001Good evening. I would like to call the meeting to order. In accordance with the provisions of the New Jersey Open Public Meeting Act of 1975, the Ottabon Board of Education transmitted notice of the meeting scheduled at 6:30 p.m. in the Ottabon Junior Senior High School Media Center to the Retrospect newspaper and the Burough Clerk and by postings on the Ottabon Public School District website and at the main and the Pine Street entrances of the junior senior high school. Roll call, please. Mrs. Ronase. Alison Lipsky absent. Mark Gaddy. >> Bill Wilson. >> Danielle D. Franchesco >> here. >> Allison Cox. >> Andrea Robinson will be late with notice. Amy Davis >> here. >> Steven Wilson >> here. >> Sarah Coen absent with notice. Michelle Kennedy >> roll call complete. Thank you. Oh, hey. >> Sorry. I
002thought it might have been a student because of all the flowers and speaking of that. Uh whereas while the Senator Byron MBER open public meetings act requires all meetings of the Ottabon Board of Education to be held in public NJSA 10 col4-12B sets forth nine types of matters that may lawfully be discussed in executive session and are noted on the agenda. May I have a motion to go into executive? >> All in favor? >> Any opposed? All right, we will be approximately 30 Minute. All right. I'd like to invite every stand for the pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands one nation indivisible with liberty and justice for all. our agenda. We will hear from our student representatives. Hey everyone, um we've had some
003exciting things happening here actually for the seniors. Last I don't know what day it was, but it was it was last week I think was career day and we had a bunch of speakers come and talk to the seniors. uh many different types of careers which the feedback was great. Everyone really liked it. The wrestling team won group one sectional fin or the group one sectional finals is tonight actually. >> There you go. The indoor track team are now the threetime sectionals champs. >> Yep. Basketball, track, and wrestling all had their senior nights. And in January we had midterms. So now all the second semester courses are in gear. Full swing. That's the term I was looking for. The musical will be happening I think March 6th, 7th and 8th, 5th, 6th and 7th. And
004the senior trip is coming up March 23rd which is very exciting. And they had a meeting all seniors. And then there was a parent meeting a couple days ago for that. And our students have been using Clayful, our mental health um chat, which is really really good. And it's good that they're utilizing the sources here. And now I'm going to pass it off to Ryan. >> Everybody. So continuing on my uh my field work at Havland, I met with Dean this week and uh I spoke to him about the Lego club that's been running. They've been building houses, working on teamwork, which is very cool. I myself love Legos, so it's cool to hear about that. Uh, also heard about the book club which is going to be preparing for Alex's lemonade stand soon and
005they just recently celebrated the 100th day of school this Monday where they did like where will I be in 100 years and 100 things worksheet. Um, yeah, it seems like they're doing great stuff and I'm really loving talking to the second graders. Another thing I would like to speak on it's more high school related is uh and I guess a little bit of a preview for later tonight would be me and Mr. lab on the topic of the AI task force have been meeting about bringing transparency to the student body as they are the ones who are impacted by the decisions made by this AI policy. So there's going to be class meetings in May where we're going to go over the ethical use of AI. All right. Um, moving on to our student spotlight
006recognition, which is arguably the highlight of the evening, as I always say, but it really is true. So, um, we are going to call each student up to the podium to receive their certificate and to hear some wonderful things read about them. Um, if you're more comfortable coming up with a special person, that's absolutely fine, too. You can come up with a special person. And um we ask that everybody just wait around until that we're finished because we want to make sure that we take a picture of the whole group as well as our staff members that we're recognizing too. So we will start off with our pre kindergarten student. Okay. Uh pre kindergarten student of the month is Charlotte Waters. This one gets good. Kudos to the teacher who wrote this up, by the
007way. Okay. Charlotte was student of the month for showing outstanding perseverance in our classroom. Charlotte consistently tries even when something is challenging and doesn't give up. A great example of this was during our exercise study when Charlotte was trying to learn how to use the hula hoop. At first, it kept falling, but Charlotte kept trying, adjusting her body and saying, "I'm not done trying yet." Charlotte also shows perseverance when racing other students. Even if she doesn't win, she finishes the race with a smile and says, "I'll try again next time." She shows the goal isn't just to win, it's to keep trying. Whether she finishes first or last, she completes the race with determination and she never forgets to congratulate the winner. Showing great sportsmanship as well. In addition to working hard herself, Charlotte is
008always willing to help others. She often encourages her friends by saying, "You can do it," or by showing them how she solved a problem. Charlotte reminds us that perseverance means trying, learning, helping others, and never giving up, even when the hula hoop has other plans. We are so proud of her and her positive attitude. Congratulations, Charlotte. >> Okay, our kindergarten student of the month is Hadley Crosby. All right, Hadley. >> The kindergarten student of the month is Hadley Crosby. Hadley is a wonderful student and an even better friend. She shows great perseverance in her learning by always trying her best, working through challenges, and never giving up. up when something feels difficult. That same perseverance shines through in the way that she treats others. Haley is kind and compassionate to every member of our class.
009When someone needs help, Hy is there. When a friend needs someone to play with, Hy is there. And when a classmate needs a hand to hold, Haley is always there. Her perseverance in both learning and caring for others is genuine and never done and is never done for praise or reward. Instead, Haley consistently shows that she truly cares and has an amazing ability to recognize what her friends need, often before being asked. It is a true pleasure to watch Haley's kindness and perseverance grow each day, and we are so proud to honor her as our kindergarten student of the month. Congratulations, Okay, grade one student of the month is Mallerie McGee. Congratulations. Thank you. Okay, so Mallerie McGee's teacher represent nominated her for the perseverance she displays every day. One of my favorite things the
010teachers about Mallerie is how well she is able to face any obstacle. She has learned how to push through her worries and continue doing her best when facing challenges. It is admirable that Mallerie faces each challenge with a positive attitude and a huge smile on her face. Mallerie has learned that even if she has to work hard to get an answer, she is smart and capable of working it out. She displays problem-solving abilities when coming up with a plan to solve a problem. I love to see how much her confidence has bloomed during her time in first grade. Mallerie does not let anything get in her way. Yeah, she is often saying, "It's okay that I made a mistake. I have learned how to fix it now." Adults remember that. Mallerie is a true leader
011when it comes to not giving up or trying another way. I cannot wait to see what she accomplishes. I'm so proud to be her teacher. Congratulations, Mallerie. And if I mess up your name, I'm very sorry, but I sit next to Mr. Gaddy and he's now giving me all the hard names. And so, grade two student of the month is CJ Embellano. Did I get it? Did I get it? Awesome. Way to go, CJ. Congratulations. Well done. Okay. CJ is a second grade student who truly shines when it comes to perseverance. Even when schoolwork feels challenging, CJ does not give up. If something is hard at first, CJ keeps trying, asks for help when needed, and works step by step to improve. This determination shows a strong commitment to learning and a positive attitude toward
012challenges. CJ's perseverance can be seen every day in the classroom. When faced with difficult assignments or new concepts, CJ stays focused and puts in the effort to do his best. Instead of becoming frustrated, CJ takes responsibility for his work and continues trying until the task is complete. Well done. This is I psyched you out. This kind of effort helps CJ grow as a learner and sets a great example for his classmates. In addition to being hardworking, CJ al is also responsible and shows good manners to everyone. CJ follows classroom rules, completes tasks, and treats teachers and peers with kindness and respect. By combining perseverance, responsibility, and good manners, CJ makes a classroom a better place and demonstrates qualities to be proud of. Congratulations, CJ. >> For grade three, student of the month is Edward Seabberger.
013Congratulations. Edward's teacher writes, "I am pleased to recommend Edward Seabberger for the third grade student of the month. Ed consistently demonstrates the character trait of perseverance. He works through difficult problems with a positive attitude and takes pride in his work. Ed asks thoughtful questions and uses feedback to improve. His positive mindset and determination inspire others in the classroom to do the same. I am so proud of Edward's growth this year and I am confident that he will continue to succeed. Congratulations, Edward. You deserve it. For grade four, we have Patrick Conahan. Patrick's teacher says, "It is with great excitement that we are nominating Patrick Conahan for fourth grade student of the month." With our fourth grade year underway, Patrick has been a wonderful embodiment of Mansion Avenue's roar expectations, especially through his perseverance. Rising to
014the fourth grade standard of respect, Patrick consistently works through challenges and does not give up when learning becomes difficult. He shows determination in his efforts, always trying his best and taking responsibility for his learning. Patrick treats his classmates with kindness and respect and is willing to participate and share his thinking in classroom discussions. Always coming to class with a positive attitude, Patrick has had a strong start to 2025 26 year and we are excited to watch him continue to grow academically and accomplish great things throughout the rest of this school year. Congratulations. Great work. Pardon. That brings me to grade five. We have Payton Wildings. There you go. Congrats. Hold that up. Give them a good shot. All right. Payton's teacher says, "I am proud to nominate Payton Wings as the fifth grade student of
015the month. Payton consistently demonstrates responsibility and perseverance, approaching challenges with determination and continuing to put forth her best effort even when tasks are difficult. As a dedicated safety patrol member, Pton reliably reports the duty on time and serves as a positive role model for her peers. Pton's perseverance, work ethic, and leadership make her a deserving recipient of this recognition. Great job. >> Good evening. Congratulations to Rose Valente for being our sixth grade student of the month. Rose is a model student who shows outstanding performance in all areas. She is an active participant in class discussions and works very well with others. Not only does Rose excel in academics, she is incredibly kind, friendly, and always smiling. Outside of the classroom, Rose is very well-rounded and shines in many extracurricular activities. newspaper club, band, gardening club,
016choir, gardening club, excuse me, choir, historical musical, and more. This is not on here, but also softball, which I can personally attest to. She's an avid reader and has fantastic writing skills. We are so proud of Rose's accomplishments and are excited to see what her future holds. Congratulations, The seventh grade student of the month is Jake Barbusio. Not here. It's all right. Jake is a deser deserving recipient of the grade seven student of the month recognition for January. He consistently demonstrates kindness, respect, and responsibility in the classroom. Jake completes his work on time, participates actively in discussions, and takes true ownership of his learning. When he needs support, he advocates for himself with maturity and self-awareness that goes beyond his years. In addition to his strong academic habits, Jake is actively involved in music as
017a percussionist, further demonstrating his dedication and discipline. His positive attitude, responsibility, and well-rounded involvement make him a wonderful role model for his peers and truly deserving of this recognition. Congratulations. It's a little high. For eighth grade student of the month, we have Tyler Seance. Tyler's teacher writes, "Tyler Severance is a kind, fun, and genuinely positive presence in the classroom. He has a natural ability to bring life and energy to the room while also knowing when to shift gears and focus on learning. Having had the pleasure of teaching Tyler for two consecutive years, I have seen tremendous growth, not only academically, but also in his maturity, confidence, and interactions with others. Outside of the classroom, Tyler stays active through football workouts and enjoys spending time playing video games with friends. His ability to balance his interests
018with his responsibilities along with his consistently positive attitude and continued growth both in and out of school make him truly deserving of 8th grade student of the month for January. Congratulations. Isla Knox is the ninth grade student of the month. Isa consistently demonstrates a genuine commitment to learning and personal growth. She is quiet by nature, but when she chooses to speak, her contributions are thoughtful and meaningful. She approaches her work with care and determination, and she is one of the few students who truly values the learning process. When she makes a mistake or struggles with a concept, she does not become discouraged. Instead, she asks questions, seeks feedback, and actively works to improve. In addition to her strong work ethic, she is always respectful and friendly to both peers and adults. Beyond the classroom, Isa
019shows the same level of dedication and commitment through her involvement in softball, playing for her town, travel team, and school team. In addition to her strong work that work ethic, and extracurricular involvement, she's always respectful and friendly to both peers and adults. Her quiet perseverance, positive attitude, and well-rounded involvement make her a wonderful role model and an excellent choice for grade nine student of the month. Very good. The sophomore student of the month is Roco Kaufman. Congratulations. Roco is an amazing student and truly deserving of grade 10 student of the month recognition. He is consistently on task, actively participates in class, and is always willing to lead and lend a helping hand. Roco regularly goes above and beyond to support classmates who may be struggling, offering assistance with patience and positivity. His willingness to help
020others does not go unnoticed and is greatly appreciated. In addition to his strong work ethic in the classroom, Rockco is actively involved in track and field, football, the fellowship of Christian athletes, and the true north youth group through his local church. His commitment to academics, athletics, and service reflects his outstanding character and leadership. Rocco exemplifies what it means to be a well-rounded and compassionate member of our school community. Congratulations, Our junior class student of the month is Gavin Price. Is Gavin here? Gavin's teacher writes, "Gavin has been a valued member of our school community and I have had the pleasure of teaching him in our class for the past two years. He is consistently kind, respectful, and a positive presence in and out of the classroom. In art, Gavin continually pushes himself creatively, no matter
021the assignment. He challenges his ideas and takes risks, even when he is unsure how to bring them to life. He actively seeks feedback and thoughtfully applies it to strengthen his work, demonstrating both maturity and a genuine desire to improve. Beyond the classroom, Gavin is involved in golf and wrestling. maybe that's where he is right now and balances his academic and extracurricular commitments with part-time employment. He is the type of student who greets others with a friendly hello in the hallways and is always willing to lend a helping hand. Gavin truly embodies the qualities of a grade 11 student of the month for January. And rounding it out, we have our senior class uh nominee, um Brooke Fel, the recommending teacher wrote, "I cannot think of a more deserving student for January's grade 12th student of
022the month. Brooke is helpful, engaged, respectful, hard-working, and exceptionally intelligent. In AP Biology, she consistently participates in meaningful ways, remains attentive, and approaches her work with focus and determination. She treats everyone with dignity and respect, and there is a quiet confidence and strength about her that sets a positive tone in the classroom. Beyond her academic excellence, Brooke is deeply involved in our school community. She participates in softball and serves in numerous leadership roles including student council, senior council, the national honor society board, interact club, peer-to-peer, Spanish honor society, and the prom committee, not busy at all. Uh, her commitment to both scholarship and service truly refle reflects her character. It is an absolute pleasure to have Brooke as an AP biology student and she is most deserving of this rec recognition. Congratulations. >> All right.
023Now, we would like to go on and recognize our teachers and staff members for the month of January. We're going to start with preschool and Havalena Avenue. We have Miss Green and Miss Fatola. Missy. Oh, wait. Colleen, too. I got both. I'm gonna start with Miss Green. Um, Miss Miss Britney Green is a Havlin Hornet through and through. Before taking her current position as a first grade teacher, she taught part-time basic skills and even spent time as a substitute in our district. From the very first time I met her met her, she glowed with pride in Ottabon and expressed her desire to be part of our Havland family. Since that day, her enthusiasm for teaching and learning has only grown. She models a growth mindset, supports students with self-regulation, sets high standards, and maintains an
024orderly classroom. She plans engaging and meaningful lessons, and her students love coming to school every day because she is there to help them succeed. Miss Greed's positive influence doesn't stop at the classroom door. She is the adviser for our first grade math maniacs club, a founding member of our PBIS team, and a teacher leader who promotes excellence for all students. Miss Green is a friend to all and genuinely one of the sweetest people you will ever meet. I am grateful to work with such a dedicated educator and Havland is better because she is part of our team. Britt, thank you for your hard work, support, and dedication to our students in our school and congratulations on being selected as Havland Avenue Educator of the Um, Miss Pollah. So, the preschool staff member of the month
025for January is Miss Colleen Spatola. We could not do anything without Colleen. You may have heard the expression, forgive the mess, we're busy learning. Well, that couldn't be more true at the preschool. However, because of Miss Colleen, our sticky, messy students can focus on the work of learning in a clean and healthy school environment. Colleen does more. Colleen, I lost track. Sorry. Colleen does so much more for us than just keep a tidy school. She takes care of us like we are her own. She facilitates security exercises, monitors school grounds for safety, assists with delivery of packages and meals, looks out for staff and students, and communicates needs proactively. Our students love talking to Miss Colleen and feel especially important when they get to peek inside her office and ask the ever important questions, "What
026is that and why?" Colleen comes to work every day with a smile on her face and has strong, positive relationships with both students and staff. She is a model to our students and an integral member of our preschool family. We are grateful for Colleen as both a colleague and a friend and appreciate her hard work and dedication to our school. In true Ottabon fashion, Colleen exemplifies our tradition of pride and excellence, Colleen. Thank you for your hard work, support, and dedication to our students and our school. And congratulations. >> Great. For new school, we have Miss Saunders and Miss Holland. Congratulations to Bianca Saunders, Mansion Avenue's teacher of the month for January 2026. She is not only an exceptional educator but also a true friend and teammate to everyone around her. She is always there
027for her co-workers, offering support, stepping up in any situation and providing encouragement whenever it's needed. Her sense of humor brightens our day, reminding us to laugh both with her jokes and at ourselves and not to take life too seriously. What makes her especially special is her ability to be honest in a way that clearly comes from the place of care and compassion. She consistently pushes others to be their best while making them feel supported and valued. Above all, she genuinely wants the best for her students, her colleagues, her friends, and our entire school community. Her impact goes far beyond the classroom, and our school is better because of her. Congratulations to Miss Jessica Holland, Mansion Avenue staff member of the month for January 2026. Jessica is an exceptional instructional assistant who consistently demonstrates strong content
028knowledge and deep understanding of the effective instructional practices. She supports students across all grade levels with patience, positivity, and high expectations, ensuring each learner feels capable and valued. Her encouraging and down-to-earth approach helps students build confidence and take academic risks, while her collaborative spirit fosters a strong sense of community in the classroom. Through her dedication, professionalism, and genuine care for students, Jessica makes a meaningful impact every day. Congratulations. And for the Junior Senior High School, we have Mr. House and Miss Greeway. Thank you. Uh, Miss Greyway couldn't make it tonight, but I'm still going to read hers after Miss Trinkles. It is with great pride that we recognize Mrs. Laray Drinkhouse as our teacher of the month. Mrs. Drinkhouse exemplifies everything we hope for in an educator. Passionate, energetic, dedicated, and deeply committed to the
029success of every student she serves. In the classroom, Mrs. Drinkhouse is an incredible teacher who brings learning to life through her enthusiasm, patience, and genuine love for her students. Her kind and passionate heart creates a welcoming environment where students feel safe, valued, and inspired to do their best. She consistently goes above and beyond to meet the needs of all learners, ensuring that every student feels supported and understood. Beyond the classroom, Mrs. Drinkhouse's leadership, and service to our school community are extraordinary. As department chair, she provides guidance, collaboration, and vision to her colleagues. As a member of the INRS team, she advocates tirelessly for students, working to ensure they receive the support necessary to thrive. Her role as graduation coordinator reflects her commitment to celebrating and guiding students through one of the most important milestones of
030their academic careers. Perhaps one of her most impressive accomplishments is her work with the Interact Club, which has grown into the largest club in the school. It actually has over, I think, 200 members. Through her leadership, students are empowered to give back, develop leadership skills, and make positive impact on our community. Values that will stay with them long after they leave our halls. Mrs. Drinkhouse's passion for education, her dedication to students, and her unwavering kindness make her an invaluable member of our school. We are truly grateful for all that she does each and every day. Thank you, Mrs. Drink House, for your incredible service, your loving heart, and the countless ways you make our school a better place. We are so fortunate to have you. Now, if you want to sit for Jill's, you want
031to stand in place for Jill, you can. >> You're welcome. And our staff member of the month is Mrs. Jill Greeway. Is with great appreciation they recognize Mrs. Jill Greeway as our staff member of the month. Jill's organization, attention to detail, and compassionate, empathetic nature make her an invaluable part of our school community. Among many other things, Jill works tirelessly to ensure that one of the most challenging parts of a school day, staff coverage and substitutes run smoothly. Whether she is in the building or out, everything is always covered, clearly organized, and in perfect order. Her ability to manage coverage schedules in with such precision keeps the entire school operating efficiently, and allows teachers and administrators to focus on what matters most, our students. And of course, one of her most important roles is keeping
032Mr. from Miller Straight, which she does with patience, professionalism, and good humor every day. Jill, thank you for all that you do. We are truly fortunate to have you, and you are very much appreciated by everyone at Ottabon Junior Senior High School. >> All right, so now it is time for the photo op. We would ask all of our students and staff members, you gather over by the clear glass um accordion doors over there. We want to make sure that we get everybody's picture. >> Congratulations What that means? Thank you. What about high school? Hi, nice to meet you. How are you? >> We're going. >> Huh? I It was nice seeing you. All right. Jeez, nobody wanted to hang around. >> Don't say nobody. Trisha's still >> I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm
033sorry, Mrs. Martell. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. You know, we're not used to this many people. Lock the door. >> All right, we are we're gonna make a little um a little switch in the order here this evening. We're going to start uh with our presentations with Mr. Inverso, who's going to give us our auditor's report. So, it's good to see you again, sir. >> Good evening, everyone. >> Everybody should have in front of them a financial summary, which I'd like to go over. No, that's one page. >> Yep. I put all one page for you. >> We did give everybody the other small report >> for them. >> Okay. So, if I could uh direct your attention to the lefth hand column under revenues we took in this year for tax levy 13,917,000 tuition 2,598,000
034miscellaneous revenue 227,000 federal aid 19,912 state aid 10,0950 total revenues 26 million 858556. We expended in the same period 27,465864 resulting in a net loss of operations of 67,308. We started with an overall fund balance of 2,64202. We're ending with an overall fund balance of 2,034714. That number is defined further below. What makes it up? Capital reserve 351,816. Maintenance reserve 241,838. Of that amount, we put 50,000 in the 2526 budget. Excess surplus 184,334. That's the amount that must be put in the 2627 budget at a minimum. Unemployment compensation 33249 designated for subsequent years expenditures 375,000 that's the amount that was placed in the 2526 budget and we have unassigned free balance of 549317 which totals at 2 million34714 the 549 317 unassigned is 2% at the bottom there of the expenditures that's what the state
035allows you to keep as unassigned surplus. So we we have the maximum amount that we can as unassigned. As far as comparison of budget to actual, the total budget was 27,979,000. We expended 27465864 or about 98%. Which is an important thing because the way we return surplus is by watching what we spend. 90% of our revenues is tax levy and state aid. We don't return any money from there. We just whatever budget that's realized. So, it's important to watch what we spend for all districts. Uh, as far as the board office records, they're in good condition. Debbiey's office did a good job and accordingly there's no comments or recommendations and no corrective action plan required. So, we commend it. Any questions? Okay. All right. >> Thank you very much. Thank you. >> Um and just
036before we go any also like to commend Deb and uh and her office for their excellent excellent management. >> Thank I I uh I want to thank you for your comments, but I do really want to thank u my office staff. So um I would not be able to run the business office efficiently without the assistance of my staff and I would like to thank them um all individually. So Lori Cray who handles all purchasing for the district and make sure all documentation is available for auditing review of the purchase orders, Christa Dosier who handles all correspondence for the office and keeps us in compliance with statemandated guidelines and Denise Bolinz who handles payroll and benefits for all the district employees and follows required regulations that are reviewed by the auditors. So many of the
037responsibilities of the business office are timesensitive and these are three ladies that go above and beyond to meet all deadlines. Again, the business office work is more behind the scenes and they don't get much recognition for their dedicated work. So, I just want to thank them all again and it truly is a team effort. Thank you. All right. Next, we have Mr. Leb who is going to give us a presentation on Clayful. >> Thank you. And thank you for the lights so we guys can see the present. It's perfect. Yeah. I mean, it's perfect for me. I mean, you guys can see that. Okay. All right. So, I'm going to try and keep this as short as possible, but I do have a lot to go over. So, I I just want to make sure
038we don't miss anything because um it is important to talk about this. So, I'm going to go over a couple things about Clayfield, what it is, and and how we've had it rolled out here at the high school and the successes that we've had and how we're going to move forward with everything. So, um what is Clayful? Clayful is an online mobile app resource for mental health for our students and for our staff. It is not AI. A lot of the students and parents were asking that question. It is not AI. It is trained mental health coaches that are available for our students and our staff to do. So it is not an AI platform. It's it's real people. It connects our students and our staff with trained and anonymous coaches to help them in
039many areas of life. The anonymous part is important because a lot of our students are more comfortable speaking to people that they don't have a direct connection with. They don't need to go tell them what's happening in their life and then see them in the hallway the next day and think they're thinking something about them. So they're anonymous. um coaches. They don't know our students names. Um they don't know their names. So that that's a that's a plus for some of our students who use this platform. It offers educational components, journaling opportunities and self-reflection for um our students as they as they go through the the process. This this app and and this mobile or this um online resource, our students are not required to use this. It's just an extra layer of support that
040they have in the event they don't want to go see a counselor or a teacher or a mental health professional. It's another layer that we have we've offered to our students to use that they can use and get assistance if they need it. So, it's not something that's required out of them, but it does offer a lot of stuff and they're all have it available to them. All right. Some key features of of Clayful is like I said it it is anonymous for coaches um for our students to go with trained coaches. It's available from 8:00 a.m. to 1000 p.m. Monday through Friday. And I'm going to talk a little bit later. We are working with um with Clayful. They're they're I mean they're working to see if they can expand those hours not just
041for us but for the rest of of the students that they serve because that is one of the things we talked about was the timing of it. It would be nicer if it was offered a little bit longer and a little bit more days of the week. So So they're working on that but as of right now it's 8 to 10 Monday to Friday. It provides a mental health universal screener which which I'll talk about in a little bit. We we use that as we rolled it out in December for all of our students. So, it does provide us a good screenshot of students who who we could we could flag who who may be in in need of help by the way they they answer the questions. They do provide educational resources, journaling capabilities.
042The journaling capabilities are part of what the coaches do for the students if they reach out to them. They give them opportunities. They they they're able to journal about stuff and then share that opportunity with the coaches. Um they might not talk to the same coach every time, but there's notes taken that the coach who picks up can pick up the notes from where the student last left off and they can they can just jump right in. U where our colleague left off with our students. It does provide immediate intervention protocols for atrisisk students which we'll get into a little bit later. Um we at Audabon have a team of about 10 staff members who will get alerted when a student reports something to a coach that is immediate in nature. So if it's something
043where a student's at high risk um any kind of su suicidal ideation anything where it puts a student in risk we will automatically be be contacted. We have to as a team one of us has to respond back that we've received it. And when we receive it, we reach out to Kelly O'Donnell who's our mental health counselor and she immediately goes into into her protocol to to reach out to the student and provide services um make necessary phone calls that that are needed whether it be the law enforcement or anything like that to to get our students um to be safe in the services that they need. So we have we have a good system of that um as of right now. How was this launched? Sorry. So the imple the implementation um at Audabon
044it was introduced to our staff um at the end of the year in 2025. We had a CLA representative come out to our staff and talk about the program and and what it was and what it wasn't and what the staff involvement was and what our involvement was and just that was an extra layer of support for for our students and for our staff. So so they came out one of their presenters gave it to our staff. Um, how it was rolled out to to our students is we had a um I had class meetings back in December and we called every class down from 7 through 12 and we spent an entire class period uh talking about Clayful and what it is and the opportunities they had. Uh, every student had an opportunity to
045log into Clayful and they had an opportunity to to take the universal screener and to chat with the coach if if they chose to do so at at that time. Um, parents were also sent out a letter explaining what Clayfield was and they were all given the opportunity to opt their student out if they chose to not want their student to participate. they had the option to opt them out, which what that would do was if a student went to go log in and their parent opted them out, they would not be able to log in the system because their parent chose to opt them out, which is their which is their right. And we don't want to force anybody to use anything they don't want to use, but it's a good resource for our
046students, but some parents did choose to to opt their their students out. Um, so like I said, we we had a structured roll out of our students on all of our class meetings and we coordinated that with Clayful and they had coaches available that entire day. Okay. So when our kids logged in every period, they had coaches who were um available to to talk to our students. So once that process happened and we had our class meetings, introduced the platform to everybody, um we only had a 40% student uh participation rate. And we sat down, we looked at the data that we had, only 40% of our students had it. that obviously wasn't wasn't good enough for us. So what I did was I compiled a list of all the students who had not completed
047the universal screener for for whatever reason and I had called all those students down individually um I don't say individually in small groups into the auditorium and I had explained to them they brought their Chromebooks down. We we logged into it together. we sat they they answered the questions um if they if they weren't opted out and we actually doubled that number to uh 80% of our students were able to take the universal screener which gave us some really really good data and some really good insight about some some things that our our students needed and we compared that data and we'll talk about that in a second too but it was nice so we now have 80% of our student population who has taken advantage of this universal screener from Clayful um to provide
048the extra layer of support uh that they might need. So for our current engagement statistics, like I said, we have 80% of our students completed the universal screener. Um as of today, I checked today before I came here. Um we've had 264 coaching sessions with our students and the playful coaches since our roll out back in December. So, in in about two months, we've had 264 coaching sessions, which equaled up to um over 6,000 minutes of coaching between our CLA coaches and our students who decided to to to reach out to these coaches, which is which is fantastic. Um they do give us consistent usage for educational resources. So, it's live data we get to we get to um continue to check and it's a growing adoption for journaling options. Like we said before, our
049our journaling is not up to where it needs. It's not it's not real high right now. Um but it's something we're going to work on with Clay. Well, how do we how do we work on getting our kids to have more journaling opportunities and how do we do a better job from their perspective on how they've historically gotten students to do more journaling things. So, like I said, it's two months old, but I think we've had a lot of 6,000 minutes. I think it's pretty impressive. Um the biggest the biggest takeaway from all of this um is we I I guess it's fortunately had this platform and we had two students reach out with with pretty critical incidents um since the since the roll out and we were able to provide immediate assistance to those
050two students and provide them the help and support resource that they needed um with within a couple hours and some some of that did involve us contacting outside agencies and getting things um in place for these these two students. So it it has it has been succ and I were talking and we said you know there's there's been some some hurdles with with Clayful and things like that but if we could help you know one or two kids that's good. So not that we want to stop there but but so far in two months helping these two students has been has been great on top of the other 264 sessions we've had. So um been successful up to this point in in our opinion. Um so data informed support universal screener results. We took those
051students from the universal screener and we also sent out surveys to our staff about relationships they have with our students in the building. We got those results back and we said you know what we should probably survey our students as well to see what they think about having trusted adults in the building. So, we sent a surve out to our students. We took our student survey results. We took our staff survey results. We took our our CLA universal screener results. And we compiled lists of students who all kind of rose to the top of those list and put up red flags. And we identified those students, especially the ones who said they had no trusted adult, which is about 45 of our students out of 790. Um, and what we did was we we broke
052that list of students up and counselors and administrators called each of those students down by eight a piece and had individual conversations with those kids said, "Hey, you know, you reported on your survey that you had no trusted adult in in this building. Let's talk about that. Is there a reason why? How do we help you get a trusted adult? I not want you to go and split your guts to people, but if you're in this building seven hours a day and you have something on your mind, I need to make sure you're comfortable enough to have somebody to go and talk to. Whether it be an administrator, a teacher, a counselor, um a lunch service lady, whether it be a custodian, long as you have somebody in this building you can go talk to
053if you have something going on. Not that we want you to spill your guts if you don't want to, but I need you to feel comfortable. So, we also took the list um of people on the top with with any concerns from universal screener and we gave that to our mental health counselor, Miss O'Donnell, who's who's now strategically going through those students along with our school counselors to provide services and and talk to those students about, you know, what they need and how we can help them as as they move forward because they popped up on a couple of different, you know, resources that we provided and they've been identified as students who need help. So, it's been very successful um in that as well. the intervention protocol. Like I said, uh Clayful alerts our
054designated staff about urgent concerns. Immediate response was taken for our students at risk. We've had seamless coordination with Clayful. They they've been they've been nothing but helpful with us when we call them, ask them for help. Um and our support team here at Ottabon from uh Miss Allen's on the call. Our counselors, our mental health counselor, our administrator are all on the call. um we all get called in the event so that someone's bound to get this notification that a student's in need. Um I said thankfully we've only gotten two but you know fortunately we had it to be able to help help the students. So um and the student and the benefits right now it's increased access to mental health support for our students and staff. We understand this is not this is not
055the platform for everybody, but it is the platform for some of our kids because some of our kids don't feel comfortable going to seek out an an adult. So, this is a nice platform for our students to be able to reach out and still get help and and stay confidential unless they really need help. But, then we have to obviously intervene, but it's a good resource for our students. Um, develop healthy ongoing coping strategies, self-awareness through journaling, reduce stigma around seeking out help, and additional resources for students and staff. um for our counseling services in the future. What what our plans are moving forward is we are going to continue monitoring of student engagement. So, we're going to keep on looking at how many of our students are continuing to use. Obviously, we're going to
056have a huge spike in the beginning because it's new to everybody, but we're going we're going to keep looking at engagement to see how many of our kids are continuing to be engaged, how we can how we can continue to promote it to to engage our students to continue to use it. So, that that's part of our future plans. Um, obviously ongoing collaboration with Clayful so that we can we can have a good partnership to help our students and staff. Uh, potential, like I said, potential expansion of hours that we can hopefully they can open that up for for more time so something happens later on at night that they're available on the weekends. And then our staff PD from Clayful, how can we train our staff better to address our students who are in
057need um in crisis? So, those are our future plans. Um, any questions on on Clayful that I could answer? Yes, Miss Davis. >> Sure. >> No, no, they they do. Um, Clayfield said they do not have the same exact coach because even if they were to ask for the same coach, they don't know who it is because they don't have the coach's name. But everything is logged in. And so if you if you and I were coaches, we're both trained the same way, you would pick up the notes where I left off from the student and you could see exactly what and you can continue from where I left off. Um there there was I'm sorry, there were some student comments also. Um I think one of the students said they they spoke to one
058of their coaches from 8:45 until 2 o'clock one day. So um not in the school. No. No. It was it was one of the days we were off from school. I got off it was PD day or something like that, but it was not during instructional time. That's actually that's a good question. Um I I don't know that we've talked that far into the university. I I know we're definitely going to do it in the beginning of the year for our new students again, but I don't I don't think it could hurt to do it with our existing students because obviously things change and and they and they could be in need later than than they are now. I mean I mean things happen in people's eye where things change. So I don't think that's
059a bad idea. I'm sure Miss Allen and I will have a conversation about that. >> Yeah. Thank you. >> Yes. >> You said you had about 80% participation rate in the universal screener. Is is is that good enough? Do you want do you have a goal of how many kids you'd like to see? Well, we won 100% obviously, but with with our students who who opted out, um, >> you know, Miss and I talked and it just happens coincidentally that the number she gave me was 80%. We just happened to get to 80%. It's not that we don't want to get to 100, but it's one of those things where um I I I can't force a kid to log in if they don't choose to do so, but I I think 80%'s a great
060number. I'm talking I'm talking to Clayfield. That's a pretty high percentage um for some of the schools they work with. So, I'm happy with 80. I'm not I'm not thrilled that it's on 100, but but I think I think 80 is a good number for us. >> Is it an app or a website? >> So, it's a website that our students can access whether through, you know, typing the actual address in. It's also in our students uh Clever. So, they automatically can log in through Clevver. They don't have to worry about it's right in there with all the rest of their school stuff. So they can utilize it when they want to and and if they want to um download the app, they can. So it could be both. >> And they're talking on the
061phone or texting? >> It's texting. >> It's all texting. >> Yes. >> Um maybe this is a question for Miss Alam. Is if there's notes being kept on the students, is the students data being protected? I assume this is >> that question actually came up about the um security of the data and things like that. What's interesting is the they have two I'm probably not going to explain this as well as they do, but they have two different databases. One that has the students n ID number and one that has the notes. So the notes and the ID number aren't together, but there's a way for them to be tracked together. But if someone was to get the notes, they wouldn't know who it was that said it. If someone was to get the list
062of numbers of people that had talked, they wouldn't know what they said. So they're intentionally kept in different places. The the only way we know who it is is if the student is in immediate need. >> Then we obviously have to know because we have to get them help. >> Yeah. >> Yes. >> Mentioned 245 264 coaching sessions. >> Do you do you know how many users that was? Like was it one person logging into It didn't it doesn't I'm sure I could probably break it down somehow, but the information on the website that we have, it just shows the amount of sessions we have. So, it could be multiple students. Um, I'm sure it's not 200 It's probably not 264 students. >> If if I had to guess, it's probably about 250 students. A
063few of them did multiple times. >> Does it say how long the sessions last or how many messages are exchanged or >> It it doesn't it doesn't give us specific. I'm sure I could call to see if they could provide that information for us. Like I said, we did have David with 6,000 total minutes out of those 264. >> So, some could be longer, some could be shorter. >> Yeah. Oh, so we did give you minutes. >> Yeah. 6,000 total minutes right now of sessions. Yes. >> So, on average, it's like I can't do math off like this, but it's like five minutes each. >> How how many miles, Miss Cox? 20. Okay. 20 minutes >> per >> on average >> session. Yeah. >> Right. Right. That's that's one of our outliers. Right. >> And
064and in case you in case you guys are wondering, uh autobon wrestling group one champs >> first time in history. So congratulations. So, >> sorry, I just don't understand the details. So, 22 minutes, but it's a texting app. So, it's like >> I mean, if there's like five minutes in between, is that considered one session or two sessions? You probably don't know, but I'm just curious like >> so, so >> how do you quantify texting minutes? >> So, I can I can get I can get in touch with playful and ask that question. I'm going to assume, and I don't want to assume, I'm going to assume it's from the moment. If you were to coach, if I'm the student, if I if I reach out to you from the moment it starts until the
065moment it ends, I'm assuming that's where they get the minutes from. >> Okay, that makes sense. >> I'm I'm not guessing. I'm guessing they're not saying each text is a thing. It's I'm sure it's the log in >> and the log out will be will be the time. Okay. >> I just needed it to process it. >> I got you. It's a good question, though. How are you fostering deeper relationships with the students who don't feel they have someone to talk to? Like how do you how do you bridge that gap? >> Um so I don't want to get into too many of the conversations I have with individual kids. >> You can't force the kids to >> No. No. So my conversation I know I'll use my specific conversation I have with the students
066I talk to is I I called the students down and it was more hey you you answered this survey and you said you don't have a trusted adult. let's talk about it. And they said, "Well, it's not that I don't trust or like the teachers or adults in the building. I just don't really feel like sharing my personal information with them. I like to do that at home with my family." I said, "I totally understand that." I said, "I just need to know that you're comfortable enough in this building where if you did need to speak with somebody, do you have somebody in this building that you can go to if you really had a need to speak with them?" And all the students I talked to said, "Yes, I have teachers or staff members
067in this building that I could go to if I really needed to, but I just choose not to talk about my personal stuff with them. It's not that I don't trust or I don't like them. It's just I don't want to share my personal information with them. So, we we're making sure that they have people that they're able to to talk to." And I feel I mean, out of like I said, out of the 790 kids we have, we only had 45 students who reported zero. So that's the way we're we're going to talk to each one of those kids and our counselors do the same thing. Yeah. Mr. W. >> Two questions. Uh number one, you mentioned there was about 10 staff members that would be alerted if there was uh an instance. Is
068that >> is that consisting of the counselors and administration mainly? >> Counselors, administration, um Miss Allen, Mr. Burke are all on the list. If something were to happen, we get we get an instant instant message and we we have to like I said, we've been fortunate where we have responded immediately. I think we've been actually were in the same room at one point like, "Hey, did you get that clinical message?" >> It's counselors and then we try to make sure there's enough of us that are like 24hour like Mr. Burke, maybe Mr. Le, we're we are >> responsible for what things going on at school 247. Counselors aren't. So, we can't just have the counselor as the person that they're going to be is going to be their go-to. And like I said, the the
069protocol is one of us has to immediately reply, you know, received, right? And that way we know. And if nobody has yet, if you're the first one to get it, you make sure. But yes, we actually had one. We were sitting in the conference room and I went, >> "Who saw it first?" And we you go, >> hopped out, made the phone call, boom, boom, boom, boom, and it was taken care of. >> And then second question, I guess this would be more directed for Miss Allen. Is there any plans to implement this on an elementary school level? >> We currently have we currently have the license for Mansion. Um when you get into lower grades, you worry about the the students having that kind of interaction. So we didn't implement the universal screener at
070Mansion because Mansion technically does a universal screener every morning. Every morning students and I don't know if it was when you guys were there, but every morning the students get um a temperature check. They have to say what what zone they feel like they're in. And anybody who's not in a green I hope I'm saying this right. Anybody who's Where's Trish? She always flags me if I'm saying it wrong. Anybody who's not in a green zone is seen by a counselor within the next period or two. Um so that already is a universal screener that's done daily. So I didn't feel the need to do the universal screener there. However, they are starting to bring it in through INRS and through counseling to do some of the journaling and things like that when there. Yes.
071>> Okay. And students are aware of that that it is >> it's still being rolled out. Yes, we had a problem with some loginins. I just actually had a conversation I think two weeks ago with Miss Smeltzer about there was an issue with the login and they but every student's account is active and it's in their Clever just like it is for you guys. >> Okay. >> Yes. >> That there were um 80% um that were screened and then you had mentioned that there were people that had opted out. Was it 20% people opted out? Do we know about how many people opted out or%? >> I I don't know how many opted. I I could probably go in and call the company. >> I want to know if how much of that 20% were
072opted out. >> No, there's there's a percentage of students who who were absent who who didn't log in. Okay. >> Um so we we're I'm still working on those 20%. >> But um as far as how many opted out as far as I don't have that I can get it for you if you wanted to. I can call to see if they can give me the numbers. No, I just I'm I'm glad to hear that it's not 20% opting out because that's that's a lot more of, you know, I'd be questioning the buy in there. >> It's not 20% opt out for sure. >> That's what I was just I can I can assure you it's not all 20% opt out. Great. >> If you want I can call Clayful. They only give me surface
073numbers. >> Sure. >> But I'm sure if I called they could give me some deeper numbers if you want to. I can look into that for you. >> Okay. Okay. Thank you. >> No problem. >> Anybody else have any questions on Clayful? Because I have two more things I want to address real quick before I go. Um we also have another initiative we're working on with our dreams our dreams training our nurtured heart approach um which has really been uh taken off. It's fantastic and I don't want to get too much into it because Mr. How is going to be here next month presenting to you on that. So I don't want to take too much of of his of his work and and his his glory because he he's doing a really good job
074with it. But nurture heart approach is another um seal mental health initiative which is led by Mr. Howy. We have a great relationship with the Dreams trainers who've been coming in uh once a month except for this past December. They invited Mr. Howe and I to their office in Vorhees to meet with them. Um which is a beautiful space by the way. We walked in, we're like, "Oh, this is what County May looks like." Huh. Beautiful, beautiful place. But they um they they welcomed us in and they did a train there with us. Um they're very excited with us at Ottabon because we have 23 members on our dreams team and they said a lot of their schools have between three and five members on their dreams team. We have 23 which includes members of
075CST, teachers, administration. Um we have a v wide variety of people on that team which is fantastic. Like I said we we meet once a month. Um, it is a three-year initiative. This is we're halfway through the first year. And what they do is they come in once a month and and they train us on ways to handle students who are in crisis and students who are in need. And then the second year initiative is how we get it from our training staff out to our staff so they can learn how to how to handle students who are in crisis. Um, so it's it's a it's a fun three-year initiative. Like I said, it's it's been great. Um, the team we have is fantastic. um they're they're just very attentive that they first came in
076and the first lesson was more elementary based and we just asked them it's a high school it's a high school group if you if you can make more of the of the the training centered around high school students. We get more buyin from our our group and they they adjusted and it went it went really really well and and they hit the ground running and they're a fantastic group of ladies um from from the county who do a great job with us. So, I'm looking forward to how that's going to continue. And then I I do want once again, I know we mentioned uh the career day. I know Mr. Wilson was there. Thank you for for attending. It was wonderful. I know I know Miss Cox's husband and son were here and you guys
077mentioned it, but I I thought that it was a fantastic We had we had uh military here. We had Okay. Okay. I don't I don't want to I don't want to I don't want to spoil the video, but we had law enforcement. We had um we had our new nurse, her husband is a sports talk radio host on 975 in the morning and he took a day off from his job and came in and talked to our kids. One of we have graduates who was an ER doctor. She came in. Uh we had a wide variety of things our our kids really enjoyed. I was saying before you guys got here, some of you guys that we have we have seniors who get to leave early and a lot of our seniors chose not to
078leave. They they chose to stay and continue their you know their day at the career day. So thank you to Mr. Corley and his team for for putting that together. It was a lot of work and it it was fantastic that we had, you know, different professions. We we had roofers, we had we had auto body, we had, you know, doctors and we had lawyers and judges and it it was um exceptional. So, I just want I just want to thank them. Well, thank you guys for your time. I appreciate it. Um and just in case anybody asked, I predicted the score tonight to be 37 to nothing or 37 to 30 Ottabon and we won 36 nothing. So, I was close. I was close. But thank you for your time, guys. I appreciate it.
079Thank you. >> Okay. And then our next presentation, Miss Allen has our SSDs report. >> This is your favorite thing ever. >> I said I couldn't believe that six months had gone by already. >> Hey, you look forward to this. This is the best. Um, I remember the first one I did, I had to stand up here and go over it and I didn't even have the data and things yet. The second one I said, "This is good. At least now I can talk intelligently about it." For the third one, I really made it my own. So, it's much shorter than what it's been in the past. U, so the student student safety data systems report, SSDs, is something that we have to do every year. It's a requirement and here we are. Uh, the
080first period is from July through December of last year. So, remember July and August were not in. So, lots of data for there. So, it's really just September, October, November, December of last year. Uh, student safety data system collects all of our incident information. I feel like those speakers are a lot louder. The report includes the HIP trainings and programs that we have throughout the district. And the data covers violence, vandalism, and substance offenses as well. So, those are all the things that are under this umbrella. So, what do we report? violence, which is any obviously any physical or threatening acts with intent to do harm. We report vandalism on school property or personal property with intent. That means when you drop your Chromebook and break it, that doesn't count as I realize that that's
081damaging school property, but it's not vandalism. There's no intent there. So, that would not get filed. um weapons, possession of or use possession of or use of. And the last one was, did it go to sleep? Did it do something? Greg, help. Thank you. Thank you, Vanna. Oh. Oh, wait. I think I did it. There's a button on here. I think I hit the wrong button. And then the HIV whether they're alleged or um confirmed. So that would be another element that is reported. Oh, and other I'm sorry, other offenses. This is always a large number for us. Other offenses means anything that has a child removed from the educational process in school or out of school suspension. So this is where our uh repeat offenders are for certain things. I actually listed them out.
082Last year we had some questions over them, so I took the data and actually listed it out. So Ottabon Park surprisingly doesn't have any of these things. We don't have any weapons at Ottabbon Park. We don't have any substance abuse at Ottabban Park. We don't have any fights at Ottabbon Park. Havlin also zero across the board. Mansion, we've had three HIV reports. You're aware of this. You read them every month. So this is again up through December. We had three. So then we get to the junior senior high school. Again, 7 to 12th grade. Big window of kids there. Take that in into consideration. So, one violence incident that was a fight uh four substance u whe again this is whether it's use uh found in possession of things of that nature three hibis and
083then 26 other incidents 10 of those were conduct things that just were because of progressive discipline got to the point of putting somebody out for suspension six of them were cell phones again not the first time they've had a device but because by December when you're still being told I told you to get your device now we have to up the Annie uh cut Saturday detentions, vapes, truency, slur. So those were all the things that ended up in that category. Uh yes, vapes are not considered the illegal substances. Um another thing that we're required to report is our restraints and seclusions. If a student has to be uh obviously restrained as a physical restraint, like if you're trying to break up a fight, there's other times that restraints or seclusions are used um more often
084in special ed than not, but or even preschool with little kids. Somebody's freaking out having a tantrum. You clear the room and you body block the kid and keep them in the classroom. That's considered a seclusion. He's being separated from his peers and from the educational environment for a few minutes. That has to be reported. It could be a five-minute thing. It could be a 30-cond thing. It could be a whatever. But we report all of those things. So at Havlin we did have one um seclusion that was reported and then we have the trainings. So every year we do trainings we do our HIV trainings. Trainings is what's for the staff programs are what's for the students. So across the buildings five trainings at park Ottabon Park five at Havlin two at Mansion six
085at the high school and as far as programs for the kids 8 13 and six. I tried to give some examples. Um the trainings, a lot of it is some of the stuff that uh Mr. Burke puts out in the beginning of the year that we have to do out of compliance or the things that we do in our opening day presentations about the HIV policy, the anti-bullying bill of rights, school safety, the school improvement team, things like that. When we're talking about programs, again, it's all kinds of safety and bullying. So we have the pedestrian safety, character ed, PBIS assemblies, zones of regulation, anti-bullying week, the week of respect. All of those types of things count as the programs that we do for our students. Uh so what keeps us safe in Ottabon? Well,
086we have obviously policy um and regulations that the governance committee works hard on keeping them updated and relevant. We have school safety plans and school procedures that are practiced in all of the buildings on a regular basis. We have our trainings and professional learning. We have uh online trainings that the students do. We do uh teachers do sorry new teacher orientation goes through a lot of these things. Districtwide opening day inservice. There's time dedicated to a lot of the things that have to be done. And then faculty meetings always reinforce anything that comes up that needs attention. uh the partnerships we have qu uh cooperative with other uh school districts and with the Ottabon Police Department, obviously the fire department, things like that help us with our drills and coming in and going over the
087things that we need. And then the student support services. We of course have our guidance department, mental health counselor, positive behavior supports. Um and then it just listed for each of the buildings what their different programs were for the positive climate. Emergency drills are required by law. Any of the teachers can tell you this and you probably remember back from when you were in school. Fire drills are required once per month. Security drills are also required once per month. There's two. We need to have two of each of the following throughout the year. Active shooter, lockdown, bomb threat, and non-fire evacuation. Remember, we talked last year at this presentation. You get a notice from the school saying that a drill happened today. We don't necessarily tell you which drill. There's a reason for that. We
088don't go through all the details of the drill. We just let you know that an emergency drill happened that day. Uh bus evacuation drills are also required by law. Yes, we're a walking district. Yes, they still have to know how to get out of the bus. You can ask our student representatives. They get to take a gym class every year and go out and go out the front door and learn about the back door and the roof hatch and the windows and all the special ways that you get out of the bus. That happens at all of our buildings. And by the way, we lend our buses to Mount Ephraim so that they can do it as well. Another walking district that doesn't have buses, still a required requirement. twice a year for all students.
089Some of the district-wide precautions that I'm sure you're aware of, but we also need to make sure we report. Obviously, we have a vestibule guest entry at all of our buildings. I have to tell you, um, principles may not be here anymore. We have had uh pretty good battles with DCPMP coming to see students or to take students and they don't want to use our verata system. They think that so the verata system any of you have come during a school day or picked up your child you have to have your license your license matches your student in the system I give your child to you if your license doesn't match in the system I'm not giving that child to you DCPMP obviously is not in the system so looking at their license isn't going
090to so then they're coming in as a guest or someone that's not so we take a picture of the license we run the background check we make sure that they're not an axe murderer and then we'll let them in the school they refuse to let us take a picture of their license their policy says says that their license will never be taken by a school official for and and taken a picture of. So, I have gone back and forth with the help of Miss Gearan and going through some of the DCPMP people. We are allowed to do a visual inspection of their license so I can verify their name and birth date and run them through the system and in order to prove that they're not an axe murderer before I'll let them in the
091building. still very difficult for me to just do that and release a child to them because but they have a state ID that tells okay Verata is an excellent system. It is very worthwhile. I have made lots of enemies in the world of DCPMP. The county prosecutor's office came to either Hav or preschool last month to do an assembly and when the prosecutor came in and saw what they had to do, she's like, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Like I I have and he's like I love this. This is awesome." and she said, "We we fight with DCP over this." They said, "You shouldn't be fighting with anybody. Make them you make them log in." When Mr. Miller had his security um training here, we used our site. It was people were beyond amazed at the
092process that we have for people to come in. Yes, it's a hassle. Yes, people are parents get annoyed with it. And I get it. I come in and don't have my go back out, get my license, same thing. But it is so worth it. It is such a good system and it's well done. Um, obviously our state-of-the-art camera system, I think we've talked about this before, the camera tracking. I know I think it was the beginning of this year, we did a fire drill. A student was missing, couldn't find the student. Mr. Bleb was able to come back in the building, pull up the student's picture, be able to find out in the school where the student was seen last. They were seen going in the bathroom. They came out of the bathroom, went to
093the breezeway, and left with a parent. Parent never signed them out. So that's why they weren't there for the f, you know. So we had to talk to called the parent. Parent has a child. Good. That took minutes, not what it could have taken because of the system, but we were able to address the parent. You you picked up a child without signing out. Do you understand what that does? Like this is what just got triggered because of this. You think it's an innocent thing, but we know we're accountable for all children. Uh there's also weapon detection. The window tinting, which we see every time we come into our meetings here in the library. They have it at the front of the building and at Havlin. We're working on getting it in Mansion. Uh the
094multi-dist reunification plan, should there be a reason that we need to evacuate, having a common place, this is something that's being worked on as a coalition with other districts. The vape detector, I understand, it's supposed to be very um helpful and and works. Mr. uh Miller has quite a collection of vapes to attest to it. Um and things that we're working on. We're looking at maybe a second sign in at Havlin. I've talked to each of the board members about that when we've had our committee meetings out there. getting some more cameras as we expand our size of Ottabon Park. We need some things outside. There's a couple places at each of the buildings that there's a little bit of blind spots that we want to work on, but all in all, we have a
095very, very safe um environment. Our school safety specialist is still Mr. Miller here at the high school and our HBI coordinator is Mr. Kley. That is the end. Any questions about the SSDs? >> One question, one comment. The comment Thank you so much for putting the details of that 26 because it's always like >> I know >> one weapon, one fight, 26 other and we're always like what's the other? So, thank you for being proactive and letting us know that was very helpful. Um question the um collaboration. You collaborate with Ottabon PD. Ottabbon PD doesn't do Ottabbon Park, right? That's Haden >> Haden Township. Yes. >> How much coordination do you have with them? >> A lot. A lot. Barbie and and obviously you go to the Ottabon Park Council meetings. Haden Township is there
096all the time. And there's always an officer. I guess they're always supposed to be at township. I don't know. I don't go to township meetings. The auto hen township officers are always at the Ottabon Park council meetings. So if I've had any questions or whatever, I can go over talk talk to them there. But uh Barbie has a a very good working relationship with them as well. Anyone else? It's part of my superintendent report, but while I'm up here, I'd like to have Greg show the video. We talked about the career fair. Um Mr. Corley's department. I'm not really sure exactly who, but I'm giving him credit for a really nice three and a half minute video that that highlights some of the things that happened at the career fair. So, I'd like to show
097that while we're transitioning to the superintendent report. my super. >> Okay, so superintendent report. One more thing before I get into my other Miss Alexis Miller. We want to congratulate her for her bachelor's degree. Added on the last month's agenda, but forgot to invite you to that one. So, sorry for the delay, but very proud. We we appreciate education to benefit Ottabon. Um, couple other things I just wanted to add real quickly. Obviously, the career day, the shout out to Mr. uh, Corley brought that together. It was one of the things on our strategic plan. It was the first ever. Um, was really pleased with it and look forward to things from there. U AI was talked briefly about by Ryan and will be a little bit in governance, but I wanted to let everybody
098know that a survey will be coming out. Um the curriculum department worked hard on putting together a survey for all the students, the teachers, the staff and the parents. Find out what their feelings are um their use things of that will be coming out to on Friday. Uh students at Mansion will be taking it on Friday. Students at the high school will be next week. Um, and then we'll have that data to be able to take to the meeting. Um, they they modeled it off of some other districts that have done something similar, but went through and it's it's a kind of cool Google, but it goes there. It does all this, but to take care of a multitude of different stakeholders. Um, the calendar is on here just to make sure everybody knows it's
099on there. The snow day obviously that we just had school on Monday, but also the half day on May 29th was just the high school half day. It is now a full district half day for an inservice um just to make sure that the elementary schools get that extra day to do the the collaborative work. We at um some of the committee meetings talked about how effective the teachers feel that that time is. So, it was worth adding that in. Um and in front of you, you have a tiny little scroll. Your tiny little scroll is an invitation to the play that Mansion will be doing. There's two dates. It's the junior Wizard of Oz. Uh Darthy wanted to come and deliver these to you herself, but she was unavailable this evening over actually basket
100for me to give out to you, but I was not walking around like Dorothy and handing them to you. Everyone is originally invited. I will be in the play. I am the doorman for when they go to see Dorothy Wizard and I answer the door. So, I'll be in it. Um, >> I'm a uhal. >> It's a musical. I keep saying the play. >> I have invitations for you for the Wizard of Oz musical that will be put on by the mansion students. Please think about joining us for it. Two dates are on there. Um, >> I am. Who knocks on my door? >> Yes, >> there's a hat. There's a really cool hat. >> It is not not yet. >> Oh, I could do that. >> That was so nice. >> All right, I
101think I'm actually done. Oh, okay. Excellent. Thank you very much. All right. Um, moving on. We've got the approval of the board minutes. Can I have a motion to approve the minutes from our January 7th reorganization meeting, January 21st executive session and public session? >> Roll call, please. >> Okay. Allison Cox, >> yes. >> Danielle D. Franchesco, Mark Gaddy, >> Alison Lipsky, Andrea Robinson. >> Yes. >> Bill Wilson. >> Steven Wilson. >> Yes. >> Michelle Kennedy. >> And Amy Davis. >> Yes. Motions pass. Thank you. We have our first public participation session. This is on agenda items only. Is there anyone that would like to make a comment on any agenda items at this time? All right, seeing none, I will close our first public participation section and move on to governance. I would like
102to recognize Miss Lipsky. So, as you can see, we have we only have items for a second reading, but lest you think we did nothing at the February 3rd meeting, understand AI task force assembled and was present. Um, there will be t-shirts. Um, it was actually a very uh we had mutual stakeholders just keeps popping up. Uh, teachers from across uh the district. So, not just the high school, we had our director of technology. We had uh the principal at school, Mr. Leb. We had Miss Martell. We had a variety of people. Uh we also had and I'm so sorry I can see his face. I could probably even draw. Nope. That was the director of technology. Thank you. Thank you. Um so, we had a lot of we had looked at information from various
103other districts. Um I think we have a I think we have a a good framework of what we're looking at and we understand just how large and massive this is. Um, and that was kind of part of the meeting was for everyone to kind of understand that this isn't just for us to make a policy and then be like, okay, it has to have everyone on board because if everyone isn't on board and understanding the ethical use of uh ethical use of digital technology and digital literacy, uh, that's going to cause a lot of problems. And so, and that means the curriculum from basically, you know, Havlin through the junior senior high school is going to have to reflect that ethical use of digital technology and that is going to be it's and that becomes
104part of the curriculum across the board. So it means that the teachers have to learn how to use it and the administrators need to learn how to use it ethically and correctly as well as um the students. So it's a massive undertaking, but I feel that we're all up to it. We all kind of know what our roles are and what we're going to focus on. So obviously the board is focusing on policy. Shocker. Uh but then we have the director of curriculum and the assistant superintendent as well as their team a and the teachers working on the curriculum that type of policy while also working with Mr. I'm the director of technology as to what uh guard rails uh we have and need to have and to go put those safety features in place
105as well because obviously the type of generative AI that students should be allowed access to is different based on their age and grade level and ability but everyone kind of needs to know how to use it ethically. Uh, one of the things and I was showing to our student reps that I thought was very funny and Miss Martella had mentioned that one of her one of the things that she does in her classroom is she has students with all guard rails on look up something and then that seems common sense but then has to factcheck AI because everyone kind of thinks like well yeah that's the truth. And so one of the things that I did um was I went to uh Google and I just did a it was one of those things that
106something came across my feed that the Seahawks had declined an invitation from the White House and I had seen that before with the Eagles and it turned out to be false and all sorts of things like that. So I was like be before I get you know excited or not excited. So, I will not know my political leanings, although I think most of you probably know my political leanings. Um, I ended up doing a quick search, just a Google search, and it always has the AI overview, and I couldn't stop laughing because I am not a sports person, but even I know that the Seahawks won the 2026 Super Bowl. Even I on this day know this. But apparently AI and Google does not. And so what was hysterical and something that is so widely
107known, it said based on reports as of February 16, 2026, there's no evidence that the Seattle Seahawks declined a White House visit in 2026. Which, okay, on its face looks good until it says as they have not recently won the Super Bowl to receive an invitation. And that's when I went, "Oh, oh my god. Wow." I kind of would not think AI would mess that up so badly. But um so it just kind of goes to show you the type of I mean it's that's wild and it's one of those things that we need our kids and our educators and administrators to know to kind of take everything with a grain of salt and that this is not to take the place of your critical thinking. This is to be a tool but like any
108tool it cannot replace your mind. So that is one of the things that's a big on the horizon and a lot of moving parts, but exciting. As to those things on the agenda in dealing with the second reading and adoption of the following policies, all these were gone over in January 21st. A lot of the things were that certain certain statutes and certain laws changed and so it was just changing maybe a little verbiage here and there of how the the name of or the numeration of said law. But then we also had some things like with sexual harassment of staff. That was one where they were talking about how it's title seven or title nine and how in the past it's only been this or that. And then it really just fleshed out everything.
109what you do with a title seven complaint, what you do with a title n complaint, and then ultimately if a complaint falls under both title n policies and how you have to go forward control um as to resource materials, library materials, things like that, a lot of that was due to the new freedom uh freedom to read act. Um, we did have the librarian at the media center come and tell us, you know, how how do you determine, you know, what books are here and and if someone wants a book or things like that or if someone has how do you do that? What do you do? What's the process? It was actually very interesting and it's indepth and he uses a lot of accredited um sites and sources for education that have ascribed to
110them like these are the best books for this topic in eighth grade and things like that. So it gave us a new appreciation and those are just the types of things that are just following that law. And so that's about all for that and our next meeting is the first Tuesday of March. I believe that's what it usually is unless we need to make a change. So, does anyone from governance have anything to add? >> Do you have anything to add? >> All right. Um, anybody questions, comments, or discussion on non-aggenda items? >> Mr. Since we don't have an AI policy yet and AI is occurring at the school, what what guard rails have been set up, what what is the guidance right there for that? >> I don't know. >> Well, I think that
111was talked by Mr. Chisum a bit at our meeting where I mean there it's locked. Yeah, that's the guard rail. That's what I was gonna say. Yeah. Okay. I mean there was an example one of uh students were putting their pictures in and getting AI images back of themselves kind of you know uh cartoonized and everything even that perhaps should be under some sort of policy where we're having children submit their photos to an online company tech company without any guidance on Okay. But >> I mean the teachers are obviously introducing it in class at times at least according Okay. I may be mistaken. >> I I I can't I don't want to say who it was obviously. Yeah. I don't want to call out any teacher in particular, but Okay. >> I mean brought
112to our attention certain sites certain um AI generated programming and when we find it we have closed it off like Gemini for example is not open and available for use. There's one that just came um that we just became aware of I think it was this week and Mr. Burke immediately went to technology and closed it. Was one where they could just show up like show something to the AI and it would solve a math problem. So like those things have been as we discover them again it's technology so it's it's a lot as we discover them things are locked out is that to say that they're not getting to it and using it of of course not even when we have a policy it's going to be difficult with that because you can do
113it on this instead of your school device and still have the ability show showing them how to yeah I don't know I don't know any Yeah, we do know that there are certain classes like there is and has been for the I think the last five years um in this sixth grade there is an ethical use of digit digital like ethical use of digital technology that is um taught to those kids. Um the students that are sophomores, juniors, and seniors now never had that because it didn't exist at the time. Uh so that is something where that does exist and obviously that teacher sets up the parameters and things like that and there are certain programs that you can strictly limit. So you can basically almost like put the students computers in to a box
114and only what you programs you want can you put in that box. so that you make sure that you know what they're doing and what what information they can get it from. And um so that's there, but one of the big issues is that this is so fastly changing all the time that anything that we do, you know, right now it's kind of like if if it hasn't been approved like this is your class ethical, you know, ethicalology. So if something comes out, a teacher can say, "Okay, you can do X with this." And obviously, it would have to go through administration to to say, "Yes, that's okay, and that's part of the curriculum and what we're doing." But quite frankly, a lot of it is just shut down by Mr. Chisum. Like, nope, that's
115not allowed. That's great. Nope. Because we don't have a policy, we just don't know how far it can go. Um, so that's one of the things that we're looking as to what what systems do we need. So that because there's so much that people can put all sorts of information in and particularly children don't realize they're giving away so much private information that can be used against them. So obviously anything with the school rigorous and strong. >> So I'm I'm I'm thinking now that Mr. Gaddy has has raised this concern. I'm I'm sure Miss Allen will take a look into exactly what it is that you're speaking to and maybe you can reach out to Miss Allen personally and let her know a little bit more of of your concerns and some of the details.
116Um absolutely. Um I was at that um governance meeting and I think we have a really solid framework like Miss Lipsky said about um who's there there's so many things to have to tackle but it was broken up into tasks and who is going to be responsible for what and then we're all supposed to be getting back together again March 31st with all of our completed components to to work out from there. So it was a very productive meeting for us. >> Governance meeting solely for the AI task force, not >> right doesn't encompass policy. Right. >> Exactly. >> All right. Um again, can I get a motion for item number one under governance? Any questions, comments, or discussion on item number one? Okay. Roll call, please. >> Danielle D. Franchesco, Mark Gaddy, Alison Lipsky,
117>> Andrea Robinson, Bill Wilson, Steven Wilson, Michelle Kennedy, >> Alison Cox, Amy Davis. >> Motion's passed. >> I'd like to recognize Mr. Gaddy for operations. >> You uh we met last Tuesday, February 10th. Um we discussed district openings. We still need a uh we discussed the schedule for next year's school budget. Uh Governor Sell in Nudity office has been given a couple extra for budget address. So address is scheduled for March 10th with districts receiving state aid numbers on March 12th. This means our next operations meeting will have to be moved back and will possibly require either moving our March board meeting or scheduling a shorter extra board meeting to get our preliminary budget voted on and submitted to the county office in time. We discussed medical insurance increases. Uh the district's insurance policy starts
118on January 1st and as she had mentioned at the board retreat uh Mr. Rockase had budgeted a 20% increase for the school year's not the school year's budget the year the the calendar budget calendar year budget well she put that estimate into this year's school budget that is correct actually in actuality it came in at a 37% increase so we are having a insurance our insurance experience review. This lets us know if we can go out to bid again. Uh it's mostly about finding out how attractive we are to a cheaper vendor. Um you know how much we cost them the bid. We had an inepth right to move and mount Ephraim. We discussed some proper claims that we've recently submitted for very uh a pipe break at Havlin. Uh luckily the quickly found its
119way facility into a grant that Havland uh fire alarm had it there. There was a broken but there was uh some cleaning up in the home economics classroom. Um also at mansion the new p new new panel switch that we've been talking about since during spring break. Uh the need to shut down the for an extended amount of time has limited as to when this could be done. We discussed the bathroom additions at Otabon Park in anticipation of the preschool classroom expansion there next year. Because of the scale of the project, we will be required to have our architect work up plans for it. Uh for a few of the items I just mentioned, we had input from our director of facilities, James Hollander. Uh Mr. Hollander Hollander was at the operations meeting to give
120us a wish list of capital product repairs and purchases for the district buildings. any purchases or product projects would come out of next year's capital reserve. And I thank him and we all thank him for coming out on a Tuesday night and speaking to us. Um on tonight's agenda, we have the usual fiscal items. December secretaries report, cash reconciliation report, bill list, and transfers. We are asked to certify that there are no changes to the school year's anticipated revenue amounts or revenue sources. and to the best of our knowledge that sufficient funds are available to meet the district's financial obligations for the remainder of the fiscal year. We have the monthly safety drill report. We have a vote on the audit report that was presented tonight. And in light of a change of the law
121at state level, we have an item regarding our public meetings notice policy. >> You have anything to add? I wasn't actually at the meeting, but I want to thank >> Yeah, it was really great to have you there. >> Very cooperative and uh actually a lot of things on the wish list he said. I think I think we can handle that. I think we can do that. It was great to actually um hear how he was going to tackle some of those without having to dip into the budget. >> Yeah. Handle things in house, right, with our own personnel. Absolutely. All right. Uh, any comments, questions, or discussion on non-aggenda items? I guess Mrs. Ron Casease, you'll let us know how we need to structure or restructure our meetings in light of the delay on
122the budget numbers, right? >> Uh, yes. As um Mr. Daddy uh referred that uh you know with not getting state aid numbers until March 12th um the budget right now they haven't told us exactly uh when the budget is due to the county office. However um there are rumors because this happened in the past with um when Governor Murphy came in office. Uh they normally give the school districts an extension of a week. So they would have been due March 19th was the original that would mean March 26th. So two options that I perceive is move our move our meeting from March 18th to March 25th the everything the whole meeting or we have a special meeting on March 25th just to submit the budget to the county because uh it will not be ready
123on March 18th for a vote with only getting the numbers by March 12th. Now it would just be I feel that we should keep the meeting at the third on the 18th, the third Wednesday since the public pretty much knows that that's where we are that that that's our meeting. Um, and then just have the special meeting for the 25th. And on the on the 18th, we will have our state aid numbers so we can get a preliminary on idea of what it's going to look at. But what happens is >> everything has to be put into the budget software, >> right? >> And that can cause edits once it's in there. So, I don't want to adopt anything on the 18th and later find out that the numbers need to change for some reason
124um because it has to be submitted with no edits, >> right? And the meeting on the 25th would would be the meeting just to push the budget forward to the county, right? That that's not just so everybody understands that's not the final approval of the budget. That's just the step we have to take to get it to the county. Okay. So, then we'll go forward with the 25th then. All right. Um and Um 7 o'clock >> 7 o'clock. >> Uh we I don't feel that we need to have a closed before hand, right? So we would just start at 7 o'clock. >> So then you'll make sure that we advertise for that meeting. >> Yes. And uh would you like me to talk about the new advertisement? >> Sure. Why not? >> While we're on
125that, >> um so um Parker McKay actually sent us guidance on the new law that came into into effect um that is imple has to be implemented by March 1st of 2026. So just for this year, it is a one-year law. Um yes, uh that instead of advertising our meetings or or any legal ads in the newspaper, um we have to direct everybody or direct the public to go to our website to see all of our legal notices. That's where they will be posted. Um yeah, question already. >> Tell us how we're supposed to direct the public to our website. >> Yes. So, um, in the law it it is, um, it states that in in your local newspaper, you need to have a public notice there two times a month, um, that just says,
126"Please public, look at the website for the for the legal notices." And um starting March 1st, you um have to have on your website all of your legal notices archived for the year so they can go back and look at them. >> Can you turn on your mic, please? >> Newspaper that we're going to have a meeting. We print the newspaper to check the website for our meeting. >> Correct. Okay. >> For a year. >> Well, they'll change the law something. I don't know. >> Are they saying this law because they plan on saying that we no longer have to post this stuff in the newspaper? So, like we're doing this for a year for the the stragglers and then everyone just knows to go to our website. >> So, if if I can just
127comment on that and Um this is just what we're public sector attorneys are opining on in general. I we have no I have no special insight. Um the obviously the internet is ubiquitous and everybody accesses it and the question is always why are we printing notices in newspapers particularly when the number of truly local newspapers is is shrinking and nobody reads print anymore anyway. Everybody reads online. Um so there is a a a big group of people pushing to just have everything published on websites. Um and from what I understand from um the people making these decisions is that it is actually local newspapers and print publications that get a lot of revenue from people who are required to publish notices in print still. um saying that you know making the counterargument which is no
128you know we people have been coming to the paper for generations this is what we need to do and they've been pushing back so um what most of us who do this work are assuming or what is common knowledge I suppose is that this is a a compromise transition kind of bill right transitioning us from an old system a new system, kind of a test period to see how it goes. And then we all expect that there's going to be additional legislation probably hearing from the stakeholders and interested parties including publications about how it went and what the impact was and then some decision about probably moving more permanently to websites moving forward. Again, I have no special insight, but this is what the conversation is. Okay. Just one other quick de is this going
129to cost cost more money >> uh for what we're doing. Yeah. Well, um the local newspaper does charge um a fee every time that you and each individual school district does do them if you do look in the in the local newspaper. >> And so is the state in this new law giving us more money to do this? No, not not at this time. >> I would just note that the the the Open Public Meetings Act requires that you publish into two newspapers, but you only p you publish your full list of meetings once um a year, typically around or after the time of rework. Um the new law in order to redirect people requires you to publish twice a month. So, you can do the math on that. All right. Um, there are no
130other questions or comments. Can I have a motion on items 1 through 10 under operations? >> Roll call, please. Mark Gaddy, Alison Lipsky. Andrea Robinson, >> Bill Wilson, >> Steven Wilson, >> Michelle Kennedy, >> Alison Lipsky. Oh, no, sorry, Alison Cox. Danielle D. Franchesco, Amy Davis. >> Motion's passed. >> Thank you. Good catch, Mrs. Candidate. All right. I would like to recognize Miss Robinson for education. Thank you. The education committee met on January 27th. Um, we looked at a teacher survey about the half days that happened once a month during the school year and they were reported to be very useful. So, those will remain in place for next year. Um, we got a lot of the same data about Clayful that was presented tonight, or at least we got some Clayful data. Um, and
131then the PSAT results for the current junior class were presented. Um, and then we talked a little bit about the new courses that are being developed for next year, which include AP French, African-American history, creative writing, and television media production. Um, and then on tonight's agenda, there's facilities requests, the usual, conferences and workshops, field trip requests. I do want to highlight the Longwood Gardens trip to enhance botanical concepts learned in plant biology. As a botonist myself, that really resonates. Um there's clinical practice experience, mentors, the revised calendar, um out of district placements, and general student placements. Um yes, that's that's it. Any additions to add? That was very thorough. All right. Any questions, comments, or discussion on non-aggenda items? >> Yes, Mr. Win >> question. You a little closer. You mentioned the PSAT scores for
132the junior class overall. Were they relatively positive or or if you could give like a >> um so the ELA average was 447 I is that out of 800? Aren't PSATs different scored differently? Okay, so um the math average was 428. There's a couple different That was October 2024. So that I guess that was last year's juniors. >> This year's juniors, the average was 480. Good job. Um for ELA and 446 for math. >> Yeah. So better. >> Um and yeah, that that was the data that we got. >> Awesome. Thank you. under education. All right, then. Can I have a motion, please, for items one through I want to make sure number 12 under education. Roll call, please. Allison Lipsky, not present. Andrea Robinson, >> yes. >> Bill Wilson, Steven Wilson, >> yes. Michelle
133candidate. I'm going to abstain from anything related outside of Ottabon High School. Six. Yes. Seven. I will abstain from everything. And then yes, >> thank you. Alison Cox, >> yes. >> Danielle D. Franchesco, Mark Gaddy, >> Amy Davis, >> yes. >> Motions pass. >> Thank you. >> All right. Um, under human resources, we have a couple addendums this evening. Um, number 13, there is a motion to retroactively approve the director of facilities contract. Number 14, there's a motion to retroactively approve the technology coordinator's contract. And there is also a motion to approve um the following uh individual for keys employment. And then we had a couple of areas of red. Age 13, number five. The third name on the list should be Maddie Whan. Uh, okay. Third, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10,
13411. The first weight training uh person, it should be Chris Callahan. On page 14, the second softball should be Maddie Nan. I think that was it. >> Oh, right. Thanks, Mrs. Ro. >> On the addendum number 15, the hourly rate should be $15.92. >> That is the new minimum wage up January 1st. >> Okay. And I would like to recognize Mr. Steven Wilson for human resources. >> Good evening. Uh the human resources committee met last night. Uh wasn't too much to report thankfully. Uh openings at the moment only in par professionals, three maybe four positions. Um Miss Allen explained that it's kind of fluid depending on what the needs are. Um for the paras, so could be three, could be four. Um lots of movement there. Um we have some new hires a keys caregiver
135one parah one sub one cafeteria sub a transfer from apara of apara from mansion havland. Um we also talked about contracts for non-union admins um we need to discuss as a board of the whole so we're going to race those folks and then talk about it exact session next meeting. Uh and then we talked for a while about policy 0150. We're being very proactive on that. And uh I thought we made some I thought we made some good progress. Um so that went well. Uh on the agenda for tonight, we have a motion to approve tenure track for first year special ed, motion to approve a transfer, motion to approve some FMLA, um motion to approve two subs, a motion to pre approve the spring coaching positions. Um, we had negotiated a sidebar with the
136teachers union recently to make sure that our practice meets our policy. Thank you, Mr. Bloomstein. Um, in the split stipens, so I'm glad that we were able to resolve that and thanks to the union. Shout out over there behind the pillar um for working with us on that. Um, very proud of the respectful relationship that we have with unions. So, we appreciate um working on that with us. Uh, motion to approve a volunteer adviser for the philosophy club. Very cool. I want to sit in on that because that sounds like right up my alley. Motion to approve volunteers for musical pilot program at Mansion. Motion to approve staff to work as registars at the prek. Motion to resend a motion from last month regarding mentorship. And a motion to approve teacher support and mentorship for
137three new staff members. Um Miss Davis just mentioned the three items on the addendum. And that's all I got for HR. Pretty straightforward this month. Dad, >> uh, just to clarify, the contracts were things that we worked on back in September and we had worked on them at at committee and gone over them and I thought that they made it to the board agenda when it came up in a conversation last night at HR, came back, looked through personnel files and things and saw that they didn't make it onto the agenda. So, these aren't really things that were newly developed. They're things that I discussed with the committee and with these people back in September. Just somehow the paperwork didn't make it to the agenda. All right. Any questions, comments, or discussion on non-aggenda items?
138Mr. William Wilson, >> question. Stephen, you mentioned you talked about a policy. Is it 0150? >> It's 0155. >> Oh, okay. And did did conversation come up with that? Because I I was I think I was the only one that was raising major concern about that. So, I was really curious if that went anywhere. We looked specifically HR's responsibilities. Um, so I don't think we touched the other uh we didn't touch any of the other committees. Um, Amy, you want to chime in here? You >> I mean, so we were doing some editing. We did some editing um as it pertained to HR committee. Um, we had the document live and then I I think I understand what you're speaking to. We um we also put in a couple of suggestions for some edits there
139as well. So, if you pull that up, you'll be able to to see um what we suggested. Um when it ca when it came to, you know, voting as a committee or not voting as a committee um and the moving the agenda items forward, um it it was kind of the discussion among the committee members that it's sort of only governance that functions that way. um if policies aren't ready to go on for a first read or a second read onto the agenda. Um so that was just you know that was just kind of the brainstorming and and kind of the thinking that went on about that. Um but I will say Mr. Steven Wilson he commented we spent a lot of time talking about it as we did during our retreat. So I just
140I think it's great that we're there we're we're having such thoughtful discussions about the language that goes into that policy. So um I'm hoping that that'll at the other committee meetings as well. Does that answer your question? Okay. Um Uh I know Mr. Steven Wilson mentioned um those contract renewals. They will be linked to the HR agenda. They are excellent. Okay. They are linked to the HR agenda. So if um if you could please take a a look at them, we will be discussing them. um in executive session at the next meeting. All right. Any other non-aggenda items? Okay. Uh can I have a motion then for items 1 to 15 under HR? >> Roll call, please. >> Andrea Rob the face. What did I skip? You're right. You're right. You're right. Any questions? I'm
141sorry. Any questions on items 1 to 15? Okay. Now, roll call, please. Thank you. Andrea Robinson, >> Bill Wilson, >> Steven Wilson, >> Michelle Kennedy, Thank you. Alison Cox, >> Danielle D. Franchesco, Mark Gaddy, Alison Lipsky, >> yes. >> Amy Davis, >> motion passed. >> Thank you. All right, we have our HIP district reports. And next we have our special program representatives, Mr. Steven Wilson for Camden County Ed Services. >> Uh they had a meeting two weeks ago. I unfortunately was unable to make it. I was at a work retreat and I was planning on attending and then my work thing went along. I should have just asked the alternate to attend. Uh it was the budget meeting. I don't didn't get bored if it it was approved. I assumed it was. It was the
14226 27 budget. Um almost 53 million. Um the commission continues to operate primarily as a service organization. Roughly 97% of the revenue generated through transportation services. I I talk about this all the time at CCSC. It's all transportation. Um, transportation was the largest expenditure, nearly $49 million, uh, with the majority of the cost tied to contracted services. Uh, the juvenile detention center program is fully supported through its own revenue streams and federal funding and operates as a self-contained program and administrative costs are relatively low, about 5% of the total budget. Um, overall, the budget reflects a stable financial position and continued focus on efficient service and delivery. >> Thank you. All right. uh for Camden County School Boards, Miss Robinson. >> I actually did. I actually did. So, we're just gonna triangulate here. Um Yeah,
143I actually did. And they just forwarded the slide presentation, so I can share that with everybody. Yeah. Um so, I will share that with everybody. And then, um also, we receive um notification about the eighth grade dialogue. It's going to be March 4th from 6 to 7:30 at Eastern High School. And we do have a representative going >> 100%. We went last year, didn't we, Mr. Guy? you're worried about the future, you know, generation coming up and everything. The dialogue is a fantastic uh show that, you know, just how involved they are and how um they're keeping on top of things. It's very interesting. >> Uh just a note on that, if the board if any board members want to attend that, you you can register yourself. They did change the whole registration process. It
144does not need to go through the business administrator. So, you can just log on and and do that. >> Either one of our student reps wants to attend that, just let let us know if you're okay. >> Want to tell me what the eighth grade dialogue is? >> Absolutely. Be more than happy to. >> Do you want to go for it? It's a student representative, I guess, from they try to get eighth grade um from every school district. Um >> they do it by county. >> Yes. So, right, Camden County. And um they're on stage and they're asked what about three or four questions about mostly like, you know, >> what do you see happening in five years or something like that? Something about current affairs and and um what makes your school special and
145things like that. I >> Yeah, I I did it. I did. >> Oh, excellent. >> Um, yeah, it's a cool experience. So, yeah, and it's it's cool. You definitely learn a lot about the other school student. You can one up. >> At least it's what I tried to do as the last person who went every single time. >> Now realizing it, I think I did that as well. I didn't know what it was called. I did it on Zoom. >> Oh, you probably did. Yeah. Yeah. That's >> That's great. That's great. I love it. >> Love, love, love it. Okay. Um, >> Sarah is Mrs. Cooland is not here this evening. Did anybody else attend the Ottabon Education Foundation meeting just by having No. Okay. All right. I'm gonna move on then to community outreach.
146Um, this is D. Franchesco. Um, so I went through the events calendar um, document that we have and I tried to sort of clean it up a bit. Um, I moved the column that says board member availability kind of over to the side so that we can really see who's actually attending. Um, I put up the top max of five people so we can just see who's going to attend. Um, it'd be great if you can put in your availability. I highlighted the things in green that I think we want somebody to attend if possible. Um, anybody can go in and highlight it green if there is something that I missed. I kind of just went by best practices. I am able events that happen throughout for the most part. There are a lot of
147wonderful events happening. The um one thing that I can't get into is I'm not a member of the Havlin PTA because I don't have a child in that school and so I don't know actually if anyone has a child in that school that Okay. So I don't know if either of you are um interested in in being a part of the PTA or at least logging in to some aspect so we can kind of see what's going on at those levels as far as events go and also to attend their meetings. I know that I was able to find some things um but not everything. I think I I was able to find something through Facebook. >> Okay. >> Um but yeah, sometimes that's close. >> Yeah, you have to be a PTA member, right?
148Yeah, >> that's the PTA. Well, that's in our weekly wave. Mrs. Chisum, but that's in our weekly weight, so maybe the meetings are listed there. Okay. So, I listed the one or two that I found. Um, and so it looks like we would need we need some people to sign up for a couple of upcoming events. Like the month of February, we have maybe five or six events and three people attending. So, we need a couple of more people to attend some different dates. Um, some of them happen to be all on the same date. Um, so that's going to be from time to time, but at least if we could look through, if everybody wouldn't mind just looking through maybe between the dates between now and the next board meeting and just go in
149and put yourself in where you can, you'll kind of see where some of the gaps are. And then at the next board meeting, I'll I'll again ask um where we really need some attention. >> Great. Uh Mr. May I >> um great job on improving like constantly improving the spreadsheet and miss thank you for putting that in the week weekly wave every week with the bold red text that says please sign up for things because then I click on I'm like oh yeah let's see what's going on this month so it's just easy I appreciate it >> right Mr. William Wilson for ad hoc committee. >> Um the ad hoc has not met yet. However, Representative Greenwood and I, Greenwood of the Mount from board will uh be speaking tomorrow to get um to get
150ourselves aligned and hopefully get a date for our first official meeting. So tomorrow I will give some information to everybody on hopefully when we uh are planning to meet next. >> Um Miss Lipsky, anything for board member orientation? >> Most of us are oriented. Yes, that's true. However, and I apologize to Miss Candidate because I should have reached out to you even though you are a wellestablished board member of the Mount E from um board of education. I will reach out to you though so that if there's just anything like what the heck do we do here, you know, in Ottabanian and any questions or queries or concerns and I'd be happy. So I will reach out to you and I and I apologize for that. I've just been in a little bit of my
151own personal help. So um any board member comments? One thing that I did want talking about different policies and specifically like board policy 0155 and I don't think anyone's ever never said what that is and I mean you can go online and find out but let me tell you but essentially I believe it was Mr. Blumenthal when he was Blumenstein Blumenthal why did I say Blumenthal I don't know Blumenstein I don't know and I always like that it's Stein um Mr. Blumenstein when he was the president was one that went to a New Jersey school board associations um the big meeting and learned about a board of committee and he really kind of sparked his imagination and he came back and everyone said that sounds awesome sauce and thus policy 0155 was born and I
152don't think anyone's really touched it since its birth and you know we change and so that is why and I think it was I don't know if it was you or me, but I think I was looking at it and went, "Hey, I'm the new chairwoman and I don't governance is supposed to be doing things and I don't know what they are." And that's when Miss Davis said, "Oh my god, yeah, we should look at that." And it takes a little time as things in education do, but we are now in it and we're all committed to it. But it is >> it it establishes the board as you see the board today committee. And so it just needed a refresh. But in that vein, I just wanted to say that um in one of
153the meetings that I had with Miss Allen to go over policy updates from a law firm called Strauss Esme that basically does everyone's policy updates, you know, at least in this area of New Jersey. Um we were having some concerns and questions and things like that. And it can seem like we're all up to date, but then you don't know what other people have done in years. because you're just kind of getting in the moment what's needing to be updated right now. And so I said, "Hey, can you call and ask him this question?" And while she was on the phone, she said, "Um, do you ever do an audit of a school district's policies to see what's up to date, what's not, and let us know." And they said, "Yeah, we can do that."
154And even better, they said they do it without any additional fee, which we call free, but we pay them. But this, trust me, and with a law firm saying they're not going to charge us more money. We just knocked on a lot of wood. And so, Miss Allen, do you know when we're supposed to get that audit back? >> Even better. >> So, we will be >> the next meeting. Yeah. >> Okay. So, looks like The main things we missed were things to be abolished. There wasn't that many that >> there weren't that many that needed updating that we were to snuff on, but there was some for abolishing. >> So, us kind of being proud of what we've done. >> We have a right to be proud. Yay. >> Okay. Good news, everyone. >>
155All right. >> Okay. I'm going to open up our second public participation. This would be on anything that anybody wanted to address or talk about. No. Okay. Seeing none, I will close that. We are going to uh go into executive session again. Um no action will be taken. But before we do, I just want to remind everybody that our next meeting Why did you live? Okay. Our next meeting is going to be Wednesday, March 18th, 6:30 p.m. um right here in the media center. So having said that, may I have a motion to adjourn to executive? >> All in favor? >> Any opposed? All right, here we go.