we live M are live just a reminder to to everyone some members of the public to make sure my mic 7 o' ready to go meeting of the south hunon regional board of education is called to order adequate notice as required by the open public meetings Act was provided on December the 6 2023 by posting the notice with the respective Clerks of the city of lamberville burough Stockton and the township of West Amwell and advertis in The Hunton County Democrat and the Trenton Times newspaper uh please rise for the flag salute flag United States of America uh Mr Harris we take the roll call please Mar Dennis here here here K keski here M stra Megan Warner Ronnie Tom Marino here present uh good evening our first order of business tonight uh we are going to have a presentation by the West dwall fors Mr F you so as we've been doing each month trying to feature some of our students in each one of our buildings I'm going to turn it over to Mrs Flynn from West and she's going to bring our students up all right hi thank you guys so much for having us um my name is Caitlyn Flynn for those of you that don't know I am the music teacher um band and chus and all of the things at West d wall school um so we are super excited to be presenting one of our spring concert songs for you guys today we've been working on it for the last month or two at this point um and it is a Polynesian song called tongo um we've been working on some call and response with the with the kids up behind me unfortunately we're missing our sixth graders today as they are away it can't Fair View um but they will be performing this piece along with us and the other pieces that we're working on at our spring concert on May 9th here at South at 6 PM so if you don't have that on your calendar please join us we would love to have you all in attendance um but please without further Ado enjoy time [Music] oh oh [Music] no [Music] [Music] than [Music] the ch thank you again so much for having having us I would be remiss without thanking um The Faculty staff Administration all of the the people um at West school and all of the parents of course of all the kids up here behind me um you are all the reason that things like this can happen because you guys support all of us and support all of them in their uh musical Endeavors here so thank you all for supporting the Arts in South hunon and especially at West anall school and we hope you enjoyed too thanks so much for having us thank you Mrs okay our next uh our next order of business is we will be uh inter we have a vacancy on the board created when Tracy Puli resigned in February um so to this evening we will be interviewing two candidates for that uh position um let me explain how this is uh going to work and we actually just went through this in November um with a candidate from Lambertville um we will have uh we have questions we are going to be asking each candidate the same set of eight questions and we're just going to you know asking for their responses um we will ask that as one candidate is answering the other one will be in another room so that they can't hear what they are saying or hear their responses we'll be able to hear them you will be able to hear them uh when that is done we are going to go into an executive session uh the board will discuss the candidates uh we will come out and we will vote to appoint one of the candidates to the empty seat um I would ask that uh this is a uh this is a board uh function um we would ask you to keep quiet and respectful of the people that are answering questions please don't speak out during uh their answers or shout out any questions of your own um there will be opportunities later in the meeting for public comment um with that said it's my understanding that uh there was a coin flip to decide who would go first uh and Miss Bachelor was going to go first so uh Mr Rashard if you have if you'll [Music] uh good evening and know I I should have said before Mr herard yes but but bottom online for the school board we are looking for somebody who um is going to come be prepared uh and uh you know interested in putting in the work and we have two people here who I think have both shown that they are interested but Jen certainly you've been coming to meetings and um participated in our strategic planning so we appreciate that you're that you're here um with that I will start off the questions and I'll ask just tell us a little bit about yourself and why you're interested in serving on the board sure um so my name is Jennifer Bachelor I have lived in West sell since 2008 I have three students currently in District I have two at the elementary school and my daughter is in e8th grade here at South um I guess my interest in serving on the board um a good terminology that struck me was and I know you guys have seen me here multiple times some of you throughout several years um is that I've been sitting out here in the audience sort of playing Monday Morning Quarterback to you guys and now I'm just kind of asking for the opportunity to put me in the game um I you know I want the opportunity to offer my opinions and ideas that I have that I think that we could work together on um and not be limited into the scope of just three minutes of public comment or over email discussions um I also feel that it's important to represent um some facets of our community that feel um underrepresented over the years um when it comes to Schoolboard matters um and really just given my level of involvement in the community um and serving on the PTO and the interest I've shown in the schools uh this really feels like the natural Next Step um in my involvement I'll be going next um what do you see as the board's roles and responsibilities um so School Board as I understand it uh the mandate is to set policies and guidelines um you guys actively hire the search for and hire the superintendent and evaluate the superintendent's role or performance um every year we the school board also um is charged with setting the Strategic vision and goals of the district um and I'd say there's a pretty distinct line that I understand between the board setting policies and guidelines versus the super attendant um who administers the school board members are not charged with administering the schools um you're really charged with setting the framework um applying setting the budget and determining how resources are best spent um but administering schools is left to the administration I'm going to ask the next question um what experiences you talked a little bit about the experiences or qualifications that you bring to the board that contribute to improving the educational system so in my work career I've um worked uh over the years as both an individual contributor as well as a manager people um in my time um but always the key there has been that I've I've worked on collaborative um in collaborative team settings um the company that I've worked for for the last almost 24 years um places a high value on Innovation um and we've always oper operated under a pretty flat management structure and the reason behind that has always been to ensure that people feel comfortable coming into any setting and bringing any idea that they have um and not being kind of held back by rank or you know things like that um so you know my work experience in my work life um that's where I've spent the last 24 years in that type of environment um Team collaborative environment um the other thing I would say in my my work life that bring to the table is that I work with an extremely diverse set of people in the company that I work for um and I've always valued um having the aspects of those different backgrounds and we always we get into such great conversations at work um and and learning about different people from different backgrounds and what they they bring to the table and the different um just being exposed different voices different Traditions ideas and how that all comes together um and and really makes a an effective team in that respect um and then in terms of qualifications I've served on the PTO executive board and in that role we' I've helped to run meetings set agendas um helped with writing uh the mission statement um also participated in a very lengthy meeting uh to rewrite our bylaws um on on one occasion um and then also over the years just as a active participant here from the public I've um contributed to uh the strategic planning session so I'm aware of uh the Strategic vision and goals um that the district has set for the next five years thank you what attributes are essential for suive school work um I would say top of mind uh being a good listener um being a good communicator being able to to remain open-minded um but being able and willing to back up your position with facts um and and and information on on any issue that you want to support um and then I would say it also would require someone to act selflessly um at the end of the day at some point you have to let go of ego and you know agree to move on um on certain points and you win some you lose some kind of attitude um you know I know that that that's uh part of the challenges faces board members right coming together and listening to each other's opinions um and being able to formulate a plan and then and then move forward so listening communicating remaining open-minded um and that really acting selflessly and and remembering that the number one thing that ties everybody together is the goal of helping the kids and that really what what we should all remain at number one again um what do you see as the major issues facing our school district um so I think there's some issues that don't I mean you know the obvious ones right we're still recovering from the covid years um The Learning you know learning loss or recovering from uh Missing time in the class classroom but also the social and emotional effects um and mental health effects of of all of that and and having kids that were you know in and out of classrooms and learning how to be good classmates and be good students again we're we're still dealing with that and that's not unique to our district um I would say that our district probably faces a more unique challenge in um the competition that we Face from some very good private schools as other choice for students that could come to our school and constantly trying to you know I would say losing students for any reason to any other choice um is is not great for our district we want to we want to keep the kids we have we want to educate everybody um which I think is another unique challenge for this district is having such a wide range and diverse of uh diversity of um abilities of all of these students that we have and trying to make sure that we're offering opportunities and programs that fit the needs of so many that are at so many different levels and that's a huge challenge um you know and I I would say also that um communication and and engagement with the community is another unique challenge um you know people and I'm guilty of it we show up when we're mad we show up and have something to say of course um I think the real challenge is then keeping people engaged beyond that point don't have people the only reason you don't want the only reason people show up here is because they're mad about something right um and I I think that's a a real Challenge and and also preventing people from getting to that point where they feel shocked or surprised at something they hear at a board meeting um I feel like when that happens it shows that maybe we didn't do our best in transparency or do our best in making sure that people were fully informed um so that's another part of that challenge is keeping people engaged and informed um and making sure that everybody's on the same page right yeah I yes I'm also I'm already aware of the process to putting your name on a ballot I have no problem doing that and I'm planning to do that so the next question is uh the board has several committees that meet once a week a month mon personel curriculum policy Finance facilities and school Community which committee do you think would be the best fit for you and um I'll be on all of them I have so much time on my hands um probably I I would probably put school and community at the top of the list um given that you know when we did the work on the Strategic goals um at the strategic planning meetings um District goals number two and number five uh Community engagement um and communication um I would be really interested in in in helping in those areas um you know I feel strongly that centering that fifth goal of communication around words talking about like branding um really came off as a bit more of a marketing strategy than a communication strategy and I feel like using words like that coming across that way can put some people off so I would love the opportunity to to work more in that area and improve um and then um one of the objectives that we came up with um for engagement one of the objectives was stated as advertising and celebrating our student achievements and I feel like that's another area that I would love to have uh more input on um you know I we talked about at the at the last meeting writing a press release talking about um the state grant that we got for tutoring and in in my opinion I feel like we should be writing that press release when our kids come back in the fall and show us Improvement in their test scores and we celebrate those students for that effort right feel like writing press releases about programs and about accepting State money comes off as a bit more of a pat on the back for you know that's something we should be doing free money for tutoring of course yes we take it um you know so I would really like to see us do more truly celebrating our students calling them out individually another thing that comes to mind is like I know in my um climate survey I had filled out that you know let we should be doing student of the month and doing more things like that um and it's great that we've got that program now but it comes out as a list of names kids you know I I follow some of the other local area schools and I see them do these beautiful writeups about individual students and really telling us why they are student of the month and I just feel like promoting more things like that and holding up our students as being the reason why we feel good about our district would go a lot further in that goal of increasing engagement with the community um and I know that the uh school and Community is where we uh we had talked about um the press release and things things like that I mean and I I would also say that another area um that I would show interest in is in uh curriculum and Technology because I feel so strongly about our student achievement and the programs that we're offering and understanding more about that challenge of making sure that we have things that fit for a what you know all of the students that we have and one of those things that comes to mind is you know are we partnering with other County Schools um to offer more program or share more programming you know of of these other great schools that we have in hun and County we are hun and County residents right um so that's another area uh that I feel like I could have in hi Jeff how you doing um so how would you as a board member work with a superintendent and other board members when there are differing opinions on different topics yeah I think that that goes back to um the attributes that we talked about before which is um listening um being prepared to have conversations but you know really focus on your facts and your information and your reasons why um and then again being able to reach down deep and not um you know avoid taking things or making things personal when you have a difficult topic that you're talking about or disagreeing with somebody there's always that human tendency or even sometimes you have an initial you know burst of reaction to something and then if you take that 10c back take take it back take a step back and rethink the situation you can come to um a better understanding and a better way to to move forward um and then I think that it's also so important to remember like I said before at the end of the day everyone has the shared goal of doing what's best for our students and for the district and you don't always get your way as we've all told our children as parents and understanding that and and evaluating all sides and then accept the decision that's made and move forward um that's just how you have to operate in those situations thank you okay Jen um just uh appreciate all of your answers here today if you want to make any kind of a final uh statement or anything um take a couple of minutes sure right ahead yeah I mean like I said earlier um I know that I have been an active participant at many um board meetings and I really do um want to join you guys on that side of the table um to work together for Solutions I know that we have some challenges coming up we have some large projects to complete um we have community members who want to be more involved I promise you when I was out in November going around and talking to people like people were Care people care and they're invested and there are people who you know feel a little left out of the conversation who feel that um the district does you know we need to make sure that we're sticking to the things we said we were going to do for the from the referendum um and we do need to have that focus on our students on all students um and I really just I'm I'm looking forward to adding my different opinion to the board um you know it's always healthy to have good discussions of all sides of these issues um and that's that's really what I what I'd like to do thank you very much thank thank you guys appreciate that so now Jen is going to go into the other room we're going to bring our other candidate in and so while we're waiting could I just ask people to put your cell phones on mute um we've had a couple of them go off it's kind of disrespectful for the candidate when they're trying to answer a question if the cell phone's going off thank you good evening Mr Mard thank you for coming and I I want to say again as I said at the outset of the first interview um on a school board we are looking for people who are uh willing to put in the time and the effort it is not always easy to find people who are willing to take the nights and the evenings and weekends so appreciate you putting your name in and uh thank you for coming um we're going to go around the table here and ask some questions I will ask the first one uh would you mind telling the board about yourself and why you're interested in serving on the board absolutely um I've lived in South hunterton for almost 20 years now uh both Lambertville and West Amwell I owned a home in both I was active in both with the community and I think the motivation for me to be here with you today is a little personal but also a little more Community oriented uh personally um my son who is four uh has been enrolled in special education here in South and I want to commend the district on the terrific job they did in addressing his communication problems he um he was very slow to speak he was um having struggling in class communicating and the district jumped right in and I'm really proud of what the district did um they allowed my son to get uh Speech Therapy both at home and at school uh they allowed him to start prek six months early so he could get a jump on improving his communication skills and my wife Reena really became a mother tiger and aggressively pursued all the different Avenues to assist him and I need to say I'm really grateful for that I'm grateful that the district did what they could to help turn things around for him and now he's right up there with all the students so I'm proud of what South did for him and I'm looking to contribute if I can uh sort of in a way of saying thank you um I also have a second uh child ariela she's 11 um and she ALS also live uh attends West Amwell and so I've become acutely aware of a whole host of matters impacting their education over perhaps the last three to four years some of them positive some of them a little negative but at the end of the day my number one priority is to really focus on the needs of children and to bring communities together I've unfortunately seen a lot of divisiveness between the communities over the last few years and I think that's really problematic I think we need to take a step forward and understand that we're here to advance the needs of the district not Town versus town or anything like that we need to have One Singular Focus that's academics we need to have a focus on being good stewards of our tax dollars and we need to focus on the needs of our students and our parents that's really what drew me into the application for the open seat okay thank you what do you see as the board's roles and responsibilities I think they're simple um I think the main two roles I mentioned earlier I think is to a create an environment that's conducive to learning um and you need to produce that environment with the resources that are allocated to you um taxpayers are responsible for funding every single dollar that that we spend here in in the district spends and we have to have the faith of of the residents that we're spending their money in the way that they feel is necessary um role of the board should not be involved in some distractions that I think have occurred over the last few years I think we really need to come back and focus like I mentioned earlier on some of the things that are really important and that's the education of our children that's uniting our communities that's being responsible uh stewards of our tax dollars and it's focusing on academics which unfortunately as everyone's aware of we've had some problems at West West dwell Elementary recently I think we really need to get B Back to Basics and focus on academics um I'll ask the third question here uh what experience or qualifications do you bring to the board that would contribute to improving the educational system it from your last well um I think it's three-fold I think everyone has a copy of uh some of the information about my background but I have an education uh in uh public administration um I have a uh education in Public Finance um I've been a uh part-time professor at Ruckers University um I know how important a role is for Education both at the K through 12 level and at the higher uh higher education level and so I think my background um in being active in the communities on certain as well as my education and as well as my experience um with my day job um I've been working on public policy I've been state in the local level for 25 years um I have in a whole host of issues education local government regulations scho funding and others so this is something I've worked on for many many years in it I think I could bring those experien okay thank you okay attributes what attributes well first and foremost I think president saying that this is a serious and folks that come to the job serious about education um I think that the goals here need to beos like I said academics um and I think kind that you put in me as volunteers it is commen I recognize the amount of crime service amount of time it takes to participate as a board member and sometimes you get a lot of stress over this um but it's also very rewarded so I think um we all need to make a better understanding and recognition of the role that you play in shaping children's education and frankly show a little bit more gratitude for spending the time help um what do you see as the major issues facing our district major issu states are different I I to I think is number one it should be our number one focus in big picture as I mentioned some of the rankings that West do that um myself my I met the years ofs try get better understanding of exactly how to do that um and my understanding is that academics use of taxpayer dollars focus on students and again bringing communities together rather than dividing them should be our our top goals appes place the first week of January would you consider or are you considered running nove in the November election to extend your time um frankly I haven't thought about it um um one step at a time hopefully uh get your support this evening and then depending on how things occur over the next I think eight nine months for the remainder of the term I'll have a better understanding of the role you play the amount of time that it requires and then I'll make an assessment at that time excuse me the board has several committees that meet once they Personnel curriculum policy Finance facilities and school Community which committee do you think would be the best fit for you um I know what would not be the best for me and that's technology um my daughter is better ated than I am so that is one uh component that I don't think I would be much uh help on all the other topics that you mentioned safety um transportation um Community all of those are very important to me I follow those debates pretty closely within the school district and I feel that perhaps those three would I would be most appropriate to seron hi um so how would you as a board member work with the superintendent and other board members when there are differing opinions on different topics getting consensus on any issue is difficult I I know that um through my day job the most important thing is to be respectful and to take a moment to try to understand and reflect on all the different positions that are brought to you whether you agree with them or not um I think that if we spent a little bit more time discussing issues with each other rather than being combative on some of those issues we would find that we probably agree on much more than what we disagree and so I would see my role as I mentioned earlier as trying to be a representative for the entire District um and try to try to ensure that all the different towns within the district collectively can agree on a path forward and can AG agre agree how to move forward um and and satisfy the mission of Education that's really what we're here for and I think that that is a role that I can could help though thank you okay well that concludes our questions but um if you if you have a final kind of statement you'd like to make anything else you'd like to say uh please take a couple of minutes and do that now H sure um I think I explained a little bit of why I hopefully get your support um but I think I want to close simply by saying how much I love West Amwell um I also want to say how much I love l bill I also want to say how much I love Stockton um Every Spring when I go on my deck I get to take a look out at open space behind my house and the horse farm there and I feel how fortunate I am to live here how fortunate my family is to live here and so getting an opportunity to serve I think would greatly enhance my love of the community and again the love of all three communi and really trying to move forward as a district okay thank you very much thank you yeah uh okay so so now I'm just gonna make a quick statement here um and explain what is next Jen's gonna come back in the room uh but we are going to move in a couple of moments and go into an executive session we're going to leave and go into another room and we're going to talk about the two candidates um we uh that that conversation might take 20 or 30 minutes might take 15 minutes I don't know how long it's going to take we will be back we will be taking action when we come back um uh Mr St uh Mr Strauss is not here this evening um he did not participate in these interviews he will not participate in that discussion uh because just in case there was a perceived conflict of interest from anyone he he has chosen not to participate in those things but he will be back for the second portion of our meeting when we actually begin doing our business if uh um once we have voted um we will have a short recess so that everybody can kind of comport themselves and then we will go on with the business of our meeting um so with that I'll ask for a motion to go in executive session at 7:39 p.m a some move by Ronnie thank you and a second by Brian thank you all in favor I anyone opposed okay we'll be back don't you no no no talk about e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e okay I will need a motion to come out of executive session at 8:05 so so move by Martha thank you a second please second second by Brian he got you just by a hair Gina um all in favor anyone opposed uh we've got some weird R going on here is that one still on all right well let's see if we see how this works um so we need a a motion to open nominations for the unex to fill the unexpired term of Tracy pul from West Amwell um do I have a motion to open the nominations by Ronnie thank you second second by Kevin thank you very much nominations are open would anyone like to make a nomination uh I'd like to nominate Jen for the vacancy thank you do we have any other nominations we have Mo a motion oh we need a second right no we don't need a second so we need second if we need it put on record we don't need a second but um so I'm motion to close the nominations so move by Ronnie second by Kevin um any okay so now it is a roll call vote Mar Dennis hiete yes R yes Kevin keski uh my vote Yes and I just like to say I very uh support Jen in all ways I think she'll do a great job on this board so my vote is definely have make work yes time read yes yes okay so that motion carries seven to nothing um at this time we are going to have a five minute recess um to uh see if we can't resolve our audio visual issues so I need uh we and well can we talk about process real quick oh certainly yeah so everyone knows so Jen um congratulations you will be so process-wise you'll hear from me tomorrow just some things that you'll need to do and then we will offici officially swear you in at the April meeting and I I do want to say both to Mr Bor and to Mr Rashard thank you very much we appreciate having people that are uh motivated and interested and involved in the community there are a number of former born members sitting out here in the audience um so I hope that uh you will stay engaged and involved um and uh you know hopefully we will continue to hear from you but uh with that we're going to take a five minute recess so we can sort out our issues and uh we will start with our business at 8 88:13 hey there go to 11 spe I would never be like sitting here texting if it wasn't somebody asking schar I should respond that yeah expensive [Music] say it's back w a [Music] e this probably head up me yeah yeah we'll get up there spring break [Music] already all right right folks I'd ask you to please quiet down we're going to continue our meeting folks I would appreciate if you'd quiet down please so we can continue our meeting thank you very much okay with that our next uh next order of business is an update for the laf PTO or PTA is there anybody here from laf first of them uh no nothing to say okay all right uh PTO or PTA Andor Miss hardan guys H Jessica hardigan West am PTO um our next kids night out is um Friday April 19th uh we had to move it because um opening night of baseball is the 12th so the calendar will reflect the change but um we had a little incident where people didn't know it was canceled so um it's it's moved um our Scholastic Book Fair um did did great it's a little smaller than we typically do but given the state of the world and the economy it was it was expected um The W variety show and art show show was last Thursday and we'd like to congratulate all of the performers and artists they did an amazing job um it was really nice to celebrate the Arts and to see all the art in the hallway and see the the young performers and How brave they are um the future PTO committee meeting will be Wednesday April 10th um at 7 pm in the west Dall library and um save the date for end of the year foam party it will be Friday June 14th from 6:00 to 7:30 in the front parking lot um we've beun working on teacher appreciation week and we plan to follow the same schedule that we typically do um and we'll be reaching out to the middle school high school to start planning that and see what that looks like and hopefully get a represent a representative up here to sort of sort that out for us um and field day was moved it was moved um because of the schedule change and it's not a half day anymore so it was moved to June 12th with a rain date of June 14th um and all of the Inflatables we were able to move everything so it really works out and our next meeting will be um April 15th at 7M in the west Amal library and that's all I have thank you for your time thank you okay um I'll acknowledge uh we did receive a number of letters uh during the month most of which are available for public viewing on our website uh that takes us to uh approval of the minutes so I will ask for a resolution to approve the regular minutes and the executive session minutes from our previous meeting which was February the 26 need a motion please so move by Ronnie thank you second second by Gina thank you any discussion on the minutes all in favor I anyone opposed uh let's see uh next up now is our superintendent update so uh thank you so I just have a brief update this evening we actually have two presentations my update and then um J and Len will be presenting which I'll introduce in a second after I'm done um but I just wanted to give a an update just so everyone knows kind of where things stand with our reconfiguration plan first of all all staff were notified uh at the beginning of March of where they'll be teaching and uh what building what content area what grade level so I know that was a stressful time for our teachers waiting for that information so now everyone has that information on March 15th even though our kids had off we had a full day professional development day and that was organized based on our new District configuration so all of our elementary teachers for next year had the opportunity to work together and then our 512 teachers as well um tonight we'll be presenting our new English language arts curriculum that will be implemented starting in September for grades K to8 as we continue to focus on improving student achievement and then I wanted to share at the April Board of Education meeting we will be presenting the new Elementary schedule for September as well as the schedule for grades 56 next year that will take place at West ANW so I'll remind folks about that when I send out my update about the board meeting um but obviously that will be an important evening as well for that information and then as we just talk about construction update obviously we're in the the midst of both projects right now and coming quite honestly to the end of our first project um some pictures that I just wanted to share share with you if you haven't seen it lately um some major work as far as the outside panels um that I think are coming along very nicely we've gotten several compliments from some of our community members on the cols uh for the front of the building and the front entrance of the building um lighting being installed all the LED lighting this is actually our new art classroom um so you can see all the walls and everything are done and now we're working on the ceiling grid and actually the LED lighting has started in all our bathrooms so you can see you know as that comes along we are really excited to see that at our construction meeting last Thursday and then I know this is something um on this side that I had showed way back when kind of what it would look like in our hallways and you can see the vision so the drywall has been installed and eventually will be colored and obviously I think we'll bring a much more um you know aesthetic appearance to the hallways rather than kind of the white hallway you know block hallway that was there before so we're really excited and you can see the ceiling and the lighting and things along those lines so it's coming along very very nicely so over the next two weeks we're going to continue installing the green panels in the front entrance contining installing the ceiling grids light fixtures in all of our classrooms um installing the remainder of the bathroom tile they will start up all the HVAC units we're going to condition the building as we prepare for floor installation um they will begin outside site work on the front of the building and then that area again flooring installation will take place sometime in mid April and we are still on target for a completion date of June 2024 with the goal that all of our furniture will be delivered by the end of June beginning of July when the building is completely turned back over to the district so a lot is happening we're really excited we've been very very fortunate that this job is going very smoothly from the Contracting side of things but also from a material side of things where everything is coming on time there hasn't been any you know wait time the lead times have been great where we've gotten things ordered very very early in the process so um you know we're really excited as we enter into the home stretch of this building and then for our middle school so a lot has changed since our last meeting um I just kind of wanted to put it back on people's radar you know of the design and kind of the layout of what the building looks like so obviously you got your you know your front entrance here and this is more of like Performing Arts Horus band our steam room our science rooms the classroom wings and then if you look at the site from above you can see from the foundational work we're getting very close to completing the foundation so obviously you know this is the gym space and as you look over here this is coral and band and then our steam room and our science rooms and as you continue to look at the site you can see the foundation here it's being poured is for the you know two layers you know two decks one on top of each other for classrooms 56 and 78 So eventually as we move along um they're continuing and they probably have started this already these pictures work from Friday to finish out the remaining of the front entrance and the front of the building the library area which is here so fingers crossed that we get some nice sunny weather and you know not as much rain as we've been getting but we're still making great progress so I'm really excited about that um and like I said it's amazing to think for the Elementary building you know this time last year we were getting ready to move out and start the project and now we're in the home stretch of completing the project so very exciting stuff all right so that's my update um and then quite honestly uh a really important update that we're going to share and um I'm GNA invite janeen lenon up to the podium um janen is our director of curriculum instruction she's only an assessment she's only obviously been here since October but it's been very busy kind of evaluating our programs and one area of focus has been specifically our Ela program um and I think the important thing to point out before Jane Allen starts is that when we looked at this program revision um we were looking at something for KA so there are a lot of districts when they talk about language arts programs they'll do a K5 and not necessarily include the middle school we felt very strongly that it was important um to include the middle school all the way up to 8th grade and Jan is going to give you the background of the program the reason why we selected the specific program that we have and then next steps as far as implementation they're all you thank you good good evening everyone members of the board um the community that's listening at home and then our members that are here I just want to say I'm so excited for this next step and listening to all of the feedback um and all of the concerns the community members have had about our test scores and then the excitement enthusiasm as I have met with board members I just want to thank you all for your support as I've brought things to the curriculum committee and different ideas the Administration has been supportive as have all of the board members I also have met with a lot of community members um just to get an understanding of um their questions and concerns and make sure that as we design this program moving forward that for many years to come we're building something that's sustainable and that's going to really support still students here um our most valuable asset here in South hunon so um as I go through this I tried not to include a lot of edu speak which is just jargon um so if there are follow-up questions or anything I I feel very comfortable meeting um with anyone that would like to send an email or reach out um and I'd be happy to answer further questions this is a general overview as uh Mr Souza pointed out for our Ela programming again remembering that we will be rolling this out or implementing all of this beginning in the fall so I um I will start and I'll also end with this I am having I'm going to host a evening for parents or any community members that's interested for with our test preparation and the things that we're doing right now um so I'll be hosting that in April um and the last slide does share the date um the time is yet to be determined but I feel like it's also important to address those questions as well because the immediate that's what we're going to be doing in April excuse me in May and I just want the community to know exactly what we've tried to put into place thus far um and I really again commend the board for supporting us me and the teachers who have really embraced this because it's tough to make changes um halfway through the year or Midway through the year when you've had plans and you've had a class and you're also working with lamberville on location and lots of other things that just come up out um during the year so with that I'll go ahead and get started so I'm going to go ahead and go over the rationale how we actually chose the programs the research behind the choices and then our professional development Next Step so what is our training for the teachers looking like um and that's really that the last sentence South hunon Regional School District will be moving forward in a direction that will support all Learners um to achieve the highest level of academic success and that will be something a theme that you'll hear through out the um program reveal is that I really am looking at how we can support each one of our different groups of students as well as differentiating for all of the various needs of our Learners so really as we start right now the time is now and the sense of urgency um as you all have pointed out in various board members of board meeting excuse me and Community is that we need to address our test scores and they are what the community the world anyone that clicks on South hunon Regional School District sees from our performance report so what do we need to do to shift that um and just so you know I truly believe deeply that is not the teachers nor is it the students it is really just aligning the resources the programming and the training um and the shifting demographics of our community and so these are really the three shifts um that have come in the last last couple years probably the last eight years or so with the Common Core State Standards and then with the New Jersey student learning standards and regular PL practice with complex text and academic language reading writing speaking grounded and evidence from the text and building knowledge through content Rich non-fiction those are a lot of words that hold a lot of meaning I'm going to go into some of little bit of a detail with this because I also as much as this is a program designed for kindergarten through eth I know that we have a lot of families who are interested in what does this how does this play out 912 or what does this look like for our Co college or career ready students and so the next couple of slides will speak to that and then I'll shift into exactly the programs and how we chose them the first shift as we've talked about is the regular practice with complex text and next to the text is the word why so some of you have shared research and articles with me it's information that I've studied over the last couple years that there's truly a gap between the complexity of college and high school text and we're seeing that um disparity grow more and more and it's in the news it was in New York Times two days ago um I know that it's out there and it's in the minds of those of you who have middle schoolers and high schoolers and even those that may have had South hun graduates that have gone on um and when students can read in terms of text complexity the greatest predictor of success in college so when they can grapple and understand complex texts then that's where we're seeing the success in the next steps in their path after they graduate um currently too many students are reading at too low a level so 50% of the graduates can read sufficiently can can read sufficiently complex texts so half of them cannot and this is this is nationally this is not specifically South hunon but I felt like South hunon is facing a lot of these challenges right now and so what are we going to do to change go ahead also show you all know these slides will be shared out tomorrow morning so you'll have time to read them digest them and then at that point in time if you have further questions or want me to elaborate on something I'd be happy to um the second shift is spe reading writing and speaking grounded and evidence from the text so what we're working on now is looking at how students write and then provide evidence from the text um and we are doing that in kindergarten through high school and what we're doing now with the shifts is looking at how that language is continuous and it's common um some of you that might have middle schooler or high schoolers may have heard them talk about claims evidence and reasoning Cs and that's just means that when when you state something you need to Pro provide evidence and then back it up with reasoning so there's evidence is a major empis on the ELA standards and this is something that obviously we all know as good writers whether you're writing scholarly works or you're writing a narrative piece or you're um annotating you need to be able to evaluate and present um evidence from the text and then being able to locate deploy evidence are Hallmarks of strong readers and writer and that's what we want all of our students to be able to do as they leave and as they travel through the grade levels here in South and here's one of the biggest shifts that will probably be most noticeable to you um as family members and community members is the shift from information to L to literature or adding information um so in our K5 classroom students should be reading according to the standards 50% informational text and 50% literature so informational or non-fiction um and then as 6 to8 students get into six and eight 55% should be informational and 45% literature so that's where there's a huge shift in the current programs that we've had in the past and where we are and moving forward and where the shifts have been in the test because the test the njsla and the State Testing has shifted a lot so have the AP tests and so have the SATs so these three shifts that I'm talking about now are really things that all of our students need to gain um confidence and understanding um and informational text is harder for students to comprehend The Narrative text so when they are presented with an informational piece about uh it could be plants uh in third grade on the njsla they have to be able to read it understand it and then they if they have to write about it they have to be able to cite evidence from the text so what you'll see as we shift to the new Ela programs uh in K8 and then working towards what it may look like in high school is you'll see a shift with more informational more non-fiction because think about the things that you read today uh might have started with the a news brief on your phone or it may have been the newspaper or whatever it may be it may have been a document whatever it may be most of our time is made up with informational if we get to read a novel it's truly um for some of us that's a great joy but it could be like 12 minutes right so we have to really get our students comfortable and kids love I mean there's no doubt there are kids who love dinosaurs there are kids that love um learning about the Titantic World War II so informational text isn't necessarily something that children don't like it's just often times they haven't been presented with enough different topics animals animals of the PLS all different types of things so we just need to make sure we're getting those resources in the students hands and then teaching them how to read them so this is a little wonky and it's a lot of words but I wanted to give you um an overview of the ELA programs so all three of these programs and where we are shifting and moving towards in the future is an asset-based practices so we view the diversity that students bring to the classroom as characteristics that add value and strength to our classrooms and communities so we look at what people's background is and what they bring their experiences and we look at that as an asset um and so the three programs that we're going to be implementing next year is a program called hegerty which is a phic awareness curriculum and so I know when we talk about back to the basics you may hear that in the news that's truly that it's learning what a letter S and a sound is and how those go together um without getting into too much detail the reason why nursery rhymes are so important um as many of them many of us experienced them as even we were learning to read is because that to learn how to rhyme and students that can pick up on rhyming is an indicator on their read reading ability usually that's one of the first times if students don't hear Rhymes that's that's a trigger for us to say ah oh you know we need to dive into this a little bit deeper um so hegerty is uh will be implemented in our prek kindergarten first and second and we're very excited about this coming into the prek because I have heard in my short time here that the shift or that um the leap from our prek programs to our kindergarten programs is often pretty wide and it's a large adjustment um so I look at this as a way to say oh wow the four-year-olds and five-year-olds are going to be experiencing something that they will recognize when they move to kindergarten um I often associate it with um families that tell me oh well my child can read when they come into kindergarten and how are you going to differentiate and I'm like won't it be wonderful for that child to sit in that class and know how to do something because boy that bus ride was all new going to a cafeteria and buying lunch was all new so we we like to give students I say set them up for ESS so it's okay if a child understands something and has information before they shift to the next level um foundations uh is another program that builds on the pheic awareness it's called a phonics program some of you have may seen some things in the news about the science of reading and um understanding what our phonic program is foundations is a phonic program and then the next step is what um is called Whitten wisdom which is our core knowledge and those are all wit and wisdom is where students are reading and writing with war-winning books and from contemporary authors so I just wanted to show and this will um we're not going to click on any of these links tonight in terms of timing but you'll see that when you look at this you'll see that there is research behind all of the program that we are implementing next year so you can go and click on Ed reports you can Google Ed reports wit wisdom and you'll see that it earned highly effective um rankings and there's all different information about um building Knowledge and Skills in the language arts the one with the star is very um userfriendly so it's got a lot of pictures it will um you will understand it if you're reading it from the parent perspective and it also gives you some tips and tricks on what to ask when your children get home from school like how is school today fine what did you learn oh I don't know well now Whit wisdom says well what did you why don't you ask your child um you know what was the meaning of your book today or what did you read today um and so it's um it gives you everything that you want to know and then um foundations and Orton Gillingham and the Wilson Reading system so those of you that have young students or have followed along in the last last several years of our Orton Gillingham um roll out and implementation Orton gillingham's approach and I'll get into that a little bit later on the next slide um but foundations again science of reading for those of you that are interested in a little bit more about how these programs align to the science of reading and um those parent letters will be parent letters that will be sent home to uh families at the beginning of each one of those grades so hegerty I just want to go over a little bit about what it would look like you'll get more of this information for those of you in the Elementary classrooms during back to school night um so hegerty and the phic awareness lessons are only about 8 to 12 minutes it's usually done in a whole group it can be done in a morning meeting or a time when the the class is coming together it can be done after lunch when everybody returns it really is a way just to bring the students together they can typically sit in a circle um and they're practicing different sounds and letters and again there's two other research bullets at the at the bottom um that speak specifically for those of you that um are reading Specialists or have studied reading Dr Kilpatrick has um is pretty much a foundational leader in the Orton Gillingham and multisensory approach there's some specific data upon the increase uh once students learn from use hegerty and um even though this is not our school district we do use Dibbles some of you may be familiar with the Dibbles assessments that are part of been part of our benchmarks for many years so I'm interested to see how with our Dibble scores raised with the implementation of the hegerty program um so I just want to speak a little bit about the Orton Gillingham approach or the OG approach and truly it's called called a multisensory that means students tap they write in sand they may write um letters or words in shaving cream on the desk the idea is that you're using many senses to learn how to read the basic building blocks or the foundational building blocks um and so they're just some different FAQs at the bottom so I just wanted the community members to know and families to know that we're not throwing the baby out with the bath Potter we're still using the Orton Gill ham approach it's just taught through foundations and the previous program we used was called Isme and um Isme just did not have the full package that fundations and hegerty and wit and wisdom do they actually all go together um so when a teacher is teaching a Whitten and wisdom lesson about reading um they're studying them they're talking about the moon there will be a specific place in um the teachers manual and the teachers guide that says this aligns with Foundation unit 2 lesson four um and use the decodable which is a a reader a small book that would align to that as well so we're trying to put everything in place for our teachers in terms of resources to provide them the best of the best um and then provide them the training the best of the best because we know when the students come um and they're sitting in front of us they are kids and they are bringing all of their kidness with them so we want teachers to be comfortable not to have to make decisions um on oh I need to go make these extra copies or where am I going to find this resource and it's not research based it's all just consistency that's not to say that it's a scripted program um and one second grade teacher may bring something else than another second grade teacher because that's the art of teaching um we're just really providing the science as we shift right now to I'll talk a little bit more now about uh Wht and wisdom Wht and wisdom is published by a company called great minds um and this is taken directly from the great minds um the inside of the teachers manual and I think it really speaks to what we here in South hunon believe and so we want to um I just wanted to share this message with you so that you know this is what our vision is and this is our these are our goals um moving forward so the difference between wit and wisdom and what many reading programs are um how they're designed now similar to um how we talk about how math has changed since many of us um or even 15 years ago when students may have sat down with 25 math problems to do um so has reading uh they're no longer reading groups in the same way that we may have had them in the past um we're really looking at reading comprehension and how it builds on knowledge so you um when you see these slides um at home tomorrow or whenever you decide to look at them Wht and wisdom is all um built on the context of real works so there's art music and authentic texts that are woven into each one of the units so um as you saw in the first part you'll notice masterpieces um and photographs there's one of George Washington crossing the Delaware because in the fourth grade they study George Washington and um it's one of the informational texts as they learn about um the Revolutionary War so this is another picture or a masterpiece art piece of art that's taken from it and just to give you a little perspective and I'm not going to go on and on but I just want to teach you a little bit about what the reasoning behind using art and music is to maybe introduce a less the reason is because everyone can access that Tech that picture everyone in the class no matter where um where you are in your reading growth or your Continuum or what your first or second language is or H when you've moved to South hunon you can look at that picture and say oh you know the teacher could ask what do you think the boy in the water is doing oh well he's really white maybe he's freezing and it looks like he's calling out to a friend okay does anybody else have a different IDE a what do you think the gentleman doing laying on the ground is with the dog oh that's his dad and he's watching him oh I don't think it's his dad I think it's a stranger so you understand what I'm saying that everyone can contribute to the discussion and there's no judgment there's no oh well I was a level L last year and now being in fifth grade I need to be a level Q like there's none of that anymore so everyone can access that's not to say that students don't have the differentiation and the scaffolds they need but to launch something and to make everybody feel a part of it um so that's just a little bit about um what it means to build content knowledge here is aligned to standards so many people ask how does it all fit together Reading Writing speaking and listening standards are all part of wit and wisdom so we don't have to have a separate program for writing we don't have to have a separate program for reading and then we don't need to say okay we're now going to have a speech unit because the speaking and the listening are all part of wit and wisdom and it's all built in together here are some of the titles you may notice many of them are award-winning many of them are Newberry there's even some cicott some some credit Scott King um you'll also notice that there's a mixture of informational text or non-fiction and again I can share with you any of the lists of texts um if you're so before we end it will be available certainly when um at back to school night the teachers will be able to share the different picture the different books so just to give you just to wrap up a little bit and share with you how it all fits together um you so you know that the saying or what's out there right now is called core plus more that means we have a Core Curriculum which is our wit and wisdom which is our Reading Writing and word study and then the plus more is our phonics and our phic awareness um and so when you build knowledge uh many of us just learned to read it just happened um but for many kids and people that didn't so we have to be able to pull those pieces apart to say oh is it sounds that you may struggle with or is it letters and down that's where I'm down at the word recognition comprehension is putting it together you have to understand it and you have to know something about what you're reading you can gain that information as your reading but you have to have um the mental flexibility to be able to do that within a text and then it all comes together and we have wonderful readers here at South hundon and they all score fives on the njsla these are just what the resources look like just so you see if um you know you're in a classroom you come for parent conference um as I talk about um in an open house or something so all the teachers would have the the letters strips will all be the same so that in second grade you learn to write your be's the same way your third grade teacher expects you to write them um that is just the consistency that helps build um the common knowledge for our students prek through two and then again some of the books from um wit and wisdom I want to speak just a bit about our different um populations of students uh that we need to make sure we are meeting the needs of students in our enrichment program our special education and our multilingual Learners so each one of these programs addresses um any one of those groups of students if we um want to put the students in certain places and what they need uh so you can go ahead and read those bullet points um to yourself but I did want you to know that everything was looked at um through the lens of our varying populations and there's a lot of words on these I'm going to stop talking for a sec but I just want you to know that when um I was putting this presentation together I reached out to some of our pilot teachers so and I didn't actually speak about our pilot we have 10 teachers in um grades K through five one um teacher at every grade level um at West Amwell and LPS they're they're split up and these were some of the comments they said and I just said you know after um implementing Whitten wisdom or piloting Wht wisdom for a couple months what are some things that you notice um do you think it's successful should we continue on as we've been um talking to them monthly um we have observations and visits and debriefs about their lessons I just met with two teachers today bless you um about how to grade writing because the writing pieces are very different um than writing pieces that and the rubrics are very different than what we're used to in the past the rubric in wit and wisdom for writing is identical to the the rubric for the njsla so that's really important for teachers to always be um evaluating students writing along the same with the same criteria that they will be evaluated on the njsla um so and it's also good writing so they go hand inand and so I just said I would mention a little bit about professional development um we rolled this out already shared the presentation on March 15th April 16th we will have the great minds the Wht and wisdom trainers come um and do a full day of in-person training for our K8 teachers and um we're doing half days so that not all the teachers leave the building at once um so I'm working with the principes for that we do have a foundations Integrity training um in May for the prek 2 teachers with a review and overview of the materials we're not as concerned about the teacher being pulled out of those classrooms in May because those are untested areas um untested grades and then I'll offer um July we'll have a voluntary I call it a boot camp we'll have I'll offer four days and teachers can come and we can start some lesson planning we can look at assessments it'll be voluntary but um believe it or not there are a lot of teachers that like to come over the summer and sort of start wet their appetite read through the materials um and then when we return in August one of the days will be and working with your grade level team and implementing it um and planning and then the the graphic on the left I just want to talk a little bit about is called a Socratic seminar all of the Wht and wisdom lessons are um they and all the modules or units in all grades K to eight have what's called Socratic seminars and it really are class l or student-led discussions they're very structured but it gives students the opportunity to talk to each other and um you know oh well I noticed that um wild animals can appear dangerous and a first grade student I was in a classroom last week you know the the student added on I agree with you Hannah um but we have to be careful because as we read in our book some animals look cute but have dangerous features and so we're really seeing students talk to each other like that um and they do it beginning in kindergarten so anytime a student can speak or talk it's like if any of you are involved in a book club or any type of study as soon as you start to talk to somebody about it it helps you process it it also helps you say oh I didn't really like this book and then you turn and somebody says well I liked it because of this this and this and then all of a sudden you're like oh maybe I did like the book um so these allow students to grow as critical thinkers and um it also helps develop their thinking at a very young age and then there is the save the date it will be April 23rd it will be here um so I can do a live stream and so it'll be impers and on Zoom thanks uh does anyone on the board have any questions about the presentation question but I have a comment okay um I wanted to express our gratitude I know that we since You' come on we've had a lot of conversations about how important it is to raise achievement and we've watched you you really work hard to understand the needs of our district um the needs of our individual space needs of our individual teachers and I know that this is a culmination to a lot of research and thoughtful um um just even the idea of like piloting with the teachers and getting their feedback including them and then presenting it to the staff and to the district pent Council it's all really I thought it had um a wonderful approach how we're we're doing it and I'm looking forward to well thank you thank you it's you know anything that we do is not it's not my idea right it's all of our ideas and so it's board members it's community members it's the students it's the teachers it's the feedback we get so that we can come to you know a decision on what's best for our students um and so I just thank the board for all their support thank thank you oh y That's great um so talking about the percentages of um you call information non-fiction nonfiction versus fiction um percentages is that across Alles of stud like science no just reading reading reading and writing yes uh well 68 so the standards shift a little bit and I can do a little bit more research and I can follow up with you but um it would be the the shift in high school is because students take specific classes so if you're going to take a creative writing class you're going to be writing creative writing if you take a journalism class you're studying and writing about journalism if you're taking a British literature class you are then studying learning so as students go through high school this course has become much more um uh specialized so but through nth grade um and even 10th grade we do want to make sure our students get a foundation of both because we need them one way or another the other thing is pushing um sharing a lot of this and I've been doing a lot of training and conversations with our social studies teachers and our science teachers because it's very important if they're writing in science and math and social studies that that writing aligns to exactly the way they're being instructed in their writing and reading classes so I've been meeting with the different departments to say this is what we're rolling out and I want everybody to be on the same page in terms of the training so when we train on March 15 all teachers um in k k six were trained and then because of some other um some other needs and that had to be taken care of with our 78 teachers we just had the 78 ELA teachers but it's conversations I've been having especially with the science and the math department um and social studies since I got here in October there any other questions from the board okay thank you very much for the presentation okay um and so with that we come to the period of public comment uh so this is open to the public uh for a comment on any that you want to say we ask uh in the interest of time it is 9:00 um we will ask that you limit your um statement to address it to the board and limit it to three minutes and um we will if it is something that if you have a question that can be answered in a few words we will try to answer that question if it is a question that is a little more complex or may need more research we will go back and get you an answer out of respect for everybody else uh we don't want to try to deliver long answers in this forum this evening so with that um I will open the public comment to anyone who has something they like to bring before the board hello just let us know your name and your community Doug sheets from West dwell Doug sheets West Amwell 20 years Lambertville 25 years so lifetime um excuse me I'm not best with words and speaking I went to South H hopefully my my kids are better at it than I am but anyway um first uh I didn't vote for the school to happen um I'm a little disappointed that it went through um I don't think it's the best plan for us uh it's a moood point um I'll you know keep my quote about opinions to myself um but um you know we're renovating LPS which is in a flood zone and will always be in a flood zone um I don't think it's been 15 years since um this addition on this school has been done um where we needed to separate the Middle School from the high school and um now it seems like there's going to be a lot more vacant rooms here in this school that doesn't seem necessary um but anyway that's my opinion on that and doesn't really matter too much anymore but last time we were here somebody made a comment about the a athletic field and preparedness for that so I thought I'd look on to the um website and see if I could find the plan there is a site plan pseudo site plan on there I don't believe it's the finished final developmental plan but it does show one field in there so when this project started you essentially took away three Fields right there's only on the plan one field to be replaced back right so hopefully at some point you could tell us what are we going to do with the other two fields that were removed right there's going to be a Varsity Softball field but there's not going to be anything for baseball or softball for a middle school I don't believe right now they're going somewhere off site we know where that is and I don't believe it works for the district at all so hopefully there's a better plan to get these kids um field where it should be right at the facility um more importantly why I want to be here is I attended meeting last week with uh Mr Coach Lee Hall wrestling and they're going Varsity this year which is fantastic right sounds like they're getting a new mat and everything uh however he commented that um his assistant coach may not be um his contract renewed or so whatever may be but I'd like you to take in mind that if he's got a program moving forward right that hopefully with a new hire that you know someone has maybe wrestling background or so because you know he needs help to further program and further the kids in the sport it's a great Sport and um that's about it you know the world needs more wrestlers that's a quote for sure Tim Johnson thank you thanks dou wrestling get it on the board I will say Mr Hall is I think one of the best coaches that we have at this school he is a he is a phenomenal coach and mentor to the kids so thank you we will get more help I can answer that part um does anyone else have anything they'd like to bring before the board hello Denise bog from West dwell and um thank you very much tonight for appointing Jen Bachelor I am delighted to see that you saw all of our letters and really I think all of West Amal does appreciate that so thank you um but I'm here uh as president of the shr softball booster club and I was here at the last meeting and brought up the challenges with the bus driving situation for the softball team so in the first week of like full practices even eight days I guess some of which were already at the school so I don't even count those so let's just say one week of full busing I think three days we've already been um putting our softball team on a bus route through Stockton and then coming back down so um I'm hoping that that can somehow be resolved I don't know I was told there's enough bus drivers um and then the other um thing we'd like to address is the you know the plans it's it looks like they're progressing nicely for the new uh medal school so I'm delighted to see that but um you know the whole issue of having all of these teams displaced it's it's challenging you know we don't have enough bus drivers it's probably costing add additional money it's time it's effort it's taking away practice time for our teams so if there's any way when the structure gets built with the walls if there's a way to move the fence in and start to like work on the softball field and the other fields that need to be you know fixed completed that would be greatly appreciated because we'd love to be back on the field next year and and I'm hoping that you can figure out some kind of plan that you can get us there sooner and that we're not displaced next year so I'm you know talking about it now so we can think about in the future and one last comment uh thank you very much for the presentation tonight it looks like a great STP like in the right direction so good found otion thank you thanks good evening my name is Georgia angeri for those of you who don't do not know me I am a senior at South my parents are Nick and Jennifer Andreoli um I'm here to speak on behalf of the softball team we are having a busing issue um a lot of girls have brought it up to me and they wanted me to talk about the issue I wish I could have had more girls come but it is a school night um I wanted to go over some things that some problems that have been coming up um now the girls do come off and get off the bus at 310 to 315 now when they get their gear off the bus that takes about 10 to 15 more minutes and I know that sounds like a long time but we're not soccer players we don't just come in with like barely any gear we have a lot of gear and we have our other stuff as well um so this brings up issues due to the fact that it takes time away for the girls to practice um the issue really is is the fact that you know the bus drivers really drive around and drop the rest of the kids off we have talked about trying to get the girls or trying to get the bus drivers to drop the team off first then dropping the rest of the kids off that is the only change that we've really asked for because then they're getting dropped off more at 3:00 rather than at 3:15 and this isn't much I didn't think that that would be much of a a big deal just because it it's not taking that much time for the bus drivers it's not you know a hassle for them in any way I at least I don't see it that way um so I think that this would be a good change it's just one little change just for them to drop off off the girls first rather than dropping everybody else off first I know when I had to experience it last year it made me sick I we were on the bus for like a very long time it was we get off at like two we get on at like 2:45 and then we leave so for me it was a very long time it was like 40 minutes almost on the bus and I know some of the girls said that they've gotten sick a little bit off of it too they said that it was a struggle for them and it does take time away and I know that for some people it's it's not it doesn't seem like a lot of time but it is um for me as a softball player this is so important softball has gotten me out of so many things in life it is honestly a lot of my life and it is almost all that I think about it's a 90% of all that I think about and I know that a lot of the girls think about it as well so this is just a big thing one more thing I'd like to say um with softball and with really every team Athletics is so important South hundon may be small but Sports can be so important for a kid to get out of just little school and jump forward and put their mind somewhere else so um I also think that we can't you know improve in Life or in in sports or really in anything if we don't change so all I'm asking for is just for the girls to get dropped off first rather than everybody else get dropped off so that's it thank you thank thank you Georgia that was well said I I will I will say George's like I think probably been a four year this will be her fourth year as a letter winner she's been a great softball player here and I look forward to watching you hit 400 and knock a couple bombs of um does anyone else have something like to bring before the board hello everybody uh I'm Tim Eberly a resident of Lambertville for I think almost 20 years now which is crazy I know some of you um in our household my son Luca is a uh is a seventh grader uh academics comes first and I know that's a lot of what has been discussed here tonight but I'm actually here to talk about uh sport which was mentioned previously and that is wrestling um so prepared a little bit here try to be real quick um but um so 1974 Barry rle uh came up with the South hun wrestling program started the program and uh I'll just say I grew up in Bridgewater but um my family is originally from roselt Park which is a very small school very much like South hunon and my grandfather was on the first ever Roso Park wrestling team uh Roso Park park has one of the oldest programs in the country and when they started it they thought it was small they couldn't how are we going to do wrestling and then look where they are now uh so anyway 20201 uh that was the last season for South hunen and it's now been about 25 years um there's never been a district champ at South hunon um but they are now going Varsity just fantastic I was at a meeting the other night um and I think uh you know most programs when they disband uh they don't come back certainly and I think there's a reason that this one is coming back I think one of the reasons is the sport of wrestling and the second reason is where we are so this is hunting County uh Pennsylvania um for those of you you know maybe not steeped in wrestling you know history this is like a hot bed of wrestling in the United States um Central North hunon bores these are some of the best programs not just in New Jersey but anywhere um within maybe uh 45 minutes of here uh you know there are probably six to eight wrestling clubs um so wrestling I have uh along with Doug there you know I've been a coach of the junior program here which is both sides of the river it's soulbury and uh and South hunon so West Amwell Lambertville soulbury so uh what I want to go over in my limited 40 seconds here is uh we had a banquet the other night uh k through eight there were over 125 people there um the turnout for wrestling in this area is insane but what happens is you need a feeder program and there's young kids and then they get here and there's no middle school team and there's a coach now who's trying to get things off the ground with a varsity and there's a I guess a teacher that's not being retained who is an assistant so so I just I bring it up and that you have a there's a core of kids we've been coaching from when they were kindergartens they're wrestlers they are are we gonna come can we come to South is there going to be a is there going to be a serious program and my son's one of them um so uh I just ask that um I'll finish up um it's fantastic that uh there's a varsity wrestling program again at South so that's congratulatory thing um but what's the planning for it um and uh do you really have it for these kids like is there going to be a plan to actually have a program because that has to be a feeder system so we've put hours upon hours in the last seven years to get the kids to hear can we now get them into a high school program the last thing I'll say real quick and excuse my extra 30 seconds here um but uh wrestling itself I had said the the area but wrestling is um what the hardest toughest High School sport they probably is uh it's humbling it's grueling it's strength stamina it's tactical Mastery like chess it's weight cutting it's one-on-one athletic combat mental marathon and most importantly for the school um it builds a strength of character uh and you want more wrestlers walking around a school and the last thing I'll say is being a progressive School uh yes you're starting with the boys team but uh girls wrestling is the fastest growing sport in New Jersey and they just said in 20 26 there's going to be an NC girls uh you know wrestling championship so it's not just limited to boys so that's all thanks for your time thank you very much the only thing I'll say just kind of both comments so we have full intention of replacing the assistant for the wrestling program and I've had conversations with Jason Miller about you know the future of the program and the fact we would love to have a middle school team if we have the kids so you know once the 58 building opens up and uh you know we're looking at you know different opportunities for kids there wrestling definitely on the road map down the road so keep the kids coming I will say too you know as a board we have we have former wrestling champion over here um I uh you know we have people who are supporters of wrestling uh my cousin wrestled for Coach Runk back in the day back in 1998 or so um we had to go and buy we've invested we have bought mats okay we have bought the equipment we are this is not something that you do if you're just planning to do it for a short term we are interested in seeing it flourish so the fact that you have that you guys have kids that have trained and they're coming here that's kind of what we were hoping for so that there would be because you do need a core of people who would do it so I just wanted to note that Gina did you son participated [Music] inam new P year and the amount of put and development that that they're doing is just it's it's amazing and it's really does anyone else have something they like to bring before the board this evening these late board meetings are very fun um Michaela biresaw West stamell I have two kids I would mostly just like to say to the board and to our community that we are in a really good position to do great things I am seeing a lot of change in the way that we're approaching things the way that we're addressing our special education approach curriculum Staffing data you name it and as a former English teacher bringing this information to our Ela program is absolutely critical we have spent as a culture as a country spending decades talking about the power of math and science and me the the little English teachers going but what about the reading and the writing and I've seen in our school district great efforts being made toward the ability to speak to communicate to disaggregate information and spit it back out but I have not seen that done with consistency and this Pro haven't researched programs but bringing this in and creating the scaffolded structure to put our kids in a position to properly answer those tests whether it's science or history is so incredibly valuable and I thank you very much for that presentation but I also would like to say that when you guys asked the question today of what is a the role of the board that's the role of the board to create the vision to put the right people in the right place and to promote our students what I'm going to ask of our community tonight is to put down the anger and the fire and to get on board with finding these Solutions and supporting these efforts I'm not thrilled with how I see our community today I've said that three years ago I said it two years ago but I feel strongly that we have people on this board today that really really care and are willing to seek those Solutions and Jen I'm excited that you get to bring your opinion and your perspective but I really really beg of our community simmer down and get on board so we can support the incredible efforts that are happening today so I thank you all I thank you all for hanging out and thanks for your efforts than you dou gra Lambertville um I wanted to just express to you all just just profound how profoundly grateful I am to all the work dedication and heavy lifting you all have done for our communities every day that I walk by the the where LPS is now I I just find it stunning at all the effort that had to have gone in to moving a whole elementary school and I feel such gratitude to you all and the district for all that work um I mean I had my phone's dead I had other things I wanted to say but the other thing I wanted to say is my son's in ninth grade and he has uh three friends were over and uh having dinner with us and they started talking about a book they were reading which I knew nothing about because my kid tells me nothing and um they spent 20 minutes talking about The Book Of Mice and Men 20 minutes for ninth graders these idiot kids I I was shocked I was absolutely shocked so I'm very grateful for that as well to have my kid who doesn't read who does not read any book spend 20 minutes talking so so I'm very grateful thank you thank you Doug I will just say Doug your son may not be much of a reader but he's a heck of an actor I did a fantastic job in the play oh that's the old one okay all right West dwell I'm gonna piggy back on the softball parent issues um I could say I could care less because I'm out of here in 54 days and don't have to deal with this school anymore but Doug and all these great parents have really done a great job of building up the younger girls developing the love for softball and I think we have a chance to have another couple years of a really good team we could have had St Champs a couple years ago but we won't go there um but if you look at the banners in the gym I think you're going to see a lot more current dates for the girls than you're going to see for the boys the boys have a great field the boys have great dugouts the boys have great signs the girls don't even have a field so my understanding that's been brought to my attention is that with the new plans um the field is going to be down where the major Trail is now I guess that's what my daughter is telling me that part um but I have come to find out that there's no plans for dugouts to be built for the field that's not that's not true okay because that's what has been brought around so I was hoping that that wasn't the case so okay then that's good so let's keep that on on board and then uh I guess just to kind of drill in the the thing about the the busing because the girls say they don't really get to start practice until 3:30 so you're already losing a half an hour there and then the girls who need the early bus need to leave early um so they're losing out on practice again and you do have a potential to have a really good group of girls here and I don't know how Middle School gets to their fields um if they go directly to hwit doesn't really seem right to have the middle school team get the preference and the varsity teams the high school teams that really need the time don't get that so thank you thank you for consideration thank you Georgia for speaking up so just a couple things I'll say so Mr Harris and I will sit down tomorrow and take a look at the immediate need the bus situation um just from the field perspective so what I will tell you right now timeline wise so our contractor has you know pretty much fleshed out for the next 12 months targets for every little thing for the project right now the completion date for the new softball field which by the way will not be down near the nature trail it's actually where it is now but kind of reversed in the opposite way I have drawings of it I can I can send it to you if you'd like to see yes plenty yep yep so the plan right now for a completion date is actually January 17th of 2025 but the issue is really the grass so we we need to we if we want to have a chance um we're really going to need to seat it in the fall in order to be able to make that happen because you're not going to grow grass in January so what we're going to try to do is this Wednesday we have a construction meeting with our 5A contractor it's on our agenda already we're going to talk about what are our options that hopefully expedite that process I can't guarantee anything but it's on our radar we're going to do everything we can because obviously we don't want to miss SE can I just say as a former Varsity softball player um I will be the softball are I'll check up on this um and I'll make sure it's preferable I definitely get the concerns especially getting equipment off bus we have a whole lot of stuff buckets of balls um Nets te's uh anything you can think of Under the Sun um and uh I get it and appreciate your comments and appreciate the concerned parents and uh um you know also the Char Transportation I know we're going to sit down and talk about some of the busing concerns and and find a reasonable solution and uh find something that works does anyone else have anything they'd like to uh bring before the board hello uh I'm Andrea little bu dwall Township just want to say thank you very much for that presentation it was articulate um strategic and I'm excited and I wish you could just roll it out through 12th grade um because it's exactly what I see going on with both of my college students uh now and what they are actually diagnosing like tonight I was hearing and uh and I love the idea that our students are all appreciating literature um and talking about it so that's not why I'm here today um to today I'm here to address the board um that you're going to be looking at a resolution to approve the 20242 preschool expansion Aid budget and I'm bringing that to the attention because in November of 21 a referendum was in front of our district when designing Lambertville Elementary School it was known there were more prek students in the future than the two classrooms on October 15th of 2021 the administration documented to the State 36 prek students for 2022 enrollment I will send this I'll email this to everybody because it's a lot of information um that was three classrooms within the document stated 90 eligible pre students for the future program this was submitted before the referendum was up for the vote knowing the new school was not reflecting enough space it was a November 21 agenda after a referendum was approved that this was presented uh um the referendum also stated for the grades prek to four within the lville Elementary in the middle school is five and eight the point of referendum was consolidating in the districts so that the grades would be together like meaning all of our residents by grade would be together um so meaning fourth grade would all be together prek also would be included in that so what prompted my research to go back to these different years um the big capital letter is TBD on the superintendent report last month stating that three prek classes next year will be at was and that five with the five at sixth graders and the other two classes will be at LPS all pre- students should and need to be together just as the referendum states there are 64 students projected for 2425 school year which is five classrooms what we'll need to change is fourth grade there three classrooms are going to need to go to the new building this is not represented in front of you today in the reports we're only really talking about fifth and sixth grade the TBD shared to the public shows that there was really no plan um there is no plan and that the community was led to believe that lamberville was large enough for prek to4 it was not designed to manage any flexibility there was only one classroom designated for a flexible space we are projecting 90 students between three years old and four years old again this paper work was submitted October 15th of 21 within the documentation uh the communication to the public did not include this and what I'm just saying to you tonight is is that the TBD didn't really sit well for me um I believe that when you were looking at what's going to happen for the next school year you really need to consider grade four going with grades five and six if not third grade as well because we're moving children too often um when the referendum passed it was documented that West dwell would be sold and the funds would help offset the cost of the referendum the citizens in this District deserves something to be correct from that referendum and that would be one of those things um we are too small of a district to be considering four buildings we deserve these answers we deserve the plan and we deserve that transparency um TBD should not be part of that conversation when we went into this referendum so thank you I will put this out there for you um because I abbreviated well I have some responses I'd like to resp so just a couple things I think you know you're referencing the demographic study which was done in February of 2021 at that time the reason why the number that was projected for preschool was so low is because there was no pre preschool expansion needid we didn't find out about preschool expansion aid from the state of New Jersey until the summer of 2023 so it was not on our radar it was a pay- for only program there was no way that we could afford to have pay for students to come to preschool for free so when you say improper planning honestly I got to disagree because we were not aware you're talking almost two years that went before we even had any idea the state of New Jersey was going to fund free preschool so with that when we found we we I'm not I'm not looking at the set yeah we were not awarded the grant so I I mean I just want to clarify and obviously you can disagree I just want want to clarify that when a demographic study was completed right preschool expansion was not on anybody's radar I'm not actually referencing the demographics because um I'm actually referencing what was submitted to the board November of 2021 was the 2022 23 District enrollment and planning worksheet that had um for 2122 Early Childhood Universal we only submitted that we were having 36 students and it has your documentation but it has here that our risk eligible preschoolers was 90 45 for three years old 45 kids for four year olds so this was within the board minutes um from 2021 to the state so this was submitted to the state in October um before the referendum so we are we were aware that we have the potential for 90 students um well it's it's I'm looking out of here can meet I mean at this point I don't waste everybody's time weet walk you through the process and the reason why quite honestly we said TBD is because we want Community input the reality is for next year is our plan but for the 25 26 school year the board of education's going to have to make some decisions about what this is going to look like and quite honestly they don't want to make decisions without Community input so you're going to hear about that in our school and Community report tonight that bronnie will share that basically what we want to do over the next six months is really have informational sessions and get an idea from all parts of our community of what would you like to see there are different options and there's different options that we'll share that will have budget implications and everything else no final decisions were made there hasn't been anything decided other than what's going to happen for next year so I would welcome Community input when we have those information sessions so the board can then make an educated decision based on that input of what things will look like for 25 26 and Beyond with our preschool program we quite honestly think we're probably going to cap at six CL or five classes we'll see based on our numbers right now we'll probably have a better idea when we get in the next Hall the rate now probably looks like we're going to stick to probably 75 kids and not go up to 90 based on how so that's five classrooms yeah right and we have two designated so my point being is that understood but I think that you need to I would like for the board that was my point to look at the documentation of what was submitted to the state I'm presuming we all things send things to state that are not what we're Believing on so we have five classrooms thank you m thank you very much I appreci I apprciate thank you very much is there anyone else who would like to bring something before the board do we have anything online we have one it is from jannon brookhead um South Hunter and just a reminder Regional educ ation Association would like to invite everyone to our annual family literacy night on Thursday April 11th at West hwall school starting at 5:30 pm children will participate in literary based literacy based activities and will receive some some of the over 4,000 books will be given away we are pleased to be offering transportation from lamberville and location building to West anwell at 7M graphic no novelist Jamar Nichols will'll give a presentation and sign copies of one of his books we look forward to seeing you all there so information was sent out about this there is a Google form for anyone who might require Transportation we're going to be running a bus back and forth um for this night we'll do reminders because I know it's still several weeks out but obviously if you know of anyone who is interested in coming but transportation could be a barrier please spread the word as these go out so they can sign up in advance so we kind of have an idea of how many students will actually have to transport in parents if I could just add to that um I was delighted to see that Jamar is going to be presenting uh having seen him at several conferences present he is a great great author and um I I think it is a fantastic thing that our students will be able to see an actual author and graphic novelist um in person so I'm I'm excited thank the uh education ass for doing that uh any if uh seeing no no other comments I will close this first period of public comment uh there will be a second one uh later in the meeting um and so we will move to our committee reports beginning with uh buildings grounds Transportation finance and safety Meg Al righty um I will um keep this brief um just a few things to highlight you'll see here we have um our preliminary budget um so in April will'll be right meeting to vote on the the budg presentation on the presentation we'll have our budget presentation in April um so definitely give that a good read um and also just something to highlight from our committee meeting um you'll see um as has been the custom for the last few months um we have um several items um up for um sale through municibid and our auditor um you know made special notes that that's a really spectacular um program that's going on in our building um that Alan albaner has taken upon himself um to start and um you know he's finding any uh item that we no longer have a use for to sell it to recoup some funds and um it's just a pretty um spectacular thing so I wanted to make note of that and then of course you'll see um a transfer funds from our NJ arm account as well um as we make some payments for referendum related costs um with that I'd like to move items a through P so moved can I have a second please through P any discussion on items a through P um so I will note so we are passing we will be voting to pass a tenative budget um that is we this is a procedure that we do every year um that will then be sent to the county and reviewed by the county we will pass a final budget in April um it is possible that the budget will change between then and between now and April um I believe this current budget has a 2% tax increase is that correct that's correct okay um anybody else any discussion on any of the other items under a3p if there's no discussion let's vote Yes rank ke yeses yes Strauss yes War yes M Dennis yes Marino yes gallager yes uh Personnel committee Gina is that you yeah okay um so the personal committee met on March 20th 7:30 number items including number ofation various for coach and S facilitators the committee reviewed the non 10 review process teachers ands administrators this class in February the committee also was informed of open of the district trans Elementary the middle school high school one and middle school high school one mental health Clan one leader of the middle school high school data manager and one by secretary several candidates the agenda appr um finally discuss the process yep so now okay so moved can I have a second please second second by Megan thank you any discussion on items A and B there is no discussion let's vote Yes Yes M yes yes yes yes yes G yes um curriculum and Technology yes so we'll do this real quick since everything was discussed on either but either presentation um regards to technology just no real updates parent squ is moving forward so working through evaluating class link um technolog is being finalized technology in security being finalized at the elementary school of discussion of that cafeteria in the gym space wanting to use that um space for the community whether it be events or meetings or classes we discussed that briefly um and once this once the plans at the elementary school are done we can move forward to and transition to the middle school security um and everything else we talked about in Tony in Tony's um presentation reconfiguration assignments and we discussed the curriculum presentation made my job easy T because everything was talked about before Chang me and nothing to move in okay um so let's go to policy I can get that all right so we talked about for first read um you can see up on the screen eligibility of Resident non-resident students both a policy and a regulation and then specifically policy uh guidance counseling with some updates based on statute changes um the policy and the regulation for the first it was just more you know interesting you know information about things like you know if a senior leaves a certain time of the year and you know if they're moving for whatever reason and being able to stay within the district and finish out and graduate um things along those lines and then for a second read um we're bringing forth uh policy and regulation for education of homeless children and youth we talked a little bit about this at the last meeting of just if unfortunately a student is found to be homeless what do that you know does that play out as far as where the student will attend school based on where they previously domiciled compared to where they may living be living now and how that can may be changed unfortunately you know periodically throughout that process okay so with that then we will need a motion to approve items A and B move Michael thank you and a second a second by Martha thank you very much any discussion on items A and B if there's no discussion let's vote Kevin kki yes M St yes War yes yes Jan ke yeso yes yes uh school and Community Mrs Marina um school and Community we discussed first we went through the um some of the potential website layouts um from um baren Square to improve the website looking at how um individuals and families might use the the website anding certain components more prevent on um we also talked about the preschool expansion and discussed we we've planned a while back to have a press release regarding the pre prek um program that will come out in April or May to really talk about what is happening currently in in the prep but we also talked about how over the next six months we really to look closely at our options for the 25 26 school year um and as a part of that we will be hosting information sessions um to review those options and gather Community input um this will happen after we have a little bit better idea of how one of the students we have because there's a Sur that but sounds like getting closer to that that number um and we also talked about how important in those sessions it is to clarify the details because there seem to be quite a few questions about it to really go back and look at things such as the fact that there's three threey olds and foury olds in that so there are two grades included in those numbers to give information about the funding details what the timeline was for that with the requirements of the of the um State initiative and how it looks in terms of rolling out and what all all districts across the state will be expected to do um the considerations that we have at the time that led us to the current program config configuration and then to really spell out each and every option um so that we know the educational and financial benefits of each option and again Garner that um Community input so that we can make the best decision for the district um then we also looked at the the calendar snow day options and um evaluated whether our um our current practice and the um different practice where youth ads days at the end of the school year um which would be would work best and we definitely recognized that there were challenges to each um we made the decision to stay with the current practice but there was a change in one of the professional development days to combine it with a week that has half day so that be a long weekend for families um talked about the presentation about the change in the um English language and we also reviewed uh some current information about a program an AI program that is being piloted by a few of the district teachers and really looked at how how important it will be to um consider the use of AI and computers for that matter to um that there needs to be very specific guidance in practice um to ensure that it's always being used appropriately as a tool that enhances educational programming and not as a substitute for and that was it and we have the calendar to move okay I'm back okay so we will need a second for the calendar Michael thank you any discussion on the revised calendar for next school year yeah all good then let us vote oh all in favor yes yes anyone opposed no we're good uh routine in items I do need a resolution to accept the uh the hi report from last month who is discussed in last month's executive session removed by Megan second by Brian thank you any discussion on that all in favor I I anyone opposed um and so with that we come to the second period of public comment uh same rules as the first if you have something to say um three minutes try to keep your comment to three minutes and we may respond or we may ask you to draft a longer response so come on up this hardigan no go ahead that's all good in looking at this I sorry Jessica hardigan W um I notic with the Committees um out of the six committees four of them are chaired by Lambertville board members um has there been any consideration for making it a little more equal between our two communities I noticed that no one's been named chair for policy yet well uh Mrs Puli was the chair for policy and she may have been the chair for another committee as well I just mean moving moving forward moving forward we will be looking at now that we have a full compliment of board members we have we will be looking at all the Committees perfect thank you and thank you for your presentation it was wonderful I really appreciate your dedication to our at education I've definitely noticed a huge difference since you Bo thank you okay does anyone else have anything they would like to bring before the board little come one up if you want [Music] Point program so expect has not however of [Music] them Elementary School respect thank you very very much thank you thank you all for uh anybody else have anything like to bring before the board um nobody online nope okay just with that I will close the second period of public comment um we do have a need to move into an executive session so move um 9:44 I anticipate that will take about a half an hour and we there will be no well well we'll say but there will be no action in any case whether it's five minutes or 30 there will be no action taken after we come out of that meeting so with that uh all in favor of moving to Executive session I thank you minutes oh