that I will show you [Music] everybody ready the meeting of the South h00 and Regional Board of Education is called to order adequate notice as required by the open public meetings Act was provided on December the 6 2023 by posting the notice with the respective Clerks of the city of lamberville burough of Stockton and Township of West dwell and advertised in the hunting County Democrat and the Trenton Times newspaper I ask everybody to stand for the flight United States the rep it stands Nation God indivisible liy for all here Martin Dennis here here Frank Keys here Mor here Johnny Todd Marino here uh good evening welcome welcome um we have a uh I see we have a presentation on the agenda I'm excited to see um the ballet students here this evening um you want to I'm going to ask introduce principal konas who will introduce our performer to good evening good evening on behalf of lamberville public school it is my pleasure to introduce to you Roxy ballet but before they begin thank you to the organization of young audiences and the LPS PTA for supporting and funding the Roxy ballet to work with our second grade students and I want everyone here to know and understand that ballet is more than just Movement we have learned such things that pertain to culture and confidence and self-esteem so I could not be more proud of our second grade team I would also like to thank our outstanding second grade team Miss Kenny and Miss kuchi take it way Roxy so what we're gonna do is out to your audience and what you're going to do is present your solo that you created okay using those powerful words that describe who you are so that you can show the audience how you can communicate with your body and let them know how amazing you are the mus let's figure this out do you think can [Music] ice yeah it's ready our pose and ready travel [Music] [Music] [Music] go to your partner find your partner for with [Music] for our community birthday [Music] CH go [Music] go [Music] and while um you saw kind of like maybe a lot of second graders with a lot of feelings I think over the course of the 12 week 12 Fridays I went was with them they were able just to learn a lot about the Art of Dance how they can use their body as a way to communicate to share um we went and we took uh the theme as being community so they had to go and create movement based upon who they are they had to create a duet which you did with Kito about your family and sharing and then at the end them in their family how they show up in a community and what our community is and you want to share some of the words because I think this is very power powerful what were some of the words that you chose about your community together togetherness car caring helpful helpful what else was your community you remember anything else together are we brave because of that yeah all right so thank you just so much and thank you um or school board for recognizing that dance is a very viable part of a child's education St ter yes yes Tera yes well he was well yeah Stephen and mat were probably pretty close to yeah good evening everyone it's an honor and a privilege to present to the board of education for recognition our 2023 2024 class of retirees each retiree has demonstrated excellence an incredible work ethic dedication and professionalism during their career in the South Hunter Regional School District they've done an outstanding job supporting and servicing students staff parents and our community I'm going to ask my administrators to come up and say a few words about each one of our retirees and then I'm going to ask our retirees to come up make their way around shake hands with the board and then we have a little gift for you here before you leave um not all of our uh retirees could attend this evening but we are going to acknowledge each and every one of them by saying a few words so we'll start out first with Mr Miller from West HW good evening um the West mwell is very proud and uh honored to present to our retirees and I went in alphabetical order so you could fight with yourselves about the order later uh first we have Chris Carbone Chris Carbone's career at West Amell School has had a permanent positive impact on so many Wildcats in her 30 years Chris has held many different titles has led countless projects and has always been a resource for our staff she received the honor of Governor's educator of the year in the 2015 2016 school year in my years as principal Chris has always been a helpful collaborator and a wealth of knowledge I will miss our talks together both professional and personal and all the great stories you have always shared about your students students on behalf of our entire School Community I would like to wish you all the best with retirement next we have Beth Sergeant Beth has always been a professional with an unwavering commitment to her students and colleagues she has been a model for High student expectations during all of her 28 years at West dwell School Beth received the honor of Governor's educator of the year in 200920 school year she has been a great mentor to many sixth grade colleagues and has left a mark on so many staff and students I will always remember all the sixth grade fun we had together Museum hopping in Washington DC surprise visitors at the monument tour and all all of the sixth grade promotions Beth on behalf of myself and our entire school I wish you all the best in retirement finally Carol Williamson who's still at school see you tomorrow uh Carol has been an exemplary par power professional at West Amwell school for the past 27 years Carol like the other two has received the honor of Governor's educational professional of the year in the 201627 school year her enthusiasm and creativity are evident in her ability to engage with her students Carol has also been an asset to our school Community as a leader and collaborator with other West Amwell teachers and power professionals she never hesitates to lend a hand join a group or guide new staff I am grateful for your willingness and enthusiasm and in taking on some of our most challenging roles your successes with our students are unparalleled on behalf of our school myself and our entire School Community I too wish you the best in retirement next our direct director of people Services Dr James nay Smith good evening everyone we want to wish Miss Julie Aspen a great and restful retirement we congratulate Miss Julie Aspen on her retirement in December 2023 she has a jump on some of you right now Julie was a dedicated and Valu staff member of the South hunteran Regional School District for 35 years Julie developed and then shared her expertise as a teacher coach and learning disabilities teacher consultant Julie was also a leader for her peers and a willing mentor to staff who are new to the profession we wish Miss Asma success in her retirement and all of her future endeavors as she continues to share her vast experiences with various organizations next principal mcnut good night Heather Damron is an exceptional educator whose passion for teaching commitment to Student Success has greatly impacted our school Community throughout her 19-year tenure at South hunon High School Heather has consistently demonstrated an unparallel commitment to fostering intellectual curiosity and creativity amongst her students her passion for the English language is notable igniting a love for Learning and self-expression in every classroom interaction I personally had the pleasure of working alongside Heather for 15 years and throughout this time I've witnessed firsthand her dedication and Innovative approach to teaching she possesses a deep understanding of the English language and literature and has a remarkable ability to inspire students to explore analyze and appreciate the Power of Words Heather is not only a skilled instructor but also a compassionate Mentor who invests time and effort in nurturing the holistic development of each of each student she actively listens to students concerns offers guidance and support and celebrates their achievements instilling confidence and self-belief in their abilities she is known for her unwavering support and mentorship always going above and beyond to ensure the success and well-being of her students Heather has dedicated countless hours making South hunon a special place to learn she has been the adviser to our school news paper thespian Club GSA and drama club to name a few she brought us the belljar project The Great Gatsby and the Day of Silence years of students remember their shoe box project where Heather got to know what was important to each of her students and their lives she exemplifies an out the qualities of an outstanding educator passion expertise empathy and dedication her impact on students extends far beyond the confines of the classroom shaping Young Minds in inspiring a love Al learning that will last a lifetime Heather will be dearly missed here at South Hunton I wish her well in retirement thank you next from LPS principal K jonis good evening again unfortunately all of my professionals were unable to make it but they certainly I'm sure wanted to be here some are already enjoying their retirement Miss sasman Miss sasman was a power professional that always brought passion to her work she absolutely loved themes pick a theme and she was there she would go big she would always make special events even more special for all of her students Miss sasman has a warm heart and she was always willing to help wherever was needed we wish her happiness and relaxation miss Tom Linson miss Tom Linson is happily still with us and will be with us till the last day of school again it's unfortunate she was unable to attend Miss tobinson has many years in education over 30 with us at South it has been about 15 years and Miss Tomlinson has been absolutely amazing she is a strong par professional who is always student centered she has made such an impact on not just the students but the colleagues in which she works she will absolutely be missed we wish her again happiness and relaxation Miss Dumas Miss Dumas is a teacher of special education M Dumas has always had a learning focus on all students that really encompassed creativity Miss Dumas brought creativity to everything at LPS she continues to be with us and will be until the last day of school bringing all that she can think of our way I am confident that whatever Adventure is in store for Miss Dumas it will include freedom of expression and creativity there is no stopping Miss Dumas we wish her happiness and relaxation and then we have our business administrator Mr hars I'm here to congratulate George Hunton unfortunately George could not be here tonight but regardless the district would still like to express our GR gratitude for his hard work service and dedication over the past 10 plus years to south hunon regional in those 10 plus years he has overseen countless projects large and small his leadership and commitment have greatly contributed to the smooth operation and continuous Improvement of our facilities through his efforts he created a safe efficient and welcoming environment for everyone in the organization his expertise and institutional knowledge have been invaluable to us as he moves into retirement know that his impact is efforts will not be forgotten we wish George a fulfilling and joyful retirement our retirees want to make their way out into the hallway maybe we can get a group shot out there why don't we just have a five minute recess memb we can talk five minute recess we can get a picture back someone that heard how are you conratulations I guess right excited but you'll be great what so hopefully we can get together yeah yeah whenever I mean even if it's not like Sumer okay it's been a busy year with Grant yeah yeah hopefully we can continue that Trend next year [Music] I actually have working with you you for coming excellent excellent it is our new laf and are we calling it something else are we G is the name changing I don't think so not what tell me yet is something for them to consider yeah she everybody what's that you got three minutes two minutes have a clock on the screen see you cut thing well I was I heard my son told me last night to meeting said he said no it is I'll pretend I okay sorry my kid was here my kid was here told him he wasn't I said he won't be driving anywhere for the rest of the week if he's missed exactly good night thank you congratulations sleep in all right so we'll thank you very much good night you guys thank you um we will resume our uh resume our meeting um or it is H we were just discussing up here apparently today with Senior Skip Day and uh it is beautiful outside so it is hard to blame a 17 or 18y old for not showing up to school board meeting so we will not have a student representative report this evening so we do have dedicated PTO folk and PTA folk who are here so I will ask if they oh yes I'm sorry before we there was one one teacher who was not here tonight who is retiring is leaving our district um is Miss Bogman who is a teacher here at the high school phenomenal teacher here at the high school and and Miss mcnight is going to say a few words about so um I'd like to say that I've also worked with Kim palagon for the past 15 years and um I was very happy for her as uh she moved on as her husband um received a job in Texas and she decided to retire here from South hunon so as I'm very happy for her I was very sad to see her go um she was the epitome of the the power of patience and understanding um with her students um she never gave up on any of her students um she always had a a way to figure it out or to reach a student to explain it a little different and um her time was always dedicated to to to her students and making sure that they felt supported um successful and um heard um she was a class adviser for many years um and instilled the love of Disney amongst all of her students um any senior class uh where Mrs Bogden was the adviser um they all knew that she was an extreme fan of Disney and knew that going to Disney with Miss Bogden would be the experience of a lifetime for them um she is sorely missed however um in the hallways um students still ask uh you know or say things that Mrs Bogden would say because she was always rational she was always um understanding and uh had a way of of of compromising with students so that they felt valued and their opinions um in the classroom I I've never met somebody that had such a passion for history and a way of explaining it to somebody who you know you know would put things together but she would she would be able to explain it in a way that made it fun um and made you want to learn more um organization um as well I learned even um co- teing with Mrs Bogden throughout the years different organizational tools that I still use today um in which she instills on our Stu she instilled here on of our students in South hunon so I hope she's doing well in in Texas uh she's dearly missed and uh but we wish her well in retirement thank you thank you Mr M um so with that it's PTA PTO up okay um this is I'm Jessica Harding and I'm GNA read um the LPS ptas um their wathon has just wrapped up and it raised a little over $3,000 um they want to congratulate the kindergarten for raising the most overall it's pretty exciting um the PTA will provide that grade with an ice cream party um future appreciation week was a success thank you to the LPS parents for providing snacks the PTA sponsored a breakfast from Panera and a lunch from Chive um field day is scheduled for next Friday May 31st at Brierwood day camp and then on to the West Mall um our Mega 5050 just wrapped up also um we raised $4,560 and our winner won um $2,280 it's not as much as we did last year but it's pretty good chunk of change um as I said our Mega 5050 ended on Friday May 10th and the winning ticket was was pulled by four of our top selling students our winner was Nicole Claus from Lambertville who used to be a school board member so that's pretty exciting um we have really scaled back our fundraising efforts we rely really heavily on the mega 5050 and our kids night out events so we really appreciate everyone who supported those events um teacher appreciation week was a huge success we did a breakfast a sound bath a snack day and a lunch in on Friday um cooked by our amazing committee thank you to everyone who donated items to and thank you to my committee who works so hard all week it's a lot and they did a great job um we also worked with the LPS PTA to organize a snack day and a luncheon at the middle school high school so thank you to everyone who donated items to that was greatly appreciated our next kid night kids night out event is Friday June 7th from 6:30 to 900m in the multi-purpose room and then this Wednesday we have another reorg meeting um at 6:30 p.m. at Lambert from on location on May 22nd um so if you're interested in the future of the PTO and what it's going to look like we really want people to come we want to hear what you have to say and um we'd also like if it's possible for maybe some administrators to get together and give us an idea of what your expectations are because we're so used to the events that we're used to sponsoring and things that were past and we just would like to know like what the future holds for for the PTO and and what we would be responsible for moving forward um our field day is June 12th with a rain date of June 14th and save the date for our end of the year foam dance party it's going to be in the front parking lot at West anwell um June 14th from 6:00 to 7:30 and then we never have a June meeting but we have so much going on in June that we weren't able to have our fiscal meeting in May so we are going to hold um a member meeting June 3rd um in the library at West Nal and that's all thank you thank you thank J hi my name is Megan cinkus and I'm here on behalf of the laf um so just a few updates for you there are some changes to the executive board beginning in September uh Janelle and Wendy will be stepping back from their President and Vice President positions uh myself I be stepping up for the president position uh Kate marinski will be taking on the vice president position we have some big shoes to fill um but we're excited uh both uh Kim and Tom will be staying on to kind of keep some continuity and so you know we're looking forward to exciting uh 2024 as we step into these roles um secondly um we love hearing from the students from all the grant Awards uh most recently we heard from them on the Hamilton trip so keep those things coming keep the grants coming keep the feedback coming we love hearing it we try to you know advertise that um when we can so um glad they're enjoying it and we love the we love the feedback um next we have completed our review of the senior and summer Awards and we will be presenting those in a few weeks and then lastly we are um planning is underway for golf day this year in the fall um the tenative dates are scheduled for September 29th and September 30th it congratulations on the new position good luck okay uh let's see with that we go to um correspondence this month we did receive one letter which is posted with the agenda online um so we will move to approval of minutes I'll need a motion to approve the regular minutes and the executive minutes of our April 29th board meeting move by Ronnie thank you can I have a second please second second by Megan any discussion on the M none all in favor I anyone oppose okay let we have two uh we have a we have a special report this evening actually I'll let Mr s or we let Jan noan introduce his report sure so if you recall we've been doing program reviews over the last several years um this year we did a program review um with our gifted and talented program and we partnered for that review with public Consulting Group or we call PCG um they had done our special education review as well in the past so what we're going to do is we're gonna have PCG come up and do an overview of their findings and recommendations of the g&t program review and then after complete they're completed I'm going to have um Mrs glandon come up and just talk a little bit about next steps for us plan based on those recommendations um and findings for 2425 so at this time um I'll have Rob and Mara come up you can do your own formal introductions and give a little bit of background and I'll be pulling up their slide deck for the presentation excellent good evening everyone members of the board South hunon leadership and staff what an exciting night to be here thank you for having us so many of you are familiar fa which is really exciting for us as Tony mentioned our team had an opportunity to work with South hunon last year on the comprehensive review of special education programming here in the district and then we had the opportunity to come back and conduct another comprehensive review this year but on the enrichment program also known as the gifted K to2 gifted and talented program evaluation my name is Dr Maria ulick and I'm a senior adviser at public Consulting Group I've been there for three years with the firm and specialize in conducting comprehensive in targeted reviews of programming around the country as well as providing implementation support for districts so that can include action planning project management and facilitation of different uh special education initiatives and I'll introduce my colleague Rob good evening uh Robert frantom Allen I am a senior associate with public Consulting Group I've been with them just one year because prior to that I retired as the Director of special education for Denver public schools um and as soon as I retired they pulled me right back in again to be the director of gifted and talented education um as well too I typically work in the science of learning and literacy division doing professional learning around the country on the science of reading and so I'm on loan to this team because of my background and gifted and talented education thank you Rob and so I have my laptop up here with me this evening because we do have the full report so any questions that you may have um feel free to um interject throughout the presentation but we also have built-in time at end of our presentation to answer any questions that anyone may have excellent so a quick agenda overview um Rob and I had an opportunity to introduce ourselves we'll also provide you an overview of our project we'll review the findings as well as recommendations and answer questions um we also know that um Jane Ellen is going to come up and share some of the next steps for Action planning and implementation of the find of the recommendations as part of this engagement PCG created TW a series of six um research questions and so thank you to there we go perfect thank you I we'll read those out to you as they're presented right now but the way that these con these questions were designed is we wanted to Target six key areas in the research and literature base for gifted and talented programming to ensure that Not only was the review comprehensive in terms of the bread but that we created enough depth in the question questions to be able to gather the data both quantitatively and qualitatively to ensure we have a full understanding of the practices here in South hunteran so question one to what extent are best practices followed to identify and evaluate all gifted and talented students in K to2 in South hunon Regional School District question two what are the identification rates of identified students disaggregated by race gender second language learning and disability to what EX ENT do sta Staffing ratios support Fidelity of gifted and talented enrichment programming to what extent are professional development opportunities made available to to support staff um in gifted and talented programming to ensure Fidelity of best practices to what extent do current service models curricular and instructional strategies support gifted and talented student strengths and interest and their academic Developmental and social emotional needs and question six what specific procedures are utilized to promote family engagement efforts to support inclusion equity and access to ensure all families have gifted and talented Learners are knowledgeable about opportunities for their students so a the initial draft of these questions was provided in the scope of work and prior to finalizing the questions we worked in partnership with Jean Ellen and Tony to ensure that we revise these and they reflective of their of the district's Vision as well as what is best in the literature we wanted to provide an overview of our research methodology approach um if you had an opportunity to see some of our work previously in this comprehensive special education review you'll know that the firm does deploy what's recognized as a mixed methods research design study and so in the graphic within you'll see that we prioritize collecting both quantitative and qualitative data in order to analyze all the different components programming and so for this study when we conducted the data document request we were provided a series of demographic data and so that included um the number of all the students uh that who are currently enrolled in enrichment programming from grade three through grade eight within that data we were able to disaggregate that by school race ethnicity disability status second language learner status um as well as performance on different uh measure on a different measure for entrance into the enrichment programming and so that really gave us an opportunity to look from a quantitative analysis to answer some of those research questions we also deployed a qualitative research approach that included a series of focus groups which we'll talk a little bit more about and interviews as well as um we met with students this time which was very exciting we did not do that in the comprehensive special education review but we did do that for this review which we can talk more about and we're happy to answer questions but that was a really thrilling opportunity in addition to that we gathered survey data for the qualitative approach and then analyzed any existing documents within the district and so an overview of our data collection activities a total of 15 focus groups and interviews were held and that included members of the board parents South hunon staff and students we held focus groups with students who are enrolled in enrichment programming at both elementary schools as well as in the middle school so students in grades seven and eight in order for students to participate parent consent was gathered prior to the opportunity and a teacher did stand in the room um who was present throughout they they observed the questions and answers um we didn't know if students would be a little hesitant to speak to us but Rob hop in that was not the case um I was surprised I was like TR furiously taking notes and Rob's like asking questions and and they filled up the entire 45 minute window which was fantastic it was a good indic that these are very precocious students who had a very strong opinion about their education so it was exciting I agree um and what was also very neat is we actually um deployed student engagement as well through the stakeholder survey we had a series of surveys disseminated 69 students in grades three through eight completed the stakeholder survey 35 parents completed a survey and 43 staff each of the survey questions were designed specifically for the subgroup so students who were in elementary programming and enrichment had a series of questions that were similar to Great students in grade seven and eight but were more um age appropriate developmentally appropriate to answer and then grade seven and eight had a series of questions all were in alignment they were just more fine-tuned for Developmental appropriateness and then parents had a series of questions that were answered that were in key domains and then stakeholder uh staff survey had as a series of questions that were also in similar key domains um we did create an opportunity where everyone who completed the survey um answered in a lyer type scale but there were also open-ended narrative questions that you could elect to complete they were not required but you could complete narrative open-ended questions and we and we did not gather any student information or parent or staff information so it was anonimous completion which we always do um but the narratives were actually very insight full as well too um in terms of the findings and recommendations we found that um students in particular really have a strong Vision in terms of what they want and we tried to articulate that in the body of the report as well too and we're happy to answer any questions um Rob and I had an opportunity this fall to come and visit South hunon enrichment programming in one Elementary and one high and one Middle School class um due to the nature and the structure of the program we know Miss kubak is at one Elementary School on day one Elementary School on day B and so on the day that we were here we saw her um at Lambertville Public elementary school or LPS and then again a data and document requests a series of documents related to structure resource allocation District procedures Etc were included in the analysis of data collection we wanted to provide you a highlevel overview of uh survey respondents by subgroup so you'll see that 51 students in grades 3 through six completed the survey a total of 18 students in grades 7 through 8 as I mentioned previously 35 students app parents in the enrichment program 43 student 43 uh staff members in South hunon for a total of 147 surveys completed and then when we look um in the par chart to see the breakdown of Staff we'll see that approximately 59% of those who completed surveys were General Educators approximately 10% were specials or elective teachers as well as 14% identified as other school-based staff members and then a relatively small percentage of 3% School building administrators but given the number of school building administrators that makes sense it's relative in comparison um 7% of student support services and 3% of elll teachers and I'll transition over to Rob for the findings all right so we looked at a number of different categories with which to organize these findings and you'll find them um listed here the first thing we looked at was the overview and uh the General Vision of gifted and talented programming um within the school district um the very first thing is we have to commend the school district for really putting a spotlight and energy on a population of students that are often overlooked um across the country there is no federal law providing guidance for serving students who are gifted and talented it is really up to each one of the states historically New Jersey has not provided a very strong guidance until recently when they passed a law about three years ago on um how um improving services for students who are gifted and talented so thank you very much there is a reason why many states have identified um it as a mandate to provide social emotional support services for students who are gifted and talented research shows that students who are truly gifted and talented do have a tendency for an inclination towards mental health issues primarily caused by the fact that they did not receive interventions at an earlier age to better understand who they are and why they are a different learner or a different thinker um and why they need those additional supports out there when we think about exceptional students we think about that classic bell curve and two standard deviations below the mean is oftentimes where we find our our students who have disabilities who are then um receiving specially design instruction for um um to support them with their disability two standard deviations above the mean is also way outside of the norm and oftentimes these kids come in with a um cognitive ability that is so precocious and so Advanced to their peers and oftentimes don't understand why they are different than their peers and therefore requiring those additional support service or they will struggle with finding success in their adulthood um in a couple of um recommendations that we looked at um within um um South hunterton Regional School District was what is the vision for our programming for students who are gifted and talented um and at that current state there was no Clear Vision and it was also very clear at this point that many of the stakeholders were even sure what the definition is of a gifted um student student or a student who is gifted and talented um and we went back to the New Jersey Law to really look at how is South hunterton Regional School District meeting the criteria with this law and did discover that there are some board policies that the board may want to take up in order to be compliant with the law but also provide a vision for gifted and talented programming for this District so that um superintendent Chief academic officer and teachers have some guidance with um moving those forward as well too then if you look generally overall where the percentage of students who are enrolled by enrichment and um grade this gives you an overview of where you're going to find um these students you'll notice between the two elementary schools there's a pretty equal distribution um of that population of students and then you'll also note um the numbers there at the middle school and high school level so what percentage of students really should qualify for gifted and talented programming again we're going to look to special education it's often 10 to 15% of the population that same thing will apply for gifted and talented anywhere between 10 to 15% of the population um the National Standard to qualify for gifted and talented programming is some sort of level of performance or cognitive ability at the 95th percentile or higher um and then another 10% or another um 5% of those students performing at the 90th percentile to the 95th percentile are what we would classify as students in a talent pool that show potential but they need to be provided with experience in order to grow from that potential and eventually move into that gifted and talented category and then our students who perform at the 99th percentile would be categorized as highly gifted and talented students that oftentimes requires a vastly different set of programming and support systems um for them as well too we want to look at identification practices right so this is how we first find out who are our students who are gifted and talented um in our findings we find that South Hunton Regional School District is following and using the industry standards for identifying students who are gifted and talented in one category there are actually over eight categories of gifted and talented much like in special education you have 13 disabling conditions um which could range from a learning disability to a loow incidence disability social emotional intellectual disability within the area of gifted and talented the one General category that South hunterton really focuses in on is General intellect but other categories include giftedness in quantitative reasoning or mathematics giftedness in language arts giftedness in science giftedness in social studies and then we also look to the Arts and physical movement so those are other categories in per area of Performing um Arts like music dance um uh music both orchest orch orchestral and um vocal um performance um creative arts and then also physical education or what we call uh um um uh psycho motor skill development and then other categories also include leadership um within there so one of our clear findings is that U South hon Regional School District uses the industry standard tools such as the Kart Kat and the Renzulli Hartman scales um but those are tools that are really designed to identify just the general intellect um categories we could not find that there was strong evidence to screen or look for students who are gifted and talented in those other um categories um that are out there as well too and so part of some of our recommendations is to expand that eligibility criteria to actually go out and look for students in multiple categories outside of that General intellect um and then to bring together a team of people to then go and evaluate that body of evidence to each determine if the child truly is um um gifted um that team should include uh one member who can read psychometric measures such as a school psychologist possibly a school counselor um or a um um a diagnostician that knows how to read those tools understand percentile rankings and um some of the limitations of some of that uh measurement as well too as well as those individuals who have a degree or Advanced um background and gifted and talented um education um and then also thinking about bringing in representatives from some of our other populations that are often overlooked um one of the areas that I have a particular interest in is twice exceptionality these are students who qualify for services under the individuals with disability Education Act and or a Section 504 um of The Rehabilitation Act and are gifted and talented currently at this time South hunterton Regional School District does not have an identified twice exceptional student um on their roster um for students um what happens is oftentimes the disability is masked by the giftedness or the giftedness is masked by the disability uh one area that we find a lot of students who have twice exceptionalities are students who have dyslexia um something that occurs within the brain that kind of fires some amazing gifts on one side but because they can't read those words on that sheet a paper they often get overlooked for their potential area of um giftin as well too um and in addition to that we really want to take a look at our second language Learners our emergent bilinguals um the the measures that we often use can sometimes be biased towards a student whose English is not their first language um and then that could um lead to underidentification of second language Learners who are gifted and talented and current Curr L South Hunton Regional School District does not have a student who classified as a second language learner and is also gifted and talented so those would be two um areas that we want to bring in some of those Specialists into that identification team to maybe make referrals to some of their population of students that they feel are very precocious and then the other area that we really want to make sure that we have representation of is our specials teachers our uh music teachers um our Arts teachers and our physical education teachers we're also making certain recommendations of students who may be precocious in both those areas as well then the other um age-old question is how do we serve these students who are gifted and talented and one of the first things I'd like to say is you're not gifted and talented two hours a week you're gifted and talented seven days a week 24 hours um a day and so how can we think about how to serve students all day long in every single classroom who are gifted and talented so one of the things that we would challenge South hunterton Regional School District to think about is um a variety of different service models that may be able to address all of these students um um needs one teacher who is gifted and talented cannot necessarily serve your students who have General intellectual reasoning quantitative reasoning arts or leadership or other um types of gifts so we can actually come together as an entire district and serve this population of students through some very strong understanding of what is gifted and talented some professional development and the adoption of practices such is called Universal Design for Learning Universal Design practices are what works for our students who are gifted what works for our second language Learners what works for our students with disabilities guess what that works for all students um um out there as well too um and so one of the service models that I would challenge the district to do some re research on and to review is called a cluster grouping model this is a model that I adopted in a very small Regional School District that I worked for um in in Colorado as well too what it um one of the things that we do know and one of the things that your students made very very clear was they needed to spend time with each other they needed to spend time with peers who have that same amount of intellectual reasoning um that is there research show shows that inclusionary practice is the best for everybody but two populations of students one students who are deaf and heart of hearing that only use sign language as their form of communication that inclusion is actually exclusion and then the other is our highly gifted and talented students they need to find time during the day where they can be with like peers in order to go through some of those challenges um either through um um opportunities to learn about social emotional um needs and to find others that are like me but also to have those um intellectual challenges what a cluster grouping model does is it's a creative way of placing students within a classroom where there is a cluster of GI and talented students but there's also a cluster of special education students and maybe a cluster of other um populations of students and what this does is it reduces the load on the teacher to have to differentiate for many many different groups within the classroom uh um you know a teacher might have 30 students they try to differentiate for 30 now we're differentiating for three different distinct groups which makes it much easier for planning and much easier for delivery of instruction commonly um we are told well isn't that tracking and isn't tracking something we shouldn't do no um we still want a very diverse classroom which is why we have equal amounts of students with disabilities and students who are gifted another model that we would challenge you to think about is a schoolwide um enrichment model um enrichment is something that supports everybody and through multi-tiered systems of support and the continual layers of support we have identified children who actually need extra support um and uh an enrichment model allows them during one period of the day to be able to go and dive deep into that area of support that they need this would allow your students who have incredible um creative arts to maybe come together and spend extra time with the art teacher or it may also allow your students who may be struggling with learning Word level reading such as dyslexia to be able to come together and through fun engaging ways improve their reading ability as well too so those would be two um service models that we would highly recommend and of course that comes with a good amount of professional development now one of the things that we really talk about in the education the children is something called wraparound Services wraparound Services is much like a triangle where you have the family the community and the school and when the family community and school can all come together to wrap around a student we see achievement that um go Grows by Leaps and Bounds and so part of this is to make sure that we are engaging our family um um Community to one understand what is giftedness What is the process to identify giftedness um and have them be a partner in developing goals um and working for students just like we do for our students with disabilities as we develop an IEP so the New Jersey state law doesn't say you have to develop an advanced learning plan but it does say you need to document what are um the goals um of that student and to be able to work towards those goals and of course that's going to be much stronger when we involve the parents and the community um in that process as well too um as a matter of fact one of the um strong evidence-based models for students who are gifted and talented is a mentorship program um looking to the community to find who are those mentors that excel in their area of strength and partnering those up with students and finding an opportunity for them um to grow and learn from each other as well too and given a very robust and diverse Community especially in the um area of the Arts that you have um with in here I think you probably have lots of opportunities and as evident um this morning you partnered obviously um with an artistic organization to be provide services um um for your students um as well too and then of course systems and structures everything is going to be made much stronger when we put those systems and structures um in place you have a very clear committed staff and beloved staff members from both parents and um students that was made very clear in our um focus group um um areas um as well too um and so one of the things we challenge you to think about is I think you need more than just one teacher who specializes in gifted and talented at the elementary level um perhaps consider an additional FTE particularly now that you will have some um um changes within your school structure without having two separate elementaries um as well too so then have having one at one school one at the other school and then those support services at the secondary um school as well too um and then um you want to um utilize that staff as a part of your evaluation team but also as uh opportunity to deliver professional learning because of the experts um in that area so that they can support the entire District um in that professional development um as well this me that's to you all right on our version of the slides we have our names down at the bottom so think goodness we remember these um in terms of our recommendations road map um this may look familiar we are adopting the same procedures following our special education comprehensive review as well as in this gifted and talented comprehensive review you'll see as we walk through these recommendations when Jane Ellen comes up to present she's going to dig a little bit deeper in terms of how South hunterton is going to be addressing these at a high level but it's important to know that PCG our scope and contract actually includes two additional action planning sessions with Tony Jane Ellen as well as the rest of the leadership team that they'd like to designate to participate in this process and so we have not yet held those action planning sessions but that's really where we put all of our heads together and say what do you want to prioritize how do we want to prioritize it let's take a step back and from a 10,000 foot lens figure out what other initiatives are going on and we know there is a lot of moving parts right now in South hunon and so we want to be super strategic in how we embed some of these other opportunities to improve gifted and talented programming or enrichment while we're still working on some of the special education initiatives from last year and elll initiatives and overall learning growth and so again um I'm sure Jo Tony and janen will lean into the board as well for your participation and feedback thinking through some of these different opportunities but we want to recognize that it takes at 3 to 5 years for full implementation um once the districts and their leadership have identified the priorities for the recommendations not everything we recommend May resonate with a district and that's okay but we do recognize that in our partnership together we want to close the loop and hand this over to our district Partners so they are well prepared to implement the spirit of the recommendations that are most recognized and so as Rob mentioned creating a vision that's going to serve as the anchor for the district we want all of our district team members all of our district leadership our parents and even our students to know what is gifted and talented or enrichment programming how did I get here what ways do I get here and that digs into the identification practices as well but we want to streamline identification practices to ensure that whatever is identified as the key tools that are recommended across that expanded number of domains so beyond just general intellect quantitative reasoning language arts leadership physical motor um we not only expand the tools but we adhere with Fidelity to ensuring that the students who truly fit within that 5 to 10% of the student population or up to 15% of the student population are funneled into the gifted and talented programming right now um in 7th through 8th grade approximately 18 so no I'm sorry 34% of seventh and eth graders here inth hundon have qualified for gifted and talented programming approximately 30% of the student population in grades 2 through six at Lambertville have qualified for gifted and talented programing and approximately 18% of students in grade three through eight at West mwell have qualified for gifted and talented programming and so while those procedures are in place we want to ensure that we're identifying the correct bucket of students to ensure that those services are implemented appropriately with Fidelity and then when we're thinking about those service models I know that Tony and and Jane Allen have already begun thinking through opportunities for enrichment specifically to be embedded throughout the day but more importantly um with our partnership thinking through how can we explore either cluster grouping or embedded instructional opportunities throughout the day and then also um within that process really look at your um your families and your stakeholders and how do we increase that family stakeholder engagement um um through a number of ways and then of course developing your systems and structures so that this is sustainable um so that if um um Tony is not here and Jane Ellen is not here the program still continues flawlessly without um um any Interruption as well excellent and so we will just identify a few of these steps and then we'll turn it over to Janel and this is the actually no I apologize we can jump into our questions perhaps and then turn it over to Janel okay great and so where we are right now um in the action planning process we'll work with Tony and janen to identify the initiatives that are most important so let's look at those recommendations and think through what do you want to prioritize now what do you want to prioritize in a few years and we'll develop those into a tracking system with key performance indicators and so that's really taking a look at as I said the other initiatives that are in the district and then thinking about what kpis can be tracked and whether you're using a current system to do that we can utilize that system or help develop a metric in order to track those and then ensure that those are communicated those objectives as well as identifying a status and review outcome process and so ensuring that the district has a way with Fidelity to go back and say six months ago we said we're going to do this this is where we stand uh this is how we're going to continue to move forward and then of course recognizing we as needed um things happen with there's as I mentioned there's a lot of change you all know that better than anyone and we want to ensure that there's the flexibility and the spirit of the recommendations are adhered to understanding the GI given changes in the community and so we are happy to answer any questions you may have and I'm going to log back in my computer in case we need to answer anything from the body of the report M question this is Martha Dennis just a a quick question I I think I'm understanding that at the moment we're overidentifying do I have that right correct okay and do we know what do we know how that occurred if we were using the co we're using the two tests that were identified are we setting our our our threshold to low or or do we know what the how we how we got there [Music] instead of reaching the 90th or 95th percentile we said the 75th the reason being to give them a chance um because we didn't know when that might come again and also because our pop okay this I'm sorry because our population espe um at LPS but also to a degree at West Amwell are far more common to threaten than any other place um the the thought was to air on the side of Hope of almost whatever anyway that was why thank you did did we apply the same 75% at West H and Lambertville because there's there's a big difference yeah it's interesting I'm just wondering you know same tests that actually can be very peculiar to one year when you're in a district as small as this if you happen to just have a class you know at one place that has just a lot of kids that's the way it works it's also been in the many years I've been doing this has also been the other way too like to where there be far more in West Amell as opposed to Lambert Field but then again that can change on a yearly basis so that what we're looking at in this is point in time sort of data point not a trend yes I think just as the general you know we've talked about this for the years right because we're act our cohorts are so small if you're only identifying 5% of the kids that's gifted and talented and you only have you know 20 or 30 or 40 kids in a grade level you're talking about you know a handful of kids um we we kind of made it I think as a district we've known this for many years we made that decision because you wouldn't have a a significant enough cohort to have any kind of a gifted and talented program if you did not expand the parameters a little bit um in order to include a few you know a few more of the kids um that's you know that's kind of I think the reason that we did did things that way absolutely and we put in the body of the report and we would like to note here that by no means are we advocating stream lining the number of students that are in there right now students take great pride in being in the enrichment program um parents take great pride in their students being an enrichment program and South hunterton staff love having children in the enrichment program it would not be the appropriate course of action to withdraw a student who may have a lower coat score at the time than it was administered which could theoretically be two to three years ago um from the enrichment program that's we are absolutely not advocating for that at all I think that be detrimental to the well-being of students um our recommendation is more streamlining moving forward in the sense of having a strong eligibility decision-making team and then really to your point uh Mr Gallagher like looking at that whole cohort and saying like hypothetically we have 502 graders now um if we were to apply the stringent 10 to 15% window of Eligibility that would leave us with three students based upon the portfolio of data so then we may want to open it up to the top 20% of students and then what would that window look like but utilizing a strong structure and system in terms of an eligibility decision-making team documenting that and then thinking through um what are the policies for remaining in the enrichment program I know right now there is a current expectation that if you're not at performing at a certain grade level that you could be removed from enrichment programming if that's no longer appropriate remove that expectation and just think about how to continue to support students to to remain academically engaged and perform in the classroom as well as benefiting from the enrichment type programming and if I also might add keep in mind you're really only identifying one type of gifted and talented student and that is a student who has General intellectual um um reasoning your numbers may stay the same but now we might be qualifying students in other categories that are not measured by that coat um there as well too um and for some of the students that perhaps are not forming at that 90th per of the coat somebody saw something um there so now we might be wanting to dig in a little bit more with the data to find out exactly where that area is so that we can match up the programming to best meet um those students needs um I think there was you know some um note of one particular student that scored at the 40th percentile on um the coat you know which is well below the 90th percentile um um threshold but chances are on the Renzulli scale somebody saw something in there it could be an area of leadership that's not going to be measured by the coat so that requires digging deeper into that area um as well too which is only going to be better for your students across the board because now we can identify the specific strength that they have and then the other thing I'd like to also point out um you know at one point I had to hire tutors for my high school students who were gifted in an advanced place so high academic achievement is not an indication of giftedness as a matter of fact one of the categories I'd recommend for us to look for is those children who have a lot of Behavioral issues and a lot of office referrals often times um behavior is a form of communication and if they're not being challenged that may be one way that they communicate with um um the teachers as well um um too um um to kind of keep that in mind and also you know really understanding where is the difference between a high achiever and a student who is um um truly gifted is going to be another important piece um um I think for the team to really explore and understand and provide some professional development on as well I just had a and you can answer this briefly because there's probably a lot more to it than what we would want to go in now but looking at other areas where kids might be gifted or Excel like SCI I mean easier ones might be science social studies language but um you know art music dance how how is that measured I mean I wonder if the reason why poat or this other scale that's used which I didn't really know that much about um are relied upon is because there's some sense of objectivity to it as opposed to you know whether or not a third grader is a good artist or a good dance I you know it's a little bit more subjective and so I'm assuming there's a way for I talk a little bit as we to looking at different gifted thank you but there are tools out there that will support that so the Renzulli scale actually is a broad one that looks at all categories but it's filled out by a teacher and a parent um sometimes a student fills it out um um and then you identify those that seem to be strong by outside observers and then you can go to um alternative times of assessment instead of a standardized um assessment but maybe um a rubric oftentimes in the Arts we look um to you know musical performance you've had Jazz combos that go off and do a competition well who are the students that are scoring the highest um in those jured um performances or artistic um um um um artwork that is then submitted to a jury or a port folio that is then submitted to show those Tendencies then you have an expert in that area like an art teacher and an art Community member that then goes through all the artwork that has been submitted to say yes this child understands color theory or this child without being taught or this child understands you know um how to use pointalism to bring the color together to make a painting pop or um something like that or this is a child that shows potential if they receive that additional amount of instruction I bet we will see them rise to that level of gifted and talented student yeah and to answer your question as well miss Fete we had an opportunity to speak with students as I mentioned for the focus groups but also in their narrative responses for the survey we asked questions such as um pick out of the of this list what are the best ways that you learn and you could students could say when I have a chance to read directions when I have a chance to decide what the directions would be when I have a chance to use my hands when I have a chance to use my body um and then also in narrative responses they got to um they had the opportunity to really describe to us what they would want enrichment programming to be the students were excellent advocates for themselves in saying I am in enrichment and we're working on science for example but I really love creative writing and I'd like a chance to work with Miss kubek on creative writing opportunities um and then also students in the Middle School saying like we're doing more of an Ela type enrichment programming but I actually love math and really excited about taking algebra and I wish I could do some type of algebra now to like prepare for high school because I'm really excited about that opportunity and so I think um your students felt very empowered to advocate for themselves and I think they really enjoyed it and they came out and said like especially the older students like thank you for asking us what we want which I was really impressed and we shared that with Tony and Jane Ellen several times and included that in the body the report so I think um they would be an excellent resource for you moving forward in figuring out how to redesign um the the enrichment programming J maybe if you want to just go through a few of your slides and then that might answer actually I do have one question but this might be covered and if it is that's fine but so I did want to ask um you had mentioned the cluster grouping model again I want to go back to the fact that our small cohorts and one of the reasons we did the regionalization you know the combining our grades and same buildings was to create a larger Cort which we thought that would be be helpful but could you C could you talk a little bit about how that could work given our kind of unique situation and again if you know if you were planning to cover that I don't need to Ste your th so yeah and then you all can jump in just I'll just add a little bit um to to address that question as well too there's a whole mirid of different types of um um instructional models that you could be looking at including accelerated um learning and of course larger school districts have more resources to be able to move them around um cluster grouping tends to work really well in small um school districts because it's a quick easy um fix that you can Implement pretty quickly doesn't require a lot of resources um except the um um um providing professional development for the teacher who will have that cluster group so that they can better differentiate for those population of students yeah okay thank you can I just ask one look Qui question again if cover I'm just wondering and this would be General but what would be the fewest number of students that could make uh a program like this um not worthwhile but helpful or you you know because if you only have one or two kids I don't know two would be the minimum two would okay yeah okay and um we even know that in as students get into high school and we look at meeting the needs of students that have gifted abilities in high school it's very popular to do independent studies so if you have a student who's gifted in a theater or gifted in debate or gifted in any variety of different abilities independent studies are very popular um at the high school level and I've also been involved at the elementary level to do independent studies as well if it was an extremely gifted student in the top 2% of the population and as Rob said there wasn't a specific program or service model so we designed um some one-on-one independent studies for that person so it's is long as you have the staff and the professionals to support the students then we will do anything we can we don't want want to ever say well we've identified them and now we don't have anything to do with them it is our um that's why we're here to provide those services for everyone and again I will invite Rob and Mar to jump in if anything that I'm presenting um what I did was just quickly um I only have about five or six slides but I took all of the recommendations from the report and I just went and um highlighted or bulleted some of the things that we've discussed based on um the vision and so meeting with the administrative team as we heard from the report we are first and foremost is going to be established a districtwide gifted and talented leadership team and on that team with a variety of stakeholders teachers parents board members um and administrators we're going to look at creating that Vision because we really can't put anything into place if we don't know the why and as it came out there was a lot of people that don't know why for our gifted and talented and that's why this program review has come at such a wonderful and opportune time because we have so many different things and it gives us that opportunity to disrupt things that we had in place that don't meet the need of now having a prek4 a 58 and a 912 building so this allows us to put those structures and systems in place with the new configurations um so it'll be important to develop a long-term plan for the district and I'll work again with with the board of education curriculum and Technology team and committee to develop what that may look like in terms of curricular resources um I know back and forth It's been um we've gone around and around about gifted and talented versus enrichment um based on the New Jersey Law as Rob was referring to three years ago we may want to consider and with the decision of the gifted and talented districtwide team do we now want to call it a gifted and talented and not enrichment um because we we have enrichment after school we have enrichment opportunities that don't often times um don't oftentimes meet the needs of War are for our gifted and talented students so these are things and again no decisions have been made really as I said I took the recommendations and I said how can we take these recommendations and make them applicable to us again we're looking at a three to fiveyear plan so what are the things we need to determine first and that is the team the vision and then we need to look at our board policy and the procedures for gifted and talented um so you can see what those things are looking at the very important the general the V excuse me the various areas of giftedness we heard that over and over again and we want to make sure we're doing that so we do um we have started with general intelligence but then we need to look at academic artistic aptitudes and Leadership abilities and what are those things that we already might have in place do do we we have a student council do we um is that part of our gifted and talented program because we can provide opportunities there so we'll be not looking at you know every erasing everything but what are the things that are working well and how can they serve our students in these different abilities and again if you have questions pee please feel free to jump in at any time with any of the slides um or I can take them at the end um again we're going to look at our identification practices because we're again looking at that 10 to 15% and maybe looking at those students that we can really Target that gifted um eligibility for and have that decision-making team this team I Look to be more school-based um and I would be on it as well as the school administrator and certainly our gifted and talented teacher and then maybe there's a general education teacher maybe this is also where we have one of the child study team members who can help us analyze um as Rob said the data what is how do you read this report um from a student or how do you look at our coat stanines and look at all those different pieces of the coat report we need to look at the trends for twice exceptional and M multilingual Learners are we overlooking our multilingual Learners because of a language barrier that we are perceived language barrier whereas if we step back and say wait this child speaks two languages I think that's gifted right so where is it that we need to look at marrying all these different pieces um and that's why multiple measures truly come into play um we need to reconsider the expectations um and as Rob said you're not gifted for two hours or an hour a day you're gifted 247 well if you're gifted at seven or eight years old pretty good chances you're still gifted at 910 1415 or 17 or 18 so we need to look at the whole child and how our perception of that child and what their true portfolio is moving forward as they move through the different grades um and we need to expand the use of our screening tools and assessment profiles and this is Gina exactly what I was talking about about a profile or a portfolio where that's very common with looking at artistic ability we might have the art teachers from the middle in the high school as well as the art teacher at the elementary school and sit together and identify you know what do they see in art where what's the progression to an AP art class and so what do we see in our elementary students that would get them there the same thing with musical ability I could see our music teachers at the middle and high school all part of a committee we're small enough which is wonderful because we can have a a team of five people to help identify are gifted and talented um we don't have to have multiple people who don't even know the district and how wonderful it is and they know each other um so we need to look at that we need to look again at the coat um we need to refine some of our evaluation um I want to make sure that parents know how to read a coat what does the score report tell us uh Miss kuac and I were even talking today about letting students know where is my giftedness when I could identify that nonverbal and the paper folding and the dots what did that tell me about my learning and so we need to make sure that not and the teachers know as well so we have planed to put the coat scores and students individual reports as part of our schoolwide data meetings so if we're talking about looking at students and the needs we may have concerns about standards with support well have we looked at their coad score because if we see a high above average coat score in the verbal reasoning but yet we're seeing them some difficulty with decoding words or comprehending what is it that we're missing because one multiple and that's why we have multiple measures one measure tells us this something else is telling us that so we need to dive deeper um so looking at that um looking at the Divergent thinking oftentimes we refer to gift and and talented students as divergent thinkers they're looking at thinking at a very different pathway and how are we allowing that thinking in our classroom not it's all always one way not that you have to get color this way they have to have this you have to have that but are we open with our rubrics and understanding that is it does it matter what color um Asia is when we're coloring a map no it doesn't what is it that we really need people to know or students to know about Asia um and consider some non-verbal screening tools for our multilingual Learners again we need to work on our family stakeholder engagement and as Miss hard and always presents at our meetings there's a lot of Engagement from our PTO PTA and now coming together as a district as well as our laf so how can we all work together to bring our community involved in um into our schools how can we bring artist artists in to help us with the portfolios musicians so all of that different extensions how can we bring that culture and climate that is in our West Amwell as well as our lamberville communities into to our schools and help us with identifying students and then lastly this is really where we're getting into the systems and the structures so providing professional development for our stakeholders and professional development we know that teachers know what um what a gifted child may be but do they know how it presents itself to the student in the classroom that child that can't sit still the child that does that always wants to stand the child that is always out of their seat or doesn't seem to be paying attention what are we missing here so understanding and in the last page of the report there's some information about the myths of gifted students and as Rob talked about you know I always call them School smart what is the difference between our school smart kids and our truly gifted kids we have a lot of kids that do school well they'll sit they perform they'll answer questions they'll follow the rules are they gifted or are they School smart and that's okay we just need to be able to identify where they are we also um in many my years of teaching the gifted and talented students the truly gifted students were the messy Learners they were the ones whose parents I was meeting with constantly to say I just don't understand you know they they score they have these scores but this child can't follow directions or is talking back or has a lot of social reactions well oftentimes as Rob said that social emotional piece is really important so we need to educate parents and teachers as well as administrators that we all on this team and what can we learn from the student and their behaviors because oftentimes behavior is just communication what are they trying to tell us um again planning some opportunities for training to include identification I would like um to have with our new website I want there to be a complete web page devoted to gifted and talented the identification process how to read to coat um all different aspects the portfolio what the portfolio process looks like so it's very easy for any family member to say well you've shown me this interest in art maybe there's some type of program or what else can we provide at the schools and it's all right there so that communication piece is very important um and then developing a gifted and talented policy or procedures manual very similar to the mtss um manual that came out of the special education review so how are we going to put those things together and again these are just the first steps in a 3 to fiveyear plan um and obviously look at supporting um gifted and talented in each one of our school buildings as we transition to the three different buildings um and then so I spoke very quickly um because I know we've been here we've heard a lot about our gifted and talented um program review but I do want to be able to open this up to any questions you may have um um and laa and Rob can jump in as well the last thing I'll just mention too quickly is that you know you heard last month when we presented the schedule that we're going to that accelerate block has a lot of opportunity for the clustering of students there right now with our two tools kids don't have common time um within their schedules to get together but now that we'll have you know an accelerate block pretty much in the elementary school and in the 56 next year um it will provide a ton time every day where those kids could come together and not miss another class in order to be able to come together and that really is the beautiful thing about the accelerate blocks so those students will have cluster grouping as Rob had mentioned five days a week um they may be in band which also may be so it only may be four days a week but just as I've talked to you about what that looks like for intervention services it's the same for our gifted and talented the one other thing I do want to share is um talk about the homogeneous grouping in our class the reason we've chosen the curricular programs and the structures and the things that we've chosen moving forward is because they allow for small group instruction I know when I came to the district small group instruction Blended learning all of those differentiation techniques all support Learners so that the gift and and talented students or the high- Performing math students can be in a math group together after the teacher has presented the 7 to 20 minute um the objective for the math lesson then students that are like-minded can go solve problems together and we do that because as Rob said those students need to grow off of each other maybe that's a book club maybe in the reading or maybe it's um there's all different types of math olympiads which are really multi-step problem solving which then could be part of our reveal math class so when we are creating and choosing our curricular programs we're making sure we're very careful that they meet the needs of all of our students so I could stand up here and tell you about wit and wisdom and the how it provides the support needed for our multilingual learners for our special education for our standards with support and for our gifted um they those are the goals of choosing programs and that's why it's very important we choose the right kind of program for South hton one really out so for anyone who listens to NPR radio show on their is all about actually excellent show Med no longer feels like were inter few adult [Music] of Personality as so I know we we're talking a lot about things that we can do in the next three to five years but um just kind of want to focus a little bit on the the year or two ahead of us um as we trans transition and I I was just looking at our website and our current enrichment referral checklist actually has Kat the Renzulli scale and also the NJ SLA math and ELA test scores and we haven't talked at all about having that factored in um is that all going to continue to be a relevant piece no not at all um and the reason why the website has not been changed or we have not talked about you know what are the next steps for next month is because we were for the program review and so we've we meet uh twice a month um and so we've been talking about the findings they've had we've talked about what are our next steps um we've talked about how to put this in place starting pretty quickly and that's what the two action steps um would come from moving forward we will not use the njsla um as part of our identification and when we we've talked a couple times about and it comes I think in a lot of different ways small group instruction um and when I look at like my current fourth graders class size that I think it was only like 12 so you know I guess I'm I'm wondering if are we it sounds like we're moving in a direction that it seems like it makes sense to have a few more kids together so that you don't have a lot like on your ends you might have groups of two and three or you know what I mean like so does it make sense to look at our class sizes um again to to implement a lot of this stuff to make sure that we have groups as often as we can and not a single or a pair right with class we'll be able to make it work with 12 certainly um class size will be something that the board um will discuss um but you anytime a TW a student a class of 12 with anytime you meet with a teacher anytime you can meet one on one anytime you can um there's lots of different configurations and students in elementary school middle school and high school we move around a lot so you're not with two students for 80 minutes or you're not with a teacher so there's a lot of movement sometimes it's independent work some and there's four people working independently sometime there's two working in parts or pairs and three working with the teacher so and it all just is very fluid um so I think 12 is a blessing um and we are so lucky but if the board moves in a different direction um we can make whatever structure and whatever class size we have work I also want to point out that because we're bringing all of the grades together yeah and we have this this period of time that's dedicated the accelerate or the flex that that allows the kids to yes to join other classes right so I for see our you know third fourth and fifth graders or excuse me third and fourth graders um going to to accelerate together for gifted um they would be in their classroom for the other core content but during um accelerate they're moving all over the building very similar to flex at the high school so um obviously we have one teacher but one teacher could certainly meet the needs and accelerate with third fourth um second third and maybe another day is first and second so absolutely certainly and as much as students like homogeneous grouping that does not necess necessarily mean grade level you to be homogeneously grouped um with a second and third grader um many schools have models called a multi-age classroom when it's first and second together um and you can you can be gifted in second grade and meeting your needs and working with a partner who's in third grade and you're still having the same cognitive um intellectual exchange so when you're talking about that that and that's the Accel schule so is that similar to what you guys were talking about with this the schoolwide enrichment model that's the yes okay so and that model is not it doesn't have to be on its own it could be done in conjunction with like cluster yes often times tier one tier wide schoolwide is the entire school and then cluster grouping is almost like a tiered support right so you have what's good for tier one and for the whole class providing those and then you have specific clusters or PR specific interventions or um extensions so oftentimes assemblies that come and do architecture are considered part of a schoolwide program because everybody is benefiting from architecture assembly and Building Things and making things whereas then you might have your gifted and talented students take it off and build a bridge right in their accelerate because they were just so enamored and so AED by what this means and now you've got future engineers in front of you so it's really looking at exposing and providing the best possible um opportunities for students and then narrowing just like we do with everything else we don't want to just fire hose out there because somebody might be artistic and have really you know no interest right now in solving math problems with you know multi-digit multiplication or something it sounds like we might be in a good position right now we are for implenting some of these instead of three to five years like right yes absolutely yes yes yes and that's all part of the design when we went looked at new schedules we looked at building accelerate in knowing that we need to meet the needs of our gifted and talented students I was going to say that like it there's been a lot of work that is almost if you will building the infrastructure structure around exactly what's recommended we're calling it something different we've been calling it small group instruction and there's been so much professional development around that but the teachers are really getting good at that um and so this is just another opportunity for that there's also the um I look forward to seeing how we'll work this into the Strategic plan because if we're saying that we need to get more Community engagement then we would want to have you know those eight different areas and really identify one of the things we said we wanted is more mentorship programs so it it fits nicely in there and we can it informs the the process that we're identifying people um so it's it's it it matches quite nicely any other questions I just want to thank Maria and Rob um you know we'll continue obviously our relationship but they've been amazing um you know Mar was great when we did the special ed review and then you know just throughout the whole process keeping us on task for organized our deadline so um you know I want to thank you for your your work it's will have a huge impact on us moving forward thank you we we actually wanted to do the same and um just it's this is a Bittersweet moment for us because this wraps up two almost two whole years of Engagement with South hunon and so seeing Julie retiring tonight when we worked so closely when she was here for the comprehensive special review and then James tonight and then principal I mean was seeing everyone and and you know spent two years with Tony and and it was been it's been wonderful um we have on behalf of PCG and on behalf of Rob and myself we have thoroughly enjoyed all of our work here in South hunon and we hope to stay close with you in the future please always reach out if you have questions if we can help um we're always here to to be your partner um we thoroughly enjoyed all this work thank you so much for the opportunities thank you thank you very much for coming it came a long way too Rob I believe flew in from Denver right so and and Mary drove up from Baltimore so they they came a long way to be with us tonight so we really appreciate you being here take care have have a great night safe travel home all right so I just I know we've been slide dick you know death I'll just quickly just wanted to share a few things um just in my update mainly construction related um so just wanted to share some the latest and greatest so our flooring is being installed in all the classrooms this is our new art room you can see which is pretty cool the way it's coming out the nice thing about the floors that were um putting in our building sustainability environmental wise no wax so we don't have to strip we don't have to Reax every summer we just have to use soap and water and they're good to go so we're really excited how that's coming out this is pretty much the for throughout the building um in our classrooms lighting and ceiling tiles all our classrooms you can see the look of the ceiling tiles you can see the type of lighting that we're using all LED that we're really excited about um acoustic panels installed in our new music room so that's coming together um if you've driven by lately you probably noticed new concrete sidewalks that are being put in throughout the building so that's an ongoing process um and also just make you aware so right now it's covered in the plastic other than the piece right out in front but we did do and it looks a little different we did do pervious Concrete in front of the building so what that means is underneath the area that you see with the um the black tarp the black plastic there's all drainage underneath there's piping that goes out to storm water so the goal there was that when it rains it will seep right through the concrete and not run off the concrete and obviously that's all part of the environmental piece so it does look a little bit different you can see on the side here than your typical smooth concrete because it is perious um we have a new area in the front it's being constructed for trash and recycling pickup so no more um I know the city land will be happy not trying to back up that big truck down the alleyway to try to fit in there to get to the dumster so this area will be paved um they'll be able to pull in get it and get out very quickly so that's under progress um and really we're in the home stretch so over the next six weeks most of the work will be site work completed outside they'll be finishing the rest of the concrete Paving is going to be starting in the next couple weeks um the flooring will continue to be installed and completed our estimated completion date right now is June 30th 2024 we have confirmation of our furniture delivery and installation will start on July 1st and our technology installation will start in July as well so um we're we're still making great progress ress um you'll see you know as part of the site work um all the landscaping and all the different things that will be done and we've been working with uh lamber B Go Wild on what exactly is going to go out in the front of the building we had an initial list we sat down with them um thanks to Mary and bour and um they gave us our blessing on some and wanted to change others and we were able to do that just to try to incorporate native species to that area so we're really excited about that um and then remember the sycamore tree well there it is remember we had talked about the benches right we had to take down that big sycamore tree which had been there for so long but um this work is coming from not only our maintenance department but also our own students here at the high school in the wood shop with Mr raw so this is just an example I think we're going to have probably six or eight of these um that we'll have that we'll utilize around the school in the V area there's another area too outside the library that we think would be a good spot so I was excited to see that you know this time last year we were getting ready to take down the tree and after you know the Kil process the drying out and now the putting together and the staining um it's pretty exciting to see the Ben come together and then the other piece that I wanted to share and I've shared this with some folks um this is officially our new mascot for the South hun Regional Elementary School so after many design from our students thank you to our students and then taking it and enhancing it a bit um but it came from our student ideas um our middle school and our high school students this will be the new logo that will be on the sign out front as well as on the gym floor um in the gymnasium so really excited about that we're still working on the middle school one but um this one is finalized so we're excited just a couple things I wanted to share so if you've been by lately the middle school there's a lot going on there's a lot of Masons that are on site right now it's purely mostly a masonary building block building so what you're seeing is a lot of folks on site and assembling that building they've been working on the gym um lately the front of the building on the left where the science classrooms the art the music room um the coral room so a lot is happening they're making excellent progress um and we'll continue hopefully now with good stretches of weather maybe not as much rain it will help with the building process so I just wanted to share that I did on what are these bigall these big things um that's a good question they had them up originally for like the like yeah no no no no I think it's more just for the structure of like each space yeah and they're working off that as they move up the wall they were pretty big when I saw them too each of those blocks is about 30 lbs there if You' got a few hundred blocks on that that's a lot of weight on that scaffold so I got to tell you being out there at the site I don't envy the Mason's hands seeing them and having the amount of blocks and that's that's horrible although if you ever go and watch them work it's amazingly they can [Music] lay quickly goes somebody who knows what they're doing put up a ro yep um I did want to share something and just kind of highlight something from our finance agenda this evening that will be on there so we do have on our plan agenda a change order that direct addresses delay claims for the middle school project it's been submitted by um various contractor we've been talking about this at our finance committee over the last couple months that we knew this was probably going to be coming um just to kind of share some information of the reason why a contractor files a delay claim is when a bid on a pro when they bid on a project they basically calculate the materials that will cost and as well as the labor hours and cost and it's based on the completion date so if you recall our original completion date for this project was July of 2024 and because we had Del layal permits the new completion date is now March 31st of 2025 so the reality is during that time um they're going to be here for almost an extra year the material and the labor costs have increased so what does that mean well it means that typically we will get a change order um when a delayed claim is submitted vetted by our construction attorney our architect and our construction administrator better known as Josh Bon because a lot of people know him by Josh now who's been on both our sites and they basically vetted out that DET termine whether it's valid and it's accurate so the contractor has to provide justification of here's what it was originally when I bid it and here's what the increase in price is and a lot of times it comes down to the labor rates so if you look at the change order that's actually on the agenda it's quite long you'll see the justification in there because of the labor rates that have increased for the laborers the foreman all throughout and how that kind of plays out um the delay claim that we have on the agenda tonight is is for our masons in the amount of 9929 Ernest Bach which which is our general contractor the 256 VIP concrete um obviously with the ma you know the majority of this building is block and and concrete and then RS and tile so the tiling company that be doing a lot of tiling work in the building so the change order right now for the delay claim is $386,500 obviously this is where we are so tonight um it's being recommended to the board to approve this change order and then what happens is it puts that to rest more most importantly with our general contractor you can see the highest number is right now um and then with our other subcontractors as well now I want to be crystal clear because the question probably is well what about some of our other subs that are on the job I.E carpentry Plumbing hbac painting electrical Etc could we receive delay claims from them as well all right and the answer is yes however now that we memorialize a completion date and it's approved by the board it does give the board more leverage if something submitted down the road to say Hey you knew about this months ago that the completion date was changed and now all a sudden four months in you're going to submit a delay caim no no no no wait a minute come on now why why all a sudden have things has changed so then it gives us the ability to go back and negotiate and kind of go back and forth the numbers that you saw in the last slide were not the original number that actually came in after some vetting by our you know folks that I shared on the slide they went back to the contract said no this isn't making sense I think it really need and then they work through to kind of land on those numbers so we don't know um quite honestly it's not a process where we're going to go out to all the sub and say hey everyone are you going to submit a delay claan because you know what the answer is going to be um it's more about a wait and see but we positioned ourselves now because we're you know memorializing a new completion to have a lot more leverage as far as those negotiations go however Bach is the big one right even all the subs that come along depending upon what they are it's not going to be anywhere near the amount that obviously Bo will the general contract so I just wanted to be transparent you know as far as that you know goes and that it is on the agenda this evening you know that we're recommending for approval that we've been talking about at Finance all right so I know your slide deck presented out so move along just add one thing perhaps the the superintendance report that's just a mention of a couple student things just I don't know if you want to say anything we just have we just had a spectacular prom on yes me okay I don't know if anybody went down to the lville station the kids all meet there around 5:30 or six and they get their pictures taken before they go it's great it's great to see families it's great to see these kids that maybe you've seen when they were you know little and growing up and the brothers and sisters and everybody else um the uh sports teams baseball and softball are both starting their state playoffs this week uh they will be playing both of them will be playing home games the softball team will be playing here on Wednesday the baseball team will be playing on Thursday I understand there's a number of track and field athletes who have qualified for the regional meeting in both the running events and also the the weight throwing events so yeah there lot still lots of things going on here at the the elementary school student things and just a side note on the prom it was the first time I had the opportunity to see a bent in person somebody came going up in a bent was dropped off that was my son all right okay uh with that we will um we have uh next up on the agenda is our of public comment so um this time is open for anyone to if you have any comment on any item on on the agenda or anything that you'd like to bring before the board we just ask that you come to the podium tell us your name the community that you're from and try to keep your remarks uh to around three minutes uh with that is there any uh anyone who would like to bring something before the board see nothing of interest from the or no one uh in the audience um do we have anyone no one on the uh response so I will then uh close this period of public comment and we will move on with the agenda there will be a second opportunity for public comment later in the meeting um with that we will go to our committee business uh we'll start with buildings and grounds uh committee uh Miss Warner now War to Andrew for a report sure um so we discussed some the things attorney just review the status of the elementary school Construction and provide some pictures and updates um we also discussed whaty just reviewed with the middle school project and delay plans um we discussed the upgrades necessary to the high school well room Rd was posted on Friday May 17th spit opening for that will be May 30th talk about more about PRK in the future new contracts and highlights for contracts on the agenda um are spire and that's our it infrastructure um Gloom which have to do with the AV materials for the elementary school critical Response Group is part of our Safety and Security Del battle is for bus maintenance LBJ Interiors those for some work to be done on the new gym and in medicine in Fr of our on the agenda for appr tonight other highlights Municipal tax levy schedule for 2425 is approval transfer funds for construction payments out of the NJ arm account resolution for to join the continue to be a member of the njsa that a yearly prun thing to do can we join the PIAA instead sorry we have a resolution to accept the bid for Food Service management company from m services that was the wining result from our food services RFP the previous month resolution to approve these purchase agreement for the it some of that is going to be purchased through Federal funding called eate and then the remainder will be made up from District funds and through purchase and then also the pay authorizations for construction and the MJ arm count update is up 2.1 sorry can you say that again 2.1 and thank you for the report so with that um we need a motion to approve item a through o move by Megan thank you can I have a second please second by any discussion on any of those items for the um the bloom proposal it um there was a descriptions of the monitors that are going in so the classrooms are are doing the seven the 75 in and those are interactive does that replace Smartboard yep okay and that's like a thing that hangs on the like a TV TV and then for the other ones that are kind of like throughout the building they're like there 65 inch screens and those are not interactive are they more like that yeah okay um because I know I saw that it we there there's supposed to be one um it says in does it say in yeah in the vestibule and then also in the main yeah there's two areas there there's secured V with set doors and then when you walk through the second door there's a whole another section kind of open Office a lot of wall okay all right and then and so those are just going to have like information any other questions or discussion on items a through just mention one point of random trivia uh the administrator who is in charge of the New Jersey inter schoolc Athletic Association is a South graduate that is corre um anyway um with that uh let's vote on J yes Denis yes yes yes abstain yes R yes yes uh Personnel um we have we have to move items a Gina would you like make a report for [Music] me and for myself te veloc and as well as we riew the for resignations requirements requests for extended use of options as well as foral movement [Music] addition we were opening we updated on the status of the administrator negotiations add updated on stat and agenda for tonight and then finally Mr went over the high so with that uh would you like to move it okay we move in a second by n thank you any discussion 8% the only thing I'll mention is I just wanted to say I'm really happy that we were able to come to an agreement with our bus drivers and I think our board negotiations team who was working over the last several months their current agreement doesn't end until June 30th of this year so anytime you can finish your negotiations and settle on a new contract before the existing one ends it's always a positive thing and quite honestly is very uncommon in most districts so that's a credit to the board um and to the leadership of the bus driver ass to be able to get that done so thanks appreciate that willingness to work with us excited to continue to work with them um any other discussion on those items and then let's vote Martha Dennis yes yes Mich yes yes yes yes yes uh curriculum and Technology um Mr Keys is not here but I can tell you that we did meet the Tuesday before last um his agenda is or his uh minutes this of the meeting are posted and basically that meeting was taken up with the discussion the presentation and subsequent discussion of the presentation from PCG which we saw here tonight so uh there is nothing to move for curriculum and Technology uh so we will go to the policy committee Mrs Dennis yes we did not meet this past month but we do have one item one regulation for the second reading that is regulation 2200 on curriculum content uh just as a reminder the only revision is to remove the list of protected categories and replace the list with the expanded list is to finded under State Statute this change is mandated okay so um would you like to this is so we need to move that for a second reading is that right we do yes okay so I'll see a motion for that to be moved on a second reading Meg thank you and a second for that a second thank you byina I have my reading license on so I got to switch back and forth I want to see what's going on five feet away from me um all right uh this is a a call Vote for This yes yes make war yes yes yes yes uh Mr Tom Maro Community okay so in school and Community um Vince saell presented an early draft of the website design we talked about that last month um as well um and we really focused on um giving feedback about ease of use um including you that the District page really needs to be very clear here as to how to access the individual pages from the other for the other schools um and some of the commonly accessed information and providing quick links for families um on the website so that is still in revision and it will go to the administrative team and then come back to our committee um so was still in the works we discussed the press release for the prek um and what we really talked about um was how this needed to be a focused press release there's a to share about the history of the prek expansion and state regulations but we decided that this press release really needed to focus on the current program and its impact on children and families and because we'll be hosting an information session um to gather feedback um in the fall we may run a second press release to really try to um bolster Community par participation to help with the longrange planning for Universal preschool we also reviewed the climate survey and this is a survey that that we are now giving annually to students parents and teachers to really understand um the what we're doing well in the school and where we need to improve um one of the things we noted was that it's really important that survey takers or people when we're when we're asking people to complete the surveys that they get some information about how that information is used um because unlike a lot of surveys that we take um the this data really does Drive decisions um for example when we wanted to improve the way that teachers were involved in decision-making Tony added a superintendent teacher council is that what you call it staff advisory staff advisory counsil I like I knew I wasn't gonna get that right um and then also to better understand responses to individual questions we're looking at what if we can add a text box to that um so that survey is looking to go out um in the beginning of June um and then we talked about ways that we celebrate that the district is um implemented celebrating student achievement um what our current practices are and how we can um further improve upon them to really make it more meaningful for students and families and that is it nothing to move Co thank you um we do have um one uh routine information item we do need to accept a harassment intimidation bullying report this is the report that we discussed last week or last month excuse me during our executive session um that uh is something that we can do by a Voice vote I believe so I will ask for someone to make a motion accept Megan thank you so much and and second please second second by Jen thank you very much any discussion on that really limited what we can discuss in any case uh so all in favor I anyone I anyone obstain um we did as as is recorded here we did uh School did conduct fire and safety drills in accordance with the state regulations uh during the past month and so that brings us to our second period for public comment uh same same rules parameters as the first uh so I will open it to the public if anyone has anything they would like to bring before the board see none I will look at the screen next to me and seeing no one is there either I will say we will close the second period of public comment um at this time the board does have need to go into an executive session uh I don't anticipate I anticipate that taking about 20 minutes there will be no action taken after we come out of that executive session but leave the room you're welcome to stay if you like um so we'll have a um with that I'll need a motion to go into session 9:15 Megan thank a second second second right thank you all in favor