##VIDEO ID:RgSbF1SbmpY## the January 30th meeting of the South Orange Maplewood Board of Education order Mr Moody can you please take roll call [Music] yes here here here here here here please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance please take notice that please take notice that adequate notice of this meeting has been provided in the following manner that written notice was sent from the office of the secretary of the board at 2:30 p.m. on January 5th 2025 that said notice was sent via email to Maplewood and South Orange Township clerks and the editors of the news record Star Ledger tap intoa and the Village Green do I have a second with that I'd like to make a motion to enter into executive session at 6:32 p.m. to discuss attorney client matters Personnel negotiations and hibs the length of the executive session is estimated to be 75 minutes after which the public meeting sorry hold on thank you um the length of the executive session is estimated to be 75 minutes after which the public meeting of the board shall Rec convene and proceed with business where formal action will be taken may I have a second second okay thank you board member Meyer all in favor okay let's go e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e good evening everyone thank you for joining us tonight I'd like to make a motion to approve the prior board meeting minutes and executive session minutes from the regular meeting on December 19th 20124 do I have a second okay thank you saki Gable all in favor please raise your hand great meanings have been approved next we will have student update thank you uh first I'd like to congratulate the photography students congratulations to senior Sam Rosenthal and sophomore Val long from the photography club for being selected to participate in the Drexel University high school photography exhibition this is the second year in a row that Columbia will be represented at this prestigious National event and congratulations to all of wit for being accepted to the Future imag makers workshop at NYU Tish marking the second year that CHS has had student Presence at the workshop stop the photography club is stronger than it's ever been in terms of participation and Talent with Mr kona's help um I would also like to thank dilia Balin art teacher Miss mcnali who submitted four pieces of artwork to represent dulia Balden at the Essex County yam exhibit in Newark and all these four pieces were accepted so congratulations to kindergarten student marold s thir third grader Maya P fifth grader Michael R and Eliza K from first grade Eliza's artwork was also selected to represent Essex County in the State Exhibition um and we want to recognize CHS Junior Leo Panagopoulos for his restrung nonprofit project where he's been restoring acoustic guitars and donating them to Veterans and VA hospitals inspired by his passion for music and respect for the military Leo refurbishes his guitars and provides cases tuners and beginner materials to support veterans recovery through music uh we're also happy to announce that two Columbia High School students have been selected for the 2024 to 2025 all North Jersey region honors ensembles senior Ryan gayowski will serve as the tonist for the all North Jersey region Orchestra and Junior EMT Simon has earned a spot the all North Jersey symphonic band on Mallet percussion special thanks to their band instructor Mr Bower for his dedication to our students and music program uh miss van dornick we want to congratulate her she graduated from Eastern Illinois University in December with a master of arts and music education and the guild script recently won a first place award for newspaper Publications in the category of Senior High School within enroll of 1700 to 2500 this club continues to be a wonderful collaborative experience for students while highlighting the abundance of talent at CHS the art and literary groups edit design and Market this very special publication that represent students hard work and finally we want to recognize Columbia High School senior Lucas Mullen a licensed drone pilot for his outstanding collaboration with Mr Draper and Mr valz from The District Administrative offices Lucas has been skillfully capturing stunning Drone footage of school buildings in the district a project that will serve as an invaluable resource for emergency responders in the future thank you for sharing your expertise and contributing to the safety and preparedness of our [Applause] community I I'd like to begin by highlighting the success of the alumni commment this space has quickly become a valuable resource for our students who are utilizing it throughout the day for studying lunch and various activities it provides a welcoming environment that Fosters both academic focus and social interaction making it an essential part of student life Additionally the alumni Commons has played a significant role in encouraging students to consistently wear and carry their school ID cards further enhancing school security and accountability in speaking with principal Sanchez I learned that clubs without advisers will now be able to meet in the alumni commment this is an excellent opportunity for student organizations that are still in search of advisers as it ensures that they have a designated space to collaborate and continue their activities furthermore principal Sanchez shared some exciting news regarding the library that there will be a soft opening in about a month with a full reopening expected within the next 6 to 8 weeks this is a major development for our school Community as the library serves as an essential place for research studying and academic support Beyond these improvements we have also been working closely with superintendent Bing to advocate for mandatory one-on-one meetings between sixth grade students and their guidance counselors we strongly believe that early exposure to these resources starting in the middle schools will encourage students to make use of their counselors throughout their academic Journey this initiative aims to provide students with more P personalized academic and career guidance ensuring that they feel supported and prepared for the transition into high school and Beyond additionally we are in the process of developing a student survey that will be distributed to the student body in the near future the goal of this survey is to gather feedback on student concerns identify areas where the school can improve and ensure that student voices are heard in shaping the school environment we believe that this will be an important step in fostering open communication between students and administration while addressing key issues that impact Student Life does anyone have any questions good okay next superintendent update thank you gentlemen before I yield the floor to Dr Gilbert we want to highlight some uh really nice things that are happening around the district um last Sunday on on the 26th we had our Columbia High School Chinese students attended the uh s lunar Fest uh they performed songs and dances uh they also did a ribbon dance and a Dragon Dance uh CBS was there and and filmed the event uh interviewed the teacher interviewed uh some of our students uh I believe we have a little clip uh in regards to uh what the students were doing and uh a piece of the interview [Applause] 11 now time for a check on your forecast John Elliott is live in Maplewood with your first alert forecast and really exciting information this morning hey John well and we're in this very historic setting I just love this this is the Woodland this was built in 1930 for the club and now it is just obviously used Maplewood and South Orange for performances and Gatherings like the lunar Fest which get underwe today at noon so it's just beautiful to be here um right now though let's get you and your historic home ready to head out on your Sunday so yesterday yeah yesterday was was better it was still cold we a bit highs around the area yesterday we're just in the upper 20s through parts of the Hudson Valley and yes you did have little bit of snow and then when Wednesday a nice big bump so we're coming back oh this is fascinating I'm just going to let Vince tell the story I'm joined Now by Mike Chi No you're Mike no yeah and she's doing Tai Chi right that's right so what a Tai Chi is this ancient Chinese it's like a dance but isn't it a martial art I believe so yeah and an exercise in some ways too and they say it's extremely relaxing well this is fascinating I'm enjoying this all right so Mike kind enough to join it's you're with s what is s so s crosscultural works is the local community organization that actually sponsors uh lunar Fest they've been doing they do all sorts of fests all year and um like Habibi Fest Middle Eastern Dali Fest uh you know uh for Indian you know sometimes um happy Fest for like the Polynesian area so it's it's an organization that puts on cultural and educational events uh really just to share of the vast cultures that are around with the towns and with all the neighboring towns I got to tell you I'm enjo I'm so enjoying watching this and look at what we've done here so during the course of your afternoon we are going to be having different kinds of dance not only the taiichi but the Dragon Dance Now I was talking to your Budd Lonnie 500 people showing up here today that's right maybe maybe more we hope we hope we can accommodate everybody yeah I mean this is going to be really interesting and then it's uh also events for the kids wow it's like she's so interesting this is like like I was just talking to uh her before and she's been doing this she studied in China she studied here she has students here wow this is very cool and now I feel guilty cuz I can't stretch and move that well um so Mike thank you for getting up early with us we have events and we're going to talk more about uh what's going on during the course of the festival all morning long wow we timed that out perfectly Mike that's great thank you for your help and uh we'll have much more coming up from Maplewood uh right now that we'll send it back to you guys in the studio John I was just telling Jenna off camera my dad and I my dad is 85 years old we do tai chi via Zoom yeah he's out in Ohio because taiichi it you're absolutely right martial arts based but extremely good for seniors and flexibility and movement so there you go I'm as soon as I welcome back 611 now time for a check on your forecast John Elliot [Music] time [Music] I'm p p [Music] I've been hearing a lot about this young young man so I'm excited to finally meet him he's mentioned in almost every meeting I see Mr Sanchez back there so maybe Mr Sanchez will say a few words um I know Lucas Mullen is here you've heard his name he's becoming a a legend he is the certified drone pilot uh for the district uh you you can see his work uh on the new website um he's done a lot of work with Stanley our director of Safety and Security I know he's doing work with Mr Sanchez so I just wanted him to stand I wanted to acknowledge uh all the great things that he's currently doing in the district uh and we are not even close to being done so uh my thanks and I I my team's thanks the school district's thanks uh the stuff you're doing is amazing the visuals are just wonderful so you will be seeing much more of his work uh over the next few months thank you very much sir much appreciated um want to acknowledge uh 28 students who participated in the model uncom uh conference at Yale University in New Haven Connecticut the model un conference uh takes place uh at Yale University every year this year it was uh between January 23rd and 26 so I want to send Kudos out uh to those students who took the trip do want to congratulate uh South Orange uh Middle School uh first year uh that their students entered the New Jersey School Board Association steam tank challenge uh and they have two teams that qualified uh for the competition three teams that qualified for the uh competition so I'm looking forward uh to getting more uh news about their Adventures uh we had very little time to prep I mean the kids worked all week all weekends and just put together really some great projects and uh we're looking forward to show off those projects at a board meeting over the next couple months but very very proud of these students um want to also acknowledge uh the Colombian the CHS newspaper uh the American Scholastic press Association uh awarded uh the student newspaper um first place uh in ranking uh at their annual review of student uh Publications so I did want to call out the Columbia congratulate them uh that is a great honor um did want to also reach out uh to our Psalms staff uh teachers Administration everyone uh they had an evacuation last week and if you could draw it out on a board uh it could have not gone any better uh so big shout out uh to them and their staff for just being well prepared uh and making ensuring our kids are safe and secure uh I do want to read out a recent letter uh that we sent to parents uh in regards to support and Assurance for international families dear South Orange and Maplewood School District families our district is steadfast in its commitment to providing a safe supportive and inclusive environment for every student and family we serve we understand that questions about immigration status and related concerns can create uncertainty and we want to assure you that we are here to support and protect your child's right to a highquality education New Jersey Law and federal regulations clearly affirm that all children regardless of immigration status are entitled to a free public education our schools do not and will not engage in practices that could exclude any child from enrolling or participating in school instruction laws such as the family education rights and Privacy Act also guarantee the privacy of your child's education records ensuring that personal information is protected and shared only when required by law our district has established clear responses and courses of action to address any interaction with immigration enforcement that may occur on school grounds we will prior prioritize student safety and protect the confidentiality of All Families Our educators are trained to provide emotional and practical support to students facing these real world challenges to keep them secure and supported at school uh these are challenging times for many but we remain P purposeful in providing a welcoming and Equitable learning experience for all students in South Orange and Maplewood uh and thank you uh we do also want to shout out the over 105 individuals uh that applied for our uh initial year of our budget advisory Council uh we uh accepted 30 individuals uh those notices will be going out tomorrow uh meetings will be starting in February uh we'll be working with them around uh budget transparency getting some uh advice around uh presentation and budget numbers and really just talking about how the budget process works uh and where the district is going and these extremely trying times in regards to the state aid budget and we talked about that at the last meeting um many districts went down to Trenton last month uh to talk about the state aid formula and the Need For Change um we have been on the short end of that formula now for quite some time uh and there are some major changes that need to be done uh and we need to continue to advocate for South Orange Maplewood School District to make sure we get the funding uh that we need uh to facilitate the excellent education we are currently giving to our students so I will turn this over to our assistant superintendent of access and Equity uh to give us a student enrollment update for high level classes um I want to thank Dr Gilbert for all his work uh on this um I know he's put in a lot of hours uh he is a true Equity Warrior I am very happy to call him a colleague and a friend so I'll turn it over to Dr Gilbert thank you Mr being to the uh Board of Education uh glad to be here and I have my orders this presentation has to be 20 minutes I'm about to break a record so if I talk too fast please let me know and I'm set my timer here okay I know you will I know you will Madam president uh and we will begin now so this presentation is going to do a couple of things one is going to update you all in the public the board in the public on our current enrollment numbers through our triple I uh or intentional integration initiative and then we're going to go through the student enrollment in advanced courses now I will let you know that this this presentation in its entirety will be placed on our website so you'll be able to go through each and every slide I think I finished at 125 slides have no fear we will not go over5 slides uh presently right now I got a new setup here hold on wa give me a few minutes here figure this out yeah I'm going to need some help here cuz it's not might need to get a clicker y sorry [Music] everyone not Jonathan you're gonna have to click yep okay well that first first slot there we go all right so this is the timeline for our am I controlling this or you all controlling it from the back I can't hear you thank you okay this is a just a timeline for everyone to know how we got here through our intentional integration initiative and uh just know that we're now in year four uh that means this year our integration grades included kindergarten first second third sixth grade seventh grade and eighth grade please know that when we talk about grades that kindergarten and our rise in fifth grades who become our sixth graders are the only whole groups that go through intentional integration when we talk about first second third sixth seventh I mean seventh and eighth grade those are our new enroll leads so when new students come in we put them through the algorithm uh just to give you a highlight of the uh algorithm that we use uh the variables that go and the placement these are the four placement uh variables that go into our triple I uh parental educational level income sibling preference and proximity these come off of the uh registration materials and please note that the parental education level and the parental income level uh are optional but if people don't put that on the registration what what is used is the census information for the neighborhood area and the average that comes up for those particular areas and so if you don't designate this on the registration material the US Census average for the particular area that you live in uh comes and then each person is assigned an SCS tier um tier one being low tier two being mid and tier three being high and please note as you you see on our factors race is not one of the variables that is used in our algorithm the algorithm is what we call Race neutral but that does not mean we we don't have to monitor the racial makeup of our schools a quick reference point about the statistics that I'm about to show you uh if you see on the screen and you try to get your calculator and say well this doesn't add up to be 100% that's because in order to protect some of our students because of the low number of the students that are in there we had to protect the data and so you will see an item on the statistics that talks about uh less than or greater than 5% that factors into the adding of those particular percentages and so um I'm going to actually run through this was the kindergarten enrollment in uh 2122 2223 last year and this year you will see that up to this particular point now this made this number will change because this data is picked up from where we are now we have enrolled over 5 15 kindergarteners through our intentional integration efforts and you can see how that has spread out and Spann across our school district this is our first grade enrollment numbers from 22-23 you can see that we had to protect to protect those students there were only 33 so we HD the totals and then that's why you see it like that this is 2324 this is 24 and this is 24 425 our current I don't know why it's flashing like that but I hope we figure that out um there were 38 first graders enrolled in uh School through our intentional integration that's 38 new first graders and you as you can see the percentage uh as they span out there at the bottom this is our second grade enrollment now you see that started at 23 24 last year was the first year we did our new second graders and so this was the enrollment last year and in this year we've only had 22 new second graders enrolled through our triple ey sixth grade enrollment from 22-23 that was the first year of their Mass enrollment into the triple ey and 2425 531 sixth graders and this is the percentages and how they panned out uh at our two middle schools and then seventh grade enrollment 31 newly enrolled seventh graders this year and then eighth grade which is this is the first year we had our new eighth graders come in and so far we've had 21 new eighth graders come in through triple triple I so now uh before we go into our figures this is the enrollment as of yesterday uh we went through Power School and pulled these numbers out so this is what our demographic data looks like across our district we are uh our white population is 54 our students are 54.4% our Asian students make up 3.3% our black students make up 21.9% our multi-racial students make up 13.4% and then our Pacific Islanders make up 2% of our student population this is how the demographics run across our schools you can see the visualization here if you start at zero and go to 100 you can see how that distribution looks like across our schools but for those of you who are really getting real close to the television and trying to figure that out here's a table that goes along with that so uh on how our students spread out uh demographically across our school I think it was important to add this slide this is the first time we put this in our presentation because I think for you to really understand the other numbers that I'm going to present for you you kind of need to know how our demographics look uh in in our district but I also wanted to talk about this so in 2013 2014 this is what our district looked like and I really want you to pay close attention to the white population versus the multi- uh racial population and our black population you can see in 2013 2014 our population of black students for example was 36.3% then in 2223 you can see that number drop to 2 3.3% as the and a white population of students increased and so did our multi-racial student population increase and in 2324 this is what the numbers look like as you can see still there was a decline uh in in one of in our population a rise in our white student population a rise in our multi-racial population and a decline in our black population and then you saw the numbers that I put up for our current look and our current District as it looks like now so course enrollment and classes just a little background uh by way of uh settlement agreement we are required by January 31st of each school year to prepare a written report and course enrollment by race and gender that's important for me to put out there because you will see some gender slides that we put in there are in our binary uh that are divided by binary by by binary male and female however we do want to acknowledge that we do have several students in our district who are not who are or n gender non-conforming therefore uh but their numbers aren't put in here because we have to protect their identities and if putting them in there what put kind of out them but this is why this presentation is important so one other statistical reference I want you to see so you'll notice when you look through here that maybe on some of the slides some of our class data doesn't match up quite to what the enrollment data uh says that is because a c a couple of groups of our populations of students so these numbers come from the subject area uh identification markers that we use in our district however for our multilingual students and our special education students they have different markers and so they're they are not included in the numbers so you're going to see the difference so the numbers you'll say well you just said we had 23.2% of black population as an enrollment but I'm looking at this number in this course and it's not adding up that's why it's not adding up because the multilingual students and the special education students are not in that particular number they have a different they have a different identification marker so I just want you to see that because I know there're going to be people who going to go through this with a fine tooth comb and I just wanted to make sure I put that out so here's Maplewood Middle Schools Enrollment numbers this is the number based on uh our males and our females and again we want to acknowledge the fact that we do have some non-binary gender identification students who aren't represented here but that's for the protection of those students here's the four-year Trend I want you to pay attention to the four-year Trend as you can see just as the numbers I showed you with the entire School population or what we've looked like in this District over four years over four years of data I gave you you can see that our schools are M mirroring that as you can see an increase in our student our white student population versus our other student populations which are are slowly are are declining here's a four-year trend on gender now I'm not going to go over every single course but I do want to go over the four content areas if I can quickly and these are the trends as you see across the line in language arts at um in of Maplewood Middle School my gender these are going to be the science numbers the fouryear trend data in science social studies and then I left the World Language piece in uh as well so you can see uh especially for our multilingual students to kind of get their their their their um view into the space these are the course enrolling numbers for South Orange middle school again paying attention to the trend line data this is the current enrollment for 2425 but then when you go to the trend data just remembering the numbers that I show now uh at at our particular school to see now the multi-racial group at South Orange Middle School is actually Rising that's why you see the rise in the other category to the 24.1 uh uh percentile and you can see South orangs is pretty much remaining kind of flat in terms of the aroma but with a slight decrease in the black uh population this is the gender breakdown for South Orange Middle School language arts if I'm clicking too fast let me know science social studies and World Language and then Columbia High School now Columbia high schools trend is actually trending U just as we showed in our data but you can see that the white population of our students seems to be increasing at a faster rate than our other populations of students as they are are starting to show a decline in um in enrollment this is a 2425 numbers by gender this is the four-year Trend our multi-racial population is the one holding steady in that other category that's keeping that number uh relatively flat and by gender now inside of our um high school though High School does have honors and AP cles so you're going to be able to see what that Trend data looks like like um I want to call your attention here to the language arts data and to show that what we're seeing in in language arts in particular at Columbia High School as an example of what's Happening across the board in some of our advanced placement courses um for example in our language arts area for example we did see about uh plus 15 increase of students who went from from AP in the previous year to to this year enrollment into advanced placement courses in our langu English language arts classes that's good but as you see you're going to look across the data as I click through here quickly you're going to see that's not the case in many of our other classes right so I I I wanted to stop and pause here with that reflective point to know that what we're seeing in our advanced placement courses is what was outlined for us in the Ruckers report that we still challenged with moving some of our bipac and our most marginalized students into our advanced placement classes now remember those slides that I showed you at the beginning that also shows the population decrease of our school district in those particular populations what that tells us is that our challenge is even greater because as those populations shrink we have to be as more and more intentional in making sure we open those classes up because now there's a smaller population of students that are open that we have to kind of move into those particular classes does that make sense so this is language arts this is science science and language arts are pretty much trending and come somewhat in similar fashion I mean science and yeah language arts is trending in some similar fashion now social studies you'll see uh this is where especially at advanced placement courses we saw some of our largest increase of students especially some of our bip pocket marginalized students a lot of that this year also it contributed to the fact you know we opened up another AP class in in in in at the high school uh AP African-American studies that opened up a class that got more students actively involved in it and our US History AP class seems to be one of our rising stars and able to in in getting students especially our bipox students and our marginalized students and surprisingly enough AP Psychology is another class that we're seeing uh a a growing trend of students moving in to that particular course and here's World languages I wanted to really put our world language AP numbers up but again those numbers aren't as high as I needed them to be to put that data on the screen and I just want to protect those students because I I just want to make sure we could identify those students but we are seeing a little bit of an increase in our world language for AP for AP classes and some of them so as I talked about I gota go got to go quick um as I talked about earlier here are some of our first time this is what our numbers look like over three years for our AP students uh I just did the four core areas as you can see we saw a drop a little bit of a drop in AP English from last year to this year but they had a significant increase from 2122 and these are these numbers are like our first time bipar and marginalized students who enrolled in those classes but as you can see social studies it has shown a trend of increasing the last couple of years and then also we're seeing a slight Trend and AP calculus and statistics those are two of the classes I P I pulled out because they had such a such a high number and in our Sciences we had a huge jump last year and we saw we dropped down slightly this year in the number of firsttime bipox now again these are firsttime students I don't have a chart in here to show you the entire enrollment in those classes but remember our aim is to try to see how we can get more of those students into AP and once they're in the AP how we support them to keep them in and these are just some of the classes I wanted to highlight these are some of the success stories I think you you should see uh there Ela composition class even though they sh they showed a decrease this past year from 33 to 27 last year they had 33 students in there I talked about psychology which has a large number of our firsttime bacet marginalized students taking those courses um history I think driven like I say greatly by usap history class but also the addition to the the AP African-American history class has helped in that area and then you can see the other classes uh there we have we have saw a sharp decline in AP Chemistry which is something uh we got to keep our eye on as well so some of the things that we're doing as we talk about expanding uh our uh AP work for our U bipar and marginalized student populations um AP and me social norance campaign for Columbia High School is coming an uplift committee which is a district Le committee that's going to be working with students and their families to encourage them to take advanced level courses right we're doing some work and growth mindset in this district and this is one of those avenues that we want to make sure we encourage uh students to do a preap framework integration in the eighth grade is something that's coming along on the horizon and then we're going to uh work to get some uh Columbia High School scores on AP within the Middle grades ELA teachers really starting to look into our middle schools which I'm going to give you some data on that CU that is really our training ground and our and our growing ground for our advanced placement courses additional supports that we're going to be putting in place and specifically support I mean with an emphasis on supporting our bipar and our other marginalized students remember I told you accelerating is one way but how do we keep them accelerated uh support programming uh this is creative fifth and sixth grade transition plan for math which we'll talk about at some other point uh intern intentional grouping of kids in classes uh some math intervention teachers parent Outreach and information meetings and again I talked about the uplift Comm community and now why I wanted to put this and this is emphasis around math is because math in middle school is our marker for if our students we is our marker where we're trying to see if our students will advance to higher level classes in middle school math is the only course that we have that has leveled right so they have we have an advanced math and we have uh we have honors math and so TR tracking those students in N work kind of gives us a gauge of these students are going to uh uh uh move on to high level classes um and so this is the math Trend that we've seen in our middle schools at MMS over the last four years by gender this is Psalms by the way Psalms is South Orange uh Middle School I gotta watch my jargon and this is Columbia High School and within those AP classes uh calculus and statistics and there's also one other class there's a well it's it's a physics class but it's it's like an algebra one type of focus area too and there you go [Applause] questions questions anyone I was just was curious I know I we have um education income sibling and proximity are those weighted all the same or is one stronger than the other just curious so I can't answer because I don't have the I don't I don't know the ins and out of the algorithm that they use so I don't know what the weight values values are in that I just know that those are the areas that go into determining where we place the students yep no thank you it's my first statement as a new board member um one of the slides that actually caught my eye was the one that had the enrollment of the new kindergarten it showed that we had 55 kindergarteners just kind of want to like point out to the board and the public that you know it is about 70 students below our peak in 2018 19 we had 586 kindergarteners like we know our enrollment is actually lower than it was about five or six years ago when we passed the lrfp and you know something a conversation for the board the district the community to have the next few months and years is something to do is like how do we adapt to our low enrollment like we want to make the best use of our school facilities and help ourselves budgetarily and educationally and we not are there any conversations the district is having about like enrollment that you would like to share so there's several conversations that we're beginning to have U primarily um one one of the areas is as you know as we move through intentional integration initiative we really got next year we add uh a we add our fourth graders and then the following the next year we're going to add our fifth graders and so we really are trying to look at not only the trend data as they move there but we know that in two years the group of fifth graders that we put through the algorithm are going to be the first whole group of students who actually went through the algorithm as kindergarteners now we know we're we're putting our families in the unpairing at Marshall through the algorithm again but that's a little different than saying we have our kindergarten students and in a couple of years they're going to go so so our conversations around what does this look like at that inflection point that's the first thing and when we talk about enrollment in our kindergartens one of the things we really are working with our schools on our people our people around is that all of our kindergarten schools are great our expectation is for those kindergarten schools to do the very best they can for their young people and so we know that sometimes the anxiety around triple ey when you you you you go through the algorithm and run to where your placement is our Our concern is typically around making sure that the students who get placed at those schools get the very best education they can now uh as you talk about in terms of enrollment numbers and getting those numbers up I think that's a larger conversation as a district that we should we should have in terms of what is it we need to do to Market ourselves or prepare ourselves as new families and things things come in so those are the kind of internal discussions and also part of the Ruckers implementation plan also includes us actually looking at housing looking at um other factors that may be influencing our intentional integration initiative so that's a lot but it we're it's happening so I have two questions one is um are we tracking the um races within the multi-racial and if so I think it' be interesting to start looking at that it's been so long since I registered my kids I can't remember um but so that's one of my questions the second question is on slide 120 uh where you talked about additional supports for bipox students one of the things listed what one of the things listed was create a fifth to sixth grade transition plan which caught my eye I think that's a great idea are these things that are going to be happening or or is this in the future will happen at some point so this so this I'll start with the last question and go to the other question so this year part of as you know the ruckus's implementation plan was for us to look at our math Pathways as well as look at increasing our rigor in math and putting together a systemic approach that advances our students Through Math and I tell you we're talking a lot about math but the reason we look at we working through math as our test for the rest of our subjects so that fifth to sixth grade plan will happen this year this is the plan we're putting in place this year to help move as many students as we can into higher level math classes in middle school so that's kind of a sneak peek into some of the work that we're doing the whole plan will be revealed once we get work out some of the other issues but that that's that's going to happen yep that's perfect now to your multi-racial question so our multi-racial categories actually a category that's recognized in the state so that's or people call it two or more races right so people who identify with two or more our other uh groups are captured but their numbers are significantly small and so they were kind of in the other section and we're not trying to other IND other individuals but that's where we kind of put everyone together so in the enrollment slides for the schools multi-racial was included in that particular but as we went to the the as we went to the the the class sizes although multi-racial is in there the significant numbers are would lean themselves more to our multi-racial population than our other populations okay uh so I have two questions for you Dr Gilbert and they're separate so I'll ask them one at a time first of all with regard to the uh algorithm that you were discussing before I know that uh originally with the triple I plan we were basing the determination of Parental education and income level on the census State at the American Community survey and there was a move toward then bringing in the uh the parent provided information are we this year or for 2425 did we rely solely on that for as many parents as provided it I know that in past years we kind of looked at it but had that sort of a um you know background info and was primarily using the uh the Census Data yeah so we we lean first on the data that's given to us if the families identify that on the registration packets then that's the data we use we only go to the census data when we do not have that that particular so if Kevin Gilbert does doesn't put his income level and Kevin Gilbert Jr is going to be play I don't have a son named Kevin gilber J by way it's going to get placed in into the into a school then they have to go to where I live to see what the data says my average education level in there so they can go into the algorithm so as much as possible we just encourage families to feel that information out then we can use that real time information but if not so I don't know the data on if we have more families that identified than others but our first goal is to use the data that's on the registration forms okay got it thanks uh and my second question totally other end of the slide deck here uh I really appreciate you providing these four-year Trend data slides um but looking at them is tough right uh because we're not seeing the kind of progress we'd like to see in moving our black Hispanic and other students into those higher level classes in fact in some of them we're seeing uh a decline in the direction um and I appreciate you talking about what we're doing to address those in the high school looking at the middle school and it's obviously coming up from the earlier grades as well I guess my question is and I I don't know if you're prepared to answer this but in looking at this with the lens of the Ruckers uh implementation uh and our settlement how does this data reflect on our ability to meet our obligations under the settlement right now and what do these numbers sort of what what are they saying as far as what we need to do differently in order to make sure that we are staying on track right so I would I would answer by saying I think the plans that we're making are it's going should make an impact right so now and as I've talked about in the past you know we're looking at a three to four three to five year plan and we talked about last year we were gathering our information this year we finally got our data of infrastructure in place so year three next year we should see some movement some of the things that you saw me put up there are our plans to get that movement going our intent efforts to see those numbers Rise um I don't make guarantees but what I will say is by putting those things in place we hope to see those numbers start increasing and by the end of the five years we hope to start next year in the year after that to start seeing a steady increase uh and and start showing that the things that we're putting in place are going to work and there's only the beginning because you know there's other things we have to do I mean that's only part of the story I didn't put the professional development pieces up there too because when you break the number down on how we keep our students in advanced level they've been very clear that there are certain barriers that are preventing them from going on further which means we got to do a lot of professional development with our students and we got to make sure we as an institution areen putting barriers in place that prevent those from happening so all of that's happening right now but the I think the uplift team which is Dr Bean bought Dr Bean I'm giving you your doctorate sir brought that to us uh as well as the uh the uplift teams are going to be great I think the F the the fifth and sixth grade work that we're going to be doing with families I think the growth mindset work that we're we're putting in and we've been putting in a lot of equity work with our uh principles through our D meetings and I know we also put together a fiveyear kind of professional development plan for our teachers all of that combined we hope that you all will be quite pleased with our ability to advance those numbers and do what we have to do to meet those recommendations thanks oh man a stupid question let me sit up for yeah I was just wondering if data is also being collected on the performances uh in these classes by race and gender cuz I mean I understand that the first step is to get them into um get our marginalized groups into advanced classes but once we're there is there a measure of how um they're doing and if they're being supported and if so what are kind of the most direct measures that are being made to um encourage these students to actually perform in these class yeah absolutely so yes so this part was talking about getting them in but absolutely we're monitoring how they do while they're in the class right and there are supports in place at the high school level that we're monitoring that we hope to spread out across into our middle schools uh like AP core for example which is a class designed to help people who may be struggling in advanced placement courses to kind of get them back on track well things like that so yes we're definitely monitoring the grading the grades that students are making and it's more than just getting them in there we want to keep them in there but we can't keep them in there if we don't have the supports and so we're looking you know some of the supports that you saw here are things that we can also do and then we're always looking for other interventions and things to to keep them there so but absolutely uh because to your point it it we want you to be successful in the class we don't we don't want this just be a number and say hey we got you in we want to make sure we support you to keep you in and make sure you're successful y thank you I'd be remiss because uh an bodner's not here to mention link it and the change that that's making in our in our practice uh you know part of this work is also going to be around getting more granular with the data which is going to include the development of common assessments going from uh prek through 12 uh so we'll have a a nice uh data card or baseball card as we're calling it for uh every student in the district absolutely well not a question but I wanted to say thank you to um to you Dr Gilbert and your team for your dedication to this work especially in the context of the National Climate some parents might be concerned about our commitment to having our bipac and marginalized students reach their full potential and maintain success in these high level classes so this presentation shows that although we have work to do um we don't intend to leave any of our students behind so I just want to say thank you thank you yes absolutely co-sign what board member sacka Gable said this gives me a lot of hope to see even though we are certainly still a work in progress in terms of the supports and getting the outcomes that we want and again again my question is really going back to those supports I guess to better understand the effectiveness I think a lot of them sound right in terms of Outreach and and it looks like uplifting groups might be looking at how do we perhaps leverage students to to you know one student voice to affect another um how do we understand the effectiveness of these additional supports in increasing participation in advanced courses do we have plans to survey students and families who participate in them so specifically Would We Gather feedback from those who maybe received some of inputs so that we could understand or determine what what initiatives are particularly effective in their decision to enroll in AP courses so that we can further refine those practices yeah absolutely so some of the things that I did not mention that we're currently doing uh focus groups for example so one of the things that helped drive a lot of the language that we saw in the equity audit from Ruckers was that they did focus groups and that's a practice that we've continued the last several years and one that we continue to do so we hope to get feedback in in in from that area definitely want to talk to about the Mr Bean mentioned the baseball card and that's something that's going to be new to our families that we're going to be explaining all of that to them and part of that baseball card is actually going to include a recommendation from the district where we're actually going to sit down especially with families who see that recommendation and go I don't care what the district says I want my child in regular math but we want to meet with them and let them know why we believe their child can be successful the work that we're doing around growth mindset so so definitely the only way we're going to know if we going to be successful I would love to say that we can we can be the gauge of success by looking at that but we got to hear from the people we got to hear from the students we got to hear from the families we got to hear from the staff those that's where we learn if we're doing what we say we're going to do and so absolutely that's going to be on the horiz it yeah I think you mentioned the word and we had this conversation with Dr Fergus around the idea of inputs and just for us that's work that we need to do on our end is getting widening those inputs and getting more quality so our data reflects that and we can use that data really to drive more decisions absolutely hi Dr Gilbert thank you so much for this presentation I love all this data you know that I do um I have just two comments and and two questions um the first is I you know seeing the trend over time is is really important and if if it's at all possible moving forward I think it would be helpful to give some some sense of numbers so that you know what's a denominator effect versus an actual like reduction or increase in students um what also would be helpful is if there's a sense of how many AP classes are in a subject area so for business I know we have AP Eon I'm not sure if there's any other APS that fall within that category versus science I think we offer a lot of other AP courses so it gives a sense of kind of how many classes are affecting the data we're looking at um but to my questions I think you know for what I saw here was a little bit of a win in terms of black enrollment um in language arts in terms of us getting back to we had a 10% increase from last year to this past year um and then in mediate Tech I saw a steady increase in black student enrollments 5% each year and I was just wondering if there's anything which I think is related to what Liz and and Mr Bing were saying is there anything we can learn from those jumps in terms of how how did those how did how did those students decide to enroll in those classes and maybe we can mimic though what happened there in other classes yes absolutely yeah absolutely so we've partnered with equal opportunity schools and one of the things equal opportunity schools does is they do not only do they do surveys but they do like uh trusted adults work with the with the staff and stuff and they've actually given us data from talking to um our advanced placement students as well as our students who aren't an AP and what we've learned in some of the the data that they've given us around students desire to go you wouldn't believe the importance of the influence that our adults have on the expectations that they have for our young people right one of the things that really stood out in the data that I saw although it wasn't as high as I want wanted to see uh was that about 50% of the students said an adult encouraged me to go into uh into the AP course um also unfortunately one of the barriers or one of the reasons why students leave AP is they don't feel like they have the support or they don't feel the the encouragement from the actual AP teachers a reason why they get out right so we got two ends of that Spectrum right that we have to work on right so we know if we invest in the growth mindset to have our teachers really encourage students to get in they get there and then we invest in helping our AP teachers understand that once they hear how valuable and important you are and helping them maintain and invest in their skills invest in their well-being that actually helps us so we are collecting that data and uh that data is is is relevant I want to go to your comment because I didn't pay you to do this but I'm glad you did it there's going to be another document that I'm going to make available to the board and that we're also going to put on our website which actually gives you the raw numbers that I presented in the percentages the slide deck is already 120 if I had included those slides it might have been to 200 or 300 I know y'all might have run me out of the district for that so we're going to be putting that together you all are going to get it as a board and we're going to put it so you can actually see what those numbers look like and then that that can be help you understand we're going so I thank you for putting that in the space and uh thanks for that I'm excited to to see that I think um and then when I was kind of looking at the uh the more negative data that we definitely want to improve you know I saw that um science black enrollment in the science AP courses has has declined significantly also black students make up a large proportion of the regular science courses same with language arts uh social studies and word Lang World languages so I know right now we're our discussions around AP but even thinking about what we can do to support black students move from regular to honors courses I think would be something to look at because those proportions seem very off um you know 50% or more um in those classes our black students when our as you shown our black student population is more like 20% thanks we don't want to forget that our honors class is also an advanced course that we want to help encourage and we are looking at those numbers as well so thank you okay thank you so much Dr Gilbert that was great we know it was a lot of work thank you all right and next is our business administrator update thank you madam president uh and thank you Dr Gibler for all of the uh the updates on the triple I initiative and I I applaud both the uh the board and the district on taking a multi-year approach and looking at incremental gains and being self-reflective and trying to continue to grow those initiatives um similarly with the construction update of course we have the proceeds of several bond referendums that we're we're completing out some work on so I'll just read through the work as it's coming to completion of course we always have continuing maintenance and construction needs in the district and we tailor those to dovetail to create academic environments for growth uh for all of our students so uh construction update Seth boen School Epic management closeout items are being addressed by the aps contractors uh our final architectural punch lists reinspection were issued and APS who who's a contractor is addressing a handful of items final change order review meetings are being held uh and conducted with spel epic and APS which are our architect and our general contractors at Seth boyon uh on to tuskin school epic management close out of items are being addressed by APS final architectural punch list items and inspections were issued and APS is addressing a handful of items there uh final change order review meetings are also being conducted with uh spel our architect and epic and APS Marshall School uh the building management system programming was uh is to be completed in short order and the architectural punch list items are also coming to completion uh with montro School the boil are operational and condensate tank was installed and now everything appears to be working properly the building management systems programming is also scheduled to be completed in short order and Architectural punet items are to be completed at monos with Colombia High School we've got uh d-wing the new science rooms uh were completed the awing science rooms are underway uh the media center you know we're working on case work and final finishes to be completed in February uh common area completed and in use by the school roofs and Coatings are underway uh on the b-wing areas and they continue uh a-wing science rooms work is underway wall framing and sheetrock is underway renovation of existing guidance area is also ongoing at Columbia uh Maplewood Middle School our Boiler Room is completed and all boilers are functional we're working on punch list items and troubleshooting some heating issues that have Arisen during these cold weeks the building management systems programming is ongoing and almost completed an initial training will occur next week on that building management system uh final area of the roof will be completed next week when the weather is a bit warmer and the Privacy room and all gender bathrooms are completed and in use by the school South Orange Middle School electrical service uh via Bennett the work will be completed in the next 2 weeks and they're making connections from the new switch to the main distribution panel now uh due to the revised delivery date uh you know from late December Bennett's now targeting completion at the end of January South Orange Middle School uh is waiting for the building permit and should be issued this week uh they've set up site trailers and they're starting demolition for two new bathrooms and ordering materials so we're looking for some good things to to happen further in the spring but uh a lot of things are coming to completion thank you any questions okay thank you Mr Moody I'll Now read the board president's update first I would like to acknowledge that this has been a difficult month for many in our nation and here in Som after a month filled with natural disasters displacing our loved ones drastic changes happening by our new president presidential Administration Dei being eradicated lgbtq rights in Peril ice raids and the condemnable actions from the weekend at our local synagogue OAB Shalom I feel compelled to share that I personally hope those affected continue to persevere in the face of these challenges in addition the Board of Education remains committed to vigilantly tracking federal and state level policies re reviewing and reaffirming and strengthening our district policies as needed to protect our students and create safe learning environments and working collaboratively with the district Municipal leaders and our community to uphold our mission and values in support of all parents students and staff on behalf of the board I would like to extend our condolences and acknowledge the passing of a pillar in our community Carol Barry Austin Carol was a founding Trustee of the South Orange Maplewood Community Coalition on race who held numerous leadership roles within the organization for 28 years including co-chairing the Coalition schools committee I personally had the pleasure of collaborating with Carol on initiatives and observed firsthand her advocacy for equity in our school district she'll be greatly missed this month an important Milestone was accomplished we created our board governance manual with the support of superintendent Mr Bing and the superintendent's office this is a board goal that we began implementing last year thank you to all of the past and cour current board members who contributed to this great effort it will be reviewed on an annual basis to update as needed next I'd like to share some fun behind the scenes details about bard of Ed life and acknowledge the board Sunshine committee the sunshine committee has been in existence since 2024 thanks to board member Callahan launching the idea when she and I connected on ways to improve board culture she has helped us carry this on in 2025 one of the very important mandates of the sunshine committee is keeping a record of members personal preferences on things like their favorite coffee or ways we can show appreciation such as celebrating their birthday when we go to our exec session at board meetings so a big happy birthday to those celebrating this month board members eard and Callahan happy birthday ard's living her best life El were right now um last but not least I'm pleased to share that three weeks after our first Su negotiations meeting held on January 7th we achieved an important Next Step today we sign our memorandum of agreement with Soma can't see Rosie is over there dancing in the corner and we are working on the salary guide although we had not come to a tentative agreement with the mediator on the 7th after negotiating until 1:30 a.m uh our efforts continue thereafter to get to where we are today once the salary guide is agreed upon it will be ratified by Soma and then voted on by the board as the final step thank you to everyone involved and we look forward to finalizing the SU contract the school year for our hardworking teachers thank [Applause] you now I'll read the board president's statement the Schoolboard meeting is a business meeting in public and not a meeting with the public often times it may appear to members of our audience that the Board of Education takes action with very little comment and in many cases a unanimous vote before a matter is placed on the agenda at a public meeting it has thoroughly been reviewed by the administration the superintendent of schools and the Board of Education after which it is placed on the agenda for board discussion and action at a public meeting now I will read hearing of individuals and delegations for public speaks thank you for coming in person and joining us online this evening the South Orange Maplewood Board of Education values public involvement and respects that you've taken the time to address the board at tonight's meeting as this is the board's business meeting a friendly reminder to please be respectful as we take into consideration your valuable input which will inform future deliberations and work by the Board of Education and its committees the board does have tie limits by policy and it will be enforcing those to enable as many people to speak as possible this evening each individual will be given 3 minutes to speak the first public comment period is usually limited to 1 hour with priority given to items related to the meeting agenda and the sub second public comment period may be limited to 30 minutes okay first up Fred profeta thank you good evening board members superintendent Bing and Madame President um I'm here tonight to follow up on an email that I sent to each of you uh yesterday on the subject of the partial closure of the um uh Underhill Sports Complex to the public and this was a closure that was set forth in amend rendum from Mr Bing that was effective on um uh January 1 the memo stated that uh certain unruly persons were refusing to leave the field over a period of time when students were using the field and has forced District staff to call the local police to handle the situation um the email sent to you uh outlined the history of the of this field and its renovation in 2008 uh and I'm not going to repeat that here in the interest of time but um just U for bottom line at at that time I was the mayor of Maplewood and I was leading an effort on the public hey Fred can you give the background on the field excuse me can you give the background on the field I'll give you some extra can you just give a little background on because I thought it was interesting when we met okay sure um yeah well it's thank you um it started because the condition of Underhill field at that time was was awful it was basically just a dirt field it had little grass uh parents were were um upset that their children were injured or could be injured uh visiting teams didn't want to come here to play uh you couldn't play field hockey because the ball went all over the place and same with soccer so it was a there was a big outcry um and I addressed this board at the time and said that I was willing to make a public pledge of money uh and would the board do the same and they did um and uh I said I would undertake to to raise money from various um uh sources main ones being Sean Hall and the um the public um I then spoke for some time over a year negotiated with the president of Sean Hall monsor Sheeran uh who originally came up with a uh figure of $100,000 wanted to give finally he was he was at 500,000 but he wanted to make sure that Satan Hall students were able to share the facilities also and we guaranteed uh that and along with me and those negotiations with him were the board president um and it was Beth Dy during part of that time um the um public portion was from in various uh segments there was a an Outreach to the Columbia High School alumni association which produced a lot of money um one of the reasons was that we were going to name this field the very the football field after my mother who was a teacher in this district for 30 years and was really much beloved so when using her name and saying oh we're going to name it after her that actually helped raise some money um we ended up then and the propeta family of course was induced to contribute also um so we ended up with 500 from seatan Hall 500 from the district and 750 from the public um so the U predominant um source of the funds was the public and it was understood at the time uh Sean Hall had it in a resolution that there would be this um access to the field as long as it didn't interfere with activities of districts students it was also understood that that would be the same for the uh the general public but that was back in in 2008 so you know we don't expect everybody to keep records of all these things but um indeed that's what happened um so I met with um superintendent Bing on on January 15 to disclos this history and the the partial closure and um very productive conversation I thank him very much for the courtesies he extended to me uh and he proposed a tentative solution uh of course the devils in the details but this is the outline of it um that there would be two stages and that stage one would be residents residents only of South Orange and Maplewood who were 55 and older when if they had a pass um would be able to access the facilities as long as long as they didn't interfere with District students stage two would be um uh if stage one was successful stage two would then open it up to the general public with the same provisos um now I think it's important um you know part of this thing and and superintendent memo was the um the involvement of police um I wanted to check on that because I had heard various accounts of this so I spoke to this the field you know is in Maplewood so it's the Maplewood police chief that is involved uh I talked to Chief Sally about this um this week um now there are various reasons you can imagine for this but here's what here's what I learned from him um he hadn't heard about this um and I said oh you got records he said sure we got records so go back to the records and tell me what they what you what you what you find so he called me back yesterday and he said that from the beginning of 2024 to the present um the police have not removed any person from the field who's unruly or aggressive uh and they responded during that period of time 10 times to the field uh none of those the records don't show any infractions of the rules involved with those with those uh incidents two of them involved uh suspicious Vehicles two of them were medical issues one was a ball that was kicked through the window of a neighboring residence so there's a disconnect here between um and and and I think we have to dive into some of the some of this information and find out what's really going on um maybe the maybe the District staff um was able to handle these more more than often than not didn't need to involve the mwood police but whatever it is uh we want to make sure that uh that the solution fits the problem we don't over we don't over regulate we don't under regulate like to get it just right to the extent possible and uh I greatly appreciate uh superintendent Bing's um willingness to talk about changing that January 1 memo and to extend those courtesies to me he's been very gracious and I wanted you and the public all to know this thanks very [Applause] much thank you um David Stanford Burr [Music] okay all right um well um good evening my name is David Stanford Burr a maple woodan and a senior citizen and here is my December 19th 20124 letter to the editor of the news record titled Underhill restrictions are not needed the 1121 2024 News Record article s District announces hours that public can use Underhill referred to a new school board policy of restricting Community Access to Underhill Sports Complex on school days from 8:00 a.m. to 3: p.m. that's 35 hours a week which goes into effect 1 2025 superintendent of schools Jason Bing says this peremptory action is intended to strike a balance between usage and efficiency I failed to perceive the balance considering the community of taxpayers who value under Hills track as a necessary facility for maintaining health and well-being especially among its seniors the Underhill track is the only track for running jogging and walking in the community that is currently open to the public it has long been used by the public as a convenient and safe neighborhood resource the alternatives for our citizenry to take to the uh the alternative is for our citizenry to take to the streets which imposes hazards of falling negotiating around other joggers dangerous crosswalks and vehicular traffic which is a public safety issue the track's rubberized surface is Kinder to feet and Joints than paved roads and sidewalks the track is little used by students during school hours as Columbia students are in class in the gym or on Colombia's field it is Clinton school's elementary students during recess or outdoor activities that are the main beneficiary but why are eight hours per school day set aside for recess where is the balance in that equation furthermore one of the rationalizations given for for this Fiat is to preserve the artificial turf on the field but the Clinton students exclusively use the field while adults who want to walk or exercise use the track for decades Clinton has used its own field for recess and has an extensive playground with a jungle gym and other apparatus the Underhill track like much of s facilities was built and is maintained by the taxes of its residents who are expected to continue doing so while their community services are cut clearly if the facility is hosting a track meet football game soccer match Etc then the prohibition on public use is reasonable otherwise the facility should continue to be open to all less freedom is not an ideal that should be allowed to rain I urge my neighbors to speak up against this overreach and task the school board with transparent accountability so we may all enter into a happy New Year for further context there are 43,000 citizens in South Orange Maplewood and there are 500 50 enrolled non-t taxpaying Clinton Elementary students which represents 1.27% hardly a democratic resolution or a balance between usage and efficiency thank you for your time thank you Leonard reback thank you good evening my daughter is a student at Columbia High School in Miss scenix honors uh pre-calculus class she was doing fine in the class until the teacher went on maternity leave on December 3rd uh which I understand is going to persist through most of the remaining school year no substitute was hired and there was no plan in place to ensure uninterrupted learning families were informed on December 9th that students would be using an online learning program and parent information session was held on December 12th it took another week uh for the student accounts to be set up that was just two days before uh winter break meaning that they went three weeks without math education we understand that it's challenging to find leave Replacements in math but the online program has been problematic the students watch short watch short videos that are not always effective and then do lots of problems the initial problems are usually fine but then they move very quickly on to complex problems involving tricks and a lot of algebra sometimes they involve Concepts that will only be taught in future videos that haven't even been covered yet they really need to focus on more basic problems that will allow the students to internalize and remember the concept they just learned my daughter spends usually spends more than an hour a night doing homework somay and that's with me helping her and sometimes more than two hours I know that that's not a unique experience we need a much more efficient and effective solution no one checked in on our class until this past Friday that day uh Miss Paro came into her class and told the students that they're lying to their parents about how long it takes them to do homework and that there's a lot of idle time where they're not using their computer I see for myself how much time she's spending and she spends a so-called idle time working through algebra graphing the equations and looking up Concepts that either haven't been covered yet haven't been covered well or uh that you just forgot from previous uh lessons so the these are some of the uh some of what she's been doing during the idle time over the past two weeks or the so-called idle time the students were told that they could go to Any pre-calculus teacher during conference period to get help but they need to know which teachers to go to where they're located and when they're available I emailed Miss Paro and Mr Sanchez a couple of weeks ago asking for this information and I have yet to hear back from them in any case the school is failing its honor students and needs to do much better thank you thank thank you Nancy G good evening I'm Nancy G executive director of the Community Coalition on race thank you uh board chair president Duval Wilson uh for acknowledging the sudden passing of our dear friend and colleague Carol Barry Austin we are grieving her loss deeply and I invite the public who wants to uh might want to learn more about her and all that she's given to our two towns and to this school district and to the Community Coalition race uh check out our website for the full tribute I've known Carol since my days on the school board which was over 20 years ago I witnessed back then sitting on that side um and then regularly over these last two decades her special talent for building relationships bringing people from all uh bringing people from all perspectives many of which went against her own together to learn why integration and racial equity in schools and classrooms are critical to the success of a diverse community and success means stably integrated where all residents are valued have a voice and share in all Community opportunities and I I want to uh Veer from my written comments uh to uh thank Dr Gilbert and everyone who is involved in collecting the data and putting together that presentation tonight um long awaited important detailed information with potential Solutions and he used our word which is being intentional about how we resolve this this would uh make Carol proud this is what she's been asking for for longer than the time the Coalition has been around Carol never stepped back from the core goals of integration and excellence and equity for all students no matter who was in charge or what groups were working to preserve their PR privileges over students of color we will not waver from this goal and we'll do all in our power to challenge the district to live into achieving real racial Equity I'm Jocelyn Ryan I am hold on JN I want to make sure they that they restart the time for you because you had your separate sign up so you get your full time thank you I was Carol's co-chair of the schools committee Carol Barry Austin spent 28 years trying to make our schools a better place for children of color she forced many in our community to acknowledge the racial academic achievement Gap she pointed out the Ridiculousness of our previous system of overleveling when it was unpopular and cost the Coalition Town funding she repeatedly appealed to this board not to sacrifice the good in the vain hope of a future perfect she dragged many of us along with her on her quest to make this a more Equitable district for students of color she believed in the goals of the intentional integration initiative and the schools committee will continue to monitor its implementation and progress the goal of the schools committee remains a school district that is stably integrated overall where there is equity for all students within classrooms levels and schools where the staff is racially and culturally diverse and committed to creating an inclusive bias-free environment where students of all Races are expected and encouraged to excel in a community that is proud and supportive of its students and until we have achieved that goal we will continue the struggle as Carol would have wanted thank [Applause] you thank you um last is John John GL thank you my name is John MCT and I wasn't going to speak this evening but my two colleagues um well sort of suggested it but nevertheless um so it's going to be a little bit of a hodge podge but uh uh again my name is John MCT I am 76 years old and have lived on Park Avenue since 1982 and have used the Underhill facilities for over 20 years and since my 2012 retirement I go to the track about five times a week during my time at the facility I must have passed Clinton School teachers staff and the children playing hundreds of times and I can say that there absolutely never once was a negative experience always a cordial smile and an acknowledgement and perhaps a few friendly words with the children in fact some of my exercise colleagues that go all the way back to 1978 also confirmed that they have never experienced quote unquote negative reactions I have asked many people old and young and no one recalls ever having negative reactions or excuse me interactions the nearly unanimous view among my fellow exercis exercisers is more than is more that they are grateful for the facility and treasure and respect it uh personally uh USC Underhill uh Sports Complex has been a godsend to me my long recovery from a 2021 surgery induced uh stroke uh the track itself was critical as far as my recovery I had to learn again to walk before I uh I could do anything else and then slowly but surely I came back to jogging uh to the point where now uh I go four to five times a week and my jogging is pretty much uh an old man's dog but nevertheless it's critical to me and um um I the other point I I see I only have as far as the issue of the police being called I would like to have further details and if possible the police report picture this an individual that has exercised on the track for many years and by the way is a person that pays some of the highest property taxes in the nation nation is told that you have to leave the track well this has never ever happened to him before over the many years that he has exercised at USC Pera perhaps some staff members at Clinton are new and were not familiar with the track operations the history and the utilization um I could go on and mention a few other points my two colleagues have brought those up but uh uh you know I stand firmly in favor of the continued utilization of uh the Underhill uh Sports Complex by the populace of Botha of both South Orange and map wood and uh as I said I'm part of the over 55 crowd thank you um is the person online still there Leonard Leonard oh wait no you came so we're good yes perfect all right that's it then um okay okay so next we will have committee reports I'm just going to give a little update um much of the work our board does happens in committees and the results are brought to the board meeting for Action detailed minutes of each committee meeting are posted on our website and we encourage you to review them we'll now hear from the chairs of each of our committees with a few brief highlights from this month's meetings and we'll just start from this side so you can are you okay to start or okay great okay so the curriculum and instruction committee met on January 21st at 6:30 p.m. with all members present we discussed progress and updates related to District goals including the following highlights for goal one we received a preview of the middle school math presentation which will be shared in the near future for goal two we heard initial updates to Freshman Academy for the 25 26 school year and for goal four there was a World Language curriculum night held the night of our meeting we didn't review any new policies for adoption this month but there is a revision to the high school computer Graphics curriculum up for board approval this revision ensures just greater coherence with the New Jersey learning standards in addition we received updates on the timeline for the recreation of the CHS student schedules schedules for next year the program of studies is on track to be completed and approved by the district cni team this month which ends tomorrow um and they are preparing for students to begin choosing classes by the end of February at our February committee meeting we'll receive another update on scheduling and we'll have an opportunity to discuss the criteria the district is using to streamline course offerings for next year our next meeting will be on Monday February 10th at 6:30 um any questions or comments okay a full recap as our board president said is available on our district website great thank you the special services committee met on January 28th we were joined by board members Meer sakic Gable Deval Wilson along with superintendent Bing Miss Jess Maria Dr Gilbert and Miss Bodner we began with a CPAC check-in with Miss centino reinforcing goal number four increasing collaboration with CPAC at board committee meetings they shared their results from an outof District transportation survey um we had about a third of our outof district families responding 71% reporting pretty minimal concerns we did highlight some communication gaps um with difficulty accessing information um and plan to do some website updates to ameliorate that um we also talked through some issues in terms of it support for integrating power school and Frontline uh to ensure parents receive necessary information before conferences updates on our district goals we looked m mostly at goal one which is College and Career Readiness in the world of special services what that looks like is talking about professional development um our New Jersey Department of Ed monitor had small group CST sessions where they focused on IEP compliance we also will be hosting training from Dr Ross Green's company which will focus on building leaders and mtss teams in February focusing on collaborative problem solving for student behavioral needs uh we also talked through K through five IC proposed changes Miss Bodner joined to share some insight on those proposed changes from her lens emphasizing collaboration between our curriculum and instruction and special services team we had a robust discussion about logistics implementation Staffing model support training and communication next steps included continued updates discussions and a clear presentation to be shared with the board and Community we also talked through par professional data and utilization and reviewed for regulations uh additionally Miss Jess Maria announced the official opening of our new er classroom which is an exciting development in terms of expanding student support and services in our district our next committee meeting is February 13th and I open the floor to colleagues for any questions all right seeing done I will pass it on thank you should I go twice CU I got uh I got two committee ones to go for is that right all right you get to hear me twice in a row uh so I'll be reading the uh personal committee readout for uh for uh Regina eard who is not here today um Personnel committee met on Monday January 27th at 6:30 pm all committee members were present board members kapadia that's myself gford sacka Gable and committee chair eard along with M Dr Gilbert Mr ad Doan Miss Durant and Mr Bing much of which was discussed as confidential however you can read the public facing minutes out on the district district website among the topics discussed in committee were 5-year Workforce diversity plan in the year one progress uh HR has established a new launch date for the teacher staff survey and is working on an internal communication plan there was a topics of Staff evaluations discussion around supports given to the administrators to ensure they are P pacing to hit specified deadlines group effort between cni and HR with support and holding staff accountable SLT is also going to be helping out and monitor Mr Bing will also be shadowing 2025 26 um budget updates HR is working with the business office looking at position control rosters although they have not begun discussions on individual positions just yet we'll have more to discuss at the next committee meeting business office consultant on that topic Mr Bing discussed bringing on a consultant to accelerate the current business office budget audit we reviewed six policies for first read the public facing minutes include specifics to the requested edits policy 9181 volunteer athletic coaches policy 9180 School volunteers uh policy 2431 do1 athletic department and coaches 4217 use of corporal punishment support staff 32161 identification badges for the teaching staff 421 6.1 for identification Badges and support staff nothing of note other than some feedback for the district on the regulation for 9180 uh School volunteers the next committee meeting meeting will be Monday February 24th at 6:30 p.m. any questions comments all right part two yeah Municipal Partners uh readout so this one is uh this was the first time we met in uh in January 25 um I will do this probably on on occasion as there subst updates but for since it was the first one of the New Year I'll I'll give give the update here we met on January 2 7th at 1M with all members present including board President nuia dval Wilson board member bimma capadia superintendent Mr Bing mayor Sheena colum Village trustee Dr Livia Lewis Chang mayor Nancy Adams Town Council Deb Angel business administrator Pat warry this was the first meeting of the new year with plenty of new faces going I already said that never mind we move on three areas of note from the from Monday's meeting um the the the meeting agenda was actually changed at the last minute because of the unfortunate incident over at OAB shalom we spent most of the meeting discussing the incident over the p over that previous weekend where the town was with regards to the investigation the response and the communication with the public I would say of the most tangible outcomes there in particular was Mr Bing will expand the invite list to his Interfaith quarterly meeting to include more leaders in the community uh that is scheduled for February 4th I think I think um the other uh item of note here was uh Mr Sanchez brought up brought up the prom and election day overlap on uh on the date of June 10 primary elections are being held uh with at CHS which is also the same day as the prom uh both dates cannot move so uh basic for some background CHS inherited the election polling site after Clinton sto because of the construction so we're looking to see if the election polling site can move uh but at minimum the district and the town need to coordinate uh road closures and Logistics as we plan for the prent elections to overlap so that that conversation will be ongoing uh one of the requests that came from the township um was Data requests on school placements given the triple I and a lot of geographical placements the township is requesting this geographical data as it relates to school placements to plan for bus routes crossing guard placements pedestrian traffic patterns and the district has been in coordination with the police about the traffic and will include Town Council reps into those meetings to ensure cooperation and information sharing the next committee meeting will be Monday February 24th at 1M any questions comments all right uh the fft committee met on January 26 with board members Meyer Callahan and Bennett and myself in attendance we received two presentations proposal for Middle School athletics Miss Winstead director of Athletics provided us with a thorough And Timely presentation of needs and objectives for implementation of Middle School inter inter Scholastic Athletics program this program would serve us well to develop earlier aptitude essentially creating a feeder program that better prepares our student athletes for high school um we also received the presentation for the um uh so sorry South Orange middle um South Orange Maplewood School District budget philosophy presentation our uh business administrator Mr Moody gave us a draft budget philosophy presentation that expressed the district's strategy for setting goals and priorities The Intern internal District communication forms and timing for review and feedback across stakeholder groups we received the construction update regarding lrfp uh our architect has conducted interviews with SLT principles and Facilities they have concluded in the lrfp all items that were taken out of the original Bond including the carryover projects from the previously submitted lrfp uh the architect is estimating full completion at submission of the lrfp to the uh Department of Education by June um I'm excited to talk about the solar study that um I'm uh that the district is announcing that they have asked our architect to perform a solar capability assessment to identify facilities that would be ideal candidates for rooftop installation this would not only benefit our schools in capturing significant savings but would also increase students knowledge of renewable Tech technology there are companies that provide schools with educational materials that teach students about their systems performance and even go so far as to provide kiosks or websites that students can view how much power their solar array is generating and how that correlates into minimizing our carbon footprint so that would be pretty cool if we could do that um an update on the auditorium rigging and Stage maintenance uh technology director Mr bonds provided history and current status of the rigging challenges across the district a preliminary assessment shows we'll need $1 million worth of upgrades for MMS soms and CHS that said stages are currently safe for use if rigging systems remain untouched we will be Cons considering comprehensive repairs in future budgets or Bond referendums um Mr bonds also updated us on the power school data breach he informed the committee about the uh about the power school data and shared that sensitive information such as personal documents social social security numbers or financial information are not contained in power school and so would not be a risk of being exposed that said Power School will offer two years of complimentary identity and credit monitoring services to students and staff impacted by the breach uh through trusted credit reporting agencies uh these are my highlights but for more details please go to the district website for a full cap of the meeting in the board committee section the next meeting will be February 19th and I open the floor to board members for questions and comments for discussion beautiful give me a look nope all good all right thank you the uh policy and governance committee met on January 8th uh present were myself board members Bennett Brown and Wilson along with superintendent Bing Miss Jessa Maria and Dr Gilbert uh we have one policy that we discussed at the meeting and has been put up for first read policy 4217 corporal punishment this is a policy that is applicable to support staff uh this is being brought forward not to make any subsid of change to uh our corporal punishment policy but uh sort of as a clerical reason uh two years ago policy 3217 the adjoining policy that addresses teachers was updated to the newest language uh by our vendor Strauss Esme which mostly mirrors the state statute uh 4217 was not updated at that time so we're doing this today just to get that parody so that there is not a distinction between the two groups as far as how that law is being applied in our district uh at our meeting we had a conversation with Representatives Mar vendor Strauss Esme that maintains our policy manual and advises Us in the changes that we make to our manual and discusses the ways that they can help our district which is in a number of ways a lot of services they can provide uh we had an update from the administration on what we're calling our regulation catchup project we do have a number of policies that require a regulation to go along with them that is currently not there the administration is diligently working forward creating those uh and bringing them forward for adoption and we expect to have a number of those uh put in place in the near future we discussed uh policies that board member capaia mentioned on uh volunteers and uh athletic volunteers and other volunteers in the school district as well as athletic coaches uh in uh changes to ensure that the correct and adequate trainings are taking place uh for all of those personnel with regard to student interactions and student safety along with background checks for our long-term volunteers we would anticipate those likely coming up to first read uh at next month's meeting along with a newly proposed policy uh requiring all of our teachers and staff to wear their IDs at all times which mirrors very well what we're already doing for our secondary students uh we had a conversation regarding ongoing board uh efficiency measures uh trying to look at the way we conduct our meetings especially and how we can streamline them uh various measures that came up in a survey from last year were discussed including making adjustments to how we handle uh the structure of our meeting uh which is contained one of our bylaws as well as the structure and Order of our public speaks and those discussions remain ongoing into future meetings uh finally I'll note our meeting was held on January 8th which was before the change of presidential administrations and feels like about a year ago um and it's before the executive orders that we've all heard about uh so I just want to make clear uh that all of our policies right now including all the ones that memorialize our values of inclusivity and equity for all of our students uh remain fully in place and unaffected the policy committee will be discussing at our next meeting on February 5th uh all the options we have for safeguarding uh the protections that we uh want to have for all of our students and how the board can best respond to uh future measures that may come down the road questions all right thank you okay that means we are now going to the action portion of the meeting thank you President Wilson um uh as action items uh I would like to present for consideration resolutions 4711 through resolution 4721 for consideration discussion and vote okay anyone have any comments no yeah yeah I'll highlight just a couple items in here uh just a couple items that I saw in here uh specifically in our financial regulation 4714 I wanted to highlight uh 4714 H is uh signing our new contract with the YMCA for the valuable before and after care services that the Y provides uh I personally am very happy to uh see that our relationship with the Y continues uh in good faith and ongoing uh and look forward to ways that it can uh continue to grow uh to support our kids and our families outside of the uh school day uh to make ends meet for all of our families I want to note 4714 I and J relate to donations that the district received from uh United Methodist women tomorrow and the rent party Pantry uh to support our toy drive and the Clinton School library uh it's always great to see donations from the community and finally highlighting 4714 L uh we are voting tonight on bringing in a consultant uh to assist in the business office uh which is part of an ongoing conversation with our new VA and assistant VA to make sure that our uh business office is in the shape that it needs to be for our on ongoing uh uh financial and budgetary needs so it's a pretty modest amount and we wanted to make sure we're taking this step to actually bring those forward for a resolution in full transparency of uh use of that consultant thank you any any further discussion okay well i' like to ask for a vote then board member Bennett yes board member Brown yes board member Callahan yes board president Duval Wilson yes board member eard board member gford yes board member Kapaa yes board member Meyer yes and board member saki Gable yes all right thank you the eyes have it sorry being I having a side cono okay thanks everyone um that concludes the action portion of the meeting and hearing of individuals we'll just see if there's anyone who signed up there's no one online no okay great so now moving on to new business is there any new business no okay such a easy night okay great so then I will now announce our future meetings the Board of Education will hold a board retreat on Tuesday February 4th 2025 at 6:30 p.m. to discuss the board board's role in curriculum and student achievement as well as data decision- making we'll have our njsba rep here doing some training for us and then the board will meet again in public session on Thursday February 27th 2025 at 6:30 p.m. where where action will be taken and with that Mr Moody I would now like to make a motion to adjourn the meeting on Thursday January 30th at 9:41 p.m. May I have a second okay thank you Miss Brown and all in favor all right meeting is adjourned thank you good night