##VIDEO ID:UsuqZYfC2yM## e e e e e e e e e e e e e it is 606 on Tuesday January 7th 2025 and I'm calling this meeting of the north hund bores Regional High scho High School District Board of Education meeting to order in accordance with the requirements of the open public meeting act njsa 1046 at seek adequate notice has been given the time date location and to the extent known of the agenda of this meeting was published in the hund county Democrat on October 25th 3rd 2024 and the Star Ledger on October 24th 2024 in addition notice of the meeting has been posted at the North hton High School and Vorhees High School provided to the municipal Clerks of Bethlehem Township Califon burrow the town of Clinton Clinton Township Franklin Township Glen Gardner burrow Hampton burrow hybridge burrow Lebanon bur Lebanon Township tberry Township and Union Township as well as any other interested parties and posted on the district website fire exits are located in the front and back of this room and um if alerted to fire please move in a calm and orderly fashion to the nearest smokefree exit at this time please silence all cell phones please rise for the flag seat I pled to flag of the United States of America and to the repblic for it stands one nation God indivisible liy and justice for all the official election results are attached to the agenda for Angela and fuzo Dei for Califon burrow and tubry Township Daniel spaton for Clinton Township and Lebanon burough tar Marie hints for Lebanon Township and hybridge bur and Richard lordy for Union Township so congratulations to all four of you congratulations some returning and some new so welcome um I'd like to administer the oath of office at this time so if those four people would join us at that backdrop stand I state your name do you need to us is this i t Mar hin Angela an Daniel Richard gy do Solly swear or affirm swear or affirm that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the constitution of the state of New Jersey that I will support the constition of the United States and the constition of the state of New Jersey and then I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same and true faith and aliance to the same and to the governments established in the United States and in this state under the authority of the people so help me God and to the government established in the United States andate under the authority of the people so God hi t h Angela de Dan richardy her that I possess Theif prescribed by law for the office of M of Board of Education and that I not disqualified as a voter pursu to rs41 disqualify to Crime for offed in njs 121 I will Faithfully partially per all the of to the best of my ability congatulations nice follow Direction that's right that second one just Clos once you get started at all yeah something 12 like swiming good job so at this time I'll take roll call Miss cagno here Mr Chapman here Dr Genie here miss Gallow here miss hin here miss kran here Mr lordy here Mr mcisaac here M Reyes here miss seleno here Mr Spanton here and Miss vato here great thank you so at this time I'd like to call for nominations for the office of president of the Board of Education and I'll just do a quick synopsis of how this will kind of play out is any board member May place a member's name in nomination and a second is not required elections for each office will be conducted by a roll call vote when the nominations for that office is closed the candidate receiving the votes of the majority of the board members present and constituting a quorum will be elected to the office in the event that no candidate receives a majority vote we will then um do subsequent voting and will repeat the process until a majority vote is obtained so at this time can I call for any nominations on the floor for board president I'd like to nominate Brendan mcisaac I'd like to nominate Kim selino representing Bethlehem Township in Hampton burrow are there any other nominations discussion we can have discussion if you'd like Yeah I wanted to I just wanted to say something I just the reason for my nomination was with the upcoming strategic planning I think it's critical that we have somebody as strong as uh Brendan um he has extens of experience it's not only as a board member but as an educator and administrator um and doing my research I wrote some stuff down um I think everyone here knows about his integrity and it's earned him the respect of his peers on this board he has a long and distinguished record of service um from 2012 to 2020 he served on the Clinton uh Glen Garder Board of Education including six years as president from 2015 to 2020 uh he's been with 100 in central since 19 1997 as an English teacher and he's been English supervisor since 2007 uh he was also named a 2014 supervisor of the year for New Jersey um and again just because of the strategic planning I think it's critical that we have somebody with experience going forward discussion any further discussion okay then I will conduct a roll call for each person individually so I will start with Mr mcisaac for his nomination so bis kago no Mr Chapman yes Dr Deanie no Miss Gallow no Miss hits yes Miss kran yes Mr lordy no Mr mcisaac well after that intro I can't vote now so miss Reyes no Miss seleno no Mr Spanton yes and Miss Fato yes and for Miss selino Miss tagno yes Mr Chapman no Dr Deanie yes Miss Gallow yes Miss hins no Miss kran no Mr lordy yes Mr mcisaac no Miss Reyes yes Miss seleno yes Mr Spanton no and Miss F no just have to do a quick tell have 6.3 for misso just double check it and 5.7 for Mr MC ISAC so misso congratulations can we wait till nope okay on I know this is your meeting now hey you're moving the out already that's it you got the big seat now thanks you're wel congratulations so president and what I could do this time is just take one roll call and just ask for the individual's name instead so is easiest if there's two candidates we can do okay okay we're moving forward uh with uh number seven election for office of Vice President um any board member May place a memb name and nomin ntion a second is not required elections for each office will be conducted by roll call vote when the nominations for that office are closed the candidate receiving the votes of a majority of the board president and constituting a quorum will be elected to the office in the event no candidate receives a majority vote of the board members present and constituting a quarum the procedure including nominations and subsequent voting shall be repeated until someone receives a majority vote of those board members present and con con uh excuse me constituting aqu quarum at this time um can I any nominations for vice president on the floor I nominate Nicole Gall I'd like to nominee Tara hens any other nominations okay Katie do you want to take them together sure yeah we can do it together this time I just wanted to to discuss that I just want to provide some um input on that too I Cara did an excellent job last year for us as vice president I think she provides a very balanced uh Common Sense point of view and in looking at the various issues she also has an excellent background us with the strategic planning as well as as it relates to facilities and the other work that we do now that John is is no longer with the board um so I think that um she would be an excellent candidate for us to consider for vice president any other comments discussion thank you Beth so this time I'll just ask which candidate you're voting of course we don't go through it twice because you technically have one vote has to be for one or the other so I will start with Miss cagno Nic gall Mr trapman um ter Dr Deanie Nicole Gallow Miss Gallow Nicole Gallow Miss hins Tara HS Miss Co train Tara Mr lordy Nicole Gallow Mr mcisaac uh Tara H Miss fres Nicole Gallow misso Nicole Gallow Mr Spanton T Miss viat ter distance is 5.7 again just double is Miss Galla at 6.3 congratulations congratulations thank you congratulations congratulations set up at this time we will have a presentation from kegal Law Group um regarding our school ethics Act and the code of ethics for the all school board members sounds good can I ask a question Qui um are you able to share your slide yes you could pass take pass down send these down that way as well am I can I do that from a glass giant bigy guy let people filter out for the presentation sh I'm sure they had somewhere else to that must be it it's really once in a lifetime opportunity get everybody away all right good evening everyone and congratulations to our new president and vice president uh it's great to see you guys there and it's great to see everyone who I recognize and of course the new faces um my name is Jacob Minon I am with the comegno law group I'm one of John Keg's Associates uh and today I get to have the privilege of going over the school board ethics presentation for this year uh the uh something to note is that this presentation does not replace the individual requirements that you guys have to do the uh School ethics training through I believe it's school boards that still offers it you guys still have to do that uh unfortunately I wish I wish I could replace it but I cannot um so just make sure that you keep that in mind that that's still done by the deadline uh so what I want to do today is I want to in front of you you guys have a a a sheet to sign after the end of this presentation but the sheet itself is actually very helpful because it lists out the school ethics act itself so you can actually follow along as I'm talking with what subsection I'm referring to the in general it's pretty straightforward and what I want to do today is I want to just walk through briefly each subsection and then I'm going to be giving you some examples of you know what type of uh Pitfall someone might fall into as a board member uh with regards to potential violations of school ethics act and you know what the response from the SEC might be and we'll talk about those and I'll be able to address any of your questions as we go through them uh generally speaking the slide that's in front of you now is that there are these are just themes that we're going to see as we're walking through each of these subsections of the school ethics act so generally speaking the board you guys all act as a unit you're not acting as individual board members in Your Capacity as a board member you guys are a board so it's important to remember that that you all are the governing body of the school district you all are in charge of the highlevel policymaking decisions and you are an entity that takes action you are not individual board members that are trying to take action and you'll see this come up in a few of the subsections that we're going to uh discuss um you are the decision-making Authority uh uh limited and may not administer the schools we'll have a whole section talking about not micromanaging not trying to do the job of the superintendent or of the principal or whoever that you guys are the ones that are really looking at everything from a 30,000 foot perspective and you guys are making the big decisions in the district the so just jumping right into it uh I we we have little titles uh for each of these this one's just called follow the rules this one the first couple are pretty straightforward um the as a board member you have to uphold and enforce all the rules and regulations of the state of uh and the Board of Education uh you are not allowed to uh try to loan wolf any issues that come by your desk you're not allowed to try to take things into your own hands you have to go through the proper channels you have to do uh you know if if an issue comes to you from a parent or from a Community member you have to relay those issues in a fashion you have to follow the rules as your station as a board member uh it's fairly straightforward um and just for a couple examples here uh there have been violations of this in the past where board member violated The Code by trying to issue a rice notice to a district employee directly without taking the proper legal procedure um as many of you all know uh and if you don't know you will know very shortly that when you are issuing a rice notice or you wish to discuss Personnel or an employee at the district that is something that the superintendent does um that is something where if you are concerned about an employee you have to take that to the superintendent and they issue these notices um the only employee that you will manage is the superintendent himself uh the other another this also comes about when a board president violated the code when contacting a newly hired hired employee and told them that their emplo appointment was void because he had directed the superintendent to remove the individual's name from the agenda but the superintendent failed to do so again not following the rules not going through the proper channels uh subsection B uh this is just something to keep in mind at all times while you guys are acting uh on the board which is that the kids come first it's the priority is always the children and the students of the district at all times uh we see this subsection come up in SEC petitions when it is clear that the board member is trying to act in a way that is not Student First it is because they're trying to prioritize a friend or a family or an employee that they have close connections to and if you ever find yourself in a situation where you're not sure if what you're about to do is is ethically appropriate if it doesn't at in either directly or indirectly involve the students or your responsibilities as a board member it's probably not example of this is a board member violated the code when she refused to leave the executive session while the board discussed a matter involving a member of her family um the issue there was that she wasn't she wasn't really concerned about her Duty as a board member to the students it was because it was involving her own family clear you're clearly not allowed to do that uh this one a little bit lengthier and you you'll see that this violated a whole bunch of Provisions uh but while discussing the matter of an employes actions and possible discipline in executive session a board member had the ba distribute copies of a letter that the employee wrote to the board but instructed the ba to not give a copy to the superintendent uh the member stated that she had been in contact with the employee had picked up the letter from the employees home noted that she was representing the employee because they are her friends and questioned the accuracy of the superintendent's version of the incident and motivation for disciplining the employee and indicated that the employee should not be treated this way uh all of these I mean whole whole bunch of problems here um of course but clearly not Student First this is very much her concern was her employee who she has some sort of personal connection to uh subsection C uh generally speaking we're looking at the big picture are here so subsection uh C and D are very similar and often when we see petitions from the SEC these two are almost always paired together so I mentioned at the beginning of this that the board is looking at this from a 30,000 foot perspective you guys are making the big big decisions you guys are doing the policymaking the planning the appraisal uh it is the board's job to make those big decisions and not try to manage the day-to-day operations of the school so not try to manage individual employees not try to manage uh individual complaints uh or concerns that parents May uh bring you uh I I often say that one of the biggest decisions that a board makes is the hiring of their superintendent the reason why you that that is such a big decision is the superintendent is the one that you all manage and is the one who makes all of those individual day-to-day decisions for you that's why you know you guys have a great superintendent and uh that's why you know you pay him money to do that is so that he can do the day-to-day managing it is your guys' responsibility to take only kind of the big picture approach into play here so an example we have here is that board members conducted a visit to assess a candidate for assistant superintendent without board authority I mentioned earlier that no no lone wolfing it as a board member you're not allowed to go out and do your own thing you guys act as a unit this was clearly a violation of that um board member violated The Code by volunteering for a school club where a member had contact and control of students Personnel Resources and administration as well as received orders from District personnel and administration this is one that we see fairly frequently at least in as as questions that come by our office um a lot of times board members you know all of you are are are despite what you know the public may say are not in this just for the large paycheck of being a board member uh but are instead doing this because out of the goodness of your own Hearts because you care about the community you care about the students you care about the schools you you care largely about this education in this process so a lot of board members because you're so proactive in this nature want to be proactive with volunteering for a lot of different things so we see a lot a lot of times we have board members come up to us and ask am I you know as a board member am I also allowed to volunteer for doing X Y and Z and the answer is it depends but typically what we're dealing with here is that you are not allowed to volunteer for activities within the school when it involves direct supervision of other students um or other Personnel you can't take any type of super supervisory capacity or have kind of consistent interaction with students while you're doing it so what that means is you can't be a coach or an assist assistant coach for a sports team but if a the uh drama director were to reach out to you and said uh you know we're we're we we're looking for volunteers to help build props for a big play that's coming up that is okay you're allowed to do that you're allowed to get together with other parents or uh you know or other volunteers to help help out the community or help out the school still you don't have to avoid all other actions you just have to make sure that you're not doing anything that could possibly put you into conflict with your role as a board member uh subsection subsection D is no micromanaging uh I mentioned that C and D were paired uh we almost always see that these come together uh but it simp simply states that you'll carry out your responsibility not to administer the schools but together with my fellow board members to see that they are well-run uh evidence of violation is that the board members gives a direct order to school Personnel or becomes directly involved in activities or functions that are the responsibility of school Personnel or the day-to-day administration of a school district or Charter School so here we have an example uh which was prior to being appointed to the board a member was appointed to be a volunteer coach for a high school football team despite being appointed to the board the member continued as a volunteer coach the uh Ethics Committee found that simultan simultaneously serving on the board and being a volunteer coach in the district violated the act very similar to what we were just talking about another example um a board member would violate the act by participating in an exit interview or merely obser the exit interview as it would breach the board member's obligation to refrain from being uh directly involved in activities that are the responsibility of school personnel and would equate the micromanaging of school Personnel so every once in a while there will be questions that come by essentially asking well you know we have our concerns we've heard a lot of concerns from the community about a certain teacher or we had a lot of concerns about a staff member or a janitor we want to be directly involved with the interviews or interactions that the Administration has with that individual you can't do that as a board member that is considered micromanaging and that is too much of the day-to-day operation of the school that is why you hire such incredible employees to do all of that for you and that you put your trust that they are doing that correctly if there are concerns that it's not being done correctly those are concerns that you bring to the superintendent those are concerns that you bring to the board president these are not ones that you try to get involved in yourself uh subsection e uh I like to call call it I can't promise you that um this is a big one and one that we see come up uh fairly often and it it is always it is almost always done with the right intentions uh whenever whenever we see this subse it's usually not because someone is trying to be sneaky or had bad intentions it's usually because a board member is trying to help out a Community member or is trying to accomplish something that they truly believe is the right idea but they're not doing it in the right way and I want to give you a quick example of one that I had a couple years ago where and and just you know keeping it broad is there was a um board member who was very very well known for being anti-bullying and was it was they very much against bullying always took a stance on it the community knew that parents knew that the school knew that it was you know it was a mission of this of this individuals to stop bullying in schools so what would happened was uh when a bullying incident happened uh the the parent knew that this was true of of of the board member and called the board member directly and said listen this is what's happening I I need you to do something about this you know my my child was uh shove you know shoved in a gym class and was called names uh this has to be a in a certified HIV can you do something about this and the board member said you know of course we can do something about this you know that's a horrible thing to happened to your student you know we're going to get to the bottom of this we're going to launch an HIV investigation we're going to get everyone involved can't do that because you can't promise that that's something that's going to be able to happen and you're also not going through the right channels to do so so there are a lot of issues with that type of example um and just by by way of furthering that example you know one of the problems is we don't necessarily know based on that whether or not it was a hi we we you that under under this you know under the uh state laws shoving someone down and maybe calling them names doesn't necessarily rise to the level of hip so you can't it's it's dangerous to make these promises but when you hear these types of things when you when these complaints are brought to you that is when you bring that to the superintendent or the board president here's an example uh board members violated the code when they made personal promises to a uh candidate for an assistant superintendent by advancing the possibility of his employment with the district and promising to resolve a contract issue for the district which had the potential to compromise the board I think it's fairly clear here that you can't do this can't make promises to possibly Advance uh the employment of a potential assistant superintendent another one board member communicated uh via private text messages with a staff member that resigned offering to accuse the board president and the superintendent of malens for failing to provide a rice notice and conspiring to undermine the board and the administration um the board member was reprimanded this is a violation of not just this subsection but several subsections as we'll get to in a moment as the board as a whole is supposed to act in unity and as a a singular force uh that's that's has a a good image for the public uh subsection F uh no special interest or personal gain this one's fairly straightforward uh this very much dives into uh having to conflict off of various uh resolutions that may come before you uh but this is I will refuse to surrender my independent judgment to special interest or partisan political groups or to use the school for personal gain or the gain of friends um and evidence of violation would be that a board member takes action on behalf of or at the request of a special interest group or persons organized and voluntarily United in opinion and who adhere to a particular political party or cause or uses the schools in order to acquire some sort of benefit for the member or the member's immediate family or friend so here's an example board members uh May well actually this is I I have this one first just to show that this is probably the most common question we get on this issue which is that board members are allowed to endorse candidates for the board if the endorsement is made as a private citizen and not uh as a board member you guys will probably learn this in your school board's training or already know this but you have to always keep in mind that you're wearing the board member hat when you see it on the board so when you guys make statements to the public or you're making an endorsement you have to make sure that whatever you're saying the public knows that you are making that as an individual private citizen not on behalf of the board just something to always keep in mind and that goes for uh public presentations and endorsements or social media posts as well too if you're saying something on social media uh subsection G uh is of course confidentiality issues um definitely one of the more frequent concerns we see are the are the breaches in confidentiality happens a lot more than people think everyone thinks that they you know whatever happens in executive session stays in executive session but sometimes people will tell their spouses it will tell the significant to others you may be someone who knows everyone in the community and you'll think that it's okay to tell someone else and then it gets everywhere and spreads like wildfire um so make sure that you hold all matters confidential pertaining to the schools uh and especially with regards to uh student confidentiality and privacy you guys will be hearing a lot of information especially in the executive session of things like uh Hib appeals or student concerns all of that of course Very confidential uh violation occurred when a board member was or a board member was censored for uh responding to and having a social media message reposted over an alleged student discipline incident of a high school student uh the message identified the students school grade level gender and specific details about the incident and the length of suspension imposed um this is a a good reminder that simply not giving the name of a student does not mean that you are maintaining confidentiality in the very similar way that if we were to have uh let's say a Hib investigation that if we just took out the name of the student we just redacted the name that wouldn't mean it's confidential um there is uh and uh furpa gets into this a lot as well too we we have to frequently cite to it because anything that could be possibly identifying about the student could count as well so if you were to go talk to uh one of your friends and say yes you know I you know I won't tell you the name of the student but I learned that there was this bullying incident it was you know uh the the girl with the brunette hair that sat next to uh Jimmy in class I mean you may not be saying the name but but that's enough identifying information for the person you're talking to to maybe know exactly who it is that you're talking about so it's all you always have to be very careful when you're talking about these things and preferably not talking about them at all if you're talking to anyone else about it um uh another uh issue was the board member violated The Code by publicly posting confidential information that the staff member was removed from the school and hospitalized for a medical condition um sometimes we see this when it's really out of Good Intentions uh in your uh practice as a board member it may come to you uh especially uh if you are board president and the superintendent reaches out to you about someone that they have to put on leave uh because you might be the first to know about that it that type of information is very confidential even if it seems like you want to just wish them well on you know Facebook or Instagram you say oh you know I heard that you were in the hospital I hope you're doing well that type of information could be very sensitive information and if it was disclosed to you in your capacity as a board member you certainly can't be reposting it on social media platforms uh board member was reprimanded for inadvertently copying a Community member on an email that was intended to go to the board members uh where in discussions that were held in executive session over a staff member and parents complaint over a security issue were revealed this was likely just a mistake just be very careful about your emails um and this is also a good time to remind you all to be careful about hitting reply all to emails as well too you all may receive emails to the the entire board may receive emails keep in mind that you cannot just hit reply all to these emails and have discussions back and forth about things because that counts as board discussion you that that would be like having a meeting like this you're not allowed to do that so please do not be in a situation where you're hitting reply all and trying to have a discussion over email with the entire board that's why we have committees can I ask a question of course so and that would that would be any majority correct so it's not just all the whole board yes yes yes any majority yes in the the same way if you guys were meeting in public I mean or if you guys said let's all get together and go out to dinner and discuss school stuff you know it it you if you had a majority you wouldn't be able to do it it would have to be noticed to the public okay uh board member may continue as a freelance journalist however uh may not report on board issues and must ensure that no information was discussed or so uh or anything that was in executive uh session was disclosed it's fairly obvious obvious speaks for itself but it's an interesting example of where someone who was still working in their capacity in their in their job were still able to continue doing their job but just had to be careful and tiptoe a little bit around what they were reporting uh the board member would not violate The Code by sending a letter to the editor expressing his opinion about the budget or making a statement to the Press so long as in the letter you do not hold yourself out as a board member and the information is accurate and not confidential confidentiality speaks for itself um the accuracy is important you want to make sure that you're not saying anything that is is is blatantly inaccurate or defamatory of course because that could cause all other sorts of problems um but that you are allowed to uh in in Your Capacity as a private citizen still make these statements you don't lose your right you don't lose your your Amendment rights to be able to make certain statements just because you are a board member you're still allowed to speak about these things subsection H uh this is always a fun one uh which is listen to your superintendent's recommendations um you know as I mentioned earlier you guys do a great job of seeking out superintendent you got a great superintendent uh you have someone youve hired someone who has a massive amount of experience in this and someone that you trust to try to administer the schools properly generally speaking the superintendent recommendations are something that you should be listening to and cognizant of and uh I guess making sure that you take give them the due weight uh that does not mean as we'll discuss in a second that you have to always vote with what the superintendent's recommendation was you guys are allowed to as individual board members vote the way that you truly feel it should be voted but at the same time we want to make sure that as a board we have a sense of unity in that regard and that we have a sense that there is Faith placed in the people that you all are hiring to administer the schools so here we have a board member May participate in an interview committee for candidates for high level administrative and supervisor positions however the board member participation must be limited to offering observations and assessments and the final recommendations are within the perview of the superintendent there's a lot of decisions especially with regards to um uh other employee concerns or matters with regards to hiring or discipline or whatever it is that is strictly within the superintendent's purview kind of touching base again on that micromanaging issue which is that these are the decisions that the superintendent makes not you guys as the board as a whole or individually um that said as I mentioned earlier the board members did not violate the code when they voted not to reappoint employee to a former position um despite the contrary recommendation to the principal or the superintendent you're still absolutely allowed to vote however you see fit at that time if you feel that there is a routine uh Habit of always kind of budding heads with the administration that's something that has to be addressed with the administration that's something that we should all sit down together and talk about it um I I I do have a confession here which is I stole this slide from one of the partners in my firm and I asked him what B what Bartles and James were no he he looked at me like I slapped him exactly um so uh sub so I don't maybe all of you know I me I'm the only one who didn't but this was apparently some advertisement that ran for like wine coolers and long time and at the very end of the ad they did some C like kind of kchy Catchphrase where they say thank you for your support or something like that yeah he told me to go look up a YouTube video on it I didn't uh so subsection I um is is generally getting to making sure that you are always trying to be in a supportive environment that is why we're here you want to support each other as board members you want to support the B board as a whole and you want to support the administration that you put so much trust and faith into um an example we have here is that a member violated The Code by sending a letter to the superintendent copying the State Board of Education and executive County Superintendent accusing the superintendent of allowing employees to violate board policy um this is the type of situation where if you have these concerns you have to run it up you know run it up the totem PLL you have to bring these concerns to the superintendent to the rest of the board that has to be something that's discussed that way when something like this happens it Paints the board in a really bad light and that's kind of what this subsection is getting at which is you don't want to do things that youur the trust of the the public Community with the board if it's if the sense is getting out there that board members are individually trying to make Jabs or comments about the administration or about each other it doesn't look good for the board and that can actually be a violation of the school ethics code um the board member violated The Code by sending an email to the superintendent that was also sent to the ba and all other board members asking the superintendent to provide an accounting of her personal leave it's not an appropriate way to get that information board president violated The Code by posting a picture of the superintendent on Facebook with the comment now if we could only do something about the local terrorists that destroy our dreams and burn futures um obviously a terrible look uh for the district and for the board it does not paint the board in a good light when you do things like this you have to be very careful with social media uh use proper channels I've been talking about this generally this entire time uh but this is very much that you will refer all complaints to the chief administrative officer and will act on the complaints at public meetings only after failure of an administrative solution and when we say failure of an administrative solution that doesn't necessarily mean they do something that you didn't quite agree with this is like there have been complaints brought to the superintendent and nothing has been done for months and they're just sitting on their hands and not responding to emails not picking up the phone that's when we're talking about like a failure of administrative solution so if you disagree with one of those Solutions that's something you can have a discussion about but that does not mean that you you know want to Ambush uh the superintendent in Open Session by bringing up a new matter and uh having there suddenly be a massive fight going on on the floor um evidence of violation is a board member Acts or tries to resolve a complaint or conducts investigation or inquiry before referring the complaint to the superintendent or um other than at a public meeting in Prior and prior to failure of an administrative solution uh a couple examples here board member violated The Code by going to the principal directly in connection with a parent complaint rather than referring the complaint to the superintendent uh and then the board member violated The Code by not providing the superintendent with letters because he did not like the superintendance management instead the board went to uh other administrators to address these issues you still have to go through the channels even if you are afraid the superintendent's not going to agree with your position on it you still have to at least bring it to them first so now getting a little bit into the conflicts um uh in New Jersey and some of you may have been previously confused by this um is that the the school ethics act have has definitions for uh members of media family and relatives this is with regards to how when you have to conflict off certain issues that may come before the board whether it's negotiations superintendent contract various things that you may be voting on for Resolutions um but there's also the nepotism regulations the state nepotism regulations by the state uh if that sounds strange and confusing it's because it is uh we don't know why they have both of these and why they couldn't just refer to each other um but this gives you this slide and you'll all have this will just gives you a um just kind of a definition of what who falls under immediate family and who falls under relative you'll notice that at the bottom of the left side here where it says others it's kind of a catchall because it refers to the uh nepos uh nepotism regulations uh that you see on the right there too with regards to relative so just getting a little bit more into that um this is a very handy chart that if you ever need if you're ever worried that could be a conflict you can help uh rely on this and if you're still confused or if you fall under one of those maybe categories you know talk to Rich um and and if need be they'll consult with us on this the uh for the if you have an immediate family member who is in District and working for example as a board member you have a spouse that works as a teacher in District or is uh under the board as an aid or something like that uh there's clearly a conflict there so you have to conflict out of a lot of the negoti that take place with the union and you have to conflict out of potentially anyone who is their supervisor so that could be the Principal the superintendent things like that um out of District if it's an immediate family member still a conflict the idea being that if they are in the same Statewide Union but they're working as a teacher in a different District that is still a conflict that you have to conflict off of various things that come before the board such as negotiations with that Union um and I at the under where you see the May with regards to to relative and other there's a couple C there's a couple kind of caveats carved out of there that it could go either way depends on whether or not they could be and these are just examples um but whether or not they are an officer in the njaa or whether or not they have some sort of leadership role or can influence whatever negotiations are happening over wherever they work there's other things that you have to other variables that you have to take into consideration at that time um this is just a general recommendation to complete your training requirement uh if you don't you get nasty letters so you want to avoid that um some we often get questions on substitutes uh so I just included an advisory opinion on this uh but it essentially advised that where a board member spouse is employed as a substitute teacher in District the board member may not participate in any Personnel matters of those in the chain of command over their spouse uh I've mentioned a few times be very careful with social social media just really careful uh I'm not a big social media person myself but I know a lot of folks are so really really think twice before you post on Facebook Instagram whatever it is that you use even if you are not referencing board issues like I'm not saying that you know don't post uh this is what happened in executive session today that's a problem but if you are about to post things that are very inflammatory um statements that could really cause a lot of drama cause a you know cause cause cause a mess online l so to speak really think twice before doing that and I would really recommend that you don't do it because if you do anything that paints you in a bad light it Paints the board in a bad light and that's where we sometimes get petitions uh coming in I think we have a few examples of that as well board member was censored for responding to and having a social media message reposted over an alleged student discipline incident of a student the message identified the students oh this is I believe this is the same one that we had earlier yeah so this was also under fell under this category um both of these found that two board members violated the act when they posted on Facebook that a substitute teacher who was running for election was unemployed and engaged in misconduct as a substitute teacher notwithstanding the fact that the statements were not true and actually applied to another teacher the commission found that the board members violated uh the provisions and issued a reprimand uh these two found that board member violated the act when he had posted offensive posts on his personal Facebook page that were anti-muslim although it was found that the posts were on his personal Facebook page were not made in capacity as a board member and the contents of the posts were personal opinions the board memb is still violated the act as it was a private action that may compromise the board and undermine public trust member was only censored because he had not run for re-election therefore removal was not an option um so generally speaking everyone should read and become familiar with the code of ethics um and also sign the written acknowledgement that you all have in front of you so that um we can keep record of that and that's it um so of course if anything comes up you're always welcome to ask your board president ask Rich if it's something that is still and You Know Rich has been around the block so he may be able to answer a lot of your questions as to whether or not you know something may be an Ethics issue uh but in case they're not he can elevate it to us and we can try to figure that out as well um so I'm happy to take questions now if you feel more comfortable relaying those questions later we can always talk later as well anyone have any questions I have a question sure so so if it's a oneoff situation where you're you're helping out with a sport let's say is it okay to be in charge of money like if you're collecting money for snacks or whatever for athletes would that be something to probably not jump in I would say no I would say no it's you know it's it's it's with good intention but it would be better to see if there's someone else who's available to do that and if there's something else that you could do instead that would probably be best yeah Jacob the point what about boosters if we're involved in booster clubs Boy Scouts Girl Scouts same thing just steer away from be the one who who deals with the money itself and I wouldn't be the one who is in any type of supervisory capacity of the booster club but if you're just helping out here and there and not having constant interaction with students and not giving orders so to speak it would be fine I have a question of course can board members make donations to these pubs that's interesting I believe I believe they can yes I I let me double check on that for you parent should be able to as as an individual yes not not as on behalf of the board yeah yeah and I should clarify not on behalf of the board certainly like you can't say the board make any donation to this CL um but as an individual parent in your individual capacity I yes I believe you can okay yeah so like your book as a parent yes in your in Your Capacity as a parent yes good and I I can I can double check it but I I but my offcu answer is I think that should be fine yeah yes so in your section on um not running the school the micromanaging Department your examples were um about um staff hiring kind of stuff do you have other examples you know kind of more like fiscal aspects um decisions that are made that that always there's a lot of stuff that comes in front of the board sure that could be really you know picked apart sure um let's see you know you got for it would be appropriate for the board to vote on a resolution that potentially um let's say uh a a company wants to take out an advertisement on one of the fields one of the sports Arenas and they say okay here's uh $5,000 for that you guys can decide to whether or not to accept or deny that as part of a resolution but then getting your hands mixed into exactly how that $5,000 apply and should be applied to the you know should be applied to that field team should be applied to a teacher salary here how do we manage that that might be a little bit uh too much um the finance committee could possibly deal with that but that could get into the realm of administrative prerogative of exactly where each doler is going so to speak if that makes sense I actually have an and I remember an example that was brought up in one of the previous sessions like this where they talked about um a board member had an issue with SEC there was a security issue that they felt like there was a security issue and then that person went and like went to the principal and made them bring them around and to do their own basically due diligence to see if it was a safety issue I think I recall that yeah the the issue was that um someone brought to their attention to possible security concern so they went on they went onto the school themselves and started taking pictures of where they thought all the security concerns were that was an inappropriate thing to do as well that was that was considered micromanaging yeah that's a good point anything else um just a was this printed from the website or that's ours no that's I I believe R for generated that okay should I yeah there's two JS so should I cross out the one that's in I and then sign it yes that's fine you can do that and actually we also have another a different version of that to in case that I guess we can do but yeah feel free just to cross out the letter and sign it it's for it's for the retention by the uh by the district all right well thank you everybody thanks Jacob Katie would you like those collectors if you can sign them now and pass them in be great not thank you Che thank you thank you that was very informative that was very okay moving forward we are going to take a motion and second to approve action items 9.1 through 9.13 second I was back Dan Dan any discussions I have a discussion Katie on 9.8 I went to the and Tarot can back me we went to the delegate meeting they did have this discussion it was passed on the floor for they will there support and jsba supporting there's no more um newspapers The Star Ledger so we're just waiting now on legislation so now it's a waiting game to get updated legislation cuz the one that's on the um been passed right now is only until and you can correct me if I'm R I think it's the end of February um so they're enacting some sort of legislation after that point so I was going to say the same thing which is for right now we still have to appoint our official newspapers because even from now until that time of legislation expiring we still need to advertise whether it's in print or it's electronic um we'll still need to have that um resolution in the system but most likely by March we should have updated legislation and yeah exactly there'll be more language that we so they told us they were actually pushing delegate they said they were hoping by the end of January to have it before February I was like because they did the temporary legislation it just means they're they're kicking it a little I would imagine it this will come up again and we will take another y right now though we're going to act as business as usual okay just to comment on that too so I had also sent a note just to make everyone aware I note to Rich earlier today because we're reopt the policies and I wasn't sure if we were doing that because we're going to be evaluate we're doing the New Jersey school board policies but I guess until those policies are in place we need to reopt these and so I just wanted to clarify that to yeah we did get um I got notice from um school boards today they are sending us a zip drive with the policy manual on as soon as I get it I'll get it up there for where we'll be in a policy committee and we'll review it and then that we replace what we're reappointing tonight perfect excellent if you look at policy 0154 those are the annual motions and it always um says that you have to reopt your bylaws and policy so this is just kind of the standard resolution and then what we move forward cuz I'm assuming it will be just strictly by that time digital I don't know if they're going to drop off the end of January it's supposed to be digital so there is going to be a time period where it would be great to put it in paper but it's going to end up being digital we still have the 100 in Democrat correct I think there are counties that don't have any so that was what the discussion was so the only other notation I would just have in your mind is that I did have to change the March meeting date so when you open up 9.12 um we got the updated school budget calendar from the state obviously last minute as they typically do so I had to revise the March meeting date one week prior to what we had originally scheduled so I will be getting that published as soon as possible so we can get that in print and then we'll see if we have any other edits after that but I wouldn't anticipate anything after that point okay everyone have that M any other questions okay roll call vote Miss um Dr deie yes M tag yes Mr Chapman yes Miss Gallo yes Miss hin yes Miss kran yes Mr lordy yes Mr mcisaac yes Miss Reyes yes Mr Spanton yes Miss VI yes and Miss Leo yes thank you car okay moving on at this time we'll have opportunity for public comment uh during this portion of the meeting the public is invited to address the school board with questions or comments the public is requested to sign the register provided for the this purpose and to State their name Municipality of residents group affiliation of applicable and direct their comments to the school board president while all comments will be considered and a response will be forthcoming if and when appropriate school board members will not respond to the speakers at the time of their appearance the public comment period will be a maximum of 30 minutes in length unless there are unusual circumstances those appearing will be allocated 3 minutes to speak and no one will be permitted to speak twice until those that have not yet had an opportunity to speak have had a turn good evening I'm Stephen codron I'm from Clinton Township New Jersey first and foremost congratulations to the newly directed and newly elected board members and welcome back to those who are returning I'm here to tonight to remind the board that your job is to ensure that our students receive a quality education we come to school from 7:45 a.m. to 2:25 p.m. every day to get a quality education from people who are highly knowledgeable in their craft while our parents and other community members are a valued voice in this North Hunter and Vorhees Community they're not directly impacted by decisions you make within this room we are so as a student here I urge you to continue protecting our education and all facets of said education furthermore our students have rights as individuals the greatest of which is the right to an education as outlined in the New Jersey Constitution additionally we are also guaranteed the right to read and the right to express ourselves how we see fit by the United States Constitution we are not exempt from our first amendment constitutional rights just because we're inside our school we're American citizens like you and we appreciate and enjoy our rights just like you do our students and staff put their trust in you to provide them with the tools and resources required to give students a proper education please don't break that trust thank you good evening it is an honor to be here this evening um particularly in light of a young person a student who um is attending Excuse me yes let us know your name and oh I'm sorry sorry I did write it Marina bartelli of Franklin Township um two of my uh kids are North graduates um so again it's an honor to be here and to watch the workings of a board of education I'm sure you're all aware of the gravity of the responsibility that you hold for educating the students in this District um and again well spoken um for the student Stephen um so that being said um I do value education I value leadership that has qualified um qualifications and experience and the wisdom and common sense to make a path forward and a board that can work together in the best interest of the students to that end I'd like to read a quote from social media we live in a flat Dome the heliocentric model is false I wonder if any of you are aware of the individual in this room who is recently just now elected vice president that that's their social media I hope there will be no buyer remorse congratulations any other public comments thank you um I'm going to call for motion second to adopt uh resolution 01725 d10 for executive session to discuss matters falling under category 8 as reflected in the attached resolution the board expects to be in exec session for approximately 30 minutes and upon return to public session action will be taken second and Nicole voice voice sorry sorry I'll get it hi hi oppos any oppos OBS and extensions don't come to meik it's been a long time ride the bike e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e was Jessica and Nicole yes and we need a Voice vote all in favor any n extensions uh call for a motion second to approve agenda item 13.1 and to were including hand carries do I need to no hand carries so move second that was Christina and Tara and I need a roll call vote Miss p yes Dr Dean yes Mr Chapman yes Miss Gall yes Miss H yes M kran yes Mr lordy yes Mr mcac yes Miss Reyes yes Miss Selena yes Mr spanson yes Miss yes okay good uh call for a motion second to adjourn so mov second any names any exension thank you everyone have a good night