##VIDEO ID:3vdm6xuAQhc## e e e e e e e e e e roll call certainly Tom Miss here Mr Clark here Miss Evans here miss groger here Dr King miss pasculli here Mr pluta Miss Santos here Mr van heis here you have a qu thank you um the open public meetings act authorizes the Board of Education to meet in executive session under certain circumstances uh the open public meeting act requires the board to adopt a resolution at a public meeting to gain to go into to private session uh tonight specifically we will be discussing uh Personnel issues including but not limited to the employment appointment termination of employment terms and conditions of employment evaluation of performance um most specifically employee performance uh formal action will not be taken we should last about 30 minutes and um may I have a motion to move into executive session so moved second a motion made by Mr van High seconded by m groger all in fav all in favor I I okay e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e everybody for coming tonight sorry for the delay we had a little bit of a a lengthy executive session um but we're ready to start our board meeting um and I'll start with the announcement of the open public meeting statement the New Jersey open public meeting law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend meeting meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon as required under law adequate notice of this meeting has been provided via email and or fax to the times the Lawrence leder the public library and has been filed with the municipal clerk this notice was provided prior to the 48 Hours required by the open public meeting act the board reserves the right to limit public discussion of personnel items and other matters as defined in the law and we'll have the flag salute I to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for stands nation under God indivisible liy and justice for all okay okay happy to see so many faces out there tonight um we have our peer leaders Here For the First Time welcome welcome back welcome back floor is yours hi I'm Aaron can you hear me all right yes uh we just started the cell phone uh parking lot at our school and so far it's it's go it's good it's working um the classrooms have been more engaged and the teachers have been pretty strict about this rule so there's no negotiating about it um once we sit in our seats teachers have made it clear that we should not have our phone out we should either put it in the cell phone Cubbies or into our bag um I have yet to see one student break this rule so far thank you so much I love hearing that hello I'm suin Cota and I'm here to talk about the smart pass that was implemented this year it involves creating digital passes as you know and instead of using paper passes I have noticed personally that the smart pass has definitely reduced traffic in the bathrooms and hallways I don't really see kids anymore loitering around the school walking around doing their own thing also since the teachers and security have access to see who's in and out of the bathrooms they know who's supposed to be outside in the hallways or not I think that's a good idea personally I think these passes help the school administrators keep a better track of the students making sure that they're always safe yeah great thank you I'm Carmela Thompson I just want to touch on the Athletics here at um Lawrence High School so I'm personally on the football team and we're off to a hot start we are 2 and0 we're so happy we are off to a hotar 2 and0 for the first time since 2016 I believe yes um yeah third game on on Friday we're uh we're hopeful it's it's looking good in practice so far this week as well foot hockey got their first win actually about an hour ago weting West Windsor South improving to win and0 on the year so yay as of right now Athletics is off to a hotar let's hope you can keep it that way thank you keep up the good work shorter hi I'm a mckian um kind of to touch on what um Carmelo was talking about um I'm a part of our girls soccer team and so far we've also went on a 2- 0 streak um uh we beat Heights toown yesterday I'm pretty sure 60 and then we have a game tomorrow against um sorry I'm blinking out um we have a team we have a game against Steiner and then on Saturday a game against Ying so we have a lot of upcoming things that we're looking forward to um and then also we just wanted to touch on freshman orientation it went really well this year we kind of just greeted The Freshman um introduced ourselves introduced you know our administration because you know you guys are big part of everything um and then we just showed them around the school you know um told them about new things like we touched on like the smart pass and all new things that we kind of started to um show at Lawrence High and yeah they enjoyed it um we made sure to show them where their schedules were um help them get to classes on time and then show clubs that we have so they can be a part of you know Lawrence High School and see the experience so great thank you thank you hi hi I'm zaye Spencer along with peer leadership I'm part of a program called teen pep uh where we teach freshman about like sexual sexual education and stuff like that through peers like myself and within the first week we spent a lot of time building like a community of trust so it's like easier for us to talk to the Freshman about it and we hope to start our first out preach within a month um while on topic of like younger younger people in general uh I'm also a part of a program called uh sorry early childhood development uh where we are like uh teachers AIDS and we hope to install uh kids like myself within a month as well and yeah thank you great thank you so much thank you so much peer leaders as I no longer have a student in the school I'm going to rely on you to give me all the information about the teams and Kevin Van Heist because our kids are now gone um so happy to hear the great news about the phones the smart pass the Athletics um day three four day five of school yeah five thank you fantastic thank you for coming um you can stay or leave if you have something else to do but we really appreciate you being here and sharing all the great things that are going on at the high school thank you thank you thank you so much go card a so sweet okay uh Tom can we get oh do we have any recognitions okay no recognitions and acknowledgements Adoption of a minut of the minutes can I have a motion to adopt the regular session minutes from the 828 meeting so moved and second second Tom with a motion and a second Mr Clark yes the Sens yes M Kroger yes Dr King yes M pasculli yes Mr pluta abstain Miss Santos absent AB thank you sorry Mr van heis uh abstain I was absent as well M Bose yes motion Carri thank you uh reports to the board uh superintendent's report okay I'm going to start with welcoming Edison Ryan our second student representative for the board Mr Aldridge I believe we're going to be ceremoniously wearing him in I love it so we'll do that now so photo ops line up if you want to take a photo y so for sure if you're going to take a photograph come on up and uh don't you're not imposing anywhere you think's the best shot okay come on dad get him Edison you're gonna repeat after me I Edison Ryan promis to uphold my duties as the student representative of the Lawrence Township Board of Education as prescribed by the New Jersey statute and Lawrence Township Board of Education policy I Addison Ryan promised to uphold my duties as the student representative on Lawrence Township Board of Education as prescribed in the New Jersey statute and the Lawrence Township Board of Education policy and then I'll continue to attend meetings of the Board of Education to represent students to present concerns and proposals to the board for its consideration and to keep students informed of the business and activities of the board by providing a monthly report to the the student council to attend meetings of the Board of Education to represent students to present concerns and proposals to the board for his consideration to keep students informed of the business and the activities of the board by providing a monthly report to the student council excuse can't say congratulations welcome aboard welcome Edison thank you welcome Edison all right so bear with me I I did want to just start off my report by a brief moment of silence for 91 to recognize the victims um and that great tragedy to our country thank you convocation day was an absolute blast we kicked off with our exciting rebranding video which you'll see a little bit later on um we will be viewing that um but more importantly we're the empowering words of our keynote speaker Alicia D Lorenzo we did survey our staff so we were spot on with this type of presentation to really open up the school year with um our new motto is ltps this is us all of our staff will matter we're moving from belonging to mattering um it's a different category psychologically speaking you you can belong and and fit at a table but your voice to be mattered and heard is is a different level for us um and that's where we want to kind of bring um our district forward in the weather was perfect we enjoyed lunch outside we had food trucks we had had professional development in the afternoons day two was a building day where the teachers received again another set of great sessions and um a lot of curriculum and support to really launch the school year successfully um so I am very proud to announce that our district just got our scores back for the New Jersey quality single accountability Continuum review which is otherwise known as New Jersey cack process for the public it is a three-year um every three years districts are evaluated in five areas which I will read off to you it's instruction and program fiscal management government operations and Personnel I'm proud to announce that Lawrence scored a perfect 100% in three out of five categories yielding a district average of 95% overall this designates Lawrence Township Public Schools as a high performing District I think that's this was no small feat our leadership team had to band together with the support of our central office team to provide the appropriate documentation to be evaluated for this process it is quite extensive we're all breathing a sigh of relief we now have it documented so we're in the right direction thank you um with national Arts education week during this week the field of Arts education joins together in committees across the country to Advocate educate and celebrate the impact and transformative power of Arts education it is um my proud um honor to say that Sarah Foster one of our district uh supervisors was selected for the George debono award and she will be receiving that award at AJ 2024 coming up in the next couple of weeks she'll be accompanied by myself and our board president miss Bose we are so proud of Miss Foster and all of her work in arts education thank you more updates for the public um I know there's been some questions out there regarding the six days cycled schedule that we are providing a pilot for at Le and slackwood this year the six day rotational cycle of specials um is really an opportunity for all of our Specialists to see kids you never miss a block of instruction so if you're absent on a Monday and you had gyms scheduled the cycle goes to the following day it reduces um fragmented instructional time that happens over the course of a calendar it positively supports student behavior in maintaining student engagement for instruction and it allows flexibility during instruction if all goes well we will move all four of our elementary schools to this schedule next year and finally our preschool program um is Seeking a dedicated Community membership for our early childhood advisory Council it's going to be called the ecac you know we love our acronyms in education um but essentially it is an advocacy group made up of community stakeholders to help us really inform preschool um and help us make decisions for where we go next with Community providers and Partnerships we really want to Foster um and meet the needs of our constituents in the community we're hoping to have people join our team um that are interested in early childhood education and sort of fostering this great partnership in our district egita Paro is our new supervisor of early childhood education I believe um we have a QR code so those friends working at home or in the audience that are interested please fill out the survey and she will be in touch about the first meeting we're very excited about that I will'll leave that up on the screen for a minute and you might have seen our new logos around town we haven't been shy on social media or any of our news broadcasts we have rebranded we have refreshed um you will see our new school logos proudly adorned in our parking lot this evening we're trying to prepare for back to school nights you will note that we have refreshed and revitalized the existing logos with the support of our PTO we've had educator feedback the administrative team and really the idea is ltps this is us we are one all of our logos are now embraced in the shield signifying that we are as a unit we are a full district and we are operating under the same Mission um so we have our launch Day video which we're going to queue up and play um for all of your benefit in the public at [Music] home welcome to Lawrence Township Public Schools a national District of character for over a decade this year we're excited to refresh unify and expand our district through inspiring initiatives an enhanced website a userfriendly app and a fresh brand identity it's a new year at Lawrence Township Public Schools and this is us our new website is your destination for all things ltps it's been designed with our community in mind and packed with features to make your visit seamless and efficient discover District news event calendars and a special site dedicated to the ltps referendum which includes future plans for district reconfiguration whether you're a student parent or faculty member our new site is tailored to better meet your [Music] needs our app brings our community closer together like never before instantly have access to the Genesis portal news calendars directories lunch menus and so much more all in one place plus never miss a moment with our apps notification options follow specific schools and set instant alerts for news calendars and menus stay connected at ltps and download it today our brand is getting a makeover with new logos for all schools each school mascot has been given a new look and is now placed within the same lawen Shield to match our District's logo whether you're a preschool Cardinal kid slackwood Eagle lawrencville Elementary School Dragon Ben Franklin Mouse Eldridge Park Falcon Lawrence Intermediate School owl or a Middle schore High School Cardinal we are all one at Lawrence Township Public Schools and this is us this is us Bravo thank you great um that was really great Robin thank you I don't have a lot to say but I just um wanted to welcome back all of the teachers and staff um who have been in our district before and a special welcome to all the new teachers we have I did stop by to the new teacher orientation maybe two weeks ago and I was so thrilled to see so many beautiful faces and where they're going at and and talking to them in the schools and how excited they are to be here so I am really appreciative of all the hard work we took to get here this week um I also want to say congratulations to our district on that qack score um I don't think people really know what goes into that uh process uh but it is a lot of work um we had a new superintendent here um and so that we relied on our staff to really pull together all that information our supervisors and administrators and a score of 95% is really outstanding for this District um and it really goes to show how extraordinary it we are in in this District um so many new things are happening you've done so much work this year uh Robin I think the video the website the app there is so many amazing things going on in Lawrence Township we do have a lot more to do um but I am so proud to be the board president I look forward to an amazing year of so many great things um and I'm always proud of the people that work in this District um and our students uh they are amazing so um this is us thank you madam I wish you all a really fantastic year can I add something to the amazing things um I just wanted to share on behalf of a family who experienced two major transitions into Lis and LMS this week um that I just want to Echo your applaud of all of the Educators and leaders um you know it's a big deal and it's just been so wonderful to have so much focus on students it's a hard time and I just think um experiencing it real time two big ones in one summer um was really beautiful and just all of the work that the teachers and and principles did starting last May um all the way through has just really I think made it great for a lot of the kids and I just appreciate you all great and so Tom I'm sorry I uh forgot to do your board secretary report that's quite all right I don't want to steal too much of Kevin Thunder when we get the finance so board secretary I just wanted to to acknowledge the the custodial and maintenance staff we cleaned over 600,000 square fet of building this summer and we had a fantastic opening we uh we finished the Paving and Li the paving at L es and Ben Franklin schools and so we were done at Ben Franklin with five days to spare so we knew we would go up to the hilt we were five days um uh just sooner than we thought we would we had some modular building Renovations that happened this summer the transportation department was ready to go and it was a fantastic roll out with a new director um and she was surrounded by people uh who are a great team willing to help her every step of the way um and sometimes I think she can do it all by herself um she's fantastic uh we had our registration for the first time we changed the way we do registration we registered over 250 students um and we're still registering now so today we're still constantly registering students for school at this point also to give you an idea where we are with the preschool uh expansion we are looking at a facility uh in town that has the possibility of four um classrooms for us in subsequent years and so our architect has walked that with us as has the county uh business administrator and both are excited about the prospects of this location and the quality of the facility some things about uh the referendum in terms of next steps we have submitted the project to the Department of Education for their consideration and what that means is they'll evaluate our estimates based on what they believe are reasonable and how much they believe that they will contribute in the form of state aid to us and so we're waiting back to hear from them within about the next two to three weeks uh we'll be bringing you some sample questions um and for the boards just to repeat what you already know we have not made a determination yet to hold a referendum this is still in the consideration phase you will be uh have a resolution brought before you in November where you will either choose to do this um or some modification thereof um after you've seen what the state is willing to do for Lawrence Township and so we're waiting right now to hear back from them about that and so that's where we are one of the things that um I'm very proud of and I think that it was May when we had the walkth through at Lawrence Intermediate School and within about two days we were set in motion to address all things that all people had asked for and so we were able to transform over the summer the look of Lawrence Intermediate School um you'll see that we removed some trees opened up some sunlight you'll see that we had the exterior the band of the building painted the lower side of the building painted you'll see that we painted the Portico in colors that were primary to give the feel of an elementary building the same things happened on the interior of the building and these are things that our our constituents asked for um and spoke right from their their mouths um in our feedback sessions they had asked and the principal had asked for uh certain sets of furniture to Pro promote which in adult talk would be group process and kid talk it's probably something else um and so that furniture was delivered to Lis um to make sure that we got kids connecting with one another and not connecting through a phone um so these are important steps that were being taken uh we replace the stage front at Lis and we'll soon replace the or uh finish refinish the stage AG um these are all uh items that are necessary for Gathering to create Community we also replaced the number of SNS in all the classrooms at Lis and also we took and looked once more at how to address uh the traffic situation at Lis which plagues us so one of the things that we brought to finance and finance gave us the nod to do was go ahead um with the shuttle that moves from Lis over to and across 206 uh over over to not the park but Oakland uh I believe it's Terrace is the name of the street just outside of the park and the reason we're not going in the park is because we can't do a k turn with a school bus we can but we don't unload students and then do a k turn yeah um where was such a large vehicle and what we'll do is we'll use the same vehicle to shuttle back and forth I've already cleared this with the principal of the school Dr Fischer she feels it's a great idea and so we'll look to do that as well um we were out there at the beginning of school uh and watching the traffic and speaking to parents and informing them the same things that Dr fiser had already said that you can drop off at the park and you can pick up at the park you don't have to come in so we're working it from multiple angles um I think that if we have a 54 passenger vehicle that takes two trips over to Oakland we will be able to address their needs now also in addition to that we walked a number of streets uh all the way over in the ster area as well as uh Familia court and so we will be running a bus into that area um because there are a couple households that uh were a matter of 100 feet over the limit and just as we always do if we have a bus there and it has vacant seats anyone else in the area who didn't make it can can get on um so I think that we addressed some of that area not by policy but by um operations um and of course you were a part part of that and uh thank you so much for that but I wanted to bring those to you because those are things you keep hearing coming up and um we'll be out as soon as tomorrow I believe with uh the quotes for the shuttles that will eventually be a bid um it'll be upwards of uh the cost of two two routes but we will pay to keep the bus the whole time so great you thought outside the box thank you well it's um you're welcome but we also looked at seeing if we could extend the light um and so we learned some things about that too we studied it we found that the most we could get through on a light the light lasted about 22 seconds and I'm not sure if I'm right on this but Jill correct me if I'm wrong the most number of cars that we get through were 11 wow that's in the many days that we were out there um so the primary culprit that we found was the timing of the light if the light were longer and let this the cars on Edgars move through then there would be significantly less traffic we didn't have speed because 206 is basically stopped um at that point so we we we went the um the uh functional way of using a shuttle instead yeah because we I don't think we're able to change the solution at the like thank you thank you for for calling thank you so much we did follow up and uh I really appreciate and I know the full board does as I'm sure our community does all of the work that you putting into to make that little area of Lawrence and the getting to and from Lis a little bit more accessible and safe I know you're always working on it and there's some things that just can't be done um and that's a reality but it sounds like this is a a good next step for us see Lis has given Ben Franklin a Ral you know for the happy school so now you know Lis is looking kind of happy you know so I want all our St happy thank yeah thank you so much um do we have tonight oh yeah the Le okay uh Comm uh committee reports uh community relations and legislative affairs has not met they will be meeting next week um and we'll do our liaison reports so this will be our first opportunity for our student board member to give his his report so welcome Edison thank you so good evening everyone my name is Edison and I'm honored to serve as your student representative for this year uh since moving to Lawrence in 2018 the warmth and support of this community have always stood out to me and played significant role in shaping my experience here outside of this position I'm actively involved in the computer science club NHS a nonprofit organization called grants for grads which my sister and I founded last year and soon soon Council as well I'm also a proud member of the Lawrence cross country team so woohoo yay uh thank you all for the warm welcome and I'm looking forward to working with you all so uh first I'd like to share some exciting news on September 28th Lawrence High School will be hosting a bipartisan Community vo voter registration drive this event is open to all community members to help them register to vote update their information and learn about voting options such as absentee and early voting various local organizations including the League of Women Voters and the NAACP will be present to assist and provide information it's really a great opportunity for us to encourage civic participation andure that everyone is ready for the upcoming election plus there will be food and drinks uh food trucks and family friendly activities so we hope to see many of you there in other news uh there will be a new broad there will be new broadcasts up on the ltps TV starting Saturday uh last week's Varsity cross country meet the varsity boys soccer and football games will all be up uh so be sure to check those out as well uh and finally our schools are looking forward to celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month which begins on September 15th and runs through October 15th uh thank you this concludes my report y thank you so much ENT um New Jersey School Board Association I'm short and sweet today wait no the reporter me Mercer County Schoolboard Association hybrid meeting will be held next uh Thursday September 19th and dinner will begin at 6 program begins at 6:45 virtual meeting will also be live via swoo a uh new option for check-in for this meeting will be a QR code and if anybody would like to try it I have it on my phone so you can set up so when you come in you'll be recognized and you don't have to fill out all the paperwork so we're we're the first County meeting to try this out so kind of exciting um the program of the evening is uh effective strategies for educational leaders it's going to be a good one so try not to miss it if not zoom in on there with us our County Executive Board held a meeting this morning and we've reviewed bylaws by Mercer County Schoolboard association bylaws will be up for review and acceptance at the November 21st meeting which will be held at Trenton Board of Education building they're getting another award this year their board has worked together for another board wide certification i''d love to see us do that too and lastly upcoming programs New Jersey school board's fall labor Summit is navigating labor relations in the education lands Escape that's October 1st 9:00 a.m. to 2:45 location is at New Jersey school board headquarters registration is required that's my report thank you so much Joanne I just wanted to um thank you for all the work that you do with New Jersey school boards I know sometimes I limit your talk but um I think it's really important for the community to understand and appreciate how much time you devote to New Jersey school boards that you are the president of Mercer County um and really the go-to expert on this board for all things related to New Jersey school boards um and I think it's really important that the community um and the board understand how much time you put in for us um and we do benefit from it even though sometimes we make light of things um we really do value your uh contributions um from the New Jersey school board so thank you so much uh student services student services has not yet met this month okay um review of communications no nothing uh so this is our first opportunity for public input um if you have something you would like to say please come up to the podium state your name you can write your address down and limit any comment to three minutes thank you come on down sign in first hi my name is Melissa Rono I live over in NASA 2 neighborhood um I've spoken a couple times with Mr Eldridge and I also am a transition mom with the LMS Lis all at the same time and um we are struggling with busing and I'm glad to hear that you're working on it and I wanted to bring it to your attention that we have started a petition in the neighborhood to request it because the need is great um and we feel that it is not a safe unanimously feel it is not safe for 9-year-olds to be walking to school or riding to school I've walked it I've rid my bike takes 38 minutes my daughter does not have the attention span to get there safely even in groups we are all struggling to get car pools together I can think of close to I think there's like 12 people within two blocks of me who are fourth or fifth grader so the neighborhood does have a huge Lis population we are adding to your congestion problem um and I feel that anything more than a mile for that age group is unacceptable a mile and a half to the high school feels reasonable my son rides the bike as a 12-year-old I think that's safe and that's great for him and I think I applaud it but I think anything under the age of 10 needs supervision and a safe route and I would like to uh let you know I have 64 signatures and I just started this on Friday and I'm going to keep working on it until I know when the bus is landing in my neighborhood I'm sorry what did you say I will keep working on it until I know when that bus is arriving because we the need is huge and we are yes so we we we are going to by the board's policy we have to have a bus out there to the addresses that we talked about uh well I didn't say the addresses I wouldn't do that um so the and we will and we did in the past um now we're going to have have a bus out there by the board's policy because there's certain people who were over the the walking distance so we went out with wheels and went from the front door of the high or the Intermediate School right to these folks houses what you're asking for is a change in policy and I hear you clearly that's not an administrative decision um and um but what we will have is we'll have a bus in the neighborhood now and I don't see us retreating on the notion of if we have a bus there we will take as many students as we can the other thing that we did was with the shuttle what it will do is it will drop off um on Birchwood null uh Birchwood null and Oakland Terrace right in that area right there we haven't decided exactly where yet um but that will bring the students and there's upwards and and I got to think that it was just short of a hundred students that we saw crossing right something of that nature um and so we'll run that bus across to that area right there which even if the policy stays as it is now will reduce the walking distance um and so those are things that are probably not exactly what you wanted to hear but it is certainly working in that direction well I'm first on the wait list okay you told me to my on my on the phone and it still doesn't bring me any peace of mind because I want to know what's going to happen to the other 20 kids if we can't fit on that bus so which oh okay you write your address down I did okay great just want make I think I am officially 1.7 but it yeah depends on what Google tells you that day it tells me something different every couple days sometimes it says 2.1 sometimes it says 1.9 um but for a 9-year-old that's extremely F so so that you know what we did was we actually walked it from uh to to three different residences in the area and we went from their door actually put the wheel up against their door we had two different Wheels so that and they weren't they were different manufacturers so that we knew that they were correct um and then we went and walked it um to see if we could and we're always working towards yes we're not working towards no we we hope when we go out there and we do that we want it to work we don't want to say no so and it did work and and and it's a good thing well the two big statistics that stuck out to me was that safe routes to schools consider one mile for intermediate to Middle School to be acceptable 1.5 for high schoolers and the American Academy of Pediatrics states that kids aren't ready to walk alone before the age of fifth grade so that my 9-year-old falls into the not ready to walk to school alone group thank you thank you so Jill would you capture all the information I want to make sure that when we reach out and we do have that bus I want to make sure that for those people who did contact us we're reaching back out to them first so and it doesn't mean they're more important than anyone else but we need to to get back to you because you reached out to us okay what's that okay thank you not to get through this in three minutes I'll I'll I'll leave this for you as well my name is Ken Kieran I live on Gainesboro Road I've been a resident here for 35 years my wife has been a longtime resident I've had three kids go through this school 98.5 million referendum let that sink in the referendum is literally specifically for schools and grounds um the website States you know that this our Lawrence is growing from what I just saw up here but that contradicts what the growth of the township is 2020 our census was 33472 residents as of last week on the New Jersey demographics.com 31771 a drop of 171 agents on the one of the key findings on the survey referenced within the referendum highlighted the community's emphasis on educational areas within the school following ranked is extremely important academics stem mental health special education and diversity equity and incl population of LHS students has really only moved up and down about 6% during the same time our ranking has only gone below 150 once since 2017 2018 school year our Lawrence math performance and Ela Trends have never met goals according to the National Center of Education statistics math is 22% within lawren schools and bottom 50% with our overall testing rank at the bottom 50% judging from this experience how's the school board changing the behavior to better our children and students TA taxpayers of Florence Township we being asked to spend almost $100 million in infrastructure that addresses the middle school and high school does not and um given the state of the grant that supports bringing these in I I'm I'm sorry but Tom you explained this to me about um it is not no longer a grant as part of the the structure but if we expect the growth of 500 students in the next five years how does almost $100 million to Lawrence taxpayers relate to the average predicted growth of 39 students per grade within the budget estimates taxpayers are being asked yet again to spend more money on new Turf projects Improvement to facilities already improved during the last referendum the cost of these improvements were over $6 million the budget also allows for architectural engineering fees of over $10 million 10% average 7 12% as I was told the survey revealed a clear desire to keep academics at the Forefront of decision- making and I'm paraphrasing that paragraph from the website the refer referendum does not address of academics at the Forefront okay your time is up you can leave that document if you want that would be fine and we can review it okay okay will it become part of the record um if you provide me with something I will note that it's part of the record I will keep it and it will be something that would be subject to Oprah --------- ##VIDEO ID:1h_2CC3LHj8## trust the administrators in this district and I trust you as our board so um I know superintendent clim has been going around and um talking to people about the uh growth that's necessary and the plans um so I appreciate all that and I'm sure you'll do the same if there's a referendum you will educate all of us uh about the great plans but I do trust all of you thank you so actually this is a um pointed question uh to Mr pluda who is running for re-election um uh previously when you ran you had some kind of bizarre statements about our Board of Ed about our admin about our staff you said that the board of aded many of whom are sitting here are obsessed with indoctrinating students you said our ltps elementary teachers are child abusers um you said that children need to be saved from our excellent administrators Educators and Board of Ed members I don't remember I don't remember saying this where where are you finding this I can right we have one two okay I'm happy to okay bring show you the documents um so the reason I'm bringing that up because I'm hoping that you will um participate in the two forums so we can hear if that's changed now that you've been working with colleagues the um League of Women Voters candidate Forum maybe with your running meate who's sitting here uh that is on the 2 4th and then the one that LTE and nja is hosting on the 8th and I wasn't of October I was hoping you might be public in Sharing if you'd be attending those forums I'm not sure yet okay I hope we get to hear from you both of you say it again not a problem great thank thanks for your time thank you any other public comment okay seeing none we'll move on um Bo discussion and work session we have none today um so we'll go to our board discussion and action items our first is Personnel committee report and Personnel action items okay great I forgot to say something about the athletic Hall of Fame event that's going to be held here at Lawrence High September 27th 5:45 in the Commons um I have a list of all the inductees I'd love you to take a look and if you can make it that night to support our new class that would be awesome now on to personel thank you you bet um we met on the 4th at 8:15 in attendance were Dr Robin Clen Sean fry Kevin Van Heist Arendelle Clark Robert Puda and myself Joanne groger we reviewed our current vacancies including transition coordinator library assistant and maintenance position we'll be recommending a new counselor for Lawrence High School and you will see this on tonight's agenda we are in the midst of our Genesis rollover and have begun the initial stages of loading data into the system for personnel and we're excited about our awesome new Educators hired for the 2425 school year I think we have some amazing people that have jumped on board with us because this is us thanks to the county office for working with us to process emergency and expedited certifications and we discussed upcoming negotiations for 2425 and there were no changes suggested for policy 7420 on tonight's agenda you'll find approvals for two resignations hires pending background clearances mentors Subs teachers and sub secretaries a salary adjustment due to earning a master's degree level woohoo unpaid sick leave you'll see amendments for stiens and salaries confirmation of for staff and Subs due to clearances and appointment for sub instructional assistant and with all of those things listed above I'd like to move P1 through p7 please second Tom with a motion in a second Mr Clark yes Miss Evans yes M grober yes Dr King yes Miss pasculli yes Mr pluta yes Mr van heis yes M Bose yes motion Carri thank you uh CIA APD report and student service uh action items CIA PD met on August 30th from 8:45 to 11 in attendance for Dr clim Emy Goomer Jean muy Michelle Bose Michelle King via Zoom Diana pasculli and myself can you move the mic we talked about uh The Six Day specials schedule that Robin talked about so uh I know a lot of parents are concerned not knowing what they put sneakers on their kids I Su that's important always wear your sneakers you'll never know when it's gym day um it mean oh I'm sorry fizzed but it means that kids will consistently get all of their specials rather than every Monday holiday they miss out so it's for the in the best interest of the children um The Six Day specials are being piloted at Le and slackwood um Dave Adam joined us to talk about the LHS acmy it was enough to make you want to come back to high school I'll tell you what they're doing at the high school with the acmy is mind-blowing they're going to be um opportunities for kids during the school day as well as after the school day to um focus on Career ready and provide diverse areas of interest and opportunities the first phase will be a multi-year rollout beginning in the 2526 school year we're excited for that we talked about cell phones at LHS like the peer leaders said and we're glad to have that rolled out successfully and the rest of our meeting was about the new curricula that's in our classrooms and it's extensive but I linked it for you in your minutes and I forgot to put Di in our minutes and so when you go home just write her name in please and with that I'd like to move ois 1 through 31 and oss1 second Tom with a motion in a second Mr Clark yes Miss Evans yes Miss Kroger yes Dr King yes Miss pasculli yes Mr pluta yes Mr van heis yes Miss Bose yes motion carried okay fin committee report and school business management action items uh Finance did meet on Friday morning uh in attendance was Michelle Bose Amanda Santos pepper Evans uh Dr Clen and uh Tom The Immortal words of my predecessor Tom Patrick Tom has stolen all of my thunder so uh the committee uh we did uh discuss uh and were briefed on the Lawrence daycare day school facilities uh evaluation that Tom referred to earlier we did talk about the shuttle and and the um Tom and staff were already kind of in work with some ideas in that in advance of school starting to address some of the concerns that we've heard from the the various neighborhoods um so we were briefed on the idea of a shuttle and since then efforts have been made to actually get that implemented um we also received the updates on the paving projects which were completed ahead of time which was outstanding so the kids came back not only to um parking lots for the parents and staff members but also new soft surfaces for the children um which was playground areas and things like that so there was a lot of excitement um from the staff when they arrived at the buildings to actually see those new surfaces and then certainly with the kids on their arrivals last week um Lis and the high school HVAC um Replacements will occur in the upcoming year and that's being scheduled around when schools are out of sessions so that the equipment and cranes and those types of things don't interfere with uh staff and students being being uh in place we received the update on registrations that uh Tom had mentioned earlier um kudos to all of our staff for getting all of those done and and Jill was here up there as well uh backstopping um our registrations uh a very labor intensive um and hectic uh uh process especially as the approach of school year comes to the wire um which was fantastic um District efforts were continuing to get the unpaid lunch uh accounts cleared from last year and then as we look forward uh there's been some investigations on our app and they will actually have the abilities to actually turn on low balance notices so parents will be able to yeah you can they can do that now do that now yeah that's a provision that people are using perfect so that way um parents will at least be not uh notified when the account balances start to get low which will help with collections efforts and keeping those aages to a minimum um and then certainly the district's migration to our Genesis system we also received an update on that uh essentially all departments have migrated over and we're kind of finalizing the formal uh migration crosschecking double quadruple checking of the data and the multiple data entries um that our staff were doing uh and what we didn't talk about but I will Echo Tom sentiments um just our facilities and ground staff and getting all of the buildings set up um you know talking about this is us certainly I saw Charlie McCain uh one of our esteemed members in the parking lot on the way in and of course Charlie and I have known each other since grade school here uh so the whole This Is Us thing and and here he has out there um so I told him that I would certainly give him um and all of his colleagues there a shout out I mean the grounds look fantastic the athletic fields look fantastic the schools I mean you can um you know use the floors as mirrors essentially so um tremend new banners new banners that are up um so uh it's fantastic so with that um I will move spm1 through 11 second Tom with a motion in a second Mr Clark yes Miss Evans yes Miss groger yes Dr King yes Miss pasculli yes Mr pluta yes Mr van heis yes dispose yes motion carried thank you and this is um our next opportunity for public input is there anybody who has something to say seeing none we'll move on new business all right on new business you will see payout due to retire retirement substitute approval start date amendments edps a mentor appointment leaves of absence leave replacement adjustments and background clearances and I'd like to move nb1 through nb24 second with a motion and a second time Mr Clark yes Miss Evans yes Miss groger yes Dr King yes Miss pasculli yes Mr pluta yes Mr van he yes Miss POS yes motion carried thank you and with that I want to thank everybody for coming tonight um and a motion to adjourn so moved all in favor I I good night everybody and thank you so much thank you e e e e e e