okay I would like to call this meeting to order will the secretary please call the role Mrs Becker Mr sisar Mr Cummings here misss guas here Mrs herck here m Mr Hong here Mrs Reese here here well Mr Winston and president LAX here we have a quorum please rise to salute the flag I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all okay the New Jersey open Public's meetings law was enacted to ensure the rights of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed and acted upon in accordance with the provisions of this act the East Brunswick board of education has caused notice of this meeting to be published by having the date time and place thereof posted at the Board of Education offices written notice was also provided to The Sentinel the new Exar Ledger the home News Tribune the alternative press of East Brunswick and the municipal clerk of East Brunswick all Board of Education meetings with the exception of executive session discussions or videotape for later broadcast it is the policy of the Board of Education that videotape meetings are not edited for any purpose individuals who speak at the board's public meeting should be aware of these videotaping rules good evening to my Die Hard fans um but as promised we are going to see you in an hour because I'm going to call for a um a motion for close session whereas the Board of Education must discuss matters which are not appropriate for discussion at a public meeting and these subjects are with than the exceptions to the open public meetings act and are permitted to be discussed in closed session the Board of Education intends to discuss matters as follows those items listed on tonight's agenda the length of Clos session is estimated to be 1 hour after which the public meeting of the board shall reconvene an action will be taken now therefore be it resolved that the East Brunswick Board of Education will recess into close session for only the affers said subjects and be it further resolved that the East Brunswick Board of Education hereby declares that its discussion of the affers said subjects made public at a time when the Public's interest in disclosure is greater than any privacy or governmental interest being protected from disclosure in accordance with the open public meetings act mooved by Mrs Becker second by Mr Winston um any discussion all those in favor opposed extensions motion carries see you in an hour okay welcome back we we are going to start back up again with the superintendent report thank you president LAX good evening everyone the artwork on display in the boardroom this evening was created by students from Churchill Junior High School the art teachers of these talented students are Darren Amy Deborah manuna Leah leaver Carolyn Spooner and Kimberly valada Matthew Hannis is the principal students at Frost participated in the great kindness challenged by doing various activities to OTE the power of kindness during the week of January 29th Frost students were crazy for kindness that included crazy hair and hat Day created cards for the Sunrise Assisted Living facility worked collaboratively with during their buddy activity and collected coins for kindness for students in Kenya the students are learning the importance of kindness and will continue these acts throughout the school year I had the pleasure of attending the National Honor Society induction ceremony on Tuesday February 6th where 87 students were inducted in the East or at the East Brunswick High School students were inducted in this program due to their demonstration of scholarship service leadership and character a student qualifies to join this organization through their GPA but is accepted based on their application which includes a lot more than just grades students and families gathered for the ceremony and enjoyed light Refreshments afterward on Wednesday February 7th the hamers technology teachers hosted their first ever Tech night a night filled with beginner block based coding and an opportunity to control robots in real time via the code joy platform the night was well received by almost 100 coders and parents who attended the Hugh Tech team is already looking to plan more events that create exciting stem opportunities for our students I also had the pleasure of attending Irwin's 100th day of school celebration first graders from Irwin School sang songs played instruments made their own math problems and dreamed about what they would do with 100 somethings each student Drew an original art piece and told the audience about their favorite 100 facts or dreams and I found it interesting one student looked at it from a completely different perspective he said he did not want 100 snakes can't blame him the festivities were well attended by appreciative parents and the students were happy to celebrate this important milestone in ele School through a grant provided by the East Brunswick Education Foundation Warren dword will be visited by six different professional groups performing traditional music from around the world so far the students have experienced performances by the following sunna who used East African instruments as well as taoa who gave a performance on traditional Japanese drums so six more artists to come there that's great in sports veto Tropa signed a national letter of intent to play football at Wagner College Middle School wrestler Sean Riley won the mammoth middle sex and Tri County championships in the 128 pound weight class for Churchill and varsity cheer took first place at the JFK competition and also the grand champion at the St John viani competition this past weekend so congratulations to all of them on Friday February 2nd the district held a denim day for American Heart Association and National go red day a total of $2,245 was collected on March 1st 2nd 3rd 8th and 9th the East brunic High School drama club will be presenting The Lightning Thief this Dynamic musical adaptation of Rick Ryan's best-selling book opened on Broadway in 2019 when teenager Percy Jackson discovers he's a demigod he and his friends embark on an epic journey to find Zeus's missing lightning bolt and prevent a war among the gods tickets can be purchased at ebhs dr.org on February 28th and 29th the Hughes drama club will be presenting Frozen kids you'll love this fanciful and heartwarming stage adaptation of the celebrated animated film join Anna Elsa Olaf Sven and all of your favorite characters as they embark on an epic Ice skill journey of self-discovery camaraderie and the real meaning of True Love tickets can be purchased at Hugh hues. book tick that's B O K tx.net I would like again to remind the community that school unfortunately will be open on Monday February 19th as indicated on our school calendar because of the inclement weather weather day we've had to take this year that's all we have for tonight thank you thank you very much the moment you've all been waiting for our budget presentations Bernie is going to kick them off for us and uh let us know what we have in store good evening we are at the beginning of that time of year with a budget development well not at the beginning of that process we've actually begun that um in the late fall but we're at the beginning of the presentation and review process so I want to go over a few things before we get into a couple of the Departments that um we'll be discussing their budgets this evening first uh talk a little bit about the budget development process process um first of all at the school level uh it is based on projected enrollment uh we take a look at uh what the per pupil costs have been on a historical basis and the school budgets are there to support day-to-day School needs is strictly day-to-day School needs then at the department level when I talk about Department level that would be academics it would be Athletics facilities Transportation student services and so forth special education at the department level we utilize what would be called a modified zerob based budgeting budgeting um that process would be um looking at the prior Year's budget making reductions to that prior Year's budget for anything that was a request or should be looked at from a zero base meaning start a new reanalyze recalculate uh and then move forward from there one of the other aspects that's taken into consideration through the budget processes class size and this is particularly important in the elementary schools looking at what those projected enrollments are how many sections are required at each of those levels and assessing whether uh those class sizes require additional sections or whether a section can be realigned or even reduced but to maintain within the thresholds that have been established by policy and also by utiliz izing what the square footage actually is for the classrooms and then of course salaries the collective bargaining agreements play an important role um looking at what those uh bargaining agreements require in terms of salary adjustments moving forward for the existing staff and also for any new staff that might be added into the budget uh due to need now I need to point out some things we are uh I am anticipating V challenges and I don't know what the bottom line on these are but we are looking at this and we'll certainly be discussing these in the weeks ahead uh first of all Staffing in the current year we have had to approve the board has had to approve a number of positions that were not budgeted but were subsequently required due to Legal compliance uh that was an absolute necessity during the course of the year it's unavoidable it has happened in other years as well but I want to make sure that that is is something that uh the board and the public is cognizant of we also have a number of position requests for next year we haven't had the opportunity to delve into the totality of what those would be at this time um and also need that needs to be taken into consideration with what the overall bottom line is with the budget certainly student Mental Health Services we have seen uh and certainly had discussions uh at board level but student Mental Health Services are an increasing need throughout the district so there's definitely going to be an impact in terms of uh providing those services and what the cost would be uh teacher shortages and absences have had a significant impact on the cost of substitute teachers that will certainly have an impact on the budget we've had issues that we've had to contend with in the current year we had similar issues last year so from a historical perspective um I'm anticipating that we are going to need to budget appropriately for those contracted transportation services that's that is nothing new we've had this conversation year after year it is as difficult today as it was pre pandemic to hire bus drivers for the companies to have uh bus drivers in place their rates have gone um up quite substantially over the last several years so that is also a challenging area for us and contracted services in general renewals we are anticipating uh rate renewals that are going to come in um at probably at rates that are uh not exactly to our pleasure when I say not to our pleasure we have in the past been very successful in negotiating rates where contracted Services have agreed to maintain rates and have zero increase I'm not anticipating that to be the case for this budget cycle so that'll be something else to keep an eye on health benefit rate increases um I've already gotten uh the initial rate increase information uh that is a definite um uh area that we'll be going up um I I hesitate to say by what percentage at this point because I don't have final data but I can tell you that will be increasing and I just literally received today uh Workers Compensation Insurance rate increases um without getting into a lot of detail uh is another area what we don't know is what state aid support we're going to receive at this time um I haven't heard any grumblings out there um we will know um in uh a few weeks uh where that is we're hopeful that uh the state aid amounts will be greater than they were in the current year to help offset these increases but again that is an unknown uh area and I have on here in terms of Max maximizing Enterprise Revenue I think that is an important aspect for us and the district has done a very good job of maximizing its revenues over the last several years we've been recovering since the pandemic uh in being able to get back to levels or close to levels that we were pre pandemic but that's an area that we need to keep an eye on we need to uh see what we can do in terms of maximizing those revenues and uh discuss what what opportunities might exist even for the future if not this budget cycle the next budget cycle uh we do have some ideas uh that we uh will be discussing with the board uh at a future date so having said that um that was a lot of information I feel like I was almost like a like a a circus Barker here I didn't mean to sound so fast but uh it was important to go through these bullet points so at this point I'm going to turn it over to Dr boy Dr boy will review the academics but actually uh I'm going to interrupt you for a moment we're going to go a little out of order M Mrs ree brought up a very good point we have some students here that came to speak to us this evening and it is a school night so if you don't mind Dr boy I'm actually going to suspend the three uh remaining presentations absolutely and I'm going to go to the understandable but before I forget there were a couple things I forgot I'm sorry I'll let you finish just because I don't want to come back later and talk about these so uh where are we in terms of timelines uh budget presentations we have of course this evening March 7th and March 20th the governor's budget address uh is slated for February 27th by law that is the 4th Tuesday in February uh that's when he's required to give the budget uh address not when February 27th has to be um and uh state aid data uh will be released by law two days after the governor's uh budget address the tenative budget must be adopted uh by March 20th so that is a Wednesday so as a reminder to the board that board meeting is on a Wednesday the public hearing will take place on April 25th and the final budget adoption will be held uh on May 9th and now thank you Mr J to the good of the cause with the students thank you so much very good point Mrs re yes yes yes yes I know that you guys were going to be thrilled by The Buzz budget presentations but just in case and you have homework so there's a test test the Board of Education recognizes the value of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to express themselves on school matters of community interest to protect the privacy of all students and staff concerns regarding individual students and staff members should generally be addressed by first meeting with the appropriate administrative staff in order to permit the fair and orderly expression of such comment the board should provide a period for public comment at every meeting of the board a participant will be limited to 3 minutes duration lapse time will be determined through the use of a timing device operated by the board secretary and I do always like to remind the public it is your time to speak to the board please don't take our silences not caring about the issues you are raising anything that needs followup will be directed to the two lovely ladies um lovely there's a lot of lovely ladies but the two that are sitting on the end um anything that we need to follow up we'll make sure that you're uh in is left with them contact information and we will follow up with you now that being said is there anyone that would like to speak to the board this evening if you could come on up now for my students if you could tell us your name um and the grade that you were in you do not have to give us your home address okay hi my name is Savannah SEO and I'm in eighth grade Savannah could you repeat your last name please Savannah SEO thank you hi my name is Olivia Bronco and I'm in eth grade hi my my name is Sydney Hitchens and I'm also in eighth grade hi my name is Olivia brco and I'm an eighth grade student at TR Junior High School Cindy Savannah and I have been working to transition the already existing dance club into a varsity team sport with the goal of competing against other high schools and ultimately earning a varsity letter for the team the current dance club members are required to have physicals fundraisers and follow the protocols of the school like any other Varsity athletic team would they participate in an intense try out process survive cuts and participate extremely hard every week to perform at the school events the dance club athletes are just that athletes and should be recognized as such many other schools and especially top universities and college colleges recognizes dance as an athletic sport what we are seeking to add to the already existing Club is more practice time for these athletes to devote to comping competing for their school and the ability to participate in more formal High School competitions where we can represent the school and town we love participation in Varity Athletics in high school is the ultimate expression of school spirit we would like more opportunities to represent our school as we are proud members of the East SP Community thank you hi I'm Savannah SEO an eighth grader at church Junior High School I came here today to inform you that things that we have done as a team to put our goal into action we put out an initial Google form that we created across multiple platforms we received our first response in September 20123 the last response was filled out in November 2023 in total we had 35 people interested afterwards we met Mr Malta the athletic director of East Brunswick he put out a more official form he received the first response in December 2023 Mr Malta emailed us an update on January 29 2024 saying that we had a total of 147 responses then we emailed the ninth grade assistant principal Mr Ivanovich for permission to hang up Flyers that we created the flyer included a QR code to the Google form Mr multimate once we had permission we own 50 Flyers of cjhs then we emailed Mr malter to see if we were allowed to hang them up at hammerel Upper Elementary School when we got the okay we hung 50 additional Flyers at Hughes as shown we have taken responsibility to get a varsity Dance theme I along with many others have a strong passion for dance as a competitive dancer I love to dance with my teammates and represent my studio by bringing a varsity dance team into an e East Brunswick School setting you will be contributing to the happiness of our community thank you hi my name is Sydney and I would like to share with you some of the reasons why we would like to compete on ebhs dance team excuse me Cindy your last name Sydney I'm sorry your last name please Hitchens Hitchens thank you I won't be all the time we won't penalize you on getting her name wrong the first reason being is because we and many fellow students would love to have something to participate in at school and to show school spirit next we will promote the physical next the dancing will promote the physical and mental well-being of students the dance team would be a gender neutral dance team being a part of a dance team will also play into academic strengths and will help students learn time management as honorable students and competitive dancers we all all excel in our school workor in fact Olivia was student of the month in October there are many competitive and non-competitive opportunities at Regional competitions and National competitions as well as school sporting events in addition it gives students who are looking to pursue a dance career an opportunity to be recognized by programs and competition there will be many opportunities for students to earn it to earn dance scholarships to universities and colleges lastly we would love a dance team because it would give students a sense of unity and being a part of a team in a school set in setting we have written we have a written form of our proposal we would like to hand out to you and we hope you will consider it thank you thank you thank you so much thank you so much did a great job girlsc if you dance as well as you do public speaking I think it'll go a long way and I love the fact that you all talked about being an honor role student of the month scholar athletes so thank you for that um is there anyone else this evening that would like to speak to the board see you a tough act to follow okay seeing none I'm going to close the public portion president Lex could I just one second yes please we if you could communicate with Mrs mandler and could we set up a meeting to talk about all right yeah thank you if you would like to sneak out quietly before the budget presentation yes thank you Mrs Reese than you very thank you and now Dr Bly you get to follow that thank you so much have a good night I'm going to expect tap dancing no just kidding just kidding you don't want to see that that okay good evening everyone I'm happy to present to you the budget for the Department of academics for the 2425 school year um before we get started I just want to share some context with you this budget was developed with our refresh cycle in mind as you see throughout the budget we have a refresh cycle established for textbooks for instruments for equipment for classroom libraries um to make sure that everything is current being refreshed current in a timely manner uh the budget was also created with equity in mind ensuring that um our classrooms our schools our various grade levels all have uh the same uh provided for the students and um in a manner if you could just go back Bernie one more uh and in a manner that um ensures that our teachers really have everything that they need to be successful and that the work of each department is moving forward in a fiscally responsible manner so the budget before you um includes curriculum materials instructional supplies textbooks online resources next slide please for all of the content areas the curricular areas Arts education science social studies math language arts uh practical arts and word languages it also supports other areas such as professional learning opportunities for all District staff um basic skills programming gifted and talented programming home instruction for all students in the district the flex program that is offered to our uh students in 9th through 12th grades our ESL program uh staff evaluations for all staff in the district um all district testing and our instructional coaches and the last slide here is a visual representation of the budget you see that science is the biggest chunk that does include the sixth grade Fair viiew overnight experience trip that's uh funds the not only the trip but the transportation for that as well so that's a high level overview of this budget and I'm happy to answer any detailed questions that you may have any questions from the board okay okay thank you thank you so much Dr thank you for your support next on the uh agenda presentations um and discussion is Athletics uh Mr Frank Malta will be reviewing the Athletics budget thanks everyone and good to be here tonight uh I enjoy uh constructing our budget for our coaches and student athletes uh gives my office an opportunity to help support our coaches our student athletes um it allows our coaching staff to have input into some of the wants and needs that we we want to have for our athletic Seasons to compete within the GMC with and within the state um I take great pride in our athletic budget and providing for our athletes and our coaches so um when I when we do this in our office uh I'm going to highlight a few of the different uh budget support systems first is uh updating some of our banners or tropy cases and pictures you know one of the things that um you know I've been trying to work on for the last couple years is updating those pictures at ebhs at the high school with some of our varsity teams as well as at Churchill for our middle school and our freshman teams uh we have wonderful trophy cases there and I love to see our kids represented within those trophy cases uh and that's something that I think just enhances gives everybody a great feeling when you walk into our building and see how see how welcoming that it is and how how how much pride we have on our student athletes uh another highlighted feature here are our official fees uh over the course of time uh in especially the last 3 to four years there has been an official shortage uh so some of those fees have increased greatly over these last few years so we have budgeted accordingly uh and we're trying to stay on top of that part of it we're fortunate in that we get to play longer in our season simply because our teams have had success not only in the state but in the GMC so that adds more into our budget for our officials so we're very fortunate in that regard our outside facilities uh our venues such as our cheer venue uh our bowling alleys that we use our golf courses we've seen significant increases with those uh with that part of our budget as well and we've done a very good job I think in communicating with those facilities and kind of knowing what's coming down the Pikes so we've been able to really I don't know get ahead of it and we've done a good job in my office of doing that so I'm very happy about that part and that we give our athletes that opportunity to use those outside facilities to be able to compete uh we've seen great participation numbers over the course of the last couple years uh it's something I take a lot of Pride and I try to get a lot of our messaging out for our families and for our student athletes to get involved be a part of something you know uh be around your teammates be around your friends be around kids that you grow up with that are in your classes that you know for you know years and years and years that's the great thing about High School athletics is that you get to share those moments with some of your closest friends and peers that you know your entire life um so uh our big booster club our booster club has done a wonderful job of supporting uh they had a we we we meet every summer and we talk you know a few times throughout the year and our booster clubs have been so supportive of our kids and of our teams uh it's another thing that I think with the communication that we have with them I take a lot of pride in that you know we're able to talk and uh we're able to get feedack back from our parents and they do a great job supporting our Athletics uh during the fall the winter and the spring Seasons uh one other point too is our school physician uh we're in the process of a new school physician uh and we've had to budget just take into account what the fees that are going to increase are uh and we've done that uh We've uh we've had a a a school physician that we've used here in the past uh and he's done a wonderful job for us and now we're moving on and we budgeted accordingly for the new uh School physician that will have an opportunity to work with us um next bulleted point is our athletic trainers supplies and equipment uh we have a full-time trainer and a part-time trainer here uh and we're very fortunate to have them they're very good at what they do uh and they're in need of more supplies and I I think too it kind of goes hand in hand with some of the participation numbers that we've seen increase so we need more supplies for our athletic trainers to tend to our athletes that are injured uh rehab them and get them back onto the field so that's something that you know our trainers have communicated with me and we've done a good job of working together to increase try to increase These funds you know to give our athletes the every opportunity to get back onto the field um next would be our transportation um we've my my office and the transportation office I think over the course of the last three years we've really worked very hard to communicate work together uh and give our kids every opportunity to get to and from games our Church Hill uh shuttles have increased uh and as I said some of our games have increased as well so being able to provide that transportation and communicating with our transportation department they've worked very hard to to do this with us and we've really we really have a very good working relationship and we've done a good job of budgeting to get those buses for our children to get to our games and lastly uh one of the things I take a little pride in is uh the uniform replacement chart uh we had an opportunity to uh increase some of those funds over the course of time but yet we're able to provide new uniforms for every level of sport that we have here from the Middle School right up through the varsity uh I think that is a great thing that is not done everywhere and it's a special thing that we have here in place uh our kids our parents our coaches really appreciate that uh and then putting together that uh uniform uh rotation chart has been great one of the things I've always felt as a coach and and and a person as Athletics when when you look good you play good and I've always believed that so uh that's part of uh that's part of the uniform replacement so I chose these things to highlight just simply because they're some of the the biggest talking points that we have in our athletic office uh and I wanted to share those with you tonight so thank you very much for that and if there's any questions please thank you and I have to tell you that I would say that you're strategic to make sure that our kids are winning before you come but you know what I'm seeing a pattern they're just that good try so you did it last year too so good job yes thank you uh Mrs Becker hi thanks so much for that report so um members of the finance committee always have um the pleasure of of hearing these budget budget reports twice um uh we get to preview them and take a slightly deeper dive and then we get to to bring that information to the full board and we have our budget um discussions um but one thing that um I don't think we talked about the other night but I think that it's it's it's important to remember that there are certain fixed C costs my sorry my Long Island accent costs um that are going to come into play in any budget but with something like this there are the things that you cannot possibly conct for instance how far any given team is going to go right in in the Red Division the GMC's States each time they go and we want them to go all the way course but each time there's another tournament which means more official fees which means more Transportation so there are certain things that we need to be prepared and it's for a very good thing very good reason to be flexible about so um I appreciate the fact that I think that you're very cognizant of that and um you know work with Bernie to make sure that all our teams can go as far as as as they're able to corre right and that the um the fees are adjusted accordingly also about the um the uh uniform uh rotation system that we had put this in in play years ago because it was just so completely halfhazard to the best of my recollection we also had one for equipment we had set a rotation for equipment replacement because we were finding that that was also a bit lopsided now obviously sometimes when you think of equipment for um any given team it can range from a soccer ball to um more um extensive equipment for another team do we still have a kind of rotation in place for uh wear and replacing wear and tear on our equipment we do we we have set numbers uh on our budget every year for it a lot of it's based on wants and needs a lot of safety equipment as well that we take into account um so you know again the input from our coaches is a is a great help and and what those needs are to be able to run our programs you and your coaches do a fantastic job thank you and um as we talked about in finance it's it's not just that our kids win tournaments it's how they conduct themselves on the field it's the recognition we get for their sportsmanship and the recognition they get and support they get for being student athletes so you and your your entire um staff and team just do a fantastic job with them thank you we get we have many compliments throughout the year uh throughout our Seasons about the character of our kids and that starts from our coaching staffs uh I think they lead by example and it just trickles down to the rest of our student athletes and you know that's really from our Varity Sports all the way down to our Middle School athletic team so we take a lot of pride in that we talk about it quite often in our meetings and it's you know it's it's a big talking point there so thank you for recognizing that Mr so Frank uh thank you very much for the uh budgeting presentation I have two questions so number one so in your budget school physici police and security combin is about $20,000 is 5% of your entire budget can you elaborate how this small amount of budget our school fac can help help we need to our athlete when they compete so our school physician is in charge of signing off on our physicals and reading through our kids physicals as we as they hand them in throughout every Sports season that's his that's the biggest uh job of our school physician for athletics right now so will the school facili travel with our team if our student compete outside East Brony no not necessarily our school physician usually is at uh home football games it's it's a requirement throughout the state uh but not for any of our other athletic teams okay so you use very small small amount of money to help our student to secure our students healthy condition and their games thank you for that and second so you you spend up one third of the entire budget for the transportation so it's one third of your entire budget so can you elaborate how this money be spended I if you use our own school bus or outside school bus are how I going to pay them uh so we do use our own school buses uh we get we use two per day and then our Churchill shuttles as well uh and then we have to Outsource anything else that we would need to get our teams from that our school buses wouldn't be able to cover those rides so the payment to our own bus and outside contract bus the same it is different the contracted bus is usually a more expensive bus and uh transportation and and I we communicate a lot about some of the pricing that we get and we sometimes turn away some of the expensive more expensive uh trips to find a cheaper Trip s so we try to be fiscally responsible in that regard if I can elaborate on that a little bit please um so uh the athletic budget includes the transportation costs for contracted services that is not the cost for the transportation services provided by by our own Fleet that is contained within the transportation budget okay thank you very much for addition okay so by your experience did any did the transportation cause any problem preventing our student from traveling outside or longer distance for the for the competition uh it is not uh I think our transportation department has done a wonderful job accommodating and working together and communicating with my office to be to be sure that we have our buses in place to get our to those functions okay thank you that's all my concerns thank you very much again Heather your hand up yeah I sorry um I had questions at the committee meeting the other night I just had one comment I wanted to make um when I was looking at the budget I was seeing that it's not just the security costs for our security and for um the Township Police Department to be here at our home athletic events but that we also take security with us to some events away and I know I spend a lot of time at our athletic events but I know that last year I think was the first time I saw that in mass and I just wanted to complement that because other districts you know when we travel some some schools don't even have security at the events it's visible and it is a great comfort as a parent to see that for many events our security is able to go with our teams sometimes they are the only security present and I just think it was a wonderful addition to the pro I think was last year the first year of that uh I think in the past we've we've had security go to some of our way events we we've kind of we pick and choose what those events are depending upon the the nature of the game the nature of the game well we've increased the visibility I was going to say I not last year I spent a lot of time and last year was visibly uh an increase and many parents commented on it and I would just say that the community on the whole is grateful for that increased presence when we take the kids on the road thank thank you for recognizing that we uh my office with our security theme at the high school we also you know we meet once a week just to make sure that we have coverage for these events and we pick and choose those events that we may send security to uh on the road so thank you for that you're welcome Barbara hi thank you so much for what you do and uh we recently added a lot of Middle School sports you didn't have previously maybe you could tell us the reception that it's receiving I hear good things and maybe you could share with us about yeah so our Middle School sports at Churchill really they're the foundation and the feeder programs for our High School athletic teams um we take a lot of pride in the fact that we're able to teach you know the the stepping stones for you know what what our what our High School athletic teams are like and the fact that we have those uh middle school teams to be able to compete against some of the other teams in the GMC at the middle school level is a great thing for us and it keeps more kids you know involved in the activities and you know doing things after school and you know being an active part of our community at the school and do you see more kids involved you know being at the younger age oh yes and that brings more folks through the pipeline up to the high school definitely so our numbers you we've as we talked about those participation numbers increasing the Middle School numbers really have been one that uh has really gone very high so we're happy about that okay thank you so much Frank thanks appreciate you having me thank you lastly for this evening we have uh Louise Sultana loroco uh who will talk about the special education budget hi everybody um thank you for the opportunity to speak to all of you um and talk about our neuro neurod Divergent population and some of our favorite students throughout the district so the special education budget um is built on a couple different pieces the first thing that we look at is federal code then we look at state code and we prioritize what's called LR the least restrictive environment for our students and that looks different for every child so it is a big part of the child study team's um process to ensure that we're looking at the child um holistically to see how we can meet their needs but also have them be amongst the general population um we also look at the academic placement we work closely with the academics Department student services department um for School counseling and for student assistant counselors to provide services for our CH for our children whether that be in groups with general education students or um you know with our in our child study team and then every year we assess the effectiveness of our programs we look at Trends we look at concerns that may be coming up through the pipeline and we meet with all child study team members to transition and we use that in programming for the following year we continue to give that information to the finance department to academics Department to the buildings so that we can start to predict what the needs would be for the following years it's a little bit of how we kind of come together to figure out what the needs are in special education thank you so there are many different types of services that we provide um we are very fortunate to have a board that has been supportive over the years to ensure that we are able to meet our our children's needs it starts with the evaluation process so if you look at evaluations for student needs we provide speech language o occupational therapy Physical Therapy um augmentative evaluations to provide our students a voice psychiatric neurologic educational neuroeducational social there are a lot of different evaluations that are looked at it is um decided through the child study team um and at the I AP meeting with the parent to see what evaluations are needed to ensure we're looking at all the needs of the child and then from there um we would figure out what programming they need um programming can look very different we have in class resource models where there's two teachers in a classroom we have resource room pull out we have self-contained classrooms and then we have um different types of pushin models where we can have a class within a class so throughout the district um there's many different types of programs and we really cater those programs to student need and communicate that to the business office and academics to ensure that we are creating a program for all of our students and there's more up there we have testing kits Support Services um teacher of the um um visually impaired and of the death then we have FM units we have augmentative devices so anything really a child would need we would look at how to provide them equal access to East Brunswick education so over the past few years um we have seen difference in Trends in added District students so this is one of our more costly areas when it comes to special education if you look back at 2010 we had 993 students who were out of district and over the years we had built capacity within the within East Brunswick to maintain more of our students but in education the pendulum swings and things kind of shift back and forth and we're starting to see a little bit of a slight increase in um the need to place students at a district a student would go at a district that has truly intensive needs that we can't meet so that may look like um um medic need or an intense Behavioral or social emotional therapeutic need and then we work together with the child study teams to place them in a um location that will meet their needs through their iip and we always look at them so it's not there's not sent out a district and that's the end of it every we often visit them throughout the year about three times and then there's an annual rview always looking to see if we can bring them back in um one of the things that is complicated about an out of District placement is that we don't have um the ability to predict how much is going to cost all of the time because they do change their prices which makes it um hard for the business office to give exactly what our needs are for an added District placement another piece of an out of District placement that might be tricky are students that move in so if in their I AP from another District it comes in that they are an out of District student we have 30 days but that's also a lot of transitioning for a little guy so there's a lot of thought that goes into deciding whether or not they're going to come back in District and whether or not we have the room at the time um it's quite a complex process we do us utilize the my wonderful supervisors and the child study team to carefully organize how and who and what we need to do to ensure that we're meeting all of our students needs and then finally this is an overview um so you can see the added District tuition is probably the well is the most um cost for the special education services we offer speech occupational therapy Physical Therapy um to our students that need it we also um provide counseling for our students um specialized Transportation program supplies Improvement of curriculum there's a lot that goes into creating programming individualized for um students that need it but um I have a really strong team I have a lot of support from all of you this uh special education parents Advisory Group has grown um and has been a wonderful support to the special education department so that's kind of everything in a nutshell I could probably stay up here and speak for a couple more hours but I'll save you that um but if you have any questions please let me know Mrs be um this is a question a comment um Jeff I think you you brought this up at the finance meeting that um you mentioned about um the variable of the cost of a private school for out of District placement so we often talk about things like caps there's a cap for everything right there's a cap on this and the state puts a cap on this and state puts a cap on that one thing that is not capped in this state is right I think that's what we were talking about um that there's no cap formal State cap on private school tuition they can literally raise a tuition every single year whatever they want and throughout the year and throughout the year and um another thing that was brought up in finance um I'll take credit for saying this one that um raising one school raising the prices might red flag other private schools in the state say oh we way is ours so it's it's we're we're we're really it's horrible to put a price tag on education for any child but the fact that they are allowed to to increase their tuition is mind Bing we agree oh sure Mr Winston I can't compliment you enough on what you do and and with that though I do know that your department more than anybody else or any other budget presentation is a moving Target uh and if we've learned anything is that you do your job so well that e Bron just become 20% um special needs to some degree although not necessarily to the 57 or so Adam District however yeah you know my background is in numbers so I'm sitting there trying to do the probability and statistic and it does look like you'll probably see a two to four student increase in that number based on uh Redevelopment coming in I expect to see you back here probably in September after movein season um in some of the new developments that have gone on around town um so um I guess my my comment is don't hesitate to come back out of um uh anything that would be a detriment to what you've built you have a hard job and you do it extremely well I have a really good team well so the teachers the staff they're phenomenal just I'm just supporting a fabulous team and that is uh the sign of a true leader and and I appreciate those comments more than you know so um come back when you need us because I think you're going to um this budget I don't think is the one we're going to see ultimately so I think your going to be hard we'll see yeah thank you for the presentation and and I love to Mr Winston's point the kind of a true true leader Mr Malto the same thing talking about his team Dr buy as well so that's awesome uh just question on these evaluations it's an extensive list do we do we are most of those uh are we able to administer most of those in-house or are we Outsourcing a lot of those so the bilingual evaluations for the most part are outsourced to the commission um it's difficult to find people who speak all of the wonderful languages that are spoken in East Brunswick so a lot of those do go out because we do want to test our students in their first language um as long long as we're you know fully staffed so right now we have a couple people having babies you know that are out so we may need to go out for a psychological or um you know a neuros are always out to our doctors but um we try to keep in with within the house as much as possible because it helps with who knows the student you could reach out to the teachers from the prior year um teach out to the administrators school counselors there's a lot more conversation that can be had and the evaluation is more thorough when you go out like with most things you know we learn that with busing too like when you go out it's just not the same quality as from within so uh enough good thing has been said thank you very much for your wonderful job so uh my comment is when I look at the numbers out of school tuition by every every student is close to $80,000 per student to only if we fact in the transportation the NS so one single student will cost easily more than $100,000 so uh is any way we can build the in-house capacity to keep students inside the East bronsing public school that will benefit students a lot not just financially to the to the board if we keep student inside our public school there will be less transp ation time and then student will be happier because they they know they stay with East BR now be bused to other District or other school so is there any way we can explore the possibility to keep as much as many student inside our school district just my comment I'm I Bernie and I are looking at each other because this is a conversation that we have multiple times a year there's a you know a balance between looking at you know what students to bring back in what how we can meet their need the not just the cost but also the size of the building is taken into consideration we have students that it could be very overwhelming the size of hamers Churchill or the high school um and they really do maybe need intensive sensory supports that we're not going to find in the 1950s High School um so there's a lot that goes into really creating the right program for each student however you have helped so over the over the years bringing in therapeutic supports um adding additional case managers adding additional teachers adding the additional speech therapists and the things that you have you have helped keep students in District um you know I don't want to keep going back to covid but Co certainly impacted a lot of our students when it comes to related Services occupational therapy speech um they needed a little bit more academically we're seeing an increase in students that need more individualized instruction and we're just trying to kind of keep up with that and then um we also do have a significant number of people who mooved to East Brunswick for our programs so but by what you've been doing you have been helping so it's not it's it's just like you know just the ever moving Target that we continue to look at as time goes on I know you guys are dealing with very challenging situation legally we have to help financially you don't have any barging power you don't have we don't have any pricing power and additionally because you guys doing so good job we are attracting more student come to our school district that's why the percentage of our students with IEPs going going up almost every year but hopefully you know new high school we can have some more space for those special needs student we keep more student you inside ours with District thank you again Becker Leo you you brought up a really good point um and I I know that that you know this um but some of the new board members may not know it and and people watching this this board I'm very proud to say years ago I'd say well over a decade ago made a very conscious decision to bring to keep as many special needs children in District and again as you said it's it and as leeu said not just because of the cost because of the least restrictive environment because we felt it was the best thing for the children to be part of the community to go to schools with their neighbors and we made a very conscious decision to spend resources on the staff on the curriculum on any um special technology or curriculum items augmentative devices so that we could have more in District programs our Autistic Program is a prime example of that prior to our commitment to resources and staff we were sending so many children out of district for that and I'm I'm really we all are so proud of the program that was created in house through the dedication of the staff and the teams and and um and also the parents and and children I think they they play so much a part um in ownership of these in-house programs the thing is sometimes um there'll be children with such specific needs that we just we can't address it here and by the the the thorough and efficient law of the state we must provide the most optimal education for these kids and we can't do it here that's when we turn to the out of District so I I think that your your your point is is so well taken leu in the sense that we should always continue it but I just wanted to provide a sense of of history that historically this board has really really done that and I'm always been very proud of us did you have something you want yeah just just real quick I know that tonight and at finance committee uh the the big blue section has been touched on a number of times tonight and was in finance as well and that's the out of District uh placement tuition we had some conversation at finance and of course it leaves the question what's being done the costs continue to go up what's being done and I mentioned to the finance committee that as superintendent in Middle six County we've been advocating for I went back and looked at my notes well over seven years now about the cost cost the uncontrolled cost of out of District placements and legislative support or legislative relief for that um I was able to confirm after the finance committee that this this is at the governor's desk right now and is uh being considered as part of the school aid in the budget I do not know what that means in terms of real dollars but I was able to confirm that this is actually in budget discussions right now I'm glad to hear that wow yeah thank you so much thank you all right leading us to our Board of Education may I please have a motion for the items under Board of Education and you'll notice we have the 2023 2024 calendar revision as well as the 2024 2025 calendar um addendum moved by Mrs Becker second second by Mrs herck is there any discussion Mr Winston uh on the calendar 20 year 2324 I see what's been added uh reading it if additional days are needed for emergency closing school will be closed on April 24th and April 23rd in that order uh April now um last year I was very proud of this board to approv the many holidays that they did uh if I recall correctly we had a lineup of many Muslim uh community members uh who were asking about e and the reason why they were asking was because the importance of Eid was bringing family together for tradition and it's a uh it's an opportunity for these families to celebrate together um April 23rd is the second Sader of Passover um I don't know why we would include that for the same reasons that we approved Eed I don't think that should be one of the default days uh the 24th still Passover but it's not the first and second seder of the 22nd 23rd uh and I don't like the idea of having uh that holiday which is a very big holiday very important holiday for the Jewish uh religion uh for the 23rd to be handled so I do object to that particular date and I just want to go on record of stating that thank you any other discussion okay this is a voice vote I believe correct yeah all in favor oos oh I have an abion for um for the minutes minutes okay same same minutes February 1 opposed opposed to the calendar okay not I'm abstaining from one uh opposed to the calendar okay okay motion carries leading us to two items under Community programs don't all motion at once I'm sorry just a CL I just want number three approve number yeah I knew you were going I was I just want to clarify two only Heather Vicki for the uh for Community programs is there any discussion yes Barbara I just wanted to compliment Community programs you know in our package a list of all the different enrichment programs that they offer and the range of of what is offered art some coding 3D printing uh I mean it's the breath and then second P go into um languages Mini Med School I me uh so compliments to uh the district Gilbert and her team because um they really go above and beyond to to provide opportuni for our students they don't have to travel somewhere else to go for some of these things so thank you and you're not you're kind of a humble there but I have to tell you when you were the community programs chair a lot of these you brought to um that committee so s she did she did but I as long as you're giving some uh Kudos out there and and and the coding some great stuff I'm thrilled that hammer are doing that I invite me to any of those events yeah you are welcome to any of those so just just let us know any board members um those type of things let us know glad to have you no thank you and I mean honestly some of these coding classes outside of our district are three times tce so not that they don't do a great job but I feel we do a very good job and and provides access to students M otherwise have access to to that stem background outside the school so hopefully they'll use it and get good careers great job all those in favor I opposed extensions motion carries leading us to curriculum and instruction we have three items this evening moved by Mrs Becker second second by Mrs herck is there any discussion I do yes Mrs GL sorry um I just wanted to say I appreciate uh item number two on the budget for a costume designer to work with the director and the students um having having watched many many uh High School performances be put together it's an intensive amount of work and I feel like students never actually go home and the advisers even more so so to bring in um expertise in that area and the amount is not as high as the hours that go in I am sure but I just appreciate that we bring these experts in for them on top of the talent that we have in house as well because to put on the plays and the musicals is such a huge Endeavor and our students do a phenomenal job and I'm glad we're able to support them this way they do good point all right all in favor I opposed abstentions motion carries is there anything that needs separating out for our 10 items this evening on Financial Services okay if not then I'm going to ask for a motion on items 1 through 10 moved by Mrs Becker of course you can second by Mrs G and I will let Mr  start the um discussion did I jump the gun a little bit that's okay your perfect timing still getting comfortable um thank you I just wanted to give a quick shout out to to uh the East Brunswick Education Foundation for the work they did um and number three and and here with the read read Across America week I uh understand that these are grant opportunities that they offer to um teachers and and to all the schools across the district and I just think it's it's just such an awesome opportunity for the students the teachers and and the school communities as a whole to take advantage of this so I'm just really enthused about seeing that thank you you do a great job great point is there any other discussion then I'm going to ask the secretary to please call the role Mrs Becker yes Mr Cummings yes Miss gu yes Mrs herck yes Mr Hong yes Mrs ree yes Mr Winston yes president LAX yes motion carries leading us to our two items this evening on human resources move by Mrs Becker second second by Mrs gloss is there any discussion this again is a roll call vote uh will the secretary please call the role Mrs Becker yes Mr Cummings yes M gu yes Mrs herck yes Mr H yes Mrs ree Mr Winston yes president LAX yes motion carries we've got one item this evening for staff development move by Mrs Becker second by Mrs herck is there any discussion all those in favor opposed motion carries um we have seven items this evening for student services moved by Mrs Becker second by Mr Cummings is there any discussion I just want to say one thing yes um I was I reviewed the um the monthly school reports section in here the fire drills the evacuation drills I mean gosh those are just so important and I just want to commend all the people who are you know continuing to stay in front of that um and and really you know encourage that ongoing Behavior there there's it's just it's so vital to the well-being and and you know the health of of each district each all the students getting acclimated to this process God forbid it should ever need be needed so I just wanted to thank everybody for their effort there that's Dr F and your team thank you yes Mr Cummings the principles really do a fantastic job of of keeping on schedule um and we schedule through my office but they do a fantastic job the staff you know from the teachers to everyone counselors nurses all the staff really do a nice job of really making it important for the students to learn how important those drills are so thank you for for noticing that thank and as a parent too I'll add on I I always appreciate getting the emails that you know this occurred today from the principles um sharing that you know because it's important for us to talk about it with our kids when they come home and make sure that we're all aligned so thank you Dr figuro I want to mention something just so the board maybe it's important for them to rehear it but in the past you you have taken students in staff on the other side of this equation oh yes yes that's one thing we have done especially at the uh secondary levels we've given students a chance teachers a chance to actually see what it's like from from the from the outside so not being in the classroom not and it's it's an amazing to see how they feel and how you know they say wow there's there's nobody in the school it's it's absolutely quiet and we can't see anything and it's dark and it's you know it's it's really good to see that and we've come a long way you know our our um security team as again the principes our our staff have really the last dozen years or so made our drill even that much more important um based on what's happening in the world um and we wanted to make sure that our kids all knew why we do it and that it's not a stressor you know there was a lot of questions that will these drills stress out our students and now the kids a matter of fact we've actually had situations where we've had substitute teachers that were new and coming into district and the kids would tell them where they should go during the drill so it's really it's just and that's at the elementary level so it really is wonderful at uh you know U and again it's really all about the staff and and those who are running the drills every day thank you Mrs Becker L I'm so glad you brought that up that was that was really great to know about you know um getting that sense of the other side and I think you said something really important that we need these drills to become so commonplace and so Hardon my PM drilled into their head that God forbid in an emergency they don't even think they can follow the rule and and and it is a testimony to the incredible um process the whole process of security that we've built in this District such a vital part of it um you and your team our security officers the principls everyone coming together to ensure the safety of our students but the drills it's it's so important for them to just do them and not even give it any thought obey do it because in an emergency you can't stop and think you've got to do so thank you for your part and your whole team's part and keeping our fits safe okay the secretary please call the role Mrs Becker yes Mr Cummings yes Miss GL yes Mrs herck yes Mr Hong yes Mrs Reese yes Mr Winston yes president LAX yes motion carries leading us to committee reports information items and for the good of the cause for the board um and I just wanted to let everyone know um we do have lots of great sporting opportunities but we now have one more youth Cricket um coming to coming to East Brunswick the um East Brunswick Cricket Club um they're looking to start that this spring so if you're looking for information you can reach out to support at ec.org for all those Cricket inspired okay well then seeing as we've got no need for an additional Clos session I am going to ask for an emotion to adjourn second uh it looks like Vicky and Jeff all those in favor oppose motion carries thank you good night everyone