##VIDEO ID:Vwu8EtHCggU## meeting ctin roll call Dr calino here Mr dri here Mrs Fano here Mr Grow here Mr Palama here Mr Petrino here Mr Rapaport here miss Zuckerman here Dr modra here Mr brookhiser here miss Patel here okay pledge allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all an open public meeting notice please the New Jersey open public meeting law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting their interests is discussed or acted upon in accordance with the provisions of the act the monville Township Board of Education provided a public notice of this meeting which included the time date and location that was posted at the Montville Township Municipal Building all Montville Public Schools the Montville Public Library the Montville Township Board of Education administrative office building the district website and advertised in the Daily Record and the monville tap into the board's official newspapers on January 28th 2024 okay thank you so I'd like to welcome Mr Brook CER Miss Patel our new student reps would you like to introduce yourselves and give us a little bit of information on the high SCH hello everyone so um I'm Benjamin brookhouser and I'm the sac uh student council president uh for the school right now and uh here I'm Gia Patel I'm the class of 2025 president so student council president so tonight we have a little bit of the past stuff that has happened um in the school some of the present and and then some stuff that's going to happen in the future as well so we're going to start off with the past um as everyone knows uh school started September 3rd and I'm just going to give a little rundown of what the sports have done um so the girls varsity soccer team is 5- one they beat Pope John Lakeland mendum Cranford and Morris Hills and their one loss was to parpan Hills the girls varsity volleyball team is 3- one they lost their first game to Milburn but are now on a three-game winning streak uh beating Randolph Wes Morris and Morris nolles the boys varsity soccer team has a record of one win one loss and two ties uh they won their first game against Pope John then proceeded to tie the next two against Caldwell and Sparta and with their latest game they lost to ppan Hills 4 to1 uh and the girls varsity field hockey has a record of two wins and three losses they won their first game against Wayne Hills lost the next three to West Morris Verona and panic and their latest game they won by beating Morristown so that kind of wraps up the sports and now kind of on to the clubs and different things that have went on uh in the school so the graci's Army club sold gold t-shirts in the retunda during lunch on Thursday September 5th and Friday September 6th to where to the gold out football game um for that Friday night and to also raise money for Childhood Cancer uh the late bus started uh September 9th for the high school uh the Montville theater company has announced that their fall production will be Alice in the Wonderland um and they have their interest meetings already for that and they also have uh a meeting for the stage crew as well so they're kind of all set with that um last week was the National Suicide Prevention awareness week and each day through schooly which is our um like uh school students kind of uh uh website that we all use for um different announcements and classes uh they were posting spotlights and different information um about important resources for students staff and parents to check out mville also had their first spirit week last week uh on Monday it was occupation day people dress as an occupation of their choice Tuesday it was twin day where people dressed identical to another kid or kids in the school Wednesday was USA day for 911 people were red white and blue Thursday was Jersey Shore vers Jersey day and people dressed to go to either the beach or um as if they were going to a game with a jersey and Friday was color Wars uh where freshman wore yellow sophomores wore green green Juniors wore white and seniors wore black at the end of spirit week on Friday we held our first school pep rally um we had five different events including flag football the water bucket and sponge relay race potato sack race a grade wide scavenger hunt and lastly a tug-of-war game both students and teachers participated in in certain events uh it ended up being a big success for our first one of the year and now I'm going to pass it on to Gia she's going to go through the present and the future thank you Ben so as you all probably know back to school night and the club Fair will be this Thursday September 19th and students will be able to browse through the club tables at the club Fair during lunch the club Fair will also resume at 6:30 which is a half hour before back to school night officially begins at 7:00 ambassadors from student council Key Club NHS and pal will be assisting parents as they are in the building Key Club is once again having a back to school night VIP parking auction and the highest biders will be given VIP parking spots to avoid the struggle that most parents have to find parking spots the proceeds will be used for key club's upcoming events also right now the class of 2025 and class of 2026 are hosting a combined mums fundraiser um with korsos orders will be accepted until October 2nd and people will be able to pick up their orders until October 20th senior portrait portrait retakes are also available right now and the retake dates are scheduled for October 17th and 18th today the National Merit Scholarship semi-finalists were also announced and from mths Hong Jin CA and Curtis Wang have been named so this week later this week Gracie's Army foundation will hold a 5k fund run at the high school at 9:00 a.m. on Sunday and it's just to raise money and donations for the foundation next week there will also be representatives from numerous colleges coming to share information on their respective schools and the schools that are coming to mths next week are NJIT Stockton University Lafayette College George Washington University Bucknell University William Patterson Michigan State University and LSU on SE on Sunday September 29th from 1: to 3:00 p.m. at the high school there is also a military service AC Academy info session so we'll have representatives from all theems including the Naval Academy West Point Air Force Merchant Marine Academy Coast Guard Academy and a bunch of The Roc scholarship programs this would be a very good opportunity for any students particularly junor Juniors or seniors who are interested in these types of programs both the girls tennis teams and the boys soccer teams next games are tomorrow girls tennis will be away at Morris Hills at 4: and boy soccer will be away at Wayne Valley which is also at 4 field hockey and girls volleyball will be at home on Thursday field hockey will be playing Randolph and volleyball will be playing Morristown both those games are also at 400 p.m. girl soccer will play on Thursday but they'll be away versus LPE Valley at 6:30 and this Friday football will look to get their record to 4 and0 when they verse Roxberry away at 700 p.m. that's it thank you by the way can I also just mention that uh tack on to the games uh Sports all the sports are free except for football so come on out and support the Montville High School teams um it's a lot of fun you'll enjoy it but good luck to everyone good point uh question everybody's wondering what did you dress up as for occupation day go first did I dress up as so um on occupation day I dressed up as a caddy cuz I'm a cad for a country club so I wore my I wore khakis and a collared shirt and then I threw a my caty bib on so very nice I um dressed up as a dentist because yeah very good all right okay thank you excellent job tonight thank you welcome uh Dr Gorman would you like to go with your presentations sure uh Charlene we're gonna start with you but uh we're in our uh we're on our third week of school right now we're off to a great start at all the levels uh some normal hiccups that we have here and there we're working out some of those Kinks but overall it's been great we've had two of the back to school nights already and the last one is going to be this Thursday with the high school so we're excited to get the whole year Rolling uh Miss Peterson want to take the podium you have the microphone right there and she'll be working with the board right now on the board's self-evaluation great thank you so much is this on I guess um so thank you so much for the opportunity to be here today to to continue working with the board um and so like we said tonight we're talking about the board self- evaluation so for the benefit of the audience here um you know the state used to require that boards had to take some time and reflect you know on their board self- evaluation and then maybe it's about five years ago or so that they relaxed that requirement so now we say that boards that would do this do it because it's a good governance practice that if we hold the rest of the district accountable we should hold ourselves accountable and we should take the time to reflect on our work because a lot of times the work of the board is really focused on the work of the district and what's going on in the schools but sometimes we really need to take a step back and say how are we doing how are we doing in our governance work um you know there's more and more evidence that says that high- performing boards who work together with their superintendent can make a positive impact on student achievement so we really want to make sure that we're giving our students every benefit that we can by looking at our work and you know saying are are we doing the best that we can for our students um so the way this process works is that each board member um completes an online um self-evaluation and then New Jersey school boards compiles it into one Anonymous document so that's what I'm here tonight then is to review that compiled document with the board um so it is you have both the the complete document um but then I also put a summary together because the document itself is like 20 Pages by the time all said and done um so was able to consolidate it down to about three pages figured that's a little bit easier way to talk about it um so all nine board members filled it out and then also the the superintendent filled it out as well um so it there are nine different areas that the board evaluates itself in um and so the first the the top half of each area talks about the board so that's why there are 10 responses to each one of those because of the inclusion of of the the superintendent in the process and then the bottom part of each half is about you the board memb so that there's nine responses to that so the the board self evaluation is based on a 4.0 scale so as we look at then you know I kind of did an average and said okay if I took those nine areas and looked at how the board evaluated itself in each one of those nine areas for the board score um the overall average was a 3.8 um and so you know that really kind of demonstrates something that you you know I'm sure you probably know in your work of that you're a high performing board right that you have demonstrated that as you reflect on your work look at the work you do together and had all these different indicators to kind of identify your work that it you know it came to be that that the scores would reflect a high performing board so one of the things that I did was said you know what okay instead of just taking this year looking at it by itself I'm like okay I was here 10 years ago I'm going to see what that look like so in 2014 the board's overall score was a 3.7 so then I'm like okay let's fast forward five more years so in 2019 the board score was a 3.8 so the reason that that's significant is because you have been able to sustain this level of performance over at least a 10year period so for some boards sometimes they get that snapshot or there's one good year but how do you make this be part of your culture how do you make this be part of the way of saying this is how our board does things this this is the way that we operate and so just wanted to say that to me this board self- evaluation and the fact that you were able to sustain it over a 10-year period um reflects the fact that you really do have that culture of a high performing board um so I just kind of wanted to kind of put it back to the board and just kind of see kind of what your Reflections are about your work and as you look at how you work together you know how you feel that you know what that looks like to you and how you feel that that has made a difference and then also I think there's you know some significance in the kind of the the length of service right that your board members have had and the opportunity that you have had to come together and work together as a board team um so also wondered kind of what you know thoughts about that as well so I'm going to kind of before I get into this kind of turn it over to the any board members that would wish to respond of kind of what your overall Reflections are about your work together as a team and so we'll put it out there yeah here you go well I would just say that in general we do work together pretty well um we obviously have different opinions about many things but I think that in the end we respect each other's opinions and seek to find Common Ground where we can I think that lends a lot to the atmosphere of this board and the lack of contention that many other boards have um I also appreciate the fact that we do get together before our meetings and have a chance to socialize and get to know each other and build friendships and Bonds Beyond just being on the board so I think that helps our atmosphere here yeah I I agree with David I think our board really understands what its roles are and I think it understands the concept that an effective board member makes an effective board and effective boards impact student achievement in very positive ways I think we we get that um you know I I believe to Be an Effective board member and board you need trust training and experience and I think we have that here um and I think we also understand it's very important that we're cohesive here and we do our work in committee and that's where we produce things that get um that that get approved here um and lastly I'll just say we also understand how important it is to work at having a good relationship with the superintendent in this case we don't have to work too hard to have that good relationship um but for boards that needed that's important just when I uh when I first came on the board it's been a while but they have the you have the training when you first come on the board and the class I went to I remember one of the things they always said they said you do not want your board meeting to be the best show in town and um I think that's something we've definitely adhered to this board meeting has never been the best show in town um you we work well I think it's very professional it's very cordial and it's it's like it should be it's just a pleasure to be on the board it's a pleasure to associate with the people who are on the board with me and uh like you know Karen and David said we all get along very well with with each other and you know if there is any dirty laundry we never hear it in public it impressed me when you did the 10year um 5 years and 10 years ago and how the scores were 38 37 39 which tells me that the board has been very consistent board members come board members go I think the training is something that I'm a little disappointed that the school boards has taken that mandate that you had to go when you were first elected away but I I think a lot of us as Mike said learned stuff at that time we were required to go it's one thing having a webinar or Zoom or something like that that helped out but the training I think is second to none and I think uh as my colleagues have indicated that we may not always vote together the same way but we all have a unified approach to everything and our basic bottom line is the kids and that's why we're all here we're not here for self- Glory or any of that stuff we're here to make the best education and I think the students that were down here gave a glowing report of what's happening so far and the graduation exercises for the last umpty years have been nothing but positive and I I thank my colleagues the administration and I thank the school boards for them yeah I I just want to chime in there a little bit uh you're exactly right these volunteers put a lot of time they're away from their families and the success of the schools you know is a reflection on the commitment that they all put into this I I appreciate all their support but as Karen said about the committee work that's where a lot of the work is being ironed out and then these meetings go very smoothly because of all the work that's going on behind the scenes so uh the board has been extremely supportive of all the initiatives or recommendations been put forth all on the on the behalf of the students so it's been a pleasure we have board members from two years to 30 years here and it just shows you the the cohesion that we have with this board so it's been a pleasure working with everybody so I began my journe Journey um during Co in January and that was that was actually tough for me for the first year because I didn't have the one-on-one with everyone even though everyone um helped me and offered me advice and I was on Zoom taking classes which I which were wonderful and sometimes I'd be in different counties looking what bake County was doing so I learned a lot but everyone here really supports one another we do have differences in opinion but overall we always come to um an understanding of the other person's Viewpoint and sometimes people change their minds and sometimes they don't but everyone is very respectful um and it it is easy to work with um a great superintendent and we know that we are not in charge of running the schools and that's what's I think so so important I think that's how boards get in trouble we support you we oversee um but you are very kind you always ask us our opinions on things um and I really feel like that the school's in great hands not only from our superintendent but our attorney um our business administrator her team and um the rest of my colleagues and of course um both of you Casey and um I can't Andrea sorry thank you so much I'll just just say um it's been a pleasure working with all of you for two years now I could count on no fingers the amount of votes that we've had that have have had an opposition to them uh everything's been pretty unanimous uh which goes to show you know we act as a unit we talk things out beforehand uh and I think that goes a long way uh I'd be remiss to not mention you we have the president of the New Jersey Board Association onor board which helps go a long way in things and um and and a good Administration makes it easy for all of us so thank you okay I wasn't going to just talk like because everyone was talking but I have to say so ditto but um really I guess the point I want to make is that I've never once doubted that everybody is here for the purpose of doing the best that we can in the role that we're supposed to serve to serve the students of this community and and community and do what's best for the children and um that's just been a pleasure and just in thinking you know about running for multiple terms many of us have done it um that we really do serve so well is is why we want to do it and the purpose that we feel like we're accomplishing in a good way and I just really do enjoy serving with all of you and um I think we do good work so thank you and uh in addition to what everyone else has said um I think every meeting that we have we also get an outside evaluation of how well we're doing and that's with all the audience and and the uh the the towns people who uh who show up and there's certainly no shortage of outspoken parents in this town and uh the fact that uh uh we don't have a lot of uh outspokenness at our board meetings every once in a while yeah there there may be an issue but then we address it as a board or or the Dr Gorman addresses it as the superintendent and it gets taken care of when we move on so from that perspective I see that as an outside uh of evaluation we're we're doing the job that the town expects us to do uh because there there's not a long line of people here to talk at our our board meetings and I actually see that as okay we're doing a good job so um I I think that's a good thing yeah I have to agree with every with about everything everyone has said tonight um I think we work well as a cohesive unit and we are lucky to have a great Administration here goinging the school I would say again that I would say that you probably all said it better than I could right that I think that this really just kind of demonstrates everything that you reflected in the board self evaluation and as I was sitting here listening to you I'm thinking like I could take the video from this meeting and use it as a training right of saying to other boards that this is really what what this should look like and that it really does help make a difference when it looks like this so I just wanted to say again kind of echo the sentiment that you all have said and just to really thank you for the time the effort the work that you do and like I said sometimes just as much as that's just part of what you do not only day in and day out but in your case year in and year out right um just want to just kind of say sometimes we just kind of need to reflect and kind of um really just kind of validate that work and say you know what we kind of know we're doing good work but then when we fell out the board self- evaluation and we see these scores that we're getting and we see that we're sustaining them this is kind of helped validating what we kind of know that we're doing but sometimes it's good to just see it on paper and just kind of see the fact that you know we are all again expressing our opinion Ops about this work and to just take some time to talk about it so unless anyone else has any other thoughts about the board self- evaluation I just really wanted to say thank you for everyone for taking the time and for doing the great work that you do thank you uh I would just say one additional thing is that I do appreciate the self- evaluation because it it gets me thinking back again what my roles are what I should be looking on what I should be focusing on and and gets me to think about how can I be a better board member as I go through the different you know standards and qualities that make us high functioning board so thank you my pleasure thank you you have anything no thank you for coming we really appreciate it you come several times a year and your advice and wisdom is always appreciated so thank you so much it's my pleasure uh one uh Mark you queue us up for the next presentation please uh one correction uh the presentation that was just happened is going to be the NJ SBA school boards Association so it's not the ASA different organization thank you students appreciate it all right so our next presentation is uh ctin slunt our business administrator is going to walk us through all the great things that happened over the summer and give you an update on our facilities so at this point the buildings seven buildings uh that are the schools throughout the district are now have reached 50 years older old or older and with buildings that are that age there are all kinds of challenges that come to pass and the Board of Education committed almost a decade ago to begin a process in which the educational facilities of the district would be renovated and updated and maintained so that they would be in the position to service another 50 years worth of students and so as part of that we have really since the referendum in 2017 we've just been continuing that commitment that the board has made to the buildings and we've worked through various improvements at each level so the first is going to be the high school in terms of what we've done in the past we have done repairing of the exterior facade and the redoing of the stadium fields we have done roof repair and have installed solar solar panels we have done work within the building in terms of updating the bathrooms and the gymnasiums and we have done work within the hallways and the retunda in terms of brightening them and cleaning them up this summer in particular we did roof repair and brick work on the 2001 edition that's the addition that's in the back of the building and we did repair work on the hallways and the lockers as we begin to look forward we will be upgrading the electrical systems and Fire Systems repairing the bleachers and we are looking into an aerial athletic apparatus that would expand um offerings at the high school as well as for the entire town so we've done a lot of work at the high school and pretty much now we're beginning to now do more maintenance work than big renovation work Lazar was the next one that we we worked on at we redid their exterior facade and we added a security vestibule to the outside of the building we have done roof repair again to take on solar panels we updated the media center the bathrooms and the gymnasiums and then we did a big renovation of the hallways um and the floors in all of the Wings as those walls were beginning to crumble from 50 years worth of of use this summer we did renovation work in the cafeteria and the interor ior vestibule so here you're seeing the exterior V vestibule when you walk into the building we did work on the inside in order to give a cohesive look we installed way signs what way signs are is they tell you which way to go that is a security upgrade but that actually is what they're called um we did replacing of door hardware within the building for security reasons and we began the process of upgrading the science labs that's a multi-year project that we just began this past summer and then we'll be adding to it as we proceed forward in terms of projects that are upcoming we will be replacing the univ ventilators in the sixth grade Wing one of the discussions that we had last year was that all the univ ventilator systems throughout the district are now also 50 years old and they really there aren't parts anymore for these units and so this is the beginning of that replacing process that will occur at all the schools schols Cedar Hill in terms of the past we redid the gymnasium which is the building or the part of the building that you see on the left of the picture that you are looking at we also did roof repair to take on solar panels we did updates to the media center bathrooms and gymnasium and inside we did a lot this year this summer with lighting and painting the hallways brightening everything up brightening up the classrooms for all of the elementaries did something called a seam and coat cover on the roofs what that does is that puts it seals all the seams of the flat roofs and then puts a cover on top of it in order to prolong the life of the roof and then we continue to complete the exterior vestibule which you're seeing in that picture right there and did a lot of upgrades to the facade this particular picture um in the case of the sister schools which is Cedar Hill Woodmont and William Mason if you recall maybe 10 years ago the buildings looked tired they looked like they had serviced 50 years worth of students what we wanted to do with Cedar Hill was we wanted to freshen it up in terms of unifying it color-wise but also making it more inviting more something that a a new kindergartener who's going to school for the first time would be excited to be going to and this example of Cedar Hill is what we were going to propose to do for both William and Woodmont come next year in terms of work that's still going on here we still are doing the parking lot um if you have been at Cedar Hill what you've noticed is the upper parking lot was it was basically falling in on itself so we've done work there where we've put in a wall to up to hold it up and then we'll be doing repaving we will be replacing door hardware within the building and then again similar to Lazar where we're updating the interior vestibule to m the external one we'll be doing that at Cedar Hill Valley View is another one that has had a lot of work done at it we've been doing a lot of exterior facade work and we did a whole new entrance way this is a sign that you see as you come into Valley View again work on the roof in order for it to take solar panels we did the media center and the bathrooms and the gymnasium this year we spent a lot of time inside we did lighting and painting of the hallways again we did seam and coat cover on the roof in order to get some longevity from that roof they are slated for an interior vestule so there won't be anything outside the vest security vestibule will actually be in the building we'll be replacing door hardware and we will be adding a staff bathroom um we've did a lot of movement of programs within the district for the 2425 school year so we have a lot more staff at Valley View and it need they need more bathrooms the three buildings that have not gotten as much love at varying amounts are Woodmont William Mason and hildale and that's not cuz we don't love those buildings but we weren't able to tackle all the projects all at once so for example with Woodmont and William Mason a lot of the work that you saw at Cedar Hill in terms of unifying the exterior putting in the exterior of Vesti for security reasons making it more inviting that same work would be proposed for William Mason in Woodmont for the following year summer of 25 and hildale is a challenging building in that it architecturally it's challenging so we intend to go and do facade work as well as the vestibule um for the summer of 25 and that's a much larger project than William Mason or uh Woodmont will be because of the whole building will need some reworking um in terms of what we've done in all places uh we have done the bathrooms and the media centers and the gyms both Woodmont and William Mason because of the way their roofs were were able to take the solar panels so we did do some roof work there hildale is one building that does not have solar panels and that was based on both the roof line as well as the way it's oriented we weren't getting enough sun in order to make it worthwhile to put solar panels on it all of them had the seam and coat cover for their roofs in order to extend the length of their roofs and as I indicated we will be doing exterior work at all three so as you move through all seven buildings what you see is us really trying to get them ready and prepared to keep going um definitely the board and the administration recognized a that that we are stewards of these buildings and that we need to leave them our phrase is leave them better than what we found them and that is the goal that we're trying to do thank you can I ask a quick question on the unit ventilators uh how many more years are we going to be working on those you will easily be working on them for another 5 to 10 years are we saving any of the good ones that are still usable so that we can replace other ones in other buildings at break there's really not much left of these after we pull them out to really reuse them I was just thinking that you know to Salvage something certainly if there's anything salvageable but some of these units are literally glued together to keep them going um so there's not much salvageable from them we are looking at some other opportunities um psng or New Jersey Power and Light um has offer is offering a program we're waiting for the second round to open for things like replacement of units like like this for energy reasons and we're going to see if we can jump on that I can't do all I'm certainly can't do all the projects because we're talking millions of dollars worth of projects but I can do it in some locations and what we're going to do is see if we can get in on the next round of those so we are trying to be very creative of trying to find places to fund we did that with a lot of the programs through Rod grants that were offered by the state but there is a lot of work that needs to be done on the univ ventilators and so there's only so I can chip away at it I can't really do it in one big swoop okay thank you any other questions from anyone Mike Che curiosity what is an aerial athletic at press uh you want to go no you go no well uh project Adventure if you know that term that's when you have the ropes courses outside or sometimes in gymnasiums it's something that we're looking into right now project Adventure is the trademark name like Kleenex or Q-tip but so its technical name is this aerial uh Athletic Facility so we're looking into putting outs there the kids would be harnessed up going to uh ziplining and uh doing climbing it's all about trust it's all about building confidence and things like that so it's it's a we we'll be going out for a bid for that pretty soon and then hopefully have that on our campus where would it go right well they're going to do some surveying and all that but one of the ideas is out there by the softball fields the baseball fields tucked away in a corner that wouldn't interfere with anything sure hi ctin I know a few families from hildale and they I I feel like some of them feel like my poor school yes you know we understand I've heard that a lot even when I I talk to folks so my question is can you communicate to us I don't know how it get to them what they will be getting in the future because I know the Topography is kind of the bill buing is there's a lot going on there it's small so can you um well they're going to be getting an an exterior vestibule if you're looking at the picture that's still up on the screen where the walkway is into the building that's actually where the vestibule will go we would have it fit into that little slot between the classroom that's on your left and the gym that's on your right and then what we have some drawings from The Architects of updating the the exterior look to do some cleanup work the problem is that that building was originally made of basically concrete and so the effervescence over years and years of time of water has discolored the concrete and we would give it a refreshment to do that um as we're beginning to now figure out how to do that that's the piece that has held this particular project up I guess my question is I I know it's there's a lot of Stu it's a smaller school so when they do um um things for the parents there's not enough room for the parents and the kids if they do a Halloween parade there's not enough and the other students and the all the other schools get to have that so I just wanted to share that concern with you I'm sure you've heard it before but there are in terms of the size of the classrooms that's our smallest school so when uh we talk about you know 20 in a classroom they're feeling it a little bit more than some of the other buildings just because the rooms are a lot smaller it was never as large of a school as some of the other locations and this is an example of it where it's difficult to have everybody together due to that I don't know that I'm going to be able to solve that particular problem um as part of this but that is one of the reasons why this project has been held up for so long is because we're trying to be creative to solve some of those other types of problems while doing the renovation work that we know needs to be done in terms of the facade getting sealed and that type of thing um you know at one point well not at one point uh hildale was designed to be an open school an open floor floor plan how and then some years ago the walls were put up and classrooms were made for the most part how did that how does that or at all if it does at all Impact um the small classroom sizes or anything else that needs to be done at hildale well and part of what hildale faces which is the case of any building that was designed as an open classroom building cuz H Hilda wasn't the only one they're all over New Jersey um and then you close the spaces up their HVAC systems were designed to flow the air as though they were open so you always end up with problems with Heating and Cooling and as we begin to consider some work at hildale we're considering the fact that we'd like to do what we're doing at Lazar but at hildale one of the advantages of us being in 2024 is that when you buy that uni ventilator it has a cooling component to it that can be activated and it's a very energy high efficiency cooling unit that would solve some of the problems that hildale faces because right now if the system was built for that air to move we've put up walls so you're getting a hot and cold spots and the way we compensate it is we compensate it with the ductless splits that are hanging on the walls but those duck splits are coming to the end of their life too and they're going to need replacing and when we do that replacement we we would pick something more like what we're doing at Lazar those high efficiency units that can do both Heating and Cooling yeah okay any other questions no so uh you you see the wonderful things that are going on here and I I just want to thank katine for doing such a wonderful job her whole office everybody that's working there to make these things happen but also getting out there with Steve to and his maintenance and Department as well as the custodians they just do a great great job of making this all happen and it's lots of visits out to the field talking to the engineers and everything and uh and pushing these projects forward so excellent job sure what's wrong with you we got to buy you a new mic probably doesn't want prob um I took advantage of the tour that Kine and Tom offered and while it's one wonderful to see this on paper to see it in person really drives home the amount of work that's been going on in our schools and I just want to thank both of you for all of the work that you've done um and if you you know if if you're ever in some of the schools take notice of some of the work that's been done in particular I was amazed at the light differences created by the new fixtures in Cedar Hill because one hallway has them and the other hallway doesn't and it's a big contrast even the Lazar cafeteria looks fantastic even though not much was done but it just thank you yeah facilities look great yeah huge difference between 2D and 3D but yes exactly right thank you uh the other person I want to thank is Sue Marinella who uh is also making a lot of these changes at the last second helping us put this whole presentation together she's done a wonderful job capturing the pictures as well as helping us communicate all these wonderful things that are going on throughout the district so thank you sue uh just one of the things that Sue helped me with uh was put out this parent survey we hear from parents all the time uh through different communication channels but we wanted to try to capture the essence of what a lot of them are feeling what are they saying and um and what's going on so we put out a parent survey which uh has been done at any time recently and we gave us a we got a lot of good honest feedback from everybody uh parents were asked to fill this out one per student or if they wanted to do it just for their family different grade levels they had the option of doing that but that was this past June this is just going to be a summary of everything I didn't capture all the questions and put this in here but uh just just going to give you a quick overview so we had about 23% of the high school parents uh fill out the survey again at the same thing with the middle school and at the elementary schools we had 35 5 uh% of the parents which is you know for the elementary that was a little bit over 400 responses at the middle school that was just under 20000 and the high school is just around there uh by industry standards that's those are pretty good uh results coming back from the community that you have enough input to uh really gauge what people are thinking just a word cloud for uh what's going on uh at the high school so you have uh challenging was one of the major words that came up when we asked parents for feedback and they had a free right uh they said good students are engaged diverse excellent comprehensive opportunities rigorous lots of different words up there and you can see as you go through the smaller smaller words those were used less often so that's how people felt about the high school looking at Lazar you see same kinds of things engaging challenging good appropriate supportive safe the list goes on great caring independent uh so those were some positive words as well as some other constructive feedback from some parents there and the last one at the all all the elementary schools combined seeing great caring fun challenging uh helpful engaged so again all positive words and you're seeing a lot of the same words being used for all three levels I know this is a little bit blurry on this next slide uh we had a Scream Capture it a little bit to put it onto this presentation but when you look at this you'll see that 86% of the parents were satisfied overall with the quality of Education this was uh uh at the elementary level and you see 83% would recommend the child school to other parents moving on to the right the academic challenge is appropriate for their child 75% agreed or strongly agreed this is the the blue and the red uh bars and 77% were satisfied with the academic progress of their children so by industry standards again anything between a 75% and an 85% is considered very good and we're fitting right in there with those measurements at Lazar similar a little bit lower but similar 76 were satisfied with the overall quality 71% they said they would recommend their child school to other parents 70% saying that the academic challenge is appr apprpriate and 72% saying that the academic progress of their children they were satisfied with so again you're looking at three quarters of of the parents coming back saying positive things about what's going on and the last at the high school they go up a little bit more again 80% in the first category 79% in the second one 75% that the acade academic challenge is appropriate and the last one 76% that that they are satisfied with the progress of their child another slide just all the three different levels this is looking at the academics I didn't do all of them we actually looked at like eight or 10 of the different subjects but I just wanted to capture four of the main core subjects that we look at but what you'll see is at the elementary level which is the top left there you'll see again very satisfied and satisfied you'll see that most of the scores are at the 78 percentile for the elementary so the parents are satisfied or very satisfied 78% or or a little bit more with language arts at the elementary level with math with science and with social studies when you drop down to Lazar you'll see the numbers range between 71 and 77% so still within that 34 range of of parents being satisfied or very satisfied again with those four core subjects and when you go to the high school the number of raises for those subjects between 80 and 83% of the parents were satisfied with language arts math science and social studies and being just very satisfied or satisfied so again very uh strong numbers that are coming out and that the parents are pleased with the education that they're getting here these are just some uh interesting uh data points that we wanted to take a look at so the first one at the top left corner of the pie chart shows about 65 6 6% of the parents were saying uh yes it's about 65% that uh the homework that their child is receiving at the high school is just right I know it sounds like the Three Bears but it was just a just right and then you had equal pie charts there of 17% saying it was too much and too little so it looks like we found pretty much The Sweet Spot there at the high school for homework moving to the right hand side we asked how many parents are having their children participate in sat or act preparation type classes and it was about 49% of the parents were saying that they are getting some outside tutoring to help them that way uh 29% said no and 21% it was not applicable to them yet on the bottom left you'll see that parents are supp supplementing their child's education with tutoring uh outside of the SAT or ACT prep and you have 39% almost 40% of the parents saying yes they are getting some kind of outside tutoring to help their children and on the right hand side how many parents are getting involved with private counseling for uh college and 23% said yes they're doing that um whereas 52% said no so just interesting fun facts there just to give you a gauge of what what's going on outside of the school with the parents some words that came up with the comment section from the parents that I just cherry-picked a bunch of them that they think a wellness day monthly would be helpful some constructive feedback and we got lots of them we got dozens and dozens of the comments my child loves the high school I'm delighted that they had such a positive experience great School District amazing teachers the arts program really top-notch that came up at all the levels that was very uh pleasing to see that uh I'm very satisfied keep doing what you're doing uh not to that we need to do a better job preparing them for college so it was a little bit all over there but uh we take all that feedback seriously and we'll be taking a look at this as we move forward at Lazar similar comments uh I'm thoroughly impressed with the staff and Leadership uh my CH my child feels challenged thanks for the extra after school extra help our child has done well working with their abilities in ela and math my child has really enjoyed music in the musical theater program and overall it's been a great experience uh the two pie charts I'm sorry the two par charts over there my homework that my child is receiving again similar numbers that you saw at the high school about 65% said it's just right and then that they're supplementing their children's education with professional tutoring came out to about 59% were saying no they're not and only 41% are getting outside tutoring to help their child and last at the elementary level uh I'm thrilled the teachers are outstanding the ironment environment is nurturing mindful activities resonate with my son too many kids in a class was something that came up once or twice the teachers and staff are caring the teachers are well qualified and the program well executed and more Arts Theater would be great at the elementary level the amount of homework the children are receiving again just right the 67% of the parents are are feeling that it's just right in the right area for that and 28% said they're getting outside tutoring to help their children with their core subjects at that level so that is the summary of the overall we had some other information about Med and things like that but we're working with our directors of medick about that that's helping inform us there was a lot more information or more opportunities parents were asking for during the holidays during the summer we're taking a lot of that feedback they're giving we're going to be trying to enhance more of the programs so that's a a quick summary of overall of everything was going on on the parents mind back in June Michael uh if you could go back to the uh academic slide oh yeah this one um yeah it's a lot of the charts look very consistent with each other the one that's a little little uh uh off is high school math where the dissatisfied and very dissatisfied um looks like they're they're much higher than at for the other subjects is there any drill down on no there's no drill down the yellow is that it's neither satisfied it's neutral neither satisfied or whatever but their numbers still fell within the 80% uh you know percentile so yeah yes it was a little bit lower than the others that they went as high as 83 84% but uh so that was a little bit lower at 80 so it's still within a you know they're close enough but just wondering if if there's a reason why the uh dissatisfied and very dissatisfied are so much higher than the other subjects yeah if there's a drill down or if there was comments or reasons provided um I'd have to go back and take a look and try to really figure out you know some some comments from parents were very specific and they even named their child and then other people were just very general so you try to get a gist of what they're trying to say and we'll take another look at that yeah I think also maybe um you know a lot of times people don't answer surveys unless they have a reason to like you know there's something bugging them either POS either positive or negative it tends to be those people who answer these surveys um you know this is not a true it's not a scientifically conducted survey it's not a true random sampling of the population but I think all in all it shows that people are generally well satisfied with this um I think they they do like the education they're receiving here in the district and I I think it's also reflected in how the rest of the state views us yeah and it's a very good Baseline so I would like to do something like this in another year or so from now and then see if it continues or we see improvements but it's a good way to get some good positive feedback back yeah I think maybe as you go on you might see more participation possibly hopefully um but it's also always a good idea to get some feedback even if it's incomplete at least you know we can get some idea of what's going on and the perceptions and you know and look for ways to improve AB absolutely looking for ways to improve correct um anyone else questions comments about the okay guess thank you thank you very much business administ Kine business administrator report nothing more more come on no more okay uh there's a lot of good news even though it's still early in the year um there's a lot of good news there I encourage people to read it uh let's go to the committee reports facilities and finance Karen come on you you can do it yeah so the facilities and finance committee met right before tonight's meeting um and uh we can say our budget is healthy uh we can also say that facilities projects in the school district are uh moving ahead very nicely as we just heard from uh Mrs sl's report earlier okay thank you uh curriculum Michelle no report okay policy Joe just that we're having the adoption tonight of the 15 policy and regulations okay thank you Communications Mike rport uh we are meeting next Monday Monday okay uh safety Christine yes thank you we had our Safety and Security committee meeting on September 11th um so I'll briefly go over some things that we discussed um we talked about the police um the different ways they're patrolling the schools and how they're coming into the schools and this wonderful relationship we have with them in town um as well as the sheriff's department we talked about the status of the security vestibules at Lazar um Cedar Hill Valley View um and then U what we're doing in the future for the elementary school and the high school um we talked about a visitor ID system for the schools before entering and Lazar will be our um first project so we're excited about that uh we talked about Shar 911 the communication system for the faculty and staff um cyber security is uh most important to us as well um we updated our software um we have a third-party audit which will come and see how we're doing um no major events have occurred regarding threats only non-critical um uh we talked about our fishing training how it was very successful um we talked about other types of training that are going on um we closed some security gaps as far as our cyber security uh which was great um we also talked about um purchasing life vac for schools and for when the kids go on field trips and and that's a device um that will help in case someone the thrust don't work this will help any type of obstruction so it's just a backup so the administration's going to be looking at that and then we also spoke about Sheriff ganon's program hope one and different types of training for overdoses and that was it yeah just a point of clarification uh the fishing training was uh for scamming of emails not fishing going out there so I just want to make sure before people think we're all going on fishing trips or something like that so thank you Dr Gman okay okay I know it's a rough okay uh delegate liaison Karen New Jersey school boards we're having our board of directors meeting on Friday okay Michelle Morse County School boards yeah they're having a hybrid meeting in person at Panic Township High School the topic is mental health resources for your school district um it's on October 2nd so hopefully some people could attend it's unfortunately on M Shana so I will not be able to attend okay uh Joe Morris County Educational Services we had a meeting last Wednesday they are in the process of beginning the annual audit which will be done over the next few months as well as our next meeting will be on October 9th great and DAC drug awareness drug awareness met on September 5th um we're taking part in the county ID checking initiative which is handing out ID guides to all the local businesses that um sell tobacco and alcohol the guide goes through each state ID gives them a clear picture of what it should be looking like so they can check it um we're also taking part in MAFO day on October 13th as well as um working with the art department on doing the poster contest for Red Ribbon Week which takes place at the end of October thank you yeah and by the way that's a good point real quick Montville day October 13th uh we will not be having a meeting before then so thank you for reminding us um okay Charlie uh mville athletic boosters there has not been a meeting yet I'm waiting for Mr GRE notify me okay uh liaison to the schools Karen Cedar Hill no report okay Charlie hildale no report Joe Valley viiew uh last Thursday uh they had their back to school night which is very well attended our first PTA meeting will be next uh tomorrow Wednesday next Wednesday okay uh William Mason John uh first meeting will be October 16th okay Mike Palmer Woodmont no report okay uh Christine or Michelle Lazar it was Christine no report okay and then the high school I attended that one that was a virtual one all the meetings are going to be virtual this year at the high school with PTC hopefully that will increase attendance um so we're they they talked a little bit about the back to school night uh it's going to be a soft opening at 6:00 uh there's no Home Room Before the 6:30 start they're going to be talking about the clubs in the cafeteria before the back to school night starts so come and see that we have two Sat testing dates the first of which is October 5th PSAT is October 23rd um okay and they talked about photos um homecoming is coming up on the 9th of October and the homecoming dance I guess is the 10th I just want to jump on that so we are now a testing site for SATs I we have one date on the books but that was something we had to apply for for we haven't been in sat site for either a long time or or ever but uh we're we're happy to have that back and offer that to our students yeah make it more convenient convenient yeah okay um and then before I go on just one more thing we had a meeting with the mayor vice mayor and uh administrator Township administrator a few days ago uh we talked a lot about the ongoing development in town and the housing um we talked about the crosswalk lights that are being installed by Lazar and how they're going to be uh potentially installing more of these crosswalk lights at all of the schools um this is going to be an ongoing process I think H they're thinking maybe hildale next in the 2026 uh range um and I think we will leave it there we um again we're talking to them a lot about the impact of the housing on the schools it's going to be a big issue right now our enrollment is going up we're seeing a lot of new kids coming from the developments but also a lot of turnover in town and that's having a a significant impact on our schools especially the elementaries so it's an area of uh grave concern so okay so let move on uh next area is public participation anyone has any comments or questions about items on the agenda I invite you to come up state your name come on up State your grab the microphone state your name address and let us know what you're thinking about the agenda hi I'm Danielle Manon Vasser um my address is 18 Rockway Valley Road in Montville and I'm the secretary for Montville kuas and on behalf of Montville kuas Club I would like to thank the board of education for supporting the approval of the Builder Club advisor as a formal bu Builder Club member from the 90s I'm thrilled to see this chapter revitalized it's a great opportunity for lar students to develop leadership skills take on responsibility and participate in service projects that positively impact our community by empowering students to collaborate and give back we're helping shape Future Leaders while allowing them to make a meaningful difference today thank you okay thank you very much okay uh consent motion for items a i through n second thank you any questions on the minutes uh section J Administration any questions there uh questions on facilities and finance I'm sorry what come for items on the agenda I think we'll Builder Club you want to come up for Builder Club come on up Tom thank you my hearing sometimes is not that well what but in any event I had I had two topics at least that I like to just comment on uh number one uh I'd like to thank Danielle and the Kanas members and of course Charlie is a member as well uh I'm a member since 19 1978 and at that time we had a key club which was not sponsored by the Montville kuas was sponsored by another group another quanis group but when kuas came into being in 78 uh we took it over and we were proud for the last 46 years to be part of them in addition the uh Builder Club was started somewhere I believe Charlie in around the beginning of the 80s or something like that and it ran for many many many years and uh for some reason it stopped but that's okay because now we're back on track and I like to thank this board on behalf of uh Danielle and the kuas club uh for looking at a way to uh to get us going again with the builders club uh Danielle is a product of the builders Club she was a Builders Club at Lazar school and that's nice to know maybe one day I hope she sits on this board but the other topic I wanted to talk about which I was very much impressed with the presentation on the school by Ken and uh and I have to say that in order to know where you are and where you want to go you should know where it was in the past these schools were the elementary schools and Lazar were products of the late 60s and early '70s with the high school and when I became uh a board member back in the mid90s uh the first thing I did as a new board member and having first of all was a split board very factionalized not like this board I mean we really had some some problems but we went through them Charlie you weren't on the board at that time but you know the people the principles in at that time but in any event one thing that I did we I I I uh commandeered the school bus and took all the board members around to every Elementary School and it was really eye openening uh Windows you can see on the sides cracked the roofs everything it was a it was a mess but now they had been in built for about 25 close to 30 years and maintenance was not one of the things that the earlier Generations wanted to spend money on but in any event after the board saw that we started to come together as a board because we had a common goal and that goal was to try to get these schools going we did a referendum and every Elementary School including Lazar was added on to there were additions there were uh for the time it was good and then when I left the board we were we already had ongoing with the high school and I became the chair of the advisory Council for the building and the uh maintenance or the new new construction at the high school so I'm very proud ctin uh I think you're doing a great job in advising this board and making sure that we continue uh I also have to say as a resident when I go around and I look at the schools and I see what's happening over the last few years the vision and the facade is so much better than it used to be which is good for our community because we do attract people to our school system or to our town by our school system one last comment uh I know I could go on and on for probably another 10 minutes but I have to say that Andrea and Casey have been around for 13 years I've worked with them they are just great people and you you are lucky to have a staff Tom that you have thank you very much thank you thank you very much one last thing one last thing I think this survey should go to the realtors in town and they should be you know give them multiple copies because they can hand them out the prospective uh newcomers to town we'll be putting it up on the website but thank you yes I think they need hard copies in their office as long as they give us a little bit back on that percentage of sales that's how that's right Revenue hey we do that but but but thank you for your comments but you know you what you see on the outside is also happening on the inside not just uh physically but with the curriculum and with what's going on so that we've done a lot of changes including this year Andrea and her team have really put together some great things at the elementary level and we're working them all the way up to the high school level so over the past couple of board meetings you've seen the different uh students doing presentations the awards they're winning the different programs we're offering so it's happening not only physically but also with the the softer things of the curriculum the academics academics yeah are there any other questions or comments from the public no okay then I'll close the public participation and move back to the consent resolution I think we did I and J so any comments about facilities and finance no uh section L Personnel any questions comments about Personnel a lot of approvals there um um and then section M curriculum instruction we also have a lot of courses that we are approving uh for the most part these are very minor changes to these for the most part um and then section n we have all of Joe's policies there you go okay any questions none okay uh roll call vote Please Mr Grow yes Miss Zuckerman yes abstain K4 AF Dr calino yes Mr dodre yes abstain on K1 check 9220 Mrs Foo yes Mr Palama yes Mr Petrino yes Mr Rapaport abstain section I yes to everything else Dr modra yes okay uh there is no more closed session to be had uh section QR old business General board comments new business yeah yeah I I would I would like to make a general board comment okay Mr Palmer would you please okay um yeah I guess in reference to some questions that I had asked uh Dr Gorman about the music program Lazar I got some questions and I just I just want to share a lot of this because it's really really good news um you know due to co a couple years ago the music numbers are really down it's hard to do band Orchestra things like that when you're doing it virtually so numbers are down but I look at what we have for this year and just to compare to a couple years ago I see sixth grade band at Lazar two years ago 47 this year 91 Orchestra sixth grade two years ago 30 this year 39 chorus two years ago 41 this year 105 um right now we have about 53% of the kids in Lazar are an either band chorus Orchestra or a combination thereof so they're actually the majority and I just think that's absolutely remarkable I think it speaks U volume both the teachers there and the uh supervisor and the only thing I'm going to add is that with all these new kids in band again you got 91 in sixth grade and 104 in 7 and eth I just think as we build our budget for next year I think we're going to have to make a a commitment maybe to purchasing some additional instruments um I mean a district of this size should probably have you know 15 or 16 French horns about 10 tubas you know 10 euphoniums at least and a couple bassoons and um also towards maintaining the ones we have so you like it's great news I'm really really happy about I'm just think it gives us an opportunity for expansion in the future well we we'll work on those numbers of instruments U but you know I have to say Mr Green and the other music teachers over there have done a great job kids love Mr Green over at Lazar yeah we have know and have we have all the great teachers at Lazar right now and the fact we have so many such a great chorus teacher at Lazar there a great feeder program for the high school and you get this feeder program from thear theater into the high school theater program and uh it's funny Mike Sherer when he was at the um high school he was the Drama teacher and he said he would have killed to have a a theater program like that when he was at the high school so you know kudos to everybody let's just keep up the good work and let's keep our foot on the accelerator yeah and I'm glad you noticed that and that was reflected in a lot of the parent surveys there were lots and lots of positive remarks at all the for that so thank you yeah and I would encourage everyone to come view the the theater Productions at both the high school and the middle school they are fairly cheap actually quite cheap and they're quite good so other board comments uh I just wanted to give a shout out to our own uh Mrs Marinello she and Charlene Peterson are going to be speaking about strategic planning at the New Jersey school public relations association's fall workshop on September 23rd so good luck with that good job Christine you had something no I just wanted to say at the September 11th ceremony um it was it's always so wonderful to see our students there performing singing and supporting our veterans and those we lost on that day and it was great seeing you to Dr Gorman it was I was so happy to see you um so I appreciate that and Charlie was there also but it's such if anyone has never been there it's really a beautiful ceremony that the township and the VFW put on yeah very moving stories we had one of our high school students sing there um it's very touching sad but it was beautiful okay are there any comments one more comment one more com well wait is this general or new general new whatever you want I had the pleasure of attending an alumni event at the high school Friday before the football game I'm not sure if the administration was aware or Tom Zing's head uh we we right right outside in the back parking lot there Coach Rick deont got a bunch of pizzas and just via text message to maybe about 101 15 people he texted turned into 4050 former football players that he's coached Wayne Gino uh was there and supported it and and I was talking with Wayne and and if they could get some type of thing going where that's a yearly event hopefully maybe move it down to the grassy null where we can have you know a real legitimate tailgate and cookout I think that would be great for mville just the pride and the amount of people that move back to this town that that can be involved in that I think that would grow exponentially over the next couple years and it be good for the the school in the town well get on it I will your job it's it's your idea you got run with it come on take that no um one other thing I thank you for reminding me of this though you didn't really but I'll uh we spoke some of us been speaking about cell phone use particularly in the high school um this is something that maybe policy needs to take a look at um there are questions about the extent of cell phone usage during school times whether it's necessary um we can talk more about it but it is definitely something that's on the radar for at least a few members and I would appreciate it if on your next policy meeting you might have a discussion around this yes no I think we should I mean it's all over in the national news you know you'll be seeing more and more districts taking a Firm Stance on cell phones so yeah def meeting yeah it would be a challenging uh thing to implement but I think it's worth at least starting a discussion on it right now MH thank you okay um anyone else board public any public participation comments anything you want to say seeing none I'd like to a motion to adjourn the meeting motion to adjourn the meeting so second thank you see you in October yes sir