##VIDEO ID:OJjdX9Zlb_A## good evening it is Thursday December 19th and I'd like to welcome you to the South Brunswick Board of Education meeting and call the meeting to order please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance and please remain standing I'd like to observe a moment of silence for the students staff and family from the Abundant Life Christian School in Wisconsin IED aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon the primary purpose is for board members to discuss and vote on board business in accordance with the provisions of this act the board secretary has caused notice of this meeting 48 hours prior including date time location to be posted in the South Brunswick Public Library and the board office filed with the Township Clerk and communicated to the home News Tribune and Star Ledger Mr palowski may I have roll call yes you can once I find my documents that I currently have here we go Miss Julie Ferrara Mrs Laura Hernandez here miss Deepa carik okay Miss Alicia Khan Mr rajer Krishna yeah Mr Mike Mitchell president Mr Barry Nathanson here Dr Smith araj here Mrs Lisa Rogers present we have a quorum thank you sir I got you may I have a motion in a second for approval of the agenda move Mr Mitchell move second second Dr Raj all in favor any Nays agenda is moved uh yeah that's good approv right approved approved um next order of business is uh board minutes the board secretary Mr P's draft of the board and executive minutes from November 21st 2024 were posted on the board portal do any members have any changes to the minutes no the minutes stand as written and are approved thank you next is the report of the student Representatives sumra good evening everyone um starting off with some School news every day of December is a spirit day to start getting in the holiday spirit December 2nd was holiday lazy day the third was holiday colors the fourth was World AIDS day where we wore red um the fifth was Winter Wonderland sixth was black and gold nine was don't sweat the small stuff the 10th was the best of the season the 11th was duck the Halls 12th was holiday sock day the 13th was cool kicks Friday the 16th was ugly sweater day and the 17th was holiday lazy day part two the 19th was mad about plaid and 20th and tomorrow is hats on hats on our annual student council fundraiser Deck the Halls where we decorate doors for the holidays was a huge success we had orders of over 70 plus doors and the student council did a great job in making it happen our vaa meeting was on December 9th and our high tops program at the high school did a presentation on leader ership and effective communication engaging students in multiple activities they also discussed a new fundraiser where sbhs is collecting new or very slightly worn coats for the underprivileged students who attend sbhs and each donation no matter how many coats is one service hour bring coats and jackets to activities the class of 2026 hosted a winter wonderland on December um Tuesday the 17th we had a wonderful turnout and our Juniors had a lot of fun participating in the gingerbread contests and drinking hot chocolate the trip had more participation than the previous years and our oh wait hold on the class of 2026 and 2027 recently hosted a successful trip to the King of Prussia Mall the trip had more participation the previous years and our teachers as well as our students had an amazing time this year student council was eligible to run 1 person for our parent organization njasc our Board of edra myself was chosen on Monday December December 16th I had my interview at Neptune High School where I was slated to run for NJ State vice president elections will be held on at TCNJ on January 8th where I will be campaigning with the rest of student council as well as our some of our presidents and vice presidents from class Council and giving a speech results will be announced later that day now on to Athletics we will now be accepting Sports forms for spring season tryouts the forms must be dated and signed no earlier than December 16th the deadline to Mid Winter forms is Thursday February 6 2025 please get your child's Sports forums early to avoid delays in the process more information can be found at the athletic in the athletic handbook on the high school and middle school website thank you so much for your time I hope everyone has a restful and enjoyable winter break and I look forward to reporting more in 2024 very good thank you so much and good luck with all the campaigns we wish you well okay moving on to the report of the president I have a couple things as the public has requested an update on Miss meth's ethics charges for the board attorney the oral arguments that were postponed for October 23rd were heard by the judge on Tuesday December 17th we will advise once the judge makes her decision I'd also like to give a shout out to the transition training center uh for hosting their holiday pop-up shot tonight if you haven't had a chance to do it buy something I just bought six items wonderful each year we truly do look forward to seeing them outside all of them and their smiling faces and all of the different items that they sell they put them together themselves the transition Center helps them prepare for Life After attending our schools so if you haven't had an opportunity to purchase an item please consider doing it or contacting the center for support if you haven't heard our pal Peewee cheer squad our national champions yay hey my granddaughters on that yeah um they took home first place at Nationals in Orlando that's very prestigious um it's a very prestigious title and um they go up some against some real talent like Texas cheerleaders they're tough out there we could not be more proud of you so congratulations to our peeeee Squad also for board members and jsba mandated trading dates have been posted so if you any board member needs to register please work with Administration to confirm your participation there are also several webinars on January which I highly recommend if you haven't had a chance to look at it that you consider post um participating in well they are posted on the njsba site now before I turn it over to superintendent feder I want to take a moment to State a few things as we close 2024 first on behalf of the members of the South Brunswick School Board we would like to express our deepest gratitude to each and every employee of this amazing District your your dedication and hard work play a vital role in supporting our students and their families whether you're in a classroom the office or behind the scenes we believe that every single interaction matters and we thank you for the impact that you have made every single day I also want to give a special thank you to miss Maryann Murphy who is leaving us tomorrow I'm going to try to get through this over the past two several years Maryann has provided this board and me personally with insight and guidance that only a person with her tenure would know Maryanne your answers to some of my most craziest questions when Scott wasn't available were always sent with calmness patience and understanding and the turnaround time was impeccable thank you again ma'am for your years of service to this District you will truly be missed [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] and then finally it's been an incredible honor for me to serve as president of the board over the past two years as we prepare to reorganize the board in January and select a new president I want to extend my sincere appreciation for the commitment and the passion that this board has shown in support of the the district's Mission I look forward to continuing our work together in the coming year building on the strong Foundation that we've laid and advancing our shared goals for the future of this District thank you once again to the members of this board for all that you do and with that I will now turn it over to Mr feder all right just so you know I usually was available but I just told BF to deal with it I believe that yeah uh so start off with a uh first we have all these all these great students in the front here this is our traveling choir our traveling holiday choir they were just at the board office this week and now they're here to Grace us tonight so we're going to call them up in a little bit to sing welcome and thank you in advance we know it's going to be pretty awesome um next is's a group of people here for some reason I don't know why they all came so if you can just get the ready um I just want to start so we've been doing a search for Indian field new principal and a bunch of the people who who are the people in the audience who are part of the committee all right so um we met we talked tried to find the best candidate and we found the best candidate no question we found an awesome candidate and uh I'm going to call that person up to the mic so if we could please welcome Mrs Meg Berry [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] thank you if I had known the Wardrobe was black hoodies and and uh pajama pants I would have won with that cuz my kids wanted to know why I was so dressed up leaving the house again today thank you for this um good evening Board of Education Mr Federer central office administration indian fields Community I'm deeply honored to be named the next principal of indianfields elementary school I'm humbled to have the privilege of advancing in a in leadership within a district that embraced me with open arms and consist Rec L provided me opportunities to grow I'm thrilled to join an elementary school with an exceptional staff you guys seem super fun already I'm here for that um and uh in my opinion one of the best assistant principles Allison I admire you as a person and I'm excited to work with you in the near future I want to express my heartfelt gratitude to Kimbo you're the reason I found my way to South Brunswick you saw my potential not just who I was but who I could who I could become and I believe and believe that I would be the right fit for this incredible District I will always be grateful for the door you open for me to my family thank you for your unwavering love and support they're watching on Zoom hi everybody you're my motivation and my Foundation I worked hard not only for you you but because of you I couldn't give my all every day without the strength and encouragement you provide one of my favorite speeches is man in the arena by Theodore Roosevelt it's a guiding principle in my life if you look at my laptop you'll see a sticker with the entire speech on the back cover of it if you visit my home or my office you'll see it on the wall it reminds me daily of the courage it takes to step into the arena and to dare greatly to the Indian field staff and students and Community I'm ready to step into the arena with you together we will work hard celebrate successes and rise to me challenges headon I'm so grateful for this opportunity and I can't wait to get started thank you [Music] [Applause] I just just let him finish let him finish second no no no no no just just just wait you want make a motion to amend the consent agenda I will that's not making a making a motion to amend the consent write that you want to say something no go ahead are you you want to say something no all right why the Love Fest over there news I'm going to keep going just note none of us have ever had a whole group of people come and hug us before we even started and some of my staff's in the audience I expect you to wait until we're done and I want hugs after this exactly all right next on my list um already spoken about from uh Lisa as you know uh murf is retiring uh to tomorrow is her last day of being present will not be our last day of probably tormenting me or me tormenting her that will probably go on for a lifetime um for me when I got here mateline Daniels here who mine Daniels came by today to say goodbye to murf so that was really nice got to see meline and um murf and I have I I would I'll characterize a very special relationship she is one of my favorite people and it's like an old married couple it's true it it really is because uh I come in in the morning and the first thing I have to do is greet my work wife and I do that with a a murf from down the hall and uh then she starts on me did you drink your water did you bring lunch it just goes on and on and on and uh at the end of the day on a day like today so today superintendent's report my report murf writes this report and and every single two weeks she asked me starting about 2 days in advance did you read my report no I'm not going to read your report until 4:00 on Thursday murf leaves at 4:00 on Thursday it's my Petty torment for her torturing me about the report then murf concludes to put a bunch of things in this report that I'm never going to read and she knows that and she Stills it every single time anyway this is our relationship it's built on pure torment back and forth and I wouldn't tra trade it for anything but she's leaving this is your last day when I say last day she just cries so uh tomorrow's her last day and you're going to be incredibly missed and uh Marcia actually said that she's going to miss me yelling murf yeah to you in the mornings but really it's uh for someone to put in was it 20 29 29 years of service uh starting in different levels being in in different places and uh it's a loss to the district and so murf congratulations on your retirement and uh I'll see you tomorrow all right I have another one of these this is [Music] a all right another another one here we go again ready Barry Barry nathon he's been a board member since [Laughter] 1927 he was shooting for 100 years he's just going to miss that sorry bar um but Barry's been on the board for a number of time a number of years how many years uh since 2001 2002 something 2001 20 let's see if that's correct let see if we got that right 2002 very good to 2024 so 20 22 years of doing that he was President uh from 20 to 21 during that wonderful time of Co yeah congratulations on that and vice president for different years before that but Barry has served on probably every committee for multiple years he is an avid if you ever go to a football game you'll see Barry sitting by himself on his chair behind uh the the um the goal post and um probably goes to every game heavily involved in all kinds of things always just the most positive spirit uh for this District so with that said Barry you're going to be missed but as you as you promised uh you're probably going to take Ed bur's seat right over there oh Jes and uh be sitting there every meeting and coming up and and saying hi and sharing the world with us and uh can't say enough about you Barry so thanks so much for all your years i' appreciate [Music] [Applause] oh boy I wasn't sure if he going to take the mic off back so uh before I go on Barry Lisa would like to say a couple words uh oh uh oh good luck Barry and I go back a bit Barry's trained me in so many different ways to understand the school boards um I always depended on him to answer questions when I just was at a loss as a new board member so just Barry as you close your Timeout on this board I want to thank you on behalf of the entire Board of all the members for the Dedication that you have shown and the school district sorry your knowledge your experience and your deep understanding of our District's history have been invaluable that's what we're going to lose the knowledge you've provided many of us with Insight that have guided our decisions and helped us better serve our students our staff and the community as a whole your cont contributions have made a lasting impact and we are grateful for your commitment to Excellence and we'll see you at the next game thank you [Music] anybody okay I'm trying not to cry so uh ladies and gentlemen as I stand before you tonight I want to take a moment to express my heartful gratitude for The Incredible Journey excuse me I've had as a school board member while the recent election didn't go as I hoped I remain proud of the work we've accomplished together over the years I want to give a special shout out to our amazing staff whose dedication and hard work make our schools a nurturing environment for our students to the parents thank you for your unwavering support and partnership in ensuring the success of our children and to the students you are the heart of our mission your growth and achievements Inspire us all to the current board members I encourage you to listen and learn from one another as you continue to serve our community although I may not be on the board I will be in the audience at every meeting cheering you on most of the time and who knows maybe one day I will make a comeback thank you once again to everyone my fellow board members or except exeptional staff and the parents and students of South brunic I'll be watching closely and supporting you in every way I can so just goodbye for now there you go okay all right ah quite a meeting okay so before I move on I'd like to amend the agenda please I'd like to add a motion to the agenda by amending the agenda consent agenda amending the consent agenda to read upon the recommendation of the superintendent of schools that's me I'd like to make a motion to appoint Margaret Barry as the principal of Indian Fields Elementary School to be with the date to be determined at a prorated salary of $130,000 annually and can I get a second to that motion second Miss Ferrera all in favor I any Nays motion passes [Music] woohoo I'll close out just by reminding us we have homework free uh holiday from the time we're done until January 6th but nothing projects due no test till January 8th we close as of tomorrow on early release day and I wish everyone a happy and healthy holiday and an incredible New Year in 2025 start changing those checks now 2025 thank you all and thank you all for coming out tonight and please hang let's hear from these these great kids in a few minutes okay thanks so much turn back over to thank you so much um now we would like to move on to the performances I love this time of year I can't wait for you guys the first is we are going to hear from the South Brunswick High School concert choir I'm going to call up um Mr Sears where is he is he there oh there he is to the podium first to say a few words show a little slideshow um and then uh we will go from on there we're going to move on to oh we're oh yes I'm sorry my apologies so the board members in order to enjoy this we're going to move to the first row here where the blue is and I'm going to ask you to remain seated there uh once Mr Sears is completed all right we can move out there all righty the mic is on good evening everyone we're going to start off by and myself in our music program just a small little uh car magnet go ahead and put this on the back your SUV your sedan your truck whatever you're rolling with and uh and this has a wonderful sbhs and it has a little music symbol here it's also a fundraiser for our Papa our Performing Arts parents Association uh but this is a gift our gift to you to just just to thank you for all you do for us we appreciate it so everyone's going to get one of these tonight it's up here on the table uh so thank you uh but we have so much more and I'm going to try to get through it quick and uh but what I'm really here for is to share some exciting news from the high school performing arts department uh and we're going to start off with the choir our South Brunswick High School simply about how artists and Music Makers and artists in general uh can shape the world and predict the future and have a force in shaping the future and I have such brilliant not only artists behind me but humans that I've had the pleasure of uh teaching and learning from the last couple years and especially these last couple months with this piece and we really really hope you enjoy We Are The Music Makers featuring Lizzy Newell on vocal percussion and a trio of singers tonight uh singing a uh semi chorus uh s Don uh minaki uh rali and uh Franklin Pet [Music] music we are all and we [Music] are we are M we are sh we are and we are bre [Music] [Applause] [Music] of is [Music] [Music] [Applause] Dre and sing from me [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] uh the next piece we have for you um if you were at the board office yesterday we actually did not perform this piece for you yesterday but you'll hear it tonight um it is called the northern lights and do you recall the one day in New Jersey where we all got to see the Northern Lights wow um I didn't get to see it unfortunately but um I actually got to see it through them so I want you to really listen and just imagine what it was like to experience that light in the sky um if you were so lucky to see it Northern Lights by ol [Music] ch [Music] Christ Christ Christ [Music] [Applause] Christ Christ [Music] [Applause] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Laughter] we [Music] ch [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] for our final piece for you this evening to get us into our holidays as our usual holiday concert tradition to always end our concert home for the holidays and before we perform for you I yesterday we dedicated our wonderful performance at the board office to Mary Anne and to our retirees for a wonderful uh service to South Brunswick and we would I'd like to extend the same uh especially to Barry for his many years of service to South Brunswick High School thank you so much for being a music maker here's [Applause] [Music] outc to the holidays [Music] for the holiday no matter how far away [Music] you if you want [Music] to mil for the [Music] you and he Wasing pania [Music] pumkin atan to Pacific [Music] is the holiday the holid no matter away you if you want to be [Music] happy for theol you can't Bey [Music] have a happy Hol have a happy Hol happy Hol happy Hol [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] thank you so like the song Happy Holidays thanks to as we transition to our next segment let's give our conser chire one more round of [Applause] applause all righty onto our South Brunswick High School music department honors this is where we have a little bit of time to highlight our incredible South Brunswick Viking marching band season and I I tend to get excited and share a lot during so bear with me um our South Brunswick Viking marching man had an incredible competitive season presenting their 2024 show titled hindsight inspired by a quote from Steve Jobs's 2005 Stanford Commencement Address you can't connect the dots looking forward you can only connect them looking back this quote inspired all aspects of the marching bands show this year and the concept reminds us that only in hindsight can we see how our past experiences have shaped our journey and L us to where we are today and further while we don't really know what's ahead we should be encouraged to live in the present # District theme Scott and trust that the dots will connect in the future our competitive season um is unlike many uh we compete in group five open class uh which is the largest group which means ensembles have to have over 95 students I believe we're somewhere in the 120 130 range so we are the large in the largest group of of competition and we're in open class competition which is the most rigorous from a rubric scoring when there's adjudicators at each of our competitions that the marching band attends on the left you'll see there exactly how the marching band is adjudicated in all of those areas music proficiency Ensemble music music effect visual visual effect Color Guard percussion all of those areas are being adjudicated real time as our students put on their incredible show that they put together all right on the right is our competitive schedule and I've usually made this a script but I want to kind of tell a little bit more of a story through it this year starting off in at in Central High School the South Brunswick Viking marching band took first place with a score of 77.2 which is a wonderful way to start off the season by the way because it kind of builds that confidence like first place we're doing great right then we went on to our home show our South brunic High School Tournament of champion Tournament of Champions and I believe it's our 44th annual by the way where we compete in exhibition so we perform but we're not getting a score That's rated as far as placements with others we then moved on to nor pen high school competition where we got fifth place little humbling here but got a score of 81.1 and our score continued to go up then we went to the lwig muser classic which was held at MetLife Stadium where we inched up to third place but got four or five points higher 85.7 now this is the part where I'm going to pause for a second like any competitive sport or team our marching band is no different we're making tweaks along the way we're listening to the judges adjudicator's tapes were changing visuals they're adding in more props the props are becoming more elaborate they're painted different they're adding Little Wings on the back of their uniforms and they're putting new moves where they lean to the side they're they're enhancing things after each competition um if you were at the Hillsboro High School competition you would see some of that come into play because they got first place with a score of 88.1 further increasing their score then it went on we went on to state championships which were actually held at South Brun high school because our facilities are so amazing thank you board of education but at States we got second place but score of 93.3 so we're super happy with the score and super happy with our performance and personally I have to just share a little bit here I was at that competition the states and I kind of felt like we are in first place and that's and I know I'm biased because I'm the supervisor but really we we really took that one I'm just I'm just going to put it out there even even though it was second place it it felt more like first to me so I'm just going to put that and for all those who were in attendance I think you would agree so um it it it was outstanding okay so then we went on to US and's national championships which again were held at MetLife Stadium this one's incredible not everyone goes to Nationals so you kind of get this mix of marching bands from all over kind of like the East Coast Pennsylvania Connecticut Virginia it's like all over there then some of the people in our own back neighborhood are there and some aren't we earned fifth place out of 15 in again group five open so the largest groups in the most competitive aspect of rubrics we earned fifth out of 15 and a 93.6 uh rating score and it was our highest placement since before the pandemic so let's get a clap for that [Music] in normal fashion as a Storyteller I like to kind of go directly to the source sometimes so I spent a little time with um TJ and Josh our our directors and I said tell me kind of what your takeaway was from the season and I'm going to quote them a little bit here um and here's what here's what they both said they said this season our students overcame numerous challenges and celebrated meaningful Milestones showcasing their growth perseverance and passion every step of the way and they also went out to share we have a Young Band this year almost 40% of the members being underclassman so the future is incredibly bright for the Viking marging man that's their words and what I say that is I agree and Bravo to the March man thank you directors all right next is uh kind of from me to you this is kind of like a behind the scenes little look um this is what I like to call um what most don't get to see this is behind our high school kind of where the bus is lined up on the side there and this is what I would consider is a warm-up formation in preparation for competition um that's our brass line I believe there um but something that many won't see in the behind the scenes is this and while I was back there while our March man was warming up each of the sections brass woodwind percussion Color Guard each of the sections had their own kind of chant and like togetherness and like little song they were singing and it was like this huge unique little just for them moment and it just kind of felt a little different this year and for me um this sense of camaraderie and community and belonging is something that we've been hearing a lot from Scott in our themes and from our Board of Education as to what we should instill in our in our kids and our staff to our students um as like what's really important here like what's important in education and it just man it warms my heart that this is what marching band does for our kids who are involved and sends that message of belonging community and camaraderie and it was just a special moment I wanted to kind of share it with you so alongside that comes a lot of thank you so first thank you to our marching manand staff let's give them a clap thank you to our Papa our Performing Arts parents Association which this would not be possible without them thank you to our students who did definitely would not be possible without [Applause] [Music] them but one one a special shout out cuz I mentioned staff here in a thank you um let me actually jump one more someone move my slides around here we go two of our staff members our um percussion caption heads who work with our with your kids and and and our students uh Jacob Ford and Kai Ron quillow in conjunction with our band directors um they felt so strongly about our percussion section this year in the marching band that they submitted to present at our state conference for music education and they got accepted and listen to this not only did they get accepted to bring our kids our battery to perform there for other music educators across the state but look at what the title is It's marching man percussion for the non- percussionist so our staff our students are presenting to people who don't have the skills and what we have which we value so much here in South Brunswick and what a way to give back to the world of education and to others in our own backyard and to present at a state conference it's just wonderful news that I wanted to make sure I was sharing so our staff and our students are going to be presenting at the New Jersey music educators Association in the spring so let's give that a clap [Music] all right next is just a short little clip Mr Brungard I got to give him some props cuz he put this together he always put together just a little clip because maybe you didn't get out to our competitions wait is it long okay um maybe you weren't able to get out to our many competitions um this is just a little clip to kind of give you a little taste of of our theme and what our kids really are capable of which is incredible so I don't know if I press play or if I can hit this button but stay tuned here we go [Music] you can't connect the gospel you can't connect the godsel you can't you can't you can only looking backwards [Music] backwards so you have to trust that the dots connect in your future [Music] future you can't connect the dots forward [Music] you can only connect BS [Music] St [Music] w [Music] sh [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] woo [Music] so we have to trust in something [Music] what [Applause] [Music] you have to trust me something [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] the will down the RO you confidence follow your [Music] [Applause] [Music] and that will make [Music] differ 933 [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] yeah all righty at this time I'd like to invite our board president Lisa Rogers up to come forward to present certificates of accomplishment to our South brunz High School Marching Band drum Majors all right all right here we go our drum Majors please step forward we have aishi chel vagis yamuna and Ariel to we got congratulations and thank you so you guys are great excellent job all righty the next portion of our music honors is um the students who have successfully auditioned into a region Ensemble or all state or all East Eastern and I'd love to uh invite up um our directors Mr Brungard Mr oldum and Mr arenula to recognize their students who successfully auditioned into one of these honors ensembles tell me what you want I do uh for outstanding achievement in region Ensemble auditions uh for region Orchestra ch Caleb ho for choir sfic donj Riley green s Carr chiali Pia oh okay to [Applause] you're is there like a timeout music it's just a rest it's a rest we're in rest I don't know anything about music I just like to listen to it okay that's plent these orders are different I did S I did not get to these I did not do those she's not here okay she's not here okay okay okay uh great moving on still choir uh Franklin Pito oh my God there we go congratulations di sures conratulations and stuti vishwanathan who placed first for alos very good very good you the future who do we have here Savannah all right and we have four band students who auditioned into either a region band or region Orchestra so up first savan Lee in symphonic band playing [Applause] flute Mana cavi also playing flute in symphonic band [Applause] Ria Gupta playing bassoon in symphonic band and Orchestra and manov swam Nathan also playing bassoon in symphonic band [Music] in addition to region ensembles sbhs was honored to have students participate in NJ MBA All State ensembles for outstanding achievement in all state auditions ger [Music] bannery sfic Donan we get Riley green and SE Carr and chiali pandia very good very good and for the first time we have students participating for with acceptance into all Eastern Division ensembles for choir ger bannery sfic donj shali Pia and say her car [Applause] [Music] okay good somebody else you want to close it up I believe that's it uh just real quick students let's give them a huge round of applause [Applause] here just so that everyone understands there's regions All State and the requirement for being an all Eastern is it's you can only audition or even be there from All State you have to be in All State first to even get into all Eastern is that correct yes yeah so it's even like the 1% of the 1% it's like super amazing so only every other year and every other year so amazing all righty um as we conclude our presentation I just wanted to say thank you to uh most importantly our students their families our Board of Education and our music department just for all the support of our Performing Arts in South Brunswick as you can see from the presentation tonight uh it's really incredible but it's only incredible because of all of that support and us working together and uh and we really appreciate it so um thank you and congratulations to all of our [Applause] students all right well turn it back over to president Lisa Rogers amazing job job good job good job on there we go thank you so much um to the entire music department what a phenomenal phenomenal group of children you have um and to the parents and to the parents Association the music uh the band parents Association thank you thank you thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your support um the kids are amazing um it truly truly is it's my favorite time of year um home for the holidays always gets me so it was a beautiful presentation so thank you so much okay moving on we are going to go on to our next presentation oh by the way Mr SE I get to listen to that band every single night my backyard is right up against not right up against I'm down way down welcom Farm Road but I get to hear that every night and my husband and I said outside on the deck having coffee or whatever and it's it's phenomenal because we get to hear it so thank you for your for your treats okay moving on we're going to move on to the um presentation that Miss Blair Ean and Miss Jamie Bower are going to uh present uh the school safety report for the reporting period of uh period number two which is January to June of 2024 and they will also be including the Hib self assessment report for 23 to 24 thank you oh miss Jamie that's right I'm sorry that's okay it yeah she's sick oh I'm sorry please pass on or I will thoughts to her all right good evening everybody I'm Blair Eisman director of programs and professional development and I also serve as anti-bulling coordinator with Jamie Bower and director of Special Projects um and unfortunately she is not able to be here tonight so I'm going to be sharing our safe schools report we are required to report out two times a year specific information related to Hib investigations in the district also going to be sharing our self assessment grades from last year the state requires that we grade ourselves on hi prevention programs so we'll be sharing those and then Scott's going to be sharing some school safety data we are always reporting one reporting period behind so we're talking specifically about January through June of last year the reporting period we're in now doesn't close until December 31st so when I come back in May um we'll report out on what's Happening currently uh this time of year all right so for those that aren't familiar or need a reminder for an incident to be found to be an active Hib there's three parts there's some sort of gesture physical written verbal electronic there needs to be a violation of a protected class and there needs to be substantial impact on the student or their school day so you could see here from um this chart on the left we uh last year January to June investigated 41 different instances and of those 41 13 were found to be violations of Hib and they are broken down by elementary middle and high as you can imagine incidences are reported at schools um quite often and principles are able to make a preliminary determination after some fact finding to decide could this possibly fall under the Hib law if so we're going to investigate if not we're going to handle it under code of conduct or some other way um so even if an investigation isn't handled Under the Umbrella of Hib does not mean that it's not addressed the next chart also just breaks it down by um by month number of Investigations on the left um and then the number of confirmed investigations on the right here you can see the um protected classes I mentioned there needs to be a protected class um so these were the protected classes of the alleged incidents could see the majority um fall under appearance and race ethnicity or ancestry the law does have other other could be anything from um skin condition um other also in this instance um we're using a new platform it's called hibster and we're using this um platform to house all of our investigations and they do have an option under other um it's called No identifiable nature and basically what that means is when we started an investigation at that time the uh the motivation or the protected class wasn't evident at that time so that's why um those others are there for those cases this is just to show you from 2016 to present for the second reporting period January to June kind of our numbers this time last year we investigated about 80 incidents under Hib and this year as we just saw we at about 41 so happy to see a decline blue is the number of Investigations and red is the number of confirmed Hib yes um so the reason for the spike um there was a change in the law where the state um was requiring that we complete it's what's called a 338 form and we were required to fill out this 338 form um when any type of incident came our way um and then had to check off if we were investigating or not so there was just a change in the in the law and that's why we saw that Spike there good yeah come on up so it's just just we learned how to navigate you know the first year something changes you kind kind of you overdo it and then after we were starting to play with it a bit and we realized that some of the things that we were trying to follow the law on we we had options to really do what was more appropriate which was code of conduct and so we were just really better at applying the the new law now which is why you'll see probably more steady if there was a spike now that didn't involve a change in the law that would probably concern us but that Spike that particular spike is associated with a change not with a change of student Behavior necessarily yeah thank you all right I feel like I say the same thing when I come up here and that is that as a district we always believe in being as proactive as possible educating our students building Community to prevent acts of Hib so the next few slides have just some of the many different initiatives and programs that are happening across the district some are in all schools some are in you know maybe middle or high depending on the appropriateness but you could see a variety of activities and clubs and lessons here cares uh next to morning announcements care stands for cooperation assertion responsibility empathy and self-control so really helping our students hone in on those traits last spring we did have a parent Academy for our families in the community on hiw and updates Communications with families the last three their kindness week Super Friends and lending libraries those are specific to Deon and Deans or preschools more support for parents Behavior committees everyone in the district truly plays a role in hi prevention but special thank you to our building and District admin counselors and our anti-bullying Specialists who really lead this work so thank you to them all right as I mentioned when I started we also do have to report out on our results of the Hib self assessment that um we did for our programs specific to Hib for last school year purpose of the assessment is for us to reflect on where are our strengths in this area where might we need to improve the assessment does have eight core Elements which are up there for you so these are the eight different areas that we are scoring ourselves on and there are a number of indicators within each element this is just the first page of the self assessment it's just a brief 35 pages and um it is available online um and I could share if anyone wanted to see it in its entirety all right so we are going to move to the GR here for last year they wouldn't fit on the slid so we put them Jamie actually put them in a spreadsheet for us so you could see across the top each core element a reminder of what what they are and then the maximum points that we can score in each of those categories so I'm going to give you a minute to look at that and then we're going to talk about where I know everyone's eyes went to immediately so you'll see their Dayton and Deans um which last year 2324 which what we're scoring ourselves for that was the first year that they moved to buildings that are solely preschool prior to that they were part of indian fields and Brunswick Acres so the anti-bullying Bill of Rights talks about Hib policy for kindergarten through 12th grade so when we submitted our grades for the 2324 school year we were asked what about Dayton and Deans and so we questioned we explained that they are solely preschool buildings policy says K12 they responded that they do need to be scored um the good news Megan plumber and her crew um have already been doing so much work I wouldn't call it hi I would it's developmentally appropriate for preschool they're talking about kindness how to be Super Friends how to be how to build community so we did score ourselves using the state assessment based off of the work happening at Dayton and Deans and although plenty of amazing things are happening for our littlest Learners um we did fall short um when looking at the state assessment so I'm just going to share with you so you could kind of understand the why um so in certain areas we had to score ourselves zero um there's an indicator under element one for not having a school climate team Dayton and Deans they do have a team that meet regularly to um reflect talk about programs and planning of events and things like kindness week and their training on the pyramid model which is their Seal program um but they technically do not have a school climate team so we had to score ourselves a zero we also had to score ourselves a zero because there wasn't any training for the school climate team that isn't there um element five um we had the score ourselves is zero because we did not appoint an anti-bullying specialist to date and Indians for a preschool and then we had the score ourselves a zero because there wasn't a meeting between the ABS at Dayton and Deans and anti-bullying coordinator under element six we could only give ourselves one point because although we have a process for reopening a case if we get new information there weren't any cases at Daye and ordines to reopen um but we weren't able to give ourselves anything higher than a one element seven um an indicator there we also to give ourselves zero points because there was no evidence that we reported information on hi cases to parents but there weren't any hip cases so those are just some um and hopefully that helps you explain the the difference in numbers Megan Jamie and I have met to talk about what we're doing moving forward um so we do have some plans in place that um we'll be able to report back when we come back in May oh sorry Reggie can you go back to the other slides thank you all right um so I'm going to turn in over to Scott for this portion of the school safety data and then we'll come back for questions here you go sir I would like to thank Blair for being so delicate about how ridiculous the preschool information actually is it is absolutely absurd that they want us to start calling parents when three-year-olds do three-year-old Behavior so I could care less if we score zero next year on that to be honest with you I I don't care what the state wants it is ridiculous it is absurd it is anti-education it is absolutely ridiculous however when we submit the document it keeps getting rejected without us putting preschool in So within about 3 days all that data was done in 3 days that's about what it was done in it was back up we told the we didn't do this last year Well we need a score we didn't do this last year we need a score okay we'll give you a score okay we'll give you a score but the idea of start calling parents at 3 years old to say that your child has committed an HIV or these kids are three they're four they're learning some of them are special needs students I mean this is absolutely absurd so that was my take on what you did but thank you for being so delicate with that and um anyway so here we go with the next stage of this this is another report we do um school safety data system report um in here you're looking at the First Column of type of incidents these are like the more serious level of incidences or confirmed hivs so again just think of that for a minute they're putting in here I I I guess I guess my you know how I feel about this stuff they're putting in here the idea of vandalism and violence with a confirmed HIV for what could be 5y olds in the same category it just doesn't belong there but we have to report it this way so we report it this way um there was a substance abuse um if my memory serves me correct it was a vape it was a vape at Greenbrook it was a child with a vape um not good of course but um that's where we're with that the weapon at Greenbrook was it I think a small a small um kid who forgot a a small blade that was like in a backpack I think it what it was but we take we take it all seriously we're not going to take any chances I'm not trying to downplay that we don't want kids bringing in anything and some cases when we have this with the little guys it's it's it's a mistake it's an accident something they used over the weekend with their parents or something but it's not like someone came in it's just not that um anyway um the next page talks uh about the middle and high school and as you can see when you look at the the thing that it's a weapon at at South I'm actually trying to remember the weapon South I don't I don't really remember what that was it must have also been um a blade of some kind that was seen as a weapon and address even though when we do these things we could find that they were not there was no like Intent no Criminal Intent no none of that you would have heard about that and I don't think I remember anything to do with this really becoming a thing but we still report it that way that's That's just How We Do It um you're looking at substances for you know middle and high school that's that's that's not a alarming number I'd rather it be zero but theide aidea that um this is a big deal for us this is a lot of time and attention here we have three um substance abuse coordinators at the high school and they share a little bit with the middle schools but mostly they're high school and um it's an area but you know it's it's a lot of work a lot of that time it's Vapes uh when we find a vape um they automatic things happen related to testing and having a child test and be um you know have a um a substance test so when we do that we toward them and and that's how it goes so the ones that are not founded are not on there when it's founded it goes on there and that's how that works with the Vapes um should I think what else is on there otherwise it's the suspensions again you know we're working on that we've talked about that again those numbers for six for if you think about the size of the middle school there's over 2,000 kids in the middle school you're looking at 47 independent times of suspension that's over a six-month period that's that's a that's a really not a high number the high school's 87 is uh still it's a lot of kids but we we like that to go down so that's an area we're working on is reducing that 87 um in the way that kind of it's what do you Pro what what constitutes an an in school around of school suspension and that's what we're talking about we actually are working with a a group called gomo on the restorative practice work to try and come up with alternative ways keep kids in school but still provide the appropriate level of of disciplinary and reflection that they need to do that so that's where that goes that's all we got on that right so questions for most probably most likely Blair so the previous slide a category called others right um all the while I was thinking that there needs to be a um uh the need yeah the the others category um the protected class um I was assuming should be obvious uh in order to qualify as a Hib and this is others and I'm not really sure well these are alleged so these were what we investigated not all of them were actually found to be him oh this was just the investigat yes it's important to add sometimes the reason it's not found to be him is because there is no identifiable protected class and therefore even though someone made the claim until you go through the process sometimes you know get to that spot okay and so those six were probably not found investigations I missed the investigation um and the other uh if we can go back to the other slide so vandalism and violence Elementary level what what could that be fist fights kids beating up each other what could that be fortunately we don't have that many kids actually beating up each other there which is good I mean because that that does happen I'm not saying we never have it we have had issues um but yeah it could be that vandalism is pretty much vandalism they could uh someone could uh we had vandalism once at the high school field where someone drove a truck causing a ton of damage that's vandalism someone could do damage break a window write on the bathroom things like that that would be vandalism violence could it could run the Gambit of things but also HIV confirmed remember so HIV confirmed is in that same column they might not have even been that oh it's that's what I'm saying the problem with the reporting system is they put HIV confirmed with violence in vandalism which hi might be but it might not be you know vandalism writing something horrible about somebody on the wall would be vandalism and possibly an HIV right and if it's if it's an HIV that didn't involve violence or vandalism it still Falls in this column [Music] so me question does any board member have any questions to my left or I right Miss Ferrera oh I just wondered about the um the suspension uh figure years like do we know are the majority of them in school suspensions or is there data to reflect yeah I don't I don't actually have that with me I can definitely get that for the next board meeting okay oh shoot but we do have um data exactly on on we can we can disaggregate that suspension in any way by reason uh in school out of school demographics um we do all that right now we're in the middle of actually creating reports on that specific information to work with our uh consult that was one of the areas that we are disaggregating suzan is working on that with Mike Moore on producing all that data so I can we can definitely suzan if you can remember if we can provide that to the board once we provide it to um gomo all right so we'll send that out to you guys thanks you're welcome Tia Miss caric yeah so um are we reporting all sorts of incidents in in this particular report in other words let's take a hypothetical situation like if there is a a little group fight that's happening in a hallway you know that kind of thing does that get reported here yeah a group fight would would get reported yeah and that would get reported under the school safety report correct yeah in Genesis converts to this say it again I'm sorry that gets reported in the school safety report correct yes a a a group fight would get reported okay I I just wondered because you know it's not a HIV but it's like an incident that's happening in right right so again the problem I have with this particular report is they put it in together you it should be HIV confirmed on one column and violence and vandalism or even disaggregated that even they could do that because they're they're very different violence and vandalism are very different in your mind right vandalism could be spray painting and violence to your point could be four children backing you know ganging up on one right and and and it would show up in the same as a confirmed case got it okay yeah anyone else great so just a couple things um first thank you to the staff and the Specialists the HIV Specialists uh there's a lot of requirements that the state puts on you guys and the paperwork is immense um so thank you for that uh also um I just want the public to understand that from the board's perspective when there's a situation that occurs at a school any of the schools um once Scott m Mr feder confirms that the safety of the students and the staff is done that is his priority um and the environment isn't basically in a controlled environment if you will that's when the board is notified if there's a serious situation so I want the public to understand that this is not the only time that we hear this we get our Hib reports um at prior to every meeting and we get a detailed explanation we don't see the child's name so we do we are provided with that information but I want you to understand that that information any incident that's serious enough um for the board to be notified we expect Mr feder and the staff to First protect the students in the staff not to notify us first okay so I just want you to be aware of that um Lisa can I can I add an example yes please so um this week yes at one of our schools there was a incident that took about probably the whole incident took under five minutes but that incident when when when we hear a claim we don't wait to see if the claim is true before we might lock down a situation that would be the wrong way to do it right so in this case there was a claim of a weapon at one of our middle schools and um it was a bright blue red and yellow like water gun yeah that was in the school now again not that we want any of those things brought to school but the part I I have convinced myself we will never control are the people out there that feel what should happen is I should try to create Panic yeah in the public and that is the use of social media someone decided on their own to put out that a gun was found in the school with no context of any kind for it didn't go anywhere which which I'm giving credit to our Community hopefully they're they're realizing like that you know if a if a gun was really found and I mean we would be it's just it's it's I wish there was a way that my words could be heard and then it would magically disappear that no more people would try to you know uh instill Panic without any information or context of any kind whatsoever but I am convinced that will never happen so with that said to what Lisa said I actually forwarded you um the basic note that was sent home to the parents which basically said all it could say right which was there a situation it was handled in minutes and that's the end of it that that's it if you don't get more than that it's because there isn't more than that it isn't because there's hiding and isn't because we want don't want parents to know information um and I know the Panic gets worse uh that was that was before that that that that happened before the the the Wisconsin issue so you know now we know it gets heightened every time after one of one of these happened and unfortunately you know the crazy part of this is there were just a school shooting in Wisconsin and I don't think that was the lead story no and I don't think it really has any I don't think it even has any flow in the new news anymore I think it's kind of over and wow like the idea of kids getting shot in schools is just like oh another another kid got shot in the school interesting for about 5 minutes and then we're going to go on to the next story and and that's sad but I just want I want to reinforce what Lisa said for both the board and the public if there's something to share we're going to share it and uh in the public we can't always share as much as people want but we do share everything we can in in as timely a fashion we can sometimes we can't especially if there's police involved the police control the narrative at that point not us and we are forced to wait and see so that's how that plays out so just all we can ask for is patience when something happens we do try to be as upfront and as transparent as we are able and that's how it goes great and also and a final note hi prevention starts at home so to the community to the parents your involvement in the teaching of your child on how to treat each other is vastly important um you have an impact on your kids so please take a moment and think about how you maybe teach your child of hi pre hi prevention and if there's any further information that you need to support you go to the principal ask the principles of the schools um for guidance you know what you can do what you can say it really does go a long way thank you so much Scott and Blair appreciate your time on this thank you although Jamie couldn't be here I do just want to acknowledge she's retiring tomorrow also right and so I do just want to publicly thank her she jumped into this work with me and she really played a huge part in transitioning us to hibster which really streamlined our investigation process so I do want to thank her um Peter aam will join me in the spring when we do our second report and looking forward to working with him in this capacity Barry thank you for your service Mary and Murphy there aren't enough thank yous I adore you and happy holidays everybody thank you Blair and thank you to Jamie we know you're out there in the universe somewhere so just wanted to pass on our congratulations on your retirement okay and thank you again Mr feder um moving on we're going to move on to board committee and liaison reports um so we will start with Finance uh for any update I know okay so we did meet on the 26th of November uh and in attendance were Mr Nathanson Miss Ferrara our president Rogers Mr palowski and Mr feder um which we actually met um virtually so um and then amongst the topics discussed was the budget calendar we also went over the second question funding um and had a little discussion about that Mr K Mr palowski provided Insight uh regarding the next steps with a failed second question um he entertained questions from members uh that were present um also the committee discussed the rates for labor facility fees supplies and utilities that add up to a rate uh we also discussed the Fe Fe uh the fee structure I'm sorry for outside renters and determine the next course of action which is for Scott and David to meet with the township um also finally we went over the 25 um we we didn't go over it we uh at the time um of the meeting it was brought up about the 25 uh 26 budget and at this time we're expecting cuts to state aid uh atmin will provide an update Us in the near future uh as to next steps on that as well also the budget calendar was to be placed on the next agenda so it is out that's my report Madam president very good any questions for finance committee chair I have are you now can't ask yet you will be able to I promise yeah but but let me do the um public comment yeah being the first one being that we did talk about it on here even though it's not you can come up and ask that question we might not just you know we not we not not might not answer it but it's important for us to hear the question and okay just let me get through the reports first okay our next is policy committee chair is absent today any update from policy committee our our policy committee was to meet uh this evening um we did meet U prior to last board meeting and uh we had a few um updates with regards to cell phones cell phone usage and appropriate AI use um meeting tonight was canceled um so we'll report back out we just did receive an alert from stra sesme so departments and um committee members will all see that uh summary update okay come out in the next few weeks any questions for Mr palowski moving on education committee uh the education committee is scheduled to meet on January 26th 26 26th am I right 26 yes 26 26 January 26th yeah no problem before the board meeting okay and for his final report Mr Nathanson chair of business operations Yeah we actually we haven't had a meeting in a little while the last meeting was uh regarding uh security and uh Mr feder is putting together the questionnaire in the committee so so that I assume there will be one after that any questions for Mr Nathanson I to R trct here nothing okay so it's the 23rd the 23rd is the education educ thank you for clarification please make sure our chair ch um post your minutes on the portal very good okay moving on now we move on to public comments on agenda items um so the Board of Education recognizes the value of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to express themselves on school matters of community interest complete copies of policy 0167 which govern this portion of the meeting are available to the public at the a Auditorium entrance online or by contacting the board office to permit the fair and orderly expression of comments we ask that participants be recognized by the presiding officer and preface comments by announcing his or her name place of residence and group affiliation if appropriate and by completing the sign and Sheet excuse me please print legibly or we may be unable to document your name for the permanent record Mr palaski any registered voters uh excuse me register speakers we have some students who would like to speak during this public comment section we felt it most appropriate uh so if I could have D shesh up to the first public comment um to speak and her group of uh Affiliates are we giving them are we giving them more than three minutes are we giving them more than three minutes they go okay well I just want to make this statement that's why not the not the three minutes okay I just was checking that's all no not more it's got you more years mer just hi I hope everyone's having a great evening we'll try to keep this short um my name is Magna uh my name is kapati my name is arushi Pau uh hello my name is urja k hi my name is isana dudy hi my name is Dia SES and we're beyond the burnout the burnout um beyond the burnout yeah thank you we're part of a mental health promotion for HOSA and um our goal is to create a spirit week with our advisers Miss Donna marine and Miss Perry Orlando and um our campaign is trying to help people recognize and prevent burnout and as students that have like experienced burnout before we would like to help people do this our first step in improving mental health of everyone is Unity so we would like to implement a districtwide mental health Spirit Week on the week of January 27th to January 31st um as January is mental Wellness awareness month and and this week is also a month where many students will be overall by midterms and tests and teachers in grading them as well so everyone is just working very hard and it's just um they'll feel very stressed and we hope that this Spirit Week will will help everyone be uplifted by uniting them and um overall make them feel more motivated our spirit week is meant to bring students together but not only students we also want to bridge the age gap between teachers and students um and this Spirit Week allows us to do that because everyone can participate and um everyone can be United in the face of burnout so on Monday students and teachers dread the long week um ahead and the stress that comes along with it this is known as the Monday blues and to combat this um students and teachers will wear um warm colors uh like red orange and yellow to stand up against the most Dreadful day of the week and um to battle the blues we must stay warm so as Tuesday arrives um students are finally like relieved to overcome Monday and by matching Sorry by matching their clothing and twinning with a friend they can basically just like unite and they can put on a stance that like we are preventing burnout and it can overall just um like highlight the importance of having a support system so to win be a twin during the middle of the week also known as hump day it's important to be strong and show awareness for something that people struggle with every day anxiety since teal represents anxiety awareness teachers and students should show support for their peers by wearing teal clothing in order to heal wear teal I like that we are almost at Friday which everyone knows is the best day of the week so to embrace the idea of taking things lightly instead of overstressing the little things we will all wear our laziest comfiest outfit have no sweats Friday is almost here on Friday the week is officially over stress and pressures relieved and it's time to celebrate the end of Mental Health Awareness Week by wearing your bright clo colors these bright colors represent the joy of officially successfully getting through the week Burn Right not out thank you good good job stay right there don't move does anybody have any questions I have a quick question for you um are you just looking to do this at the high school level or are you looking to do this to bring it down to elementary and middle so we were planning to do it at a district level so that it brings more awareness to anxiety and stress and burnout in just all the all the things that affect the mental health of any type of students elementary through high school are you going to include the parents because we're pretty stressed whatever you want well you know that um Mr feder has a tagline in most of his it's all of his um District Communications and it's being present is a gift to yourself and others and I think that being present going through things that some kids are going through is extremely important to help others get through what they're going through so I commend you all for bringing this to our attention and we will take a look at doing what we need to do to support that so hopefully let me just ask Mr feder a question um do we want to have anything at the next meeting saying that we can move forward with this or you have to look at this further yeah so so we we'll what we'll do is I'll speak to the schools and see if that's if that week works if there's anything that's conflicting everyone's thoughts get their ideas and then um I'll be able to get back to you one of you did email me I believe can you just so the best thing to do is set an email like send an email tonight but hit hit schedule send so it comes to me on January 6th that way you don't have to remember to do it but then I'll I'll see that like around 8:00 in the morning on January 6th and then I will that will trigger me to make sure that I follow through and then get back to you on that by that week Fair okay yeah once Mr feder does his administrative stuff um then he'll bring it to us and uh we can then go ahead and make a decision but I appreciate the entire board appreciates what you've done tonight and brought awareness to a very very important subject thank you do we have any other scheduled speakers no other no other registered speak so I'd like to open it up to the floor if there's any um people in the audience that would like to make a public comment um on any of the agenda items please proceed if you can just um couple things so there is a three minute time limit um Mr palowski will give you about a 15sec wave um and if you could just announce your name who you're affiliated with and if you don't mind um just spelling your name so that it can go on the permanent record thank you minut hi my name is adithia Patel uh spelled a d t a a last name p a t e l I am Senior at sphs and um you know one thing I just wanted to bring up to the board was the idea um which is something that I'm seeing personally from my end you know I think I'm someone who relatively you know has some credibility in the fact of you know just being aware of school policy you know budget policy District policy um you know I am I was elected you know president of um JSA and now uh it's our called South bunsic debate um and one thing I kind of wanted to discuss was the idea that um I I believe our students are not really you know too aware of the excuse me of the budget situation um that happened I mean last year it was a huge thing I mean we had you know students you know um who came here and also we had students you know who were talking about how we should email um some legislators and I feel that this year that attention is you know pretty much gone and um you know I'm asking people in the history clubs asking people you know who are very intellectual you know very qualified and um you know to know all this stuff that and um I think the fact of the matter is they don't really know the issue and you know don't really know you know what's still happening with our you know budget situation um and I really think that you know what's the solution to that I believe that the board um of Education to set an email or you know to the principles and I believe the principles should be sending that um to all our students and parents you know so we really know what's going on because the fact of the matter is you know um even teachers you know when we we're talking they don't really know as much as U at least I would say is appropriate considering you know um last year you know we're looking at a belief if I'm not mistaken you know a $6 million cut so I think that's really all I had to say thank you very good thank you yes I was going to ask you if you could y so the interesting part is last year you didn't hear about any of this until around January February right the reason is is because until there's a um a decision made by the governor which is in February yes none of this really starts so there is nothing new since the last presentation I gave in July okay that's why they haven't heard anything new yet so there's the process that happens is uh the governor gives an address okay within two days after the address they have to provide us with our state aid numbers what I did announce at the end of last year which is no different is that every year with a 2% cap on the budget you start with a deficit every year no matter what happens to state aid okay what we don't know yet is what are we really looking at yet there right now there are funding bills in place there are meetings happening there's a lot going on but nothing to report other than to say there's a lot of stuff going on that has no actual um staying how at this minute in other words there's no bill that's changed anything okay there's nothing yet but unfortunately I I pretty much we promise that come January February depending on how things move we'll be right back in the mix again with reports letters home and all of that but just so it's not that we have kept anything out okay there's nothing new to report and last year you didn't hear a word about this until probably around February so it just feels like that because you heard so much like over a short period of time for four or 5 months this is pretty much all I talked about yes yes and then what happens it goes into a lull because the legislature stops there are recent bills but again like I said they're not nothing's happened yet okay and until that happens it's kind of hard to tell people well we don't know what to tell you so right now at status quo the 2% cap still exists nothing has changed hopefully I'll be able to report positive news next year instead of waiting on always negative news okay um but that's the reason just to share that with you so I guess my question to you is you're saying that nothing was passed or something that you don't say that there's anything really appropriate to report there's nothing there's nothing has been passed nothing has changed we don't know the numbers because we don't know those numbers until the governor decides upon them okay um and anything in a bill related that would change funding formula funding law is nothing new since uh the last time I spoke oh so next time you would uh simply you know report to the parents and that would be for the uh 2025 2026 school year or would that be for it it'll be for the 25 26 school year nothing's going to change for this school year that budget is struck already yes yes but um a lot goes into the preparation for the 2526 okay just we can't really start until something in funding changes or we get state aid numbers so the process is always like a late January February through generally May last year it went all the way into July understood but usually it's over by May we've struck the budget we've shared the news whatever is happening has been out there um this year we're also going to be looking at a a um excuse me a survey specific to certain categories in the budget so we can get from the community what they the value prioritization okay so but that's also that's when you'll see a letter for me and I don't have to send it to the principal to send out I can send it out to actually everybody to keep it nice and clean and know where the information goes understood all right all right thanks so much for coming out thank you just a really quick point I what you brought up was very very important and I commend you for doing that um in we do a board's Corner every month and we attach it to miss Murphy's um letter that goes out on Thursdays I was actually going to speak to Mr feder about this for January because the budget process will start to kick off um to show the community the the not the process necessarily but the calendar um so that people begin to understand the process and the timing behind the um the budget process so I think your your point is spot on and it's very timely yeah I think one thing I just propose maybe some you know a little bit more Simplicity o I completely agree with the it's just more reporting entirety of the thing but I think um maybe just some some a little bit more Simplicity in the emails will help with our students just kind of being you know more aware of what's going great thank you appreciate that when just to follow up real quick with this because you you skipped over lers on uh I was at a 2hour meeting with yeah one second one second let me let me just back that up hold on so I did not go to the liaison um so I do have to do the liaison report I do apologize for that I did skip that so hold if you could just hold on for one second I just want to close out the public comments just one second okay so just um thank you I appreciate it is anyone else in the audience um that would like to make a public comment okay seeing none I will close out that section of the B of the agenda and I will request that we back up very quickly and if there's oh yes goodbye thank you if there's any um updates from board members regarding liaison Mr Nathanson yeah so last Saturday I was on a 2hour plus uh legislative committee uh meeting for New Jersey school boards uh they had two uh assembly members one was from education uh the I will be sending out tomorrow to the entire board I just got all the minutes in the backup from that committee uh and Mr feder too regarding legislation that is in the hole waiting to to uh get to the committee so it can be uh released and hopefully passed there's a lot of good legislation that are sitting there also the long serving uh assembly woman uh that uh was the education chair has uh recently uh ran for County Clerk and Camden she has left uh I'm in Communications with uh some of the top assemblymen I also spoke to the speaker the other day because it's very important that they pick someone that actually has some knowledge for them to move forward since we are losing one of the best a for Education she was a former School Board member uh for a long time she became an assembly woman she was assembly woman for like ever Y and now she's the county clerk of Camden so we need someone in that seat I also spoke to Senator goal who is the Senate side and he's keeping his hands in to who uh gets appointed so hopefully we know that that uh shortly and I'll be able to tell the uh board and uh Mr feder who that's going to be thank you any other liaison updates okay thank you um Madam president I do have an update but if you mine I'd like to share it at the next meeting because of the time that'd be awesome thank you so we'll hear from you on the next meeting thank you for that okay um moving on to Old business there is no old business or new business at this time so the next agend item is the consent to agenda review and walk through oh I'm going to ask for a new business doc item yes so um putting it on his new business um because it's going to be coming and it's going to be something the board's going to have to pay attention to um very clearly over the next few years oh yeah um there is we have we're looking for an update right now on housing so uh and Suzanne pointed this out the other day just to kind of go over this so thank you Suzanne um just so you're aware and I want to make you aware of this there are currently 3,177 units in the hopper for South brunwick so that is a lot now those units range from town mostly the vast majority are town homes or apartments there's only a very very few single family um I believe this number of single family are 90 out of all of those 90 out of 3177 they range from uh one to four bedrooms in the apartments in the town homes and they run the Gambit of all the areas from Ridge Road to uh other side of 27 everywhere they're everywhere um so what we what what David is going to be doing probably right after the break I assume Dave is reaching out and trying to get another we're looking for we're looking for the answer to this question how many units can we estimate might be occupied by July 1st 2025 and then 2026 for each of these areas because um what what we need to do and this is this is upsetting the apple cart uh as you know we put out a request for interest in K5 uh configuration I I would be shocked if we do not have to redistrict the elementary world I would be shocked in the next 12 to 24 months I would be shocked um the reason is as for example the North umberland South Brunswick Center on North umberland with 1776 units as that continues to get built out that is going to impact there's no way one school can one Elementary School can handle those numbers so you have to do something you can't just you can't bus send four different school buses to one neighbor neighborhood to bust them to four different locations you can't afford to do that so this work in the K5 configuration is going to be this is a big piece of it is the enrollment projections based upon the housing developments so um David will be working with the township uh to get specific answers and they're estimates because the township isn't going to be able to predict exactly but we want to know what the phase of each of these where are they uh what's the likelihoods so that we can get an idea because as early as September 25 we might have to make tweaks small tweaks to to the enrollment to deal with this um and this is going to be ongoing and the problem you're going to face as a district is there's law on when you can even go to referendum yeah on building and building takes probably three years from start to finish at least three years by the time you're able to go to that discussion and see if you need to build you will hit a point where there will be overcrowding in the schools the need for um trailers and decisions you won't like the best way to handle this is Extreme proactive measures that's thinking ahead it's working with our community being transparent about every all of it and that's going to start with this K5 conversation and because that's where it's going to have the most impact it doesn't have any the high school doesn't really get impacted on configuration and the middle schools are pretty much are going to this one or this one it's not it's not the same uh issue but those two schools you know will have impact but the bottom line is right now today we have room we have room for a good number of this um we probably have room for 1,500 students it'd be a little crowded but we have room without having to build however 3,100 units will produce more than 1,500 students it's only 700 minutes basically and um when all that is going to happen there are different stages of where these things are right now some of them are being built right now one of them we already have students from and I would think by the end of the year based upon some of the building we might have students from two SE two different places it's possible right now we definitely have from one that's the one in um North North umberland um again there's some that have just been approved with no groundbreaking yet no no finalized plan but we've also seen how some of these things go from nothing to something very fast um the zoning I know Barry's uh sits on zoning and no I on planning sorry um and you know these things are you know this Township has fought the fight against all of this and they've lost some they've had to you know settle some I guess but it's it is what it is the town you know when you hear about this don't be like why is the township doing this the South Brunswick Township council is not doing this they are not the culprit here this is the state law New Jersey not federal New Jersey uh mandating certain building so these things are going to happen it's question of when we are trying to get a handle on the when so that you can be prepared to make decisions that are not fun I'm giving you this in advance warning it will not be fun the r-word of redistricting is not fun no one wants to have their student move from school a to school B you'll have to make some hard decisions and I'm just want to give you this update uh Dave is going to send out our spreadsheet that was divid the spreadsheet was created by um um Dr grip who we paid last year remember for a study and uh that was a year ago now so we need an update on all these measures here and the only people that can do that for us is the township Jill uh who is one of our miracle workers she is into this and she probably can give us a good idea but it's not the idea we need we need the township to give us information estimated occupation by this date and this date to start that's about as far as we could even expect them to have an idea and uh we're going to have to use that data to really looking look hard at this so we're not going to be in a position of of overcrowding one school and not handling that properly so putting it out there yeah so just so we were at a planing board meeting the other night uh so the board understands that come January I will be the the next Vice chair planning board uh I spoke to the uh director of planning uh Mr Campbell uh I also had a conversation with Brian bidlack who's the former planner the current Township manager regarding this because I you know you you and I brought you brought that up before uh they are going to work on the numbers and I'm going to continue to push them because because it it not only affects the schools it affects what we do on the plan board it affects what's happening ony board and such there were there are a bunch of things that have like just been approved within months so I assume those like the conversion of yeah uh a major the Sino Hotel so that's so like sin hotel is not on our list oh okay and that's what no but that's that's that's the point we want our spreadsheet ask for are there any other developments anything else that we need to know so more than likely it's more than 3177 but we need the township who has this information we're school we educate kids we don't do this work but the township does and it's a partnership that that that we'll engage with them so they can keep us up-to-dated so we know what to do and just to follow up what you said to the board and anyone that's listening at home the township was the last Township in the state of New Jersey fighting the affordable housing members hard okay we were Court constantly and it was basically we got to a point and we got lower numbers but it's still not great unfortun all affordable housing no no so uh on each of on each of these developments we actually have the breakdown of um bedrooms which ones are affordable like how many two bedrooms are affordable two bedrooms are market market price we have all that okay that's on the spreadsheet um yes everything that we know is on this one spread sheet it was div again we didn't we didn't i' like take credit for it we didn't do that this was done by a demographer but any updates to this are going to need to be a regular occurrence between David and the township so that we stay up to speed on what's going on well even even the builders a lot of the builders didn't want to do this this is again like Scott said it's the state because obviously they make more money on market value units so what they did is they have a percentage of market value that they're they're renting for instance at maybe $33,000 a month and then there's one and two bedrooms that are affordable housing for a lot less right so that a that's the nature of the Beast there's a formula a state formula that gets applied to all this but so so how I'm sorry I'm sorry this is something that makes me a little nuts how now Barry you're on the planning and Scott you're the superintendent Dave you're the ba that you know connects with the township how does a a citizen of South brunsw find all this out as opposed to driving down the street and go oh my God where did that come from like how do we get to know that there's 3,100 up there so we we in all honesty uh I can't answer for the township it would only be the township it would not be the school district you need to attend town counc I'm only I'm reporting because of the impact the impact it will be to budget and remember we've survived some of these budget decreases because of enrollment if enrollment stops decreasing and the 2% stays the same and they even take more state aid or even they keep state aid flat the impact is going to be far greater than what we've already felt it's we're going to be fighting again we well so to answer your question Laura all you got to do is go on the PIP web website all the agendas for both zoning and planning are on there prior and but right now most of the stuff that the planning board is getting is commercial oh is it okay okay does anybody have any question done already no other questions here so I have just two things um should this be part of the shared services committee or from your perspect and is it too early to determine that but is there a need and maybe you want to think about it it's a I just want to put it out there is there a need for any separate committee associated with the redistricting or where you are at this point so answer to your first question um absolutely not as far as shared service meeting okay and the second one you should pick an existing group probably operations to um support the committee structure work on this I don't think you're at the point now where you need separate a separate a separate group all right so I'll ask then the chair right now of um so Dave you know any update that you could provide to the business operations committee that can be reported back would be very good okay um and at this point we shall keep housing update or we come up with a different term for it just be old business um as old business enrollment enrollment okay so it'll still it be enrollment will be added to new old business and we'll expect updates each uh meeting if there isn't any that's fine of course but it will remain as old business until such time it no needs no longer needs to be any other questions for Mr feder on that no all right we're good all right Mr pal palowski excuse me consent to genda review please consent agenda [Applause] review consent agenda review we have our business board operations we have a bills list some financials some transfers we went through our um tax sheltered programs and we updated our participating investment providers you can see in uh 14 that list and the services or the options they provide we have a budget calendar we're approving we're accepting official certification of election results we are approving a parental contract we have our Hib self assessment school district grades that we saw our presentation this evening we're approving that presentation and those numbers we have an athletic shared service agreement with our hockey teams with uh North Brunswick um we're approving a reappointment of uh Lori uh was that budoo budoo to serve on the south brunsick Township Commission of Arts uh Professional Service with Baya nurses that's an improvement of a not an increase of a not to exceed for nursing Services um extension of Professional Services again with students for with special needs for drug testing psychiatric vows we're approving an agreement with the uh New Jersey survey platform um for this is um it's between Ruckers and University and South Brunswick school district for a climate Improvement plan and service Sur it uh provides us access to a database that allows us to validate School climate and a survey we have a harassment intimidation bullet reports we have a resolution for travel related expenses reimbursements and student field trips and that is your consent agenda any questions for Mr Bowski if you could also just um when you have a chance just side to bar here could you just send out the updates for the general funds since we haven't had a finance committee meeting to the board so that they we could see what the status is on the funds like general fund 10 that'd be helpful any questions general fund 11 general fund 11 sorry fund 10 your Revenue fund 11 Revenue fund yeah Revenue expense funds any other questions all right so I need a motion and a second for consent agenda please motion Miss hernandz motion second Mr oh I got a one down here sorry Mr Krishna second um roll call please sorry Miss Julie Farrar accept Miss Laura Hernandez uh yes but I abstained from a13 .13 Miss DEA carthic yes uh Alicia is absent Mr rajer Krishna yes Mr Mike Mitchell yes but aain uh from item a 1.3 page 9 uh Dr Mr Barry Nathanson yes Dr Smith Raj yes Mrs Lisa Rogers yes motion carries thank you sir actually Mrs Deepa carthic did you vote Yes I got you all right very perfect thank you mixed up on my boxes no problem thank you motion carries thank you sir all right next uh is the public comments this is the second opportunity for the public to comment in any matter do we have any members who appr registered for the second comments Mr palowski none none are there any audience members who wish to make a public comment in this section seeing none we will close this section of the agenda for second opportunity for public comment please note that our next scheduled board meeting is set for Thursday January 9th 2024 I'd also like to welcome lordes as um Mr feder's new assistant we welcome you and we look forward to working she's been overlapping with murf and I think murf's been training for her how to torment me yes good good I'm going to miss hearing hey murf Lisa wants to know so I'm going to expect to hear Hey Lord so we welcome you and good luck to your new position May I have a motion in a second to adjourn move move to moot uh motion is hold on guys I gotta do that move to motion is Dr Raj second Mr Nathanson as his final second all in favor any Nays on behalf of the Board of Education I would like to wish the community a very happy healthy winter break and here's to a bright and successful 2025 good night everyone [Music]