come back to uh public session Mr Gallow second by Mr Hughes we're back at 7:23 on agenda questions please uh limit your questions at this time to resolutions under new business on this agenda as a matter of fairness you're asked to limit your questions to no long no more than one and your remarks no longer than 3 minutes if you're here representing the group please identify yourself the group and your position in the group if you're here as an individual please give us your name and address this section of public participation will be limited to 15 minutes please specify the resolution you're referring to in your question I have a motion to open to the public Mr Hughes second bya Mr copin we open at 7:24 seeing no one may I have a motion Mr karski second by Mr Gallow we are closed at 7:24 and 12 seconds Miss marquetti we're going to put you right up front so you can uh give us your report first thank you okay so first our action through Athletics Club hosted the hoops from Marcus game on the 18th and they raised $4,200 then our Habitat for Humanity Club started their snow angels program for the year where they shoveled people's driveways and they raised $260 so far um interact is going to be selling candy Gams and the money that they raise is going towards the Marcus kale scholarship fund and then our high school started participating in the north Jersey student of the week so staff will be nominating students based on their involvement in co-curricular clubs and activities um we're doing the hearts for Marcus card screenings in the beginning of February and our goal is to screen 120 high school kids and then our winter sports are doing well in particular girls basketball bowling and then winter track and field and our Winter Guard has their first show this weekend at West Orange High School and then we're having an assembly on January 31st called Always connected which is about education and awareness in terms of appropriate use of social media and then that same night there'll be a parent presentation so that they can go assembly as well and then we had a really good International night which happened last week and on February 3rd in support of class of 2024 Project Graduation the Harlem Wizards will be at R Middle School at 6 playing at teachers than Dr Maturo what do you have for us tonight um let me ask Dr would you like to start or end my reports I will start so we have a presentation uh this is specific uh this is a state mandate that we report out on NPA Dro is going to be giving a brief presentation to the board okay good evening so um you might be wondering why we're talking about NJ GPA again you saw a similar presentation in the fall so what happened was we always have NJ GPA reporting out with njsla and SS and all of that but this year the state wants us to also report out on anybody who took the ngj GPA in the fall so that's what this is okay so a lot of these slides you've seen before the njpa is a New Jersey graduation proficiency assessment it's given to all grade 11 students it's test Ela and math and you can look at the bottom there to see what exactly the pieces are that are tested in terms of changes that happen so when this originally came out um the original uh mandate was that all students had to take the assessment in May of 2023 there were some changes so one of the changes was that the cut score change remember we were talking about this it went from 750 to 725 right the other thing that changed were um if you recall the asab do you remember that that assessment the asab was also taken out as an option for an alternative assessment so this is just the information of the changes you're going to start to see things talking about Pathways so to graduate you can either do the ngj GPA or an alternate pathway so if you didn't take if you didn't pass the ngpa in the fall or the spring then you could take an alternate assessment so the act the SAT they're all listed there that's called pathway two there's a pathway three that if you didn't pass either the NJ GPA or the alternative assessment you can also do a portfolio appeal so when we report out on small amounts of students this is something we can't report out for under 10 right so we always talk about that when we do our normal testing presentations so when you look at the next slide I'll show you the amount of students that actually took it in the fall and what we're reporting on but just remember you have to go through one of theway graduate and something that I want to point out is that the bottom Aster there all the students who started with us in September of 2023 all graduated meeting a requirement that we put forward so this is the information in combination from the spring results and the fall result results so the top shows you the participation of students the test in the spring and then the bottom section were 10 out of 22 and 20 out of 37 those are the amounts of students that took it in the fall so if you took the NJ GPA and passed it in the spring you did not have to do anything else you were given the option to take the NJ GPA in the fall if you had not passed in either math or Ela so we had 10 students that took us up on that and 20 students who I'm sorry students and 37 students who took us up on that offer to retake the njpa 10 students actually sat and 20 students sat for math the 10 students for ELA since the number is so small we can't report out exactly on who pass and who didn't pass but what you'll see at the bottom is the breakdown of Pathways for graduation so NJ GPA in total you'll see the March score passing rate you'll see the October score of passing rate and then you'll see the total so out of all students who are graduating in uh this coming June 92% of our students passed the ngj GPA and Ela and we had 86% pass the ngj GPA for math now what happens we have that second pathway so if you didn't pass one of those you could take an alternate assessment P sat BCT and Acer again aspat was taken out we had 10% of our students passing in English and 12% in mathematics using an alternate assessment for those that are counting for looking for that 100% it's not going to add up it looks like we're you know we have 110 you know per of our students so the reason why is because we have students that either move in or move out from Spring to Fall so you have a different actual Base number the other thing to keep in mind is that students actually will take this as a um like almost a safety net but then they ended up passing the NG GPA to if you look in pathway three we have no students that need to take a pathway for um pathway 3 for ELA for the uh portfolio assessment but we did have 5% of our students that had to do it for account and I can't tell you whether they are all going to graduate I My Hope Is that they will the reason why is because those 5% were still portfolio appeal so we'll get those answers um pretty soon for disaggregated data you normally hear me talk about different subgroups um we cannot do that with this information because it would go under our number of 10 does anybody have questions on this specific page so pathway two the PSAT sat Act is there a a minimum score that they have to yes so each each test own cut score that they have to hit so it'll be different right as I said the njpa was a 750 then we went to the 725 this year we talked about that it's similar in those other tests they all have their own proficiency cut scores in order for graduation question these last two slides are um are they're the same that you saw in the fall so it's Ela and math what we for students that if they didn't pass the ngpa in the in the spring what we would do for them in the fall and then all the support that we put in place um the biggest thing here is that and Mr Pascal will tell you this if you was standing here regardless of what's on this page we're going to support our students no matter what so we want all of our students to pass along a pathway we all want them to graduate and we've been successful in doing that with our kids so I do want to thank Mr Pascal left but Mr Pascal the administration and obviously the teachers who work oneon-one with some of our students in order to have them pass that acup place during the summer or an alternate assessment or through portfolio SE thank you thank you okay um I have a couple things that I definitely want to share with the board in the community um I I feel like it's it's becoming a trend which I appreciate we return back to our focus of thunderer partnership um I'm happy to report that uh Dr fa myself and Mr Pascal went to Rao College this week we were able to meet with uh Dean Goldstein the new head of school for school of Contemporary Arts ATO College as well as Professor leor who made the contact Professor leor is a parent in town she's wonderful all L of supporting our district so she was able to make the contact for us we sat down with Dean gold and he was very excited about the opportunities of continuing our partnership with r ripo College some of the things we talked about were um the partnership K through2 and the experiences of bringing in either students or professors from the college into our schools in a number of different capacities um he also spoke to us about specific experiences that we can invite not only our students but our community to one being the animation and VFX um conference which is in February there's going to be presentations for our students in the community and there's also going to be workshops that they can take advantage of that Mr Pascal is going to be working with the teachers to communicate that to our students he spoke about the opportunities for gallery openings not only at the college but also here in uh in Mawa um we spoke about opportunities for our students to be able to Showcase their work at Ramapo College um we also spoke about having um possible internships with the professors there along the lines of of pro providing content um for various uh cours workk and um Mr Pascal was definitely interested in pursuing that um we also spoke about having some professors give giving feedback to some of our students on portfolio reviews um a number of our students provide portfolios to colleges to uh gain credit for specific courses and we uh finally spoke about uh providing Dean uh Dean Goldstein our course of studies in the per in the visual Performing Arts uh categories that we can connect with them to create dual enrollment add to our dual enrollment offering so we left very encouraged we also know that you know Rome wasn't built in a day um but there are a lot of actionable things that we can start on this spring that we can find come to fruition either in the summer or in the fall of of 2425 so it was uh it was exciting to maximize the experience of we have a college right in our backyard um so as as you all know we met with Dr Jeb I believe it was last year now we're meeting with Dr Goldstein and I know we also have connections with um uh Dr Romano um who's also working on dual enrollment opportunities so our focus is really to make sure not only are we creating Thunder Partnerships for K12 classrooms but we've been really committed to making sure that our while our kids are here if we can get them College experiences college credits things like that we want to build that type of experience up so when they leave here it's our hope that they leave with a pocket full of credits that's going to offset that financial burden um once they do go to the college level so that was something we want to celebrate speaking of celebrating um I've tried to make it a point to Spotlight our Sports programs because our Sports programs are definitely a point of Pride for us and I'm happy to report that our MAA high school girls as Gabby shared continue to roll with an 11 and3 record um counties are right around the corner and I ask everyone to go out and support all of our teams and the board was um supportive enough to allow us to have Middle School sports by just to remind you our soccer team in their first year won the Championships our basketball team last year went to the Championships and our current basketball teams our boys are 9-0 and our girls are 8-1 so this is a big week for our Middle School sports basketball programs as they come to to the end of the season and begin the playoffs uh Performing Arts to be honest I I think it's best if you continue to follow uh Twitter for ma high school because there are celebrations across all of our performing Arts whether it's course whether it's band um uh whether it's our Orchestra there are County and state recognitions uh to name a few um the next piece sticking on the positives the next piece is MAA schools Foundation open their grand cycle um I I I just want to say yet again how grateful we are for the the support that they have provided to our district uh from for the 13 years I've been here and well before for that every single year uh Dr fa and I meet with their committee and they are open to so many different ideas that push our district further and they've been um key in providing resources to our district to make sure that our um offerings are at a high level so thank you so much for the M schools Foundation um we have North jersey.com I ask everyone to log in I believe Mr Pascal tweeted this as well we have two students who are up for student of the week there are teams of the week there are athletes of the week this is student of the week um and they need we need they need our help and support this award seeks to highlight academic achievement extracurricular activities volunteerism and other Pursuits that are part of the lives of so many of our young scholars there are two students Hannah po who's a junior um and David uh kabel who is a senior so please log on to northjersey.com student of the week and vote for our students something that's not as exciting but I want to make sure that you guys are aware of it and I I think the community needs to be aware of it as well at your table you'll see a voluminous document um that speaks to New Jersey quality single accountability Continuum user guide the New Jersey quality single accountability continuum is the Department of education's monitoring and District self-evaluation system for public school districts the system shifts the monitoring evaluation Focus from compliance to assistance capacity building and Improvement it is a single comprehensive accountability system that consolidates and incorporates the monitoring requirements of applicable state laws and programs and complement federally required improvements the system focuses on monitoring and evalu evaluating school districts in five key components that based on Research have been identified to be key factors in effective school districts these components are instruction and program fiscal governance operations and Personnel I think it's important for us I wanted to share this with you because this is something that we've been working on for over a year if you take a look at this document this shares where this details all of the things that they look for along the lines of our compliance they not only look for it we have to provide um samples and artifacts and proof that we are aligning to their expectations to share with you what this experience is there's an a a remote monitoring experience then there's an on-site monitoring experience most recently we went through and completed fiscal governance operations and Personnel in the last couple weeks instruction in program has been postponed by the county until I believe it's April 23rd we will be getting our scores back from uh this com this audit for lack of a better word um I'm hoping prior to the end of the school year I can't make that promise because it's out of our hands at this point whenever we get that back we can report out on how we are doing what I can share with you very informally and before we get scores in hand the first four indicators went well um they came on site we provided all of the things that we needed we talked through how we were navigating specific components um the county inter room superintendent came as well as the the director of special education at the county level I think is title is um so that was a lift to say the Le at least um but it is my hope that they they were able to see how we are functioning as a district um and I'm hoping that we're able to report back in June or whenever they give us those the reports uh what our scores are so I would just wanted to give everyone here and in the community an awareness of what's Happening behind the closed doors um that you really don't get a chance to see um at the community level okay thank you everybody got a copy of that take a couple minutes and look through it because some of the stuff that you know it it goes into a lot of magicia there's a lot of detail there and the amount of work to compile all this stuff and to go through not just the you know the remote part where you know the remote part is putting stuff together and sending all of this stuff to be evaluated and then they come and they go through the buildings and they go through you know everything this this is this is this this document is a huge amount of work that these guys have put together so I think that's awesome and look forward to positive results because if we get positive results and they leave us alone for Le five five years is that what it is so we do well there we go okay Mr B what you got okay um handful of items tonight uh first thing I just wanted to say since our last meeting a couple weeks ago that we've had um two maybe three delayed openings and one early dismissal big thanks to our buildings and grounds Department as well as everybody at the township DPW for helping uh keep our roads uh safe for our buses for working with us regarding those um early dismissals and delayed openings um big credit and and thanks to them for their work so far we're certainly not out of the woods yet so got a lot of winter left but uh thanks everyone for their support and help with um um clearing the roads Mak it safe for buses for students or for parents to transport kids to and from school uh next I just have a couple of housekeeping items um the first one are two uh resolutions that will be um added to tonight's agenda uh when we added resolutions to the agenda we do read them in full so just bear with me while I read these two agenda items in full we're going to add them to the end of the new business section of our agenda this is going to be the first one is going to be new business item 18 T and the resolution reads resoled upon the recommendation of the superintendent that the Board of Education continues the suspension of student ID 39502 while she completes her education online through educ or virtual education conent upon her being domiciled in the MAA school district and be a further resolve that she must be assessed for treatment at a certified drug and alcohol treatment facility that is approved by the Student Assistance counselor or designate and complete the recommended course of treatment along with providing proof of same and be it further resolved that if the student fails to regularly attend and complete the expected progress benchmarks before her schooling through edere she'll be disenrolled from the monwa school district after a prior notice and being issued a final warning and be it further resolved that the P shall not be permitted on school property or to attend any school sponsored events or activities and be had finally resolved the decision upon the students participation graduation exercises will be made upon successful completion of her Academic Program uh they'll be added to the agenda as item 18t the other resolution to be added is uh will be agenda item 18 U uh this resolution reads resolved upon the recommendation superintendent the Board of Education continues the suspension of student ID 39605 while on home instruction pending for enrollment and completion of a minimum of two treatment sessions as certified drug and alcohol treatment facility that is approved by the Student Assistance counselor for designate provides proof of saying and be a further resolve that upon her return to school district environment the student shall be evaluated for therapeutic services provided by the effective School solution ESS program at MAA high school and be had further resolve that if the student one fails to regularly attend or complete the treatment program at the drug and alcohol facility or two does not regularly attend home instruction or three commits any other disciplinary infractions warranting suspension will result in an expulsion hearing before the board or committee thereof to discontinue Educational Services and we had finally resolved that the people shall not be permitted on school property or to attend any school sponsored events or activities during the suspension period uh that resolution will be an 18u uh with those two resolutions being added I also want to share that there is one resolution on the agenda that will be tabled to a future board meeting uh that is agenda item 18r and agenda between the Board of Education and the ma Education Association that agenda item uh will be tabled to to a future board meeting and the very last uh piece of house ging keeping I have is for members of the public to be aware and for board members um we've already communicated with that our next uh regular schedule board meeting which had been scheduled for Wednesday February 21st uh is going to be cancelled that will be replaced with a board meeting that is going to be on Thursday evening uh February 15 notices have already been sent to the paper as well as the Town Clerk and school offices regarding uh these changes and also posted to our website those was the have for tonight thank you thank you Mr bleer Fair yes have a few items to report on the first piece some good news for MAA High School uh we were just contacted by college board in particular their advanced placement program ma high school has earned uh an award from the college Bo AP Computer Science female diversity award um this achievement was earned for our high female representation in our AP Computer Science principl course uh in 2023 MAA high school was one of 834 high schools recognized across the country in the category of AP Computer Science principles for this distinction in enrollment yeah it's really awesome um as I was reading the agenda and since we're talking about AP I also want to congratulate Miss beon miss cranic and miss Morwick who will be serving as AP readers for AP Chinese and culture AP English Literature and composition and AP music theory I know as a former AP reader um it's an awesome experience and it could certainly catapult instruction as a result of that experience so I wish them an awesome time in June the next piece at your uh places is a flyer SL invitation for tomorrow evening uh from 5:00 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. where the high school work-based learning coordinators our guidance department and the leadership team have organized an event where light Refreshments will be set up an overview presentation of students work related to their work placements will take place and ultimately this evening we'll be used to thank and honor our mentors and work-based placements so I know that we've been talking a lot about this and it's great to see something like this come to fruition so this will Also Serve obviously as a Showcase of our students experiences uh from their respective internships and and externship experiences and lastly another bright spot um at your places is an article from Columbia University's website uh the title is a rare story of Hope and pancreatic cancer treatment um this is connected to a MAA high school graduate uh the article is about a patient who entered a laboratory for pre clinical research first conducted by a Columbia University oncologist the laboratory is led by uh Kenneth Olive PhD who was a 1994 graduate all high school I know um um going SO3 so his his leadership related to this laboratory was featured and I also believe his father was a former um MAA board member which is really cool so uh the article highlights the unique comprehensive facility that is Colombia's pancreas Center as they are working hard to offer the world new possibilities and hope for a cure for this deadly disease um according to the article um although for the better part of 40 to 50 years the only treatment for pancreatic cancer has been surgery and old school chemo treatment which has often been a disease that has been defiant when responding to new therapies fortunately due to this recent lab's findings they're making progress towards identifying new therapies that will change the outcome of this devastating and aggressive disease so shout out to another MAA high school graduate with whom we are proud of their contributions to the field of science medicine and the world so great report how you become aware of this um Mr Pascal so whenever there's like good news he you know he spreads the good word so he sent that to my email get oh I don't know I mean he's interconnected very interconnected proba he probably taught science and he came back set yes in his in his email he said Ken was a bright stud a bright science student obviously he went to Bucknell and then he went to MIT to earn his PhD SL yeah right um but uh if you if you do get the opportunity to check out this article online the video there's there's a YouTube video video connected or embedded in the article which is um it really brings the contents of the article to life as well so great and having having grown up with Ken this is not a surprise I do get to talk to him periodically I see him on you know on other things and he is a super interesting guy to talk to it's this is this is his lab does a lot of good work has for years and this is really I mean this is this is his passion he's you know to talk to him about is super inter I have emailed him so that he can connect with our students so once I I get a response yes we will make it work so might be a help all right cool thank you okay I'm going to channel my inner Dr Mory here actually I'm not I'm going to be quick so all right so uh Dr morthy did leave a report tonight um just very briefly um that uh since the last meeting she was able to um put together our our committee assignments um uh I'd like to report that our committee assignments have been completed for the year thank you to all the board members for their prompt replies and uh cooperation in completing this process the five standing committees and one ad hoc committee U for each committee there's a chair person and three board members uh the chair people are uh Mike Gallow for negotiations also Mike Gallow for finance and Facilities uh Dr Mory for curriculum and instruction uh M daviero for uh community relations Mr Denise for policy and Mr Copan uh for the ad hoc Transportation committee uh we also have ass sign Le on and alternates for MAA access for all MAA schools Foundation MAA Town Council uh Bergen County uh school boards Association and njpa legislative every committee uh meets on a regular basis during the year each month or as needed minutes from each committee meeting are shared to the full board and committee reports at board meetings are an opportunity for updates to be provided to board uh and and the public regarding what's taking place on each committee that's Dr Mor's report uh committee reports oh I'm sorry we have so tonight we have uh Mr zmer is here to conduct our annual uh ethics training which we have to do make thank you just good evening everybody members of the board of the administration members of the community uh thank you for having me here this evening to discuss the New Jersey school ethics act um the school ethics Act is a law in the state of New Jersey that governs the conduct of certain school officials and I'll explain how the term School official is defined in the ACT thank you very much appreciate it um the preamble to the school ethics sums up nicely why New Jersey has a school ethics act in the first place uh and as you can tell the theme is that the taxpayers the folks who elected you to serve have to feel confident that you're acting in the best interests of the school Community the students rather than for your own personal interests Financial interests the interests of family friends businesses uh in which you may be Associated and what it says is that in our representative form of government it's essential that conduct of members of local Boards of Ed and mobal administrators hold the respect and the confidence of the people the officials must avoid conduct which is in violation of the public trust or which creat some justifiable impression among the public that such trust is being violated so what does that mean means not only do you have to avoid actual conflicts of interest but you also have to avoid the appearance of impropriety um I always tell board members if something doesn't pass the smell test if somebody's going to question is this decision being driven by a board member again for their own interest their own personal interest or for the interest of the school district which is the reason they should be acting then the board member needs to take a step back and I always advise board members a on the side of caution recuse yourself literally step away from the discussion don't vote and so forth so New Jersey does require that we annually discuss this we talked about qac before I think this falls into the governance category we'll be able to check that box um who does the ACT apply to it applies to school officials uh board members of course but also applies to school administrators high level School administrators assistant superintendents of course the superintendent Bas and principles the code of ethics within the school ethics Act only applies to the conduct of Board of Education members and so if you look at the school ethics act it's essentially divided into two parts you have the prohibited acts which deal with conflicts and avoiding conflicts and then you have the code of ethics which I'm going to discuss now just briefly walk you through them uh board members are responsible for following the law upholding the law that's what section A refers to section B is that you're to make decisions in terms of the educational welfare of all children you're here for everybody regardless of race color religion Creed Etc um section c really defines what it is to be a board member a board is really a policymaking b body you set policy for the district you set policy we use stra smme they kind of provide us with the Frameworks the templates but then we have the ability as board members to kind of shape those policies to fit the needs of our district a lot of policy is contained in statute regulation so you don't have a lot of discretion but there are areas where you do have discretion to again shape the policies to fit the needs of the school district planning for the future of the district and Appraisal taking a step back and saying how are we doing what can we do better and so forth and framing those plans after you have consulted with them and what they mean by that is doing that through your work on the various committees not privately um section D is an area where board members sometimes get themselves into trouble if you read the decisions of the school ethics commission your job like I said as a board memb is not to run the school but to make sure it is well run you have the administration running the daytoday operations of the school district and if you read the code it talks about what does somebody have to prove to show a violation of that particular provision and all the others but I'll highlight a few for the administration to show somebody violated that You' have to show that somebody gave a direct order to school Personnel or became directly involved in the day-to-day operations of the school district and so you go to the school ethics commission website you'll see all their decisions and here's an example of a board member for instance getting involved into into the day-to-day so the SEC referring to the school ethics commission found a violation where a board member showed up at the guidance Department office started asking the secretaries to produce sat reports for him then proceeds down to the school um gymnasium where he inspects the locker room does his own inspection and then he starts telling the PE te how they should do a better job supervising the gym class that day somebody got wind of this filed an Ethics complaint and clearly this was found to have been a clear violation of administering the schools a big no no um section A you have to recognize your Authority rests with the board and you're not allowed to take U make personal promises or take private action that could compromise the board you have the ability to act when you're here at the dayus through your various committees but once you leave this room you do not have authority to bind the board to act on behalf of the board or quite frankly even speak on behalf of the board unless you've been authorized by the board to do so um section F says you're supposed to refuse to surrender your independent judgment to special interest groups partisan political groups or to use the the schools for the gain of friends or for yourself um Surrender Your independent judgment is the key in that does that mean you can't advocate for a particular group of students no of course not it's the the buzzwords are surrendering your judgment so that you're no longer independent about the way you're thinking about the issue um confidentiality board members as you know come across a lot of confidential information in the course of their duties as board members confidential student information confidential Personnel information litigation issues and so forth we're allowed as you know to discuss those topics in executive session uh the superintendent will often communicate you with you about confidential matters and I always tell my school district clients that if the Board of Education as a whole doesn't feel confident that what is said in Clos session is discussed in Clos session stays in close session it really undermines your ability to Be an Effective body because nobody's going to want to have an open onest dialogue or debate about anything for fear that as soon as the meeting's over and this happens unfortunately everybody in the community knows what was said that you said this you said that and it completely undermines everything on top of the fact that it's a a very clear ethics violation so I I really want to stress to everybody how important confidentiality is and that your spouses and your friends and your significant others they are not bound by the ethic you should not be going home and telling them the things that you talked about here because that's how things quite frankly get out into the community it's a real problem and then the other part of that is you have to provide accurate information so you're allowed to you don't Surrender Your First Amendment rights and I'm going to talk about that in a minute as a board member but it's important that when you talk about things pertaining to the Mawa School District that you're accurate in what you say section H voting to appoint the best qualified Personnel after considering the recommendation of the superintendent by law the superintendent makes all Personnel recommendations in the district the board can't appoint somebody without Dr Toro's recommendation there's another section of title 18a that says the board actually shouldn't withhold its approval of the superintendent's recommendations for arbitrary in capricious reasons does that mean you have to rubber stamp everything that comes by you no but unless you have a very good solid reasonable reason you're generally as a rule supposed to support all of the Personnel recommendations that come before you from the um next you will support and protect School Personnel in the proper performance of their duties so what does that mean somebody's going to show somebody violated this what would they have to show that somebody took deliberate action which resulted in undermining opposing or compromising or harming School Personnel in the proper performance of their duties read some of the cases from the ethics commission board members publicly criticizing or evaluating particular staff members obviously that is not supporting and protecting School Personnel in the performance of their dut um and if I'm going too fast please let me know chime in questions concerns whatever um section J I like this section I think this is a good section for board members this section is the section of the school ethics act that says if a complaint comes across your desk so to speak refer that to the superintendent of schools to handle you should not be handling complaints from community members on your own it's a it's a great ability to punt when you're at the local supermarket and somebody comes up to you and says my kid teacher is giving too much homework on the board what are you going to do about it the answer is I'm going to go talk to Dr Doro he'll get back to you he'll take care of it or you can certainly refer them to the chain of command have you spoking to your child's teacher did you go to the principal etc etc the point is you should not be dealing with these complaints on your own as a board of education member so if somebody feels that somebody's violated any of the things I've talked about can anybody file a complaint and the answer is yes anybody anybody in the community anybody on the board can file a complaint the Board of Education as an entity cannot file a complaint against of members but the board members individually could sign on to a complaint there's also a six-month statute limitations that means the complaint has to be filed within six months of the time of the alleged offense the school ethics commission is the only entity that can determine whether a conduct whether a board member's conduct violated the ACT I can certainly give you my legal opinion but at the end of the day the sec's decision is the only one that's binding uh we can request an advisory opinion from the school ethics commission so if you want to know about a particular course of action and how to handle it they will issue a written opinion to you on how to conduct yourself um I've only had to do that in a few situations I I represent a district in uh Somerset County where a senior student got elected to the Board of Education he in his senior year he got elected to the Board of Education the board turned to me and said Mark you know what can he vote on can he vote on his teachers can he vote on other student matter he's a student in the high school and a board member and I scratched my head and I said this is one of those occasion I think we should write to the school ethics commission and get an advisory opinion and they gave us a very detailed response about you know the dues and Dons of what that member could do it was helpful um what are the S sanctions for violating the act at the lightest end of the spectrum you have a reprimand that's kind of a slap on the wrist in the form of a letter uh from the school ethics commission to the member a censure is a resolution similar to what Kyle read a very detailed resolution read publicly at a meeting about the member's conduct certainly embarrassing it usually makes headlines we have to post it on the place where we post notices U not a good thing obviously suspension pretty self-explanatory and then in the most extreme cases removal from the Board of Education uh can you file an Ethics complaint against somebody if they're no longer on the board what do you think with six months there you go as long as it's within six months window of time even if if they're not on the board anymore suspension and removal is obviously not going to be an option um but yes the answer is yes I I talked a little bit about this before you don't Surrender Your First Amendment rights by being Board of Education member but there are certain caveats you have to make sure you're disclosing accurate information uh you can't disclose confidential information or information which has the potential to compromise the board you shouldn't publicly criticize your staff and so forth um I also refer you to board policy 0146 and 0169 which says that if you're going to make a speech in an organization if you're going to write a letter to the papers if you're somebody who likes to post on social media or Twitter X whatever you like to use it's important that if you're speaking about Mawa School District issues you have a disclaimer you make it very clear that you're speaking as an individual and not on behalf of the Board of Education you're speaking as a private citizen and the school ethics commission recommends the following disclaimer if anybody wants me to email it to you if you somebody who likes to do these things I'm happy to email you this verbi but the gist of it is you have to say the following statements are made in my capacity as a private citizen and not in my capacity as a board member these statements are also not representative the of the board or its individual members and solely represent my individual personal opinions so that's what you need to say on any postings speeches letters and so on and so forth so um every year uh I like to kind of pull some interesting cases from the New Jersey school ethics commission these are all available by the way on the department of education's website under the school ethics commission tab all public decisions which is another reason why you don't want to be the subject of an Ethics complaint um and uh so let me get your thoughts on some of these is actually a district that I represent um number one um so in this particular case we have a board member who's a member of Unico I don't know if you're familiar with Unico it's the Italian American organization she's a member of Unico this board member is very upset because she learns that the School chorus is not performing at the Unico Columbus Day event and she decides that she's going to call the teacher the head of the chorus and say hey why aren't you guys performing this year she emails her she Tex texts her the teacher in a very awkward spot say well the principal didn't want us there board member essentially tells the teacher well the principal doesn't know what he's doing that's ridiculous he should you guys should be here and somebody got very upset with this board member and filed an Ethics charge against her so true or false do you think this was a violation of section D which is um not administering the schools and section e which is recognizing your Authority rest with the board and not making personal promises or taking private action that could compromise the board what do you think true or false true true all right well one for one ask follow what if the individual emailing board member emailing from your personal email address because your child was a member of the bank disclaimer um I think you know look you don't surrender your rights as a parent either so if you're simply writing to the teacher as a parent asking that question I think it would be fair and I would probably to your point want some language in there saying something like I'm emailing you Jessica mother because um want to know in the past you guys have performed Jessica's upset so yes as long as you made that very clear that did not happen here I always let my wife by the way all these decisions you know keep in mind I'm boiling down some of these decisions are 20 30 pages long I'm boiling them down to like a paragraph so so but the point is if you want to learn more about what happened certainly feel free to to read the cases how about this one this deals with the the prohibited act the conflict section so a board member violated section B and C of the ACT um dealing with I'm sorry that's the code that's um b b is um making decisions in terms of the educational welfare of children and section c is um confining your board action to policymaking planning and appraisal and um not engaging in conflicts when she attended an executive session of the board while her husband's candidate was discussed so this board member's husband is applying for an open seat on the board of education the board discusses the candidates in closed session and she attends the closed session while all the candidates including her husband are discussed um you think that was a problem abely you want to say something for an appointment or yes for an open seat on the board so they have a vacancy they adver I thought it was for for election like why are they talking about that executive was foration on the board so yeah they the school ethics commission said look she she had an undue privilege or Advantage she was a board member what that was the only reason she was allowed to sit in and no other spouse of any other candidate got to sit in on the executive session discussions and so that was a violation how about this one yeah on that one so a board member violated sections e and g e is um recognizing your Authority rest with the board not making personal promises or taking private action G deals with confidentiality so the board member uh gets an email from the superintendent of school saying hey hey good news everybody the NFL may be using our stadium for a big event I just want to let you know this and so forth the board member then takes that email and forwards it to the mayor and the Town Council uh the superintendent um made it clear that this was not a public matter no decision had been made do you think that's a problem yes yes of course board members have to maintain confidentiality the matter was still under deliberation by the board how about this one uh this comes up a lot of board members who who's a teacher in another district and a member of the NJ can participate in negotiations with the teachers in the district who's a member once there's an MOA with salary guides what do you think sure false can you as a teacher in another District participate in negotiations in your own District where your board member once there's an Mo MOA with guides anybody think it's true words salary negotiations are largely done PR much but not approved by the board yet not formally approved you're at the correct like the one yard line B so now it's just a matter of putting the contract together and but the answer is true the answer is true the school ethics commission says once you were at that point in the negotiations and by the way the member can actually vote on the final contract once there's the Moa and the guide even if you're an nja member in another school district or if your spouse is an nja in another District um so they're not conflicted then they're conflicted up to that point so they shouldn't be sitting in when the strategizing about how much they want to offer what their proposals are going to look like but once there's that MOA and guides the board member can actually vote on the final contract if they were a teacher here they couldn't vote on because they'd be voting on the road contract yeah although the law is they couldn't be a teacher where they a board member anyway yes um but if they had but piggy back on what you said if they had a relative who worked in MA they would be completely conflicted from beginning to end um how about this one a violated section c and e I should have C is on policym planning and Appraisal uh e is uh recognizing your Authority represents the with lies with the board so this board member start emailing vendors falely blaiming she was reaching out on behalf of the board requesting price quotes on Chromebooks she contacted da from neighboring School District doing a survey getting their opinions about the Chromebooks U is that a problem in the words of George castanza my favor sign um that is a problem that is private action she was never authorized to start doing her own investigations surveys falsely representing to vendors hey I'm a board member you know would you be interested in submitting a proposal about Chromebooks and so for so a board member who spouse is a member of the burrow Council would violate section c section c is from the prohibited accidence as a board member shouldn't act in any manner where they have a direct or indirect personal or financial involvement that could compromise your objectivity so would a board member violate the conflict section if she were to vote on a shared services agreement between the board and the township to employ an SRO what do you think should sheain that what do you think that was an advisor so this person wrote to the school ethics commission said my husband's a council member uh we have an MOA which is an agreement between the board and the council should I substain and recuse myself what do you think would the board true or false should but I don't so you're saying true then you'd be correct that's that's a trueth board member should abstain recuse him or herself and so but it's interesting only that neither spouse has a financial true but I guess they felt you know something your husband's counil May thank you you're right how about this one um this is this is an interesting one one day you will this this is a very interesting one this is a hot button topic as you know probably around the state section A deals with upholding all laws and rules of the State Board of Education following the law section D is um not administering the schools and F is um refusing to surrender your independent judgment to special interest groups so a board member votes no along with some other board members to a motion approving the health and PE curriculum resulting in a TI vote resulting in the motion going down in flames uh so they don't kind of they're left without this help in PE curriculum they're out of compliance with the New Jersey student learning standards uh is that a true or false we think it's false FSE the answer was false and what the ethics commission said was you vote as board members you have a right to vote your conscience it's not a good thing that they were left out of compliance but voting on a particular matter generally um unless there's a conflict of course is not going to be an Ethics violation because people would be in violation of the ethics act all the time if they voted no to certain things that they don't support so that was not a violation Mark can I ask a question about that yeah being that this is mandated by the state what's the district action in order because my obligation as superintendent is for us to be in compliance with State expectations I'd understand if that was something that you know a curriculum that wasn't weren't obligated to adhere to which is hard to find one of those too but how do we work how do we work as a district to make ensure because my responsibility is to make sure that the district is in compliance with all expectations how do you do that yeah I mean I think what they have to do is go back and revisit why they the board members didn't support it perhaps it could be tweaked in such a way to still be compliant with the state and and try again they never get to that issue in this case and you know you about this earlier not having this curriculum could put you in Jeopardy in CAC with you for instance corre so the board has caught between a rock and a hard place which is why I personally don't think the board member should really be voting on things that are mandated there's not really a lot of discretion anyway but again I think they had problems with certain parts of the curriculum and they probably hopefully went back tried and and tweaked it so that they got the support that they needed was ultimately not not an Ethics violation all right final question a board member who's employed in another District as a bus driver so we've got a board member who works in another District as a bus driver but you know you don't have to be in the union if you don't want it you don't have to pay the dues but keep in mind irrespective of whether you pay the dues the terms and conditions of your employment are still governed by the Union contract so here we got a board member who's employed in another District as bus driver true or false is that person precluded from being involved in all aspects of the negotiations with the bus drivers in the district where the board member sits as a board member in that particular situation if they board m is not technically in the nja in the district where they work what do you think and so they're in the board on they're on the Mawa board hypothetically and now can they participate in the Mawa bus drivers negotiations because they're not a member of so you think it's a false is a naying member so he still a member uh he's he's his employment is still governed by the Union contract which is negotiated by the nja but he's not a member of the Union so that means for instance uh he doesn't have a right to be represented in agreeance he doesn't have the nja attorney representing him or her for his issue so it's optional whether employees in a school district have to be they don't have to be in EV their contract their employment is still governed by that Union contract but they don't actually have to be jees paying members and and um some people are not members of the Union so the question is is the fact that he's not technically an nja member does that prude him from being involved in the negotiations in his own District where he's a board member with the bus drivers the answer is it was true he was precluded and the reason was because even though you're in the union your contract is negotiated by the nja anyway your collective bargaining you get all the benefits of that collective bargaining agreement even though you're not in the union and they felt it was a conflict of interest even though you're in another District yep yep some of these are really tricky you know um so that was that was that so um does anybody have any questions thoughts how do we get on the school ethics commission so we can change these answers it's funny I say this when I when I prepare this quiz and I look at the decisions from the school ethics commission I don't know if you get distress ask newsletter every month most of the cases that are filed against are dismissed most of them are dismissed most of them don't satisfy the burdens approved believe it or not and so that's not to say you should act unethically of course but I mean a lot of people as you know file these ethic charges because they have vettas against other people and so a lot of them are frivolous um so so that's it any questions good all right doing a report for Trista who here tonight for community relations we had our first meeting last week yeah not last week um off the year of just going over some of our goals for the year and some of the big things and mins that we will be talking about at some point but in the meantime uh we talked about the new website uh the redesigned website Well Done by Administration and and everyone involved um it's really sharp looking I think the information is uh is well laid out and in good places especially the calendar which everyone seems to be looking for lately every time an authentication goes up um it is going to take Google a little while to reup its search engine algorithm to know where to point to the different things so when you type in uh school calendar it doesn't take you there yet but it will eventually but it looks really good so well done uh we also talked about uh starting uh Community Round Table called uh t- bird talks basically coffee with the superintendent under a different name um and S oh yeah and sorry you're going to maybe some board members I'm looking to start those uh hopefully February March more to come on that so that was our first meeting obviously uh from a community relation standpoint we be looking to um you know just have more for the community and and and be more transparent and have more information for the community at large as we go along Through The Years look forward to it next you Mr cou real quick Transportation we're having our first meeting on Monday I want to thank Kyle and Tracy they sat with me for about hour the other day and brought me back up the speed as to what we did last year where we're going be this year so thank you both week anyone else fantastic I'm going move that thank you Mark good night everybody thanks board member remarks additional comments on other non it I just have a real quick question Dro is there any update on the uh calendar for the 2425 yes yes we we are developing that calendar we shared uh the calendar with um the executive committee yesterday um and we also um are working with our mea and ministrative team um we're going to be sharing it also with the um which has been a practice prior to me the executive committee of our hsos and we are hoping to have it on the February 15th um agenda for board approval or vote anyone else yeah so I had a very interesting experience so on January 9th I had the pleasure of attending the State of the State address delivered by Governor Murphy and so one of the the more shocking initiatives that he rolled out was his interest in allowing 16 and 17 year olds to participate in the voting process and personally I do disagree with that the governor's initiative but I also see that as an opportunity for MAA so I do believe that 16-year-olds they maybe are not mature enough politically active enough but I think as a board we should come together because whether we agree with it or not this is initiative that's likely going to pass so I think as a board we should come together and try to strategize hey how should we uh revamp our Civics education in the school so MAA will be prepared come time whenever this initiative gets passed we're going to have the most prepared students the most active students the students that want to participate in the voting process Chris is this for local elections state election oh yeah let me clarify so the the governor did say it we're going to start out or he wants to start out with local elections so specifically board of education but I don't see that ending at just the board of education level I do see that in a certain time frame whatever it is uh having access to vote at Town Council uh for County Commissioners other state level uh spots so who doesn't want them to vote for for a can I ask a clar question sure um Mr Hughes is there anything specific that you have a concern about either at the middle school level with the high school level specific to our Civics curriculum that um we need to strengthen I know I just thought it would be good to take a look at it and see like hey is there a couple options that we could have a little more hands-on experience have a little more instruction on local level politics is there how much instruction do you think I know this is Maybe like a broad question but how much instruction is done on the local level of of governance I I think a good resource to get clarification on that um would either be Mr Corey or Mr Pascal as well as Miss vaness and then miss vaness could can provide you with the different touch points throughout the at the very least the 612 curriculum um that talk about not only local level government um but state level and uh National level along lines of Civic uh Civics and the education within that so they're I I believe they'll be able to shine a light on all the different opportunities and then if further discussion is needed we can speak to the specifics that's why I was asking if there's anything that that comes to mind um that that is of concern but they can definitely share that um that information with you I appreciate it it's an interesting thing I mean we it's something that would be kind of a sea change right I mean to be able to prepare our kids for that you know for that uh that responsibility really it's an interesting yeah align to the current curriculum I know that Mr Pascal Works um with the county along the lines of getting the students who are of age registered to vote as well at the school level to make sure that we're taking away any sort of obstacles um for participation but obviously that's the end of the experience but also the touch point in between of having an awareness of what is your role and responsibility and then the ramifications of whatever it may be yeah what does what does it mean and what what's actually happening what are you doing what are the ramifications of this basically you know preparing them get getting them registered you know that should be the end process well in the new website if you go to the high school student services there's a voter registration section and it's a wealth of resources on not just to register but the whole process of voting and why it's import Do It um one of the opportunities I think we could add to that though is that the County Board of Elections is looking for students can help out they're they're way short of poll work so I think you be as young as six don't quote me but I think you be as young as 16 to work at a as a PO work that 17 no there's another update too that they voted in um if you're 17 and you're eligible to register you can vote in the primary that's a new law starting two years from now so it's something to update because as we had voter registration at the high school available to encourage students to let them know that they can participate in the primary so that's two years from now it'll come into action so get on engagement having that on the website is cool with all that information kids aren't to a lot of detail there I I was just should be in theom for sure 2026 say that it's not but that that change anyone else y just shout out to Courtney carella and the our foreign language teachers who pulled off a fantastic International night last uh Thursday it was packed I got there at 7 there was lots and lots of people there the entire cafeteria of the high school was ringed by um displays and food and and not just of the languages we teach there's a a person doing Japanese calligraphy there was an Islamic community display there was there was a lot of stuff a lot of people eating there was a lot more food this year um I didn't come as hungry as I should have um but it was a fantastic night and and it just shows how wonderful our community is and all of the people out there who who want to share their um cultural backgrounds with the broader uh Community which is great um just a calendar update on February 1st the M High School chamber coffee house will be at 7:00 in the media center at the high school always a great event and encourage people to attend sorry Rick one more thing um I had the pleasure of judging Deca a Deca competition at rampo College um I I think it was couple weeks ago at this point lost track I want to thank Miss Torino Miss Ferguson for inviting me and asking me to do it but also for preparing our students if you've never sat through a Deca competition this is unbelievably impressive um these students are given scenarios and they have to come up off basically off the top of their head with responses to these scenarios and some of the students I didn't see any MAA students I think they kept us kept them away from the ma judges or from me I don't know but um the the the kids that came in the students that came in they were incredible incredibly prepared just really just impressive impressive kids so I'd encourage all of us uh to reach out to you Mr M Miss Ferguson to express some interest to do this they're always looking for judges they're also always looking for help in preparing the kids they they'll have mock kind of competitions in the high school I've sat through that as well um so please reach out to them offer to help it's it's very rewarding I'm not going to be able to go totic City this year but uh I went last year for it and that was just even that was States we had two students I think went to Florida for Nationals um so that was that's it's a really cool program and um I hope more students enroll we big number it was like 75 or something yeah and this year Nationals I think is in California California yeah I think there like 75 students at ramp College from it was really cool old business can I have a motion on NS from last meeting Mr Gallow second by Mr Denise um Mr Denise yes Mr Gallow yes Mr Hughes yes Mr karski yes M Jansen abstain Mr coplin abstain and Mr D Sila yes's Marathon still going weour new business 18 A through U excluding 18r which has been Ted we have a motion Mr karski second by Mr Gallow Mr Denise yes Mr Gallow yes Mr Hughes yes Mr karski yes M Jansen yes Mr copin yes and Mr Dila yes uh new business a through o may I have a motion all please M Jensen second by Mr cin Mr Denise yes Mr Gallow yes Mr Hughes yes Mr karski yes Mr Jansen yes Mr copin yes and Mr Dila yes excuse me public questions or comments public participation of board meetings is in accordance with bylaw Z 167 at this time members of the public may ask questions or make comment on educational issues or School matters of community interest as a matter of fairness you're asked to limit your questions to no more than one and your remarks to No More Than 3 minutes you're here representing a group please identify yourself the group and your position in the group if you are here as an individual please give us your name and address this section of public participation will be limited to 15 minutes may I have a motion to open to the public Mr cin second by Mr we're open at 834 see this thing uh Robert Ferguson 23 teris I'll be brief uh representing myself as a parent and also uh as a member of the township Council uh first as a parent uh Dr too thank you so much for mentioning the Middle School sports programs uh two of my daughters play on the basketball team it's a fantastic year fantastic program uh can't thank this board enough for for vering back Middle School sports for for our students uh second U now as as a council member this will be my last meeting at least for this year we not supposed to clap that you can clap while you want um there'll be a new Council aison starting at the next meeting it's councilwoman Janet ARA uh she's been on the council for 12 years uh fantastic council member uh she'll be very engaged um I'd really enjoy enjoy being a delay on to this board uh as a parent of three kids in the schools I I really like coming to these and hearing what you guys are up to um we've done a lot of stuff cooperatively as a town and as a school board probably for the first time uh to the level that it is now um and that's a combination of myself council president May Mr kmari really bringing the teams together to save money for taxpayers and that's really we want to do um that will continue that's not going to change without me being here uh but I just want to thank you guys for all that you do and have a good evening thank you thank see no one else may have motion to close Mr Gallow second by Mr Hughes we're close at 8:36 uh we do need a second executive session tonight um once we go into executive we will adjourn from there there will be no further action uh may I have a motion Mr toin second by Mr Hughes thank you everyone for coming tonight