so um I'd like to call the um meeting to order with a roll call Mr Donnie Miss quack absent miss m here Mr mmud absent Miss Brogan here please join me in a flag salute and Pledge of Allegiance pursuant to the requirements of the open public meetings act advanced notice has been given to the Star Ledger the record and the clerk of the village of Ridgewood in addition notices were posted in the office of the board secretary and in all school buildings so welcome everyone we've got a nice nice group before the snow day tomorrow right which nobody wanted right right so we've got some uh presentations uh Dr Schwarz we do uh and for starters we have a recognition of someone uh who is uh very important here and someone who we want to celebrate um I'm going to invite up uh the principal of Willard Elementary School Miss Carolyn Hoffman to uh take it over from here good evening it is an honor to be here tonight to celebrate Christa Valentine Christa tonight we honor you as we announce your retirement from Willard School after 32 years of service as you calculated the other day that's over 630 students who have sat in your classroom over 630 students that you have taught to read write add and subtract over 630 students that you have taught everything there is to know about dinosaurs and Penguins over 630 students who were fortunate to have you as a role model cheerleader and teacher your influence though goes far wider than your classroom Christa your positivity professionalism laughter and love for education in Willard School has impacted all of us your organization motivation and I dare say love for lesson planning have made you a leader among your team you have represented first grade in just about every curriculum review your knowledge of the first grade learner and primary instruction is highly valued by colleagues and administrators and even now in your final months you're still sitting on the grade one literacy team for your input so it should be no surprise to all of you that Christa leads our social committee she ensure she ensures that staff are celebrated honored and supported fun fact Christa rewrites the lyrics to a song for anyone who retires it is always funny genuine and kind just like Christa good news is that she already wrote her own song for her retirement because that's just the way Christa is Christa as you know your retirement threw me a bit even though you tried to prepare me for a couple years that it could be coming um it's hard to believe you're moving on there is so much I will miss like hearing and seeing you in your class dance the it's Friday Friday song students passing in the hallway will surely be looking for your monthly calendar of special days in your window how are we to know if it's make your bed day or popcorn day but truly in all seriousness your influence will always be felt at Willard School thank you for all you have given to your students and colleagues we are Greatful and we wish you all the best in your retirement great your I'm speechless um no I'm actually speechless I'll steal this um thank you for your kind words I it's very hard for me to say goodbye to Willard and it's very hard for me to say goodbye to Ridgewood but um as I was just saying to Sheila 35 years ago I taught her children in nursery school so when you get to a number like that it's time to go but I'm grateful to my Willard family I'm grateful to you I'm grateful to my own family and all the support I've had I love what I do and I'm going to continue doing it in a different manner but thank you for everything be missed thank you thank you for all the on behalf of the Board of Education and Ridgewood Public Schools Miss Valentine thank you so much for everything that you've done for so many students in our district and uh we're really grateful to to to be here and to celebrate with you we'll do a quick quick quick photo your teacher in the back he's saying I OB je that's my teammate members want come on up okay next up we have some of our student representatives from Ridge Elementary School we have with us today I believe we have Oliver besser Sloan gross Charlie quickin did I say your name right Charlie cucin Sorry Charlie cucin and Gavin pereza all right well I'll leave it to you to go ahead and take it away good evening Board of Education members we are members of The Ridge School student leadership I am Gavin pereza I am Oliver beer thank you for inviting us to share many fabulous things happening at Rich School this year we have enjoyed many special activities so far and they are still many more to come kindergarteners have had some special events this year in the winter they had a Thanksgiving feast and decorated gingerbread houses special mystery reader visits dressed in cost streams and read favorite books to kindergarteners they learn to practice mindful nits with Go Noodle and and learn how to be a good friend to others in coming months kindergarteners will take a trip to vanon to learn about animal habitats and environment and celebrate the union of Q andu first grade students have also had many exciting experiences this year our school therapy dog Riggins is still a member of the first grade team she enjoys hanging out with all the students they went to Museum Village to learn about colonialism and then have their own Colonial craft they had rich in December they celebrated holiday traditions around the world last week was 101st day school and students have been practicing their math skills Through Math centers each week a new thir first grader is a superstar and celebrated by their classmates they will soon be preparing for their annual first grade show second graders have learned how fun reading can be from performers called rock out for reading they played guitar and sang songs about characters and story elements and then they enjoyed the idea of a story through song second graders also prepared a r box assembly and celebrate the retirement of their beloved teacher mrso lastly they are looking forward to beginning their research on on an important person in history like Amelia aart or Jackie Robinson To Make History come to the life our third graders have been very busy this year they took a walking tour of Ridgewood and they visited the library the students made animal biomes and look forward to sharing their culture through an ethnic tasting party each week they Spotlight one student and celebrate their week's work with the TGIF celebration soon students will be going to the turtleback zoo and will be visited by the be guy and Joe the space guy fourth grade is full of activities too they learned to play the recorder they built and decorated gingerbread houses and they had a chance to join the student leadership also in art this year they made they made mandalas which will be displayed in the halls of Rich fourth graders will have the opportunity to visit the Liberty Science Center and watch the play Ellis Island at rmo College they they are eagerly waiting the return of the circus program at Rich School our fifth graders are having an amazing last year outrage they start each day with making sure the school is safe in orderly as Ridge safety patrol leaders they spend the day at the beginning of the year building and getting to know each other better most students have learned to play instrument and showcase their talent at a December concert they had field trips to Storm King Museum G Space Center and they will be closing out the year at Woodmont Day Camp participating in more team building activities what are you to remember Bridge has many school act schoolwide activities too there will be offered visits by John perah and Ellis broch who's the author of this year's one school on book masterpiece student leadership sponsored H holiday candy grams raising $2,000 which was donated to the briwood SSA they will also be hosting a St Patrick's Day Bagel breakfast to raise money for the Bergen rameno animal Refugee some students have arrived early to sing songs and be part of glee club which was performed popular tunes that got the school moving this new this year the Ridge Community celebrating an evening of music that spotlighted individual musical talents also we had special yoga instructors who spend the weekend PE classes teaching students how to keep their bodies fit and flexible in the next few months community helpers like ridgew EMS DPW fire department and police officers will teach K through2 students about what they do to keep the community safe and working smoothly of course they plan on bringing their full equipment to show off how it works too in June we love to end the year with our annual field day a day filled with PE filled with PE activities and tons of fun the r students and staff have been busy this year learning and having fun we feel so fortunate to have so many opportunities and we are grateful for the opportunity to share with them all with you thank you for your time tonight thank you if parents want to come up and take some photos that would be great and then we'll um maybe we'll go over here and have all the students um on the repeat board is that was that perfect y nail it oh you want to do the H the students just stay here for a minute let your parents take pictures and then we'll just go over to the board yes Board of Education your kids did a great job would you like to come up and get your picture taken you guys play okay I don't really want to get see Sarah's next thank you again to everyone who came tonight uh for those of you here for our presentations please uh thank you for coming please don't feel like you have to stay um we'd love to have you of course but uh but sometimes our meetings run long so appreciate that all right and next up we have a student representative report from uh Miss Sarah bronstein of Ridgewood High School Miss bronstein would you mind giving us the report of course um Lots happened since the last time I've been here uh to begin the deputy mayor Pamela peran recently spoke to the green Club about health effects of modern lawm maintenance we've learned a lot in environmental science as well about lawn uh lawn maintenance especially in Ridgewood and how it might affect local ecosystems so she helped educate a lot of students on that all 13 teams from the applied engineering club made it to the 2024 NJ steam tank challenge Regional they will compete in the next round in front of a panel of judges and present their projects also at super science Saturday at rhs in March the applied engineering club is run by Dr Labowski but has amazing student involvement with team leaders and coaches directing their peers and other groups on how to best succeed project interact as always is very active they volunteered at the Social Services food drive on Saturday the 27th of January project interact also began making Valentines for Valley um Valley Hospital to donate to the hospital for the next couple of weeks letters for Rose had another writing session inviting students to write letters to the local nursing home that is in uh Juniper and premis Senior student council just closed their clothing sale selling merchandise for the class of 24 and hopes to raise more money for prom in June I want to say that it's closed now but there still might be some shirts and sweatpants available U mock trial had a big week they went to the Bergen County Courthouse to compete with a real lawyer as the judge the defense and prosecution teams both won moving Ridgewood into the next round the defense team also went back to try the case against Northern Valley Regional at demerest Asian Fest will be performing for the students on March 1st and the bank V will be on the second opening it up for parents and um non Ridgewood students um a bunch of students all put on various performances to show their different cultures it's a very popular day for rhs students as I know many including myself love to watch the performers they've been working tirelessly since December and I know they have a lot of rehearsals so I'm personally very looking forward to this uh super sign Saturday is on March 2nd from 9:00 am to 1:30 p.m. and is open to all various rooms around RS will be used for the robotics team applied engineering groups live rocket launches and other science experiments Ruckers will also be attendance along with the ridge of police officers firefighters and EMS all doing different um experiments and getting the kids involved Jam B was very successful they had shows on the 8th 9th and 10th this is a very important performance uh the parents put on performances to help raise money for senior scholarships and having been through the process there's a lot of scholarships that need money for so I think it was a very successful weekend which is always good to hear some of the ban went on their California trip uh two Thursdays ago and returned last Tuesday uh they competed outside of Los Angeles and Richwood does this every four years allowing many different band members to do uh to go and they haven't done it in a while because of Co so it was very was very happy to see everyone there I think everyone had a lot of fun on Tuesday February 6 students from Ridgewood High School got to meet um previous US Women's National Soccer Team and Hall of Fame goalkeeper uh Briana Scurry uh she shared her story of Triumph tragedy and Redemption Scurry spoke my greatest save was one of the tell me your story options for students to read at the beginning of the year tell me your story is when the entire school pretty much reads a select of Five Books um it's very it's a very nice time we do it every year and it's very important because students that are as young as freshmen all the way to seniors all read the same five books um and project indirect also had their January food drive which was very successful this year boys wrestling had their County tournament three weeks ago now and were very successful the girls and boys track team had their seals last Saturday they've had a very successful winter season winning League champions for boys and girls girls also had a win at the Bergen County relays and I know the boys had one of the fastest medal times recently and I think was ranked number one in the entire nation which is crazy uh the girls basketball team won their first County game on Thursday the 25th against Rutherford and unfortunately lost to number three tinck on Saturday the 27th during a close game Richard girls will continue the regular season with a winning record of 10 to n and begin preparing for the state tournament Thurs day the 25th uh girls and boys swim had their senior night on Tuesday the 30th the swim team had their league championship at hackin saac girls cheer went to Dallas to compete in Nationals and came back with Ninth Place with close to 350 other high schoolers um high schoolers competing boys bowling competed in three games last week in head counties on Saturday they have a current record of 72 and they also won counties the Alpine racing team went to the east Invitational at Mountain Creek girls earned second place and boys fourth two days later they had a conference race uh the women's team placed Fifth and the boys third and finally the boys and girls track team both play first in sectionals thank you and happy snow day Sarah thank you so much and um if you can if if you feel comfortable at the next meeting can you report on how our our Juniors uh doing with uh or seniors doing with the EAS and EDS and what the mood is right now in that senior community absolutely um I can sort of say a little bit on it now um EDS was December and a lot of EAS were just recently there's been a handful I know ridgewood's suffered a good amount of deferrals but there's been a lot of Hope in terms of deferrals it sounds like a lot of colleges plan on deferring and are going to take kind of a large amount of their class from the students that are being deferred there's still a lot of students have had a lot of success though in terms of getting at least one of their top three schools um I know a lot of students that are also getting money at these schools and I know scholarships are coming out soon as well um I know a lot of kids that have had success with but I've also known a lot that haven't it's been kind of back and forth but I know there's some big dates coming up where students will hear back from the schools that they got deferred from I think it was a lot more successful before this year and then I think a lot of the January schools hit people pretty hard but it's not quite over yet um I've heard a lot of positive things though I know a lot of people are getting into some great schools and if it wasn't their Top Choice they're getting money at their third or fourth choice which is just they're all very excited I know a lot of students that are going to visit their school soon as well and scout out their options which is great thank you so much Miss bronstein really appreciate you all your comprehensive reports and that was a fantastic on the-fly answer there thank you for that okay we'll open up the microphone we open up the microphone for public comment please state your name and address and if you could uh just pay attention to the time clock that's usually up there if it's not to keep your um statement to um or your comments to four minutes um know that we will go through all of the comment period um and we won't have a back and forth dialogue um and answer questions but at the end of public comment if we can ask questions or answer questions or clarify something we will attempt to do that if not we will get back to you okay okay so um phone's open and welcome thank you thank you hi I'm Elizabeth fres I live at 618 Morningside Road and um I'm here to advocate for timely and thoughtful High School field Solutions before there is a long-term solution so I understand that um there's been an addition to the agenda just recently which is great um we're really excited that um you know there's it seems like there's an accepted bid but I just wanted to go ahead and say what I wanted to say um for the future so you know as we're all sitting here um the question is not if we clean up the fields but when and there are so many of us that are affected by the field disrepair and want a quick cleanup we have 5,000 youth athletes and coaches we have 1,800 high school students and PE teachers we have 300 High School lacrosse baseball softball and flag footb football players and we have 700 people in the community who signed a petition stating that they would like quick cleanup and a contingency plan for going forward all the people that I just mentioned and all of us here we're not all going to speak I'm trying to keep it concise but we all really have two main goals the first goal is to act on the bids quickly so we're asking to please review the bids right away and pick a vendor so that they have enough time to secure proper Machinery needed for this difficult job and that way we can all be ready by the anticipated start date of cleaning up by the end of February or beginning of March our second goal is to establish an agreement with neighboring towns to secure field access for March 14th through March 22nd the first week of varsity practice if we don't use it we could perhaps roll roll the rental over for a future time but we're asking to make calls now to Faber in Glenrock to Hing Cliffe and Patterson and revolutionary field in Hawthorne to establish a field usage agreement that be can that can be utilized now and as needed until a long-term solution is realized these goals are important to so many for three main reasons one is the overall health and mental well-being um it is significantly improved for people when it's participating in sports and when one has the opportunity to get outside and move during the day secondly the Ridgewood motto of tradition and Excellence is not upheld when un there are unusable fields and no practice space for four state championship teams including baseball boys lacrosse girls lacrosse and flag football bless you um and third thing that I wanted to point out is that practice space for lacrosse in particular requires extra consideration because the speed of play and flying balls at about 80 mil an hour make practice at Somerville Haws Kennelworth or even a parking lot very dangerous so I would say that if upholding the tradition of Excellence or the well-being of kids in our community is not a driver for you then maybe money is your number one decision-making Factor so to this I will say fix the fields as soon as possible we all know that the fields will be fixed so why not do it when you can serve the community best plus if we use our own Fields alternative practice space and busing to and from them do not have to be expenses secondly we ask that you pre-negotiate field related contracts for savings we understand that the Board of Ed must get three bids if the bidding threshold is over $44,000 so why not get a trusted vendor pre-approved by the state of New Jersey so money and time can be saved in pre-negotiation and then also provide a quick response when flooding reoccurs if you could wrap it up yep thank you um and then we just asked that when making decisions and what to bid we have please have faith in the vendor and make sure that the that the work is done according to contract and I just like to close it with a line from the board of admission statement that's posted on the high school website that says we take great pride in helping each child reach his or her full potential so being slow to act cannot be the reason that our students and community and our athletes have a chance to do their best thank you thank you are there any more um comments thank you see you do have um someone on the phone ajm yeah hi this is Anand um uh I live with uh John Street um in Ridgewood uh of course you know um I I I we may have lost you you know uh I'm sorry can you hear me yes thank you hello can you hear me yes we can hear you hello hello I can't hear you can you hear me we can hear you okay yeah sorry okay if that is the case you know I mean I do understand that you know the the the the field has to be fixed you know but again you know I've been uh I have been on this since last few times now and and it is not right that you know we keep on pouring the money to fix this uh day in and day out you know we cannot keep on doing that so so please you know find a solution uh uh you know get the grants get the help from the state wherever you can and and and please stop you know uh uh basically asking the asking the people of you know the resident of the Ridgewood for the money we cannot keep on doing this you know that's all I'm going to say for now you know um I'm I'm literally tired of uh uh you know giving the money for the for our property tax I just got a property tax bill today and you know it has gone up you know a majority of majority of the money goes for the school and we cannot use the money properly and and please stop spending it just for you know cleaning up I think enough is enough that's all I'm going to say for now thank you thank you okay with that I will close uh public comment um and I I know our superintendent and has um some information on the fields but you're going to do your District goal status first or or do you want to do your report first I if it's okay with you I'd be happy to reverse the order and do the superintendent um report first so uh welcome everybody I hope um hope you're not inconvenienced by the snow day call for tomorrow um real quick uh we'll get to the get a field conversation just I just don't want to forget to say this um I don't I don't gather that many people so far tonight have expressed concern over there being a snow day called tomorrow but I just wanted to reiterate for those who are who are interested that effectively you know the weather models produce sometimes a lot of diverse thoughts about what the storm is going to bring um but it's also waiting to the morning although that is most certain for us is not always convenient for families and for our staff so it's important to me to make sure that we um watch those models and if there's uncertainty we wait but when the models really converge and they all basically say the same thing it's important I feel like to show respect to the community and to our staff members and college as early as possible especially for parents who have to might have to make some alternative plans for their kids this storm seems to be such that I don't know that I think most people are going to be snowed in tomorrow but um we certainly wanted to get that out there as soon as possible but again if we if there's uncertainty we do wait and I want to say that just because I know that the days can be inconvenient for some folks um I wanted to talk about the superintendent coffee PR primarily tonight as a part of my report I know that there are some members of the community who were concerned about the fields thank you all so much for coming out and sharing your concerns with us we share your concerns at the superintendent coffee I spent a considerable amount of time sharing some information that I had just to try to help everyone understand kind of where we are in the process of getting the fields cleaned up and resolved um so uh Miss Broan asked me if I could share uh some of that again tonight being that we probably had some folks who were not able to attend the coffee or who have not watched the coffee as we got started here tonight um couple parents uh who were who were visiting here uh indic were at the coffee and indicated that I really appreciate that you took the time to attend and be there with us um and I'm just going to pull up the presentation don't worry I'm not going to make you all sit through it a second time but uh but for the sake of those who might not know exactly quite what we're talking about um Miss Brogan asked that I would just run through it again run through some of the Salient features of it so let me just go here let me go to the superintendent coffee presentation and view all right let's see okay so again without belaboring the point I'm just going to say just a few things and then I'm going to get to a couple points in the presentation um the some of the emails that I've received and some of the comments tonight reflect uh a perception in the community that there has been inaction on the district's part and I understand how it could appear like that um the reality is that we have not uh we're not in any kind of disadvantageous circumstance due to any kind of inaction uh we have been contact with vendors since this uh since this mess came about it's important to understand that the cleaning of these fields is a pretty non-standard occurrence this isn't like your routine maintenance it's not uh simple matter of reskinning a field or just doing something normal this is we're not most Fields do not experienced this kind of disruption and of all the different cleanups that we've had in the past the one that we're experiencing right now is arguably the most significant um we did a little bit of a look back at some prior years we had some years where there were no cleanups two years ago we had several cleanups that was the year of Hurricane Ida or maybe that would be three years ago by now um and uh and that was a pretty significant cleanup the fields are Ur So anything over $25 $25,000 per field um uh is covered by our insurance policy so this we did file a claim we have no reason to believe that we won't be covered for this specific event so that helps with cost but nevertheless that's a high deductible especially considering the fact that we have two fields that we're responsible for so it's $50,000 in occurrence that said the vendors that we had out even early on uh they were very clear that we need to wait through the winter season before we can actually take action uh the reason for that is that the fields themselves and I'll show that in a second they have to be dry the muck that's on there is really caked in and it's wet and in the cold months that moisture stays in so we're hopeful that by the end of February uh in early March we'll be in a better place where they those that that that um that silt can actually be cleaned up um we have been talking with the vendors part of the challenge is that um again each storm is a little bit different it's this is this particular storm is not a basic silt deposit situation where we have we have a deposit on the field that needs to be cleaned off and then the field needs to be disinfected and then uh needs to be um the infill maybe needs to be cleaned a little more deeply and then gmax tested to see if we can do it again in this particular circumstance we have had a significant loss of the actual infill and as I said a really significant to positive silt so this is a more robust and intense cleanup than we've had before and some of the initial quotes that we got really were not fully comprehensive um additionally the providers that come to us are not all in the state contract which would mean that we would have to go out to bid if if we were to um if we were to want to include really consider all of them uh looking at some of the companies that are in the state contract tonight we're actually recommending one of those companies who has given us at this point a comprehensive quote they're working with our insurance adjuster we have an adjuster coming out to evaluate the field again just to make sure that we're fully covered under our claim and other than the weather there's no reason to believe that we won't be open that said we can't control the weather and we don't know if the temperature is going to drop if we're going to go a rainy spell God willing it will dry out around that time period and we'll be able to just proceed and be ready for the start of the season but we do have contingency plans in Exploration I cannot make a commitment tonight exactly what those are but I can assure you that that what was proposed by our speaker uh and who is speaking for I know many of the parents specifically with the request that we would have uh the first week already laid out and planned and covered that's certainly something that we that we intend to have in place um and again I just can't I can't make those commitments here tonight but that's something that we very much expect to have if it's not if we're not already right there um some of the suggestions about pre-negotiation Services again we're not held up by a bid process because one of the one of the providers is in the state contract but something that we're considering is uh recognizing that this cleanup might be something that has to happen from time to time and so pre-negotiated or not pre-negotiated but rather uh anticipating the need for these types of services specking out the anticipated need and then possibly bidd uh in advance of anticipated need is something that we can also do but again with this with a with one of the providers in the state contract um we're that's not holding us back all that would do is give us the ability to potentially be inclusive of other vendors but there're not a lot of uh not a lot of vendors in this game there's only a few and uh and at the at the end of the day the lowest if we use the bid process the lowest bidder will be the one that that uh that we have to give the award to so again we have the we have uh the services uh to be recommended to the board to be secured tonight we have the insurance claim in place we have contingencies being fully explored so uh it is my hope that we can deliver all that you're all that you're hoping for and asking for in the meantime uh I know that uh you will not be calm and comfortable until this is done so I'm not going to ask that of you but uh I just want to uh ensure that we assure you that we will be engaging in consistent communication as we get through each step of this process U miss corus our public information officer is working with our buildings and grounds Department as well as the high school and she's helping advise their communication so please know that we will keep you in the loop um as a point of contact for updates uh Mr cook at the our athletic director um is certainly very much involved in these processes so he's a good person to speak to of course you can also speak to Mrs corus you can always send me an email but I get a lot of emails and I'm probably not going to be the quickest response um but I would certainly recommend speaking to the two of them and if for some reason something seems really off and you need to you need to ping me please feel free to do so all right so as far as the presentation's concerned I'm just going to do a quick overview and this is available on the district website but you can also watch the presentation which would probably be the easiest way to do it on YouTube so the district has a YouTube channel and the coffees are recorded and placed on there so this was my timeline but I showed a couple of things the first thing and most people have not seen this we all know what the field looks like Stadium Field looks like it's nice and clean we all a lot of us saw what it looked like when it was flooded but a lot of people don't get a chance to actually see what is actually happening in fact some of my prior coffees we've had circumstances where where folks have suggested that perhaps we just need to uh take care of the foot Bridge because the foot Bridge gets clocked but you can see I'm gonna mute myself there as I'm taking this video and commenting um and I'll just give you a voice over here so this is the foot Bridge over here and you can see the water is well over the foot bridge and what's significant about this video and the reason I I wanted to make sure I captured this is you can see the water flow you notice how it's coming completely around the field here and into and across the field uh this seems to be you can't tell from this shot but that water seems to be going right across that neighbor's yard and right into our field which means it's not getting backed up by the foot bridge and you can see the water flows all the way around and into the field and we're not even at the uh we're not even uh peaked out at the the uh at the at the water here so what's happening is because the water's just flowing up and over the banks it appears the water's flowing up and over the banks it's just carrying with it a tremendous amount of material and then of course because we have a fence here which we need to have um the debris get and leaves get stuck in the fence that also helps trap silt and so we end up with a pretty significant accumulation issue um and just to give you a sensus to just how much water this is at this particular storm um and again this this was this was the last most significant storm this is a view of the other side of the bridge so there's our field of course there's our high school and you can see all that water so this is a pretty significant amount of water coming across this area so some of our cleanups have been not anywhere near as significant it's been more an intrusion of water and then recedes and it leaves some silk behind but this is uh this is a true flooding of the fields and um that foot bridge I just thought I would show this to this is uh in the in the uh in our late I can't remember if it was it late September or early October but our fall storm this was the morning of before it crested and again you can see it's not as though the foot Bridge here at least is getting that clogged up um it's more that when it overflows that some things gets stuck but you can see here at the in the last storm you can see how high the foot bridge is in the last storm the water was about up into this middle R so that's clearly well up and over the banks uh what we also talked about was the cleanup Pro so our steps um let see if I can second here we go um I included this picture this is from a a cleanup several years ago and uh you can see that um it's really important you can see in this picture how dry this all is again if you were to go look at the field uh it is very Mucky uh still right now and it's going to be very Mucky again tomorrow sorry that's not a technical term but that kind of It's A fitting description um but this is a when it dries sort of like if you have a spill of something in your house and sometimes it's better to let it dry and like cake up and then you can scrape it you can break it off or cake it off or break it up and it'll fall come off um it's the same principle here when it dries it scrapes up actually quite nicely um and then we can scoop it up and we can we can haul it away but it is a rather large production um again I included some facts that you know we do have a $25,000 deductible so it's $50,000 total uh we we have filed for a relief VI a FEMA and this last time around because it was a state of emergency um as I mentioned we have vendors coming and we have contingency plans that are not just limited to local school districts for the medium term I shared we'd been talking about raising the field and some people had had trouble conceptualizing what we mean by that so I found a vendor this is I don't this is just from a Google search uh this is a vendor who provides such uh water uh detainment systems I believe that they're called um they they operate at different levels but the idea is that the field would be raised we had talked a little bit about maybe like a parking garage under so it's a little more useful but the reality is that uh that these detainment systems are an actual product that people do use for Solutions and so the idea is that the rain water would come in and it would have some sort of a place to go and then there would be a pump in this system that could then excise that water so the idea is it would be have like a su pump so that it would stay generally very clear uh so it would function like a sum pump and it would be empty like a base and then as the water would come in it would it would fill and then we would pump that back out more steadily the reason we would why that would be important is because the D has rules that we can't adjust make adjustments to our property that would impact the flow of that Brook in a flood pattern because if we were to enable that flood to pass through our area more efficiently that would result in a much higher rate of flow and and flooding in towns beneath us and you could see how much was gushing out of us uh down toward Glenrock so this would this would help alleviate that and hopefully you know if if it's something that we we're able to do or we decide to do um let's say it's viable then uh then that would not wreak havoc on them and could potentially be D approved um that is a medium-term potential solution that still is several is would be years out um but uh but in the meantime we're also looking at repurposing areas within Ridgewood that are within our control uh for possible solutions and of course also possibly engaging in sharing of of properties of of fields and areas outside of Ridgewood as well as much as no one wants to play outside of Ridgewood and then for the long term and again we're pursuing all three of these at the same time for the longterm we have a feasibility study being conducted by the Army Corps of Engineers I mentioned Congressman go heimer's office was was was kind enough to get us uh connected with a point of contact and we were able to make uh requests from them uh Keith kasmar The Village manager has filed uh has filed and made this request on the entire Village's behalf and we're uploading um all the pictures and images that we have of the flood and also uh sharing with them our repeated loss lists including a lot of residential property that continually gets impacted by these floods so we're hopeful that this will qualify for an eligible project remember uh we have we have uh we are a municipality so we control you know so we can we have some level of influence over the brook but we can't fundamentally change the brook because because that's something that's really governed by the state uh the bridge down the way is governed by the county um and so between the state and the county uh there's only so much that we can do but the uh Army Corp of Engineers of course is a federal division which has pre which which has authority over all the others and does have the ability to intervene and say that this is an eligible project and then they can take action that would impact multiple communities um and would supersede uh the the the author the um uh the D and again I'm not uh I'm not I'm I can't I've not managed these projects before so I'm doing my best to educate myself um so I'm I'm going to just put a little caveat in there that uh that everything I just shared is uh definitely true in principle the details is what we are what we're working out I don't know exactly what the level of solution to the Hocus Brook flooding would exactly be I'm not sure if that would involve uh adding walls to the brook itself um or having some other kind of catch bacing mechanism that they would fund but either way uh we are working with them and we're g to find out um so I understand these projects are they're long in terms of determining whether how long it takes them to actually excuse me the projects are long in terms of how long it takes to be approve for a project and design a project and then Implement a project so again that truly is a long-term solution and then we just provided some district and board updates uh so I want so I want to share that with you if you haven't if you have more questions we did a whole Q&A there was lots of conversation the coffee went on for quite some time and so um I definitely would encourage you if you haven't seen it to certainly if you want interested in that portion please watch that portion um board members did you have any questions or comments regarding that while we're here no I thanks thank you there all right my pleasure and so then I would just use the rest of my my uh my superintendent report then just to share with everybody that we do have a follow-up superintendent coffee on March 14th but we're certainly not going to wait to provide updated information regarding our status and our progress so um we will be in touch again miss corus will use our our our communication channels to help keep everybody informed um we'll be working closely and coordinating with the high school um as well as the community and we will be providing you with updates as we go all right would you like me to do the uh that be great go presentation at this point also yes thanks that would be great and I want to just thank the parents for coming out tonight yes and we would not be offended if people want to go home but thank you so much for all coming this is good information have a great night thank you all so much and thanks for your advocacy and support really appreciate it miss bronstein you know you don't have to stay too long if you don't want to either okay thank you for coming and doing a great job you know what if uh wouldn't mind I'm just going to just grab a little something to drink I'm work talk to speak L we'll be right back okay we'll continue in just a minute yoga class thank you okay thank you for that I'm actually it's getting pretty warm so I'm just Good Morgan I yeah called the order yeah okay can I just maybe set the stage uh for goals so the um the board establishes goals each year for the superintendent um and they're districtwide goals and we also had a strategic plan which the community had input in in developing with the staff um and the board in 2019 so um uh Dr Schwarz uh new to the district in in July has dug into all of what's been happening in the district and is is really beginning to report on the status of the district goals and the Strategic plan so that's where we are would that be fair to say I I think that's fair um it is I am still very new it's funny I feel like I I live here um even though I don't sleep here um but uh but it's a great community and I'm blessed to be here uh no doubt uh so I am starting to feel like Ridgewood is familiar to me and that I'm feel like I'm starting to pick up a good sense of recent institutional history some long-term institutional history most importantly understanding the values of the district but also importantly I'm I feel as though I'm starting to arrive at a place where I have a reasonably strong sense of how we're where what we're doing well and areas that we want to do a little a little bit veteran and uh spoiler alert the one of the themes is consistency and quality control uh there's so much great stuff going on in Ridgewood you don't need me to tell you that um the the social media post that Miss corus throws out all the time I mean I can't even keep track of all the incredible things that are happening all the reports that we hear I mean it's just so many best practices in place in one place across so many schools it's it's pretty mind-boggling but that said from a systems thinking approach there are definitely there is there is definitely an absence of centralized coordination for quality control so I say that carefully in particularly because the centralized piece is the piece that's sort of missing the schools themselves um and I see this often when if there's especially if there's a there's uh changes in the governance structure of the leadersh administ central office leadership structure schools themselves will often kind of just move forward themselves especially if they have really excellent faculty facy and and great leaders which our schools do so again lots of great stuff we're also really blessed to have a group of Elementary principles particularly who really coordinate well together and enjoy collaborating so again uh without that centralized guidance it' be unrealistic to say that they're going to really truly have high fidelity across all of them but it's pretty incredible to me how high the quality is considering again that that that that lack of coordination for the last few years and I don't mean I don't mean to say and I just want to be really clear I don't mean to be uh I don't mean that as a statement of judgment on prior administrations um what I mean is just I know it's I think I'm stating the obvious in that for the last uh four years or so we've just had a lot of change and so and that's pretty it's a pretty good amount of time plus we've also had one of the most sign probably well without a doubt the most significant disruption education that that uh that that any of us have seen uh in our in our adult lives and God willing will ever see for a long time and that has presented a host of challenges and disruptions that everyone is feeling uh the studies on learning loss are pretty clear that uh families and communities that have more means generally suffer the loss less but that doesn't mean that that's felt equally across our community so we need to be vigilant and we need to have great systems uh at both at the school level and at the district dist level to ensure that our outcomes for students are Equitable across the board so that's kind of the theme um that I'm going to share that that of just where I'm at uh in the district now that said over the summer when I was learning how things were going here we had some admin Retreat time and uh I be began right away by having the uh administrators just form groups um there were not they were just kind of uh diverse groups without specific charges and they but they were asked to engage in something called the question formulation technique which is actually originally as a teaching tool but I find it's a really powerful um group collective intelligence tool and it it engaged them in the process of um instead of thinking about things that we should do or are supposed to do which can sometimes result in some argumentation um it forced them to ask a lot of questions about the district and through that process we were able to identify what the most important questions are that we should be asking ourselves given where we are and then once they once they prioritized what the right questions were then they started to think about the next steps and those actions and it was from that exercise that was kind of the beginning that information was sort of the beginning of what I was able to bring to the board as an initial recommendation about District goals so uh and then we had several different rounds with the board members and the administrators where we went back and forth and and me and Mr Mr fredman and Mrs Murphy um went back and forth and represented um and just kind of monitored the change to make sure we didn't lose anything and that back and forth but the feedback from the board and the the the concerns and the OBS observations of the administrators really dovetailed beautifully I think we were really all on the same page and so we came together with a list oh and we also obviously were engaging with the community we had surveys from the prior year as well that data was informed so there's Community input in that respect and so we got to a place where we rather expediently considering the circumstances developed some District goals that everyone felt pretty good about and by pretty good about it I mean I don't think anybody really hated you know this is this is democracy so uh so that's a pretty that's a pretty high Mark if we can pull that off so the presentation what I'm what I really want to do for everybody tonight and I did was able to give the board members a quick preview uh copy over the weekend so they've had a chance to look at it a little bit but we haven't really had a chance to talk about it much so for those who aren't familiar with board operations if you're watching um this is really the board's opportunity to be be able to have a conversation about this we are absent two of our board members who are very important to us um so that's a that's that's an unfortunate loss but uh we I'll certainly follow up with them and they've have a they've had a copy of this and we'll uh we we'll proceed so my goal tonight is to uh Engage The Board of Education trustees but also our families any faculty members who are interested in the public which I'm going to collectively call stakeholders and our district goal Pursuits so um and I want to invite feedback from stakeholders in our continuous Improvement processes and I'm I am inclined to give this presentation at my next superintendent coffee so that way the community can benefit from it as well and we can hear their input there as well um I'm also inviting feedback I'm sorry and and then also of course we want to be transparent about our efforts um I didn't include a slide that says what this presentation is not but I feel compelled to share that this presentation is not an attempt to be comp to give a comprehensive update of all the little efforts that are going on at a very detailed fashion um rather this is is uh I'm sorry I said that wrong my goal for my goal for this presentation is to be fairly comprehensive in terms of all the different actions that were enumerated in the district goals but not to get so detailed in all those little details of action that that that that are the substantive part so this is really a I'm trying to be very process oriented here um and I want to emphasize that because in managing change especially when we're trying to affect change effectuate change in so many areas at the same time it it's a it can be a trap to get too deep into any one topic they're all important every single one of them so but good process results in good product and if we can believe in the process then we can feel good about the product um and I think this year we're going to come up with some solid outcomes but to be clear the main goal that was we wrote the the main we wrote these goals together cognizant of the fact that we wouldn't necessarily be able to come out of this year with a lot of very concrete student outcomes per se but rather we wanted to engage in processes where we would may have made real process progress and we would know what our next steps would be with a lot of clarity so I think I hope that you'll see that here today so um one of the the goal one was had to do with our strategic plan and it's been important to me to understand what the state of the district's vision and Mission and branding is um I know that we have this tradition of Excellence as a funny story when I came and I was appointed I went up and I spoke at the podium and uh and I wasn't really fully aware of how much the tradition of Excellence was a part of the community or not you I see it on the signs but a lot of times people will have like branding that they don't really necessarily believe in and um but it's funny before I came here I used to talk about having a culture of Excellence meaning that if you want to have positive outcomes for students you have to have within your schools within your families within your community a culture of Excellence meaning that we're always striving for excellence we're never going to get it right it's always it's it's it's it's ephemeral it's not something that can be grasped but it's the pursuit of Excellence that helps is is along the ways where we experience greatness so it was funny I was at the podium and I I reference that we have this great culture of excellence and of course some one of the members of the press asked me this very like aggressive question about like what did you mean culture of Excellence like they thought I was like Mis like I was misspeaking when I was like I got the tradition of Excellence wrong um but uh but I very quickly came to learn as a result of that conversation and all my conversations um with our students and with uh with community members that concept of the tradition of Excellence is very real in people's minds whether it is I think some people think that maybe it's not always the healthiest thing I know that some people feel like that but I know that many also feel like it is a it is an it's a critical part of what makes Ridgewood Ridgewood so I thought we'd start with just looking at what our mission statement is and I'd refresh everybody on what was what came out of the last Vision setting exercise in 2019 so the statement is right there so if you want to see this uh you can you can read the statement um which says the Ridgewood Public School committed to a tradition of excellence and innovation in partnership with the community provide a rich and challenging learning environment enabling students to maximize their unique potential to become lifelong Learners and productive responsible citizens so that was quite a work of Excellence to get all that into one sentence so I thought I would break that out to some some some core components so if you just take take all those statements and you kind of make you itemize them it's really six things it's this concept of excellence and innovation which is great partnership with the community which I think everyone here would agree is really important rich and challenging learning environment I think that's important riger maximizing student potential right we want to see that all kids can have a CH have a chance to to hit their whatever that means to to to unlock as much potential in themselves obviously want kids to love learning we don't want to end when when they when they graduate right lifelong learning and then I love this part about being a productive and responsible citizen I think that's that is really important here and that's something I think is is should be should be maintained so I don't think anybody would disagree that these things are important so I'm just going to say I think our mission statement is pretty solid and I think it's it's would be good to say that it's a good starting point as far as the vision 2024 this came together in 2019 but it was the vision for where we would be this year there's a lot of really great elements in here I'm not going to read every part of it but all of these elements are research based I don't know the extent I can't really tell the extent to which this specific vision is is really widely embraced we're going to be serving community members to try to learn a little bit more uh about their perspective and um and and and so we're going to get a sense as to how much how much these things resonate with them but the reality is that uh that this is all good but I think it's up and qu up for question as to how much how how much this particularly sits in the hearts of uh of our community members I know many of our staff members it's important enough sorry can I just make one comment on the slide um I've recently seen some research that talks about replacing empathy with compassion so we may want to look into that that's a subtle Nuance I appreciate that yeah that'd be great okay so I'm not going to get into this right now but suffice to say that this would be something we'd want to look at in our strategic planning exercise but right now this is our vision and I will say this Vision if you see the H's all around the picture I don't if you can see those here here here and here and you have it up here the habits of learning this is a really cool principle that I think is very important I think this is very uh again I'm just I can't um I don't know about specific research around the concept quote habits of learning but uh as the district has taken it to has taken to understand it I attend we did some training around this and figuring out you know what exactly are those habits of learning that make students successful and I know that's been well researched espe especially with respect to gifted giftedness and and what academic behaviors are associated with success um and that's really what this is about so regardless of this specific term this is really about applying what we know about what makes students successful to developing a vision for students which I think is is really important because it's the behavioral dispositional elements of being successful that it emphasizes so what I decided to do was uh I had the different we we've broken up um our administrative team we've asked them to choose what committees they want to be on for the district goals so we've had District goal committees they've been having their own meetings um they've been really passionate about their work they've made some really great progress they put to I asked them to put together slides for me they did they did a nice job uh but I realized that they were just kind of by the time I put them all together it was sort of like the saying used to say Death by PowerPoint there's way too much just just slides with content all over them so I was seeking for some sort of a system systematic way to kind of give a sense of progress uh I've been a big fan of Gant charts over my day and so typically what I've used in the past with with my prior boards is a Gant chart system to kind of give them a sense as to how we're progressing so I've sort of adapted that here with the color coding it's not exactly a Gant chart but that's the that's the concept so um we're basically having our activity I created a status system current actions then pending actions and you can see the key here so we're labeling activities either established again nothing's ever really truly completed so I prefer to say established because that means that it's subject to continuous Improvement in process initialized which means that it's it's their initial steps are being taken but we haven't been able to dive fully in not yet begun is frankly we just haven't really done anything and tabled means it's placed on hold and I'm pleased to say that when I went through this system I didn't find anything that really qualified as not yet beginning or being tabled um although frankly uh in every in most other circumstances when there's ambitious goals put in place always something ends up becoming obsolete so I guess I I guess that's a good thing that we we did well when we set these goals so District goal one has to do with his strategic plan I'm not going to make you read all that but I put the language there from our website what I did was I broke down this language into a series of activities here that are that are enumerated within those goal statements so for this one it's timeline for a new strategic plan identifying a consultant to develop a new plan developing a state of the schools address incorporating certain priorities into the Strategic plan you can see here there's all these priorities they are I to they're they're one two three four and five so I just kind of Limp them together for the sake of conversation in this line right here and then use the website and social media to educate families so for timeline for strategic plan we are in process uh the the committee did a great job of inventorying some of the successful outcomes of the prior Five-Year Plan um there's more work to do there so I'm not reporting on those outcomes here and now but they have made good progress there um same thing with the next one identifying a consultant uh they've they've uh looked into four perspective firms actually interviewed them and obtained quotes and gave like a little analysis of each one so that the board has a starting point if we decide to move forward with the consultant however these two are definitely appli we have budget considerations so the next pending action we really have to see where we strike with the budget to see what kind of funds we have uh to invoke a consultant to do this work or if we have to decide to do it ourselves oops sorry about that everybody I just lost y'all state of the schools address we talk about this all the time our surveys have been developed um our initial data analysis has been reported already regarding njsla and college admissions presentations at our board meetings so some of that data has already been Mo moving forward forward but we're going to be Distributing surveys collecting that data doing a lot of analysis of that data as well as further achievement analysis and we're still waiting on the njsla compar comparability data to be released which usually comes out right around this time of year and we'll be able to provide uh that that with that we'll be able to do much more with the njsla data in the meantime we'll use other types of data um and we still have uh some college admissions investigations that we're engaging in we'll be reporting out on uh with respect to uh incor incorporating priorities in our strategic plan until we actually begin the formal strategic planning process we can't really incorporate them so I'm calling this initialized but we've done some initial generative AI training for professionals throughout the district dist that was very odd so we've done some initial initial generative AI training uh for uh throughout the district I know many members of the administrative team are using it uh through our Google account we have access to Bard which I think just changed his name to Gemini is that right yeah so so uh so our our faculty have access to generative AI models I personally have become a rather obsessive user to try to figure out like what it's what its strengths and weaknesses are um it's a it is it's it's interesting I find it it's kind of incredible how powerful it is I'm also finding it pretty incredible just still how limited it is but nevertheless it's something we want to be on the front end of and figure out how we're going to appropriately uh Empower our kids to be successful to leverage it as well College admissions again we've already we started cracking into that um there's some different there's a variety of mental health efforts but we need some sort of a unifying Vision around that and then uh program Innovation is something that uh is called for that we are seeing a tremendous amount of in the district but we really need formal timelines uh before we can embed these into a new plan and part of what we called for was a profile of a graduate in which we would basically say what really a pro what profile really either a couple different types of graduates or really all graduates should be able to experience and then we kind of work backwards by Design to ensure that every kid and every every young person who graduates our schools uh will have some minimum standards and then uh some obviously some much higher than minimum St minimum uh attributes as far as the website I felt that um um um uh because of all the work that we've been able to do with respect to community engagement in the website a lot of that has to do with Miss corus Miss corus you're getting a lot of shout outs I don't want to hope that you're not want want want Miss CR not to be too overconfident she's doing great work uh but she's uh she's getting called out here in a lot of positive ways um she's really cleaned up our website significantly uh brought us into a lot of ADA compliance but also really made it much more easy to access uh she's secured our social media accounts across multiple platforms and has helped to secure all the school accounts and the principal accounts as well um we've done a lot of par parent engagement sessions although they haven't necessarily been coordinated into a unified uh kind of system and the superintendent coffee recording um are are made available to everybody so we I think we're really established that we're doing this well I think by most other District standards we're in good shape here but we obviously are going to be uh subject to continuous Improvement uh our website's going to improve even more as we transition to a new website communication is going to be much more efficient through that website um but that is a heavy lift that miss corus is guiding us through uh there was a call for frequently Asked question Pages uh we have some of those from prior years but we've not gotten to a place where we can we've we've meaningfully been producing them consistently and uh and obviously want to have an integrated system of family education before I go on to the next goal is anyone have any comments or questions about this goal from the board I actually I just had a um a question about um identifying a consultant what qualities or what characteristics you know did you survey the staff to determine what you were looking for in a consultant before uh they determined the you know the for perspectives like yeah it's a great question so so for now we we what they did to get started was they pulled in uh The Firm that we used last time and then a variety of well-known competitors for that firm and again it was really just a preliminary preliminary analysis so we would want to do something a little bit more comprehensive um as a as a board when we if we decide to go in that direction um but it was very helpful to hear the different perspectives I mean and the prices range just to give you an idea they range from like $4,000 to $60,000 but they offer a a very different range of services so for some for some districts it's very you know for some Services it's extremely comprehensive others it's a much lighter touch so we would have to figure out on our side before we knew how to decide which was best we'd have to do some work on our side about really what we're looking for from them yeah and we have a lot of internal capacity too so we don't necessarily have to go with something that's too full full service um the only comment I have is um for inventory of what happened in last five years whether we implemented the plan or not um I don't know if it makes sense to spend money on that it can be done probably by surveys internally to our staff and administrators and uh that should give us you're saying what the outcomes were the last one yes for the outcomes for last five years yeah if that information can be gathered by surveys and internal polling yes in of hiding somebody from outside from that so we actually we actually already have a have that list so I'm going to I'm vetting that list right now and then that would be in our next board cycle with committees we'll be reporting that out to all of you so you can see that right but it say that also says budget consideration so oh I gotcha I understand um yeah so I guess the next action would be to actually share that and with board member review so that you can all give us feedback regarding those things as well yeah and um I just wondered if you you know if we because we have been on a a cycle we were on three years I think five years is a better cycle when we're doing a strategic plan things are changing um tremendously and I think Ai and and and internships and preparing College preparing our our students to look at opportunities in careers makes a lot of sense with college being the expense it is do you have a a timeline in mind now um if we were if we were to go with uh strategic planning are you thinking late spring or early fall or so thank you for that question that that's where it comes down to budget um we're in we're going to talk about some of our budget processes in the last goal um but we're not in a place where we can necessarily project exactly where we're going to land this year financially so I'm not comfortable yet just just yet recommending that we would embark on that in the in this fall to Mr Donnie's Point there's still a lot of work that we can do and I'm sorry if I do realize this a little misleading it sounds like we're done we're not there's a lot of work that we can do in in concluding where we've what we've accomplished in the past um and we can also set forth an ideal timeline in the new year uh with a strategic plan and whether we have a consultant or not I mean there is a lot of capacity that we have in here and there's a benefit to having the team do it in fact the consultant would really just be guiding their work I've been guiding it's funny I've never actually gotten to a place in any of my districts where I've actually gotten to the development of a quote strategic plan because uh we always had such momentum and so many things getting done that it didn't seem to make sense to pause and actually do a plan but that said in my experience then the the activities that are happening then become very leader developed or leader dependent right so so I had up feel feeling a lot like I was carrying a lot of load myself or my team was carrying a lot of the load um and owning a lot of it whereas the consultant can really help to organize the community as well and really get that buying and I think the power of the plan that was done in 2019 is was that you did get a pretty good amount of buyin and especially Among The Faculty I have to say the the outcomes that we have the the educational outcomes that that we have right now um it's pretty remarkable what work continued despite the pandemic despite the leadership changes governance changes um people kept soldiering on because they had a Clear Vision of what they were trying to accomplish and I would say the beauty of a strategic plan is that it does give the ability it gives some staying power to to the to to to the intentions that are set so so I so I think that we can map out a lot of that without necessarily having the firm on and honestly the more that we do without the firm theoretically the less we have to pay them too so I'm sorry before I go to the next go the next one M Murphy or Mr Freeman did you want to share anything sure because I've been sitting in on some of the meetings of of that committee and I just wanted to clarify because it's true up there we have um you know the prior plan for Budget consideration it's not really for Budget consideration I think it's just it's more for consideration so when we move forward with the next five years there were it wasn't concerned from the committee but it was um wanted to make sure that that work is part of the next five years so because we're not you're not starting from scratch even if the goals are different there might be some overlap some Synergy so that that's really what it was referenced it seems to me when we've done the uh strategic plans before we start with a sort of a state of the schools what we've accomplished where we are and then it's really visioning what we want to accomplish in terms of What's um what's changed since you know five years ago to now and I'm to me that's a very powerful process because we are lifelong Learners then and we are demonstrating that as we move forward so just what I've experienced in the past thank you yeah that's consistent that's consistent with with with with what I've come to believe all right so our next goal uh was actually led by Miss Murphy and it was on inclusivity so this is sort of where our folks who are interested and concerned about diversity equity and inclusion uh would have their their their interest represented um but I we chose to use the phrase inclusivity uh frankly because I know that sometimes Dei means different things to different people and really here most importantly for us we want to have an very inclusive School culture for the sake of being inclusive of all making making people from all different kinds of identities and genders and backgrounds and racial and ethnic and uh and even neurological backgrounds that they would all feel included here um we want make make sure that people that our students as they come in that they all have uh Equitable access to the curriculum and experiences and uh and are successful and so um we developed some language here around that specifically and basically what it worked out to was we were concerned about uh studying proportionality among students to ensure that regardless of background students have equal access to Opportunities and the curriculum proportionality around employees so that way we have a diverse student body so that our students can learn from people with various backgrounds and identities um because it's part of a liberal arts education is learning from many different types of folks uh we have an there was a recommendation for an employee advisory committee to kind of help uh by committee uh navigate the difficult world of trying to hire to improve diversity while also not violating uh basic uh hiring practices so that's a bit of a challenge but that's something that we called for here we also know that our schools as a function of um prior work have Dei committees but there seemed initially like there was possibly some inconsistencies between the way that they operated so we wanted to review those and then of course um there was a call for ensuring I just wrote District Dei training but really it's about ensuring that our uh our our faculty members and our administrators and our support staff as well um all understand what it means to create an inclusive environment and how they what that looks like in action so uh I I wrote some notes Here uh which I'll go over Miss Murphy would you like me to just go over what I wrote here what what how I translated your notes here or do you want to go over it yourself all right and again to be clear I part of the way that I've processed things as i' like put them into tables and things like that so so I took the notes and then and then I I put these tables together myself but we did go over this today and we're in agreement on on on on the uh the core of it so as far as proportion is concerned you the district should be very proud of its technology department um you have for the size of the district you have an absolute topnotch technology department particularly uh in Our IT director sahim morun and I'm sorry I don't remember George's specific title database manager data Wiz yeah Super Genius uh was it yeah more or less yeah right so uh the two of them are uh just really I mean everybody in the Department's great but the two of them especially are really passionate about using data um which is great because I am like that too and I don't get to talk to very many people about it because I their eyes glaze over very quickly but um in some of my first conversations with them uh we really really got excited talking about some of the the things that I wanted to accomplish because they have basically had the same vision and they've already done most of the work so they we have effectively right now two Data Warehouse Systems um one is a very uh uh administrator and teacher friendly well more administrator and teacher friendly version called linkit which is a commercial product that originated in New Jersey and it's basically a place where we can put student achievement data and we can we can uh do really it takes some training but we can do some really cool robust data analysis including U basically at the push of a button that stable cohort analysis that I showed you all on njs laa where we track just only the students who've been with us for both testing periods um so that's really great for being able to monitor student achievement being able to see how our schools are actually performing being able to see leading indicators of student progress because it also includes benchmarks of student student progress but Seri and Georgia have already put together a large database on something called metabase which is which is I believe an open source platform that basically uh and through and I know that there's some mixed reviews about Skyward because I think some people don't like some of some of the lack of functionality I've never met a student information system that everybody loved but um Skyward particularly uh is uh complies with um with the data format and I'm I'm I'm I'm blanking on what it's called right now um I don't think it's one roster but it's another one like that basically it's a it's a it's a um it's a data coding format that is universal which means that you can basically we can take all of our any parts of our student information data and upload it into this system and then we can create all kinds of custom reports so something that they had already had established was a chronic absenteeism automated email report which basically sends the schools um a a report of any students who are chronically absent which is over 10% absenteeism and they get the names of the students and they also get a chart of all the other schools so they can see what the chronic absenteeism at their school and how it compares to other schools and that's really powerful because research shows surprise surprise that kids have like need to be in school if they miss school their learning suffers so that's a a very simple way of trying to make sure that our students can achieve more is keeping them in school so that was a that was a quick automation there are uh countless others that we can do and because it's open source it it's effectively it's not limited by a specific user interface and they're very Savvy with this so we are in an excellent place uh to develop not only uh static reports which we'll show in the state of the schools address but also to do some dashboarding which I which is pretty Universal in most other Industries um but not Ty commonly used in education but nevertheless very powerful so imagine you know we tend to look at our lagging indicators our our Summit of indicators when we show our presentations up here like njsla scores and graduation rates that's the end of the road but along the way if we can use all the data that's in our student information system to provide real-time visualized analytics then we can help our help our principles to get that regular feedback and draw their attention help them Focus their attention because they're so distracted because that's just the life of a principal on just a real-time update plus a lot of them want that but it's so labor intensive to create it we can automate it so we're in a great place for that and I just digressed into Data functionality but that functionality um will is is going to really help us with our all of our proportionality studies as far as the employee advisory committee um basically our goal committee right now is serving in that capacity but Mrs Murphy has some steps in place so I'll let her talk about that um we I'll also let her talk about the the where we are with our Dei committees and de training so if at this point you want us just to share with us Mrs Murphy um so since I started in the district um and came to Ridgewood last September the conversations around equity and inclusivity have been at the Forefront of many of the conversations I've engage with I've engaged with with the administrative team with staff with Community um stakeholders and it's definitely at the at the center of most of our conversations or underlying most of the conversations that have in the district regardless of the the over uh Ling topic um and it's it's very uh important to everybody here that we are looking at uh issues of inclusivity and equity in all that we do uh part of the work of the committee has really begun with some very deep conversations about where our values are as a district and where we've come from over the last um more than five years and I'm I'm grateful that on on the committee we really have a repres representation of Administrators that have been here for like 5 minutes like myself um or people that have been here for you know 20 years and have really been able to share some of what they saw um and so that's helping to shape the conversation and where we go with next steps uh the committee definitely agrees that um looking at process looking at um what we're doing and hiring and and how we're attracting staff is critical peace and our conversations um are starting to evolve we also have some volunteers that would like to also join that that committee and um there have been Community stakeholders that have been referred to me and as we start to expand we'll start to have those conversations more broadly and next steps oh you know toward as we formalize some of the the plans we're taking with the committee as we move forward that piece of the committee as we move forward um in addition we have had the opportunity to have some um very meaningful conversations with um possible Partners um and the committee has really um connected with one or two two of them in the fact that the vision of those Partners really meets um the vision and values of the committee and so we have we're now in the process of of um reviewing proposals that we have have seen and then we'll be sharing those out um but the work is really progressing and um as far as where we go with next steps we're looking at the data that's coming in and also looking at really uh an equity audit um which is stated higher up in the go in the uh goal um as a way to figure out where we go next um so it's a great conversation um and there's very good work that has been done and we're really ready um to start to build upon that work and and and go to next steps um for the district in the coming years thank you Mrs Murphy and I'll just uh just again just to be clear that um a lot of this comes down to being concrete so we want to be concrete about ideal processes ideal training um and uh well at the same time some of the uh some of the providers of like Dei Audits and plans can be quite exorbitant with their pricing so we recognize also that we have a lot of great resources in the community so some of these un University Partnerships provide a nice uh a little bit more of an affordable um and good fit potential opportunity that we'll look at there as well just um add what I'm kind of thinking is a summary of what you just said so that I make sure I understand it which is because you talked about a lot of the good work that you've been doing with regard to the Community Values and so as I understand what you've said is you're in this great place where a lot of that has been identified and embraced and now you're in the process of creating the processes for not only the advisory committee um but even I would say it would probably uh come down to the Dei committees in each School potentially and um in how that would also Infuse Dei training is that fair does that make sense I said yeah I think that makes sense and I think you know part of what has happened is that again there have been great committees established and now we're trying to get a centralized process in place so that we're all on the same page and we're working towards the same goals and all close from the same deep conversation yes thank um thank you uh Miss Murphy and thanks Dr schwaz for uh a lot of details around this um the only comment I have is um on your comment about there are some volunteers who have expressed interest in community members and if we are including volunteers or community members on um employee advisory committee or hiring committees or any of that um I think we should have a even for that we should have a process in place on how volunteers or community members end up on interview panels or um any of the Committees that should not be based on who's coming here and speaking or reaching out or expressing interest it should be based on a process so and also to be clear this is this advisory committee is not to sit on interviews it's not to be part of that process and I think um so there have been people that have reached out there so we have not invited anyone in from the community at this point we're open to anyone that may reach out that has an area of expertise and will include Community stakeholders as appropriately um and I agree with you we're not just going to invite the whole world in but it'll be through the correct process inil right oh so that that's what I'm saying that any committee that influences the administration um if we have volunteers on that that should be based on some process not based on I agree I'm reaching out to you great any other comments on goal two all right so goal three focuses on our Ela and math programs we've been talking about Ela and math for quite some time and of course the States state assessments Focus heavily on Ela and math as well so cutting to the chase our goals called for the following uh Data Systems which I've already started talking about scope and sequence of our courses resource evaluation professional Learning Systems of identification I'll explain what that means in a minute and then habits of work so as I said before our data systems are pretty robust uh and I this is where I mentioned the chronic absentee reports um we are uh we're going to be generating simultaneous to generating the actual uh visual data visualizations for our state of the schools address we'll also be establishing functionality to run those kinds of VIs visualizations ations automatically as well um as we also look at the benchmarking data that we have we'll determine needs for additional benchmarking which show this more down here and then of course our dashboarding needs as well so this is this is really well up and running and now we're now we're just implementing scope and sequence refers to you know what the what the um what each course covers in the sequence and the Order of courses so that's gerain to each specific area uh subject area we've identified already this is in process we've identified that the elementary middle transition and the high school middle school high school transition um we see a drop off in scores so we're studying that uh we also uh are currently evaluating our secondary math sequence some of you might know that we have a rather unorthodox um sequence with respect to math and I say say unorthodox by New Jersey standards um there's nothing fundamentally wrong with it except that it does not align well to the New Jersey standards and because of that it creates some other unintended consequences so if we continue with that program we should be very we should be very mindful to ensure that it's actually impacting kids positively uh given the trade-offs and then we also are engaging in a k k to5 Ela program evaluation prop pending actions we're going to facilitate grade five and six and grade 8 to9 articulation meetings uh we're going to affirm or modify our math sequence and we're going to continue to align our curriculum uh vertically under resource evaluation we are engaging in uh being very intentional about ensuring that we have resources and a curriculum that explicitly aligns to the science of reading um we have our data right now show that our students are doing very well in language arts uh and and although we don't have we don't have robust data sets that we're looking at right now for our youngest Learners um again our language arts data generally is very strong and our growth data is very strong um it would appear as of right now we're testing this hypothesis it would appear that um our district has not been a lock step District uh with respect to the um the teachers College model U but rather they've been really taking the parts of it that are helpful and good um and then leaving the parts that are bad that said as I started this whole presentation about consistency making sure that we have quality control across the board um it's pretty clear that we have some we have widespread excellence in this area but it would also appear that there are some areas where we can be more consistent and I can't assert to you right now necessarily that um that that that everyone is fully understanding all the science all of the science-based practices fully and I can assert to you that there aren't possibly some remnants of some practice that that isn't great in some Pockets uh but the data would not seem to indicate that we have a major systemic issue except for the fact that we don't have a systemic quality control system so that's where I said that we're going to I'll talk about that more when I get into systems of identification prepending actions um obviously continuing to evaluate programs across all subjects that should be an ongoing process I think we have it as an ongoing process here program evaluation is crit it's like the scientific method we do something we study it we find areas of improvement we hypothesize why we're not doing as well we try something else um and we monitor we use other research to inform what we do but we also just continually study like action research what we're actually doing and um I'll get into that more in system systematizing under professional learning uh we do have a strong culture professional learning here I want to thank the board for supporting uh allocating funds towards having really highquality speakers come and speak with our students and our faculty members uh we're doing a a book read with Natalie Wexler who is the author of the knowledge gap which emphasizes some of the the importance of content knowledge uh for closing the the achievement Gap among different groups of students um those of you who might uh be interested in studying the njsla and other standardized assessment probably know that much of the difference in standardized test score performance between communities has to do with the access of students to different life experiences and the content knowledge that they can have because of the backgrounds that they have so it's really critically important that if we're going to provide equity for students that we have to provide them with Rich and robust cont uh contextual and content based understandings so that way when they're learning their discret skills they have a place to actually apply them and understand where they're relevant and uh and also that they can in when given a when presented with a problem that requires some context or content knowledge that they would have the ability to understand what the question is asking so they can show their skills so um so she's going to help us with that uh we also have for example Molly NES actually I believe is on the agenda here tonight am I get am I mixing my agendas up um uh who will be providing professional development this September I think there was a question about about that earlier um for uh um research-based read alloud practices to help model uh reading for students and so um we're also surveying our faculty to get a sensus to what kind of supports they need as well and then we'll be collecting that data in the coming month and uh we're also going to be engaging we also recognize that we have a lot of really great professional development activities but they're not necessarily unified or planned in a unified way um so by calendaring our professional development a little more thoughtfully we might be able to get a little more out of that PD um and also be able to have a little bit more of a thorough um implementation as well but there is no shortage of good PD in the district that's then that's a that's a good thing so it's really again about centralized coordinated imp planning coordinated planning um and then data collecting on how we could do better in fact actually professional learning maybe I was being a little stingy maybe that probably deserved to be uh set as established but um considering the fact that we um just don't quite aren't aren't quite uh where we want to be with that um integrated calendaring and planning unified planning uh that's why I left it in process systems of identification I said is initialized um for those of you who are kind of who follow Trends in education and best practices in research and education you're probably familiar with the concept of the terms RTI or response to intervention or a multi-tiered systems of support New Jersey has its own version the New Jersey tiered systems of support and despite these acronym kind of things the reality is that they what they all talk about is basically systems and it's a systems-based approach to and I just said systems of identification because that's the first phase that we really want to be focused on but it's systems of identifying students who are not hit who are not meeting grade level standards especially but also who maybe maybe are are are not able to for whatever reason uh succeed or Thrive under an appropriate appropriate education for their age and so we have something called inrs teams at the school they that refers to intervention and referral services inrs teams have been required of school districts by code for decades so that's nothing new but they can be just procedural or they can be really meaningful and um we have uh there's some stratification to the Fidelity of the practice of IRS teams in the district but there is a lot of really great models uh and and frankly they're doing a lot more than a typical inrs team does uh for those of you who have not familiar with inrs and what it's like to be a principal and do inrs the natural course of doing of of of being responsible for an intervention Referral Services team is you start to be realize that you can't handle every issue that students experience on a one-off base basis so what ends up happening is you end up creating systems even just as natural product of inrs whereby you're engaging in benchmarking Universal screenings and you're coming up with a variety of uh templated interventions that fit certain profiles that students might need and that's really and you kind of back your way into a system of identification or a system of support so we're in a place where we have a lot of a lot of emerging systems but they're not organized from a centralized perspective so we've started using benchmarking benchmarking and linkage uh so a few years back that was implemented and that's a really great start because it gives us leading indicators as to how students are progressing also helps us to create a data picture on how they're progressing particularly in language arts and math we had it only through Elementary two to five but now we have it in grades but we just expanded it to the middle school as well so it's going to take us a little bit to get uh generate some some good data to keep showing that but that's going to help us to have a more complete picture as to how our students are doing within our programs we can also do benchmarking with other school districts in that program in a way that an additional data point an additional analysis point to the nsla um I have a intervention system audit that I developed uh in my prior District um I had started using these types of systems several districts ago ESP when I was a principal and it's how we really had some really fantastic student growth achievement so uh I adapted a model in my prior district and I have that and I think actually that's something that we don't necessarily need to uh to pay a professional for um so we'll engage in that uh in the coming spring and certainly setting up for next year that's an ongoing process um but one of the things that I know Mr uh Freedman is working on with the with his team is looking at uh expanding some Universal screenings that's something we have to plan now because there is a financial component to that so uh we'd like to see that that work expanded going into next year so we can start with an even better picture of how our students are doing I alluded to the habits of work before as a function of the vision 2024 we have defined the habits of work initial training has been provided as well and this certainly has Merit and should be should be involved in full scare training for staff and widescale implementation Mr Freedman how did I do do you have anything you want to elaborate on for me I always like to talk so there's always one or two things in my head actually tying it all together the way because you mentioned earlier you know looking at the centralized systems Mr Donnie and I have had these conversations I think have been pretty fruitful kind of talking somewhat in the same way and how I term it is I think it's it's Equity of experience so as we look at all of these different things that we're um that we're focusing in on the idea is to make sure that it doesn't matter what school you go to what grade you're in um what street you live on um anything if you've lived in Richwood for five minutes if you've lived in Richwood you're a 12th generation uh you know Ridge woodi and to make sure that when you go through everything that we have to help students move forward we're making sure that that's in place wherever you are so a lot of the magic um of Ridgewood I think is it's almost the art of Education like it's the art of the the experience it's a very unique place there's a lot of incredibly special things going on here here um and our our goal and role is to keep that magic and keep that art but Sy systemize it a little more from a from a centralized um standpoint so as I'm listening to you and I've seen this before it's not the first time I've seen it um I just wanted to share what was in my head thinking about it and even when um M Murphy was talking about you know hiring and and Dei and the initiatives and I've been sitting on those meetings and I think that's really the over overarching theme to make sure you know that as we identify everything we have is with each experience that we have so we can move kids as far ahead um as we can I hope that made sense that made a lot sense thank you for that Mr fre I really appreciate that you know I tend to tend to reduce things sometimes to to very simple Concepts so using the term quality control but that really humanizes it well the way you described it really is about Equity of experience and it is true talking to parents now that we've had a chance to speak with many different parents in the community it's very clear that we don't necessarily have that Equity of experience I would say the majority of people feel very well served by our schools and that their students really thrive in our schools but there are undoubtedly many community members who are concerned based on their own experiences and based on the experience of others and that's the nature of human institutions it's and that's where our job as leaders and administrators and as as as Governors here um it's our job to ensure that we have the systems in place so that way we can have that consistency of experience thank you you want to go first okay um so thank you Dr Schwarz and Rich for uh the details I just have couple of comments on this one um the since I sit on the curriculum committee I know a lot of work has gone into math and Ela um so I'm um I'm appreciative of all of the the work that has gone into this um on the ELA um soark you mentioned that the data does not show that we are doing anything wrong or the data is good right right that something along that line Edge more and say it's generally positive generally positive right so so when we when we say that the data is generally positive and at the same time we are also saying that we have identified areas of improvement where we have identified uh field experts uh um Natalie Wexler and Mary West and we are working towards um the changes that slightly contradicts because if we are saying that our data is generally positive but we are making change what's the driver for the change so is the data driver for the change uh public comment or is have we identify a driver for the change number one right and that why why are we embarking on this change and then if our current data is good then how will we go back and evaluate whether our change changes worked or not so maybe the data that we are looking at today is biased towards the Reading Writing uh model because we don't have to be defensive about our practices here because it's Ridgewood is not unique in what we are doing it's a almost Nationwide problem a lot of schools have implemented the columia model or the Reading wrer Writing Workshop readers and Writers Workshop model so maybe the assessment that were done were based on what was being taught with those models so if we are trying to evaluate where we are today and establish a baseline maybe we need to talk to natal waxler and Molly Nest that how do we identify whether we have a gap today or not and what data should we be using what type of testing should we be doing today to identify our Baseline before we are embarking on these changes so two years down the road we can compare whether it worked or not because if we are looking at njsla data and if we are saying that data is generally positive then how will we know that the changes work that's something I think is missing so I did you want to you want to finish and then I'll go back and answer you're I'm gonna answer that if that's okay it's a great question so the the the best way the best way to describe where we are is that we're in process all right so this is quite an investigative process that the state of the schools address and that's going to be one of my big takeaways is the state of the schools address is a major Milestone this is a status update when I say generally positive that's a relative term there is public education is generally inefficient I should say inefficient it's very efficient but it's not um it's very uh it's inconsistent so any Community you look in you look at proficiency rates um I I have seen very few schools that that really consistently um have systems in place to ensure that every student who is struggling has the proper supports and that every single teacher teaches with the same level of fidelity it's just not very common and it's true across business too it's the same thing not everybody performs you can't you can't have a group of humans and have them all perform at the same level so we have diversity among the effectiveness of our teachers generally speaking I can't find any evidence that we have any areas where our students are failing to learn or that are where we are engaging in practices that are robbing students of the ability to learn the and I'm and I'm saying this generally speaking with respect to and I know that every many many here listen to the sold the story podcast which highlighted some districts particularly in areas that where administrators mandated a very lock step approach to a specific prescription that was put forth at one time by the by the teachers college and Lucy Caulkins uh right re workshop model I can't say right now the extent to which parent interventions with tutoring is the reason why everything is generally positive but I can tell you that in some that when we look across teachers in classrooms and we look across schools there are certain spots where we have very very really excellent and consistent results and spots where we have less than consistent results results but again I don't have any indication right now that we that that there's something fundamentally wrong with the district's program per se or fundamentally flawed with like the resources because teachers here are given a considerable amount of latitude with respect to being able to respond to their students and our principles expect that as well we also do a strong amount of data collection too for each child and again we can do better but a strong amount so where we're at with respect to providing professional development we're not fixing a problem the only problem that we're fixing is a lack of explicitness about what our values are about reading and about learning we want to resolve that we want to resolve it first and foremost at the practice level because the reality is that whatever we put on we can put whatever we want on paper what the teachers actually do is what matters so if they understand the science of reading that's an overuse term here but if they understand what what's what actually explains how kids learn how to read they understand the best practices for getting kids to learn how to read we have veteran and experienced teachers largely they they understand what the kids need what we're trying to do is make it more uniform that understanding and we're trying to give them access to some of the best Minds in education so this is for me not a we're not fixing a problem where this is part of that continuous improvement process so thank you um I I would still say that if we are spending money on Professional Services with with the uh industry experts these are very highly sought out sought out experts right we we should have an expectation that maybe they will be able to answer us that okay what changed after how do we evaluate or how do we determine that something changed after we implemented these processes or policies that you're recommending that we are not just going and making changes based on a podcast right so what's the driver and what will be the outcome well so so the driver is that we do we do lack an explicit there's been a lot of muddying of the water and I think that we are subject to that like any place is we we have been a Teachers College District there are there are some practices within Teachers College approach that that are perfectly fine if not really good um collabora Collaborative Learning with kids is really good flexib ability grouping can be very helpful at times um the differentiation and student choice that can go in with a lot of it is and some of the holistic elements are are can be very beneficial for students and the district appears it appears as though we have numerous elements in place to ensure that some of the glaring um omissions of the program such as grammar and decoding have been addressed and some of that training has already been happening the problem is that that there has been that it's it's reasonable to assume that given the given the fact that we've been a Teachers College District and given the fact that there has there is a a new respect for some of the things that good instructors of reading have always known about the importance of grammar and decoding that we now need we need to be explicit and make sure that that's fully truly understood um when you're in education we go through fads and Trends and certain things become the in thing to say and be a part of and then there's the things that are the out things to say and be a part of and I will say I was definitely I came up in education when the whole language instruction thing was really popular and it was believed that kids just read because they read and and it's true that when kids read especially if they're reading books that they're really interested in they will acquire it to some extent but kids also need instruction in the systems and the science of what reading is we're coming out of an era where across the board in education there's still a lot of thinking in terms of this holistic model because it's what everybody was really trained in and grammar especially has been demonized and stigmatized significantly so bringing in experts in this field is not about we haven't found something inherently wrong it's it's based largely on a hypothesis I'll admit that I'm hypothesizing and it's and that's that's informed also by our conversations with the principles that that to make to really provide the training in in the reason in the practice but also the reasons why these practices are important so read aloud for example like being able to model reading for students and having Exemplar texts and having a student have an adult who obviously knows how to read well be able to pause at the appropriate time and read with teach and read with cadence and pause and engage in thoughtful reflection on the text these are really great practices for kids so there is a lot there is some inference here but I don't want to wait until we create a perfect data picture when the general consensus is our teachers would benefit by this explicit support was was that helpful yes definitely and um and the last point on that was that when we are um at these board meetings when we uh pass resolutions to hir experts or um purchase a a specific program or do pilots or bring in experts for specific skill development then if we can do some sort of follow timely follow up that okay what was the result of that um and what is the next expectation and timeline because when we when we present these things there is expectation and the residents want to know what happened after after that right so we have to do a followup and summarize uh the results of that and the next steps great we can certainly do that I agree I think that's important especially if we're going to be investing in such a really notable folks thank you Mr Freeman did you want to add anything to that no I think that's a fair expectation yeah and I think we're all excited to kind of be walking down this path um and to have a reporting system so people know what we're doing and and what's happening and what our timelines are no I think that's uh a worthwhile comment and I just uh from all of this I I just want to give a big shout out to Dr Matthews and our M supervisor Miss and um because I've sat in those curriculum meetings and they have done a lot of work uh it's it's it's a lot of effort a lot of uh work uh with Mr fredman to get to where we are today so a big shout out to the three of you can I well I'm gonna comment quickly on that one thank you very much and I also think that um you know Dr Matthews and uh and Miss onmo like we're going to have them here and in forums so that they can share some of the information that you've you've heard um and that I've heard because I think they're the best voices because they're the ones that are owning it they're the ones that um the passion is in their heart and they certainly have the intellect to move this forward um and are creating incredible buyin so thank you for those comments and I just wanted to follow up with that sentiment fine um I just have kind of following up on what SAR Rob just said so you know again I'm trying to simplify the overarching theme so that I can understand it and you know I'm I'm getting you know the clear picture that a lot of this work is is you know identifying our values identifying the explicit practices and then making sure that they're kind of standardized and um uniformly uh as as much as possible throughout the district so would I you know we've heard a lot from particularly some of the members of the special ed Community about um certain uh like Orton Gillingham and things not being always executed with Fidelity I'm asking would a lot of this work would that go to address those concerns maybe not each and every one of them but would this be designed also to address those types of concerns that um processes we have in place to help kids with different learning differences um that that would they would be better served if there was more explicit instruction to the teachers on that said if I'm hearing you correctly you're identifying the fact that we've heard from some community members who have been concerned about the Fidelity of the implementation of some of these programs or at least the lack of consistency the perceived lack of consistency in some of the some of these intervention programs yeah and and would this with this specific training address that so I would describe this specific training more as like um I it's a little cheesy but I like to think of like like uh schools as like Gardens right so there are things that we do to generally fertilize the garden right it needs water needs sunlight it needs fertilization right so like the bringing in experts who are leaders in the field who are very science-based like that's like fertilizing the whole garden at the same time but when we talk about areas where we maybe have something that's not working that doesn't mean we're not going to have targeted interventions and targeted attention so like let's say for example we have a certain initiative that's meant to provide a certain service but there are certain parts that that that are not going well that would be more of a targeted approach and that's really where we're going to dig into the data so as we go into the state of the schools address and that is where we're going to focus on like where are these specific targeted areas we can improve so the focus on science of reading is more of a general everyone make sure that everyone really understands the important particularly of of of background of content and background knowledge but the specific oron Gilling him training that's a more Niche thing that's more specific some schools have made that Universal um in fact I'm really blessed to be in a district with my kids where they uh someone made a decision a long time ago that every single elementary teacher would become eventually Orton Gillingham trained which is a wonderful expensive time commitment uh but but a really worthy goal so if we were decide to go in that kind of direction that would be taking something that right now is more on a small scale and turning that into as I said like a general like fertilization interv intervention um but I I think that it's important that we do acknowledge that that's a that kind of fits what I was saying before about some of the like that quality control and ensuring Equity of experience exactly where I was going with that exactly so okay that that's helpful my um other questions were very very basic but up on the very top you talk about articulation meetings so for the um people who don't know what that means can you tell us what an articulation meeting is of course of course so um sorry I'm being very edgy speaky here so when we talk about vertical and horizontal articulation what we mean is that we're trying to articulate or be clear about what our curriculum or curricular goals are and our expected outcomes are across different grades and across different subjects so grades would be vertical articulation subjects would be horizontal articulation so across different subjects right so within a grade like let's say in fourth grade maybe we'd have an articulation meeting across all of our schools where all of our fourth grade teachers come together they talk about about what they do that' be horizontal um but if we were going to focus on making sure our kindergarteners through our through our fifth graders were working together to make sure that our scope and sequence that would be vertical we we we see a fallof for some reason in student performances in sixth grade so something happens between their fifth grade performance and their sixth grade performance where their proficiency goes down it's not everybody but in aggregate we feel it so we'd like to bring our teachers together in sixth grade and in fifth grade to vertically articulate that Gap so we can figure out what's going on maybe it's a change in expectations maybe it's a change in grading structure maybe it's a maybe there's a fall off of Just support you know maybe they have more structure with the with the it maybe it's departmentalizing the fact that they now have instead of having one teacher all day they have a bunch of teachers and we're not helping them navigate that change maybe that's what it is but the point is we're going to get the teachers together and basically have them solve that problem and it's about you know uh centralization and explicitness right just in a different in a different way yeah right um and then my last comment question is you're talking about habits of work and I remember you've mentioned that in the past and then I saw habits of learning in like I'm sorry that's my fault no no I thought they're the same they are the same they that's exactly what I need thank you sorry yeah no that's good thanks well just a followup on that if like if it's an expensive Affair to trade each teacher all of the teachers that um our elementary students on the reading pting um and if different afford it you know right yep right if if if it's really needed if you think it's really needed then I I've heard in the past that there are some parents even who committed uh funds towards the training that if re decides to send um Elementary School teachers for the training they will pay for it there were some commitments made earlier or we can do some sort of fundraising but at least we should know um what the expense is if if it's needed then it's needed thank you appreciate your support okay yeah just one final comment and I'll get a quote yeah I'll figure out what the what the training cost but as we were sitting here I was also thinking about um just continual excellence and growth and how that happens and I'm going to use a horrible Sports analogy and I apologize for anyone it's not a sports fan um but it's just fres in my mind so the Kansas City Chiefs won the Super Bowl last night right so they've won three out of the last five Super Bowls they have the same quarterback they have the same head coach and there's some other players that are the same but there are a lot of players that were not there when they first won the Super Bowl so they have adjusted to the times um they've changed some of their offensive Str and defensive strategies so what they're doing is they're maintaining m in excellence over time but to maintain it you've got to reflect on what's in front of you and you have to be willing to change and grow and learn from it so I view these processes as Ridgewood um and I think Ridgewood historically has been this so it's continuing like that look at we're going to change we're going to grow we're going to listen we're going to see what's in front of us and we'll adjust we appropriate and we'll keep what we need so um you know going to keep it's the Andy Reid of the Ridgewood Public School District um but I was just reflecting on that we were talking about well yeah our data is good but it doesn't mean our data will be good tomorrow it just means our data is good right now so how do we keep it that way and how do we keep everybody engaged and fresh and excited to come to school staff and student alike our apologies to any San Francisco fans in the house thank you we'll have to talk later about that Andy re reference I'm not sure no that's quite a compliment all right thank you very much so District 4 is really about finance and Facilities so I boiled this down to effectively the 2022 23 audit 2324 budget projection 2425 budget presentation which again for those of you are not familiar with School operations we're always working in three budgets at the same time basically so there's the last budget the current budget and the future budget uh we're we have facilities assessment and master plans I lumped two items together because they're very similar we have security and we have vendor Services monitoring vendor services so the 2223 audit uh has been completed so that's pretty easy and so now we're going to incorporate the outcomes of that audit process in our 2425 budget process and budget assumptions the 232 four budget projection uh we have some it's under it we've been kind of in a state of on of a where whatever we can engaging an ongoing uh analysis we put a partial budget freeze in place to ensure that we have our funding that we need throughout the year um we're we're doing line item status review as needed um it does appear that all of our accounts are adequate no reason for alarm oops um but we need we still need to complete a detailed projection which we will uh do concurrent with the budget process the 24-25 presentation um we've already met with all the schools and departments regarding their budget proposals given them some guidance on it um reviewed them comprehensively um I I didn't add it on here but uh our business office has also been very diligent about uh cleaning up a lot of our account codes we had lots of really creative and unorthodox uses of account codes uh that made it very hard to figure out um what everything was for um so we're trying to reduce those down and reduce the amount of countline so that it's easier for board members to and to to to evaluate where we are and for business office for that matter so this will be uh we obviously have a culminating budget proposal in the next over the course of the next com coming weeks for the 2425 proposal under facilities assessment and master plans now we're pleased to be recommending an architect of record uh as a function of our our of our uh bid process uh that we engaged in um and I want to welcome we actually happen to have uh Matt GM for Caro with us who is a engineer partner right with the with with the GM Caro firm so thank you for being here with us tonight Mr J Caro um and we we'll get to that in the agenda regular agenda in a minute but also um we started um our our our finance and Facilities team of Administrators uh started by going through all of our uh sites so they actually have a spreadsheet which I'll be going over with the the the facilities committee where they have inventoried every known and again I'm saying known I should probably should put that in quotes because you know all we can know are the things that we know and we know that there's lots of things that we don't know so for now we're focused on the things that we do know and we've inventoried all the things that we know are Urgent and important right now but uh something that we're going to be discussing as part of our budget proposal is uh setting aside funds uh to conduct a comprehensive assessment uh we're hoping our new architector record can help us with that um but a comprehensive assessment of where our facilities are and uh what and but also ideally what our facilities could be so it's not just about an assessment of of the current state it's also a bit of an assessment of what's feasible and what's possible to make our schools everything that we want them to be for security um I've already it's not really a function of the goals but it's just something that I'm doing is on a monthly basis I meet with the The Village um Village manager police chief and Fire Chief and we just keep each other up to speed regarding ma safety matters for the district and next week we're going to have our first district security team we have a variety of security uh items to be considered in the budget proposal uh but this District security team will be providing us with ongoing uh um ongoing recommendations and there'll be the a lot of times security measures you know they often were often balancing convenience and cost and security so finding that striking that balance is something that this group can help us with it's going to consist of some administrators and also our our Municipal uh repres our Municipal um safety leads particularly our police chief and our fire chief under vendor Services uh we've had um we've had a lot of transitions with the biggest vendor in the district which is Aramark they provide all of our facilities management and custodial Services uh due to some rollover and changes we have not been entirely happy with the way that the uh the the the contract has been implemented uh they've had a significant change over and um and that's been that's been great um and that was the driver for us having concerns about the vendor services but one of the things that we found is that if we're going that when we have vendors we often we don't necessarily have someone designated to be the one holding the vendor accountable for specifically their account so right now I'm just using our our facilities management as an example our faciliity director spends an inordinate amount of time kind of uh reviewing reviewing the contract and trying to settle disputes about uh elements of the contract so something that we've done is we've asked the board to approve um a um transportation and operation supervisor which is going to uh as a comp as a function of that be a part of U managing uh vendor or um monitoring vendor Services uh so that would be kind of way of getting taking a position that we already have anft that we already have expanding it slightly but getting a lot more out of that position so that will I think that will really help we have we have to recommend a qualified candidate we haven't uh we're not at that point for this meeting but that will certainly help us to monitor that anyone have any questions or concerns around the finance and Facilities status update all right well then the takeaways again I would just drive this home for everybody um the 23 24 District goals which is what we just talked about and the 201924 Strategic plan to me remain important and relevant maybe not necessarily equally to everyone but I can attest that the goals seem to continue to be pertinent um and I felt very good about reporting on them that we were focusing on many of the right things and all the all the really important things represented there and the 2019 24 strategic plan um as with any plan there might be elements that maybe aren't as relevant anymore but there is a lot of great work that came through that and I definitely uh would like to see I I would recommend strongly that uh we move forward in developing a new Five-Year Plan um through whatever means we agree to and the RPS administrative team it's important to note um I didn't call them out here because I didn't uh because there's quite a few of them and we really want to be uh ultimately want to be even more inclusive with faculty members but for now we're working with our administrative team so know that this is not just a function of Mr fredman and myself and Mrs Murphy and Miss cot uh doing this work uh all of our principles are sitting on these committees as well so down to the principal level we have and vice principal level too assistant principal excuse me and supervisors yeah supervisors too so all of our administrative team is involved here um and they're really uh and they're really owning this process which is great because um you know I always consider that my role as a leader is if I were to just evaporate tomorrow and disappear would the work continue and I would say that the work would continue um and the 2425 budget process and the 24 state of the schools address are really two major milestones in our goal completion process uh the remember the budget process uh the tentative budget will be struck uh on March 18th that sound right March 18th and then April 29th is when the final will be struck and then in May we'll do the stage of the schools address and after those two events occur we're going to have a very clear picture regarding how we're proceeding for the coming year where we are and what we have yet to to do was that may I just ask was that generally helpful to you as board members um you know it's been a while since um I felt as a board member that we were looking holistically at the districts and and a real focus on what we're doing with our children and how we are managing and evaluating their progress um I am thrilled with this presentation and I thank you so much um this is the work of the district this is the work that I think the board is really should be engaged in um and I thank the administrators for their work in this um this is exciting and I think we can we're going to move forward I already see uh with your guidance um us be moving forward and I thank you for that because it's it's been a long H without us doing that for a while so um this gives me hope you know I walked away from convocation uh with this glimmer thinking oh we're going to be in a good place tonight I see it again oh thank you that's so um thank you for that this is um great work I I want to see it continue and um I look forward to the budget and the state of the schools address but more than that I look forward to um energizing our our staff more um to continue what I feel is great work but that the need for consistency the need to make sure that our teachers have all the skills and resources that they need to put into place um these big Ideas um and um to keep moving forward I I liked what you said uh Rich the the you know moving forward and um we're it's not you know did we do things differently well there's a time and change when my children were in elementary school the big debate was whole language phics and it was it was not a and it was an either or and I never could figure that out why is it an either or because every child learns differently so you can't you can't just do pigeon hole one instructional strategy so um y thank you thank you say ditto Sheila said it really perfectly yeah thank you great well I'll just just say uh just want to thank the uh thank our administrative team they put a tremendous amount of work in and I want to be clear we we did I did would pull them together in our admin meetings uh we'd save the balance of time and we'd let them work together but they scheduled their own meetings and really really moved the ball forward without a lot of guidance uh so I just kept I I got to be really a a facilitator and a and a supporter of their work as opposed to a director and uh that makes me like I said that makes me feel great I feel like if I uh like I said if I if I Disappeared tomorrow uh the direction would still be clear so kudos to them great wow that was now we'll go to consent um Regular and routine issues yeah I want me to yeah so attendance at conference is May I have someone make a motion that great second I'll second it any questions Mr Donnie yes Miss maau yes Miss Brogan yes motion passes Administration I move Administration we can we can do a separate um vote for two for two yes okay absolutely so I'll move um Administration one and three a second I just noting Mr Donnie yes Miss M yes Miss Brogan yes we'll go back and we'll do um Administration two which are first readings of some revised uh and abolished policies and regulations which um have been reviewed a while ago by the policy committee a second Mr Donnie yes Miss MC so I have to recuse myself from these policies that's broken yes so I I think the motion can pass I think it's majority majority okay thank you uh curriculum and instruction would you like to move that anyone curriculum instructions on second Mr Mr Donnie were there any questions on those no um um yes and although we already discussed this I again wanted to give a shout out that we are getting Molly Ness for more professional development on read alloud uh practices so thank you to Dr Matthews and Mr fre m m Miss Brogan yes motion car um Human Resources uh and um as we already noted uh we do have um two retiree well one retiree we've celebrated tonight and we have another retiree um so uh Dana Higgins a special education inclusion teacher at Ridge after 32 years of service is retiring Ing and of course Christa Valentine who was here today first grade Willard after 32 years so we Cong congratulate them and I will move Human Resources a second and Dana will be joining us at our next sport meeting oh great it's always nice to celebrate Mr Donnie yes Miss mcau yes Miss Brogan yes motion carries moving to page uh see page 11 and uh Finance I move Finance so um for finance I'm also going to uh we're going to need to remove uh number nine in finance for voting please so I'm Mo Finance minus 9 which is the teacher pension exchange I second I just uh with we have so many um donations um and thanks to our community so from Somerville home and School Association $3,722 199 a gift and kind of furniture for the creation of a Zen Den for mental Wellness at Somerville Elementary School Bridgewood high school student activity account $866 190 to be used to pay for two overnight chaperon for the elps overnight uh trip Willard home and School Association 3572 which is a gift in kind for pro prometh Promethean boards for Willard Elementary School Somerville PA a dad's night $75,000 to use to uh to enhance the library at Haw Elementary School George Washington Middle School home and School Association $580 to be used to purchase books to support the birthday book program for the 2324 school year Somerville home and School Association $ 39,19114 gift and kind a gift and kind of an indoor trampoline and balance beam for the Glenn School s Somerville H and School Association and Dad's night for $2,920 125 a gift in kind of painting the multi-purpose room to create that zenen for mental wellness and learning Services home and School Association cpeg 25 thou $2500 to be used for enriching special education programs these are tremendously generous gifts um in each year as we look at all of the generosity in our community through our home and schools and through parents through the dad's night jamur all of this are just um amazing gifts to the district so just wanted to sh give them all a shout out and we can unless there are any questions on this we can go ahead and vote and then we'll come back to number nine I need a second still oh sorry I thought it was sorry I'll second that sorry about that Mr Donnie yes Miss M yes Miss Brogan yes um could I give some clarity to number nine because I think there's a misunderstanding about what it is oh sure all right so teachers pension is a private company that provides a 403b 457 Roth IRA product or any staff member it is a private company it is National so it is just adding an additional vendor to our already large list of vendors as an opportunity for any staff member to invest um additional tax shelters in addition to any pension they are inum at the state it is not related to um the teachers pension of New Jersey for clarity of what that is I know the name is confusing confusing it's a voluntary program where you actually can you make you make your just like AA Equitable or Security benefits or any of the other uh numerous uh parential any other the other uh companies that are there okay so because the reason why I we pulled it out was because I thought I had to recuse myself because I thought it had to do with the terms and conditions of employment so I just want to be clear that it's just an additional vendor similar to other vendors we already have so it does not affect terms and conditions of employment as you understand it I'm not trying to correct okay it is an optional benefit that's open to all staff regardless of whether they are um part of any particular group of Staff here at the district got it okay thank you um if if I if I may ask U if you have multiple vendors where um our staff can choose to deposit their 403 b and 457b contributions do we provide an easy to understand table that shows their administrative charges and fund fees and uh any expenses and expense ratios that they are easy to understand for them to to pick which one they they can go with I I would just be a little cautious about stepping in between that because vendors can change their rates and they don't we don't control their rates so it really is truly just another vendor so they could they could have policy changes and that's between the employee and the vendor so I wouldn't want to I wouldn't want to run the risk of falsely representing uh what their what their Provisions are so they have to do their own homework or do they do they have any assistance and understanding which option is better for them or so yes so that would be another question is providing some level of assistance but I but just in response to your table I wouldn't want to represent okay uh the the company's offerings to them but M mury right and and I will say that you know none of us here are financial advisers or um you know skilled in giving that information that's not any of our expertise but I will say that during orientations or other conversations that I have with employees um I encourage everyone to make sure that they're asking questions to each vendor that they don't just talk to One vendor that they explore the options that they ask what the costs are um and I give them kind of some sample questions that they should ask because you know your personal money is it's very personal what you do with it and and how you invest it so it's important that just as you shop and I tell them I was like just like you shop around for a computer or a television you have to do the same thing for this service and maybe even more so so we do provide some education so they they know the types of questions they should be asking um and and again it is voluntary many of our staff choose to I have staff don't thank you so I move we did we already move this oh okay I move uh Finance nine I seconded Mr Donnie yes Miss maau yes Miss brokens yes okay we're going to um now resolutions and motions not included in consent agenda uh on this uh in this particular one we have um we're pointing if we agree to this a new AR engineer firm uh for the district and we will ALS we also have an addendum um which identifies um JCW Incorporated which had I guess theyve changed their name which had been Sports care is that or is it one and the same DBA so they just yeah okay um the original Board of Education upon the recommendation of the superintendent of schools approves the agreement with W uh excuse me JCW um Incorporated DBA Sports care synthetic field maintenance under the um es cnj Cooperative contract number 22 23-37 for Synthetic Turf maintenance repair and replacement services so we are um moving forward hopefully with when the agreement uh with this particular vendor to clean our Fields um so that is an addendum onto the agenda so generally we have these on not on consent so when we have not on consent we we vote on each item separately would you like to do that yeah that's the purpose of not keeping them on consent okay sometimes we do so we will U Move a then um I move a which is the approval of corrective action plans for the 23 2223 school year this is as a result of the audit of Mr Donnie yes Miss mcau yes Miss Brogan yes motion carries number uh B not number letter B Award of of a bid for architect of record um we did have a committee meeting uh there was a process that this went through of uh we had a a group committee that evaluated all of the bids that came in all the responses that came in I think there were 10 right Whittle down to three and a second committee where um Mr Donnie and I were part of uh interviewing the three finalists and then there was agreement on um the recommendation here so I move b a second Mr Donnie yes Miss MC yes Miss Brogan yes motion carries okay see oh and the addenda so that is see I thought I lost my agenda anyways C I move C second are there any questions Mr Donnie yes Miss M yes Miss Brogan yes motion carries okay um approval of bills the um Mrs quap uh was unable to be here tonight but she did send me an email and she had reviewed the bills she'd signed off on them had asked her questions um and felt um that they were all um appropriate and so I will make a motion on her behalf uh to approve the bills is there a second I'll second Mr Johnny yes Miss mcau yes Miss Brogan yes motion carries okay board member announcements um I just have a couple of things to um update with I I'm the new liaison to the group special education parent is that in committee reports instead yeah sorry that's okay but we'll get to it yeah this is just any that was that was all I had oh okay easy no okay um so I just wanted and um unfortunately hju is not here right now but I did want to just you know congratulate the aapi organization who held a wonderful Lunar New Year Year celebration at Ridgewood High School and I know how hard hu worked in that and promoted it and this was the second year and very successful so congratulations to that group and to huk for for her leadership in that event um at the stable our Ridgewood High School students if you haven't seen their artbeat exhibit um has a display uh titled a display of words the exhibit is open to the public 8:30 to 4:30 Monday through Friday and um you know it's certainly worth a a stop by to to see the student work um and the student advisor Mrs Maxwell the art teacher is their advisor and she was very much engaged with with them and doing that um I thought it was s really significant uh that one of our students at Ridgewood High School Ryan uh shatani who's a sophomore co-authored an article with um a a professor in in uh Psychology today about the importance of teen sleep and of course one of the um things that is is mentioned of you know it's it's the importance of teen sleep and then what can we do and the importance of what we can do one of those things is starting school later so it was uh his experience and his interest in this um to uh co-write this article so congratulations to the students I'm always amazed what our students really do and as Sarah mentioned um congratulations to our 13 student teams from the applied engineering club who are currently uh competing in the New York steam New Jersey steam tank challenge um and if there's a precedent from the past I'm sure we'll see some way ERS on that one uh Federated is hosting uh two wizards games at Ridgewood High School on February 25th at 2 and at 6: pm and I checked to see whether I could say oh tickets are still available um and was told that the tickets sold out in for both games in less than a minute so this is a super popular event and congratulations to Federated to continuing their work on that um the um our um Ridgewood High School is hosting their annual college night on March 19th from 6:00 to 9: there's h a slew of colleges that are um going to be there um represented there and I think their focus is on sophomores and juniors primarily uh so uh parents watch out for that it's m March 19th at the high school and the annual Asian Fest is scheduled for March 2nd uh for the community uh students will see it on the 1 but March 2nd at 5 o'clock um the student performances are really amazing doors will open at 4:20 to purchase your tickets and it's open to the to the public and finally really um congratulations to the producers and the cast and crew and the sponsors for janary 2024 smooth sailing um on S on Saturday they announced that they had raised over $244,000 for student scholarships it was a wonderful show um I think when I I look at and it was long uh but when I look at it as an example of really the heart Spirit talent in general generosity that makes Ridgewood this very special Community we live in and uh really congratulations to them not only for the money they rais but just for the just for the exuberance they show um and they get out of their comfort zone some dancing and singing and uh performing on stage it's really quite amazing so congratulations to them okay board committee reports Mary now I'm ready right B and liaison call it yes okay so um as the I'm the new representative of cpeg uh of the Boe to cpeg and I was at my first meeting um and I learned all about unified Ridgewood which is a program that's um being spearheaded by Doug a day and it is really amazing and I would encourage anyone in the community whether you have uh a student in special ed or a student in gen Ed to really check out the offerings of um unified uh because it's it's really quite amazing so a couple of other things um cpeg has been is continuing with their sensory friendly dinners which are an enormous success they're actually starting to sell those out too and the next one is on February 27th at puos which is on the West Side by uh Westside Bagels um they are also uh expanding their accessible events to um focusing on the Arts they were able to get a couple of their students to uh the Wednesday night performance of jambur which is kind of like the uh the dress rehearsal and some of those students got to see their parents on stage which was amazing and they're working with the new players to see if they can come up with some uh arrangements so that some of these kids can see the Shrek performance when that comes up um uh uh Ridgewood unified and rhs special needs siblings and friends which is a club at the high school together they're going to host a science night in in anticipation of super science Saturday and that is on um February 15th uh and then uh they're very very excited about this we talked about the Wizards games and Federated has worked with the Wizards to provide a sensory friendly event for the kids who being at the actual Wizards game and if you've been there it is noisy hot there's a lot of stimulus and it's tough for some of the kids and so the Wizards are going to uh conduct a sensory friendly event for those kids who would have difficulty going to the the Wizards game on Friday the 23d um and our students are in our steps program are going to be running concessions and whatever money they make those proceeds are going to go to Ridgewood unified so um there's a lot of really great things going on um and then finally just to remind you that the the Statewide week of inclusion is next week February 26th through the uh 1st of March so and an offshoot of that Mary um will be um at Super we've been talking super science Saturday team had been talking to cpeg and um so that first hour where we have um often it's quieter from 9: to 10: in the morning um we've been uh they have the cpeg has been encouraging students who might need a quieter time uh we'll be telling our presenters um that um are these our students will be coming that's usually a time where it's a downtime because we have a a science show so they could come to The Science Show but if they don't want to come to The Science Show make sure they see the presenters and we've been working with them to make sure that that um hopefully will be an opport another opportunity that's great I think some of the high school kids also in the siblings and Friends Club are going to attend the elementary science fairs with some of the the specialed kids to help them present their projects so I just like the the way the community is really coming together and that it's really fantastic yeah that's great uh would you like to um report on um curriculum I know that you and Mr Donnie are on that yes so um I was at uh the uh curriculum meeting um which was amazing because there's so much that is being done and I'm always so always so AED by the work and the uh the depth of what what's going on in our schools um generally the two things and and really Dr Schwarz touched upon it um in his uh District goals report but um Mrs en nembo shared the presentation of analyzing the outcomes of the math sequencing she's working on that and I think her next step then is to talk with the faculty and then make a decision as you know what they want to do with that if they're going to keep it if they're going to modify it how they're going to work on that uh and then Dr Matthews um led a discussion on the multi-year plan to bolster the science of reading and we talked about uh again a lot of what Dr Schwarz has already talked about the evidence indicating that we're actually in a fairly good place but that what we really need is you know centralization and the explicitness of some of the um some of the processes and uh ways that they teach the kids um we also talked about the fact that you know we're not always really clear I guess in the community as to what's going on I think after tonight's presentation that that's probably been rectified to some degree um but uh we're going to continue to work on that and then to articulate um the scientifically sound practices on the science of reading so that not only are the teachers clear but the Community is clear so everybody knows what's going on in our classrooms that's it thanks thanks you have anything to you want to add okay um and then um SAR and I are on um facilities together um and uh the facilities committee met on February 5th and um we discussed the fields and so you've heard uh some of the um you know what was the outcome of those discussions and and we're moving forward um we did talk about the contractual arrangements and timeline with aark uh who provides our facility maintenance um Management Services um the status of selecting a new architect engineering firm that has been completed tonight and thank you for that and thank you for being here um and some uh pending facility projects and possible future projects that will be discussed as we move forward and we have um if we go if if we just decide we'll go with the line of having an assessment of our facilities of what the current statuses and what what might be improvements and needs will go forward um we H recommended um the board members really recommended um resurrecting jrc which is the joint uh Review Committee um which meets monthly with the um with aark with our with that team with uh our landscaping company uh Damian our our U manager of um facilities um and usually the ba is with us so that would be Julie um and and um and we we meet we have been doing it over Zoom for for a while now but we meet um we focus on one building each month so we would start later in the year but um this gives the the building principle an opportunity to just discuss those overall issues of of Maintenance Cleaning uh landscaping and have a good conversation about um scheduling landscaping and whatever is we have Leaf cleanup and spring spring tuneup and all the things that happen um and it's a good opportunity to again help monitor what's happening in the district um so um and um the good news uh is the state has awarded the district um $132,800 offset maintenance costs incurred during this fiscal year so that was um good news uh from the state so uh the fac the finance committee our finance committee is missing tonight because that is uh Muhammad and hu but they are um really beginning to look at uh budget and they'll have um a number of meetings as we go into the budget season and through all of our committee assignments we will also be looking at the budget and implications that are are part of our committee so what's happening with curriculum and what are we funding in facilities and then of course Finance we'll um look at it but each board member will have the opportunity to look fully at the at the budget and have discussions so um that is our work uh for March I suspect right um and then um this is an ongoing process once a month um most months I suspect that we just started um but it has been in the past as well where the board leadership team Dr Schwarz um Muhammad myself and the village uh Keith C kasmar and who's the village manager um and representative from The Village Council this month it had it was Paul vaganos the mayor and we're just looking at issues um that we intersect on so what were the issues Fields right um and and what's the timeline to to clean and and their timeline for Maple um also water quality and you reported already um s Rob about that the um village is under a um The Village must um remediate the posos um and take that out of the system and they have to do that by the end of 2026 uh so we do uh there is still work to be done but um they are moving forward with that and um I think a meeting will be set up um again with Rich calby to to take a look at at something that things we might do in the in the school district for the school um and um there was just a sharing of our the budget timelines and when they are doing their budget and it was a pretty short meeting at the end of the day but it's it's a good opportunity just to keep um keep Communications open the village has just hired a Communications um manager if you will um and so hopefully Christine and the new uh Village uh communication will when there are communication issues for the district and the village jointly to get out um a good way of doing that of course under the um good guidance of uh Dr Schwarz and Keith kasmar yeah so are there anything else is liaison that you wanted to um to nope okay um the village is on safety The Village um looks like they will be funding um uh the the sidewalks on Glenn to uh finish that work and um they are looking at uh potential sidewalks or better walking opportunities maybe uh for Clinton Avenue to Rich but that is still under discussion about what the outcome will be for that um okay discussion items um we had some policies um for um approval Mary are you okay with these policies these are fine I can handle these yes okay um would you like to move then move um oh no oh sorry this is um this is just no we're not voting this is just discussion I'm sorry this is first uh this is just the first time they're on the agenda did anybody have any questions about that um board goals is um on this be and it was um we had discussed these um I sent them out to everybody I I I really didn't hear I heard from Mary and but no one else but um this was when we were going to approve it for the 20 24 year so um I think we could move and vote on them no next meeting no well if they're in now you got me confused if they're in do we move on them if we can discussion now I'm sorry so it's since it's under a discussion would we we can move we can vote on these yeah okay I'll move um approve the 2024 board goals for um approval okay I second Mr Donnie yes Miss mcau yes Miss Brogan yes the work has you know the work is already started on all all of these so uh um that's good acceptance of minutes um Mary I realized uh January 22nd the 6 and the and February 6th we will probably have to hold these until the next meeting um you could it's up to you I only need to recuse myself from the executive session miss minutes on the 22nd um if you want to move the regular public meeting well we can move the eth and the 22nd um Regular re orgon regular but on the 6th of February can't I can yeah yeah so that's why I'm saying on the on the January 22nd executive session and February 6 special public meeting you weren't here and executive session we will hold for the next meeting um I because I yep I I think do we do we need every I think we need everybody here right no you oh January 8th and January 22nd we can actually move and vote on yeah we can move yes so we can move regular meeting January 8th and January 22nd just two of them so so for clarity we're going to move january8 regular and January 22nd regular minutes that's it are going to postpone everything else until the March yes meeting yes got it so all in favor because this is just a voice V vote uh uh all in favor of approving the minutes motion you need a motion do you need a motion thought we didn't oh okay I move the the eth reg reorganization regular meeting and the 22nd regular public meeting and I'll second that okay all in favor I okay and we will table those or move them to the next other business okay comments from the public oh our little hand board up thank you uh good evening uh Matthew Gian fararo I'm here representing Gian fararo Architects and Engineers uh I'll I won't take up too much of your time but I just wanted to be here tonight to say thank you for deciding to move forward uh with our firm as your protective record uh my father and I said in our interview uh that my grandfather started of the firm 47 years ago uh my father has been with with us for 37 and I've been here for nine uh my grandfather taught my father who has since taught me that uh it's all about building relationships so um you know we're not a a one andone architectural firm so I thank you for the opportunity uh to allow us to build a relationship here in Ridgewood and to serve the district uh to the best of our abilities uh I understand that there are a few projects or maybe one in particular that the board is eager to discuss so we're excited to jump right into that uh and we look forward to you know doing our part from an architectural and Engineering standpoint to uh help the Ridgewood Public Schools continue to uphold its tradition of Excellence uh that it is so accustomed to so thank you thank you thank you for being here yeah thanks M for waiting I don't know what your expectation was for how long the meeting will be based on the agenda but uh thanks for uh staying around my thank you that's great um are there any uh oh there are some hands UMO Hi Megan you yeah hi can you hear me yes we can yes okay um this was a wonderful presentation tonight so thank you I am trying to keep up with my notes because there was so much shared um I want to thank Mr Schwarz for the presentation it was so helpful in illustrating the work and the process going into developing the Strategic plan I feel like I highlight every time I speak um some of the things like I am just so grateful to having these um presentations with transparency um and even just some of your comments Mr Schwarz when parents are asking questions or um making statements that you reflect on and say I can't make a commitment tonight but I can tell you what we're working on that communication is so important in our community and very much appreciated um I can continue to share many comments of appreciation tonight on so many topics throughout this presentation um but just to highlight a couple um Jamie Murphy your work um and focus on Dei has been amazing um and thank you um for your continued work and efforts in that space um Mr fredman your comments that really resonated with me um regarding systems equity and experience um and then to maintain a level of Excellence here in Ridgewood we need to be willing to change learn and grow this is key and I'm really GR ful to have you as an administrator leading our district with this mindset um Mr schwar uh several things um you shared so much helpful information tonight um a few key points I'm really glad to see that you've clearly documented the inrs teams and implementation aligned to the ntss model I think some of the questions around Ela from Mr dony and miss mcau um following I guess regarding how implementation and some of these changes to the ELA um curriculum and how we Implement those changes can be addressed with contined professional development and commitment by the district to align practices to the ntss model currently this is an area of concern that affects our special education students and at times I think is hold almost serves as a holding ground for some of our dyslexic students um following the ntss ER the early reading model is not only current not currently happening across the board in new a lot of New Jersey districts but it's also not happening here with consistency um this is an area where intervention and instruction could be improved if we follow this model so there was an announcement that came out and was sent out to districts last Thursday offering a three-part virtual community of practice for district leadership teams and Educators serving students in K through3 to learn more about establishing and implementing a multi-tiered system of support designed to provide research-based early literacy instruction and intervention and the deadline um for districts to register to uh be involved in that Community is March 1 um I hope that's something the district is uh kind of sharing caring out to administrators and teachers and um or at a district level looking at um being included in that and participating in that if you're looking for information on that I'm happy to forward it to you just let me know who I should send it to um and then my last thought for this evening again Mr Schwarz comments um you shared we can put whatever we want on paper um but what we practice and what our teachers actually do and I don't remember the exact wording you use at the end of that quote is what's important um so this really highlights an underlying issue of so many of the concerns I've shared and I love the focus of the discussion on processes and concrete planning um so and the centralized goals and looking at these issues from a district level so that we can improve consistency across the district yep I'm finished that's it thank you so much just trying to keep people much yeah um I would say you could uh send that information um can send it to you or to Rich to to Mr fredman maybe um so we have that information and it's already been distributed to the administrative team and we already have members that have signed up but thank you for for offering that okay and it another hand oh Laur uh you're on yeah I'm on hi oh I'm sorry I oh I didn't see yes you're on um yeah thank you again you know I mean uh um again you know my my concentration is basically on the field and um and you know it's good that again there is an engineering firm I think which are they going to uh give a recommendation of of you know they're going to study and do the recommendation is that is that what it is that's what my understanding is uh and also is there presentation I'm sorry I was not uh I was I was not uh uh listening at that time I had something else was going on so is that uh that presentation available for uh you know for for public uh if if that is the case you know that would be that would be good you know at least you know people can see what what they're going to do and things like that uh that was basically a comment on that and the second one is basically again related to the field just a suggestion you know now that I think I I heard that you know there is a$ 25,000 or $50,000 um deductible there right so is there a way the you know the the current parents of the school will they be able to do some kind of a fundraising event or something like that and and raise that you know the the money for your uh you know the deductibles or you know more than that you know whatever they can do you know how we should find out the you know how the parents can uh they can how they can help you know if they if they if they want to see this you know this field back back to life sooner right so again maybe you can explore I don't know you know I'm just throwing that as a suggestion I don't know whether it is possible or not that's different but at least that's the you know just again a suggestion and the third one is I'm not sure you know I thought I heard that there is a a communication director or somebody to deal with the board uh Boe and the Ridgewood Town is that a full-time job is that really necessary I mean you know that I mean the the the current staff should be able to to to handle that I don't see a whole lot of things going on between between between you know for that position I don't know you know what kind of position that is and is it just exclusively for that or you know anything like that so so I think maybe you should reconsider if you know the bottom line is you know we need to cut the budget where possible right I mean sometimes it feels like you know the school board is is spending uh money just like that unnecessarily many times and know thinking that you know of 60 70% of our tax tax money goes to the school I mean we should think about bringing the cost down instead of you know [Music] going spending more so that's these are my comments uh thank you uh yeah um will um what we try to do is hear all the public comments and then we'll respond to any questions that we can answer afterward so there's another uh person waiting to comment I think no I'm done okay thank you Laura McKenna hi hi everyone I'm Laura McKenna 861 Bingham Road um first I just wanted to say that was a great presentation Dr Schwarz with all of the goals laid out I loved your chart identifying what where the status was what the plans were for implementation and evaluation that was great and and you echoed themes that um are have um you know were issues in the last campaign the need for consistency centralization articulation I'm just thrilled that the district is um you know uh attack issues headon it's it's wonderful um Mr Donnie asked a great question at one point he asked so we're going to um spend all this money on professional development to help teachers um transition from uh the teachers College method to the science of of reading how are we going to measure whether it makes a difference or not and um while I am a huge fan of evaluations um and monitoring um numbers and seeing how it's going to come in um and I think we should absolutely do that I think we're not going to find the neat numbers the neat responses that Mr Donnie would look for because there's too many variables that we can't control of in Ridgewood we can't control um how much parents are tutoring and compensating from one method for another and sometimes I don't think Ridgewood needs to reinvent the wheel This research has already been done it's been done um at the nation's top college Coles research institutions in the country um Colombia itself has has stepped away from the readers Writers Workshop I think that the data already tells us that we need to make a change and um you know as you know that's this has been an issue that I've I've put forward um for a year now at Board of Education meetings and elsewhere so I'm thrilled we're dealing with it we're tackling it and we're going to be um you know keeping current as Mr fredman says that's keeping current keeping um up with the the latest methods um that are being used across the country I I think is super important and I'm I'm really glad we're doing that and at some point I hope we can also start looking at other issues like actually there's a science of math now that's being talked about oh and I just want to give another endorsement for uh Natalie um wexler's method of bringing increasing um uh knowledge of core of core facts and how facts are essential to doing reading as well and reading comprehension so thanks again everyone and uh thanks for giving me a chance to talk thank you um see if there's anybody else and then maybe we'll Circle back to talk a little bit about the questions that were asked Dr Schwarz do you want to address some of those questions thank you yes thanks for the opportunity and I mean primarily I would like just like to acknowledge and just provide a few next steps or clarifications but um appreciate Matan ficaro coming out um I have had a chance to work with the gmaro firm uh before and uh we've been very happy with their work so it's uh nice to have a familiar face serving as architect of record um Miss beerley thank you so much for coming out for all your kind words thank you for being so uh attentive to the whole three-hour meeting live and live and uh and as it's happening so thank you for the kind words um and uh yeah I am I'm very uh grateful for your investment and uh and for your consistent attention to best practices in public schools um Mr hegade I definitely hear your concerns and certainly your themes of about concern about fiscal responsibility so um uh so yes I believe you did hear correct that we have an engineering uh we appointed an architect director record and they are also Engineers so and it is Our intention to uh to to study how to find a long to study some different long-term Solutions I think you asked about where to find the presentation and this is for anybody who's interested you can go to the district's YouTube channel and you can actually watch the presentation you could W watch the quick version I did tonight here at this meeting you can also watch the superintendent coffee where I had go into more detail uh the presentation itself is on the website and I believe and I I'm just I don't I don't have this Page open miss corus that is on the super superintendent page on the superintendent page and under that's it Office of the superintendent and then there's a link to the coffee so you can see the presentation if you just want the presentation you can see the presentation there but I do recommend that you watch the conversation uh you had an interesting sentiment about parents fundraising the deductibles um generally speaking we try to ask people to fundraise for things that are like kind of forward thinking they get a little more excited about that so we're not asking them to fund the deductible because I believe that is our responsibility to make sure that we have those things covered however uh we have been uh mobilizing some fundraising for those that feasibility study that you referenced there before and then um as far as the communication director Mrs Brogan referenced that but that was in reference to the The Village so the village will be hiring a communication manager so that's not actually something that will be employed by the Board of Education a position that would be employed by the board and then last but we do have an office we we do have our own officer and I know Mr heed has spoken with Miss corus before as well um and then Dr McKenna thank you again so much for joining us uh thank you for sticking it out for so long in person and then following up uh virtually really appreciate that but again really appreciate your experience and your expertise and uh and your knowledge base as well and all the resource sharing that you do for us too so I appreciate your sentiments about uh knowing that that research has already been done that's great um I do want to say I do think um some of these things are hard to measure that's one of the challenges but if we're creative we can find ways even if it's as simple as uh you know asking teachers their perceptions of their confidence level and engaging in certain practices we can learn a lot even through that as well which we'll be doing so thank you for the opportunity to respond Miss broen okay with that I will um close thank you for that uh close public comment and um we're not going into executive session so I make a motion to a Jour I would love a second second all in favor everyone have a good night we are back on March the 4th um have a lovely break next week um Monday and