so am I my she is Joe I'm having trouble with zoom give me a minute yeah Board of Education meeting we're calling the meeting to order at 7:03 p.m. if everyone could please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance Unice the New Jersey the New Jersey open public meetings law was acted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon in accordance with the provision of the act the Verona board of education has caused notice of the meeting to be published in the Star Ledger posted with the township of Verona and the Verona Education Association hting of this meeting setting forth the time location and agenda were posted on the Verona Board of Education Office and on the Verona Public Schools district website copies of tonight's agenda and resolutions have been made available to the public via the Board of Education website Mr Cruz who please Calla call attendance sure Mr Waka I'm present Mrs verella here Mrs Ferrar here Mrs prisco for the record Mrs priso is absence today Mrs freshy here we have Quorum thank you hey I would like to uh welcome m marene Peterson from the New Jersey Schoolboard Association thank you so much and I have to say I do feel welcome when I come here I walked in everyone said hello I'm like I must be coming too much if everybody knows me so well but one of likable people yeah what what a pleasure it is to be here and you know really wanted to acknowledge the work that the board is doing you know the board is has committed to um working toward New Jersey school board's board certification so what that means is that the board is working together as a board team training together um to earn 16 credits which is essentially 16 hours of training over a 4-year period um and then in addition to that the board you know completes a board self- evaluation we've looked at you know your policy manual um our Labor Relations looks at one of your bargaining agreements everyone has to be compliant with their mandatory training to pass the governance section of CC so it's really you know a lot of of work for abort to do that and it's you know quite an accomplishment for a board and so you know it really kind of demonstrates the board's commitment to training the board's commitment to kind of setting that example of everyone else you know we pride you know districts pride ourselves on professional development so it's important for the board to to set that example as well um and you know and I have to say that and not only are you training together as a board team but a lot of you individually right are taking training through New Jersey school boards and earning the the board certifications so it's really exciting to see you know the board I said like really you know honoring this commitment that you've made to your community to serve them and doing that through training in the best way possible so um so said we um so I think we are up to 11 of the 16 credits so we know you'll be seeing me at least for five more times right um to um help the Board finish this process so ideally um you know board certifications are recognized and well actually all of our certifications I guess at the last County meeting of the year um so hopefully we can continue that work um to to try and complete it perhaps by the you know the last asex County um meeting this year so having said that um so tonight's topic we're going to talk about policy by um or governance by policy and so if we think about um you know governance sometimes it's really a you know kind of a nebulous concept of you know you see boards come together we see you sitting at the board table but what does it really mean to govern and how do we kind of separate that and you know really focus on that and really make sure then that we're doing our work and how are we doing our work in the best way that we can um and separating that from the the the work of our Administration so we have you know kind of different ways to to look at our roles and look at that work so um this is a model that's out there that's not you know necessarily only for school districts it's a a model for nonprofits to use um that talks about this um policy governance so just going to kind of take you through through some of the tenants of it and then we can just kind of see how that really does um relate to our work and make us think about our work a little bit different differently so this said that John Carver is the creator of it and so really looks at this from the perspective of you know why are we here and saying that you know here really to to represent our community and making sure that our community's expectations um are being translated into work into the work that we're doing here at you know in the district so I'm just going to kind of go through this um looking at the the the different levels so the there like I said there's 10 different tenants so here's the first one that says essentially and um that as the board um that we exist to act as the informed V voice of the owners so again looking at the owners and saying okay that's different than the stakeholders so the stakeholders are the people that we serve like the students like who are we helping and who's part of our process but then who who are our owners like where do we get our Authority from who are we accountable to so we know right that we're elected by the community right um and then but also our Authority comes from the state so we would have to think about um you know that that difference of who we're accountable to um recognizing that like I said we have multiple stakeholders and we're accountable to them in some way in terms of trying to meet their needs um but a it's you know the community like I said that elects us um so as we think about this accountability chain one of the things that I thought was interesting here is saying that the board should look at itself as one step below the owners or one step below the community instead of one step above the superintendent so thinking that you're not necessarily here as the superintendant boss say you're you're essentially here to make sure that the needs and the expectations of the community are being carried out in the district so just kind of a way to to really think about our work from that perspective um and then in looking at um the work that we do saying that the board speaks with one voice or not at all and saying then that as individuals kind of we have no more power or authority than any other member of the public that our Power Authority comes together as a team so when they say we speak speak with one voice that voice is the voice of the board majority you know so we say as board members that we always get our say we don't always get our way right so our say is that as we sit at the board table here each one of us has the right to participate in debate participate in discussion um but then we have to honor the process and the process would say that we come to a consensus that the majority comes to you know a decision and then as the board that's kind of the voice then that speaks for us so you know a lot of times you know boards will um assign the president to have that you know that role as the spokesperson for the board and sometimes people um you know confuse that with saying well does that mean the president's voice is stronger than anyone else is and really it just means that you're giving voice to the the one you know one entity that doesn't have a voice the board majority um so and that's really what um you know speaks for the board so as we look at the board you know and look at our role kind of saying that um we should look at the work that we're doing of kind of more from an an outcome saying like instead of being focused on the inputs from the board's perspective we should be saying well what is the outcome um so a lot of times you know we sometimes get to you know pulled into the how and trying to talk about like what's going into a decision versus the Board saying well like what are our expectations what what is the outcome that we were expecting from that or hoping to see from that and then that's really where the board should be focusing its questions and its thoughts and making it clear of saying this is these are what our goals are this is what the direction is these are the outcomes we hoped to see and then leave it up to the administration to say what needs to happen um you know what are the inputs that that need to make that happen so um and then from the perspective saying that from the boards you know that it's up to us right how we function how we do our work how well we how well we work together um and hold ourselves accountable right and a lot of that is um you know it's some of it's outlined in our board bylaws some of it is just outlined in just kind of the protocols of the way that your board does things but you know ideally we're creating a culture here that this is the way say that the Verona board does things so that when new people join the board they should be joining the board coming into this culture of how you know that that this is how things work here um so the one of the the ways that they say like as we look at work and look at our relationship with with the superintendent and kind of Distributing that saying that rather than being so um prescriptive of this is what has to happen you know you have to do it this way essentially kind of saying okay everything is acceptable except for these things so kind of setting up like you know they call it guard rails of you know like in the example that um they gave about this in the books that like let's say that you were um at the airport the Uber's coming to pick you up from the airport there's eight different ways to get back to your house so you say to the driver I know there's construction going this way so whatever you do don't go this way um but any of the other seven ways you pick are just fine so kind of saying that same thing in terms of as we're providing direction to the the superintendent the staff saying you know these are are the outcomes we want these are the kind of the parameters or the guard rails that we have to work within and then how what you do and how you do that is up to you rather than us prescribing what that would look like so um and then saying that from the our um policymaking role as as we're looking at policies and we're developing policies kind of that that almost that same concept of saying rather than trying to get down to the nitty-gritty start with like the broadest level and then say okay is this providing the direction we feel comfortable with if we're not quite there yet then maybe add a little more detail but don't come into it with the perspective of again trying to add as much detail look at it more from the broadest level and then work your way down only providing um as much detail as needed until the board feels comfortable that any interpretation would kind of be within those guard rails and be able to accomplish those um those ends that we laid out for it um then talked about the importance of that relationship with the board and the superintendent and saying that you know that the superintendent has to be kind of that funnel right that we have to honor the chain of command that as a board we only have one employee that employee is the superintendent so we have to make sure then that our communication our conversations things that we're doing um have to funnel through um the superintendent and then also saying that we should not be doing any work that's already the work of Staff right that sometimes they say that if you identify different ways that could be considered micromanagement that that's one of of the kind of one of the signs of it so making sure then that we are staying um focused on on our work and then importantly for this relationship to work saying that the superintendent should feel that the board will honor its commitment um to policy governance and that the board has to have trust in the superintendent's ability to manage so both of those things have to be in place in order for this to be an effective working relationship so and again as as we look at um saying okay so we know then that if we've kind of set those ends of you know what the expectations are then you know we know that we are responsible for um evaluating the superintendent and saying that it really has to be based on these objectives that we set these ends that we set so that's why you know part the evaluation is based on the goals because that's you know that's kind of how this relationship works together so kind of some of the the the terms of looking at this of just kind of saying that um you know that that the work that we're doing is in relation to what's important to the community that we are you know setting those values in our policies we're monitoring the Performance Based on those goals that we set and then saying like we should always be asking yourself too you know we know that we also have a responsibility to the community and saying are we using your tax dollars in a way that is you know meaningful to you and helping um to accomplish those ends that you've set or you know that we're working together toward um so this just kind of takes all of those different pieces and kind of says okay almost like the the top half would be the the board part of it of saying that you know we're looking at kind of the ends um what's our big picture Mission our strategic plan and then underneath that would be then the staff saying okay we're going to take those big picture ends and we're going to execute them we are going to um you know kind of again it's the difference between the what in the how right so just kind of another way um to show that um and then there is a governance clock so this is the the governance clock and again that will show you that everything on the top half is kind of the boards the bottom half would be Administration so it's saying the boards above 9:00 and 3:00 the administration is below and starts at 12 o'clock with the goals um then kind of the our policy so again we're staying in the Ford's work then at four o'clock would be the the regulation so what helps carry out and support the policies would be the work of the administration um all of the the the District Operations that are accomplishing the goals the the district kind of you know putting reports and information together and then at 10:00 sharing those reports to the board that would let them know if their 12 o'clock goals are being accomplished so again just as we continue to you you never know like what's going to catch someone's mind of helping them understand kind of what your what Your Role is and where that distinction is but just kind of different ways to kind of look and see that work and how that work is separated so as we just kind of as you're looking at your board just wondered if there was anything that resonated with you of saying you know that is kind of how we do things or if there's something here that you thought that perhaps you're not using that would maybe have you think about it a little bit differently um so just kind of throw it out there and see if anyone has any thoughts about it I just as a board I think we tend to look towards our policy first and we trust Diane to implement the policy that's written um I think that kind of keeps us in our own lane um which I think we all everyone here and Miss prisco is very cognitive of kind of what our lane is and we I think we do try to stick to our lane and let the administration deal with the day-to-day stuff I I agree with Denise I think it's interesting like the idea between the policy and the regulation being at full 4 o' right because it's that's pretty close to that that equator um under this model would it be strongly advisable then to always have the policy and the regulation be voted on on the same agenda because sometimes we say we like this policy and then a meeting or two later then we'll put on the resolution so um I guess from a technical standpoint uh the board approves the policies and the board the only regulations that require board approval are regulations that are mandated the otherwise the regulation is essentially the how right and it's the administration's way of how they're carrying out the policy yeah because I think that's an interesting point because you know we we might as a board say we really like this policy but then we might turn out two months later to say wait a second I'm not so crazy about how how the the regulation is written um and that's why I I think it's probably close in this model to the that three o'clock equator because I think you know a lot of times at least our board we've we've had a lot of input or not a lot but at least a marginal amount of input into suggestions towards what the way the regulation is going to be worded and in practice even though we don't have to have board approval on regulations other than mandated it's been a practice that we just put them on so the board members see them read them digest them I know they don't have to be twice read but we've been doing that well but I think that's working right it seems like it's it's a good practice for your board and I think you made the perfect point of saying it helps kind of connect the two better right and and especially if each group understand that like you said that you understand that your role is the policy role and that the administrations is the regulation and so this is a perfect way to say each group understands but then we also are trust trust one another enough to connect the two right so good okay so then the last piece of this was just kind of going through a little bit just more about kind of talking about policies and and regulations and so again kind of looking at our policies and when we put policies together saying you know how do we um you know sometimes if if we look at our policies instead of just looking at them from kind of the the the clinical lens or the legal lens of what's in the policies you know we should be looking at them too from the perspective of does this match what's important to us you know sometimes you know boards will look at policies and say like is this matching kind of what we want for our students is this matching our community's expectations looking at them through an equity lens so looking at policies through different lenses based on you know what's important for your District in community so kind of saying it should also be a way to kind of take that vision and make sure that you're incorporating it into your policies so as again just kind of and we almost just did this through our conversation of kind of taking that lens of saying okay that the policy is basically kind of the those broad statements of the goals of the board and then the direction it wants to take um and then the regulation being um the administrative piece of this so we're just going to kind of go through these and just kind of say do we think this is policy do we think this is right regulation could be both so a guideline or course of action it probably could be B right it's definitely a policy and probably the you know so the the poliy would be the guideline perhaps for the board and the public and you know and then the course of action could be the regulation how about informs the public yep stepbystep instructions regulation yep assign specific responsibility yeah that could be both two right clarifies expectations I was thinking more regulation but could be both like how about superintendent can change it regulation secures the board's position poliy and then Ensure continuity both that could kind of be both too as well right so you can kind of see the important role um that each of them can play and for for different groups um and then if we you know kind of talk about our policies in general but for the board's perspective kind of the policies that talk about our work are are bylaws um and so these are kind of the board's rules so there's so many times when boards I just had a board call me today asking me a board member resigned and asking me about their vacancy and what are they do and I'm like well what does your bylaw say about it you know so so it typically you know we have to just get in the habit of thinking that that's the first place that we should be looking when we have questions about um you know the the the workings of our board um so as we as we look at policy you know one of the things that our policy Department says in terms of you know know kind of what makes for a good policy is saying that it should be clear it should be legal it should be workable um saying it should be understandable to anyone that reads it complies with the statut um and then said okay that you know and then has like a a course of action that can go along with it and said okay how do we know that it's working well we know that if our students are achieving in the way we want if our staff is able to follow it feeling like they have that the the support and the guidance they need our parents and Community are supportive and important we stay out of court right um so those are all things that help make sure that um you know that our policies are doing what they are supposed to um so again as we look at what our policies are supposed to accomplish making sure we comp you know are in compliance that it helps set fair and reasonable right so that we are making sure that everyone is treated the same way um in terms of the terms and conditions in our policies that we have stability operating principles um you know reduce crisis making decision and keeps the staff and Community informed you know and sometimes we don't even really realize um you know how important our policies are to us sometimes until we get into a situation you know where you have to rely on the policy to to kind of help make that decision because sometimes things you know people can come with emotion pleas and you know different situations and sometimes it's really helpful to say nope our policy says this um so this is the course of action that we're going to take so and that was it um so I don't know if anyone has any questions or I have one question I've always are there any districts you work with that don't use Strauss smme yes they are schools right yep I mean yeah some use us some will I don't know if anyone that doesn't use some kind of uph house here it would just be too hard to stay up with all the the laws and gotcha thank you okay thank you so much that great I appreciate one more off thank you does anyone have any other questions thank you so much M Happy Thanksgiving that's next week I know it's next week okay um okay we're gonna uh thank you so much we're going to move on to uh the superintendent report and I'm going to keep my report uh fairly short tonight we have another presentation and thank you uh for coming to do that tonight um we have Dr Miller Mr Stevenson and Mrs ker from the curriculum uh instruction office to do our testing presentation just want to give a uh just a warm um Standing Ovation uh to the uh fall Cabaret singers it was a huge success amazing I can't believe how talented our kids are um I can't wait to see what they're capable of this week with the uh Spotlight players um presenting Agatha Christie's am murder announce and that's this Thursday Friday and Saturday two shows on Saturday 7 o'clock all three nights and a mat at 2:00 on Saturday um unfortunately uh last meeting we spoke a little bit about we were waiting for the high impact tutoring Grant results we did not receive that Grant we did not receive a rationale as to why uh I am uh investigating whether or not they can give us a rationale so that if it was some um fault of our grant preparation we'll know how to prepare those differently next time or was it just that there was a lot of people applying for that Grant and we were lower on the need level than some of the school districts that received it I do want to say thank you uh to Mrs Kohler Dr Miller Mr Stevenson and um Mrs Simmons I believe was involved I think Mrs Peter before she she went on maternity was also involved in really doing a great job I read it went through edited it it was very impressive and I was very disappointed to um not receive that Grant um they did say though uh that they're seeking additional funding and that they would go back and take a look at those grants that did not receive and try to give a secondary round so we'll wait on that as well um our QC team uh District team met for the first time last week and the subcommittees have met subsequently and are hard at work Gathering the necessary evidence for each area I will say um Mr Cruz is a a subcommittee of one we we'll let Mrs H hanowski help you um and I I'll help you whenever I can um teacher sgos and administrator goals have all been submitted and are in the process of being reviewed and tweaked uh as our professional development plans uh both R due October 31st we always thank the state for putting two huge projects due on the same day um and on Halloween and on Halloween yes so um I I'm not going to go into much more I know we are already doing preliminary planning for the next administration of the New Jersey student learning assessment and um uh we're waiting to hear on whether we have to do the graduation proficiency assessment or not that's jury is still out on that so um but we'll be prepared if we have to do that so without further Ado I would like to um oh we have um sorry we have student representative first before I'll keep this one quick since we got the njsla presentation coming up uh so just real quick student council will be organizing third annual student staff volleyball tournament I know kids look forward to this one every year it'll be November 16th after school in the main gym and uh funds go towards like student council projects winter semi-formal that sort of thing uh the 16th yes uh class of 20 24 is holding recycled shoe drive from now until December 8th donations are accepted in bins at the front of all all the all district schools so uh it's fundraising opportunity there and again Spotlight players a murder is announced November 16th till November 18th and uh congratulations to our fall Sports everybody's wrapped up at this point um with great Seasons all around I don't have the specifics in front of me but I know for sports like soccer soccer cross country um football made playoffs this season it's been it was a really strong and our volleyball team notably made it to states exactly so um congratulations to all of them winter sports start up next week I believe well I have to say I was unable to attend last Saturday's volleball game I did go to all of them they were a hoot they were like so heart wrenching they were so close it was s they were such good games but um and I missed you know the the pounding of kinan sorry that worked out well for us um yes that was it was really great um they worked really hard all of our our athletes do thank you Rees and oh the Recycled shoe drive is it just sneakers or is it all shoes there we go I I believe it's Sneakers but I can double check on that okay thanks because I believe it's also only sneakers oh only sneakers okay um thank you so much does anyone have any questions okay so we're going to move on um to Dr Miller um presenting for njsla yes you might want to May okay good evening everyone and everyone at home watching um we're going to go through uh our test results from last spring for the njsla in uh English language arts math science as well as our access for L's results so we'll begin with our Mi our mission statement our new mission statement to empower students to cultivate their intellectual curiosity and social responsibility is there a way we can move the camera like that I see because like I'm GNA have graphs I'm sorry we will have graphs if can we shift that down to the lower right yeah thank you so much nice job okay so uh I'll translate here so and we're going to also shout out our strategic plan goal number one uh to develop and execute a plan that promotes best practice to increase student outcomes and achievement and we have four goals sub goals that are linked to that so this is we've been doing this for a while uh but njsla it's a scored with language arts and math and five different performance levels and grades three through nine uh the five levels are does not meet which is a 650 again it's the minimum score partially met at 700 that's level two approaching and you'll see on the graphs that is yellow is 725 and then when you get to met expectations or exceeds that's the student passes and that's green when you look at our graphs so you're going to have I think it's red blue yellow green well you'll say uh yeah and if you're color blind will help you out at home I will say some of the things so we're GNA begin with language arts and uh the top of the chart say say District grade three is there a way we can hide any of that because it's blocking the title yeah it says leave could you click on the leave part or does that have to be open just I want to be able people to see the titles can you can you then that's better yeah that's that's good all right thank you for your patients uh so we're going to take a look at our results and uh we begin in 2019 because that's when we left the park Consortium and we began njsla and you'll see in 2019 that's the graph that's on the left and again we have blue is one red is two yellow is a three and a four and five a passing score is green so that we have that same pattern throughout all of these graphs and they're layered so 2019 and grade three around two-thirds of our students met or exceeded expectations for English language arts in 2020 and 21 we were not assessed due to coid and lots of uh conflicts and struggles we had with schools we were still teaching but we had a lot of other things we were working on so back in 2022 we began to assess again and those are our results 49% of our students PED in grade three and then in grade um three last spring three fths 60 over 60% of our students so I would say our students we're returning back to somewhat some normaly uh the 18% are our students who are approaching they're between a 725 and a 750 so those are those are students that we focus on sometimes to try to push them over the hump and if you'll notice the idea is to go from Blue to Red from red to yellow and then from yellow to Green that's what we try to do when we look at our results we try to shift the kids one to the right and some make bigger jumps so we take a look at grade okay the uh I can't Advance the slide now okay let's see now okay we're better all right so in grade four we have uh in 2019 we had uh seven out of 10 students 69.7% of our students earn an a passing score a two-year layoff and in grade four was 58% and last year it was a slight dip to 55% and if you look at the yellow the students it's if you add up the yellow and the green they're around the same so the idea is they're either approaching or are green and I will show you a slide later where I look at cohorts and you'll it'll be a little more informative because right now it's not Apples to Apples it's really one group of kids and then the next group of kids uh disaggregated results we we pull apart our data and this is what we normally see especially in earlier grades uh girls are stronger readers than boys and with language arts so we have 61% of a little over 61% of the girls that have earned a passing score and with boys it's 46% and then we if unless you a subgroup is a 10 or larger we do not report out on that so then our next group would be our students who are white our not economically disadvantaged so are students who are not free and reduced lunch students have an IEP no IEP if they have a 504 and are they are they're not the are these students are not English language Learners so we we break that down you go to grade four and you'll see the girls at 62% the boys at 48% they inch up a little we our Asian subgroup we have 10 students who are who are Asian in grade four so they go at 80% of passing and then along the board when you take a look at uh well how does Verona do against the estate average so if you look on the left and again I will explain it to you because it's hard to see um on the left the far left is the New Jersey average for grade three Ela and then next to that is Verona and then the third graph is the fourth grade language arts New Jersey average and then it's Verona and what we want to see in Verona is more green and more yellow and you want to see a shift from if look at the state that has blue is 20% we're at 9% the state is at 14% 15% and we're at 15 but then you shift over if you look at the yellow and you look at the green we're about 13 points higher and if you shift to grade four again you see less blue for Verona around the same red and a little more for green and again our stats are around between 150 and 170 students so every students about a point and a is around 75 point8 if you take a look at the cohort and we'll do this for each one of our grade levels uh that's it's it's it's blocking the title uh um oh hi floting yeah I can explain it just for there we go that's good thank you sir so we have our students in grade three from two years ago to our students last year and what you want to see is a shift from Blue to Red to Yellow to green and you see that so the students are learning and the state does ultimately we will get an SGP score this year so when we see this trend overall the trend is movement to the right that's good that's what we want to say now I can Advan the slide though yeah okay thank you all right so now some strategy interventions professional development and support So if you look at the following bullets there are things that we are working on presently with our curriculum Department as well as principles working with teachers and trainers uh we have reading interventionists at our uh Elementary School schools who are helping our um teachers just you know being able to interpret results from our map grow being able to interpret the results from njsla we have uh information with how well students do with certain test questions and we can backfill that and take a look at like so this is the type of questions that are in the it's called the New Jersey digital item Library we can go back to that and then we share that at grade level meetings we did have foundations training which was nice and again we've kind of normed our K1 and two teachers we did that in September so that's good phonic is a very strong Foundation about learning language letters continues with Miss Duffy and Miss Anderson and we would like to shout out the last bullet we are adding in class resource at our elementary level if you took a look at some of those prior slides that will help some of our students students who have an I move up you know when students are classified It generally means they're two or three grade levels behind but if we get them in class resource with the uh the teacher who's in the classroom with support they can learn closer to grade level so we want them to inch that way so we're starting to work on that path as well so can I just for those people at home or in the room that don't know what F foundations and letters are foundations is a phonics based instructional program and letters is um a reading and to help teachers increase student reading acquisition yes I think everything El is pretty self-expand to right yeah yeah oh hegerty is very similar to foundations yeah yeah and hegerty we foundations is around 20 25 minutes heger is around seven to 10 minutes daily that's the recommendation and it's really cool students as they do it they really it's body movement it's a lot of stuff that Maro talks about it's fun like little chances they're learning right I got to same marono comment there and then uh so they get into Middle School on grade five so in 2019 really extraordinary results and then 21 20221 again and you look at last year like o but last spring a remarkable Improvement I think uh students and I think teachers uh really getting back back into gear and saying all right we're going to get a nice year where we get just a nice flow and continuity of instruction I think that's what's represented here if you look at grade six again you want to see a shift from all the colors to the right and you're seeing that nearly identical to 2019 if you look at 2023 some would say it's an improvement I would uh in two and then in grade eight is a shift it's not quite there but again I think the more we Trend towards green the overall the results are better um when we take a look at the disaggregated results you one I look at always is the the uh girls and boys Gap is closer it's looking pretty good here but then big difference there in grade seven between the girls results and the boys results and then also in grade eight so that's a conversation with teachers that so if you look at grade seven and you look at grade eight that is a big discrepancy and if you look at the populations it's girls are nearly 90 boys are 60 so there's a big gap there but like here it's closer with 80 and 74 all right and then if you take take a look at the results again like how what do you measure this against we have information uh from the New Jersey average so the left the graph to the left is uh the language arts for grade five for New Jersey and then you have Verona which is four points higher for green and a lot more for approaching and then you look at sixth grade substantial difference with green it's it's it's nearly 20 points percentage points and if you take a look at the blue and the it's about 10% so it again a good shift and if you look at grade seven and grade eight again from 56% to 68% 12 points and in eighth grade should be a little higher you know the 55 it probably should increase a little but if you take a look there's more in the yellow so again it's the kids that are like that 740 to 750 range if you look at the cohort so grade four in 2022 and grade five in 2023 there's a shift to the right if you notice the blue and the red it shrinks As you move from the left to the right and that's what you want to see that's growth they all don't pass but they're all moving to the right you look from five to six huge difference and it's it's it's 30 points uh and when you get to six to seven again you see growth you look at the blue and the red they're similar but the yellow has shifted to green and you get from seven to eight it's pretty pretty flat uh the the uh blue and the red do decrease though and shift into yellow but it's getting those kids so it's like a focus the advice would be to eighth grade how do you get those kids to move over the hump that's a conversation and again con things that happen we have tier 2 intervention we we did it last year with grades five and six there was Market Improvement uh even though we spent about only a semester with it so we've continued from September this year we'll see a year and what that does that that we think that will have substantial impact uh letters training we have a lot of Middle School teachers who are interested in working with Miss Duffy and Miss Anderson working on the letters training and again they work well as they doing letters training they just don't meet four times they're working on this daily with several students so they're doing it every day with kids uh we're unpacking standards in order to understand the layers and how compounded the standards are there's a lot of layers within standards and for our viewing audience the standards have just been released there are new standards now for language arts and math at which we will be working on uh building Administration supervisors will have reviewed already the njsla data but we can continue to do that in department meetings uh again going into the new New Jersey digital item Library analysis where they actually give us some questions that have been asked in the past or that are similar so that gives us a little help and then we have map growth assessments we've been working on for over three years uh finally for language arts uh we go to the high school and if you take a look from 2019 to last year there really isn't any difference if you take a look at the disaggregated results there still is a significant difference with our girls to boys um but if you look overall at the next slide versus New Jersey if you look at the state average is a little over 50% we're nearly 75% so we are doing well and we should do that well um we have a few students who are blue who are that it's that 650 to 700 but only a couple uh we have some kids who are in red but again if you look at the yellow and the green it's nearly 90% of our students and if you look at the cohort I think that tells a good story too the kids that were for eth grade and they go to the ninth grade look look at their growth that that's that's impressive there are 10 less kids but some students um you know they all don't all don't come to Verona High School so we was a few kids there and what we're doing right now with our building Administration and our supervisors is that we continue not only to unpack the standards but we're taking a look at like uh I know Mr Stevenson had a few meetings the past few days he's working with his staff to take a look at what was asked not only in New Jersey SLA but also what was asked in NJ GPI and from some of the questions that they've released are we asking the questions the way that they're worded on the on the test like it's a continual revision and reflection um and that is this is the final slide for our English language arts so I'll explain this to you with some patience so if you take a look at grade three uh what is the lighter blue is the 2022 New Jersey average scale score and then you have the Verona score which is 747 that was a spring of 2 too and then last spring the darker blue is New Jersey and then the 749 is perona from 20123 and if you look as you go across they do increase ultimately to 767 for our ninth graders and a long time ago when I was an assistant principal in 2005 because it only we only used to test grades 48 and 11 when they introduced when I got the job thankfully uh grade three and grades five and grades six and grad seven the goal was to move the students up as they go and the ultimate ultimate measuring post was the high school but we try to look and analyze as we go so we can give good feedback to our teachers in our administrative team and our community as how are we growing so overall I think we're we're trending definitely in the right direction with language arts are there any questions with language arts at the at this moment before we go to math yeah um I have a couple be quick um I know these are average Ela um yes when we're thinking about flushing out reading versus writing I'd imagine these are right the average of the two content are correct I know that you spoke a little bit about questioning and kind of providing that support to teachers but are we also looking at some of these data points and then comparing it to curriculum to see where we have possible deficits in the curriculum because I see a trend in these lower three four five grades and I'm wondering you know if that's something if we do look at that and if not if it's something that we we do we look when we get professional development we look we adjust our curriculum often we're not we're sometimes we're like we re we adjust our curriculum every year we reflect if we learn something sometimes we just rewrite a unit if we see something that's glaring we try to address it from what information that we can glean and and try to translate that right we do so one of the one of the helpful uh pieces of information that we get from njsla are the evidence statements so they'll give us um a plotted graph to show us which U areas um specific questions but they're also there tends to be a pattern within the areas um Dr Miller and I were looking at third and fourth grade math and we saw something jump out in Geometry right right and uh operations in algebraic thinking so that's when we'll go back back to the curriculum and see are we not hitting this what is the issue but I I do think one activity that we're doing across the district will help the unpacking of the standards and looking specifically not just what the standards are asking kids to do but at what cognitive level they're being asked because we could be asking students to do something at retrieval which is kind of like the bottom basement of all of the taxonomic levels but if the standard is asking them to do something similar but at the analysis level if our teachers aren't aware of the cognitive level of the standard and are teaching it at the wrong level our kids are never going to be successful when they see that cognitive level assessed on a state test for the first time so we're trying to get rid of any mismatch between the cognitive level that the standards are being asked at and what our teachers understand to be teaching at and assessing at I think that's going to take us a a good distance yeah and add to that like uh what time of the year was maybe this topic or idea taught because that's also reflective oh was this in September was it spiraled in was it Revisited sometimes what you teach early if it's not built upon it's well we did learn it right did it happen after did we get to all the topics we found with some we didn't get to some of the topics and then I just have one other question with the discrepancy I know this is a national this is an average right with the the discrepancy between boys and girls but have we ever done um an inventory of our libraries of our classroom libraries to see or to think about maybe interest you know when we're thinking about diverse texts also considering interest with our because you see that in the lower grades and oftentimes if kids don't have books that they're interested in Reading they won't read and if we don't read we don't get better so I wonder if that's something to to look at to see if there's a need there yeah we libr if you go into our library we uh we assign $500 a year we've been doing this since before this is my 11th year uh we have very diverse libraries at our elementary level uh and the students are allowed to choose they are given reading inventories in the fall and they're given suggested like uh letters to read it doesn't mean they have to read that letter but it's if they're like a level G they will tend to gravitate towards that they're allowed to take them home read them with their parents so there are from when I was a child there are there's a lot more interesting books for students the feedback I would you know we would have with teachers is so what why do you think that is like that like they're the ones teaching like what is it that they say because there was a couple where if we pointed out there's a discrepancy why is that part of it I think is maturity I think with some students are more mature than others uh and so you tend to see that even when you take an assessment that comes through um part of it is you know we have to ask the teacher what what is it that they say but we have libraries that we've been built at our Middle School that they can now take take they can take books and five to six and read them assign with like novels that they'll get but they have Choice books that they can read Dr Miller does the does the state provide us with this aggregated um subgroup Statewide so we can compare to see if that's not yet when I went to the website they had lash 20222 but as if this date and of the time is now 8 o' uh no we we're not given that so it we even we even ask and Mr Stevenson will talk about it some Miss Coler we talk about this it's like when we even get the cumulative frequency graph where students get it more wrong we'd love to see the breakdown by students like we have the techn there technology exists so if you're a parent it'd be neat to have a blueprint for each child because we we're looking at just what the district average is per item score word it'd be really powerful we could get students and I think I think we could do I think it's possible we have that with Matt but we also get the sub the sub by student in that big data file well yes but it's it's not aligned up in a cumulative frequency graph like the way it is for like grade three Ela and it goes what students only 20% got right versus ultimately like around 80% of the students got right that would be powerful I think the data exists to do that just they don't have the template for it or give us the power to do that that would be really neat because that would be informative to a teacher I think they see it in the classroom but it would probably be like map it'd be like more reinforcing and even I'm a conversation with a parent I just ask a quick question that's more um broad sure we compareed to overall New Jersey is there a way we can compare to our like peer districts Factor grouping that we don't do anymore they used to give us a DFG uh comparisons they're not doing that anymore not right now but they I can find results from 2021 but nothing that was last year comparing to You Know A District like New York or like Trenton where there's a lot of English language corers lot and so it's not really Apples to Apples no it's not um it's not and sgps are not either and I've had those discussions with the state right they're not value added given that I I and the supervisors and Dr Miller and the principles know I feel this way given that the state has a lot of districts in it like Camden and Newark and Irvington we are too close in several areas to measuring out with the state and those are areas we're working on yep yes so I think that wraps up language arts we're going to move to math now okay for the real data people let's go some math sorry same pattern as before this is grade three math we've got 2019 the prepandemic on the left and we've got us in 22 and 23 um you know I think this starts to speak to getting back to normal for the most part and you know these kids in third grade were in kindergarten when we shut down and so thinking about that losing the back half of kindergarten in large regard and then hybrid the interesting teaching we had done I that looks pretty good to me fourth grade similar tale um there's some changes in fourth grade this year or really last year um that we're going to look at and some of our priority with uh Tamra jario as our math coach has focused on both grades three and four um and we're kind of thinking increasing that on grade four here's the disaggregated results for for grade three um we see at least the opposite pattern males and females um we could be seeing possibly stereotype threats in both sides if you're familiar with stereotype threat it you know stereotypes are projected you know girls aren't good at math boys aren't good at reading and it kind of comes out in scores fourth grade similar taale males and females here's math three compared to the state and math four compared to the state this is comparing the same kids to the same kids this one's a little disappointing to me because we don't see the outcome that we really want to see right instead of growth we get a little bit of a backslide not really acceptable I think before you say it's not acceptable is it possible that in certain grade levels they're introducing New Concepts and in other grade levels they're reinforcing the concepts so we we should see when a new Concepts is is brought to a kid attention as opposed to being just further elaborated on that think yes and no um third grade in math tends to be the buzs saw year where you introduce multiplication and fractions which are like the heavyweight Concepts um our math program that we've introduced front loads some of those things into first and second grade in ways that are accessible um because third grade is that heavy lifting grade fourth grade takes those things and and and takes them further so we'll add more fractions like third grade is just halves thirds fourths six and eths and no more fourth grade adds more denominators um fourth grade will add decimals and that's probably the newest thing there in fourth grade um but this isn't the pattern that we've seen in the past but we had some staffing changes well I guess my point is that I I think there's there's more to it than just saying that one grade level is doing better than the other I think that you know in grade three if you're if you're telling me that here's the the basic part of a concept and grade four here's the more challenging part of a concept well I think it's reasonable to expect that the more kids would do better on the basic parts of that concept so I wouldn't what what I'm saying is I I'm really overwhelmed by how strong the the Verona teachers you pedagogical skills are and I I think that just we should be cautious of making that kind of blank of State I see your point thank you what we're working on we we you know we had the Good Fortune of launching Dimensions math in 2019 and so we got to shut that down in the pandemic and switch our our PD to zoom um now I say that tongue and cheek it was the terrible timing right um I'm I'm kind of proud of the results that came out thereafter as these third grade teachers have had the most time with the dimensions program and understanding a CPA approach um we've been encouraging them to add uh games days where they practice Concepts in in a way that's playful as opposed to just calculating on paper um we'll be looking at the njs SLS and unpacking those standards again to understand the the level of cognitive rigor we're also going to look at the digital item library and understand what the questions are um there's there's a continuing we've mentioned it in Prior presentations of multiple answer questions not multiple choice choose all that are correct they'll have six or seven options you have to get all of them correct to get one point um if our teachers were doing that in the classroom we'd probably have a conversation if that's a six-part question and you get five of the parts right that should be five points out of six State doesn't look at it that way um we've got our math coach uh working with with teachers the our new teachers and grades three and four primarily this year um we'll take a look at our math results and again we'll try to match up that Digital Library to the level of rigor of the standards so for those people that don't know what CPA is it's concrete pictoral or representational and Abstract cor so you want to move students from the concrete you don't want to give them abstract before they get the concrete so it's a it's a progression of how we teach mathematics this is grade five grade six um my one comment on grade six is we initiated a new program the amplify math um and the it kind of continues the direction that Dimensions math did at the elementary level and in fifth grade um barely big change in pedagogy for those teachers instead of standing deliver and I do we do you do it's more I'm going to give you a problem you're going to try it we're going to discuss it here's another problem you're going to try it we're going to discuss it then I'm going to help you connect it all and take Matthew know to to learn and understand Matthew don't know um the the pacing was a challenge for a brand new program for teachers W who weren't terribly familiar there were things they didn't even get to quite honestly because of the timing and the change in pedagogy and the scores are basically the same as pre- pandemic and a big recovery from uh 2122 yeah so give more time with the program give more support give some more coaching um and better timing and comfort and everything else I I expect good things there here's seventh grade uh even better than prepandemic that's interesting I think we still need to move a large number of kids out of that yellow approaching standards into passing eighth grade this is where the the biggest split in our students they take a different test and you can uh yeah the sample size so we have math 8 and we have Algebra 1 right and this has always been concerning to me he split those kids and and now you have the kids that don't have a high math self-esteem and they're only hanging out with other kids with with low math self-esteem and and and I worry sometimes we don't have the same expectations for them at that point is is there that blue seems very concerning um blue is higher than the green yeah I mean obviously I'm sure you're you're looking into that oh yeah carefully but I hope there's some sort of plan that we're working on to address that absolutely we're g to meet with the eth grade teachers and share the exact data and you know get their take and and work hard to move that over there's Al one tells a different tale but this is two groups of kids we're clearly not happy with our eighth grade scores however it is not far from what other schools also present when you pull your top kids into algebra one you know and imagine now all of your best peer models are gone from your group and then we've also had a pattern of encouraging more and more students to take that higher level as much as we can um here's the disaggregated results at least in fifth grade we don't see that male female dichotomy that we saw before right here's six basically identical here's seventh eth again here's your sample size 91 students total comparing Verona to the state both fth and six 7th and eth yeah I think I think those two graphs on the right kind of explain what's happening in eighth grade math across the board and just as pointed out we're not happy with where we are but this kind of where things are in eighth grade math here's algebra one in the state now that's everybody that elor one whether they're in middle school or high school not necessarily a fair comparison but likewise that'll be in a minute too when we talk about the high school only tells us that we have a true algebra one program in our eighth grade which is not true of middle schools across the street across the right looking at cohorts again trying to compare the same kids to the same kids on these two consecutive tests from fourth to fifth from fifth to six from sixth to 7th 7th to eth in algebra one mush that together right so now fifth grades in their third year of implementing Dimensions they're growing more and more comfortable with the CPA approach and what we kind of call upside down teaching of you try we discuss I help you connect um we've got the second year of amplify again more support better timing better sequencing um and again it's it's to change what it means to be good at math being good at math isn't just quickly getting answers being good at math is being able to reason and model and think and solve problems that you don't have a standard way to do um we've got our tier two at both fifth and sixth grade um this year they'll be in as Dr Miller pointed out a full year of the win program um again we're unpacking the standards we'll move to the new 2023 math standards barely minor changes which is good so we can we have consistency there um we'll be reviewing this data with them I have a department meeting next week um and we'll also look at our map map growth assessment results because that gives us a little bit more granular information and again kind of mapping all that back out to the way the questions are asked by the state and making sure that our own local assessments line up with that and kids are familiar when they get there here we are at the high school um the njsla for math only assess ninth graders and so there's three different sets of ninth graders they took Algebra 1 geometry or Algebra 2 these are the same like eighth grade students that were split out before took m eight here's geometry notice the difference in 2019 we tested every student in Geometry not just the n9th graders in Geometry not really an Apples to Apples comparison of either 22 or 23 to 2019 here's Algebra 2 again 2019 was every kid who took Algebra 2 22 and 23 was just freshman taking Algebra 2 because no one took geometry maybe grade one or two some kids accelerated through geometry in the summer okay and so they they through you know summer advancement landed in Algebra 2 but it we're not over 10 so they won't get reported next year the disaggregated you would expect based on gender bias and then that that the female that the female is is higher than the mail on this one one of well what one of the things that we start to see at the high school is that the girls kind of conform to to classroom rules better better than the boys um and sometimes yeah I mean I think it's I one of good yeah yeah yeah here's the geometry disaggregated results and you kind of notice there's a number of things that we can't report because the sample size is less than 10 again the the male female difference here's Algebra 2 so uh is I didn't even notice that was on so is this like Algebra 2 as a h across all grade levels for DHS so this was algebra the freshman in honors Algebra 2 only gotcha right that's why the sample size is 22 we used to test in grades 9 10 and 11 in math um but the state changed that two years ago right these last two testings have just been freshman they were Tak the GPA and the graduation proficiency assessment that lovely test right right so attempting you know comparing us to the state and you can kind of see we have the two groups of Algebra 1 the middle school algebra 1 versus the high school algebra 1 trying to compare the same kids to the same kids so here's math 8 from 22 to Algebra 1 and 23 um this is also co-c concurrent with the new program because the amplifi ma was in Algebra 1 and you know there there were certain challenges after eight years of math like I do we do you do there can be a little frustration like why don't we just do it the way we used to um towards the end of the year they're like yeah we like this way this is much better comparing Algebra 1 8th grade to honors geometry 9th grade and this is the place where we'll look and see where our sequence in that iron geometry lines up with a test and and were there things that were taught post test that need to be moved forward here's Algebra 2 we're in the second year of Amplified math for Al alra one we did a field trial for Algebra 2 last year so they got their feet wet a little bit and this will be year two in Algebra 2 we're using it in Geometry as a base um last year we spent some time with Japanese less study style PD so the teachers could see other teachers teach um and and see really judge the level of Engagement with the content on the students part focus in lesson studies not to focus on the the teacher but the students and how the students are making sense of the math and then making recommendations for how to like polish the lesson we'll be doing that again um probably in the new year once some of the the dust of getting the school year started settles um again we're unpacking the njsls um we've started a book club which most of the Math teachers are taking part of there's a fantastic book called building thinking classrooms um by Peter lll that has a lot of P pedagogical techniqu te that they can employ um to to make student math more public to make student math more discussion-based to make student math more collaborative um and so we look forward to them implementing those strategies um and we just the other day looked at this data so that they could understand what we see and we're we also took the map growth for Algebra 1 and geometry and so we have a little bit of more granular data I for one in some sense miss the start strong um the data I don't miss giving it I don't miss giving it in the beginning of the year I miss the data that we got back because they gave us every single answer to every single question every single student took and and when we get this they just give us broad buckets okay but you can go into a couple subscores but it doesn't tell much no it really doesn't you to to really move things you really need that granular level data we wish it was like the PSAT where you got every question a rationale behind every question why you got it right why you got it wrong um then we could really move things that's what help from from Sal Con yeah yeah so I I don't know this reminds me of like Uncle Sam's pants or something um blue is the state right light blue is the state 22 dark blue is the state 23 red is Verona the slightly right lighter red depending on which red sensing cones you have in your eyes you can tell the difference or not I'm pretty sure um and the darker red is 23 do anybody notice anything funny something jumped out to Dr Miller and I look at math 8 look at the difference between 22 and 23 the math 8 scores were like 25 points lower than every other score across the state so we think there was some renorming done somewhere we don't totally understand how they go from asking student students 40 something questions and then giving them a scale score from 650 to 850 that's what they do and there was a jump from you know the 720s to to 750 740 which we thought was odd we've reached the halfway point of our presentation I'm joking no way past three quarter point we'll do it yeah brain break everybody needs to stand up we'll quickly go through science science is tested in oh yeah I forgot different performance levels and different scale so instead of a fivepoint scale there's a four-point scale um you're good if you get a three or four one or two you're not quite there um and then instead of a range from 650 to 850 it's from 100 to 300 300 yeah the science results have never been good um largely because they only take it a few times and largely because the test is mostly about reading and not much about science um it's also frustrating they've released very few questions so I show the teachers the questions and they ask are there more no there aren't more um different vendor right this is Measurement Incorporated um they've been very stingy over time when I was a biology teacher we had the end of course biology they released eight total multiple choice questions in the entire 10year history of the test that makes it hard to know what you're trying to reach similar taale there I don't know you know I've looked at a lot of other states I've not seen it i' I've looked at a lot of other states and felt jealous of the way that they were assessing science yeah because Measurement Incorporated wasn't good when the science standards weren't good now that the science standards are good they're really terrible it's hard right disaggregating those fifth grade eighth grade 11th grade know that because this I mean right youd scores but I think timing especially at the lower elementary science just yeah quite frankly takes aexi it takes a backseat too often so I think by the time they're being tested there's been a lot of catchup so that has a lot to do I think well you know I I framed my Science teaching career around the project 2061 effort if you're familiar was the the the American Association for the advancement of science set up a set of national standards back in 1996 I want to say and it was titled the project 2061 because that was the next time hi's Comet was going to return and the goal was scientific literacy for all Americans by 2061 um the well the the ngss is the next iteration of that um and that was a positive sign averages but this is also tends to be the last test that they take and so I think every testing session there's a little bit of fatigue U particularly with the 11th graders they know it doesn't count for but it also it also tests biology chemistry physics and Earth and space science yes all by March of junior year correct and and there's a lot of our right there's a lot of our 11th graders that don't take physics or will take physics as a senior but it's tested on this test it's it's difficult so we're reviewing our units we're unpacking standards um where where the and if you've ever spent any time with the ngss it's meaty and bulky and a little bit dense we started finding patterns in the way that they're written today which I think will help with unpacking and helps kids see kind of the Continuum of science as a as a discipline and a practice over time um which was kind of exciting and we'll review the few test question questions they gave us all right and thank you so much for having us here this evening this is GNA be very quick you can do it in two minutes or less um but I'm gonna speak very briefly to our access testing results they should have let you go first I know that's what I thought just kidding um so what is the access test it is a nationally normed assessment that is provided to all of our students who are our multi Learners and also our students who would qualify to be a multilingual Learner in our program but whose families are opting out of the program and it is very helpful for us because it measures our students progress in English every year and um it focuses primarily on listening speaking reading and writing so why do the students take the test they take the test one to hold us accountable to ensure that our instruction for our multilingual Learners is strong they also helps us in determining if a student is eligible to exit from our multilingual programming so in order to exit you must have a 4.5 or higher overall on the access um assessment as well as your teachers and your in-class assessments have to support your exiting from multilingual Services it also helps us with our instructional groupings and to really inform our instruction this past year our students on average and this is both students in our programming receiving multilingual instruction and those who opted out overall scored a 4.5 this is out of six so they scored a 4.5 in listening a 3.9 on average in reading a 2.9 uh in speaking a 3.1 in writing an overall uh comprehension score of a 4.3 and comprehension score is a combined um measure of the reading and the listening assessment they scored a 3.3 three in literacy which is just 50% reading 50% writing a 3.7 uh in the oral uh category which is both listening and speaking and then overall a 3.4 and these scores really are consistent um with what a lot of districts are seeing for multilingual Learners in particular um students having a little bit more difficulty with writing and with speaking because that's more of the expressive part and typically in learning a new language receptively reading um you know a little bit easier listening than actually producing speaking and writing so we are working really closely with our multilingual teacher Miss buen she's really focusing on that writing and that speaking especially for our students who've been in the program multiple years who you know really are ready for an exit um to make sure that they can get that 4.5 or higher and we're also working on consultation with their general education teachers because they're only receiving uh multilingual Services you know every day for a short period of time but making sure that these strategies are infused into to all of our general education classrooms and especially as um we're grateful that our multilingual program is growing that we're continuing to provide teachers professional development needed to meet the needs of all of their kiddos thank you thank you see she should have gone first that's that's all that we have for you do you have any additional questions after this thank you very much you're welcome yes comment I think that um I think the presentation was excellent there's a whole lot of data and it's clear that you guys have really do Dove quite deeply into it um but I think this is a a slice of of the Verona public school education but I I think it's just a slice right this is 90 minutes or so great of what our kids did on a nice sunny day in May where there's zero extrinsic motivation right like they're not it's not like there's anything high high stakes except for the the the the the high school test right right um and I think you have to look at the eyeball test too and one of the few Silber lightings of Co was that we all got to kind of in the background see what our kids education was really like and what the Verona teachers were doing yes and the Verona teachers they killed them they absolutely hit the the ball out of the park every time with their creativity and their and the adjustments and and I I think that you know the the grades and probably more importantly the benchmark assessments that's going to tell us more about how great our teachers are doing with the kids um and I and I appreciate that there's a lot of thought put in towards what programs are we going to use and and how effective are these programs but but except for Reese here all of us had a a math program where you'd get the book the first day of school and you could see what your kid eight years ago had what his name was right um yes and we still learned and I think that's a testament to just how good teaching is and how important it is and uh I appreciate that the the teachers are looking and with with a good attitude towards the new programs that are recommended um but I'm just really proud of our our staff and what they do for the kids thank you thank you and I think just one final comment is when you looked at the cohorts you saw for the most part positive growth and I agree with you uh our Math teachers are learning to be patient and let kids figure things out and not tell them and uh I don't know that in many other districts so thank you I can say it's not happening in many other districts so it's a belief system in getting adults to change their mindset is a challenge it's harder for to change adults mindsets than it is for children it is and I'll tell you if you ask if you ask someone that wants to continue to do it the same way they've done it for years if you go to the doctor and they send you to a surgeon you need to have your gallbladder out the surgeon says I'm going to make a six inch incision you're going to be in the hospital for nine days and you're going to be eight weeks in recovery and then you say but my neighbor had laparoscopic surgery yeah we don't do it that way no right I mean that's the analogy that we're asking people to either continue to do what they did eight years ago 10 years ago or to move with what we know is best for kids and our teachers here are really good at moving with what we know um just what we undertook this year with standards unpacking they're great about it and it's a lot of tedious work yeah um but we have I've said it multiple times sitting at this seat are they are gems are teachers yep they are so thank you yeah it's appreciate that point true um okay uh next we're moving on to committee reports any any no no questions we're done with questions okay committee reports Athletics yep that's it so we had a uh an Athletics meeting and I I got to give Laura our ad uh credit because even in like August she was talk Talking up about how good our volleyball team could potentially be and then you know they realized that potential and it's always good to see a group of student athletes accomplish something it's it's rare and special so kudos to them um and then we talked about some other matters related to Athletics and that's it all right um give reports Mr Wonka okay next we're moving on to uh public comments on agenda action items for tonight oh okay seeing none um any discussion items from board members see them okay so we'll do a roll call um I'm ready um well we'll call okay okay okay okay okay um so now here you are uh routine matters I need a motion to approve minutes from the October 30th so moved thank by m fres by m roll call any discussion for oh any discussion you're doing a great job by the way thank you so much this was I mean my head is really commissioner commissioner okay any discussion items no Mr Cruz can you please do a roll call sure Mr wer yes Mrs Rella yes Mrs Farrar yes and Mrs prisco's absent U Mrs freshy yes motion passed thank you okay moving on to Personnel I need a motion well any discussion I need a motion first there right okay I need a motion to to approve B1 through B7 so moved and I'll second okay so move by Miss fres second by Miss Roselle any discussion I just have two quick questions um for the summer hours would be 1.4 do we know how many that's from this past summer and we don't know how many hours she worked yes it was for this past summer and she um I believe worked the fulltime days at her regular rate and then just one more in the sorry B 7.2 The Substitute Teacher who's still GNA hold the position as RBT she's if so if she's stoping are they is it going to be a substitute RBT like how is be honest with you I have not spoken to Mr uh FR yet about this I he told me that he was going to make her position the sub position because we have another RBT that can step in um it's has to do with attendance concern I just want to make sure that that we're covered for IEP requirements well there's no RBT requirement for for IEP so we they're in there taking data but I don't believe we have any spelling out of a need for an RBT in um in an IEP so it would be a para which is also in the room Mr Cruz can you please do a roll call Mr Walker yes Mrs brazel yes Mrs Farrar yes and Mrs fresy yes motion spoke um I'm gonna I'm GNA say that we we should table b72 because I don't think that's correct go back yeah yeah I would yeah go back I'm sorry my apologies um process would be we have uh we we made a motion and we seconded it yes then we voted oh you voted so we could we could just someone could move a a change and then we repeat what the change is then we vote on that change yep okay my apologies so the change will be for b72 to B someone's got to move that so b7.2 change of status to be tabled until the next meeting I second okay Mr Walk for seconds so then do I need we got to vote on we got to vote on that motion all right so then I need so then I need to I need a motion to remove we just did that we just did that okay so now I need a motion to approve M commissioner barela's motion but right but we're going from hold on I just want to make sure here because we're we're going to B7 but this was b7.2 so it's all of B7 less b72 yes yes right so that's did we follow that so it's all of B7 less b72 yeah b72 will be table okay we have to vote on the table I thought we just did we just that was that was right so it was B7 less b72 so that takes that off so we t b72 right now we have the others okay um so I need a motion you got a motion I got a motion a second any discussion that was the discussion Mr Cruz can you do a roll Mr wer yes Mrs frella yes Mrs Farrar yes Mrs uh prisco abson and M rushy yesk motion passing that was Roberts rules 101 right there that was big deal you know was have no backup on this motion either I just quickly checked my backup I don't have any backup on the motion so I think there might have been an error okay so we'll put it back on we have another meeting in like three days okay benefit of a month that's true okay uh moving on to education I need a motion to approve C1 through C2 I'll move it okay move by Miss gella I will second second by Mr W any discussion yeah uh didn't we approve the uh oh Council for his the uh Princeton University history education class what we did this two additional people that are attending gotcha all right any other discussion he Mr Cruz can you please do roll call sure Mr Walker yes Mrs Vella yes Mrs Ferrara yes Mrs fresy yes motion carries thank you okay moving on to Athletics and co-curricular um I need a motion to approve D1 so moved okay move by Miss fresy second second by Miss gazella Mr uh any discussion okay Mr um Cruz can you please your roll call Mr Waka yes Mrs FAL yes Mrs Farrar yes Mrs fresy yes motion carries okay so we don't have any action in facilities so moving on to Finance I need a motion to approve F1 through F3 so moves move by Miss fresy second by Miss gella Mr Cruz can you do a roll call oh sorry discussion on finance no discussion okay um Mr Cruz can you do a roll call sure Mr Walker yes Mrs fella yes Mrs Ferrar yes Mrs freshy yes motion carries thank you okay uh then moving on to governance and policy quick question there yeah um for the for the Board of Ed schedule next year the the budget hearing that's not essentially a board meeting correct or is it a board meeting the the because there the three we have in March on this agenda so March 5th it's not it should be just March 12th and the 26th yeah the budget hearing should be March 12th so I'm going to motion that we make that edit and that out didn't you take that out before Mr Cris yeah I may the update I thought you did I thought you did too but it's it's on the agenda that I'm looking at so am I looking at a an old agenda is it it's on there right yeah mine's mine's printed recently so I apologize I I did it on the Google Doc not on okay so March 5th the budget hearing is March 12th right yes so we We'll add it no but I just there's no sense having three meetings if we could just have two and join them yes so if you if you ex out March 5th budget hearing and then March 12th is a budget hearing public meeting yes okay I thought I was losing my mind I knew you changed it we didn't vote on it we didn't even the motion we didn't do the motion yeah okay so order on the discussion okay so going back to governance and policy I need a motion to approve G1 through G3 so moved move by Miss gella second second by Miss freshy discussion we just had we just had okay in the other discussion okay uh Mr Cruz can you is a roll call sure Mr Walker yes Mrs frella yes Mrs parar yes yes Mrs freshy yes motion carries thank you okay doing good thanks you're doing great all I can think about is all right here we go um see public comments y um if there's anyone from the public that would like to come to the podium for comment on any items please state your name um and you have three minutes being on no congratulations um for the for the record my name is Mike Bo I uh live on Mountain View Road here in Verona um I I just wanted to comment on um uh the presentations that we had today uh but with a little bit of a different context and it's tied to the unfortunate news over the weekend of the police report being filed uh that was uh published online by the Verona Police Department about a bullying incident involving uh some 13y olds don't really um feel it's appropriate to comment any further I just know what the public knows from what they're reading my concern is despite all the excellent academic news that we saw here today um I want to fall back on what the opening presentation talked about in terms of accountability and with respect to accountability what I mean is that everything that we do if we don't have a standard of accountability that assures that our students are safe from this bullying that that that we've read about then none of those um academic achievements are going to matter we have to ensure that our students are safe across the board and when I'm talking about accountability I know the role of the board is as it was described but we have to show up every day set a level of decorum a level of expectations that permeates throughout this community that ensures that this stuff does not happen I'm not calling anybody out here by any means whatsoever but what I'm saying is is that how we present ourselves will carry on how our administrators carry out and then how our students treat each other it's just something that we cannot allow to continue if we don't don't these academic results aren't going to mean anything you can't learn in an environment where you are afraid and terrified to be here that's all I have to say thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you okay I changed my mind hi my name is Laurel Bry I live on Newman Avenue here in Verona um I was here a few weeks ago um and just for the record I don't want to be up here saying you know stuff that I talked about last week um my voice was shaking it was embarrassing you know nobody nobody wants to you know call out stuff like that um but uh Mike I think you bring up a really good point and I was actually thinking the very same thing as I was sitting listening uh to these to the results here and I think part of the problem is and it's a good problem to have is that Verona has consistently done so well uh you know ranking high as a school district in the state across the country year after year it's why people want to come and raise their families here and send their kids to the public schools here and I think what happens then is then there's a comfort level to say we've got good schools so we don't have problems or any real problems and the fact is we really do um real problems like bullying racism alcoholism drug abuse um misogyny date rape sexual assault it happens here and because we are go good school district doesn't mean we can just brush it under the carpet or hope that things will get better I think it really need especially with you know now coming off the pandemic three years now almost four years now there is still so much that we need to catch up with students are hurting adults are hurting and it's all just compounded into our kids and I think it needs to be all hands on deck you know there was used to be a peer leadership program I don't know if that's still happening it is um the Heroes and Cool Kids there needs to be a bigger mentorship problem uh program I think to help bridge the gap between the younger younger students and the older students um maybe there needs to be some further training from the teachers uh for the teachers for recognizing bullying um to prevent uh future cases um so anyway that's all I wanted to say and I wasn't going to say it but since you brought it up Mike I figured I'd second second the opinion thank you a part of our strategic plan focuses on character education programs um something that Verona does not currently have in any area with the exception of pillars of character which is not really a program at our middle school and we do conflict resolution at the elementary school board remembers from last year we had the kids here it was very adorable very proud of those kids but I I have said to our elementary principles and to Dr Miller and his team as well conflict resolution is that it's a resolution of conflict it's after the fact right character education is preventative it gives kids empowers our students to make better choices with regard to being kind to one another and having empathy for one another and so we are we will be piloting a program based on empathy um in grades five through eight um we don't know which teachers are are going to Pilot it yet we're still trying to organize how what that's going to look like um rather than just purchase a program and say this is our program we're going to go with it we're going to let teachers actually use it for a period of time the um makers of that program have agreed to give us a discounted um look at that um it's really a program that can be done uh uh in any grade level um at the middle school teachers would rotate so um it's 10 minutes a day but it would rotate from the English teacher to the math teacher to the science teacher to the physical education teacher to the art teacher to the music teach so everybody is knows the program and understands the program and is looking at making our world here a little bit better for everyone because we do um have some negative um reportings actually from our own students we have not done the presentation on the climate study yet but when we do you will see that our students across the board um when you drill down into um some of the indicators things like students at this school pick on each other because of their sexual orientation because of their gender identity or expression because of their physical appear appearance because of their academic or learning ability because of how they speak because of how they move and walk um a good number of students probably more than for the most part more than 50% in some categories are reporting this as a medium problem or a big problem and um for instance students at this school pick on each other because of their physical physical experience now I'm looking at um 6 through 12 so our middle school and and our actually this is hbw so it's 6 through eight um only 25% of our students reported as not being a problem so 75% of our students are reporting that kids pick on each other both online and in person and so in looking at this uh earlier this year um we recognized and this drove our decision to put that into the Strategic plan as a major uh component of our strategic plan so I I'm going to say the same thing I tell everyone this is not an overnight fix it's going to take time to roll out but I I believe we're in a a very positive footing um the uh we we're working with Mrs kler and Mrs Simmons and um Mrs acrian who are really all very very well well I'm so sorry well versed in programs like this and have experience outside of uh Verona um and we hope that within you know 3 to 5 years we see significant change um in in some of the behaviors I mean the reality of it is when students can't divide fractions we teach them how right when they can't read we teach them how when they don't know how to make Behavior choices we punish them we don't teach them how to make better Behavior choices so I I do think it's not going to be a a catch all but it will be better for our students in the the future after we Implement a program like this sure thank you for that I'm just going to piggy back on that because I think this came up in discussions at the board before when we did the Grand River Solutions there were some uh voice of the student in that uh result as well which is on our website where students said some of these similar things that that you brought out in the climate change and I think um one of the things that came up if I recall correctly is what exactly does see something say something mean like to help our faculty help our students to identify what is something and what's the mechanism on how to report that and get a result or get get attention like we definitely need to be proactive I I do want to thank the audience members for for bringing this topic up it's extremely important and I think everybody sitting at this table table um recognizes that and is on board with that so thank you for that and then just real quick I I think we skipped over number five The Unofficial um Verona results so that does have to get reported out publicly okay sorry yep sorry I I'll come back can I just quickly um that's what I thought that's why I that's why I skipped over it yeah but we that yeah but we'll come back I just to also say a couple things one I think that I I really like to hear this idea of it rotating through the multiple different teachers because I think that all you know most students find comfort in a different content area or with a different teacher so I think it's really important to not see it in only one area but instead rotating through um I I also wonder and this this also came up but I wonder if we should really look at our phone policy in school because I think that it is such a distraction it's not only an issue at home um but it's also such a distraction in the buildings and I think when we're working on character Ed if we're focused on our phones we're not really doing that character Ed work so just sorry one more thing since why not um to you know B Lisa spurred me to think of you know we also have to empower the students and make them aware that they if they report something they're not going to get blowback that they reported it you know I think of that HIV that we voted on last time where we knew it was an HIV we knew that it impacted the student tremendously but no other student would come forward and say who said those things um you know so that I think is is a a hole like we have to like Empower students to say no yes that you know my friend said that and you know understand that there could be consequences with his friendship but that he you know that as a community as a school we have the person's back and that we won't let them become ostracized because they're doing the right thing and stepping up I think that often is what keeps people from and especially kids I mean they're kids they're kids you know I mean my kids lie about brushing their teeth they're gonna lie about things they're not gonna tell everything so we have to make sure they understand that if they do come forward and they do say something that we everybody all the adults in the room will back them and understand what they're saying yeah and um two things from me so first off I remember specifically from the Grand River Solutions the number the figure that stuck out to me the most and that genuinely like scared me a little was that 50% of students couldn't confidently tell you how to report an HIV that was the specific number on that so um I was really glad to see that going forward after the study came out and after the uh curriculum U the curriculum team took a look at it that the long-term plan available on the school's website includes plans in coming years of course for uh staff for administrative counseling staff and student um training and development in these areas so I know it's down the pipeline but I'm really happy to see that included in future plans and part of a character education program would eliminate some of that fear because it puts an emphasis on doing the right thing and who to talk to how to talk to it how to say it um anytime you get into getting kids like even um I I know I spoke several times about um academic teaming academic teaming when you get kids together and your classroom is structured so you're you're doing true academic teaming you have I mean there's a social and emotional learning component to academic teeming that's very deep because kids have to know how to disagree with one another in a in a professional way in a kind way there's a lot of team building that goes into that so moving our moving our teachers to a different way of thinking about instruction bringing in a character education program as long as we do it with Fidelity right because just having it on the books doesn't cut it um will I get will get us to the that quicker thank you thank you okay um Mr Cruz yes so apologies for skipping number five um all right this time we're just going to read out the unofficial Veron School Board election results on November 7th uh we had two candidates on the ballot U Michael Boone with uh 18 um 55 votes and Dominic f with uh 1051 so congratulations to Mr Boon on his uh win on November 7th thank you conratulations thank you to Mr Ferry for putting himself out there and running um okay all right I'm going to email you the positivity project so you can take a look at the website okay thank you okay the next schedule public meeting will be held on November 28th beginning with confidential session at 6 pm and the public session at 7 in the Verona High School Learning comments I need a motion to adjourn the meeting by Miss freshy welcome by Miss fella um all in favor I I the meaning is adjourned at 9:03 p.m. hold on thanks W thanks fresy thank you going around are you sure you don't want it it's a good purple pen