001Thank you. Okay. Good evening everyone. In accordance with the Open Public Meeting Act, NJSA 104-6, adequate notification of this meeting has been provided by advertising in the record and the Herald News, posting notice in the board of education administration building, and filing notice with the city clerk to ensure accessibility interpreter services are available upon request. Please submit your written request at least 24 hours prior to the board meeting to the school business administrator, Dr. Steven A. Lewis at stephven lewisle ew wis hackinackschools.org. I hereby call to order the special meeting on Wednesday, March 11th, 2026 in the Hackinack High School Media Center at >> 6:17 p.m. Dr. Lewis, can you please do a roll call? >> Trustee Alston Balutra, >> present. >> Trustee Abrahamza, >> present. Trustee Carol >> present. >> Trustee Gilmore >> here.
002>> Trustee Jones >> here. >> Trustee Pringle >> present. >> Trustee Stein >> here. >> Vice President Martin >> present. >> President Harris >> present. >> We have quum. >> Thank you. Please stand for the flag salute. I hold 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. Please be seated. >> Okay. So before we go into executive session, I would just like to make a just a quick um clarification here. So, originally this meeting was meant to be to approve the preliminary budget. Um, that's what's stated in our in our calendar in our district calendar. However, our new governor, Governor Cheryl, she just gave her state budget address yesterday afternoon, which means that after she
003gives her statement, she has 48 hours to release the state fund information. Is that correct? Right. Information. um which means we do not have that information for us to approve a preliminary budget tonight. However, um in between that time, we did receive the letter that we have been waiting for from the state of New Jersey um approving us to use our cash reserves. So that happened on March 2nd, which means our next closest meeting was already which was March 11th. Um so we are here tonight um for the consideration of the board to resend or recall the instructional staff um that were going to be rifted at our last meeting. Um also to to add to that didn't say oh yeah so for the preliminary budget our next board meeting is on the 18th. It
004is our hope and expectation that we can have the preliminary budget done by the 18th. If not, then we will let the public know and we will create another special meeting specifically for the preliminary budget. Okay. So, at this time, we are going to go into executive session. Be it resolved that the Hackasak Board of Education determines it necessary to meet in executive session on Wednesday, March 11th, 2026 to discuss legal, personnel, student related matters, HIV reports, negotiations, and other confidential matters and be it further resolved that these matters will be made public when the need for confidentiality no longer exists. Can I have a motion to go into executive? >> So move. >> Okay. Motion by Trusty Stein and a second. >> Second by Trustee Carol. All those in favor say I. >> I.
005>> Anyone opposed? Any abstensions? Okay. Just >> Okay. So, Trusty Alra abstains. All right. So, we're going to go into executive session so that the public is aware. We shall return approximately before 7:30. Thank you. All right. Good evening everyone. May I have a motion to reopen to the public? >> Make a motion. >> Motion by Trustee Jones. Can I have a second? Second by Vice President Martin. All those in favor say I. I. Anyone opposed? Any abstensions? Okay. Thank you. Welcome back. It is 7:32. Um, so we're going to go into public comments. Public participation shall be governed by the following rules. If in person, a participant must sign the sign-in sheet and be recognized by the preciding officer and must preface comments by announcement of his or her name, municipality of residence, and
006group affiliation if applicable. Two, each statement made by a participant shall be limited to a 3minut duration during the public session. Three, all statement questions or inquiries shall be redirected shall be directed to the presiding officer and any questions or inquiries directed by a participant to another board member shall be redirected to the presiding officer who shall determine if such statement, question or inquiry shall be addressed by the presiding officer on behalf of the board or by the individual board member. And four, all board and or acting superintendent responses to questions or inquiries shall be held until the end of public participation. At this time, the floor will be open to anyone in public who would like to speak. Okay, I see that there are none. Anyone online? Okay, there are none. So, at this
007time, the public comment section is closed. on to our committee reports and resolutions and the chair of personnel is trustee. Thank you madame president. Uh the personnel committee met this week and we have uh only two items personnel items A and B to offer. Um given there are two I would like to read these resolutions um for information. Uh personnel item A. Be it resolved that the Hackinack Board of Education upon the recommendation of the acting superintendent of schools recall the following non-certificated whose positions were reduced for the purposes of economy and efficiency at the January 28th, 2026 board of education meeting effective March 31st, 2026. The staff members noted below will retain their employment through June 30th, 2026. And that is personnel items A1 through A6 and personnel resolution B. Be it resolved that
008the Hackinack Board of Education upon the recommendation of the acting superintendent of schools recall the following certificated staff whose positions were reduced for the purposes of economy and efficiency at the January 28th, 2026 board of education meeting effective March 31st, 2026. The staff members noted below will retain their employment through June 30th, 2026. And those are personnel items B1 through uh through B69. Um so again, I'd like to to make a motion uh and offer personnel items um A and B. >> Thank you, Trusty Mahamsa. Uh so we have a motion from Trusty Amrahams. Can I have a second? >> A second. >> Second by Trustee Pringle. Okay. Um, Dr. Lewis, can you please do a roll call? >> Trustee Alman Bucha. >> Yes. >> Trustee Amarza. >> Yes. >> Trustee Carol. >> Yes. >>
009Prestige Gilmore. >> Yes. >> Trustee Jones. >> Yes. >> Prestige Pringle. >> Yes. >> Prestige Stein. >> Yes. >> Vice President Martin. >> Yes. President Harris. >> Yes. >> Motion carries. >> Thank you. And um you know, once again, I just wanted to thank our mayor and council um for their support in order for us to let this happen. Um and also with the approval of the state for us to use our cash reserves, we are able to to do this tonight. So, thank you once again. Um moving on to new business. >> I have I of one item. >> Sure. And in the interest of time, I'm going to bring it up as a new item. It could be postponed till a future agenda >> to answer. >> Yes. >> Okay. Sure. >> But
010um I have a suggestion that we uh consider shifting from uh personnel committee to a committee of the whole for personnel given the number of personnel decisions that we will need to ratify in the coming months. Um I think this is something that we should consider so that all trustees um have an opportunity to discuss at the same time but I I defer to discuss this at a future meeting. Anybody else want to add to that? Okay. Thank you. Any other new business? All right. So we are going to move on to our second public comment portion where individuals may address the board on agenda and school matters of community interest for one minute. Anyone from the public would like to speak? Okay. Anybody online? None. Okay. So public second public comment section is closed.
011Now we're going to move on to our presentation. Um today or tonight I should say we have our New Jersey school board's um field rep Melissa Del Rosaso who will be presenting um for us tonight on the CSA evaluation. Welcome Melissa. Where is it? Sorry. Hold on. We have a technical difficulty already. Okay. Hi everybody. Um, I'm back. So, uh, thank you for having me back and I'm looking forward to talking to you this evening about the CSA evaluation process. Um, I don't know if there's any Is there anybody new here that hasn't done it yet? >> Okay. So, you need to pay attention. No. Um, we're going to go through it and I'm I'm going to send you a copy of this presentation later on. So, don't worry about going overboard with taking notes.
012It's to get the idea of the overall process. Um, understand what what you're doing and why you're doing it. And then, of course, if you ever have any questions as you're going through this, you have my number pick give me a call and I will walk you through personally if any if you need anything. Okay. So, let's go. >> Okay. Okay. So, the superintendent evaluation tool is what we're talking about tonight. Um, there's there's a couple of different pieces to it and there's legalities to it which we are going to cover. But to start off with, it's very important that you understand whether or not you're able to participate in the evaluation. So, as an ethics reminder, a board member whose relative works in the district may not take part in the superintendent evaluation process.
013Um, you don't have to uh raise your hand or do anything like that now, but I just want you to consider thinking about any conflicts that you may have and then having a discussion with your board president and then if you need to ask your uh board attorney, you go down that road because it does get very complicated and it's important that if you need to recuse yourself or say out of the process that you do that early on. Okay. Evaluation of the chief school administrator is the board's means of oversight and appraisal of the effective management of the school district. As we talked about during the ethics presentation and went through, your main responsibility, you have one person within the district that you are responsible to hire, evaluate and um oversee and that is
014the superintendent. Okay. Okay. So the legal guidelines and why you do this is because it is a required by statute. You need to do an evaluation of your superintendent once a year. It must be in writing. God bless you. Um you must the board and the superintendent meet to discuss the findings and the evaluation will be based on the goals and objectives of the district responsibilities of the superintendent. So those are important to know and you'll be going through their areas of strengths where they need improvement, professional growth, um student progress. You will have your board goals, not your board goals, my apologies, your district goals is what's a big driver in this evaluation process. Okay? And the most important thing you'll see up there is this all must be completed by July 1st. So
015what you do when you create your calendar, you're working your way backwards from that date. So that's really important and it's very important for QAC which is what we're going next. So the CQAC requirements um it aligns and you get points for doing this if you get it done by July 1st that's six points. So you really don't want to miss out on that. And then obviously the process itself is also what you get points for. So do you need to use the NJSBA evaluation tool as it is it required? It is not required. However, it will meet all of the requirements that you will find within the statute. So, it is optional to use. Most districts do use it. It's a pretty easy process and it's all laid out for you. Okay. That being
016said, it allows participation by all non-click conflicted members. It's online. It's fairly simple from that. And um it's just a process where the the CSA uh be puts in their information and gets it going and then it comes out to the board. So it's just a pretty seamless process. Oh, there you go. Making the process seamless. I just keep rolling into it here. Um so there's a few steps that you want to do before we even get started with that. You should be having a uh you should be reviewing your district goals. I would say at least twice a year. So you should about around this time be looking at how you're doing against your district goals. Your superintendent should provide an update so that everybody's on the same page before you jump into the
017process. Okay? And part of the process will be that the superintendent is going to upload those district goals and do a self-evaluation. But as a group, you should be reviewing it at some point in the near future if you haven't done so already. And again, a minimum of doing it now, but it should be done throughout the year to make sure that the progress is moving along and there's no surprises. So, what you start out with is your BA will need to make sure that the district census is up to date within the New Jersey school board um system and that means that you have a designated board president because everything that everything rolls off of these important pieces, right? because the board president is a part of the process and the information goes to
018the board president and then follows down from there. All um board members information must be in there. Please make sure that the sentence census reflects your schoolboard email address. You should never be using a personal email. And this is really important here because if you ever had an issue, your personal emails would be able to be operated, etc. And especially because it's dealing with personnel, you just want to avoid that at all costs. You also, like I said, want to make sure that your board president a is aware if there's any conflicts for anybody so that we can mark that in the system and then that individual will not be uh filtered through the process. So, if you have a conflict as a board member, you're not going to get the email. You may get
019the email if it's not marked, but you won't be able to get in to do the processes, which is what we want because we want to prevent that from being an issue down the road. Okay? There we go. And then we are going to talk about the evaluation calendar. Um I gave off some copies and I understand you're already um moving along on that which is great because again you start it seems like it's a long ways off July but it comes a lot quicker than you realize. Okay, covered that. Making sure the census is correct. Another thing is when you go on the New Jersey School Board Association website, there is a tutorial, frequently asked questions, and a ton of information out there. So, as an individual, if you haven't done this before, or
020even if you haven't, because you know, it takes you don't do it for a year, and then it's like, how do we do this again? You can go in there and there's video and everything else, webinars and stuff like that to help you as well. But, of course, I'm always available as well. So this is a sample calendar uh that I gave um I left that with you Jennifer so that you have that but basically that's the process and what you'll see is it starts with district goal setting which you've already done and that's behind you but it's kind of a cycle. So when you come out of the CSA evaluation you'll see all the way at the top June and July you're rolling right back into doing district goals. So the process is cyclical.
021All right. So the whole process, the way it works, district goal setting and action plans, district goals, progress updates, that's the thing that I mentioned you should be doing twice a year. A lot of boards have trouble keeping up with that, but it is really important so that you know, I mean, when you set goals and objectives, it's really important to see how you're doing along the way so there's no surprise down the road. Okay. The superintendent evaluation pre-conference, that's what we're talking about now about having an update from the superintendent on where you are. so that the board is all on the same page. It's a great opportunity to ask questions if you're not sure of something because before you move ahead to evaluate it, you want to make sure that you fully understand
022where you are. Then it goes, the superintendent will go in first and complete the district goals and self- assessment and the six leadership standard self- assessment as well. So that's the first step and then it moves on. Once the superintendent has completed it, you will get an email. The superintendent has um 48 hours before the board is updated to go in and begin their part. And the point of that is so that if the superintendent thinks of something or wants to change something, there's that little buffer in there. So once the once the board of ed gets that, they're it's opened up to them and then they go in and they complete the individual superintendent evaluation. So each one of you will be doing your own independently. Once that is complete, the board president lets
023me know and then we go ahead and we compile all that information into a report that the board will review. The board will review all of that and then you'll come up with a summary. So one of the things you're going to find when you're going through this process is you have to make a lot of comments. And as somebody who has done this, sometimes you might struggle as you're going through it. So, a couple things to remember. You can save where you are. You don't have to do this all in one sitting. Okay? So, don't be overwhelmed by that. And you can go back in and pick up where you left off. And if you want to move forward once you've done the ratings, you at each end of each piece, there's a comment
024section. It's really important to take the time and write those comments because you're going to be coming up with a summary and it usually falls on the board president to put that together. and they will take all those various comments and kind of put it together into a summary that really speaks of the board's perspective. Okay? If for some reason you don't have a comment in a section, you still need to put something in if you want to move ahead. So, what I recommend that you put in is just put a period in or something like that so you can move ahead. Another thing is if you're not sure of the comment, you can move ahead and as long as you don't submit it, you can always go back to that area. whatever it takes
025to move through it so that you don't get caught up because I know sometimes that will delay things. Um, so those are just some tips there. Once you have all of this together, you're going to do the annual summary conference. So non-conlicted board members will meet with the superintendent to discuss the annual performance report. It's important for this piece, just so you know too, the board president will deliver the summary in advance to your superintendent so that the superintendent has the ability to read through it prior to the annual conference. That's also very important because you don't want to surprise them and you want them to have the opportunity to read through it, of course. So, the summary will be made up of the majority of the board opinion. It will not have dissenting comments
026or or opinions in it. Okay? It's going to be the overall perspective. However, it is at the annual summary conference that an individual board trustee will have the opportunity to speak and and voice their concerns if there is a dissenting opinion or opinion that differs in the majority. Okay. Um and then the board president and the superintendent sign date the annual performance report. All of this needs to be done by July 1st. This is super important. If you remember nothing else tonight, remember this, okay? Once you have the signed version, the board president will give it to the board attorney to hold on to. Okay? And the CSA should keep their own copy as well. We at school boards do not keep them because they're personnel records. We will delete them by the end [clears
027throat] of the year. So, we cannot recreate it. I have an example now where a board just called me and there was really extenduating circumstances that they did not have. the the superintendent had a major um emergency family issue that stopped them from doing it and there was a ball dropped whatever and at the end of the day they don't have a copy of it and they called me now and they've all been deleted for the year from last year so they have to kind of recreate it and um you just don't want to be in that position so both the board should have a copy and again it's confidential so it should be kept with the board attorney and then the CSA should also have their copy Okay. Um, now we're going to go
028into the pre-evaluation conference is to discuss or share like we talked about the pro progress on the district goals, performance based on the standards, student progress, any questions or concerns. Okay. So that then we all know where where the the district is on their goals. The evaluation will be based on the goals and object objectives of the district. It's very important that you're focusing on that when you're doing this review. You do have an opportunity to you will also look at all of the different leadership perspectives and things like that, but it's also very important that you're looking at this in a very objective manner and you're looking at it how your CSA is a is and they should be evaluated on the performance of the district and how they're doing that role. You want
029to make sure that you're keeping out anything personal, right? That you're wearing your board hat as you go through this. Um so three to five of the most critical focus areas for the year to move the district forward, advance student achievement, hold superintendent accountable through the evaluation process. Um it's an annual collaborative process. Again, this is your one opportunity to evaluate and it's a very big opportunity for you to help push the district forward through your evaluation of the superintendent. Okay. So this is the website and when you go that's the landing page. So you'll see the quick resources and where you see CSA and board self-evaluation that's where you would be going and this is what it looks like. So again I'm going to send you a copy of this. There's another thing just
030so you know too. If you're especially if you're new at this or if you want you're one of those people that kind of want to see it on paper, there is an op option to print it as a PDF which might help you take notes or plan it through before you do it online. Some people just more comfortable that way but it is an option there that's available. Um this is an example of the compilation for a goal. So whether it's achieved, satis satisfactory progress made, little or no progress made. There's also an opportunity on there for you to mark that you have not um I forget what it was like you haven't seen it, right? So you have that opportunity in case it's something that you have not had the had the opportunity to
031view. For new board members, another important thing to remember when you're doing this, you are doing this based on your time on the board. So, you're not really going out a full year if you were newly elected and started in January or or whatever your circumstances were. Please remember to do this review only from your time on the board, which is another example why you may be in a position that you may have not had the opportunity to see what that particular criteria is. Okay? But even if you've attended every meeting and you think you know know what what's been happening, make sure you're by now you know that as a board member your perception is a little bit different than an audience member, right? Community member. Okay. So the standards the reflect qualities values
032of leadership work integral to student success and it assists the boards in identifying areas of strength and where more more focus is needed. These are the six standards. I'm not going to read through them, but you can see them. And this is another example of what the assessment looks like. So, you see down at the bottom where there's board comments. That's what I was referring to. Okay? And then each standard looks like this. Also, be make sure you look your your superintendent will be attaching evidence to go along with their self-evaluation. So, they're going to have some proof in there in what they have accomplished. Make sure you take the time to go through that evidence and and look at it. And if you don't see it or you don't know where it is, either
033reach out to me, you can reach out to your superintendent, your BA, anybody. But just make sure that you I'm I'm not going to lie, my first year I did this, I never even saw those the evidence things. So, it's not necessarily easy to find. I think it's been updated since I originally had done that, but it's they do a lot of work to put that in there. And uh you don't want to miss that. This is a sample of the compilation and what it looks like when it is done and put together. So you'll see that depending on where everybody falls out in in you know it comes together and you'll get an overall rating and you'll see trends which is also very interesting and something for the board to consider in how you're
034evaluating and what you're looking at. Um so the annual performance report consists of the compilation which is a compilation of non-conlicted members remember opinions and then like I mentioned earlier you're going to go with the majority opinion when you put your summary together not any dissenting opinions. So in other words, if you have a seven member board and you have five people that are all up at the top and there's two down at the bottom in in perspective, you're sticking with the top five and that's what go is going into the the summary. Okay. And then you have the annual performance report which is the evaluation. And here we go. Steps to the final outcome. Same thing over again. Annual performance report written by the board president or designate. So, we want to make sure
035that the board president has enough time and enough comments to be able to write that summary. And then again, you discuss it at the end. And remember, in the beginning here, um, and at the end, you need to make sure that your CSA is riceed. Okay? Rice notice. Um, I we are able to provide you with the template to put together the summary. That's an example of it. I will get that to you. And again, this is just more examples of what it looks like. And there's the part not observed is the part that I was talking about earlier, right? Okay. The annual summary conference again is a lot of the same stuff here. We've covered this. You need to have that before July 1st. You're going to create your calendar based backwards from there.
036And also, as you'll see in there, it's the majority of the total members in the minority opinion may be expressed vocally in that meeting. So, next steps. Um, so New Jersey school board, what I guess the next step would be you're pretty you're moving along in it already. So, your board president's going to let me know if there's anything anybody that's conflicted. Um, this is telling you basically after you've completed the thing. So we comp compile the individual responses. The board president receives the confidential compilation, reviews it with the board. Again, this is just going into more detail of the picture that you just saw before. Um, and the superintendent is wred. You discuss it. You come up with the summary. You make sure that the summary is agreed upon. Hence, the board president writes
037the annual performance report. You will also have an opportunity if you build your calendar out enough to have one more review on that. Um or you can the president can discuss it individually with board members if so that you don't have a quorum in a board meeting. But it also can be done right in that meeting just so you know in your first one depending on the amount of time that you have to do that. Again this is what I already mentioned who keeps a copy. Really really important to make sure you hold on to those copies and that they're kept confidential. Um, okay. So, this goes into again what I said earlier. It is a cyclical process. It's not a once a year event. Even though we're talking about the evaluation piece, it goes
038from creating your your objectives, making sure that they're being carried out. And again, this is just the um this is just a piece of of the puzzle. And even though we spend a lot of time on it, it's a very important piece. The objective here is to for you to oversee how the district is run and that's the piece of the puzzle is the CSA evaluation and understanding the importance of that piece. Okay, that's pretty much it. Any questions? Thank you. Okay, like I said, I will send you a copy of this um and a little bit more supporting information which will walk you through it. But please don't hesitate to call me if you have any questions because it's a lot to look at and go through and when you it can be a
039little overwhelming if you haven't done the evaluation before. And even on the individuals as a superintendent, if you have any questions going through the process, please let me know. And the same thing as board president, you have a little more pieces a few more pieces in there. So please don't hesitate to let me know if you have any questions. And again, thank you for everything you do and appreciate your time. >> Thank you so much. Thank you for that refresher. And and just so you know and everyone is aware. Um we already pre-planned already we have our dates already scheduled for our meetings um discussions. So we are all set to go so far. >> That's great. And if you want to share that with me, just so you know, I will pencil it in
040and and make sure I'm on top of making sure that you get your compilation as quickly as possible, especially if you're first on there. So it's not like me going through a bunch of emails because you can imagine it's 70s something districts and everybody's doing it at the last minute usually or hitting it all at the same time when you get that bottleneck. So if you let me know that I will make sure that I'm on top of it for you as well. >> All right. Excellent. Thank you so much. >> Thank you. Appreciate it. >> All right. And um Okay. So that is it for this evening. Uh we will not do board comments tonight as next week is our regular board meeting. Um and we have a lot more to say by our
041next meeting. Um, so at this time, can I have a motion to adjurnn? >> Motion by Trusty Stein. Can I have a second? >> Second one. >> And a second by Trustee Gilmore. All those in favor say I. >> I. >> Anyone opposed? All right, it is 8:00. 8:00 PM. Thank you so much, everyone. Get home safe. Thank you. Have a good night.