in addition to reporting out on the data that you saw this evening, we are also required to kind of share with everyone what are we doing? What are we doing to support our students here in South Brunswick? And so just to
highlight some of the things, first of all, the teacher support. You cannot underestimate what that connection with the adult in that classroom working with that student really focused on those students needs can do to increase
performance. The connections are very important. Our um instruction is individualized, very targeted. Um on occasion we will cluster students. We are very deliberate even with our placement process of students in the elementary putting
students that have similar skill sets together so that the teacher can provide targeted instruction for those students. And then finally, one of the things that we wanted to highlight here, if you've joined us in previous years, we put this slide up here to show you some of the
programs or strategies that are happening in each of our sites. This year I chose to bold for you the ones that I wanted to really highlight that are kind of a little new or different in in what we are doing here. So first on
the left side there you will see the K3 literacy universal screener. We now are using a metric in K through three with our literacy to that is nationally normed. So, it allows us to look at how our students are performing and then we
overlay some of our local assessments to identify students that might need something a little different or more of something in terms of instruction. In addition, we creatively used our entitlement grants, ESSA, for those of you that are familiar with the every
every student succeeds act. We use some of those funds for professional development or consultants. And so we had sheltered instruction, professional development for classroom teachers to work with a specialist in the area of
multil- language, multil- language learner instruction. Um, and we had over 40 teachers in the cohort this past year that were trained that are able to bring that back to their classroom environments, not only to work with our ML students who you see have not
performed at as the same as their peers, but also to benefit all students in those classroom settings. And so we're quite proud of that and continuing that work in the upcoming year. In addition to our special education programming, um, one of the things Mr.
Morales and his team have done is we have expanded one of our special education program offerings that we have had in the elementary at Brooks Crossing and have brought that up to Crossroads North and so we have opportunity there for our students in that environment and
program. In addition, we have Wavefinder which is our social emotional learning curriculum because the academics can't happen if the whole child is not tended to and their well-being is addressed as well. So, we had this in our middle schools last year and have moved that up
to our high school and we are conducting additional sessions at the high school level um as part of an extended home room throughout the course of a month. They might have one or two more opportunities where it's very focused on this.
In the elementary schools, we have implemented the schoolwide elementary reading program in some of our special education classrooms in grades 35, which are smaller groups. And this gives them a reading program that they are using
specially designed for that population of learner. In our middle and high schools, the HAP and Excel periods are being revisited in what are we doing and how do we maximize that time with students to provide additional support for students that
need it much more than just a place to go to catch up on your homework. It's really a little bit more focused that um the team here is really working to say how do we redefine that? And finally, the INRS process is the intervention and
referral services process. That is one of the mechanisms by which students can receive additional support in South Brunswick. And there is a multiddisciplinary team. Think of it as you have a teacher, maybe you have a counselor, maybe you have a supervisor,
you might have a behavior specialist. They all come together um to support a student that might need additional help within the classroom setting. And so we've spent a couple of years now really looking at our process and redefining it and um are in a much better place with
that. So at this point that does conclude the portion where we were planning to share with you our achievement results, participation, and some of the things we do as a district to support our learners. Before we go on to the
district goals portion, we wanted to pause here just to see if there were any questions. I will share with the public watching and those of you in the audience tonight, our board received these slides in advance of this evening and had an opportunity to review and ask
questions. We also shared it with the board education committee earlier this week. Um, and really got some good feedback from them and questions during that portion. Um, but I want to open it now to see if there was anything that sparked. And if you all don't mind, I
know Rajes had something back on the ML slide that he wanted to ask about first. >> Yeah, I think that's okay. That was more I saw general ed in ELLL, so I was a little confused, but that's all right. Not not important. >> Thank you.
>> A question about HAP. So, we talk about how um how we're redefining it. C can you be a little bit more specific with that? So in the past it was one of these opportunities where students were scheduled for that and it really was a place where they can go because they didn't have a class during that period.
They were actually scheduled for a hap and they would use that time to catch up on assignments. Um, but the intent is to really look at can we utilize that with the staff in that environment to match them to some students that might need extra help or offer the option that a
student who's assigned a HAP could go back to that teacher to watch that lesson again or get extra help. So, it's really kind of using that in a less traditional way but more targeted. >> So, so we're in the process of making that happen right now. Okay. Thank you.
>> You're welcome. >> Yeah. So um uh the 11th grade science um assessments so they do they cover u physics, chemistry and biology all the three of them in that assessment or how does that work? >> Yeah, think of those science as kind of
that culminating at the end of a period of the science curriculum. So fifth grade is not just on fifth grade standards. It's very comprehensive. Um Dr. ma'am and as our curriculum expert is there something that I'm missing on that that you would add
>> it's um it's general science it's not necessarily physics biologies like all of it alto together that's part of the problem too >> yeah that's that was >> it is not um science subject specific >> yeah yeah that was what I was wondering too it's it's it's hard to
>> it it really is hard to have that be um an indicator of how we're doing. It's not. >> Yeah. >> Thank you, Dr. Mmon. >> Julie, just wondering if you have any uh
data on testing accommodations since testing can be difficult for quite a bit of the students we've talked about this evening. Uh do we have any data on how well our students do with testing accommodations or whether it's helping?
We can pull that data. Uh we haven't for the reporting purposes as it's not something that the state requires us to report out. Uh we certainly can disagregate that in terms of the accommodations that students receive >> like the number that we who use accommodations and uh I just think that
testing itself is difficult for for certain students uh and not just one category of students but certainly it's reflective of some of the statistics we see here today. >> It is. Yep. And and I'll say this that our our new assessment that Mr. Palowski
was actually mentioning the NJSLAa that we're field testing now which I know was not your question. We've already even encountered some challenges for some of our students um that require some accommodations and for us luckily we're in the early stages of that where it doesn't count and we reach out to the
state. But back to your question, we do have the ability, yes, to go back and see if there are accommodations that stand out um in terms of students that maybe have challenges related to the accommodation in particular. >> Yes. >> And and whether they're beneficial in in
overall change in grading. >> Yeah. And then individually, then we're talking about the child study team and the case manager that would review that specifically with the child. But we can definitely look to see if there are trends with them as well. Yes. >> Thank you. >> You're welcome. Thank you for bringing that up because
it's important to note that some students are eligible for accommodations on the assessment to make it more accessible. >> Rajes, >> yeah, just just a quick one. I was looking and reviewing the uh two-year comparisons for for uh results within
South Brunswick. Again, I personally am not keen on comparing with state because that's not accurate according to me. So if I just focus on two years, I see a lot of again there is a lot of noise but a lot of trend where level ones and
level two numbers are increasing and in some same ways the the level threes and fours are reducing from last year. Is there any specific trend you're seeing? I know that it's it's a mix obviously, but I see a lot more level ones and level two increasing versus the
fours and fives >> in ELA or math. Were you on a specific slide? >> I am on right now on ELA, but I saw similar on math too. >> I do want >> but I didn't pick math because it is confusing. Yeah, while Suzanne's pulling that, I do want to say that that is
though sometimes where the state comparison is helpful because the tests and the sometimes the format does change. And so it's not that we're always looking to say like are we performing better than the state. We typ we would expect to in South Brunswick, but seeing where the state goes is
really helpful for us because we do know and the um those in the back know that that's a challenge terms of the test was a little bit harder or a little bit different this year. So that is one component of it of why we do look at the state on that part. But I know what you're saying about we don't always
need to say oh we're performing better than the state. >> Yeah. We for a lot of things we compare within our county and our neighboring districts. So I wouldn't apply the same principle here. >> Yeah. So I don't have that right here in front of me to give the specifics on that Rajes but I would share with you
that is something we will take a closer look at um to look at the numbers too because not only percent but the number of students that have moved bands and actually disagregating because the one that you saw there was all students but now parceling apart like what what is
the program that students part of is it our special ed is in those numbers as well. So really taking a closer look is something that we can do inhouse to better understand and to answer your question of like is there a trend that we're seeing and I would imagine my
supervisors in the back are already spinning their wheels about saying what what are we going to look for next to be able to make some recommendations. So thank you. >> Okay. >> Okay. So thank you for >> I had one question actually I have two
but the first question was I saw that on grade three I think and it's on slide number 15 or 14 uh on the grade three EL ELA um scores are a little bit uh lower
than the math scores. Is it because that in grade three you're not using as many word problems and things and you're just using numericals? Is that why the grade three uh NJSA scores for math are much
better than the uh than the ELA? I I'm trying to understand what is why is it >> I would I would suggest that comparing comparing ELA to math at a specific grade level >> we're going to pull curriculum apart and
try to disseminate why students are doing poor or or not as well or in math versus LA. But I think one of the things that you'll see from what we have listed as goals kind of gets us into how our different groups perform.
And I would share Deepa on this particular slide. When you are a firsttime test taker, there are definitely things that we need to understand about our third graders when they're taking their first standardized test, be it ELA or math. But when you
look at this and you can see how students typically do in third grade in comparison to by the time they've done this for multiple years, we start to see that progress over time. But to Dave's point, when we get to goals, that is some of the work that's happening with our leadership team.
>> Yeah. But I'm just trying to uh I am comparing the same cohort of students, grade three math, grade three uh ELA. That's all I'm asking. Why was there why is there a difference in the same year? Number one. The second thing I wanted to ask is uh you had the slide where uh you
have the ELLL uh economically disadvantaged and special ed for 2024 2025 in comparison to the earlier years for the economically disadvantaged uh cohort. How have we performed? Do you have that data?
>> You're compare you're you want to compare last year's economically div disadvantage to this year's. We we didn't have that in this presentation >> but we do have the information that we could take a look at >> just to see a trend. >> Yeah, we do have that we could take a look at that. >> So for example, if like for here in this
slide not to belabor the point 17% was not meeting in the economically disadvantaged bar. This is on uh I don't know what slide number this is but uh whatever that slide is if you can pull that up. grade three at 3 3 to 10 throughout by program ELLL uh you know
it's that slide so if you are not if 17% was not meeting in 2024 2025 did we see an increase in that percentage or did we see a decrease in the last three years >> that we can we can find we have the ability to do that we're not required to
do that here but we do have the ability we'd have to look at the keep in mind these are different students in different grades testing right it's not the same cohort in what we're presenting here >> see you have to see the same >> and then
>> that that's my assumption is that >> you have to say cohort >> is it is it the same cohort the data is it for the same cohort over the years >> this is just for the all students 39 who took the test last year >> I'm talking
>> it's not it's not a cohort. It's it is a cohort. It's not a comparison of the same kids. >> Okay? >> Where the other slide I showed you earlier was remember we showed one that said here's the example of when they were in third grade and then how they performed in fourth grade. We can do
side by sides for each of those groups if we dug down deep enough. >> But we didn't need to do that for tonight's presentation. But I hear that you're asking that's something we'd be curious about. >> Yes, I'd be curious about that. Yes. Sure. >> Thank you. >> I just wanted to add one piece about
your first question, which is the data only came in recently and so we are required to report out at a board of education meeting within a very short time frame the data which means that a lot of those staff members in the back of the room, supervisors and administrators haven't even had the
chance to fully dive into some of the things that you're asking that we're asking to and that we will. So the questions are definitely noted as well because over time we're going to have even more data coming in from the state that we don't have but also a little bit more time to analyze it at that time as
well. But it's been a short turnaround that we're required to present the data out at the board to the board meeting. >> Understood. Thank you. >> You're welcome. >> Yep. >> Maybe a followup for for you and your team. Um as I understand we have quite a
few intervention programs. So maybe as a as a as a followup if you can kind of summarize maybe in the next board meeting or offline what programs are working what not and what needs some improvement and how can we as a board support so we can move students up uh a band level.
>> I'll give you one quick example but yes there might be more that we can share. The one would be this schoolwide elementary reading program within our elementary special education programs. That is a shift for us. So this is the first year we're using it in the
upcoming school year, but it was because we noticed a trend that our current reading instruction in those environments was not as successful as we would want it to be. So that's just one example of where we've made a shift
based on those trends. That helps. >> Huh. >> Thank you. We know what we need. We can try for it. If we don't know what we don't know, we don't know. >> So, at the most it gets rejected, but I think it would be it would be better for
us to know what and how much. So, we can try. >> Yes. I mean, I'm sure there uh language language arts supervisors K5. We fight all the time about we wish we could all K5. that way
we know right that we are um not only using those resources that we know work we know it works it's just we can't get we don't have the money to get it all for everybody the training the time so we've been doing it a little bit at a
time my guess is when we look at third fourth grade next year for instance those are the kids who have had foundations you will see a difference because we No foundations is working. But again, we didn't start foundations. We started it
in our schools that get um title one funds. We use that first and then we brought others on board and kind of so that type of stuff. It's going to take three to five years, but we'll we'll take the money and then we'll you know like those things work. We know.
>> Yeah. Here is my my recommendation so we don't go back and forth. Decouple the money part. Let's focus on and simplify. My brain is not smart. I don't understand that much right so what works what we want to do and then we as a board and community we can share if we
had we can do this to do this so and then we can figure out so decouple the money let's just focus on what can we do to improve um um our students and go up band levels that's it >> okay so I think >> I'll get it for you >> and I think that is actually perfect
segue what you are both discussing right now because that is one of our goals um as we move forward this year. So Dave and I want to transition you. You saw the achievement and part of our responsibility is to share out what our district goals will be as we launch this
new school year. I know it's the end of October, but we're here tonight sharing with you data and our goals. And so I want to first um we would be remiss if we didn't circle back to all of the good stuff we did last year. Um, so just a
quick reminder, a walk down memory lane of what our goals were in the previous school year. We had three of them. One, safety and security. Um, one of the things I would highlight there is that you all as a board approved our secondary code of conduct that went
through some revisions this past year as we aligned with more restorative practices. Um, so that was part of our first goal. The second um you worked tirelessly as a board as did Mr. Palowski and his office on that fiscal
responsibility balancing a budget during very tumultuous times with lack of state aid and the S2 funding formula catastrophe. So, you know that um we we worked in that area, but an offshoot was really looking at our need for possible
reconfiguration or redistricting. And then the disproportionality, you heard me talk about one of our um program strategies was the INRS rebrand, but also the um implementation of the universal screener. That was another
thing that I think um our elementary language arts supervisor had been wanting for years and it was a very high ticket item in terms of funding and fortunately when the state mandated it they put out the focus grant it gave us
an opportunity to apply for that and receive some funding to h help offset. So that is um where we are at based on the previous year. We just thought it would be important to remind you and kind of fill in some of the gaps of what we've done um in the past year moving
forward. Um that first goal curriculum program and data literacy is exactly what you're asking us to continue to do to continue to look deeper at the data not only for individual students and what they need but also
programmatically. What is working for us? What is not working for us? where do we need to shift our course and make adjustments and so that is part of our first goal. Um we have one again that relates to the fiscal responsibility
efficiency and fiscal planning and then program growth and facilities. We have three slides that follow. So we're we're coming down the home stretch. Those three slides um will give you some action items that we have identified under each of these goals. Um
so I'll speak first to this curriculum program and data literacy. Um use datadriven cycles to refine our curriculum to monitor our progress, intervene early and scale effective practices and you can see our action steps with how we intend to measure
that. Um first of all a meaningful data analysis cycle. Um, we are actively working on a district data handbook of when those cycles should be, what would be included in them, what are our metrics, how do we identify students for
various services within the system, the assessments and the tools that we're using. And then finally, that last piece about the SEAL, right? Um, integrating that into our curriculum, not an add-on, not something additional we're doing. It
should be part of our fabric and our instructional practice within every setting here in in our school district. And then we have some examples of what we would be looking at as the measures to show um our progress towards that goal. >> Okay.
>> So our next piece that we were looking at was the efficiency and fiscal planning when we're going to ensure growth and aging infrastructure resource allocation managed strategically sustainably equally. Let's let's be honest. Our our facilities right now are in a really nice place. Like when when
you walk into South Brunswick Township schools, our our walls and our floors and our classrooms are gorgeous. The things that are failing are the things that we don't see every day, which would be our roofs. Our one roof alone, uh just the roof that wasn't even the
entire roof at South Brun or at the middle school south was a $3 million job. We don't have $3 million in our accounts anymore to do roofs. So, we're looking at um establishing a reserve or an action plan that's a multi-year
budgeting framework so that we don't get into these volatile situations and we can put monies aside. The issue that we ran into and we're continuously running into is that in an S2 environment, we're constantly looking for ways to do things
more efficiently and at the end of the year trying to put some funds back into our savings account. What's happening is at the end of the year we look to put those funds in that savings account and they don't exist because we're such a a tight budget over year after year after
year. Um, we're really looking for ways and and some things to do uh that's going to create some revenue. So, we're we're back to the revenue generators. One of the revenue generators that I'm currently engaged with um a township down in uh South Jersey uh Brick
Township just approved solar uh canopies over uh parking lots. And the way this the way this is designed uh provides the district res revenue source, not SREx, not um solar give back money or not
solar discounts on your your energy bill, but it actually you lease your parking lots to an energy company, they put up the solar, they pay the district. So, we're still constantly in my office going after revenue generating opportunities um with it whether it be
in healthcare with our health center or whether it be with solar and the next generation of what the solar look like. Uh and then what we have to do is we have to align that budget and that program reviews. We ensure that what we're doing whether it impacts I I
always tell people every time we talk about revenue generators everything that we do to generate revenue or every efficiency that we create goes back into the classroom. It goes back into the school. it goes back into implementing uh the next big
project, you know, and and creating using it to build what the next um energy efficiency or what the next efficiency in the district would would look to would look to do. So, how do we get there? Um, one of the things that we have to really get ourselves wrapped heads wrapped around is creating a
zerobased budget. Um, I can remember eight years ago I walked into an elementary principal meeting and talked about zerobased budget and I think I I lost everybody at hello. Um, and it was just like we don't that's not how we operate. Um, and it's we we walked away from it. I I made friends with everybody
over the years, but it's one of those things we really have to talk about starting at zero and building a budget from zero and what that looks like for your program. Um, it's a big to-do in South Brunswick. Uh but we're at that point in our budget cycle to where we
have to find a way to create either savings in current program like I said earlier generate revenue. So we're still looking at efficiencies and fiscal planning. Uh the next problem the next uh program we look measuring outcomes is blank. Uh measuring outcomes is blank
for a reason because we're in this right now. We're evaluating our school capacities utilization redistricting scenarios and updating enrollment forecasting. We do it every day. Uh we're considering the housing developments, the demographic shifts. This is all now. Uh it's been happening
for the past two months. Peter Ratine uh VC and Rob Sears these that crew has put in so many hours. Our measuring outcomes will be next year when we open up school and our class sizes are somewhat normal and leveled across the district and
we're ready to um open the school year with a with a a feeling of um consistency and not the unknown. We're not at Brooks Crossing saying to ourselves, well, looks like that classroom is going to have 27 kids to this year. you know, we got two more moving in and they we said we'd move
them to another district, but they live right next to a school, right next to the school. Uh, you know, those things we're living this right now and we're in the we're in the midst of it. So, our measuring outcomes will be next year when we open up, you guys can throw up this this goal and say, "Hey, we did
okay." Or, "Hey, there was a reason you didn't do measuring outcomes because everything's a train wreck and we didn't figure it out." Um, but I'm that's not going to happen because I know the people that are working on this piece um have it together and uh it's going to be an amazing year next year. So, that's our that's our our last goal is to just
redistrict and re-evaluate and uh constantly forecast and work with our township to figure out where the developments are going. And we put we're putting together a plan that allows the district to be able to be flexible um
for the next few years. you know, it's with our transitions of of uh superintendent and everybody um moving in and out, assistant superintendent, we looked really um intently at like what do we want to do? Is it is it one plan for three years and kind of assess or is
it a plan for five years? And uh we're working on on those intricacies right now and we're going to present a really good plan come January that um that allows us to survive classroom and educationally uh create some
efficiencies maybe but maybe not um but more so for the kids in South Brunswick to create that awesome educational experience. So that's why those measuring outcomes are blank. >> We're in it. >> Yeah. But think about that. It's how we're going to accommodate that growth, how we're going to communicate that, and
how we're going to implement it really are how we're going to be able to measure our ability to accommodate this this growth. >> So, those are those are some goals that we're looking to uh streamline, put in place, and uh you know, accomplish all of the things that we talked about
earlier in all of our achievement and test out. So, that's it. That's our that's our presentation. If you have questions on goals, just uh email me directly. We can figure those out. All righty. Thanks everybody. >> Well,
how do you follow that up? >> Yes, that's a lot. >> That was I know I know how we're following it up, but first I want to say that great job. I mean that that so much work goes into that. It was very clear and all those numbers and I know that looks like a lot, but it was very clear
and concise how that was broken down. So, um, thank you. Thank you for all of that information. And now to follow that up, we have Miss Blair Eisman and Mr. Peter Ratim. We're bringing back up again for our uh annual HIV
report. >> 10 minutes or less. >> This will be quicker. Promise. Um so good evening everyone. Here with Blair Eisman, uh director of programs and professional development. And uh the state requires districts to assess their proactive measures specific to
harassment, intimidation, and bullying. So this is done through a self assessment uh each school completes at the end of the school year. It's done by the school's anti-bullying specialist along with input from the stakeholders on the school climate team and then the district will submit those scores uh to
the state in the fall. Ahead of that submission required to share the scores with the public at a board meeting, which is what we're doing tonight. So, we're going to present the HIP self assessment for last school year. So, that's July of 2024 through June of 2025. I'm going to share some
information to help give context to what the assessment is. So, here you can see what the goal of what the self assessment is. Uh we really use this to help determine how to strengthen our work intended to help the schools and
district evaluate efforts implementing anti-bullying the bill of rights and opportunity for schools and districts to reinforce and strengthen hit prevention and intervention programs, policies and practices. So what is the self- assessment? This to
me is is one of the best ways to look at it. It's eight core elements. These are the eight core elements. There's pieces within these, but these are the overarching ones. So, I'll just leave it up for a moment for you to read. And then within the self assessment,
each core element has a number of indicators to take a deeper dive into our practices. So here we're showing you one example of core element one is the example here along with one of the indicators. In this case, it's indicator A. uh a score is then given uh to each
of the core elements that Blair will be sharing with you next to give you an idea. I know it's small, but within just this part of indicator A, you have that first element and then in
addition to that, there's an and. You did this part and then there's an and and you did the other part. Right? So, I'm not reading them all because we have these available um in the 38 page document that's linked there for the board and then it'll be on our website as well as the more in-depth part of the
NJ DOE website for this. But the reason I mention that is because within each element, it's not just a check off, it's check off and then and did you do this? So, that's why you'll see some of the scores will kind of vary little bits here and there, but just wanted you to uh to see that part. And then it's
important to note that there have been no substantive uh revisions for the 2425 self- assessment and the maximum score a school may receive uh remains 78. And finally, we included the links that I mentioned to you there so that you can
find out more information if you'd like. >> Good evening everybody. So you could see on the far left column all of our schools down the side across the top are those core elements that Peter shared with you just as a review. You'll see
underneath each one of those how many points maximum that a school could receive in each of those elements. The far right column is the total score for each school out of 78. And you'll see the majority are between 76 and 78
points total. And then at the very bottom, the district score 76.3 out of 78 is an average of the school scores. So I do want to point out Cambridge and I want to celebrate them. There were some unexpected crucial personnel
decisions and implications that happened last year. And during that time, various levels of personnel, including principal Christy Peton, supervisor Amy Finkelstein, they stepped up to support HIP programming. They're commended for scoring
transparently the way that they did through those challenges and also for maintaining the programs, classes, and response to HIV allegations consistent with all other elementary schools. So I know you notice a difference there between their final score. So I wanted
to make sure to point out that that was due to some sorry personnel implications that occurred there starting around December of last year. We have to celebrate and appreciate our anti-bullying specialists. They really lead the charge for all things HI and
HIP prevention as well as all of our building administrators. Next steps for us, for Peter and I, we meet regularly with the ABS's. We actually had a meeting with them yesterday, discussed current investigations or investigations that occurred so far this year, trends,
things that they're seeing in the buildings and work that they're doing to address those needs. Peter and I check in regularly and then discussions happen amongst ABS's and their school climate teams at the the building level.
So again, the purpose of tonight was simply to share last year's scores with the public and we'll be back again in December to share more on investigations and that data. And that concludes our presentation. You're welcome.
>> Yay. Thank you, Blair. >> Any questions for us? Nice and quick. >> No, there's no questions. >> Excellent. Have a good night, everybody. You are my favorite tonight. >> Perfect. >> Awesome job, >> Peter.
>> H Okay, so the next order of business is uh board committees and liaison reports. Conor, I'm going to wait for you to go last. Okay. Um nothing with finance. I'm going to bring you up. Okay. No finance, no business op. Education committee.
what we saw tonight, we saw on uh on Monday night in in education committee. Um and then I'm going to go to Alicia now. Yeah. Okay. Miss Khan for policy. Mhm. >> So, we had a policy meeting prior to the
last regular board meeting on October 9th and in attendance uh was myself, Evelyn Mammon, Kimberly Milley White, Suzanne Luckorn, David Palowski, Laura Hernandez, Raja Krishna, and Mike Mitchell. So, we just examined the new
policy alert 235, which contained policies that are up for first read today. So we also had a discussion on policy 0164 conduct of board meeting and policy 0143 board member election and appointment.
So from the policy alert we have 11 policies up for first read and I'm reminding all board members to take a look at them and ask any questions well in advance of our next board meeting for the second read and then I willing
of policies now. All right. No one else. Okay. Okay. So, we have policy 0173, duties of public school accountant. This outlines the responsibilities and requirements of the accountant and the
board of education. We have policy 0174 legal services. These are language updates, no changes in implementation of our uh requirements. We have policy 0177 professional services. These are minor
revisions that were made in the updated administrative code regarding the awarding of contracts for professional services. We have policy 1570 internal controls and this addresses the requirements for receiving state aid to establish specific policies and
procedures on internal controls designed to provide management with reasonable assurance the school district's goals and objectives will be well met. This is policy 1620 administrative employment contracts. So this addresses the requirements of the executive county
superintendence review and approval of employment contracts for superintendent, assistant superintendent, and school business administrators. We have policy 611, special education Medicaid initiative program. So this addresses our district's appropriate steps to
maximize participation in the special education Medicaid initiative program. So next we have policy 622, budget preparation. So the revised administrative code does not change and the current budget
preparation and budget submission requirements. So next is 0143 board member election and appointment. So the changes that were made here don't have any impact on South Brunswick. Um next we have policy 1636.01
notification of promotion, new job and transfer opportunities. These again these changes have no impact on South Brunswick and we have policy 2422 statutory curricular requirements and again these changes have no impact on
South Brunswick. So the last policy is 5339.01 student sun protection. So, a student's sun protection policy was adopted requiring school districts to develop and adopt a policy concerning a student's use of sunscreen and
sunprotective clothing while outdoors at school and school sponsored functions, which addresses a district's right to require written permission from the parent of a student prior to the student carrying or using sunscreen at school or school sponsored functions. And those are all the policies for first read. And
again, just ask any questions before the next board meeting. You heard it. You heard it first. Here we have a sunscreen policy. >> Yes, we do. All of you administrators, make sure every student has a written note from a parent before they use sunscreen or ingest sunscreen.
>> Just be laughing. It's serious. >> It is a policy does exist. >> All right. Thank you, Miss Khan. Uh board, please, please, please, please, I know it's long. I know it's tedious. read the policy changes, ask questions
before we end up back here next month. Okay. Um Okay. Uh old business, we have none. New business, we have none. And that leads us to our consent agenda
review. All right. So, uh we have a really quick uh consent agenda this evening. items. Um, business board business, approval of transfers, financials, a bills list. We're disposing some surplus property. Uh,
some Ford, some pickup trucks, some cargo vans, a big dump truck, maybe lawn mower. We're approving a comprehensive maintenance plan for our buildings. We have a resolution uh with the ES or MOESC, which is the Mammoth Ocean Educational Services Commission. We're
approving an HIV assessment uh self assessment. Uh we're approving statement of assurance uh for the HIV self- assessment. Uh we have some professional services. We have a nursing plan. We're also approving a resolution for travel.
All listed. Uh Kelly educational pricing agreement for the 26 uh school year. And we have our personnel. And that's your consent agenda this evening. >> Any questions? All right. Roll call.
>> Let's do that. Roll call. Here we go. Consent agenda. Can I get a motion? >> Miss Ferrara and Mr. Mitchell. >> Mitchell. >> Miss Julie Ferrara. >> Accept. >> Miss Alicia Khan. >> Yes.
>> Mr. Raja Krishna. >> Yes. >> Mr. Mike Mitchell. >> Yes. >> Dr. Smith Raj. >> Yes. >> Mr. Rajes Sony. >> Yes. >> Miss Deepik. >> Yes. Miss Laura Hernandez. >> Yes. >> Consent agenda passes.
>> Awesome. And that brings us to our public comments. This is on any topic. The board of education 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. Complete copies of
policy 0167, which govern this portion of the meeting, are available to the public at the auditorium entrance, online, or by contacting the board office. To permit the fair and orderly expression of comments, we ask that participants be recognized by the
presiding officer and preface comments by announcing his or her name, place of residence, group affiliations if appropriate, and by completing the sign-in sheet that's at the podium. Please print legibly or we may be unable to document your name for the permanent
record. Each statement made by a participant shall be limited to three minutes. No participant may speak more than once on the same topic. Mr. Palowski will indicate when you have 15 seconds remaining. All statements shall be directed to the
presiding officer. No participants may address or question board members. No discussion between a participant or respondent shall exceed the threeinut time limit. It is our plan to listen to each member of the public. Once all questions and comments from all members
of the public are made, the board of education may respond or respond via email in the most timely and efficient manner available. All questions and comments made will be noted. As always, differences of opinions are welcomed.
Disrespect is not. Mr. Palowski, do we have anybody pre-registered? >> We have no pre-registrations. >> Do we have anybody in the audience that would like to come up? >> Going once, going twice, and we will end this portion of the meeting. And every
administrator is going, "Oh, please, please, please." >> Please note that the next scheduled board of education meeting is set for Monday. No, Thursday, November 20th, 2025 at 7 o'clock here.
That was from last that was from this week, right? Okay. Yeah, Thursday on the 20th. And can I have a motion to end the meeting? Smita Rajesh. All in favor?
>> Good night. South Brunswick.