you good okay good evening everyone thanks for coming um in accordance with the requirements of the open public meetings act chapter 231 pl1 1975 announcement I wish to announce that the New Jersey open public meetings law was enacted 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 provisions of this act the school district of the cadams board of education has caused notice of this meeting to be published by having the date time and place thereof posted in the board administrative offices sent to the clerks of the chadam burough and chadam Township the library of the cadams The chadam Courier The Daily Record The Star Ledger and tap do you want to take roll sure miss Ross here Miss Allen Mr dandro here miss Kenny here Mr Ryan here Mr Smith Miss Weber here Dr Zang here miss chiarelli here two three four five six seven present and accounted for perfect please join us for the pledge of lesions if you're able the flag is over here to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all okay perfect thanks everybody for coming out tonight I don't have any further comments at this time um I do just want to make actually real one one quick um an announcement to all of our student athletes at the high school they have been just killing it this season so I don't have all of the specific statistics but all of our winter sports are really doing amazing and uh I just want to give a huge shout out to they're not done yet but huge shout out to all of [Music] them um on to our administrative reports Dr Lusa thank you Miss chiarelli uh just a few items here to kick off before we get to a presentation um first two changes just very quickly our next Board of Education meeting will take place at chattam middle school so please note that you can see we have the set behind us but the next week of our board the next board meeting is the very week of the production so we'll be at the middle school and we'll send out uh a reminder and post that on the on the website and then our April 22nd board meeting we need to move to April 29th and the reason for that is that the state released its budget calendar since the the last meeting and there's a window of time during which school districts must adopt their budget and our uh April 22nd date Falls outside of that window so we need to move the next meeting to April 29th and again we'll update all of the calendars on the websites to reflect that the second bullet here has to do with Schoolboard elections and um as I mentioned about the the budget calendar when we received the memo regarding the budget calendar we also received noticed that Governor Murphy had signed into law uh a bill back in January mid January I think um that made an alteration to the current law around School District Board elections and budget votes uh and the the short of it is that now a school district that elects to hold its Board election in April will be treated the same way as a school district that elects to hold its Board election in November and that might seem like a non uh a non- news event but let me just explain that it used to be way back in the day that all Board elections in the state of New Jersey took place in April and all school districts that were type two districts like us um that's a that's the most common formation of District uh but there are other districts like City districts and districts that might have a a board of estimate um most districts are type two and type two districts not only did they have their election in April but they also presented their budgets to the voters in April and then the voters voted the budget up or down and in 2012 Governor uh Christie at the time signed into law a bill that made a change and treated April different than or different from November elections and the change was essentially that if a board decided to remain in April School District an April Board election in April the board would continue to have to submit its vote to its budget rather to the um to the public for a vote but if a board moved its election to November it didn't have to do that so long as the budget remained within the 2% tax levy cap uh inclusive of other adjustments that the state determined so most districts decided to move to November because it meant that there was no longer um a vote on the base budget the only vote that would occur would be if the Board of Education adopted or or or put forward a separate proposal to increase the tax levy Beyond 2% and of course this board of education just did that and there was a separate vote that took place in November so for the last 10 years school districts that had their elections held in April were treated differently than school districts that had their election in November and that was by Design the new law that has just taken effect uh about a month ago means that April elections are treated in the same way as November elections so this isn't a topic for lengthy discussion right now but in board business either tonight or at our next meeting or the subsequent meeting or future meetings one of the things that this board could consider is moving the election back to April and there therefore moving the budget adoption back to April and any proposal that would exceed the 2% tax levy would then take place in April not November uh and the reason that probably many Boards of Education will consider doing that is that uh when a separate proposal is put before the voters it's better for the school district and the Board of Education and the municipal um clerks to know the outcome of the vote before the next school year uh whereas if you take our our case this current year we put forward uh a proposal in November those proposals were approved but those proposals now can't be implemented until we're more than halfway through the school year so of course we're uh provisioning health benefits to a segment of our par professional staff that's just took effect March 1st essentially that's something that we would have known and been able to plan for and and recruit and so on and so forth before the year began had the vote been able to take place in April so I'm just mentioning it because it's something that uh we were notified about since the last board meeting and it's something that will probably require deliberation on the part of the board uh in the in the coming meetings and coming months uh next bullet has to do with the calendar 2425 I've mentioned now a couple of times that uh our uh agreement with the Teachers Association the collective bargain bargaining agreement between the Board of Education and the association calls for an additional work day for teaching staff that's a day without students a day devoted to professional development um that won't take effect until next uh 25 26 school year um or I'm sorry 2425 school year so we don't have to worry about this current year but next year we do have to make a calendar adjustment and while we're doing that something else that I've mentioned from time to time is that we surveyed all of the families in the district at the end of last year about the holidays they observe in their homes and we found that uh we had a significant percentage at least relative to other holidays observed of families who observe Lunar New Year and dwali and so um I just have a draft calendar for your consideration uh but uh I think at some point we should have a discussion about whether we should incorporate those as school closure days in the course of the calendar may not be next year because we've already adopted the calendar for next year it's been in place for about a year so some families have made plans and some staff have made plans but if not adjusting the calendar for next school year then as we're looking uh over the course of the next two months to adopt the 2526 calendar it's something that um I will at least include in at least one or two of the versions so that you can think about that and we can discuss that in committee and at future board meetings uh next up longer list than usual I apologize uh we have been registering students for kindergarten since the end of January we have 20 seven students registered as of now um we also as you know and we've been talking about for the past couple of months have opened up the possibility of having students in third grade attend Lafayette Avenue School next school year and since the last meeting we've had the deadline uh come and go we've been able to confir firm that we'll have 65 total students as of today 65 total students attend Lafayette next year as third grade students the effect of that is that we will free up one classroom at Washington Avenue School and another classroom at Southern Boulevard School uh so those two classrooms can be reallocated to kindergarten and with those two classrooms plus the nine that we're currently using in each of the if you three in each of the schools nine total this year two more for next year would be 11 and if we have to get a little more creative than we normally might want to get we can probably squeeze another classroom or two if we're in a dire situation we um believe we've arrived at a point where we can offer all families who are interested in it full day kindergarten for next year so um we still have a couple of details to work out and the board will have to have some conversations including around uh formalizing or confirming the tuition amount we we do we're not at a place where we can do this for free at the current time by um moving sections to to Lafayette it's not a zero sum game so we still are going to need a couple of additional staff members at least to be able to pull off full day kindergarten for everyone next year uh so we have to determine the tuition amount and we have to determine a couple of other um details I'll say that could affect individual students in uh specific individual circumstances uh but I do plan to notify the community and those who' registered for kindergarten that we will be offering full day for everyone uh within the next week or two uh and then the last item for me is uh that we have a special event planned for this Thursday I've spoken about it before uh but on the first day of school this year with our staff we had a really special special and moving uh presentation from a holocaust Survivor named ma Dame and Ma is has been back to the district she's coming back again Wednesday to talk to more high school students uh but she'll be here for an evening presentation for parents and anyone else who would like to attend I expect a decent sized crowd of students who will come and hear her again or for the first time and hopefully bring their parents with them uh and that'll be uh this Thursday night at 7:00 right here so if you're able to attend we invite you and then the last bullet is going to be a uh just an update from our pre uh prek to third grade schools and their staff with Dr donu and this is just a touch point so as I've mentioned we're going to have in in preparation for the reconfiguration of the grade levels one presentation in March which will be focused on the K3 schools becoming K2 schools then in April we'll take on Lafayette and Cheryl Russo will be here to talk about the transformation of Lafayette from a grade 45 to a grade 34 school and then in May uh the CMS team will come and they will talk about all that they've been up to with respect to transforming CMS from grades 6 through 8 to through grades to grades 5 through 8 so before I turn it over to the folks who are here to present I'll just answer any questions if I can about anything that I have mentioned so far any questions I do okay goe uh my quick question on the calendar I'm sorry the April School Board elections move is there any um limitations to the board can it happen now if you don't do it in a certain time are there penalties is there any parameters that we need to be concerned of or aware of my reading of the of the law and we can get legal guidance so that we're on completely solid footing is that any change must be voted upon at least 85 days in advance of the next election so in other words you'd have to to do it at least 3 months ahead of um nov I guess November uh the law also specifies that board member terms are shortened to comply with the calendar and not lengthened so I believe that what would happen is for anyone who is I I believe that the first time you make the move you have to have an election in November and then another one in April and the ones the people who would be up that following year their term would move from ending December 31st to uh April 30th I the next okay okay I got it I might need to so people who would be up for next November 2025 would actually be up in April correct but the crew this November is regular yep okay okay got it you may have to remind me of that a few more times I I believe so I believe so but we would get guidance that's a nice little disclaimer everything I told you it might be true it might not be um okay to confirm that okay that's great thanks I appreciate it and the mod Dam event is going to be outstanding I did have the privilege of hearing her speak during during a teacher um meeting and she was outstanding and there's so few Holocaust Survivors so if you can clear your calendar for any event this might be the event to to clear your calendar for so um I'm going to get here early to get a good seat just in case there's a run on the seat the 732 seats in the auditorium thanks yeah okay perfect I have question anybody have any go ahead uh Dr Lusa do we have any solid numbers on how much it costs to run an election essentially we'll be running an election every April uh presumably the school district would have to pay for that and even if candidates are unopposed we would still have to run the election and and pay for the staff Etc do we know how much that costs today that that's correct I don't know how much it cost today and I have a recollection of what it cost back in 2012 but I don't know if my recollection is accurate and that number certainly doesn't stand today the thing that I do recall though from back in the day is that we at least are able to uh determine the hours of the election and and many years that I remember we began the voting at 2 pm which reduced the cost of the election but it also made it safer for the schools because they only needed to cover an hour or two of the day in terms of people coming into the buildings and voting in the gyms whereas now I think the polls typically open at 6:00 a.m. so we have a little more um disruption in the schools than we do when we have a a school boote and Governor the the new Bill signed by Governor Murphy doesn't address any of that or we just left on our own to try to figure that out yes as far as I know there's no no money attached no funding attached to it and is mailing vote allowed yes I I mean I I think it's treated the same way as all other elections yinglu could you repeat that there's a weird Echo is the mailing vote allowed mailing mail thank [Applause] you got it my yeah all right so we need to figure that out and find out what the cost is and we'll discuss that I guess in committees okay perfect and then the final item for me is a presentation from Dr donu and uh the folk she has with her those are our principles so we we're going to have to head down though because the screen is is going to be [Music] lowered [Applause] okay good evening everyone um I'm excited to be with you this evening to give a K3 update um this started out as simply um an overview about the reconfiguration plans for our K3 schools but we decided we would also take the opportunity to share with you a few reasons why these schools are so special I'm happy tonight to have with me Dr Crawford who's the principal of Milton Avenue School Mr frier who is the principal of Southern Boulevard and unfortunately Miss dudlo who's the principal of Washington Avenue had an unavoidable family conflict um but hopefully I can represent um her thoughts for Washington Avenue accurately and luckily we have Washington Avenue staff here representing everyone tonight go wash so our agenda for this evening as I said our Focus really is to share with you how we are approaching reconfiguration for the 25 26 school year I thought we would also take an opportunity to share some one of the specific changes that will be occurring when we return to school in August of 24 and then at that point I'll turn it over to the principal so they can share with you um what's going on at Milton um SPS and at Washington Avenue so uh Mr fire is going to get us kicked off with sharing um how we are preparing for reconfiguration uh good evening I'm pleased to present about the collaborative efforts of our reconfiguration teams across each of the K to3 buildings these teams are composed of dedicated representatives from every grade level including Specialists from special areas and members of our child study teams alongside the administrative leaders throughout this year these teams have been actively engaged in regularly scheduled meetings fostering an environment of open communication and shared decision Mak this Collective approach has ensured that the needs and perspectives of every stakeholder are carefully considered as we navigate through the reconfiguration process in addition to our internal discussions Dr Donahue scheduled each School the opportunity to go visit other K2 schools in the neighboring districts including Floren Park Mountainside Mars Plains and marst toown these visits provided invaluable insights into some of those best practices that we're looking for Innovative approaches and potential challenges that we might face as we go through our reconfiguration during our site visits we concentrated on six key areas to inform our reconfig reconfiguration teams instructional schedules examining how instructional time is structured to best meet the needs of our K to2 students lunch recess schedules assessing the organization of meal and playtime to ensure smooth transition and enriching experience for all of our youngsters facilities evaluating the suitability and functionality of our facilities to accommodate the unique needs of kto2 students and support effective teaching and learning outdoor spaces analyzing the availability and design of outdoor areas to promote physical activity exploration and Outdoor Learning opportunities special events exploring how special events and activities can be tailored to the developmental stage of a k to2 student to enhance their engagement as well as their enjoyment and support beyond the school day investigating options for after school programs and resources that provide additional support and enrichment for K to2 students beyond the regular school day these were the six areas that we really dove into with curricular leaders from all of those districts so now I want to turn it over to Dr Crawford she's going to discuss some potential opportunities thank you thank thank you so from these visits we were able to uh look at a couple of different things for our potential opportunities as we transition to be K to school K to2 schools um so uh we want to take a look at the schedules that we currently have so with these schedules that we currently have we want to think um a little bit about kindergarten we want to allow a little bit more student choice in our kindergarten schedule um allow some time for positive peer interactions sometimes this is a time when students will meet some of their best friends or first friends so what does that look like sometimes it's hard to do that in a curricular area um we want to be able to um H cultivate any conflict resolutions uh skills that these students have you know what happens when we both reach for the same toy or we reach for the same you know um game or we always want to be first in line that's a big thing in kindergarten um we want to take a look at some of um as lunch and recess what can that look like a little extended time for those kindergarten students to get their wiggles out which is always a good thing um and then we want to look at some Flex periods for first and second grade um how can we um have these grades be a little bit more creative so additional time outside some project-based learning opportunities that could be cross-curricular um we are always looking at really good seal activities and initiatives and we also do some really good uh strategy groups so that we have students that might learn in a different way or might learn with different friends um and maybe those groups might look differently for each uh curricular area um those enrichment activities that Mr frier spoke about uh we um visited one group that had an artist in Residency program which is an amazing opportunity for students um we want to consider that we want to look at maybe a spring concert for kindergarten because we love to hear our students sing um and it really cultivates their love of music and then they get to be on this awesome stage when they're in high school so maybe that can start as early as kindergarten um and then we want to look at our traditions we love our Traditions at our elementary schools so what does a tradition look like at each grade level and how can we um revisit that and what makes the most sense for each of the grade levels some other opportunities we're exploring and again we're exploring all of these we're not saying we're jumping in feet first for all of them but um Partnerships with other schools in sdoc those connections a lot of students like to come back and visit the school where they used to go or work with our other students uh we want to look at maybe having some support for before School academic programs we're always hearing from our parents that um K to2 kids are up early and ready to go to school so maybe we can um you know grasp that opportunity for some good supports um and then our third grades have so many privileges in our current classrooms they get ch and chorus and all that stuff well we can shift that to second grade um and those second grade students will then become you know the head of the school and they'll be able to step up as role models for all of those other students so um our next steps as we're considering our changes for 2025 2026 is work with those um all of our administrative teams to um look at schedules at the K2 and those schedules can be we bide for time everybody wants time with the kids but we're going to look at those look at our staffing needs um professional development is very big uh especially if we're looking at all of those initiatives so what will our staff members need in order to be successful um coordinate logistics for the move in the summer as we know our elementary teachers love their stuff so we want to be able to bring all of our stuff to our new classrooms and make it just right for students um we want to prepare for a transition to full day kindergarten um and then as all of that goes on we want to maintain our communication with the community and um as all of our progress moves forward so I'm going to hand it over to Dr Johnny who's going to look ahead for next year thank you so much so when we do get to um this coming fall I keep saying fall even though we're back in school in August um but one thing that is definitely happening is that we will have revised progress reports and this is for K to 5 but since we're talking about our K to3 schools I'm going to discuss um the relevance there um the revision was necessitated because there are newly adopted New Jersey student learning standards for both English language arts and math uh the structure of our progress reports will remain the same our progress reports are what we refer to as standards based because they link back directly to the standards all of the indicators will continue to reflect the New Jersey student learning standards um teachers will still be able to offer comments in each trimester and the scale of 1 to four with four exceeding grade level expectations three meeting grade level expectations two approaching and one not meeting those will remain the same I'll be working with the curriculum instruction committee as well as our supervisors of ela and math and they content leads to make these changes we'll present them to the curriculum and instruction committee and when we return to school the revisions will be discussed with parents at PTO meetings in each of our buildings so I'm going to share with you some of the specific changes that are very relevant for K to3 and I'm going to start with English language arts previously when you would look at a report card or look at the standards there were four subheadings um for foundational skills and they were reading print concepts phonological awareness as well as word identification and when the standards were revised it was recognized that these foundational skills needed to be enhanced and so as we go to approach um rewriting and revising the progress reports based on the standards there is what you will see a much greater focus on decoding and encoding and teachers speak that's how we break words down and then make them um we will also be focusing ref the standards on morphology which is how we analyze word parts and recognize words we will also be FOC focusing on how we reinforce awareness of our sounds and speech and how they link to letters and one continued Focus will be on fluency and comprehension another significant shift with the English language arts standards is previously there were not foundational writing skills the um those skills were just encompassed within reading and it was recognized in the revision that um foundational skills specific to writing are necessary for our young readers and writers and what will that will look like is that there will be more um focus on on in the report cards via the standards on sound letter Basics letter formation spelling elements of grammar and syntax which is what we refer to as the structure and formation of a sentence unlike English language arts the uh the changes to the math standards were not overly significant the ones that are most relevant for K 3 is that measurement and data used to be um they were considered one domain and these standards have required that they be broken into two um measurement and data literacy data literacy they're referring to the skills that students need when they want to ask questions collect um information analyze it interpret it and communicate about data that sounds very high level um when we refer to data literacy in our k3s we really are talking about how they would analyze what they might see in a graph there's also been a shift in establishing the progression towards solving word problems that involve money and another significant shift is that the term fluency has been replaced in the math standards there was a um overwhelming sentiment that there was too great of an emphasis um on accuracy and efficiency um over speed and so that is another um change that you will see reflected in the progress reports as they are shared out so at this point I'd like to return it back to um Dr Crawford and she's going to share briefly um what makes Milton Avenue such a special place so Milton Avenue School we like to call it the little school that makes a big difference um because we are a very small school but um we have wonderful staff just like everybody in the sdoc I will say um and so our enrollment our total enrollment it's actually now 306 um students because we have preschool and preschool is a little bit of a revolving door so we will get students um as they turn 3 years old into the preschool so we now have 55 preschool students 56 kindergarten students 66 first grade and 69 2 grade 70 third grade our staff is 70 which seems very large but all of those little friends in preschool need a lot of help and so we have some wonderful Paras um that um help us out quite a bit with our little friends so what's a couple of things that makes Milton Avenue School um stand out or a little bit different we um are lucky enough to have the bridge program which is a program um that we coordinate with eighth grade students at chadam middle school they come to our building once a month and they have a big huge play time with all of our preschool students um we have some students that work with um our friends one to one um and then they get to know them and then they come back for field day it's a really nice partnership they can walk to us and a lot of the students as I said might have been at Milton so our teachers get to see former students um and they love to come back and they love to spend some time with our kids uh the other thing is our veterans memorial walk we have um a wonderful Veterans Day committee um so we ask the community members to send in some pictures and stories about family members um that are veterans and we highlight them and we put their picture on a little board and we tell a little story about them and then the students get to to learn about the veterans that are been in our community um not only that but we do um a candy Drive where we send lots of candy to some of our veterans we do Valentine's for veterans and we have a really nice partnership with lots of Veteran facilities in New Jersey and in Pennsylvania um and then another thing we do is lots of Outreach we do collections this is one of um a pajama collection that we did and we partnered with Scholastic so Scholastic um bought a book for every pair of pajamas so all the students that got pajamas got good night stories um and we also do other collections like food drives um we do some things for people who um some veterans that might need some hygiene products and so we have a bunch of those programs that we have at Milton Avenue School I'm going to turn it over to Mr frier so he can brag about Southern Boulevard yes Southern Boulevard is that big it is a very large school excuse me uh at SPS the total enrollment right now stands at 383 students uh distributed across the grades kindergarden currently has 73 first grade 97 2 grade 109 third grade 104 and we have 75 dedicated staff to support all of the students so at SPS fostering Community engagement through service projects is a foundational part of our mission this this slide highlights three of our notable initiatives the cougar carees cooler the connection that we have with Bridges and hope week so the cougar cooler initiated uh last year with the support of a chadam resident Sharon nuner it demonstrates our commitment to minimizing waste while helping those in need students contribute unused packaged food during lunch which is then refrigerated and collected weekly for distribution to the chadam food distribution at the Methodist Church uh secondly our long-standing partnership with Bridges uh facilitated by third grade teacher Hol Isa and chadam Resident Lucy Malatesta involve students assembling bag lunches for individuals facing food insecurity in neighboring cities this Hands-On activity which includes decorating bags and writing uplifting notes Fosters empathy and civic responsibility among all of our students and lastly uh we have hope week hope week is a month-long service project that we do atbs the New York Yankees began hope week in 2009 and this was now our 11th year continu ing their program for community service hope stands for helping others persevere and Excel so for the month of November we request donations from the community this past November we requested change for Unicef new socks for students or excuse me for children and adults that are homeless used crayons that get recycled and made into new crayons for hospitalized children canned goods and non- perishables for Helping Hands of chadam food pantry on top of that this year during a week in November each student participated in a direct Hands-On service project that Illustrated the importance of giving back so kindergarteners they created care kits that provide basic necessities for those in need in our local communities the first graders they created suncatchers and wrote notes and they were sent to the elderly at our local nursing homes nearby the second graders they assembled sustainable bag lunches and continued with our bridges Outreach and our third graders they created busy bags they had puzzles and games and they were sent to children at the gorab center in Marist toown all of these initiatives not only benefit those in need but also instill a sense of purpose and compassion in all of the students at Southern Boulevard I am immensely proud of the impact that SPS continues to make and I just couldn't be prouder so that's a little snippet of Southern Boulevard thank you I'm going to pass this back to Dr Donahue as I said I hope I can do this Justice um I know Miss DLo is passionate about Washington and uh hopefully I represent uh their initiatives as a faculty and staff there so Washington total enrollment right now is right at 295 in kindergarten we have 68 students first grade has 85 second grade has 71 and our third graders um total 72 at was Washington and our total staff is at 61 Washington definitely capitalizes on the fact that they are so centrally located and they make it a point to be involved actively with the community um the slides that are represented here uh you can see that students from Washington Avenue actually have the opportunity to go to borrow Hall and see what it's like to participate in uh politics at the burrow level they definitely enjoy their close proximity to eclc the third graders have a partnership with eclc where they will walk over visit they will engage in peer activities with students at aclc and quite often they will do a craft to all to promote positive relationships our um residents down at Garden Terrace greatly enjoy having Washington So Close by they go locally or frequently and will um visit with the um residents there they'll entertain them and it's always um a highlight as you may know um EC uh Garden Terrace is on the route for the Halloween parade which is a beloved beloved um Community event and lastly Washington involves themselves in give back give thanks whereby each grade level will pick a spe specific kindness initiative and follow through with it that could look like making cards for um Elder residents it could look like composing or compiling hygiene kits for veterans and it can also look like a food drive to supp support um people who are food insecure so hopefully our presentation tonight you're walking away with a bit more information um focused on how we are approaching the reconfiguration the opportunities that we see for K2 how we're planning for it and involving many voices hopefully you've also gotten uh a glimpse as to what the progress will progress reports will look like when we return to school in September as I said all pto's will have meetings to help parents understand what they look like um again they are all rooted through the New Jersey student learning standards and finally I very happy that everyone had an opportunity to hear from the k3s they do unbelievable work on a daily basis they faculty have incredible patience you cannot do this job with tremendous dedication a love of children and a love of learning it's a challenging job but hopefully you see that when you walk through the halls in our chatam schools This Is Where It Starts they don't just show up at um chattam High School magically ready to be high schoolers it's a long road and the foundation starts with our K3 schools so thank you to all the teachers and the principals and everyone who supports us along the way and if if the board has any questions we're happy to answer [Applause] them [Music] okay thank you so much for that amazing presentation these kids do do a lot for our community amazing can I ask a question I do yes you can ask a question and not to anyone in particular except for I do have one for Dr donu um Dr Crawford what did you mean I understand the whole conflict resolution when you say give students more choice in kindergarten can you just give a a 20 second example of what that looks like that's different than it is today doesn't matter I don't care Dr Crawford mentioned it that's why I was picking on her but I don't care who answers it I'll answer I want Jee I want Gene albanes to answer that in fact free gim for all uh so one of the things that um we know about educating Little People is that choice is important their voice um in their they they need an opportunity to make decisions and what we've seen in going into other K2 schools and what we know from our own research is if we are able to incorporate some free time where students are able to choose what they want to do um it sets them up for success in that they're doing something that they want to do but quite often it's those play opportunities where as Dr Crawford alluded to there is a conflict in a can be something very small it can be taking turns I wanted to play with that and it provides the students with an opportunity to quote unquote work it out on their own um sometimes we can all tend to be hoverers and when we are attending to academic needs there always seems to be the pressure of time like we need to make it through I need to get through my lesson but if we are able to incorporate more free choice and students are able to do what they want to do it naturally provides those opportunities for them to learn how to resolve conflicts big or small as they occur recess I feel like it's a little bit like speed dating you know they get out there they can't decide what they want to do if they know every day that they have this one point to look forward to we really do believe that it will help cultivate the skills that you know are just quite frankly very necessary not just in the classroom but beyond okay great and then also I had a question about the um enrichment activities and I again I don't need an answer tonight if you don't have one but have we also worked with work family connection on how that may look when we reconfigure the grades so any not unlike I'm glad Mr a is here because um he will often have um parties or any one of the schools that have after school enrichments students are always then able to go to work family so the fact that they may require after school care does not prohibit them from taking part in any after school enrichment activities but I if your question is would they provide academic support any academic support that we are looking to provide we would want to come from our own teachers right now it was more the the former that we're working with them to ensure that no student is prohibited from participating in an activity correct because they also go to because they require after care that's correct that's correct um and real quick um and again I don't need an answer on this tonight but Marco you had mentioned um you're looking at facil facilities playground equipment things like that and you know when you know just make sure the board is aware you know that you in three years you're going to need new playground equipment in five years you're going to need a new you know widget so we would just ask that you we you know we don't have a pile of money but with proper planning we can come up with the equipment so I would just ask that you you know um as you're planning just keep in mind that it might take a year or so to come up with funds to to to fund whatever it is that you think is the next you know required thing and my last question is I promise this is directed at Dr donu um the changes to the New Jersey uh learning standards does that require or come along with professional development I'm kind of pointing to the teachers here so if we're putting Another Brick in their bag you know what's coming out or you know H how do the teachers then have to adapt or it's it's seamless they're just that great and there's no um you know additional training required so not unlike the question that was raised about funding with elections the answer is no the state likes to um give us new initiatives um I'm happy to say in this regard much of what chattam is doing I would say compared to other districts we are ahead of the curve but as with any programs that we bring in we do provide training so this year as you will recall from the beginning of the year we're implementing fundations in grade 2 so we've had ongoing professional development for that throughout the year we actually have our remaining sessions um we had today we're having one tomorrow with coaching with Heather Rocco and Dr lonza so the state does not provide that Jill but we understand the need for if we're going to ask teachers to roll something out that they need the tools and resources to do so and that will um Factor um squarely into how we use our PD days um when we return to school in August and then again in October and then the end end of the year okay great thank you I appreciate it thank you Ann yeah for sure um can you hear me Jill Jill stole my question on student choice but I have two others um when you're uh thinking about the composition of the kindergarten classes are you going to be uh doing evaluations again of all the incoming students and if so is that July so that's a great question and um one of the things that the kindergarten team and BSI has been very adamant about is that it how helpful it would be in developing our class list um many of our kindergarteners that have not gone through our preschool program arrive unknown to us and what we know about a class list is once it's developed it stays so our plan is if I'm getting the date correctly on May 30th um the plan is to do a half day for the K3 schools which would then Avail all teaching staff particularly kindergarten and BSI to um bring in our incoming kindergarteners so that we could conduct very rough and I want to say screenings but it's really a get to know you at that point the principes would be able to do a nice orientation for the parents and having taught kindergarten I do know that you know a 20 minute um look see with a child it just helps you understand you know what's their personality like are they having a hard time detaching from their mom or dad or caretaker so that we have a little bit more information to go on when we go to um develop those class lists so that's the plan great and that maybe this will help uh answer the second question and maybe you don't have an answer tonight but are you seeing any um uptick in ESL students compared to this year too early to tell um you know Susan last year when we got to October we had definitely noticed a significant Pop there's an unpredictability to it um the way we find out about an incoming student is there's a survey that triggers in Genesis and because as you know registration in the school just is ongoing you really don't know so I my answer is there really is no pattern um this year we're holding steady still under 30 for total ESL students in the district I will say though that the majority of students that do come to us um are fifth grade and under we still have very minimal at the high school and the middle school so it's something that we are looking towards and I actually just um had a very productive phone call with someone who would back on the topic of professional development be able to do um an ongoing residency with next with us next year um in the event that we continue to see any type of increases with those numbers thank you I have regarding the new standards for mathematics um you mentioned there's a shift from and I I don't know if I got this correctly that's why I'm asking the question so we have fluency accuracy and speed obviously I'm good at the fluency and accuracy part is the weight shifting towards speed in the new standards it's actually it's actually shifting away um there was a time where um you know universally it was thought that you needed a fast retrieval of of your facts and you know agreed that's a very good thing but we've also seen that the pressure of timing sometimes just sabotages the students and so the shift intentionally away from the word um fluency it it's the state's way of saying like let's just make sure they know the content um and if we're less focused on speed hopefully it will help them be more efficient and like taking the pressure off of them okay so it's less focused on speed I worried about that part okay good thank you anyone else any other questions no okay perfect thank you guys so much that was [Applause] amazing okay moving on to the business administrator report Patricia can you hear me okay we're still working with the Architects regarding the security vestibules the summer roof projects and the rod grants that's it okay perfect sorry Patricia what was the update on the vules they're working with the Architects we're still still working with the Architects oh still okay did Peter give you a um estimated time that he's not going to be still working with them and he'll have some he hasn't given me that information okay thank you I can I can jump in there we met with the Architects the week that school was closed and we toured each of the each of the buildings went through the final kind of uh Renditions of the plans we had a couple of adjustments we wanted to make here and there most of the buildings are pretty straightforward and don't require a lot of additional construction the two exceptions to that are Milton Avenue School where we are going to have to coordinate some ESB bestus abatement in uh Dr Crawford's office and also uh take advantage of kind of the the way the layout is is with the nurse's office having a door right there and Dr Crawford having a door right in the in what would be basically the Man Trap or the vestibule we have to do some reconfiguring and expanding the of the uh nurse's office and then at the middle school because there is a stairwell that is a fire egress point right in the main Entry Way um there has to be more extensive work done there to essentially wall that off and create another um another point for the stairs to empty so the middle school will take beyond the summer uh it'll extend definitely into the fall because the construction is more involved and we'll have to use the entrance close to the soccer field to the left of the building we're still on the timeline that um the architect will finalize the plans in the next couple of weeks hopefully we'll go out to bid um probably May and then we would get the work going as soon as school ends uh in June that's the plan right now and that the work would all be done except for the Middle School uh By the time school starts up in August wow and The Architects confident they can turn that around go out to bid in May and shovels in the ground it by the end of June it's all dependent of course on the bidder and the and the contractor we get but we're we're lumping all of the projects together with one you know in one project so that it's one contractor that we're de dealing with and we're hoping that the concentration of the materials and of the site to be you know one one single project will entice enough biders that will get a decent hit and then they'll be able to mobilize quickly and work through the summer okay I guess keep us posted yeah yeah if they can do it in April that be better going off a bid but it's up to them all right thanks thank you Patricia okay moving on to our student liaison Ohana you have an update for us um so um a couple of reminders okay so um all of the CHS students and the incoming freshmen from CMS have completed their scheduling meetings for next year so now the schedules are going to be created um tomorrow tomorrow we have a district Coral Festival so Lafayette and Middle School and High School cor students are all going to be here actually and um going to participate in a joint Festival together which is going to be a really fun interconnected event um and then this Friday we have the PTO senior fashion show which is always um a great event EV and then next Monday through Thursday are the NJ GPA which are graduation proficiency assessments um that testing for all Juniors next week and then Wednesday March 20th through Saturday March 23rd we have the spring musical layes which is shaping up to be really incredible so so go see it and then um a couple of shoutouts so you said you didn't have the specifics of the athletes I do so um we have state champions in um fencing for both girls and boys fencing and in um boys and girls swimming and then girls basketball just won sectional Championship so it's a really great season for our winter athletes and then um also our robotics team just won a county competition so covered all the bases aana could you please elaborate on your involvement in the in Lay Miz um yeah so I play woman four um big role really important Ensemble is great though um we have a great time lots of numbers um it's really fun to play a poor Parisian you might be woman four but you said that you had a solo right on the top of that deck right there I do I do right up there right in the center I'll look out into the audience for that one so please all attend break a leg Yeah break a leg what are the dates the 20 she said the 20th 23rd yeah 23rd thank you so much for that update yes the show is going to be amazing and if you haven't gotten your tickets do it stat because we hear there's a rumor it may sell out so uh it's going to be a good one for sure and keep your eye out for aana up top okay great any questions from anyone before we move on okay perfect uh committee reports for personnel Weber yes thank you we met on February 7th and we covered a few topics uh we talked about the power professional and I had mentioned I think at the previous meeting that thanks to the the generous residents who approved one of the last second questions um were starting to roll out the benefits to the par professionals um it was the first phase was to the Paras that have the most number of hours there'll be a second phase probably closer to the summer and then anybody else that trickles after that so the the paraprofessional benefits are for the par professional themselves and they can pay in um for child for a child if they want to you know um not a spouse but a child we um the Personnel department is also going through a um benefits usage audit just to make sure that everything is ticked and tied and squared away and that we're not you know spending money where we don't need to or um if there's maybe a better mous trrap out there so Beth and her team are going to undergo that which I'm sure will be extensive um also some eligibility verification it was part of the whole um audit so thank you Beth in advance for taking that on and I think that was the highlights and also just about recruiting for the the the next school year as we've mentioned and Dr Lusa has mentioned several several several times over the years um how difficult it is to recruit I remember when I first started on the board 10 12 15 years ago Beth would go to the University of Delaware TCNJ and there'd be a line out the door and now there's crickets so we really have to come up with a better mouse trap in recruiting and I'm hoping that Dr Lusa works with his Co Hearts to try and even make alternate route easier somehow we have to make teaching more attractive I know the simple answer is you know more money would certainly get more people in there um you know but that's challenging in itself so it you know things like World languages they're just not graduating World language teachers anymore so in the very short future we'll probably have online for World language classes I I think it's inevitable and it's and chadam is lucky we're able to still recruit because of Beth and all the teachers but you know 10 years from now it's going to look drastically different so something has to change to entice teachers to become phenomenal teachers like we have here sitting in the audience um so that's that's the report for personnel perfect when's your next meeting don't know okay the 20th 20th thank you Beth 20th okay perfect um curriculum Miss Ross Yes we also met on February 7th um we had a preview of the presentation that was given here tonight so uh we discussed a lot of what Dr Donahue and the principes uh outlined for us um the changes to the New Jersey learning standards and the impact that it's going to have on the report cards for next year uh we talked about the site visits that were made and the rec reconfiguration plans for the buildings and then also uh we had an update on the third grade cohort that is moving to Lafayette like Dr Lusa said 65 students are confirmed the three uh third grade teachers are also committed to move two from SPS and one from Washington um and that is it we have our next meeting March 20th perfect thank you uh finance and Facilities Mr Smith no uh finance and Facilities has not met our next meeting is a week from Wednesday perfect awesome and policy and planning Mr Ryan same update policy and planning has not met we meet the same day that finance and Facilities meet perfect okay awesome thank you um anything from any liaison reports I do I have um I have a liaison report from CF um they recently approved a grant for $7,600 for the uh High School TV film broadcast studio to upgrade um pieces of equipment that students can use in the TV production classes uh the good news is that this equipment is also uh being used to film and broadcast a lot of the events throughout the district including the fashion show that's happening Friday night um the musical theater Productions graduation and tedex events is tedex happening again this year yes awesome all right thank you excellent thank you so much anything else you have a burrow update I do I do have a burrow update thank you okay uh great so um councilman Strickland who's in the audience here um and Dr lus and I met Monday and we have a regular Cadence we try and do that once a month you know time permitting and again the the desire is to keep a line of an open line of communication to anything that impacts the M municipality that might overlap with the school or vice versa um what we talked about um often and always is security and traffic because that's really um a lot of The Crossover with the municipalities but so I appreciate um Justin's time in in meeting with us and and helping facilitate anything that the school may need and being a liaison you know for the school buildings um you know he's he's really the burrow rep but he also helps give us an eye into what the municipalities are their challenges are and some of their struggles so thank you Justin for meeting with us and I look forward to continuing the relationship excellent thank you any other Leone reports I guess that's it okay perfect um I'd like to move the minutes from the February 5th um public session and executive session Chris delandro second it I'm not sure who has to up who was not here who has to gr has to okay perfect meway yes okay uh Miss Allen not here Mr dandro yes Miss Kenny yes Mr Ryan Yes um Mr Smith Miss Weber yes Dr Zang yes Miss chiarelli yes minutes pass 701 okay perfect thank you so much um okay so this is going to be our first chance for public commentary notice of public comment time limit hearing of the citizens during the public commentary section of the agenda is an opportunity for any member of the public to be heard about issues which not topics scheduled for the current meeting to help facilitate an orderly meeting and to permit all to be heard speakers will be asked to limit their comments to a reasonable length of time when you do go up for a public comment if you would just mind um wouldn't mind just signing in and stating your name that would be great I good evening my name is Bill I'm current member of the estto technology department I'm also a CHS alumni and lifelong chatam Township resident I'm here to talk to you briefly about a mistake that occurred during the recent negotiations of our contract between myself and another technology department member who unfortunately cannot be here tonight due to being under the weather his name is Michael and he's also a CHS alumni and he currently has lived in chadam burrow for two decades union members were told that we're going to receive a roughly 3.8% salary increase this year the maximum rate allowed for members who are not on the guide over the next four years our salary increase was to be the same um ballpark as that unfortunately our current salaries were misre presented in the data used to negotiate they were possibly assumed to be much higher than they actually are the result that being the two of us who are currently now at the low end of the scale are only getting anywhere from 99% to 8% this year and every year for the next four years of the contract myself and Mike are not here to place blame or anything like that there certainly is blame that could probably be going around we just want to get the situation corrected get what we are promised and get what typically has occurred during uh past precedent with prior contracts as it currently stands our non-union tech department some of the members will be making more money than us despite some of them having less tenure as well as less education levels giving us what we are promised would only cost an extra $4,000 or so for both of us per year on a budget that's about $65 million a drop in the bucket for a town like this but for people like us would certainly make a big difference I want to stress that we're both long-term residents of the cadams and consistently support the school budget referendum every year and always have to keep the school district of the cadams the amazing District that it is unfortunately this issue has gone unresolved for many months now and working through our reps has not gotten the issue resolved Michael and I look forward to hopefully meet with the board president and our Personnel committee directly to go over our concerns and get this resolved I want to thank you for your time and thank you for everything you do on the board um I myself am current board member volunteer for our HOA committee and I've been doing that for about four or five years and I know what a thankless job it can be the late nights and um people coming to you with issues so I do want to thank you for that um it truly is a thankless job um and I appreciate your time thank you thank you Bill hello hi my name is deina Tobin I am uh the mother of a rising kindergar NSE so I'm pleased to hear that you will be offering um full day to all um I think you've indicated in the past that that it's been 7,000 um I'm just wondering at what point um you'll be able to tell us what the charge will be um for this year um I can appreciate that you don't know that right now um know the amount right now but um is there a cap is there a cap to how much you can increase it um from 7,000 to this year that's my question could you would you mind just signing in right there on the sheet for us that would be great thanks and we'll get to all the answers to the questions at the end of the public comment section there's anybody else that's looking to speak doesn't look like it okay um I'm going to PT that question over to Dr Lusa as far as the kindergarten tuition amount when do you expect to have a number I know that you know we're still in discussions do you expect by the next board meeting yes okay so there is no cap um the board is able to charge whatever it wishes for uh fde kindergarten irrespective of the current charge uh we have an executive session later on tonight where we'll be discussing some matters that could tie into kindergarten uh as indicated we have a finance committee meeting on the 13th so I would say the absolute latest would be the 14th 15th and we know that we need to inform families of that quickly in case they're weighing other options and are planning on not sending their kids to us uh if the charge is too high got it okay perfect so yeah so 14th or 15th we do have a public meeting on the 18th so I'm sure at that point we'll have everything resolved and you can make a public statement about that correct okay great um okay so we're going to close this portion of the public comment section we do have another um section later on in the meeting and we'll move on to our regular agenda huh oh okay you want to answer that yeah I just okay go ahead and Mike I'm the chair of the with no microphone I'm the chair of the going to go on in a second uhuh excellent thank you so Bill I'm going to have to take oh sorry I'm going to have to take that back as the chair of personnel and do a little more research so I don't want you think we didn't hear you I just need to Circle back and and do a little bit more research on some of the items that you just talked about thanks for coming out sorry an should he wait to hear back from you do you want to respond respond to him or do you want him to send you an email oh no no I'll respond to you okay yeah yeah okay perfect thank you um okay moving on to our uh regular agenda um for personnel oh that would be be me I'll get the hang of this that's okay a few years from now um great so I would like to move Personnel items 1 through 18 on the regular agenda um we have an addition of 19 and 20 and we have um amendments on six and 8 and uh Dr Lusa if you could comment on item number one sure thing uh item number one is the retirement of Janet Kramer who is our art teacher here at Lafayette Avenue School um when she emailed me to inform me of her retirement she in let me know that her first day was in January of 1967 at Southern Boulevard School so of course I asked her why she couldn't just stick around three more years to make it an even 60 but she said it was time and she's obviously been an institution here um everyone in chadam who's had kids go through the school system knows Jan Janet Kramer so I'd like to publicly thank her for all of her service wish her the absolute best in retirement and um I think on behalf of everyone we can all just stand in awe of a 57-year career in one place absolutely amazing I'm thinking maybe when she retires that we should line the um the circle with anybody who has heads left cuz I have two in my attic that I'd be happy to get rid of cuz you know I have seen some on the side of Route 24 that people have dumped in the past that' be great line up the head I think we should I think we should notify the entire Community anybody who has a head drop it off and we should line the entire driveway and I bet we could fill it I have at least one left if not two all right hang on to it got perfect um okay I will second the uh Personnel agenda items agenda items 1 A1 through 18 and addendum 68 19 and 20 Miss Ross yes Miss Allen Mr delandro yes Miss Kenny yes Mr Ryan yes Mr Smith yes Miss Weber yes Dr Zang yes Miss chiarelli yes um agenda items passed 801 I mean 800 sorry perfect thank you um moving on to care finance and Facilities Mr Smith I would like to make a motion to move B1 to B15 on the regular agenda to a vote um in addition to the chadam Education Foundation uh donation for the broadcast studio that M Ross mentioned uh like to also thank the chadam athletic boosters uh for a donation of $440,000 to be used towards new barrier netting on Cougar field so we appreciate uh those donations second I second okay Dr Zang second it okay all right agenda items be 1 through B15 Miss Ross yes Miss Allen Mr dandro yes Miss Kenny yes Mr Ryan yes Mr Smith yes M Miss Weber yes Dr Zang yes Miss chiarelli yes agenda items pass 800 perfect uh moving on to curriculum Miss Ross Yes um I'd like to move curriculum items C1 through C2 on the regular agenda second agenda item C1 through two Miss Ross yes Miss Allen Mr delandro yes Miss Kenny yes Mr Ryan yes Mr Smith yes Miss Weber yes Dr Zang yes Miss chiarelli yes agenda items pass 800 okay perfect thank you so much that completes our regular agenda um moving on to board business anything I don't have anything specific anybody have anything else that they you want to discuss it do you think we should discuss it tonight or table it look at it bring it back for next time okay yeah let's wait so we have a chance to look at it and then pick it up if that's okay with everyone yeah to I just that's the only thing anybody have anything else that they want to discuss no I'll set okay perfect um this is our second opportunity for public commentary as I stated if you wouldn't mind just signing in and stating your name that would be great Mr Heap nothing come on easy you feeling okay Justin nothing Justin all righty all right okay okay moving on that concludes our public meeting we will have an executive s uh action will not be taken action may be taken we don't know yet thank you everyone for coming and thank you for your extended time we know you have a long day so everybody get home safely thank you so much