okay thank you okay we are back from executive session welcome uh do we have any board correspondence this evening no do not okay great let's go right into the committee reports education the education committee met on April 3D and at 3:30 uh the first item we covered was summer reading uh Mr Quia the was our um English super advisor reviewed the process of how the summer reading book options were selected for each grade level students voted for three titles that will comprise the option for their summer reading list for each grade level uh Mr quo also reviewed the books that were selected for grade level uh reading and schoolwide reading with the committee uh the committee was pleased with selections and thanked The English Department for listening to their suggestions regarding the process Sumer reading options are on the agenda tonight for discussion and for uh the April 25th meeting for approval uh we then had an extended conversation about health presentation and guest speakers um after a lengthy presentation uh And discussing about the selection process for guest speakers the committee asked the administration to research the benefits and um or were the advantages or disadvantages of content being delivered by in a single gender format for future discussion uh recent events that occurred the steam Fair occurred on March 13th and Hills hacks on March 16th both were well done and well received the science students in the steam Fair were engaging and their experiments outstanding there were 31 total experiments on display with hills hacks was engaging and the collaboration with the middle school students made the event a success a junior Symposium is coming up uh in which senior students will speak to Junior students followed by talks regarding the college process and financial aid um in the area of testing Mr labr informed the committee that testing for the NJ GPA was completed at the end of March testing was seamless and did not impact instruction uh the New Jersey uh student learning assessments and AP testing will begin um in May and we also just had the uh the first round of sat testing on the computer format correct so um it's testing in our schools Our IT team for helping that to go smoothly yeah absolutely uh then we also uh Mrs faen shared with the committee that um some of our 12th grade students will be working as interns at some of the elementary schools this spring so uh that was those were the items on our agenda I would invite any Committee Member to add to that I just had I just wanted to say briefly because nothing was really said as a followup when the parents came in to talk about um their concern about the the Pres the health presentation um my opinion my sole opinion I'm not speaking on behalf of the board was that um it was a pretty giant leap and not necess not a necessary one to assume that because of the person's appearance that the person um that we needed to investigate their qualifications so I understand that the um the Pres presenter read the article that was in uh the Echo and was concerned and so I'm reaching out to the presenter through this forum to say um I mean I apologize it's not my place to do so but I I do apologize if he was offended um and any person in our community or student in our school who um similarly doesn't look the way um mainstream I guess people expect people to look if they were offended I think we should apologize as well I don't think the speaker was treated with a sort of respect we should treat our guests guests in our school and that's just my opinion uh other committee members comments board member comments great okay uh Personnel I think we have a couple items Mr Lee uh language changes affirmative action programs are now listed as educational Equity practices and these policies used to list all the protected categories whereas in the new policy simply State the protected categories listed any questions okay moving right along operations Miss pra the operations committee met on April 3rd with Michael bernberg Heather tror Chris Bick Tim sty Elizabeth JW and myself in attendance Chris gave an update on the construction projects noting that all the projects are currently on schedule the nurses s is being painted and awaiting fire inspection after which the flooring and Cabinetry will be installed the five six locker rooms and athletic trainer space renovation started a few weeks ago uh the pad outside the robotics room was installed the track replacement will begin right after graduation the chiller is scheduled for to begin in November Tim said it was going to be a very busy summer with all construction projects ongoing hence there will be no rentals rental approvals with the exception of the summer Sports Camps run by our coaches Tim reviewed um all right Tim reviewed the items on the agenda for discussion and approval he also noted that the new healthc care rat slated for discussion which will allow staff ample time to review their plan and make informed decisions if they want to move to a different plan he also reviewed the additional policy language that added to the transportation policy IT addresses request requests for additional bus assignments I expressed my support for the policy change but noted that it is difficult to project who will be transported on a route with 100% accuracy Michael questioned if if there had been changes in technology that would allow for some sort of scanning of student IDs as they boarded buses um to further allow us to be certain how many who exactly was on a bus at any given time uh Tim mentioned that the Watchung barl K8 is interested in sharing a transportation coordinator this will be further discussed at the Personnel committee meeting and we adjourned at 900 a.m. it was a busy early morning thank you any questions for Carol okay let's keep moving on uh Mr Morrison you probably have something get to report on regionalization finally uh on March 27th 2024 wung Hills Regional was informed by the Department of Community Affairs of the approval of our school regionalization efficiency program or srap for the purpose of evaluating the Wong Hills Regional High School District PK through 12 consolidation feasibility study the grant is in the amount of $135,000 uh the members of our shared services regionalization um committee uh will be meeting to uh with our group to uh begin the process shortly uh as a result we will be convening the study committee with our Consulting Group from the Rowan School regionalization Institute at Rowan University the study process will be facilitated by Kathleen helaa who is a former watchong or I'm sorry former Warren Township Board of Education member a former senior Field Services representative for the New Jersey School Board Association and is now an educational leadership consultant and part of the Rowan School regionalization Institute team she will be joined by former longtime superintendent Ken green as well as former Commissioner of uh education lucal Davy along with Mark magar on our team additionally our uh SSRS group is extending an invitation to a representative from LGH Hill Warren and Greenbrook Boards of Education as well as representatives from the township Committees of lill Warren wung and Greenbrook to be part of our advisory committee to that group and we're extending an invitation to those bodies to appoint somebody uh to join us uh at our first meeting our first meeting will be Tuesday April 23rd at 6:30 here uh in the um in our uh Media Center um and the uh uh and along with that uh we will be working on uh the plans for uh the timeline for the remainder of the study uh as well as the process that we will be using for communication to the public uh we anticipate that um we will be hosting uh public forum uh on the shared services regionalization study uh sometime in May for the public uh as we kick off the work on this important project on behalf of the families students and taxpayers of our community any questions Bravo no Bob it seems like again I've been on the board a little over three years I think from the start of my 10-year uh regionalization was a uh certainly a topic and uh I appreciate you spearheading the effort I know you put a great deal of work into it a lot of frustration uh ups and downs disappointments at times and I'm just happy that at least this part has come to a fruition we've gotten the approval to move forward and uh I know that you're excited to get started run the committee and see what we can do and you know we've had a lot of discussions with respect to regionalization and and how we can uh benefit uh our school working together with our uh sending districts so certainly appreciate all your effort and those on the committee and the rest of the board for really sticking to it because there were certainly many times we could have just said enough is enough but I appreciate your efforts well and we and I think that you know now the real work begins and I also want to you know uh point out and and share congratulations and thanks to our colleagues at the Wong burough Board of Education who are our joint Partners in this process uh again even though the Wang Hills and Wang burrow are the uh Partners in the the feasibility study process we are extending the invitation to all of the other districts because this will be a complete evaluation of the entire Wong Hills Regional sending districts and and or and our all of our four constituent sending districts as well excellent thank you B all right let's move on to first opportunity for public comment the first public comment period will be limited to agenda items for this meeting only the second public comment period will be open to any topic all comments are limited to 5 minutes uh and again if you could please sign in with your your name U and address that'd be great uh does anyone have any comments any public comments seeing none I close the first round of public comments okay uh are there any future action any discussion with respect to any future action items okay let's move on then uh Mr President I'd like to move items A1 through A5 so the policies that I I did a deep dive into these policies they're long and they're fairly um Draconian in their changes um they don't necessarily match up with state law per se but State administrative policy uh which is pretty well documented I think my biggest concern about this is the use the the sunsetting of the word equality and the replacement with the word equity and the reason I say that is because it doesn't determine who is the Arbiter of equity therefore it leaves up to chance or up to whoever to Define what Equity means now if you were to read the whole entirety of the policy there is um some indication of what Equity should be but there's no authority of what Equity is the reason why that's concerning is because the word equality is pretty definitive uh in what it should mean on a general basis but the word Equity is not and I think we're fairly a lot of us are familiar with that one picture explaining Equity where they have the different boxes right but what's behind that is the definition of and um I need to explain that just real quickly for the benefit of who's ever listening and that is a um a normalized person a mediumsized person and a full-sized person are all trying to look over a fence and the exploration of equity is where you give two boxes to the normaliz gentleman the or person trying to make this as gender neutral as possible and one box to the mid-range person and the uh tall person doesn't need a box so uh basically it deprives the Tall Person of resources now in the in that example it totally makes sense and one could see that the problem though is that sometimes inequality I should say inequity is not so obvious and is in the eye of the beholder and so without a clear administrative Authority on what Equity is these policies are questionable uh for instance a administrator um not our administrator but an administrator could give special resources um under the guise of equity to a group of people um in an unequal manner as well as what some other people may say an unequitable manner um the problem with the policy as it stands right now or it's written right now is that there's just no overriding Authority on what Equity means and Equity could very easily be racism it could have easily be genderism it could be all of these things or it could be a very good but without a uh Authority that's checking and checking policy it's kind of so I would uh ask the board to have a conversation about what is equity and how it's applied in this particular policy so just to be clear are you arguing for equ equality or for Equity um for a clear classification of what e how Equity is going to be admin administered under this policy it's a question it's not an answer do you believe we have equality now I'm not the Arbiter of equality it's just well I would argue we don't okay I know what equal means you know what equal means my definition equal would be per capita and I don't believe we have that okay but you know what equal means just what I think it means okay do you know what Equity means one could argue it's similar but depends everyone's going to have different definitions for different words for the same words yeah the wholesale change of equality to equity without an overriding administrative touch base Touchstone is questionable which uh of these five who uh what committees uh discuss these five these were except for transportation with personel Transportation obviously operations again tonight is for first read we can certainly further discuss it we're not voting on to approve these policies uh but I also note and I'll question this as well they all have an M designation which means they are technically mandatory so I know we've had some issues with Strauss s May before and by there are certain statutes which we talk about all the time that the law says this is the law and it's the way it is and of course our book say is three well it's no longer three inches th because it's all digital but uh if it were printed out of those policies 90% of them come right from statute and we could just say just look at statute 2ab b36 or whatever it is so the question number one is whether or not these mandatory mimic and mirror the exact language that the state says so the the reason there's two reasons for having the policy one is uh we just went through qac and they did actually look for every single one of these policies all the mandated policies they look to make sure that we actually have them um and that they're updated but the other piece is when while I know largely they do mimic the the statute when we get questioned on something when a parent or you know a Community member wants to know about our practices they're not reading New Jersey Administrative Code um but you know we'll sometimes go to the code book to look but the the policies are much easier to search are much less unwieldy and we do refer to them a lot administratively um you know when when uh anyone is challenging something or just looking for a verification of something they're not going to the you know we have the administrative code fat books in our office because they actually still print those out every year and those are not for for a lay person and somebody who who's not familiar with educ educational terms and where to look that's not a place you're going to send somebody to look to to get you know verification of something now I'm not saying I disagree with a lot of the policies do just regurgitate statute um but they are something that we are required to have and we did just go through cusac and I have to tell you we haven't gotten our official results yet because it has to go through the state um we should be fine in terms of from my conversations with the county however because um for example for the instruction and program uh there's five different categories one of them being governance which is you know where they look at all of our policies um if you don't meet 80% in any of those categories you have to go under a corrective action plan and if we all I know we're already not a fan of how much the state has their hands into our district by not complying with these things it means they're going to get their hands and here more um and with the instruction and program indicator because that change from the last qac you know they talked about this streamlining it K8 districts were actually at a severe disadvantage because um and we said this I said this years ago Regional soups and and K8 soups that pleaded with the state can you please differentiate it because Regional districts and K8 districts are very different from K12 districts in terms of you know when you're looking at at different indicators and the K8 districts don't can't don't have a graduation rate to count as as one of their um School progress school school Success indicators and the so the state pulls another factors for them and it hurt a lot of ka8 districts throughout the state and so because of their State score there were a number of ka8 districts that failed by fractions of a point um so you know luckily we were not in that boat because as a high school we had different indicators but you know as a result some very high- performing districts now have to have a corrective action plan for something that they don't even really have control over because it's it's different you know pieces that the state decided to look at because KS don't have a graduation rate um so again so me just alluding to that is if we're not um compliant with some of these mandated uh uh requirements it will cause us to be you know under control for some you know for other pieces of our of our district be because you know the um they'll come in and be able to to mandate some other you know um action items for us to undertake that being said again I'm not saying that I think everything that's in policy is well stated and well worded um but you know I don't necessarily see anything that's super problematic with how we Implement things I mean truly equality has never been a practice in education for as long as I've been in it because we've had special ed um and we have you know our multi-tiered system of supports and so not every student gets the same resources gets the same courses get there's differentiation throughout is it said the best way in here um you know perhaps not uh and we can always certainly look at the language um but that's I get frustrated with the policy updates sometimes because it's literally changing words I'll never forget the ones I got a couple years ago and I just waited until we got different changes they we're literally going through the policies changing pupil to student student yeah and I'm thinking Okay so we going to have like 75 policy updates to to change a word so I you know I put those aside until there was actually a material change to it so trust me it's I I find it annoying so I don't this is a very strange situation on my part because typically I'm less is more this might be more is more and that what I'm saying is we could actually add a statement to the policy that includes an oversight of the authority of what Equity means that would make these policies more in my mind um more Equitable no I won't go there but I mean more doable I think what what I'm concerned about is that there's no oversight on what Equity is and Equity is less definable than equality and therefore I think we we could run into issues now that that being said I think I don't really have a problem with most of the wording it yeah I'm sorry yeah B so oh yeah thanks it's like a family of microphones yeah uh so so I think that um I certainly understand what what Mr Gall is is saying and I and I do have uh you some similar concerns now that you pointed out uh because there has been an awful lot of discussion around the the removal of of equality and the insertion of the word equity and while I think think the intent I I certainly understand the intent we have seen in imple implementation um some challenges that have have Arisen uh particularly when the the idea you know regarding equality it's it's really about we want the equality of opportunity right we want the students to have the equal opportunities to be able to participate to be able to take advantage of things and I really do believe that this Administration in this board has been very attuned to trying to ensure that students do have equal opportunities to participate in uh certain programs and certain academic programs I specifically recall when we made the changes to the AP requirements where there were all these prerequisites that created barriers for students to have the opportunity to study AP uh and then by removing those barriers we created a more equal opportunity for students to participate in the use of the word Equity um again we can all look at that image that you described that the the fence and the boxes people standing on them and and agree yeah that may that that certainly makes sense um however the idea of uh of equity in some instances has been um been used to define it as um equal outcomes right so that the outcomes are the same and that's just not feasible you know you can't you you can't have you can create equal opportunities but you can't expect every human being to have the same outcome and I think that's where the issue is with the interchangeability of these words um because we are we have seen it create some problems in uh in other areas where the expectation is everyone has to have the equal outcome and as a result when we go for equal outcomes if you have High Flyers on this side and low Flyers over here then it they they revert to the mean right so if we want equal outcomes then we're going to get rid of advanced math we're going to get rid of some of these other things like what what is going on in other parts of the country um so I think that I I I I do agree and I'm all for equal opportunity and I'm certainly supportive of equity for those that need the additional assistance to be able to take advantage of that but you know there's there's nobody that can can uh guarantee equal outcome for every single individual it's just impossible and I think therein lies the challenge of to your point guidance definition Clarity around it so that we don't end up in a situation where good intentions turns into the devaluing of the educational uh quality that we have here at the high school yes Janine I just have a question is whatever is in the policy the same wording or definition of equity as is in the policy you know the the statute thank you because that's important we need to have the same wording as the statute correct yes from what I read it was an administrative law not statute the statute was interpreted so it's not the statute that's what I read I'm not a lawyer statute doesn't interpret law statute's either statute or it's not statute is a law yeah they they took the law and then they they do what is the wording maybe you're talking about the New Jersey Administrative Code yeah the administrative code is then rewarded into a policy so it's like um somebody took the statute and then turned it into Administrative Code well if the statute is the law right if we're if someone would refer to an issue of equity it I feel like our wording in our policy needs to be the same wording as in the statute otherwise aren't we going to be running into trouble um we did discuss this in personnel and I thought that this change in policy was instead of spelling out the protected classes that's the right term um it was referring to the and I don't know if it's Administrative Code or statute yeah it essentially be um what what's happening with all these policies is instead of listing the protected categories they're saying as per the categories in um listed in njac whatever the number is so that way we don't have to continually update the policies and then what they did is they um replaced affirmative action with educational Equity so that's one of the things too they changed the you know their their usage of that term um that was really the only other the the content of the policies other than that is the same there was a ton of changes from equality to equity that there was one of them are we had more more broad changes I think that's the it's in 1140 is that the one you're looking at the education I gotta be honest with a lot of words and I read him this afternoon and I was trying to understand as best I could um what what I came down to is and this just my I think it's not necessarily a bad policy it just doesn't have oversight on what Equity means to a real live action of this Regional High School and I think if we simply added some sort of oversight of what Equity meant I think I don't think it's really that big of a deal that's just muching sense Dan maybe you can give an example of what type of wording you're thinking should be added to help explain I'm because I'm I my impression is that we're writing a we're doing a policy and we're the ones that we're when we're adopting and implementing it we're the ones that are making sure the superintendent is making sure that whatever is done is Equitable so that would be the person yeah so it doesn't spell it out on who so it uses the term to Janine's point they use the word Equity a lot but it doesn't Define it and it does and and therefore and that's my concern if you don't Define it and it's not defined and it needs to be defined really really well because Bob's point it can go a little r um that's that's my you know let's define it as but but could we look at another policy in New Jersey Administrative Code it gives definitions uh for educational equity for Equitable educational opportunity for Equity um so for example the definition of equity as per New Jersey Administrative Code that all of this is aligned to equity means all students have the opportunity to master the goals of the curriculum in an educational environment that is fair just and impartial to all individuals Equity focuses on consistent and systematic access for all students students to curriculum resources instruction and environments that sustain opportunities for excellent outcomes so it talks about opportunity and access is really what it speaks to with regard to to equity they have you know Equitable Educational Opportunity so I don't know if this might help a little bit this is the code that it pulls everything from um I can share this we can also you know reference that I mean it's referenced in here but again you know most people don't go to the code and read the code yeah I just want everyone to understand something one would argue that the more you define something is the less you define something I know that seems odd but that is really the case because if you just find something by saying whatever these 20 items or 30 items or 40 items whatever it is now if there's something that's not specifically defined the person comes and say oh you didn't label you didn't Define one of these 40 it's not in there so therefore it's not in there so the more you define something it creates opportunity for items that are not defined so that's why typically within the law which I live in we see less definition and then we allow the judges to interpret it make it clear I know that sounds odd but in our situation we have the board that interprets to some extent but actually at the end of the day it's a super Dr jid Who's interpreting then we the backup and that's really what our role is sorry sus I was just going to say say that also I think in general our policies are you know our our our Authority is the superintendent with the concurrence of the board but um I never thought about it before and maybe some other of our policies do Define who the authority is and we could look at other policies and maybe you know borrow the language from other policies where that's defined but I'm not sure that that ever is defined since it usually is the super and the concurrence of the board we had this discussion I want to say two months ago about a particular gosh I forget the particular subject but what it came down to was the board was defined as the authority on that subject in that policy and and that that actually settled a question that was very similar to this I want to just reiterate the I the issue I have is the authority to oversee what Equity means by the board which I don't see in the policy if if the policy had as overseen by the board and and in fact I think it took out the requirement of every three years that you needed a committee to check on something or another on the comprehensive Equity plan they they just moved it to a different policy so we still that's still a requirement the comprehensive Equity plan well equality plan now it's an equity plan it's been our it's been the comprehensive Equity plan for as long yeah they just moved it from one policy to another okay so all right maybe I got a question why would you move something one policy to it's because no this because they create I think it's because they created a one specifically for that ni put your mic on we didn't have to submit it at on that same timeline so in terms of comprehensi of equity plan we still have to have one um and then it names that the district has to have an affirmative action officer um for instances like these which is um which is me in this case I mean it you might be speaking to it and then go ahead in the comprehensive Equity plan I mean it starts off with what the Board of Education shall do with regard to overseeing the comprehensive Equity plan ensuring that this is all implemented but I'm sorry Carol I didn't I can't possibly say this as eloquently as Peter Fallon used to but oh we know it's coming already but to to Michael's point the m i don't this was always Peter's point we should just our policy should simply say we are following this law this is the law done don't interpret it don't and that was Peter how many times any he vote no for exactly that reason and that's what I plan to do tonight so but he changed that before he left the board he voted yes rely he did oh well only because he didn't have an answer when he actually won one the evening anything further on so it was not actually P it's going to be voted on 835 and then you can still decide how you want to vote on each one I would like to three either for separate for Aur discuss but the standing motion is a through five A1 through A5 right and that was second then then you made a motion I mean can you just can yeah can but that's what I had suggest because we've already had the discussion so yeah I don't think we need to separate just say what you want okay just just a suggestion you know since Dan's question at least the beginning part of it was is this is this part of administrative code is it statute is it required by the law period that's really one of the questions number one and number two is then there's some subtle language and differences that you would either want to see in there or whatnot we you could always have the attorney review and see if this is something I mean there's there's language that is changed literally all the time by the legislature and the governor and then or or and it or a group like the Department of Community whatever and some of it's laws some of it is interpretation of a code it's like you said so I think that's something if you want to ask the attorney to review it we've done that before with other come because I don't know if the timing right the timing isn't critical that's the other thing too is you can't always you don't have to approve it a first but but you're not approving it at first read is just you know the the first discussion of it so that's certainly up to the board but I'm happy to reach out to Mark with questions and if you want time to kind of process so you can send me you know I've gotten the gist of what some of the concerns are basically the definition um is there a timing issue on this are we going to be if this went for another week would we get in trouble we're just uhit we haven't gotten our QC score so let's just not let them know that we're um no I mean I the the changes are not um they're not they're not per se changing any practices that we're following it's more making sure we're in compliance so it's not like we're not going to be implementing something because this isn't moving forward to okay I I'd just like to make a motion to table it let's see what the says it's just a first reading so just yeah just table it take a no no just don't motion a yeah I second yes I hi hi roll call please roll call here Dan uning un taing uning yes so that's yes okay Katherine yes Bill yes uh Mr Morrison no sober no Potter pra yeah trur and Mr Burber no so that uh it's actually defeated it's so you got to vote on A3 there's five votes there five yes the table yeah just we're just voting to there nine of us here yeah five voted to table it five people voted to approve table so it was approved a minute V go hold a second Dan voted the table it Katherine voted the table Carol did oh and you voted the table sorry I apologize I had your phone okay A3 but I'm not sure we want to put transportation in the mix no can I just I I'll mod can I just modify it to sorry minus 8600 we do6 oh yeah be or we just pass it matter I mean if we don't do 25th 25th and then approval would be in the first May meeting the transportation policy is not a rush either so you can throw that into the mix can I just ask um if you because it'll be easier for me to articulate your questions to the attorney if you shoot me an email or even a text is fine um but just you know exactly what you would like me to ask him that would be really helpful and then I'll share that with the whole board okay roll call on okay okay Mr Gall yes M Lee yes Mr marich yes Morrison yes sober yes Potter yes rasa yes tror yes and M Burber yes Carrie uh Mr President I'd like to move items A6 and A7 second okay Mr Gall yes Lee yes May yes Morrison yes sober yes rer yes M chur yes and M bber yes motion carries Mr President I'd like to move items C1 through C7 second okay Mr Gall yes Miss Lee Yes Mar yes Morrison yes Dober yes Potter yes rasa yes TR yes M bber yes carry Mr President I'd like to move items D1 through D6 second microphone it's on I'm just not talking into it so I apologize uh again oh let's do the roll call by well I want to just thank uh erns Wessel foundation for Their donation certainly appreciate that with regard to student scholarships and uh it's a transfer money from the Fifer scholarship fund to the the gansy uh scholarship fund so and and hold on there's one more I apologize one more that was a good week for good two weeks for us uh B Watkins Memorial music scholarship found uh scholarship fund uh several donations from uh uh Diane Raymond Churchill the marmo Leos family I apologize well done you got it okay Pino writesman family and Katie tan so thank you very much to everybody who has uh provided donations to us we certainly appreciate that thank you okay you want make sure you're stay on your payment okay okay Mr Gall yes Miss Lee yes may Check Yes Mr Morrison yes M obber yes Potter yes proa yes chour yes and Mr Burber I abstain on D1 and yes on D2 through D6 carrying great thank you okay now is the second opportunity for public comment do we have any any public comment again did you sign in did you sign in there's a sheet when you sign in we'll give you plenty of time to make it back up to the hoium great thank you and just state your name and where you're from please uh good evening my name is can you hear me through the mic okay uh good evening my name is Anton leonian uh from lill uh Wun Hill Senor a couple weeks ago a speaker came into the school to give the senior health classes a presentation on consent and abuse in relationships the presentation was very informative and I'm truly grateful that the school was able to give the senior class access to such a presentation however at the March 5th board meeting some parents voiced what they perceive to be issues with the speaker's gender identity and the topic of the presentation to the parents who believe that topics relating to their children's relationships should only be discussed at home I must say this many parents are certainly able to give their child an adequate talk on consent and abuse but there is a reason why physical and sexual violence in teen relationships is such a big problem not just in America but right here in New Jersey for the teens who lack adequate support from their family active discussion of this issue through presentations like the one we had in health class may be life-saving no matter the gender identity of the speaker delivering them the fact that the speaker's identity even slightly concerns you is appalling and it's regretful that you don't understand that your actions and words at the podium that day may have been incredibly hurtful to many members of our school's LGBT community and to the Board of Education it is my sincere hope that you do not replace presentations like these with a talk about the benefits of quote marrying young and having multiple kids and quote thank you thank you any additional comments public comments yeah please good evening Mary leonan lill Township I'm Anton's mom so I'm going to be very quick just thing is it's not the first time all those issue even if it's regarding regard into regard to like certain books or this particular issue I mean people keep forgetting they should remind themselves that W changill Regional High School it's not private private or religious school it's a public school and everyone should welcome to be welcomed here and yeah before like this like particular book or particular presentation they we just all should remind ourselves that this is public school thank you thank you any additional public comments seeing none I'm going to end the second opportunity for public comment do we have any other business we do good then I'll have other business Tim I'm wondering if there's an update on the traffic patter yeah we have no update at this profession time we haven't done anything new I know we we've talked uh internally but we're still struggling with the same thing and try to come up with a plan that is saving I know you mentioned it but we're worried if we make a change is actually going to be worse and that's what it can't be worse possibly but I don't I don't it can't be worse yeah we're still we're still kind of trying to figure out better details because they not the way we have it is not we have pedestrian Crossing yeah traffic with no signage there's not even a sign where you drop off your kids there's no direction whatsoever zero I was wondering I drove by Ridge the other day and it occurred me that they block off their driveway way to all non-bus traffic for I think 15 20 minutes in the morning and in the afternoon meaning that no parents no students can enter that only buses is that maybe that might work in interim to say if we can't do it but then people just say those 10 15 minutes no no nothing but buses the the buses aren't the issue yeah the buses are actually well I mean you're the one most organized you're talking about them Crossing and front of the buses and back and forth but then it would also allow them to all the buses are gone so it's like that whole 20 minutes all the buses are gone no and then and then all the P pedestrians go in front of the cars with the parents driving so you have we have drop what you got 250 cars no I'm sorry yeah so I my assumption is that the administration is coordinating with the Warren Police and trying to figure this out is that correct okay you know I don't know about the rest of you I don't have a degree in traffic studies don't play one on TV so you know I'd certainly you know defer to The Experts to figure this out but you know to Mr gall's point this has been a bone of contention for a significant amount of time and I would hope that we could figure some solution out or at least something that's at least better than what we have currently now they may come back and say no we're wrong and we're going to have to you know re architect some other way of you know moving traffic and and people through here but you know we've got to rely on the professionals here one of the the first steps so you know which Dan has mentioned you're right there are not signs directing people where to drop off so we were talking about an initial step of at least having some signage um clearly indicating we we did add a crosswalk but clearly indicating where the crosswalks are with you know they have those little standing people um to at least start with that to to make it clearer where that is um and having directional signs so at least that's an initial step we can take uh we really we've met with them a number of times if we just can't come up with something that they don't have concern yeah concerns with um safety wise so I get I'm not going to beat the dead horses I've said my piece I guess uh according to the normal board timetable if it took three years to get consolidation I got another year and a half to go but that wasn't the board's fault realization sorry that wasn't the board's fault I'm being fous maybe maybe part of maybe we need to have the architect come in here and figure out how do we reroot you know what but I mean I mean but I mean completely overhaul just we you can you can make massive changes to the the entrance like Rec Curbing and we did talk about that but that would be a major investment it would that was one of the options is to move things around me our biggest problem just so you guys one of the things we wanted to separate buses and the cars and have the cars go down Regional come in and go out that way problem is there's there's another Inlet where people park behind so unless you have a police officer standing right there as parents are going this way and kids are coming in this way and making a left you really I mean that's that's the danger that we're worried about because it's head on right there so that without that little back parking lot we'd be golden but we have that back parking lot so we got to figure that out and that that's the part we're struggling with without without extra bodies standing out there to make help people get to the right places that's our our number one thing and right now if you talk to the police they'll tell you well right now people know where they're going even though it's disorganized and it's quote unquote working it's not working it's 20 minutes to go yeah a quarter mile at 7:22 in the morning yeah it's not working I'm I believe me I'm not in love with the way it goes this might be a stupid suggestion but there's no there's no such can we just have different drop off spots for for different grade levels like okay grade nine drop off is here grade 10 here grade 11 11 grade 12 and then there's four different spots to get dropped off the issue would be because we even talked about um having you know uh staff and buses in one and I guess students park like anyone who parks there no drop off but again actually monitoring that to make sure that people are following that that's what we we would need like placards and personnel and if you come in a different car though so those are some of the things we are looking at um the other issue is if we reroute the buses at all for example if we send them out the back of the school it adds too much time onto their root so we like we looked at all these different combinations I'm just talking about people in cars or pedestrians buses could be like you know say this is the time and nobody else comes besides the buses and then if you're dropping off or walking these are the spots it's it's a 15minute interval I could tell you it's a 15minute interval 7 to 7:15 most of the buses are done it's from 7:15 to about 7 :30 it's there all the cars coming in all at once with the kids and it that's where it gets overwhelming and there's kids walking in between and it's just messy and that's the part I'm just G to leave the conversation I me obviously we can continue but um Frank saledo who you probably remember he was a mayor and Warren in 1938 39 and he actually died in office in 2014 or so years he fought he fought for mailboxes on both sides of Hill crests he fought for like 30 years to do that it only changed when a kid got killed I'm telling you I'm telling you as a board member that every morning I go down there and there's Crossing of pedestrian traffic in front of hundreds of cars please I'm begging and this is I'm trying to do this in a nice way and in a but I'm Earnest about this it needs to get fixed it's not that complicated I'm just going to leave it at that okay could we build a excuse me could we build a pedestrian bridge at we talked about that too I'm not kidding you I mentioned that in one of the first meetings oh yeah I mean that if you have crossing guards it does help for sure Personnel helps more people out there would absolutely help well you got to pay you got to pay him but yeah no it's that it's that half hour time really we're notak I mean you see plenty of other districts that have crossing guards all over the place and if I'm not mistaken sometimes students are cross I think I was a crossing guard at one point it was like a thing to do when you were in school are you safety volunteering and a badge you want me to be safety patrol and teach a class is that what I'm hearing what else can they do Tim I know I've asked this before when my son was a freshman or sophomore I used to drive him once in a while and I thought you had to go into the back and it was coming in off of mountain and no they all come in the front I know but I came in off of mountain went in the back I never I never it was easy it was a breeze what what's wrong with that I don't know I we have enough entrances into the I mean it's taking the traffic you know require that every I thought it was a requirement that they had to come in off of Mount I think the volume of car is going if if everybody went into the back I think you have a problem that's the so and that's the other key issue is regardless of how we change the traffic pattern you still are trying to get 1,700 students and almost 300 staff in here you know and if everyone thinks they're going to come in between 7:20 and 7:30 it's never going to happen so that's part of the issue is there's just no possible way to funnel that many people into the building but what what about that as a suggestion because it worked and I thought it was policy then I don't think it was everybody doing that seon I think if you had every sing I would I wouldn't have thought to do it except for my son told me that that was what I had as long as I've been here it's always been both just because I know in the morning there's always well why not there much it would just be there's not as many coming in that way I'm saying if you had all the cars going in the back it would be a mess because you did it it's a mess as one at a time one at a time a lot of kids carpool and parents come with more kids though in multiple grade level so I don't know so one kid has to then walk you know I mean I dropped my neighbor off and my son off there were different grade levels and one had to walk a little bit further yeah how many people who are eligible for the bus don't take the bus and are driven a lot all of my kids but it's but it's nor but it's the norm now not it's not just us it's it's even for the lower grade that's the point I'm making put the kid on the bus and you're going to eliminate some tra very simple solution no one wants to hear it no that is the best solution never that it's things have changed dramatically in our society for sure well Janine you can do that we may not want to do that but you I'm sure we can well what no but I mean I guess what you would what you would say is that no you know cars are allowed into the parking lot between a certain time and then it makes it really difficult right off so can you do we have anyone who gets dropped off between 6:45 and 655 earlier No in fact if you go then it's like literally twoes let's incentivize people to bring their kids earlier free breakfast coffee would do and any other discussion on this item before I decide if I'm going to create an ad hoc committee on dress code in presentation since that seems to be an issue amongst certain people people I just leave it out there okay um so the the other thing that I I've been well we we've been discussing is that I I think it's time and I want to say this in a super respectful manner as I can Janine it's time for Greenbrook to join the Regional High School as a full member I'm just going to put it out there it's uh Warren uh lill and green and Wong have been subsidized Greenbrook for the last three years I think we need to I would beg to disagree with that oh okay Mr sty have we been subsidizing Greenbrook they're paying tuition are they are they subsidized yes let's Let It Go are they subsidized yes or no to the tune of millions of dollars the board had an agreement they paid their tuition right to the to the tune of millions of dollars it's time to join the re the Regional High School as a full member and pay your fair share it's time Mr President motion to adjourn yep totally