##VIDEO ID:AU1YOIT19sA## right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or activ in accordance with the provisions of this act the Frankfurt Township Board of Education has caused advanced notice of this meeting General agenda to be submitted for publishing in the official newspapers as well as district and municipal offices on May 17th 2024 please rise for the FL iedge Allegiance of the United States of America and to the for it stands Nation indivisible liy and Justice we're g dooll call K Adam Jamie Armondo pres citn Fredo Mandy Jou is here Jennifer N here Charlene Jesse vaugh here John tiger said he'll be here in like five minutes I don't know how okay okay so first thing um with the vacancy um of Leif Anderson uh we are going to open up the floor for the board to nominate a vice president I nominate Caitlyn Fredo I second else all in favor all right congratul [Applause] um then we have the staff member of the month do you want to read that Mr stor sure thank you this nomination was submitted by Lauren gainy Nicole jerck Jess n zato Christy Vis Jamie wolf and myself it took that many people to come up with some good things actually there were nine of us and three were just like I'm out I'm out all right right uh Mike Lombardo is a candidate worthy of the recognition of staff member of the month he's an incredibly dedicated staff member who has come to our rescue so many times if there's an issue Mike is on it broken pencil sharpener he fixes it busted shelf fixed knee tissue Mike's the guy for the job passing out milk in the cafeteria yeah that's Mike no matter the task Mike is there with a smile and a helpful hand these may seem like small things but it turns out these are the big things he is vital to the day-to-day operations of FTS and a valued colleague and Friends he is reliable and always willing to help allowing us to be better at what we do every day Mike goes above and beyond to ensure our school is a clean safe and welcoming environment for students and staff alike he consistently takes pride in his work always with a smile if a maintenance request is issued Mike is the one who gets it done regardless of what the job requires whether it's mtic ously cleaning classrooms ensuring hallways are tidy or taking care of whatever teacher requests for through school dude his dedication does not go unnoticed Mike handles the cafeteria chaos like a champ helping the little ones he's always patient even getting sodas for cafeteria staff through the day what truly sets Mike apart though is his positive attitude and rapport with all he has formed meaningful connections with students and staff often taking a moment to chat or encourage them forget trying to have a conversation with him at the elementary end while class is walking by for a barrage of hell and hi Mr Mike are certain to bring your discussion to a screeching Hall we are so grateful for his presence which contributes significantly to the nurturing atmosphere of our school for all this and more Mike deserves this recognition and we hope he knows how deeply appreciated and love to is my [Applause] all I just showed up to read only you get those kind words but you also get a gift card so thank I wore my tensy sweater for lucky you good great thank you thanks [Applause] [Laughter] um so next uh thank you Mr Mr Storch and we're grateful to Mr Lombardo um so next up we have the recognition Circle so Jennifer N will be our March recognition Circle and we've add L Anderson to April there's no Frankford here there is oh Frankford hero he was uh nominated today he's an eighth grade student who has shown tremendous kindness care for his classmates and peers um specifically walking into my classroom to tell me that you know somebody might be feeling bad and maybe I should check in on on him and he has truly grown to me being here so short to be one of the kindest students we have um this month's Frankford hero is Malcolm Thomas [Applause] when did he get his hero he will get it he's at DC right now oh so it's Friday probably okay and we have a student council update Mrs sasi osar is that you y osar reading all right good evening and thank you for inviting the student council to present their report so far we have had our student council election which is our like representatives for each one room we had three meetings had our Hall and dance last Friday in which 77 students attended including me it was very fun we have be a tall F drive today which will run until November 18th and will benefit the B industry in layette we get the food to the pantry and time for Thanksgiving distribution we're in the planning stages of participating in the stuff the stocking gift and toy drive sponsored by project s assist sufficiency sponsoring appearance night out again this year sometime in December preparing to decorate the Christmas trees in both elementary and middle school players and planning to help the PTA at the Bender fair if they need us we meet twice a month during seven periods students bring their lunches and we eat and play in we've got a bunch of great students again who are excited to be part of student council and have great ideas thank you so much for listening to our report report again in November [Applause] thanks our next presentation is Mr Simons with an update on summer and Richmond all right you in a perfect world I would have done this about two months ago that's right but we're here today we head into the dark days reminder about summer uh summer enrichment is a program it's been around for about 35 years some of you remember Doug post he ran it for a long time and since retired his son Brendon and I have taken over the program for about seven years we started with about 60 kids in the program this past summer we were up to 105 uh which is as you know our population about almost a quarter of our school population attend summer in Richmond uh which built into a 10 member staff plus 25 volunteers high school kids coming back serving for the community they also need community service hours if they're interested you know for um Honor Society at High Point or wherever they're attending uh but we have about 140 total in our program it's a difficult program to run um place so I I type bigger now cuz I'm old uh anyway part of our program is utilizing the classroom that has the kitchen attached with it in the past year we've run into some some staffing situations where we use the the room for what's the official name to the program lld MD lmd MD lld oh lld right uh summer enrichment has utilized that specific room for about 35 years I'd like to see if there would be a way and I haven't really spoken with them yet but I wanted to make it aware to the public and to the board as well that we can kind of work together as we have been in the last handful of years uh to continue using the program and not lose that Ro um summer enrichment and this is something that I wanted to make clear to everyone again Su Richwood is 100% self-funded we run uh a lot of fundraisers throughout the school year and for the second year in a row it shows on our agenda that we were receiving grant money through Esa Title One funds I don't think that's accurate and it could be a different organization but it does mention suff enrichment yeah no that might have been Mis for the extended school year program you can't swing some money towards us for that though right so with that said it takes yeah it does take approximately about $20,000 to run the program um one of the things that Brandon and I have spoken about in the past week or two is uh changing how we do our annual trip to Mountain Creek busing this past year was over $1,000 and we in increase I was told significantly going into this summer uh we if need be we're going to do a pickup drop off at Mountain Creek for pounds it would be the only way to save that amount of money it's significant it's a heavy hit because we also cover part of the funds for each person who attends the trip at about $15 a clip so it was about a $2,000 loss for us just around the trip um we also have busing uh Finance issues oh I'm sure no I no I'm not saying that you don't that's not why I wrote it up uh point being is that I I would love to see summer enrichment continue I think it's vital for a school uh Brendan and I work extremely hard and the rest of the staff Miss Miss Murphy over here I don't know if there's anyone else on staff here tonight who's been a part of the program but anyway we work extremely hard and I think the community and the school district itself has seen its value over the years you know your kids go to it your kids as well uh it's valuable to the school and I'm not just saying that because I enjoy running it but I've seen what it can do for kids throughout the you know not only for kids who attend but for the kids who are in high school and Beyond who who want to come back to help um I just hope that in some way shape or form we can continue the program as is but also realizing that times have changed significantly I appreciate your time [Applause] yeah all right Mr Newman you're thank you so you probably noticed this big screen behind me um I'd like to thank uh Howard Technologies uh for letting us demo this interactive uh flat panel so one of the things when I came here um one of my goals is to bring technology and upgrade our technology you know within the build building I have a lot of ideas but we have to start somewhere so luckily um I have a contact that works for Howard Technologies they're letting us demo these boards to see if we like them so we didn't pay anything for them we're pretty much borrowing them if you will um so I just wanted to kind of break it out tonight just to show just some of the the capabilities U within this so I'm going to kind of work that into my superintendent or and our principal um updates so kind of going back to the beginning of the month we had a great fire prevention um assembly and all these are coming right from our Bulldog bulletin so which are also accessible online on our web page but you know we all have fire trucks I figured I'd show you some pictures right there's some information here about our upcoming Halloween parade that will be on Thursday um so make sure if you're looking for details like Hey where's my third grader get picked up you're going to be by the Buddy bench near you know the front playground and so on and so forth um so then I'd like to talk a little bit about the week of respect uh which is always the first week in October um we had our daily themes so that was a schoolwide theme like every day something different to uh you know promote respecting each other and positivity um I know the middle school right uh Mr Mr Sylvester I'll let you talk a bit a little bit about uh Brian Thomas so uh we had Brian Thomas come in again uh Brian has was here last year um he has been here before he is a Sussex County native he was a stellar athlete for Sparta High School who has worked with pass it along which was an organization that CT Kurt Walton was a part of and the CEO of I believe um and Brian does a tremendous program where typically it's three days of inclass instruction of really about positive self-image positive selfworth you know how to set goals how to really kind of uplift yourself and pull yourself up by your own bootstraps to kind of get through those tough Middle School years um and the kids love him I think him going into the classroom makes it a little bit more personable they're not sitting in this Auditorium where there's the entire Middle School um and he meets them at their level and he sees them every day and that kind of weeklong intervention that they get with him goes my uh this year since they our entire Middle School got it last year this year our fifth grade because they hadn't had it yet um got three days intense within their Ela classes uh then we were able to do one day with sixth grade one day with seventh grade and one day with eighth grade as just kind of like a refresher from what he had been and we hope to kind of set that up year to year um and have that kind of be a pivotal moment of our week of respect uh here in October and that was all graciously donated and funded by the PTA um so thank you PTA without them again we wouldn't have been able to continue this great tradition because the kids really do love thank you um so then let's move on to I see somebody in the audience we had a mayor's visit thank you uh to the Mayors um Silverthorn and fr for coming in to speak with our third graders uh was a really great tie in to our social study curriculum learning about government um they asked some really good questions um really good questions where's your Mansion so I thought that was kind of cool to get the third grade perspective like the questions that they asked you and thank you so much for your time and coming in and um you know helping out our school and our kids with that that was just a wonderful thing um next we're currently in Red Ribbon Week um the focus of Red Ribbon Week is students to stay safe health healthy strong and drug free um and then I'd like to congratulate all of our athletes for a great season um in field hockey and in soccer and I know there's so many other things that our kids do that might not be school sponsored but you know youth football and whatever it is Art music karate um you know for our students to go you know beyond the walls of the normal school day for all their extracurriculars and you know um just being a well-rounded uh student and let's see um let's see what we got here okay so we have a Veterans Day ceremony coming up on November 11th which will is actual Veterans Day so it's the kindergarten through fourth grade students will be participating in it we formed a committee um again if you're looking for information it's all right here in the recent Bulldog bulletin um if you have a veteran that you would like to be honored so you don't necessarily have to be kindergarten through fourth grade it's open to Middle school you know fill out the form if somebody would like to come or if they're currently serving please send us a picture um we'd love to honor and uh recognize them so that's all right there and then I think information Governor's educator of the Year nominations um we sent that out to the community as well um I believe it might have been done internally in the past but we want to get the also the parents right if there's a great teacher your child's had a great teacher in the past or currently have a great teacher please don't hesitate to uh fill out the form and uh when is that due by so that is November 6th okay November 6th and then I see somebody else in the audience we had kindergarten apple day so pictures right and all this is right there in the Bulldog bulletin so our goal is to keep you informed on a weekly basis um right from our website if you're looking for it you missed it the email usually goes out around 3:30 every Friday but you want to get caught up on Bulldog bulletins you missed it that little tab right there will take you to all the Bulldog bulletins uh throughout the school year so um I think that's my uh update report thank you thank you Mr Sylvester do you have a further princip report okay here come on up my job here tonight is to present to you our njsla results from the spring of 2024 um and to start us off we just wanted to kind of speak to our qack year last year last year the county came in and did an audit on how we were doing um and one of the areas in which we did not pass was cni curriculum and instruction and one of the things that is important to note as we go through this this presentation is that out of the seven schools who were qack last year all seven schools did not pass curriculum instruction for their njsla scores so everything we're talking about here we are not alone um this is kind of a countywide I guess you could say issue and something the county is trying to address as a whole if I can expand on that too it's a Statewide issue because only about 20% of the schools in the state that got qac and if if you don't know what qac is it's the county office the Department of Education comes in they look at the five main areas and then there's like indicators off all five of those areas okay so Finance governance curriculum and instruction uh personnel and um was it fac facilities building grounds Okay so for whatever reason the njsla is what is used to determine this and the njsla is still using 2018 standards well we're in 2024 standards have been upgraded across the board curriculum has been modified to meet the state standards yet the assessment is still based on 2018 standards so it's not necessarily in my opinion a school across the state problem it's a procedural problem problem with the actual assessment and their lack to adjust so my personal opinion so um a part of this or because of this what we had to there we go what we had to come up with over the summer was this District Improvement plan in regards to ELA and math um and this is how we plan here at frankfur to improve our test scores um one thing that we implemented up at the middle school level is that we have started Ela and social studies teachers cross-curricular infusion and implementation of grade level standard expectations what that essentially means in short term is that our Ela and our social studies teachers have been given the opportunity during the week at least once a month every other every other week whenever we really kind of see fit to sit down and discuss you know what are you doing in the ELA room what are you doing in the social studies room how can we cross curricularly attack these standards so that we can support each other are we all using the same rubrics are we all using the same methods and strategies are we all using the same scope and sequence and following these same patterns what are you doing in ela that I can support you in social studies and vice versa and opening up those doorways and those conversation hallways we've already seen some some tremendous um conversations being had specifically in the ELA and social studies one with Mr Simons and Mr storge back there um we talked about okay how do we really want to approach what we call a race paragraph is it R Ace if you need multiple pieces of evidence is it r a c c which way do you do and it really kind of just opening up that dialogue so that we can get everybody on the same page and approach and a tackle this as a team what we're also doing is reviewing our student performance um this presentation we are going to be going out to the staff after it was done here at the board and showing them and giving them the same presentation again so that we can be on the same page and we can move forward as a team together um we have been as an admin team meing to go over our student data whether that's from mobx orl just to kind of see where our students are in these benchmarks where these instructional gaps could be and how we can address them um we are asking our teachers to do the same as they do every day and have been utilizing whether it be mimx orl to kind of address any gaps that they see within their classroom our curriculum coordinator is riding revising all of our curriculum K to 8 to make sure that our standards are as up toate as possible and this is not only in ela I can I think do the dot there we go I just have to cross the threshold um this is not only an Ela but it's also a math um where we have in ela and social studies in that cross-curricular world we also have math and science working together um and this has been tremendous a lot of our science teachers just for an example in one of the meetings we had didn't realize that oh you guys are talking about measurements now we don't talk about measurements till March let us move our measurements units so that we can support each other and our students can really kind of build their skills throughout the school day and multiple classes and the opportunity we have at least in the middle of School level definitely in the elementary school level as well is that team time um so our teachers get their Department team they get their grade level team and now they're getting this cross cross-curricular team time and it's really allowing our staff to kind of like I said get on the same page and tackle some of these issues um again in math we are using mobimax andl to support any instructional gaps that we are seeing longterm as well as as we are seeing daily so that we can attack can address those gaps as soon as we see them um and that is the long and short of our oh sorry science um for science we are like I said those math and science teachers are working together to address any of these issues this science portion of this State Testing is rather new so we're still kind of working through what or how or what these questions look like how we should approach them and our science teachers are are working through that as well then I think just a brief synopsis so uh third through eighth graders take the ELA and math assessment and science is only fifth grade and eighth grade students take the Science assessment um some intervention strategies that we've also been implementing um we get there so collaborative classroom is our new Ela curriculum we are in year two of this program for our K to4 teachers um We are continuing professional development with that this is a program that what we talked about or what we discussed with our staff members is it was a lot that first year and some of them were maybe a little overwhelmed because it was so much but we kind of knew that going in introducing this curriculum and what we're hearing this year from our staff is it's tremendous they love it they um specifically our fourth grade team is really kind of going into this full circle and is really happy that we're moving forward with this collaborative classroom uh we have address vertical articulated fluency expectations essentially what are the skills that your first grader needs to know to be able to move into second grade and so on and so forth uh We've implemented benchmarks grades first through fourth those benchmarks allow us to get data in real time to see again where our students are and where any instructional gaps may be so that we can attack and address them as possible and as I said we' started those cross-curricular team meetings how about the little doc 's your knuckle sorry doesn't like him doesn't as Greg I was going to say he'll be my V uh as Greg pointed out we do have a tremendous summer enrichment program we feel that this does a great job at keeping our kids in that school mindset for as long as possible keeping them familiar with the building and with our staff is is great we also Run summer ITI we have RTI during the school day which is small groups of students utilizing strategic skills this is year two of sips as well sips is a reading program a phonics instruction program that we are utilizing within our RTI teams to try to build our pheic awareness within our students um and then we also have period 10 uh period 10 is our after school tutoring program it's our homework help in which we have staff members stay after school where students can be nominated I guess you could say to attend period 10 and there they receive extra enrichment they receive extra help from a staff member um and this year we've actually opened up our doors to Highpoint and we have a number of High Point students coming on Tuesdays and Thursdays to offer their help with the tutoring itself um we are offering them volunteer hours we have about four to five coming every Tuesday and Thursday um it's been awesome so far it's early on in period 10 so we don't have a lot of students and with that almost every student has gotten one toone instruction because of these high point students coming down it's been awesome we're also opening up to grade four this year um that's starting later on in the year but we want to try to expand period 10 to help as many kids as possible now getting into our actual test scores so this is our Ela overall 60% of Frankfurt students in grades 3 to8 are meeting or exceeding expectations compared to the state average of 51 um we are absolutely crushing Ela um we are doing a tremendous job I'm going to get it one time guys like there who would have thought the young guy is that what it is J um math overall 42% of Frankfurt students in grades three to eight are meeting our exceeding expectations compared to the state average of 41 so again we are still above that state average and we're still doing the tremendous job science uh overall 22% of Frankford students in grades 3 to8 are meeting or exceeding expectations in science compared to the state average of 24 um we are a little bit lower in this science component but I just recently joined a quote unquote think tank of Administrators within the county to discuss what is going on because we are actually the top three in science in Sussex County um Newton actually reached out to me being asked what's going on we need help what are you guys doing um and I think something that we are doing that I've heard a lot of good things is we have introduced a new curriculum in our science Mystery Science and from the feedback we've gotten from our staff they love it it's got great programs great videos great tools that our students can use and everybody seems really happy with it so uh our sub group data we have fewer than 10 students in these subgroups so we don't have to report out on that the class of 2024 current ninth graders so the ninth graders at High Point our eighth graders last year in math as you guys can see right we have 2019 2020 covid 2021 not applicable and then we see our Trends moving forward with this grade we see a steady average around 75% which is phenomenal you would see most of the state average here would be around 52 so well above and then again in math we are um hovering right around that 40% which is great again the state average there would be probably around that 38 Mark so in this grade we are doing well um this is split between eighth grade math and Algebra 1 Algebra 1 is the advanced math that allows you to take geometry your s or freshman year when you get into high school and as you can see in that class our students excelled 75 70% met or exceeded [Music] expectation in ela that right okay all right um yeah duh sorry as you can see not applicable not applicable for those covid years and as we can see here we are trending upwards from that 20122 year uh in math we have starting out at 16.9 dropping to 9% and then bouncing back up to 22% this 9% low has quite an asterisk this year our students there saw three different teachers moving through that year due to maternity leaves um and then this year uh they also saw in their seventh grade year a maternity leave at the very end of the year crucial time in terms of test prep um but again trending upwards those are all trending positive numbers our current seventh graders right we see 37 6385 tremendous trending upwards and in math again we're moving up our current sixth graders right we see 42 2455 um we see a little bit of a dip there but again we're still kind of climbing up that Mountain um in math same thing see a little bit of a dip but we're moving up our current fifth graders right 43 to 44 56 to 32 we are course correcting our fourth grade team is working diligently to address any graphs that they may have seen um we are working with our fourth grade team to ensure that those numbers continue to move up and then our third graders last year our current fourth grade did a did a great job 57% of both Ela and math now when we compare those 57 to 48 for third grade math 57 to 43 in uh third grade ELA 32 to 46 in math and like I said our fourth grade team is ADD addressing that and we are working with them to address that 44 to 51 like I said we are working back in fifth grade we climb back up 35 to 40 in ela 55 to 52 41 to 36 in sixth grade 85 to 53 crushed it knocked it out of the park in our sixth grade 22 to 38 and again remember this was that year that saw that sixth grade maternity leaves I guess right transitions yes that's the word uh 47 of 54 in ela 70 to 40 for our Algebra 1 students from last year and then 40 to 38 in our um 8th grade math 74 to 53 in our eth grade ELA um again those numbers looking there those trending upwards numbers are what we are happy with we are seeing a consistent Trend upward um and that's all we're really looking forward to 97% of our students participated in ela and math 98% participated in science are third Sixth and eighth graders outperform the state average in both Ela and math our fifth graders outperform the state average in ela all tested areas are above the state average for meeting and exceeding expectations from 22 23 to 24 remember um overall we are at 60 compared to 50 and overall we are at 42 compared to 41 in terms of percentage so as a district we are trending upwards in ela five of the six grade levels increased their meeting and exceeding expectations in math four of the seven grade levels increased the meeting and exceeding expectations and in math all grade levels increased across the five levels of achievement so again looking at our hard stats we are trending upwards that's it and that's that thank you mras great job [Applause] I guess these fifth through eighth graders too are the or the kindergarten through third graders the year Coe hit correct so we are of that still walking out of that thank you Mr Sylvester so now we're going to open up public comment um can I get a motion open so public comment is a 3 minute limit per person and a 30 minute maximum time in Mr lard 6:38 anybody sign up she over there you signed up Mrs eer yes why don't you stand up and talk thanks i' just like to begin by saying that I myself and I know many people in the township uh parents and people around enjoy the Bulldog bulletin so thank you very much for doing that that would be great good source of information also uh fifth grade just going to count on the or talk about what you mentioned about Brian Thomas I actually got to go into one of his classrooms and he's excellent he knows like within a day of being there he knows almost every single Student's name and he calls on them so it's it's great and the kids really listen to them so thank you PTA for doing that and bringing that in i' also like to thank Mr Sylvester for supporting all the sports events I know we at a lot of field hockey games and soccer games so we really appreciate your support the kids enjoy seeing you there so thanks for coming um I just had a question and maybe it was answered I was a little late um on number 18 on the agenda it mentions summer enrichment as being part of the Federal Grant I know the summer enrichment is self-funded so I just wanted to know right so that was answered it's the extended school year not someone richment is funded by that grade extended school year okay all right thank you okay you're welcome Also earlier in this month we were instructed to change our formula for for creating class trips for the funds how it was funded I know last year we had to start paying for the nurse and all the busing because the budget shortfall and I understand that but then earlier this month uh we received an email staing that we now had to account for those students who were either at IEPs in special education or were on free and reduced lunch so and then calculate subtract them out of the number and then calculate them in for the final cost so what that means when you interpret it say you have a class of 50 students and say five are on free and reduced lunch and 10 are on U have IEPs or special education you would take the total trip cost and divide it instead by 50 you would divide it by 35 so all the other parents of that are not on free and reduced launch or IEP students would have to cover those costs so I really don't think as a teacher as a parent in Frankfurt you know I students all kids all went through here three kids and as a taxpayer that the other parents should have to pay for those students it's just my feeling I don't think the number also is accurate because I know in the past uh running the camp Mason trip for I don't know how many years it's been running for over 55 years and myself I don't know at least 20 running it that we've never had a student not be able to go to Camp because they couldn't afford it we've always had money in our student fund that each grade level had a fund and I think a certain amount of money was put into that each year so so that we could cover all those costs of students that weren't able to pay for it um and I just wanted to to know where the board stood on that and is that the formula we're going to be following from now on and and how we you know go from here you talking about any class trip or Camp Mak no it was any class trip so like I why the reason I'm bringing you up is because I know myself when I read that and I know others felt the same way why would we run a class trip you know like it it makes it very difficult on us to to to put it out there to run it to say okay now instead of 50 parents paying for it 35 are going to cover the cost and then if even if 50 ended up paying for it that the extra 15 that we were paid that that that where does that money go go to I know was told to go back into the account but it really isn't fair to over have parents overpay for a trip and I know it's for me your time is up and um I don't know the answer to your question so okay figure it out all right thank you very much I appreciate it no one else signed up Mr I sent an email prior to the meeting do you still need me to sign the paper you don't have to sign the paper but you can stand up thank uh give your commentary so many of you may know me I was an active uh PTA volunteer for the last 13 years um on and off the board serving many different positions um and and today I'm here as a concerned parent of a um disabled child who attends Frankfurt it is now his third school year here at Frankfurt um he attended the preschool program half day for two years and now is starting in kindergarten uh with the lld program but has um been able to also be involved with the children um without disabilities so he does half day with his the kids with disabilities and half day without disabil um which in our opinion is great because he gets the best of both worlds um at our very first I meeting of having a child with a disability and having two children that previously graduated here without disabilities um we were handed by the child study team here two packets this one is your parental rights and special ed which has teeny tiny writing and what your rights are the other one is the special education chapter 14 uh basically all of the New Jersey state rules and regulations regarding special education here at frankf that's it um we've probably met now in the last three years maybe 15 times with the child study team it's been quite a journey um we're really trying to take everything that has happened to us in a negative Manner and turn it into something positive and try to help parents coming in Frankfurt going forward not have to go through the struggles that we faced um we don't want any parents um or other children to go through what our child has experienced here so I would like to share with everyone tonight on the board and in the audience um first I've created what's called an all about dealing this is my six-year-old autistic son um this allows any new staff members AIDS par professionals and teachers about a quick five minute of who my child is with special needs what his trigger are what his interests are he is partially verbal so that he can communicate with those new staff members um that don't know my [Music] child bear with me as I'm going to try to do my absolute best to not cry while I share some important information with you all tonight before I begin I think you should first I should First share with you all that I have had previously two of my other children graduate from Frankfurt who got a wonderful education experience filled with lots of great memories that being said my youngest son who was diagnosed with level two autism is Special Needs has an IEP has learning disabilities and I'm now disappointed to share the neglect he has endured already this school year surrounding his IP accommodations not being met unfortunately the progress that he has made which I'm now going to allow my husband to finish because he gets three minutes as well correct yes I wasn't even going to stop you f actually unfortunately the progress that he has made over the last year and a half by having inhome CMO State services with four hours of therapy each week is now being exhausted on regressive Behavior caused by neglected incidents that occurred here at Frankfurt there's no reason for these unacceptable neglectful incidents to be taking place at Frankfurt whether it's lacking communication shortage in staff or a teacher not wanting to try a different learning approach than what they might be used to in the past we as Dylan's parents feel that it's imperative for us to share these problems we are currently facing with a board of ed other parents as well as the community we need to Advocate not only for our child but for all children attending Frankford regarding our recent neglect incidents and IP accommodations not being met for a six-year-old autistic son in kindergarten so that no other child ever experiences this embarrassment nor parents find themselves asking if they are doing enough for their child we are hopeful that by sharing our recent negative circumstances that it could potentially save another family or child from experiencing the pain that we've recently endured as his parents in my opinion with the Mental Health crisis across the country and neglect or abuse occurring with individuals of special needs in today's world we all need to take the negative endure our most best to turn it into a positive did any of you know that Frank retention school does in early or has ever had a toilet chasing policy in place for special needs children or Elementary age children that are still learning toiletting skills when entering preschool or kindergarten I was unaware of this myself even being a mother with special needs child who's had an IEP for the last 3 years had I known this or been made aware of this we could have clearly stated in his IE to avoid this lightful situation I'm about to share with you all on Friday September 20th 2024 I received a phone call at 2: 11 p.m. in the afternoon from the new school nurse Elizabeth leaving a voicemail standing no emergency however my son Dylan had had a bow movement accident at recess and soiled himself so they wanted to know if myself or my husband could pick him up since it was the end of the school day after about 45 minutes from that call my husband arrived here to pick up Dylan and the school nurse had explained to my husband that due to school policy she was not certified to clean him or wipe him after a bell movement accident when Dyan and my husband arrived home shortly after we went to clean Dylan up after having this accident when removing his pants we were mortified to find tried feces from his lower back to his ankles as we both begin to try and clean him up with Wipes we surely realized that wipes were not going to do the trick we had to put him in a warm shower and feed him so that we could screw him clean while he repeatedly said with a frown on his face and tears in his I I'm so sorry Mommy and Daddy I didn't accident this lack of toileting policy and is not even listed under the gifted and talented curriculum on our website and for the instruction for njsla and in my opinion this can this is not countywide this is due to lack of Staffing as well as lack of communication or resources providing from our school to our paring Community we later found out that this was not a neglect situation by the new nurse she's actually very pleasant we got to meet her but she came from Florida the policy of Florida was dead parents had to sign a consent for to allow certain staff members to wipe their children so I don't blame her I blame the school for not teaching her what should have been done with my child arrive in the nurse's office busing accommodations for my Specialty's child were removed over the summer without having an IEP meeting and it wasn't found out until the first day of school when my bus arrived for my child there was no Aid the disciplinary approach that's happening here to special needs and over stimulation or inappropriate behaviors in my opinion is not what it should be Youth Sports for special education students with disabilities we don't have them here at FR Nicki dusza our school social worker I met with her several times at IEP meetings don't know if you're familiar with the cpeg group stands for special education parent group she's excited that I'm interested in getting this up and running for Frankfurt we've never had it and it's very difficult to get it up and off ground so I will be meeting with her in the next few weeks to hope we get this started here at Frankford we were recently approached by someone in the community to provide a donation because of our special needs child to help get something started here in celestic County my first point of action is to create a resource binder with that that's going around of explaining to parents how important it is to create that for their own children with phone numbers and emails and every possible resource available at their fingertips so they do not go through this journey alone so we will be starting that with either our funding or this donation there have probably been about 75 emails back and forth between the St child study team superintendent nurse social worker psychologist since September 5th the attendance of how many people we have enrolled here at Frankfurt compared to one social worker am one psychologist in my opinion is not enough so when my child is screaming and has a tantrum and a meltdown and overs stimulated Dr McKenna is on the Middle School side who's there for my choc we've had two IEP beatings already since September 5th totaling four hours these were all things that were put in place before the summer just to correct what he was not having met this school year special education curriculum I asked to meet with Dr Janine mey there is no special education curriculum I think we need to have one other schools in the community Cantini being an example has what they call service animals emotional support dogs if you've noticed maybe you saw my daughter walk in this evening with her brand new 16 week old adorable puppy who she is having trained to be an emotional support doll my daughter has suffered for the last four years because she went through Co missing her eighth grade dance her in-person Frankfurt graduation her freshman year on Virtual land went away to University of Hartford and is now taking a medical leave of absence while she deals with her anxiety and her stress I think frer needs to look into having a service animal or two we are willing during the six-month leave while we get this dog up and trained for emotional support to bring it in to Frankford and give a shop let's see how it does we get free inhome therapy offered by performed care of New Jersey it's called CMO Services we get a case manager and we get two therapists a week total in four hours of inh Home Therapy outside of Frankfurt those are free services not once did the school give us those resources to contact re form care of New Jersey who took a huge weight off of our shoulders two years later that's something that will be in the portfolio to these parents that are coming into their first IP meeting all about my child what I shared as I said um we'll pass around the audience so they can see as well aba therapy Brave Wings in Sparta um one of the staff members at our first IEP meeting had heard of them didn't know much about them can't say enough wonderful things about them they are now located in Sparta they were in Andover they are an ABA therapy that works with out your health insurance um where you would basically pay co-pay they offer after school activities as well as AV therapy for speech PT and op just as kids and teens scen they provide weekend programs with scar who I just recently got hired as an assistant manager for a group Dylan is part of the just as kids program in Sparta three Saturdays a month from 10:00 to 3: the state provides him with resources to go on day trips they go to museums zoos do Sky Zone they just went pumpkin picking pumpkin painting it's wonderful and these are free services in Sussex County that again our school is not sharing with us special needs parents DD elegibility again allows you to get those free state Services we were not informed of that my new job I'm hoping to have more resources here for Sussex County in Frankfurt at my fingertips resources such as an organization called as you are it took us almost 2 years to get a diagnosis because of Co weight list as you are is a virtual diagnosis there is no waiting be able to share resources with families there's a special place in Nutley New Jersey it's about an hour and a half from here called your kind of cuts may have seen it on Tik Tok they perform special needs haircuts the gentleman is amazing they do in home and in person okay is this all stuff that would be in that cack I'm sorry what was the group called c s p a so this is all stuff that would go over in that group to help guide parents right so that they're not basically trying to do self research Google what to do there's currently I saw an open board bed position um to kind of fill in for vacancies I will be applying for that I think that theard of I'm sorry but that was closed on the 25th you had to have your l was the 20th so that was my apology but anyway I think at some point the Board of Ed needs someone even if it's a volunteer to join in on the specialty inside so if parents come to meetings and they have questions there's someone who has um the availability to these resources um I do want to thank the summer enrichment program and all the staff as well as the majority of Dylan teachers and needs for making the accommodations met um as I said um over the last 15 years on and off the PTA board I'm just very saddened um and disgusted and a poll to say the least that these situations are happening here at Frankfurt um tonight we're asking you all for your help and support to be the voice for our children and struggle that struggle to verbalize their needs and help us Implement policies to protect our children who have special needs but are all people first before their labeled stamps or diagnosises and I just want to share that I have my friend Randy here tonight whose son was was a previous FR graduate with my daughter he would have graduated with my daughter in June and at the age of 15 going through Co triy to commit suicide he is now on life support he is fully vegetative and she's here to show just how bad the Mental Health crisis is along with the special needs this is unacceptable and we're asking that you please look into these incidents I would be happy to provide you with any paper trail emails we have our CMA Services coming in every week their state mandated reporters these are huge red flights here at right through they are asking me to call Trenton at this point and get the state involved I don't want to do that I want to allow time but I can't allow too much time because now because my child was left in a hallway alone and locked out of the classroom we've gone back probably 15 Steps when we should have been going ahead 20 so now we're having problems putting him to sleep at night because he's afraid he's going to be locked out and if he has a night terror so severe regarding what has going been going on here he will self and then we are on our way to the hospital because we can't control him at 6 that's all I have thank you gra he do you think you could put that in I appreciate you speaking could you there was a lot of information um could you put an email out to us with that information to the board yeah I appreciate that what you do is you email Mr lard yeah and then ask him to for it to the board sure in the body of the email thank you for com um motion to close public comment second um and that leads us into executive session and we do need to take a couple minutes in executive session a couple probably 20 is what we always say um can I get a motion to go into executive session I just have to get through this Qui yeah and I have to eat dinner I'm starving there a football tomorrow for hey your eth graders are doing good I got lot I got a bunch did you get pictures y I got a bunch tomorrow morning's my day one recap oh they did so good yeah I like they look like they're having a blast yeah they are send me any of you got yeah I'll [Laughter] did you hear the music oh my God I was so they were all dancing out we are back we're back in order here um thank you we have the communications and public relations next um so we have a lot of monthly activities in November um we're alled here so so it's Red Ribbon Week the eth grade eighth grade is in Washington DC this week we have the K through four Halloween period at 2 p.m. um on Halloween we're closed for teachers convention the 7th and 8th on the 11th we have the Veterans Day ceremony for the ca cor the 12th we have a PTA meeting um and the 16th is the pta's Tricky Tray so donate to your class donate from your family come to the Tricky Tray um um it's at the Richards Building at the fairgrounds we have parent teacher conferences the 18th through the 20th which means an early dismissal at 12:45 on the 21st is p picture retake day we have an early dismissal for Thanksgiving on the 27th and then we're off the 28th and 29th for Thanksgiving so lot to do in November and a couple days off so that's nice um we do have uh under policy and curriculum some policy reviews um that are going on going uh if passed in the consent agenda so we'll have the wellness and nutrition um that's njda mandated annual review of that policy we have um a bathroom assistance policy and a field trips policy um so those are all those the last two are in the first reading um and then we have Finance physical plant and transportation so Mr lard do you have an update on the roof project roof project where new Ying says comption actually just received a uh request for documentation for that to get most of our Rod grant money reimbursed um we still have a change order pending um they've looked at it they're still trying to figure out what the best way to address the um scam between the two sections of the building bwing and c-wing so bwing is at the end of this hallway c-wing is where the gym is located uh so we're trying to work uh figure out the rest best way to do that also to make sure we're making the most out of the broad gr funds that we have so uh trying to get everything I can done in there rather than lose the 40% funding so did we get a roof warranty on the yes okay that 30 years and then what we're trying to address in the scene between the two buildings that would also be it's just whether I can expand it a little bit to uh get part of that roof done at the same time um in know way a doer repair that expands that that section of the roof like flashing it uh no there's well it would be flashing the seam but they have this liquid or roll on roofing membrane that comes with a 25e warranty apparently that section of roof based on its condition and age is a is a valid candidate based on the company that makes the product so I'm just trying to see either we're doing only a few feet of it or we can do several feet of it that's what I'm trying to see what we can do within the parameters of our grant um so that's still ongoing if we are able to do that portion it would probably happen in the spring now we're getting too cold in the season uh sewer project we did meet Brian myself and uh with Mike cloon uh we met with an engineer from kleinfelder who was the engineer original engineer on the sewer project this was strictly just a they wanted to come in and just take a look at the site so we came over met with them met with the one engineer because she was not on the original project but she's taking over a lot of these projects for that uh company uh we showed her the Dr drawings kind of where we're at you know what has happened to to date showed her where um on the drawings where things were originally with the project um and just kind of walked around and talked about ideas so that was just a preliminary meeting um there she was going to start drafting up a proposal to see about doing engineering work or the next phases uh at that time we would certainly have the the Mayors uh the town councils uh in on the on the discussion this was kind of a shortterm notice uh they gave us a three-hour window and they might show up um and then so we just met with them but it was no intentions to leave anyone out it was mostly just a uh FYI meeting at that point to kind of familiarize the engineer with the status of the project that has happened and and what we are considering going forward uh that's it now in the agenda I do have our we have annual maintenance uh annual items that go for two set which is our school facilities checklist that's the Safety and Security checklist that Brian bansmer does it goes through the building checks off all all items um our biggest issues usually are um we have groundhog issues we have a few other facility issues that keep responding and that has nothing not necessarily to do with the construction of the building but they're ongoing things with regards to test issues or things of that nature our comprehensive maintenance plan or annual maintenance budget form which is M1 that tells us minimums that we must make sure we budget to plan for upkeep of the building uh this is what our our maintenance Reserve usually goes to I try to put I try to put about 20 to $25,000 every year in there you can see we're already using some for uh fixing the ventilation in the Middle School offices as well as we repairing um we use it to repair uh chlorinator pumps for the for the well uh and that also our annually we update our long range facility plan for all projects that are in there and that is the driving factor for our calculation of what we can put into our capital reserve is our LR projects um other than that I don't have anything uh to okay so school safety and climate we had a fire drill on October 18th an evacuation drill on October 21st um last week was violence and vandalism prevention week we had a school bus evacuation drill on October 4th and that was supervised by Mr Wizard Brian banser security guard Mr Newman New Jersey State Police and the bus Duty staff um after that we have the consent agenda question Jennifer has a question is number five supposed to be October 7th not SE yes October 7th all right so do I have a motion to vote on the consent agenda and it is numbers 20241 28-3 through 20248 10 28-26 29 299 all the way through 29 I a motion from Caitlyn in a second from J sorry Jess it's late [Music] night um be it resolved that the Frankford Township Board of Education accept the recommendation of the superintendent of schools to approve the above identified regular agenda items number 202 310283 through 20 oh no 2024 10 28-3 20 241 28-29 we'll do a roll call Jesse vaugh yes John tiger yes charl molar yes Jennifer N I have to abstain from three and four but Caitlyn Fredo yes Jamie arm yes Adam uh yes obain 345 Mandy J yes I have to abstain from four speak out that's right John so that leads us to our second public comment Mrs oh motion to open from sorry Mrs that's okay um quick question uh when you when we do policy reading is it typical I know we I've never heard anybody read the actual policies but is it typical for the public not to know what the policies are until they're approved yes so you have the first reading but you guys get it we don't we don't know what the reading is so is there any way I I don't know if that well I guess until it's approved it's not a policy on the second reading so it could get revised okay so the public has no access that typical at all most of the time okay all right um on the field trips is was there a policy made in regard to what we I mentioned earlier you can't talk about it's not about your not about the funding okay thank you anybody public comment anybody for public that was Mrs anyone else for a public comment yes Mrs I just have a quick question uh that I forgot to mention when I was up um do does the Board of Ed by chance know the um policies relating to incidents being reviewed on video footage and also so with regards to um if it is I guess by law by the state or by the school maybe it's a bylaw that if a special needs parents request a parents's name so that uh for instance we constantly see like the same triggers happening around a specific teacher or parah and we go into an IAP meeting and we ask for that person's name uh we were told that they are um there are independent contractors that are hired through Frankfurt but the reasoning that they wouldn't give us the name was because they didn't want us to reach out to them directly but it wasn't for that purpose it was for us to find out if that particular person maybe was triggering our child per se um to work with our inhome CMO services so that we could work out a way I just I'm not sure if the board knows these policies or not it was just a question we have policies um and I'm I'm trying to be so compassionate here um the board has to act as one whole unit right so even though I'm the president I can't speak for what all of these other board members think um so public comment is really a comment that you're given okay and it's not like a back and forth discussion so you can something but you can also wait or if you were to email Mr lard um and ask him to forward it to the whole board we would then um be able to review um but yeah that's that's and the only reason I asked is because we did bring it up in an IEP meeting but I couldn't find it on the school's website as a and I think um like IEP meetings yeah the board is not privy to any information in any students IEP meeting okay that's not our job like we're we're not here to run the child study team or any of that so and that's still confidential even to us we don't get to know about those intimate details of um an i to share with you right but again I can't comment on it I'm not an IEP Specialist or but I could reach out to Chris privately and ask to he would forward it on to us for us to re forward it to the board and if yeah I obviously I'm going to do a synopsis of what I stood up and said but I can can I include those few questions in there as well to the board to address yes it just it's very hard for me Faith because I I I am so compassionate towards your situation and and um it's just it's maybe it's not the board that would answer like really the chain of command at the school is to go through the teacher if you can't get through to the teacher you go to the principal if you can't get through to the principal you go to the superintendent um and then if when you do all of that and you come to the board and believe you me I was on the other side of this for a long time and I came to a lot of board meetings it's interesting concerns that I had and it's very frustrating to sit over there and have this person sit here and be like no so we followed the chain of command which is what led me to coming in here today so and I I appreciate your vulnerability I am so compassionate towards your situation and um you know again if you email Mr lard and have him forward it to the board then that would probably be than but I no that's fine I just again we're still new to a lot of things and we don't really know until something happens how to approach it or how to request something like that um I may know a lot about like the PTA volunteer side but this is something that I'm just not familiar with A A pretty new parent even though he's six um he only got diagnosed three years ago this so this is still a New Journey for us so we're just trying to kind of navigate through how to go about certain things so I appreciate that yeah thank you um I just want to clarify so you send to the send to me I will forward to the board but the board itself is not allowed to discuss it among each other between so it'll be something like M Jal May say we're going to have a committee meeting and we'll have a committee together policy committee to discuss and it could come in a later time or something like that after like you talk about it or among that's fine yeah no that's fine thank you for letting me know anyone else for a public comment just for clarification purposes for now organizing any field trips I know you have a policy but you said it's not due to funding are we to continue to follow to have if we make it creative Feld trick for our students that we take out the number of students that have free reduced lunch plus all the IEP students so I mean the formula that Mr lard uh sent to the entire staff is very similar to all other schools and what they use so I would recommend just the formula that Mr lard and notified the entire staff of continue to follow that formula so other parents will be paying for students that can't afford to go possibly but if there's any excess Surplus it gets rolled into the class account it follows them from year to year so the I I don't want to say too much and I know we can talk if you'd like to come in tomorrow we can talk further about it okay are is there in the future um when hopefully funding gets a little bit better is there any plan to put money back into each grade level's account so that we can avoid having to do this kind of formula and having other parents pay for other parents Mrs eer Right now we are going year by year on our funding and it's not a pretty picture and I last year during the board meetings regarding the finance committee and the budget let everyone know that we are continuing to struggle here at frur and that it may not get better so in the future if we have a windfall of money I would love to put money into every class bucket it's probably not the reality but we're not getting cut in any more next year I can't tell right we don't know the idea but as of the 2008 where that whole process that was all that's right but we don't know what we're getting we could get more or we could get less we could get nothing we've been told to expect flat funding what we got last year we got $29,000 more though last year than we were supposed to get fundly what was that 27,000 27,000 so unfortunately we don't know won't know those exact figures until the beginning of March right so it gives us two weeks to figure out a budget but it has to be voted on by March what is it 16th March we have to have it submitted by the 20th so we're going to plan for all different kinds of scenarios but the reality is we'll have two weeks to figure it out we know ex the numbers thank you sure I didn't sign the form but just have a quick question um why and doesn't have to be answered but why would children with IEPs not need to necessarily pay for their field trips because I understand the free and reduced lunch and the financial burden but I mean I work in special education there are plenty of families that have students with IEPs who are not um in a financial hardship that would be able to pay for their own children and I I pay my children's you know fair share of their field trips and things and they are getting very expensive but if I decide that my child has to sit out because the trip is gotten so expensive because I'm paying for other people's children then that's not right so I understand the free and reduced lunch but people with IEPs don't necessarily have a financial hardship fortunately it comes from the state yeah and the state also says if you read the next one three or whatever it says regardless whether they meet the the requirements for free and reduced lunch if they say they can't pay they can't pay and no child will be excluded so that's what the state has come down to say so and basically that's what we've done here for years and and the school has paid the difference right now we're saying okay now we're going to put it on the parents and that's where us as teachers are like and I got to be honest I feel like you know we're not going to do anything extra you know we'll do our camp M and we'll do what we can but I think a lot of teachers are scared like for example like to go to kindergarten always used to go to the library should be a free trip right it's right here but you got to hire the nurse you got to hire the bus and they're like forget it we're not going to charge a kid5 $10 to go to the library when they can go there free so unfortunately that's what's happening on the teacher end that a lot of teachers are feeling like I feel bad for parents having you know everything for them all right good me too okay um but yeah uh we we've actually uh been informed that not that we have had very minimal times where people could not afford right a class J that's why I'm afraid if you put them in that formula you're going to be way I that's how I do whatever I can explain the formula after oh I understand the for but I'm saying we've only had a few in each class that have ever had to use it so to take 15 kids now and subtract them from the cost and put them on the burden that was definitely not how I explained it in my message but I'll I'll explain it I'll I'll send out a clarification okay that'd be great the idea is not to drive up costs it was to help help figure out a formula on how to estimate the cost of field trips right but that that's what you're what you're saying is what we we have not ex okay let's talk about that later we're getting late can I make one quick comment on her request um what did you byy any chance go to Mrs for the special program that she does or the PTA for funding extra funding I'm on the Heth Foundation oh you're on the yeah and we we decided they came to us and we decided we're that that's not something we wanted to get involved with at this point because it could be endless the only only reason I asked the we're going to motion to close public comment thank you okay any other items are good to the order um yeah one thing um so I attended in person and Charlene intended online on October 1st the susex County School Board Association meeting um at Farm Balon Country Club uh the main focus they talked a lot about um Workshop which already just now happened and then the main meeting program was guiding principles and the board ring policy interestingly enough um so we learn and we're educated um from njsba abouty great also everyone it's getting to the end of the year and you have to complete your governances whether one two or three so just make sure that you did that um if you haven't go to the PTA um tricky try Sports PTA anything else no motion to adjourn motion [Music] second don't [Music] your here are