##VIDEO ID:rZfrpd4k0PM## e [Music] [Music] [Music] why why [Music] [Music] you e [Music] com [Music] [Music] [Music] your [Music] [Music] don't to wor [Music] I I [Music] [Music] and they want [Music] [Music] [Music] how are you [Music] [Music] talk [Music] [Music] [Music] all my brothers [Music] [Music] just [Music] [Music] all [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] okay yeah and my mom think [Music] [Music] [Music] look [Music] [Music] [Music] I was say be careful you'll be over right back [Music] [Music] [Music] needed just going to say [Music] [Music] yeah that's same [Music] [Music] [Music] tell I like it this way nice and chilly [Music] [Music] [Music] for e [Music] [Music] I call the meeting to order all right salute the flag i al to the flag of the United States of America this meeting is compliance with the open public meeting law and has been duly advertised in the newspaper as an official meeting roll call Ms Gardella Mr McCarron present Mrs barokas present Dr Osman Mrs Rivera Mrs Cass present Mr P present before I motion for approval of the agenda i' would like to uh update Finance number 11 with the amount of $12.5 million uh for this property I will go more into what this motion uh means when we go to standing committee reports for budget and finance I need a motion for approval of the agenda with theendum second discussion roll call Mrs Gardella yes Mr McCarron yes Mrs barokas yes Dr Osman yes Mrs Rivera yes Mrs Cass yes Mr triple Murray yes I now turn the meeting over to miss Peril for for her superintendent report thank you Mr palmary and good evening everyone uh welcome to the board meeting and I cannot believe that it is already November and we are talking about Thanksgiving coming up soon um it's incredibly how quick the school year does go um and many reasons why it goes quickly is because of all of the wonderful activities and happenings that happen in our school district on a daily basis and I consider myself very fortunate to be able to get out to see some of these things but tonight um we'll begin like we always do hearing about all the happenings at the high school level we look forward to these reports every uh board meeting night so from Liberty tonight I will call Katie to the podium first to talk about everything happening at Liberty High School good evening superintendent perelli Board of Education members and guests thank you for extending me this opportunity to speak on behalf of Jackson Liberty for those of you who don't know me I'm Katie urgle a senior at Jackson Liberty and I'm honored to share a little bit about what the students and staff have been up to this past month October seemed to fly by because of all the popular events that took place as mentioned at the last board event meeting student council in the classes had been dedicating their efforts to a widely anticipated Battle of the classes and homecoming since the start of school I'm happy to report that both events were huge successes it was a tight race but the class of 2025 took home the win in battle of the classes and there was a great turnout at homecoming it was nice to see so many Liberty and Memorial students enjoying the night we would like to give a huge thank you to our wonderful ptsn the dance would not have been possible without your help we're very lucky to have a hardworking and supportive group of parents October was also filled with many spirit days and events for week of respect violence awareness week and Red Ribbon Week another another highlight of last month was our fall pep rally it was a fun-filled afternoon that allowed us to highlight many Milestones accomplished by each team throughout the season as well as many of them luck in their completed postseason plays although fall Sports have since ended it was a month of recognition for many of our athletes senior Delany spov has signed her National letter of intent to run division one cross country as well as winter and spring track at Sienna College Michael kissir also announced his commitment to play baseball at georgean court University Riley Thorne and Jules Georgiana were named conference all division players for field hockey while deia Hassel received honorable mentions additionally Grace chulu was named all division player for volleyball in football Mason chorell Jason Justin utg Donovan Lou Jac and Aiden Kelly were named First Team all division for offense corek PS Derrik Matthews and Tucker binko were named first 10 First Team all division for defense coray Thomas James Dressler were named second Team all division for offense and Brennan Koger Justin Bray Justin selini Jack nishwitz was named for defense other people who have stood out this month are ban casai Zaden mustow Evans for being our seniors of the month additionally we would like to recognize Dory o' hallerin and Rocko Malon for being our October athletes of the month Mrs saves was recognized by the National Honor Society as their selected teacher to honor while miss Dominguez was named Liberty's Lion of the month speaking of Miss Dominguez as environmental Club adviser she organized an amazing experience for not only the organization but our school by planning a NASA Artemis Moon tree on our grounds NASA and the USDA Forest Service have partnered to send tree seeds and space on Artemis 1 this helps promote stem education and connects Artemis 1 programming to Educators and the youth Nationwide we are very excited for the newest addition to our already impressive campus jlhs doesn't look good just look good it does good as well with the upcoming holiday season many Liberty programs are looking to give back our Jackson Liberty band parents Association organized a very successful clothing drive this past Saturday if you missed it don't worry the boys wrestling team is also hosting one from now until the end of December they're they're accepting all donations of clothes and shoes within the school our National Honor Society is doing whatever they can to help make the school experience all that it can be they inducted the largest group in school history at the end of October with 39 new members they wasted no time getting to work right away they shared a cultural day with our MLL students that honored and celebrated Traditions around the world helping students gain their voices by sharing their p perspectives additionally National Honor Society is selling cookie Gams to help make people's days as sweet as possible the World Language Honor Society is using the same concept selling talkie Gams helping to Bright in a friends day as wonderful as those all are nothing has shined brighter than jtv's 7eventh annual home for the holidays it was a huge hit showcasing many amazing performances from our students it specifically highlighted senior Ryan Idol who did an amazing job hosting and Performing throughout the night they're not the only ones taking the stage our performing program is full in full swing the atlid players accompanied by the Liberty choir are spending countless hours predicting their upcoming show you're a Goodman Charlie Brown we look forward to packing the audience with for performances at 700 p.m. on December 5th 6th and 7th you don't want to miss it finally with all Brave military service members in the community our school went on out of their way to honor them on Veterans Day the interact Club was honored to have veteran Mr Luke Stango as their guest speaker to offer insight into his experience during the V N More additionally our school concert choir visited the local retirement community of Westlake on Veterans Day to reinforce that they are never forgotten we are so fortunate to live along among so many Heroes and it was a pleasure to honor them as you can see Liberty is in full swing of the opport and taking full advantage of the opportunities their clubs teams and classes have to offer the weather might be cooling down but things are just heating up around here I appreciate you for providing me with this platform and I can't wait to report back for next month thank you thank you Katie that was a great report full of just incredible happenings at Liberty High School so next to the podium I'd like to call Colin from Memorial High School good evening Mrs permil members of the central Administration staff and Board of Education members my name is Colin Williams and I the student council president at Jackson Memorial High School it's an honor to share here tonight the incredible events achievements and upcoming activities happening at jmhs as we celebrate the talents and dedication of our students and staff first I'm thrilled to announce that Jackson Memorial High School's drama club will present our allall play Mean Girls Jr performances will occur on Thursday November 21st and Friday November 22nd at 6:30 p.m. with a special special showing on Saturday November 23rd at 2 p.m. the cast and crew have worked tirelessly to bring this hilarious and heartfelt production to life we invite everyone to come out and support our talented students as they showcase their creativity and passion for theater yesterday our Powderpuff football game was an enormous success the event brought students together for an evening of a fun and friendly competition the Junior and senior girls gave it their all on their field with a score of 287 seniors while the boys took on the roles of coaches and cheerleaders adding to the excitement the energy was electric and the event showcased our incredible school spirit at jmhs proceeds from the event will be added to our class's individual funds to help them with prom and Junior formal on October 19th we celebrated homecoming with an unforgettable night of school spirit and Community Pride the evening kicked off by the a much anticipated homecoming football game on October 18th which was a win for the Jags congratulations to our team on their strong performance and to our homecoming Court who represented jmhs with Grace and enthusiasm the homecoming dance where students came together to celebrate making memories that will last a lifetime I would like to thank the ptsn for their tremendous support at the event we loved all the food and the Beautiful decorations this year I had the opportunity to attend the Liberty homecoming dance it was a great M atmosphere and I'm sure all the students had a great time I sure did the annual Battle of the classes also had an amazing turnout this year each grade participated in games and spirited competitions that filled the gym with enthusiasm and laughter congratulations to the seniors who took home the winning score but a big thank you goes out to all the students for their involvement in sportsmanship events like these truly highlight the competitive but friendly nature of students at jmhs on AC on an academic note the National Honor Society held its an annual inauguration last week welcoming a new class of outstanding Scholars leaders and volunteers the C ceremony celebrated their hard work and dedication to academics character leadership and service we are proud of these students and look forward to seeing the positive impact they will make on both our school and our community PSAT scores were recently released and it's been a great it's been great to see so many of my peers taking the time to review the results and plan their next steps as students these scores give us a clearer picture of where we're exceling and where we can approve as we prepare for the SAT and Beyond it's encouraging to hear from classmates who are using this as an opportunity to set academic goals and work towards them Additionally the intera club has seen tremendous participation this year students have been actively engaging in service projects and community outreach from organizing food drives to volunteer at local events the club makes a meaningful difference and inspires others to get involved as the fall Sports season officially ends I want to take a moment to congratulate all of our teams for their hard work and dedication the girls soccer team had an incredible one winning the Central Jersey group the central championship before a hardfought loss to Shaunie in the semi-finals of the state tournament their determination and teamwork were inspiring to all of us every fall sports team represented jmhs with pride and we are grateful to the memories they created this season we wish our athletes the best of luck as they prepare for the next year looking ahead we're excited to the start of winter sports wrestling basketball bowling ice hockey swimming and winter track are gearing up for what promised to be an exciting season triy outs and practices are soon to be underway and students are ready to give their best efforts on and off the field court ring or pool we look forward to cheering them on in the coming months thank you Mrs pry and the board of education for your continued support and for allowing me to highlight the amazing accomplishments and exciting plans at Jacks MOA high school we look forward to seeing you at our fall play Mean Girls Jr and at the many events that make J jmhs such a special place I'll be back next month with more updates and stories to share thank you thank you Colin for a very extensive report again highlighting the many things and opportunities events activities um academic recognitions of our students I just want to pause for a minute and thank um and let the students know just how proud We Are of them you know I had the opportunity to attend both both um National Honor Society induction ceremony amazing what our students do and I'm so proud of them and I know that they'll continue to do wonderful things and I want to say how proud I am of our staff who helped them to get there and thank our parents who also help them to get there uh just incredible opportunities for our kids um I also want to take a minute to thank our ptns pts our parent organizations who have supported so much of what you heard from both high schools uh homecoming um all sorts of the battle of the the classes events without our parents we couldn't do those things so I want to thank you all for your support of our students um and I also want to thank our Jackson Ed Foundation who has also on the agenda tonight put out some grants for our teachers and some of our teachers will be receiving some money to help them with some additional um things that they would like to do in their classroom so wonderful support system here of our parents our parent organizations the Jackson Education Foundation and our staff so thank you to all of you for making these wonderful opportunities for our students so in November we also held uh parent conferences for the elementary and middle school level and those concluded and we had a terrific turnout and parents got to hear about the progress of their students I want to thank again our teachers for holding those conferences um and helping our parents to better understand where their students are falling academically and uh socially emotionally we have quite a few other things that I'd like to point out uh the you'll see some of the slides behind me the board may want to turn around and see some of them just some of the other highlights that have been happening across the district again wonderful opportunities and um events for our students this year we have this opportunity of working with the big brothers and big sister program to allow some high school students who had to apply there was an application process for this to work with the mammoth Medical Center the southern campus where they're getting to go and we had our first visit this past month where they were able to go and meet with mentors within that hospital and learn learn about different job opportunities in the hospital and they got to Shadow them um for the day an incredible experience and that will continue throughout the year they'll have that opportunity um in November we celebrate Veterans Day and we had many opportunities across the district for our students to learn more about the importance of that holiday one of which was at gets you'll see there behind me a really meaningful activity that teachers Victoria cun and Vicky Hayes were in charge of and really honoring the opportunity for for our our students to participate and replicate um a plaque that actually or I should say a sign that actually um from 1943 was in place for Veterans Day here in Jackson and they had the opportunity to update it as well the students and did a replica of that you can see a picture of the replica behind me uh really an an opportunity for those students to learn uh the importance of what our veterans do um to help support us here in the United States also at gets uh during the Veterans Day ceremony we had the opportunity to see some of some vets and also the police uh Department took place in participating in that as well um so a really nice honoring of our vets and for our students to understand the meaning of that day also at McCulla you may know that they do an annual run for vets but it's so much more than just a run there's so many more conversations and lessons and projects that the students do all week long during the week of um during that that week the Veterans Day is celebrated you'll see there um many of the veterans that showed for that run for vets and the breakfast that they hold uh and the opportunity that students have to get to hear from those vets as well so some wonderful great opportunities those are just two they were happening in all of our schools to be able to recognize the importance with our students of that that special day uh you heard from both of our high school reps about the plays that are happening this month please get your tickets and come out and see them they are always fantastic I'm looking forward to see both our bands also have um you know just so proud of them and everything that they do and they and they accomplish and again with the support of the parent group behind that and our teachers the Jackson Liberty and Jackson Memorial bands represented the district super well here at the Robinsville High School band competition took two uh top spots overall for our both of our high schools and we just love seeing them work together and being at the same competition together was wonderful for the district and and also our our high school reps mentioned are um very talented athletes who have committed to colleges and have had a signing day this past week uh you'll see some of those those names that were mentioned in the high school reps report uh congratulations to all of them that's a huge commitment to your uh it's tough to be a top athlete and an academic scholar at the same time so congratulations to all of them we're really proud of them and we look forward to to following them and seeing how they progress in their college experience and finally I um also wanted to just mention that many of these things are posted on our Facebook page report so please follow us there and you'll see some of the other wonderful things that uh we Post in regards to the great opportunities our students have within the district um I'm going to conclude my report this evening with an update on our strategic redistricting and restructuring planning committee work um in each meeting November and December before we get to the recommendation to the board I'll be reporting out the progress of the meetings the committee work so I'm going to go to the podium for this and there are some slides to uh to view for the board a just don't spill any water on it so as we can you hear me okay okay can you hear me yes okay good so uh as you all are aware and I would hope our community is aware at this point we have entered into um strategic redistricting and restructuring planning we're um calling that the srrp committee for um in order to be short and not have to continually restate those those three words over and over again so tonight I'll be sharing information about the progress of that committee the committee is made up of 42 people that is inclusive of parents teachers administrators and board members we have had three meetings so far uh since the onset of the committee so beginning tonight I wanted to point out that when we first began planning for strategic planning and doing our research in the district um um we knew we needed to move forward and we needed to make some changes here for several reasons that we'll talk about tonight but through my research I came across this slide from the school boards New Jersey school boards this slide is used in New Jersey school boards to determine if a school district should be entering into strategic planning they ask these questions and if these question the answers thank you the qu the answers to these questions are yes you should be looking to do strategic planning so I found that this side was very validating that we were moving in the right direction uh and knowing that we needed to do some strategic planning here in Jackson as you can see is the school enrollment changing yes it is is the makeup of your school population changing yes are there more people in your community who don't have children in school yes and would you benefit from a road mapap for the district's future so yes we could say yes to all of those so again this was uh validating that we were entering into strategic planning um you know as we should because of these things that are changing in the district so why strategic planning for Jackson um we I had presented in earlier in the year about some of our goals and knowing that we needed to take upon strategic planning as a major goal in the district we have really smart people here creative and talented people and for the last seven years we have worked hard to problem solve and be able to continue to keep strong programs um academic opportunities co-curricular for our students but we have really now hit that fiscal cliff where it's going to be extremely difficult to not affect our students and we have seen that in this fiscal budget year so obviously number one reason is financial challenges we need with reduced uh state aid coming to us from the last seven years and the rate of inflation that we've been dealing with so we also know that the challeng is to keep these strong programs due to financial reasons is difficult and we are committed to keep keeping strong programs here we have changes in our student population for several reasons some of those things are academic some of those are mental health and some of those have to do with um different groups of people who have different needs within our district we have aging facilities as you can imagine we've postponed many big projects due to our budget restraints and the the reduction of of state aid coming in the last that came at us at the last seven years so our facilities have have some needs as well we had as we well know from this year in this fall outdated trailers and trailers that needed to be disposed of and we needed to get students back into classrooms within our buildings so that was a big challenge that we knew we needed to face our class sizes needed to be more Equitable across our district and we have seen a uh decrease in enrollment in the last uh several years so these reasons stood out for us that we definitely needed to enter in to strategic planning and making change in the district so pulling this committee together we started um our first meeting looking at this goal and setting this goal for the committee as you can see we set the goal to be to assist the administration in making recommendations to the Board of Education how to best provide as strong Equitable and sustainable opportunities for our students within the limitation of our financial challenges so that we could be sustainable financially we want to we wanted to establish clear priorities to move the district forward and expect to make key decisions on how to address class size inequalities among our grade levels and across our schools ensure all students have access to the same academic and extracurricular opportunities as there other as other classmates and peers and obviously Rectify serious facility needs that impact student learning so we all agreed that this was our goal for our strategic planning committee and from the onset we were committed to this goal in fact this goal sits on our tables each meeting as a reminder and we revisit it often as we work through strategic planning the purpose of the committee we went over as well and the role of the committee in our first meeting uh our role to review data and other information that's presented identify priorities provide perspective input and insight and to act as a think tank to address the challenges and to help the administration uh make that recommendation to the board to address the challenges faced by the district everybody was in agreement that these were this was our goal our role and our purpose so as I mentioned we had three meetings thus far and you can see the agenda that was set for these three meetings here we have reviewed a lot of data we've looked at enrollment we have looked at the uh report from The Architects of our facility assessment we looked at the survey results of the survey we sent out to our staff and our parents we looked at trends of the survey and we've just started to enter into looking at grade span models and analyzing those models so you can see there we'll begin to um from this point forward begin to look at those models a little further but these were the three meetings and I just want to pause here and make it very clear there have been no decisions this is all still in the review process of looking at data and information and in that progress of analyzing information that was presented one of those things that I just mentioned was the analysis from our architect as I mentioned just a few moments ago our facilities are we have some facility needs um and so with that the architect came in and shared information with the committee about the analysis of our buildings that we did this past spring um we do have some debt that is rolling off um in June on June 30th in 2027 it does seem like that's still far away but we still need to keep that in mind as we work through this process because through a uh possible referendum we could help to address some of the big facility needs that we may have in regards to updating our facilities so this was all shared with that committee um the condition of our facilities and what's important for the strategic planning committee is not to make any decisions about a referendum but to make decisions about what's important in our facility ities to make sure that we have strong facilities for our students so there is some overlap here in talking about our facilities and a possible referendum um in the committee work that we are doing these were some of the things to consider when we talked about our facilities again aging facilities projects that have been postponed um for example our bathroom conditions um I would think that many of our students would say the same thing we need to update the bathrooms uh there's a lot of needs that have stand you know stand out that we really need to address some buildings have some serious needs that may not even be able to be addressed due to our financial restraints so again that's why you might look at a referendum to do those things aside from safety issues addressed in our facility there has been um you know no priority list yet towards what are the things that we need to make sure we address but we are working through the process and strategic planning and some things may come out organically that we should consider for a referendum so they sort of have to work a little bit in conjunction but again um we're making no decisions about a referendum right now it's how does it align with our facility needs and how could we perhaps update our facilities there you see uh just some a bullet or two about um the financial obligations so with a referendum just so that everybody understands that there is when the the debt rolls off the books there is no um Financial um increase to our taxpayer for that um in fact in some cases you can actually give a little bit of tax relief if you choose to so the next thing that I mentioned was the survey results that we did go over with the committee I want to take a few minutes here just to inform the public of some of those survey results um it was real important for us to put a survey out to gather perspective perspective um we knew that this survey was about people's perspectives what their thoughts were what our staff's thoughts were what our parents thoughts were and what their perspectives were on how um the questions that we asked what was their feedback from their perspective we didn't expect to have complete factual data but we expected to understand where people thought things were in need to be addressed within the district so we did have a really strong response rate I was happy to see 981 respon responses and the survey results are just one piece of information that we consider as we move forward with strategic planning but is of course an important piece so um we'll just I'll just take you through a couple of those slides tonight so the condition of our district facilities good and excellent came out pretty strong here for most people with you know about 20% Fair considering Fair conditions our facility but again looking at that we're happy to see that but again that's going to be from each individual's perspective of right of what they know about their own facilities whether they work in that facility or their children attend that facility but again I do think that this is still important information to see that most of our the people who responded feel that our our facilities are you know are pretty strong we did break that down a little bit and ask for um people to rate excellent good and fair for some specific areas in our facilities and you'll see here here again most of the things came out excellent and good and fair you know when you look at poor it's pretty small that green bar is pretty small for most of those things I mean you can see in the grounds maybe we need to be looking a little further at what our grounds look like like investing some attention there and when you uh look at this next slide you can see that orange fair and that green pore popping up a little bit more in some of these areas around athletic fields restrooms and Furniture so that was important trends for us to note again as we move forward with strategic planning and how we address our facilities uh eventually down the road as well you can see here on the next slide that the again pretty decent results the green is pretty low uh maybe cafeteria we need to look at a little bit further in some of our cafeteria areas but again from a you know a big picture view these are some areas that we need to make sure that we're taking into consideration as we move forward as far as safety goes um and security I was happy to see that uh large population um agree that and feel comfortable with our security approaches and feel safe um but I do want to note here too that's excellent and we're happy to hear that but we never stop working on that we can never do enough so we continue to always try to make improvements in that area but I'm happy to hear that you know that these results were pretty strong looking at this next Slide the class size question on whether um at each level um families or staff felt that the class size was appropriate or too large or too small um you can see here that at the secondary level the middle in the high school majority of the folks who responded to the survey felt that the class sizes were appropriate um and then at the elementary just a little bit more than half felt that they were too large so um it's nice to hear and see people perspectives on this ideally obviously we'd always love to have low class sizes um but it is it is helpful inform information for us as we move forward this was a question in which we asked you to um the people who responded to prioritize um how we should be looking to spend funds in the district um in relationship to our facilities um and other things so you'll see here that the top three we listed on these slides the blue is number one the red is number two and orange is number three so obviously you can see Equitable class size is number one here um that the majority of the folks who responded would like to see us addressing the Equitable class size through this strategic planning we don't disagree absolutely um and then you look next at the next ones that are you know school buildings addressing school buildings addressing our classrooms our restrooms our media centers again um so again this information is helpful for the strategic planning committee as we move forward when we get to a place of making decisions the next slide was very validating um because we asked people what what is the most important outcome you would like to see out of strategic planning and this was a check all that apply question so you could have checked everything that you would want there and you can see the three major areas that pressed out as the top three um Equitable class size throughout the district maintaining programs and academic offerings and creating a district that is financially stable and I'll even go to number four which we didn't read off but maintaining and expanding extracurriculars and all four of those things definitely align with what the goals were for strategic planning so it really did validate the importance of the work we were doing and what we wanted to address through strategic planning this question um I think is it's a good question but we may be needed to work a little bit on the wording of it again people are responding based on what they know about their own schools uh so this was really again what's Equitable in the middle schools and what's Equitable in the high schools and pretty much you have that standard bell-shaped curve um most people agree that things are Equitable but again you're only understanding what you know within your own buildings um I will just pause here for a minute because sometimes I hear from people who will say there's you know there's not Equitable programs across the two high schools or the two middle schools and um I just want to be clear that always do we put out Equitable programs it's about who signs up who registers for those things that um whether we can run them or not or not you know we're in a financial situation that we can no longer run classes with five students we can no longer Run Sports with a small amount of students so that's where you end up getting an imbalance and an inequitable opportunity um that it appears to look like an inequitable opportunity so I just wanted to comment about that okay so moving on we also allowed for open-ended questions uh uh question about what are your biggest concerns about entering into strategic planning and so you'll see this is very um you know a lot of information to look at but what we did was we categorized all of the responses that we got and we got many of them and you can see here what pushed out as the top three biggest concerns was the bus ride distance staying with friends Mental Health and Social concerns and I would group those two together because as we read through all the comments many of the comments were about uh students being able to stay together for their social emotional needs and not separating Stu grade level students out from one another and that happens when you redraw lines and sending areas for schools is when you end up separating grade level um students from one another so what that message is saying there is they want grade level students to stay together they want students to stay together with their friends um and they they overlapped number two and three that red and that yellow with those kinds of things and then there was concerns for mental health in any transitions that might happen for students so any change that might happen for students that was a concern for the people who responded that we make sure we support them well and of course obviously we would absolutely do that the um the fourth area that that that pushes out there is the class size that's the green um again circling back to what I just said earlier with some of the results uh Equitable class size stood out again and making sure that it was um it was Equitable across the district and the grade levels so at uh the last meeting meeting with strategic planning we entered into some more information in each meeting we just kept talking and adding more variables and more information um to look at and to review as we move forward and so at this last meeting uh Mr stto presented and talked about how the how the transportation department operates what are just so that people could understand more about transportation and also understand some of the challenges that we have with Transportation so we have a fleet of 100 uh large bus 54 passenger buses and we have 45 uh Vans which is actually down from um just 5 years ago we had we had more we'll talk about that in a minute um it we spent some time or Mr soda spent some time talking about due to the size of the town you know 100 square miles that's we the third largest uh district and town in the state of New Jersey so it's it's it's vast and that does create challenges um for transportation especially the distance and where the schools are located as well becomes a challenge um so we went over some of that and also explained the importance of of needing to do a tiered system in order to make it all work and so he shared with the group what we currently have in a tiered system because sometimes people just think oh you know this is just one tier or this is all that exists at that tier you know just for example the first tier for the high school is not just our high school students getting bused to school but it's also all of our students who have to get bused to mates OCC for performance art academy our votch students that get bust um in the morning to the am programs there's a lot of layers that happen there just for the morning and then that also follows up in the afternoon uh tier two as you see is the middle school but also on there is switlick preschool Annex uh PM mates we have to get the kids home from p on that tier from those schools and also our High School athletic runs have to happen at that second tier that's a lot of Transportation happening uh tier three is the elementary schools and as you know two years ago we put them all in the same time so they're all uh running at that same time period in tier three also during the day we have other Transportation runs happening midday for votch uh students that are going midday to votch work study we have special education students who go out for work study programs and and then we also have our after school and Grant funded and subscription buson happening so it's a big operation and so it was important that the um committee understand that because we also have to work within the restraints any decision we make with Transportation so uh they do aim for uh routes no longer than 50 minutes in many cases we are well under that but again with a town that's 100 square miles it's a bit of a challenge um and then he also explained that in addition to our own um desire for efficient transportation we are held to efficiency rates um from the state of New Jersey and it is tied to our funding we're supposed to be um utilizing 90% of our total number of seats available on daily runs and we get rated and we get funded accordingly so it's important that we are efficient and using our transportation to its fullest capacity so also understanding Transportation challenges uh it was shared with the committee as I can imagine everybody in this room understands that you can make the best plan on a computer for a route but trans but the traffic has a a a big piece of that that does not get necessarily figured into a computer um program so and as you know the traffic uh has continued to get a little bit more congested here in town over the last few years we've also added a preschool program and we bus um a large number of preschool students and it's required by law to have preschool a needs on those buses so that's another challenge for us um and so back to my point about our buses and our Fleet for the last few years we've had to limit our bus replacement we're on a cycle for bus replacement we've had to shrink the number of buses that we buy in each of the cycles due to the fact of not only our budget restraints here but also the inflation and the cost of buses now you can see there um it went from $105,000 to $165,000 a bus so now we have limited the number of buses we decrease that cycle by several buses each cycle so that's again a continued Challenge and then um as you well know we've mentioned before the the size of the town and the challenge of our preschool students being added to that you can't have preschool students on the bus for long periods of time so the committee got to hear more about Transportation we'll continue to talk about that as we work through um the models and the analysis of grade span models and that is where the committee has left off they're reviewing um multiple models of grade spans and taking into consideration the many things that they have been presented and also taking into consideration the priorities that the committee is also looking at and so it's a big undertaking uh could I have the next slide please um they're looking at a various different models and there's a lot of work to be done here and again want to reiterate what I said ear earlier there have been no decisions made we're still in the review and Analysis process um we will be updating again at the public board meeting at the December meeting we still have several other meetings um that are yet to come in which we will be making um making our way again through those models could I have the next slide please um in which we will be looking at some of these priorities here as we go through each of those models to determine what would be the best recommend Commendation and I just want to point out here these are just some of the things and the factors that we'll go into looking at all of those models and analyzing them um so I won't read them to you but I'll let you take a look at them but as you can imagine a lot of the priorities I've already mentioned are part of that so we have several other more meetings November and December we have four more meetings and uh we'll update at the December board meeting we'll do come together one more time the committee will come together one more time early uh January with the goal to present a recommendation to the board of education at the January 22nd board meeting it's really important that we look to make that decision by January um we've set that timeline knowing The Angst um and the concern that everybody has about change that's going to be coming um please know that this committee I'm so impressed with them it is really everybody knows that change has to come but is really being thoughtful really looking deep asking good questions all in the best interest of our students and being able to sustain this District to do go on for multiple multiple decades being as strong as it is and we were committed to that and I know the committee is is just working so hard and I appreciate all their time it's a lot of long hours after work um and I know that they'll continue to do great work so more to come at the December meeting when I'll have an update on four more meetings are there any questions from the board can't hear her mic's not is not working I can hear you so I can repeat the question okay okay this one's working um I just had a question do you feel that the district at any point is going to reach out to the township regarding some of the traffic concerns moving forward I feel like that's like such a big deal regardless of whatever is the determining um factor that comes out of the committee and the board in January like I feel like that should probably get going do you think that will be in advance you know what I'm saying like I'm just thinking there's certain like I went to visit facilities in September and I couldn't make a left into one of the facilities for at least 10 minutes you know and I just feel like so we do stay in constant contact with the township about traffic issues I know Mr binsky has um been in communication along with Mr SoDo to um the traffic safety officer about some of our concerns that we currently have one in which you just mentioned um and they're working with us to make recommendations so we stay in constant communication with them but certainly as we move forward in the process we will will keep them informed of our concerns for certain areas thank you sure yes you be able working okay sorry um I know a couple of people have asked me maybe you could just let everyone know how did you pick the people who are on this committee so we we put out several um opportunities for our administrators to let us know if they were interested um and then we picked people by level for the administrative team and then we asked for suggestions of multiple people who might want to participate had the availability and time we asked them to share with parents um in their school of the availability do they have the availability to participate and they were selected that way and the same with our staff have any other questions um just for people who are wondering like I guess I'm piggybacking on um Erica's question um as we go into our December board meeting you share more about what the committee is discussing will people have the opportunity to hear it digest it and also be able to comment at our Forum here yes up on the screen there I have I have that information we always have public comments that's the purpose of us reporting out um giving the public the opportunity to review hear and come forward with questions this meeting at the December meeting and I I have said before in the past we appreciate hearing from anybody if there's something that somebody has for information purposes sharing they certainly can reach out they can send an email they can give my office a call um you know we'd love to have everybody who's interested in the committee but when you make a committee larger than what we've got it really can't move um quick enough in the direction that we not in the direction but they need to move by January and so it's hard when you have very very large groups to do that the survey was a way of providing input but we certainly will take any other input that any Community member has and take it into consideration um absolutely thank you everyone I'm going to go back to my seat to finalize thank you maybe can you hear me yep so the very last thing I just want to say is I wish everybody a very happy and safe Thanksgiving and appreciate everybody's interest concern and input on some very difficult decisions we have to make but I know will be good decisions for our students thank you I turn it back to you Mr promary thank you Miss prilly at this time we will have our standing committee's report buildings and grounds chairperson Mr McCarron yes we met on November 4th persons in attendance were uh Mr Riva Mrs Cass myself superintendent permil assistant superintendent rante and Mr Bruno uh we heard from dco energy regarding potential solar carport ideas and future energy related grant opportunities we received an update on districtwide projects um some of those projects are gets installed a new electromagnetic flow meter for Lift Station Mcall if repair to Major leak in the guest restroom of the main office Memorial Fieldhouse install the hand handicap railing Memorial d-wing installed two new compressors in the carrier HVAC unit Memorial power wash the baseball dugouts Home and Away bleachers Crawford Rodriguez installed three new light fixtures in the cafeteria Johnson upgraded the burglary system Elementary School playground projects are completed um homman Elementary School Jim HVAC project tentatively start dat for November 26 uh we also got an update on the status of Master planning with the architex and our next meeting is scheduled for December 2nd at 5:00 pm thank you Mr McCarron uh next is budget and finance which I am the chairperson we met on November 18th it was myself um Miss Cass and Mr McCarron and we did a preliminary 25 uh 25 26 budget uh analysis for our district however the state of New Jersey has not provided us any funding numbers so it was just us projecting of what it could be uh more to come on that as we get closer and we get some solid uh budget numbers from the state so we can move forward with our our own budget so we're hopeful and then uh to to just touch on when when I moved Finance 11 to $12.5 million uh and what that means so as you all know um roseen hour was put out to bid even though the board unanimously voted to not sell it it did get pushed through by the state and it had to go out to bid we did receive one bid for Rosen hour and it was for $9.1 million however we did have professionals come out and assess the property and the indicated value value for roseen hour is $12.5 million so with that the uh board has rejected that bid we uh we have budget concerns in our district and this amount to 12.5 is going to be the minimal that we will accept for a bid we will be putting it out to bid a second time and uh I just want to be clear with this motion and movement that 12.5 will be the minimal bid that we will entertain so that is why we um approved that on our our agenda other than that I don't have anything additional for budget and finance we will move to uh scholarship chairperson just stepped away so let's come back to her advocacy committee uh chairperson Miss Gardella good evening um the advocacy committee has met met you know we meet a lot um not necessarily just the group of us but with legislators throughout the state so we met on October 25th um Miss barois and myself had a virtual meeting with assembly men star's Chief of Staff his name was Michael NOS um you know I could go through this I'll go through as quick as I can because I feel like we spent a lot of time on things tonight um we talked about the historical impacts from S2 funding uh as it relates to our district those are things that I'm sure many people are aware of such as mandatory categorical Aid the pandemic inflation tax caps advances in state aid closing a building our state monitor now we're talking about redistricting in an effort to continue to provide students with an excellent education and be financially sustainable without any state aid increases which is what we're expecting since S2 has not been revised at this time um we highlighted that without any of these funding increases here at Jackson we continue to have high rates of high school graduates which is not true for all districts throughout the state who receive above adequacy state aid funding we reviewed the premise of local fair share the impact of price uh real estate price increases in housing sales on the S2 narrative this is not only a Jackson issue because sale prices throughout the state of New Jersey are increasing um we supported and informed the chief of staff of assembly men zi's idea of um State funding to adequacy which is something we reported out last month um and talk talking about you know if the state funds A District any District in the state to adequacy then the local fair share will just make that District awesome you know adequate is not meaning that it's an awesome place to uh you know be living financially um you know we always urge support of bipartisan bills that will address the lack of funding going to many school districts um and really you know you talk to people who in the legislative area that are familiar with education and they all know it's going to get worse come 25 26 not just for Jackson for many districts throughout the state um and then we also met with um Senator Henry on uh November 13th um with Miss permil additionally and we basically talked about um all of those same items uh along with the bill that the senator presented to us it's um I forget the exact number but I'm going to talk about the same exact Bill coming through the assembly in my next paragraph um and you know one thing we've reiterated with him is it's 190 districts or something something like that um that have been impacted you know all of those districts are not financially mismanaging money including ours um and then on November 15th we had a virtual teleconference with Alex zi it was um Allison Tara and myself and his chief of staff and we talked about this bill that he's putting forward in legislation it's a541 and it's providing funding back for students where um the per pupil spending was less than $199,000 per student which obviously Jackson's qualifying for that and where um they were functioning below fiscal adequacy by the Department of Education and where they were allocated less money from one year of 2023 to 2024 to 2025 2425 um anyway uh it actually impacts like 190 school districts so we're not standing alone and um it may give a smaller lump sum uh he actually talked to us said give Jackson like $1.8 million um should we qualify and it would not necessarily have to be designated to one particular thing like you know I think we got money that was a facility grant that had to go to a building like this is anything that the district determines would improve their um school district and I just wanted to highlight I didn't my my prints are cut off so I'm going to read from my phone I apologize but it's going to actually imp um all areas from urban districts like East Orange Jersey City pic to Hillsboro freeh hole Regional Oldbridge Jackson Toms River brick Eve sham and even districts that are more rural like lenpy and Chesterfield along with many other so actually in the last sentence here it's talking about 290 school districts um so you know I say because I'm a proponent of being noisy that you know anybody in the audience who wants to start to use that information to feel F letters to the go to the Department of Education and our local legislators you should start doing it now because like jeppie said we don't know what our school funding is going to look like but yet we're talking about it um any questions that was a lot you're welcome yes thank you and thank the committee for your dedication and advocacy um enrollment study committee chairperson Mr McCarron it was uh reported out but I just wanted to thank everybody who volunteers their time for this uh committee it's uh been a great committee seeing it work together and uh obviously uh I'm excited to see where our district goes thank you thank you I need a motion for approval of the minutes the close session meeting October 16 2024 the official board meeting October 16 2024 business meeting second discussion roll call M cordella yes Mr McCarron yes M barokas yes Dr Osman yes Mrs Rivera yes Mrs Cass yes Mr pmer yes I need a motion for approval of the bill list second discussion roll call Mrs gella yes Mr McCarron yes Mrs barokas yes Dr Osman yes Mrs Rivera yes Mrs Cass yes Mr Tri p yes I need a motion for approval of the treasurers and board secretar reports second discussion roll call Mrs Gardella yes Mr McCarron yes Mrs baroas yes Dr Osman yes Mrs Rivera yes Mrs Cass yes Mr P yes I need a motion to open the public forum on agenda items only we will hold another public forum during this meeting for other questions so anything in regards to the strategic planning will be on the second public forum this public forum will be for questions on agenda items only second please sign in and state your name and whether or not you are a Jackson resident each person is allowed a maximum of three minutes to speak no person may speak more than once on the topic until all others have been heard okay seeing no one come forward and a motion to close public forum all in favor motion to move Finance second discussion roll call Mrs Gardella yes Mr McCarron yes Mrs barokas Dr osbin Mrs Rivera Mrs Cass yes Mr P yes I need a motion to move facilities second discussion roll call M Gardella yes Mr McCaron yes Mrs baroas yes Dr osbin yes Mrs Rivera yes Mrs Cass yes Mr P yes I need a motion to move programs motion second discussion roll call Mrs Cardella yes Mr McCarron yes Mrs barokas yes Dr Osman yes Mrs Rivera yes Mrs Cass yes Mr triple Murray yes I need a motion to move students second discussion roll call Mrs Gardella yes Mr McCarron yes Mrs baroas yes Dr Osman yes Mrs Rivera yes Mrs Cass yes Mr P yes I need a motion to moove personnel second discussion roll call Mrs Gardella number yes Mr McCarron yes Mrs barokas yes Dr Osman yes M Rivera Mrs Cass yes Mr P yes I need a motion to open public forum on any topic pertaining to the Board of Education motion please sign in and state your name and whether or not you are a Jackson resident each person is allowed a maximum of three minutes to speak no person may speak more than once on the topic until all others have been heard hello thank you very much no yeah okay for the presentation I greatly appreciated the slides and all the information good okay so thank you again um I just do have a few questions um the slide mentioned that we do have decreases in 12 but it did not mention preschool I am curious what those numbers are because it does seem like we're still expanding the preschool so that doesn't really jive with me um why that doesn't then flow over to K 12 so I'd like that explained please uh also one of the slides said that the debt uh doesn't really end until 2027 do we still then have to have the state monitor for that length of time and if so how does her decision making impact anything going forward uh particularly the sale of the school can the state step in and say well no you do have to accept a lower bid um the traffic situation that was brought up I also and I think it tied in with your asking about the correlation with the township uh roots and everything are one thing but I live on a particularly dangerous street because it is a straight away and people have their heads down on their phone whizzing to get to 195 so I would like that the Transportation uh aspects are really considering what these streets are like not just mileage um also you're referring to the committee examining different models I would have appreciated a slide or two relay what these models are we all know rumors are circulating through the town but some of the transparency I think would be to let us know what are these models um and then the timeline for change so you're mentioning January being you know okay here's our decision but I related to you last month the town that I grew up in it took two years to come to the formulation of uh they ended up consolidating the middle schools and the high schools so I'm wondering how this is all driving in three months and what is the time frame come January for the roll out so maybe the decisions being made by January are we looking at changes come September or are we looking at a 2year workout to pull it off and I think those are all my questions and thank you all very very much for your efforts thanks thank you you um M pery would you like to touch on some of those questions would you like Mr binsky to answer to De or I'll start and then um I'll ask Mr binsky to join in so I just want to make sure I captured everything the enrollment numbers Miss McKinley that you asked um you know I don't have them in front of me but I can say to you uh we've lost about 350 something students from last year to this year and that's mostly in the uh number of students graduating being higher than the number of students coming in um and so you see the decreases happening at the younger grades we're maintaining pretty much students that we have uh in District for the most part it's the incoming students where we see those decreases we do have some movements out as well but um yes we are still expanding preschool there's something in the preschool um state aid requirements that's called me meeting your Universal preschool number and the universal preschool number gets calculated um you know with different numbers by looking at your first grade population um and and taking a look at that first grade population and considering that like your Universal number we're we will continue to expand um probably by a few more classes for the next two years keep in mind those classes have about 15 students in them because that's the requirement you can only go to 15 in each preschool classroom and so we're going to probably meet that Universal within a year or two so again we see even just this a little bit of a Slowdown there um with our preschool enrollments as well so I hope that that answers it to you know in general terms um and perhaps at the next meeting I can go a little bit more specifically in some of those enrollment numbers for everybody U I'm going to turn it over to to Mr vinsky about the debt it is different debt that we're talking about here so do you want to explain that a little bit so it's a it's a long-term debt it's debt related to the referendum that was passed 17 years ago when we um we built schools in Jackson so that that debt is coming off the books in two 2027 and that's what we're talking about and that is a a debt payment that is made annually it's about close to $7 million and that contributes to the tax rate uh and it is it's been on the books for 17 years and it's coming off and that's what uh we're talking about I appreciate the question because I I I should have been a little bit more clear perhaps in the presentation about the type of debt we were talking about um in regards to traffic uh safety and situations absolutely those are things that we have to take into consideration they're not easy to be able to figure out all the time but we certainly do need to take those things into consideration the traffic and the the safety of those routes uh not just calculating into a computer and getting a number um in regards to years to come to us to strategic planning solution you're right when you look at historically strategic planning in many districts who have the luxury to do it over time um absolutely we unfortunately do not have the luxury for that we are in a financial situation uh that we need to be able to sustain this district and we also need to be able to offer our students Equitable strong enriching programs curriculum and co-curriculars so this process is expedited and we are looking to make a decision early enough so that we have warning to us to everybody about the plan for September um the recommendation will be for change for September okay um in regards to the models uh we'll absolutely take into consideration what you just asked and what people applauded and um look to to present the models perhaps at the next meeting so that everybody can be clear okay thank you good evening uh my name is Andrea frangela I currently have two children in mccul and in Liberty so I just had a few questions pertaining to the re structuring redistricting um I understand no decisions have been made I understand no models have been presented if I may comment on what everybody is here to hear or to mention in the model the from what we're understanding the high schools will be combining not decided but that's what we're going on so I just have a few things to say about that um we are two sides we are a liberty side and a memorial side and if we want to become one school we need to become one school we can't be a memorial or a liberty we need to just be a Jackson High School um for everyone I think it's hard for some to go one way or the other personally I don't care what our name is I don't care what um my child wears but I think there's a lot of people that do um I just want them to have the best opportunity they can in the building that they're in and with that being said um my opinion you know Liberty is an 18-year- old building memorial is a 60 plus year old building I think the facilities and the grounds and what they have available at liberty for me I'd rather have my high schooler there than my middle schooler there um and I won't go any further than with that being said the last thing I want to ask is you say that you're going to present to the board in January the decision that being made what if the board denies that decision what happens next thank you so to your first point um we need to unite right if if that's the decision we absolutely need to unite that's what's in the best interest of our students and for this District um the second part I'm sorry sorry just escaped me what what if the board do oh what if the board thank you um I didn't write that one down so thank you what if the board doesn't P um approve the recommendation we would need to go back to work and come up with another recommendation um and then come back to the board um we'd ask for input from the board obviously on what they would prefer to see and take that into consideration in the strategic planning committee and see if we could come up with another recommendation thank you and also Mr there are three board members currently on that committee with you already so it's one away from a majority right so that go that they would have input in this entire process any additional questions or comments can you just explain people ask this could you just explain because people do ask me this all the time why like certain boards were not the whole board's not there like on this committee we're not all there which is true um do you want to just kind of explain why we can't all be there sure uh so by law we're not allowed to have a quorum of the board together for um for any meetings that we have so that's four board members we cannot have four board members uh because well I'll let you explain that a little bit Mr zider but by law we're not allowed to have that because we they can't make decisions on behalf of a full board and by having four you your making a decision on behalf of a whole board so um we can have three board members on any kind of committee that we have such as strategic planning Mr Zid would you add anything to that that's correct so if we have four people together that are board members that's considered a board meeting that has to be ad advertised it's got to comply with the open public meetings act it's got to have minutes agenda public participation there's a lot of additional constraints that are placed on the board that's why boards operate by committee that make recommendations back to the full board for its consideration and vote good evening my name is Monica hiter and I have three sons that attend um Liberty High School and mcalli Middle School and I'm concerned about the stakeholders ability to be heard by the uh committee directly a committee we were not offered to be a part of can you tell us how to get our concern for our children actually in front of the committee and not just here so that we know that our comments and our concerns are not just sitting in someone's inbox but actually um being read at the actual meetings so I just want to be clear by the committee basically so are you asking how would somebody who would send input to you know perhaps myself or a board member how is that being translated to the committee correct I'm asking if you can ensure that the actual concern will be presented as it's written so that we can have an active role because at the December meeting it's going to be too late we can comment at the December meeting but the process is happening now yes so in order to be proactive and get our concerns in front of the committee that we were not offered to be a part of and there are people who would like to have been a part of that and KN the process and instead we're finding out after the fact so we're not able to be proactive because we're not on the committee and that's a problem and I'm also concerned is it equal is there equal representation of every part of the community every school every grade level special education students in the special programs students who have children in sports we don't know that information so we don't know that the people that are making the decisions are truly representing what we want to be said and heard and considered okay so I'm asking you how we can go about doing that now before the decisions are made and it's too late okay thank you for clarifying so any information that was forwarded to us to a board member to myself or another administrator we would absolutely read that information the way it's written to the committee okay um and perhaps again I we can share out we do board updates so in our board update of this evening's meeting uh when Miss irman puts that out districtwide we'll put the makeup of the committee in that as well so that you can see that there is representation of those things that you you just asked um really not trying to do anything uh not transparent here so I appreciate the questions we certainly will answer anything um and provide information that people are looking for we have all the same goal here to try and do what's in the best interest of our of our students so thank you any other questions comments seeing no one come forward I need a motion to close public forum all in favor I at this time we'll go to board comments starting with Mr McCarron thank you everyone for coming out to tonight's uh meeting and I just wanted to wish everybody a Happy Thanksgiving thank you thank you for coming out continue to come and stay informed it's an important time I wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving thank you I also wanted to thank a lot of our staff members who are volunteering their time from for our students our budget constraints and also our um hosting new teachers I saw that we had multiple student teacher thoughts on our agenda and obviously talk about the state level teacher shortage so that's great um you know I think it's great to see so many faces in the audience it makes us really excited that some of the same things that we're working towards you guys recognize you want to be a part of and you know all all comments public are very much appreciated at my so thank you very much foration have a great night uh hi everyone um first of all I wanted to congratulate the Jackson Memorial High School girls soccer team for um basically getting to the central group three um award they I it was an amazing game I've never seen anything like it I was really moved by it I don't know if many of you were there but um our girls really played their heart out they uh came together as a team um and they didn't start that way where they were doing so well so uh after 14 years the last time they hit this was in 2010 so congratulations to you girls um I also want to congratulate all of our student athletes who signed their National letters of intent it's a really exciting time for everyone and I'm looking forward to seeing more student athletes you know throughout the year sign their National letters of intent so and as Megan said it's really nice to see some familiar faces in the audience and some new members that we haven't seen um your thoughts and comments are taken from all of us um you know valid questions whether or not uh voices are being heard on the Committees um I can assure you that there's people from all different aspects of the school district so we're definitely hearing you loud and clear we read a lot of things on Facebook whether they're nice or not and um you know I just want to uh remind people that uh well basically just you know have a great Thanksgiving everyone and thank you for coming out fil I just want to say I just want to Pigg you back on everything that you know going going towards the end is tough so we say all the same congratulations but everything that all of my colleagues have said I mean all of our students all of our staff we do do amazing things here and I think that it's great um there is a lot happening in this District um and A lot's going to continue to happen and we always have the students best interest at heart so I just want to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving and a good night and thank you all for coming this evening I would just like to say I'm very grateful for all the passionate questions and concerns they're all very valid they're all being heard so thank you keep it up this is a process that we would like to go through as a community because we have to do this together other than that I just want to wish everyone a very happy and safe thank Thanksgiving so have a good evening I need a motion to adjourn by acclamation I mic problem tonight