001[Music] all right good evening everybody we're going to call them to order [Music] just want us to welcome it seems like we have a lot of fine people here for the awards so glad to see the new jersey open public meetings law was enacted to ensure the rights of the public to have advanced notice of and attend the meetings of public bodies at which time any business affecting their interests is described inactive in accordance with the provisions of this act and the board of education policy zero one six two the board of education of the borough of bound brook has caused notice of this meeting to be posted on the board office uh in the board office and at baumberg high school and faxed or mailed to the courier news the found borough clerk southbound
002board of education and any person who has requested individual notice and pay the required faith please stand for the pledge of allegiance congratulations indivisible [Music] uh for item number 1.4 i believe we were scheduled to swear in our new board member uh but i don't think we're ready to do that at this time correct dr gallagher that is correct uh we cannot swear him in yet we haven't gotten clearance okay so we'll just add that to the agenda for the next meeting uh roll phone mr bail here mr fazio miss casino here mr januzzi here this is lima miss moussan mr semano mr zipko here we have a forum okay thank you um for my president's comments today i'll actually be relatively brief uh the board committees are now well-formed and we are uh all
003have all met at least once uh we're in the process of uh creating our strategic priorities for the year and hope to continue to provide updates as uh they're available uh we're continuing to pursue uh hiring of our new superintendent um so we did hit a few milestones in between the last meeting in this meeting i'm not necessarily ready to announce anything yet but i think i speak for the members of the board when we say that we're excited with the progress uh and hope to have something available to share before the next meeting um uh and at this point i'm going to turn it over to dr gallagher for his superintendence report um my mic doesn't work so if you can't hear me just let me know uh we're going to start off with
004our governor uh teacher of the year awards so at this time i would ask mr januzzi if you can go to the corner of steam and our first recipient this year for lamont lemon addicts is scott capalbo [Applause] [Laughter] it's my first year please don't hold it [Laughter] you congratulations scott [Applause] lafayette school teacher of the year tracy hendershot [Music] for smalley school teacher of the year brittany nielsen [Music] i'm gonna and specialist of the year for smaller school lisa hanson so [Applause] for community middle school teacher of the year caitlin diaz congratulations [Applause] for community middle school ed specialist of the year alyssa d geronimo [Applause] foreign high school teacher of the year courtney [Applause] foreign high school and specialist ed specialist of the year anthony [Applause] this time we're going to move on
005to our students of the month and we're going to start off with lamont lamont annex with dr s hi good evening i'm student of the month craig cruise [Applause] we're laughing at school uh mrs clark all right for the month of february last year students of the month are diego mendova santos so panetta [Applause] [Music] mr edwards okay our first recipient angelica ramos [Applause] our next recipient carlos ponton our next recipient octavio [Applause] also his birthday today [Applause] and our last recipient emily [Applause] and for community middle school mr santa sermon hello everyone community middle school is proud to recognize its first student of the month michaela gilbert [Applause] and our next student of the month for community middle school eric garcia nicholas [Applause] high school we have mr smith good evening we would like
006to congratulate the bound brook high school crusader citizens of vermont our first recipient isaac solis [Applause] so [Applause] our second recipient ariana belgrave [Applause] our next recipient jordan galdemez [Applause] and finally our last recipient nicole martinez martinez [Applause] this month's gem awards will start with lamont lamont annex and dr s since her time at lamont indiana began for may has gone above and beyond to put her students first she brings an incredible amount of joy knowledge to the preschool and kindergarten students through music her students enjoy her class and musical instruction she provides them because of the winter concerts you organize the upcoming spring concert students get to share their joy for her class with their families as well miss journeyed dedication passion inspirational her impact goes beyond the students and beyond the classroom she's
007filthy relationships among our students family staff his office said that music brings people together and this is a statement because of her enthusiasm for teaching in all things and for lafayette school we have mrs clark all right we shouted her out on friday stephanie is one of four new first grade teachers at lafayette and has truly found her place amongst our students and her grade level peers she has made a concerted effort to build relationships with both new and veteran staff and has integrated herself into the boundary community as a high school cheerleading coach missy alpha is one part of a co-teaching care whose symbiotic relationship was obvious from the start when i walked into their room and found their desks pushed together despite several challenges in the classroom including deep social emotional behaviors ms
008bianca has always remained positive willing to listen to any advice offered all while advocating for the needs of her students her students are truly lucky to have a teacher who is able to remain calm while pushing students to their fullest potential in both regulating their social emotional needs and academic challenges thank you mrs tianfa for your dedication mr edwards [Music] good evening again miss huttersberger is in her second year of smalling school she works with our genie and ell students in third grade she works closely with our elo teachers to collaborate ideas to help modify and support her students she has an awesome tp in her room to display a quiet area for students to read and unwind ms hydra's worker utilizes our pineapple chart for observing other teachers to improve her skills this just
009shows how she wants to improve and better herself for her students she always takes part in any of our school culture builders halloween read across america week red ribbon week and anti-bully week are just a few she participates in recently she has taken on a very important role she is the supervisor for one of our new implemented clubs at smalley school she is taking on the outdoor classroom and gardening club she has personally purchased materials of several students into groups to help keep our outside clean and up-to-date we are looking forward to seeing how the area will look in the spring so teachers can start using the classroom again smaller schools gem of the month of february is third grade teachers [Applause] yes hello again the community middle school is proud to recognize denzel sanders
010as this month's representative gem award recipient mr sanders joined cms at the beginning of the school year as a middle school case monitor in addition to these responsibilities mr sanders has filled in as a substitute feature in almost every classroom throughout the school year although this was not part of his original job description mr sanders served a vital role in maintaining instructional continuity at the middle school in december mr sanders was asked to fill in for the recently vacated middle school foreign language position mr sanders completed rosetta stone training is currently the cms classroom advisor for spanish in addition mr sanders is the assistant coach on the bound brook high school girls varsity basketball team mr sanders uses each day as an opportunity to connect with students and share his knowledge of teamwork and leadership
011mr sanders has demonstrated a natural ability to develop a positive rapport with his students which is its fundamental element for effective teaching and learning on behalf of community middle school staff i'd like to thank denzel sanders for his contributions and for helping our students achieve their goals [Applause] we're familiar with good evening again it is with great enthusiasm that we announced that julius routine is a recipient of the bound book gem award for the month of february this boutini is successful at promoting the social and emotional growth of our students through increased understanding between school and home this buccini feels intensively with families making an extensive effort to know utilize community resources and carefully compile social history materials in order to tie home the community in school together in addition miss buccini supports students by
012advocating for their emotional mental and physical well-being as well a test she meets with great confidence whether through counseling students connecting ethnic students with helpful resources as well as providing additional more intense support when warranted this boutini provides a safe space where students feel comfortable discussing mental health decompression and coping mechanisms furthermore ms puccini takes an actor's role in offering mentoring and suggesting suggestions for teachers and other school staff that are seeking ways to support students social and emotional needs she's developed and provides crisis intervention strategies to improve student success while working to maximize coping skills for students in difficult situations while maintaining confidentiality mrtini finds a way to strategically collaborate with staff to identify students that are struggling identifying the root cause of their issues lastly she seeks solutions to improve social and emotional
013learning which ultimately leads to better learning experiences for students in crisis congratulations again mrs buchini this is a recognition that you're most deserving we truly make donald play school a better place for students the district gym award hosts the david appointment dave came to us as an assistant football coach a few years ago he's now elevated himself to the head coach of our football program and when he came here as an assistant coach we made him a pace monitor here in the high school he's partly that into really taking on a mentoring role for our students at uh here in bamberg high school as well as on our athletic teams he's also our head baseball coach we've moved him into a new position part of our work study program as we're trying to develop a
014new work study program again our kids to go out to work while they're uh still in high school so they can gain real life experience as well as credits and get them ready to move on we've been trying to um put in for perkins grants to pay for some of the uh some of the work study programs that we have um we've obviously been falling a little bit short so dave took the initiative and went out and secured us a very large donation to make sure all of our kids go free to rvcc in the new vocational programs that rvc rvcc is now implementing which is uh advanced manufacturing cosmetology hvac and a few other programs so dave has always gone above and beyond for our kids but on this occasion he's really gotten away
015well above and beyond not only for the kids but for the district to make sure that all of our kids get this opportunity to learn to trade over at rvcc by making sure it's been paid for so dave congratulations right [Applause] correct yes congratulations [Applause] good all right so at this time we're going to take a brief recess um however what we're going to ask is for all of our teachers of the years and our ed specialists of the year so they can come up on the stage we'd like to get a group picture if at all possible so if you can please come on up and if there's any family members that want to take any pictures feel free to do that at this time he was in the cafeteria oh okay [Music] uh
016to what happened all right two committee meetings uh earlier this evening those reports will be a part of our next regular business meeting for tonight's meeting the operations committee met earlier this month we reviewed where things stand currently with highest priorities being given to finance and facilities which are within the purview of that committee so uh budget preparation for the coming fiscal year um you know a reference of what our state need aid is going to be and the state of our facilities and what projects we expect to kick off or at least begin planning for in the coming year so that represents our committee reports for this evening and we are now open to the public for agenda items do we have anything online dr gallagher we have nothing on it okay anyone in
017the room seeing none we are going to move on to number five which is the approval of the minutes from uh our last meeting on february 7th resolved at the boundary board of education approves the minutes for the following meeting regular and executive meeting minutes for february 7th 2022. i have a motion motion thank you mr powell a second second thank you mr zuko any discussion all right can we do a roll call please mr bail yes mrs casino yes mr januzzi yes mr musa mr usmano yes item number 6.1 approval of district and high school personnel resolutions resolve that the superintendent recommends for approval the resolutions is outlined in personnel resolutions under district and high school this is 6.2 through 6 11. i have a motion thank you mr zepco was that a second
018i heard mr son yes there you go open for a discussion okay hearing none can we have a role call please item number 7.1 approval of middle and elementary personnel resolutions resolve that the superintendent recommends for approval the resolutions is outlined in personnel resolutions under middle and elementary schools this is 7.2 through seven point eight i have a motion motion thank you mr powell a second second thank you mr savannah discussion hey any other questions um i just have to upstand from 7.5 so noted may we have a roll call please sure okay uh mr bail yes miss casino yes mr jinoozi yes miss musand yes ms rasamano and mr zipko yes up to item 8.1 resolve that the bamboo board of education approves the resolutions as outlined in education resolutions under district and high
019school this is eight point two through eight point four i have a motion ms musino very quiet [Applause] yes item number 9.1 resolve that the brownbrook board of education approves the resolutions as outlined in education resolutions under middle and elementary schools this is 9.2 through six matter of motion thank you mr powell a second thank you miss moussan discussion okay can we have a roll call please mr bale yes mrs casino yes mr januzzi yes mr mr simano mr zipko yes okay wilson thank you sir item number ten point one resolve that the boundary board of education approves the resolutions is outlined in policy resolutions under district and high schools this is 10.2 i have a motion listen thank you miss russell a second discussion okay hearing none let's have a roll call mr bail
020yes miss casino yes mr januzzi yes miss moussan yes miss russell yes mr zipko yes motion guys thank you item number 11.1 resolve that the boundary board of education approves the resolutions as outlined in financial resolutions this is 11.2 through 11.8 i have a motion motion thank you mr powell a second okay thank you miss moussan discussion um any other comments or questions hearing none can we have a role call please mr bail yes mrs casino yes mr januzzi yes miss musa yes mr assamana yeshua thank you we are up to item number 13 i believe new business yes well actually i think we have item number 12 other items to come before the board and i believe mr zuckerberg or something oh i apologize no no no that's fine i just i have a
021concern that several constituents over the last month have come up to me about school watches the presentation the taste and allegedly uh on one there was a mold within the sandwich allegedly but the number of students that have come up to me or adults that i've spoken to always having some shopping they say uh you know wow this is what we're getting you know take a look at it and uh so i just i would encourage parents because you know the board's job is not to run the day-to-day um faculty of the school system it's the gallagher the superintendent so i would encourage parents to reach out to dr gallagher and make any complaints in relation to anything with his school lunches but i'm just i'm just concerned with the amount of money that we're
022paying for that people that these concerns would be coming up so i just want to throw that out there i'm sure it's an isolated incident but um you know to the student that had you know either sour milk or a sandwich that didn't taste good or presentation you know the thing you have to understand in our district is that that lunch may be the only meal that the kid's going to get for the day i mean yes we have breakfast also but i think within our economic socioeconomic situation that we have in town here i i i think that that's that means we need to take a look at that and i just you know i mentioned it to dr gallagher well what i'm going to say is that's going to be addressed immediately because
023as you know being on the board prior how much money i've opened to our our cafeterias and how i've stressed that we've changed the content and the quality of food for our kids um that has been one of my main stays here in this district so i am deeply troubled by what you said here tonight and that will be addressed by me um with pomponi tomorrow morning okay so now we are up to the business yes okay is there anything that we're prepared to say or we want to say regarding uh our evaluation of uh masks in school well we do need we need to talk about that um and at this point in time you know um i've spoken to dr frank his his opinion has been and has not changed over the last
024few weeks is that it should be optimal at this point in time he does not believe that requiring kids to wear masks in school is more intended at this point in time considering where we are in a pandemic sense also with the further research that he's read regarding uh the effectiveness of masks so um his professional opinion is that um we go with what the governor has put forth which is making masks optional in school at this point in time i've spoken to christine larson who has reached out to the district nurses um again the different nurses their their concerns more are revolving around you know contact trades and without masks and those type of items and again at this point in time talking to a number of people and trending the way we are
025i i would recommend to the board that we suspend contact tracing um at this point you know come mark 7th when we take the mass off um until such such a time where we enter the orange again um if we hit the orange again and the numbers are going up then i think we need to immediately uh re-initiate the contact tracing involves mess at that point in time but that's my opinion um again i don't know if that would be something that would be coming from the governor's office or from the health department this is just me you know giving you the feedback that i've got and kind of interjecting my opinions here and there um but for the most part the general consensus would be from the medical professionals would be to make maps
026let the maps fall to optional after march 7th suspend contact tracing um obviously we will continue to do our testing for those who want to be tested and the staff obviously that are not vaccinated would have to continue to be tested so that would stay in place and then you know like i said you know we re-evaluate um where we are in the in this health crisis issue as we move forward right now the numbers are going down i would i would suspect that we're going to have some counties or some regions in the green very shortly um but again that somehow turns around the trends go back up we have the full capacity to re-evaluate that big determination later to go you know back to something more restrictive do we think that this is
027a good opportunity to offer a comment vaccine uh be happy ready okay yeah just tying it into the masks coming off if there was an opportunity a few days ahead to say okay it's coming now is a great time to get your shot or get a booster if you need it the county's been great with that um you know obviously the category step up we did one in january i think the second shot is actually the next couple days here um so we've offered it to our school population in our community that can get vaccinated right here on site with us okay um and the second shot is upcoming this month okay if this already happened it's gonna happen this week um as for the boosters um i have not heard anything out of the
028county about doing boosters in schools yet i'm sure they're still you know widening down some of their clinics and things that they they've had going um you know that's always something we can reach out to the county and ask if they're going to continue or offer more i'm just thinking it would be top of mind you know you know you're taking your mask off at school now would be the time if you're going to get a shot or a booster uh we could offer it well i i can also tell you that dr frank is absolutely open to coming in and doing any any of those things that the county is not willing to do it if we feel that it's warranted um he would be more than happy to try and schedule something for
029us in particular here in bangkok for vaccines in the vaccine that was our last one attempt so it's worthwhile and 88's a good you know i think the county was kind of hoping for you know 250 or better but 88 is what we got i mean you have to remember our student population is 2 000 you know so i think just percentage-wise they're looking at from a percentage i i just think uh at this point in the game a lot large percentage has already been vaccinated so we're not dealing with or had it right right so you're not dealing with really 2 000 it's probably much less [Music] different parts of the student population are the faculty populations um faculty off the top of my head i know we're in the mid 70s close to
03080. for the students i did have mrs larson gather that for me so i do have it here unless christine you know them off the top of your head but i know i know i know it's pretty pretty low i think um memory searching correctly about eight percent for the students vaccinated eight percent of students are vaccinated yes [Music] a lot of pre-k kids are not eligible for it so i would just go kindergarten through yeah well and that was actually going to be one of my questions which is is there any guidance that's looking at the youngest populations that can't be vaccinated right now i i know there's been talk about but i've seen nothing that says there's anything coming for for the younger kids at this point and we're still waiting for guidelines
031from the department of health they've given us nothing so um you know it's always hard to it's hard to say when something's coming out i mean we only do today's the 21st so we you know our next meeting is march 7th yeah two weeks from now so i have to stop paying attention because it changes rapidly um so masks on the regardless of vaccination status correct okay what about quarantine all right again i think we're going to have a hard time doing mandating and important teams we haven't gotten any further updated guidelines but i mean again um i'm not sure it does i think i think it goes away we've asked those questions we've not gotten clear guidance on them we've asked those uh questions because the master quarantine and everything fell underneath that executive
032order when that he's letting that executive order expire on seven so that brings us to the eighth on the eighth we have a whole set of questions that we haven't gotten answered and if you recall at our last court meeting you know i specifically said we really could get some more guidance out of the health department i was hoping we'd have somebody or at least some indications i still think yes so that hasn't happened so again you know follow the board directive i went to dr frank and asked the questions and reporting back with the best that i'm getting questions from parents and and not being able to give them any information because you know it's not a mean decision it's kind of more report decision on this that you know it puts all of
033us not only me but all my administrators my principals and everybody else in a difficult position because you know they're seeing they're seeing parents on a daily basis they're asking questions and the answer we don't know it kind of makes us look a little like you know we're not on top of our game per se because you know people are asking questions we don't have any inkling what our general direction is going to be at this point in time so so from again what i would advise the board is is to go along with what dr frank said he is our chief medical inspector um go along with what he has to say let's monitor the numbers and continue to monitor everything after march 7th and again we can always take action later okay i
034think the other thing probably that we should stress in general is that we want everyone to be comfortable to still be in the setting to the greatest extent that we possibly can and that i think the masks optional approach to this has something to do with that right so if people aren't comfortable being in a masculine environment they still have the opportunity to do that which is not imposing on people who do feel comfortable and you know just for the everybody's awareness following the last meeting i did reach out to mr paxton just to get a temperature from the teachers um as you might imagine there wasn't a universal answer in one direction or the other there does seem to be a high level of comfort within uh some group of the population you know
035somewhere between 50 and 60 percent of the respondents to his survey uh were comfortable in a masculine environment but recognize that that still leaves a pretty big percentage of teachers that may not be um so i think we just have to be mindful of kind of everybody's feelings and anxiety as they go back into this we've been in masks for so long it's important that we bring everybody on the journey together so we get to the end goal together which is everybody back in school in a really great learning environment for social emotional and you know general health right so our decision is to just keep it keep it if you want to wear it if you don't want to wear it i think the recommendation that we're getting from our local public health advisor
036is masks optional at this point so are we are we saying that that is our official uh decree tonight that this is something that works well i think our official decree really is that we're just going to stay back with what the governor has done so again the governor is going to let this lapse he said make a mask optional and we're kind of just going to allow that to happen like if we monitor the numbers and if the numbers go in any specific direction [Music] i think that goes back to rogers point which is for the board members that are assembled here tonight do you have enough information and you feel comfortable enough with the direction that we're taking or do we want to come up with some other option here that allows a
037little bit more time to elapse but not a lot because we have anxiety in the general community of what's what's the situation gonna be like on the seventh so do we have a comfort level to make a decision tonight if we don't do we wanna set an intermediate target between now and the next meeting where we're gonna reevaluate and make a decision or do does anybody else have well if you're gonna re-evaluate you're gonna have you know are we saying tonight yes we're letting it lapse that's fine or are we saying something else because i'm confused so and again to get back to clarity the order is that was the governor's choice right we have two choices we can take action which would mean that we're going to impose something at the local level that's
038in addition to what the governor is saying or we can do nothing and if we do nothing which is actually a recommendation from our local health advisor here then the mask mandate disappears right so we're not doing anything so yeah as of now we've chosen to do nothing follow the governors or like i would if and this is going to sound redundant but i think that if we're saying we're not doing anything i think we should say it we should say it that's i'm afraid and i think that's what doctor said he'll get something else i think what roger's saying is he wants us to to vote it oh right let's let's agree on exactly what we're doing and then dr gallagher has crystal clear direction i'd just like to say again as i've said
039about this topic many times nobody sitting here on the stage has a medical degree and the only person we have advising us with medical degree has has given us pretty clear direction so that's where i stand do we feel that there's any benefit to um we commit to going back to it looking at it looking what the culture is like with with the decision and then if we need to to change and modify it and then let people know that we're not just going to say it and it's done like we're going to keep read about it trisha what do you think um i think we should just go with the guidance that we've given we can reevaluate later obviously if the numbers go back up i think you want to be able to re-evaluate
040of course you always have the ability to read that okay okay so i'm hearing yes we're going with masks optional we're not going to institute any requirements beyond what the governor uh is repealing what else goes away on the seventh distancing pretty much but you have to you have to realize we're at three feet now that doesn't change for us because we're always down three feet we're never under three feet in any of our classrooms to begin with and what we've been doing in the lunchrooms we've been it'll be the same tomorrow or as it's going to be on eight okay by the way it's okay to say that you're right for the record [Music] where we're at as a board in general so i just because it's it's it's very easy for things to
041get lost you know we get lost in the minutia and to join us like all right the masks mandate on the seven but then there was question about distancing and and some other things you know so i i just i'm just putting that out there i just want to be clear yeah and i would say to be clear if and it sounds like you're going to go with you know letting the executive order go away not doing anything so the three things that happen is number one that's become optional on tuesday march 8th second thing is we're not enforcing quarantining unless we unless we have to or there's some other piece of information that comes out that says that you know we need to continue and we stop the contact tracing for now now again
042at any moment in time we can go back we don't have to wait i just want to just to be abundantly clear you're comfortable with this direction correct i'm comfortable with it i just want it to be clear yep i mean because i think at this point we're as clear as we can be without additional good people guidance good piece right now is i have a few days to get a letter together um i will share it with all of you this way if you guys have any concerns or anything you want to add or take out feel free and let's get something out by friday [Music] okay any other new business from the committee members [Music] here you know we are up to item number 14 open to the public for discussion dr santa
043sermon hello everyone hello just kind of hoping to have a few more people just a couple quick items from the middle school hopefully some people online dodgeball coming up at the middle school march 24th we still need teams so did you get our team uh i don't think uh miss diaz got the board team in yet but also if you know some outsiders i have an outside team coming in anybody be greatly appreciated just to make sure we get the event outside well hang on a second we want to win ringers i'm recruiting my competition what are you doing can i just mention that i thought i had seen something on the website that mentioned that i was postponed is that incorrect information on the side the dodgeball no no the only thing that was
044postponed was our school dance the night of the ice storm and that's going to be the 18th the week before okay um based on did you see dj availability i believe it's the 24th it's a thursday thursday night yeah the other thing i just want to offer uh congratulations to the bamboo community middle school wrestling team and girls basketball team on their championship seasons the wrestling team finished the year with a record of 12-2 in the team's regular season they had a dual meet championship and a league tournament championship there were 11 wrestlers who competed at the varsity level tournament and seven wrestlers competed in junior varsity level portion of the tournament in the varsity all 11 wrestlers placed including five champions two runners up two third place and two fourth place finishes in the
045junior varsity division valenbrook had four champions with one runner-up two third place uh and two third place finishes uh the bamboo community middle school girls basketball team finished their season 16-1 and camp and captured the central jersey athletic association first place tournament trophy with a 33-29 victory over north plainfield middle school just congratulations to those athletes and to all the student-athletes who competed this year at the community middle school [Applause] a confession very good oh we have no comments on thank you sir so we are ready to move on to item number 15.1 which is moved to go into executive session we are going to go into executive session under item one two and six i have a motion mr powell thank you a second mr samantha thank you all in favor hi hi here
046we go [Music] you okay [Music] square she's getting a lot of kids okay all right we are reconvening now for agenda item number 16 resolved at the boundary board of education uh proves the resolutions is outlined in approval of hiv cases under high school this is agenda items 16.2 and 16.3 i have a motion thank you roger may i have a second second thank you mr bow sorry mr rodriguez let me notice that uh roll call please mr bail yes ms casino yes um thank you item number 17.1 resolved at the boundary board of education approves the resolutions as outlined in approval of hiv cases under middle and elementary schools this is 17.2 and 17.3 i have a motion thank you mr bowell a second second thank you miss casino mr bail yes this is
047casino yes mr noozy yes mr musa and we have exhausted the agenda so we're up to number 18 but i have a motion to adjourn awesome thank you mr bell a second exactly all in favor all right you're in recess bang the game