001Okay. All right. Good evening everybody. We're going to get started. I like to call to order for the Committee of a Whole meeting of the Board of Education March 4th, 2026 at 6:30 p.m. in the Board Room of the Administration Building at 70 Conover Road, Coltsneck, New Jersey. If I could please get a roll call, Mr. Marasco. Yes, you may. Mrs. Camera. Here. Mrs. Horowitz. Here. Mr. Ringo. Here. Mr. Rigney. Here. Participating remotely. Mr. Scales. >> Here. Mr. Scarpa. Here. Mrs. Volpe. Here. Mr. Walker. Here. Mr. Whitberg. Present, but you do have a quorum. Okay, great. Thank you. Pursuant to the Open Public Meetings Act Act Chapter 231, this meeting has been duly advertised in the Asbury Park Press in a schedule of meetings dated January 23rd, 2026, notice of which has been filed with
002the Deputy Clerk for Coltsneck Township and the requirements of posting of notices have been met. At this time, I'm going to ask everybody to rise for the flag salute and stand for the national anthem. 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. No, go right ahead. Go right ahead. Yes. Go ahead, Danny. Sing. Say can [music] you see by the dawn's early light what so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight were so gallantly streaming and the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air gave proof through the night that our flag was still there. Oh say does that star-spangled [music]
003banner yet wave o'er the land of the free and the home of the brave? >> [applause] >> Wow, that was awesome. I apologize for my horrible voice. Thank you so much, Danny. Okay. Oh, okay. Yes, absolutely. Um, can I get a volunteer to read our mission statement this evening? Anybody like to read our mission statement? Mr. Rico, go right ahead. The mission of Coltsneck Township schools is to empower and inspire students to be confident, creative, self-sufficient learners who maximize their strengths and talents and contribute as responsible participants in their ever-expanding world. Great. Uh, thank you, Mr. Rico. Um, tonight before we get started with our agenda items, um, I just want to call attention, um, uh, I want to point out that this week we lost, um, six members of our military, um, due to
004the conflict, uh, in Iran. So, I just wanted to, uh, go over their names, um, just so we would remember them as a Board of Education. Uh, we have Actually, I'm going to ask Brian to do this for me. Um, I'm going to ask Mr. Scarpa, being, uh, the liaison to our Naval Weapons Station Arl, to take over for me. Thank you, uh, President Volpe. So, in recognition of the fallen, um, the names are Captain Cody A. Cork, Sergeant First Class Noah L. Tizhens, Sergeant First Class Nicole M. As Amour, and and a Sergeant Desian J. Cody. And their ages are 36, 42, 39, and 20, all in the prime of their lives. Um, hailing from the areas of uh, Iowa. All were assigned to the 103rd Sustainment Command, I believe, in Kuwait. So, thank
005you for this opportunity. And if we can spend 15 seconds of moment of silence for those that have fallen. Thank you. I just want to also, um, mention that two other, um, servicemen are not listed here because, uh, their next of kin has not been notified at this time. So, at the next meeting, we'll be sure to, uh, recognize, uh, them for their, um, unwavering service to our country. Uh, okay. At this time, we are going to move on to a very, um, exciting moment. We have two students here, um, that we will be presenting an award, um, and I just want to give a little background here. Uh, the two students, one Danny Pinkus is here and Ella Roman, um, and this here is an exceptional, exceptional, um, accomplishment from Danny. Uh, he's one
006of our students. He's in eighth grade. Uh, I've actually known Danny since kindergarten. You're right, Danny? I've known you since kindergarten, and you did this fantastic You authored this fantastic book of Danny's Guide to Surviving Middle School Life with Autism Autism and Lots of Pizza. So, I just wanted to show everybody this is on Amazon and, uh, I believe it won a best seller, right, Mom? Best seller. >> [applause] >> I want to give Danny a huge hand. This is fantastic. I do want to read an excerpt if I if you don't mind. One of my favorite parts of this book is on page 16, um, and it says Danny's Friendship Rules. So, one of them, which I abide by, uh, two friends are better than 10 fake ones. This is absolutely true. Um, number
007two, if someone makes you feel bad about yourself, they are not your friends. And I absolutely, uh, believe that as well. Uh, number three, your friends are out there. Sometimes it just takes a little bit of time to find them, but you will find them. So, I just wanted to read that excerpt. I think it was phenomenal, and all the work put into this is amazing, Danny. Our district is absolutely so proud of your accomplishment, and we just want to recognize the Board of Education wants to recognize you tonight. Uh, also, uh, Mr. You're very welcome. Um, also, uh, Ella Roman is here, and she actually, uh, uh, did the pictures in here. She illustrated the book, and, um, she did a very, very nice job on that. So, we appreciate all the time that
008you dedicated as well, uh, to the success of this book. So, I just wanted to, you know, I know we're live streaming to the, um, people in Coltsneck, and we just want to recommend this book. If anybody wants to come out and support Danny and read a fantastic book, it is on Amazon right now, best seller list. So, we are Dr. Garb is going to help me recognize you with an award from the Board of Education, and, uh, yeah. This is the fun stuff, right? So, if the two of you would come join Mrs. Volpe and I, come on up for a second, please. Come on. How about Danny right here? Ella wants to be over here. Great. Okay. So, we have a special certificate that we give out, okay? And what are we the
009Coltsneck what? What are we the What's our What's the mascot? The thing that runs around at the Jersey at basketball games and stuff. What's that? What is it? I'm thinking. The Are we the Coltsneck Frogs? Um, I'm having Are we the Colt? The Colt. We are the Colts. We are absolutely Colts. So, when we have the Colts, right? We have a special award that we give to special people in our district. And there's a lot of people who deserve a lot of special awards, but tonight, they're your special awards. And the reason why And these special awards that we give out, we call them golden horseshoe awards, okay? So, for Danny, Mhm. So, Danny, for the extraordinary accomplishment of writing and sharing a book that offers heartfelt heartfelt advice from middle to middle school students
010about kindness, character, and friendship with honesty, insight, insight, and determination, Danny has transformed his personal experiences into meaningful guidance that will encourage others to lead with empathy, resilience, and respect. His work reminds us that leadership comes in many forms and that one voice can truly make a difference. So, we are proud to honor Daniel's creativity, perseverance, and commitment to building a stronger, kinder school community and overall friendships. So, Daniel >> [applause] >> Yep. [cheering] That's for you. Can I take your hand? Yep. I'll bump We're so proud of you. Absolutely. There we go. Okay. Want to have me give out all of hers? Okay. Okay. Ready? So, Ella We're going to present you with a golden horseshoe as well. And we're going to do that for in celebration of illustrating a book designed to guide
011middle school students in practicing kindness, building character, and fostering authentic friendships. This achievement reflects artistic talents, perseverance, and a deep commitment to collaboration. Through thoughtful imagery and creative expression, Ella, you have helped transform powerful ideas into engaging and lasting resources for others to in the future and currently. Ella's contributions highlight the important role of the art through the arts have in shaping understanding and building community. So, would you do me the honor of accepting this golden horseshoe? >> [applause] [applause] >> Daniel, you're a fantastic kid. Fantastic kid, and you are too, honey. And your picture? You want a picture? How about a picture? Now, before you sit down, I have one more thing that you need to do. I need the two of you to sign this copy of this book for us. >> [applause]
012>> Anywhere you want. Perfect. Thank you. We are so proud of you. Thank you so much. Okay. >> [applause] >> Great. Um at this time, I just want to um recognize Dr. Rigby. Um he always makes the time to come when we present awards to our students, um especially Cedar Cedar Drive students. Uh we just want to always continually thank you for all your dedication and hard work. Uh the students that are coming out of this school are just exceptional, fine young men and women, and we are just so proud of them and all the work that you do to guide and lead them in their educational experience here at um Cedar Drive. So, thank you so much, Dr. Rigby. We certainly always appreciate you on our staff here. So, thank you very, very much.
013>> [applause] >> Um at this time, I always say you're always welcome to stay for the meeting. Um this is where we basically um you know, this is basically where we do our um action items and our COW uh discussion. So, at this time, I'll take a 5-minute recess. If you guys want to If you guys want to um cut out, that's absolutely fine with us. All right. Thank you guys for coming. Yeah, thank you very much. Take care. That is so cute. Very nice. >> [snorts] >> Congratulations. Okay. Um Okay. So, at this time, we're going to just go right into the evening's agenda. Uh we are going to um take notice of our inter- information items. Uh we have one listed there. If everybody wants to take a quick look at that. Uh
014we'll open the floor to the public. If anybody wants to come up and have a comment or question, you could do so at this time. Just state your name and address for the record. All right. Uh seeing no comments, we're going to uh move right into our action items for approval. Uh yes, I'm sorry. Uh yes, absolutely. Um okay. Let me just look at this really quick. Okay. On the action items for approval, if everybody would like to take note of number four, uh the resolution um operation district safeguard, if I can call upon um Mr. Scales, if you would mind reading this uh out loud for the community, uh I would certainly appreciate it. And thank you very much for drafting this. My pleasure. It's a long one. Sorry. Resolution to operation district safeguard.
015Be it resolved that the Coltsneck Township Board of Education approve the following resolution. Whereas the Coltsneck Board of Education declaring the state of operation district safeguard a critical school capacity condition and requesting municipal, state, and federal action to ensure responsible growth and educational adequacy. And whereas the Coltsneck Board of Education is constitutionally charged with providing every resident student with a thorough and efficient education in accordance with Article 8, Section 4 of the of the New Jersey Constitution and Title 18A of the New Jersey Statutes. And whereas [snorts] recent residential development approvals within the Township of Coltsneck have resulted or are projected to result in substantial and sustained enrollment growth that exceeds the design capacity of existing school facilities. And whereas overcrowding in classrooms and facilities creates adverse conditions that compromise instructional quality, student safety, and
016compliance with state educational standards. And whereas the Board has determined that the district current long-range facilities plan identifies capacity deficiencies across one or more schools with no available state funding or bond authorization sufficient to accommodate additional enrollment growth. And whereas the Board recognizes that municipal land use decisions directly affect school district capacity and that coordination between the governing body, the planning board, and the Board of Education is essential to safeguard educational quality. And whereas the Board supports responsible and sustainable growth that aligns with available infrastructure, transportation, and educational resources. And further acknowledges that continued development without concurrent investment in school capacity will impose untenable fiscal and operational burdens on taxpayers and staff. And whereas the Board seeks proactive cooperation with the Township Committee, Planning Board, County Planning Board, state and federal agencies to implement interim
017and long-term measures ensuring that new housing growth does not outpace the school district's ability to serve its students. Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Coltsneck Board of Education hereby declares a critical capacity condition within the district as verified by current enrollment data and facility utilization reports and directs administration to submit updated findings to the New Jersey Department of Education in accordance with NJAC 6A:2-6. Formally requests that the Township Committee and Planning Board immediately consider a temporary moratorium or phase scheduling of residential approvals until a coordinated school impact plan is developed. Number three, urges the municipality to adopt or amend its master plan and develop review procedures to include educational impact analyses and a required component of all major site plan or subdivision applications. Number four, requests legislative and executive branch action including review by
018the Department of Education, Department of Community Affairs, and Council on Affordable Housing to ensure that school infrastructure capacity is recognized as a limiting factor in municipal growth obligations. Number five, authori- authorizes the superintendent and board attorney to engage with municipal council, planners, and relevant agencies to pursue joint strategies such as developer impact contributions, age-restricted housing incentives, or other lawful mechanisms that mitigate educational overcrowding. Number six, directs the superintendent to prepare quarterly reports on enrollment trends, facility utilization, and class size data, and to make such reports publicly available. Number seven, invites and encourages collaboration with community stakeholders, parent associations, regional, state, and federal union educational officials to advocate for adequate facilities funding, responsible growth, and preservation of educational quality. Be it Be it further resolved, copies of this resolution shall be transmitted to the Township Committee,
019Planning Board, County Superintendent of Schools, Commissioner of Education, Secretary of Education, Governor of New Jersey, local and federal legislative representatives, along with supporting documentation outlining current capacity constraints, and and projected enrollment growth. Adopted this 4th of March, 2026 by the Colts Neck Board of Education. Great. Uh thank you so much for all the work I put into that, Mr. Scales. Um I just at this time want to um ask if anybody has any questions, comments on that particular resolution, or uh anything from items one through four. Any questions or comments? Okay, we'll take a roll call to move those items. Any action items one through four, Mrs. Cameron? Yes. Mrs. Horwitz? Yes. Mr. Rico? Yes. Uh Mr. Rodenata? Yes. Mr. Scales? Yes. Mr. Scarlato? Yes. Mrs. Volpe? Yes. Mr. Walsh? Yes. Thank you. Motion carried.
020Uh great, thank you. We're going to move right into the board liaison reports. I like to start with Mrs. Horwitz with Parent Advisory Committee. Thank you. Uh um our next meeting is going to be Monday, March 23rd at 7:00 p.m. I can jump right into PTO if that works. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Okay. So, today was their general meeting, um and I'll share some important dates. Uh the district-wide read-a-thon is going on um until March 6th, so this week. Um the school the elementary school store is March 10th through 11th during school hours. Um 7th grade skate night is March 12th from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. at United Skates of America. The 6th grade IPlay event is March 13th from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. at IPlay American, Freehold. Um the 42nd annual Women's Gala is March
02119th. The first grade fun and fitness night is April 16th, um from 6:30 to 7:45 in the primary school gym. Um May 8th is the spring flower sale. Uh it'll be during school hours in the primary school. Um and lastly, the 8th grade dance is going to be Friday, June 12th. Wow, that's a full uh lineup of events coming up. A lot of good stuff. Yeah, a lot of good stuff. Uh once again, we always want to thank our partners uh with the PTO and recognize all the time and effort they put in uh for our students. So, thank you there. Uh moving right into the Colts Neck Township uh school newsletter, Mrs. Cameron. Okay, I'm just reminding residents who do not receive the newsletter via email that you can go to the school website,
022coltsnecktownshipschools.org. We have a link to subscribe under the Board of Ed tab. Just go to newsletters. And our next newsletter will be published shortly, end of this month. Okay, great. Uh Mrs. Cameron, I have a uh um a question. I had gone to the seniors meeting today. I'll touch base um where Mr. Walsh does his report on that. Um but Mr. uh Mrs. Bautista reached out to me asking if we can um add the Friends of the Library sale in our newsletter. Would that be something you would uh be willing to do for her? >> will. Okay, I will contact her and let her know. Uh she did reach out uh Mrs. Horwitz, I I know she did reach out asking if the PTO would make some type of announcement. I told her that I
023have no, you know, authority over um what they print in their uh in their newsletters. Um if you'd like to ask, but right now we'll do it in our newsletter. I don't I I believe they don't do anything like that, but just for next meeting, if you could come back and let us know if they are willing to print anything regarding outside in in our Township, and let us know uh what they come back with there. Um okay, thank you, Mrs. Cameron. I appreciate your report. Um the Colts Neck Township Schools Arts, Sports, and Extracurricular Activities. I know Mr. Wickberg is on his way, um but Vinnie is uh participating remotely, and I'd like him to do his report. Sure. Thank you so much. Great, thank you. Uh right now the the um girls softball
024and boys baseball uh good is still uh sign-up is still available during the uh the late registration phase. And the sign-up fee right now is $275. Um it's available both sports are available [clears throat] to for 4 to 16-year-olds. Uh for girls uh softball, uh for 4 to 6-year-olds, it will be tee ball. And for baseball, 4 to 5-year-olds will be tee ball. Uh The opening day for softball is April 1st, and that goes through June 30th. For baseball, uh opening day is April 11th. And I believe there is military discount uh for uh for those in military uh in our town. And uh if you have three or more children who sign up for baseball or softball, there should be a discount as well, too. They are looking for volunteers, so if anybody can
025help coach, that would be great. Um moving [clears throat] on, uh the father-daughter dance this year will be Saturday, June 6th. Uh it will begin be be held at Trump National uh Country Club here in Colts Neck, and it'll be from 4:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. And of course, go to coltsnecksportsfoundation.com to sign up for that, register for that. Um >> [clears throat] >> due to last week's weather, um the cheer uh parents meeting that was scheduled for this past Monday, um uh is uh rescheduled. It'll be uh Monday, March 9th from 6:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. at the Colts Neck Library. Uh the session will provide important information about upcoming fall cheer season, including program structure, expectations, and opportunity to ask questions, uh whether your child is ready uh already participating uh or you
026are simply interested in learning more about the cheer program this fall. They encourage uh anyone to attend who has any questions and uh who's interested. And if you have any uh questions uh prior to that, you can always email at [email protected]. Thank you. Uh great, thank you, Mr. Rodenata. I just want to add to that um uh as you know, we sent out an email today just um uh trying to gauge um what days we would be available to meet with the Sports Foundation. I had requested Dr. Garabed uh to put that invitation out to the leadership at the Sports Foundation, so we can meet with them as promised just to uh you know, uh strengthen our relationship and go over uh some of the requests and things they may need for next year's season.
027So, we are waiting to hear back uh you know, from them if they're willing to meet with us. I believe we agreed on a Tuesday evening, so once that meeting is set, and um me and um the liaisons meet with them, I'll report out to the full board. Um okay, moving on. Colts Neck Township um Committee, Mr. Walsh. Sure. The uh Township Committee recognized uh the Daughters of American Revolution, first of all, awarded two high school seniors awards uh based on their civic engagement to the community and patriotism. So, they were recognized, two two great kids. It's the mayor read a proclamation um for colorectal cancer awareness. And it's a leading cause of cancer death and people of 50 age of 50 or younger. And um Mrs. Bautista, a cancer survivor, colorectal, a big advocate
028of educating in the community at at large and throughout Monmouth County uh the importance of going and getting those exams. Could be a lifesaver. Two ordinances were introduced for um affordable housing. Two brand new ordinances, and that is more basically basically to comply with the Fair Housing Act regulations. It's something that they had to to adopt, so we would the Township would be in compliance for affordable housing. The Township spent about $348,000 in vouchers that went out, anywhere from medical insurance fees, uh recycling fees, software uh license updates, uh leaf collection, senior citizens, they uh they funded $8,316.22. Thank you very much, Township Committee. And the they went over the storm, the last storm. The they uh Committee Committeeman Rizzuto and uh Committeeman Tobia went over the Township's uh efforts in making sure the roads
029were open during that storm. Significant amount of snow. We had a lot of back roads that were closed, and they were that was due to down wires and trees, which made it very difficult for the public works to get to them, so um all in all, they did a good job. And what else we have? Committeeman Buss You know, the Township's been really trying to hear what the town wants to build, and we had they had big hearing, I think last January. And um Now, they out did a lot of outreach to different organizations, but they really wanted to focus on what can where where the town can get 100% credit for these affordable housing units. So, they step back and they're looking at that um you know, overall picture of what what road to
030go down. Um Again, um committee member Sudo thanked the police department as far as uh that's part of his uh liaison responsibilities to having a seatbelt clinic. Uh I think it's in March. March 8th, I want to say. It's coming up from 5:00 to 8:00. And what else we have here? The Superior Court held uh the hearing. Alito addressed the affordable housing was struck down. So, end of the road. The fight is over with. Uh it's been exhausted for trying to uh fight the affordable housing. Specifically, round four for the state. So, here we are. Um And then they discussed basically the the importance of working together as a township and the residents in determining what best building going forward to meet the round four obligation. The passing of Tom Savage. He's president of Colts
031Neck Firehouse number one. They recognized. Great guy. Served this town for years and years and years. Volunteer service to Colts Neck Firehouse number one. Personally known known Mr. Savage. He's a great guy. He passed away. And That's it. Township Committee. Okay. All right. Thank you for that lengthy report. Uh moving on to Mr. Scarpa for the Naval Weapons Station Earl. Oh, did I miss you? I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I missed Mr. Cameron. The 250th Thank you. No, it's okay. Thank you. Um thank you to all that came out Sunday, March 1st to celebrate George Washington's birthday as our town's kickoff event for the year. Um it was rescheduled because of the snow. Um it was also hosted by the CMBA. It was a night filled with delicious food, drinks, beautiful costumes, and great people.
032Mayor Viola, Deputy Mayor Bizetta, Councilwoman Buss, and Councilman Rozetta all attended. Um and I saw the costumes because I am on the Colts Neck, New Jersey 250th page. So, I am reminding everyone to join. There is a page both on Facebook and Instagram, so you can see the highlights from that evening. Okay, I also want to remind um our residents that our school district is in the middle of our patriotic theme for Read Across America week uh with tomorrow being American pride. Celebrate that we are all on Team USA by wearing your favorite jersey. Um Reminder to our families and um high school families that the calendar contest is on. So, Dr. Garabed created and shared a flyer for the township's contest. And it's on again our Colts Neck Township schools website under our USA
033250th tab. Um likewise, we have our Board of Education video contest under the same tab. So, I encourage families to go on and get your kids involved. Under that same tab, we also have links to Monmouth County, New Jersey websites. Um all the Monmouth County library programs. We have links to what's going on with the um nationally, the White House, the uh State Department of um US Department of State, the National Park Service, Smithsonian, etc. So, there's just so many ways to get involved. Um the historic preservation society will be sending out a fundraising letter. Mostly for preservation efforts at the Montrose schoolhouse. And that's Colts Neck's historic one-room house. Most of you already know that. Um it's part of many historic programs including educating our students through field trips. So, I'm encouraging if you're
034able to give to give. And last, I did send Dr. Garabed a link for the 1776 flags that uh Sue Fitzpatrick had ordered and are around our town hall so that we can um emulate it and have it around our schools as well for America's birthday. So, um other than that, everything else is the same from our last from the last time we met. Okay, great. Thank you for all those updates as well. Um we're going to the Colts Neck Township Senior Citizens uh Mr. Walsh. Yeah, I'd just like to um the board of education give its sincere condolences condolences and prayers to the president of the senior citizen. His son passed away this past weekend tragically. He was a great kid. 26 years old. Um he was the baby of the family. Children five
035children. He's a great kid. Smart. Uh he's working uh just almost finished with his MBA. And just tragically passed away. Raymond, the president, is a great guy. He's been serving this town for years. Uh as part of the fire department. The fire police and all. Just a great family. And Shabelle's well known. Been in the school system. Still little kids. Grandchildren and all. So, I just want to extend our sincere uh condolences and prayers to Raymond and Tam. Um so, I know hate to even talk more about, you know, seniors that's with that loss. The uh superintendent made sure that the seniors were invited to a play on March 19th. >> 19th at 12:45 at Senior Drive. She extended the invitation to see Alice in Wonderland a dress rehearsal. Our president went to the meeting
036today and personally gave out flyers. Maybe you want to pick up from there. Uh yeah, I'll I'll >> sure they, you know, we want to keep them engaged and we'll always make them feel welcome in our schools. Uh yes, I went there today to give a personal invitation uh to all the seniors. Um I handed out these flyers to almost every single person there. Um the vice president um Mrs. Walton um she was exceptional. She actually asked if I'd like to make some remarks on behalf of the school board. Uh I was uh very honored to be able to get up and speak. Uh so, not only did I invite the group to our um performance of Alice in Wonderland, I just uh let them know about the uh achievements once again the past few
037months about becoming Purple Star School. Um our ranking number 15 out of over um 650 some odd school districts on money.com. Uh and I also um mentioned uh the fantastic visit from Secretary McMahon. Um everything was well received and um hopefully we will get a big turnout. I told them that the kids have been working so hard um performing and practicing their roles and that they would be the first ones to witness uh the play during the >> food out, Doc. Put some food out there and they'll come for sure. Well, I was I was talking with Frank and, you know, he's like, "Mention it's free and it's in town." And that'll get them to come. So, um hopefully, like I said, I'm waiting to hear from Dr. Rigby to see what the turnout is,
038but I gave this out to a significant amount of people tonight. So, uh anyway, thank you. If you can continue with whatever else you have, Mr. Walsh. >> to say one last thing. The seniors have a trip to No Limits Cafe. That's great place. And that's a special cafe in Red Bank where the uh disabled kids uh special needs cert you know, prepare the meals, serve the meals. And they're going to go there as a group, which is great. Maybe we should go one day as a board of ed. Uh So, there that's tomorrow actually. And uh Red Bank. I even I wasn't even aware they that that was in town, but you know, uh everybody should get out and support that. And uh we should as a board maybe go out one day for
039lunch. Yeah, would you like to do it as a group? Okay. Um all right, let me see um I I don't know too much about it. Um but let's see if they take reservations. We'll see if we can get a reservation for all of us to go out um and support them. So, I'll uh I'll touch base once I find out. You want me to circle back to Yeah, absolutely. Just circling back to the March 19th invitation to the seniors. Just a reminder if for everyone who would like to attend as our guest to please bring an ID when they're coming in cuz they'll go through our visitor No, that's okay. That's okay. That's why I'm at it. And we'll follow up with another communication to them just to make sure uh through our visitor
040Absolutely. Thank you to Dr. Rigby and the the students and and uh staff involved in the in this play. Looking forward to it. All right, terrific. Okay, moving on um Mr. Scarpa, if you can um do your report for Naval Weapons Station Earl. Sure. Um and before I get into the Earl, I will say I know the um the No Limits Ca- Cafe quite well. I'd be happy to uh help coordinate that. >> Oh, excellent. Okay, great. Thank you. >> absolutely. Thank you. Great great program in Red Bank. Uh this is a formal invitation to our to our residents uh from Earl in our schools for the summer program. Uh we did reach out. Kevin reached out earlier this week to the um uh Ms. Jones to see who might be interested in attending the
041summer camp program. We are in March. I know our summer camp is is not too far away. Uh but we do want to extend the opportunity to the to the students at Earl. So, um we let's see what level of interest exists and then maybe perhaps we can coordinate something. So, I think that's still in flight with Ms. Jones, but we'll we'll update that as quickly as possible, but hopefully it becomes something that we can sustain for the benefit of the Earl students on the summer program. But again, a formal invitation went out to see what level of interest they would be interested in participating for the summer camp program. She did say that they they do participate in camp on base, but maybe we can work out something where they can be more proactive
042in participating in the summer program here. Okay, great. I just want to add to that at my visit with the seniors today. I actually was standing next to Mr. Colby and I was I was unaware that he was there. I never met him before, so I just chatted with him a few minutes and I let him know that we're willing to work with him to make sure that the military children are given any type of opportunity and he's completely on board to >> Excellent. Thank you. to to collaborate with us on that mission. So, I was very happy to meet him and speak with him. Anything else, Mr. Scarpa? >> That's all. Thank you. Okay, the school boards. I really don't have much for them. A couple items here. I just want to remind everybody
043for their governance two. I think most of us are on two and three governance mandated training. I finished mine. I believe there's a few others. I think Mr. Walsh finished his. Is anybody else just a reminder to get those done. Submit your financial disclosure statements as well. I also wanted to touch base. I will was invited to attend on Tuesday, March 10th. Dr. Garabed sent out the invitation. We are going to the event at Wolf Hill Elementary School. Yeah, in Oceanport. It's the eighth grade dialogue. I went last year and it was an exceptional event seeing all these children represent their districts beyond stage and speak so well of their own district. I Oh, I wasn't sure. Okay. So, I I wasn't sure if that was allowed. I just want to make sure. So, our
044district, our eighth grade class, Paula Kozik's. I actually know her. Very very nice young lady. She performed in the play last year. Did an exceptional job. So, I'm so very proud that she will be representing our district and our eighth grade class. So, I will be there with Dr. Garabed and Dr. Rigby and I'm looking forward to that. So, I'll report back at the next meeting. All right. That will be that will conclude the Staten County school boards. At this time, we will start the committee of a whole work session. Let's see what we got. We have nothing under the ad hoc affordable housing. Oh, I'm so sorry. >> No, I apologize. That's why my esteemed colleague and I were snickering. Oh, okay. We've got some breaking news, which I think >> Oh, okay. Yeah,
045please take the floor. Do you want to do the breaking news like do do do do do do do? Mr. Walsh had had told me that the the town had just um released the program area decision. So, my trusty AI tool, I just put in that PDF and I'm going to I'll read what this means cuz let's just say operation district safeguard could not have come at a better time. All right. So, what the what the program area decision is what the document was, it was um a a dispute between the Township of Colts Neck and the superior the Superior Court of New Jersey. So, this decision came out today, the 4th. The court reviewed Colts Neck's housing element and fair share plan if it meets the requirements of the New Jersey Fair Housing Act
046in the Mount Laurel doctrine. So, essentially what we had presented was the zero units from a rehabilitation perspective and that our fourth round obligation was which fourth round is from 2025 to 2035 would would be 100 units. Our prior obligation was 218 units from the earlier rounds and that was completed and then 306 units from the third round, which is partially completed. round is Levana Square. So, when the remaining third round units are combined with the new fourth round obligation, the town must address 239 affordable units. Um but unfortunately, the affordable housing program concluded that Colts Neck's plan does not comply with the law. The Township attempted to use what's called a durational adjustment, which you've heard us use quite some time. Um and we should not have to approve any new affordable housing construction
047during this 10-year cycle. The reviewing body determined that this approach does not satisfy the Fair Housing Act in Mount Laurel and the following development sites must be approved by May 13th, 2026. We have Aubrey Road, which is 68 Aubrey owner LLC. That's 36 acres. It's an estimated 204 units. Another active acquisition Route 537 site, which is the Wells Spring site, 263 units. And then our friends over on the Dutch Lane Road that the town's been fighting tremendously, 389 units. So, the total affordable units for these projects must equal 171 units. That's essentially 20% affordable housing out of those units. If you add up all those units, the town must approve 856 new units by May 13th, 2026. If we fail to do that, um the consequences are we lose immunity from the builder's remedy lawsuits
048and then developers could continue to sue and potentially force housing approvals through the courts. So, bottom line, our plan was inadequate. And this requires the town to allow major housing developments with these affordable units or we lose all of our legal protections for zoning law. So, we need to change these zones and certify that these can go forward as of May 13th. 856 units. Yep. Yep. It's pretty interesting that I know two out of those three were already purchased and under contract. And that was the one on 537. I knew that. And I knew about the one on Dutch Lane. And it was those LLCs that purchased it. I did not know about the one on Aubrey. But and it's that was done before this ruling. So. Okay. That concludes my ad hoc affordable housing
049report. All right. Definitely not what I expected this evening. Um anybody anybody want to comment on that um discouraging news? I I just think that it's uh the times are shifting and it's First of all, Ms. Scales, thank you very much for the very thorough presentation earlier because it really set the benchmark of expectation of what we have to do in face of what what's coming down the pipeline, especially with 800 and somewhat units that they could potentially be built here. It's quite concerning. It's it's quite concerning and then we have to look at the transportation infrastructure as well. That's a critical piece this piece. Not only housing the students, but transporting. And that's a very very expensive piece of our infrastructure, you know, that gets brought up into the finance committee. So, thank you
050for shedding light on this. It's not good news and I I think we need to have this at the top of every meeting so that we can deal with it on a on a on a uh on a month by month basis because it needs to stay in the force in the forefront of our thoughts because this is going to require some extensive forward planning. Especially when you have a a school that is near capacity and we're going to have to likely shift things around depending upon who moves in and what the timeline might look like. But I'm very concerned about the transportation piece as well. I'm concerned about our finance meeting that was held prior to this and how that's going to change our our direction there um as well. Okay. >> say one
051thing. Our Board of Education, I feel we're up to it the challenge. And we're going to meet and uh address the situation and make sure our kids in the future are educated the very best, the best facilities, the best teachers. Um I'll give us a lot I'll give the board a lot of credit, everybody sitting here for our the work and effort in preparing for this new developments are coming our way. Anybody else have anything to say on that? All right. We'll move right into buildings and grounds, safety and security. Mr. Walsh, if you want to take the lead on that. Um I think a lot of the building and grounds issues are going to be what I talked about earlier and address the infrastructure needs for 2020 26, 2027 and beyond. We're looking at
052making sure our school district is up and ready for meeting the challenge of all this new housing that's going to be built and making sure our present facilities are upgraded to reflect our the team the top one of the top school districts in the state of New Jersey. Okay. Yep, that's definitely going to be a challenge. Uh anybody else? Mr. Morosco, do you have anything on I'm sorry, Dr. Garabedian, do you want to add anything? Yes, just underneath on the agenda we had a meeting last week with representatives from DCL that they'd like to plan commit like almost like a ceremony completion ceremony and there's an educational component for it as well. So, uh we're coordinating some video and whatnot over spring break and they're targeting a celebration that they want very public board members
053to come with the kiddos and students likely at Cedar Drive. They're aiming for September 25th. Originally they thought April but they'd rather have a year's worth of data to be able to present and show the work that's been done pictures and so uh Friday, May 25th is a date they're looking towards with a a presentation component of it about um what the ESIP work has done highlighting very specific projects all the projects that we've done um and just a very forward thinking from that way. In between that time and likely in the spring they're going to facilitate um working with the administration and staff at Cedar Drive um a one-day workshop for kids who would like to participate in energy conservation through that type of of programming and so it'll be an opportunity an educational
054opportunity and then invite those students to be a part of the video that they create that'll be presented at the 25th ceremony. So, it'll be a good presentation. It'll be a lot of fun. So, we're looking forward to providing the board with more information about it. It was it was a nice a very nice meeting and looking forward to everything that comes along with that. So, Mr. Walsh, I did uh I sent a very late email. So, I'm going to apologize. Would you like me to talk about what's in that email now or wait till new business? No, you can talk about it now. You're sure? Uh did you receive it before It was on route but yeah, I was I I didn't want to kind of short without having to Okay, thank you. I
055appreciate the opportunity. So, there was a conversation um uh a recommendation from transportation staff. We've been talking and really doing well and doing some good good work with our bus cameras. We've had an increase to 12 ticketed uh um cars violations of the passing of the stop arm cameras. There's a recommendation from transportation staff to take it to another level because where the violations are not being ticketed, they're not being recognized is because of a blurry license plate. Remember there are three components description of the driver, make a model of the car and a clear picture of the license plate. The majority of the of the vehicles that are not being ticketed the the the drivers who are not receiving um a violation is because of blurry uh license plates. Now, that is not a
056fault of the program cuz the program actually you've seen the pictures are very clear. When the bus arm camera's coming out and a car is driving, it's a blurry image. It's hard to capture that especially on a front plate and in some instances cars don't have front plates, right? So, on some of the makes and some of the cars don't have them. So, the recommendation actually is to add another camera to the back of the stop arm camera that will catch a secondary picture of a license plate in the back and another potential make and model of the car gives another option of it. So, it secures that component of it. So, um in anticipation of tonight's uh conversation uh what we were able to obtain a quote. It would be an an additional about
057$11,000. We can still take it from the same line from where the other um where we purchased the first cameras from which was the breakage that we had in the radio the new radio. So, it's the same amount we have it to cover into budget no additional funds needed with from the budget but I like to make a recommendation that we proceed cuz as we're going through this as a new program um you know, I've had a couple districts reach out to me with information how we're doing it. So, I'd like to say from the beginning as we're kind of doing it leading the way of the conversation and how to do it I'd like to go along with this. Do you um like I said, correct me if I'm wrong. Do you think it
058would be feasible or um better served if we ordered one to see if it really makes a difference and versus spending the 11,000 I mean, if we're having a hard time reading it um with the you know the speed we put it on the So, I'm sorry. No, it's okay. It's not because of that. It's because that when they're passing the stop sign is moving. Oh, is that what it >> It's exactly what it is. triggered when it's like yeah So, so it's So, if it's No, no, no, no. So, when it's when it's out, that's when it'll you know, and so if they are So, if they are passing and they're going they're going so fast and the and the stop sign's coming out, it's blurry because the stop sign is moving but once
059it's stopped, it'll get a very clear picture of the back. Yeah, so that does this, why why didn't they know about this before? They do. So, Mr. Mr. Rico, I met with the folks less 2 weeks ago. Okay. Uh and then so all cameras are in the back of the school bus right now. Okay. So, if the bus stops, okay, and the camera goes out the stop sign goes out, it triggers the camera to take a picture, Mhm. okay? So, the stop sign is the trigger. The camera's in the back left of the bus, okay? What's being proposed is to have the camera still in the back left of the bus but also to be in the back side of the of the stop sign. Cuz what's happening is a full 75% of the of
060the proposed violations are not getting ticketed because of either blurriness or no front plate. And every car is required to have a back plate. So, had putting that extra camera on the back end of the stop sign in addition to the front the one in the back behind the bus would bring us close to 100% accuracy and allow for even more opportunity to maybe gain some revenue share because what's happening is a 70/30 split. The state takes 70% and the county takes 30 or the school district uh school district um municipality The township takes 30. We propose that we the school district school opportunity take some of that 30 and bring it back into the fold because we did ops we did come up with the funds for the first 18,000, 19,000. So, I am
061and Mr. Rico are in favor of this program to capture that additional and to provide that extra level of security. It makes common sense to do so. Sure, I'm on board. I just to you know, remind you that I >> a full 36 have been caught but only 12 have been ticketed or 12 48 have been caught. Only that's a lot. 48 in a few months. And only 12 have been ticketed. So, we're out of about a 25% effective >> the program. Yeah, that's improve the Yeah, which is terrible. Yeah. All right. So, why I think the board would support it. Um I just want to remind you that I did go to the town the last uh committee meeting um and we're still waiting on an answer if we can recoup that um to
062basically put it back into our funding for I have not heard back. Um maybe uh Mr. Walsh, if you could reach out to one of the members on the committee and see where that's at. I think the the attorney, Mrs. Bennett said she was uh Okay, so yeah, let let's move on that cuz I'd like to see if we could get that money rolling in even if it's a small percentage, it's something. And Brian, I'm confident if you Kevin and Jason um feel that those are worth it I'm sure the board you'll have the board's full support. Yeah, absolutely. All right. Any other comments on the on purchasing um connection Oh, I'm sorry, Mr. Recanati, go ahead. I um the camera that's on the back of the bus is that just not at the right
063angle to to get the the license plate? No, it's it's blurry cuz of the motion. So, that's the it's it's in the right spot. They come out and actually position it in the right spot exactly to get it and in the presentations we've seen the pictures that we do get are very clear. It's just when it's moving, there's a better op- opportunity to get a secondary picture. Okay. Yeah. And you're you're the numbers Mr. Scarpa were talking about were are right on. It's about 30 at this point in time it's about 37 that have been captured but unable to be ticketed because of the clearness. All right, great. Um no more comments on that? Uh all right. Anything else for the buildings and grounds safety and security department? I think the tent your our uh
064staff staff are making the Oh, but can you put your mic on, please? They're custodians and Nick's crew did a great job with the storm clearing all the our you know snow out of the so the kids can get in the school. There was a lot of snow. And you know, uh more importantly our facilities stay warm. There were no pipe leaks, no water leakage. Uh so uh thanks to Nick and as facility director and his whole staff. All right. Anything else? Okay, uh we have nothing under communications. We are going to go right into curriculum at this time, Mrs. Camera. All right, thank you. All right, um all board members have a folder and the folder has the attachments. It was also on the agenda. So, you may have already seen this but it's
065another version. So, this is our K through 8 assessment calendar um for the 25/26 the school year. So, what I did is I kind of organized it a little differently so I could just go by grade real fast. Um in kindergarten we start with dibbles. Dibbles is phonics. It's an early literacy screening and then we use it throughout the um K to 2 for progress monitoring. Um we have the envision topic test. We have bar comprehension checks, which is um really a formative check for reading comprehension and by formative I just mean something that the um teacher is sort of ongoing in the class discussions, quick writes, things that the teachers monitoring. Um we have our Fountas and Pinnell reading, which is for fluency and comprehension, uh which we talked about at the last meeting
066replacing that um for element of our being a writer reader program. And then we have our on-demand. So, if you add it up that's approximately 30 assessments that we're giving our kindergarten students. Um Well, I was counting each topic test. For like that alone is like about 14. So, um the dibbles is three times a year, so it was just I I was counting each test a little different. Okay. Um grade one, same thing. We're still using dibbles. We have the envision topic test. We have the same thing, the bar comprehension checks. We have the Fountas and Pinnell that will be replacing and then we have the on-demand writing three times a year. So again, I got about 30 assessments. Um grade two, now we've added the MAP testing for both reading and math. That's
067three times a year. We have the envision topic test. We also have quarterlies in both math and science, which is four times a year. Uh we have the midterm in math. We have the final in math. We have the Fountas and Pinnell reading that again will be replaced, the bar comprehension checks, the on-demand writing. So, that is a lot for second grade. That's about 36 assessments. Um grade three, we have the MAP testing again, envision topic test again, the quarterlies for math and science, the final math, the bar comprehension, the on-demand writing. Okay, approximately 34 assessments. Grade four, pretty much the same thing. Um we have the MAP. Um we have the reading, math, envision topic test, quarterlies, math and science, midterm, final. Then we have SAGES reasoning, which is more of an IQ test,
068I believe. Um bar comprehension check, on-demand writing. So, about 36. Um grade five, we're moving to also in um the end the MAP testing. We also have science, envision, the quarterlies, the final math, the bar comprehension. Um So, it's really like the same going on from this point. Actually, in middle school the assessments go down and um we have the MAP. We have the envision, the quarterlies, the final math, the on writing. So, that's pretty much the same for 6, 7, and 8. So, there's actually a slightly less in the high 20s in in middle school than we do. Um so, any questions or comments on this very detailed sheet uh provided by Dr. Reynolds. May I make a comment? Of course. So, one of the things we wanted to point out is there's been
069like some conversations about assessments and testings and I want to make sure that as a board we're comfortable with the conversation that assessments and all tests are assessments, but not all assessments are tests. We have to get into that habit. So, when you're at a soccer like you every uh we have a lot of parents here who play sports, kids play sports, or you rehearse in a band, right? You go to sports, what is the coach watching for? They're watching for if you're a soccer coach, you're watching for your ball handling skills, your kicking, your positioning of your feet. You're watching for all those things. Your coach is assessing in real time every time you go to practice. That's an assessment of your skills. That's the exact same thing that is happening here. So, we've
070detailed out the different assessments that go on on a regular basis. It doesn't mean that the district has stopped dropping and testing. It means throughout the day teachers are using very various assessment tools to assess where students are in their reading. Assessments inform instruction, right? The goal of an assessment is about growth and performance, not just the end performance on a test that yields a score. So, there's a big difference between an assessment and a and a in my opinion and the philosophy of the district, there is a big difference between an assessment, which can take many, many, many different forms because on a regular basis, I could also say teachers are assessing personality in terms of you know, we're having a bad day here. What's going on? There's a million assessments that go on
071on a regular basis. There's this statistic out there, Mrs. Cameron, you might know, how many hundreds of decisions do teachers make in a day, you know, with regards to what's going on in with just a child or a group of children? So, while on paper it's a very comprehensive and again, I really do thank Dr. Dr. Reynolds and Mr. Capozzi who worked very hard to put all of this together so that there was a vis- What? It's a good document. It's a great document cuz I think it also shows and the follow-up one's like kind of like a little bit of an explanation as to what it does and the overlap and everything. So, if you were to say, are we over-testing do we test a lot? I say, no, we're we assess a lot
072cuz we are a data-driven decision-making in our instructional practices and these things all inform what we're doing across numerous outlets, not necessarily just relying on one source like an NJSLS or one test that is a summative final culmination that produces a score of an understanding of learning. Instead, we're progress monitoring throughout using various tools. I just wanted to make sure that we were all somewhat that's a from a philosophical point of view, that's how it's presented. Okay? Sorry. So, that's all I just wanted to cuz it is a lot of information. I totally understand that. And just like adding on, so you have, you know, really what Dr. Garabed was first talking about is what's called your formative assessments where your teachers are just like checking in to guide instruction on an individual lesson. There
073might be like an exit ticket or a class discussion. Then you have more of a summative assessment where you're evaluating what students learned at the end of a topic. And then you have your benchmarks, your NJSLS, you know, your periodic assessments to just progress monitor um towards different standards over time. So, if we can now pull out the second sheet, that's just sort of a comparison. Um And just, you know, you could you could argue some of these points. You could agree with some of these points. Um the this was a little bit more subjective, uh but this is Dr. Reynolds um you know, thoughts. Um I do want to share the one I get to um like a personal story in a little bit. So, we have obviously we have the envision, the K
074K to 5. We know that it tracks our daily lessons. It's unit mastery. It's standards alignment. Um the strengths are that it's a very strong alignment to our state standards. It's perfect for daily instruction. That's what it's used for. It supports reteaching, enrichment, small group differentiation. Um it obviously only it measures math. Um there's not a lot of data on like the limited long-term growth or system level data. And of course, it's multi-tiered, which just means that it is used for intervention um as well um just for, you know, targeted academic growth. Um then we did do the i-Ready pilot. Um that is just another diagno- diagnostic tool. And we did discuss the price of that. That was I believe the 66,000. It does also support tiered intervention, uh tiered instruction and intervention. Uh we
075have the MAP. That is to track students growth over time in both math, reading, and science. Um what that is a little different. It's norm referenced, so it's providing, you know, long-term analysis in terms of how students in New Jersey compare to students around the nation. Um Then we have something that I mentioned last time um Achieve 3000. I do love the program. I had my middle This is my personal story now. I had my middle school conference recently um about my son and I said, oh, what level is he reading on? So, you know, in in in the younger grades you had the Fountas and Pinnell and you got an exact level, so you knew like, oh, my my child's reading on a higher level than grade. And um unfortunately, they couldn't really give
076me a specific level because it was on level because of the fact that that, you know, he's reading a book that's on grade level and comprehending it, which is wonderful. That's all like I said before, that's all um part of the summative assessment, a formative assessments. But what I really like about Achieve, especially for our middle school students, is that the special teachers in terms of science and social studies, they can use it as well. And one of the teachers at the conference was like, oh, I love that program. We used to have it. And um more so is that as a parent, you get information every month of where they are as a reader. Are they making progress? And then on top of that, you get you have three benchmarks. So, you have um
077three level sets they're called. So, I do think it's a it's a fabulous program. It's something we might want to consider. Our curriculum committee, you know, or maybe pilot it for 1 year to see, you know, get some feedback. Maybe Dr. Garabed and Dr. Reynolds and I can um and the curriculum committee can maybe talk more about it. Maybe something we want to bring into the middle school because now that we have our being a writer program in K through uh five, we we have a program that's going to give parents feedback of what level their students are reading at. But then when we get to the middle school, we really don't have a a program that's as structured as that. So, that was just something I kind of took away after his conference. Um
078So, you know, really I think what we're very strong we we have plenty of assessments, all different kinds um from our daily unit instruction, that's our envision math, our being a reader, being a writer. We have the long-term benchmark growth, that's our MAP MAP testing. Um we have targeted diagnostic testing that's built into our programs. We have tiered intervention that's built into all our programs. So, overall, you know, I I think we have a strong foundation. I think the weakness was really in middle school with with really knowing where your child is at what reading level. And parents should know that. You should know if your child's on level, below level, above level. You should you should have an idea of where they are. Um any anyone else want to comment? Again, this will take
079a while to read. And just recognizing it is, you know, it's her opinion. You could Some of it I I agreed with, some of it I disagreed with, but it is um, you know, in blue is sort of, you know, her thoughts, her reflection on our different programs. Yeah, and I want to extend uh Dr. Reynolds had a prior engagement. She wasn't here be able to She's happy to come back anytime if we want wanted her and follow up on the conversation. Go ahead. I more so for for Dr. Garuba. So, the Achieve 3000, you know, based on what you said seems like it could be a good program, but we have used it in the past and >> We have. So, why what what happened that we're no longer using >> It priced it
080out the district. So, when we were it's it's extremely expensive. >> the cost? >> Correct. So, it is a um it is uh it's based on um it provides um leveled non-fiction newsletters. The news, basically, is what it does. And it it levels out the reading based on whatever this level set is at the time. So, students take an assessment at the beginning and then they can grow based on the difficulty level. >> updated. Oh, I'm sorry. So, you now have fiction. Right. >> that. They didn't have fiction. >> Sure. So, that's it's an online program. It is like a supplemental type of activity kids would do at home or during, you know, a group act small group instruction or what or whichever. And then as students were able to progress through the articles, answer
081the questions, the articles would get adaptive. It's an adaptive type of program. Um so, that's is that's what it was. So, we did have it here. Okay. And then um we went to Newsela like a lot of districts when it started to become pricey because they do they don't base it necessarily it's site license wise, so it's expensive. It is a great tool. It is it just expensive. >> Right. So, when we were looking at, you know, the programs that we've had, we made the decision to move away from it. It's not thing we can't revisit it in some way if there's a need, but there was just something else. >> had it, didn't we have it for fourth and fifth, too? Didn't we have it for some of the younger grades, also? >> Yes.
082So, it might be something we want to just target for our middle school students cuz we don't really have a way of assessing their reading level right now. Well, we we don't we we use MAP. And MAP gives you the the they do do MAP testing in language arts. Right. But this this is every month. Like this is this is There's a lot more feedback. So, you know, there's a lot of advantages versus just three times a year. You know, this is like right away if there's a problem, you know, you're you're made aware, which I know as a parent I I like as much information as I can get about my children and and how they're doing academically. All right, the last thing is um and it was a beautiful flyer that I believe
083we'll be posting on our website now and hopefully um the one about the NJSA um NJSLA testing, all the spring dates. Yes. Okay. Yes, but put a pin in that because I wanted to to share we just got a broadcast last week that they might be changing it again. So, we put all that effort. There is so much time that goes into planning and scheduling and having that and yes, you're right. She it was beautifully done. We just have to go back and double check now that it is right. Then I'm not I'm not going to read the dates that what testing is, I just know it's in right now it's scheduled for May. I won't give the exact dates or anything like that. Um because it could be changing. So, I'll I'll revisit that
084at the next town meeting. >> Are those tests um uh able to be uh made up? NJSLA? >> Yes. Yes, there's a make We have makeup windows. When we announce the schedule, there's makeup windows they refer to it as. And when they make up the test, the kids can't take two in one day. They're allowed to take up to two in one day. Okay, cuz I remember a couple years ago we were away and she had gone and missed it and I I wasn't sure. I'm sure she I'm sure she was pulled and Yeah, okay. I just want the public to be aware that if you do plan a vacation in May, um that you are able to uh redo it, so. Okay. Just a quick quick question before we >> not recommended because then
085they're missing so much instructional time to make up the test thing. But but I absolutely posted and it was kind of like, you know, Just but um before you move on, um again, this this document's probably the coolest thing I've seen. Like comparing all this stuff cuz it's crazy. There's so much that these kids and not to minimize this at all, but is there a way to add two columns where we can get the cost of each of the program Absolutely. what our performance is versus our peer institutions in each program? We absolutely can. Yeah, so we can do the cost because there a lot of them are annual subscription based. We're doing it right now in budget. So, we can get that that would actually um we have that in in the our budget
086details. So, I can absolutely do that. Now, what we do every year and additionally behind the scenes is you've heard me by you probably have heard me say, are we getting our return on our our investment? That's what we're looking for. And so, um we do look at districts with similar tools, similar things, how it's also used. So, for example, um we were talking recently about we have IXL, right? And so, we use it as a small group instructional supplemental, but we want to maybe look at it and ask parents to part with their as a home because districts that we've, you know, that we have spoken to do anecdotally, we want to codify this, obviously, that are are requesting time at home, certain amount of hours, may be getting a little bit of an
087edge on that. So, we might we're going to look at that cuz we want to make sure we're using it to its full extent and reaping the benefits of it for the students. Um so, yeah, so absolutely we can do that. >> Cool. Performance wise, I'm not sure I'll wait Comparative data would be only available I mean, we can look at it through the um Currently, unless they they volunteer it, we get everything from the school report card. Uh the public that that the DOE publishes whenever we make any kind of comparative like districts or programs. And then you have to do the secondary, are they using the same programs? Yeah. That's what I mean. But certainly. Cuz like some of these companies, like I don't know what the the 3000 stands for, do you
088know? Uh Systems 3000? >> Yeah, what is it? Oh, Achieve 3000, I'm not sure. I'm not sure. Because like, you know, something like that, they're a company. Of course. >> to have data, right? In order for them to sell this company >> data is excellent. >> Exce- It's extensive, yeah. >> So, like they can send us at least like a report like, "Hey, here's how we stack up against the our competitors in this space, right?" >> Sure. Let me explain. With with Achieve reports, you can focus in on any skill as well. You can just focus in main idea. Okay, what students are comprehending main idea or not, cause and effect. You can go through each skill. Yeah. The reports are so detailed and I know in terms of the special subjects, too, they have
089articles for science, articles for social studies, articles for reading. That's why I love it so much cuz it's not just a you know, it's not just an assessment. You have that part, but it's it's used It can be used daily in class. And it can be assigned for homework. And they did change it now, too, where their home what they do at home will not affect their Lexile, which I like as a teacher because I don't know if at home they're getting help from their parents. So, I want to see what their Lexile is just in my class, not not outside. Cuz that's kind of like the the drawback. Like you you don't want the state or federal agencies to mandate what you teach your children, right? But it's impossible to compare your program against
090someone else if they're not using it, right? So, it's kind of like this double-edged sword where like if you to to your point, like what's our ROI on each of these? And then if we're struggling in each of those categories, can we, you know, get rid of it and start something else, but And that's what that was actually the catalyst when Miss Cameron and I spoke about. That was actually the catalyst between the pilot of it for i-Ready. It was like, all right, are we doing Do we have the best assessments in place, you know, for that? And and looking at it, especially because when we look at the progression of student achievement, you know, we start as our kids are still taking the third grade and then they progress and grow, you know, we
091you want to see that growth every year. So, we want so We're the best Think about it. We always do a test of our tests, I guess you could say, an assessment of our assessments we are always doing ourselves. >> in Monmouth County, if you think about it. Like we are and no one can deny it. Right? So, if you think about it now, that's step one. Step two is the best district in New Jersey. Step three, the best district in the United States. Like so, we're we're there. And then this like again, this compares it perfectly to show us like oh my god, this is where we're struggling and then So, this is cool. Thanks for putting this together. You're welcome. And and you think Dr. Reynolds and Mr. Capasso put a lot of
092because we definitely when you put it on paper, it definitely shows, you know, a lot and not to be overly analytical, but it's data driven decision making. That's what we want and we want to have the tools that collect the best give us the best data. Cool. Thank you. You're welcome, of course. So, we can continue that again that conversation with regard to Achieve. Right. Okay, wonderful. So, we will do that. Um so, number two, we're moving on quickly. Um NWEA MAP as a predictor of NJSLA and that is that is a definite yes, it is a predictor. Um MAP growth is norm reference. It's aligned to state standards. Um and it does, as I said before, compare students to peers nationally, which we are as Mr. Skill said, we are much stronger than usually
093as as a nation. You can say you're the best school district in Monmouth County. You can say every time you need Not ready to say that yet. >> [laughter] >> But I love your confidence. Um it is used to forecast performance and identity gaps. Um and it, you know, it is something that I have recommended before that maybe we we can eliminate and use something else. It's something that although we could also obviously continue using it. Um could we replace it with Achieve? Achieve is very limited in terms of it's the predictor to NJSLA. So technically is is using the Savvas benchmark test which I've mentioned before. They're not as strong a predictors as to NJSLA. But at the same time you could also just look at last year's NJSLA and compare it and that's
094that's probably the strongest particular predictor of all. And I would agree with you. I would agree with you if the test wasn't different this year. Yeah. And and now this year we have though we have that testing they took in September that now we can compare to the end of the year testing cuz they did take that adaptive. But yes, this is our if everyone remembers a complete transition year with the NJSLA. So we can no longer compare it to previous years because it we can only compare it to how the students did earlier this year. So maybe some MAP is something that in a few and maybe after we take this NJSLA a few times maybe it is something down the road we we can can eliminate just for cost or you know maybe
095again we'll want to keep all these assessments. Um it's just a lot to think about and we also want to just make sure we're not over assessing as well. We don't want to take away too much of the instructional time as well. There's always that fine balance which is why I think Dr. Garreby and I were both blown away when we found out in September they were taking full NJSLA cuz it was just so much time. Um when it was supposed to just be you know testing how the new test was supposed to be. >> [snorts] >> So that's pretty much it. Um you know those are some of my thoughts. Uh we like I said most importantly we have our tiered interventions. We are constantly assessing and you know changing curriculum based on what
096we we are seeing. DIBELS is excellent for early literacy especially it helps catch um dyslexia dyslexia thank you. And um you know my final thought really is the best predictor of NJSLA is previous years. But um you know MAP is strong in that sense. So that is the advantage of continuing with the MAP testing. Um any other comments on that? Okay. And then number three is the summer bridge 26-27. Um Mr. Skill spoke about including our military students more in that. I do advocate for our um for continued Board of Education funding for the summer bridge. Last year we had downsized it a little bit and it was wonderful so I would continue with what we did last year. At least that's my recommendation. Um cuz the rate we'll never get money for that again.
097That was just >> Yeah I mean I can talk we It's [laughter] a it's a discussion for the board. We just wanted to have a really good discussion because I know we it came up when we were approving the tentative budget last year. There was another grant that came out with there was another high impact tutoring grant we didn't qualify for because there was a requirement that a certain percentage of our students had to underperform on NJSLA to meet the eligibility. We didn't meet it. We Our kids did too well. So we we didn't meet the eligibility. We met it. We met we met the Yeah we met the the first high impact grant tutoring grant and that's what we funded when the accelerated learning loss grant was done. So we funded it for three
098complete years fully funded last year was the first year it Right. had to come into the budget. It is a $60,000 program. So I just and we've downsized it three weeks those types of things and for just budgeting purposes just and having open conversation we want to just see is does the board want us to continue with it? Do we want to Um we've run two components an academic component. We've run a and and also a performing arts component of it with a theater and band program. So um would the board like us or what is the the temperature basically for the board's tolerance for us either absorbing all the cost again putting together a hybrid where the academic program is at a no cost where there is a minimal cost for the band and
099instrumental. period that the parents and the kids love the program and the kids need that summer bridge program. They they they ensure that they can succeed going forward. So every penny we spend on it is that's what we're here for as Board of Ed. Okay. Like personally I feel we should fund it 100%. Kids love going to school. They have the to do the theater. So it's a combination of learning academics and also the kids getting together and having a good time. So I agree 100%. I advocate for continuing the for continuing the board's supporting the program. Okay. I I I just wanted to say as before as we're putting these programs together if we're putting that you know as we're as we talked about in the finance committee we are putting things in the
100bucket and we are still actively every time a grant comes out we always look at it and say all right this would be a good fit because when we do when we do meet eligibility we're successful with our grant funding. So I think that that's something we're always on the hunt for. This year there was no eligibility or funding for it. Right they want to learn in the summer. So who are we to deny any child the opportunity to learn? Yeah and the other component of that is is that we also have we run facilitate in middle school summer school for it because there are some students that we that you know we we require to come to summer school and we bring that into the summer bridge component. So if if the majority board
101wants us to we will go that way. It's in the it's already in the budget right? There's already a placeholder for it. It it is part it is in the bucket currently. Yes it is. It is in the bucket. We call it we have I have we Mr. Marasco and I have about 20 buckets and right now we go this and we put this in the bucket and this comes out you know we did that's the way the budget gets developed until the very end. Okay. So it is in the bucket. It's in the bucket. Right now. Yes. Got you. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. I'm done. Thank you. Curriculum is over. Okay. Um okay we're going to move right into finance. Oh I'm sorry Mr. Rogneda. Sorry about that. Go ahead. Go
102ahead. And you're muted. There you go. I'm just saying a thumbs up emoji on that. He played sound to the thumbs up emoji. Oh okay. Got it. Yeah I see. Um okay we're going to move right into finance if we can get a a brief report there. Um we're going to go to our co-chairs um Mr. Scarpa and Mr. Rico. All right. You want to get it off? You want to take it off? So yes we started discussing the 26-27 tentative budget. Um we went over uh what certain you know tax increase or no tax increase looks like to the budget and what it would add what it would you know possibly take away. And um it's just a beginning. Uh I believe we go till we have to approve the budget when Vince in
103mid-March right? I mean Well that's actually Sorry mid-May. Yeah there's a second item. Oh go ahead. Okay. Okay go ahead. going about it if you Well let's do this first. We have we're still developing the budget if you don't mind. So but we did because of the governor's address being pushed back the original submission date requirement for Boards of Education was March 19th which is the day after our next our RAM meeting right? So that was our our goal. We do have an extension to the 29th 27th. So Mr. Marasco we're we were going to ask for a potential just a special meeting to to approve the tentative budget on Tuesday the 20th. 4th I think it What was the date? I think that was that was the date right? On the Tuesday after to
104give us a little bit more time in going with it and just literally coming in and just just a special meeting for that at 6:30 we can have five people come in and even if minimum four We did this last year. We did it last year so it would be a case of that. >> volunteers uh So if you're amenable to that we would schedule that and that gives us a little bit more time especially with state aid coming in we don't know what that's going to be yet. So and we won't know that to the to the address. So it gives us a little bit more time um to do that and if we can Vince how does that schedule look with Phoenix getting Phoenix in to have a conversation? Oh that's flexible. Yeah
105we can um we can arrange that. Be at least two weeks in front of this deadline? Well that that doesn't necessarily have to be ahead of this. That that meeting. Why is that? Uh that's more future discussion of how we're going to put some things in place facility wise. That that doesn't have to do with next year's budget. I'm sorry what's Phoenix? I I forgot or should I know? Phoenix Advisors is a financial advisor firm that we partnered with for years during the times when we had two referendums put out there. They help us decide whether like for long-term larger financing whether a bond referendum or like lease purchasing. They they look at rates they look at projects they look at what's eligible for here and they help to guide us as and and provide
106suggestions recommendations to the board about how how best to pay for something is basically what they do and we're looking at some long-term facilities. Mr. Marasco facilitated with buildings and grounds a long-range facilities uh conversation and so we are identifying in that process things that are in that for next year and then also beyond next year setting it up. So that's where the Phoenix Advisors we were recommending getting a meeting on on Yeah the reason why I bring that up is that because I while I recognize that it's not part of the the the budget it's still top of mind as we are looking at our numbers here. We're focusing on the long-term opportunity of our facilities and we have a growing list of needs on all four of our facilities. So I want to
107take special attention to addressing these individual points and we will do so. We're going to have a walk around with with with our superintendent and the principals for each individual school to address those needs but in the larger context, you know, there's going to be a greater need for capital especially from what Mr. Scales represented today because we are going to have an influx of students. We're not sure where that resides. So we want to make sure that we make the right decision. You know, I get a little concerned about the timeline crunch of late March here but we'll work with what we have. I'd like to have as much information as possible earlier on so we can digest it. So getting on on board with Phoenix for the long-term facilities but we're also looking
108at the rateables for the town and what and the adjustments from last year to this year. By way of education for the board, the the rateables was $4.89 billion in in in market value for the residents of Coltsneck this year. That's the gross number from a point of real estate. That's basically the starting point by which we're working off of our numbers. So that assessed value has increased exponentially over the past several years so that comes into play as we as we look into setting up our budget for next year. You know, but we're getting tight on time so let's let's coordinate another maybe next week another sit down. Okay, thank you. I think that would be a question I've got too. Like you said the rateables are yeah. And then you look at our
109new governor who yesterday in front of says New Jersey we have a $3 billion budget hole to fill. Right? So if you think about where they're going to try to cut but more importantly like you as the you as the finance chief, right? Chair, what does that mean when you've got a $3 billion hole in a budget? It means that you're spending more money than you have. Like I think my my son knows how to do that, right? So but if you think about these rateables increasing substantially like is there is there things that we can look into to put money aside? Like I don't know what the rules are you know, you have to put money aside for you know, two years expenditures and things like that. Like those are the things we got
110to start thinking about. Like for the the future boards, the future students like if our town value went up and our lovely Monmouth County leadership likes to assess us every single year. It's going to continue to go up. Let's let's just face it. But now I mean you can capitalize on that money's there without us having to increase anything. I think that's something to look into because we've got to start putting money away. We're going to need a school. That also address attention committee and contributing more to pilot fees from these developments are coming in to our school district. Absolutely we're getting zero. Cuz that rateables doesn't include the need to work with our attention committee and give us the appropriate amount of money we need to educate our kids. Yeah, we're going to be
111building 800 homes. Percentage of that can come back into our classrooms. Yeah. If you applied to like you applied the multipliers that we had for trying to figure out what the bottom line was, we were trying to figure out what would our tax revenue be from. Now you can you can apply those same things. Like I can rejig the the equation just to you know, add in 856 now new units. It's a substantial amount of money. homes. I think we as a board need to work together to make sure we're funded and we can do the right thing for our our our parents and kids in town. Totally. Cuz if you think about like we have to be very selfish about it as well too. Like if the town's going to take more money from
112us not from a tax perspective but from a rateable perspective, right? We are owed that money. That can't be going to Netflix or an airport. Like it has to we have to make sure that when there's more money that's being taken from every Coltsneck resident that goes to schools and not are there any abatement programs tax abatement program structuring with these three now three approved builds? So we yeah, we don't know for the new ones but they said no for Levana. Yeah. It'll take a while. Okay. Probably take a while to figure out but think about it. They're developer I don't think I don't think they need it, you know, so but otherwise like that's usually the incentive to get someone to come in and build rather than like we don't want you to build
113here but now the the county and the reason why I asked that is because that that throws a big wrench into we have expenses from day one and you have an abatement opportunity that may go out two years and now that's like we have to consider that. Yeah, you're right. I'd be interested to know if there was any abatement. Cool. Yeah, but thank you all for the committee for doing this. It's we still continue to be very healthy financially. So okay, I'd like to suggest why don't we since you're the liaison, why don't you reach out to committee member Brucetta that I'd like to request a meeting with him. Dr. Garabedian graciously agreed to sit in with us and the finance committee and Mr. Brucetta so we can put this on the table what our
114demands are, what we expect from the committee. Do you all agree with moving forward? Okay. I think the again attention committee member Brucetta will be very receptive to having a conversation that's going to be you know, enrich our community with a great school district. Okay, I do believe there'll definitely be some collaboration there positive collaboration. So let's move forward. I'll have Dr. Garabedian set that up or do you want me to? Whichever you prefer. Would you like me to make the formal communication? Okay, all right. I'll reach out. I'll copy everybody who I like in attendance and then I'll you know, I'll reach back out with any updates on that. Okay? And what Mr. Scarpa was referring to and Mr. Rico those PDFs that we're going to put in the board update so that everyone
115is kind of seeing what we're seeing at this time. The details look different because we're in a new system so you'll see what's in there so far like an image but it's a snapshot. It's still evolving. So so just know it'll be right there. You'll see few hundred lines of appropriations right now. What's in there and knowing that it's still a work in progress. Okay? Okay. Is there anything else? Where were we at now? Let's yes, number three. Yeah, you guys want to continue with that? I got it here. Yeah, so back a couple of superintendent updates. We referred to an incident that occurred back in in November regarding one of our virtual servers. Okay? So Dominic Petrillo who is our network manager reported on Tuesday, November 19th in 2025 during a routine upgrade overnight
116on the 18th of a particular switch on the network and a restart of one of the virtual machines that's on the virtual server the domain controller which handles a lot of stuff that is listed in here he provided for me to share failed to boot properly. Okay? So what does this mean and simply stated the server is is critical and in charge of making sure any device student or staff that needs internet access is given an IP address and allowed on the network. It's a monitored IP address on the network. This server failed to boot after the troubleshooting. It was determined there was a larger issue with the ASX host one of the two virtual servers in the district. Very quickly Mr. Petrillo was able to move all of the virtual computers over to the
117one virtual server that was working correctly at that time and that's where everything has been running because he has not been able to get the other server up and going. So everything is being hosted with no backup on one server. So this is I want you to know that this is just for transparency. This was a project that was in last year's budget that came out of to to say okay, let's see if we can get through and it failed in November. So we made it from budget time to November until it failed. So it we're at a point where it needs to be done. In the budget at the time excuse me, the full replacement would have been about $40,000. Since that time knowing that we wanted to be the most um you know,
118address it in the most appropriate and and critical way but also being conservative, Mr. Petrillo I give so much credit to went out with his expertise consulted talked about the different things where he's actually able to do more of a hybrid approach that has a rebuild of a virtual server host a refurbishment if you will plus some virtual new storage array and a 40,000 ticket is now down to 18,000. Okay? So with that. So based on the critical need of where we are now and all the things that are managed and all of all the devices that we all use. It's my recommendation that we move forward with this. There we can handle it within budget currently with no additional funds being being done. So I do feel from an infrastructure technology point of view
119this is something we need to move forward with. I don't want to include it in the budget next year. I'd rather address it now which we can do financially. I can get that lead at time. I think he wants to address it as soon as possible because right now we've just got one server hosting everything. I Anything that you mentioned with thousand on the end of it. >> I understand that. But I wanted you to see the number that went down. I know I know I I see it. But every time I sit next to you and hear that at the end, I cringe. Yeah. Yeah. >> I understand. So yeah. Um thank you for explaining that. >> Of course. Absolutely. And if anyone has any additional questions, Mr. Batchelor is happy to give that
120information. Just let me know and I'm happy to give share it with him and to provide you with the If he can great. Is it like can he just do like a health assessment just show us like cuz I like I don't know where our servers are held or anything like that. Can he do that? Yeah, he absolutely. He would probably request just for different reasons that it be done. He's given some updates before that they just not be shared publicly. No, of course. For vulnerability reasons. >> Well, that's what I'm saying. Like wherever the Yeah, okay. Of course. There's other stuff we can help him with. Of course. Yep. Thanks. Dr. Garabed, shifting gears going back to something earlier today. With regards to the the stop cameras. Yes. We met up with the transportation
121folks last week or two weeks ago. They were speaking about one of the challenges was the uploading of data. You know, when when the buses come in, the head of the transportation has to go out to each individual bus and she takes time doing that. There was an opportunity that if it arrives at a location like the sort of the Wi-Fi picks up on it automatically and that would alleviate a lot of time on her end and they can let her better serve in other areas, you know, which we would discuss in negotiations. The $11,000 proposal, does that include that up you know I'm going with this? Yeah, no. Uh Yes, we can talk about that. From from as I mentioned it to Mr. Batchelor, he would have to do some more. Right now it
122is a very it's based upon the actual devices themselves. So the recordings are on the devices. It's not something that's connected to a Wi-Fi or can be uploaded. But it would have to be uploaded and put something. So it's definitely something he can look further into Okay. um with what we're purchasing right now. But the purchase the the the price you gave does not include that infrastructure to have it automatically >> We would look at Yeah, we would look more from a network internally to see what we can do internally. He wants a better idea of how to do it internally than Okay. >> purchasing more at this time. Yeah. >> Okay. All right. Yeah, as we're learning more about how to do it. Yeah. >> Thank you. Okay. Um anything else? Anybody want to
123add anything to the finance portion? Okay, we're going to try to uh move along quickly. I know uh Mr. Scales is up with policy. So let's uh try to steer head that. Yeah, real quick. The uh the attachment is just uh It's a proposed project plan. Um for operation district safeguard. It's it's intricate. It's um It's about 6 to 9 months worth of like implementation. So if you think about like just any project plan or any you know, if you're implementing just new technology or a new set of you know, rules and laws or whatever. So this at least I broke it down into each phase and in each phase it'll show you what's required of us as a board, who we need to reach out to, when we need to reach out to them.
124And then this allows us from an accountability perspective to check those boxes. Like say for example, I reach out to entity XYZ and they don't respond to us. You know, we can hold them accountable for not responding to us, right? Like and we can log this information and this can always be available to the public. That the reason I have it under policy is because we would have to wiggle it into you know, policy and regulations. It's just living there as a living breathing document for the public to access. And then if people, you know, wanted to help us with this project, you know, they're they're more than welcome to. There's nothing legal about any issues or anything like that. This is simply just a sum of sort of steps that need to be taken
125in order for us to implement this operation district safeguard. Yeah, I saw it was very detailed, the timeline and everything. Um you know, we could touch base on the appointments. I saw that you did that. Uh we can discuss that too. I'm going to read it over again. Um and then uh yeah, if anybody has any input or questions, please reach out. I know that document was pretty lengthy. So if anybody wants to add or contribute to it, feel free to um to respond to him. Uh anybody want to comment or add anything this evening on it? I was just very impressed by the by how detail oriented it was. And uh it's six pages. I don't know if everybody got a chance to read it yet. Um Now it's new light shed on it.
126So we But yeah, now right after what you shared tonight, it's more important than ever. Yeah. So thank you again. So like I said, try to if anybody wants to read it or double read it, please reach out to Mr. Scales with any any suggestions or additions they may want to add to that. Although I think it's very well well done. Um anything else Mr. Scales on that? >> No, that's it. Nice and easy. Yeah, very easy. Thank you. All right, negotiations. I know this is basically to be done in executive or private sessions. I'm not sure if there's anything that we could speak on this or right at this point. I think just on this we're just noting that those two negotiations are going on at this time. >> wasn't sure if there was
127something we were going to add to that. Thank you. Um okay, there's nothing under transportation personnel also that is something that's just noted by Dr. Garabed. I don't believe we have any questions or comments on those items as well. Uh so at this time if anybody have any last questions or comments on the bulk of the cow agenda. Anybody want to add anything? Uh okay, if not, we'll open the um comments the second portion of the comments of this evening. Anybody want to get up and uh make a question or comment on anything presented tonight, you may do so. State your name and address for the record. Okay, uh seeing nobody would like to, uh we are going to close public comment. Uh we will open up to new business now to any board member
128that would like to uh discuss anything. I have Yes, Mrs. Cameron. Um first I wanted to give a shout out to our Colts Neck resident Mary Perhara. Uh she owns the Colts Neck General Store and Deli. On February 23rd, it was the day after the storm, she had posted on Facebook um first responser first responders and essential workers, the grill is on, coffee's ready. So just a big shout out to Mary. That was just going above and beyond for for our community. Um Secondly, um in regards to Danny's book, The Guide to Autism. Are we ordering copies to have at the middle school and and Crescent? If can we can we make sure we have copies of his book in our in our in our library? >> looking into it. Yeah. Okay. Wonderful. And then
129the third thing I want to talk about the signs. So Um last year, you might remember that the Colts Neck PTO, they graciously donated um lots and lots of beautiful signs for all our buildings. And what we had before were I believe they're called electronic message centers or like LED message boards. And so those message centers allowed us to share like a lot of important information, school closures, um teachers of the year and then um any like event reminders. So my idea is if maybe we can have those those signs again as well as our new beautiful signs because in my district um a lot of families pay money and if it's your child's birthday, the sign will say you know, you know, happy birthday Jonas and parents will pay like $10 for that. We
130can use it as an opportunity for like the Colts Neck Sports Foundation where they can advertise, the CMBA can advertise, um you know, and again we can make some revenue. So it's just an idea maybe worth considering and in addition to you know, the beautiful signs just going back to I don't know how much that would be. That would be something I guess building and grounds would look into. Um But I I believe right LED signs or I wasn't sure what they called EMC. You know, the ones with the letters. The ones with the letters where you go out and you put the letters on the board each time. Those were the those were the signs we had for our all three buildings. Right. That was but then we never had like We only had
131the ones that had the letters that were like We did not We did not have electronic signs. No. We weren't allowed to put those up. We've got We've looked into those before. Um for Cedar Drive you're allowed to, but because this is a county road, we have looked into it multiple times and we're not allowed to. Wow. Because of the because of the the lightness, the light or something with the electronic display of the of the residence. >> it off at night? The answer was no. I mean it was just a >> [laughter] >> We've actually Because we've actually looked into it because um you know, it takes a you going out changing it all the time. But we had the kinds where you had the letters and went out and did it. >> because
132it's such it's a great um just way to increase revenue. The high school The high school has one. Correct. We were just told no. And we we've looked into it. >> maybe maybe we want to visit and ask again. Maybe it's different it's different community, you know, it's different it's different it's a different >> school is after county roads. Sure. Hm? We can look Sure. Yeah, so it's just a new idea just to again increase some revenue. I mean we every birthday it's it's $10. It adds up. So and parents love taking pictures of their kids in front of the sign on their birthday. So Okay. Um that's all. That's all for me for new business. Nice. May I May I one thing? Yeah, please. I just want to give a 2-second update about the
13325-26 calendar. So, we have used all three of our emergency closed days, okay? So, that puts our tentative last day of school, given anything, at June 24th, okay? Because we have 3 days built in. We do that every year. We we build them in. So, there we won't be revising to give any days back. We are putting it in the universe. We are not going to have any reason to close anymore. That being said, we would just need to look elsewhere elsewhere. You know, and with the upcoming spring break coming in, it's not something that we like to do cuz people have plans. So, just know that hopefully, you know, we have good weather, we have good energy, no power failures, nothing with pumps, nothing with septic, nothing with anything else that happens. It can
134has potential to happen. We're going to put all good vibes out and we're going to be fine, but just knowing that that currently right now with the use of the three emergency days, the last day of school is confirmed as the 24th. So, we'll be looking I'll be working with Dr. to be to give a a definitive update on eighth grade graduation and those types of things. So exciting. Is there anybody else for >> [clears throat] >> a new business? Yeah, I've got Okay. >> Mr. Mr. I'll close I'll close this out. Okay. >> [laughter] >> All right. Um I wanted to bring up an issue that I think we're having with the enrichment program. And I wasn't quite sure how to bring it up. I don't want to step on the administration's toes about
135it or bash it in any kind of way. Um I I feel like I see a opportunity to um improve it. Um and it was it was brought up. I I wanted to do it for I wanted to mention something about this for a while. But something happened this week that was just like uh I got to say something. Um I I don't like how the enrichment program pulls kids in pulls them out. I I think um uh we can you know, bring up a you know, start discussing the uh you know, maybe looking at to uh making like I don't want to say this. I know it's like a trigger word, a gifted and talented class. Not a trigger at all. >> You You You can call it whatever you want. I I I
136don't really care I don't really care, but a dedicated class for you know, for those those kids. I know we have we have programs for you know, if kids are falling behind to you know, pull them back ahead. And I think that uh uh we need to possibly look into you know, taking the kids that are are ahead and not holding them back. I I don't know how to take that further. But we have classrooms, right, Dr. that Right. That's in the middle school that I think Yeah. elementary school? Elementary Oh, oh. Sure. All schools. I mean, I'm we can speak to that in another as new business we can talk to that about it. It's a pretty extensive conversation with a lot of detail that goes into it. I know that I know the
137situation Dr. Reynolds. Correct. The teachers and the the people that lock goes into identification. There's a lot to our program, so I think it it it definitely deserves a more timely conversation. I would also encourage, you know, if it's of a personal nature that it that we have conversation with No, no, no. That Dr. I'm just doing the the the chain like oh, you I can always communicate with Dr. Reynolds about anything that's not Do all the public school systems in our county have dedicated classrooms for for Some. Uh that's called heterogeneous it's called homogeneous grouping. That's not something we have until we have our accelerated math programs. We do heterogeneous groupings and then we have targeted intervention where students interventions for students to catch up on specific skills based on different assessments. And we
138have target tap, which is targeted enrichment. And then we use an identification criteria with a natural break in data where we see kids who qualify. And it allows actually our philosophy and again, we can come to visit it in a more robust type of conversation, but it allows for more opportunity for students to participate who may have missed something. It's skill-based based on moments in time. So, that's what we have looked at, you know, through the years. So, we can certainly entertain a larger conversations if the board likes to do that. I actually was a gifted and talented teacher for 2 years. I love the experience. And it was something in my district that we started in second grade. It was one second grade class that branched out to two third, two fourth, two fifth.
139And originally, it was such a strong program because it really was just the G&T population. But through the years, those classes only had eight or 10 kids. And so, what was happening was then they were bringing more kids in just to keep the classes about same number because some you know, some people felt it was unfair to have a teacher. And so, then it was slowly getting watered down. And then we went to an enrichment the pull-out enrichment because of the fact that then um first of all, it was a lot it was just a lot cheaper. And that way then you could argue well, a kid is only gifted in one area versus another, so that way you can meet their needs. But the research does show like you were saying, no different than
140tiered interventions that really our gifted students do really like need sustained academic challenge, not just periodic enrichment. So, the research does support what you're saying. It would just be a model. And I do believe once they get to middle school that they're already grouped that. But it is something that, you know, it does really be a great conversation to have maybe through our you know, our second through fifth grade or something like that. So, And I can share years ago we actually had a an enrichment gifted and talented task force and there was a lot of information and data that was collected based on our programs. I'm happy that was years ago. I can share that with what we've had. It's been evolving through the years and certainly can welcome another conversation. Right. It would
141just be it would be a very small class usually cuz there's just true gifted and talented. It's not just a child who gets A's. It's it's a lot more than that. So, but yeah. Okay, great. Yeah. No, no, thank you for bringing that up. Yeah. And they go back in and they they might have missed something. Like just personally, my my daughter forgot uh miss you know, came back to her normal class and didn't realize there was work assigned in her book. Didn't bring the book home. She didn't know there was work for it and Right. Yep. That that's Yeah, no, this week we could definitely, you know, talk about with curriculum and go forward. I love the idea. So, it sets us apart. We have such a strong special education program. It would be
142nice, you know, to also enrich our enrichment students. Ms. Rigberg, I just want to comment first of all, I appreciate you bringing that up. We should never be afraid of bringing ideas. That's what we're here for. That's what we ran for. So, I also want to reiterate, we're never here to criticize or scrutinize the administration. So, I don't want you to feel just by making comments, that's not our mission. You know, it's >> that's their job. I don't want to Yeah. No, no, no. Dr. Garabedian. No, no, no. Like I said, if you ever I always encourage the board members to reach out to Dr. Garabedian and in this case that you did it publicly at a board meeting is excellent. This way we work on it. What I like you to do is bring
143up those issues that you feel are troubling or that you'd want to see changed and reach out to Dr. Garabedian an email and then like I said, we could put it on the agenda so we could have an open conversation. I don't want anybody to ever be afraid of saying something at a board meeting. I I don't think anybody in this on this board gets triggered with any word. So, never never feel that way. But I just I I just want to Well, I wasn't concerned anybody here about that. >> Okay. Well, I just I just want to make sure we're here to make positive change and work alongside with the administration, not tell them what to do. That's not our role as board members. We don't tell them. But we they certainly are open
144to suggestions or you know, complaints, conversations. That's what they're here to do. So, it's phenomenal that you brought it up and maybe you know, working with Phyllis and Mrs. Cameron, excuse me, and the administration, you know, we can better our programs. That's what we want to do. All right. So, thank you for your comments and we're looking forward to send get that email out and add some things that, you know, that you want to address. Okay, Mr. Scales, I know you wanted to say something and then I'll wrap it up with one or two comments. Yeah, I think um just kind of some of the conversations we've had about affordable housing and things like this and then um our schools being named after Monmouth County roads. It got me thinking, you know, when you look
145at sort of a publication that comes down and I'm like, well, wait a minute. Who you know, who truly is like an ally of our district? Right? What person is doing things that protects our school? Right? We don't have a governor that is protecting us whatsoever. We've got a $3 short hole. We've got a county team that's not protecting us, that didn't help our township committee fight for the affordable housing. So, when you think about the nation the United States of America has a birthday coming up and it's 250 years. And I've been struggling trying to figure out, well, how can our school really celebrate and promote that as well, too. So, what I'd like to propose is to form an exploratory committee to rename the primary school Donald J. Trump Primary School. So, I'd
146like everyone to take that into consideration and form a committee and see not only how much this would cost, but sort of, you know, what what what lines, if any, could be crossed by naming a school after a president. But, I've done some research on it as well. There are no schools in America named after Donald J. Trump, but there are 80 named after Barack Obama. Wow. So, what I yeah. I I sent that that those statistics to Kevin. Did he follow those? No. No. >> Oh. It's so funny. I just sent all of that information to him. So, I think it's time. I think it's time to Again, it's it's confusing having kind of the same name after two schools, but but I think if we look at who our true ally is and
147and kind of who we're modeling things after, the birthday of America and someone who has contributed a great deal of time to this great town of Coltsneck, it would be our president, Donald J. Trump. So, I'd like you all to consider that. Absolutely. I love the idea. I know and this is what gets the the mind going here. The branding that went behind the original naming of the schools. Is there Is there any found in the bylaws, but is there Is there methodology in the bylaws that came up with okay, we're going to call this Conover because it's Conover. Well, it was It wasn't stated as the the official The official name of the school is in the bylaws. Yep. By law, we can as a board, we can change any name we want. I
148I find very interesting. I I think the branding association behind is is critical cuz it sets a tone for generations to come. It's something to consider. I'm all on board for considering the opportunity. I love the opportunity of branding and and what it means. You're right. See what does See to tell you? What does Conover tell you? You know, I live on Deerpath. What is the name of Deerpath? You know, so I mean like, you know what I mean? Like, it's it's kind of yeah. If I may If I may, we were actually we were actually a beneficiary of Conover estate Yeah. when that when they passed and that was was one of the things we used to purchase uh uh playground equipment with. So, it's it's named after a landowner of Coltsneck. Conover itself
149>> Correct. It's a person. Conover is a person and I can provide you that historical information. I'm happy to share that onto the board because it's commemorating I do believe this was actually somewhere around here. It may not be actually here. This was the property of Joseph Conover and we actually were beneficiaries of his estate not too many years ago. the primary school. So, just wanted to give you that information. It's the It's the We'll call it the newest school in the district, right? So, to to your point again, crossing those lines, if something is named after an individual, one of the properties are named after that individual. So, we still have room for But, yeah, so some things to consider. Thank you for listening. Yeah. No worries. I I definitely think Oh, yes, Mr.
150Rugnetta. Uh piggyback on the piggyback you know on that on Mr. Skills suggested. I think it's a great idea, but I also maybe consider one of the schools Joshua Huddy school especially for 250th anniversary of the uh of our country and the revolutionary war uh naming one of the schools um not only after our president, but actually after Joshua Huddy cuz he's a local revolutionary war hero and definitely um symbolizes our town. So, we could take into consideration that as well too with exploratory. I like that. Joshua Huddy Park. Joshua Huddy Park. So, I mean if we're doing one, maybe do all three. Yeah. That's so funny. I just to be completely transparent, I've I me and Kevin have reached out to the president and would love to have him visit our district as well.
151So, instead of having Secretary McMahon, you know, just be transparent so in case anybody wants to Oprah Oprah request my records and I you know, I know people were wanted to know how long and all that stuff how long it took me to contact McMahon so that I I am working on that with Mr. Walsh's assistants. So, you know, like I said, it's out there. Obviously right now the tensions with the the ongoing conflict in Iran, that's not going to happen anytime soon, but I just want to let the public know that. Yeah. Um okay. So, moving on. I want Anybody have any final thoughts? Okay. Anybody Nope. Okay. Um lastly, I just want to the last meeting I meant to speak on this but it's the my mind we were so busy with other
152things, but I just want to remember not only the military that we lost um uh recently, but the family that was murdered in our town back in 2018, the Canaro family. I I did not know them personally. Maybe Mr. Walsh being in the police department, he you know, had some um you know, just normal interactions with them, but I I just wanted to remember the two children, their parents um that were violently taken from this earth. Those two children you know, were students here and um I can't imagine um the situation that the district went through. Dr. Garabed, the teachers that were you know, um in contact with these children every single day watching them grow, helping them you know, achieve the best you know, people that they can be. Um and it's it's just
153so sad that this entire thing happened and I just want to make sure that the community knows this board does remember and the fact that um the uh brother Paul was found guilty on all counts. Um so, justice I believe was served, but the reason why I'm bringing this up is I just you want to remember those two kids that they were you know, their lives were stolen from them. And uh What's that? Yeah. So, I just I just wanted to make sure >> that lead up to the schools, too. So, think about it. So, like I said, I prayed for them. I I hope they're in a much better place and I hope that we served them well while they were here. So, thank you, Dr. Garabed. I know you went through a lot
154with that situation. Um okay. Ending that, please pray pray for the military that we lost also and at this time I'm going to ask for a motion to move into executive session. We have a quick executive session on a grievance. Obviously no action's going to be taken on this tonight. Um and it probably would run about 10 minutes and our live streaming will conclude at this time. Motion. Thank you for joining us. Second. Second. Mr. Skills, all in favor. Opposed. Motion carried. Good night. Have any Mr. Wickberg is present for that vote. Roll call. Okay. All right. Can we