These principles are not extreme. They shouldn't be political. They are foundational to education and intellectual freedom. At the last meeting, uh both Dr. Gayy and Mr. Meyer spoke of your love for books and reading. I was really glad to hear that you both rightly enjoy the freedom to read what interests you and our students and their families should be afforded that same right. In closing, I urge the board to reconsider its stance on the ALA Bill of Rights. reinstating it is in the best interest of all students in our district. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Sarah. Any other comments? Please state your name, please. Brandon Champion. Uh, this is my first time getting to meet you guys. Uh, my wife actually got to speak for me last time. Uh, I encourage everyone here to follow what Miss Chalk said because being in the position that I am in a hospital, I have to deal with the aftermath of children not being recognized, not being appreciated, not being uh viewed.
Um, one of one of the principles at the elementary schools uh said that they even lock the door even if it's uh 20 degrees below. They'll lock the door and the kids go outside and they play outside. The very interesting thing about that is um and I'll be talking about that on the next slide is um those breaks are they call it lightly supervised but from what I observed they're unsupervised. Um there's a big focus on uh student uh self-reliance and I'll talk about that next. Um they'll have a lunch break usually 60 minutes. Um they don't want to rush lunch. Uh they'll they'll give the kids you know typically 30 minutes and then they go outside again. Big emphasis on going outside taking breaks. Um then they'll have an afternoon uh break as well. That's kind of like the morning fica. Um and this uh the next slide is probably uh well this is an example schedule kind of like what I talked about.
P is to approve agreement for professional services between G Gloucester County Special Services School District and Berlin Township School District for the 2526 school year. This is similar to the uh Burlington County one where they give us a list of services that they offer and then if we need them, we have them and it's we're ready to go. Uh Q is just to approve some budget transfers. Um one is from salaries over to source for teachers. We just talked about this in our uh finance committee. We've been um covering some of our vacancies with um subs from source for teachers. So we're just reallocating funds from salary lines over to um the sub line. And then um Q is just to move from textbooks, which we didn't utilize those funds, over to home instruction. This is for gened students who are currently in different placements outside of the school that the teachers are our in-house teaching staff cannot provide those services.
So, this year we spent half of every PD day as a district seems unwrapping standards and next year we're looking at hour and a half to two hours. Um so that gives some time back to the schools and but continue unwrapping and continuing with coaching. Um let's see one big piece that was common across all schools for both math and ELA was MTSS which is um multi-tered system of support which means like we strengthen the core program which all students receive. Then we strengthen tier two for those that um still are struggling after um main like whole group instruction or whole class instruction and that's usually done by in small groups by teachers and then increasing uh um our efficiency in tier three which is like title one instruction um e and special education. So although we have things we don't really have a really strong program of um even resources and procedure in place.
and without the ALA to guide what you know the library can do. Um being being able to cherrypick books for children based because we don't feel that it is appropriate for them to learn about different religions or orientations or races or things like that. I will have a lot more individuals roll through the hospitals because of not feeling that they are respected. I'm a little bit I'm gonna say emotional right now just because last time I watched the live I saw many parents speak up in behalf of this and what I saw was them being met with indifference. What I saw was them being met with at one time an eye roll which I had a little chuckle at. And these are these are the parents of these kids. I'm a parent of these kids. I have a kid in first grade going into second grade.
Um they don't have bells and this is all three levels. Um kids kind of come and go following a staggered schedule. Uh there's no mass like exit or arrival. Um you know and and the teachers all share uh a room kind of like this. And you think about like um in the business world go into a room and you have cubicles everywhere. Um the teachers all share a room like that and they collaborate and support each other. Um and then they go to the classrooms. So no one has their classroom. Um they go and serve the classrooms. So um the next slide is is really the one that um out of anything I really picked up a lot here. And so this first uh picture is of uh a library. This is a an elementary school library. Um there's about six to eight chairs in there.
They're getting them from um the placement that they're at. So, we just needed to transfer funds into the appropriate account to get that covered. Um and then that is it.
And so that's something that we really are looking to in improve, which will also help with those areas that were starred on um the other page that was um aligned instructional practices, um intervention for students not demonstrating mastery, and then also providing enrichment for students who are easter. In number five, you say create a position. Is this an additional instructional coach that we're going to be looking at? This is an instructional coach, but only for special education teachers. Okay. And and it's not a new position. You all approved it two years ago, I think. And the issue is we've not been able to find somebody to put in that position. So, we've kind of had it on hold. So, we're bringing it out again. and we're hopeful that we can uh can find somebody who's qualified to be in that position. Originally to be for special education teachers and EL, but finding someone who has expertise in both is difficult.
I want every one of these kids to feel that they are seen, that they're heard. The only people that can help in that situation right now are the ones right here in this room that can take away or reinstate the ALA. All I'm asking is for you guys to listen to these ladies who are much more important to this than myself and everybody else in this room about what they're talking about. Thank you. Thank you very much. Anyone else?
And what they do at this elementary school is um they teach their first and second graders. Um like groups of six to eight at a time. They take them in there. They teach them how to choose a book at their level. They teach them how to um use the card catalog system uh in Sweden. And then once they're convinced um that the kids can do it um and I witnessed second graders um and they said, "Now go to the library and check out a book." And uh I watched second graders leave the school by themselves without adults unsupervised. went to the public library, checked out their own books, came back, and made it back on time in 30 minutes. These these were kids walking through the streets of Stockholm, uh the capital city of the country. And um and they did it on by themselves.
Does anybody have any questions? All right. Uh Mr. Mr. Golden. Yes. Mrs. Allen. Yes. Mr. Phillips. Yes. Mrs. Helma. Yes. Mr. Juliano. Yes. Mrs. Oriente. Yes. And Mr. Davis. Yes. All right. Perfect. Um, old business. Nothing. New business. We don't have anything for negotiations other than that sidebar agreement, which everyone was aware of, but other than that, everything else is good to go. Finance committee. Um, we went over the budget report, the revenue report. We didn't have any changes to our special ed placements right now. Um public hearing is on Thursday, May 1st. The county office approved our budget. I think it was Tuesday. Advertised budget is sent to the papers and that will be um published on Sunday 420. So that fills the requirement to have it out three or four days before the actual public hearing. Um if you remember last time when we had the when I talked about finance committee, I talked about the state was releasing this tax levy incentive aid which sounded so good.
So, um and then it down, our EL teachers are doing really well. We have outside coaching for them already through title three grant. And so, um we decided ELA. These are our goals as a district for ELA. Refresh. We just What's VO y and e y beginning of year? No. Good. You have to remind me. I just I just after I said that I thought oh that and so they were developed in the same way looking efficiencies that we already had um last year and looking at what the schools had as their goals in determining what we needed as a district when the action steps are very similar. Um the pieces that are different would be a screener for ELA for seventh and eighth grade. We have a lot of things in place for our K5 well K4 and then next this coming school year we have things in place for fifth and sixth grade.
Hearing none, we'll continue on to our consent agenda. Dr. Brody, would you like to go us through that, please? Yeah, you've got your uh minutes and financial reports. We've got a few resignations. Mike Hall, our high school cross country coach, is resigning. Michelle Bell um is our high school finance secretary. She's also resigned. She's moving to be closer to family. Cynthia Friedrich, our bus driver, is going to retire at the end of this year. Laura McWills, a middle school cook, is also going to be leaving us. Craig Nelson, um, has been or served as our IHSA swim coach that, um, we have some kids that that participate in swimming activities and so he would be the one that goes with the state. Um, and Tim Gagan in his retirement is no longer going to be our high school scholar bowl coach. Um, so we've got some employments.
And so then the next thing I I have here is a picture of lunch. And and the first picture there is kind of like a typical buffet style. You can see um there's a lot of fresh fruit food um salads, things like that. Um on that particular day, their main entree was tomato soup and that was the only choice that they got. Kids uh got their own plates. These are first graders, second graders all the way up through sixth grade. Got their own plates. Um put the appropriate proportion on their plates, sat down, um knew where to put their knife, fork, spoon, all of these things. And uh when they finished uh they were able to get back up and get another appropriate second portion. I didn't see kids piling things on. I didn't see kids wasting any food. Um and then they sat down.
Yay. you didn't spend all your money, you can get extra money from the state. Well, I mean, it's not it wasn't that great. So, um the gist of it is that yes, you can raise your taxes if you've been uh below adequacy on your budget and have only gone to the 2% cap. However, the state is only kicking in 5%. So, say we asked for a million dollars. Well, the state will cover $50,000 and the rest falls on the taxpayers. So, we were like, we're not cutting programs. where you know anything that we would have wanted to add would have been you know in addition to and so Adam and I talked and we were like there's no way you can justify um asking for more money when we haven't cut anything you know are there things that we could use and things that we can do with those funds absolutely but it's not it's not something I'm willing to to you know do or take on that additional um burden for the taxpayers so it was too good to be true um and then the grants were continuing to submit those monthly reimbursements No other reports are due at this time.
We need to get some some things for seventh and eighth grade for them to better kind of narrow down what students need when they're struggling. And then something we learned um Amanda through monitoring things uh we learned that we're supposed to be um providing some compensatory services for students. So, if they're not mastering the state standards based on either our benchmarks and or our state assessment, we're supposed to be offering them additional support. Now, they are invited to our after school program and they already receive their targeted minutes and things during the school year during the school day, but um we are supposed to be providing additional outside of what we provide to anyone else for those students. So currently we do two days of um after school program for all of all of the students that um would like to come and so we're adding an additional third day that would be only for the students and those programs are voluntary.
Taylor Shyanski is going to be our um, middle school art teacher and Jenna Helton is our recommendation for fifth grade teacher. Uh, we've got some leaves of ab absences. Audrey Elliott is uh, our social worker here at Parkview. She's going to be um, with child from August to September. Amanda Sanfield, high school family and consumer science teacher, also will be 12 weeks away when she gives birth next school year. Uh, and then we've got some extracurricular assignments. Ty Wolf is going to step in as our high school cross country coach. Emily Bala would be our middle school cheer coach. We hired her last uh month as one of our teachers at the middle school. Michelle Michael Noli is are gonna step in as the IHSA swim coach. um he holds the same role at Waterlue and so uh Mr. Nelson was very excited that he was willing to to cover for that.
And so I asked the principal, um do do you guys have food allergies? And the principal said, well, yeah. I go, well, how do you handle that? Um, I think she pointed out and I try to zoom in on the sneeze guard there. They have a little cards taped to the sneeze guard and uh the principal said if they're allergic to a food, they need to read the ingredients. And if they read in an ingredient that they're allergic to, they don't get the food. And so one of the things that is so different is, you know, here in the states, we will uh get doctors and parents that will tell us, you know, here's what they're allergic to, put this in your system, and then we make sure that you you know, the the responsibility is on the adults to make sure that that happens.
Um, school bus inspections, if you remember last month, I said they were coming up. We had them in March. Next inspection is September 18th. Um, we did have one person submit for our board vacancy. Sarah is likely coming back. It was more of a force. It was just a conversation. So, we had a conversation the other day and she had asked if anybody had submitted. I said, "No, go ahead submit." So, um, so Sarah is the only one. So, I don't think we need to do an interview, but hopefully um we can get her um appointed at our May meeting. So, I'll be in touch um with you and with everybody else and we'll get that get that ball rolling. Um so, so that's that was finance. I'm I've taken over this whole meeting, guys. Sorry. Um NJ New Jersey School Boards Association. I haven't seen anything uh come through on that ed services.
They don't have to come with their voluntary um the after school invited encouraged but it's not mandatory. What is the percentage of attendance? We're It's It's We're The elementaryaries do a lot better than probably the middle and the junior high. As they get older, it's harder for to get them here. Um, and who runs the after school? The the principles do a lot of the running of the program. Oh, okay. So, in the past, we had our 21st century grant and so we had an actual coordinator at every school and we don't have that um anymore. So they look at their data, they determine which students need to attend, they invite those students, and the teachers help invite those students to them. So the teachers do not attend that after school at all to help. They teach they teach. Oh, they do? And they're they're paid $35 an hour for after school.