e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e make Miss Munos will you please introduce your sure good evening everyone I'm Rosa munes The Interpreter for tonight's meeting thank you R thank you welcome to everyone here and those of you joining us virtually to this April 24th do Board of Education meeting for those who wish to provide public comment remotely a Google form was posted on the district website at 6:30 p.m. and those remote comments will be addressed in the second public comment section the commentar publicos this meeting which is hereby call to order at 6:39 p.m is in compliance with the notice requirements of the law public notice was posted in the office of the Board of Education and communicated to the municipal clerk and daily record on January 9th 2024 can we please rise for the flag salute I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for it stands one nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all Mr sabahu May me have a roll call please M ESO present Miss DS present Mr Miller here miss nothing here miss Phillips Miss penales present Dr sener present Miss soles here miss mandes here miss pinales will you please read our mission statement I'm sorry I didn't tell you ahead of time working together as a community our mission is to Welcome All and provide opportunities for our students in a safe and accepting learning environment to become creative empathetic resilient and who choose to make an impact the ler Board of Education acknowledges that the law of the states establishes that members of the public I'm sorry they no that's all that's I'm sorry I'm just sick it's okay thank you missis thank you um we have a presentation this evening the 2425 budget presentation um and hearing uh will we going straight into Mr sabahu Mr sabolo you may have the floor actually all three of us oh okay oh okay good evening uh with me tonight is Mr sabaho and Miss Gibbs our director of Human Resources we will be presenting the proposed 2024 25 school budget this evening and in so doing we are going to do it in kind of two parts one's going to be what 2023 24 has been and some of our accomplishments uh with the budget that the board approved last year and where we're going in 20242 uh with the proposed budget uh in so doing and what we've done over the last several years and we'll do tonight uh we want to make sure that our budget is always aligned with the approved goals of the district and so uh we'll be taking a look at what we've done uh within the goals and and where we take these goals uh to the next level uh we know certainly that the board will reconvene uh during the summer and in the early fall we'll uh adopt new District goals uh but uh with the expectation that they will be aligned uh with what has already been established and taking the next steps good evening one of our goals for this past year was to Foster and nurture a positive climate and culture across the entire district and one of the ways that we did that were was through our professional development days we had five full professional development days built into the school calendar two of those days were inservice days back in August prior to students arriving and then days throughout and the one that I wanted to highlight today was the March 22nd PD because it was an ed camp for format and what that means is um a a quick shout out to our director of curriculum instruction uh Mr Rory Carl for really doing a fabulous job of organizing um this Ed Camp format and also to our teachers who volunteered um they were surveyed about things that they were passionate about things that they could speak to and instruct others so this March 22nd p D day really was about our teachers teaching teachers um we had we started the morning it was a great morning um with our mindfulness and mind clearing activities that included everything from yoga and stretching to walking to basketball no I did not participate in the basketball um I didn't want any workman comp claims so I uh participated I was the MC for the interactive trivia which was a whole lot of fun some of the positive classroom culture things items and topics that teachers spoke to and and taught other teachers are listed there everything from deescalation strategies to Executive functioning to Brain Breaks uh to uh making phonics fun so you know the Ed camp for format really gave teachers an opportunity to uh nurture one another and build that positive climate and some of the things that were said in the next slide um were are there for you to read but you know what what I'd liked it was empowering to have a voice in shaping our own learning experiences so you know uh Mr Carl sent out the schedule of what was going to be available on that Ed Camp day oh and by the way it was all here at the high school which was most of it was at the high school so if you were here that morning um it was a really funfilled day of learning and um it was about empowering the teachers and when you do that that really lends itself to fostering that positive climate throughout the district and while I don't have a slide on it I do want to speak to um and give a shout out to our uh Dober middle school and Eastover because they exemplified the positive culture and climate by being a state both the middle school and East over State schools of character um and that process proc you may be wondering um was they had a committee where they there is a rigorous um application process and through that process they were identified as that do Middle School was um they scored so well that they've been asked by character.org to apply for the a national school of character so we're waiting to hear taking an extensive look at their I ready data and what that's showing them and where emphasis has to be and where they've been successful uh so uh that we're very proud of that uh but in addition to the programs themselves uh as uh maryan it's really important that we provide teachers with the professional development that they should have so that the analysis and the use of with uh particular emphasis upon uh sheltered English instruction and that's instruction that's given to a mainstream General Ed teacher who is working with multilingual Learners in their classroom so that their techniques complement those students needs and we're really proud to say that as of now 30% of our teachers throughout the district have been trained in sheltered English instruction at this time last year we had 8% so that's really uh a large growth the district is committed to continuing that work uh but but we're very very proud of that progress uh additionally uh We've launched a uh new uh ES L program uh called sage and uh there are many titles now uh in Spanish for our students to read so they really have uh a rich array of resources to use in literature with our students uh the new span Spanish uh language arts program launch uh through Benchmark taller uh is also in place so there's been a lot of work in terms of resources and programming uh for our multilingual Learners if you're looking at this slide and you're thinking this looks very familiar it's because it's last year's slide just updated with some different colors but this year um we're going to be showing you pictures because we know that pictures are worth thousands of words so this year in last year's um you know you we had some of the the facility improvements that we were going to do and these are all of the ones that were accomplished in this 23 24 year at the high school um I'm just going to highlight some of the ones you're going to be seeing in pictures our G our new sound system in the gymnasium our new sound system in the auditorium um some of the seiling tile replacement in our hallways the weight room renovation um in our in all of our schools our document storage our facility assessment and long range facilities plans at East over and do Middle School some of the hallway r ations and our playground equipment replacement Delk 2 will be talking about and showing you some pictures of some much needed office space including our development our professional development area Academy Street it's first floor renovation and North do it's hallway renovation and their ceiling replacement as well and so our first pictures are of Delk 2 um this is over in Wharton and this building gives us the opportunity to have while the building is over 24,000 square ft we utilize three actual classrooms um while there are nine in the building we use it for offices for our supervisors um our house there we have an OT there a speech therapist there we have an entire CS team housed there and we also have um a three um three three special ed classrooms are in Del to and in the next slide this as you can see this is one of the three classrooms ex it it is spacious um It is Well decorated and it's giving us that space that we need for our for our students in the next slide of Delk 2 um on the left that's our PD room if you've had if you haven't had a chance to be there it's a it's a great space for professional development and also on the right um is a picture of where some of our supervisors are housed with some new office space also at Delk 2 this is a work in progress but we do have a fence and fences are expensive so it provides the safety for our students to be outside and we don't have to worry about them running off so um you know just remember that we just we just moved into Delk 2 in September and we have an outdoor playground space that is safe for our students to be at yes and dr's gonna add just one item about to uh there are actually seven classrooms there cuz four of them are part of the Cornerstone preschool so uh three are are district run and staff and the other four are run by Cornerstone uh which runs the uh three and four year old program for us and you're up with Del one uh Del one uh as you may know uh is a property that we acquired the prior year and that is uh in Rockway although the address does say do uh and Delk one has a four classrooms uh two special ed classrooms and two gened uh preschool classrooms uh we continue to improve upon that property uh Delk one now has a brand new fire system so this is just a a picture of the uh control panel uh for Delk one uh so we want to make sure that any of the improvements that we make in our in all of our district schools are also found in our preschools uh the Delk one also has a new playground area and we've relocated uh classroom walls uh for sufficient space uh preschool classes have a a requirement an absolute requirement of square footage uh the original uh walls didn't uh didn't adhere to those and so we were able to based on the nature of the construction at Delk one uh change them so that we were able to uh accommodate that square footage uh that the state requires and you can see a CL a picture of the classroom there uh the classrooms at Del one are really really nice environments for three and four year olds Academy Street Elementary and and we've been talking about this throughout the course of the school year year as we know we had a significant water intrusion problem we've had it for a number of years and so the first floor has not been available uh it it will be very very shortly uh I actually have a little update in tonight's uh brief superintendent report but this is a look at uh two of the three rooms uh as they stand right now and as you can see the floor has been done the uh the walls have been done the ceilings uh again nice environments uh that we're really looking forward to welcoming our students back to at element at Academy Street the the key piece that you can see is the new uh water uh project that Lies Beneath the floor the the French drain that goes around the building and the Sun Pumps that have been installed uh to prevent these Renovations from uh from the damage that the water has caused in the past uh looking uh continuing to look at Academy Street Elementary as you know we uh have had in our employee uh two full-time painters that was uh a an investment that the the board also supported those painters have been hard at work uh repainting the entire interior of Academy Street Elementary you can get a um some sense of of that work from looking at this hallway and the stairway uh unfortunately we can't see all the way up from the stairway which is very very high but I have seen pictures of our painters on very tall ladders uh you know completing that work so uh again although Academy Street is a historical building for us uh we continue to invest in its upkeep and making sure that it's the best environment possible also I want to highlight uh the sensory hallway uh there it's uh not unique to Academy Street because we are uh also we have put those in place in in other buildings as well at Eastover and at northover and they've been a great addition and our kids have really gotten uh a great deal from those uh and then just continuing with Academy Street uh the the outside wall and you know learning a little bit of the history of Dover my understanding is that's the foundation of the original Academy Street School that remains and supports our playground area uh if you had seen that a year ago that was in quite uh a state of disrepair that uh that wall has been firmed up it has been repaired and it has been painted and uh although if someone looked at it right now they they may not uh see the difference but it is a a pretty drastic difference there's a picture of the modular that was installed uh at Academy Street and has been in use this year and a uh look at the inside of one of those modular classroom so you can see uh again uh they are uh good spaces for our students so this is the hallway at North do and um I I don't know if you've had a chance to go over there but the tile is beautiful it's a full hallway renovation including the ceiling it's bright it's welcoming it is um it gives it an entire new look um and it's kind of along the theme of some of the hallways here at the high school which is great to see um and the next one we have a new modular classroom that will house two classes next year right outside um I have not had the opportunity to go inside but I do hear that is quite spacious we have some playground equipment um that's been replaced the swings are the newest I know um in speaking with Mrs Carlton she is looking for more and the great thing about this playground at North do is that it is accessible not only to North do students but the community as well so it gets a lot of use um in its location and it still looks um great is this you yeah uh rounding out our elementary school schools at East do elementary and also including do Middle School uh there's been a number of hallway Renovations there as well uh you get a a a picture of what some of those look like both taking a look at the floors and the walls but also we're very very proud of the murals uh we've had a partnership as you may be aware of with Mars arts and they have um completed the the mural here uh at the high school at the MD school and these at East over Elementary and it really does uh it's not only lending uh really uh aesthetic Beauty to the school but these are all representations that our student had our students had input into these represent Concepts uh that they wanted to depict and I think it really gives our hallways uh a flavor of our students you know what they want to see in their schools uh continuing to look at East do elementary and Dober Middle School uh we completely redid the carpet uh for the football field uh I I think it's you know it's always been a striking field but now uh with its Continued Care and upkeep uh it really continues to be a an area that we can be very proud of um and as uh Maryann was just discussing in regard to the playground equipment at East over we've also uh replaced a number of items there so our playgrounds do get a lot of use uh and uh as was mentioned that use is both for uh our uh School uh students but also for the community at large and so it's it's always great to see um them uh with with people in it and there's always people in our playgrounds yeah I'm just going to say we um the football field and turf field and the track has been getting a lot of use I will say it's great to see the track open to the community um Miss Tanya and I have been walking there the last few days on the during our lunch hour and I will you would be surprised the number of people using the track during the day and it's so great to see that as a um asset to the community here if you haven't been to this new hallway this hallway right outside the auditorium between the AUD in the cafeteria that if you walk straight back goes to the band room and to the security office um this hallway is is brand new um it features our play bills of over the last I counted just before over 20 plays um are highlighted and their historical um Essence has been captured for the last 20 plays so that's really interesting interesting if you haven't had a chance go check it out but the great thing about this hallway is it looks a lot like our athletic hallway and the other hallway was the library media center so these beautiful gray Subway tiles with the wood with the wood I mean it's just it's fresh it's new it's bright um it really is great looking and next we have at the high school is that it oh I have the remote ah one of my favorite rooms in a in a high school the gymnasium uh brand new floor with our brand new do uh Dover Tiger logo there in the center um I'm sure all of our our basketball teams appreciate that and our wrestling teams although it gets covered up with the mats but we also have a wonderful a new sound system um and we have a curtain the much needed curtain that separates the uh gym so we can have multiple classes and getting ready for coming up in this year will be the painting of the gymnasium so um just really looks great I was I took a little tour um on the PD day and ah so we also have our wait room total renovation new um it's a new space great mat so everything is there um available to our student athletes and being utilized by our physical education classes as well and that's so several years ago we acquired the Belmont property so that we could relocate our administrative offices at the time it freed up 11 instructional spaces in the district and it provides a unified area uh both for registration and for our business department and for our special ed department and our uh multilingual leadership team um so all in one place which really helps the coordination of services and it's also become a uh a go-to spot for our parent Community they know where to find us and so we are very proud this year to do some upgrades to a building uh that I want to do I want to point out um has uh been historically was built as a do school so we're we're very proud to continue to make use of that space and this year uh we didn't have a flag so we we added a flag pole uh which I think is pretty striking when you when you come up to the building it's it's it's very noticeable but we also upgraded our HVAC and boiler system and you have some pictures there of the equipment that was added uh at Belmont uh this year additionally uh the board supported the the move of our buildings and grounds Department from the the shed area behind the high school uh and now our Carpenter and our plumber and our electrician and our grounds department and our uh buildings and grounds Administration uh are in uh this uh small house area which is right next to Delk 2 uh and it also provides space for our repair trucks uh to be parked right outside uh so uh and we'll clear the way for us to uh dismantle that shed space uh behind uh the high school area and potentially uh open that area up uh to to Future modular uh should the district go in that direction so the upcoming slides we're going to talk a little bit about what the budget is going to support and where we're going and in doing so I am going to do a quick look back for personnel because I think it's really important to just capture um AA and I were kind of going over the numbers um as we were sitting in the foyer so 2223 we hired over 55 certificated staff uh TW this year we hired over 70 certificated staff a lot of those positions were new positions um and the great thing for the 2425 budget is that you know we're going to be able to sustain all of these positions moving forward um and while 55 and 70 sound like a lot I do want to you know remind you that one of the great things that Dr mlin has done in his time here is really looked at some of the programs and fortified them and made them stronger and better with the hiring of new positions like inclusion coaches and you know bilingual teachers and special ed coaches so you know th these are new positions um that we've been able that we're going to be able to sustain so this year um HR won't be quite as busy um we're only we're going to be hiring districtwide three Elementary ESL teachers those are new positions we are also going to be hiring two bilingual teachers at Academy Street because there is a need the program is growing there and this will be addressing the needs of our multilingual Learners and districtwide we also will be hiring an occupational therapist a part-time physical therapist uh at the high school you've heard Miss Miss hardenberg speak to you about our transition work-based learning coordinator um for our students who are our special education students who are eligible for that and their community- based instruction and we also because there's a need of to hire an Autism teacher um the numbers are increasing so overall this year there are only 8 and a half new positions added which is if you compare to Prior years is a decrease but we've we've been doing a lot of hiring so before moving on I do want to just comment uh as uh as we've outlined to the um finan and facility committee meeting uh we did receive last year uh $10 million in terms of state aid and this year half that amount uh additionally Esser funds which we've had the opportunity to use over the last three years are also expiring so it does make us have to be uh much more um um Limited in terms of our spending uh I don't want to in any way make it sound like those positions that were just described meet all our needs because they don't we we certainly could do a lot more hiring and have uh really a great rationale for that hiring but I do I do think it's so important to indicate that during the time of Esser with expiring funds we were able to absorb any positions that were created with those funds uh we're also able to uh maintain summer school which is something we're very proud of uh you know throughout the elementary and middle and high school levels and additionally what we will be doing at the high school level is adding a number of extracurricular stiens uh obviously stiens uh don't have the same uh cost value as uh as a a full-time teacher but they are very very important to the life of our students who uh we would like to see here not just for their school day but after their school day and involved in areas of Interest so the math Honor Society the visual performing practical Arts Honor Society the social studies Honor Society and the Spanish Honor Society are all new sement depositions that will take place with this school year and provide great opportunities for our students that are connected to their area of study their area of study uh interest and and certainly uh be able to explore those in Greater depth than they can even in in just the classroom level uh also uh we've been working with the do Historical Society uh to complement their great work in our community and so we will be having an advisor for the do history club uh also in terms of extracurricular stiens uh in terms of Athletics we will be adding an Esports uh advisor uh and a boys and girls uh golf coach and a girls flag football coach so we're excited about those new opportunities for our students and at the middle school level expanding our cheerleading to Winter cheerleading one of the things that we committed to uh this year and is in the budget uh is to eliminate the need for fundraisers for athletic needs so uh anything things that our teams need to compete practice equipment uh playing equipment uniforms those are in our budget so that students will won't have to go out and Shake A can uh so that they have the right kind of uniform socks we want to make sure that that's in our budget and it has been Incorporated uh we're also looking to make our transportation system more efficient and um several years ago we had no routing system uh at this point we would be moving to the transfinder routing system which is uh really uh the state of Industry throughout districts uh this is the software that uh really is recommended and works in line with our Genesis Program uh we'll be improving our new website um Miss suus and Mr levit have been at work uh behind the scenes in populating the new website the new website will not only have a new look and new features than our existing website but it will also have its own messaging system so we replace School messenger so we're excited about that uh advancement um we we will continue to uh replace prometheum boards throughout the district um we'll have a new uh ticketing system for both it will be a combined system for both technology and maintenance and we've gone through a few different iterations of programs to find the most efficient way of meeting repair needs whether they be Technology based or maintenance based throughout the district and we'll also be moving uh expanding our work with linkit to utilize the linkit intervention manager that will replace some of the Frontline systems uh that we have in place now uh and uh it will be as as you can see integrated with our linked program and really provide the more we can have our programs work with each other and populate information the better uh looking forward District y to preschool um as you know uh the preschool program has uh gotten stronger and stronger each year uh this year we will receive an award from the state of $516,000 64 and that will support the now over 350 students that are in 26 classrooms throughout our own programs and our partner programs uh throughout our wider Community we have a total of 10 Community Partners and I've already referenced in some comments our newest partner is right here in our own Delk 2 uh the Cornerstone Family program uh I do want to uh have a shout out for Cornerstone they've been a great partner they run our after school programs uh in our elementary schools they step forward to provide this program also to provide after school um programming for our preschool uh children and this year they will be running a summer program so uh they really have been wonderful to work with uh and easy to work with and they want to be here they're committed to to our community so uh just a few Kudos their way in terms of where we are going for facility improvements in 2425 uh we will continue to do work throughout the district uh Dober High School will have a total replacement of ceiling tiles for classes in the 200 Wing uh new stalls will be installed in the girls bathrooms and there'll be roof curb repair uh something nobody will see but is very important uh on top of the building uh and East over and do Middle School uh much like the pictures you saw of the high school gym we will be resurfacing the gym floor and installing a new curtain uh that floor had to wait because that uh roof has had historical leaking problems so now that that has been remedied we can do the work on the floor um and uh we will also be replacing a piece of roof uh it's a little bit hard to describe but if you were walking down the stairs from the Middle School office uh going by the courtyard uh there is a piece of roof over that uh lobby area that needs to be replaced so that will uh that will be getting done uh this summer at North do um we will be replacing 12 classroom floors uh and I that's not just a retiling so uh given the age and the construction and the heating systems at the time North DOA was built uh a number of our classrooms uh in the older section the first floor section of the building are actually caving in uh from the sides and so the floors are cracked and the only way to really remedy that is to uh do some jackhammering take out old pipes that are no longer in use along the perimeter of the classroom and replace those floors so that will be done uh this summer uh additionally there will be a roof replacement over the media center area area of the building there'll be a new sidewalk area that doesn't exist near the playground area and um there will be doors uh select doors throughout the school that will um have both their doors and their door frames replaced uh at Academy Street uh there'll be a roof replacement over the multi-purpose room and uh there'll be outside railings one of the things we're really conscious of is the um the areas where our students are arrive and are dismissed from where our parents come into place and uh the lack of uh safeguards there uh with the school being on a hill so uh that will be both a safety and a facility um message so at this point I'm sure the moment you have all been waiting for uh we will have our business administrator explain the finances of this year's upcoming budget good evening everyone as we can see from the uh from the dollar sign we are getting to the finances uh a budget consists of planned expenses and expected revenues it's the financial expression of the districts needs and priorities it's a living document so during the year there are a lot of changes there are a lot of projects that we didn't budget so we have to work around it we have to do some transfers so it's like a living document so talk about the process first we get the information our software is able to uh find out how much we spend so far this year how much we spent for uh last year and also what was the budget amount so uh we do project uh do the projection from there also we verify the uh Personnel cost for the district uh there are fixed fixed costs that we cannot change like the salaries and insurance uh with the increases and then we meet with the administrators to C department needs and anticipated costs and then we prepared the account Appropriations and determine the revenue sources so 2024 25's fiscal year uh we increase the tax levy by 3638 $832,000 uh as you see uh tax Lage it was $18 million 191 and in 2425 up to 18555 and local tax L de is it went up from 767 to actually 67 76 to 681 sorry balancing the budget uh when we talk about revenues we have the grants federal state and local property taxes which we can only increase 2% uh state aid Surplus from prior year savings uh includes cap Reserve maintenance Reserve all other reserves and the local Revenue uh with that we provide appropriate stuffing provide effective instruction programs control line item expenses and support District uh initiatives when we look at look at the revenue for 2023 24 to 24 25 uh our biggest revenue is State a you can see it was 7 72% little over 72% which went down to 69 and uh second big one is the tax levy it went down from 23% to 20% we made up the difference with the capital reserve which is 5% the other revenues almost stay the same uh we use Capital Revenue only for capital projects we cannot build into the budget so uh anything in the 5% should be capital projects uh those projects are the uh rod grants hpac for2 buildings for next year and also uh High School generator so our as I said our biggest Revenue State a which is 60 million little over 60 million actually $62 million tax is 18.5 and uh as you see Capital Reser like 4.5 and we also use maintenance reserve for $500,000 Bank cap is a spending authorization that can be carried forward to through the budget Cycles as I mentioned before we only have 2% uh tax l cap but we can use Bank cap so that percentage goes up uh so in 2022 23 we had $917,000 uh generated Bank cap and 2324 we are going to have 24 uh 47 to 26 and we're going to generate more uh which we didn't use in this budget it's it's toal of $1.1 million uh I'm going to simplify the uh budget ucac spending uh the budget ucac is the uh uh the revenue we supposed to get to uh provide in uh enough instruction uh and education for the for the uh students our district education budget is almost $78 million is the second number from the bottom so in order to provide good education and uh everything needed we need $78 million this consists of uh two revenues uh one is equal Equalization Aid comes from the state uh the other one is uh the tax levy so as you see we have 18.5 from the tax uh Levy and 55.6 which adds up to $74 million that makes us little short like actually like 3.7 million short than budget ucac meaning that we need almost another $4 million to provide the proper education for the kids so with that said next year budget is going to be a little tight the expenditures uh as you see uh which is a good thing we uh the instruction uh goes around like 30 31 million dollar uh second big ones is the employee benefits uh which is uh almost $60 million and goes from there with the student support services and everything and transportation is going up every year with all other things so the key uh impact on the budget is the salaries health and other employee benefits transportation and whatever we left it's go uh we have to deal with the inflation and increase logistic costs some actions we take uh uh to uh get down the district cost as we go with the Cooperative purchasing which is like a Cooperative purchasing is a purchasing system they they do like a purchasing bid for all schools so we can get much better prices uh also we use ases uh to purchase electric and natural gas what they do they get like a better deal than residential so we can get better deal on the utility irate reimbursements for internet and it infrastructure and we also have co uh Cooperative purchasing of property insurance and workers compensation which is like there are like Insurance Groups we are in those groups so we can get better rates for the insurance we also have shared service with uh town of door for fill and semi reimbursement program uh some of the grants we get Esa Grant which consists of Title One 28 title three three IM and4 Ida snap grant funding uh SDA Grant uh eate and preschool expens mention Aid I want to talk about the rbl uh what are rbl uh essential ratables are the total tax base for the town the higher ratables the less of an impact any tax increase would have on an individual taxpayer with that said do town from 2023 to 24 went up like a million dollar little over million dollars and at the same time Victor Garden went down $100,000 so with that said we we did like 2% tax Lev increase uh for average door home which is uh SS is$ 240,000 uh dollar uh it's going to be $14.54 per month increase and for Victor Gardens it's going to be $943 per month increase uh all the schools go with the fiscal year so so our fiscal year starts from from July 1st and ends in June 30 but when we talk about the tax everything goes with the calendar year so in order to calculate uh the percentage increase and the tax level impact uh we what we do uh is let's say when we calculate 2023 calendar year we uh get the 20 uh 22 23 fiscal year tax levy and uh multiply by by uh 0.5 and we get to 23 24 as you see I multiply by five and then we get the average and uh we get this uh text calculation that makes the difference so increase from 2022 to 24 calendar tax Lev is almost a million dollars thank you very much uh user friendly budget will be pass posted on the website uh most likely tomorrow morning uh we appreciate your support have a good night so at this point if the board has any uh questions for us um fortunately right after our presentation is our um public participation we can certainly hear uh questions at that time regarding the budget uh from our public but if the board has any questions for any any of the three of us uh be happy to answer them are there any questions or comments from the board m Miss nutting um it was nice to see that you do have some plans for sports I know going back a couple of years we approved bowling and you know just to say that we have the money now to try to support some of the different things that our students could broaden their Horizon of opportunities for them is nice to see um Esports you going to have kids that have the opportunity to actually achieve a scholarship for those things um flag football for girls that they can also it's giving our students another Avenue of making it into college um even golf it's giving them a different out Outlook of uh different things and providing for our do students which I really do appreciate because looking what 3 four years ago we have our own ad do alumni come back and teaching here and opening up uh the bowling as a option for our students and to see this year that we actually had two students go to honorable mentions which puts do on the map of um information and also also making it to the first rounds of uh States for them so it's nice to see that we're uh looking at different things and giving our students that opportunity thank you thank you I I think the the goal has been we know obviously uh we know in education that if students are invested in school not just for their academics but for other activities uh that they'll be more successful uh they're exposed to different things and different people and and different kinds of experiences uh the bowling team which you mentioned a couple of times I think has been uh a great model for that uh it's uh fun to watch uh their matches I've been able to just stop by and see a couple of them um but the type of experiences that we're uh looking to expand or to capture everybody to see you know maybe the student who's not interested in football and basketball will be interested in Esports or flag football thank you any other comments or questions from the board Dr s um thank you for the presentation um I really liked uh this is I guess a little bit of an old format now where um our pres our the presentation began by linking our district goals with our spending and I think it's important for us to be reminded us as board members to be reminded of our goals as well as for our community to see the correlation between the goals of the district and where their money as well as uh is being spent um thank you answered a couple of my questions uh in the presentation I have a couple more and I'm sorry I thought of a couple more while we were uh watching that um you mentioned that in the previous two years we had hired uh 55 and 70 additional new teachers and you mentioned that we could hire more um if we had the the funds to do so could you name uh two or three programs or areas where additional staff members would make a significant difference um for our students education yeah right away I would say at the at the elementary level uh we have a couple of spots in different in different schools that already have high enrollment and um we really don't want Elementary classes over 25 students we do know that our population fluctuates so what we're looking at now could be different in September but we usually plan for what we have right now and in some of those cases we've had to stay with a higher number uh 26 27 in one case then we would have uh obviously the other piece of this is always if we have the space to put those individuals in but right now um what we've concentrated and you can see in the positions that have been described are are programs of greatest need and that's where we have invested that I will say also um although we've invested a lot in our intervention systems through Orton Gillingham and basic skills math and basic skills uh reading uh that uh recently uh I attended a meeting of our our um intervention teachers and they all indicated just how great a need there is that if there were two or three of each of them they would have full loads as well so that you know that's an area that we obviously want to keep an eye and and as much as we can continue to invest in okay thank you for that um I we are using the withdrawal from capital reserve um to fund projects this year um this means that we have less money quote unquote in the bank to contribute to any space Solutions such as a building or an expansion project such as a referendum or a modular classroom or modular classrooms in the future is this a good decision for our long-term success this brings our capital reserve down to 4 million I think yeah it's going to be uh it's going to go down but what happens is at the end of every year uh if we have Surplus we're going to adding more but it's a little early right now to say how much it's going to be uh but uh with the budget we um since we get like $5 million L state aid and we also lost uh $4 million in the S funds this how we had to balance thank you um on slide 43 the calculation shows that our budget is below um oh this question is awkwardly adequacy and uh we are not we are choosing not to use some of that banked cap um in previous meetings Dr mclaughin has mentioned that state officials have commented that the state will not make up shortfalls um due to um insufficient funding from the local tax levy do we anticipate an impact from being below adequacy um in the next year in in in brief will this impact our state aid next year uh actually uh as a as far as I can know there's no like a direct uh thing with the tax slav and Equalization the only thing is when you add up uh that's how you find like how much difference for the uh actually District adequacy so what happens is uh State doesn't come up with the difference but if you don't increase the uh tax L next year by using Bank cap or any other um adjustments like we had uh 500 little over $500,000 uh adjustment this year we didn't use sometimes we get enrollment adjustment uh we didn't get it this year my recommendation to be using all for next year because obviously you could see it like uh uh we have 18 uh I just put on this screen if you want to look at it 18 uh5 uh million doll in tax levy and they only gave us a 55 so we we are short $3.7 million uh we don't even know how much they're going to give us because the formula keeps changing the state but uh clearly we can see that they're not making the difference so we are short like $3.7 milon the only way to get this back up to use the bank cap and in adjustments thank you and then um finally I noticed I uh the honor societies a wonderful addition but I did notice there were no English and no science honor societies was there a reason that those two groups of students um are not going to be represented uh basically what we we went with is the recommendations that were being made by our um by our Administration and a lot of these were driven by teacher interest I I will say uh that uh really put these groups together so uh but uh that being said just like we've been talking about with all of our extracurricular activities uh the intent should be to continue to grow these you know we didn't have these honor societies before and we had others um honor societies are great because they do a lot more than you know just honor students that though those students are really involved in their content matter and uh they all have a service obligation as well so they give back uh to their to their peers so uh my expectation would be that the board will hear recommendations next year of in increases in those areas thank you very much are there any other comments or questions from the board seeing none Dr ml Miss Gibbs Mr sabahu um and everyone involved in the budgeting process thank you for all of your efforts and hard work I know that it is um not an easy task so thank you um we appreciate you thank you we are moving along to public comment on agenda items only the board recognizes the value of public comment on education issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to express themselves on school matters to ensure fair and orderly expression of such comment each statement shall be held to a time period of 3 minutes public comments limited to items on this agenda shall be entertained for approximately 30 minutes upon the discretion of the presiding officer please understand that public comment portions of our agenda are not structured as question and answer sessions but rather they are offered as opportunities to share your thoughts with the board the board may or may not respond to public comments however all comments are considered and will be investigated and addressed as appropriate please be courteous and mindful of the rights of others when providing comments comments may not be abusive obscene threatening or irrelevant please understand that students and employees have specific legal and privacy protections the board is not permitted to respond in public to comments about students or employees please be advised that you are commenting at your own risk any public comments that are directed at a particular individual or individuals could subject you to Legal liabil liability for defamation with that public comment is now open is there any member of the public uh in person wishing to speak on agenda items only all right good evening everybody John Coniglio 24 Taylor Town Road modville all right a couple things so uh first thank you very much for the presentation that's all right there we go all right used to be taller um all right so thank you very much for your uh presentation very clear outlined everything that we need and I will say and I think um Dr mlin would agree and others in the district would agree that we wish that we could you know pay for a lot more things and do other things as they noted but I will say that the items that were listed in that budget are the imperative items for sure and you know the fact that we're receiving less money less State funding this year we really from looking at what was presented there we are really doing the things that are critical um you know Dr mlin mentioned the flooring and the lights and the SE ceilings and everything like that and all of those things are things that we've talked about and things that are absolutely imperative that are fixed for our students and for our staff so in that whole presentation there was nothing that was Superfluous or anything like that it was all things that are very important and imperative at this time so just wanted to make sure that we knew that the next uh thing I had a question on the stiens and we've talked about some of the stiens um but I some of them are new so I just wanted to be make sure that we would negotiate uh amounts for those at some point in the next two months all right um and then also in regards to the stiens you mentioned um boysgirls golf is that boys and girls together yeah okay that's what I figured um and then for the Ed camp that was mentioned Ed Camp was run very well in March and again kudos to uh Rory Carl for putting that together the staff really enjoyed teaching to the other teachers in the building and we were able to share things that we don't normally get to share so it was good that we were able to talk to each other and teach each other for change it was a little different but it was it was very well organized very well run um we were compensated for our prep time I just want to make sure that I threw that in there because it was implied that we were volunteering our time which we were volunteering our time during the day but we did get compensated to prep all of the activities that we were going to do um but overall the Ed Camp was very well uh put together very well received and um I hope that we continue to do that thank you thank you um is there any other member of the public wishing to speak on agenda items only seeing none public comment is now closed we are moving along to the approval of minutes is there a motion to approve the minutes from March 19th and April 13th so move is there a second second that was Miss penales yes we have a motion in a second is there any discussion seeing none we have a motion and a second Mr sabahu may we have a roll call vote please misso um yes to um hold on the 19th the March 19th um and as a conflicted member I would have to abstain to April 13 I believe that's the date y m STS yes Mr Miller abstained for March 19th meeting I was not present yes to the other ones right yes to the other minutes April 13 oh a so you're abstaining from the 19th and yes to the 13th yes that's correct well I said it just okay got it thank you Miss nothing abstained from the 19th and yes to the 13th Miss penales yes Dr sener yes Miss stes yes Miss mandes yes we are moving along to Communications um the cboard communications I am aware of are from Mr Nunes on April 14th with an invitation to graduation um and Mr mcau um on behalf of the administrators Association on March 27 March 27th in reference to a Personnel matter are there any others that I'm not aware of did you did you get the one from um Mr Hae Mr haime oh I I missed that uh I don't know the date but that was also an invitation to graduation as well thank you thank you did I miss anything else no okay um we are moving along to the student representative to the board report who will actually be putting something up on the screen for us so miss Calderone Alvarez you have the floor good evening good evening I want to start off by sharing that dber high school's quarterly assemblies took place last week as well as this Monday last week the senior assembly the the senior assembly was held where information was released regarding all the exciting upcoming events such as the 2024 prom the senior trip which will be at Dorney Park and graduation expectations rules and procedures were shared with the students this Monday freshmen sophomores and juniors had their gr level assemblies in all assemblies students were recognized for their academic achievements with their honoral certificates this was a change since prior to the third marking period certificates were dropped off at teachers mailboxes for them to hand out to their students during Home Room in addition the positive behavior interventions and support program also known as PBIS was introduced this new program aims aims to create a more positive culture and climate in school students will witness different activities throughout the building such as conversations regarding character development appropriate conduct and positive expectations for DHS students going above and beyond be and being recognized by teachers can lead to incentives and recognition of students for being role models to our school a soft launch of this new program will occur during late May or early June which will seek for permanent implementation for next school year on another note 45 out of 250 students at Dober High School were eligible for the National Merit Scholarship recognition program this program studies the PCT scores and the top 2% students are eligible for this National recognition program 45 of them being from do high school this program contains various subcategories of recognition including the national Hispanic National africanamerican National first generation among others congratulations to all those students who are great representatives of do high school in addition administrative professional day was today April 24th and do high school did not miss the opportunity to recognize the honors and honor the secretaries by bringing in flowers and cupcakes among other thoughtful surprises I would like to move on to discussing a survey that was put out with the intention of collecting student perspectives regarding their safety within the high school last month Miss Mendes requested that I survey the student body in order to get in order to get a feel of how they view safety within our school I informed Mr nun upon this request and together we created the five question survey that was sent out to the student body the survey was sent out last week and by this morning we had received a total of 179 responses which was a little discouraging I suggested the teachers encouraged students to fill out the form sent to their emails in that instant Mr nun sent out an email for for teachers to take the time during home room to make sure students completed the survey this was a great idea since the total of Number the total number of responses increased from 179 to 499 out of a total of 1,133 students which means that 44% of the student body participated and contributed with their perspectives it is important to note that the responses for this survey was in ler scale form this is a scale ranging from 1 to five that allows students to rate their agreeableness with one being strongly disagree and five being strongly agreed the questions and instructions were all translated to Spanish since the school with the school is predominantly Hispanic which would allow all students to understand and be held and be able to provide us with their input so I would like to present the DHS Safety and Security student survey data um the first slide demonstrates the data colle Ed from the statement I feel safe when I while I am at school we can see that the negative response was is represented by the numbers one and two which is a total which received a total of 54 responses or 10.8% of the student body the neutral was represented by the number three which received 138 responses or 27.7% of the student body and the positive responses were four and five which means that they received a total of 307 responses or 61.6% the next um the next question was I feel comfortable being in this in the school environment where we could see that the negative was received 77 responses or a total of 15.4% and the positive received 298 or 59.8% the next statement States I feel comfortable approaching teachers counselors administrators or other staff if I have any safety concerns again the negative was represented by one and two and received a total of 63 responses which is equivalent to 12.6% and the positive received 332 responses or 66.6% um the next one States I am aware of the safety protocols and emergency procedures in place at our school the negative received a total of 32 responses or 6.4% and the positive received 394 or 79% and lastly the last statement States I feel that the school administration has addressed concerns regarding student Safety and Security in a timely manner we can see that the negative received 94 responses for a total of 18.8% and the positive received 270 responses equivalent to 54.2% and as we can see from the data collected for the students who participated most of the information that we received was positive but this is this is only for that only represents the students who actually participated in this survey and that's it thank you Miss Calderon Alvarez not that I expected anything less but you definitely exceeded expectations as always with this presentation thank you um that was uh amazing to see um that data uh are there any questions or comments from the board based off of her report Dr ser and then Mr Miller I'm sorry um miss karez you are leaving some giant shoes to fill like NBA star level shoes to fill for next year's um student rep um thank you for that that was well crafted data explanation graphs were great and I'm picky about my graphs so really nice job thank you thank you yeah I'd like to thank you also and I hope that you've been uh working to find a successor or a few people uh to fill your shoes when when you do graduate um so I I just wanted to ask Dr mlin just based on seeing that are there any surprises I don't know if I'd say there are surprises obviously we we want those positive uh you know those last two positive columns to be as high as they can be um I am I'm I'm happy that the vast majority of students are aware of safety procedures but with the drills that we do each month and the awareness that we do I would I would hope it be even higher so I I wanted to say my own comment would have been uh that we'll certainly rely on this data to to see how we can build up those areas and especially address um you know though that seems like there's a core group of students who who didn't answer positively to those questions so we must be we must be missing students across the board um and every student is significant you know no matter what the percentage is so uh one of the reasons we invested in surveys um the Panorama survey which you know also goes out to students and to parents and to to uh our staff um is to really get an idea of where we stand because you know we can think we're in a certain place but if those who are experiencing and are not expressing the same thoughts then we have work to do so uh I think the commitment that uh that I wanted to share with with you uh was that this is this is not just data collection for the sake of data collection we will use this and we will uh use it to inform our actions thank you Dr s um I forgot one thing that I wanted to say I was really I I agree with Dr mlin that every our goal is for 100% of students to answer five but I was really um not surprised at all but really thankful that the I believe it was the highest positive rating was our students comfortable uh comfort with approaching our staff I think that speaks tremendously highly of all of our staff and their efforts and hard work um and the importance they place on building relationships with our students so that the students do feel comfortable um finding someone whenever they have an issue that needs addressing Miss NY thank you so much for uh taking the time and uh creating this survey between the two of you um I think going forward just with this information it should definitely be a new uh standard to do this yearly with our students this this survey that way we do see the uh growth and making sure that our students are definitely continue to feel safe and for that numbers to definitely get higher so miss calone opz what we've just heard is that you set a precedent so it will be something that we will continue to do so thank you thank you Mr Miller I just wanted to add one thing that um perhaps before we get to the end of the school year would it be possible to have a focus group that anyone that took the survey would want to have a discussion on you know those topics to see if you we can learn some more from the students why they may have felt the way they did to make sure they understood the questions and um and make them aware of you know options for safety that they may not be aware of Miss Calon Alvarez um was the survey Anonymous yes yeah it was but just to put it out there for the student body to see if anyone want to participate in focus group yeah yeah I think that would be valuable um Miss KZ thank you I have a question sorry M um Dr MCL do you how can we have an increase of participants in the in the um you have any suggestions on how we can increase the the amount of par participants in the survey yeah I think I think what happened today uh as a a second effort to get more is really important if if during a class period time is set aside uh we're much more likely to get results back whether that's in an English class or um whatever the case might be English is usually the one we choose because it's all four years kids are are are taking an English class um but I I think that um having a designated time and not having anything else occur within the amount of time that we think it would take definitely help um can I add something yeah I was just want to say that I feel like realistically for surveys a downside to surveys is that not everyone is going to answer or the information that they're going to give is not going to be 100% accurate but maybe an idea for more students to answer could be like Mr M Dr mlin said included making an assignment like make teachers making an assignment for like as a grade to receive more points more responses extra credit thank you for that um suggestion uh are there any more comments or questions from the board no thank you we are moving along to the board president's report today's report will be focused on the superintendent search since our last meeting we have launched a landing page with information on the district's website um please continue to visit this page for the most upto-date information on the superintendent search since our last meeting we launched an online survey speaking of surveys um inviting all district families and community members to participate in the superintendent search by completing an eight question input survey I'm happy to report we have received hundreds of responses Kathleen our consult consultant hosted our first inperson input session on Monday the 22nd and will host a virtual session on April 29th we are also in the final stages of scheduling input sessions for All District staff and teachers all of the input from stakeholders will be considered by the board when choosing our next superintendent lastly the board conducted first round interviews for interim Acting Superintendent on Saturday April 13th and we have have advanced three qualified candidates to second round interviews these interviews will take place on May 7th I will continue to provide these updates at our meetings along with the information posted on the district website as always do not hesitate to contact the board with any feedback and that concludes my report are there any comments or questions based off of my report seeing none we are moving along to uh administrative reports Dr mlon thank you so as usual Miss caldron Alvarez stole some of my content but that's okay it's good to say it twice today uh we did observe Administrative Assistant Day throughout the district I just want to highlight the efforts of our administrative assistants um who really work tirelessly to support uh every facet uh of of the district for our staff and for our students and um I hope uh that that uh those tokens of appreciation uh that were um administered at the at the school building level um did convey just how much uh they are appreciated and certainly uh one day is not enough uh but uh and to to convey our appreciation throughout the the school year uh for all that they do so congratulations uh to our administrative assistant on being recognized today uh certainly they are worthy of that uh I also wanted to highlight uh that this is our second meeting and our first official meeting with a simultaneous interpretation uh so those uh who uh attend future board meetings uh can request a headset and have all of the content of the meeting uh provided to them uh so thank you to our interpretation staff uh as well as to Rosa munes who's always here for a public comment and to provide personal assistance uh yesterday we were notified that do high school has again earned National and metro area rankings in US News and World reports 2024 best high schools uh places are high school within the top 40% of high schools throughout the nation uh congratulations to our students and staff we've consistently acquired this honor and we are very proud uh to celebrate that more information concerning this selection will be posted on the do High School portion of our website some project updates and some which may have been mentioned in the course of the budget presentation the north over Elementary and East over Elementary modular units are progressing well and they are anticipated for completion in miday uh once they are fully completed uh we will then go about Furnishing those uh classrooms and they will be set for uh September the renovation work uh on the Academy Street first floor is done as I mentioned with ceilings walls and Floors completed and there's a very good chance we will be able to use at least some of the three rooms if not all of the three rooms for njsla testing in May which will be great for Academy Street School since small group testing areas are in high demand and and uh not very available uh also I wanted to mention that since the water remediation work there has been no water intrusion uh since that time so um we knock on wood that that uh continues and that this has been an effective intervention for that much needed space uh work has also begun on the electronic signs uh as some of you know we've been talking about this for it seems like years uh and they are finally coming to fruition uh if you as you leave the parking lot today you can see the back ho in the front of Dober High School which is our first electronic sign installation that is occurring each School building will have its own sign and this offers another means of communication with our school Community tomorrow April the 25th is take your child's work day in addition to our students who may participate with their parents on this important day many of our staff have confirm that their own children will be here on hand uh each school is prepared for this day with activities for our special guests and we hope uh to inspire the next generation of Educators who will be on hand in our schools and in our offices I'm extremely pleased to share that on the evening of May 2nd the Dober schools will be receiving the Community Partnership award from the County College of Mars each year our collaboration with the County College expands and it now ACC compasses students in our do college promise program our joint CTE program in graphic arts that has four three credit college classes uh and an additional du enrollment class in introduction to data science as well as a class in anatomy and physiology one so uh again something to be proud of and that completes my report for this evening are there any comments or questions based off of Dr mclin's report we are moving along to Mr sabahu good evening uh 20242 final budget is approved by the Morris County Superintendent and business administrator it's on the B agenda to be approved by the board today uh you will see see two resolutions on the agenda for Rod grants for North D Elementary School and D Middle School we already received the grant offers from the state by approving these resolutions we'll be able to accept and execute the grant after the approval Grant submission packet will be sand State and our architect will come up with the specs we will prepare the bid package and go out for bid this will take three to 4 months when we award the vendor for the project it might take up to two years due to the lead time on the HS equipment so it this whole thing is can take to two to three years the proposal from USA Architects and planners is for architect and engineer services for Rod gr project is also on the agenda for approval we will meet with the architect and the contractor this Friday to find out if we can move forward with the high school Pro freezer project by utilizing the weekends before the end of the school uh we were uh planning to push it to the end of the school uh so uh this way it doesn't interfere with the instruction but we might come up with another solution so we can get this project before the school ends uh because this project started last year and we still trying to get this done and also finally we collect cting proposals for district audit Services thank you thank you Mr sabahu are there any questions or comments based off of his report seeing none we are moving along to Boe reports uh Mr Miller any updates from the Morris County Educational Services Commission I was unable to attend the last meeting but uh looking at the agenda there's would have been nothing that I'd have to report to this body perfect thank you Dr serer legislative report thank thank you um not a lot to report uh a lot of things going into the assembly um or the Senate but uh still needing approval from the other house so the one item that I would like to draw your attention to is a 4144 um this would provide tax credits to taxpayers contributing to organizations which award scholarships to certain non-public school students um Dr mclaughin sent this to me because the administ the njasa which is is the administrators equivalent of NJ SBA um individuals and corporations give money to quote student support organizations that hand out vouchers for private school tuition they then get back most of the funds they donated in the form of a credit against their tax liability money that would have gone into the state treasury to support public schools and other public goods so instead of funding the constitutionally mandated public education system that serves the vast majority of New Jersey students those tax dollars are diverted to private schools serving a small number of children without meaningful quality or accountability standards so this is something that njasa um opposes because it it funnels money away from our Public Schools so um an appropriate action for anybody listening at home or board members is to reach out to our assembly um members to tell them that we oppose uh Bill 4144 if of course you also do so um and that is the conclusion of my report thank you Dr Ser um Miss DS the Morris County njsba report good evening uh Dr mclin Dr Sor Miss ASO and I joined Mr Nunes in celebrating our Dober High School senior Jenner Gonzalez as he received his unsung hero award at CCM on March 20th 2024 it was a lovely night as he was recognized along with many students from schools around Morris County their stories were truly inspiring the final Morris County SBA meeting of the year the second annual Nancy hellberg Memorial recognition ceremony will take place at Roxbury high school on Thursday May 2nd 2024 it will honor all Morris County board members who received honors and Milestones during the past school year they will also take time to honor many of our unsung young hero Award winners and scholarship winners it will be a 600 p.m. start time for those members who would like to attend in person members who would like to join virtually may join online at 6:45 p.m. you must pre-register for this event with mcba this concludes my report thank you thank you Miss towns we are moving along to administrative approval is there a motion to approve items 1 through s so moved is there a second second M Solas was that you we have a motion and a second is there any discussion seeing none Mr sabahu may we have a roll call vote please misso yes to all except for number four I'm going to abstain on that Miss STS yes Mr Miller yes Miss nothing yes Miss peles yes Dr senner yes Miss SES yes Miss mandes yes we are moving along to Personnel Miss nutty okay I would like to make a motion that the board um approves the recommendations from superintendent for 1 through 18 with a hand carry motion and I'm going to read this one in be it resolved that the Board of Education approves the unpaid leave of employee number 359 32947 through May 14 2024 second we have a motion by Miss nutting a second by Mr Miller is there any discussion the only thing I would say is miss you got it um okay we have a motion by Miss nutting a second by Mr Miller no discussion Mr saahu may we have a roll call vote please misso yes to all except for the hand carry um item M STS yes Mr Miller yes Miss nothing yes Miss penales yes Dr sener yes Miss SES yes Miss mandz yes we are moving along to negotiations Miss nutting uh we do have a upcoming meeting with the dssa on May 6 so I look forward to starting those procedures moving along to governance Mr Miller yes the governance committee met on April 16th uh we had discussion on the policy for remote meetings um we wanted to find out if it was possible for the whole board to meet remotely if it was necessary uh in consultation with our uh educa Board of Education attorney that's not possible uh so the determination was that we would uh stick with our current policy which dictates that if a member is going to be absent they have to give a 30-day notice but we also have to have the proper equipment to conduct a meeting that would be both virtual and in person which we do not have so at at this point in time we would not be able to uh do that uh the other discussion that we had was to uh um add some training that would take place uh within the first 90 days of reorganization uh in January that would include introduction to IEPs and other uh programs um and that will be on our agenda um to vote on uh for the first reading we also looked at our goals to see if there was anything new that we would start accumulating to add for the third quarter report uh we didn't anything new but we did determine that we have to have one more full board training and we were hoping to do that in July so if board members could think of what that could be um and and send that suggestion to the governor's committee so that we can try to formulate a plan for a July uh all board uh training then we also uh discussed um the descriptions of each of the Committees that we wanted to review and we wanted to develop a framework um and we're going to do this for the the the governance committee that would enable certain timelines that need to things that have to happen within those committees and um once we put that framework together we're going to send it to each of the committee heads so that they can go through and document timelines of activities that need to happen within that that um that committee so that we can document it and make it part of the description so that anyone else that comes in will know how that committee is supposed to operate and I believe that's it for the report um so I would move uh items one through three I'm sorry okay did did you want to propose a wording change for the second reading yeah I was going to yeah I was going to introduce the three and then and add the change so I'm going to recommend that we approve items one through three however uh wording change for the second reading um that talks about interpretation Services uh in the policy we we say that it will happen at all meetings but there are certain times when we have meetings that although we open to the public it's usually a closed session meeting with no action being taken uh so we wanted to change the policy to say interpretation whenever feasible at meetings and then that it was taking out the word all so we have a motion is there a second second is there any discussion Mr Miller um perhaps there a question for Mr C I know you mentioned the um policy related to participating on our meetings virtually and I don't maybe I'm not recalling this correctly but I could have I if I'm remembering correctly we eliminated that policy we didn't no it it states that we I remember we went through this at a reor and we discussed the the policy and I I could have S subsequently I thought that we made some changes or eliminated the policy I I don't recall exactly what happened now I remember that the that you the policy stated that you had to give notice 30 days in advance but it was also contingent upon us having the proper equipment that would enable someone to attend virtually that wouldn't be disruptive to the meeting and that the public would be able to hear as well Dr s you wanted to I'm blanking on the word but I believe we put it on hold um Mr crew what's the correct terminology we at that reorg meeting we um you put the that Pol we we for that that night we chose to I'm blanking on the word I I I we chose for that night to all agre for that night to suspend we suspended the policy for that night but I believe it is still in effect um may I ask a question um this has now been an issue right this I I believe this policy should exist in a digital world and with knowing that we need Forum um in order to do the business of the board on behalf of our students and so um I think it's really important that um we charged Dr mlin to figure out this uh sorry it's you're the sorry okay um to figure out this technology issue um in a reasonably timely manner so that we can utilize this when it is necessary I I agree I think um it's time that we figure that out uh so Dr mclin are you okay with taking that on sure thank you um the other thing Mr Miller can you um tell me about any updates you may have not discussed this but in reference to the um CSA evaluation have we discussed has the governance committee discussed that or is that now at the next uh meeting we'll go through the timelines of that okay perfect um and I believe Dr mlin you've already received the okay um so we have a motion by Mr Miller a second by Miss ASO is there any other discussion Mr sabahu may we have a roll call vote please M ESO yes Miss Dallas yes Mr Miller yes Miss nothing yes Miss pinales yes Dr senner yes Miss solnes yes Miss mandz yes we are moving along to student achievement and curriculum Dr serer thank you the student curric the student achievement and curriculum committee met on um it says March 9th I believe it was April 9th April yeah um we had a really great meeting uh Mr Carl was in attendance with um Miss gensinger um and um Miss sha uh we received a list of um PD in the District um in addition we received um information on a proposal for a new math program um teacher feedback which I love that the teachers were consulted um that our current program that we're using for math doesn't meet our students needs with not enough resources or enough language support um and so teachers again were involved in a process to choose a new textbook Series so we will be moving to a new series that does provide a multi-tiered system of supports multiple languages um and that is uh essentially teacher approved um secondly we had a presentation um from Nicole Goldsmith and Kristen Baker from NJ AGC which is the New Jersey Association of gifted children um on their uh evaluation of our g&t program um the two Consultants conducted three full day visits one to DMS one to East over and one to northover which houses uh various classes in our g&t program um and met with Miss genser as well as building principles and then what they they collected data as well from using our um student information system to assess whether um there was bias due to gender due to socioeconomic uh status due to uh students being twice exceptional due to home language uh due to being a multi- lingu language learner as well as race and uh um ethnicity um and they found some biases in some areas um not as well but they did notice note that there were some patterns of under representation um due to socioeconomic status being twice exceptional and multilanguage uh Learners and so their recommendations were to look at the identification process they suggested a new um measurement device uh a screening device called the naglieri series um which is languagefree so that would um hopefully identify students regardless of their home language or their facility with English um creating a rubric with multiple measures and utilizing a teacher rating system um and uh they also proposed some ideas for expanding that program um expanding it to Early Elementary um the New Jersey Law uh that governs this requires that kindergarteners are identified and provided Services uh providing a Continuum of service uh student ident I'm sorry student interest clubs um and then identifying teachers who could benefit um teachers who could identify students who would benefit from additional challenges identify barriers to participation um offering tiered enrichment activities for both interest and growth oriented student groups and offer professional development for all staff not just our g&t teachers so they have the knowledge base and skills to deliver instruction that encourages talent development and um that is culturally responsive so um that was a big report uh the result of months of work and I believe we are going to hear back from them moving forward as to uh you know how to do this and how that's going to look um in over uh we also received highlights from uh Mr Carl regarding the Ed camp and uh I don't think Dr mlin mentioned this uh we had um this is on our website uh great news regarding the Blackwell Street Center for the Arts High School student art show which is not related to our Blackwell Street the center received over 600 submissions 22 of our students had pieces selected for display in the show and two of our CTE students received honorable mentions in the graphic design and illustration category and one of the artists um had both of her pieces received the honor so a shout out to Kelly arango and marisal Santos who are those two students um and this is um Kudos toct program which is conducted in partnership with CCM um this concludes my report um and therefore I move that we approve items 1 through five is there a second second Mr Miller so we have a motion by Dr is second by Mr Miller is there any discussion seeing none Mr sabahu may we have a roll call vote please miss ESO yes Miss DS yes Mr Miller yes Miss nothing yes Miss penales yes Dr Senor yes Miss SES yes Miss Mendes yes moving along to community relations Miss aavo thank you Miss Mendes the community relations committee met with the citizens advisory committee on March 21st first the citizens advisory committee members brought concerns and questions to the meeting regarding the 2024 2025 Cal school calendar traffic at do high Genesis Parent Portal District's website the superintendent search and they also address the district space issues questions and concerns were forwarded to Dr mclin for feedback and we will be discussing um I'm sorry and will be discussed at the main meeting um for your information consideration the current SE AC members term expires on June 30th and new applications will be posted soon on the district's website I hope that um that we get the community involved and then we get people to apply for um to be part of the um citizens uh the cic um and this concludes my report thank you Miss ASO we are moving along to policy Miss pinales thank you Miss Mendes um bear with me I'm losing my voice please um we met on April 9th it was a great meeting we had a presentation by our lawyer John crout um about residency in our efforts to um learn more about registration um we learn about policy 5111 El eligibility of Resident and non-resident students the following do not affect enrollment physical conditions of housing terms of lease immigration business status with some exceptions all domile students in the district qualify for enrollment some do documents that the district could ask for at the time of enrollment could be a property Bill Taxes Deeds contracts of sale lease mortgages sign letters from landlords and other evidence of property ownership tency or residency border registrations licenses permits Financial records medical records employment documents among others we must consider the totality of information in documentation and evaluating and application and unless expressly required by law the students will not be deny enrollment based on the inability to provide certain forms of documentation there is however investigations of student domiciles that are ongoing and the policies in regards to residency will be further research and analyzed by the board with that that concludes my report and I would like to a mo to make a motion to approve items one through two on their policy we have a motion by Miss pinales is there a second second we have a second by Miss nutting is there any discussion seeing none we have a motion by Miss pinales a second by Miss nutting Mr saahu may we have a roll call vote please M ESO yes M DS yes Mr Miller yes Miss nothing yes yes Miss penales yes Dr sener yes Miss SES yes Miss Mendes yes we're moving along to finance and Facilities Mr Miller yes uh the finance and Facilities meeting uh committee met on April 16th uh a number of the projects have been discussed in some of the reports uh but there was a um a districtwide projects plan study that's been being worked by our Architects and um they will be discussing space ideas and recommendations of uh in May um there were a number of facility upgrades or up uh in um the middle school and the high school uh in the gym uh some of the uh athletic equipment bleachers were repaired um uh playground equipment was were repaired was repaired and there were a few classrooms that were painted um and fire inspection had been conducted at all schools during the Spring Break um from a finance perspective uh everything has been discussed with the budget but we are collecting proposals for audit services and that concludes my report but I would like to move items one through 21 on the agenda we have a motion we have a motion by Mr Miller is there a second second who was that me Miss we have a motion and a second is there any discussion Dr Ser I just wanted to thank uh miss staco and miss Reva for their donations to the district scholarship account and a thank you to Paul Miller Subaru for Their donation to six Academy Street classrooms any other discussion seeing none we have a motion by Mr Miller is second by Miss ESO Mr sabahu may we have a roll call vote please M ESO yes Miss DS yes Mr Miller yes Miss nothing yes Miss pelis yes Dr sener yes Miss SES yes Miss mandz yes I'm going to do it in new business thank you um I'm sorry some informational items upcoming Board of Education meetings we have a special meeting on May 7th we have our regularly scheduled public session meeting on May 14th June 25th and July 23rd um facility usage the town of Dober recreation department and the East do PTA and then Dr serer trainings sorry I have too many tabs open um I first of all I'd like to apologize to the board I did not submit these in time um to get them into the agenda I would like to highlight um training opportunities there's not a lot different offer um available that was not available there's not a lot of new trainings that have been offered but I did want to draw your attention we received an email um for this is mostly uh returning members I know our brand new members attended the weekend governance one but if you are in need of governance 2 three or four training there is now online uh the online portal is open so uh we did receive an email so you can register for that and the workshop conference 2024 dates um were announced that's 10 uh October 21st through October 24th so in the past um a number of us have attended it is a fabulous it's four days uh I can typically only attend one but this is a fabulous opportunity to meet other board members from around the state and take care of mandated training um and learn a bunch of other things so um in the past we've sort of seen who was able to attend because there is a uh I believe there's an early labor discount and then um a discount if we register as a district as opposed to individually um thank you Miss Mendes thank you Dr ser and for the board's reference I did um forward the um list of trainings that Dr serer sent over um we're moving along to Old business is there any old business seeing none we're moving along to new business um is there any new business Miss I'm not sure if this is where I should say this but I just wanted to let you know that um Mrs DS and I um completed the um governance to last week which was um Center on uh the budget which was very timely and uh negotiations congratulations thank you to both of you um any other new business I have an item um in keeping with our commitment to engage All State holders um I make a motion that we amend the agreement with K helaa Consulting to include two additional Community input sessions at a cost of $500 each second was that Dr serer yes is there any discussion seeing none uh Mr sabahu may we have a roll call vote please M ESO as a conflicted member I will have to abstain M St yes Mr Miller yes Miss nothing yes Miss penales yes Dr sener yes Miss SES yes Miss mandz yes thank you we're moving along to public comment the board recognizes the value of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to express themselves on school matters to ensure fair and orderly expression of such comment each statement shall be held to a time period of 3 mon minutes public comments not restricted to items on this agenda shall be entertained for approximately 30 minutes upon the discretion of the presiding officer for those who wish to provide public comment remotely a Google form was posted on the district website at 6:30 p.m. remote comments will be read by a member of the Board of Education the Board of Education will alternate between in-person and online comments please understand that public portions of our agenda are not structured as question and answer sessions but rather they are offered as opportunities to share your thoughts with the board the board may or may not respond to public comments however all comments are considered and will be investigated and addressed as appropriate please be courteous and mindful of the rights of others when providing comments comments may not be abusive obscene threatening or irrelevant please understand that students and employees have specific legal and privacy protections the board is not permitted to respond in public to comments about students or employees please be advised that you are commenting at your own risk any public comments that are directed at a particular individual or individuals could subject you to Legal liability for defamation with that public comment is now open is there any member of the public in person wishing to speak thank you can I close the computer so there's more space on the I don't know can we do that yes yes the wire thank you good afternoon everybody uh my name is Amma Lugo um the um uh Transportation director here at do Public Schools um H thank you for the honor and the privilege that I've been given to lead the department um I think that depart the Department of Transportation always gets a lot of heat and I felt it that it was needed to come and give a little bit of what's happening in the department in the positive way um um going to tell you a little bit about me I have over 14 years experience driving in school districts um I had I took the certification for transportation director and I continue educate myself in the transportation field um the logistics of transportation is something that is a passion for me I always try to find ways how to make things happen better efficient and effective that's always have been my goal and especially um I always knew that I wanted to work for two districts was one was mantal that's my home and the next one it needed to be with my Latino community and this was the place otherwise I would not have invested my time because it's a very um hard hard job being a transportation director uh when I came to the to the district um I was advised not to make many changes and I understood why it's not easy to make changes when you come to a new District however soon as I step into the department changes were needed there was no way and we changes that you know you ref of feathers uh but unfortunately that was the need uh one of the needs that we had um uh we didn't have spare buses to cover routes if a bus broke down we were at a loss so immediately I knew it I needed to create something to to cover those those routes a bus and then we didn't have a a sub driver that was a problem every District needs to have a sub driver as we need to have a spare spare tire uh so I created I I rid uh routes and I created uh one spare bus we now we count with one spare bus 54 passenger and we have one van uh spare van that we can count if in the need of a bus we have it and and I created to a bus a um a aid and a bus driver as a sub by moving and redoing things um and that was very important because when people got sick we had somebody to cover and um I did that uh another thing that we did was to re we needed to rearrange the route because the the buses it was not utilized in the best way and we were coming late most of the time for um I rearranged things now we are able with Mr Dixon to to meet the needs for the sports um we have two drivers two open slots that are utilizing just to come early to meet the needs for sports or any um uh field trip uh unfortunately Miss Lugo um so your time has expired but I will grant you an additional minute so thank you so I have uh give you thank you I have given you you um some sheets which it shows um the first sheet it talks about how when we came to the department uh that's all the staff that we have I call it our resources those are all the staff that we have in the open time that they not driving and we have uh the resources to utilize this um creating routes I created two um pre- routes and I saved the district fif uh around $660,000 just at the end just the end and I'm projecting that we can save $168,000 by next year if we keep that up and probably even double it uh 300,000 if we keep on um using the resources that we have instead of giving it to to Outsource it um for the lack of time I do create it uh CCM because we had a lot of problems with the uh btic schools I did create it uh three routes using our resources and and open seat and with that I um we saved the district about $40,000 just at the end of the school year so I'm looking forward to do even more for the district if the opportunity is given to me thank you thank you Miss fugo um Mr Miller any virtual comments yes there's actually two but I'll I'll read the first one it's from Susan shower 346 West Clinton Street and over uh good evening this budget presentation provided a year in review section which I appreciate showing the community where its tax dollars has been spent is the duty of the board and I thank you for starting with this I must say I was quite surprised with the HR director's role in presenting the budget along with the superintendent NBA this is unusual but given the continued absence of our district uh assistant superintendent I assume that the HR Director was filling the Gap can anyone explain to the public the absence of mulano her absence has gone way past a curiosity and more of a concern of who has been filling her job duties thank you Mr Miller is there any any member of the public in person wishing to speak yes I'm sorry um Miss Mun do you want to connect with her perhaps or I don't know how you want to handle it you tell me okay okay hi um good evening my name is nuia what's your last name I'm sorry last name uh noia vialva and I work in the on the transportation um Department over over 10 years over 10 years as a boss eight in transport when the new supervisor Alma came in a lot of things were not working well some of the employees there were not um complying with their uh schedule of work schedule um the time and the routes were not agree they were not agree in agreement with the time that they were getting paid and they were um manipulating other employees to get support in things that were not correctly done when Alma came in she made a good changes very positive for the district and all the and the students yeah and what it was fair for the employees for us employees simply Alma is doing the right thing try to comply with the our schedule work schedule um the working hours that they're getting paid for the work hours and everything is the same for every single employee and when the changes are have been excellent for the students um especially for the routes that there were long routes what means okay she was trying to give an example like for nor northover they were from 2:30 to 4:30 p.m. now they are from 2:30 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. there's a less time for the kids to be in the BS students as well as parents are very um happy with the changes as a owner homeowner from over I just want to complain about the high taxes that have been paying um 40. 96% of my taxes going towards the school of do and I want those taxes to be um you know they're managed in the right way for our wellbeing thank you thank Mr Miller is there any other I know there was one other virtual yes all right Mr Miller the virtual comment is from Susan shower uh 346 West Clinton Street in reference to the facility Renovations at Del 2 location are those are these all paid by the expansion Grant monies in reference to the total transportation budget amount of over $6 million how much of this represents pre students Transportation not reimbursed by the prek expansion Grant thank you thank you Mr Miller out up with a SE Ru Ru okay good good evening my name is l Rua okay so a so a okay I am a boss a okay that's okay this the time that I got to this place I saw a lot of disorganized a lot of lack of respect and and lack of empathy for the [Music] rest there is a lot of comp like kind of like people getting in their in groups okay there's a lot of otic things and there were suppos um what are you saying um there's a human there should be human resources here I want to leave and I saw that was not a good place for psych you know my uh psychological um good place for a person no one of my um one of my co-workers asked me if I was happy and I responded no she asked me why and I and I and I rep the environment is very heavy she told me do not leave because a new supervisor is going to come in and maybe she will organize [Music] this wow I responded uh the person needs to have a lot of character and a lot of love to this company because wow I stay and the supervisor came in and changed and changed that um there was a lot of more there was a more respect empathy and and feeling of belonging belonging to the work even if I was what is unfortunately everything was utilized against her because they have an association and they went to the association to complain about it to talk things not good about [Music] her Union supported them and when since they were they felt supported by the union and they started not um showing to work to affect the whole um work environment so she will look bad in everything they make fun of her Etc they don't respect her for [Music] nothing and since they are very their support is very hard all this for be personal she's an excellent leader the one that the district needs she takes good of she um takes care of the interest for everybody for a good and besides that she she does a very good job I hope that her contract will be renewed we need to learn more about from her that's what we need to um get ahead in the future toward the future thanks a lot is my opinion Mr Miller did any other virtual comments come through no is there any other member of the public in person wishing to speak Miss Mendes before we continue I think that some of these things that they're speaking about are Personnel matters there's a there's a lot of accusations here I I think we might be crossing the line uh Mr crew can you speak to that please well I the um the board is not permitted to comment on uh Personnel related items uh we do give warnings at the beginning of the every public comment session where we advise uh members of the public that uh you know if they speak about individuals particular individuals they're doing so at their own risks I I haven't heard anything specific I've heard things said positively about someone I I haven't heard anything specific well there were accusations about time stealing and and all of those things I I I didn't hear anything I did hear it no no I didn't hear anything about any specific person um if that would be uh I would just give them warning again again they're to say what they wanted okay I just want to make sure yeah if there was any anything about a Personnel person accusing them of something that certainly should get the same warning that we give at the beginning of every um public comment okay but again as you pointed out any Personnel discussion the board should not respond to thank you what same I work for the transportation department for seven years I feel happy because to work with with the district here she he said um because uh what else I'm sorry said again because I live in Dober and I love my work all the types of Works were developed correctly until Patricia the previous supervisor now that that that's one example if you could perhaps explain to him that if he's talking about a specific individual that he should be careful that he'd not say anything um you know that is anything defamatory and and the board cannot respond left some problems when the new supervisor came in she wanted to fix all the problems because there were not control of the time of he's talking about people who has been here for a longer time you know like people that has okay one person who came in as a boss a were assigned six more hours than the person that was here in the district for a longer time I'm here because the new supervisor is trying to work out to make this a better place to work and work with the problems that we have and she's trying to resolve all those [Music] problems as a a do Resident I would like everything to be resolved in a good manner for everybody's um wellbeing because right now there's not a Harmony at the workplace and the problem that doesn't come from the supervisor M supervisor Mr supervisor is from some of the workers there simply they don't want to follow rules they just want to do whatever they feel like it what is that no it's that's all much Mr Miller did anything else coming through no is there any other member of the public in person wishing to speak I'm seeing none um public comment is now closed and I will hand it over to Dr mclin yes uh there were uh a couple of questions budget related um from Miss shower uh the um Renovations at Delk 2 uh are not funded through uh the preschool Grant but I do want to emphasize that building also is only partially used uh for preschool we have special ed classrooms there therapy providers there and administrative offices and professional development space um and the uh in regard to uh preschool Transportation now I know this topic has been raised uh before for uh preschool Transportation uh about a year ago uh we were provided with information that this we could not include that in the Pea budget so the Pea budget is used for other areas that were not initially funded to make up the difference but the transportation itself has to be funded through uh local funds I do not have that figure here but I can certainly bring it back uh to the next meeting thank you Dr mlin um with that I will entertain a motion to adjourn so moved second we have a motion by Mr Miller a second by Miss nutting all in favor say I I any oppos good night meeting adjourned please stay and help clean up if you can