001I'd like to call this meeting order. For those who wish to provide public comment remotely, a Google form uh was posted on the district website at 6:30 p.m. Those remote comments will be addressed in the second public comment section. This meeting, which is hereby called to order at 6:30 p.m., is in compliance with the notice requirements of the law. Public notice was posted in the office of the board of education and communicated to the municipal clerk and the daily record on January 12th, 2026. would please rise and join me in saying the pledge of >> allegiance. Pledge >> algiance >> to the flag of the United States of America and to the stands one nation indivisible and justice for all. >> Mr. Shower, could you read our mission statement? >> Absolutely. Thank you. Working together
002as a community, our mission is to welcome all and provide opportunities for our students in a safe and accepting learning environment to become creative, empathetic, resilient, and who choose to make an impact. >> Thank you. Roll call, please. >> Mr. Suedo, >> present. >> Mr. Mor, >> present. >> Miss Phillips. >> Miss Finales, >> here. >> Miss Kates, >> here. >> Dr. Center, >> present. >> Miss Shower, >> here. >> Miss Son, >> here. >> Mr. Miller, >> here. Okay, we will now have our presentation of the 2026 2027 uh budget. Mr. Haimey and Mr. Sabahulu. Thank you. >> Thank you. So it'll ah there we go. All right. Perfect. Thank you. Thank you. Um, [clears throat] good evening everyone. Thank you for joining me this evening. I want to start off uh by one
003I want to thank uh the board of education um as well as the administrative team. As you all know, we were presented with some challenges with this budget and it was a very difficult budget to manage. Um but I do want to thank for the support that I've received from the board of education as well as the support from the administrative team. Getting through this process wasn't easy, but we did it together as a team. So this evening, uh, as I mentioned, it was a challenging budget to get through. Um, one of the things that we did as a team is really communicate and and think about what's best for our community, what is best for our students. In doing that, we want to be able this evening to show our staff, our community of
004Dover, uh, the work that we've been putting in and the work that we've been doing since 2024 when I arrived as a superintendent and this past year as well. And hopefully that by the end of this presentation, everyone has a vision and understanding of the work that's been put in in order to make sure that we are going to stay consistent when it comes to our supports, when it comes to academics, when it comes to our programming, when it comes to our uh district. And a word that you're going to hear constantly this evening is going to be constant consistency because that is important for the success of our students. So our focus has remained again constant in managing our resources in managing our [clears throat] our resources responsibly and effectively throughout the district. And
005that is something that we want to make sure that we're going to stay constantly working in order to make sure that we're providing our do district everything they need and supports as we move forward. So here we're going to talk about reduction to transportation costs which we know has a huge impact on school budgets. In 2526 we reduced the district transportation because of our dual dual language and our G&T programming which now reduced all of the in-house district transportation from school to school. Stagger school times we made that change this past this year. uh again allowed us to reduce the amount of routes that we were using and also eliminate some of the contracts that we were using from outside of district. We brought back five preschool classrooms, lowering uh transportation costs by about $400,000,
006which again is a huge saving to our district and allows our students to be homegrown and be part of their community with peers that they see next door. And we added two buses to the fleet, reducing again the outsourcing because these contracts are huge. With two new buses, we again are allowed to use our in-house drivers, our in-house routes. We don't have to outsource to any other district. 26 27 we brought we're going to be bringing back two three sorry three more preschool classrooms and eliminating three more buses. That's about 250 about $300,000. We also purchased another bus reducing outside transportation costs, especially for those transportation costs that come in with any of our sporting events. When we're able to now in-house host our student our our sporting events inhouse, the money stays in here.
007We're not sending it out to any other busing company. So when we talk about constant and consistency, we that also speaks about how we operate as a team, how we operate as a district. One of the first endeavors that I pursued in coming in as a new superintendent is that I wanted to have the ability to really look at our district staffing. Are there positions that are repetitive? Are there positions that do the same thing? Are there ways that we can continuously keep in mind our taxpayers of do keeping in mind our students? How can we be efficient? How can we be responsible in 24 from 2024 to 2026? These are the positions that have been either eliminated or or not filled. Um because we found that in research and data we collected some of
008the positions were overlapping with other responsibilities. For example, director of special projects, assistant superintendent, supervisor of building and grounds, district community leaison, communications coordinator, confidential secretary to the assistant superintendent, secretary of bilingual department, condensed secretary and for technology and buildings and grounds and technology integration coach and device application and managers. Continuing with positions condensed for or eliminated for 2627, director of student intervention and testing, supervisor of social studies, kindergarten teacher assistant aid, um elementary teaching position, high school teacher position, and middle school teacher positions. Um also the Dover Bridge Academy positions are going to be filled inhouse using already existing Dover certified staff, administrators, and support staff. three new preschool teachers hired from current staff within, which brings the total to 1 point to an estimated $1.1 million. [clears throat] And in this condensing of
009positions, I want to take this opportunity and really thank the administrative team. I also want to thank our teachers for the flexibility. I know that throughout the year we found ourselves uh in hope of in hopes of being responsible we found ourselves uh collapsing small classrooms and also filling in any retirement resignation with in-house staff which allowed us to eliminate and reduce the amount of staff that would have to have been cut due to the budget cut that we received from the states and the health premiums going up. Uh if you've seen around other districts they are having major layoffs. We did not find ourselves in that position because since 2024, we have been effectively working as a team to make these reductions and then asking our staff, our students, our staff to be flexible
010in these changes that were upcoming and the changes that were also coming up for next year. Our objective was to try to save as many jobs as we could and keep our staff in house because there are some phenomenal teachers here that we want to make sure we keep them here continuously working in do. So again, to all of our staff, our administration, I really thank you again for the flexibility. It wasn't an easy job uh but it was worth it in keeping some of our great staff here in house with us. Enhanced efficiency again with our capital improvement projects. We have deferred several projects for the future. We right now our prek building phase one was $4 million. Roof replacement $2 million. Do high school hallway upgrade of 300,000. Do High School Auditorium Sound
011and Light of 400,000 and North Dover Cafeteria Table Replacement which is 200,000 which brings our total to $6,900,000 saved and we have deferred student achievement and programs. So with all these changes that we've been doing since 2024 to 2026, we want to make sure that we're still able to maintain our programs and supports for our students. We are understanding that when it comes to our students, our community here in Dover, we know that a lot of our parents and students depend heavily on the supports that we're able to provide as a district to continue to give them the success the the tools they need in order to be successful and able to progress and move forward. So again, constant consistency. We maintain all our programs and initiatives in special education. We continue with our emotional
012regular uh regulation. impairment uh ERRI at North Dover uh which has grown. We have approximately seven students in that classroom now. Uh multi-disabled um at ED and DMS and we expanded our ABA program or expanded applied behavior analysis classrooms at ED uh child team members being in the in the buildings that has provided an extra layer of support for our students, our administration and our staff as well. and our therapeutic social workers that added to all elementary schools. So, [clears throat] I'm going to speak a little bit about the ABA program and the MD as well as the uh the ER classroom. So, for those students, if we didn't have these programs inhouse, we would have to send the students out of district. The cost to the district would be easily for one classroom over
013half a million dollars. Uh based on the class size, these are students that now have an opportunity to be with their peers in house. they have an opportunity to have classroom classmates that live right next door to them in their own neighborhood and allows us to then continue to provide these supports for their students here at home with us where once again I've always felt as a parent nobody takes care better of your own children than you having them at home continue on with the programming we are going to speak a little about gifted and talented so our gifted and talented program made a change this year uh again reducing uh transportation no longer needed because they are now being housed inside of the buildings. This is one of the newsletters that one of our
014GMT [clears throat] teacher provides for our parents. Again, keeping them informed, keeping them the information needed. Our CCT expansion, culinary, graphic design, computer science. These are the programs that we want to continue to expand for our students. What I have found that as when I was a former middle school principal here in Dover is that we were losing 15 to 20% of our highest kids going to other districts looking for programs that were offering. We want to be able to compete with the surrounding districts, but also to offer our students who want to stay in Dover the opportunity to expand their knowledge, the opportunity to be able to grow and go out into the field and be productive. Uh our dual language expansion at grade six, we're moving it all over to grade six. I
015guess who are dual language now being at each of the buildings reduces the transportation before before we dual language we had our multilingual students traveling between the schools throughout uh in the morning and the afternoons uh because the program was either offered at one building or the other now they're in their house in neighborhood schools with their teachers with their principal and getting supported with the our dual language and then our expansion AP courses offerings we're going to continue to expand give our kids again that exposure that is needed for them to be able to be successful in [clears throat] continuing the growth within our with our students, we have to talk about the staff. How do we continue to support our staff in the growing of our staff? So again, ESL cohort teachers, we
016have 12 teachers working towards their ESL certification, in-house shelter instruction, observation protocol, SCOP training for our staff still continuing, giving our staff more tools to be able to apply within the classroom. ESL and ELA. So, ESL English um English student learning. Um these programs are still continuing to expand uh both the techniques and the craft that is needed to teach e uh ELA in an ESL classroom, giving them a more stronger foundation to able to continue to grow as students and expand our our BSI, which is our basics uh stu um basic instruction basic basic Oh my god, I'm stuck. I'm uh losing myself a little bit here. My apologies. Our basic instruction for our students. This is a foundation that is needed for our students who are struggling within the classroom. We're giving them
017that support to be able to expand. And now we've added it for our bilingual students, which again meeting the needs of our students. PBIS, positive behavior intervention systems that we have been on a three-year uh course working with all of our from K through 12 working with our staff to look at other ways of addressing behaviors. How can we be better at being more proactive, recognition, creating that positive environment that we all know benefits our students and our staff. And our ELA coach, which is new, uh is grant funded, so it has no impact on our salary of our budget. All right. So this year uh these are the three goals that led all the hard work that we've been working on. Uh advancing equity and excellence through inclusive and coherent practices, enhancing leadership and
018capacity for transformational and sustainable growth. And last cultivating an inclusive and supportive climate that promotes equity, engagement, and student growth. So year this year we did a little something different with the presentation. And this year we wanted to show you some pictures also some of the some of the action steps that we've taken to support our goals and meet our goals this past year. So to develop so the action step the first action step that I want to discuss is here develop a system for designing and supporting academic rigor through focused instructional walkthroughs observation tools aligned with district priorities. So in the year of 2526 we implemented walkthroughs for the first time. Walkthrough is a practice that allows us to really collaborate and work together as an administrative team, but also support our teachers in
019their growth as educators. This year, we did 1,200 walkthroughs throughout the entire year. That that information uh was used in our skip committees, our staff meetings to again talk about small instruction, uh to talk about rigor, to talk about understanding. And we did it differently in that we wanted to break it down in different cycles. We wanted to develop a walkthrough that spoke to us as Dover and not just adopt a program from somewhere else, but we wanted to homegrow our program that speaks to what we're doing here in Dover. So our first cycle was environment and culture, right? So if you think about September and October, you're thinking about culture, procedures, you're thinking about establishing yourself. When you think of the second cycle now, focus and engagement. And third cycle, instruction and rigor, and
020then fourth cycle, checking for understanding. Uh, one of the things that we're going to be working this summer as an administrative team is we're going to be reccalibrating our walkthroughs and we're going to uh continue to discuss some of the data we found and how do we apply it to make sure that again we're providing the best support we can for our staff. Next next bullet we ensure consistent opportunities across grade levels, departments and programs by identifying and addressing gaps in cross offerings, expectations and access. So with that, we really did a big push for our PLC's, an opportunity for our staff to be able to come together, analyze data, have conversations, talk about what the next steps are going to be as a whole. Once again, having an opportunity to really share ideas, share
021strategies is a great way for us to continue to promote our growth within uh our elementary grade level teams focused on common assessments. And our PLC's implementation again, once again, was throughout to the entire district, K through, I'm sorry, pre-K all the way up to 12. And in the picture on the bottom right, that is Mr. Carl meeting with the team over at Academy. Continuing uh to utilize data from multiple measures, link it I Ready, Amira, and GSLA profiles to drive instruction decisions, inform interventions, and promote accountability. And this has been a big drive for us is really using that data to say what is it what is the data telling us and how do we use it to improve? And one of the things that I know Mr. Carl and uh Mr. Chuy have
022worked on is this do data dashboard and it gives you all the information of our students. So from attendance to behavior trends um access for L's which is access is our testing for our multilingual students allowing us to understand what level of understanding they have or acquisition they have of the langu English language and be able to then allow them to get the right supports depending if they're beginner, intermediate or advanced. We have our NGSLA data which is our state test standardized testing and it starts at third grade and again it just gives us a picture and opportunity to really look at the student as a whole and use some of that information in order against to drive our instruction. One of the things that I'm proudest of and we're really going to go into
023it um really get into it next year is our data analyzer. So again util utilizing data in multiple re measures. So, our data analyzer is something that our team has developed and by our team I say Mr. Carl um as a way of making sure that we as a team are able to catch our students before um before it's too late, right? We need any students to slip. We want to make sure we are able to catch them and support them in in uh at the right time. So, the way the data analyzer is going to work and I showed here an example is it's going to give you a baseball card view of every one of our students. The spreadsheet will highlight the student's name based on any discrepancies it may find. So for
024example here the reason it was flagged if you see on the second box on the lefth hand side it says I already concerned placement declines from one to two below and it was highlighted but if you notice it gives you the building the course it gives you the teacher it then gives you the the timeline of grades. gives you first market period. Also gives you a mid-market period grade. It gives you all the assessments most recent from I Ready, Amira, and GSLA. Also gives you the I already from years over years trends and GSLA trends uh for math and ESLA trends for u for language arts and programs or context. So for example, are they a special ed multilingual program? Uh what year did they enter G&T uh humanities or G&T STEM? Again, it gives
025our administrative team, our teachers the opportunity to be able to see all these pieces just on one card. Instead of looking at Genesis and then I ready, then a mirror. Here is one-stop shop to be able to locate that information needed for our students. All right. The next bullet uh require participation of all students in appropriate assessments ensuring necessary accommodations modifications are in place to promote equity and access. All right. So, K to6 differentiated standardbased benchmarks assessment created by the do data team from each of the schools and I rated in a mirror benchmarks elementary and then linking benchmarks for middle school and high school. And this is just an example of what the data looks like for our staff to really look and analyze and work as [snorts] a team. Providing district-wide professional development.
026equip educators with tools, strategies that promote high expectations, inclusive environments of all students. So our November 4th, we have our ed camp style professional development. This is an ed camp style that we have now I believe is our third or fourth year and it gives an opportunity for our staff to come together and create their own in-house PD. Uh for example, this year I did the social emotional piece just to help and support our teachers with the classrooms. Uh but there were also others that were done in-house where there was differentiation, higher order questioning. These are are components that so many of our talented staff here in house have mastered beautifully and now are sharing that knowledge with their colleagues. All right, goal two. So our action steps provide targeted coaching mentorship for school and
027district leaders focused on equitydriven leadership, instructional best practice, and effective team development. So this past summer we had Tracy Se work with our administrative team on resetting, refocusing and reentering ourselves. Uh Kevin Oliver worked with administrative team on restorative practices. Um our and then for the second bullet we have facility and collaboration leadership practice through retreats, team meetings, professional learning communities aligned to share goals and continuous improvements. Uh we have our monthly district administrative and elementary administrative team meetings, monthly supervisor check-in meetings, elementary administrators and department supervisor become became members of the paramis literacy uh leaders network and this is a network that Mr. Chewy has been a part of for many years and it allows them to work and and dialogue with other peers in their field to talk about some of the new
028strategies and new trends that they're seeing in literacy. And it's really a all team uh combination where they come in, they visit, they do site visits at each of the buildings and really work together as they're looking at what are the next steps and really do that strategic planning which is very important and it keeps that consistency going in as well. All right. Uh data to again continuing the conversation on data using the data informed protocol to support leadership reflection guide strategic planning and monitor progress toward schools and district goals. Each district administrator created a strategic plan aligned with district initiatives and department goals. And I want to share with everyone that this upcoming summer we're going to organize things a little bit different. we are going to have our admin week, our summit week,
029our retreat uh many names uh at the end of June as opposed to the end of August. Why is that? Because it allows us as a team to really be efficient in the summer, we can plan and prepare at the end of June so that we can strategically plan for the entire summer and really get ourselves ready to go. And then instead of doing it at the end of August where our administrators are really worried about getting the buildings ready, uh getting it welcoming the staff, welcoming our students, and now it gives them an opportunity to relax a little bit, get their buildings ready to go, the departments ready to go, and it gives them an opportunity to really be focused on what's most important, which is welcoming our kids back to our buildings. uh
030the walkthrough data has revealed and inform instruction decision making and do data analyzer which I spoke about before again identifying our students academic attendance and es seal supports which again is very important where we're looking at the whole student next bullet promote innovation and adaptive leadership by encouraging reflective practice risktaking and equity-minded decision- making across leadership teams so again when we talk about leadership we talk about sharing that leadership right together with our teams being collaborative whether you're administrator, a teacher, a custodian, a secretary, it's again we are all here for one thing and that is our door students and each school implemented a school leadership team the SLT uh they come together and in the summer and they work on their calendar and they strategically plan their calendar for the entire year to make
031sure that they are on top of all the uh parent engagements uh parent communication events programs things of that nature. uh the [clears throat] schools analyzing analyze buildingwide trends through walkthrough process and their skip committee teams. Again, our administrative team walking and having collab collaborative conversations about what they're seeing in their walkthroughs regardless of which department they're in, but then bringing that information back, that data that was collected from our walkthroughs and sharing that with our skip committees in house. Our skit committees consist of teachers in the building that then work together with that information to create professional developments at staff meetings again promoting the work that's being done in house but also looking at trends and areas where we can support again better our teams. Goal three. So the first action step expand implementation
032restorative justice culturally responsive discipline practices to support student engagement attendance and equitable learning environments. We all know that when it comes to our students traditional uh consequences our traditional uh way of addressing discipline. We know that it works with that one student who who got in trouble that first time. But when we're talking about supporting our kids and knowing that our kids are going to need that guidance, that support in order to make better decisions in the future, we want to look at ways of of addressing it as a whole team. And we want to make sure that not only are we addressing that from within the building, but we're looking at it districtwide, which is why we have our monthly district climate culture uh meetings. Uh we have our yearly staff surveys feedback uh
033PBIS framework executed at each of the school and then social emotional training from Dr. Melissa Saden and uh Mr. Kevin Oliver who also talked about restorative justice that these were huge components that were used in some of the conversations that we had when we also looked at our discipline matrix the way we were addressing behaviors within the building and one of the things and I know I spoke to one of the vice principles Mr. Kyoton had offered to me uh that some of the reflection sheets have really allowed our students to really have an opportunity to reflect on the behaviors and talk about what the next action steps will be. Give them that growth and that opportunity to look at it from a different perspective. Strengthen family and community partnership by enhancing communication practices, increasing
034opportunities for collaboration in support of student success. Again, I' I've always preached and I always remind everyone as a as a do public school, we are part of the community. We're not a separate entity. At the end of the day, what happens in our buildings affects the community and what happens in the community affects our schools. So, with that said, we really want to continue to explore every option we can when it comes to communicating with our community. And some of the things that we use this year to really get that information out to our community is our brand new district newsletter, which we have um used every month to provide information on my behalf as well as each department, highlighted every school, events, sporting events. uh uh our our performing arts as well as
035tips on technology which is again us giving you all the work that we're doing here because again we're so proud of what we're doing as do our [clears throat] parent square which is our new communication for our parents. So not only do you get the robocall or you get the text message but you also have parent square where it's like a posting and it almost looks like social media and you can scroll up and down and get the information needed. uh community videos. Uh you know me, I've been doing videos since 2020 and I enjoy doing the videos as much as possible and the videos are great again to get that communication out there for anybody who just doesn't want to read an entire page. Just click play and you can just listen to the
036the the message. Uh the Latino Institute that occurred this this is our third year hosting this event and again uh we had 60 plus members from the community join us. We had gifts opportunities. We had workshops on uh getting licensed, workshops on immigration, knowing your rights, workshops on how to help students with homework, uh so many different workshops offering these resources to our families for free. So, it was a great opportunity to also engage everyone. At the beginning of school year, we had our ready set school. That was an opportunity to get our students, our families on the right foot, getting started in the right way, in the right direction by offering our families a one-stop shop opportunity that evening to pick up their technology to sign their um their lunch forms to be able
037to pick up fill out any of the paperwork needed for their technology and get their student schedule. So again, one-stop shop. The parents don't have to go to multiple places. It's one location. They picked everything up and then go from there. Um, and then our BOE student representative, Miss Sophia Garcia, which I has a student in the middle school, who has done a phenomenal job this year at reporting back to all of us and holding me accountable, which I appreciate. Thank you. Uh, next steps, uh, increase opportunities for students and staff voice in school level and district level decision to build share ownership over over learning and and climate initiatives. We have our cultural climate connection committee survey. We have our ed camp workshops, our student forums which I want to speak a little bit
038on our SGA meetings as well as our do high school educational panel and AP language students. So the student forum I want to speak about it because it just recently happened and it was an opportunity for me to meet with some of our high school students and it was enlightening. It was great conversation to be had. uh it gives me as an opportunity as a superintendent to still stay connected with our students. I don't get to see them every day as I used to as a principal. And the conversations were great. We really had great conversation about technology, uh the new uh cell phone policy, you know, personal [snorts] device uh procedures. We talked about communication, the importance of having a voice because if we want changes to happen, then our students have to use
039their voice. They have to use the surveys. They have to use their their electronic emails in order to communicate which I have to say I'm very proud of our students because they do email me. I don't think I've ever emailed the superintendent as a student before. Uh but they do email me and say, "Mr. Haik, have you heard about this?" Or they want to give me a heads up about what may or may not be happening, which I do appreciate. Again, using the voices is very important and we want to continue to encourage our students to be a part of it because when we talk about community, it is all of us, students, parents, staff, support staff, administration, implementation systems to track and celebrate both academic growth and social and emotional progress, reinforcing connection between
040positive climate and student growth. Again, all this hard work we're doing, but we want to also celebrate it. We want to acknowledge it. We want to put it out there. and our door uh data analyzer is going to give us that information to be able to support our kids. Our link is going to be able to give us that information as well. And then our DHS celebrations. So this uh just today we had our rare tiger PBIS uh recognition as well as honoral recognition. And again at this is the first year since I've been a door that we're doing it at a high school level. And to see our kids, even as seniors, uh, walking on stage and receiving their certification, their acknowledgement for the hard work they're putting in, and to have that moment
041with their parents is an amazing, uh, view to have, and it's once again speaks to the work that we're doing as a district. Uh, and again, uh, parking was an issue, but it's because so many families showed up, which is a beautiful thing. Um, highlighting students at board education meetings. We've been having presentations. Again, our representative does everything she can to make sure she brings all the highlights that are going on with her classmates as well. And our PBIS highlights, which not only at the high school, but it's happening at the middle school, it's happening at the elementary levels as well. Acknowledging what it takes to be that tiger, to be part of Dober. And here are a few pictures of some of the events that we've had and celebrated with our families that we've
042had together to acknowledge our students. So we have our PBIS again on the top left that is a picture of how packed that auditorium was in the in the high school. We have a day in clay uh allow allowing our kids to work with clay hands-on experience and to understand the history behind working with clay and what some of our ancestors had done. Roar is one again acknowledging all the kids and the the way they're demonstrating their uh potential through PBIS. our unsung hero hero Elena Thompson, former student of mine as well. Uh and on the bottom left, volunteering at NJ Nurse, which was which is one of our nonprofit organizations here in Dover, supporting our community. And then our prek sneaker ball, which was probably one of the nicest events I went to as
043the little ones were dressed beautifully with their sneakers and all you hear was yelling and running, barely any dancing, but they had a great time. And shout out to the administration who did a great job of putting this together for our students and the parents really enjoyed being there as they are starting their journey as future Tigers here in Dover. [snorts] Again, continuing with our communication and partnership, right? We have our New York Road Runners club donation where the kids received New Balance sneakers. Uh Northover held their trunk or treat. We had our community liaison who are also that bridge between our community and our our our buildings. We had the student fundraiser, the car wash, which I go to every year to support our our soccer teams, [clears throat] breakfast of Santa, which was
044a huge hit this year, and our parent forums. We hosted several parent forums this year as we did the year before, again, to give an opportunity for our community, our parents to engage me in conversation and questions again to keep the pulse of what's happening or not happening so we can continue to improve here in Dover. We had our Dr. New medicine's play at the middle school. We had our multilingual awards night, interactive club, our murder mystery dinner theater, which that was the first time we had it this year. It was sold out. Great experience. Again, I will suggest anyone to come out next year if they host it again. Uh it was a great time to have. I really was trying to figure out who the person was. I failed at that, but it
045was an amazing evening and uh great memories built that day. and then our futures at Lake Aakan. All right. So now the next couple of slides are going to highlight some of the work that we've done in the buildings for each school. So Door Bridge Academy, the new construction, as you can see, well the windows are closed, but they're to my left hand side. Uh which by the way, I did a brief walk through the building and it's amazing at the size of the building. I was very much impressed on how big it is inside the classroom sizes, the gymnasium. It is really coming together beautifully for our f for our our students. Uh the spacing is going to allow so much flexibility within our buildings allowing now the elementary schools to once again have
046their arts, music, and art in a classroom. Allow our students to receive their services in appropriate locations, no longer in the hallways. Uh to allow our our staff to not have to share uh offices to give them the spaces needed, adequate spaces needed for them to be able to do their jobs accordingly. So, this really is going to allow us to really create that flexibility that we've for so long have struggled to have here in Dobert and it was one of our biggest obstacles, but now uh DBA is going to offer that flexibility once again. And again, I want to reiterate that we have fully staffed that building with in-house with only the additions of a security guard and a custodial position. And by the way, the one on the bottom left, that is a
047gymnasium. And the people looking small, it's because that's how big the gymnasium truly is. I mean it is amazing though too new playground various painting projects and desk in the PD room at academy we've had a new kitchen equipment uh new kitchen serving counter painting of the main office using our colors orange black white and gray got to love it and various new doors which I'm so happy about the changes and the new added edition was recent was a vestibule. Now we have a man trap. Uh now when our our families come to visit, uh they don't just have access to the entire building. We've now added an extra layer of security to protect our students and our staff. At North do we had lighting upgrades and relocated and is much bigger and much more
048uh adequate for the spacing needed. the HVAC project, falcony room upgrade, which is a beautiful kitchen. They did remove that little hot plate they had in there, but it's okay. Um, the new kitchen oven, uh, partial roof and various doors, uh, replacements and the gymnasium door floor. East Elementary, the vestibular entrance, uh, main office was re renovated. HB projects, murals. They now have their own digital signage outside of their own entrance into the building in front of the building and replace some of the doors as well. And Dober Middle School HVAC system upgrades phase two investibial and the roof. And Dober High School, as you can see on the top left, we have our new generator. Uh we are a shelter for the entire town of Dover. This allows us to be able to still
049function as one with our very own generator in case of any natural disasters. We've [clears throat] added extra parking down by the other side of the parking lot. We've also done some uh planter boxes that are going to be placed outside of the cafeteria where the kids have lunch. Uh the planter boxes are going to provide a little barrier and protection from our students. Uh [clears throat] and gymnasium painted. And we also added, well, I've mentioned already, we mentioned the added, the uh extra parking spots. And then at Belmont, at Belmont, we've uh done painting in the interior. And I do want to mention that pretty much about 90% of the entire district has been painted uh with our school colors, which again brings that unification, that pride of being Tigers. Um the confidential conference
050room we have now on the third floor of the of the Belmont building. And we've added the last two pictures of our superintendent, Mr. Bob Becker and Dr. James McGlaughlin. All right. And now what what the 2627 budget will support. And now my partner in crime, Mr. Sabahulu, will be jumping in on some of these slides with me. So personnel for 2526, maintaining all previous programs, initiatives, streamline roles, and enhanced efficiency, and eliminating redundancies. As I mentioned with all the changes that we've done from 2024 to 2026, uh we for 2627 are going to bring the AVID program to the high school. We just had a small team go down to Elizabeth to do a showcase of the AVID program and it was exciting to see all the work that's being done there and to
051see the students elevate and be able to perform in public public speaking which is a very challenging uh piece to do especially at a young age. We did some classroom visits. um they require every student in the AVID program must apply to a college, a trade school or a job and they help them with the application process which is again giving our kids the tools necessary to be able to advance and move forward. Uh we're looking forward for the implementation at 9th grade and then we're going to strategically plan it to then move it up and then eventually also have some implementation at the middle school. Uh DMS expanding electives to new programs. So middle school right now is getting their schedule redone. There's going to be new electives offered to our students. Previously, we
052were offering art, uh, coding, and two years of Spanish. We are now going to expand those experiences for our students in order to make some of these electives tie into the high school, get them started at an early age, really thinking about what the next steps are going to be before they get to do high school. And then preschool, additional teachers and teacher assistance for additional in in district classrooms. So again, that gives us a cost of savings when it comes to transportation by having our preschools inhouse with their own peers. And here is a visual of our DBA looking forward to that September 2026. uh as the building continues to go on and and and uh getting to its final stages, we will start communicating to, you know, to do some tours and a
053soft launch and hopefully we can do something in June where our future sixth graders can come and see the building before the year ends and then have an grand opening in the summer to allow people to come and have a tour of the building, come together as a community. Again, because this is going to be such an amazing space, the flexibility, uh the work that's been putting in for our students is going to be fantastic. And again, I did a small preview walking through the building and the size is beautiful inside. I mean, it's really going to be amazing. And nurs's office was huge. I mean, it's an incredible space that's going to be created for our community. I couldn't be more excited at this opportunity. And this was something that was done with again
054not increasing cost because of what we did moving and managing our staff within house. All right. And then our projects. Mr. Sabahulu. Good evening everyone. I saw business administrator. I'll be talking about the projects and also mainly on finance. Uh when we look at the projects for 2026 27 actually we came out with the all the projects uh with our buildings ground director and we're waiting for the revenues. Then we got the budget cut for $1.9 million. Our project uh file became the wish list item. So we defer most of the projects but we still get will get a lot done. Uh the f very first one is DBA phase 2. Uh we uh support this project mainly from the capital reserve. Last year actually this year uh we spent like $9 million of for
055the capital reserve some project from the capital reserve for to support this project. And uh now next year we're going to be paying the rest of the $3.5 million. So it's going to be phase two. Uh DBA technology instruct infrastructure. These are going to be the cabling and all the servers and everything else with that. Uh do high school auditorium ceiling replacement. If you look at the ceiling, it means a replacement for a long time. Hopefully it's going to get done uh next year. Do high school parking lot extension. This came out with the DBA project because since we are going to have the building in the same campus with the high school, we need more parking space. We are pushing for 45 more cars uh spot for more cars but uh we are in
056talks with the architect architect and the engineers. So we we're trying to get as much as we can. Uh old field house renovation field house boiler replacements. These are main like a small projects hopefully uh door middle school gym AC replacement uh probably a rooftop unit uh H upgrades all over the district uh east door roof replacement. Uh this roof replacement is uh couple hundred,000 but if you look at the whole picture we need at least $2 million to fix all the roofs needs to be replaced or refurbished. So what happened was that with that this also became the wish list item. We only entertain door next year. So, we're going to do one at a time. Uh, east door step and student bathroom upgrades and east door cafeteria floor replacement and purchasing. We do
057purchase a lot more. As you know, these are the equipments I'm going to talk about. So, 54 passenger school bus. Uh, school buses regularly go over a little over $200,000. They're like a range of like 220,000 230,000. But when we get a school bus, we can cut down three routes from the uh from outsourcing. So uh we can knock down like $300,000. We can even get the money back within a year for the school bus. So it's not like we are spending money. Actually, we're kind of investing uh other stuff, kitchen equipment for DBA. Uh we're going to have a small kitchen uh in DBA which is going to be called like a warming kitchen. The food is going to be coming from the high school, but we still have some equipments over there. It's
058going to be $50 to $60,000 on the equipment and all the other stuff we're going to be buying for. So, when we talk about the budget, uh budget consists of planned expenses and expected revenues. Usually, uh everybody does the budget differently. We get the revenue first, then we try to cut our expenditures. But in public schools it works little uh backwards. We come up with the expenditures and we wait for the state number to be released and if it comes less like is this year we like uh we got a of $1.9 million then it becomes we uh we have to work backwards because we only have like a couple weeks to work the budget out to balance the budget. So uh the budget also it's a financial expression of district needs and priorities and
059it's a living document. When we say living document, everything might change with the budget during the years. Something unexpected happens that we can hold a project, we can get that done or we have to do something emergency repair, we have to make it work. So it's like a keeps changing every time and usually we can transfer funds but if it's like a more than 10% we get the county approval for transfers. Uh this is the tax levy in increase. Uh this year's tax was about $22 million with over $22 million with the local tax le that we had a debt service uh almost $680,000. This is paid off as of April as far as I remember April 1st this year. So we don't have that no more. So when we look at 2026 27 when
060you see $24 million uh 24.6 we're going to be subtracting $680,000 which makes a little relief for the taxpayers. uh initially proposed budget was like $26.3 million because uh in some cases we can only increase the tax level by 2% by law uh state law but some cases like a bank cap use enrollment adjustment and health adjustment. I'm going to be explaining a little more in the further slides but with that we can increase more than 2%. And we were planning to use all the health adjustment for which was like $3.8 $8 million, but it would be a lot of burden for the taxpayers. So, we only used $2 million of that and we didn't use 1.8. So, that's why it was initially proposed 26 uh.3 million, but we ended up being like 24.6. I'll
061explain a little more on that one. So when we look at the revenues if you can see since we got the state aid uh budget cut this year our state aid was 65.5% of the budget uh uh of the [snorts] to total revenues but it went down to 64.8 which is tax levy picked up the difference and it went up from 23% to 26%. So we are we rely on the state aid mo mainly we have like 64% state aid uh uh revenues. So like some districts they rely on the tax levy a lot but we are not that kind. So we rely on the uh state aid most of the for most of the revenues. So the proposed budget is uh 22.6 million and state a was like 60.8 and local revenue is 3.6.
0626 this is this includes mine hill tuition and capital we withdrawing $3.1 million for the phase 2 for the DBA project for uh from the capital reserve budget fund balance medicaid and as I said had adjustment we only take two $2 million out of 3.8 eight. So this is a different uh view for like expenditures. If you see the biggest expenditure shows like a $30 million for the instruction, which is a good thing. But when you look at the second one is employee benefits, which is like a $22 million out of $100 million budget. So it's pretty uh odd to have that much uh for the expenditures. Um, so if we dig a little more for the health and other employee benefits, next in next year's budget, just the health and other employee benefits is
063going to be $22.7 million. And this year, it was 77.8. So it's like a $4.9 million increase. So it's almost $5 million increase. At the same time, we lost like almost $2 million state 8. So the gap increases. And also the salaries, our whole district salaries like $46.8 8 million. If you think about like average 3% increase, we're talking about another $1.5 million. So, the gap is huge. Um, and also when we get like 20 our horizon rates for the uh medical insurance went up 29.8% but we kept the increase at 28% uh because of the uh stop cuts. Transportation comes next with the $5.3 million. But we're trying to lower transportation every year and also there's inflation and increase logistic cost and everything else as you expect goes up like 10 15% more for
064all the other supplies. So when we talk about the appropriations um when we met with the finance committee they had this idea to show the difference in the last five years. and look back, you can really tell the difference. Our instructional expenditures from 202122 school budget to 26 27 went up like $9 million which 42%. But this this could be like 20 to 25% because we got this all this funds and COVID funds those years. So it shouldn't be even that much. But when you look at the employee benefits, it went up 139%. which is very uh I mean it's it's a lot to uh balance out. So what actions we take uh for the budget? We do cooperative purchasing for district supplies and services. Uh we also purchase electricity and natural gas through a
065ASUS cooperative which is like they get get this like all most of the public schools they have this group they they uh beat out the rate and we got much better rate than the residential other companies and rate reimbursements for internet and IT infrastructure which is going to be helping a lot with the uh door academy instruct in infrastructure cooperative purchasing of property insurance and workers compensation shared service with town of over for fill for school buses and semi reimbursement. We also get grants. ESCA is the very first one title one to A3 and three immigrant and four IDA. And we get preschool expansion aid is around like $6 million. We get DCF grant is around $300,000 and all the other grants. So, uh text analysis readables. What are redables? Essentially, readables are the total
066tax base for the town. So the higher the rebels, the less of an impact any tax increase would h would on an individual taxpayer. So when we look at do town and compared to Victor Gardens uh Victor Gardens doubled uh in the reds, but do town it was like less than 1% increase. So in the next slides I'll I'll show you a little more ex explain a little more how it affects and this I already talk about the qualify for health adjustment for $3.8 million but we only used for $2 million uh to lower impact on taxpayers. So now if you remember d tax reles only went up 1%. So when we increase the tax level 11% uh from this year to next year average impacts for impact for the household is going to be
067$37 uh 98 per month. uh initially it would have been $5066 but if you remember we didn't entertain taking all the health adjustment so it helped to help the taxpayer a little bit and this is average SS home which is $240,000 is not the same thing with the market value the uh the uh the value you see for your house on Zillow or uh realtor is not the same thing this is just the SS value is not the market value and now uh since the readables went up 1% you see the tax uh actually impact for the household in do but when we look at the Victor Gardens still same increase for the tax level 11% but they have like a decrease per month $1282 because their readables went up double compared to this year.
068So this this makes the difference. Uh Texas determines the average SS home value. SS home home value is not the same as your home's appraised value. Just want to mention again and we also have like uh we operate with the fiscal year but when it comes to the taxes it goes to the calendar year. So in order to take uh calculate the tax ratio uh we uh take the half of each year's tax levy amount. So when you look at the calculation of 2025 calendar year tax levy uh we have to get like half of each year's to get the tax levy calculation. uh budget uh presentation and the user friend the budget will be posted on the district website hopefully tomorrow presentation already up in the website but user friend budget is going to
069be uh hopefully uploaded tomorrow. >> Thank you. >> I want to thank you Mr. Haimey Mr. Sabahulu for the detailed comprehensive budget presentation. Um it's both responsible and strategic. Um it aligns with our district goals to promote student success and I'm really excited about the future direction of the do public school. So thank you again. Uh any members of the board have any comments that they'd like to share before I open up to the public? Mr. report. >> Um just just to reiterate um Mr. Sabloo didn't say this specifically in his presentation, but it was seen on the slide. Um uh the and I mentioned this la uh in March that the that the finance committee um was not was not willing to move forward with the initial budget um and the tax implications that
070that would have had on the on the average taxpayer as was shown on the slide. The initial tax increase would have been about on average $50 a month. and through the hard work of the administration and cost cutting measures and getting creative um that that number was reduced by about $13 a month. So, I just wanted to make sure that that was said because Mr. Sabu didn't didn't mention it specifically in the presentation. Anyone else have any comments? Everyone's good. Okay. At this time, I'd like to open this portion of the meeting to the public. The board recognizes the value of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to express themselves on school matters. To ensure fair and orderly expression of such comment, each statement shall be held
071to a time period of three minutes. Public comments limited to items on this agenda shall be entertained for approximately 30 minutes upon the discretion of the presiding officer. Please understand that the public comments portion of our agenda are not structured as question and answer sessions, but rather they are offered as opportunities to share your thoughts with the board. The board may or may not respond to public comments. However, all comments are considered and will be investigated and addressed as appropriate. Please be courteous and mindful of the rights of others when providing comments. Comments may not be abusive, obscene, threatening, or irrelevant. Please understand that students and employees have specific legal and privacy protections. The board is not permitted to respond in public to comments about students or employees. Please be advised that you are commenting
072at your own risk. Any public comments that are directed at a particular [snorts] individual or individuals could subject you to legal liability for defamation. At this time, is there anyone in in the uh audience that wishes to speak on agenda items only? Just please come to the uh podium and just state your name and address Maria Crian 25 Julia Terrace and do I don't know all the agenda items so I apologize because it's the first time I've come to a But can I comment on the presentation of the budget? >> Yes, absolutely. >> Okay. So, one of the things that was great is data, right? And you you showed a really great thing about the students and where they're falling behind and the teachers and the classrooms. One of the things as a parent is
073yes, there's a lot of communication that goes out. Yes, I can sign into Genesis and see how my student is doing, but at the same time, not all parents do. So, in Genesis, is there a way to send out alert to parents when students are falling behind when you do have attendance issues rather than it being a phone call or a um [snorts] a mail that you get to say with your progress of your child maybe once a quarter that Genesis can send out an alert to a parent to say, "Hey, your student has now been late. your student is falling behind and has this bad test score or falling behind in this classroom. Just as much as it the data is important to administrators, teachers about students, it's important to parents too to be
074able to support teachers um of the school. So when you're thinking about data, don't limit just to your staff. Think about how parents can help you as well. So to me, Genesis is the only portal we have as a parent that we have to log into and see things. It'd be great if we can possibly even get alerts out of Genesis to say, "Hey, look at this. Something's going on." Because not all parents sign in, but getting an alert, an email such as we get emails for everything else, it'd be actually beneficial, I think, to a lot of people. >> So suggestion. >> Well, thank you very much and really appreciate your comments and please come back because anything that you say provides more insight to the board and to the administration uh to help
075make things better for our students. Um Mr. Haime, do you have anything that you think you could offer? >> Absolutely. How are you again? Good seeing you. Um so we do do we do work on with Genesis, we do send out an alert. We do a midterm progress report. Uh we also what we do is we run the data halfway through the year to see what parents haven't logged in because it can show us when was the last time they logged in and then we send them an alert. Hey, you haven't logged in in a while. Jump in some Genesis to kind of get that information as well. Um in regards to the parent communication, you know, I agree the more parents are involved, the better it is for us as as a community, as
076as a school. Uh, one of the things that I am looking to do starting this summer is I'm looking to start up a parent academy and it's going to be like a three-step workshop and working with our families and really it's going to focus on our families being part of the PTA booster clubs, being part of the community within the buildings, right? Um, for one of the things that you know, for example, speaking about PTA, for example, right, we have PTA members with that I appreciate because even though their children are no longer there, they're still running our PTA strong and still doing an amazing job with the organization and the fundraising for our students. Um, but it would be nice to also give them a break, right, because they've been doing it for so
077long and get a next generation of families to come in and also do the PTA and be able to continue on the legacy to the next stage. Um, so I'm looking to really engage our families in some really good conversations starting in July and August and then to do a midyear one uh where we can really talk about what that leadership looks like. How can we make sure that that knowledge that we've gained as parent leaders, as parents involved in the community can be passed on to the next kindergarten or first grade parents to continue that progress and continue to move forward. Um but again I will continue to work with my team and look at other ways of engaging our families through Genesis and reminding them that that information is there because again I
078agree parents having that information is important whether it's attendance whether it's behavior whether it's academics. So we'll continue to explore and exhaust every resource we can to keep all our families informed. >> Yeah. And not just the bad kids. I'm saying good kids too. >> Good kids. All of them. >> All kids. You're welcome. Anyone else in the public? Okay, I'm going to close this portion of the meeting to the public and entertain a motion to approve the minutes for March 17th, both regular and executive session, and the special meeting for March 24th. >> So, move second. >> Okay, we have a motion, a second. Any questions or comments about the minutes? Roll call, please. MO. >> Yes. >> Mr. Mako, >> yes. >> Miss Palees, >> yes. Um, abstain from March 24th special meeting.
079>> Miss Kates, >> yes. But I abain from March 17th meeting. >> Dr. Center. >> Yes. >> Miss Shower. >> Uh, yes. for um the March 24th special meeting. Abstain for March 17th regular and executive session. >> Miss Son, >> yes. >> Mr. Miller, >> yes. >> Okay. Communications. So, we had several this past month. Uh we had one from Alexandra Kamargo, transportation issues, and we had another one uh some safety concerns from Diego Ramirez and a another parental issue that was sent to us by Sergio Cervantes. We also had a letter from the Mine Hill Board of Education um giving extending their sincere thanks to our board for a successful and productive meeting with their board of education members when we met in Mine Hill. And that was signed by Diane Mars, president of
080the Mine Hill Board of Education. Our student representative uh report, Miss Garcia Hi everyone. Good evening members of the board, administration, and community. I hope you've had a wonderful month since I've last seen you. I'm very happy to present the April report on behalf of the Dober High School. I'd like to begin with community service and student support, which has been a major focus for us this month. We would like to take a moment to acknowledge the passing of a fellow Dover High School student. We are deeply appreciative of the support and care shown by our teachers, counselors, Tiger Rap members, and administration during this challenging time. We also thank the administration for organizing moments of silence and for providing a space where students could gather to reflect and honor his memory. First, on behalf
081of SGAA, we want to express our gratitude to the Dober High School administration and staff for the compassion shown during this recent loss of in our student body. Our school community has come together with unity and care as we work to honor our fellow students and we truly appreciate the support from everyone. Continuing with our service initiatives, the National Honor Society Spring Blood drive will take place on Wednesday, April 29th. We're proud to share that volunteer participation has doubled since the last drive and more than 70 students have already pledged to donate. We'd also like to thank Mr. Cyrus for his continued leadership in organizing this important event as this de directly impacts lives. This month, Dober High School also hosted Bring Your Child to Work Day, welcoming the children of our teachers, staff, and
082faculty for a full day of hands-on activities. Students and staff helped facilitate experiences such as rocket launches and science, chocolate tasting with Mr. Der's food of history, history of food class, tumbling and drumming activities, breathing exercises with Mr. Hollandor, geome geometric garden building and math video productions projects and ceramics. We also want to thank our cafeteria staff preparing prep preparing themed lunches that make made the day even more special. We would also like to highlight a positive event that recently brought our school community together. On April 23rd, 2026, do high school under the leadership of Mrs. Gerardi, our dean of students, hosted bring your child to work day. And we would like to give a special thanks to all the teachers who organized engaging activities, as well as the student volunteers and peer mentors who
083helped make the day memorable and enjoyable for our guests. Overall, the day was a great success and wonderful example of the engaging hands-on experiences that take place at Dover High School. Thank you for your continued support. We are also in the middle of our SGA elections of the for the 2026 through 2027 school year. Applications opened on April 27th and are due by April 30th. Applications close campaigning after applications close, campaigning will begin and students will vote during the official election window on May 7th and May 8th. We're excited to see strong interest from students who want to take on leadership roles and represent their peers. In addition, our prom shop was held last week. This free event offered hundreds of dresses seniors giving seniors the opportunity to find beautiful prom prom attire at no
084cost or at significantly reduced prices. This was a meaningful way to ensure every student can participate in prom without financial barriers and moving into academic excellence and future planning. We are in the midst of AP practice testing as students prepare for their exams in May. We also want to congratulate the AP research class who presented their projects last week under the guidance of Mr. Bronson. Today, Dover High School held its third annual third aware annual awards ceremony where more than 400 students were recognized and celebrated by families and staff. It was a wonderful moment of encouragement and pride for our school community. We also want to bring forward student concern regarding senior parking logistics for next year. With the new annex construction, students are wondering how parking will be allocated for rising seniors. They are
085asking whether logistics are being reviewed to balance staff and student spaces and whether there are possible solutions to the traffic congestion we are already experiencing. I did notice in the presentation that there was [snorts] um a lane dedicated for for the sixth grade annex for drop off and if that will affect anything um with our high school students. Additionally, about 30 students attended Mr. Haime's home room representative forum where they they appreciated having their voices heard. Topics included pep rally planning, the new cell phone policy, and over overall school climate. Students are looking forward to the next meeting and I've heard really good things in the hallways about this. Our PBIS committee has also continued reinforcing schoolwide expectations and promoting positive behavior throughout the building. As you can see, they've displayed they're displayed both in
086English and Spanish next to the cafeteria screen. And finally, we are we are proud to recognize our top academic scholars for class of 2026. While these titles are significant, they only represent a sliver of the dedication, preser perseverance, and academic excellence both students have demonstrated throughout the year throughout the year left over high school. Congratulations to Mobashir Amed, our valictorian, and Matt Matthew Lei, our saludiator saludatoran. We congratulate them on this remarkable achievement and wish them continued success as they begin their college journeys. Next, I'd like to highlight arts and culture. Our dance recital will take place on May 5th, and our spring concert will be held on May 13th, 700 p.m. featuring jazz band, chorus, and concert band. We invite everyone to come out and support our talented performers. We also want to recognize
087our outstanding art students who participated in the Blackwell Street Art Show, which had over 800 entries. First place in acrylic/ oil paint is Scarlet Al Mendarez for Banana Split under Mrs. Garcia. Honorable mention went to Maiden Diaz for the fair for his work Fairy House. And second place in photography went to Angel Gomez under Miss Peterson. We are incredibly proud of their accomplishments and our art teachers guidance to get them there. I like to share updates from athletics and unified sports. Our unified flag football team continues to promote inclusion and teamwork and we were excited to see unified basketball featured in recent Dober now article. Their next home game will be on May 7th here at Do High School. The athletes love the support and if you can try to make the next game. Our
088spring athletes are also in full spring in in full swing including boys volleyball, softball and flag football. We encourage everyone to support them throughout the season. And we'd also like to celebrate the major achievement of our Cyber Tigers robotics team. For our first time at for their first time ever, they've qualified for the district level competition, competed in two playoff events, earned the excellence in engineering award, and finished the regular season 68th out of 143 teams, their highest ranking to date. We are proud of all of them at Dober High School. That concludes my report. Thank you for your time and we look forward to continuing our work to support the students and community of Dober High School. >> Thank you, Miss Garcia. I just want to say that um your report really brings to
089life a day of a Dober High School student and it's wonderful and I thank you very much for putting all the time in to be um expressing all the good things that are coming happening with the students but also the things that can help improve student life. So, thank you. >> Thank you. I really appreciate that as I try to go and reach like every group in the high school and see what's going on in every corner cuz I feel like there's so much going on and it's impossible to h like have them all in one thing, but I'm glad I can do my best. >> Well, you keep doing that. It's great. Anybody have any questions from Scarcia? >> Okay, now on to my report. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Uh good evening
090again everyone. Um and as usual, it's been very busy um and very productive for our board this uh past month. Um numerous committee meetings taking place, including a special meeting dedicated to the approval of our preliminary budget. Um, I would like to extend my sincere appreciation to our finance and facilities committee for their commitment and willingness to participate in additional meetings to ensure a thoughtful and responsible budget development process. I would also like to recognize our superintendent and business administrator for their professionalism, leadership, and countless hours of work in preparing the 2026 2027 budget. This year's process was particularly challenging due to the significant reduction in state aid which really required careful planning and difficult decisions. Despite these challenges, the administration has remained focused on balancing the needs of our students with the responsibility to
091our taxpayers. On a more uplifting note, I had the pleasure of attending the Dover Historical Society's Flapjack fundraiser at Applebee's in Rockaway where members of the Dover High School Interact Club volunteered their time to support the event. The Interact Club uh sponsored by Rotary International is grounded in the powerful moto motto uh service above self which provides students with meaningful opportunities to develop leadership skills while giving back to their community. What stood out most was the pride, professionalism, and enthusiasm demonstrated by our students. I was especially pleased to see our board student representative, Miss Garcia, actively involved in this effort. It was inspiring to witness young leaders who are not only committed to service, but are also eager to learn more about the rich history of the Dover community. I look forward to seeing the
092Interact Club continue to deepen its connection with the Dover Historical Society. I also had the distinct honor of serving as the keynote speaker at the second annual career day at Easttover Elementary School. Speaking to our fifth and sixth grade students was especially meaningful to me as a former Eastover student. I had the opportunity to share both my professional journey as a chief information officer for the United States Army and my volunteer service as your board president. Through an interactive presentation, I emphasize the importance of education, particularly in areas like math and technology since that's my background, as well as the value of perseverance, lifelong learning, and community community involvement. I also shared a bit of history about Easttover including images from its early days when it was being constructed uh which helped uh connect the
093students to the legacy the school they attend today. Uh what made the experience truly special was the level of engagement from the students. Their curiosity, thoughtful questions and enthusiasm for their future careers were remarkable. Hearing aspirations such as becoming pediatric surgeons, engineers, singers, and veterinarians was very inspiring. Our role is to create the opportunities and environment which will allow each of these students to achieve their dreams. In closing, I continue to be encouraged by the dedication of our students, staff, and community. Uh together, we are building not only strong schools, but a strong future for Dover. With that uh we can move on to administrative reports. Thank you sir. [clears throat and cough] Sophia great job when no uh good evening to everyone. Um want to echo in um Sophia had mentioned that on April
09416th tragedy did struck uh Dora public schools as we mourn the loss of one of our own uh Christopher Chavez. You know our thoughts and prayers are with his friends, family and those impacted by the heartbreaking loss. I do want to take this opportunity to thank the administration, school counselors, therapists, Tiger Rap, teachers, and all those who supported. Uh we came together as one uh and really uh made an impact in our building as we hope to continue to support our kids as we move forward, continue to support our staff as well. Again, uh this is one of our own family uh where we lost someone uh and their impact would not be forgotten is that they had a huge impact on our student body and our staff as well. Um yesterday I had the
095opportunity and I did mention already in during the board uh budget presentation that I had the opportunity to visit the AVID showcase with a team composed of teachers, administrators uh at Elizabeth School District uh who hosted a very well organized informational session for for us to to observe. The presentation included data related to attendance, grades, overall student achievement, demonstrating programs, long-term impact. Uh uh we also participated in a in a gallery walk uh showcasing Elizabeth 16 years of the AVID implementation success. Uh the visit concluded with classroom reservations followed by testimonials from students, staff and administrators which provided valuable insights and positive culture outcomes of AVID as it created throughout the entire district. I also want to take this opportunity this evening to acknowledge our new HR director, Miss Bass, sitting right over there. Welcome,
096Miss Bass, to the team, district team. Um, and, uh, we're looking forward to working with you as the new HR director for Dober Public Schools. I also attended our Tricky Trade event, uh, over at Academy. It was a tremendous success. Uh, I spoke to Mr. Edwards this morning. They raised about 17,000 for uh, the PTA at Academy, which is fantastic. Um, again, I was there in attendance. I tried to sneak out without anyone noticing, but Mr. Edwards wanted to highlight that I was exiting the uh cafeteria. Uh so embarrassed me a little bit, but it was okay. We all laughed and it was a good time. So again, it was all in good fun. Uh but great uh reflection of our community coming together and and enjoying an evening and having fun. I believe it
097ended at about 11:30 uh that evening. Midnight. >> Uh was that >> it was midnight. >> Yeah. [laughter] So, um, again, a great evening, great outcome for the community coming together, and it's a great tradition to continue on. Uh, DMS had their seventh grade orientation. Uh again inviting our Mineh Hill students academy north do east elementary to get a tour of the building get to know some of their student some of their teachers get a taste of what the schedule is going to look like as well as all the clubs and offerings that there is at the middle school from band to chess club things of that nature. Again it's great to have our students come in into the year and really experience it as they see middle schoolers walking throughout the building too. Uh
098uh so thank you to the administration of the middle school for continuing that tradition. Uh I spoke about the day and clay and it's a workshop again hands-on building techniques with Miss Gallagher at Door Middle School uh arts class again organized well put together and it's is having a field trip inside of a classroom. Um bring your child [clears throat] to work day tremendous success. I had an opportunity to bring uh my daughter uh my other two children no longer want to uh participate in bring a child to work day which is unfortunate but my daughter had a fantastic time. I want to thank the the entire district for making our kids feel welcome being part of the family and it's great for our students to see that extended family as well as um my
099daughter participated in the events at Belmont but then she said can I go to the middle school and I lost her for the rest of the day so I get to see her at the end of the day. Um but again and thank you to the middle school for watching her and and letting her be part of the activities over there. Again that's like her second home at the middle school. Uh [clears throat] Ed had their bingo for books uh was a great success again an event for the community creating so many opportunities for our students our staff to come together again in different phases. Uh so it was great to see that and I mentioned already about the student forum and Sophia also mentioned thank you again for for mentioning it. Uh it's it
100was a great opportunity to again continue keep connecting with our students to hear the feedback. Um if if we don't know what's happening, we can't make the changes and but again I want to empower our students to continue to reach out to me uh to join me in the student forums to to discuss to have conversations. It is important that again their voices are heard because they are the ones who create this environment in the community within our buildings and they are the future of dober. Again, I want to thank the students for taking that time and not holding back, which I always appreciate in these conversations. And again, look forward to continuing the growth of our student forums and giving a voice to our student population. So, that is all I have to report
101for today. I want to thank everyone. Uh, and that's all business administrator's report. Oh, first any questions for Mr. Haimey on his report? [clears throat] Everybody good? Okay. >> Good evening everyone. I'll be talking about the finance and facilities uh items on the agenda. But first, I want to apologize for board ducks being up and down over the last couple of days. I'm sorry if you didn't have access to the agenda when you needed it. We uploaded a PDF version of the agenda to the website to help to address the issue. Thank you for your patience. Items 1, four, five, six, and seven, the financial reports for March 2026 are presented this evening for the board's review and approval. Item three and four, we would like to formally acknowledge and express our appreciation for the
102generous donations and scholarships received through the National Instrument Fund Initiative, Miss Jamie Cho from North Door Elementary School successfully applied and secured funding for four guitar racks and 18 guitars. We thank her for his efforts and extend our gratitude to the program for this contribution. Item 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12. These items include three out of districts terminations and two new out of district placements. Item 13 is uh the three shared service agreement is up for renewal. This agreement renewed every two years provides security guard professional services for our school buildings. Item 14, the 2026 27 budget is presented as up for approval. Item 15 and 16, these items represent year two funding for grants that were awarded to the district this year. Item 18, the agreement with JCPL for electrical services required for
103lower bridgemies presented for approval. Uh this agreement is for uh relocating for uh three poles for the Dbridge Academy. Item 19, the Rodgers contract for 202627 school year in the amount of $516,000 is pres presented for approval. This contract supports student mental health services. The district receives a $300,000 DCF grant that offsets a portion of this cost. Item 20. This item reflects a lease agreement for student devices. Item 21 pending board app approval the district will proceed with a reverse bid process for the listed IT supplies to ensure cost effective procurement. Some lower value items may be sold on go deals. Item 22. This item is presented for approval and includes the paging and phone systems as well as the wireless clocks for the bridge academy. This concludes my report. Thank you. >> Thank you.
104Any questions for Mr. Sabahulu? >> [clears throat] >> Okay, we're going to move on to board of ed reports. Uh, Mars County Educational Services Commission. I attended their meeting, but there's nothing really to report to this body. Uh, legislative report, Miss Gates. >> Um, since our last meeting, both the Senate and Assembly held voting sessions and advanced legislation affecting some of our schools. On the governor's desk, the following bill now awaits the governor's signature. I think you remember I reported on uh the mercury floor removal. So, this would prohibit the issuance of construction permits for flooring in schools or child care centers unless the flooring materials are certified by the manufacturer as mercury free. So hopefully that will be by the next report that will have been signed. Um the Senate held a voting session
105on March 23rd and passed the following legislation. Excuse absences for postsecary activities which would permit excuse absences for students participating in college visits visits to secondary technical institutes and military recruitment uh recruitment activities. Uh the assembly held a voting session on March 23rd also and pass the following legislation. Uh vaping awareness would direct the department of health in consultation with the department of education and the office of the secretary of higher education to develop guidelines for school districts and institutions of higher education to facilitate the implementation of onampus anti-aping awareness. campaigns targeting student populations. Link to subsidized school meals application would as embedded require public schools to post links to the subsidized school meals application andformational videos um produced by the New Jersey State Office of the Food Security. This concludes my report. >> Thank
106you very much. Any questions for Miss Gates? Okay. On to the Mars County uh New Jersey school board's report. Mr. McCort, >> um the Morris County School Boards Association did not meet in the month of March um or April rather. Um so the only thing I want to do is remind um members of the next meeting um of the Morris County School Boards Association which is uh next Wednesday, May the 6th at West Morris Mendum High School. Uh dinner begins at 6, the meeting begins at 6:45. You can either register yourself on the school board's website or have Mr. Sabah register for you. And I mention this um as far as attendance of the board uh because a couple of our members will be recognized at this meeting. Um Dr. Ser will receive her certified
107board leader um recognition and myself and Miss Asdo will receive our new board member boardsmanship certification. Um, also the uh winner of the Irene Lefay Excellence and Boardsmanship um award winner will be announced. Um, I do not know who the winner is. I know one has been chosen. Um, and as I've mentioned before, um, our own president, Mr. Scott Miller, is one of the nominees. I'm sure he would love everyone's support there. Um, and and smiles and and happy faces. Um, That concludes my report. >> Okay. Any questions for Mr. McCort? All right. We're going to move on to administrative approvals. Can I have a motion to approve items one, two, and three? >> So moved. >> Do we have a second? >> Second. >> Any discussion? Okay. Can I please have a roll call?
108>> Mr. Sero? >> Yes. >> Mr. Mor? >> Yes. >> Miss Palees? >> Yes. Miss Kates, >> yes. >> Dr. Ser, >> yes. >> Miss Shower, >> yes. >> Mes, >> yes. >> Mr. Miller, >> abstain on number one since uh I did not have access to read them all, but I can vote yes on everything else because I did look at those. >> Okay. Personnel, Miss Selenus, could you please take us through that? >> Sure. I would like to make a motion upon the recommendation of the superintendent and the board to approve personal items 1 through 14. >> Do we have a second? >> Second. >> Any discussion, questions? Could I please have a roll call? >> Mr. >> Yes. >> Mr. Mar, >> yes. >> Miss Penelis, >> yes. >> Mates, >> yes.
109>> Dr. Center. >> Yes. >> Miss Shower, >> yes. >> Miss Son, >> yes. >> Mr. Miller, >> yes. >> Okay. Negotiations. >> Um, there's no report at this time. >> All right. Thank you very much. Governance. Miss Asavdo. >> Thank you, Mr. Miller. The governance committee meeting was held on April 21st um at the Belmont Avenue Administrative Building um at 6:30. Um attendees were Miss Asdo, uh Mr. Shower, Mrs. Phillips, Miss Solenz, and our superintendent, Luis Himebeck. Um some of the items for discussion um was the appointment of the chairperson, which I myself um accepted um the chair. Um we also discussed the process of the annual review for our superintendent. Uh the third item for discussion was the Board of Education goal review process. Um the chairperson will update on progress quarterly in
110public which will be done uh May, September and December. Um we have also asked Mr. Sabahulu to give us a budget status report. U just a little brief um description if we are um on target with our goal with our budget. Um Mrs. Phillips um is going to make sure that in our Google files that there is a meeting notes template um available with instructions that this will ensure that our committee chairs are filing notes in the same form just to have uniformity. Um the fifth item discussed was the um is a two-tier system in which communication protocol will take place um if there is an unforeseen circumstance um such as the passing of our our student. Um and this concludes my report. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Thank you. Any questions for Mrs. Mavado?
111Okay. Okay, we'll move on to student achievement and curriculum. Dr. Ser. >> Thank you, Mr. Miller. Uh, the student achievement and curriculum committee met on April 7th at 5:15. In attendance were u Miss Panelis, Mr. Miller, uh, Mr. Haime, Mr. Chewy, and we had a as well as uh, I was in attendance and we had a special guest, Mr. Frank Ayanucci from the AVID program as well as our DHS principal, Miss Ross. Um, The purpose of this uh present the entirety of the meeting was discussing the AVID program um which we learned a lot about. You've heard it mentioned tonight during the um uh budget presentation. You heard it during Mr. Hime's report. Um and so I'd like to give you a little bit of a snapshot um for people um on the board as
112well as people at home about the goals and how the goals of the AVID program will be implemented. Um the goal of the AVID program is to assist students who are in the middle, right? Our gifted and talented students have numerous resources um available to them. Our special education students um have numerous advoc um resources available to them. But for many many years, the students in the middle um we've been talking about how to help them um and haven't really come up with a coherent and [snorts] comprehensive way to do that. And so the AVID program um the mission of the program is to close the opportunity gap. And so to help students who may not be ready for college or secondary um education to help them with uh behaviors with uh methods of studying
113as well as the support necessary to be successful in high school and then to transition into their post-secary um education. And so the structure of this approach is that There is the AVID elective and then the AVID schoolwide. And so the AVID elective is a fullyear course that students accepted into the AVID program will attend. And so one of their classes will be with the same teacher for all four years. And during this class uh these teachers who are trained by uh over the summer at by AVID um they will learn um strategies. So during the week they will attend three types of classes. strategy building, study groups and connect and explore. So during these uh uh classes, they will with this same teacher for four years um learn how to take notes in class,
114learn how to study. They will also have the opportunity to get help if they're struggling in math on a certain concept. There would be an opportunity within this class to get a little bit of help as well as get the help with their peers. So learning how to rely um on each other as well. and then opportunities to explore such as visiting colleges, getting help with college applications um and then as well um assistance with financial aid. So all of those things that um might inhibit a student in the middle from um achieving their potential. Um the second part is the AVID schoolwide where the avid trained teachers will provide strategies for all the teachers at Dober High School. And so as the students are moving throughout their day, um they will be hearing the
115same terms. They'll be encountering the same strategies in all of their classrooms, just reinforcing those ideas. And these strategies are great strategies, so they'll help all of our students. Um there's also a component for parents. So um monthlyish parent meetings, um so that parents can reinforce the ideas that are being taught in the AVID program at home. So for example, having parents do an at home binder check um so that students are at home learning and being reinforced on the idea of keeping a uh organized notebook um or something like teaching parents how to help their students with Cornell notes. Um all of this as almost everything in Dober comes with now will be um analyzing data um on these students in terms of attendance, behavior, demographics, AP class enrollment and many other things. And
116then all of this supported by the AVID program which provides coaching, virtual workshops, networking sessions, classroom walkthroughs um with feedback and much more. And so I just wanted to give a shout out to Mr. Haime, Mr. Carl, Mr. Chewy, Miss Ross um for seeking out this program and making sure that it's going to be implemented next year. We're going to start with the ninth grade next year and then um hopefully branch up into 10th grade. And just tonight, I learned possibly down um into eighth grade. And so again, this is a fabulous program for our students in the middle. Um and hopefully you'll hear more about it as we start uh next school year. Um you'll notice on the agenda that we have a ton, if you were able to read it, if you got
117to boards before it went down, we have a ton of amazing field trips happening. Again, as always, thank you to all of the work that our dedicated teachers put in behind the scenes to make sure that these wonderful experience has happened. Um, I'd [snorts] like to highlight that grade three is going to Carnegie Hall to play the recorder with the symphony. I think that is just an amazing experience. And a big shout out uh to Miss Ditter and Mr. Brahm's fifth grade classes for helping to clean up at Crescent Field on Earth Day. Fabulous work. With that, I would move that we I would move items one through three. >> Do we have a second? >> Second. >> Any other discussion? I have a question, Mr. Miller. I just noticed this. I did notice this
118before, but there is no attachment under um for item one, the certif certificated uh staff graduate courses. Are there actual um courses to approve or should that not have been on the agenda? >> Hold on one second. >> There's no indication of an attachment in our printed copy. >> [snorts] >> Yeah, I don't I don't see anything there. >> Did anyone see it? >> It's not there. >> Then we'll have to >> move to the next meeting. >> Yeah, we'll just have to all abstain on that one and then we'll take it up again next time. Okay. And uh Dr. Ser, you have a question. >> Um I have one question. I see that summer meals stop on July 31st. I seem to remember that we distributed meals all summer long previously. Am I misremembering
119uh what we've done and I know that's that's not our program. I believe it's federally funded. Um could you explain what's going on this year please? >> Yeah. Um some of the service program was different when was the uh covid time they would pro we would provide uh I wasn't here at the time but even other schools we would pro like a brown bag lunches they would just come and pick it up because uh state would reimburse for that but this summer food service program just different just this is just for our summer food service uh this is just our uh summer school and also anybody uh want to utilize we just go with the summer uh school dates uh After that we don't provide anything. We don't get reimbured either. >> Okay. Um are
120there are we connecting maybe the school leaison? Are we connecting with families um to who may suffer from food insecurity through the month of August for help? Are there resources available and are we connecting those families with those resources? >> Yes, we we budgeted for leases to have summer hours so we'll be able to continue to provide the support for our parents, our families that need it. >> Thank you very much. Okay. So, roll call. >> Mr. >> Uh, yes to all except for number one. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Mr. Makur, >> uh, yes to two and three. >> Two and three. Okay. >> Miss Penellis, >> yes for two and three. >> Miss Gates, >> yes. For two and three. >> Dr. S. >> Yes. for two and three. >> Miss Shower. >>
121Uh, yes, only to item number two. I was unable to open item number three. And of course, number one, >> I couldn't hear. I can't hear you. >> I'm sorry. Only for Yes to item number two. I was unable to open item number three. >> Yes. To two. >> Yes. >> Okay. >> Misses. >> Yes. For two and three. >> So only >> Two and three. Okay. Mr. Miller. >> Yes. for two and three. >> Okay. Community relations, Miss Gates. >> Um Mrs. Phillips and I attended the Academy Street PTA meeting on March 25th. Um during that meeting, I was asked to obtain the board's t-shirt sizes. Um they wanted to gift us with these t-shirts which I delivered tonight. Uh due to scheduling conflicts, we were unable to tend uh attend the East and
122Dover Middle School for April. But we will uh participate in those later this month. >> Uh Mr. As Mr. Haimey reported, we attended the Academy Street uh tricky tray. Some of us did not try to sneak out and were a little bit more competitive. So it did end pretty late. There were a lot of baskets and and gift cards. Uh it was a packed house. uh for the citizens advisory committee uh we held our first uh citizens advisory committee meeting uh full meeting on March 23rd. I shared the post comments with Mr. Himey who uh replied back to me in written response and then attended our meeting on April 20th. Unfortunately though we had very limited uh members there. So he will return to us of this month for our May 18th meeting and then
123this will be our final meeting of the year. Due to scheduling conflicts, we will be canceling our June meeting. This concludes my report. >> Thank you very much. Does anyone have any questions for Miss Gates? Okay. Thank you very much. We'll move on to policy. Mrs. Shower. >> Thank you, Mr. Miller. Um the policy committee met on April 21st at 5:30 to approximately 6:30 at 21 Belmont Avenue in the conference room. Our our facilitator was our superintendent, Mr. Lewis Haime. Board members in attendance were myself, the chair, Susan Shower, Mr. TC McCort, Elena Skates, and our vice president, Kimberly Phillips. Um, we had several policies on the agenda to review. We had a second reading for policy [snorts] number P1552, which is sexual harassment of a staff member. P2530, resource materials, P9130, which is public
124complaints. Um, and there was some discussion during that uh review. Mr. Mr. Hime clarified some of the policy covering only public complaint not teacher staff member grievance. Um moving on to P5512 which was harassment, intimidation or bullying. And we then finished with P7510 which was use of school facilities. There was extensive discussion that continued on um as our second reading. and we had discussion during our first reading. During this reading on April 21st, um we clarified that there would be some changes to the policy which would um stop it from actually being on the agenda this evening, Mr. Croo, for the second reading. It's actually needs to revert back to first reading to make the changes to the policy. I would assume Mr. As I look at the agenda, it looks like things are listed
125for first reading. >> P7510 from I'm reading from my notes. >> Yeah, I'm I'm looking at Yeah, >> it's on the agenda for the first reading because but I'm just noting it from my meeting that um we needed to make changes to it as discussed at the committee. >> That's fine. >> Okay, great. >> But I the other ones look like they're on for first reading as well. >> Very good. Thank you. U moving on. We did regulations for a second reading. Regulation 1552 for sexual harassment of a staff member. Regulation 2530 which is resource materials. Um and then first reading of policy number P1220 employment of chief school administrator uh mandatory and revised. And there was some discussion and clarification made on that policy. Also P2535 library materials. This policy is clear and this
126is a new policy. Um P9130 public complaints revised. Um again, Mr. Haime made clear that this policy shall not be utilized by district staff members or board of ed members unless in their capacity as a parent. Um policy number 9130 is separate from any employee grievance policy and procedure regulation first reading regulation 2535 library materials new we had no questions about that regulation 9130 again public complaints revised uh we finally had reached the point of no questions with that and then job descriptions for elementary dean of students supervisor of school counseling administrator of student performance and strategic planning and chief academic officer. Mr. Haime gave us a thorough and brief review of all job descriptions listed. Our next meet our meeting finished at 6:30 and our next meeting is scheduled for May 26 at 5:30
127at the Belmont Avenue building. And that is the end of my report. And with that, I would like a to make a motion to approve policies number items one through five. >> Do we have a second? >> Second. If if I may just interrupt for a second, Miss Sher, I just want to I just want to be because when you asked me the question before, um I had heard you mention 9130 and a couple of the other policies and they were on for first reading, >> but there was one you said that had been on for second reading and would have to go on for first reading. >> It was already at our last meeting. It had been on for first reading already. We would have been having the second reading this evening. >> No,
128I understand. But what number was it? >> Uh 7510 P7510 school use of facilities. use of school facilities. >> So I think it is still listed as second reading. >> Yeah. So that has to strike that one off the second reading. >> Yeah. So um if if if everyone consents I think you could you want to do it as a first reading tonight? >> That's what they're recommending. Yeah. >> Or drew it as or is it a first reading the next time or is it tonight? >> Tonight. Yeah. So if everyone if everyone consents, you can just uh amend the the motion to move that one to first reading. >> It's there twice. It's in first and second. Okay. I can I ask a question about 7510? >> Yes, absolutely. >> That was the one
129that >> Miss Phillips suggested alternative wording that is not currently present in the >> Okay. I wasn't sure which one it was. >> Policy. The policy was not adjusted to reflect the adjusted wording that Miss Phillips suggested that we all agreed to last week. >> Okay. So, I think it should be a first reading and then one more chance to get the wording right for May. >> Okay. Right. And I it does look to me like it's as a second reading. I don't see it in the first reading list that I have. >> It's not. >> so what what we're suggesting is that we move it to the first reading. >> Right. 7510 policy and regulation. >> Policy and regulation >> to the first reading list. >> Correct. If if everyone consents to that, then
130I don't think you need to do a motion. You can just >> So my only concern is we don't have a clean document yet >> that that has all of these proposed changes and adjustments to 7510. So perhaps it should we should hold off on first reading to May >> so that at that agenda prior to that meeting everybody has a clean copy to to look at >> and so policy kit well we won't meet before then >> right but that's what we would be doing. Yeah the changes that we noted at the committee >> that Mr. Hime has >> no but there was a more changes with the email discussion that wasn't it >> that's a different policy >> oh my god >> so 7510 if we move it to a first reading the
131changes can happen as they were supposed to happen in the last however many weeks and then we could approve it as a second reading right >> in May with the changes and we would be able to see those changes correct >> on the second reading >> next month in May. >> Correct. Okay. >> Are you okay with that? >> Also, at the committee meeting, we would see the clean copy at the committee meeting also. >> Okay. So, everybody's good now. >> Yes. >> Roll call, please. >> Mr. Suo, >> yes. >> Mr. Mor, >> yes. >> Miss Palees, >> yes. >> Miss Skates, >> yes. >> Dr. Center, >> yes. >> Miss Shower, >> yes. >> Miss Son, >> yes. >> Mr. Miller, >> yes. >> Financing facilities, Mr. court. >> It has been a
132a bit of a busy month um for the finance and facilities committee um thanks to the budget process and as such we met both on April 13th and April 23rd. Um all committee members were present on April 23rd. Um Mr. Miller was absent from the April 13th meeting. On the facility side, progress continues across the district on several of our ongoing projects. Uh, as the community has seen in real time, Dover Bridge Academy is now essentially fully assembled. Uh, exterior work will begin shortly and final systems work is [snorts] underway. We remain on track for substantial completion by the end of June and look forward to seeing the building once it is complete over the summer. Improvements at the high school courtyard and North Dover Elementary are moving forward and several key projects including the
133Route 46 building acquisition, generator installation and testing and other site upgrades are now complete. On the finance side, it will be no surprise that our attention was focused primarily on the budget this month. As you will have seen in the in tonight's presentation and as I previewed in March, this was an extraordinarily difficult budget to craft. Tough decisions and some very real sacrifices were made, but those decisions were necessary in order to limit as much as possible the impact on the taxpayers of both Dover and Victory Gardens. On behalf of the committee, I want to echo Mr. Miller's earlier recognition of our administrative team. They put in many long nights and an incredible amount of work to bring forward a budget that this board could stand behind while protecting what matters most, which is student
134achievement. That balance is not easy, and they delivered. And I will also point out they delivered on time. It's also important to be clear that many of the cost increases we are facing and are reflected in this budget are outside of Dover's control. This is not unique to us. But because we are so a dependent, it impacts us deeply. Which is why our message cannot stop here. Our entire community, not just this board, needs to be heard by the people who are in the position to make changes that will affect Dover to the positive. Do's story must be told loudly and consistently so that we are not we are not shortchanged again next year or in the years to come. Finally, the committee continues to review policies and procedures to strengthen fiscal responsibility, including how
135we address outstanding student balances and ensure accountability across the board. The committee is next scheduled to meet on May the 5th. That concludes my report and I would now like to move approval of finance and facilities agenda items 1 through 22. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Any questions or comments? Dr. Ser, >> I just had one question. Um, has anything changed with the SLEO contract? >> Uh, yes. Uh, regular, uh, hour rate went up $2 and for emergencies, uh, it's $3 per hour increase. >> Okay. Thank you. And I wanted to reiterate, Mr. Sabaholu's thank yous to the members of the class of 1972 for their generous donations. >> Thank you, >> Miss. >> I was just going to say the same thing. My I my gratitude to the class of
1361972 for the generous donation. That was very nice. >> Mr. Miller, um I I know that Mr. Sabagulu mentioned it in the budget presentation, but I I again feel it cannot be mentioned enough. Um a thank you to the community of Dover that in uh the year of 2003 voted yes on a referendum to build our beautiful middle school edition. And in addition here, we always forget about this part, but we uh did an addition here at the high school of our beautiful and still very viable media center and our health and wellness uh unit at the back of the building also. And that that bonding from 2003 through careful planning and um refinancing several times being paid off four years ahead of time just this past April. So, thank you very much to the
137Dover community. We are now free and clear and have no more bonding debt and um I think that's a pretty big thing in these days and times for a school district. So, thank you very much to the community for paying your taxes for all of these years and allowing this to happen today. Thank you. >> Thank you. Any other comments? >> Um this these are all questions from Mr. Hogley, I believe. Um number seven, the cafeteria report. Could you possibly explain just for the public who may not have seen it um the balance what that entails and what we are doing and maybe thinking about doing um to remediate that balance moving forward? >> Uh actually I'll be on more detail for the finance committee but uh right now what what happens is we get
138the reimbursements a month later. So the balance is exactly approximately how much we're going to get is a little over $200,000. That's what we get as a reimbursement. So at the end of the year when the auditors go over it, they put as like a receivable so it doesn't go that much. So it's not going to be that bad. Um number 19, the Ruters contract. Um could you maybe just for the public explain the differences between this agreement and prior agreements um in the in the vein of the costsaving measures that we've mentioned before? >> Uh I think three years ago it was over uh a million dollar. I think it was like$1.1 or $1.2 million. We went down to $500,000 which is more than half we cut >> and and we thank Mr. Heimer
139for that. He worked pretty good on that. and and maybe Mr. Hime can expound. These are not savings that are going to negatively impact anyone at all. It's more of a right sizing of the agreement for our district. >> That is correct. Uh when we made the first adjustment to the contract, we added our TSWs, our therapeutic social workers to elementary and middle school. Uh before we had made the changes to the contract, we have cal collected data to see uh how large the case loads were for each of the case managers. uh found that at the time uh we can uh based on the case load we were able to do that in-house and be able to see a a cost of savings. Uh again we did that with this second year looking at
140the contract again and looking at the data and seeing what we can uh what is the data telling us in regards to the case cases that are being used. Uh we found that again we're just making an adjustments in certain areas we were able to still continue to provide our social and emotional support for our students uh while still being responsible physically with our district. >> Great. >> I just want to also mention sort of interrupt uh this was paid from Esther funds like a three years ago. So we took on to general fund. So that's why we have to cut it a little bit to make it balanced. >> Uh last question uh item 20 the Apple lease. Um I know this is part of the technology plan to switch from laptops to iPads.
141Um looks like this is uh the procurement of about 720 or so devices. Where does that put us um in the full replacement process? How much longer do we have to go before um all of those laptops are are out? >> This this is four year lease. We uh we do like resale after four years as far as I know. >> So it's it's uh right now myself and Miss Solstice have sat down and we talked about um the plan and it's going to be about a two-year though we do have the lease and it's going to be about a two-year plan. Uh the reason we were looking at this is just the cost effectiveness of having the iPads and the fact that the laptops are not as durable and therefore there's a lot of
142spent time in repairs when it comes to our laptops. The iPads itself have showed success at a middle school level and we're looking to continue on to the high school level. We also did a site visit to one of our uh districts in New Jersey who was iPads all the way up to the high school and saw what the kids were doing and working on and saw that it was continuously still having a positive impact on our student body. >> Thank you. >> And I'm assuming that comes with the keyboard. [snorts] >> Yes, sir. >> Okay. Just making sure. >> And a pen. >> Uh I don't know about the pen. Any pen? No pens. >> Okay. Just wondering >> I you know I I do want to um I I I have to say
143something also the um with the insurance of continuing our Rutgers program. This allows our district our high school tiger rap program to continue and that also is a program that has served our students their families um for well over 30 years probably 33 years without interruption. And that is another um asset that I am very proud that we can offer our students. >> Any other comments? >> Uh just want to mention that the cost for a Rogers contract for general funds is $200,000 because $300,000 comes from DCF grant. So it helps also. >> Okay. Roll call. >> Mr. SO. >> Yes. >> Mr. Mar? >> Yes. >> Miss Penales? >> Yes. >> Miss Gates? Yes, >> Dr. Ser. >> I recuse myself from payments to employee 90014855. Yes to the rest. >> Miss Shower. >>
144Yes. >> Messes. >> Yes. >> Mr. Miller. >> Yes, but I'll stay on number six since it wasn't available for me to review in time. >> Item six only. Yeah. Thank you. Okay. Upcoming meetings May 12th, uh, Wednesday, June 24th and July 28th. Um, we had a facility request from the National Inventors Hall of Fame, uh, STEM camp for at the Easttover Elementary location. U, >> Mr. Miller, could I ask you a quick question about that? And I apologize for not sending it in in advance. Is this for our students? >> The the >> STEM camp. >> The STEM camp. >> Is it for our students? >> I would have to >> It's It's okay. I did not submit this. I can wait on >> I can get I get you that information. I want
145to confirm. I don't want to say yes or no. Yeah. >> My assumption was yes. >> Yes. But Exactly. But I want to confirm that. [laughter] >> Okay. Uh do we have any old business that we need to discuss? Um I just want to remind the board that next month um sent out a reminder at the time we're doing some training uh before the board meeting for one hour. Um school boards is coming to do training both in uh May and June I believe and um that will help us keep our board certification. So we'll send out more information on that uh in the coming weeks. Any new business? >> Mr. Miller, I just wanted to mention since um Miss Phillips is is not with us this evening, um Miss Asavdo did mention that during
146our governance committee meeting, uh we asked Miss Phillips to ensure that the template is available in our Google Docs for sharing of our various committee meeting notes so that we are all in alignment. we are all in the same format and we all provide the same information when we give our review of our various committees because we we we do a lot of work in those committees. So to give a nice synopsis to the public um of the work that we do besides the work that we do here at the table is important. Um so thank you Miss Phillips in uh TV land I hope watching us um for remembering to do that template for us. Okay. Anyone else? >> Uh I also I'll be sending email to the board members for New Jersey school
147boards conference in October. If you can respond for the dates, you're going to be there. I'll [snorts] be appreciated. >> Okay. >> All right. So, we are now going to move to our second public portion of the meeting. Uh the board recognizes the value of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to express themselves on school matters. To ensure fair and orderly expression of such comment, each statement shall be held to a time period of three minutes. Public comments not restricted to items on this budget shall be entertained for approximately 30 minutes upon the discretion of the presiding officer. For those who wish to provide public comment remotely, a Google form was posted on the district website at 6:30 p.m. Remote comments will be read by a member
148of the board of education. The board of education will alternate between in-person and online comments. Please understand that public uh comment portions of our agenda are not structured as question and answer sessions, but rather they are offered as opportunities to share your thoughts with the board. The board may or may not respond to public comments. However, all comments are considered and will be investigated and addressed as appropriate. Please be courteous and mindful of the right of others when providing comments. Comments may not be abusive, obscene, threatening, or irrelevant. Please understand that students and employees have specific legal and privacy protections. This board is not permitted to respond in public to comments about students or employees. Please be advised that you are commenting at your own risk. Any public comments that are directed at a particular
149individual or individuals could subject you to legal liability for defamation. Is there anyone from the public that wishes to speak? Good evening everybody. John Kiglio, 24 Taylor Town Road, Montville. So, I just had a question. Earlier tonight, I believe under section N, student achievement and curriculum, we had a um a number on the item on the agenda that was denied number one. And I just had a question. I was wondering if we can get some clarification on the rationale behind that without giving any names of the staffs that are on the list. And if you can explain how many staff members this impacts and the reason for the um for the decline for number one [snorts] >> that was the graduate courses >> the attachment was not there attachment was missing. We didn't have a
150chance to review it u because the the school board's application has been malfunctioning for several days. >> So, we didn't get to see it, so we couldn't vote on it. >> Okay. So, it's still an active um item that could be approved at the next meeting. >> Yes. Sorry. >> All right. Very good. All right. That's all. Thank you. >> Okay. Anyone else from the public that wishes to be heard? I have one online comment from Joanna Castile. from to Mount Hope a do over. Um the superintendent doesn't care about the employees of the district. He only cares about his own benefits. Employee well-being is not being prioritized. Anyone else from the public? I don't have any other comments. I'll close this portion of the meeting to the public. Can we have a motion to
151adjurnn? >> Mr. Miller, I would like to move that we adjourn tonight's meeting in memory and in honor of Christopher Jeremy Chavez Wami. >> Okay. Do we have a second? >> Second. >> All those in favor? I >> I thank