##VIDEO ID:E1DG4sozzzs## e e e e e e e I call good and back good all right call the orders August 22 meeting meeting announcement Wendy the New Jersey open public meetings law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon in accordance with the provisions of this act the sparta board of education has caused notice of the time and place of this meeting to be published in the New Jersey Herald The Star Ledger tap into spa.net and notice of the meeting has been posted on the sparta Township School District website thank you roll call Jan Miss Kier here miss gagnan president Miss McMichael Mr pesi miss seander here miss sarafino here Dr Serrano Mr wood Mr moris here if we can all rise for the pledge of legance United States of America stand Nation indivis okay we're now going to conven in to close session we'll be down there for approximately 1 hour for uh attorney client privilege and other legal matters I get a motion to go and close session thank you second second Joanne Miss Kier yes Miss gagnan yes Miss cander yes Miss sarapo yes Mr wood Mr Mars yes e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e welcome everybody put the mic closer mine's on Jo can you roll call please miss Kier here miss Gagnon present miss cander here miss seraphino here Mr wood here Mr Mars here you didn't call me Joan Miss Dr Sano here okay we're going to start tonight with a presentation from Dr Beck make it quick good evening everyone for those folks that are following the meeting at home um as we've been doing this presentation you won't be able to see obviously from home but this presentation is on our website and it's under the Board of Education tab um that dropped down for Board of Education and it's under presentations so tonight I will be presenting on chronic absenteeism and our District's chronic absenteeism corrective action plan I will start by defining Chron absenteeism according to the New Jersey Department of Education a student is considered chronically absent if the student misses 10% or more of the school days in session for which the student was enrolled so just doing quick math with that there are 180 days in a school year for students and if a student misses 10% of those days that's 18 days they are at that point considered chronically absent according to the New Jersey Department of Education why is chronic absenteeism important uh these are all facts from the New Jersey Department of Education website a student is chronically absent if they have missed as few as two days of school a month two days of school a month 10 months that's 20 days they would miss evidence indicates that it is how many days a student misses that matters not why they miss them when analyzing attendance and educational outcomes ATT attending school every day increases chances of success in school and in life chronic absenteeism is a primary cause of low academic achievement and a powerful predictor of students who may eventually drop out of school chronic absenteeism is not the same as treny in New Jersey treny is defined as having 10 or more unexcused absences whereas a student in New Jersey is typically declared chronically absent if they have 18 or more excused and or unexcused absences within a school year I'll talk more about treny and unexcused absences and by the sixth grade along with GPA absenteeism is a top predictor of Dropout the need for a chronic absenteeism corrective action plan so it is in New Jersey state statute that school districts that um exceed the threshold for chronic absenteeism are mandated to have corrective action plans to address chronic absenteeism the statute states pursuant to code in the event that 10% or more 10% or more of the students enrolled in a public school are chronically absent the school shall develop a corrective action plan to improve absenteeism rates the corrective a action plan shall include but not be limited to the following components um and I'll get to those components in a second so basically a individual student is chronically absent if he or she misses 10% of the school year so a student is chronically absent if they miss 18 days of school or more then when you're talking about chronic absenteeism on the school level you take the school population and of the school population 10% or more of the students are chronically absent that's the threshold so if a school like Alpine roughly let's say 750 kids 10% of that is 75 students so if you have 75 students or more that are 10% or more individual usually tough to follow um then that school has a chronic absenteeism issue as well and they exceed the threshold so if that is the case which is the case for all five of our schools uh then you have to come up with a chronic uh a corrective action plan the corrective action plan should have the following components you need to identify the problems and barriers to School attendance develop recommendations to address the problems and barriers to School attendance that have been identified outlining Communications strategies to educate and inform parents on the importance of School attendance establishing protocols on informing and engaging parents when a child begins to show a pattern of absences and review school policies to ensure that they support improved School attendance so I am going to present tonight I am presenting more generally on a district level um about what our schools are facing and what we are doing to address those the specific action plans for each School are hyperlink at the end of this presentation so if you want to get into the specific statistics and the specific um action plans of each building they are linked at the end of this presentation I'm going to speak more generally on a district level uh this evening some commonalities amongst those action plans here are our statistics so this is Sparta Township Public Schools chronic absenteeism statistics by School uh this is based on the latest performance report the latest performance report that is out reflects the 2223 school year the 2324 school year that just concluded that that uh performance report is not out yet so you can see each of our schools The Chronic absenteeism rate for 22 23 and what the state average was so Alpine Elementary School 24% chronic absenteeism rate that means 24% of the students at Alpine School have missed 10% or more more of the school days the state average so that's 24% for Alpine the state average is 19.6% for that year um Mohawk Avenue 17.8% was their absenteeism rate the state average is 14% was 14% for that year Helen Morgan similar 17.4% 13.3% being the state average Sparta Middle School 16.2% and 14.8% being the state average and then the high school School 15% um actually being below the state average of 18.1% but still above the threshold of 10% what you can see here in that particular year the 2223 school year is the um the older the students get as far as schools go the the lower The Chronic absenteeism is that's a trend you can see there back to 2122 I'm not going to read all of those rates you can see what those rates are you can see them on the screen here you can see them at home on the presentation um one thing that is important to note is that the new New Jersey Department of Education just cautions you as you go back in years um 2223 uh but if you go back in years beyond Behind 2223 they just caution uh people that are looking at those statistics because of covid and coming out of covid and uh Co really I mean you go further back than that obviously the 21 2021 um the numbers will be all over the place so they just caution you the the most accurate as far as the de is concerned the most accurate is the most recent and then just uh take the uh the later ones with more of a grain of salt so components to school corrective action plans if you were to click on any of our school corrective action plans you would see these components um that each school has to have a problem solving team and we worked together as an admin team in the district to come up with some commonalities for corrective action plans and then really gave the uh freedom to the principles to go back to their teams and actually create their own individual ones the problem solving team um for the most part except for in the high school they already had an attendance team uh but in the other schools we have data teams and um data teams and school Improvement panels what what we wanted to do there was use teams that already exist that teams that already existed RTI teams RTI committees that are already looking at students their performance and their statistics and barriers that they're facing we're just going to morph those teams into also including um chronic absenteeism in those in those buildings any decisions that you make need to be databased they uh you need to assess you need to build supports and protocols you need to implement them and you also need to include a parent SLC caregiver survey um we were waiting although we wanted to get these board approved so they were in effect for the school year we were waiting for the parent caregiver school year uh survey to make sure we were back in school and we were hoping to get a better rate a better response rate so coming in September we we will release uh surveys from all the school buildings pertaining to um students per I mean uh parents perceptions when it comes to absenteeism and each plan has to have a plan for for uh sustainability standardizing embed practices ongoing research and professional development and then of course reviewing and revising one of the key components to corrective action plans what the New Jersey Department of Education wants you to do is they want you to revisit current policies so uh what we've been working on as an administrative team along with the board of education is we've been working on revising our uh regulation 5200 and um we've worked uh for a couple of months now and came up with with certain revisions which I'll get into key revisions to the regulation the attendance regulation New Jersey Department of Education recognizes two types of absences they are either State excused or state unexcused and I will show you what those actual absences are but when the state is calculating absenteeism rates in any school for any student they really don't care why a student is out unless they are fall under the state excused category and I'll show you what those reasons are in in a moment um you are allowed to as a school district and we do come up with locally excused absence reasons but um and that's just for us and for our own use but when it comes to again when it comes to the Department of Education looking at your absenteeism rates uh they really only care if students miss school if if you miss school for State excused they will take that off um one of the state excused reasons would be uh bring your child to work day so that's a that's a state excuse a lot at absence and if a student misses that day uh and is excused for that day they then that's one day they then take their equation out of 179 days instead of 180 um and again I'll get get into what those reasons are absences outside the listed excused um are counted toward treny we'll talk about treny in a in a moment um and that really will come down to uh principal discretion when it comes to treny here are the updated reasons in in accordance with our our updated regulation these you can see down the left hand column what the state statute says are excused absences those are State excused absences and these are the only ones that will um not affect uh chronic absenteeism religious observances observance of Veterans Day participation in District Board of board of election activities take our children to workday College visits for grades 11 and 12 um up to three days per school year closure of school buildings obviously if we have a snow day that they're not expected to be in school that day um and the most recently added in fact it's a it's a brand new revision for this evening because it just came out was attendance at a Civic event and in the revised attendance in the revised regulation this evening uh that's on the agenda you can see how they Define a Civic event but that's only allowed for one day a year in addition to those reasons those are the state excused um and they don't go against uh chronic absenteeism we do have locally excused reasons that you can see there on the right hand column so the locally excused reasons which again will not affect our statistics um are all the state excused reasons Plus a student's uh required attendance in court Ida accommodations suspension from school death in the family interviews with prospective employers or admissions officers a driver's license examination and necessary and unavoidable Medical Dental appointments when you're looking at the corrective action plan some common themes that you will see um we treated it uh more like the RTI the mtss process and having and breaking it down into tears and how we address students and families that have chronic absenteeism issues tier one strategies that you have been seeing as parents we're going to continue to do for all students when they hit these thresholds Genesis will continue to provide parental notification when they hit 4 days s days nine days and 10 days of absence you will uh parents will receive a letter through Genesis promoting and encouraging student attendance at morning meetings at assemblies on school events through school announcements and the integration of importance of attendance into teacher lessons those are what all students will receive tier two and tier three um will be more focused when students start to um have more absences teacher staff teacher or staff check-ins for students at risk for chronic absenteeism formal parent meetings individualized goals and a possible truancy filing uh those are going to be few fewer and far between based on individual circumstances the treny filings so just some other key notes and and a summary of what I had already discussed that chronic absenteeism is an issue locally Statewide and Nationwide I attended my own son's uh orientation today for um for junior high and it was one of their presentations today was talking about chronic absenteeism so it's not just a a Sparta issue it's not just a New Jersey issue um it's a nationwide issue chronic absenteeism each Sparta school has measures in place to track student absences communic with parents and support students who are approaching and or exceed The Chronic absenteeism threshold please continue we will stress this please continue to keep your students home when they are sick we are trying to encourage better School attendance but at the same time um when students are sick we will ask you to please keep those students home you are allowed as as I demonstrated you are allowed 17 absences and if you think about 17 absences in a school year that's a lot of absences um so on the occasion that a student is sick and cannot come to school um please keep them home you're not going to hit the 18 just off of that more than likely our goal is to work with parents and students to ensure students attend school regularly which will lead to the success in school and we acknowledge that there are circumstances that require students to miss school absences accumulated for valid reasons will not lead to treny filings and then here are the links um again you can get uh access these on the website the updated regulation that's on the agenda this evening for second reading um is hyperlink there it's the clean version not the redline version it's much more easy to read to see what our new regulation is and then you can see the links to each individual school's corrective action plans um all schools worked we all worked together as a big committee but the elementary schools are are very similar if not identical they worked very closely together um middle school has its own needs and of course High School had its own needs so they kind of deviate from uh from the others when it um because of of uh their student population and uh that's the presentation wow thank you yep before moving on anyone from the board have any questions no perfect I a motion for the approval of the minutes motion thank you second second all in favor hi hi thank you now we're going to go right back to Dr deck his superintend report while I'm warm right hopefully it's shorter all right thank you first I would like to begin by acknowledging and thanking all of our 12-month staff for all their hard work over the summer there's a lot of work that needs to be done over the summer between closing out the previous school year and quickly transitioning to preparing to open the new school year each summer our building secretaries custodians buildings and grounds and maintenance Crews IT personnel administrators transportation department and business office staff do all that is necessary and quite often goes unseen and unrecognized thank you again to everyone as we prepare to open another successful school year um and that is always how I open my welcome back uh my welcome back speech to the to the staff as well which staff returns already Wednesday if you were not aware I would like to recognize the following staff members who appear on this evening's agenda with their announced retirements Katherine mastriani a school bus uh School Bus aid for the district has served the district for eight and a half years Karen renie who is a sixth most recently a sixth through e8th grade instructional intervention teacher has served the district for 17 years and uh Mike Willie who is a social studies teacher has served the district for 27 years so best wishes to those [Applause] retirees uh an update on the referendum progress the referendum process continues to move along as we have met with the bond Council to determine what the financial impact to tax payers would be under certain cost scenarios we have also held multiple meetings with our architect along with Administration and buildings and grounds to discuss the most ideal design for a potential addition to Alpine elementary school as well as necessary upgrades to our other buildings we are still discussing the timing and role of public input but that will be decided very soon we are getting close to the time where we will land on a final design and begin to move forward with the formal process from there an EIP update EIP is the Energy savings Improvement program both Sparta Middle School and Sparta High School recently had solar panels installed on their roofs and those panels are now fully operational these solar panels were installed as part of the EIP program that our district committed to a few years ago the program will bring Energy savings to our district and has already funded many Energy savings capital projects throughout our schools recently a board committee Ms Rossy and I met to discuss District goals board goals and updating the Strategic plan goals and action plan it is our plan to re-engage our building based committees to update each building strategic plan action plan soon after the teachers and staff return we will also continue to update and align our district goals to the Strategic plan and the board will be creating Board of Education goals as well the plan is to present all of these updates at the September board meeting in the beginning of August September I'm sorry Sparta High School hosted the New Jersey Department of Education and office of emergency preparedness as they offered school safety specialist training and certification to law enforcement administrators and security Personnel from across the state I'm proud to say that Sparta Township Public Schools had a combined 13 administrators and security officers that attended the training and earned their certification this training and certification is just one more measure we have taken to continue to make our schools safer for our students staff and school Community last month I shared updates pertaining to the revised attendance regulation cell phone policy website and other matters with the anticipated board approval uh this evening of the second reading of the AFF forementioned policy and regulation I will be Drafting and sending a community letter containing these updates and various other updates as we prepare to open our schools parents can be on the lookout for that letter early next week and lastly I would like to wish all of our students staff and families a safe and happy return to the school as we enter the 2425 school year and I will turn it over to Miss Rossi all good okay good thank all right thank you um for the president's report I just want to uh remind people with the schools opening soon um there'll be lots of questions concerns and um complaints I'm sure uh just a reminder um we as a board do not field complaints we don't take complaints so if you have a complaint about a certain building something that's happening in that building go to that building's administrator if he can't get you the answer he'll find it and take it that way go through the chain of command don't come to us go to your building administrator secondly um if you guys haven't noticed the bridge on Main Street is closed so just use that as caution I don't want you to be late to school and it's not opening anytime soon so that's all I got okay give a motion to move the hi report okay second second thank you Joanne Miss Kier yes Miss Gagnon yes Miss cander yes Miss sarfino yes Dr Serrano yes Mr wood yes Mr Morris [Music] yes Communications no okay delegate Le aison reports um I forget if I mentioned it last meeting with uh shared services um we just did a project with the town uh where was that what school was that then which one it's hard to hear yeah Paving is that better there you go yeah the yeah the high school right High School Middle School um yeah the uh the oil tank removal projects uh once the oil tanks are removed uh they needs to be repaved over and uh the town did a did a great job working with us and and saving the taxpayers a lot of money um by doing those by doing the repaving so we thank the town for again working with us s uh cost savings with that so thank you anyone else um I'll touch on two things uh just as Dr Beck said just for you um Jenny derck uh as for the strategic planning committee meeting it's everything's going super super well we had our field service rep Kelly Mitchell come out and she actually recommended us since we're going through our district goal goals board goals mission statement she thinks that we should present it all at once um just as a full-fledged thing so that's why we're going to push it back to September no need to rush anything um and just to talk about our district website everything's going really really well I'm not sure if it's full-fledged and up yet but I'm really pleased with it and I think that uh there's a little work to be done but overall it's excellent and to also uh let us know your feedback about the website because that is all very interchangeable and we have a lot more access to um Flex with the website so keep that in mind and just on that note the last component of the whole uh change over to Thrill share will be uh the district app and that will be the last thing to to come off the ground but that's that's coming soon nothing SCF nothing turkey Tru okay no one else good uh I know it's a ways away but um I recently had a meeting with uh SCF and the Turkey Trot committee through work but that's right around the corner it'll be here before you know it so look out for that to sign up and I have nothing else okay public comment number one public comments are invited on all matters pertaining only to action items at this time please State the action item number as well as your name municipality and group affiliation if appropriate for the record each participant will be given 3 minutes to speak once you have your allotted 3 minutes to speak you will not be permitted to speak again until public comment number two all statements should be directed to me as presiding officer the board or Administration may or may not respond to any questions or comments after the conclusion of public participation getting older I need to use the iPad versus the phone uh good evening Mr President Sparta Board of Ed Dr Beck cliffstar next6 Cottonwood Trail Sparta candidate for the sport Bo of Education with the make uh school's great team speaking in reference to 15.42% excuse policy I would essentially required doctor's notes for a single day's absence a lot of parents were concerned over the increase in co-pay as well as misw work for doctor's appointments for a tummy ache or the mental health day we also spoke to a few local pediatricians who expressed some concern about the potential increase in appointment request for students with the Phantom sore throat on a test day and children with a legitimate need to be seen that would not be seen we reach out to a few of you we asked the requirement be made after 3 days we're hearing that that uh is going to happen and the Mak school's great team is proud we could already help advocate for some parents and make lives easier one other concern that doesn't need to be addressed tonight but perhaps a later Amendment you eliminated family illness and perhaps you can consider as a locally excused absence the provision for serious or life-threatening illness family illness students who have a parent or grandparent facing a life-threatening surgery or Endo life moment shouldn't be asked to consider between school and family our guest is their attention would not be on school anyway Also regarding the cell phone use policy by reading of a policy is the policy isn't really changing yet we had a study done by professionals that said students would benefit with less green time over the years a big deal has been made about listening to professionals and it seems like you're not doing that here now I agree experts and professionals can get it wrong we saw some great examples during Co it is okay to respectfully disagree with experts but in this case I think they got it right we've talked to a few of our teachers and believe them when they are telling us that they are battling distractions and it takes away from the learning process profession and through my volunteering as a member of the sparta hon Squad I've seen firsthand the increase in mental health issues among our young people caused by online bullying and lack of social interaction caused by excess of screen time time away from phones and electronics would be a good thing during the school day not asking the phones be taken away as a parent I want my children to have their phone in the event of an emergency some of the discussions we've had with parents would like to see our kids talking at lunch we've heard from a few students that would like to play B maybe play basketball at the high school during lunch Instead at very least split the Lunch Period time in half half to eat half with the phone having students phone and phone separated during class is also a great idea last year we saw a few teachers with slots or something at the front of the classroom that's a great idea the only input that we heard from students and parents is that perhaps consider moving those slots to the rear of the classroom so in the event of an emergency God forbid the unthinkable students can get their phones through the back of the room versus walking up near the front door which would be potentially hazardous thank you very much thank you okay if there's nobody else motion to close motion thank you second favor all in favor okay I'll just comment yeah I'll just comment on that last part about the location uh yeah we we talked about that um multiple times with the administrative team we talked about it with the sea leadership as well about how we would store those phones and what the expectation would be but yeah those phones uh would be in in emergency locations um in in safe locations within the classroom in case uh students were in a lockdown situation emergency situation they would not be going toward the door to get those cell phones dror back to that question could you just clarify on the doctor's note perspective was that a building based like the three days I know we talked about that in committee with the three days for doctors know yeah so in the locally excused you would it would be a locally excused absence if you had uh an unavoidable um appointment I believe it says doctors and or dentist appointment unavoidable uh with proof of appointment um so that would allow again it's just it's locally unexcused and no matter if it's locally I'm sorry locally excused whether it's locally excused State excused whatever it may be just think of it as an 18-day pot so regardless of why you're missing school um whatever that reason may be if it is a family illness um students are allowed to miss school students are allowed to miss 17 days of school um which is a lot and so um I understand I mean we spent a lot of time uh as a committee and as an Administration talking about the reasons that we would allow this and what would um encourage or or lead to uh better attendance in our schools and those are the reasons that we found if there's not if there's a reason that's not on that list that a student misses school they're allowed to miss school um 17 times so um when it comes to the doctor's note the doctor's note on unavoidable um would allow for an unexcused would allow for a locally excused absence but again whether it's locally excuse State excuse on excuse whatever your your pot is 18 right um and then the the latest revision based on what stra s may just uh just send over to us if a student is absent for three or or more days um we will compel a doctor's note um for those reasons and that's districtwide that's not by building and Dr Beck if I may just add to that too I think it's important that everyone does check the most updated version of the regulation because I understand there was some chatter on social media um and perhaps some misinformation as to what the new regulation actually says but the newest version of the regulation does say that a locally excused absence does include illness in accordance with um nurse recommend mendation guidelines building guidelines everyone has the health information available by building right on the website those are obviously Ever Changing as Co proved um so we are obviously being very mindful of that but the goal overall and to Dr Beck's Point um and you know Lauren was was in that policy meeting where we discussed this at length the goal is to help the community understands the state excused and unexcused are completely outside of our jurisdiction however the local excused which is something that not all districts even choose to pursue some districts just decide we're going by the state and that's that and and that's what you get we're giving that Grace to make sure that people have the opportunity um obviously the leeway to understand that life happens but I do think it's very important that we're looking at the most updated version of the regulation because I do think that that's going to help quell some of the concerns um that said I want to also take the time and maybe it's more appropriate for for the good of the order I would like to actually commend our committee because that was probably what two hours and Miss Rossy for staying over and being late for a meeting that followed probably the most collaborative committee meeting that I've sat in on yet um and I'm super super proud of the work that we accomplished in that committee not just for the um attendance regulation but also for policy 5516 I understand uh that there are always going to be people who are not totally satisfied with the cell phone policy but I would say we worked extremely closely with our teams uh admin teams building teams to not only and beyond that teams in other districts that have already gone through these processes so all of the decisions that have been made and all the reflections you see in both the attendance regulation and the cell phone policy are rooted in data it's not impulsive it's not reactive it's not trying to not to say the word but ban use of certain things uh to the vital of of others so the idea is is everything that we I can say the policy as it stands for the cell phon specifically I'm very confident that this is going to give us the most opportunity to have a successful roll out of a plan while also addressing the ongoing culture that I think everyone is in agreement about so I would just again encourage everyone to make sure you're looking at the most updated version of the attendance regulation and also the most updated version of the cell phone use policy uh where K to8 it is essentially not qualified in any way for use so through the high through the middle school we do not encourage cell phone use at all uh and there's very specific uh delineation in that policy at the high school level it's generally discouraged and there's very specific parameters that are laid out in that policy for the buildings to operate and that it'll go further into the student handbooks where it belongs thank you okay moving on I get a motion to move Personnel policy 151 to 1548 with these additions yeah I just have a few um minor revisions thank you 15.1 18 the shs overload stiens um M deardorf um is on there twice uh for a double overload that is actually only going to be one overload not two and then um two late additions Melanie kithcart and Courtney Highland uh both uh life skills teachers will receive uh one overage for the number of classes and that's a full overage with that $113,000 number and then uh 15.36% [Music] read a statement in regards to uh policy 5516 the use of electronic communication recording devices uh she states although unable to vote I would like to officially go on record to state that I do not support this policy as it stands today for the following reasons in June we all heard the why behind our district revising the policy to address impacts on learning and most importantly student mental health and the growing crisis seen Nationwide with today's youth New Jersey school board's model cell phone policy supports eliminating cell phone use during the entire instructional day which is defined to include lunch recess hallways Etc this is the language I unsuccessfully urged to my fellow committee members to include for second reading tonight to Echo Miss delucia's plea from the last meeting I will quote the book that she urged us all to read the anxious generation it says most schools say they ban phones but that typically means that only the students must not use their cell phones during class this is an ineffective policy because it incentivizes students to hide their phone use during class and increase their phone use after class which makes it harder for them to form friendships with the kids around them a better policy is to go phone free for the entire school day end quote to further support this concept in our district presentation from June's board Mee June's board meeting Dr Esposito presented with research from columia Psychiatry that highlighted the harmful effects of the dose response relationship on Mental Health This research supports a cell phone free learning environment allowing free use of cell phones in the high school outside of class time does nothing to address these concerns and therefore does very little if anything to protect student mental health during the instructural day I encourage us as a board to revisit the policy in the near future um I just want to and that was her statement I I do want to add I wholeheartedly support the work done on this area as a whole I agree with with Caitlyn that it was a highly collaborative session and I think we've really are going in the right direction um with revised language and what went into the second read it goes further to discourage cell phone use for students while bringing the policy into the current times I am concerned and agree with some of M McMichael's sentiments that we maybe aren't going far enough to address the mental health issues at hand um and I would just offer that I think creating those healthy boundaries and and teaching digital citizenship and anything that we can do to avoid this habit The Addictive habit of this dose response relationship is vitally important to cultivating a setting in our buildings that supports the levels of highest student achievement a safe learning environment and prioritizes our commitment to the whole Child by supporting best practices for their mental health and adding them uh and helping them to engage in undistracted discourse and building relationships with one another um for me those are the skills that our students really need at the end of the day to be successful in any of their future endeavors um and I'm torn on this because I had reached out to Dr Beck and said I I may be a no vote on this tonight for that very reason um I'm moving to a yes but because I would like to I I would like to engage further discussion of the colleagues um at the board and I would like to see if the board would be open to bringing this back into Committee in January after we could take some time um to look at it in practice in the buildings um to see to Caitlyn's point we have we're saying this policy there still is not an educational we have not seen any educational benefit or mental health benefit to having it in the in the K8 setting um but in the high school looking to see is what we are doing doing enough I'm afraid by voting no that I'm not showing confidence in the process because I do appreciate the collaborative effort of this I just I just needed to be known that I I do agree with Mrs Michael's sentiments that we might not be going far enough in accordance to the research um and I really think it's important that our building teams get a chance to look at that and I would love to see the data present back to us so we could maybe further refine this policy and I'm open to discussion of everyone else obviously thank you I would just speak to the to the latter half of that when you were speaking about monitoring the the implementation 100% uh that's going to be I guarantee that's going to be a topic at each and every one of our admin meetings how is it going um and focusing on the high school uh with how is it going and and the middle school too to an extent because it'll be it's it's a it's new there what's what's going to be happening there with with no cell phones um so yes that's going to be an ongoing um process of reviewing how how it's going with administrators and with the teaching staff and getting feedback from the teachers as well as to how that's going in their classrooms that it uh you know it is working it's not working for these reasons what if we did X Y and Z just to just to tweak it a little bit uh so we are going um so yeah absolutely um it could be a it could be a topic on on every committee every month from now until whenever because uh we're going to be doing it locally so if you want if you want report outs I can do it in my weekly update or whatever it may be but we're going to be monitoring that very closely um I think on um with regards to looking at it again in January I think it's too soon um let it get in place like I said last meeting yeah we will be here next year making revisions to this policy but having it done in January after all the work we've done through the summer is just too soon to really know how it's going to pan out um I think once we get a full school year under our belt and the continued partnership we have with the teachers now I think we'll have a more understanding of where we're going come next June so the way it is now and regards to the uh instructional time um I think it covers the instructional time I don't look at lunch as an instructional period and to monitor phone you storing lunch you have 1,00,000 kids in one area for you know they're not all on their phones at that time some have to eat real fast go to lab so they're not having phones there cuz that's instructional time so you know letting the kids use their phone during lunch I really do not think is going to hurt them in any way and it's not going to hurt the school and keeping it out of the classroom I think is the main focus and having the teachers the administration upholding their end of the deal to enforce the policy as written so I would just like to chime in on that too I actually I couldn't agree more and I think that in light of and in spirit of the um amount of time that we've dedicated to this and the teams that have assembled to dedicate time to this and the building level the administrative level um I think it's really important that we remember you know our job is to absolutely support the the whole student and the wellness of the student but it is not our job to police this district and I would also say uh beyond that I'm slightly disappointed uh by the statement but obviously that's certainly within Miss McMichael's right um we discussed everyone's concerns at length um and Lauren I also agree with Dr Beck and I agree with you is there an opportunity I I do believe we're going to continue to be having this discussion probably for months just even on a board level I can't see why we wouldn't um it's not being etched into stone the policy but it is our starting point I agree with Kurt we need to give this a proper school year to see how it goes if we run into some serious areas of concern we're not beholden to that year we obviously can make re revisions as needed uh we've talked about regulation we've talked about student handbooks I think this is the starting point and while we would all love to Envision a world in which there are no phones or Temptations for our children you know our job is not to protect our children from the world it's to prepare them for it and I think at the high school level the reality is cell phones exist parents we heard tonight parents want their kids to have phones on them during emergency situations even if that's not what data shows totally within parents rights to have those concerns um but ultimately our job is to make sure that we're fostering the best education possible for our students um and to some of the concerns that were brought up by Miss McMichael again reiterating it's not our job to police conversations or whether or not someone has been on their phone for however long during the Lunch Period compared to what the time is allotted I would rather set our district our students and our staff up for success to be relieved by this policy and take part in the general uh being generally discouraged from using phones rather than policing and and and kind of implementing these punishments in the event that you're instantly violating policy so I support this policy as we revised it I'm proud of this policy and I um absolutely will be voting to support it tonight thank you just oh sorry go ahead Chad just a little followup to Caitlyn with some student persp perspective um know you may had me think Lauren when you say um you're afraid of not going too far but I think in some circumstances like these it I would lean on the edge of maybe doing a little less especially in terms of phones uh I feel like for a high school student when you transition from a pretty lackluster phone policy to if per se there were no phones in school that would be a extreme shock to students um I think already put like transitioning towards uh the phone sockets or the bins is a great idea and being recently being in classes where you have some class where it's full uh phone access and teach some teachers don't care and then other ones where it could be the teacher very strict and you need to have it in the bin at all times I think a lot of problems kind of fix themselves so for instance um with students say hiding their phones when they come into class teachers will oftentimes assign numbers to desks so you can easily identify who is keeping their phone and who isn't so there's some easy ways to weed out students trying to hide their phones but I think like Dr Beck said or Kurt said giving the time for the free periods where students could have a chance to use their phone I think is always healthy um to a degree but also what often times I ask teachers um with C like postco uh as a student it was very different because some students did not care at all about learning anymore while some still cared a lot and I would ask some teachers what they would do if some students just simply don't really care that much and would prefer to spend all that time on their phone instead of listening and they said that they're at a point where it's hard to kind of bring that student back in and I think a good solution to this could be an instance like the um phone cart or you know a place to put your phone um in lie of say eliminating all phones because then it's less of the teacher's job to really motivate the student and you kind of take away their incent to do something else it's kind of you're in front of the teacher and you can choose to listen or choose to not and when you leave that room you can go back on your phone but I think focusing on in the classroom is the most important aspect of it um I think your concerns and Miss Michael are are very very valid um and just one thing I want to add to everyone's points that we making is I think this is a very complex issue and addressing phones is more of more than just can they have them or not have them a big part of addressing the mental health issues that come with using phone I think is going to be education and I've worked with Dr Beck and Miss Rossy and sent over curriculums that I've seen about addressing like social media with students and really just how can they have a phone but learn how to properly use it so I totally think this is going to be a big part of the board's future in a lot of ways outside of just a policy as we develop curriculum and everything as well that's a very good point Thank you and I appreciate the discussion thank you for I appreciate the willingness just to continue the discussion to Monitor and I appreciate your willingness to continue sharing data with us as it goes forward I think it's important that we just are aware and I think we can utilize these great align teams things like that to see are we indeed making a difference so thank you [Music] okay if there's nobody else Joan can we get a Miss Kier yes Miss gagon yes Miss cander yes Miss sarafino yes Dr Serrano yes Mr wood yes Mr mors yes okay moving on to curriculum motion for 161 to 1613 motion thank you Chad second thank you discussion Joanne Miss Kier yes Miss gagman yes Miss cander yes Miss sarafino yes Dr Serrano yes Mr wood yes Mr Mars yes motion for finance 171 to 1712 motion thank second you second disc discussion I just want to draw attention and thank uh to 1710 um and thanking for the generous donation from the marching band booster club for the trailer at the amount of $2,120 um that'll be a great addition to the marching band program it's something we've been all talking about and working through and thank you to the public for continuing to support these fundraisers and also to the Alpine PTO for their sub Scholastic subscription for the second grade and Cutting Edge land landcaping for their um $4,600 worth of landscaping for Mohawk Avenue School thank you thank you Lauren Jo man miss ker yes Miss gagnan yes Miss cander yes Miss sarafino yes Dr Serrano yes Mr wood yes Mr Mars yes motion for operations 181 to 184 motion thank you second thank you discussion Jo Miss Kier yes Miss gagan yes Miss seander yes Miss sarafino yes Dr Serrano yes Mr wood yes Mr Mars yes okay thank you anyone have anything for old business new business lovely moving on to public comment number two the board uses this second public comment period to invite comments on all matters pertaining to the school district please state your name municipality and group affiliation if appropriate for the record each participant will receive 3 minutes to speak once H you allowed at 3 minutes to speak you will not be permitted to speak again all statements should be directed to me as presiding officer the board or the administration may or may not respond to any questions or comments at exclusion of public participation don't worry I already signed it's okay okay good evening my name is Angela Delia and I am the very proud president of the sparta Education Association and Sussex County Education Association summer is winding down back to school mode is kicking into high gear and the members of sea are ready for the 2425 school year even in the summer members are accomplishing amazing things Emily Scott from shs organized an adventure filled Hands-On learning trip for our students to Costa Rica with the assistance of Craig Merrill the teachers and students were able to embrace a new culture explore volcanoes and experience Pita Dr vivana Morales Burgess kindergarten teacher at Alpine has been selected to be a part of the rapid project through William Patterson University partnered with the n Department of Education the reading acceleration professional integrated development project rapid targets literacy in preschool and early Elementary grades the fall athletic season has begun our coaches trainers secretary and of course our athletes are working tirelessly to make sure that this season is successful and anytime you are near shs lately you have surely heard or seen a our marching band perfecting their performance I truly believe this is their era if anyone is moving forward together excuse me if everyone is moving forward together then success takes care of itself we know that you can't achieve everything on your own you need a team working together for a common goal and Sparta truly has an All-Star team I'd like to take this opportunity to thank Dr Beck and Mrs Rossy for their amenability to meet each month to discuss pertinent issues prior to each board meeting and Mr Morris miss gagnan and miss Collier for participating in the ideas committee that opens lines of communications between the board and our members in just a few short days we will be welcoming back new and Veteran staff and soon after our students the sea looks forward to another successful start to the school year fostering Partnerships amongst the community and the continued collegial support of the board we are turning the page to a new chapter the pages are still blank let's make this an outstanding story thank [Applause] you hi Jenny DK tap into Sparta I just had a couple of questions about the two policies the absentee policy and the cell phone policy I don't know if this is even on um it's been a while since I had a student in school so what is the difference to the student if they have a state versus a local excused absence does it look any different to them once as long as they're under that 18 threshold um what is the students responsibility for that do the schools still call home if the student isn't there and the parent hasn't called in other words is is the expectation still that the parent is or the guardian is going to contact the school and let them know that their student isn't going to be in um do we have an idea of how many districts in the state have to undergo a cap process for their um absenteeism and then finally regarding the cell phone policy um is there going to be any type of an educational program at the middle school to help the students you know goes to go I think Chad might have mentioned to go from not using your phone at all and then now you're going to have a little bit of access to your phone is there going to be any type of a support or educational process for the middle school students to understand the importance of restraint thank you thank you do I need to do a second time you do you can do it after if you want first once again cliff C 6 cotton with Trail Sparta as part of discussions we've been having with uh some students and getting their input at the beginning of our campaign one of the biggest concerns we're hearing is the issue of vaping in school especially in and around the bathrooms and when teachers are stepping out of the classroom for my generation it was smoking in the bathroom I guess this one is vaping vaping is already banned in schools and we'd like to ask Dr Beck what steps if any are being or could be taken by his staff to increase enforcement efforts and perhaps increase disciplinary penalties for those violating The Vaping rules there anybody else motion to close public comment seconds all in favor okay okay I will um address Miss dereck's questions um the difference to the students um difference students and parents actually I I would extend that question to what the difference for the students and the parents um between excuse and unexcused um there again 18 is the number so there really is no difference between why you are missing school unless it is the state excused um but what we're trying to do and and what we're going to do on as a tier one effort is we're trying to drill home the importance of attendance in school to students um the actual circumstance that takes place I'm not I'm not in people's homes every morning but uh if students are are excessively missing school I'm sure there's conversations between students and parents every every morning as well um so the the onus on being on the students yes uh there should be some intrinsic motivation there but really uh it's there's a almost the entire responsibility relies on the parents of course if there's reasons to um to miss school like the reasons we stated that happens uh but we are hoping that students and parents uh understand the importance of attending school and um that there's collaboration at home when that decision is made um do parents get notified yes parents get notified parents uh it is parents are obligated to notify the school if and when their student is going to be absent um and if that does not take place by a certain time that parent is notified to say hey did are you aware just making sure your student is not at school today and is everything okay um how many in the state I don't know how many are in the state I can tell you that almost every School District in Sussex County is going over is undergoing this process with the corrective action plans and if you look at the statistics if you look at the state average on on those um grade levels the statistics every one of those State averages is above 10% so again I can't give you an actual number but it's rampant I can say that um and then the educational program regarding cell phones I think Miss Rossy can feel that one yeah sure I'm happy to take that one um so we are very fortunate we're partnering with the township the specifically the sparta Municipal Alliance we're going to be sharing more information about that but we're undergoing um an initiative called screenagers which is something that um again we'll share out as we get closer to times and places and how you can access that um we're actually starting hopefully at actually Howen Morgan school which is about fourth and fifth grade when kids are starting to have more access to um cell phones and screens in general um not necessarily in the school it's not really been a problem at that level although it's not going to be something that's available or acceptable or something that they can use at that point but they are starting to have access to these devices and and there are starting to be incidents or situations where their um more awareness and education will be important for them uh as we get into the middle school that will continue and there's more developmentally appropriate uh programming and workshops for not only students but also for parents um because our parent partnership is very important um and what that looks like and how we support one another in this initiative um and I think the last thing just to add to that is while we do that work together to kind of prepare them for these different developmental periods like first having access to a phone maybe and not really knowing all of the different things that uh they might experience and then having a phone but having a lot of restriction on it especially when you're in the school building moving in towards a high school experience where you are young adults and the tool a cell phone is a tool it's not in and of itself a bad uh me mechanism it's a piece of technology and now they have to start to learn how and when and where this technology can be available to them in a useful way or in a disruptive way as they prepare themselves for the real world where they are going to have full access with much less you know Direction and uh boundaries included so there is programming and there is guidance and there is Partnerships with the town throughout that whole process so that at every level of development not only will we be able to grow their awareness and understanding but also help them teach them how to use these things and teach them the boundaries and appropriate time frames for when that might be and I just so more information to come I just have one quick comment about that too is We on terar yes um just one quick comment on that too is the policy I mean you can correct me if I'm wrong Dr Beck but from my understanding I don't think it's going to be a huge difference for the Middle School population from my understanding cell phones are pretty Limited in the middle school already as it is so it's not going to be this drastic you have it now you don't um it's pretty locked down at the middle school already um so I don't think it's going to be a drastic change as far as to what those students are used to but I do think all of the educational background in teaching these students is important but as far as the shock to the system as far as not having phones I don't think it's going to be very drastic for the Middle School population Middle School to high school is probably going to be the biggest change but as far as current middle schoolers I don't think it's going to be a drastic change and then just to address uh Mr next comments last question um yeah very valid very valid concern uh very time appropriate as we just discussed this matter today actually we had Mr zider come in he trained uh train retrain the administrative team in many matters uh regarding student discipline staff discipline that sort of thing but one of the topics that came up uh was vaping in school particularly the high school uh the measures that are currently in place uh there are Vape detectors in in the bathroom so if a student um is in the bathroom and is vaping uh it sets off a a detector a silent alarm which the administration is alerted to and hopefully can uh and and security and hope we can get there in time to um to address that matter when a student is caught vaping or caught with a vape um this is outlined in the student handbook and we discussed it again today we discussed it on on a legal level um our policy our protocol is that when a student is caught vaping in a school they are automatically sent out for a drug test because we cannot tell what's in that Vape um so it while very very well may be something that is legal um it very well may be something that is illegal and we we as administrators um don't have the equipment the time or the resources to judge that so it's an automatic if a student um is caught vaping they're automatically sent out for a drug test uh which is very inconvenient for the student very inconvenient for the parent and hopefully would deter such behavior in the future um and this is again it's not just a Sparta issue it's a definitely a countywide issue Statewide issue Nationwide issue but um there's actually a task force uh that the round superintendent round table has put together to work with the prosecutor's office because um what we are trying to do when when we're talking about consequences is um a lot of times or sometimes we'll refer such matters to the prosecutor's office um in hopes of them instituting a fine when it comes to this um and it doesn't happen very often so superintendants police Chiefs and the prosecutor's office have been working together uh a lot more recently uh to try to curb this behavior and try to figure out ways to um properly enforce The Vaping in school to discourage it yes thank you yeah absolutely anybody else I just want to touch on as far as the locally excused absences it's more in terms of like the impact on the student to Mrs Derrick's question is that it expands upon obviously it's expanding upon the state definition we're still talking about the same days but what we talked about and we made careful consideration of in committee for the second read was ensuring particularly the high school level uh when you think consider even half your courses loss of credit so we did want to take into careful consideration that while the tendance is critically important we wanted to delineate reasons that would be you know the state exclude excluded plus so that we are avoiding students missing uh or losing credit for courses that they are taking yeah to that end I when I answered your question I was answering it more broadly K to 12 uh when you're talking about high school specifically the onus is on the student and the students are made well aware um it doesn't just affect you know an elementary student if they miss 20 days of school all right I exceeded the threshold whatever what's going to happen basically uh but when you're in the high school to lawren point and to answer just on the high school level there's seat time requirements and if students um do not meet those seat time requirements they will not get credit for that course um and they are they will be obligated to make up time for that course which again is going to be super inconvenient for those students coming in on a Saturday to make up time or whatever it may be so um again when the older you get the less you see as far as uh chronic absenteeism goes as far as the percentages go but it's still it's still a problem and in the high school students are made well aware uh so it's talking about responsibility kindergarten student uh has a different responsibility for his or herself then does a uh a high school student and as a parent you do get notified specifically if it's like a halfe course and your student is coming close to meeting the threshold where they're going to lose credit so they do let you know that that's coming up but yeah there are other consequences for older kids and to go back to the The Vaping issue um it's my understanding that The Vape detectors actually almost work too well that they're going off when there's hairspray or cologne or perfume so um they definitely work they're definitely going off a lot um yeah they definitely work okay moving on they good to the order I just want to say good luck to everyone going back the school teachers Administration students good luck to the parents foremost and uh have a great year and see you soon that's it anyone I have a few quick things as well and we touched on quite a few of them um quick things quick very fast time me um so again just want to reiterate how proud I am coming out of policy uh for that committee meeting uh for 5516 and 5200 I think we did a great job uh but I also want to make sure that we're shouting out uh not only the principles but the problem solving teams for those communication strategies I don't know if everyone had a chance to see but right in the hallway here there's already uh displays that are out regarding that chronic absenteeism and trying to curb that um I received a super informative uh inclusion of that in my newsletter from Principal Layman uh as an an HMS parent so I feel like it's very clear that the work is being done on the building level uh to try to help us address this and Dr Beck hit on this earlier but I would just like to really reiterate that when it comes to both of these policies and frankly even vaping um there is a huge onus of responsibility on parents and in order for us to address our chronic absenteeism rates in order for us to address cell phone use there is an onus on parents to make sure you're doing everything you can uh not just at home but to prepare your child outside of the home when it comes to expectations following rules guidelines uh policy and regulation we can go as far as we possibly can if that's what we wanted to do but that wouldn't necessarily curb or change Behavior so again the onus on parents and the collaborative nature of we have our board we have parents we have students staff teachers Administration it's a huge collaborative unit so let's just make sure we're keeping that in mind um and I also just wanted to uh first of all commend Chad for leading Us in the Strategic plan committee I'm really excited that we're setting board goals for the first time in years uh the progress we've made I'm super excited for those to roll out next month so great job there and also for everyone starting to utilize our field service rep through the njsba Kelly was great addition to that committee uh so kudos to you for leading the way uh and one other thing quickly uh to Lauren's point of donations the marching band booster club some of us have been shouting at that mic for quite a year or two or three uh for what the marching band deserves in terms of a trailer to get them to and from their competitions so thank you to the booster club for stepping up to make that happen and if I if I could just make one more comment about the policies I I said this I alluded to it last meeting and I just want to reiterate I really want to thank everybody specifically the cell phone and attendance policies I really want to thank everybody that's been involved the board the administrative team uh the teachers with their input um when policies get revised and updated typically the way that they are done is through Strauss smma Strauss smme when when codes change statute changes they send you an update and basically you accept those changes there's nothing to talk about you might have to fill in the blanks on uh you know acceptable days of absence or whatever it may be when when the St smme revisions come across um it takes a lot of hard work and a lot of teamwork and a lot of courage to look at policies that are not on those regular updates policies that we have in our district that currently affect our students negatively or positively um and really look at how to revise those policies without uh without stra smme or anybody else telling us to for us to do it ourselves uh it takes a lot and I really appreciate that thank you thank you for saying that that's very kind of you also um I wanted to uh speak a little bit about the website Communications we're still working on that and to your point I was actually able to download the app so I would encourage everybody at the bottom of the website you can download it for the new website can see the calendar there I did get a text from Mr hardigan that it is actually up and running so that's my fault that was that's up to the minute but I encourage everybody to download it's great um and there is a while there is a little bit of a learning curve uh like Chad said there's a lot that um we want to focus on in the new site of really bragging about our district there's a lot of great things going on in our district we have a lot of great things that are going to happen this year and um there's a lot of good collaboration that's happening on this on this board and um in our building teams Administration um and we're excited to be a part of it and we wish every everybody a really great school year thank you anybody else motion to adjourn Chad's tired over there okay all in favor hi thank you for