for for wa good evening the time is now 7:02 2 Monday November 20th 2023 calling the Ridgewood Board of Education meeting in order welcome everybody can I have a roll call please miss Brogan Mr Donnie here Mr mmud here miss quack here Mr lumbo he is absent today he's not feeling well he sent his apologies um can we stand up for the Pledge of Allegiance please pursuant to the open public meetings act advanced notice of this evening's meeting has been given to the Ridgewood news the record and the clerk of the village of Ridgewood in addition notices have been posted in the office of the board secretary and in all school buildings welcome Dr Schwarz if you want to introduce Our Guest special guests today thank you so much i' love to first of all welcome everybody Happy Thanksgiving week hope everybody has some very nice plans we have some wonderful presentations planned for this evening first I just want to point out if anyone was tuning in or visiting because they wanted to sit in on our College admissions presentations uh we did have to postpone that we're sorry for the inconvenience it was just a personal emergency that precluded us from being able to have everybody here that we want here so we look forward to rescheduling that we'll announce that very shortly uh but we have with us tonight with us miss uh Beth faler who's gonna intro and we also have principal Stacy wisneski and they're going to introduce their students good evening Dr Schwarz Mr Freeman Miss Murphy Miss cot members of the Board of Education families and our students I would like to now turn it over to miss Fulmer to introduce our students for our BBN presentation tonight on this is what it means to be BF thank you very much for having us here tonight my name is Beth Fulmer I'm an English electives teacher at Benjamin Franklin Middle School and I am beyond proud to be sitting here with our student representatives from two of our BBN classes we have two sections of BFN at the yet they meet by the semester so we'll have another group coming in in January but this group has done amazing amazing things um our core message for BBN is this is what it means to be BF I remind them of that every time they plan a segment every time they put together an episode that our message to our school to our community is that we are proud of BF and we want to show people what we do each class and the fbn is way more than a class starts with brainstorming ideas it is a student run program um it's a student run show they have full class collaboration they sit together in teams they pitch stories to each other um and they plan their segments and develop scripts our filming is done in our hallways in our classrooms sometimes in our community sometimes at home they bring their footage back to our classroom edited I have one of our editors here Isaac give a little nod over here he's one of our editors and we send it out to to our home rooms um two a week each class um sends one out a week so our home rooms share it and it's an excitement of each home room um as we go along uh I think we went a little we're jumping can I get back to that's okay we'll hold it that I don't know if that went up there we go uh BF pride is a big thing for us um I'm going to give you a quick backstory I have only been at VF for two years however I've been living vfn pretty much my whole life Paul Fulmer my dad was principal at VF for years in the late 70s all the way my son was born in 1998 and he was still there because I remember he came over from Valley hospital and he and Tony benvenga started vfn so I grew up listening to all the amazing things that this was doing back to school night I had some of their parents come up to me and say that they remember being on BFN they remember episodes they did they remember the jackets that they wore as anchors and they are thrilled that their students now their children can also be a part of this program which is amazing to hear I love the fact that it's having a Resurgence after covid it sort of went by the wayside for a little bit we are bringing it back strong we focus on our BF Pride we showcase all the amazing things that our school does and we highlight so many different things from our staff to our students to our community so I want to turn it over to them they are truly the ones that do it each week um I am so proud of the work that they do I read them the emails that I get from staff telling them how um wonderful their episodes are because I really want them to know that it is really about them and what they're bringing to their school so girls you want to start please introduce yourself before you start your slide one of the things that BFB covers is our school news there's a segment called BFN five things it's where we talk about the five upcoming events we have in the week and like maybe holidays stuff that we should remember [Music] throughout our school day things like that um and we also did interviews with staff and we get information about clubs and put them on BFN so we can get students to be more involved my name is Mia mcneel and one thing that bf as a school is like really big on is showing how much we care for the community and the people and the staff and students that are our school so BBN tries to highlight certain events that may involve fundraising or gous important things that we should remember throughout the school year such as the Patterson gift Drive where we all come together as a school to donate toys and gifts to children that are less fortunate we also have the pink out where we all dress in pink and kind of compete against each other to see who can raise the most money for breast cancer awareness mon W um so our ASL segment raises awareness about the deaf community and also teaches basic sign to the students here at BF um how to communicate and understand a heart of hearing people and de uh people hi I'm Archie at BF we have students that celebrate several different holidays and on BBN we educate our students about the holidays that their beers celebrate uh BFB also has entertaining segments to keep the students like interested in BFN like interactive trivia games which they enjoy very much cooking segments where they uh where students go home and cook food and bring the footage back to BBN and uh in the beginning of the year we did a lip sync thing where we played music in the background and uh uh students outside of BFB were um given the lyrics and they sang them and one of the favorite fan favorite segments of BFB is Phil's hot Tak is Phil right here but hold on tell us your name you didn't tell us your name I'm Isaac Reynolds hi I'm I'm Phil from Phil Sal takes and uh while the main goal of BFN is to represent the entire school and really raise school spirit as a whole I really like to just take that to the next level and kind of have people really engaged and I think that Phila taks does a really good job of kind of bringing the light-hearted and friendly environment of the school and really just bring that up a notch so um yeah I'm Malica SEL and um B fbn is more than just like a thing that's with like the students in class we also really like to like involve our um students especially the sixth graders they love um being on BBN and like seeing themselves um in home room and like we like to uh highlight things like field trips and like spirit week is a really big thing at BF and um like getting footage and like videos and photos and stuff for like spirit week is um really cool because like that's kind of like everyone in the school can see themselves and like last year won the eighth grade uh French students went to like Quebec we got um some photos from there because we like to highlight things done outside of school as well and we recently started a new segment called Walk The Halls with B fbn where a students just like walking through the halls and there's rapid fire questions just like simple things to really get to know one another so yeah so this is really what it means to be BF all of what is in all of them in front of us today they they work very hard we have sometimes we have class three days we have class four days we get it together in one week so it is a little chaotic but what they put out is entertaining it's informational and it really does share and showcase what we deem to be important at BF and that are things like be an upstander do the right thing stay above the line be proud of your school be creative and really like show the kids that are watching in our home rooms that we're all in this together so we do make it light we do make it fun but we are very proud of our school and we like to we really like to highlight it in vbn every week and we would love to share it um with as many people as possible so thank you so much for having us here tonight um we really appreciate your time um if if we're if we're all good I'd love to take another picture but like we'll have some uh have the have some board members up there too is that okay all right let's let's get together you guys are good you can stay right where you are you however you set up for pictures before we'll do that all fair just everybody than [Music] you you I was just getting recruited to be on BBN that's going to be a lot of fun Phil's I love Phil's hot takes now that is definitely a bucket list item for me um and next we have Miss bronstein to give our high school report thanks for being here miss bronstein thank you for having me um so this week I'm reporting on a bunch of clubs um as the fall sports are closing out but I did want to reiterate how many opportunities that Ridgewood provides for students if there isn't already a club available it is very easy for a student to start it up for any parents of freshman or any for freshman or any high schoolers it's as easy as getting a few signatures of guaranteed membership and a teacher advisor all of whom are always more than happy to get involved and get their Club running um I just wanted to let everyone know that because I know there's always a lot of anticipation and eagerness to get involved in clubs that you're passionate about but if there is not one that you are passionate about um you're always able to make your own um but to get into it National Honor Society member members recently visited Meo Farms helping to plant and harvest crops uh similarly the green Club planted wild flowers on the school on the 12th the first quarter has finished up and grades were finalized last Wednesday most students will now be changing their health Andor gym courses the senior slideshow was presented on the 16th this was an amazing experience um food was provided and made by senior parents it was a super fun time it was about an hour and a half the slideshow was very funny uh student council helped to make it so was very personal to all of us there was a bunch of photos of as young as kindergarten and preschool to high school now so it was good seeing everyone's face on the screen applied engineering club took its members to a conference on Thursday the 9th and have since been running frequent and productive meetings members are taking leadership roles and forming 17 teams to invent with helping Community sustainability and combating climate change as their focus on Thursday November 16th the Ridgewood High School Department of Visual and Performing Arts will open the 60th season of the Maron and white recital and Art Exhibit series with the first concert and exhibit of the 2023 to 2024 school year this will be the first of six maroon and white performances that start at 3:45 in the rhs learning Commons that take place on Thursdays Maron and white performances highlight the extremely impressive artists at rhs both in Visual and Performing Arts there are singers violinists artists and photographers that get to show showcase their work I've personally been to about two of these performances and I'm beyond impressed each time I go I highly recommend attending one of the next five all these students are very involved both inside and outside of the school and perfecting their art rhs senior Julia Bes was accepted into the Richwood Art foundation's artober Exhibit at the stable where she presented two photography pieces of the boys football team the Oasis Club is having a Thanksgiving Drive accepting food donations there's a drop off at the main entrance for anyone interested in donating project interact made Veterans Day cards and sent them to the veterans program at Ridgewood High School and to the pamis veterans home they also donated $200 to the United service organization Holiday Drive during a free period on the 17th there will be Veterans Day breakfast foods class will be making and providing the breakfast with the aim of making this occasion even more meaningful and inclusive we uh the high school requested the assistance of inviting family members and Friends of students and staff who are veterans to join for the special event by extending the invitation to both the loved ones and those in the atmosphere um allowed more gratitude and more appreci to the veterans and families that showcased and came um and came to the high school the Veterans Day breakfast was held on the 17th at 8:20 in the Ridgewood High School campus Center it was a time to share stories Express gratitude and Foster a sense of community among those who have contributed to the protection and well-being of our nation I think the high school especially this year did a very good job honoring the veterans um and I think that this event will most likely continue I know it was very successful letters for Rose a club started during covid to provide Solace for elders and N nursing homes had their second round of letters due they recently started using pen pals and have individualized their letters connecting them more closely to Elders at the local Juniper nursing home I'm personally a part of that club I have my own penile I very much enjoy it 11th grade parent meeting was on the 14th guidance meeting for students starting to prepare for college and setting up score I think it was last year that students moved from Naviance to score so obviously the parent meeting already happened but if you did not attend I recommend getting all information on that those are very important uh the orchestra concert in the Campus Center happened on the 15th at 7:30 and tonight actually during this meeting is the Acappella concert so wishing them all Lu from here um as for sports the Ridgewood senior committed athletes had their official Signing Day at the high school where they got to celebrate with friends and family who attended girls soccer had an amazing season but unfortunately lost in their last round of States against freeholds but still have an exciting banquet coming up on October 29th Bridgewood crew enjoyed a hard-fought victory in the jimm Barker Cup Series and scored five other top 10 finishes uh girls cause crunchy is not done yet they Place fourth at States and the boys place third and will be going to Regionals this Saturday where they run against teams all over the Northeast and I just wanted to close out by wishing everyone a Happy Thanksgiving and holiday breaks thank you thank you for the report Happy Thanksgiving he we're on to the first uh comments from the public we'll take comments from uh those attending welcome every speaker has 4 minutes this is not a Q&A time we will be taking notes and to the extent that we can answer some questions at the end we will try uh but again this is it will just be a commenting period um please state your name and address for the record and welcome everybody and then we'll go to any anyone waiting on the phones thank you thank you Miss qua uh Lori Weber 235 South Irving Street and u before we get started thank you for inviting us back into the room I'm really pretty excited about that and uh thank you for getting those 2022 2023 minutes uh back up online I have to say as a I don't know how many decades have I lived in this I think almost 40 years now and 30 years of doing this I'm just not used to that kind of immediate proactive response from administ of leadership but I I could get used to it so thank you very much both Miss kot and Dr Schwarz so on a more serious note um I'm going to read this uh according to the board bylaws the creation of a committee requires board approval at a public meeting at one meeting Mr Lambo defended why he created the Personnel committee and appointed himself to it while at another he claimed that there never was a Personnel committee at all so which is it could someone please shed some light on this at prior meetings issues of conflict of interest regarding Mr limbo's role on the Personnel committee and his campaign use of a dad's night email list were raised and while Mr limbo's term will be ending at the end of the year uh the relevance of these issues will not end with it as far as campaign emails go it doesn't matter if there are 10 people on that mailing list or a thousand if the mailing list Bears the name of a nonprofit organization the content is expressly targeted to members of that organization and that content favors a candidate in an election all of which Mr limbo's email did that action could cause dad's Knight to lose its nonprofit status so since Mr limbo basically trivialized this concern on social media it is important to clarify that that the the issue and the possible repercussions of his actions especially since dad's night proceeds are donated to our schools in regard to the conflict of interest concerns that Miss quac has raised pertaining to Mr limo's participation on the Personnel committee the school ethics commission has addressed this as Miss Quon noted at a public meeting over two months ago the school ethics commission has issued advisory opinions on this topic they clearly assert that a board member who recuses himself from matters pertaining to a district employee something that Mr Limo does routinely may not serve on or appoint members to a Personnel or a negotiating committee rather than review the information Miss qua referred to Mr limbo was combative yet there is absolutely no getting around the fact that the school ethics commission the Arbiters of school ethics has demonstrated that Miss quac was right chairperson of the school ethics commission Robert Bender has offered important advice to board members he States school officials must always be cognizant of their responsibility to protect the public trust to honor their obligation to serve the interests of the public and the board and to periodically re-evaluate the existence of potential conflicts of interest in addition the only way for a School official to truly Safeguard against alleged violations of the ACT is to avoid any contact any conduct which could have the appearance actual or perceived of being in violation of the act and I say this because I don't look forward to filing complaints I look forward to a board that that takes these laws seriously and I would very much appreciate tonight if somebody on the board could just clarify the history of the Personnel committee thank you thank you are there any other speakers present no okay please raise your hand if you would like to speak from the phone I think it's star N9 no with that I'm going to close the first public speaking period a friendly reminder there is an opportunity to speak at the end of the meeting as well all right thank you everyone uh this is the super superintendent report right now um first of all I just want to uh just thank everyone who ran for the Board of Education um as a superintendent schools I don't get involved in the election specifically but I just want everybody to know how much I appreciate the time and energy that everyone puts in um it is a very difficult job it is a doesn't pay very well and uh but um I really it is a lot of time and it's a lot of work and and running for election in your in your your community is hard so just want to give my respect to everyone who ran um and everyone uh uh involved in the process including our current board members so thank you all for for your for your desire to serve um this has been we've it's been only been a couple weeks since our last meeting but um we've had some really um good activity and good movement on issues in the district we've been doing a lot of work locally in central office we've heard a lot about the schools but in central office we've been doing quite a bit of work um our audit process is moving forward we're looking forward to getting a preliminary audit report sometime in uh in December um and uh and being able to go share some news about that and some upates States about that in the New Year U we've been doing a lot of work going through our Aramark contract um that that's our service provider for facilities and um and grounds so we're looking to really see some improvement in the delivery of services and um I really want appreci I also want to extend appreciation for Miss cot and Mr Smith who's our director of director of facilities Miss cot of course our business administrators they've been working diligently to get things ironed out there and we've just been auditing quite a bit informally auditing and examining a of District operating procedures just to make sure that our standard operating procedures are appropriate and um that that we have good quality controls and good and just good controls in general in place if you were not able to attend my superintendent coffee last week I had an opportunity to uh just kind of give a quick overview of some of the score presentations that we gave at our uh November 6th Board of Education meeting we talked about the njsla scores uh so I'm grateful for those who participated I will say it was right immediately following the election um and we had uh an all-time low in participation so this is my call to everybody please keep coming out to the coffees we only had about 18 people on the call so uh we'd love to keep those numbers high so please keep joining us um and but by all means you can always go back and you can uh watch the presentations because they are recorded um I also had an opportunity to serve as a panelist for the Garden State Coalition of schools which is a an organization of which uh Ridge of public schools is a member district and uh it's an advocacy Group which advocates for uh for fair treatment Fair funding um and in good policy decisions on behalf of schools and I had an opportunity to serve as a panelist uh specifically with regards to a conversation around um how very timely um good practices uh and practices to avoid when it comes to njsla scores so we had a good conversation about what those scores actually mean the extent to which they're useful and the extent to which districts can uh can can help their constituency uh by advoc by by by communicating transparently and I was actually able to uh reference our presentation so I want to give a shout shout out to our supervisory team under leadership of Mr fredman honor fryberg was involved with that she's our grants coordinator so our team did a really nice job and I actually was able to share our presentation through that organization and uh had some notable uh notable faces involved there president of the State Board of Education was there where I shared it um as well as uh members of NJ Spotlight and superintendents throughout the state so it was a really nice opportunity to uh to plug Ridgewood and kudos to the team because I thought thought we represented the district very well and we've also had just I thought I would just a couple other notes um we had a nice meeting today well I would to say a nice meeting today but we had we had a meeting today with some forward conversation regarding a future mitigation of um of flooding at the at our Fields um it is going to be an uphill battle and figuring out a solution but we have some Community groups organizing interested in helping to fund some feasibility studies about possible options so certainly the the we're going to work closely with them and I'll keep the board up to speed regarding um what we're looking at but right now there's a will among several Vari of community members to raise funds to help the board to pay for some feasibility studies for some large scale possible long-term Solutions so that that we can have a have some fixes there so I'll keep you all posted on that but I'm grateful for just the Forward Thinking of everyone it seems like as a community people are committed to supporting us as we try to resolve this um and then lastly I Just Want to Thank The League of Women Voters I had an opportunity to meet with them at their most recent monthly meeting and uh just they're just such a such um staunch advocates for not just democracy but also good public education um so we had some nice conversations they had some tough questions holy moly they had me on my toes for sure but uh but it was a really nice conversation they're really nice folks and um and we had some really thoughtful conversation so grateful for them grateful for their advocacy and they're they're definitely definitely supportive of the work that we do so I'm thankful for them and then other than that I would just say Happy Thanksgiving everyone um I hope everyone has a really nice time to be with uh some friends in love ones and that for those who maybe don't have as many friends and loved ones as some of us are blessed to have you can find some some folks to spend some time with uh in a in a in a nice positive warm environment so Dr sh I just have two comments on on on your comment about the coffee um first one is if people are not showing up that's a good sign probably that they don't have complaints from you so they're not showing up there so so that's a good sign the second one is maybe if if you want more audience there and more questions then if you try to change the name of that the chat from superintendent coffee to ask the superintendent or conversation with the admin team something along those lines where people know that they can come in and they can ask questions because right now they a lot of the residents or parents may not even know that they have an opportunity to ask questions from you I appreciate that suggestion yes and uh on one hand yes I suppose it could be construed as a good thing but um my goal is to engage as many families as possible so but I appreciate that suggestion and make just make the title more explicit this is a large community and it might take people as not necessarily intuitive what the superintendent coffee is so I will take that in consideration thank you moving right on Alla thank you so much okay then do you want to present the consent item wellsely yeah we should just do that so under item eight we have consent items then it's a conferences several administrative uh I'm sorry we're going to do conf so you would ask for motion yes yes Cor so we have um we under a we have attendance at conferences so the board has had opportunity to see that and I believe they're they're attached to the agenda as well under the administration we have a rep report through the FYI was given to the board regarding our suspensions list and our Hib uh uh Hib reports to the board we also have a School Safety and Security plan review with statement of assurances this is a statement of assurance that we issue to the county department of education to assure them that we are compliant with all the requirements regarding having a school safety plan and that it is distributed appropriately with law enforcement officials oh we go one at a time I move a i second Miss Brogan yes Mr Donnie yes Mr mmud yes Miss quack yes I move B second Miss Brogan yes Mr Donnie yes Mr mammood yes Miss quack yes I move C second Mrs fileld trips yes Miss Brogan yes Mr Donnie yes Mr mmud yes Miss quar yes Human Resources I Mo human resources second Miss Brogan yes Mr Donnie yes Mr Mamud yes Miss quack yes pance um I move finance and uh before we vote I want to um thank the generous donors uh Fidelity charitable for $5,000 for equipment for the Glen School the Somerville Children's Theater $5,000 gift and kind Karen Mendes 160 about $165 gift in kind Schwab charitable step and Georgina Jones $2,500 thank you so much for generous Community I move Finance I said that already second Miss Brogan yes Mr Donnie yes Mr mmud yes Miss quock yes and I do want to highlight as part of this um there is author uh authorization to go for an RFP for contract servicing for tutoring it was a grant that was awarded to us and now we will be going through the process to identify high impact tutoring thank thank you Mr fredman for working on the Grant and shepherding that along so that we can benefit all right and uh on to page 12 for those following resolutions and motions not included in the consent agenda do we need to read this hey we we don't need to read it okay a second oh nobody moved it are you gonna move Oh I thought you moved okay I I'll move a okay so I second Miss Brogan yes Mr Donnie yes Mr mmud yes Miss qua yes approval of bills I did review the bills and I am um uh foring it to the board for approval for voting I make a motion to approve the bills I need a second second Miss broken yes Mr Donnie yes Mr mammu yes Miss quack yes are there any board member announcements I have one perfect thank you um I I too um was able to go to the maroon and white uh recital last week so um I just I have always am um so impressed with our the support our staff gives to the students how talented our students are so this was both uh the performance art so we had um singing and playing instruments and we also um had an Art Exhibit and um you could see how our staff really um mentors and supports our students in their in their work and applauds them for their um talents so it's a really a lovely event there'll be um I think there about five more during the course of the year so if you haven't had the opportunity to um attend uh a maroon and white recal I would encourage you to do so it's a lovely probably an hour hour and a half but um it's filled with joy and that's the nice thing about it so uh just that and the other is um I you know I thought we were going to have the um our High School uh report about College admissions um and I know that was just post postponed and we'll do uh we'll have it in another time I look forward to that but I was reading um just an article about uh the changes of thought about high school exit exams from the different states so I just thought I would share this article um when you have time over your long weekend um it just is of Interest I think in the sort of the pros and cons and what the thinking is behind uh the exit exams for students uh through the state so it's a short article but I thought it had some meat in it thank you anyone else sure um so I just wanted to Echo Dr Schwartz's comment about the uh recent Board elections and Community participation that we had uh a good number of candidates who participated and um they are always involved in um in the in making sure that our schools are run better and our students are getting what they need and they've been attending all these meetings for several months and in some cases several years now so I just want to thank you thank the all of those participants who participated in this process and I want to congratulate m m um for Landslide Victory and you have always been there on that side side so from January you'll be sitting here so congratulations on that thank you congratulations to you Mr Dany for your reelection welcome Miss Mel okay on to um board committee reports we should have several Miss brooken would you like to start sure um so we did have uh we did have sort of a windfall of committee meetings all in one day but um or maybe over the course of two weeks but uh in policy committee uh Dr Schwarz uh introduced Trello which is a new software program allowing an easy tracking of the system for policies it really is um it's really great so um thank you for that uh we received a batch of policies updated from Str Esme and uh we reviewed their recommendations some policies were marked to be abolished by stra Esme and there was no um there was no objection to those uh and five policies were moved forward for board discussion and will be on I think the December 4th agenda for discussion and then on for first reading and then second reading three policies uh will have further review by our administrative team and these policies are um policy 5111 uh eligibility of residents and non-resident students as you uh may recall last year uh we set the tuition rate for non-resident District employees uh wanting their children to attend uh the Ridgewood schools um and it was employees who were hired after June 30th 2022 we um established a rate of 35% of of the board's approved out of District tuition rates uh Dr Schwarz will uh study the impact um or potential impact of this um and and took a number and suggested a number of uh actions that uh the administrative team will take uh surveying current non-resident staff whose children attend the public our Ridgewood Public Schools determining the number of non-resident staff uh children attending our schools I think we have that number um the total revenues um that are a total Prof cost review other District policies and rates established by other districts um to IND um to study whether um allowing uh non-resident uh staff members children to attend impacts class size and um enrollment and uh the perception of the of existing participating staff so what's the perception that they have of um the policy and perception of staff that are uh newly hired and may not have children in schools but um what is their perception of this policy so there's a lot of study going on I I thank you for that and then we'll receive a report back and then I guess discuss some more uh policy uh 3324 right to privacy this policy uh is about um videotaping and recording staff members and the procedures to follow so we wanted a little bit more um information on that and also how how that particular policy interacts with our current policy and and where we need to go with that and then a policy 8500 is Food Services this um mainly related to districts that participate in the federal school lunch program we do not but there was some wording of interest in there um and some practices that we do have but are not um reflected in our current uh policy 8500 so uh again the administrative team's going to take a look at that so I thank you for that I don't know did you have anything else you wanted to add um H you I think that was a a comprehensive summary Miss Broan um I will say that on uh that that uh the platform trailer was really interesting to use to see real time and to um it's a way to communicate and inform um the administration team as well as the rest of the board members who could not be at the meeting to understand the process um and uh the one that we had quite a bit of conversation on was policy 511 The Residency and non-residency tuition so to have some some data on that rather than anecdotally saying this or that I think that is really helpful to ground any decision because it is a meaningful decision uh with financial and uh maybe recruiting aspects it's it's really unclear um so that is a Way Forward on that policy to move that along so um on 511 uh Dr Schwarz can I just request um an attorney opinion on if we have already started uh this year's negotiation process then should this policy change be part of that process or should it wait until that process has being has completed or can it happen in parallel so those are the three options right one is should it be part of the negotiation process if not can it happen in parallel or should it wait until the negotiation process is concluded that's any any change to an existing policy that that has that kind of impact on the teachers union I will uh yeah I I think it's appropriate to get a get a get a have the board Council weigh in on that okay thank you and then we had a curriculum committee meeting um and I um you walk away from these curriculum committee meetings and you know how hard our staff is working and how many how much is happening in our district and so much thought is is being given to new courses materials that are used um refining some of our courses so um you know there's positive feedback on World Language um and in fact at your coffee uh one parent really um talked very enthusiastically about uh about the um world language program and our elementary school so uh it's start it's starting off um with a real positive vibe so um thank you for that um and and then um the exciting news so Ridgewood High School is looking at offering a unified uh elective pathway program for our special needs students working with our gen ed students uh and first they're looking at an offering in a dance class which will be an elective uh for that and it sounds exciting and we have a teacher who wants to to do this and explore it and so that's um you know really positive we we will add um AP africanamerican studies um either next year or the following year based on enrollment and some further feedback from and state guidance unlike other AP courses uh the culminating activity for this particular AP C course will not only be a test but also a project um we're receiving requests by one of our teachers to offer a a new course called real estate Dynamics and they're reviewing that request now in social studies or does it fit in business and so there's some uh discussion on that our American Sign Language uh course is been very popular currently it's in its second year and um we are offering at this point we have four sections in uh American Sign Language one this year and two sections of American Sign Language 2 and um Mark Ferrera our our supervisor for World Language is also uh is looking at offering and has requested American Sign Language three so if we have two sections of each of those uh classes then we would uh not need to um have an additional teacher uh if it morphs into more than that we we might have to look and see what the budget um will uh will need to be added to the budget but at this point um it seems to be a very positive program and I noticed in our downtown for the holidays our American Sign Language Club our students will be uh doing some uh um interpreting for uh some of the songs that are being sung so that's pretty exciting I have to work with um a number of dep uh people um in my practice so um I thought I might give them a shout out and let them know that's pretty exciting uh to be included in in uh in the U downtown for the holidays this year uh Tim manahan uh presented an idea and has recommended that all sixth grade students um spend one quarter and in a course working title Middle School 101 which would uh really help students get acclimated to U Middle School including communication skills and Leadership skills reflection perseverance and digital citizenship so it sounds U like a great idea um that's going to come for um middle school so uh other new courses at the high school uh fashion design two I guess fashion design one has been very successful this year engineering with Applied Physics honors which is uh the second year for epic which is a uh new um course that was offered this year uh with a uh focus on engineering cyber security which may have a dual enrollment with Syracuse and I think uh BCC um might be picking that up too oh it is already okay and um mathematics applications 8 which was for the middle school would be offered to all eth graders along with their math course uh to shore up some of those math skills that um some of our um eighth graders uh would um benefit from and then finally um uh there um is an agreement to purchase ISL for the middle schools to start this year um and use the science component for that science right yeah so it's a lot happening in in an hour and a half I guess and it was just bang bang bang we could really have spent a lot more time on that curricul meeting so thank you for organizing that yeah I just want to add a few more things uh from that curriculum meeting one is um for our rap students uh the rud Academy for health professionals um we are now going to offer from next next school year 2526 um AP seminar in English uh which is already happening for the Alisa program so that's AP seminar for English so the rap students will have one more opportunity for an AP class um if then um all of the cyber security which Miss Broan already mentioned that is coming from the math department so again um we have talked about math improvements in last uh a number of meetings and so a lot of more enhancements are coming in math so cyber introduction of cyber security is one of those um from the math department and the math applications will be a one marking period course for all eighth graders uh whether they are in advanced math or in regular math because the topics that she has identified are currently missing uh or need more uh practice so the course is called math applications and she'll cover all those um topics that should be happening at the middle school level or that should prepare the students better for the high their high school so uh the chart that M Dr SCH showed last time that when we are transi transitioning from 8th grade to 9th grade there is a drop in math so all of those things are being addressed through these changes the other big change that is proposed by misso is um reintroduction of grade eight math so that will be so these are two big changes for middle school or eighth grade math one is math application scores for one marking period and in reintroduction of just grade simple grade eight math because right now that grade eight math was missing and not every student was ready for double advance or accelerated course work so those students who want to stay for math 8 and there's no if if uh like I I just want to and make sure that parents understand that there there's no reason to compare and um try to get their student in an advanced math program if they are the teachers are saying that right now you're ready for math 8 because it's just making sure that you're you're ready for the math 9 or nth the high school level so some topics may be repeated there some topics maybe it's more in depth for that grade level and eventually they'll all have that opportunity to Advan to up to the calculus in math and 12th so she has created um I don't know if the chart is already uploaded but she created she's revised the whole math program for 8th grade 9th grade 10th grade 11th grade and 12th grade for all those five grades and there's a a new chart that shows that actually it starts from sixth or seventh grade that shows that if you are taking that math eight then how can you still get to calculus in by 12th grade so what will be those different math levels so it's not a bad thing to to take that math and then Advan and then the other big changes that she's bringing in the ninth grade math uh and is changing some of the course names so the course names will now reflect the difficulty level of the math that you are taking because a lot of the time our transcript we may have two or three different levels of math but only one nth grade math is graded at 4.5 GPA so when these names are changed names will reflect in the transcript that although they are graded from 4.0 GPA but the name will reflect that it's advanced math or Algebra 1 Algebra 2 math uh redefining math analysis so all of those names are now changing for math program and there's a clear path that will show the parents in from Seventh 8th grade that okay if you take this level of math what is your transition to calculus by 12th grade and if you take a different level of math what is your path to transition what are different options so there's a nice chart that she has created and I think it's already uploaded to the website and I'll try to find the uh link to that so uh and the another thing that we discussed was uh uh the consistency of information to parents from K uh K to 8th grade for Linked uh information so Mr fredman will be working on that to ensure that whatever information we are disseminating to parents it's consistent for all parents so some parents are not able to get more information than others it's a standard protocol for all of them thank you I wanted to give an update on uh two meetings one what is the uh the finance committee uh meeting with Mr Limo um we discussed a few items one of them is already reflected on the agenda and that was the Authority Under njsa 18a colon9 d41 for the business office to pay bills between meetings these are bills that for Approved purchases or um it's there's already a resolution but because of the timeliness of maybe some of the purchase orders it's just the authority that we have um voted on in this agenda for the business office to pay the bills of already approved projects or um purchases so that is what we reviewed at the agenda meeting prior to this uh meeting uh we also um the audit is on track for uh this is fiscal year end June 30th 2023 they have completed their on-site visits so that will be progressing and hopefully we will have a CommunityWide uh presentation as soon as our Auditors is uh nearing completion of that hopefully January February but know but we uh we are well aware of the need for that kind of information in a timely manner and so um as soon as we receive it then we will do a Public Presentation on it in addition um as part of the business office um with under mcot looking at all the operations not just the general fund we looking at all revenue um operations including for example um we did an RFP on the pomptonian that will continue to be monitored and the community program as well so we are um on tra to really do a bottoms up examination of all of our uh different operations as we look to establish the upcoming B budget so that's an ongoing process so that was um that's the finance meeting in addition I'm the Le on the fields committee which is a joint um uh committee with the Village Council Members Board of Ed and different sports organizations it's the first Tuesday of each month it is through Zoom it is public and um at the last meeting which was November 7th that Tuesday um we discussed uh aftermath of the cleanup which which took some time but it was I think done pretty efficiently considering the circumstances of the last storm and there is no update on shedler and we did have a discussion again on Master library and the need for all the different sports organizations to put in their schedule it is master library is something that the Board of Ed first um initiated we had to because our old platform was being um was becoming a legacy platform no longer supported with any technical support So as out of necessity we moved to master library and anytime you have a new platform there is a learning curve um I think that we have gone past the initial bumps of that but certainly it's it's a new system and it takes time for all the different organizations to input the data we're still continue to work through it in the meantime we do have um another spreadsheet that has all the information so it does feel like sometimes it's parallel but please do keep in mind that initial that eventually all of the fields not just Board of Ed but Village Council will all be um scheduled through Master Library so that's a continuing conversation we're having CommunityWide um um on that and that's just also a security feature for us because for us for the board of Ved it's not just the fields it's all of our school properties including the classrooms the Ed Center the parking lot there's so many you know when you have million square feet of space that all needs to be monitored and secured and UND and and scheduled and so that is a program that we have and we have implemented and then we're continuing to support and scale out um that's uh that's it for us for me all right um discussion items yeah we have facilities you want to do it oh yeah okay so uh we had a facilities uh committee meeting on November 7th um there were few updates um we met with the armar energy specialist nick uh and he uh talked about the uh all the schools uh sustainable Jersey Awards so right now all schools have uh bronze level award except Glenn uh Glenn does not have a green team um all other schools have green teams and um he's coordinating efforts between all those teams so he's doing documentation and helping out what type of documentation needs to be submitted to uh Sustainable New Jersey for our Awards then we talked about the uh jrc meetings that U had stopped uh when there was a transition for arar from one manager to the other manager um High School roof uh there was an update about that that at the as a facility committee meeting there was update was that it was running about a week behind in the fabrication so maybe a week or two um Delay from the original uh time line for the um rooftop units from PNG uh two units arrived defective uh or damaged uh in transit so those will be will need to be replaced and for the other units they were working with the village for permit and uh waiting for the village to basically give the permits and install the units um we talked about all the fields uh that how uh Dr Schwartz has made it uh a priority for our Mark to make sure that all fields are in good condition and to basically enforce the contract so we already had a contract with them and those were not being maintained some of our residents brought this to our attention and since then um Dr Schwarz and Miss Scott has made of so it those are being updated and our Mark has brought some new um pricing and contracts or rfps that if we want to make big changes so what is covered as part of the maintenance versus what would require more changes or spending money there to fix them then we talked about the snow removal plans um we looked at the energy energy consumption analysis and uh then we we had some question about the pending um uh HVAC projects so basically we just wanted to make sure that um we do our due diligence for it's a big replacement so I think it's five five five to 5.5 million do project for each school for both schools Glen and ridge so just want to make sure that we are doing it right we just had some discussions and got questions about that that what are the options to get uh more than one opinion on what the right way to do it and um make more than one opinion to uh make sure which brands we are going with what is the technology for especially for ventilation because with your the Steam and hot water the ventilation was part of the system where unit vents were by the window but with the uh vrf or vrr the ventilation has to be uh engineered SE as a separate project so I think those were the updates from facilities meeting I'll just add the uh TP of the architect RFP right now is very important for a lot of those projects just so we make sure we have the right perspective a lot of that as well so the timing is good there right thank you um for the facilities committee the next time you meet I do have a question um which is we had purchased we had allocated a sufficient amount of um funds for the portable purifiers there were the large size and the more portable small one and the issue is um the filter change you know filters are costly but you do have to for it to be truly effective to reach its maximum efficacy you do need to change the filters it's like we bought 100 maybe more I mean it's quite a sizeable number so if we can just make sure that we're on track with that filter change cycle so yeah so there were two uh batches so one was right when covid started there were we purchased some some of those large unit MH um where we had those board discussions and how many to buy and which places they were appropriate for right and they were those were yeah the noisy ones but then there was a grant that we identified and Damian submitted that Grant I think that Grant provided new um unit for every classroom so every classroom has uh one unit if my understanding is yeah we we should add it to the agenda though to check the old ones especially right um even the new ones how long they've been operating and do need a filter so thank you Mr yeah we have to make sure that the grant is not that like printer cartridge type thing that you printer for free and the cartridges I think you know yeah we just have to make sure we're not in that um that we're actually using it and they changes fter on that so that's my request thank you that's a good point thanks okay um onto discussion items I think this is um a point a part of the agenda where um a previous speaker did uh mention the importance of the board in preserving and promoting uh the public trust uh we are elected officials and we operated the grace and the votes of the public um the person to answer those um and talk about it in detail is not present today so I'm I'm not comfortable talking about that at this point making that as part of the discussion if there are other discussion items okay uh we'll move on to acceptance of minutes I will um have to recuse myself from the October 16th executive session minutes I came so late that my you know it would not be appropriate for me to vote on that one I move the minutes and yes second can miss I think it's just yeah in yeah on on the executive October 16th I just wasn't present for most of it so all in favor I I okay other business great um we're on to the second public commenting period Please more minutes again please state your name and address for the record and welcome am I on I don't need four minutes and thank you Miss cck and once again Lori Weber 235 South Irving Street I respectfully disagree I I'm not asking anybody to speak for Mr limbo certainly not but I do think that anyone on the board um Miss Brogan you were also on the Personnel committee so perhaps you or maybe Dr Schwarz somebody could address just the basic questions how the committee was formed when the committee was formed if the committee still exists I mean you know just you know like I said I I heard conf conflicting things at the meeting and I just simply would appreciate those answers I'm not asking anyone to speak for for Mr limbo and whatever he did but those answers would be appreciated so uh thank you anyone else on the nope okay are there any speakers on the phone please raise your hand yes Peter Molton you're on with the board welcome hi good good evening um I had a couple items um one is earlier in the year when there were um challenges around Silicon Valley and Signature Bank um I had brought to the attention that um we have over the FDIC limitations um within uh one I guess midsize Bank bank a regional bank and so I'm not sure if it was addressed where those monies were moved into a money market um where FDIC insurance was uh not an issue or if that's something that came up with the new Administration um but that was something under under I brought up during previous administration so just wanted to bring it up again if it hasn't been reviewed um great to hear about the tutoring program that was also brought up on the coffee and so look forward to hearing more about that thank you uh Mr Freedman for the efforts and um was I was on the coffee uh thank you uh for continuing to do those and um what one thing I didn't mention on it was uh I I had some difficulty finding the zoom I had to go back into emails and then find the link and so um again as as you're evaluating maybe how to get more people on maybe putting in front of people um uh the day before of the or the day of so it's a it's a bit more present U might be might be a consideration but um I found those to be very valuable and uh it seems as though uh as it was mentioned before maybe because there aren't as many people that are concerned uh you don't have as many people calling in uh as it seems like the board meetings are also going a little bit smoother in that regard too so that's that's positive but but want all the Stak holders to be involved and understand that so maybe that will uh that that will help as well so thank you you miss qu can I provide an answer to that um yeah when we can um when we close then we can answer some of the other things that were also brought up any other speakers last call okay with that I'm going to close a second public commenting period thank you so much for speaking yes U yes so I just wanted to provide a quick update uh on Mr malton's comment um and it's not that Mr Weber I'm ignoring your question I have an answer for one so I'm just Pro updating providing an answer for one um that uh so on the uh FDIC Insurance uh Miss Davenport had provided an update she did talk to uh The Columbia Bank and she did some research and the our deposits there are protected under something called GPA so GPA um protects uh municipalities counties and school districts deposits and entire amount above $250,000 is producted by that and then so that was when Miss Davenport was our ba and then since Miss Scott has uh come on board she has moved that money into a higher interest paying account and now I think we are getting more than 4% earlier we were not getting any interest on that account so both of your inputs were taken into account for uh that deposit i' be happy to happy to to answer um Miss Weber's uh question as much as I can um and I don't actually remember the timeline but it was this fall uh an email went out um um and there had been a request from the administration uh to have Personnel committee and was there an interest I emailed Mike and said I was interested and that was that was the amount of my input um I later uh received an email back saying fine and or I'm don't actually know if I received an email back but a meeting occurred and I received a uh um an agenda for that on the agenda there was an agenda item on negotiations but we did not um we did not uh discuss that um at all and we had one meeting and the next I heard is that there would not be a Personnel committee that's as much as I know on that and so from then there has not been another meeting was it in the fall right no it was in the summer I was traveling I did receive an email oh was it in the summer it was in the summer I was traveling with um uh incredibly challenging internet connection by the time I responded to my interest I had uh uh I was informed that the committee has been solidified uh my request was not honored and the meeting did occur uh even though there was negotiations on the agenda which I pointed out to um Mr lumbo yes but it was not discussed it was not clear that it would not be discussed it was as far as I was concerned and everyone else participating was concerned if you and Mr lumbo had an agreement that it would not discussed as different but the agenda went out it was identified as being discussed and it was only afterwards that we were notified verbally uh including today that negotiations had not been addressed and that's the except that I know and can I speak to both of those real quick uh Mr Molton thank you so much for joining us and thank you as always for your suggestions um so we'll certainly we I definitely have some made some changes to the bank account but as far as the FDIC component I don't know if we Circle back on that or not so we'll we'll go ahead and do that um and Miss Weber thank you for your questions and your interest yes we have had some conversations and some changes in committees um the board had not had a negoti a um a um an H human resources or Personnel committee for some time in my prior District I had had one so I was interested in keeping one because I was used to that course of business and keeping board members up to date regarding matters that could be pertaining to Personnel so I think I spoke at a few meetings about my interest in having some such meeting um I there was some sort of action with respect to the board to put one together as it was uh for the very first round of meetings I end up having a family emergency and and I actually missed the the first committee meetings I think I've ever missed in my career were the very first committee Mee August 22nd I just looked it up yeah yeah so so I had that report so I unfortunately wasn't able to be present I don't recall the uh the I don't recall the composition how the um the agenda was put together um but it was clear to me after the fact that the board was not used to having a Personnel committee and that things were uh there was some tensions around it um we also had plenty of committees emerging as we clearly have many committees already even without a Personnel committee so uh I may I I took the liberty of letting uh letting everybody know including Mr limbo that um I think we'd be fine without operating with an HR committee so I retracted my request to have a a personel committee so we can have a couple I mean we'll be happy to talk to to speak to what to whatever extent I can personally outside of the meeting but I I I can't if if it's a clarification yes but if it's not if yeah yeah if it's a clarification question only because I'll come back here so that I can hear my own question on the replay um Miss Rogan referred to that the request that the formation of the committee came as a request from Administration and Dr Schwarz reiterated that he had an interest so I guess because the policy it's uh 0155 I think that basically says that this is something that the board must do which means that this is formation of such a committee would happen in public I just want to clar you to clarify that is this something that was just oh somebody had an idea and was it Dr schar's idea was it Mr limo's idea who whose email was sent out about who sent out the email that and and I'm just I'm like I said I'm just interested in the formation of the committee and I feel that the way that the two of you represented that I just want to clarify you to clarify exactly who who sent out that email and and is that how the committee was formed thank you for allowing me to ask a question to clarify uh we do have um all our policies on the website and one of them um pertains I I guess that number um I 01 five five but part of it has to do um with formation of committees uh and the appointment of members of committees and um for per standing permanent committees like the policy committee was designed to be yes uh the board would have to vote uh president of the board or any board member unilaterally cannot create a committee and populate the committee we have to as a board board vote on the formation of the committee that vote Yes did not take place to cl to answer that question but then who who started that's what I'm trying to clarify did that come from Dr Schwarz or did that come from from Mr limbo who who sent out that email that started the committee I mean you got it you got it you you all got it so who sent it I think this might be appropriate to maybe follow up afterwards I I can't speak for no it it's not the email came from the president of the board Mike at a request is my understanding a request from the administration to have a Personnel committee which is not unusual in some districts but we've never had one so okay prior to that so that's and so I believe if a conversation as with the with Mike right to so so I I I do no disrespect to anybody but this is way beyond our meeting procedure like we've had a lot of issues that we don't engag back and forth no disrespect at all m i just say like let's get the information and we can come back so it's clear and and clear to you Mr Muhammad believe me I'm not used to being treated this well so I I I appreciate that it's just there's just such a short meeting and there's nobody here except me and and your new board member so I just I just thought it would maybe it would be an opportunity for me to CL get this clarified instead of waiting two more weeks that's all so well I think we should compile it for you so you it's clear for you well we make sure I think I think that um Miss Brogan described it answered my question actually okay so thank you all right Miss K if if um if we had transparency if we could could keep all those um on the record that' be great because it's a continuation of the public comments um we have no other business we finished the public comments um well with that I wish everybody a Happy Thanksgiving um anything else going once going twice great Happy Thanksgiving with that we're going to close um actually can we get a motion in a second to adj yes motion to adjourn the meeting do I have a second second all in favor all thanks everybody Happy Thanksgiving Happy Thanksgiving