[Music] hello good evening everybody um we called our meeting to order earlier in our executive session just prior to us coming out here today thank you all for joining us this
evening um let's see um Dr edle do you have any comments or uh just um obvious you all right Ty okay well good evening everyone um as we head into next week just a reminder that we have a half day
next Friday and then we have an extended two week um winter break of which we'll be returning on January 6th so I just want to wish everyone in our school Community a happy and healthy um New Year I can't believe I'm saying that a
happy and healthy New Year and a um a a joyous uh celebration of the various holidays that will be um occurring over that time period so thank you grant awesome thank you Dr aderhold and now I would like to invite our
student Representatives who are here tonight from high school north and High School South um who's gonna be going first okay so um Rachel Joseph from High School South will go first and then we'll have Johnson Lynn and Ana Sul um from high High School North to go next
thank you thank you uh good evening um so I'm just going to start off talking about our music department which has been very active recently our Orchestra had their children's concert this past Sunday saw a lot of great attendance and
the kids were very into all the music and characters and performances that the Orchestra program put on our South band held their lot concer Winter concert last Thursday and our South choir is
holding um their Winter concert this Friday at 700 p.m. and additionally 15 choir students were selected to perform in the 2025 Central Jersey Music educat Association uh Region 2 honors this past
week so we're very excited for all of those who were selected in terms of clubs um South and North Model United Nations combined to host their winter mock this past Saturday and our South Model United Nations team went to the
Princeton mu conference they won outstanding delegation and placed very highly amongst the many teams that were there along with a an abundance of individual Awards uh similarly our South model Congress went to the Yale model Congress conference and also placed very
highly um our South student council hosted a volleyball tournament this past month and we'll be hosting a ice skating event in conjunction with the Mercer County Ice rank um this Friday uh along with that South will be hosting their
winter spirit week next week so I know all the students are looking forward to that to send us off on winter break and we will be hosting our third annual winter pep rally um last Monday South ran their students teaching teachers
event uh which consists of different faculty meetings where clubs and Affinity groups get to talk to staff sharing their perspectives and giving advice on how the classrooms can be more inclusive um and additionally our South PTSA ran a very successful flea market
this past month uh I'll wrap us off with a little bit on winter sports so our winter sports have been up and running um our boys basketball program had their first scrimmage yesterday and our girls basketball program has their first scrimmage tomorrow I'm also uh very
excited to say our wwp hockey team is getting their season up and running with their first game tomorrow um to point out some accomplished individuals uh Miss Katie Riley was named Trenton Times boy cross
country coach of the year uh South's very own senior shravan prep was named the Trenton Times boys cross country Runner of the year and both shravan and um another South boys cross country senior Argent s raced in Alabama uh this
past week week at the Garmin National Silver race uh where shravan placed 40th out of the 300 Runners um and climbed 28 places after being seated 68th so we're very proud of their performance and of
how the fall season went and we're looking forward to our winter season uh but that's pretty much all for us from this month I'll pass it off to my North companions good evening everyone to start off um taking a look at sports
winter tryouts took place during the week of Thanksgiving and sports are off to a great start so far both boys and girls swimming won their first meet against heightstown with another me another meet today against hun and the Winter Guard from North and South have
both have started their Seasons moving on to clubs our Red Cross hosted their annual winter blood drive and it was a huge success with over 57 pints of blood dona which is great our yearbook Club is working hard to make them amazing this
year with Club photos all of last week and continuing on this week the model un the north model un team came back from their conference at Princeton where they won honorable large delegation with multiple individual delegates winning
individual Awards and the North Yale model Congress team also came back from the conference this week where they won best delegation first out of 50 plus delegates around the nation with delegates winning multiple individual
Awards here too both MSA and Jewish Student Association hosted an Interfaith basketball and potlock event which was a huge success musical auditions are also done congrats to everyone who got a role and the musical this year will be a shop
A Little Shop of Horrors which is a throwback in time as it was the first musical put on by North Theater 10 years ago that's fun switching over to our student council in preparation for our Harlem wizard event on January 17th we
had a mini tour to CMS yoff and village where we were accompanied by one of the Wizards where he was able to put on an amazing show and raised a lot of hype for the event and passing it on to Johnson yeah kind of continuing with
student council in preparation for our upcoming week for spear week and also our very anticipated break break we chose our themes for every day during the last D council meeting with the following days being chosen Monday's our classic PJ day Tuesdays are Chill Vibes
day Wednesday's Santa versus Grinch day Thursday is anything but backpack day and Friday's festive colors day like always and we're also looking forward to our winter pep rally which will be run by our sophomore and freshman Council this year and it will be on the last day before winter break for kids to kind of
get a festive send off and in addition the high school senior Council also held their pickle ball tournament which happens every year which was a major success they made over $400 with more than 50 kids signing up to compete a lot of my friends went really hard at the
competition and a lot of them were sad that they lost but there can only be one winner and kind of going off seniors many of our seniors are anticipating their first college decisions back out this week so fingers cross they receive an acceptance and as a senior myself I
know that it's a very stressful time for our seniors so we wanted to thank the P PTSA for giving us Donuts during lunch two weeks ago which was really sweet and then in addition for a whole school we've also done a lot to kind of relieve like the mood our winter de-stress Fest
is coming up later this Thursday which is expected to be a big hit with multiple workshops and ranging from anything from badminton to sleeping in class to cooking you can choose any of them and kind of de-stress before the holidays and in addition on the topic of
special days we are planning for our Dei day which has become an annual tradition here at North and a lot of committees for students have started to discuss hosting events and also fundraisers in addition our history classes went on a field trip to New York City and saw the
show STS on Broadway many had a great time and a lot of them got to hang out in New York City for the day furthermore there was a orchestra concert last Friday it was a senior solo concert for a lot of our talented seniors as a kind of last send off one of which our
chalice Ethan Shu had a 11 minutes solo which was really amazing and finally there was an Art Exhibit last Friday as well for our Student Art clubs and congrats to all our AP art and photography students who produced amazing pieces and that's all we had at
North for this month and thank you guys for listening thank you to our students I also just want to note that we have a student running at Nationals in Cross Country this coming up weekend in San Diego uh so congratulations to North
student Allison Lee placing sixth in the Northeast Foot Locker Championship um a couple weeks ago and now she'll be out in San Diego at the Nationals so congratulations to Alison wow thank you guys for your report um and letting us live
vicariously through all of your wonderful achievements and activities and um May the themes of chill and distress take through the two we break so enjoy and um thank you good
night um now I'm going to actually turn it over to Mark Tuscano um to uh brief us on a an amendment to the uh executive session resolution sorry we're just making sure we got the keys uh yeah just uh Madam president uh
in addition to the items that were noted on the agenda that was pre-printed prior to the meeting uh the board also discussed uh an exception number four uh in addition of a wwpa sidebar and memorandum of uh understanding uh an
exception number seven in addition to the item that was listed the board discussed the matter under docket number e113 we-6 7852 and the matter under docket number p221
0339 uh and finally uh for exception number seven uh the board also discussed uh matters and issues relating uh to the open public meetings Act and the uh upcoming uh loss of print newspapers in the
state thank you Mr that uh next I would like to turn it over to uh charity Cela our assistant superintendent for personnel uh for a presentation on diversity and hiring
any better y it's better all right good good it's a pleasure to be before you tonight to talk to you about diversity in hiring in the West Windsor Plainsboro Regional Schools something I'm particularly passionate about in my role as assistant
superintendent for personnel I know that our board of education is very familiar with our strategic goals um our staff is very invested all of our administrators are very very invested we spend a lot of time thinking about what is most important to us as we think
about educating our students and thinking about the future of our district uh specifically under goal four the West Windsor Plainsboro Regional School District will cultivate a diverse and inclusive community where members of every race sexual Orient ation gender
gender identity ability religion socioeconomics class ethnicity and national origin are welcomed valued respected and celebrated this very much lines up with the work that I'm going to talk to you about tonight so I remember asking you this
question last year and I still think it's worth asking again think about who inspired you in your Ro in your role as a board of education member or an administrator or in your career for work let's say think about
the person that inspired you you have them in your mind most likely that person was a mentor of sorts or someone that you looked up to perhaps it was a teacher or somebody who had leadership in your life
perhaps it was somebody who you when you saw them you felt like you could connect with them or relate to them there was something familiar about that person right to you and perhaps if it was someone who did not look like you or perhaps seem
like you maybe different gender maybe not necessarily from the same cultural background that person probably had an awareness about you and an ability to see your potential even though your experiences were much different than theirs because they have a broad array
of uh experience themselves in the people that they've known am I right I usually am on those things but without you know moving any further when we think about the word
diversity because there's a lot there's a very broad defin broad definitions to diversity it's not always just what's popular in the moment what's trendy it's not necessarily just what people think of when we think of our cultural
backgrounds diversity could mean a a lot of things okay and when you're thinking of who inspired you it might have been for one of these reasons that made them connect with you perhaps it's demographic diversity perhaps it was based on their age or their gender or
their race or physical abilities or some other demographic characteristics that reminded you of yourself perhaps it could be culture it could be differences in belief or maybe the sameness in beliefs for you um values customs and
traditions it could be their cognitive levels their perspectives their problem solving approaches their ways of thinking about things that reminded you of you it could be functional maybe it was the role they
had perhaps you were saying that's the first person that's had that position that looks kind of looks like me perhaps it's their skills or their areas of expertise within an organization I'll tell you right now if you start talking about genealogy I am your friend I will go in the corner and talk to you all
night long because that's something that I like but most of the time that's not the case in in a lot of large groups I don't see too many people that like it like I do it could be experiential it could be differences in life experiences educational backgrounds and professional
experiences that could be what connects you to someone right but all of those are also different definitions of diversity if we have people that have differences the more people that are different is how we make more students feel like they
have someone that's the same it's very very important that we have diverse Educators in our classrooms we know based on research and we also know from experience that representation matters students need to see examples of professionals that look like themselves
that they can connect to and they need to see reflection of that in their teachers which can Inspire them to perhaps aspire to be teachers and I don't know if you've noticed but we need teachers right I would like to see our future um prospects improve as far as
those who are entering and inspired to go into the field of Education diverse teachers bring different cultural perspectives and and experiences that can enrich the learning environment sometimes you know your your perspective and how you grew up when
you're around somebody might Cloud the way that you're thinking about something but talk to somebody else and they give you a whole different lens and they're able to help that person see things a little bit different cultural competency is critical especially with students that have lots of different
experiences and equity in education of course diverse teachers can help address achievement gaps and ensure that all students regardless of their background have access to high quality education sometimes you know it's a teacher that has grown up with a blended
family or it could be someone who's been adopted perhaps that teacher has had an experience that way that can see that student in a similar situation and is able to have an understanding of that student's aptitude in a way that a teacher who has not had that background could so diverse teachers and
administrators play a critical role in fostering an inclusive and Equitable environment it reflects our strategic goals and it helps remind us that students from all backgrounds can Thrive and reach their full potential so it's always a good practice practice to take a look at the current
national teacher demographics by race right now as of 20 the most recent statistics are showing that the majority of the teachers in the United States are white 79% now that percentage is lower than it was last year even it's dropped
a few few percentage points and you can see our other um major groups of student demographics range anywhere from Hispanic being 9% black 7% Asian 2% and other comprises a whole series of
smaller subcategories but if you look at student demographics by race in the United States um it still shows that white students make up the largest racial demographic in the US population but we start to see that the other major groups are starting to take larger pieces of
the pie right it's changing quite a bit if we look at the teacher demographics in New Jersey you'll see that the large most predominant group identify as white with significant underrepresentation of the other minority groups black students
16% Hispanic 7 Asian 2 and if we look at student demographics wow right a little bit different there's the teacher demographics in the state and here we have the student
demographics where all of a sudden those ratios those percentages are changing rapidly the student population is showing itself to be much more diverse with white and Hispanic students making up the largest racial groups in the state now we think how can we think
about what that means when we're looking at those National percentages and state percentages let's talk about West Winds or Plainsboro right how do we know how do we know how we rank when it comes to those percentages and one thing that we are required to do every even numbered
year is to file the eo5 the equal opportunity I mean yeah the Equal Opportunity um um uh Commission report right which is Ure it helps us make sure that we have um representation of staff from all different backgrounds and also
based on gender so it's collected by the by uh it's a federal report that is sent every two years and we're able to see how are we doing as a district across all positions not just um overall but also how many ad administrators are male how many are female how many are of
white background how many are Hispanic all the way across to Ser to support staff how many teachers how many are how many of them are special Educators how many of them are instructional assistants what about counselors it splices down all the different positions and we're able to take a look at that
and submit it every every couple of years West Winds or Plains Barrow we um one thing I've been doing under Dr adal's leadership is to really take that information and share share it with our administrators every year whether or not
it's a year that we submit the report so if we look at our student demographics in our district as of October of this past year we can see that we have 14% white 5% black 3% Hispanic 72% Asian
and another 4% comprises all other races which you'll see in the future slides we don't include so much we focused on the four major groups taking a look at the staff 74% white 5% black 5% Hispanic 14%
Asian and 2% other races so if you wanted to do a comparison take a look at that Top Line which has like the little cluster of people that's the student line and the bottom line which just has the single
larger people that's the teacher line so if we're looking at our students that identify as white 14% compared to the staff 74% we can think about those students
when they see examples of Professionals in the school districts that look like them there's an overproportional amount students that are that identify as white in our district are very likely to see
high achieving administrators teachers support staff every level of Staff we have representation for our students to Aspire and to think about what they might want to do when they grow up for a profession over and above they almost can't not see it
right let's take a look at our black population the student line 5% the staff line 5 5% 5% is not a very large number when you think 95% of Staff right are not black however those 5% of students are
seeing a a proportionate ratio of staff um that they might think about aspiring to now we do take a look at what positions those staff members have of course because we don't want to see an overabundance of Staff in particular roles such as in support roles or
Administration or teachers we would like to see all examples but at least we know that the percentages are somewhat reciprocal our Hispanic students 3% and our staff
5% and when we look at our Asian population for students 72% versus 14% And like I mentioned on the first slide with the students that identify white and staff that identify um as white look at our students that are
Asian when they are looking for examples of professional that maybe represent positions that they would aspire to they are not likely to see very many of them they are not likely to see very many representatives
that um that are working necessarily as administrators in their schools or as teachers um or as support staff so we do pay attention to the positions that we hire and where we're hiring them for and we try very hard to make sure that we're diversifying the pool of staff so that
all of our students no matter which of those major four groups are likely to see examples of themselves because you know what we have to remember is we do not just teach subject matter we don't just Tre teach to the curriculum we teach our students
right we have to think about our students how to how they come to us today and also what our students of the future might need and many times the first impression that we have about our own aspirations or our own abilities comes from who we're looking at who do
we see when you walk into a room and you think about where you want to sit you're probably looking for someone like you before you get to know them you might change it up a little bit but your first impression usually comes from who's like me right I saw you do it in the
boardroom I saw where you where you sat in the other room but we do it as people as human beings that's what we do we look for same we look to try to be together and we want our students to also have be have the ability to be able to do the same and say okay there's someone that's like me there's someone
that I think would understand my point of view they're someone that looks like they had an experience or perhaps something they that I know about them tells me that perhaps I can go to them and be inspired so every year one thing that we
make a practice of doing every fall is I I get to come in front of all of our administrators and we talk about our new hires that have come in and and report on the um statistics that were submitted for um this helps us see how we're doing just with you know each year on our new hires
and so just looking back at 2021 we had 106 new hires and you can see our percentage is 24% of them were Asian 6% black 6% Hispanic 58% white let's take a look at 2022 we only
had 70 hirers that year 21% Asian 4% black 10% % Hispanic and 63% white and in 2023 83 hires 5% that year Asian 4% black 4% Hispanic and
65% white for 2024 this year's new highers 106 new hes 25% were Asian five are black 6% are Hispanic and 61% are identify as white and if we wanted to
see the breakdown of this year's hires you can see out of those 25% Asian staff seven of them are cafeteria AIDS eight instructional assistants but we have seven teachers two security monitors and two Community Ed members if we go over to Hispanic you'll
see there's again lots of variety across the positions for these particular groups two cafeteria AIDS two IAS one counselor and three teachers when we look at our black administrators one administrator one instructional assistant One Security
Monitor and three teachers have you noticed that there's teachers across all of those categories and a good number of them and then when we look at our 61% White staff we have administrators coun we have two counselors a psychologist nurses secretary speech therapists
teachers and an instructional assistant so it's really um important for us to think about when we're when we're looking for representation that we're looking across all positions and for all students so overall we're doing pretty well if you average just the last couple
of years um with our new hires on average 19% Asian 5% black 7% Hispanic and 62% white but the most telling data for me is when I take a look at the staff
breakdown over time so I mentioned ear earlier our staff demographics this is the same slide that I showed you earlier with 74% white 5% black 5% Hispanic and 14% Asian if we compare the statistics of
our staff from the first time I stood up and presented to our administrators back in 2016 we were at 9% Asian staff and now we are at 14% overall in the district that's a pretty significant increase we
still have ways to go but that's that's quite a bit black staff first time I presented was 3% now we're at 5% again we're seeing an increase in
diversity Hispanic staff 2% and now 5% and white staff 82% and 74% now because of the changes for the other groups that are also being um hired so all of us play a critical role in in
working together to Foster our diverse and inclusive Haven for Education this is not just about who's in who's out who's let who's included who's not included you know why am I not represented but it's not about that it's about thinking about how all of our
students have diverse needs and perspectives and experiences and the more diverse our staff are in their experience in their cultural background in their ethnicities all of the different ways that diversity can be defined the more diverse staff the more
varied perspectives that we bring makes us better at what we do all of you because of your diverse background serving on the board of education makes you a strong board makes you have multiple perspectives our administrative team is very very diverse with
experience and ethnicity and background and have some of our administrators have worked in other districts that are large small and it's it's amazing it's magical when you can hear them working together and thinking about um what how we can do something better with our procedures in
the district when you go around and you hear our staff our staff are excellent we have very very dedicated staff that are always very very much working on how they can improve what they can do better and um very much Buy in it's something
I'm very proud of I'm I'm proud of all of our staff it's um a reason why I love doing the work that I do is because of the people so I appreciate your support and letting me share our our efforts in diversity and um I'm happy to take questions answer any questions that you
might have thanks charity um any questions from the board Rachel goe thank you charity that was a great presentation I got it um was curious about a lot of times the diversity of our our hiring is going to also be based
on the diversity of the applicants and so was curious about how we're ensuring you that our D the applicant pool is diverse but also I guess the second part to the question is a lot of that is also going to be dependent upon upon teaching
programs having diverse um students right uh taking and and wanting to be teachers so are you seeing any efforts there as well from different programs trying to attract diverse um diverse students into the
teaching profession yeah well you're absolutely right on uh the fact that it's more than just one reason it's not just that Westminster Plainsboro is not looking for diverse stat that's obviously not true I mean we can show um supports that we are but it's it's a problem across all school districts
right you're you're correct the pool is not diverse the teaching the universities do not have diverse recruits and um it is something that a lot of times we can just say Well they're just not applying to our position so I suppose we're not looking that is something that um we as a
district um have not been doing we have still been very actively recruiting and one of those ways is um by our membership in our Consortium for NJ stride it's a Consortium of now 93 school districts in the state that all kind of come together and say what what's going on what can we do um how
can we work together as a network and because we're a Statewide now Consortium we have a lot of influence on um when we talk to universities we're we're talking as a as a giant Consortium and I have to uh to let you know that West winster
Plainsboro is very much at the front of that line so we are asked for and um asked for advice on what we're doing in our district what our staff members are doing and how we're doing that so a lot of it has to do with training and U making sure your administrators are aware of any kind of biases that we
might have or what are some other perspective that we can be looking at but um with NJ stride we do have Outreach and marketing to specific universities we do reach out to historically black colleges and universities which is where we're more likely to see our diverse candidates uh
we check and we have a great partnership with all of our universities um the board has approved a Pathways to teaching program for our um District support staff if especially our instructional assistance if they are interested in becoming teachers we do have financial assistance for them for
tuition reimbursement and partnership with Ryder University and the College of New Jersey for them to just go right into uh a program that will help them uh receive their either bachelor's degree or perhaps teaching certification and then be able to be hired by us we have a
um paid student teaching program now that the new teacher program which we're very proud of we just finished um our last meeting with the staff um that's an incentive for um us to go and really consider the applicants that um are coming to us and again thinking of
diversity we are looking for the underrepresented which might mean we don't have anybody to teach biology you know it might be there's only one person at Ryder University who's coming out with that certification and guess who got them we
did so that um has a lot to do with Dr ader hold's Forward Thinking on let's try to get our recruits you know if we're going to you know um to incentivize them to come to us our district is very attractive for Educators it always has been um but um I
think with the the feeling of being sought after being recruited um that really does mean a lot especially now with education where not too many people are saying hey why don't you go into teaching we're not hearing that so much
anymore so we have to you know bring up the morale for education and we have to think about what are those things that we can do um we have a scholarship program through NJ stride where we have um scholarships for all all member districts that um students will could be selected for scholarships we have a
legislative committee that um watches the bills that are coming out uh we are very involved with the Department of Education and have a lot to do with um potential changes that could help us um remove the barriers for outof State residents that are interested in
teaching and um we're very proud because our superintendent has served on two task force has been named to two task force um by the governor for um Staffing shortage and also um for um the teacher evaluation he's he's always sought after
and asked for because of the great works that is happening in in our district so I hope that helps to answer your question these are things we have to stay focused on anybody else no well thank you so much for um
collecting all this data over the last several years to be able to really see at a glance um where we could use more representation and um how much um we have improved over the years so thanks so much thank you and now we can move on
to our first opportunity for public comments the board invites thoughts and reactions on agenda items and items of concern from members of our community who are present each participant is asked to give his or her name an address prior to making a statement which will be limited to three minutes in accordance with board policy
0167 all statements shall be directed to the presiding officer this public comment period shall be limited to 60 Minutes um do you have any comments for this first period uh Debbie Debbie bear I'm uh teacher in the district and a member of
the uh Teachers Association of course um I wanted to talk a little bit about a program that we have um through Jaa were able to get a variety of Grants um and we maximize that opportunity I happen to be the chair of that committee so I'm
well aware of the amount of money it's approximately $60,000 that we're able to apply for and get grants for and so I wanted to talk about a couple in the area of community relations and sort of other support not the educational
process which of course you know we're part of that um so uh this this one type of Grant is public education Partnerships and so we have about $30,000 in those grants and they could range in anything from Little League
sponsorships you know for teams or we support both of the food pantries one in um West Windsor and one in Plainsboro um we work with pamma on a variety of other ways that we can support their Dei with the district so
that students are able to get things that they might not otherwise be able to get and the one I wanted to talk about tonight is very specific because it happened on the Black Friday which I kept saying are you sure that's the date you want this event to happen and they
said yes we wanted that date and I said really we won't be in school and what it was was the 25th anniversary of a program that we have at High School North only called the academy and it's a remarkable program
it's an a very very innovative program that allows kids who have a variety of complicators in their lives to have additional support and sort of a home base within the high school so they said to me we want to do a 25th
anniversary I was like all right that sounds fun um so we were able to write the grant so there was food and on my Facebook page I saw pictures about how great it was and people were raving about it so I want you to know that Alba Flynn and Deb rat
were really the coordinators of that event I wrote the grant we got some money they bought the food they ran the event they made it happen and they invited they got over 80 people to attend on Black Friday in school they had it in the classroom which I think
the kids loved who are of course adults now um they had at least one person from the very first class from 25 years ago and then a variety of faculty see Mr ziki was there um so administrators went
teachers went AIDS went current teachers you know current student everyone could go and they had a ball and it shows it's nice that teachers our teachers union can help support that because that was an event that without food would have been less interesting
and without that kind of support I'm sorry but it also reminds us that not everyone is necessarily going going to take the pathway that we might all plan as we sit around and talk about education and thanks Debbie the fact
that they all came back was really huge you're welcome Sor thank you yep um any other public comments for this first period no seeing none I'll close this uh public comment period and next we'll move on to committee reports so I'd like
to invite uh Dana to give us a report on Administration and Facilities good evening every um the a&f committee met on December 3rd the committee reviewed um several policies regul and regulations and recommends an
additional review at the next um ANF committee meeting which will be in January on two Pol uh a policy and regulation 7510 use of school facilities District facility use by Community groups and local organizations was discussed
including facility rental fees and Associated costs as for referendum updates punch lists and the closeout process are complete for the media centers at moris Hawk and Village Elementary Schools uh Dr McDonald provided the
committee with an update on the advancement via individual determination known as Avid that program is at High School North and High School South and he shared with us the um selection process curriculum and instruction and College and Career Readiness programming
the Avid contract for the 2025 2026 school year was reviewed and discussed the committee next discuss discussed a proposed 2026 2027 academic calendar additional stakeholder feedback will be reviewed before approval is considered by the
entire Board of Education we will the ANF committee will next meet on January 21st thanks Lena any questions from the board okay uh L I'll turn over to you for a curriculum committee report thank
you the curriculum committee met on uh December 3rd we discussed the program of studies Dr gold and the committee reviewed remaining questions about the program of studies and additional language that will be added to the uh program to clarify the process utilized to determine the change in um students
grade uh Next program studies the committee recommends we're talking about the um high school program of studies the curriculum committee recommends approval of uh the 2025 2026 high school program of studies tonight
um also uh the curriculum committee recommends approval for the community ed education programs for spring and summer 2025 programs um specifically for Youth and adult programs three listed here
lent and lent SAT and ACT test prep spring break stroke and turn swim swim camp and the spring break family recreational swim right last but but not least oh no I'm sorry professional development we also discuss professional development and on the agenda uh tonight
the committee recommends approval for the following de uh professional development Consultants uh first center for counseling services to facilitate One 90minut Professional de development session to District staff on February 14th at a total uh cost not to exceed
$1,200 and the second consultant Reggie Wright Enterprise to facilitate a two 45-minute professional development sessions to District staff also on the 14th at a cost of 14th of February at a cost not to exceed $2,000 uh and then last but not least
field trips approve the curriculum committee uh recommends approval of the following first for Grover Middle School the pollinator Garden Keepers Club um for them to go to New Jersey school of conservation uh in Sandston New Jersey from February 12th through the 13th the
cost of the trip is approximately $150 per student High School Southville trip for The Debate Club uh to Harvard University for the 2025 tournament uh from February 14th through the 17th the cost of the trip is approximately
$475 per student and then uh High School North uh two field trips the robotics team to Lehigh University from April 3rd through the 5th of uh next year at the cost of the trip approximately $300 per student and also again the robotics team
to George R Brown Convention Center in Houston Texas from April 15th through the 20th the cost of that trip is approximately $800 per student the committee will next meet on January 21st thanks ly um any questions or comments
from the board for okay um next we'll move on to Louisa for finance great thank you the finance committee also met on December 3rd we started with reviewing the agenda items for tonight's meeting the administration affirmed that no major accounts are overex ended and
that sufficient funds are available to complete the year the committee reviewed the following motions on the agenda for approval approval leasing to approve leasing software to manage Student Activity funds to award a transportation quote for a school route and to approve staff professional development travel
and expenses next staff updated the committee on solar renewable energy credits we sell these about twice a year an online auction will take place on January 15th of 2025 the administ ation shareed the 2025 26 budget calendar this Thursday a
budget meeting will take place including the superintendent assistant superintendent and assistant ba next staff updated the committee on the Energy savings Improvement program number two the capital projects that can be funded through esip 2 have been identified a meeting is scheduled for
Thursday to finalize the contract with the Energy savings company Snider Electric in the coming months motions will be presented to approve the Energy savings company and the Energy savings conservation measures for cafeteria Services Southwest Food Service
Excellence has been performing well but continues to face challenges with fully Staffing their operations although they hired three new staff members last month two took a leave of absence and two resigned resulting in net loss of one employee by the end of the month while we had hoped that the new vendor would
boost daily lunch sales this has not yet occurred despite these challenges SF is now serving breakfast on half days a goal that was difficult ult to achieve in previous years U Transportation had been discussed earlier under section one uh the committee reviewed the agenda for
the upcoming reorganization meeting scheduled for January 7th I flipped too quickly uh the finance committee discussed the proposed increase in facilities use fees and requested additional information from The Other Board Committee in other business staff reported that the High
School North dimmer rack replacement project is scheduled to begin on December 16th the committee will next meet on Tuesday January 21st perfect thanks Louisa um any questions or comments from the rest of the board uh okay that takes us to the
voting portion of our meeting um for can I get a motion for administration items numbers one through six Dana and uh Liz um questions or comments okay okay if we start with Miss
Krug yes Miss chenera yes Miss zovich yes Miss ho yes Miss Mal yes Miss shett yes Miss Juliana Miss McAn yes now can I get a motion for curriculum and instruction items numbers one through
five um ly and Rachel any questions or comments okay okay we we okay we we'll start we'll start with Miss malga yes Miss jenera yes Miss ho yes Miss Krug yes Miss Shetty yes Miss zich yes Miss
Juliana yes Miss McKuen yes can I get a motion for finance items numbers 1 through 7 Louisa and scha uh any questions or comments okay we'll start with Miss hoe yes Miss Shetty yes Miss Chenier yes
Miss Krug yes Miss malga yes Miss zich yes Miss Juliana yes Miss fan yes um can I get a motion for personal item number one plus um we have five agenda green yellow pink orange and purple um and to
note on the uh Personnel agenda one of these is about the um uh there are 11 redundancies listed for the Lifeguard position um basically more of a clerical thing about ask charity if to Y on the Personnel agenda the white one the one that went out to you in the mail under
lifeguards there's a section says change we had to we had to make some changes for minimum wage and we accidentally overrode the names of the people that we had on a different section so we had them double we had them on one section and on the other so on the addendum you'll see the correct names for lifeguard changes so I'd like you to
just um strike those 11 lifeguards underneath change if you go to extracurricular um and uh just pretend they're not there wipe them out because we have them on the addendum you'll be approving them on the addendum it's on
page seven I think five i s on page seven it's on seven on the bottom of seven there's four lifeguards under change and then the other seven are on the next page it's just put an X through
there all right thank you thank you um so uh a motion for uh Personnel items as amended um ly and Rachel questions comments okay we we we'll start we'll start with
Miss malga yes Miss Shetty yes Miss zich yes Miss chenera yes Miss ho yes Miss KR yes Miss Juliana yes M mcon yes um before we move on I do want to acknowledge a couple of retirements that we approved uh under Personnel um first
is Thomas Connelly he is our High School North technology teacher he has been with the district for 31 years and Christine estan our High School South security Aid who has been with the district for 17 years so we want to thank you for your years of dedication
and service to our district um congratulations on your retirement and all the best for new adventures ahead and um we don't have any Board of Education minutes to approve um so I'll ask if we have any board liais on
reports for this evening nope um okay um new business all right well oh do you have new business okay all right well as part of new business uh Dr ader hold and I would like to um acknowledge a very special
person on the board okay um so to Rachel Juliana our current president and uh immediate former um president of the board um you
are leaving us after what 10 years of uh service to our board so um we want to thank you for your friendship your guidance um your mentorship and um it's been an absolute pleasure serving on the board with you
um we were going to miss you on Tuesday nights Etc um last Etc um you are the epitome of fairness reason and empathy and um
it's been such it's an asset to our Collective board and the administration and um thank you for your dedication to uh not just our community but um to uh the schools and staff and
most importantly to all of our students and we just want to wish you the best of luck and everything and um enjoy your Tuesday nights for us okay um I'd also like to just Echo um my thanks uh for your 10 years of service
on the board of education uh two years as president time as vice president um to the community that may not realize it's it's a tremendous amount of volunteer hours to be a member of the Board of Education um and it's no less
than 40 40 nights per per week per year excuse me um per week per year uh but it's also time in preparation and reading materials that are sent and um and when you when you do it right you come prepped and you come prepared and
you do your work um and you've always done that you've been uh uh you know it looks like we have all uh yes votes uh tonight uh but the realities behind the scenes and committee meetings a lot of things don't get here unless they're a yes vote and so the Board of Education
serves as a community voice to push our thinking to push the administration um and it takes a lot of work to get us to Yes um and and that's because of real thoughtful insightful questions and diligence and hard work and uh and
having an understanding of the community and being willing to represent them and you've done that so gracefully for the last 10 years so thank you for everything [Applause] Rachel uh thank you this is very
overwhelming um and I was just about to ask if I could say a few words so that actually worked out really well uh you know I had been uh like you said it's been 10 years and I'd say the last few weeks I've been trying to reflect on
the last 10 years um here on the board I can't actually uh believe that when I started my kids were my two kids were in kindergarten in first grade and now they're both in high school the oldest is uh looking into colleges already so
it's just been an amazing 10 years this journey um um I've learned so much from being on this board and from from all of you um so I just want to thank everybody for for everything that I've learned and
I mean this this experience has been really uh very has taught me not only a lot but has also given me so many relationships that I've built over the years uh you
know for you know starting with just the parents over the last 10 years years who have come to Advocate advocate for your children I know we haven't always agreed on on how we end up but I think the fact that we've always had the same goal of
students first I think is is a wonderful thing that everyone at the end of the day has the same goal um our students are just amazing um it's it you know every year I am just amazed at how impressive they
all are and not just you know through their academic achievements but just everything else their their generosity their kindness and I know a lot of that too has to do with uh the teachers in this District um the amazing staff the
administrators the all of the work that you all put in to making this District such a great place um this Administration has just been amazing All of You Chris Barbara Sue charity
uh lee even you Mark I mean it's it's just been such a great experience this board over the last 10 years we've had I've had the opportunity to meet a lot of board members and I've learned something from
every single board member but the last three years this particular board has just been these women have just been the kindest most generous smartest women that I've worked with and
so thank you so much for all of that and all of your friendship um last but not least Dr aderhold I mean you've you've you know we've been working together for 10 years now and uh you are just such a
passionate and dedicated leader it always blows my mind mind how you just know everything about this District like without having to look up any notes any question we ask you just know it right off the top of your head and and how much you care for the students of this
district is just so apparent in the decisions that you make so thank you so much for your leadership but most of all your friendship so thank you all I really appreciate this last 10 years and I will miss you all and I will be cheering everybody from the sidelines so
thank [Applause] you okay with that um are there is there any other new business okay um moving on then to our
second opportunity for public comments the board invites comments from members of our community who are present each participant is asked to give his or her name and address prior to making a statement which will be limited to 3 minutes in accordance with board policy 0167 all statements shall be directed to
the to the presiding officer this public comment period shall be limited to 15 minutes hello hi G of Honda Plains bro uh I actually left the flowers and chocolate at home I thought there's a special meeting on December 17th and that's when we are going to facilitate
uh you Rachel so sorry about that but hopefully you're there on December 17th and you know I can we can do something about that uh I still remember when I met you first I think it was way back we had just moved into the district 2015
2016 I think my daughter was still in wof at that point uh I can only say that I only seen you grow younger more beautiful and more mature in that period and uh I've been coming to these board meetings for 2 three years now and uh
I've have seen the kind of questions and statements and uh other things things uh you know that are talked about here uh you're actually a role model for me for the calmness that you express in addressing that and uh I think one of the important things that you said uh
really uh you know Echoes my sentiments as well which is it's always students first we here for our students uh we have a great District it's a Well reputated District so we should always keep our students first so uh congratulations and uh I don't know what
your next plan is but I'm sure you'll do well wherever you go uh the next question was uh you know more to do with social media policies and uh I think it's more of advice
uh I have looked at a lot of sources and I think a lot of us are socially active we need to be in our personal capacity uh from what I've seen with the school ethics commission it tends to frown upon uh any social media activity and it expects uh you know all of us to kind of
uh keep in mind that uh we may be expressing things in our personal capacity but uh you know communities can be very forgiving but one thing I tell my child also is when you put something online it stays online so I think all of us need to be careful about that and
make sure that uh you know when we post something online it kind of reflects our values and the values that we pursue in the school district whether it is about mental health or uh you know putting students first and things like that so that's very important uh the third thing which is my pet be project is late
school start uh I don't think my daughter will be able to benefit from it I mean I should not say that you know there's always hope but uh maybe you know the other parents the other residents that are moving to the school district can so to that extent since we're going into budget cycle uh one of
the recommendations that I think resonated with the most of the board as put up by Dr MacDonald also in his presentation a year ago was you know there are five recommendations that he put up so one of the most prominent ones of about doing a stakeholder survey so
it's really a question uh I hope it's addressed uh you know is there anything that we are planning to put in the budget regarding a stakeholder survey or any budget that's allocated to any of the five recommendations which uh helps us take care of uh L school start so that's all I had from my side and uh you
know hopefully I'll see you in the next meeting right thank you thank you do we have any other public comments for this second opportunity hi everyone my name is Tatiana I'm a West Windsor resident um today I'd like to brainstorm with you
about how we can Implement 30 minute lunch and recess periods for the kindergarten through fifth grade students in the upcoming 2025 2026 school year to do this I want to focus on the three major concerns which are the teachers contract time and
space let's start with the teachers contract currently teachers are entitled to a 40-minute lunch what if the additional 20 minutes were used for common planning time within grade level teams a chance for teachers to actually
collaborate and plan together it wouldn't require teachers to submit additional paperwork and they'd still be working during that time this seems like a fair solution for both the union and the board and could potentially be implemented without requiring immediate
change to the contract then there's the issue of time we could try to break it up into three lunches one from 10:30 to 11:30 another from 11:35 to 12:35 and the last from 12:40 to
1:40 yet the question remains where are these extra 20 minutes going to come from I think the simplest answer would be to spread it out let's say on a typical day we have been we have between five to six subjects being taught if we
took just three to four minutes out of each one of those subjects we could have enough time to give each kindergarten through fifth grade Stu each kindergarten through fifth grade student a 30- minute lunch in recess periods finally there's the issue of
space for that I'd say let's look outward and collaborate with our peers we cannot be the only district with small lunchrooms trying to navigate these waters for instance we already collaborate with the Princeton School District on the DLI program perhaps we
can ask them how they handle similar challenges my point in all of this is that sometimes we just need to brainstorm we to be able to brainstorm with others collaborate and try let's Reach Out to the elementary Union reps and see if they'd be willing to use
those 20 minutes as common planning time let's sit down with the elementary principles and other other staff to figure out timing and space all it takes is an open mind and collaboration and sometimes that's all you need for
success thank you and happy holidays thank you um any other public comment no I know want to do additional um all right well um with
that seeing done I will close this P public comment period and uh move to adjourn so can I get a motion to adjourn uh Robin and Louisa uh all in favor say
I I thank you have a good night