April 27, 2023 - Board of Education Meeting

001we're going to get started Mary Rocco Miss Siebert yes Miss Kennedy yes Mr Paula cyanarone yes Mr Dina yes Miss Steven addictis yes Miss wolren yes Mr Edwards you sure you don't want to do it again feel my worth New Jersey it was like me while I was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice up into attend meetings of public bodies which any business affecting their interest to discuss directed upon in accordance with the provisions of this act the Bricktown support of education has caused notice of this meeting to be posted on the administration office bulletin board the official District website and channel BTE v20 and sent to the Asbury Park Press the brick times Star Ledger and Municipal Clerk's Office I need a motion in a second to go

002into executive session I'll make that motion second Nicole whereas The Brick Township Board of Education has been formed pursuant to applicable New Jersey statutes and whereas the board is charged with responsibility of Performing all acts and doing all things consistent with the law and the roles of the state board of education necessary for the proper security necessary for the lawful and proper conduct equipment and maintenance of public schools and public school property algebraic Township School District and whereas section 7 of the open Publix meeting act permits the exclusion of the public from a meeting of the board in certain circumstances and where is the borders determined that the circumstances exist for such an executive session and whereas the board has found the action described below to be necessary and proper now therefore be resolved by

003the board on April 27 2023 that the public shall be excluded from the discussion of an action on the executive session here on set forth the session will be approximately one hour and 30 minutes in the general nature of the subject matter to be discussed is harassment intimidation and bullying appeals harassment intimidation building reports it is anticipated this time that the above stated subject matter will be made public if and when it is deemed to be in the public interest to do so and the need for a company financiality is no longer required by the board Mary Miss Siebert yes Miss Kennedy yes Miss pakala yes Miss Ian yes yes Mr blandina yes Misty Benedictus yes Miss wolrd yes I didn't get it yet but I'll get on the cup oh it looks good okay

004friends she's worried about me looking good now okay foreign okay we're gonna get ready to get started so if everybody could please take your seats oh I need a motion and a second to return motion alley second Michael Mary Miss Siebert Miss Kennedy yes Miss pakala yes yes Mr blandina yes Mrs Stephen addictis yes Miss wolrd yes if everyone will please stand for the flag salute presentation of colors in a moment of silence thank you pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you can be seated often it may appear to members of our audience that the Board of Education Act with very little comment and in many cases a unanimous vote

005please understand that before matter is placed on the agenda at a public meeting the Administration has thoroughly reviewed the matter with the superintendent of schools discussed it inappropriate Board of Education committees and only then if the superintendent is satisfied that the matter is ready to be presented to the full board of education is it placed on the agenda for Action at a public meeting Board of Education members are given advance notice to review the agenda and through the chair ask questions or voice concerns in rare instances when necessary matters are presented to the board of education for discussion at the same meeting that final action might be taken Mr or Dr Farrell thank you Dr Farrell thank you Mrs wareb this evening we have our student Representatives we do have a pinch hitter for Andrew

006Cali from Brick Township High School please welcome Amaya Dalton Student Government vice president Amaya good evening I'm Amaya Dalton the vice president of the bths student government Association I'm stepping in for Andrew Cali tonight as he joins the dragon drama club in preparation for their opening night of the SpongeBob musical tomorrow reflecting on the past month the bchs Bandon choir had lots of fun on their music festival trip to Nashville visiting many places including the Country Music Hall of Fame and the Grand old Opry they found lots of success in their competition as well the voices of the FI of fire in first place with a superior rating the sirens are in first place with a superior rating jazz band earned first place with a superior rating and concert band in first place with an

007excellent rating we are immensely proud they took home the hardware on March 30th the 13th annual bths special education resources and transition fair was held in the library for parents and students after school hours on March 31st the bths guidance Department hosted career day for students during blocks one and two students and classes who signed up got the chance to hear from Professionals of several Fields including Healthcare business science technology law vocational Visual and Performing Arts and social and public service the brick hero awards were held in the bchs auditorium on March 31st the mayor's student advisory from Township and Memorial joined to help recognize our Local Heroes in our community the bchs mock trial team had a very successful season making it to the semi-finals of the Ocean County mock trial championships and securing

008a huge victory over brick memorial for the mayor's cup the Italian National Honor Society inducted four new members to their chapter this month bths would like to thank all the staff students and parents who attended last evening's event on Internet safety and cyber bullying presented by the Ocean County prosecutor's office it was an informative event that benefited all who were in attendance the color guard and percussion Ensemble have competed at several indoor shows over the last month they also hosted a very successful show on April 1st at lrms currently spring sports are in full action the boys and girls track teams are off and running we had many top 10 finishes in the last couple of weeks at the East Stroudsburg and a South divisional meets by the following athletes first place finishes by Amanda

009Vargas in the long jump and Cadence Fisher in The discus were turned in at the ESU meet in the a South divisional meet Desiree magette took fourth in the 100 meter Caitlyn Chandler took fourth in the high jump in the pole vault Caitlyn Chandler and Marissa wooder took third and fourth respectively Cadence Fisher had a nice double in the disc and shot put with a first and fourth place on the boys side Trey Williams finished third in the 100 meters and fourth in the 200 meters the boys 4x400 team finished third and Julian Beltran finished fourth in the long jump the baseball and softball teams have been busy battling through their a South schedule both teams are young but show great promise boys lacrosse is sitting at three and seven while the girls team is

010at one in five in the always competitive a South Division the golf team is 4-2 and just missed qualifying for the shore Conference tournament by couple of Strokes finally the boys tennis team picked up their first win of the Season against Toms River East earlier this week the dragons still had the second half of the spring season to finish strong tonight The Helping Hands game is being held at LMS at 6 PM this game features the bths senior football players versus The Brick PBA this is a benefit game held to raise money for a local family who needs financial assistance with medical bills this year the game is raising money for two families additionally our AP classes are in final preparation for AP testing in the first two weeks of May our AP Computer Science

011teacher Mrs segreto even organized a collaborative event for AP Computer Science classes from across the county to collectively prepare for their exam looking forward the wall of fame class of 2023 has been announced and will be inducted on Monday May 22nd at Villa Victoria at 6 PM congratulations to all the inductees the bchs junior prom will be on May 5th at Jumping Brook Country Club on the same date the district has coordinated a senior citizen prom this event was done in collaboration with Bricktown Council Community Partnership our bths National Honor Society students will be assisting at this event by serving attendees lastly opening night of the spring musical the SpongeBob musical is tomorrow at 6 30 PM there are also shows on Saturday at 1 30 pm and 6 30 PM the drama club has

012put in countless hours of hard work for this full-scale production of live singing dancing and acting we hope you can join us to see it be sure to stay connected to bths events and inside information by accessing our school website SGA Instagram bths SGA and our school Twitter at bths dragons you can always see all of our happenings monthly through Dr cajun's Dragon review thank you for this opportunity to speak on behalf of Andrew tonight who will join you again next month and I will hopefully be joining you more next school year hashtag go dragons [Applause] nice job thank you so much Amaya that was great next up we have from brick memorial High School Ava Scanlon who is very excited that the end of the school year is almost here and she's going to

013be moving on I think she'll miss this post but she feels well prepared for the future right Ava so first off this month we want to say congratulations to Mr sarluca he was honored March 31st at The Brick Township hero Awards in addition to being our athletic director and administrator he always works to make brick memorial a better place next up seven brick memorial students and 14 graduates and our choir director Mr Bettis who performs they performed at the Lincoln Center on Sunday March 26th congratulations to Alyssa cucarello Emily shornack Emily wojak Danny marks Craig Fitzgerald Josh beaudwin and Kelly Fitzgerald on this amazing accomplishment March 24th and March 25th the brick memorial Key Club received several awards at the 77th New Jersey district Key Club Convention including first place fur Club video and second

014place for their poster which that's a huge accomplishment we want to say thank you to miss Reinhard in the guidance department for organizing a successful career day on April 6th we would like to thank our guest speakers including Dr Farrell I attended the healthcare one and there was so many helpful presenters Mrs Rivera and the brick memorial NHS went to vmes and they went to Mrs Guthrie's class and they spent the afternoon doing Spring crafts and activities with our future Mustangs uh thank you to NHS again for holding exam AP exam preparation sessions to prepare to prepare for these exams that are coming up already starting Monday the members passed around tips to each other on a variety of the AP exam subjects over spring break the Burke Township Public Schools facilities spruced up the

015entryway by our main entrance thank you to the crew for that work the class of 2024 had their annual talent show yesterday at 6 PM the tickets were five dollars at the door in March a few students demonstrated their talents at the Ocean County teen Arts Festival these Mustangs have been selected as outstanding at the 2023 Ocean County teen Arts Festival and they will later go on to the New Jersey state teen Arts Festival in May we want to say congratulations congratulations to the brick memorial drama club for their four nights of sold out shows as they presented Newsies we were especially honored to have an in-school preview fourth block Wednesday April 19th congratulations to Mrs O'Brien Dr Fitz and Mr Bettis for and the amazingly talented cast of course we can't wait to see

016another production congratulations to the AP students as again they're preparing to finish up with their courses and they're taking their exams next month they were treated to an ice cream social on April 20th during lunch and I know she doesn't want me to say this but a huge congratulations to Mrs Stansberry who is the Brick Township District teacher of the year she's so deserving of this and I could not have this position every month without her and her helping me through it and she doesn't want me to say any of this but she deserves it and she's so amazing and that's in addition to being just the school teacher of the year again and yeah she's the best um I have the sports report digital this meeting unfortunately so it's hard to believe that our

017spring Sports season is more than halfway over and our teams are beginning to prepare for post-season play the brick memorial baseball team currently has a record of 7-6 overall and five four in the competitive a South Division of the team's six losses four of them have come by one run and two in Extra Innings leading the offense has been sophomore Speedster Jimmy pop who is currently batting 467 with four doubles eight RBI six runs scored and four stolen bases also contributing contributing significantly offensively are Joe Nolan Nick Nico Marabou and fonte Noriega as far as pitching goes junior Nick garbuccian has been the Ace of the staff with four quality starts going going Junior Mike Joya has he has been extremely effective out of the bullpen also contributing our senior Cole cook Benson and Junior

018Chase Cohen our Mustang softball team entered the season well aware of the challenges ahead while there are a couple seniors with Varsity experience the rest of our players haven't had much or any Varsity experience we've got sophomores and juniors taking on new positions but what we lack and experience we make up with enthusiasm enthusiasm our goal our girls despite taking on some tough losses have not hung their heads they continue to show up with interest to lead and enjoy the game with their teammates we put pressure on the teams that may have more Talent than us we've put on teams that have more Talent than us currently uh three six our strongest opponents in the division are behind us and we're learning every day we're all looking forward to some more opportunities to compete ahead

019coming off last week's Ocean County tournament championship and with the current record of 8-3 on season our golf team has some momentum heading into the stretch the stretch run of the Season we have BN Jackson Memorial Manasquan Middletown North Lacey Toms River East and North four kids were in the top 20 at Ocean County Championship Eric salazis Josh Michigan Peter Todrick and Declan bielitz we qualified and competed in the shore conference championships earlier in the week at Charleston Springs South and have big matches ahead with Southern and Toms River South that will decide our division our boys and girls lacrosse team have struggled in the win column but are starting to come into their own for sure they end this week with games against our sister school Brick Township dragons we hope to continue to

020improve on the back of the Season as we lead up to the state tournament our attendance team is currently 5'3 and are finding themselves in a battle every match next week for them is the Ocean County tournament and the shore Conference tournament our track and field teams have experienced success this year so far we are proud to say that we have hosted the first ever Aesop division me at Burke Memorial and had both of our boys and girls do very well today we are at the Penn rallies and look forward to the championship season that starts next week we have had several key key performances so far with plenty of time to improve on our personal best including Megan Megan albanowitz Katie Rogers Leanne Olivia Ryan Kelly Leila Morata Emma Canfield and Tori Tori Healy

021on the girls side on the boys side Jaden Jonathan and Darren Aponte Eric Emilio in throws and Runners Connor and Tyler Hackett and Josh and Jared Voorhees along with Connors eats and Brandon Lieb they have led the way foreign ly congratulations to some of our senior student athletes that have received prestigious recognition for their success on the fields of play and in the classroom Michael Dayton is our njsia scholar athlete of the year and Billy Caruso and Peyton viggiano have been named our shore conference sportsmanship sportsmanship Award winners all three will be recognized in May at ceremonies honoring their accomplishments as always please stay current with all of our news and updates on our brickschools.org website and subscribe to our Mustang Weekly Newsletter follow us on Twitter and Instagram at bmstang Sports and now we

022are also proud to announce to you that you can follow us on the Mustang Express podcast on Spotify Amazon music Apple and Google podcasts thank you guys [Applause] thank you Ava next up from the ROTC we have Cadet Lieutenant Kelsey Stevens [Applause] good evening ladies and gentlemen my name is Cadet first lieutenant Kelsey Stevens I am the Personnel officer for nj822 Brick afj ROTC I am happy to address you this evening with the Air Force J.R.R Junior ROTC update first I want to say I hope you all had a good and restful spring break since we last addressed the board we participated in the following events on March 25th Cadets performed a color guard presentation for the Cub Scout Pack 38th annual award ceremony at The Brick Presbyterian Church Cadets assisted The Brick Township High

023School guidance Department conducting career day for the juniors and senior class on March 31st also on March 31st We performed another color guard for the annual brick hero awards at Brick Township High School on April 6 Cadets again assisted with career day this time at Burke Memorial finally we are looking forward to our annual Air Force Junior ROTC Awards and change of command ceremony next week May 3rd at Brick Memorial High School as always thank you for your continued support and have a great night [Applause] thank you next up we have the awards for we had some state champions both in bowling and in wrestling I'd like to invite to the mic our athletic director Mr Ed sarluca and would Mr blandina Mrs Kennedy and Mrs de Benedictus please come up to help hand out

024certificates thank you okay um real quick on behalf of uh Mr barisi and uh our Athletic program at brick memorial high school and all of our school Community I want to thank Mrs walrab and the entire book on the entire board uh Dr Farrell our entire Central administrative staff for inviting us here to acknowledge um some pretty impressive achievements that uh happened this past winter uh it's been a while since we've been able to do this at a board meeting so I think it's great that we're doing it again um state championships are become very few and far between uh it seems like you know in this era of participation trophies uh there are so many different levels of championships but what these uh student athletes achieved this year really is nothing short of remarkable

025they were at the absolute very top of the mountain and uh the pretty cool thing about it is is you know they they accomplish what really every single student athlete across the state sets out to do and we had a very um we were well represented in that area so with that being said uh just a couple words about our 2023 girls bowling team uh they had an amazing 53-1 record this past season they were the 2000 yeah coming off by the way I believe uh 54-0 record last year where they didn't lose at all um so we will we will forget about that one loss this year don't worry about it girl uh there was a 2023 ASAP Shore conference the South Jersey group two and overall group two state champions and this was

026uh the first year that the state decided not to move all the way to just one state champion at a media Tournament of Champions but if they had or girls would have won it because they had the top scorer out of every other group one group two group four school so for those of you who don't know if the state's divided by numbers and school sizes so we were labeled as a group two School this year but we would have beaten all the big schools and all the small schools and I believe we were to beat most of the boys schools schools as well as the girls team [Applause] on top of the team accomplishments every one of our five Bowlers finished in the top 18 of the individual state championships and they all earned

027either first or second Team all Shore so congratulations to them uh congratulations also to coach Tori Boughton who was in her first year of taking over the program not too bad way to set the bar really really high you know um who who uh you know took over for a long time successful Coach Dave Thompson who agreed to go to the boys side this year and uh really did a great job this year with the girls so thank you for all the time that you put in um with uh with all that being said I'd like to call up the girls individually first we have senior Leah Varela uh junior Michaela Carter Junior Faith repairing and sophomore Olivia Salvatore unfortunately one of our other seniors uh this year uh this this year couldn't make it

028tonight Emily hair so we just want to congratulate her as well I don't know yeah if you guys want to come up coach can you come up and we'll take a picture of you guys once again congratulations girls oh uh next we would like to uh recognize a young man um who who once again I should say is on top of the New Jersey Scholastic uh wrestling world and I say once again because this was the second time that Anthony uh won a state individual state championship so wrestling wrestling I like to think is in you know in a world all by itself you know there's some crazy dudes that do that do this Sport and uh dudettes nowadays too you know I want to say that I can't leave them out but um these

029guys the the what they do as far as dedication and commitment uh to sacrifice uh not just you know to make weight and they can't enjoy all the foods and and the stuff that everybody likes to enjoy but just the amount of work that goes into the preparation of a wrestling season and a successful wrestling season really in my mind is second to none I couldn't do it ever um a lot of my friends that did it when we grew up they're still a little crazy you know what I mean and I'm sure that's going to follow you around Anthony you know looking at the guy sitting in the front row here but um what Anthony accomplished really really was remarkable he probably in a long line of uh wrestling Tradition at Brook Memorial High

030School will probably go down as of you know this year as the greatest wrestler that we've ever had when you look at his uh overall career so I know we're acknowledging him for this year but I just want to talk a little bit about what he accomplished in his entire career for the second time in his heralded career he's accomplished what everyone sets out to do in in earning his second NJ Sia tournament while he did it he earned his second njsa tournament most outstanding wrestler in the tournament New Jersey is one of only two states in the entire country that goes down to one individual Champion you know so uh it really is impressive what he did the the two times that Anthony didn't win the state championship he lost in the finals so

031he was right there the entire time he won four region Champions championships with which only the uh how many how many people did that Ben only you in brick memorial history I know that I think only eight in Shore conference history have done it um so that's another remarkable thing uh food region championships and he is a four-time like I said State finalist um he took second place his freshman year in junior uh having won his sophomore year and now just recently as a senior he completed a perfect 30-0 season in an amazing 138-3 career record so congratulations Anthony santanello come on send it we'll send it to him thank you Mr saraluca and congratulations to the girls bowling team and to Young Mr santanello a long family history right but you beat them all

032didn't you [Laughter] we have a another presentation to the Women's Club of brick and I would like to ask Mrs dianarone to come up please [Applause] so the Women's Club of brick has been meeting in in this PDC all year this year they teamed with the voices Club at Brick Township High School and with the Key Club at Brick Memorial High School to bring awareness to Child Abuse Prevention month uh the month of April and they planted pinwheels in the front Lawns of both of those schools to bring that attention to Child Abuse Prevention month the board of education is issuing a proclamation to them I'm going to ask Mrs dianarone to read that Proclamation and we have Mrs Betty Morrison from the Women's Club of brick here to receive it so Mrs Morrison please

033come up whereas our children are our most valuable resources and will shape the future of Brick Township and whereas the childhood trauma including abuse and neglect is a serious problem affecting every segment of our community they don't know I'm a crier [Laughter] and finding Solutions requires input and action from everyone and whereas childhood trauma can have long-term psychological emotional and physical effects that have lasting consequences for victims of abuse and whereas protective factors are conditions that reduce or eliminate risk and promote the social emotional and development well-being of children and whereas effective Child Abuse Prevention activities succeed because of the partnership created between child welfare professionals Education Health and community and Facebook faith-based organizations businesses law enforcement agencies and families whereas communities must make every effort to promote programs and activities that build strong Children

034and Families whereas we acknowledge that we must work together as a community in Partnership to build awareness about child abuse and contribution to promote the social and emotional well-being of Children and Families in safe stable and nurturing environment and whereas prevention Remains the best defense for our children and family now therefore on behalf of the Brick Township Board of Education to hereby Proclaim April as National child reuse prevention month and urge all citizens to recognize this month by dedicating Our Lives to the task of improving the quality of life for Children and Families [Applause] we'd like to invite Mrs tarnowski to come up and Mrs Johnson to come up both advisors helped with the and kids thank you Mrs ferneski and the students [Applause] yes I would understand thank you stay right where you are

035on behalf of the brick Women's Club I would like to thank the Board of Education and Dr Farrell for this honor and the high school students for their help improve preparing the pinwheel Gardens and off that topic and I've said this to Dr Farrell I am a retired teacher I taught in a tiny little school in Hunterdon County yes there are tiny schools in New Jersey and kindergarten and first grade mostly when we moved here after I retired I began volunteering I followed the same special ed teacher through four different schools in Brick until the pandemic started and I said to him I saw such marvelous things in the halls and listened as teachers walked their children through the Halls things that parents don't necessarily get to see this district is a Hidden Gem and

036now that I've seen all of you and finally seen high school students really we need to publicize it's really amazing to me and I'm so glad that you were all here so I got to meet you thank you [Applause] [Music] um we're going to start up again I need a motion in a second for approval of minutes I'll make that motion Michael second Fran Mary Miss Siebert yes Miss Kennedy yes Miss pakala hello abstained from March 16th executive and regular and yes to April 17th Miss Ian yes Mr blandina yes Miss do you Benedictus yes Miss wolren yes uh superintendent comments thank you Miss walrab tonight the board will vote on the budget as I stated the last few years where we are mandated by state law to balance the budget every year additionally we

037have a state mandated two percent tax levy cap and continue to manage the additional state aid loss the annual expenditures increase yearly by approximately five million dollars just in salaries and benefits which is more than 80 percent of our budget so we started this budget process once again with a shortfall almost seven million dollars in order to balance the budget we utilize some Surplus additional federal revenue sources and increased grants funding our central office administrative team worked diligently with building and department administration to help create a fiscally responsible budget that was able to maintain programming at a bare minimum tonight's 23-24 budget presentation illustrates how we will maintain programming while addressing some priorities our total budget actually went down from 164 million to 160 million a reduction of 4 million 282 000 or a minus

0382.6 percent reduction our operating budget increased only 0.68 percent and our tax impact continues to be low 1.77 tax levy with the retiring of debt service we continue to do more with less and for that I'd like to both acknowledge and thank our amazing staff now I could get on my soapbox a little bit about the state of New Jersey and Department of Ed with budgeting in New Jersey the public school budget process and funding notification schedules harrowing and quite honestly backwards we're basically asked to run 160 million dollar organization with unknown information State also codifies certain requirements such as class sizes and student support services but does not provide money for these unfunded mandates for example State Administrative Code njac 6A 13-3.1 mandates that high poverty or Title 1 District's Elementary class sizes not

039exceed 23 21 and K to 3 and 23 in grades four to five it's worth noting that even though brick as a district is not considered high poverty or Title 1 because we not meet the total District percentage of 40 percent only three of our schools are not considered Title One individually each brick Title One school has at least 37 percent socioeconomically disadvantaged with our highest percentage at 48 percent so according to New Jersey brics Title 1 schools are not seen as high poverty and therefore can have more than 30 in a class we will have six to seven Elementary classes next year with 30 or more students there's a great quote fight for the things you care about but do it in a way that will lead others to join you last meeting I

040communicated the effort to many local S2 districts are supporting to approve our case for additional State funding it's clear that the collaborative efforts of many have resulted in our Collective voice being heard somewhat by educating the state regarding the devastation of S2 cuts and the impact on providing a thorough and efficient education for our students some relief for the 23-24 school year was afforded us with the bill s 3732 Rick schools was able to receive 66 percent of the S2 cut back which helped save approximately 20 positions my white paper report I spoke about the short-term and long-term Solutions the state has moved forward with a short-term solution with this bill but there's much work still to be done time is of the essence for all of our voices to come together to compel the

041state to reevaluate the school funding formula so as to provide a thorough and efficient education for all students in New Jersey by striving to bring all public school districts up to adequacy this is not a budget I am proud of though as we cut positions once again we continue to reduce staff in order to balance our budget due to lack of State funding and consequently student services diminished although we have maintained programs at a bare minimum our high schools are slowly moving away from what is considered a comprehensive high school with the reduction of electives and class offerings our middle schools have seen student support services such as counseling interventionists reduce and our Elementary class sizes have increased along with BSI support diminishing since the Inception of S2 in 2018 brick schools has cut over

042250 positions a 17 reduction in staff over that time period while our enrollment over that same time period only went down 3.7 percent something to think about despite our budget woes and lack of resources our students and staff continue to make us proud I'm going to try to end this on a positive note with some achievements that have happened over the last few weeks our Brick Township High School Marching Band our marching dragons had a very productive spring break while we were all home enjoying spring break they were in some competitions our drum line placed first in their division and our Winter Guard placed fourth at a competition and both ensembos received the highest scores yet this season so congratulations to them [Applause] thank you congratulations to our high school students for receiving outstanding achievement

043at the Ocean County teen Arts Festival from brick high school for poetry Angela Dion's and Isabel campione for 2D Visual Arts Natalie Kerwin for brick memorial digital photography Madeleine kiesh film Craig Fitzgerald creative writing Jessica Cosentino and Kylie Morgan and poetry Marya Wallen congratulations [Applause] a big congratulations to our brick memorial High School golf team for only the second time in school history winning the Ocean County Championship the trophy awarded is actually named um the Hanson Cup right Mr sarluca after our longtime well-known brick family in the Hanson so great job to our brick memorial golf team for that award [Applause] I was able to see the brick memorial High School drama production Newsies last week if anybody has not seen it um I think it's over now but it was fantastic um I took

044my wife that's kind of like date night now going to the local plays at some of the high schools it was an amazing yeah he's saying I'm cheap uh sorry Linda oh if you're watching Linda we'll go to dinner next week it was an amazing opening night and I'm always impressed with our talented students Bravo and tomorrow night I'll be at Brick eye seeing brick Kai's production of SpongeBob the musical tomorrow evening if you get a chance see see our plays and musicals and our drama Productions they really are they really are wonderful and it's right here you don't have to go to Broadway um this week actually this month is Autism Awareness and acceptance month Mrs grungeer uh informed me this week was Autism Awareness Week and brick schools recognized this week as Spirit

045Week to bring awareness and communicate acceptance with autism students and staff draft dressed in a bunch of different themes each day this week for this recognition last night I actually was at our the Ocean County prosecutor's office came to both high schools yesterday and presented last night at Lake Riviera High School to a a crowd I was worried at first I thought they weren't coming in we had a huge crowd of parents and their children and students so thank you to the Ocean County prosecutor's office presenting to our high schools as well as presenting last night to our community on Internet safety cyber bullying bullying and the dangers of social media very informative session for our community we're pleased to see so many fifth through 12th grade parents in attendance with their child the presentation

046was much needed questions were courageous and the discussion was productive thanks again to special agents Mike Caldwell and Deborah Giordano for this important presentation I'm also in attendance last night the Ocean County Health Department set up an information table on children's mental health and well-being issues so thank you to them as well um April is Child Abuse Prevention month this past month the voices Club as you saw Miss McNamara and our with our Women's Club recognize the voices Club from Brick Township High School and the Key Club from brick memorial partnered with our local brick Women's Club of Brick Township to plant the pinwheels on the front lawn of each High School to bring attention and awareness to supporting happy and healthy childhoods for all our children in our community we're grateful for the partnership

047and support for the local Women's Club of brick offers our school community yesterday was our administrative professional day um brick schools is fortunate to have such a wonderful and dedicated staff of the Administrative Professionals supporting us in the best service to our students staff parents and community so much food left over from that yesterday that the administrators I may right when you start your report I'll pass out the food and the cookies now and May 1st next Monday is principles day brick schools is fortunate to have an amazing group of principals many in our back uh back of the room right now leading our schools they are true servant leaders leadership has nothing to do with ordering people around or title or of course you hold a position or authority two servant leadership inspires people

048to follow because you serve their psychological needs of Direction purpose and value Douglas MacArthur said a true leader has the confidence to stand alone the courage to make tough decisions and the compassion to listen to the needs of others a true leader does not set out to be a leader but becomes one by the equality of their actions and the Integrity of their intent our principles model this philosophy daily so think of Prince Moore Monday and we thank you for all your help the following week May 8th through 12th as designated as teacher appreciation week so please take a moment during that week to thank a teacher and thank you to all of our brick Schools teachers your commitment to supporting student growth through cultivating each student's unique strengths and talents in an engaging safe

049and nurturing environment is greatly appreciated please join us at the May board meeting which will be held at Brick Memorial High School this year last year was brick and we'll rotate them where we will be celebrating and honoring the teacher of the year from each of our schools the Educational Service professional of the year as well from each of our schools and our brick schools district teacher of the year that'll be May 4th 11th May 11th at Brick Memorial High School in the auditorium Wednesday May 10th is school Nurse's Day Rick schools has an awesome group of nurses with amazing heart and thank you to them for supporting our students staff and Community please take a moment on May 10th to thank a school nurse for all they do to keep us safe and well

050and in closing I'd just like to add as I said earlier time is of the essence for all of our voices to come together in the word to Thomas Payne it's not in the numbers but in unity at our great strength lies thank you [Applause] thank you doc thank you Dr Farrell this was not an easy uh budget process this year so I'd like to just take a moment to recognize the dedicated the dedication of our leadership team Dr Farrell Mr Edwards Miss McNamara Miss Granger Dr Anderson Mr kleisler our union leaders are building principals department and our department supervisors for all the time and hard work you put into the 2324 District budget we are voting on tonight the amount of time and emotional energy you all invested in this budget should not be

051underestimated the past few years have been incredibly challenging with the financial Cuts we continue to suffer under S2 when the S2 storm hit our district five years ago threatening to destroy much of what we all worked hard to build these leaders knew we had to find a solution or the district would suffer greatly through steadfast leadership we took an empty empty half-empty bag of lemons and somehow made lemonade the product looks different from what we initially envisioned and we'll have to work together and embrace the change sometimes when life gives you lemons you must find a new way to make lemonade as we collectively continued our fight for fair funding we must remember it's not about what you lose but what you can gain from it Dr Farrell thank you for your leadership and unwavering

052Devotion to our students staff parents and community you and your team remain committed in maintaining and creating an environment and creating environments where our students and Staff feel safe and can continue to thrive I would also like to recognize recognize additional Frontline stakeholders our teachers pair of professionals therapists guidance Staff office support staff maintenance and transportation staff cafeteria staff coaches and volunteers parents Guardians community members and Board of Education members you all continue to do more with less and we appreciate your commitment to our students district and community I would be utterly remiss if I did not address our students you are an exceptionally Lively and dynamic community the energy and enthusiasm you emanate is the driving force behind our purpose to serve you are the community's future in closing I am reminded of the

053famous quote by Helen Keller alone we can do so little together we can do so much because of the tireless efforts and collaboration of everyone in this room and those who cannot be here with with us tonight we can come together and positively impact the lives of our students and community your dedication and hard work have not gone unnoticed and you're in fact is immeasurable as we move forward with the 2324 District budget let us continue to work together support one another fight for fair funding and remain focused on our commitment to the success of our students and the progress of our community as Helen Keller reminds us together we will continue to make a positive impact for years to come thank you [Applause] we'll continue on with committee reports Miss Granger special education thank

054you Mrs walrap on April 24th 2023 myself Dr Farrell Mrs walrapp Mrs sieber and Mrs de Benedictus met we reviewed uh the current hires and resignations on the board agenda tonight we still have a school psychologist opening that we did not fill we have posted lots of really fun and creative pictures on our Twitter feed Autism Awareness Month has been great the outfits of the kids have been fantastic I just want everyone to put this on your calendars uh Unified sports May 30th of 2023 we'll be having a kickball game versus Toms River at the Field of Dreams uh we are we talked a little bit about how we can come up with some ideas for fundraising so more to come on that at our next committee meeting don't forget the preschool Lottery will be

055pulled on May the 4th and May the 4th be with us during that Lottery uh this month I would like to recognize our special superheroes um for the month of April James Marvin is our assistant principal at Brick Township High School he has done amazing things for our students with special needs he is not only their friend but their Advocate and I would like to recognize him for that and Kathy Miller she's a special education teacher at vmms she is just an amazing person I wish we can clone her um so I will be recognizing them uh in the next couple weeks and posting that on Twitter uh we had a legal update regarding some of our legal cases and our summer program is uh getting underway with permission slips homes to parents and we're

056about to set up all of that so that's all I have thank you thank you Dr Anderson curriculum and instruction you've got to be kidding I I am not sensitive but I'm starting to get a complex well should I do while he's gone yeah I'll hurry through there's no way you're getting through your report I had I I have abbreviated it I used to be so long and I have like cut it it this is just it was not an accident [Laughter] nobody listens to him anyway thank you that would be better please much well I won't say it you yes and he has a lot more detail and it goes not one report but two reports I only have one report I'm gonna time it time somebody time this what was that they'll tie

057myself yeah they all all right all right thank you so the cni committee met on April 19th at 4 30 PM in attends from miss bakala the chairperson Mrs ayanarone Mrs Kennedy Mrs Kane Ms Lane Dr Farrell and myself uh first I introduced Mrs Kane the elementary Ela social studies in K-12 bilingual ell supervisor and Miss Lane's secondary science and K-12 visual Performing Arts supervisor to the board members um and then I reviewed the April agenda items for approval under field trips we have a trip to the Museum of Natural History for Brook Memorial High School science we also had a cardboard canoe race at YMCA for Brick high school we have two band competitions one for Lake Riviera Middle School at um and one for vets Middle School the trills and thrills band competition

058while I'm talking and then vets middle is going to ocvts we have one student teacher placement okay to five observation and we have a grant requested by Brick high school for wood shop supplies it's called the fashion Foundation Grant next we had secondary update for Miss Lane she identified the high school students who awarded outstanding achievement in the Ocean County teen Arts Festival in the categories of poetry 2D Visual Arts digital digital photography and film and creative writing students will be featured at the New Jersey state teen Arts Festival in June at Middlesex County College Miss Lane provided an update on the status of the ihub launch for biology she explained the teachers have been meeting monthly with Dr Baldwin from Kane University to explore the resources Implement lessons and collaborate on creating a dynamic

059pacing guide containing supplemental activities teachers report that students are able to articulate science Concepts work collaboratively and design their own investigations and connect the concepts to the real world around them next I provide an update about the cni budget their focus will be on sustaining our programs and we do have S2 cuts and so we will delay the adoption of a new uh language arts program for the 2223 school year Mrs Lane explained Mrs Kane explained that the pause although disappointing will enable us to build a capacity of our reading pilot teachers these literacy leaders will meet regularly to plan for the use of our current resources which is a line which and align them to the new standards which are being revised and should be adopted in August and also to the science of

060reading research they will identify professional development needs to educate staff on those best practices aligned to the current research and also to pave the way for smooth transition to the new reading adoption once the adoption occurs these leaders will also help support the implementation in their respective schools kindergarten kickoff so to Foster smooth transition from pre-k to kindergarten I provide an overview of the getting ready for kindergarten Parent Academy presentation which occurred on April 18th over 60 parents attended the virtual session that provided parents with a glimpse into the life of a kindergartner the kindergarten daily schedule and curriculum and strategies to help parents support kindergarten Readiness parents are invited to our kindergarten kickoff hosted at each elementary school so our Warren Wolf and Herbertsville Early Childhood Development Centers the parents received a flyer telling

061about the kickoff and we're also sending them to our local pre-ks and any students that have registered so May 8th will be Lane's Mill and vets Elementary May 9th will be Drum Point in midstreams and May 10th will be Emma and osborneville so that'll give us an opportunity to induct our newest students into our programs at our school so we're really excited about that and the opportunity to to meet with the parents and the students and Screen them so that we can better place them and anticipate their needs for September in terms of family engagement um we had the parent Academy for getting ready for kindergarten on the 18th uh third marking period progress report cards were posted on April 21st on April 22nd I also saw on Newsies and it was like I love

062to go to Broadway it was really Broadway caliber and I just have to do a shout out for Steve Dougherty he's our one of our facilities people um Dr Fitzgerald who does is the tech director at Memorial for the play said that he has been so instrumental in supporting the the program helping with the sets load uh putting things up taking things down he is just incredible so I just wanted to do a shout out and I um it really does take a village and they work as such an amazing unit our facilities Department along with our school director Jessica Bryan and Dr Fitzgerald and Mr Betty's it it's just incredible it was amazing April 26 was the prosecutor's presentation April 28th and 9th I can't wait to see SpongeBob the musical we're even having

063younger kids in this one it's really going to be exciting May 1st we have njsla kicking off for the elementary level May 2nd is the Middle School kickoff and May 15th is the high school kickoff we also have a bilingual night plan for May 5th 15th and our green Fair yay on May 20th now all of our schools have green teams and they will be featured at the fair so we're really excited by that our next meeting will be May 8th at 4 30. thank you that was just shy of five and a half minutes just so well I was taking my time so that you could eat your cookies it was perfect thanks Sally thank you Dr Anderson um Mr Edwards facilities in finance I can definitely beat 5 14. in facilities we talked

064about capital projects and in finance we talked about money done facilities met April 18th uh first uh Miss Wahlberg miss bakala Mr blendin a Dr Farrell myself Mr York from that Architects Mr Williams from spiesel Ms Garza garlic from spiesel Architects Mr replica for this piece of architect said miss pecoria our facilities manager so first our active projects brick memorial High School Penthouse c d replacement of air handlers and the replacement of the cooling tower the cooler Tower cooling tower is up and running with temporary power and the fencing's been installed the the penthouse work will begin in June Lake River Middle School air conditioning the contractor has all the UVS delivered and stored at their warehouse and then the condensing units are delivered to on-site to storage containers that work also will start beginning

065in uh Monday May 1st second shift and it will really kick up and go into the summer along with all these projects that will happen with Veterans Memorial Middle School the boiler replacement air conditioning again the contractor has all the UV stored at their warehouse and the condenser units are stored in the containers if you're wondering what they were that's all the condensing units that are out in the parking lot um the the boiler work will begin on June 19th with the asbestos monitoring scheduled to be done the same at the same time Emma Havens air conditioning and Veterans Memorial Elementary School air conditioning are both being done by a contractor known as preferred mechanical they have all their the UVS delivered to their warehouse and the condensers are stored at both schools on-site and

066storage containers so the storage containers on that side that's middle that side vetsel don't want you to get confused by that um Drum Point Elementary School the boiler replacement and air conditioning the cessie is doing the work there The Boiler Room abatement that was to be done is now rescheduled to be done June 21st the UVS are stored at their warehouse and the condensers are on site Lake River Middle School boiler plant Emma Havens Young Elementary School boiler plant and midstreams boiler plant are 100 complete and now can be removed from the agenda so one last thing that we need to discuss so those those jobs are 100 done and up and running Lanesville Elementary School air conditioning minor setback Transformer that was scheduled to be delivered and installed on April 24th unfortunately was redirected

067to my understanding to Texas for a storm struck area that takes a higher priority we're now scheduled to get that Transformer in June cross your fingers because the Transformers absolutely needed to run the condensers that run the air conditioning they are installing the connection from the building to the pole that work began actually on the 24th and so that will be ready that when JCP L comes in in June to do their Transformer kickover we'll be ready to connect uh however you know just as a reminder that when that when the power of the building for and this is going to happen at all the schools that are getting a new electrical switch gear that those schools will be out without power for about six weeks why that electrical changeover takes place so uh the

068lanes Mill staff this summer is going to be relocated which is you know the administrators and clerical staff that are there uh while that work is being done to prepare for September air conditioning Lanesville Elementary School boiler plate boiler Replacements we are 99 complete so by the next meeting I'm hoping I'm going to tell you that that job is done as well Rick Moore High School parking lot reconfiguration we met with the township went over their review comments everything went uh hunky dory it was great um then we are opening bids on May 2nd next week with hopes that we're going to have a little bitter for recommendation on May 11th agenda Lanesville Elementary School playground ran into a little bit of a snag there we need to add sidewalk where the playground needs to

069be added it was the sidewalk was ten thousand one hundred twenty five dollars there's no money left in that budget to do the work so we were scrambling a little bit however um thankfully Mr walrab's efforts she was able to find us a donor who she just handed to me as we were listening to Dr Anderson's report a check from a donor that we'll have on the May 11th agenda for ten thousand one hundred twenty five dollars so now that sidewalk yeah it's great that will be done and that uh that project will continue however it probably won't continue until after the May testing concludes it's my understanding that we don't want that work going on while the testing is happening she says he said something about the kids being distracted when a new playground

070is being built yeah yeah I don't know it seems exciting to me but uh midstream's air conditioning osborneville air conditioning and osborneville Elementary School kitchen Edition those are all projects that we are we've authorized the architect to move ahead with Rod Grant applications those resolutions are on tonight's agenda for approval May first deadline uh the anticipation is is that we get 40 from the state to pay for those projects and everything goes smoothly with the projects that we have going this summer The contingency funds that we've available would then be able to be used to have those projects start in the summer of 2024. and then additionally we added warm wolf early childhood development center and the Herbertsville or childhood development center projects to this evening's agenda as well with the same hopes that with

071the 40 funding from the state sixty percent out of contingency funds on the other projects we'd be able to fund those in 2024 potentially 2025. more like 2025 is what I would expect for them to be complete based upon what we know with the other ones Herbertsville and osborneville parking lot reconfigurations um we met with the uh Township in regards to some property that is being purchased behind osborneville to talk about um potentially some type of access to that property to help alleviate the traffic on the on on the property currently uh we're meeting with them on uh uh Friday tomorrow tomorrow we're meeting with them tomorrow at 11 A.M to discuss it further and also the county will be there to look at any type of improvements that can be made the roadway uh

072hope is that when we finish up there if we have enough time in osborneville then we're going to head over to Herbertsville and look at the same concept and if that is it possible then we'll reschedule and get to Herbertsville another time but hopefully we can get it all done tomorrow and then also on the agenda is the osborneville nurses office relocation with the main office again that's a project that we're hoping to get 40 for we can get 40 for it then we would move ahead with the monies that we have left over and continue to see on the other projects um so some of some of the great news that we were able to share was we applied for three of our schools to receive the BPU funding there's two of them we

073haven't been denied on yet so we're still hopeful but one we were awarded that's a Drum Point Elementary School HVAC project so the BPU is going to pick up one million two hundred ninety eight thousand three hundred twenty five dollars of that project so that's a nice chunk of change uh that's going to come back into contingency now to be able to support the projects that I just got done talking about uh we also as I indicated are as they're on the agenda this evening we're there's 350 million available in njsda Grants we're going after a lot of it um not so not sure how much is going to be applied for Statewide and therefore how much they're going to be able to allocate to each district but we're hopeful that we're going to get

074all of ours funded let's see the preschool Grant 120 million that was made available for preschool Grant discussed with committee we're not going to go after that money at this time it requires 60 to be funded locally for the expansion we don't have the 60 available to be building new buildings or expanding buildings or things of that nature so that's not something we're going to be going after at this time the fire alarm system repairs Mr procorio told us that open systems new contractor is really you know knocking out all of the deficiencies that the township had a fire fire Bureau identified and that the fire Bureau is very happy with their progress and then finally we discussed a use of facilities request that the committee concurred should be denied in regards to leaving a

075truck on one of our properties and next meeting is May 2nd and then we moved into Finance uh Miss swallow Brad Mr Miss McCollum Mr blandina Dr Farrell myself first item was the transportation bell schedule analysis that was approved at the last meeting uh told the committee we have our kickoff meeting with we're having their kickoff meeting with them April 19th which we did have they're collecting a lot of documents uh update for the committee and the rest of the board as they plan on being here the second week of May and they're going to be here for four days they interview everyone in the transportation department they're going to view interview principles they're gonna really put together a thorough document and some recommendations hopefully in regards to any tweaks we may be able to

076make to our Bell schedules to help with Transportation efficiencies uh 2324 budget I won't kill that one because Dr Farrell spoke about it already in great detail it's this is a difficult budget really difficult keeps getting harder as as Dr Farrell indicated earlier it's not fair to the S2 districts who have to spend a lot more time and resources preparing their budgets because of the cuts than districts that don't have to do this um it's painful it's really is I mean we've we have uh we've had some long agonizing meetings especially in the superintendent cabinet meeting not always in agreement with where things should be reduced and not be reduced um but in the end I think we do come to a consensus that what's in the best interest of the district I'll say and

077you'll hear more about in the budget presentation one of the more difficult things that's going to happen we Statewide we've seen a huge increase in transportation costs Transportation costs have just been um you know very expensive one of the things that we're trying to do in the 2324 budget to combat the transportation costs is we're going to bring back a lot of the out of District routes that we had previously outsourced to private contractors we're going to do them with our own drivers by doing those with our own drivers that now means that we're not going to have covers built into our routes without having covers built in our routes on any given day that our absenteeism exceeds the number of substitutes that we have we're going to have to do what we had done

078in the past which is circle backs or round backs which is we drop the kids off and we got to go back and pick up another route there's it's unfortunate right now we are having a very difficult time you see the signs we have them still up all over top place we need substitute drivers we're not alone though it's a nationwide crisis there is a bill that's out there that is promoting moving this the school bus driver license from a c endorsement to an s endorsement which would then allow more people to be to obtain the license to be able to drive the smaller buses not necessarily the 54 passenger but the Vans at least so anyway that's one of the things that we'll be dealing with and hopefully um we're gonna have to get

079the messaging out right that we talked about in regards to making sure parents understand the circumstances that this budgeting has put us into promoter Services we had the RFP opening today we got one response I'll be discussing that with the finance committee at the next meeting Physical Therapy Services special services has requested increase the approved hours for physical therapy that's on this evening's agenda that's due to a lack I'm sorry that's due to lack of substitutes for staff leave of absences for that particular position njda the New Jersey Department of Agriculture has we get so lucky with this stuff we once again got luckily randomly selected for a Department of Agriculture Food Service audit so we're very lucky with that I informed the committee that Miss Richardson our food service director is going to lead

080on the audit and she's she's well prepared to handle anything with that she's very she's an excellent at her job um Brick Township High School printer purchase I got a big thank you from Dr Cajun when I walked in tonight the finance committee approved transferring funds that he had scrolled away in other accounts to now move to a printer that he wants to buy for his Visual and Performing Arts Department can be approved that so that will move ahead I informed the committee that we received a 17 930 Grant from New Jersey school Insurance Group for a safety Grant we discussed using that money to put more cameras on school buses the committee concurreds that's where we're going to move to put those funds effective School Solutions discussed with the committee that on that the

081raise to minimum wage on January 1st unfortunately put the substitute teachers for Effective School Solutions below minimum wage so that addendum is on this evening's agenda to increase that to pay those folks minimum wage the meritain at the planned Amendment discussed with the committee that previously we were trying to handle the dependents over age 26 on our own uh it became problematic uh Mr kleister and I discussed it that we'd rather have the carrier do that it comes out to be a nickel per member it's well worth the money that we're going to spend and not have to deal with making those type of decisions on whether someone should continue on our plan or not and lastly I had to inform the committee that one person exceeded the regular business or will exceed the regular

082business travel that was previously approved by 1500 it's unbelievable that person's me um and so I requested the committee approve an increase to 500 for the remainder of the year for the regular business travel and again the next meeting is May 2nd thank you Mr Edwards Dr Farrell yes Miss Mack we're going to do the budget presentation at this time um and then we'll go right into public comments all the comments on agenda and so we can and or the presentation I got you Dr Anderson for 14 minutes and 27 seconds brick Brick Township Public School District's 2024 budget presentation our central office administrative team has worked very hard to help create a budget that is fiscally responsible and maintains programming for the 2023-2024 budget the net tax levy is 1.77 percent and this is

083due to the retiring of debt service as I Illustrated last year the cost to educate a student who is classified economically disadvantaged ell or considered at risk is exponentially greater than the average cost per pupil as our demographic numbers increase and change our Revenue sources are decreasing dramatically as I said last year and this budget clearly illustrates as well Brick Township Public Schools does more with less as stated the cost to educate a classified economically disadvantaged ell or at-risk student is exponentially larger than our average cost per pupil these demographic student populations have increased over the years while our available resources from revenue have decreased dramatically the goal of this presentation is to give an overview of the budget with priorities as well as projected revenues and expenditures annual expenditures increased by approximately 5 million

084just in salaries and benefits with a total tax levy available of only the mandated two percent cap and state aid decreasing we have another budget shortfall of almost 7 million dollars once again we've utilized some fund balance our Surplus and federal revenue sources along with increased grants Transportation costs have increased special education has gone up and security has been increased in this budget over 60 positions about 34 instructional and 30 support are being cut with the hope that the majority of these job cuts are absorbed through retirements attrition vacancies not being filled and along with some non-tenured non-renewals once again this is a No-Frills budget due to the continued negative impact of S2 and reduction in our state aid is fiscally responsible and allows us to reallocate resources to maintain facilities and improve Safety and

085Security as stated we are seeing the continued negative effect of the S2 funding Clift on our district salaries and benefits alone make up more than 80 percent of our budget and this increase is about five million dollars it is worth reiterating that with the decrease of additional state aid and the ability to only increase our tax levy by the mandated two percent tax cap We Begin The Brick Township Public Schools 2023-2024 budget process with a seven million dollar shortfall in order to balance the budget which is state law we've utilized fund balance Surplus and federal revenue sources along with increased grants this is a budget that is fiscally responsible we believe that the most important factor when we are looking at this budget and trying to prioritize was to minimize the negative effect of the

086lack of funding on class sizes especially on the elementary level now miss McNamara will talk about class sizes for the 2023-2024 budget thank you Dr Farrell good evening I'm Susan McNamara director of planning research and evaluation the team has worked diligently in this budget to reduce the impact that the loss of funding has had on class size with our primary focus at the elementary level the result is the average class sizes for the 2023-2024 school year in kindergarten the maximum number of students in a class by law without a paraprofessional is capped at 25. the average class size for kindergarten for Brick for the 2023-2024 school year is 24. the average class size in grades one through five is approximately 26. with the testing grades of three through five having an average class size of

08727 plus overall class sizes range from a low of 22 to a high of 32 at the elementary level the Middle School level the class sizes will range from a low of 25 to a high of 29 in grades 6 through 8. specials Encore subjects and PE health class size averages will vary depending upon the number of sections and available staff special education classes vary depending upon program and state regulated class sizes and at the high school level the average number of students per core subject area will be around 25. however other courses depending upon course selection and number of sections available based on Staffing could be higher or lower than the average it is important to note across the levels K through 12 the team has worked to staff each of our schools to

088provide for a positive educational experience and the best service to our students at this time I would like to introduce Mrs Granger to speak about preschool and special education thank you Miss McNamara the special education department is excited for the upcoming school year where we will be addressing the needs for our classified students professional development for all staff will focus on ways to assist all students in the area of behavior and academics each year we work to identify areas where students require additional support and ensure that the money in our special education budget is being spent on supporting students where needed our behavioral supports have been widely utilized in special education and general education and more is needed in that area we will continue to have our esy program which will take place this summer

089we are so very pleased to announce that our grant from the ngdoe for the upcoming school year to provide full day preschool to our three and four-year-olds in Brick Township has been approved once again this will help us further expand our program to one additional classroom and provide a more enriched learning environment with more materials now I would like to introduce Dr Elise Anderson the director of curriculum and instruction thank you Mrs Granger due to the reduction in state aid caused by S2 the curriculum and instruction department will postpone the adoption of new programs for the 23-24 school year for English language arts we will expand our reading pilot and explore resources aligned to the newly revised standards this budget also sustains our current programs with computer adaptive software like lexian Achieve3000 to improve students

090reading skills in social studies the budget includes digital resources such as studies weekly and the savis platform in mathematics for grades k-7 we will continue to use iready mypath which uses a diagnostic assessment to create a personalized learning path so students receive instruction and practice in areas that they need it most for grade 8 and Algebra 1 Algebra 2 and geometry courses we will continue to use the big Ideas digital platform which assists teachers in planning targeted interventions and help students monitor their own progress students will also use get more math to practice concepts for long-term skill retention in science this budget includes supplies for the inquiry Hub biology curriculum which we piloted this year ihub is aligned to the Next Generation science standards and the state Science assessment most importantly the cni department remains

091committed to ongoing professional development through the use of our highly skilled academic coaches this concludes the overview of the curriculum instruction budget for the 2324 school year now I would like to introduce Mr kleisler the Director of Human Resources thank you Dr Anderson I would like to start off by noting that this budget was completed with no elimination of programs you will see the acronym FTE which stands for full-time equivalent as you can see on the slide in this budget we are reducing over 60 ftes approximately 34 are instructional staff and 30 are support staff many of these reductions are being absorbed through vacancies not being filled it is our hope that the balance will be fulfilled through retirements or attrition and now to our business administrator Mr Edwards thank you Mr Clay sir the

0922023-24 budget will see an overall decrease of 2.6 percent primarily due to reduction in Grants and entitlements from the Esser and cares 2 funding the operating budget will increase by 1.4 percent however the net operating increase after taking into consideration reductions in equipment and capital projects will be a 0.7 percent increase so where will the money go instruction and benefits make up 63 percent of all expenditures up from 61 percent in 2022-23 that service now only represents 0.1 percent of the total expenditures down from 0.2 percent in the prior year the areas that have increased the greatest are Transportation which now represents 6.3 percent of the total and have District tuition which now represents 4.4 percent of the total as indicated earlier out of District tuition is increasing by 10.5 percent primarily due to the

093cost of outages Replacements and private school tuition increases instruction is also increasing by 2.4 percent which is a 1.9 percent difference indicating that in total instructional costs were 39.2 percent of the instructional total versus 37.2 percent the prior year as seen on this Slide the large decrease in equipment and capital is reflected in the utilization the prior year of cares act money to support the capital projects being done by the district for HVAC transportation is increasing 16.5 percent primarily due to the increase in salaries for drivers equipment means we're limited to the bare bone Essentials that are needed for the 2324 school year which includes a new post's machine for technology a laminating machine at Brick Township High School a field hockey scoreboard at Brook Township High School and transmissions and engines for the transportation

094department capital projects have also been limited and only include phase one and two of the brick memorial high school parking lot reconfiguration project so where will the money come from local tax levy continues to be the largest proportion of Revenue to The Brick Township Public Schools representing 75.1 percent and as state aid continues to shrink now only representing 11 of the total budget tax levy on the general fund is increasing by the state mandated two percent however that increases being offset by reduction in debt service tax levy bringing the net increase to 1.8 percent State 8 under S2 continues to be decreased which was a decrease of 15 percent in the current school year however that decreases being offset by an estimated increase in extraordinary Aid which will be bring the net decrease to 8.7

095percent federally decreases by 46.4 percent because of the utilization of cares to money and ARP money in the 2223 budget to support HVAC projects we continue to see an increase in the preschool expansion Grant which is increasing by 9.1 percent and miscellaneous is increasing by 17 percent primarily due to an increase in estimated interest earnings now the interest rates are on the rise and total the revenue is reducing by 2.6 percent matching the 2.6 percent reduction in expenditures this slide reflects the breakdown of state aid compared from one year to the next highlighting that the S2 reduction of 2.5 million dollars is being offset by an estimated increase in extraordinary Aid of 1 million dollars it should be noted that the state provided supplemental stabilization Aid in the current school year 2223 of 1 677

096892 which is two-thirds of the reduction under S2 which flows into Surplus and is being utilized from the 2023-24 budget as you've heard me state for many years now brick Public Schools do not have an expenditure problem they have a revenue problem as this slide indicates the brick schools have fallen further and further and further away from adequacy as the loss of S2 and the lack of the ability to raise taxes has continued to impact the district under the current school funding Reform Act of 2008 which is the New Jersey Department of education's funding formula for determining state aid to school districts the formula still considers Brick Township Public Schools to be a very wealthy District enable support a tax levy of 165 million 610 065 dollars or the actual tax levy is 45 million

097277 466 dollars below that at 120 332 599 for the 2324 proposed budget how do school taxes equate in Brick we are currently the fourth lowest in the county in average school taxes per dollar and third lowest in percentage prick schools is lower than the state and the county average in property taxes school taxes and school taxes percentage we believe that we do more with less in Brick schools than ever before thank you I think Miss McNamara and Jim are going to have this posted tomorrow on the website so the presentation will be posted I think we get 48 hours from the county soup to Monday we'll have the user-friendly budget up on the website for everybody which has a lot more details thank you Dr Farrell this will be the first opportunity for public

098comment and will be for agenda items only the board invites thoughts and reactions on agenda items each participant is asked to give his or her name prior to making a statement all statements shall be directed to the presiding officer the board will not during the public portion of this meeting discuss matters involving employment appointment termination of employment negotiations terms and conditions of employment evaluation of the performance of promotion or disciplining of any specific or perspective or current employee and or student assemblyman Catalano foreign superintendent Farrell I may be the goose that's bringing your golden egg okay so if we can all get together on this uh proposition I have here it may be fruitful for all of us while I'm pleased that the legislature was able to come together to tackle this issue and provide

099some much needed relief to our schools it is clearly does not go far enough and we're speaking about Senator gopal's Bill I did vote Yes for the bill however the funds schools will will receive from legislation is a drop in the bucket compared to what we really have lost we still need to go to further address the unfair formula being used to deny schools in the 10th district and especially Brick Township the state aid that they are rightfully deserved I want to read a couple sentences and we're talking about a bill a 5253 which our Republican caucus has been working on for about a year now a lot of moving parts to it but we think we have it down to where everybody wins nobody loses and it's a great thing for our our residents

100um Republicans introduce legislation a 5253 that would increase the state school funding obligation and lower property taxes by using state tax income Revenue which can more than pay for the plan without taking money from the Surplus there's enough Revenue each year to fully fund schools up to adequacy so we can lower their share people pay through property taxes every school district in the state benefits from the plan and so does every tax paying resident it might seem too good to be true but it is possible when politics are taken out of the equation and to make it very brief and so everyone kind of understands the money and where we're going uh the governor's budget is giving us 14.6 back for for Brick Township with Senator gopal's additional 1.7 it's about 16.3 with our proposed

101bill and there's it's coming from from about three billion dollars that the governor has that sits in his budget every year from property taxes and what we've done through our formula which you can is known uh but aside from S2 which is probably the worst legislation in the world um but are you going to give us the working parts to actually put the numbers into the form I mean we could do that trick here we could do that um but what I'm going to tell you very briefly and uh if you want to know the more details of Mr Edwards is great at it he could tell you about it but anyway uh with this bill there are schools that are at adequacy and probably haven't lost anything will will get funds just the way

102our details work but what this is going to do for for Brick Township it's to the tune of 35.3 million dollars brought back to this district will more than cover everything we've lost bring us to adequacy and start us on the on the right road to Humanity so uh I'm as long as I'm I'm still in Trenton I'm fighting all the time for this I fought for every every bill that definitely impacted Brick Township um so I'm going to keep fighting to get this to committee get it to the assembly floor so we can vote on it and make things right so in the very near future I hope that this board will support me back me and come along with me and and push to get this this bill done it'll it'll be a

103great thing for Brick Township so I appreciate everything that you folks are doing in your budget and the way you're trying to make ends meet so thank you and please contact my office if there's anything that we can do for you okay thank you thank you thank you so much for coming any other public comment Mr Finelli I don't have a lot but you can have another cookie what I need you to understand is before the meeting I don't have that so what I did is I look at the budget that was in the newspaper I go over line item by line item and just look for things that change drastically and see if I understand what it is or what they did so I have like four items all right the first one it

104says withdraw from capital reserve for local share and that's 13.3 million could somebody explain what that is the second one is uh total revenue from federal sources now I know that you said Federal money increased but if I look at this it went from 16.9 to the 6 million down 10.9 million I'm assuming that was covet money it was okay then you don't have to answer that one I just don't want to assume my assumptions are correct uh total capital outlay went from 20.9 million to 267 so I'm assuming that the capital money for this year is 267 000 roughly in that ballpark and all that other money was again the covet money that we were putting in there good we're down to two uh here's the one that I didn't understand at all legal

105Reserve in 2021 it was 8.7 million dollars in 2022 it was 2.4 million dollars in 2023 78 000 and 2024 zero so my two questions are why was there 8.7 million dollars in there and where did it go and how come there's nothing in that fund now okay Dr Farrell so he I I can pretty much wrap up number one and number four together because they relate okay so the capital reserve funds were the were part of the legal reserve and we used besides the coveted money that you asked about in question two and three right the federal grants went down that's why you're seeing that your second question and the capital projects went down and your third question because those two were tied the difference that we had to use was the capital reserve

106funds that we were through to support those projects okay so that's the 15 million dollars it was like 13 million and change then we added another two million dollars just recently to fund those projects and that was the legal Reserve so that's why the legal Reserve is now at zero because we spent all those funds on the hvec projects okay I guess the quickie thing is legal Reserve has nothing to do with lawyers no no it does not it's a legal Reserve because it's not allowed to be used for anything else other than Capital oh okay the word legal through me got it you know 8.7 million for lawyers would be that'd be great right then Mr montenegger they would really appreciate that thank you Mr Fidelity but that's the legal part through me yeah

107okay that's it thank you any other public comment on agenda items budget anything before it closes well it's budget also because the budget is on the agenda we're voting okay one more question on the agenda then um under operations item 17. if I'm reading this correctly and I might not be it looked like the preschool allocation that brick is getting is 7.2 million dollars but in the presentations that I saw it was like 5.5 or 5.7 item 17 am I reading that incorrectly it so it's it's not to be reading incorrectly it's just if you look at the top of the budget you see the money that we're getting from the state is 5 million 819 304 and then the local share is one million 454 826 for a total of seven million 274 130.

108okay so that's what we're spending but part of it is what we pay okay that's it folks thank you would you like a cookie you're so good tonight please thank you all that sugar works great thank you Mr vanilla any other public comment seeing none I will close that Dr Anderson thank you Mrs walrab under curriculum instruction the superintendent recommends that the board approved the following items one through three oh sorry I need a motion in a second I'll make that motion Mike back in Victoria any board comment seeing none Mary Miss Siebert yes Miss Kennedy yes Miss piccolo yes Miss Diana roon yes Mr blandina yes Misty Benedictus yes Miss walrup yes Mr Edwards operations yes hi this evening the superintendent recommends items one through thirty seven I need a motion in a second

109motion Nicole second Michael any board comments I just wanted to take a quick second and thank you Mr Edwards I appreciate answering any questions that I had about the budget and um I'm not the the most uh well versed when it comes to things like that so I do appreciate you breaking it down so that I understood it and so I I appreciate your hard work and efforts thank you and we'll keep that in mind when we do new committees next year so I'm in the right place don't worry uh any other board comment I just wanted to um uh express my appreciation for the donations um the generous donors to our students in our schools I'm assuming we're going to accept those donations tonight so I want to thank those that made them thank

110you Victoria any other comment seeing none Mary Miss Siebert yes Miss Kennedy yes Miss piccolo yes yes I'd like to abstain on number six id210823 please and the rest yes Mr blandina yes abstain on number five ID number 1262 yes on everything else I need to abstain on operations number five vendor ID 8927 and 11957 yes to everything else Mr kleisler under Human Resources tonight the superintendent is recommending items one through thirty six for approval I need a motion in a second motion alley second Grand okay any board comments being none Mary Miss Siebert yes Miss Kennedy yes Miss McCullough yes Miss Diana Roan yes Mr blandina yes Mr Benedictus yes Miss wolren yes Miss McNamara policy and planning thank you Mrs walrab the superintendent recommends the board approve the following items under policy and

111planning one and two I need a motion in a second motion alley second Nicole second Nicole any word comment seeing none Mary Miss Siebert yes Miss Kennedy yes Miss pakala yes Miss Diana yes Mr blandina yes Miss D Benedictus yes Miss wolra yes this will be the second opportunity for public comment each participant is asked to give his or her name prior to making a statement all statements shall be directed to the presiding officer comments shall be limited to five minutes and each speaker may only speak once the board will not during the public portion of this meeting discuss matters involving employment appointment termination of employment negotiations terms and conditions of employment evaluation of the performance of promotional promotion or disciplining of any specific or prospective or current employee and or student do we have

112anyone for public comment yes ma'am I'm Marianne Palms Marianne palmisano and I found the last meeting very interesting questions were answered on finance budget shortages even getting aggravated with Mr Finelli never answered any of my questions that were related to the children and the young adults wear welfare and their options somewhere along the line the Board of Ed is so focused on taxes finances and budgets that we forget the fundamental reason why we're here the children we are taxpayers and we see and we hear things that we don't that don't align with most parents grandparents Etc parents are aware that a child can be groomed by law on transgender bisexual change their name even the bathroom they use meanwhile legally we don't have anything that we could go up against parental rights will be coming

113out of California it's called ab1315 and will be adopted by school boards across this country that parents will be notified if anything does not align with the sex of their child officially on the record many children and young adults ages 9 through 28 have been taught to reject their parents values and embrace radical left-wing propaganda how did this happen um have you heard of the after-school Satan club and it's one of my questions they presently have 700 000 members are in 33 States and tomorrow through the 30th they are meeting in Boston to organize and expand into other states they're calling it Satan con 2023. kindergarten is second grade are giving Satan big books of activity with coloring books and puzzles older grades are invited to start and join an after-school Satan Club they already

114touched the adults in our communities through the Super Bowl Halftime 2021 a Satanic ritual light of Babylon Grammy Awards 2023 Sam Smith singing in holy satanic song and they gave him a standing ovation of worship I think that's how you come say her name was accused of Satan worship by the media if you don't this think this can happen here you're misguided and in an academic bubble parents trust Educators with their children not only for educating them to go into the world and Thrive but with their safety and moral values everyone here is responsible for each child and young adult that they come across your path with the best of your knowledge the last time that I quoted scripture to you you are considered the Watchman and you are if you see something wrong and

115don't attempt to change it you will be held accountable um coincidentally I was reading in Luke 11 52 it said woe to you lawyers if you take away the keys of Knowledge from a spiritual child you yourself will not enter and you will be holding others back and when we started this over a year ago Matthew 18 6 18 6 whoever causes one of these little ones to stumble from leading them away from a conservative let's say spiritual teaching it's better for them to have a heavy Millstone put around themselves and be drowned in the depth of the sea if you're not spiritually inclined the wisdom of the world is foolishness to God but God uses man's own Brilliance to trap him he will stumble and fall over his own wisdom I asked last month

116do we have the rainbow symbol or flag posted in the school or on the property do we have the Ten Commandments posted in the school so the kids have an option do we have transgender pamphlets and posters as the CDC is is pushing do you have a club called the after Satan club and do you have any of the following drugs on the school property as puberty blockers testosterone estrogen zolodex that suppresses a child's puberty until he could decide whether he wants to be a boy or a girl so Dr Farrell no okay anybody else for public comment yes Mr Finelli quickies sometimes I think we make assumptions that we're not always correct on I'm not I'm assuming that you think everybody knows who Mr Catalano is but they might be an assemblyman and he

117I said assemblyman Catalano and came up and he introduced himself so yes okay uh second just a comment um during your presentation Mr Edwards talked about all the things that were going up like transportation we understand that because of course the cause is going up the cost of financing is going up the cost of uh fuels going up and all of the other things that affect the school district and going up affect the taxpayers that are going up also and when you put the average numbers up there for the taxes and whatnot there's a big disparity and brick between all the senior housing and then the rest of the world so that average probably doesn't exist because you got two extremes and and the last thing the presentation on class size what can you do

118about that nothing it is what it is right I know people which I didn't get an answer for what would you like it to be what what's the point where we would say all right we're not going to talk about clear size anymore because we're happy with what it is is there is there an end point or is it just be within the guidelines but they have numbers 21 and 1 and 23 and the testing grades three to five and then you look at middle school and high schools you look at looked at English right because I said um yeah I'm not saying there's a set actual number but I'd like it to be lower okay thank you thank you Mr finale some of them in Catalano thank you madam chairman Vic just brought up

119a question that I don't know where it came from uh in my mind and I'm so thankful that I came to see this presentation you know you read it in the paper and you you really don't get at that impact of of what what's happened in this world and to us but what what has the increase size of our classes what has that done to our and I don't know if I have the right word for this um I guess our grading got to our overall test scores our ability to teach in a classroom our disciplinary that we're having so kids learn English the fact that eight of our 10 schools not including our two elementary schools or Title One schools and they recommend that you should have no more than 23 students in a

120classroom but we can't do that because we don't have the funding to put our teachers in helping me with my bill I mean that's but these are all things if you have eight eight out of ten schools that are Title One schools correct about seven out of ten I'm sorry seven out of ten well still those those schools unless you have 41 of your district is 40 is title one right you are not entitled to the funding that ensures that no more than 23 students are in a classroom but brick school has seven buildings or seven schools that are Title One schools and our class sizes are 25 to 30 students in a class because the legislation puts that on the district as a whole and not the individual schools brick school yet again is

121being cut short of what these kids are entitled to and just to add to that that's a great think about it where are your classes they're in buildings why would you take an overall District number when you have seven Title One schools your classes are in those buildings yet it's okay for Brick to have you know 27 plus on those three grades through three five yet maybe a title one District right they can only have 23. right now we're our buildings are title one too so it's it's a really I cited the actual code in my comments um and if you want assembly midnight to get that to you it's also in my white paper report it's just backwards I use that word a lot lately but the more I'm going through the funding process

122from the negative side here in Brick I I was fortunate in my previous stint as a superintendent for seven years where 95 percent was tax levy and the budget was kind of easy to do the time central office Mr Edwards alluded to it for the S2 districts that's taken away from us being in the buildings in the classrooms and doing what our core value is of those students every day since the budget cycle has started has been drastically reduced and it's not right no not to mention the livelihoods of jobs affected that have been cut through this process so you know I know people say you know funding's an excuse you know on test scores and I've heard that the fact is it's a fact I don't want to use it for an excuse but

123it's very different when you're in the um the situation we are here for a myriad of reasons right whether it's behavioral social or testing and it does start with that and I know I'm a finance guy but the truth is and Mr Finelli would agree with me on this it starts with the budget and the dollars and putting resource as to what you value and what you think is important for a community and right now we're not even close to putting the resources where this board and this Community Values that's one thing we can all agree on right the resources are not being put wherever we want them to go we're just not getting them there well I'm going to keep fighting to get together and since we have you here yes ma'am and I'll

124volunteer since we have you here additional we have a wonderful director of special ed she is working on a budget and we have kids that we are putting out do you know we can only increase by two percent we lost all that funding yet the out of placement schools that she's sending to can increase their tuition by 30 40 percent without state approved state approved schools for special needs children we went through a budget meeting and I couldn't believe so we eat that their their tuition costs went up some of them 30 percent these are state approved legally we don't have a choice we're going to send those students there and we cannot you know it's like saying okay we want to increase more than two we can't and by the way brick schools is

125in the top third of special needs students in the state 22 so yet again we get whammied in the state budget formula it's 14 points the state figures 14.9 is your special ed average right and then you get more the state average is 20 when did they I mean can someone go back and look at the can we fund the child instead of a percentage right because you know there's districts that still get up to that 14 that might have eight percent of students special ed students and yet we're at 23 Mrs Grandeur and we only get 14 fund the student right right and I don't know if we have time to really get into extraordinary Aid and how the state hasn't been funding that I mean we can go maybe we should have a

126meeting in your office love to do that I mean absolutely it it's just all these things again and again and again when you have a district like brick like Toms River Lake Jackson we're not getting walloped once by S2 we're getting walloped again and again and again and you know what you know people say you're sore loser I hear that about me when I go to meeting you're a sore loser sweetheart I'm not the loser our children are the losers absolutely they are this is crippling our ability to to do things and you know when you have children especially our special needs children that we're not even getting we're you know we have 14 of them are getting funded the rest we got to figure out what we're doing and when you go outside of

127the federal and state monies that you have now you're taking it from other areas within the district and you just is this vicious cycle and something really needs to be done about it and I don't think extraordinary Aid has been funded properly for God knows how many years can we can we get together have a meeting I would love to I would absolutely love to because there's just so many things that like Dr Farrell says are just backwards they just don't work okay anymore can can you call my office absolutely that's for my chief of staff Glenn absolutely and we'll set something up absolutely I would love to good thank you bring these two guys I'm just going to comment that like you know since S2 has begun their office has been great Glenn Feldman

128no I know I read that you guys this is all your emails fantastic he's been fighting the fight with these gentlemen um I got to view the I guess it was the budget testimony where um some of the mcgucken got up and really I mean he really gave it to him he did I saw you were sitting next to him yeah because he was getting excited that's right I mean so I I got to say you know as you've heard me tell you already these these gentlemen have been very supportive of our efforts because the fight with to try to get what's behind the curtain you know which we still don't have right right I mean we're still fighting for that just they just recently sponsored a bill that says that the Department of Education

129has to provide us what's behind the curtain and yeah it didn't go anywhere it's like no one else supported it like that's unbelievable to me that other legislators throughout the state aren't supporting a bill that says the Department of Education has to tell school districts how those fundings arrived at absolutely Mr Finelli could you imagine if we did that here in Brick that man's head would explode hey I do want to volunteer get me in front of assemblyman get me in front of anybody you want and Trenton I volunteered I've been playing around even with the formula talking this could be a lot simpler if I think the practitioners kind of had a seat at the table yes so um and I'm volunteering my services as well as Mr Edwards but I think it you

130know and I mean what it really does come down to though in addition to the S2 funding that really needs to be looked at there are a bunch of other things that are happening within other funding avenues that are really they're just not right and it's not just not right for us here in Brick but throughout the state that we really need to look at and I think while I think we all realize that the S2 funding issue is going to be kind of an uphill battle for a while I think these other issues are things that we really can take a look at and possibly push through you know a little bit quicker that would be of some great benefit to some of the programs um instead in the different districts you know around

131the state so let's get together again angles that we possibly can because you know what they're doing right now just isn't working yeah well we're here to help just sometimes uh as politics go we have to get the majority party done right now to come along with us in difficult at times oh I know I know but please contact us yeah we will I really appreciate it thank you so much any other public comment being none board comment Nicole how do you follow up to all of that what else is there to say and talk about anyway I think today was a good night overall um I'm really enjoying all the presentations that we've been doing lately bringing the students in highlighting programs um it shows a collaboration between the district our students the community

132um we we celebrate their triumphs and talk about their legacies um local government you know we're collaborating all together because it's all about the students but um just honestly a big kudos to the administration team the budget's been you know crappy to say the least um and it's not easy and we've made a lot of decisions that we probably all don't like but ultimately to benefit students in the district and honestly that's it for tonight I'm done um thank you for coming out and see you guys next month thank you Nicole Ali um quickly because we've been here a while I just wanted to say congratulations to all of our athletes that we celebrated tonight um I wanted to give a shout out and thank you to coach shalanskis of the brick memorial golf team

133a great guy the guys are 5-0 in the 8th South which is incredible um what an incredible group of kids really really great guys Newsies at brick memorial I went last weekend I loved it my daughter was completely engrossed with it we attended closing night and the seniors were called out to speak about the advisors and the the adults I assumed they were all teachers that work with the group and you can just tell the the love and admiration they had for these four five adults that that put the production together so thank you I wish I remembered all five of their names but thank you very very much Mr Breezy if you could pass that along to them that it what an incredible great group of kids and great group of um leaders I

134wanted to thank everyone for your hard work on the budget and um lastly May 8th to 12th is teacher appreciation week we do have to remember that the teachers are the backbone of our district and we could have all the money in the world in our budget but without them we are truly nothing so thank you to our teachers and I encourage everyone out there that's listening it doesn't need to be a gift a physical gift to your teacher have your have your students write them a letter and just say thank you and what they've done for them and how they've touched their lives and shaped their their worlds a little bit at night I think that that would mean more than any Starbucks gift card so thank you to everyone thanks for coming out

135we'll see you next month thank you Ali Victoria I just like to lead the Board of Education and all those gathered here in a rounding um uh chorus of happy principles Day to you to our principles that are present I won't sing because my I squandered my singing lesson money but um I would just like to say to all the principals especially those who have worked so hard and cut so much in their budgets and given up a special Vision that they had for their students in their buildings this year how much I really appreciate your administrative leadership does anybody want to sing Jen Granger has a really good voice all right what am I singing all right be principles happy principles day happy principal Day to you that's great yeah thank you Victoria no

136I I do have other comments but as far as the budget goes I just wanted to highlight that occasion looks very uncomfortable I was watching his face he's like what is happening right now I was gonna do the Maryland version but decided not to okay thanks Jim this is a kid's show now go ahead all right I just wanted to say um looking at the budget and um taking my ruler and going line by line um I'm not proud of that I I do want to highlight that our preschool budget is servicing 408 three-year-olds and four-year-olds next year and all the research shows that that preschool opportunity for them kind of evens the playing field and it's great for our school district and it's and it's great for those students to um have Reading Readiness

137and um the social um aptitude to stand in line and take turns I think that's a great thing while maintaining all programs it is true that our budget um impeded the possibility for some students to um have certain class offerings and if we're students first I know that's where our administrators wanted to put that money and I know that's where our parents want that money to go as well as the opportunity for the children and I just hope that that improves in the future um uh the green fair is Saturday May 20th from 9 to 2 and all of our students will be participating this year all of our event environmental clubs from all of our schools will be there and in March I had the opportunity to click on a link to the brick

138bridge and if parents aren't looking at that you're missing something the brick bridge is amazing it highlights all the wonderful things our students are doing and the opportunities that they have that our teachers are giving them through a great deal of dedication and that's um that's under the responsibility Dr Anderson I also I'm I don't have children in the school system anymore but so I wouldn't normally like go on the on the website to read the Dragon review but the Dragon review is cool and Dr Cajun sees to it that his students are highlighted and their accomplishments are highlighted and the same is true of Mr barisi and can't read my handwriting Mr Burris he helped me Mustang mailer Mustang mailer so if you have a child in high school or have the experience of

139wanting to know what our programs are really like and what our kids are really doing it would be great to get in touch with um those two online Publications and have a nice month and I'll see you next month thank you Victoria thank you Victoria Madeline yes as Mrs stated thank you I am like so done Stephanie Stephanie stated um the many I want to thank the many people who worked on trying very hard to get us our fair share and funding I would like to thank assemblyman John Catalano on his very hard work on our non-partisan bill which would be very foolish not for every school district to get involved in this bill is totally non-partisan there's no reason not for everyone to work on this bill and get this through the money is

140there it doesn't affect our taxpayers but it helps our schools we need to all work with assemblyman Catalano and assemblyman McGuckin to get this bill through also I would like to say it was my honor tonight and a big surprise to present the Women's Club with the award what a wonderful group and what a warm feeling it was to do that thank you because there is nothing more important to us than our children also in closing I'd like to say the statement I say every week parents talk to your children ask them what they're learning in school ask them what they need ask them what they feel uncomfortable with and you need to make that connection with your children it's very important thank you Thank you Madeline Mike yes first of all I want to

141compliment the superintendent and our directors the principals and all that put the budget together in a very tight year it's not something any of us like when you have to make those cuts that uh uh getting to the point where they're going to affect children that leads us to uh assembling catalano's bill and we need to get behind that bill I said uh two months ago when we spoke about uh Senator gopel's Bill call your legislators throughout the state and help move that bill forward I'm saying the same thing now so let's get on the phone the parents out there your friends your family anybody that can start calling legislators on both sides of the aisle to get the spill through we need to get this through so that Brick Township benefits that's all we're

142here for there's children at Brick Township in doing that um I first want to get the copy of the building out to review and then and do whatever I can to help move it forward for the legislation so um one other thing uh that's it on the budget today I want to um again compliment our principles uh on the principles day I had an opportunity to attend two events in the schools and both were very uh good programs one was the brick here was what I want to compliment uh the staff the students and all who put that together as well as last night the uh Internet safety in cyber bullying uh program that was put on by the Ocean County prosecutor's office I thought that program is very well uh put together and I

143think it's a definite benefit for all of our children our parents and everybody within the uh break school system and the township as a whole thank you very much get behind that bill stop making phone calls thank you thanks Mike Fran so it was great to see all the kids again I love to see all the as I say every week I'd love to see all the new happenings and fun being brought back into school but being that this is a budget we can't do those fun things without the funding so it is so important for everybody as Micah said and Madeleine that we need to have a voice we need to have our voices heard as parents and we need to get out there and we need to go behind this bill because nothing

144nothing can be done without this money and um I too want to thank something Catalano it's so refreshing to have somebody who's in politics who's here not just listening to us but actually hearing what we're saying and is got our kids backs and is going to obviously fight for them because they deserve it they are our future leaders and we're not going to go anywhere without them because they are the ones who are going to drive us into all the amazing things that are going to be happening in this world and I am so grateful to have as a parent to have somebody who is here and taking time out and willing and able to actually further everything that is going to happen that's it have a great week guys thanks Fran um Dr Farrell

145do you have anything you want to end he's been so good and actually I'm the one that blew it tonight as going off on my laptop no no no we're good we're good I'm the one that kind of went off but it's your fault assembly man it's your fault you got me going um but uh thank you to everybody for coming tonight our next regular meeting will be uh May 11th 7 p.m at The Brick Memorial High School auditorium on June 16th we'll have our Lake Riviera Middle School promotional ceremony 4 P.M at The Brick Township High School field and our Vets Memorial Middle School promotional ceremony at 6 pm at The Brick Memorial High School field then on June 20th we'll have the Brick Township High School graduation ceremony 3 P.M on their field

146and then we will have at 5 15 the brick memorial high school graduation ceremony um weather permitting no rain dates scheduled at this point um as we get a little closer we knock on wood and uh so you know fingers crossed I need a motion and a second for for a German motion for adjournment I need a second second friend uh Mary Miss Siebert yes Miss Kennedy yes Miss pakala yes Miss Diana Ross yes Mr blandina yes Misty Benedictus yes Miss wool room I'd like just like to say before I vote um this is by far a record-breaker budget meeting we have never gotten out of here this early so yes thank you foreign