Koh will also inform the committee about a burst pipe in the high school nurse's office that happened that previous weekend so currently the heating coil has been replaced it's been cleaned dehumidified and furnitures been ordered and then gestures came in so that's the update so far for the nurse's office and that's about it any questions okay all right next we have policy okay our last meeting was on February 19th and we continued discussion of policy for one one eight point five two which was use of web tools we just felt like we really needed to spend a good amount of time discussing what kind of web tools that included but you know we were in a good place right now with that policy and it is part of your packet tonight for a first read so we'll go over that a little bit more later we also had terry cavanagh come to our meeting she's our director of HR and she really sort of gave us an overview about sexual harassment harassment in general and the idea of staff student fraternization which we needed to sort of tighten up our policies on so you'll see again later tonight that those three areas policies are in your packet for a first read we had policies in place that you know were sort of wordy and overly complicated so you'll see when we get to those later that we've really streamlined and simplified those we also talked about the tutoring policy for teachers tutoring outside of school hours that is also in your packet and that was pretty much it for policy we did talk Communications is included in our policy meetings and we talked about the need for a budget flier coming up in the next few months before before we vote on the budget and I'll be working on that with Mike Murphy and dr.
Brown that's it great any questions for Debbie for the policy committee all right well we can move on to the consent agenda I make a motion that the board approve the items listed below and the consent consent agenda is recommended resignations and new hires second any discussion all in favor all right move on to new business policies and I make a motion that the board approve policy for one 18.5 to use of new web tools for first reading as recommended by the policy and communications subcommittee seconds ok so again this policy is the Cape policy we didn't currently have a policy for web tools so we redeveloped this policy to include things that they use in the ASL program and things like Google classroom and blackboard so I think other than that it's it's pretty straight forward all right any initial questions on this okay all in favor aye aye next policy I make a motion that the board approve policy for one one eight point one one two at sexual harassment her first reading is recommended by the policy communications subcommittee second okay so this is what I mentioned previously this is sexual harassment policy we had a policy in place that actually dated back to 1992 it was very wordy overly complicated and had many many examples of things that could be considered sexual harassment and what cave has recommended is to really streamline it and and make it just clear and concise and convey the message that sexual harassment is you know not tolerated in any case but that really the definition of sexual harassment is what the victim perceives it to be so there won't be any really negotiation or interpretation of anybody saying well that's not on my list as something that qualifies for sexual harassment so so the cave policy just really simplifies it makes it very direct very clear and in Deb if I may add to that just so everybody's aware there will be there there's a new state law that I think it's by October 1st all staff has to be trained so Terry's working you know with with myself and dr.
Ruby and trying to look at time and how we can make that work many districts are figured trying to figure that out this was almost 400 employees so that's that everybody has to be trained so we have to get that done by October first so there's a lot of means if we could use technology there's some other things we could do but we're thinking of using at least one of our initial professional development days in late August to make sure that happens to stay in compliance here we do like I've any have wait to do a video yeah there's this video and there's some other ways you can do we that video yeah yeah it mentions in the new policy that the superintendent will develop a regulation that underlies this is not something that's underway it's it is talked about being underway I can't confirm if it's actually underway yet in Terry's office we weren't quite busy over there but yes it has to be done yep okay that's why good so it could be at least good day because they kind of support one yes okay okay any other questions on that one all right all in favor aye next I make a motion that the board approve policy for one one eight point one one three harassment for a first reading as recommended by the policy communication subcommittee second okay so again this we didn't have a version of this we didn't have this as a policy previously but it is recommended by cabe so this is capes version and again it really just simplifies the idea and basically conveys the thought that any harassment of any kind will not be tolerated you know in the we're here to provide a safe and positive working and learning climate and there are some examples of various forms of harassment what harassment might include we have we feel comfortable with cabe's version so we're recommending that we go ahead and use their version so this wasn't edited at all but from what cave right there was one word that we did take out under on the first page number one where it says so that the incident had to be sufficiently severe persistent or pervasive that it affects an individual disability we took out the word sufficiently because we didn't want again we didn't want there to be a gray area where someone could challenge it and say well it wasn't that severe or whatever so we took out that word but other than that we recommend adopting their policy as written any questions on this one okay all in favor all right that's policy okay I make a motion that the board approve policy for one one eight point two for staff student non-fraternization for a first reading as recommended by the policy communication subcommittee second okay so this one's joy this one is short which is a good thing because the previous version we had was much longer and it put put sort of had a lot of fluff in there what I'll call fluff talking about what the relationship between a teacher and a shouldn't students should feel like and you know we should be encouraging and of all that's true but I don't know that it belongs in a policy so again we're recommending that we go with the cave version that basically just says that staff members shall maintain professional relationships with students and there will be no interaction of a sexual nature with any student at any time period so we sort of stripped out everything around that language and got concise and to the point we tried to make it as short as the petty cash policy didn't we didn't quite get there that's still short though this is as long as the fiscal year falls I heard you snicker over there he was thinking about that I did have one question on it's excellent on all three of these if ever one of these policies was broached or breached it would be an immediate legal issue for the district has Terry reviewing these with counsel before we as a board approve them we can double-check that but I'm pretty sure she said she had I just don't know that cave actually runs them through Council well okay actually does they don't have through ours obviously but there's not there's attorneys at cave that bend these policies okay before they're sent out yes want to make sure they're consistent with law and they're insistent with issues that we would anticipate might ever come up with one share hopefully that never happened you have to trigger an investigation if they was ever breached this is this but immediately becomes a legal matter okay any other questions okay all in favor okay I'll make a motion that the board approve policy for 134 tutoring for a first read as recommended by the policy communication subcommittee Oh second okay so tutoring we had a policy I think that originated in 1999 it was revised in 2012 I think it gave some allowance for tutoring and we do allow what we're suggesting now is that teachers may work for an outside service provider and do tutoring and teachers may also tutor students who are not in their buildings and at their grade level so in other words an elementary school teacher can also tutor middle school math or something the what the policy says though now what we're recommending from cabe is that teachers not be allowed to tutor students that are in their building and at their grade level it doesn't say their grade level serious their own students right so a building where the teacher provide tutoring include don't you show the private students of any school make sure so so so the city knows where the teachers lots of classes so it doesn't say anything about their classes but it applies to the whole school yeah applies to the whole school sauce helps all arrow eighth grade teacher couldn't to order a fourth grade fifth grade yeah yeah right okay yeah they couldn't gotten their own school right and uh a science teacher couldn't in the high school couldn't tutor someone in math right correct we would be looking at you know the extra help and those kind of things rather than a charging parents for tutoring right no situation lead if it's not really a major issue early on in my tenure here there was it was a bit of an issue because we're the some faculty members were also using the building to tutor their own students and make a profit from that so that was problematic so it wasn't rampant or anything like that and we just appealed to the good faith of the people to understand the conflict of interest and it was it was easily rectified okay any other questions or comments on this okay all in favor aye okay old business the first point Oh actually before we move on to that um what day would you like us to have comments back for these policies sixteenth right or does it is an absolute it's this organism of the AG that said things that you did yeah we put up one on the twin is that I suppose every problem because April's issues the way that April's a short motivation is it March 18th yes it is the okay so it's not for April yes going on it just by the twenty so by next week then next Friday maybe did you want it is that okay that's a week and a half yes I'm Millie's are pretty short okay yeah so by Friday March through stressful yeah okay thank you thank you okay so now we can move on to old business and the first item is the Board of Education budget for the year 2020 2021 just to kind of update you guys as a sort of a quick summary when we initially adopt the budget we had proposed a six point six five percent increase over this current year's adopt approved budget the first step after we had presented to the Board of Selectmen and board of Finance was the First Selectman gets to review and make deliberations on that and he had reduced our budget at that point to 4.8% since then he has presented to the board the entire Board of Selectmen and it has gone up slightly to 5% so we're still looking at a pretty sizable but the cuts the same is just the 5% is just a different way of how they present to the percent yeah well okay we looked at today Rosalia it wasn't in a you know a less of a reduction to the budget it's incorporating it took out the kindergarten teacher that was appropriated at the beginning of the year okay this is showing the percentage often different privacy issues in our original looking at the same exact number same number yes so um do you have any dr.
grill any updates in terms of where I know you know at our last meeting we sort of said there wasn't much that we could yeah so it's sure so in terms in terms of an update the first part of the update is really nothing's changed in the last two weeks because we were waiting at the port of Selectmen and they voted last night so now we're waiting it's going over to the board of Finance so we'll see where the board of finance lands in terms of leaving it where it is or putting some more money back or taking some a further reduction so we just don't know that I tell you what we've done is the the the principal's well first of all the Board of Finance and Board of Selectmen questions there's well over 100 questions that were asked about the budget line line by line and so can the principals myself Department its we've been working on that for the last two weeks essentially we're nearing finalizing that and then the plan would be to bring that before the Finance Committee on Monday night make sure you guys are comfortable with that the committee is comfortable and then Roza I guess what you would send that off so that's that's the thought process there so we're working on that in addition to that the principles and I met with Ken Eric was there too yesterday and dr.
Rubin everybody else and we went through and we continued to scrub the budget they are looking in every one of their areas I know a big area where the town the town officials were asking questions was the actual budget from last year compared to what we're asking for in the adopted budget and they're looking at that increase and a lot of questions about that many times what that question comes down to is every year we're on a budget freeze so we don't spend what we intended to spend and it had budgeted for so that's part of the explanation with a lot of these things but we're really digging in so we could provide a lot of justification and they could understand where these costs are coming from so we're doing that work and then preparing for whatever happens next week with the Board of Finance and then I would imagine if that timing works out we'd have a very lengthy discussion I bring forward recommendations from the team to the board on them at the March 18th meeting it's kind of my understanding of where we're at in terms of process we did have some very good news and hopefully it stands working with the town and paying attention to our sure insurance premium we had budgeted nine point five percent increase and it looks like it'll come in at six point five percent that's the difference of about a hundred and seventy thousand dollars 167 $167,000 can you had an exercise we're going to do you're gonna really go through with that yeah I tzer's did the initial budget back in October with our census of employees at that time and I'm sure some of that has changed so I'm gonna update it since I'm going to be updating the number anyway I'm gonna update the most up-to-date information I have so it may be a little more or less of a savings Etna than the hundred sixty seven thousand that I've calculated at the moment but considering a reduction of 817 thousand dollars to the adopted budget that's a nice chunk right off the bat that doesn't affect programming at all it helps in our administrative costs so that's really positive news so what we've the the the team and I have been discussing is kind of how do we want to approach these reductions so we start with looking at the strategic plan our strategic priorities what are the most important to continue with so again we're going to continue the banter going back and forth and really pushing each other we look at the budget goals for this year which worth the maintain class size meet the needs of all students in terms of state and federal law continue to provide the best curriculum we can and make sure it's aligned to standards and up-to-date and then of course the technology to support our infrastructure in our learning environment and then finally maintain and continue to enhance programs and again when you get them the budget cuts sometimes you have to look at either slowing down or really bringing back your momentum on whatever the projects are that you're working on we want to stay away from people we want to stay away from those things that are as directly directly related to kids for as far as we can as we continue to chip away at getting to that $800,000 number and so then the other pieces we have to look at you know programmatic data in terms of are we getting the value we expect out of a program and and those would be other other pieces as part of the decision and whatever the recommendation would be coming forward so that's kind of our process if anybody has any further questions about kind of the thinking from the team from me any recommendations like you know suggestions of how we might approach things we're happy to us so will that process culminate in a discussion on our 18th that would be the plan and it in it I would look for direction from the board because I'm assuming and again I don't know the the can't get into the exact planning of the Board of Finance but I'm assuming at their meeting some of their meetings next week they may make an a formal decision on the board of its budget in terms of the timing so that's that's really the question I have at this point they don't have to me I don't think they have to have to make a formal decision until until after their public hearing in April okay um so they might choose to make stepwise decisions but considering that we don't have a plan of attack on it they make ask us to come back right there that if I was on that board that's what I was - sure so again 817 thousand dollars is quite a bit of money to to find and so we're gonna continue to work on it we've been prepared to have a conversation on the 18th hopefully we'd know more if the Board of Finance anticipates or it makes a formal vote on reducing it further so we would you know when there's another couple hundred thousand dollars if that was to happen we need to approach it that way so it's a conundrum and and it's not gonna be a pleasant conversation it's going to hurt so we're prepared to have the conversation so we're continuing to work on it and the principles are are literally as we speak we were answering their questions and going through each of their budgets at the principal's meeting yesterday of the kind of the key areas that we need to really look at sharpen the pencil scrub look at the actuals double-check triple-check and so they're doing that have to give them a lot of credit they've been working very hard on their budgets so we'll law will be prepared to have recommendations for the 18s for sure so as much as you can any those placeholder values or numbers that were sort of estimates at the time the budget was constructed or gonna be sort of tightened up yes so he's spending possible yes so so I mean I think of two that came up at the joint meeting that were discussions sewer for example Ken and hoi and Joan did all that running around on that it's actually gonna cost us two thousand dollars more than what Kant had in the budget when we actually really really got the information from them is that interesting and yeah I meant let me put that in writing to us I hope yeah well you have emails everything yes oh yes yeah make sure we have a copy of that sure mixed ones you sure so it's even more expensive you know considering the usage and then the number of students and that kind of a thanks number staff we're really digging in on postage you know there's some reasons for increases such as sending IEP s for students with special needs home and those kinds of things it's not as simple as pupils just send it electronically yeah parents actually have to sign permission for that there's there's there's a specific legislation there you have to be very careful about with those kind of records they have to be protected there's other things that have to happen so there are um there are expenses so but we're gonna really go through so long as you package up the responses to the questions because that's a big piece of work yes a lot of questions and I would have to say half of the questions as I read through them were just because they didn't understand our budget changes over time and how we pre bucketed things or it was tied to freezes right thanks very much so two claims my advice would be to have a little one-page or on the front that says updates on estimates they're right where you have updates on estimates you know the insurance point is number two top front sure I think the sewer costs you know what did you get maybe with a backup Charter to order like a copy of the email because we got criticized at the last meeting they're not communicating as we found those updates yes and it is part of our solution right that we have to deal with here but I think we need to be open and communicative Dickinson and I said I think that's just the same that's probably not a very long page is probably you know three or four five items the second thing I'll to say that that can is at our retirement benefits committee the town controller mentioned that she had recently gotten an update from our actuary on retirement yes and I just want to make sure we have the latest number on that yes I have it okay good it will actually increase I was gonna say that sounded like it was going out it right so we're considering that when we sure sir but that ought to be part of that update on it yeah sewer yeah yeah sure it's just that just add to the salary thing the increasing and numbers it's I get that's that's kind of hard to budget for when we started when 18 I believe in November for the salary reductions as far as mistime retirements their children all right so we had but it seems like that number always ends up being a lot higher towards the end the year there's two different things we're talking about we have teacher turnover is one ingrained that's where we hire new people to replace the old people that have retired and then we also have savings on leaves on vacancies which is the number that continues to yeah so change during that number maybe to the board finances you know defense'll that they bad member isn't on the budget as far as you know subs and we hired a new substitute contract we have the contract we new substitute third party yes yes and that number is 375 375 is it based off of how many hours really based off of history it can fluctuate so much history our history well it depends over here here there's some useful inside it's a lower yeah there were it depends on how many long-term subs we met and typically when we have long term substitutes we have salary savings yeah to offset it just so I mean we could you could pick a right or substitute number and then there's no longer there's no line items underneath it like with the teacher salary and turnovers there's no line items on that so that's that it doesn't make it hard to follow it makes a pretty hard to predict which I go into your job also I saw what is a special EDC ba that's a board certified behavior analyst so those services from certified behavior analyst those folks work with our students with social emotional issues and our students and our ELC program and they work it's all about behavior and socialization and so forth and so they are part of helping us with our internal programs that we have in relating back to our programs for our placement it's so we were able to help service our students here in district look good and so it actually is an investment cost savings I just I wasn't part of the other slides it just was on this one page it wasn't hard at the other like initial presentations on the new hires it's not new it's no no we've had not a bad no okay so the way this looks like it looks like is no it's just the the person is code it's accounted for it within the teacher's account but it's not a certified teaching position okay so it doesn't fold on that grid so now they're separately they're not part of the teachers union they're they're like but I have teachers on here - yeah second grade teacher it's all part of this line here so I don't I just don't say ye so this this 101,000 this was two already taken out in budgets prior this is a salary this is so now I see it's a salary because it's personal it's person who was in the budget last year also so okay so it's not it's not it's not new it's not way as he is known to see the plus here also and I thought I was looking at some of the salaries and it appears that we have three people in the high school that do curriculum writing it depart department heads at their departments but they're called curriculum specialists do sometimes world language span may also not teachers they're administrators there in the registration group yes so I hear in other districts that those those positions also teach so can we maybe use one of them as the math interventionist instead of hiring another physician they have evaluative responsibilities and curriculum respite responsibilities and coaching responsibilities so that's the depth okay so yes they're they're administrating during the day right um there have been times in our not too far go on past where those curriculum specialist positions or when they were more categorized as department chairs of single subjects so for example just to give you some history here right now we have a stem curriculum specialist that person is in charge of at least 20 maybe 21 teachers in their stem department which is science technology and math I might even be close to closer to 25 science technology and mathematics that was part of a consolidation effort a couple of years ago when we've reduced an administrator to bring the math and science together as one and also to bring the social studies in English together as one and so we were actually net reduced an administrator in that particular year for savings and so but when they were just department heads of one department where they may have had nine or ten teachers as a responsibility there was years where they taught either one class or sometimes two so it's not unheard of we'd have to look at that but with the greater responsibility now I don't know that it'd be realistic to have that as just part of the job description that they they teach a class but we've actually had mr.
bland in our class some math interventions I know yes yes but they couldn't such a full-time class there's no it's already a full-time job so they wouldn't be able to be as far as being a math intervention yes they just couldn't but maybe teaching a class we've had those discussion one class or something we had an overflow or something one year for a short time but in terms of picking let's see if it but yeah no no no we've we've talked about it a little bit that's definitely yes I do and in the past when it was smaller Mike we definitely had a teaching her piece not gonna work they were separate they all had one set two classes yes to at least at least one and sometimes two yeah yep and we actually made that decision to not have them as in classroom teachers when we we squished him and saved a lot of money by share having fewer right in in these coordinator roles you were three instead of five yeah yeah we reduced it was it was a good saving sir thank you the budget that was that was one of our budget cuts like this year so that we had to go figure out how to do it are you saying that one of their jobs is curriculum writing we have teachers do curriculum writing too right let me pay extra yeah for that for weekends and that sort of thing so I mean they're doing curriculum writing we're payments you should do curriculum writing it's an enormous task and right oh yeah isolation so it it's collaborative we want everyone that is willing to have ownership of the curriculum and we can't forget that writing of curriculum doubles as professional development and so we really get a two-part bang for your buck with that because the process of writing the curriculum and the thinking and the reflecting and the the researching expands the capacity of the individual or the team engaged in that so and then yeah just just to reiterate the the you know the scrubbing part the WPC a the the guess that's this the sewer there's a little bit of this is overhearing what the Board of Finance and bourse Luckman said yesterday the group life insurance I guess there's like $12,000 their savings or so and I don't have the hard numbers economy but it was there was something there maybe at least seven now think about it but everything's being yeah so yeah just wanted the savings in that account the at they spend rate we're going at this year no I think was I mean it was I think was budget 72 and it's didn't move at 64 so that's there's something spend rate that we're going this year I just did the calculation yesterday the spend rate we're going because that was one of the questions from the First Selectman at the spend rate we're going this year will end up about four or five hundred dollars under the seventy two thousand one hundred the second attempt from the sixty four and it seems like a big jump from the pre from when I saw the years prior so they're just the big jumps is there a reason for that I don't know I did not I just did the calculation yeah yeah and I don't have all of the I mean the little things the the seven thousand dollars here twelve thousand dollars here I guess cafeteria tables was a thing that was taken out of a general fund and it should've been taken out of the cafeteria fund so maybe can we maybe I wouldn't say that that's some kind of that's alright we bought them we budgeted them and bought them out of the cafeteria fund last year and we can't use the capture ones money to buy it to the repay us so was that a cafeteria Lee yes no no it was borne out of the general fund but I was last year and we can't use cafeteria money to reimburse us for a purchase we made it's kinda my question they are buying more cafeteria tables with the lunch money lunch fund this year okay we we are very well with our lunch program and so we're you're only allowed to use any excess funds in the cafeteria fund which is only raised by purchasing lunches it's not taxpayer money yeah I mean any the money there could be used to buy tables could be you know whatever whatever things we need stove fridge whatever so that's what that could be you're starting in a new range hood over the panini machine in the high school cafeteria from that lunch phone line so they're they're very specific guidelines of what you can and cannot use that money for you cannot use that money to reimburse for Fernet at the end of four prior year's purchases we kids looked into that cannot do that no also what I wanted to mention you know hiring teachers at you know specific steps obvious that dictates how much money they make we hired a pre-k teacher that you know I'm not gonna throw a specific number out but it's significantly higher than the kindergarten teacher that we were looking and I was kind of wondering it can that be a factor with you know future hires that we kind of look at the five-step range that the 7.5 so part of that Mike is it's a great question because when you look at it there you don't know what goes into that decision um a big part of what goes into hiring a number one let's just make it clear for those folks who might be watching at home I think can it's a step 7 with a master's is the kind of average we use for hiring a person in district in case we really find someone that's the right match that has a lot of experience in shortage areas we typically end up hiring people with a lot more experience because it's a shortage area so they want to come to Brookfield it's it's desirable place to work someone with a lot of experience in a shortage area where we do not have a lot of candidates and all the candidates that apply they're not all of the Brookfield quality that we desire and so we tend to in a physics or maybe a specialized math area or in speech and language higher more experienced people in pre-k in that particular example you're talking about there was a dearth of candidates it's a certification issue there's not a lot of people with the pre-k certification and if you're in the way pre-k certification works if you don't have the special education certification as part of that you cannot be a pre-k teacher you'd be out of compliance so you have you you have a you start with a very limited pool because of the nature of the state certification so that's a big part of what went into that decision and then we thought that was a very super high quality person and so we brought that person on is me we also know the numbers no but no no no into your point there was a new kindergarten teacher we brought on much lower on simulation of you know first real job less than we budgeted for exactly exactly and so Mary knows it all there's usually a like you were talking about earlier there usually ends up being a salary savings every single year anyway um so I think we're managing the grid quite well yes a couple of years was over five hundred thousand dollars in his house yeah well with subs and all that yeah yeah and yeah I guess you know when I went to look at the sub number of the 375 it's just kind of like I know it's kind of a placeholder but it is it you know it could be based on you know how many subs we typically use a year I think that's why how you doing history right well it's okay again it's it's really difficult it's been kind of out over the last couple of years because we've had so many long term leaves and we have when I first started here the recent history was it was much longer we have I think about forty leaves all different kinds of leaves last year that's ten percent of the staff that's not just teachers that's that's across the different six different bargaining units we have so you know the family leaves or whatever they might be and so that it's volatile and it's it could be very expensive you have someone who's on a leave entitled to their salary in terms of eight or twelve weeks of sick time and then on top of that you have to hire a sub as well there's also a role with with subs so sometimes you get a great amount of savings like you're talking about Mike other times it's very expensive because the substitute after forty days you have to hire the the person if they're in the teacher rank at a step one salary they can't just be at the sub rate so there's a lot of mandates and rules that when you just look at the grid you don't want you don't know and so these are great questions what the warning team that you put in November I mean it's already what over two hundred that's four yes Oh saving them yeah yeah and then vacancies do know how them in vacancies so for example looking at over yeah you mean we can maybe easy extrapolate that we 180 November and well that's what that's what I was doing I try to get it so we can cover you know why we're on the freeze to so we could cover the overage and special education is the big part of it the other part is you know I'm thinking to Mister Blanda back there for over you know almost the I don't know a year mark where's mark how long has it been without a head yeah so it's been over a year that we have not been able to fill the head custodian position here at the high school with a permanent person we had a person join us who wasn't right for that person I mean another person join us in the last few months wasn't right for that person and so there's a significant savings there because you don't you're not filling a full-time position that's in the budget so there's other areas where you get savings on the other hand it's very difficult to manage the building without that that position right so we can't assume we'll continue with that savings no you have to and I refine that calculation every month before I do ie a financial report that's why it changes yeah Julia's up doing 170mm position right but then also we have to factor in the subs yeah yeah so okay I just wonder program hold that number cuz it's a big number is a great question Omer it's a discussion on this salary point when we're meeting with them next Wednesday I think that's gonna be a very critical that we go slowly and deliberately on what's been happening with salaries in this current year because it was very clear to me with listening to the last meeting and I think you were watching the video we got from yesterday it seems to be more viewed as more happenstance then in fact this is exactly what's happening right and so I think we need to be more factual and more deliberate in terms of saying here's what happens in the summer and then here's what's happened through the year here's what's driving substitute costs and here's what's driving salary savings and the morning that's why I asked you for some of that data that you have recommended to you yeah thank you for that and I'm gonna look through that and maybe on Monday's meeting we can sit down and say how do you tell that story because it's very clear to me our brethren in the Board of Finance and the pool and the Board of Selectmen seem to say they just keep under running it so it must be something you're miss budgeting right instead of it's real things that are happening right so and why is it that it continues to get under more and more under it's because positions are open and here's what's happening would it be beneficial to make that part of that update that we have this help that ought to be absolutely part of that update right I'm on Wednesday so but I think that's a story that we're talking about to generally and both the substitutes and the salaries that needs more specificity right just because I think it will help our brethren and help us tell the story of what's happening in the world John I'm also trying to think of things maybe we haven't thought of and one thing I that just crossed my mind was we currently have 182 student days but we're required to have 180 is that correct so I would be curious to know your thoughts on first of all what would the the impact to the kids be the students be if we reduced to 180 and then Ken what would the financial implication be what would there be enough of a savings doing that to make it worth it that's a very difficult question to answer because I don't know if that would save us any money especially with the teachers because their contract says that we pay them 487 days I'm thinking of busses definitely transportation saving power of Paris I don't think it's an easy question to answer but that's why I wanted to ask now in preparation for our next measure because I think if I can so quick it's a good thing to put on oh well yeah I think we should again I'm trying to think of anything that we haven't thought of that you know everything's gonna be painful but maybe if we can find things that are less painful ya know that's that it's the lesser of the evils absolutely and the parrot contract might also have the number of days but I'm not positive enough they have to look at the language nurses you know whatever ever we could get I know it's only like five thousand dollars but they were mentioned audit five thousand savings received $5,000 audit yeah I don't get what does that mean Marsh is doing some work right you couldn't show that yeah we normally reimburse the town twenty five thousand dollars for our half of the town audit and we were expecting that to go up to thirty thousand dollars but since and I spoke to Marsha about this a couple weeks ago since she puts the financial statement here in financial statement together it's saving the town money so we can back back go back down to twenty five thousand so that'll be one of your up there yeah fan so I think when you know it's little ml again it's like 5000 8000 some thousand whatever I mean is there like a ballpark on maybe what was called insid iary incendiary findings we can get that well that that's what we're cuz I mean it sounds like as for reporting together that's what we're working on it could it could be a that could be a a good decent chunk cuz when you talk about the insurance we talked about the insurance tonight there might be 160 thousand dollars and seventy thousand other 407,000 the essence you know and there's gonna be a lot of things we don't do I'm gonna be very honest with you that's what the price bulls are looking at you know we're gonna slow down on a lot of things there's no doubt about it talked with dr.
Ruby on not doing some professional development you know to try to find some significant savings to get to eight hundred seventeen thousand dollars and possibly much more you have to take drastic measures we could do all this you're talking about Mike and we could find some significant savings we can scrub our budgets and not have memberships for a year or dues and fees to other things and knock down on some of the travel and some of the some of the PD events but at the end of the day that that doesn't get you hundreds of thousands of dollars doesn't all soon that was in the one hundred and what someone questions that work well that's what we've been working there's well over a hundred questions so which and we want to give a thorough responsible answer that people can understand so working on will you send those question responses out before our meeting on Monday my intention is to get it out to you with on Friday thank you thank you jeff has useful gonna be able to look at it a little bit sure yeah no no no no Monday's our Finance Committee being and Wednesdays the Board of Finance Mina which every which we're all welcome to attend I don't think we're in session but but but we're all welcome to attend does anybody have any other questions or comments on that okay so we can move on to our last item well yeah which is the new school building project not too much of an update on that actually yesterday I met with the media center specialist and Tecton to kind of go over there they're deep look at how the latest version of the current floor plan is looking for them how they're going to use the space programmatically and some things kind of shift it around inside the building so I think you know it was a really positive meeting and I think you know we're sort of really trying to figure out what's best for students and how are we gonna have this multi-level Media Center and how our students really gonna use in how are the media specialists actually gonna you know maintain and manage their collections which was you know a big part of their concern so so I think it was it was really good communication with that group and you know those those types of meetings will continue to kind of really finalize everything yeah and Rose I thank you for being able to attend that I wasn't able to attend the meeting and it was nice having you there and actually the media specialist commented to Eddie after you left that they really appreciated a board members presence there in addition to that Eddie was down to me with mr.
Baldwin our athletic director phys ed Health Coordinator and work with Matt cutting one of our visit teachers he's an elementary phys ed teacher and so they went over the spaces again and looked at the office space and the gross motor space and the health room and areas and swing spaces and they really had a good discussion and as well as met with our technology director mr. Conklin so you know the user groups continue to meet with the architects as we need to and it's been really positive we just continued to refine things that's what design development is supposed to be and so we continue to do that and one thing I'll just say sort of like as an aside is maybe something to keep on our radar for when this school finally does open but you know one of the things that they were talking about was in terms of managing I really two separate collections one on the top floor and one on the bottom floor was the real necessity of having two full-time library clerks to help them manage those collections while they're doing you know classes so you know those are positions that have been cut in the past so we just need to keep that on our radar as we have to today we have one school we have one at huckleberry one open and we have one at the high school and one at the middle school but none on center there's an honest Center so I mean so there's so basically saying that we need to hire an additional person that's what there's that's what they said to Rose that's what they owe ya they're intervening Meister always clear on whether we were maintaining or attic this is an app yeah okay so yeah any other questions about that okay so this was a quick meeting but we can move on to our three main points the actual presentation what's that the what the Monday school finance meeting oh okay yeah yeah should we have something in there on the budget rule Mike sort of Hetal a lot of really good questions that might be good to sort of actually put out around a quick song that the administrative team is gonna come back and on March 18th and really just do you think recommend it's laying on the budget yeah something like that that would work mm-hmm talking about all our awards table words Oh a generator well I I said I'd actually I would take this opportunity to synopsize what you just said about the building right continuing the design work and talking about the layout of the floors and then I talked about the awards yes that's what I did be three good things in the whole agenda was policies yeah oh my gosh what do you have there Deb finance meeting I have a bunch of discussion I have cable wards and we talked about the new school project with the finance project that we send enough information out on that on Facebook do we need to say it again I don't know if that's a little bit old news I don't know just trying to narrow it down a three yeah I think we should talk about our awards I don't think we bragging off the bars we do good things well it's about communication I think people ought to know that you know the award the primary awards were about the school project and people of complimented without this the school's about that communication so the fact that the state recognizes it is a really good thing okay all right thank you upcoming events okay upcoming events for March 5th through March 28th I did cuz we have a couple half days coming up Center elementary school has a PTO meeting at 9:30 on Tuesday March 10th on Friday March 13th is pi day a principal diamond we'll be sending more information on that to the families and Thursday March 19th and Friday March 20th the spring parent-teacher conferences dismissal at 12:20 at huckleberry Friday March 6 is a PTO meeting at 9:30 Friday March 13th is the PTO movie night abominable that starts at 6:30 Wednesday March 18th report cards are available on the portal and Thursday March 19th and Friday March 20th spring parent-teacher conferences dismissal at 12:20 at whiskey near we have on Friday March 6 Brookfield high school counselors will be visiting to speak to 8th graders on Tuesday March 10th spring parent-teacher conferences from 12:30 to 2:45 dismissal is at 11:40 Wednesday March 11th is the seventh grade cultural assembly birds-of-prey sponsored by the PTO Friday March 13th bingo night at six o'clock also sponsored by PTO Tuesday March 17th is a 5th grade cultural assembly that's the Dragon King Tanglewood marionettes sponsored by PTO and on Wednesday March 18th is an eighth grade cultural assembly that's also birds-of-prey and also sponsored by PTO and at Brookfield High School on Thursday March 12th we have spring parent-teacher conferences dismissal at 11:00 also on Thursday March 12th is the BHS career and tech ed Department date night for parents I don't have a time on that I think it was six times between 6:15 yeah 6:15 Thursday March 19th Friday March 20th Saturday March 21st and Sunday March 22nd is the VHS musical How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying the evening shows on Thursday Friday and Saturday at 7 p.m.
call to order the march 5th 2020 regular board meeting please stand for the pledge in a moment of the republic silence which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all next order business mission statement mr casper the mission of the clifton school district in an open and reciprocal community partnership is to provide all students with a quality education to develop the skills necessary to become literate lifelong learners who are responsible and productive citizens contributing to a democratic society in an ever-changing world thank you next order business reading of the open public meeting statement the new jersey open public meetings law was enacted to ensure the right to the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon in accordance with the provisions of this act the clifton board of education has caused notice of this meeting to be publicized by having the date time and place there are posted at the city clerk's office clifton public library administration building senior citizen nutrition center on cable tv in the local press on the district's website and mailed to presidents of parent teacher organizations this meeting will be tape recorded in accordance with policy oh one six eight next order of business recognition and award presentations can i have a motion to accept the march student of the month so move motion by commissioner drabo second second by miss basford roll call mr abbadraba yes miss basford yes miss beltran mr canova yes mr casper yes mr pacenti yes mr smith yes miss danny yes freshman student of the month okay freshman student of the month is rosalind guido congratulations to wisland guido on being chosen as the freshman student of the month roslyn's favorite subject in school is spanish while she has been speaking spanish her entire life she loves being able to learn new things about the language roslyn says her family always inspires her to do better and helps her through tough times she is a member of her orchestra and is looking forward to joining other extracurricular activities during her high school career come on up [Applause] um congratulations sophomore student of the month so moved okay no second sophomore student of the month liam riley congratulations liam on being chosen as sophomore student of the month liam has a love for history and music and has aspirations to study them in the future his freshman year history teacher mr analysia has really helped to strengthen his love for history and he wants to pursue it in the future liam credits his parents dave and tara for showing him the rewards of hard work and always being there to help him he is a member of our chs orchestra tri-m music honor society model un and roman history club outside of school he is an active member of the boy scouts and his youth group liam is in our school's music academy and is excited for the educational opportunities that clifton high school offers him i present to you our sophomore student of the month of march liam riley [Applause] um [Applause] junior student of the month junior studio month max reuben congratulations to max rubin on being chosen as june junior student of the month max has always enjoyed his english classes because he likes the artistic freedoms he has when he writes he is also grateful for mr pinto for helping him sing better but also to become a better person max is a member of our mustang marching band and mad caps he has led roles in our music musical for two years he is also the vice president of the clifton student union and is a junior representative for the student council max has aspirations to attend film school because he wants to be a film producer writer and director junior student of the month max rubin [Applause] senior student of the month the senior of student of the month is valentina leon congratulations to valentina leon i'm being chosen as a senior student of the month valentina's favorite subject is ap psychology because she likes learning about human behavior she names mr fakina as her most influential teacher because he gives her good advice and obviously cares about the well-being well-being of the students valentina says her parents inspire her to work hard because they have always worked to support her she is currently a member of the yearbook club and volunteers at the local animal shelter valentina has plans to attend college next year and one day hopes to be an intelligence analyst for the fbi [Applause] we're going to take a group picture with all the students please great order so thank [Applause] you next order business adoption of minutes can i have a motion to adopt the special minutes of the special meeting of february 19 2020 and the minutes of the regular meeting of february 20 did i say 20 twice 20 20.
good morning big hollow today is march 9th 2020. it is the 100th it is the 125th day of school this is wbhe news i'm nicola and i'm robin today for lunch dinner will be chicago hot dogs baked fries baked beans fresh grapes and milk tomorrow for breakfast there will be mini waffles sausage patty fresh apples or juices orange juice and milk we have some friends celebrating birthdays anthony c danielle h please go to the office to pick out your birthday book yesterday's fun fact question was in the little movie in the movie the little mermaid what kind of animal was smashed the answer is a crab the winner is paul tudovici come to the office to pick out your prize today's one fact question is if you if i read three books a day for four days how many books will i read all together remember to write your answer daily and include your daily class we have a special announcement the winner of the picnic table drawing for this week are second grade juliana tubal jamie trudeau vichy kaiden touretti third grade zoe three keenan kr3 conley clara tube boyfriend fourth grade carson four woods joe four fisters par four fiddle and now we will observe a brief period of silence to it to reflect on the anticipated activities of the day please stand for the pledge i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all hank will now lead us in a big hallway i pledge to be safe in every way take responsibility during work and play i will be respectful in all i do and be a star the whole day through have a merry birthday remember choose kindness thanks for watching bye
yes you're right 2020 february 19 of 2020 and also the executive meeting of february 20 2020. move it by um vice chair bass first second by mr um casper any comments revisions roll call mr abby drabo miss password yeah miss beltran yes mr nova yes mr daley yes mr casper yes mr pacenti abstain on 19 yes on 20. mr smith yes miss danny yes next order business communication and announcements we don't have any there is no first reading of policy next order of business is presentation of reports from administration advisory committees and special committees we have mr paul lurch here thank you good evening good evening [Music] if the students would like to leave with their parents you can you're welcome to stay but if you need to study get home now's your opportunity you can go smart we won't be offended i won't take that personally thank so there's thank you well thanks for having us thanks for giving us the opportunity to present uh tonight uh the audit results um obviously we are um a little tardy here on the presentation wise um a couple of reasons uh really the first reason is is because um for the second year in a row the state of new jersey was delayed in presenting certain financial information on pension reporting uh to the auditing world so last year that deadline was extended from the beginning of december to actually february middle of february this year it went and the extension went to the end of december so that's part of the reason why we're a little bit late on the other item had to do with timing obviously so i'm here to report on the fiscal year ending june 30 2019 and let me just start by saying that the board of education has three opinions that we're giving you okay in that report the first one um and and and i will say that they're all unmodified which is after you know which is a clean opinion which is the opinion that all board of education is striving for so the first one deals with the financial statements so we give a an overall an opinion in the financial statements that they're performed in accordance with governmental uh auditing and generally accepted auditing principles the second is our audit our opinion on internal controls and compliance with governmental auditing standards and it really deals with your state and federal grants the third opinion deals with major programs on those grants you do have major programs generally speaking a major program is any program that exceeds seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars in a year uh for you that that number is elevated uh because of the size of the district and the amount of of expenditures that are running through state and federal programs just as a little bit of a knowledge here federal programs you expended over 14 million dollars in federal programs and state programs you expended over 62 million dollars in state programs so quite a bit of money running through from the federal and state side what that simply means is that because you are subject to a state and federal single audit additional audit responsibilities are attached to those major programs that we identify meaning that we not only have to do financial auditing but we do have to do specific grant compliance auditing just digging in deeper into those specific areas um you know having said that um we had no findings there were no internal controls or compliance items that were reported in the report on on single audit or generally accepted auditing standards as well governmental auditing standards so great news um terrific um what i will do is i and i want to talk a little bit about equity uh the board members i believe you have the synopsis right michael yes okay so the board has a synopsis in front of them just talk a little bit about equity here and then we can get into the comments and recommendations that we have so if you look at the total equity the end of the year the board of education ended the year with 20 million one hundred and eighty thousand one hundred and eighty four dollars slightly down from last year down by seven hundred twelve thousand dollars what is it comprised of i'm gonna work from the bottom up um i don't have the synopsis in front of me i'm working off a different component but um what what you know what's comprised of that total equity and what you can see is that working from the bottom up we have an undesignated fund balance of 3.6 million dollars slight change from last year last year was roughly 3.5 million dollars it's your undesignated it's your free balance generally speaking you're allowed to keep two percent of your total expenditures in this undesignated fund balance and then of course like everything else in the world there are exceptions to those general rules we make modifications for that and that's how you get to your 3.6 so that is your free balance cash on hand rainy day reserve if you will operating rainy day moving up we have assigned balances we have designated for subsequent year budget meaning that that's the amount that's pledged in your 1920 budget there's two pieces of it it's the 2.3 million here and then the piece up top on the xs surplus designated for subsequent year 1.5 so that combination is 3.8 million dollars and that's balancing the current budget that we're in the 1920 school year then we have reserved for conferences of 193 000 and we also have committed encumbrances of 871 thousand dollars just means goods or services that were ordered but not yet received or delivered by the end of the year uh their reservations of equity as the budget rolls these items roll into your modified budget so those are now modifications in the current 1920 budget and they get spent out during that period of time if the goods and services were delivered or performed before the end of the year they would have been charged out as an expense they would have been in accounts payable and charged as an expense these are not these are just reservations of equity then we have the restricted components the restricted components the the first one here is the capital reserve uh we have 3.9 million dollars which is unrestricted or undesignated and then you have the designated component of capital reserve of 6'5 meaning that of the total 10.4 million dollars that six million five is being utilized in the 1920 budget that we're currently in meaning that the 3.9 million will roll forward for future uh use last year's budget last year's total was roughly eight million dollars maintenance reserve uh maintenance reserve is money that's set aside to maintain the facilities here you have a combination of the 503 and then you have the designated component of seventy seven hundred and fifty thousand or one million two fifty uh last year was one point five million of the total of one million two fifty seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars is being utilized in your 1920 budget to maintain the facilities of the district and then we get to the last component so it's a progression we're allowed to maintain x number of dollars into our unrestricted equity then we have encumbrances or commitments or assignments through encumbrances and then we have reservations of equity or restricted components through capital reserve those items are done by board resolution maintenance reserve is done by board resolution you do that in june every year and that's when you make that uh restriction or allocation of any excess surplus into the various components again those components of capital reserve maintenance reserve anything that's not restricted through that particular avenue will go into excess surplus so in this particular year june of 2019 there was no excess surplus because the board resolution designated any monies in excess of the mandatory amount that we can retain a component of it was put into the maintenance reserve and then the balance was put into the capital reserve the capital reserve is obviously items that are for future capital facility improvements of the district last year we did have an excess surplus so when we were here last year there was 1.5 of excess and that's why that now dropped into this particular year excess designated so it's really was last year's excess surplus so overall equity didn't change all that much and that's the reallocation of the of of the equity okay and i'll just get into give you an overview and certainly if you have any specific questions you can stop me but i'm just going to go through some of the comments that we had okay none of these are in my mind significant if they were significant they would have been part of that discussion that i had earlier with you about internal controls being material or significant or compliance being material or significant that's where they would have been captured as well we don't believe that any of these rose uh to that level but needless to say there are comments in a report and um we're here to report about them so the very first one looks at the uh or deals with the general operating account bankrec and the net payroll bank reconciliation we noticed at the end of the year that there were numerous outstanding checks that didn't clear in both accounts the general account we had some checks dating back to august of 2016.
and the net payroll account we had some checks dating back to september of 2014. the next item dealt with um a reconciling item between the various accounts and funds of the district so what we have is we have in the payroll agency account the payroll agency account is accumulating the withholdings from the employees that that are attributable to the chapter 78 contributions and those amounts are then turned over to the operating fund and recorded as a contra revenue and that was happening all year long i think this was a timing issue at the very end of the year and what happened is is that in the payroll agency account the withholdings were held at june 30th and reported as a disbursement but not yet transferred over and what happened is that in a general operating account it should have been recorded as a deposit in transit and recorded as a contra into the budgetary system so on the payroll side we had the check cut it was an outstanding check but on the general operating account it wasn't picked up as a receipt as a dit and recorded in the system as a contract so we made that adjustment yes because that that sounds complicated but if i could ask mr usi not to put him on the spot but just to give a specific example of how that might happen sure i think it might make a lot more sense it's really just timing of deposits between accounts from month to month so in this particular case it's significant because it's the end of the year june 30th to july first so for example like a pomponian invoice or something um that was used in july but not paid you uh invoiced in june but not paid until july would that be something if it wasn't set up as an accounts payable yes that could be an example but this example was the chapter 78 payment was recorded in july and it should have been recorded in june even because the payroll was so late now and i will say that you know when we went through the audit process because we're always going to reconcile the dits and outstanding checks between the funds and so then we picked the we picked upon the fact that there was an outstanding check of 300 000 316 000 that wasn't recorded as a deposit in transit and what we did is we simply made the adjustment in the financial statements your financial statements are reported correctly i think it was just as when june 30th ended it was so late uh i guess in the week maybe that's what it was with michael being able to record that on the opposite end but it's it's corrected and the financial statements are presented correctly the next item deals with um with the lease purchase um led lighting this is different than than uh some other leases this lease is through an escrow and so what's happening is is that we have a fiscal agent you enter into a lease with a fiscal agent and in essence they procure pay vendors but we have access and we have the liability for the lease obviously the transactions have to run through the borders of records and what was happening is is that the physical transaction of the procurement that was done of 310 000 through the escrow was not being picked up in the capital project fund we recorded the activity in the capital project fund and as we indicated to mike in the finance committee that in addition to that you also then when you're making disbursements or paying vendors and if they're paying those vendors on your behalf they really should be presented to the board and approved before they release those checks it's your money the financial statements are should be reflective of all those activities and the balance that's left is being picked up as cash on the account as well so we just want to make sure it is unique it's kind of a little bit different you know another way of having a lease is you could enter into the lease the proceeds could have all come to the district would have all been recorded and dispersed through in that fashion this was just a little bit of a different uh circumstance so we corrected the financial statements financial statements have the three hundred thousand dollars running through it and any cash balance that remains is sitting on the balance sheet and certainly michael knows now that any of that those specific type transactions have to be presented to the board and all payments have to be approved before the escort agent disperses those funds then we had an unrecorded liability in the food service fund for pomp tony that was the june 19 invoice and that amount was one thousand dollars you know eighty one thousand dollars you would think you know especially in the operating fund wouldn't rise to a level of of being reported but you know in our world what happens is that we have to look at each fund individually as well and so the operating fund has a very high tolerable misstatement your food service fund is much smaller the tolerable misstatement in the food service fund in my mind in our auditing world was only forty two thousand dollars so when we had a payment for palm tonium for june that wasn't recorded as an outstanding liability we recorded it but from reporting purposes it now gets reported in the audit report because it exceeded our tolerable level the very last comment deals with um student activities uh and the athletic account this is something we're seeing everywhere it's kind of tough to get your hands around and it really deals with deposits not being made in a timely manner difficult to do um you know we do some random testing here um of the random tests almost every single day that we tested we had some violation of and we say 48 hours but it's really common sense so it's just timely deposit make a deposit twice a week you want to safeguard the assets and that's the key behind all of this some of those deficiencies range from six to eight days in the student account and six to 17 days in the athletic what happens is is that a lot of times what we're seeing is is that teachers or supervisors or program managers are holding on to the monies until the event occurs so if they're collecting monies in advance of an event they're holding on to it until all students are paying at that point and then they're transferring the money over so it just needs to be done on a timely basis um i don't know if anybody has any questions um the only thing i would say is is i usually do make a quick comment on the pension liabilities we always give a little bit of an overview or an update on that so this is now we are now into the second year of reporting for the under gasby 75 which is the post-employment benefit reporting for opeb which is really just another way of saying the health benefits as we know that the employees of the district receive health benefits for life under the current system in the past we had picked up the pension liabilities for the public employees piece as well as the teacher side so now the total liabilities that are being picked up in the financial statement is just the public employees because you are liable for that that was 41 34 million dollars they all went down 34 million from 41 million the year before the teacher's pension side the liability this is not in your financial statements but in the footnote so the total liability that is attributable to clifton board of education for the state teachers pension fund is 432 million dollars and it's down 38 million from the year before and as i indicated to you the last piece is the opeb piece so that is really the health benefits side the post employment benefits other than pensions and that totaled 272 million dollars so for all these retirees in the system the state has calculated through the actuarial team that the total liability for the clifton employees your pro rata share is 738 million dollars but by statute and law you have no financial responsibility for the oped piece and the teacher pension side you do have a responsibility for the public employee side which is the smallest component okay any questions any questions comments um next time can we have like hand out do they have handhelds the community because we didn't do anything overhead the only thing was the um the synopsis that you have the synopsis no i'm just saying yes because we have people in the community here sitting here watching listening to uh numbers being told it's very hard to follow along when you don't have something in front of you to read off of so my worry is like why can't the people be seeing what we're talking about on the screen behind us yeah yes because um i i would be lost in the source at this point right now and i'll be looking at everybody like what are they talking about so i think we next time should provide the viewers on at home and also in our audience something on the board so they can follow along with us thank you that's it thank you thanks for having us sure i just want to comment to mike um for the largest district that we have and everything that was recommended i think it's minuscule and i think you're doing a fantastic job mike so thank you thank you good night good night next order business committee uh board committee reports there are no board um committee reports that were provided next order of business is public recognition this portion of the meeting is open to the citizens of clifton for the purpose of addressing resolutions on this agenda only residents are requested to sign the register provided for this purpose and to state their names addresses and subject matter comments are limited to three minutes per person issues raised by members of the public may or may not be responded to by the board all comments will be considered and a response responsibly forthcoming if and when appropriate the board asks the members of the public be courteous and mindful the rights of other individuals when speaking specifically comments regarding students and employees of the board are discouraged and will not be responded to by the board students and employees have specific legal rights afforded by the laws of new jersey the board bears no responsibility nor will it be liable for any comments made by members of the public members of the public should consider their comments in light of legal rights of those affected or identified in their comments and be aware that they are legally responsible and liable for their comments i'm sorry to the student yes so um thank you sorry about that i just as i started reading i remembered it uh all right let me bring this closer here uh congratulations to the clifton high school students of the month uh their academic rigor is certainly impressive and it's great to see that they're being rewarded and recognized for their efforts uh mr pacenti welcome back it's good to see you back in good health um i wish you better health and reason and i look forward to working with you and the last thing i have to say because i'm going to keep it pretty short for tonight is that there is another meeting for the district let me just see the official name here the district strategic planning meeting that will be held on march 25th at six o'clock um i would certainly encourage members of the public to attend and uh take the opportunity that dr robert towsey gave to you guys so thank you for uh so that's all i have to say for tonight and thank you it's a great day to be a mustang anyone else wish to speak i'm sorry period on this agenda on this agenda then there'll be another one for not on the agenda items seeing non-emotional closing motion by mr percent second second by mr casper next order of business is unfinished business there's none um next is education and administration can i get a motion for ea one through ea8 second motion by mr kanova second bye mr presentee any questions yes can we pull ea 05 for exec i i make a motion to a pulley a05 for executive session second okay motion by mr casper second by madame vice chair um roll call mr abu drabo yes miss belt um miss bassberg yes beltran yes mr canova yes mr daley yes mr casper yes mr picenti yes mr smith yes miss danny yes any other questions all right um so this motion is for ea one through ea8 with the exception of five which has been pulled bro call mr abdraba yes miss bassford yes miss beltran mr canova yes mr daley yes mr casper yes sister yeah mr smith yes miss danny yes can i get a motion um for p1 through p20 so move motion by mr casper second second by mr picenti questions pete um mr daley yes mr casper yes mr presenting yes mr smith yes miss danny yes can i have a motion to approve f1 through f8 so moved motion by mr casper second second thought mr prasanti questions i have some comments on number six our use of facilities um i had some questions about um trying to find the exact thing here um the clifton recreation department is running camps in the summer using our facilities and one is a baseball camp one is a lacrosse camp and i called the superintendent to check on you know are those our camps are those our coaches running those camps um because the the first one on the list shows the lemberg soccer academy running their own program under the lemberg soccer academy but the others are running under the board of recreation so i wasn't sure if those are our coaches if those are recreation programs uh how they're funded how they're paid and why are there only two sports offering camps in the summer uh in the past i believed almost all of our sports offered programs for kids in the summer so i was a little confused i reached out to the superintendent i don't know if you want to i'm happy comment on that yeah thank you mr smith did reach out to me so while these uh at least these two specific um items that mr smith is referring to while those are our coaches these programs are they're not going to be our employees they'll be working through the recreation department and paid through the recreation department which is why the recreation department is requesting the use of facilities as to why there's only these two and not all of the sports is a little bit of a more complicated question but the idea is that we want we would eventually like all of our sports to have feeder programs summer programs summer camps and i also think that although there's only two on on this agenda there will be more possibly a future meetings but we do have some sports that do not have you know summer programs i did speak to mr malahi about that we are strongly encouraging you know our coaches to do that we certainly want to build our feeder programs uh so that you know when our when our students get to high school um they're playing at a high level okay so just to clarify these these are this is not costing the district any money um and if i could suggest that uh this go to um is it facilities that handles athletics facilities that they look at it and maybe the coaches will be called in and see what their intentions are or something but i think all of our kids should be offered an opportunity it used to always be that there were always an opportunity for each sport to be offered to camp in the summer and if that's changed i'd just like to know why that's all so my suggestion that facilities take a look at that please thank you okay so facilities yes i have another one uh through you madam chair the superintendent could you just explain 4482 with the passaic athletic department so i got a couple questions on that online i'm sorry um what number mrs bastford sorry facilities i thought we were on the same subject use of facilities um application number oh the pacific track field the uh school district of passaic uh reached out to us they their track is currently under construction uh first they reached out to uh our track coaches then reached out to our athletic director who emailed me and they're requesting to utilize our facilities while their track is being rebuilt by all accounts and according to our athletic director there's a very good relationship among the coaches even though they're technically considered rivals and i'm told that this will not interfere with with our students practice they'll be practicing after our students are done and it'll be a temporary period of time until they're till their field is ready so it was recommended to me that it wouldn't be a problem by the athletic director the coaches are all on board so i i have no problem recommending it to the full board thank you very much any other president under um section seven of the claims list in this group i'd like a um oh we didn't get to voting yet okay yeah we're in discussion but oh dude do you want to do it when we do the vote and then you abstain and explain why okay so do it at the vote do it during the vote and then it then yeah and then you ex abstain and you can explain any other okay roll call mr aberdrop miss basford yes beltran yes mr konova yes mr daley yes mr casper yes mr pacenti yes but after abstain on uh f3 520 at 4481 with the police department for the use of the facility mr smith yes that's where you abstain now oh you won't understand okay i'm standing on yes check number 198301 for my fingerprinting uh reimbursement miss danny yes yes yeah yes okay next order business public recognition this portion of the meeting is open to citizens of clifton for the purpose of addressing any subject matter pertinent to and or directly related to the operation of the clifton public school district residents are requested to sign the register provided for this purpose and to state names addresses and subject matter comments are limited to five minutes per person issues raised by members of the public may or may not be responded to by the board all comments will be considered and a response will be forthcoming if and when appropriate the board asks that members of the public be courteous and mindful the rights of other individuals when speaking specifically comments regarding students and employees of the board are discouraged and will not be responded to by the board students and employees have specific legal rights afforded by the laws of new jersey the board bears no responsibility nor will it be liable for any comments made by members of the public members of the public should consider their comments in light of the in light of the legal rights of those affected or identified in their comments and be aware that they are legally responsible and liable for their comments does anyone wish to speak good evening board member superintendent thank you very much i just have two matters i wanted to bring to your attention first is i have questions about the capital plan for this year there are no playgrounds in our schools our elementary schools and it's a particular problem at my child's school ps1 but i've seen ps8 i'm sorry but my child is 10's attack program at ps1 there's no playground there and for the recess periods there's not enough equipment for the children so balls ropes all of these things and so i get frequent complaints from my kids that there's just not a lot for them to do during recess we are new to the district so we're coming from bloomfield schools where all of the elementary schools have playground structures i work in new york city department of ed all of our schools have playground structures so it's a sort of unique thing and i'm wondering you know what sort of thought partnership i can provide or parents can provide through ptos to think about how to bring playground structures and those sorts of things to our schools and the second is diversity there's no diversity in our teaching staff at our schools our schools are really diverse places so we have kids that are from all sorts of countries across the world we have african-american kids indian kids kids from south america kids from all over the world literally in our schools and the teaching staff is not diverse at all and so i know that this is a challenge not just in this district but across different districts in new jersey but we are in a diverse community and so you know i would love for the board to consider and for the school system to consider how to make our teaching staff as reflected as as diverse as reflect the the diversity reflected in our students particularly because there's research that says there's an outcome impact for students and student achievement thank you ma'am what was your name adrian adrian austin we emailed we did we did okay thank you hi good evening i'm lorie la lama and i just want the board to know that april 25th will be the latino institute so it will be at school 17 from 9 30 to 2 30 and we're having keynote speakers and there'll be four workshops free breakfast and free lunch for the families they'll be babysitting for the kids so andrea rock and myself will be having a table in botany village and will be passing out all the information to the families and it'll be a pride event also so we'll pass out our little giveaways to get the people involved so i just wanted the board to know that and also i have an update for the windows at christopher columbus so just pass them out i'll reserve that no but the windows are great they look wonderful and just a few things need to be fixed that's it thank you very much um madam president and i ask that we move the the playground issue and bring that to facilities committee please i think that's an important issue for the committee to discuss hi donna papa which clifton um just a couple of things as we come approaching the summer which i know it's hard to believe um every summer there's a tradition in clifton of giving summer assignments grades k through 12.
and i'm just asking as we start preparing them that um maybe we could prepare us things that are i don't know how to put it like more genuine more it's something that i know the elementary students would be more into and at the high school level if we're going to be giving summer assignments um could we please make sure we have enough materials if you are assigning a specific book please make sure you have enough last summer the parents were expected to buy the materials which really you know buying five books the other thing is if you're going to give us homework to do with our kids over the summer which none of us enjoy i'm sure none of you enjoy that either let's make it actually count for something um last year for example my daughter read five books they counted as a homework grade by the end of the marking period she had 18 homework grades so basically it didn't count for almost nothing it really wasn't um important for all the time she put in okay and the homework assignment should also be referenced during the school year it seems like most of them are done and there's no link to what's going on the rest of the year there's something totally separate if you really don't need to give the assignment and you have to give an assignment then there should be an option for the teachers to say we don't need this the kids don't need this if they're not going to use it you know if it's a math refresher for a physics course and we're not going to use that math or refer to it we we don't need to do this and make our lives i mean i think every kid should read during the summer but everything else i don't know if i was history i wouldn't make it read read you know the newspaper the time something be prepared to discuss current events i don't know if i'd make it read these nine chapters in the book and answer these 9 000 questions um and secondly um i watched the meeting and i just had a question on the referendum about the turf we're proposing at woodrow wilson uh and why we are turfing there is it just for the gym classes hi how are you um so it would be utilized by the phys ed classes there uh but it would also be for the varsity that's the varsity baseball field there also and it i'll say this publicly maybe the most embarrassing field i've ever seen when it comes to a varsity sport it floods there's no seating there's no bathrooms for for the public to utilize um and it's really uh for for a district uh as proud as clifton and i think we can do a lot better in addition uh the goal would be to once you turf the field it makes it more accessible and that field and will be open to the public for the recreation department for the community to utilize in addition to our schools oh okay i was just trying to you know make sure we're having some equality use of turf fields because you know we have a football field and the soccer field and now a boys baseball field please if somebody correct me if i'm wrong the the field at the high school is who plays there that's boys and girls but where do they both practice i understand yeah i mean i'm just thinking if you do the boys baseball maybe you should think about the girls softball too just for equality good evening board uh lance bradley uh 136 princeton street i just want to bring up i guess sort of like the elevator room uh i went to costco today you would think hurricane is coming i see you all got your hand sanitizer just wondering if there's a plan in place for coronavirus um i haven't received any literature any letters anything no announcements or whatnot but three weeks ago it wasn't even in the states now it's everywhere damn there so just wanted to bring that up and see if there's uh or here if you could give me some type of feedback as to if there's anything in place or what plans are if it arises which i feel like is inevitable at this point so that's all i have for tonight thanks mr bradley thank you for uh bringing that up i have a uh full statement here that i'm going to read when it's my turn tonight with information on that uh but just so you know you should have received some correspondence about a week ago through blackboard connect there was a district-wide email are you signed up are you getting the email blasts uh if if you're not okay it was sent to the entire community i want to say it was last thursday a week ago and while we're sitting here tonight probably about a half hour to an hour ago another notice went out with a parent's guide about to talking to talking to children about the coronavirus email address yes the blackboard connect well we'll have to verify because that i'm 100 certain that that went out a week ago tonight and within the last hour or so another email went out did anybody get that yet yeah yeah okay mr kenova is a parent uh not as a board member he so he got received it as a parent so we we need to double check that with uh with your school and in the student database system to make sure your email address is correct because it certainly went out and uh mr rose can you confirm that that other email went out tonight it did so you should have within the last hour received a parenting guide to talking to your children about the coronavirus we got one while we're sitting here you got one okay okay thank you we just gotta take we gotta check mr bradley okay and if i can uh miss danny tonight when it's board member comment if i could just speak first on that um i have a statement to read about that okay so right through it so in a minute okay and anyone else wish to speak see an emotional close second bye mr albrabo second by mr casper board member comments you're up thank you miss danny uh good evening commissioners good evening members of the community parents students i want to start with uh with a statement about the coronavirus as it is everywhere you turn on the news and and certainly people are beginning to panic um and we don't want people to panic so current media is filled with coverage the severity of illness or how many people will fall ill from the coronavirus or what is officially known as the covid19 remains unknown at this time and while dealing with unknowns can make us all very anxious um and fearful please rest assure that the school district is collaborating closely with the clifton department of health following any and all directives from health officials and the new jersey department of education we had a meeting with all of the stakeholders at the clifton department of health just a couple days ago when i say all the stakeholders i mean the fire department the police department the local hospitals um local businesses you name it and and everyone was there to discuss this current uh situation it's important to know that while this is spreading in the united states the district is being proactive we have plans to respond in a flexible way to this public health concern the district is partnering partnering with local public health authorities we're updating our response plans and sharing what we know of course our school district takes the health and well-being of all of our students staff and stakeholders very seriously to that end we've been working closely with the department of health our custodial staff have been directed and have been conducting deeper cleanings and disinfecting high touch areas including doorknobs desks tables handrails paper towel dispensers and providing additional mopping our nursing staff our amazing professional nursing staff have been kept informed of all recommended cdc guidelines that's the center for disease control and are being vigilant in their screening procedures we're asking for parent cooperation and following the guidance provided for children's illness and illness prevention meaning if your child has a fever keep them home 24 hours after a fever keep them home excuse me 24 hours fever-free they can return to school additionally as mentioned briefly earlier a guide to discussing this situation with the coronavirus with your children has been shared with you this evening via blackboard connect and if it is not posted already to our website it will be shortly we will continue to post and send guidance from the department of health the department of education and the cdc as we receive updates we were on a conference call with the governor and the commissioner of education two days ago to discuss this situation and any if there is any direct impact on our schools we will be communicating that directly with our parents via blackboard connect email phone call text messages and certainly on our website thank you abu drabo uh the only thing i have is if to the superintendent um one thing i agree with that if we have our laptops now we're gonna do summer readings maybe we can do audibles or something online text i know not all students um would like the book in their hand rather reading online but we should have both options as well it's cost effective for parents since if we're signing it it shouldn't be happy for us to go grab 10 15 books during the summer three books of summer thank you miss beltram congrats to all the students of the month i love to see that there's such a the tunes a month really true show the diversity of clifton we have students from every single uh interest group from fbi to music our movie producers today so i think it's it's interesting that all these different uh sub are excelling in our school district um i like to reiterate that everyone should keep washing their hands i know about the runs on supermarkets because i own a supermarket and we never expected to be out of water or hand sanitizer or bleach or all kinds of things that no one could be prepared for um please try not panic i know it's hard with the news non-stop drilling in and i have had panics myself of if my father and me wind up in the quarantine what happens to my business and like all kinds of thoughts like that but you just have to try and keep calm and don't watch the news too much um spring is here the good part about that is they said this virus dies when it gets warm so keep praying now we're gonna switch from praying for snow for praying for hot um i'm gonna definitely bring back the playground situation because i have noticed that that there are no playgrounds here and i grew up in a district that had playgrounds um and especially at the very least we should be supplying enough uh playground equipment whether balls jump ropes things like that um i also will take back the ccms update on the windows because it is kind of upsetting that we still have some rooms without windows so i'm trying to figure out like is it just a board like what is in that window space right now um and also the ones that are missing pieces because i know if under any construction if you don't find the piece before they leave you're never going to find that piece ever again um i never i hope this latino institute has attended well and if you need any help in the community pushing that out i'd love to be of the help for that and um i think that's it mr granova uh good evening congratulations to students um thank you for all the speakers who came out tonight uh i will also speak on the playgrounds i'm glad it's going back to facilities this is something i brought up i think two years ago where i know at school three we actually have a playground that's almost attached to school it's part of the city but you know when i asked if they could use it they said no so i'm not sure if that was something it was a regulation or something that was just something we had to ask for or ask about so i'm glad that's taking back the facilities i know that in uh in the town of little falls where my nephew goes they also have a playground there and the instead of them being on asphalt there's actually like a sponge foam almost like we have a celebi uh there's a sponge foam where they can run and play on so i'd be curious to see what happens with that um our summer reading and uh can we kick that back to education and discuss there um i know we have google classroom and maybe that's something we could put on there or even in the parent portal where we could um we could display what needs to be done or how we're going to go about doing that and then uh what else do they have here oh the the coronavirus can we also kick that back to technology to talk about alternate methods for teaching and learning in technology i want to bring that back to tech tech as well all right thank you mr daley thank you madam president um i'll also be brief again of course i'd like to thank the and congratulate all the student uh students of the month um that's a great part of our our board meeting i'd also think like thank all the speakers who came up we don't say much because it's not not a dialogue but we do listen and we do take care of uh either superintendent or we discuss it in a committee to what we can do we can't do everything but uh we certainly listen and become and thanks for making us aware of anything we may not be aware of so we're aware of most things but sometimes we don't hear everything uh like to wish everybody a happy st patrick's day coming up and our next board meeting will be on saint joseph's day so uh we'll have to bring in some cakes right joe oh say st joseph's cakes that's why okay um and lastly uh this is uh women's history month and i'd like to make a suggestion to those out there especially our students um i think there's two very inspirational there's many inspirational movies out there but two in particular uh i think there's very very well worth watching if not once or twice one is hidden figures and that's a movie about these black women who were the first employees in nassau and how they were discriminated how they overcame it's a terrific movie it's it's it's inspirational you don't have to be a woman to be inspired by it so the second one i would suggest on the basis of sex and it has nothing to do with um with that actions it has to do with the ruth bader ginsburg it's a it's a great movie and it's very inspirational when she went to how to get her law degree and what she went through both in in harvard in colombia she had all these barriers and did an amazing job to become successful and not the first one but won the first woman that's on the u.s supreme court so i highly suggest that for the students but also the general public you should really watch that it's part of your history what happened in this country so with that i'll conclude in my remarks mr casper i have a few public uh public service announcements and then i'll go into uh some others okay first one clifton high school is presenting nine to five next weekend it's friday saturday and sunday uh tomorrow is christopher columbus's play which is the little mermaid junior so if you're free tomorrow evening uh we also have the special education parent advisory group is holding a [Music] meeting for idea for parents and traditional planning on april 13th at school five those are some announcements for you um 6 30 to 8 30 on april 13th i would like to thank dr torley for her service i know she's retiring in october so thank you for all your service and hard work to our district i'd like to congratulate our students of the month keep on pushing forward we have a few months left until graduation so uh let's keep on pushing forward march 25th it was also announced uh for our last strategic planning at chs at six we have our very first superintendent scholarship fund um event which is um it's the teachers versus the harlem wizards on april 23rd from 4 30 to 9 30.
and then i'd like to say i'd like to take up uh the opportunity to thank everybody for the invitation for read across america being a teacher um reading is important so i like to encourage reading so i got to uh attend school one over by mrs colano i was in uh by miss durkin miss gillespie and mr thurston i hope i got your names right so those were in the afternoon i also saw mrs rossetti at school four it was a k2 group and in the morning i got to visit mrs bender i got to see mrs mrs santa suso i hope i get this right and mrs wisnowski and my last stop in the morning was mrs honorably at school 13.
so thank you all for uh inviting i had a great time and i have a good night everybody mr santi thank you um i'll be very brief also congratulate all the students i think it's a wonderful thing that we started a while ago bringing these students and recognize them to the community for them to strive for excellence in their classes it's great that we have student in months and i hope it continues throughout even when i leave um or this board is no longer here i think it's a great thing for our district and uh just want to wish everybody good luck try out start tomorrow for spring trot for spring sports so i hope everybody's ready and i hope the weather holds up so we can get everybody outside we don't have to use indoor facilities uh to get a true feeling of what our sports will be like for the spring and last but not least i just want to wish my daughter erica a happy birthday i know she's going through a rough time so that's it mr smith yes uh i too like uh mr casper uh was happy to be invited to read at um two grammar schools i read at school number five uh to four classes and uh read at school number 12 in the afternoon at uh five classes so uh i thank the schools for uh inviting me um we had some uh very uh interesting classes in one of the third grade classes that uh mike that i'm gonna gonna ask you to relay a message to but i'll also relay a message to them down at our convention math program were you somebody called pearson yeah well the third graders were very upset and they asked if i would please take it back to pearson that in their books where they have to write in and give a response the space is about this big and they're very angry at pearson so if we could uh advise pearson that the students are not happy with that and that they should make some improvements and i promised the students at school 12 that i would take it back so maybe we can set up a meeting with pearson and they could but it was very enjoyable to to spend the time with students and i thank the teachers and the schools for inviting me the strategic planning if you have not attended yet uh the last one is march 26th um 25th i'm sorry um a lot of planning and work has gone into to putting this together and not to be on a negative uh about it because it's such a positive but i would really love to see that auditorium filled with a lot more uh residents parents people that don't have kids residents um a town of this size there's no reason that we can't fill up the high school auditorium of people that are concerned with education and the progress that we're making or planning to make in our strategic plans going forward i know everyone has a busy schedule but to make one of these sessions would be great for you and if you have the opportunity on this last one please try and make every effort to be there we really really need and would like to have the input of as many residents students teachers employees of the district um because this is about you people this is about your town this is about the education in your town this is about the district that many of you work in um that many of you had kids go through may have kids still in it may have grandkids that will be coming into it so this is all about clifton and i just think that you would enjoy the session uh and i thank school boards and kathy and uh dr robitazi and your staff uh for putting it all together uh eric mountain with all the technology and all that aspect of it and i also must credit your um your administrators dr robitazi that uh so many of them are present at this uh at the strategic planning uh they don't have to be there they're not required to be there but they feel it's important enough to be there and uh we sure are appreciative of the amount of administrators are there so i hope everyone if you can make it on march 25th this is the last of the third strategic plans and we surely would love to have your input on this going forward and that's all i have thank you commissioner vice chair um basford good evening everyone i would like to thank the speakers for coming out tonight and i want you to understand that your voice does get heard uh we cannot have open dialogue like my colleague mr uh commissioner daley mentioned but we do we do have conversations some of us have more conversations with the superintendent than he cares to have but we all do and um this board is working well together to um look at all the comments um miss lama thank you very much because um i am a visual learner and i have to see things in front of me and that's why i commented before about the audience not being able to see the the diagram you know for themselves it's really you get lost and i just wish going forward that whenever we have a presentation and we hold papers up here that you're able to see it behind us on the board because it's really important for the people that need to see it to comprehend it and it's uh it's something that really frustrates me for many years so going forward i hope that that's changed read across america i was invited to school five and it really takes you back when your mentor's daughter is the teacher on the hsa i couldn't even read the book i was very emotional in that classroom because there was my mentor when i first started as a young parent with a kindergartner and her daughter was teaching the fifth grade class completely blown away and she had a great class we had a lot of fun the questions open dialogue it was fun because the things that they pick up and notice and i i bought two books i bought the book of isms suicides and it's instead of it being a reading book it's all his isms from all his different writings and so i picked a few of them and we actually had a little discussion about what that meant to them one was on responsibility one was on making good decisions it was really it was really a lot of fun and the kids had a great time and i thank the two classes that invited me and i i just hope that we can schedule differently that every board member gets time to go even if it's a night reading that we can get to go because i know our schedules are really busy but for each of you to really really pick up on that and to have that experience it's just something that you can ever put a price tag on it's really well worth going and i really enjoyed it so i thank school five immensely for inviting me um uh the the summer homework i always have been an advocate against it it's not my favorite thing because i remember the night before school that booklet coming out and the torture that it caused in my house um i think i i look forward to coming it back to the education committee because i sit on the uh as one of the um members of the education committee and i think that if you're gonna make a child do homework over the summer this should be some kind of incentive as a grade or an extra credit or they can fill out that that if they get a bad mark on a test whatever it is but i'm sure that in this 20 20 a year we can be very creative but there are people that just don't want to do it and i lived through one that would get through it in an hour and then i lived with one that would take all night long all night long and it was torture for the parent rental units in that house but i i just i just want you to understand that um that um that's an issue and it's it's a hard issue with me and i want to look into it so education really needs to roll up the sleeves into the homework um mr percenty happy birthday to erica my father would have been 94 tomorrow so happy birthday dad i know you're watching over me every day monday the 9th is the full moon it's called the worm moon no mr mr abedrabo i actually i actually focus on the moon and things like that you should be really careful when you bother me okay because uh people in my house know what i mean about this um it's called the warm moon because the ground is softer the worms can come up and start the birds start feeding off them you really should it's a lot to do with farming and folklore and things like that but if anybody's been noticing communication has been a little rough lately that's because the moon's retrograde and the mercury and with mercury so it'll change on monday trust me trust me trust me and and for the virgos in the house that's good it's going to change where it's actually going to change excuse me i have the floor mr abu drabo oh wait communication will be better after the night when the moon goes retrograde it causes a lot of havoc and things don't work right directions get messed up communication gets squandered but for the virgos in the room you're gonna have a great moon cycle okay so with that being said happy st patrick's day um we get to share our roots and my my irish side in the house and i wish everybody a good week if you have concerns we have web uh email addresses feel free they get forwarded to dr robert tells you or he gets a phone call seven o'clock in the morning but you know what it it it works we are we're all speaking and and it's uh it's actually uh the communication has been so much better and uh i thank everybody for that as well thank you thank you okay okay so um i want to thank the speakers for the issues that they brought up and again we do always listen if we don't discuss them publicly out here we do discuss them in committees um for any of the updates by the speakers i also want to say congratulations to the students of the month and when it comes to summer assignments i know that that can be a lot and i think that it's good that it's going to the education committee i know that mr canova i remember we were at a meeting and we did discuss summer assignments and we were talking about either everyone's on board or they're not you know and waiting we discussed a little bit and i think that maybe something with choice and opportunity because students if anything if it is that they'll be summer assignments giving them choice giving them opportunities so just pop which something what you were saying about maybe the choice to do write ups on current events you know some students might like that um option um as opposed so they're still reading but they're doing so to give out some choices because people do like if they have to do something they like to have a choice an option um and um one other thing that's um very very exciting well there's two things actually and um two that's right i'm all there's more than two things but two things that are really exciting um one of them is that we have the commissioner of education coming um march 19th uh rappellet he is coming to school three for international day so that is very very exciting and then the second thing that closes my portion i will i'll let you speak again dr um okay thank you uh madam president we received really uh great news today that we were hoping we would receive um we received our cusack results uh for those of you who aren't aware cusack stands for the quality single accountability continuum what it is it's the new jersey department of education's way of evaluating school districts and how well school districts are performing and they assess five areas they they assess the school district every three years and it's a very extremely rigorous process they spent days here um they spent days out of office reviewing documents electronically and then days here in district they review five areas instruction and program which is our arguably our most important thing fiscal management governance which is what this board does operations and personnel you need to score 80 percent or above in each of those areas in order to be deemed a high performing school district i am very proud to announce that we scored 100 in personnel 100 in operations 100 in governance 94 in fiscal management which is amazing and 82 percent in instruction and program but there they have to give a little caveat explaining what that means is so part of instruction and program deals with our state assessment results so before this before cusack even begins we know where we stand with our state assessment results and before they came in and reviewed every anything we were at 82 based on our state assessment scores which meant if they came in and they found one area of our curriculum that wasn't up to standards that they found one item that didn't have a board resolution and wasn't approved by the board or if they found anything in our instruction and program that um was not effective we would have fallen below that 82 percent uh falling below the 80 percent and then we would have been put on an action plan and it would have been ugly and we would have been in cusack purgatory but thanks really to the efforts um of assistant superintendent of curriculum instruction janina kusalevich and her team of of administrators and supervisors of course our teaching staff and everyone who pulled together our principals we are now designated or we will be after the state board of education meeting clifton public schools will be designated a high-performing district and that's something you should be very proud do we know the last time that happened janina well at the last cusack um when we the last year of the last q second we got a one-year reprieve because we were in that purgatory for several years we were in purgatory for a while now no more purgatory for three years three years great job next order of business is new business and we do have some new business yes uh miss danny and i discussed earlier we were reviewing uh board of education meetings and as you may or may not have realized when we set the calendar for this year we didn't plan any meetings after april 2nd because the election was going to be held and then reorgan we would have selected the meeting so one thing we'll need to discuss tonight is future meetings uh beginning in april and through january 1st and also miss danny and i discussed the uh whether there was a need for the april 2nd meeting it's um it's right before we are schools closed for break a lot of people are going to be planning uh perhaps vacation on a personal note and it's really not a big deal because i'm going to bring him here if we have a board meeting it's my son joey's birthday he would love to come to a board meeting by the way so administratively it's not an issue if we don't have an april 2nd board meeting i defer to the board uh that's up for for you guys for discussion we do have a meeting on march 19th we absolutely need to have that meeting mr usee will tell us that the date we we have to have a our budget hearing now remember even though the public's not voting on the budget we will present the budget to the board and the board has to vote on the budget so there's timelines on that so if we can discuss that tonight and kind of sort all that out while we're while we're all in the same room um i think we should do that if if i can just make a recommendation i think the way we've been going with the uh the first and third thursdays i i feel like that's worked pretty well um i don't think we need two meetings each month in the summer i think one in july one in august will suffice that's typically i think what what you've done in the past but again i defer to you that's just my two cents madam chair i make a motion to remove the april 2nd meeting um so and then to re after this discuss uh the calendar okay so uh so right now we'll do uh motion to cancel the april 2nd um by commissioner vice chair second by mr um smith roll call mr adrabo miss bassford yes ms beltran yes mr kenobi yes mr daley yes mr casper yes mr picenti yes mr smith yes miss danny yes so now do we want administration to put together a calendar and next meeting we look to maybe we all take out our calendars or you know or any changes or anything that needs to be done so if you can send out early maybe a list a schedule and then if we actually have any conflicts we could already contact you and maybe get that resolved and then put it on the next meeting should we continue for may and june with the first and third has that seemed to have worked so that's what we'll you know we'll put together and propose mr uc for the budget um how are we with that timeline so i'm looking at it right now so the preliminary budget's due march yeah march 20th so our march 19th meeting is perfect the public hearing which is the final budget has to be between april 24th and sunday may 3rd i mean we won't have more meetings sunday but so i guess between friday april 24th and friday may 1st so thursday april that's going to be between that it has to be between those days it can't be thursday april 23rd no okay this is statutorily so april 30th april 30th so is does anyone have a conflict with april 30th speak now no okay so april 30th so no it doesn't you're right it doesn't have to be a thursday um but if you want we'll plan what we'll throw the draft out there with thursday april 30th okay um and then uh just see what everybody else okay yes that would be our only april meeting right i defer to the board on that well that would be well do you well you don't when we spoke you didn't need administratively i don't need that april 2nd meeting i will let all my administrators know that anything that needs to be approved for april needs to be put on the march 19th meeting um and then as far as administratively we can get away with one meeting in april but again because we have that week off but it corrects but again i defer to the board on that month and a half right between meetings it would be march 19th and april 30th so i don't know if that's too long i defer to you know what when you think about it and then just i defer to what they if they need it if they need it then otherwise if you need it then that's it you tell them just like we do in the summer yeah okay so we're done okay all right so is there any other um yeah new business we got a facilities and athletics since we have a couple of things come up i think we need to have a meeting so yeah we can schedule one definitely okay all right so that's it um next next order of business is executive session can i have a motion to go into executive session to discuss contract issues negotiations ea 05 student matter security issues motion so moved second motion by mr casper second bye oh um commissioner madam vice chair basford and action may be taken you
I think people always want to have people in media or in entertainment that they can look up to and they want to kind of identify with that person and the struggles that they're going through people want to feel understood I guess and like they can relate to other people and that their struggles or whatever they're going through can be validated and represented by other people and so I mean I can see in a lot of movies my group kind of represented and a lot of other people don't really get that kind of understanding or struggle of base for that understanding or like relatability of basic struggles that they go through which can be related specifically to their minority group or even just in general I feel like now based a lot of movies books and like video games and stuff represent me um one of the movies that really represented me was like lo Simon because like I never wanted to like you know come out to people so I would have like this secret identity that oh no one is cool like knew about but in the movie it shows like how like you try to hide it but then when you come out like I'm not like you know everything's gonna be fine when people support you and stuff so it's nice to have someone like act out and represent like why I go through it because then I can like it's easier for me to like deal with it Hollywood does too little to reflect diversity but when they do put diversity in their films it's only about race relations or things that happen in the past there is no regular movies that star minorities that don't also state that they're minorities you
good morning Zocalo today is my pet 2020 it is a hundredth and 26th day of school this is WBA achievement I am Michelle and I'm Madison today for lunch they'll be late Mozza Julie tossed salad sliced red peppers fruit salad garlic bread and milk tomorrow for breakfast there will be a car faster and she's apple juice a melon we have a friend celebrating a birthday today cats Halen crap please go to the office and pick out your birthday happy birthday yes my question was if I rather sleep what's it say for four days honey put it all together the answer is Provost the winner is Kailyn hey Hayley Hayley Andrew Smith come to the office that pick out your prize today's fun fact question is in 1995 Disney and Pixar teams of just to create the first-ever computer animated movies starring a cowboy and spaceman what is the name of the movie remember to write your answer Jillian included an advice and now we will observe a brief period of silence to reflect on anticipated activities of the back please stand for the pledge I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all Lily will lead us in the big halep ledge big star I should be a pH doc people or travel bar I pledge to be safe in every way take responsibility during work and play I will be respectful than all I do and be a star the whole day through how would really change the world one random act of kindness at a time thanks for watching bye
[Applause] [Music] okay [Music] no I mean that's just yeah [Music] [Applause] [Music] all right good afternoon my name is Stacy Moore on the communications coordinator for a month Community School Corporation thank you for attending this joint press conference today and we also are thankful for those who are viewing via livestream today's speakers include mrs. and Englehart president of the Avon Community School Board of Trustees dr. Maggie Horniman superintendent of Avon Schools dr. David David Stockbridge Hendricks County Health Officer dr. Chris box state health commissioner and dr. Jennifer McCormick Superintendent of Public Instruction and I'll spell their names for you and Englehart is a and e en g you know har DT dr. B found Maggie Horniman is ma g g IE h o ER n DM aen dr. David Stockbridge and David d-a-v-i-d st o PP e RI CH dr. Chris boxes k R is Bo X and dr.
Jennifer McCormack je n ni f er MC c OU r m IC k and dr. harmon will now come to the phone it was work good afternoon this morning we were notified by the Hendricks County Health Department that a second student is displaying symptoms of koban 19 Kona virus the Hendricks County Health Department and Avon Community Schools are working closely to determine the web of individuals who have had direct contact with the two students that web has grown very large while the CDC indicates that exposure to someone with covin 19 Kona virus is only an issue if the individual is already symptomatic which the students were not last week we still believe the most prudent course for our school system is to close all Avon community schools through Friday March 20th this will minimize any exposure in large groups and we'll have and we'll allow plenty of time for our buildings and our buses to be thoroughly cleaned all practices extracurricular activities and school events are canceled elearning days will be used to the best of our ability Avon Community School Corporation uses a tool called Schoology to deliver learning materials through extended closures we understand that some families may not have access to the Internet to retrieve these learning materials so we have a forum available on our website where parents may request learning packets for their students only families who are requesting those materials will receive them rest assured that our custodians have already stepped up our cleaning protocols last week using EPA approved cleaners our health care partners at Hendrix Community Health confirmed that we are using the same antiviral cleaners used at the hospital some may wonder about foodservice during this extended closure we know that some of our families rely heavily on breakfast and lunch service in our schools a Hmong community school corporations food service department is working on to go options for our students who need food during this extended closure cold food packages will be available to all Avon families packages will include 10 breakfast lunches and meals food packages will be available at a couple of our school building parking lots cedar Elementary and Avon middle school North pickup times will be Tuesday March 10th from 10 a.m.