H what happened yes what ready good evening everyone I would like to welcome you to our July 2nd 2024 Board of Education meeting we are calling the meeting to order it is 7:06 p.m. and if everyone could please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance a reading of meeting notice 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 the public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon in accordance with the provision of the act the Verona board of education has caused notice of this meeting to be published in the Star Ledger post with the township of Verona and the Verona Education Association post postings of this meeting setting forth the time location and agenda were posted at the Verona Board of Education Office and on the Verona Public Schools district website copies of tonight's agenda and resolutions have been made available to the public via the Board of Education website Mr Cruz can you please call attendance Mr wer yes Mrs brazel here Mrs Farrar here Mrs prisco here Mr Boon here here we have Quorum thank you thank you moving on to the agenda I need a motion please to approve our routine matters uh approve our minutes from our last meeting of June 11th moot motion by Mr Waka seconded by I'll second Mr Boone are there any discussions Mr Cruz if you could please call roll Mr wer yes Mrs Bella yes Mrs Ferrara pres oruse myself Y and Mrs prisco yes Mr Boon yes thank you thank you moving on to our superintendent report Miss Diane dppi good evening um we did uh receive um in today's uh email the NJ preliminary njsla results um there were a few areas that we exceeded expectations for improvement and some that need uh to better meet that Mark um I can't go into specifics now because they're still considered embargoed as soon as the Department of Education gives us the okay to release them in the public I'll provide a full report on those um uh those that pertain to the school goals and Dr Miller will will obviously do his um his thing um when come when it comes to the assessment report um the education uh committee uh members um will be happy hear especially those that were on the committee last year that um we are will be using the atlas curriculum management platform to um record lesson plans and our goal is that what this platform can do is it can um because teachers don't type in a standard they choose a standard so the standard is identified in the curriculum it's identified in the lesson plans and then what we can do is we can upload assessment results that are also linked to standards and we can triangulate that data obviously in the first year you don't have enough data to triangulate but ultimately going down the road will be able to triangulate assessment data lesson plan data and a curriculum data to look for patterns I mean ultimately what we want to do is to be able to um uh guide our growth and Improvement efforts more strategically right so ra now because we don't have a lot of data about why we're not doing as well as we think we should we're taking rough guesses and making changes um to address um those lower areas where the test scores are lower than than we we would like so that is going to help us be much more strategic in our planning for school Improvement um with regard to the schedule changes that we Pro started with last year at hbw um uh we did make a small schedule change for next year in the fifth grade um language Arch schedule so students will be getting an additional marking period of research which is going to address um the time differential that we don't have in our fifth grade that most fifth grades that occur in an elementary uh building do get so the state recommends um 90 minutes of ela uh and 60 Minutes of math uh we get 45 and 45 at hbw so um we're looking to find ways and ultimately for the 25 26 school year we'll have a brand new schedule but getting that schedule and running uh required a little bit more professional development than we were ready to rush into for the 2425 school year so um I will put something together and send out to the hbw parent that's that may not be paying you know watching tonight or or going back and watching this video so um we are well into what I call the summer teacher Shuffle so right now uh we have teachers that are actively being recruited from other districts so you see there's several resignations on the agenda this evening and so we are now responding to those resignations and moving um you know moving to fill those positions as quickly as possible so right now open positions are at uh well still open but about to be closed we have a grade four position at uh Brookdale Avenue School and uh just to go over why that's a a grade four position uh if you recall on the last agenda we had a change that um several agendas ago the math Coach position was uh reduced so Mrs jario was going to grade four at Brookdale Avenue um with the resignation of Miss Miss guger on the agenda this evening um we have an opening at grade five math and that would be a perfect slot for Mrs Jer to fill in so she'll be transferring it's also on the agenda tonight into grade five math at hbw and that opens that position at grade four uh we do have um uh we are on the final round of interviews and had a nice group of uh candidates to to choose from at the middle school we just talked about the fifth grade math which is filled internally um uh you'll notice on the agenda this evening Miss Miss suo is resigning um to go to to another area closer to home um she's a special education teacher we are advertising that was a recent um resignation letter um and we have uh Miss u m Senora Lopez's resignation that was approved last month um and that was uh for Spanish at uh hbw and we have a final I'm interviewing someone tomorrow final at the high school we have several openings uh we I did hire he's on the agenda tonight for your approval a special education social studies teacher um for Mr Wedel's resignation we are um still seeking um special education English uh for Mrs B Miss buaran resignation we have a Spanish league replacement that's been exceedingly hard to find as it's a halfe placement um but I spoke to Mrs Peter this morning and she believes she can cover that uh from September through January with six period assignments um and we have uh Mr cross's resignation um from the business department and we are actively just re uh advertised and were actively interviewing they had five candidates that they were reaching out to today with regard to the high impact tutoring that we spoke about last last meeting um I mentioned to the board that we were not sure at that time whether or not we were going to have the attendance um during the summer months that we had hoped so we decided to prioritize the funds for the fall when student attendance would be stronger um we are we are running a multisensory reading program this summer for students who have multi sensory reading and for those that multisensory reading um it's like Gordon Gillingham Wilson those are the programs that are considered multisensory that have that in their IPs and who need that level of support the high impact tutoring uh was well attended in the spring and we hope to see that same uh attendance in the fall I can't talk about this topic without saying it was a shame that the state delayed the grant funding uh for so long it impacted the number of students who could have benefited from it and I'm referring specifically to our fourth grade students who aged out as of June 30th 2024 and are not available for full uh high impact tutoring um you know going back and looking at who was impacted by the pandemic we we know that all of our students were impacted by the pandemic but if you look at the fourth this the rising fifth graders this year's fourth graders that are going into fifth grade we in kindergarten during the closure so they missed they they they were not in school from March to June of 20 uh 1920 of that school year they also came back to first grade in a hybrid environment in F in second grade they were at least in school five days but it was in a massed environment through uh March and then in um things got back to normal but when you spent kindergarten with a good quarter of the year at home a hybrid year uh on first grade and a difficult year trying to learn in a mass situation in your second grade year it's hard even though you're back to normaly to recoup those um numeracy and literacy skills that you acquire in early uh primary education so our third and fourth graders are the ones that probably needed the most um intervention with what this grant was designed to do and it's unfortunate um and negligent I believe of the department not to get the grants to the schools in a more expedient manner or to extend that we can continue this uh working with these kids into the fifth grade they didn't either so that's uh really unfortunate um our other summer programs are off to a good start we had uh you know the opening of VC and our esy program is also running nicely we um Verona Summer music is is up and running in at the high school and I know I won't be here to see the actual performance of Willy Wonka but I Mr morn yeah Mr Moran did tell me I could come down and watch the final dress rehearsal yeah reporting yeah I'm sure he will yeah yeah um that's my report for this evening thank you thank you very much for all that information does anyone have any question going forward yeah so the question was is Mr morn going to be involved in Summer music going forward I met met with him uh the last week of school and all indications are yes and it will continue to be at the high school this is speaking historically one of my favorite programs that Verona has to offer and I'm I'm heartened I I just assume that he was going to be stepping out from that role well and also important to note that it's not a Verona program it's a Mr mortan program it's it's Verona Summer music but it's not school district uh uh supported we support it but it's um it's supported by the parents they pay for thank you great anyone else have any questions or comments thank you moving on to our committee reports there were no committee reports so we're moving on to uh public comments on action items only anyone from the public that has anything to comment on that we're voting on please come up to the podium seeing none moving on to discussion items new business and old business does anyone have um so so I was hoping to be able to um kind of discuss this first at our security committee um but unfortunately we weren't able to meet mostly because of my own personal things that I had so I had to unfortunately cancel two of our meetings um but I wanted to just kind of bring up and see how we could potentially get the ball rolling on a conversation around security um you know whether it be you know I'll be honest I'm not really a big um proponent of consulting firms I think they're very expensive and they don't necessarily you know provide you know as much as what we may be looking for but you know I think that I would like to kind of have some ideas of what that may cost if we were thinking to bring someone in to you know do a plethora of things you know to just kind of view our building our teachers our our administrators you know I'm not sure exactly what a consultant firm would do but I would like to know what our options are for that um and then also if it's something that we would possibly need an RFP for um you know again I don't really know exactly what the process looks like but I would like to start to investigate and have an idea and have discussions around what that looks like for us and what are viable options for us um Mrs per if I might um when when you're asking potential for consulting firms are you looking at the physical plant or are you looking at process or are you looking at both both both both I think that you know I think that we should I'd like to see us have options on the table so that as a board we can look at what they are again what are viable options what um are things that we possibly you know where are our weaknesses in District what are our options for kind of trying to fill those those Hol for a physical evaluation could we or I believe we've have could we partner with the town in the police department and helping us on the physical part I mean do they not have we have yeah and we've also we've also invited um uh the State Department of Homeland Security that partners with the Department of Ed so you have a joint um a department at the doe that's also functions with the um uh Homeland Security they've come in and worked with our staff that my first year we did that so then maybe you know I think I want to know what do we need and how much is that going to cost yeah I can get I think just that in itself is a place kind of for us to start start you very much I agree we should start looking into that and getting some numbers um I didn't do this the last meeting I don't think I did but um I just want to say thank you to end of the year thank yous um I don't know if I did but I want to just say thank you to everyone and the staff did um so I'm thanking you again for everything so and enjoy the summer so I don't remember if I did it the last meeting getting old I don't remember stuff but I also want to give a shout out to he wasn't a Verona High School graduate but he was a a product of our Verona schools and his parents were born raised here and went through Verona schools as well his dad actually actually threw out the first pitch this year for The Rona High School baseball game um and that's David Festa he played his first Major League Baseball game for the Minnesota Twins and I'm gonna get choked up because I've known him since he was born um and just to see him and watch him we had a watch party for him at the Verona in and he's pitching again tomorrow evening he's starting so I just would like to uh really give a big shout out to his parents for doing such an amazing job he attended Forest Avenue and hbw and then he went to Sean Hall High School and ultimate went to seaten Hall um university and he was actually um a walk- on there and he was 13th ranked in the the MLB draft so congratulations he's just a great great great great person he's humble his parents are humble so I wish him all the best and congratulations to them so that's all I have pitching until late his late yes he pitched on Barnstormers when he was younger but he was really a short stop so um but congratulations to all of them and that's all I really have right so moving on to correspondence is there any correspondence we need to report out on nothing okay so I'm going to move on to our resolutions I need a motion please to approve uh our Personnel resolutions A1 through A8 moved motion by Mr Waka seconded by mov Mrs par are there any discussions on Personnel resolutions I just had one question on A1 excuse me a1.1 are um some of these the the part-time technician role is that typically that's typically F filled by a um existing student is that just by practice so on a a11 the district technician network technician um that's not a student yes we do use students full no this is a full-time position okay and that replaces um what am I look oh oh I see it looking at the one at the bottom on a11 and and I have and then is yes it's a student okay yeah no I have no problem with it again I I just applaud that I think it's a neat opportunity for a learning opportunity for our students and that's why that's why I want to pull that up yes thank you for that I'm sorry I was I was looking at the network technician two clicks thank you Mr Cruz if you could please call roll sure Mr Walker yes Mrs brazelle yes Mrs Farrar yes Mrs prisco yes Mr Boon yes motion carries thank you moving on to our education resolutions I need a motion please to approve resolutions B1 through B17 so Move Motion by Mr Boon seconded by second by Mrs Bella is there any discussion seeing none Mr Cruz if you could please call roll Mr Walker yes Mrs brazel Mrs farar yes Mrs prisco yes Mr Boon yes motion carries thank you moving on to our Athletics and co-curricular I need a motion please to approve resolutions C1 through C2 motion by m Bella seconded by second by Mr Boone are there any discussions Mr Cruz if you could please call roll Mr wer yes Mrs Rella yes Mrs uh Ferrar yes M uh Mrs Frisco yes Mr Boon yes motion carries thank you moving on to our facilities resolutions I need a resolution a motion please to approve resolutions D1 motion by I'll move it by Mrs brazel seconded by I'll second m Ferrera are there any discussions Mr Cruz if you could please hold on sorry this is for D we're on facilities okay the train okay Mr Cruz if you could please call roll Mr wer yeah Mrs fella yes Mrs Farrar yes Mrs prisco yes Mr Boon yes motion carries thank you moving on to our finance resolutions please I need a motion please to approve resolutions E1 through E12 so Mo motion by Mr Boon seconded by I'll second it by Mrs Rosella are there any discussions seeing none I did just want to thank on E12 I do want to thank the yes family for their generous donation to FNB yes I just saw that oh sorry to hear that thank you for br that up just so uh there planning on buying aeds with this oh thank you I'm sorry buying aeds aeds Mr Cruz if you could please call I have a question sure um E11 it says we're getting 250 Chromebooks for staff um but the cost is not to exceed 198,000 that's pretty expensive for a Chromebook right these are um staff Chromebook not not the actual basic small Chromebooks so this is actually um we expect to use that whole amount because that would be like almost you know that much for a thousand in Chromebook or maybe even more um so that is uh yeah it's about and change and then it's also like um the support and the warranty for I believe um uh 5 years if I'm not mistaken but that's um uh proposal that the IT director was working so it's it's a better model is that work it's a better model and and um it's part of transitioning our staff away from Windows devices to Chrome um iOS uh OS devices I think the last time they got devices were was during the pandemic right yeah 2020 I think it was the last and and it's they due to replace those models that makes more sense thank you we get anything for retiring older the older stuff or is that so there uh whenever we do uh before disposing any um Hardware we do actually auction it off so we'll probably do like gup deals or even uh a vendor that does the buyb um so there there is um I'm not sure um what what the value is but there there is actually a return on that and then I mean so is there a way to then square that accounting so that that 198 doesn't feel as bad or is that not um the oh so as far as like the to cover the the breakage on the on the difference of that um so we we can but I I think that the value that we get from uh reselling uh those devices back is not is not that big yeah it's not but the funds would go like into like the general budget fund or oh so so yes so that so it would exactly so it ends up being a revenue um it ends up um coming back into the budget as a revenue and and it does um offset um the budget in the future Year Mr crud if you could please call roll on that for yeah uh Mr wer yeah Mrs Vella yes Mrs farar yes Mrs prisco yes Mr Boon yes motion carries thank thank you moving on to uh governance and policy I need a motion please to approve resolutions F1 through F2 o motion by Mr Waka seconded by I'll second by Mr Boon are there any discussions seeing none Mr Cruz if you could please call roll Miss Waka yes Mrs Vella yes Mrs Farrar so again I wasn't here for the doing meeting so I'm going to accuse myself uh Mrs prisco yes Mr Boon yes motion cars thank you very much moving on to our public participation anyone from the public wishing to speak on any matter please approach the podium once recognized clearly State your first and last name for the record you will have three minutes to address the board there will be no cross dialogue during the public portion if there is a question that can be answered only the superintendent board attorney or board president can respond and we'll do so at the end of all comments you will be granted one time to speak and there is a total time limit of 1 hour for public participation again please note there will be no back and forth and we request that you remain respectful thank you anyone coming up to the podium please come up and state your name hi I'm in the FM Brown section of town you state your name I'll State my name at end of the meeting okay not one person who has read the medical records the emails the documents or learned the facts has been able to say the allegations by a former FM Brown student of sexual assault by another student are not true with even a fraction of the evidence this board has and I tell you it is a fraction neither can you yet you sit in silence focus on avoiding liability rather than acknowledging a traumatized child in turn allowing that child to continue to go through hell every single day not one day goes by that this does not come up the trauma to a child is the same whether the harms caused by child or an adult just yesterday she had run from the pool because this boy abruptly showed up in Discovery you will eventually hear her own Brave words from her mouth and a video from trauma therapy where she was finally brave enough to share what happened to her and I'll spare you those details right now she is incredibly brave for speaking up when so many are too scared to speak yet you have allowed members of this community to victim shame and try to squash that bravery you've allowed adults to call this Brave victim a liar crazy blame her parents who have done everything and gone to the ends of the Earth to get her the help she needs so she is safe another educator has been here and yelled if you feel scared close your mouth and leave you are telling a child don't be brave enough to say the truth you enable the family of this child to not do the right thing either this is why victims are too scared to speak up they are the ones who need to Pro prove their innocence and be Vindicated against attackers kids do not lie about sexual assault no one let alone a child could fake physical injuries triggers well-documented symptoms of trauma documented by Educators and nurses at this school for a year and a half to only later be able to come up with a fully supported Story how could a child know the symptoms of trauma to fake when our Educators do not she told her teacher flat out a child touched her that teacher told the parent and she chose not to believe her because she didn't know what trauma looked like and why would a child lie she's lost friends her school her innocence her trusting and carefree Spirit thankfully she has not lost her strength and she has not lost her resilience especially against this utter failure of support from the community that swears that they stand strong with their Community the truth will come out I promise you that that is why we are here with the support of trauma doctors who say long-term healing requires the truth you don't need to believe her the emails her injuries the notes the records from the school from her doctor three minutes are up thank you what would you do if this little girl came up to you and said why didn't you help her what would you tell her when she said why didn't you speak up thank you your comments didn't state your name you're not going to state your name okay thank you yeah I'll say it um I'm not sure we have not spoken about anything regarding this case we are not able to speak about anything about this case we've not referred to anyone of any child and for the record the first meeting when people came out and spoke we had to stop people from calling another person a predator so it's going both sides so let's just stop is there anyone else that would like to come up some Podium aru kman I've spoken here before I have three kids at FM Brown again I didn't feel like I was going to speak today because the person who just spoke is extremely close to this case as some of you know so but what got me up here was your comment right now it goes both ways it goes both ways yes showing respect goes both ways so you stopped someone from saying those words that was presented at the first meeting that person yes could have used different words but was also some of you know who that person was so he had every right to do that but again probably should have acted differently but as mentioned last time when somebody gets up and stares the people who spoke down and says leave go ahead leave if you don't like it here leave or somebody gets up and actually calls kids Liars why aren't you then saying stop it why are you just saying stop it to somebody who used a harsh word why don't you stop and say stop calling this girl a liar why are you just going one way why are you advocating for the person that you referred as your friend after what he stated if I were any of you I wouldn't want to be associated with that person that made such an asinine comment without knowing anything so I agree it should go both ways but again your actions are not showing any support to anybody so don't go saying that the person Ed wrong language I agree but when other people do it to some little girl who came out of Bravery to say what happened to her and you don't stop them from calling her a liar and saying that parents do things for other reasons like money and making all these ridiculous ACC accusations say any of that I have to stop you right now we did not say any of that you're making the assumptions sound like we said stuff like that please stop no I'm not saying you said it you none of you said that I'm telling you right now none of you said that but when somebody comes up here and says something like that why are you not telling them to stop is is we shouldn't ever te we can't it's a right Freedom right it's a public meeting okay people can say what they want except they can't yell fire in a crowded room so why did you stop you person no no no so why was why was he stopped from saying the one word I'm just saying if you're stopping one person from using harsh language then you should say to other people to be respectful as well that's all I'm saying is have everybody be respectful thank you and I'm going to also comment because there were things mentioned at our first meeting that were against our superintendent that were very disrespectful very upsetting to everyone that sits up here but that's acceptable it's not acceptable one quick comment um this is public meeting um and I I some of you know I do attend a lot of these in in my job um and as part of public meeting is the public gets to communicate with us with their elected representatives it's not intended as a back and forth engagement between two sides of a an argument it's not intended as a back and forth engagement between the board and the public um anyone can say pretty much anything they want at a public meeting um as Miss D jppy has mentioned I personally have had people stand up there and call me racist call me horrible names um before I was even member of the board to be quite honest and and there was nothing any member of the board could say because that is that person's right um goes back to the First Amendment so well yes we do ask people to be respectful and to recognize one that what you say is being recorded it can be laid back and spliced and diced and however many ways they could do it my kids could probably do it um and two we are members everybody in this room is members of your community um and we're all going to be here for a very long time together um and so let's bring it down a bit I am happy I take notes I you know I try to pay attention to everything that's going on um but let's just remember it's public comment people can say whatever they want we have limits to what we can say in fact I'm sure Kyle would be yelling at me right about now um but you know that's really the reality thanks thank you hi my name is Joy I live on Zell Street um I just want to say I find it interesting that you guys are making comments now because I thought at the end of everybody's comments is the only one you can speak but right you're obviously not sticking to your rules but anyways I just wanted to say I find it and please don't interrupt me just want to say I find it really interesting that both the teachers and your jobs and your responsibilities and all these folks here their sole responsibility is to protect the children who know that that happened who knows if that didn't happen this investigation is ongoing Court of public opinion has already been a disaster we've got people siding with other people people siding with other people but the evidence will come out and when it does come out can't wait for it too it's going to be great because those who excuse me I'm speaking you don't have to listen to me I'll wait till you're done okay so when it does come out I hope the board does acknowledge and will put to bed any sort of negative comments about this case going forward and that we'll just wait for it to happen and in the meantime it is what it is and lastly I just want to say teachers that are here to support one another I hope it's for reasons outside of this case and not related to this case because if that's the case here that's truly embarrassing and disrespectful thanks thank you Joy for your comments Hi Megan peligrino uh you may want to stay for this no okay you can watch it on YouTube then okay good um I am co-president of the Rona Education Association and I wasn't planning on speaking either but that last comment triggered me because we are Educators we protect we teach I'm speaking to everyone I'm speaking to my colleagues as well we many of us also live in the community I am a parent of FM Brown my son just graduated I've also been a teacher at FM Brown for 26 years going on 27 we are there to protect and to teach students when our school is consistently brought up because allegations they are allegations they have not gone to a court case yet but our school is consistently brought up and tonight the teachers are being brought up and we can come to meetings because our school is being brought up every single meeting so if we come here and sit in solidary and don't say anything we have that right we go into this profession to protect to teach young children I've been doing it now for 26 years we care deeply about our community about the kids in our school so yes one of our colleagues our principal and our entire school has been brought up so we can come here and sit in solidarity oh greo I never restarted the clock that was from you okay thank you for coming out speaking is there anybody else that would like to come up and speak seeing none look at thing about that okay we're going to sorry I'm coming I need a motion to approve um to adjourn our meeting motion by Mr Boon seconded by I got it miss verzella our next Board of Ed meeting will be Tuesday July 20 oh all in favor hi hi sorry Hi and our next Board of Education meeting will be on Tuesday July 23rd 2024 confidential at 6 p.m. and 7 p.m. is our public session our meeting is adjourned it is now 7:46 p.m. and everyone enjoy the rest of the summer thank you