chapter 231 notice of this meeting has been properly advertised in the Daily Record the Suburban Trends its agenda has been posted at the appropriate locations and a copy has been filed with the banic Township Clerk thank you we please Co roll Mr Bloomer here Mr cesi here M Dempsey here Mrs Esposito here Mr K is absent Mr mweene is absent Mr Pompeo is absent Mr siic here and Mrs shenon is absent we have a quorum thank you everyone please stand for the flag Sak good evening everyone Welcome to our July 22nd meeting I don't have a report tonight but I do want to give an update on the veterans wall project as you can see we're starting in Earnest and we hope to complete the project before school starts in September over the next few weeks you will see the front of pths be transformed I'm very excited for this work to start and I want to thank the contractors and designers that are donating their services and those contractors and designers are Frank samero construction La design and construction Spano and Sun General Contracting STC electric green nature landscape design moris and Bergen irrigation Solutions architecture Corp Doug Rank and landscape design B&B sustainable landscape and irrigation Bay County welders Wayne electrical supply solomone brothers and Unilock pavers the board appreciates your help and we want to say thank you and with that I'll hand it over to Dr poris thank you Mr Sanic and deviating a bit from my script I just want to Echo that sentence as well the generosity of our community to step up in terms of time Talent effort and resources it's just it's astonishing and I I've been in on these meetings um leading up to the beginning of this process and just as the good news kept pouring in I guess I was never once surprised but it's still it is remarkable and I appreciate Mr San's taking over with really coordinating with contractors and the rate at which they're working is is is really quick and I'm excited to have the official unveiling to coincide with Veterans Day but it looks like the work is going to be done really well in advance of that so just very exciting stuff um on to my prepared comments just want to two report on two things one is our admin Retreat we conducted our admin Retreat last week and enjoy an intense and enjoyable two days reflecting on the 2324 school year and laying the foundation for success in 2425 and of course Beyond we began with data presentations that integrated multiple data sources with our preliminary NJ SLA results we'll be reporting on those in the fall we emphasize addressing Trends and determining what worked and what needs to be improved and use that information to guide the goal setting process that followed What I really like to is I feel like the conversations were very honest um where we did well there was a lot of credit given to the multiple stakeholders responsible for that and where we need to see Improvement there was very honest assessment of what needs to be addressed our work was Guided by sense of mission for improving outcomes while doing so collaboratively uh day two engage in legal training which focused on a number of timely and ongoing topics with our longtime friend Mr Tony skillo as our presenter Dr Sheridan let us through additional work in the curriculum writing process and encouraged us to explore options for our valuation protocols before we enjoyed a team building lunch which was a lot of fun and just great to just see um it's like old friends getting together and something I was really impressed with is we had one supervisor there who actually doesn't work for us yet um her official start date is August 1st and that's Miss bardine know and she brought some great ideas and then our interim director of student services prek to 5 Miss V Miss vle um was here on Tuesday and also participated in The Retreat on Wednesday and Thursday I bring this up specifically because I was really proud of how the team brought them right into the fold there was no looking at somebody saying oh you got to prove your yourself or any of that type of stuff it was you're here you're here to help let's go uh make your voice heard and they were confident enough to make their voices heard and I felt like our team was confident enough to accept input from people that were really just meeting um and just looking ahead we're looking to we're planning to present the district goals to the board and community in early or late September and are excited to be sure for the year to come as far as the Director of curriculum instruction interviews as you know uh my good friend Dr Sheridan is retiring at the end of August um I'm begrudging her a bit but I'm also very very happy for her but today we held a meeting with our interview committee as we look to begin round one interviews tomorrow our procedures organized with an intention to detail and collaboration logic there is just as the candidates are looking to Market themselves to us we want to ensure that they see the best our district has to offer and that our expectations are great and our support systems are even greater we trust the process as has produced tremendous results over the past five years and we look to appoint an outstanding candidate at the August aard meeting I believe it's August 19th we'll have somebody in place for board approval then and we'll look to get that person started either September 1st or October 20th depending on when that person can be released from the current situation and finally one thing I add a handwritten note to myself you may notice um and a lot of the um signatures for the admin team I did encourage them to re-evaluate the signatures on their emails to make sure they're efficient and don't use the font Arial but we also came up with something I really like a lot of them are starting to use a little logo that we found uh to market the the term attendance matters I think that's a really important phrase something that we discovered is that attendance really does play a significant role in student achievement outcomes um and I actually have a meeting set up for tomorrow Dr Shir at North Boulevard has already disaggregated student attendance data to determine where we see concerns with students who are um frequently or chronically absent and we want to see the the correlation and probably causality between frequent absences and and measurable learning outcomes so if you see a lot of those attendance matters um slogans or or logos around get used to it you're gonna be seeing a lot of it you're gonna be hearing a lot of it that's something we really want to hook into to really reinforce the need to be here and that concludes my report well we're going to do a presentation maybe we'll give Gordon a chance to talk about his uh his U business administrator report and then Dr Sher and I will present okay good evening go right ahead good evening there was an inspection done on all the playgrounds for the school district and it was deemed that several items on the older playground for students ages 5 through 12 at the North Boulevard school have to be replaced to ensure an appropriate level of safety uh the estimated cost for the replacement is $64,000 through Ben schaer playgrounds we are looking into other possible vendors as well as any grants that may be available to help reduce the cost to the school district the reconditioning of the ball fields will not be completed until September 2024 due to the heat during the summer months weather permitting the resurfacing of the parking lot at the high school will be completed at the end of next week the outside molding around the top of the gym at the high school is in the process of being replaced as parts of the molding have come off the building over the years the cost of the replacement is $5,300 of which there is a board resolution on tonight's agenda to for approval on July 3rd I reached out to the county office regarding the property located at 7even Industrial Road in panic as a possible future site for the board office and preschool according to the county office the district cannot use the third floor of the building for a preschool program but it could use the second floor the third floor could be used for gened or specialed students as long as the classroom sizes are in compliance with State guidance currently there are offices being leased on the second floor the building of which the last lease won't end until 2029 the current leases will help offset the cost of running the building as well as help offset the loss of rent from the post office my plan of action includes the use of capital reserve funds to purchase the building until the SDA Grant of$ 1.7 million doll has been received as well as the proceeds from the sale of the property that is located where the board office currently resides I'm still waiting on the appraisal for the property located at the board office in order to make a final determination of my plan of action once all the funds have been received from the SDA Grant and the sale of the board office property the capital reserve account would be replenished the asking price of the building is $2,850 th000 if everything goes according to plan a referendum will not be needed this is just a reminder that we are in the process of setting up the October 2024 New Jersey school board Workshop a hotel reservations so we will need to know how many board members will be attending and which nights they will be staying at the Hard Rock Hotel the overnight lodging dates are Monday October 21st through Wednesday October 23rd and finally the 10th town meeting will be held on Tuesday July 30th at 7M located at the high school auditorium excuse me the town meeting will be a Zone boarding of adjustment meeting regarding the approval of one school Global's new facility that will be located across the street from the high school thank you um I do have a on a question on that so a property that we're looking at is on Industrial Road correct that's correct and um do we think that we will be doing any busing at that point because of the distance like that's almost the farthest part of town for I don't know what our busing Ru is what is it 1.9 miles or something like that two miles two miles so um I don't know if if you guys have ever tried to pull out of Industrial Road at certain times of the day but with a bus it's going to be very difficult I don't know if that's something that you want to uh speak with I guess the police first of all I mean there there might be something that they may have to come down every day you know to direct traffic or something to that effect but I just don't want you guys to be surprised because um Gold Glove is down there and anytime you try to get out of there with you know it's the what is it the softball practice and stuff and it's very difficult to get out of that make a left turn there great that's part of the process in purchasing the property we would have a traffic um study done to see what would what would be the impact you know we don't anticipate having a large number of buses down there because there wouldn't be that many classrooms right right so it's quite we would have it done yeah I didn't think so and the worst traffic is at like 4:35 o' which will be done but um there could be a problem in the morning trying to once they drop kids off getting out of there yeah so just a thought yeah I appreciate that thank you any other questions I'm sorry did you say that we could not have preschool classrooms on the first floor or third floor on the third floor but we could second floor on the second floor okay first floor is totally empty because that's a flood zone and that floor is left empty on purpose got it in case there's a flood okay and so then second floor would be could be preschool preschool third floor could not it would be Board office that would be okay and the second floor has the leases that are until 2029 so we would have to wait that out yeah okay well it's in stages I mean not there's a number of offices it's not just like one office occupying the whole floor so they're going to be coming up in different stages different staggered stages okay is the first floor allowed to be used as a uh an allpurpose room that has no fixtures of any sort no it's right now they're using it for storage yeah it'll be storage that you could you could lose and be okay just in case of a FL we don't have an answer on this yet but one of the things we're hoping to find out is if uh the first floor could actually be considered a basement problem is it's not actually submerged but um I think it might be a shot in the dark but a shot worth taking just the same yeah I've checked with the architect he's going to get back to me yeah any other questions no thank you all am I am I good to roll with the ngj GPA you are good the role with the ngj GPA thank you very much all right um Dr Sharon and I are going to present on our results for the ngj GPA which is the New Jersey graduation profess proficiency assessment um the way we're going to break it down is as we go through the slides Loosely enough I can translate as if it has a lot of text on it Dr Sheridan will talk about it if it has a lot of numbers on it I I'll take take over on that one we'll stay where we are I just think it's more efficient and effective instead of trying to share that Podium I'm just reporting from where we are just we can both keep our microphones on and I do have the clicker so I'll be able to control the slides so um we'll we will make this publicly available um after the presentation as well we'll have Mr Shay and his team put this up on the website so the first slide is obviously indicating that it is the results report and I'll give Dr Shar an opportunity to talk about what is the NJ GPA it's got It's got taxed it's an assessment um so this is our graduation um assessment for our grade 11 students it is a requirement by the state um and it does focus on the priority standards and those standards and skills that we emphasize um and spiral up from prek to uh to grade 11 um the mathematics um Ela again is aligned to our grade uh 10 standards because it's happening in March and so not everybody's all at the same page so they're using last year's standards same with our mathematics they're not testing Algebra 2 they're testing algebra one in Geometry so you know there's pros and cons here um for the ELA which has this spiraling of um standards over and over again um you're going to see some tremendous results math it's a little bit more challenging especially for students who may have been uh not having algebra for a little while so we'll talk about that at the end in our next steps oh wow okay um okay so the um the cut score was um was in I think it was decreased actually yeah down to 725 um and again this is this is a graduation requirement so all students must take the test um they don't all have to pass it but they have to take the test in order to uh use other Pathways in order to determine their uh graduation Readiness so if they don't uh achieve a cut score of 725 or higher then they can use uh other assessments such as sat that are outlined on the district website if students fail to meet or that we can also do access scores um and if they fail to achieve a graduation Readiness or demonstrate it through that pathway they can complete a portfolio so we are very hopeful that um our continued focus on this and and targeted IND destruction will eliminate the need for the portfolio um but um it is it is uh necessary for some students you're you're up quite high in the helicopter so you get an overview and if there's something that you really want to get a better look at you lower the helicopter down so um this is a very small snapshot of student achievement and exclusively for juniors good news is um our proficiency score our percentage for proficiency was 100% in ela um for the state was 81.6 obviously we outdistanced that um every every group on which we can report which is a group with greater than 10 students um we we have 100% uh and as Dr sherid mentioned from 22 to 23 the cut score went up from sorry went down from 750 to 725 2024 it remained at 725 um we also have access it's not here but we have access to an average scale score so not only did we see all of our students with IEPs passing we also saw them um scoring higher in their scale score the bad news is we literally cannot improve upon this score so um the best we can do is hold math we still have some some room to grow um but I'm very happy to report that our overall passing rate increased in this area as well we saw the state actually went down a little bit in its passing rate from 55 down to 54.7 uh on the other hand we went from a 71.1% passing rate up to 77.2 our scale score also we saw the state increase by one score we saw an increase for ourselves of six points so I'm really happy to see that um we only have enough numbers to report on in three demographic groups our Hispanic and Latino group um saw a really nice Improvement there as well as did our students with 504s we lost progress with our students with IEPs which is obviously something that we need to address the good thing is their scale scores went up so though our passing rate went down our scale score actually increased so we're GNA look to build on that success and generally with standardized testing you do see students uh who are classified struggling more with the math than they do with the language section and that certainly held true here and the next slide is essentially a chance to brag which I'm more than happy to share that with Dr thank you so um under the the direction of Miss Abrams who was the uh Ela supervisor here for the last couple of years um a couple things she really stressed um and emphasized coming home was having um the the common writing rubric the um for all Ela classes modeled after um the one used by NJ GPA so there was a lot more consistency in scoring um and in and uh providing some released items uh for for teachers to model and for students to practice on um one of the things that we worked on in was expanding the classroom libraries um increased circulation of books in the library and that um Choice reading and providing some sustained in-class reading time led to increased volume of books read and that stamina that's so important for students so that was really good at the high school we also used common lit benchmarks so those were administered three times over the course of the year and um those again those benchmarks provided some interesting data data meetings were held on a monthly basis with um the high school principal and the ELA supervisor um to really take a look at a deep dive of where students are and their progressing grade n through grade 12 um we also had very targeted professional learning over two half days on small group instruction which was modeled by all of the supervisors and myself and um again emphasizing those priority standards and the fact that those standards again that they spiral up they get a little bit more complex but they they're repetitive over over the course you know of grade obviously K to 12 um I think help but I think in including more um interesting books some Choice reading has really has really paid off I'm I'll end it at the end um as for mathematics um so we had uh you know a lot we're seeing Improvement there we're seeing success um we are seeing that our 64% of our students enrolled in Algebra 2 pass the um this portion of the test which was which is an improvement um We are continuing with our our math PD at conquer math so we have another cohort starting next year so we'll have two cohorts teachers that are moving through conquer math next year our year one cohort finish this uh it will continue with their year two and our cohort number two starts their year one in September so um this is PD that is enthusiastically received um I've never seen more people excited to have math PD um in my entire life but I've attended some sessions and it is really really good um so it is definitely a worthwhile investment and I I thank the board um for um supporting us through this effort but it's it's really good and and uh our aim is to see these numbers continue to improve okay so couple things that were I'm going to add it here though um one of the things that we were looking for when we were replacing Miss Abrams was a candidate who had a consistent um Vision uh philosophy and approach and that's what we be found in Miss belardino who will be starting with us on August 1st so um I expect that we're going to continue to see a lot of emphasis on the things that brought us this success um she's very familiar with um our elementary FIS and panel and the Sarah writing and reading strategies which we've been emphasizing at the elementary level for the last um several years and those of course those foundational skills will continue to um to be enhanced and developed over time so we are going to at the high school we are going to continue with um emphasis on uh reading and and choice reading and independent reading time um we are also miss Abrams has requested that all teachers engage in these onetoone reading conferences um after the summer reading in order to get to know students uh be able to talk about their um and have the students also assess their strengths and their weaknesses so those things are going to begin at the um at the start of the year uh we're going to work with the ELA social studies and science department especially when it comes to reading informational text nearly all the informational text is either social studies or science base so it's a great time to um involve those departments create some cross-curricular common language um and this this is experience that Miss bardino has had at Roxberry that she will be bringing here to us so I feel very confident that she'll be able to um continue to steer Us in that direction and last uh but not least is continue to look at the evidence statements when they come out to really uh drill down into more of the student data and then incorporating the released exam items as part of the assessment and instructional strategies to give students opportunity to um see the exam questions um um before the test and something I'm just going to chime in too about that third bullet point I really like seeing uh the investment with social studies and science departments and collaborating on their significance for approving literacy outcomes some of the most complex texts with which students are going to Grapple in their high school years are going to be in social studies and science oftentimes it's primary source documents in social studies if you're trying to read something from the 19th century the writing style then was much more for for both vocabulary is more challenging they need to be able to sort through that and then in the s in The Sciences you find an awful lot of work that is very content specific and uses a lot terminology with which students may not be familiar so they have to tease out meaning from very complex vocabulary so I think this is fantastic as an English teacher I love seeing as a former Humanity supervisor and obviously as an administrator I'm really excited about this and I really want every teacher to see themsel or see themselves as responsible for improving students stud literacy skills because yes you're teaching students how to read as a social study scholar how to read as a science scholar that's really important okay and for math um similar similar is um examining the released items incorporating those into the instructional activities into assessments and and again something new is is really spiraling some of those uh algebra questions through the geometry and in Geometry into Algebra 2 so that the skills and the knowledge is are retained and they're constantly reinforced so math isn't just so siloed um in these different areas but it's all integrated um a continuation with the conquer maath uh PD um really emphasizing the use of different tools and and reference materials so there was some discussion I think at the admin Tre um that the benefit of using uh handheld calculators so um I mean it's it's a request that we've made to parents that they should invest in a calculator for their child even at at the high school that way they would have it with them for the four years and Beyond when they go to um either career or to college they'll be able to take that calculator with them um the cell phones they're just not as effective but those TI 883s are really really good um and then again model um the the uh in instructional effective instructional practices between teachers and the supervisor um and the use of manipulatives and making mathematics visible so one of the EV one of the books that we read as a supervisor team last year was building thinking classrooms in mathematics um which is a phenomenal book it can be used across all disciplines although it does emphasize math but it can be used across all disciplines which is why we all read it but it really is getting kids up out of their desks writing on whiteboard so that you can see what's going on um those non-permanent services are great because it it does encourage mistakes where you can just kind of wipe it away and then um continue thinking so all of those strategies will continue um to emphasize over the next year and and I was really happy to hear the discussion about some of the testing strategies that teachers were getting from conquer math which they were in turn sharing with the kids because if the kids feel like they have just that that small enough amount of an EDG that that can that can really be critical in their success on a standardized test or any type of assessment really so for them to hear from their teachers oh yeah students who use a handheld gular as opposed to the one that's embedded in the device to perform better it gives them that little bit of an edge and I even brought it up in the retreat I was saying when I used to do standardized test prep I would tell the kids wear your most comfortable socks wear a gray t-shirt a white longsleeve T-shirt and a college sweatshirt when you take the SAT and you'll do better I had no evidence to back it up but the kids believed it and if they believed it it became true and it helped them do a little bit better yeah so the next slide is definitely a um more data heavy slide so I'll I'll take over on this one and spare Dr shared in this experience but these are these are really interesting these are um our our way of being able to see how we're fairing by standard compared to the state we only get comparisons with the state but it's it's pretty interesting to see how we're stacking up these are called evidence statements and if I don't know if you're able to see it closely enough but it starts at one goes all the way to 37 and it lets us see um how the state did on those going from where where they really struggled to where where was much easier and there are some most areas we we did significantly better than the state but then if we look at that 15th question we we see that there's a standard we did significantly um worse than State and then uh the 30th question we we did significantly worse than State as well so it gives you an opportunity I was making the reference to the helicopter view to pull the helicopter down a little bit lower and see like where are we struggling with function analysis and so what do we need to do where is this in our curriculum have had we covered this by the time we got to the assessment granted this was all stuff that had already been taught so we'd already most likely taught it but why is it that that our kids aren't performing as well there you can also look look at where we were particularly strong like for for the 12th question um when the state was around 20% proficiency we were at 40% proficiency so obviously we we we' figured something out pretty well there so um this is all actually these are this is the official data the njla is still preliminary data but these are things that we can share with our our math department and also with anybody involved with the ELA assessment and it is good for them to see like here's where we're stronger here's where we need to do work and you can really tailor your instruction around areas where you see yourself needing additional support and something that came out in our Retreat Wednesday was very heavy on data presentations we had them from all five schools but we found um that some of what the elementary schools were reporting seeing kids struggling in the njsla results we were seeing at the high school which means okay there's definitely a trend here so how do we get kids better at reason reasoning and modeling and so this information should be used used as a springboard for improvement in our instructional design and we intend to use it as exactly that all right there's one more slide to go which talks about next steps because you don't want the analysis of data to be a dead end it's not supposed to be an autopsy it's not supposed to be a gotcha it's supposed to be something that you work with to try to improve your practice Yeah so one of the things again using those evidence statements and we'll be able to really drill down into that data is to emphasize those priority standards and the skills um and continue to reinforce those throughout the school year a lot of this I said but this is across all areas not just uh to specific groups but for our gened students our students and our special education students we want to take a look at the trends um and on specific standards like we like uh Dr poris was talking about with functions you know how are we addressing that and um ac across and where do those standards begin and how are we addressing that so by looking at that as a whole from our grades three through grade 11 we can um really begin to uh adjust our curriculum adjust our pacing things like that so um so we're going to do that we're going to continue to incorporate the released items into assessments discuss the njsls and the nuances for each of the standards so really unpacking that And discussing what that means um and what that's going to look like and giving students opportunity to um to really focus on those things and and emphasize that that the uh culture of growth and learning for all of our students and that you know having that belief that all students could achieve um it really it does matter and by continually emphasizing that people believe that um and they and they will perform better so so th some of those those are the things that we're going to continue to do and we thank you thank you both I got two comments uh first was I remember asking Dr poris maybe a year or two ago um how could I get vocabulary scores to improve and he said encourage reading and then uh I saw a push by the administration to encourage Choice reading so kids would be more encouraged to read something that they want to read and then last September when we did the presentation of the scores up at Cedar Crest um I remember sitting through the presentation of that data and the administration laying out the plan for how they were going to encourage reading in different areas so that way people like you like you described social studies science not just English um so it can be kind of a cross-cultural not cross-cultural but like a cross subject kind of uh learning and it seems like it's working everything that I've been hearing so good job I'll I'll give you a follow-up example of that we had one um Ela portfolio that had to be completed to have a student achieve their um demonstrate their um graduation Readiness and this is a student who did not do obviously did not do well in any of the njs njsla or the GPA so miss Abram sat with that student found a subject area that the student was interested in provided the appropriate level and difficulty of a reading passage from this and that student was able to produce a wonderful and a written um response that was you know that would it far exceeded um anything that they had demonstrated on a test so I think it's important to really bring in those opportunities for any choice reading it doesn't matter what the subject is reading is reading is reading and the skills are the same um and I think that's having those onetoone conferences will give teachers opportunity to get to know those students in order to make those connections and it's interesting you use the word culturally but that's accurate as well well um and unfortunately the initials were commandeered by another much more controversial idea but culturally responsive teaching which is also called CRT but culturally responsive teaching is an enormously successful way of reaching kids if you have a young scholar who's struggling with geometry and you know they're really into soccer you can use the geometry of a soccer field to help them Envision what the learning actually looks like and I love that example of the the portfolio and that was one of our previous year's Juniors obviously this past year was was a senior but you you find where the students have interests and and you you find ways to meet them where they are and and they get really engaged and yeah you want it I'll Stand By You want to expand vocabulary you want to improve spelling you want to improve grammar get get them reading and and if you hook them with things that they're really interested in all the better because they'll engage at a much higher level and be less inclined to go to Spark Notes okay thank you for the presentation we're going to move on with the meeting and next up is approval of the minutes I'm going to ask Mr Bloomer to please approve the minutes I'd like to make a motion to approve the minutes from June 24th 2024 there second second any question or discussion on the minutes Mr Gibbs please role Mr Bloomer yes Mr cesi yes M Dempsey yes Mr G is absent Mr mcweeney is absent Mr Pompeo is absent Miss shenton is absent Mrs Esposito yes and Mr syic yes motion carries thank you Mr Gs when you say absent you could mean stuck on Route three right I said when you say absent Stu on three let's keep going with the meeting all right next up is uh first opportunity for public uh comment on agend items only members of the public may speak once for a maximum period of 5 minutes by the clock during this portion of the meeting the public may speak on any agendum item only during their five minutes and if a member of the public has a question direct a question to the board president and please state your name and sign in before we begin okay I see no one coming up we'll go into the uh approval of our action items I'm going to ask Mr sesi in addition to commenting on the traffic situation on Route three to move the items under pm it wasn't fun today um I would like to move PMC 10 PMC 0125 through PMC 18-25 second question discussion G please R Mr Bloomer yeah Mr CI yes M Dempsey yes Mr K is absent Mr mweene is absent Mr mono is absent Mrs shenton is absent Mrs Esposito yes and Mr Senate yes motion carries and and one item I just want to comment on very quickly is uh PMC 0425 which is uh resending an appointment um we had brought on Miss Linda Greenberg as part of um the ability to hire under chapters 408 and 121 which involved retired teachers and professionals um we were under the impression the state was going to extend the program which they only sort of did they only extended the program for people who had been hired in 20 21 and 2022 or 2022 23 so the fact that she hadn't been hired in either those two years prohibited us from being able to employ her for this upcoming year and I'm G to put it out there um I'm I'm pushing back on this one I we obviously we have to we have to resend because that's what we're being told but it's very frustrating because um she was going to be teaching French as well as ESL these are both incredibly hard to fill areas and um in the last reported year the state gave out seven certificates in World Language seven so seven new certifications for all World Language programs and I don't see Staffing getting better and I understand like they they have certain things they have to maintain and upholds regarding retirees and the pension system but it's just very to me it's very troubling that our talent pool is diminishing and we have people who were willing to work and were unable to employ them so I just want to put that out there as a matter of public record I don't often speak out on these types of matters but it's just something that really it it's a tough one because we're trying to do what best for our kids by bringing people on board instead of having to invest in computer programs or any other desperation measure and unfortunately we're not able to do so um I actually have a question to that um so Dr poris do we have a a planner how many how many students are taking French or whatever the case may be is this something we're going to do online in this case with with what's the uh ball back so you want to have for anything like this you want to have as many backup options as you can and the position is posted will will engage with any qualified applicant um who's interested in in in interviewing and you know obious we vet them as we would anybody else um we're also looking to a possible Outsourcing option um which is which is not ideal but in circumstances where you don't have Personnel in place you need to fall back on that um the the last the last option is to do an online tool um I'd like to avoid that I mean I don't know how far I am from getting my French certificate but I I think I can still wing it um but it's yeah so that that's how many how many well do you and I idea how many classes it was going to be or it's it's not a whole lot of classes I mean this is this's one person who's GNA be balanced between French andl and I know the ESL we have a backup in place there um so you know it's three or four classes so we we'll make do but I it's also it's it's difficult we also had a lot of Staff pick up extra Duty assignments during during the covid response and that was I'll use the word heroic which is a word that gets thrown around and often doesn't have meaning here it does and um I don't want to exhaust our Workforce um but you do that for a year maybe two but I don't want to tap into that every year so um we're going to continue to publicize the need um and and really look into people know I mean I I have I have a cousin who teaches French in Ridgewood and I think you guys know I have a no poaching policy there is an exemption um for family members but she said no thank you but she is reaching out to her friends in the French teaching community and said if somebody's looking for great place to work great Community wonderful opportunity please put them in touch so we're we're we're reaching out to our networks and hopefully produces somebody who's tops off and wants to be here and can be here so just to clarify so the state only certified or only seven people graduated with this certificate this year um so wasn't wasn't for the 20123 24 years is the previous reporting data but yeah we we had seven new certifications issued for World Language I think it was 12 for chemistry I don't I don't have data for other areas but um the the reinforcements aren't arriving right and and there's yeah and kind of inadvertently falling into Gloom territory and I apologize because it's a pretty nice summer night but um we're we're facing a shortage and when when you don't have reinforcements coming in that's that's a huge concern and so I think that we need to find very creative ways to make the profession more attractive but those reinforcements won't show up for a number of years um and to be able to keep people in the profession um and you know who knows maybe we do have to start recruiting from um on a global stage and start looking for people who want want to come to this country okay be gainfully employed in our educational system and one more thing and you know that sometimes I ask questions because I know they're going to come from the audience uh who's not here but um so we're not we don't have French on a seventh or eighth grade like this we need this person to finish out the students that had the two years or and they need it right this is not an introductory level French that we're trying to push for this is I don't know the exact schedule that that she had but I know it was Heavy at PV and yeah we have kids who are already invested right in learning French and and I want to support that I mean right it's to to be multilingual is a gift and and Spanish has incredible value so does French and and I really want to see our kids still have that option without having to do two old lingo or some other fallback from a fallback okay cool thank you you're welcome and I'll try to be a bit more of a ray of sunshine in my my further comments Dr ctis is there still like an alternate root kind of thing like does that still exist where somebody had like some level of something and you could get them in the door to pursue certification I'm gonna speak um not with the same emphasis with with which Dr sherid was nodding her head but yes yes and yes so if someone is like if I went to the L angues department at the community college and like hey who's graduating with an associates degree in I don't think anyone gets Associates degrees in French actually completed enough coursework to be able to teach we like reaching out to their Network that right do they can I comment on this yeah so William Patterson has actually been very very proactive with their students and looking and seeking out creative Pathways to get their teachers into the classroom so get their teaching candidate students into the classroom so New Jersey lowered the requirement of even substituting but but William Patterson has they've been excellent and a great partner in trying to get people certified unfortunately there's just being multilingual is you're being pulled in a lot of other areas that are looking for people who can speak Spanish and they and they're paying more um you know the process to get native speakers who are interested in teaching certified is like having baby I mean it is so difficult it is it took over a year it's a lot of paperwork it so I think the state really needs to have a come to Jesus moment here and and say look what what can we do but there are so many districts that are looking for multiple teachers y so we're lucky we're only looking at one and this teacher is would be primarily at PV so I mean like to continue we do have a plan in place to to fulfill that gap for this year next year I don't know I mean let's face it if you live in brance you want to move to Jersey besides you can't you probably can't afford it to move from France to New Jersey anyway so exchange R is pretty favorable right now but you're not helping my my recruiting cost here s but but you could I mean I'm not being silly like this is my 28 year as an educator and I can honestly say I've never once woken up and thought I gonna go to work today like literally never once and so it is such a fulfilling profession doesn't just bring joy it brings fulfillment and so I wish more people um were hearing that message and Miss demp is talking about reaching out to people in Valley and I think that's great we need to cast a wider net Willie P has done a phenomenal job and and I agree with Dr Sharon they've been a great partner for us and they're really committed but I I talked to people who worked for a long time in educational preparation programs that have just folded they're just gone um and it's it's very disheartening and just for the the long range Vision it's it's trouble and and and I I feel like there needs to be very aggressive steps taken and I know that there's a state task force that just commenced having meetings looking at ways to to build up our our educator um Workforce but that takes time and we don't have a lot of time so want to see a lot happen here so I'm glad we're having this conversation I think it's really important I don't know how many people actually tune in to this via Zoom but um if ever you need an endorsement of the life of an educator I reach out to Dr sharid and or me you can tell you it is a it's a wonderful experience okay uh Miss Esposito would you please move the items under CIS sure I'd like to move CIS 0-25 through 0725 second question discussion Mr Gibbs please call the RO Mr Bloomer yes Mr cesi yes M Dempsey yes Mr kitten is absent Mr mweene is absent Mr Pompeo is absent M CH is absent Mrs Esposito yes and Mr senic yes motion carries thank you Mr Bloomer would you please move the items under FFA yes I'd like to make a motion to move FFA 0125 through F fa 16-25 second secondo second question or discussion Mr Gibbs please call the roll Mr Bloomer yes Mr cesi yes M Dempsey yes Mr G is absent Mr M is absent Mr pompeo's absent Mr Miss shenton's absent Mrs Esposito yes and Mr cic yes motion cares like to take a quick moment to thank uh the donation of the Canon Cameron accessories by um Mr Yamashita I'm hoping I pronounce that right thank you thank you uh M sty would you please move the items on the policy sure uh before I move the items I just wanted to uh mention that Dr Porter and I met uh about two weeks ago to discuss the most recent stra sesme updates so those are the policies that you see listed for first reading um since we don't have a workshop meeting in July I wanted to just give a quick rundown um notes from that meeting were shared with everybody um and I'll just kind of highlight a couple of things 01 64.6 is the policy that's being abolished that is the um remote public board meetings during a declared emergency policy So that obviously came into effect during covid um it's being recommended to abolish that policies it's really not relevant any longer in the state hasn't made any kind of firm decision on remote uh things for anything so um that one will be off the books um 2200 is is the curriculum content policy and the updates to that are to remove a bulleted list of very specific language around what standards are part of the curriculum and rather than having to update that policy every time there are new standards or standards change they're doing away with that bulleted list and instead replacing the language with our curriculum will consist of basically the New Jersey student learning standards so it simplifies the policy does not change it in essence in any way um just allows more flexibility to not have to update that policy every time there are standards updates which do kind of happen more frequently yeah just to follow up on that every policy with an m is a mandatory policy correct correct so the majority of these are mandatory policy changes exactly right yeah and so based on new statutes or changes in statutes um or something that happened legislatively that's requiring those changes um the physical examination policies for both teaching staff members and support staff are because the state changed a requirement for TB testing so we and uh another change that we can no longer flag for THC use so there are some changes within those policies and the regulations to reflect um those statutes and I did miss one on the curriculum content sorry I had a question because there is a small statement that said the will approve the curriculum annually and that was eliminated it was struck through on the draft so we actually went back to St smme and asked about that because I know we do an annual approval um we don't actually annually approve curriculum and stra sm's reply was they could not find anything in statute or anywhere else to support that the board approves curriculum what we approve is the program of study and so annually we do a resolution that approves the program of study and that is not changing and then we always approve new curriculum after it is written so we get that we review it and we uh approve discret curriculum for ELA or AP Physics or whatever course it is so that happens on the basis as they change and the annual approval is for the program of studies so that's why the um approval of curriculum language is being removed but it doesn't change anything that we do or do not approve and then the attendance policy or the attendance regulations 5200 R um the main change to that is that attendance at a Civic event is now an excused absence from the state's purposes um and so it includes the definition of what that means um and then a lot of the other uh options that are in that policy they're all the options regarding attendance uh calculations that we already have in place so we're just adding in that section about the um Civic attendance at a Civic event um 5337 is service animals you will be happy to know that the language regarding the miniature ponies stays in the policy but otherwise it's being updated to um allow for a new what was it here I'm sorry let me get to my notes a specific law change it's referencing the specific law allows for the use of ser service animals in the schools um and then 824 uh I'm sorry it's actually 8420 emergency and crisis situations is much more explicit now about making sure we are managing for students with disabilities so there may be some impact on IEPs or 504 plans that includes new language about um during emergency drills uh what needs to happen and Dr Portis is just going to check with Mr Riner Mr Lucas about whether our safety plan the district school safety plan needs to be updated to reflect this as well but the policy does provide for some more um explicit language around making sure that students with disabilities are accommodated during emergency drills those were all the highlights so we can answer any questions anybody had but if not the one question I was going to have was about that statement in the curriculum content because oh yeah why that was I flagged that too yeah so thanks for explaining that no problem so motion to approve p0125 through p0325 second any question or discussion Mr Gibbs please call the role Mr Bloomer yes Mr cesi yes M Dempsey yes Mr gon is absent Mr mcen is absent Mr mpeo is absent Mrs shanton is absent Mrs esito yes and Mr cic yes motion carries thank you Miss ESO would you please move the item under other I'd like to move um other 0-25 second question discussion Mr Gibbs please call roll Mr Bloomer yes Mr cesi yes Miss Dempsey yes Mr gon is absent Mr mcen is absent Mr Pompeo is absent m chanton is absent Mrs Esposito yes and Mr s yes motion carries okay that brings us to our second opportunity for public comment members of the public may speak for a maximum period of five minutes by the clock during this portion of the meeting the public may speak on any topic during their five minutes if a member of the public raises a question the question should be directed to the board president and please sign in and state your name before you begin uh John na Sunset Road Pompton Plains um board member of uh the high school music parents um we just had uh the vocal Department finish up their uh summer performances of Rock of Ages this past weekend uh I want to thank the the production Team every summer they pick a a different genre musical this one was 80s rock they they they pick things that expose the kids to different types of singing not just different shows different music to to make them do different things and uh we also Drew in a handful of students from outside the town which was our original intent um back when they started like High School Musical Newsies they would bring in you know five to 10 students um from Community Theater groups other schools just to expose the surrounding Community to our music here and it it helps the warning to school year with with events uh getting the word out uh the notiv they're going to begin their rehearsals uh coming up this week and I wanted to share that um the panic parks and wck their thummer Theater Camp is performing Shrek Jr at the auditorium here this Friday and Saturday so that's the future of our vocal department at the high school so come out and see those kids and see who's going to be here in a couple years um and the marching band uh this week the the drum Majors for the 2024 marching band season they'll be up at Westfield State University for their training uh to be drum Majors for the the band here and then the marching band itself will be at Camp chiena uh the week of August 19th through the 23rd um because they're in open class the staff is really trying to push to get their drill which is their marching formations finished by the end of band camp and then they can work on music and the visual stuff through their whole season to try to compete in that open class and then the only other things I had um were I understand that construction is a very fluid timeline thing but we have our home show our home competition September 28th and does it seem like the sidewalk at least along the front of the school will be usable because we have about 700 performers and about 2,000 guests but we really use that for kids to get from their rehearsal space in these parking lots here to the stadium so if we're going to have to go out to the Street sidewalk with with them then maybe we'll make some Provisions with the police department to control traffic along the sidewalk if we need to if we have to take that route and and of course I want to thank you guys for uh approving the distribution of funds from the full season events that we use for our scholarships to recognize some of the kids who make this music program here great when they graduate so thank you for that anybody else so to answer your question we will be done before you have that event going to be phenomenal and I just have to say with the timeline that Mr Sen's working on with the contractors when he was telling me the timeline as I referenced before I've been in education for a while when he was telling me how quick everything was going to fall into plays I think I did a double and a triple take of wait you're going to have done by then but end end of August right so good I'm I'm happy because I'm getting tired of putting the cones up by the tennis court every time I walk by we're talking about two different things I think I know but that'll be done soon too yeah that people I don't understand there's seven cones why are you moving the cones to drive into the parking lot the uh the veterans worldall thing it's just if you have good contractors which we have good contractors and you get out of their way they will do their job unencumbered quickly that's all it is okay up next unfinished business anybody have any unfinished business Bo announcements yeah real quick I just um so today we had our uh pth s site tour for board um so it's just great to see the work being done for the summer but then again great to see the money that we've put out through erer funds and all the upgrades that we've done over the years you know just come to fruition the the boilers um operating really well look sharp and shiny and all that good stuff so um you know I want to thank uh Mr Anderson for and Mr Gibbs for for doing that um next we would definitely like to see uh PV so if we could try to figure something out calendar-wise whether it's right after school starts or right before it begins whatever um we could we definitely probably could schedule something I don't know if it's going to be the same day as a board meeting or not but let's uh start that discussion yeah okay I missed new business anybody have any new business board member announcements yeah I'll go uh so on what was Friday 11 19th 19th I did attend Rock of Ages and uh it was absolutely amazing um I was it was a great crowd the kids were absolutely amazing the music was awesome um I I couldn't say enough thing good things about it it was just a great night overall um so I just I I just it's amazing again these kids have spent their whole summer pretty much rehearsing for this um and uh they they just showed it they showed their dedication uh to it and being in a hot school rehearsing day in and day out it was amazing but this this production was just I can't say enough good things about it so I had a great time all right I got one I just want to remind everyone that the board self- evaluation that we're doing is due on uh August 5th please complete the evaluation if you haven't already and we'll discuss that evaluation at our summer retreat at 812 and I know you're all super excited for that and well it's your meeting when when Mr blo was speaking to it reminded me of a of a quote from a Hungarian educational philosopher um I know his first name is mahaley I can't pronounce his last name but I just pulled the quote up as you were saying that about uh the work kids did for Rock of AG and I think it's consistent with pretty much everything Mr Nan has said about what those kids are doing and supplies those kids in a lot of different Avenues the quote is contrary to what we usually believe the best moments in our lives are not the passive receptive relaxing times the best moments usually occur when a person's body or mind is stretched to the limits and a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile so listening to what you just described and what our kids are working on whether drum Majors or or any role in the band or as vocalists certainly certainly Rings true there and hopefully they see that in academics I'm sure they see in athletics as well so slid share that I feel like you just gave the alucino speech from like uh that that that that football movie like every Any Given Sunday I figured I was quite the downer when I was talking about you the teaching sorage so I kind of trying to bring it back up good job mission accomplished all right uh we do have reason to go into executive session tonight we will discuss Personnel matters uh our next meeting will be August 12th the board retreat and then after that August 19th uh here at the high school no action will be taken in executive session and we will adjourn from there is there a motion to go into executive session motion second all in favor any oppos good night everyone