001[Music] Good evening everyone. I would like to call to order the April 9th, 2025 Hamilton Township Board of Education meeting. This meeting is being held in compliance with the sunshine wall having been advertised in the press of Atlantic City and noticees posted at the township clerk's office, Maze Landing Post Office, MSPA post office, Atlanta County Library as well as the schools of the district. This meeting is being recorded. Roll call, please. [Music] Mrs. Ankra here. Mrs. Bachelor here. Dr. Serena here. Mrs. Jackson here. Dr. La Hawk here. Dr. Nelson, Mrs. Pa here, Mr. Rogers here, and Mrs. Bar here. Can I please have a motion to convene into executive session? Second motion by Miss Perto, second by Miss Jackson. All in favor? I oppose. Resolve that pursuant to section 7 and 8 of the open
002public meetings act, the public shall be excluded from the portion of the meeting involving discussion of legal matters, attorney client privilege, personnel matters, and HIV. Be it further resolved that the discussion of such subject matter in executive session can be disclosed to the public when formal action is taken on such subject matter or any other appropriate time. Be it further resolved the board may take action on items discussed in executive session. Now therefore be it resolved the board will be in executive session for approximately 30 minutes. Thank you. [Music] Good evening everyone. Welcome to the April 9th 2025 Township Board of Education meeting. Can I please have a motion to executive session and reconvene to public session? Second. Motion by Dr. Serino, second by Dr. Nelson. All in favor? I opposed. Thank you. Will you
003please stand for the [Music] pledgece to the flag of America to the republic for it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all. [Music] Please take a moment of silence for private reflections. Thank you. Can I please have a motion to approve the minutes of regular and executive session meeting March 12th, 2025? Motion by Dr. Nelson, second by Miss Jackson. Comments or questions? Roll call. Mrs. Anker. Yes. Mrs. Bachelor. Yes. Dr. Serino. Yes. Mrs. Jackson. Yes. Dr. La. Yes. Dr. Nelson. Yes. Mrs. Petta. Yes. Mr. Rogers. Yes. And Mrs. Bar. Yes. At this time, I will turn it over to Dr. Zto for presentation. Thank you, Mrs. Bar. Uh, so our first presentation is our reading challenge winner for the month of April. And we have Mrs. Decker who is going
004to present our reading challenge winner. Mr. Decker, do you mind coming on up? Hello. Today I would like to present Marielle Gention. And her teacher reports Mrs. Bowman Black that Marielle is confident, positive, and a great role model for her classmates. She is kind-hearted and frequently is among the first to help and mentor other classmates in all subjects. She has the ability to share and discuss what she has learned in a mature and engaging way. She especially loves to discuss what we are reading and is a valuable part of our classroom. I am lucky to have Marielle as my student this year and love watching her grow and interact with her classmates. [Applause] Mr. Ste, can you take a picture with Marielle real quick, please? And before you take off, is the is Marielle's family
005here? Can you come down for a quick picture, please? Come on down. Sure, Marielle, stay here. Congratulations. Thank you. And while you're up here, Mrs. Stacker, would you mind staying up here? Um, I'm really proud to present uh our next award and it is uh for our very special program here at uh Hamilton Township and it's our read 180 program that you kind of leave with our teachers here and we have some great news. I was hoping you could share that. Well, thank you. So, Dr. Zto asked me to share because we had great news. Um, so I did write a little bit. Read 180 is a specialized reading program designed to support some of our students with special needs and here at the middle school some of our multilingual learners. Recently we had the
006opportunity to meet with representatives from HMH to review our students mid-year progress and the results were outstanding. So about onethird of the students in the program made three times the expected growth. And as you can see from this slide, all grade levels. So that students um in fourth through 8th grade have already exceeded the mid-year growth target at two grade levels, sixth and eighth grade have already exceeded the expected growth for the entire year. This program is making a real difference to in helping students develop the reading skills they need to succeed. So, a heartfelt thank you to the school board for your ongoing support and to our incredible teachers, some of whom are here with us tonight, uh, for their dedication in making this program so effective. Their hard work is truly changing [Applause]
007lives. So, we have about 11 teachers in the district that teach this program, but we have five of them here tonight. So, I'd like to call up um Kelly Falloon, Jess Ward, Jessica Tovin, Lee Pickering, and Amy Carter, who is also our read 180 coordinator. She does an amazing job. [Music] Yes. Thank you. stare. Dr. M, would you come up and take a picture, please? want to thank you for all you do. Thank you so much. [Applause] [Music] Congratulations. All right. I Davies team, can you please come down to introduce um something special that happened this year with our sports team? So, can I have Dr. Hm, she come down and then coaches from volleyball, can you come down as well, please? [Applause] [Music] So, I I just want to say that I am excited
008to keep having to come up here to talk about undefeated teams because we have a bunch. So, uh congratulations to our volleyball team. They went 11 and0 and I'm going to like the coaches kind of tell you a little bit about their season and the fact that we have an amazing team. Hello, I am uh Mr. Latanio. Uh this is my first year coaching at Davies. Um we had a great start to the season. Um after our first game, I had all the the students look up at the banner. Uh we noticed that there was no 2025 or any number up there. So, uh, after that, I told them all that our goal was to put a number on that banner and, uh, they played their hearts out and they had an amazing season. So,
009all the props to them cuz they did great. [Applause] [Music] She didn't want to be first, so I'm going to skip her. Uh, our first award is for Taylor Campbell. [Applause] And our second one is for Johanna [Applause] Abraham. Our third one is Jaden Forest. [Applause] Our next one is Paula Hank. [Applause] Our next one is Peter Oolage. [Applause] Our next one is Shiloh Nelson. [Applause] Uh, next is Caleb [Applause] Nash. Uh, next is Nathan Ericson. [Applause] Next we have blue L blue. [Applause] And last, but certainly not least, the only sixth grader to make the team, Colton [Applause] Cedo. Uh, we also have a manager here, um, Maya Carter. [Applause] I [Music] think that's that is everybody that is here. We have a lot more to hand out at school tomorrow. So, good job,
010guys. [Applause] I'm not sure [Music] [Applause] [Music] All right. Ready, Mr. Dempsey? We're doing this again, huh? All right, Mr. Rogers, you ready? We're going to see if this works this time. Here we go. And now would like to present to you the staff of the month for the March uh month. Here we go. Don't worry. Sheen starts a little late. [Music] Sometimes the door, can you hold the door? Yes. No, I'm going to sing. of the month. Staff of the month. All right, we have a new shader staff of the month. Guess who it is? Thank you guys. Oh my goodness. Thank you guys. I have three of my friends. The best. Thank you. Hello. That's so exciting. This is Jameson. Thank you so much. We're set about that. Okay. Mrs. J is a
011goto person. Hi guys. Bye. So, all of the kind things I said about Mary, are you ready? Thank you so much for being smart church. Miss Jameson is always willing to give a helping hand and she follows through on all of your promises. She's so kind and loving and serial for her students and staff. She's a great role model. We love working with Mrs. Jameson. She always is positive and has been by even when she has a freaking love her for being her and we want to thank her very much. A thank you guys. Thank [Applause] you. Morning. I know. We are here because your teacher, Mrs. Ellie is my future and she time her students no matter how small their she has been a great leader in her classroom and she has a true
012connection to each of her students. She has utilized social emotional tools in her classroom in order to help students need in that way. Mrs. Elliot has also done an excellent job of handling and being the chair of the INR committee and ensuring that each member of the team is heard. Great job. So every month, so every month we have a staff of the month. So I'm going to read what this person said. I would like to nominate Miss Pep for staff of the month for her incredible dedication and hard work, hard work. She played a key role in organizing the basketball team, putting in countless hours to ensure success. In addition, she is spearheading the plan for each end of the year events, making sure students have a memorable sendoff. Beyond these major contributions, she
013has stepped in across multiple grade levels and subject areas. She's always willing to support both students and colleagues when they need it. Her commitment, flexibility, and positive attitude make her an invaluable member of the D team, and she is truly deserving of this recognition. So, congratulations for staff of the month. Thank you. Thank you. So, two things I want to say about that. First, I need you guys to know that Miss Jameson from Shainer was in kindergarten when I was a teacher. So, that's making me feel really old right now. She remembers me from my teaching days. And secondly, we do have Mrs. back here and I do want to congratulate her. Can we all give her a nice round of applause? There she is. Thank you for all you do. All right. At this
014time, I have u my student council here and they're going to give us our update from the William Davies Middle School. Take it away. Start off. It is National Assistant Principal Week. So I would like to thank Miss Jones and Mr. K from S as well as Mr. Brown, Mr. Dioro, and Mr. Lavine from Davies for all that they do in our schools. Please from the front, we will be meeting on April 28th for our last session. Mr. Thomas will be coming in person to facilitate and support our club. We will be recognizing those students who have attended the progress they have made throughout the year. kindness club. At the last meeting, students made signs to promote the dance through the decades that was held last week. They also decorated the bulletin board by the
015school store to celebrate and raise awareness for neurodyiversity. We will be taking our trip on April 10th to the Ocean City Beaches to help with beach cleanup. The dancing through the decades dance was a huge success. Fifth grade welcome dance coming up May 9th sponsored by PBIS. Resilience Action Group. The Brazilians Action Group has submitted their MJ climate challenge videos highlighting their year-long projects including the Dragon's Nest thrift store, power gardens growing micro greens and vegetables, the food recovery program, and the building of bug homes to be used in the outdoor classrooms and around campus. Saturday, April 12th, the group will venture back to Esto Manor Park to finish the installation of the green gardens with the Atlantic County Parks Commission and Pineland Adventures. The Davies music department is gearing up for the Davy spring
016concert on Tuesday, May 6 at 7:00 p.m. This will take place at the Hes school. It will feature the Davies Concert Band, percussion ensemble, and choir. Nine Davies sixth grade band students will perform at the elementary honors band festival on May 3rd at Asagami High School. These students were nominated and selected for this ensemble in February. The Davies Jazz Band and Select Choir will be performing at this year's Atlanta County Teen Arts Festival on Wednesday, May 7th during the school day. These are only some of the students that will be attending the festival from Davies. Art, drama, literature, and media students will also be attending the event in downtown Hmon on May 7th. Resilient Action East SEM students went to Esto Manor Park on Thursday, April 3rd to prepare a site for a rain garden.
017Students were working with Atlantic County Park staff and the Pineelands Preservation Alliance to engineer the rain garden site which will collect storm water runoff from the nature center and adjacent parking lot plot. This Saturday, April 12th, students will return to Esto Manor to plant native species in and around the rain garden that will provide valuable pollinator and wildlife habitat. This community booth resilience project is a part of the NJ DOE climate ch climate change expansion great grant and an effort to reduce flooding and pollution in local waterways. This is what Mr. K wanted me to say. Mr. K would like to take a moment to humbly congratulate me, yes me, the one, the only Brexit Miko for achieving photographic greatness. My nature photo was entered into a national contest and caught the eye of National
018Geographic, which is a huge deal. Out of more than 500 portfolios and submissions, my masterpiece landed in the top 30. That's right, top 30, not 31, not 300, 30. The Dragon Network will be live streaming the in school volleyball tournament on April 17th for the entire district to watch. The event will be hosted by eighth grader Roman Rivera and seventh grader Andy Cologne. On Tuesday, the entire animation world changed overnight with Open AI's new animation and chat engine. It didn't take long for Mr. K's media classes to master the new node editing platforms. Seventh and eighth graders made themselves as cartoons. You can see this and so much more on the Dragon Network's Instagram page, WDMS Media. The volleyball madness prelims were Monday the 7th and now coming up on Thursday the 17th which is
019also bring your child a birthday we will have the volleyball madness finals. The following teams that made it to the finals are Mr. Perrifka, Mr. Beck, Mr. Kleco, Mr. Latanzio and Mr. Louisiana. That's everything. Thank you so much. I do want to say to the board members um what I received from the students at William De is uh for both Valerie and Braxton that Valerie is not just a great student but she's a great friend to all students and so I do want you to know that those are the compliments you don't always get to hear and I know firsthand Brexton's kindness uh not only with just uh the kids in the school but my own child as well. So I want to thank you for not only being amazing students, great speakers, but good
020humans as well. Thank you so [Applause] much for my superintendent report and good bakers. We found that out too. Um I want to extend my deepest gratitude to each and everyone of uh my staff um for your incredible professionalism and composure during today's incident involving an identified threat. Your calm presence and quick, steady actions help keep our students safe, reassured, and focused. No ma no small feat in a stressful situation. It's in moments like these that the strength of our team shines brightest. Thank you for being the amazing group of individuals that you are. I'm proud to work alongside you and grateful for your unwavering dedication to our schools and students. For your review, please see the registration and the transfer statistics for last month, the enrollment, the discipline reports, and the HIV reports. The
021following are dates to remember. April 14th is our PTA meeting at 7:00 p.m. right here at Davies Cafeteria. The 18th to the 25th of April will be our spring break. On April 26th, the PTA will be hosting the Playland Castaway Cove, uh, where you can go on rides from 1 to 4:00 p.m. Wristbands will be handed out between 12 and 2:30. On May 3rd, the Hamilton Township School District amazing resource fair. It'll be at the H School from 10 to 1:00 p.m. And that's just a phenomenal feat uh, put on by our staff and Mr. Romano. On May 6th, the Davy spring concert and we'll be at the head school auditorium at 7:00 p.m. May 7th will be our next board of education meeting. 5:15 will be executive session. 5:45 will be our regular session
022right at the DB school cafeteria. On May 8th is the Hes 45 choir in the Hes auditorium at 7:00. On the 15th of May is the Hes concert band auditorium uh in the auditorium at H at 7:00. On the 19th is our next PTA meeting for Hme at 700 p.m. in the Davies Cafeteria. On the 26th, the schools will be closed for Memorial Day. On the 30th will be the eighth grade dinner dance at the Davies cafeteria at 5:00. This concludes my superintendent report. Thank you. At this time, we will receive public comments on tonight's agenda items only. There are two opportunities to address the members of the board. The board values and welcomes comments and opinions from residents as long as remarks are not personal or discourageous. The public comment portion of the meeting
023allows the board to listen to community members and to hear their opinions on school policy and operations. The first public portion is reserved for persons wishing to speak about agenda items only. The second opportunity following action items is when residents may address the board on any school rellated issue. Each speaker is asked to limit their comments to three minutes and you are not permitted to yield your time to another. The public comments portion of the meeting during both sessions will not exceed 30 minutes. Upon being recognized, persons wishing to speak should stand and identify themselves by name and address. Any public comment on tonight's agenda? Okay, seeing none, we'll close public comment and go to board member comments. There any board members? I'd like to make a comment if I could. I wanted to congratulate
024Braxton on behalf of the board for the great achievement in uh getting into the top 30 of the National Geographic. Um not 31, not 300. That's an amazing achievement. And if it hasn't already been shared on social media, if you would give the school and the board the um rights to show your photography, I think that would be awesome to see. So, congratulations, Dr. Hawk. Yeah. Hi. Um so, on March 28th, I had the opportunity to attend the ladies tea here at um and um I just want to say thank you to Mrs. Tobin, Mrs. Carter, and the entire team that puts that together. Um, it's my 12th year attending and I absolutely love spending time with the ladies and talking about my profession and listening to all the professional women talk about how they
025got to their career and their career path and um, the girls looked absolutely gorgeous and it was just a very nice morning. So, thank you to Mrs. Tobin and her team and everyone at DBs that participated. Thanks. Um, I wanted to say I had the uh fun of going bowling with the Red Wings. Um, believe I beat somebody. I'm looking at you. Yeah, we we had a challenge, but I I went ahead and paid him out of his gift card, but it there it wasn't very pretty. But, uh, we also were able to play with Ian Lavine and, uh, we played for a hug. Anybody that doesn't know Ian, I think that's kind of weird, but for people that do know him understand the prize in that. So, anybody that wants to cash in on
026it, please feel free and you can go ahead and just give him a hug. He loves it. Um, if any of the board members ever have a chance to do the Red Wings things, I would recommend it. It's a lot of fun. um we fill the entire alley up and these are the kids that have uh exceptional attendance, exceptional grades and uh don't have any disciplinary problems. And what I would say is it's a great group of kids. And um they have a lot of fun and they take care of each other. And the good problem to have is that we filled up the entire bowling alley. It was uh what five kids per lane and we filled up 35 lanes, right? For the math. So that's the amount of kids that are meeting or
027exceeding our expectations when it comes down to the Red Wings program. So I know Mr. Lavine and a few others started that up a few years back and it's it's doing great and I would say keep up the great work. It's paying off and uh I say thank you for all the extra time you put into that. Um I want to say congratulations to Mr. K and the TDN. Um, I continue to hear outside of our group um about the TDN on uh YouTube and all the different um social social media outputs and um they continue to put out great content and um there's even some showing up there. They put all that together themselves and it looks very professional and certainly something I can't do. So, um, I want to say congratulations and it
028also ease right into, you know, the amount of talent that our our students have with National Geographics, everything you're seeing up on that screen. Um, and uh, it goes back to our our participation of our teachers, our pair of professionals, and our administration. You guys are putting in a ton of hours and it's paying off. And, uh, for anybody that looks at the HIP reports, you can see the results. Um we we I don't know if actually share the numbers but from last year the two years previous in this exact month the numbers are down um by sixfold right sevenfold eightfold I can't even do the math so it's it's unbelievable what 3 years difference has made and I want to say thank you and continue the great work and the last one I want
029to put up is um transportation office. There you are. I wanted to say thank you for all the hard work. Um, you put together a hell of a program and um, it's paying off and I think the flexibility of our own buses has paid off tremendously, especially things for like Red Wings. I don't know if we were able to use it for that, but I want to say thank you. And that's by itself piece for the program uh for the Red Wings because uh those last minute buses are very expensive and um for us to be able to run our own buses it's uh I mean night day difference and the flexibility. So thank you very much for continuing to do that. I know it was a lot of uphill battle for you but you're
030doing a great job and thank you very much. Thank you. And that's all I have. Thank you. Um, first thing I want to say is I can't believe that Mr. Lavine played for a hug. I'm in shock over that. And um, if I had known that, I'd have been there. So, watch out. So, um, I Oh, I can have it. Oh, okay. I got my hug already this year. I only get one a year, just in case anyone knows. Um, I want to say congratulations to the volleyball team. Amazing. undefeated with this school is like you better watch out. You don't know. It's like one team after the other. So, well done. I'm I'm so proud to be a part of Hamilton Township and Davies. Um I want to also talk about what happened today
031and the amazing job that this staff did. I I Jeff was Dr. Dr. uh Zita was keeping us updated and I am just so proud of the amazing job, the amazing cohesiveness that happened, keeping our students safe. It's it's a welloiled machine and I'm so proud to say that um I'm a part of this this township and um I just I I I don't know what else to say. I'm so proud. And the last thing I want to say is go to the resource fair. I go every year. There's so much information that you don't even know that's out there. So just make some time. Go for it. Plus, you get free stuff and free food. So it's worth it. Go for it. Can I say one? I want to say Mr. Hickey in the
032back of the room. Thank you for putting the He's, you know, our guy for it comes down to security. He's been seen on Fox. Was it Fox that came here? Fox News. Yes. And you know, showed his program and uh everything that we're doing is becoming the model for schools around us. And it's and it's led off by people like Mr. Hickey that come together with a program are able to train um all of our teachers, administration, and bring in uh the ability to connect to our local police department. And um you know, there's no delays on phone calls. He has a radio in one hand talking to dispatch and then a radio on the other hand talking to our school and because of the technology and the technology team and just like uh Dr.
033Trino said it's a welloiled machine and u hopefully we won't ever have ever have her have to use it but um when we practice and um you guys are certainly playing the way you practice so thank you again and and great job. I just want to piggy back on that because I have two kids in the district, one in kindergarten, one in third grade, and from their perspective, they have no idea that it's happening. They know shelter in place. Everything is calm. They're cool, collected. They come home. I ask, "What happened today?" Nothing. You know, business as usual, just a normal day to them. So really just to second what everybody said, thank you so much for the training that you do the way that you and you know put it into play and all
034of that because from a kids perspective they don't realize that there is a danger and or maybe there isn't a danger but in their minds they're just business as usual. They know what to do. They know not to panic and it's amazing. So, thank you. Um, I want to say something for Miss Peek because she's just been there for me ever since sixth grade. So, I just want to like thank her for everything. Um, she's been like such an inspiration for me and she puts in so much hard work. So, I'm so glad that she's getting recognized for everything she does. and I just love her so much and I'm so proud that she's a teacher, that she can be my teacher. So, thank you. All right. It's like a group hug at the end
035of this. This is the kind of meeting we like to have. All right. So, at this time, we will go on to committee reports. Can I please have the personnel policy committee report, Miss Jackson? Yes, ma'am. Um, so personnel and policy met on Tuesday, April 1st. Um, in attendance was myself, Mrs. Bar, Mrs. Bachelor, Dr. Zitto, and Mrs. Lzitzki. Um, and Mr. Say your name Beni. Benziani. Thank you. Um, we discussed policy additions, um, an equity plan, separation of employment, some retirements, and some resignations as well as a few new hires. Um, and then there was other topics that came up during the meeting. Um, so if I may have a motion to approve 91 through 914, second by Dr. Nelson. Comments or questions? Roll call. Mrs. Anker, yes. Mrs. Bachelor, yes. Dr. Sino, yes.
036Mrs. Jackson, yes. Dr. L. Yes. Dr. Nelson, yes. Mrs. Brener, yes. Mr. Rogers, yes. Morning. Yes. Thank you, M. Jackson. Okay. Dr. Dr. Nelson, Finance and Operations. Thank you. Uh we met on April 1st at 4:00 p.m. and uh in attendance was myself, Dr. Trino, uh Mr. Rogers, Dr. Zto, and Mr. B. Also, um Mr. Nelson. Uh we talked about uh the Shephard Transportation Renewal Contract. So, thank you again. Uh we also talked about the transportation analysis. Now with a financial analysis determining uh the uh whether or not we are on track for our uh profitability or um that program is actually um operating as we expected and it is. So again good luck a good job. We talked about Duberson and uh the uh the transaction there. Ran into a couple things with the
037state. We're working through those uh issues because it's a historical. There's a few additional forms we have to fill out and a couple more items we have to do there before we can enact that transaction and then talking about chainer and some of the work we're trying to do over there and uh having to deal with the pine lens commission there on a few outstanding items there. So at this time I would like uh to make a motion to approve um approve items in section 10 10 1 through 109. Second second by Mr. Rogers. Comments or questions? Okay. Roll call. Mrs. Anker. Yes. Mrs. Bachelor. Yes. Dr. Mr. Reno, yes. Mrs. Jackson, yes. Dr. Lob, yes. Dr. Nelson, yes. Mrs. Proto, yes. Mr. Rogers, yes. And Mrs. Barn, yes. That concludes my report. Thank you,
038Dr. Nelson. And Dr. Lero, PSI. So, um, we met on April 1st. Um we discussed um items such as our infrastructure trial, our reading uh challenge winner, the read 180 update, um the growth with the reflex and the fracks, and we also talked about the second annual autism virtual ex art expo which I think was highlighted on Facebook. We had some students have artwork in that expo. Um and then that concludes that concludes my report and I have nothing to motion. Thank you Dr. Any old business for any board members that any board members would like to comment on from a previous discussion. All right. This Can I please have a motion to approve 131 through three as listed? So move. Second. Motion by Dr. Nelson, second by Miss Jackson. Comments or questions? Call. Mrs.
039Anret. Yes. Mrs. Bachelor. Yes. Dr. Mr. Yes. Mrs. Jackson, yes. Dr. La, yes. Dr. Nelson, yes. Mrs. Perto, yes. Mr. Rogers, yes. Mrs. Park, yes. Thank you. Is there any other new business? At this time, we will receive comments from the public in accordance with the board policy on participation at a board meeting. Seeing none, we'll close public comment. And can I please have Can I please have a motion to adjourn? Motion. Second. All in favor? I oppose. Thank you everyone.