Dover Public Schools BOE Meeting - 1-04-2022

001agenda here we are call to announcement salute the flag results of the annual school election is number three swearing-in of appointed is for an election of officers and role culture votes and then they're gonna square it in foreign um you know the easiest thing to do i don't know if i have an extra one just having done this a million times the easiest thing to do is to have her have one just like if you each have one and then you could say then she could follow along if it just makes it a little easier let me see if i have an extra one okay i might because then that way that's correct yeah they change the law yeah if people always ask that i think it's the best thing that's the way it's in

002the statute technically it's njsa i know but remember rs stands for revised statutes but i would just read it the way it is no no no no no no no no definitely not you don't have to say our period as period rs is cool but i wouldn't i wouldn't change up to like njsa already it would make sense actually to do that but great um in the game uh well you know one thing all i do is represent schools oh wow and so sometimes sometimes uh just go slow i'm not sure that's a very good question i don't know you don't have to worry too much about yourself oh yeah it shouldn't be too honestly tonight shouldn't be that long because it's what the organization you know there's things that they have to approve but

003but i would not think that it would be um wow thank you thanks yes um i think it's just we're signing one um like is [Music] yeah i literally just crossed it out so is your new office closer is it are you just assigned to a different officer okay [Music] tell me what you see here okay that's super sweet thank you so much good evening everybody uh i would like to open this meeting uh reorganization meeting for the delivery board of education working together as 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 right sorry they're not hearing us or they're not hearing you have to working together as a community our mission is to welcome all and

004provide opportunities for our students in a safe and accepting learning environment to become creative empathetic resilient and who choose to make an impact good evening everyone my name is rosa munoz i'm the translator for the dover district i'm here to help anybody with any translations [Music] the dover board of um acknowledges that the law of the state establishes that members of the public including members of the board have the right to record public board meetings using audio or video recording devices provided that the act recording does not interfere with the business of this public board meeting while the recordings may be used in preparation of the minutes that do not substitute for official legally approved minutes please be advised that audio and or video images will be maintained by the secretary of the board of

005education and will be posted on the district website this meeting which is hereby called the order 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 the daily record and the star ledger on december 23 2021 if everyone would please join me for the flag i pledge salute to the land of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice i'd like to share the results of the annual school election which is held on november 2nd 2021. the results are as follows mr miller with 1347 votes ms mendez with 1170 votes miss nutting with 1109 votes and mr robles with the writing campaign with

006112 votes at this time i'd call a roll call miss gracalis present ms mendez good catch mr miller here miss nutting here miss phillips here mr robles president mr ruiz here dr senor president mr veros present we have a quorum at this time i'm going to be going up to the podium and inviting newly elected appointed dover board members to take the oath of office individually mr miller if you could please join me at the podium please repeat after me i i scott miller do solemnly swear that it will support the constitution of the united states and the constitution of the state of new jersey do solemnly swear that i will support the constitution of the united states and the constitution of the state of new jersey and that i will bear true faith and

007allegiance to the same and to the governments established in the united states and this state under the authority of the people and that i will bear true faith and allegiance to the same and to the governments established in the united states and this state under the authority of the people i i scott miller do solemnly swear that i possess the qualifications prescribed by law for the office of member of board of education and that i am not disqualified as a voter pursuant to r.s.19 semicolon 4-1 do solemnly swear that i possess the qualifications prescribed by law for the office of member of board of education and that i am not disqualified as a voter pursuant to rs 194-1 nor disqualified due to a conviction of a crime or offense listed and njsa18a semicolon 12-1 nor

008disqualified due to a conviction of a crime or offense listed in njsa 18a 12-1 and that will faithfully and partially and justly perform all duties of that office according to the best of my ability and i will faithfully impartially and justly perform all the duties of that office according to the best of my ability congratulations [Applause] at this time i'd like to invite the co-founding chair of morris county pride mr parmigiano up to read the oath to ms mendes thank you all right daniella i i daniella mendez do solemnly swear or affirm that i will support the constitution of the united states and the constitution of the state of new jersey do solemnly swear or affirm that i will support the constitution of the united states and the constitution of the state of new jersey

009and that i will bear true faith and allegiance to the same and to the government established in the united states and that i will bear true faith and allegiance to the same and to the governments established in the united states and this state under the authority of the people under the authority of the people and i i daniella mendes do solemnly swear affirm do solemnly swear or affirm that i possess the qualifications prescribed by law for the office of member of a board of education do solemnly swear or affirm that i possess the qualifications prescribed by law for the office of member of board of a board of education and that i am not disqualified as a voter pursuant rs 19 colon 4-1 and that i am not disqualified as a voter pursuant to rs

01019 4-1 nor disqualified nor disqualified due to a conviction of a crime or offense listed in njsa 8 a colon 12-1 nor disqualified due to a conviction of a crime or offense listed in njsa18a 12-1 and that i will faithfully and impartially and justly perform all the duties and that i will faithfully impartially and justly perform all the duties of that office according to the best of my ability of that office according to the best of my ability congratulations thank you [Applause] i'd like to invite miss nutting up for her oath of office just so you kind of know where i'm gonna stop okay and uh you can sign the other one just return to me afterwards do you solemnly swear that it will support the constitution of the united states and the constitution of

011the state of new jersey do solemnly swear that i support the constitution of the united states and the constitution of the state of new jersey and that i will bear true faith and allegiance to the same and to the governments established in the united states and the state under the authority of the people and that i would bear true faith and allegiance to the same and to the govern government establishment of the united states in this state under the authority of the people i i tia nutting do solemnly swear that i possess the qualifications prescribed by law for the office of member of a board of education and that i am not disqualified as a voter pursuant to rs19 colon 4-1 do you solemnly swear that i confess yeah who says the qualifications prescribed by

012the law of the office of a member of board of education and i am not disqualified as a voter pursuant to rs 19-4 nor disqualified due to a conviction of a crime or offense listed in njsa18a colon 12-1 nor disqualified due to the conviction of a crime or offense listed in njsa 18a death 12.1 and that it will faithfully and partially and justly perform all the duties of that office according to the best of my ability and that i would faithfully and partially and justifiably perform all the duties of the office according to the best of my ability congratulations [Applause] at this time i like to invite mr robles up for his oath of office i just have a sex aye aye benjamin rolas do solemnly swear that it will support the constitution of the

013united states and the constitution of the state of new jersey do solemnly swear that i will support the constitution of the united states on the constitution of the state of new jersey and that i will bear true faith and allegiance to the same and to the governments established in the united states and this state under the authority of the people that i will bear true faith and allegiance to the same and to the governments established in the united states and this state under the authority of the people so help me god i i benjamin gomez do solemnly swear that i possess the qualifications prescribed by law for the office of member of board of education that are not disqualified as a voter pursuant to r dot s dot nineteen colon four dash one do you

014silently say that i possess the qualifications prescribed by law for the office of member of the board of education and i am not disqualified as a voter pursuant to rs 194-1 nor disqualified due to a conviction of a crime or offense listed in njsa18a colon 12-1 nor disqualified due to a conviction of a crime or offense listed in njsa 18 12-1 and that it will faithfully and partially and justly perform all the duties of that office according to the best of my ability and that i will faithfully and partially and justly perform all the duties of that office according to the best of my abilities so help me god congratulations thank you at this time i'd like to uh open uh declare nominations in order for the position of president uh so anyone who would

015like to make a motion for nomination this would be the time miss phillips i would like to make a motion to nominate krista senior for the position of president uh we don't do not need seconds uh for these missions uh at this time i don't see any other motions uh is that accurate uh so at this time i like uh to motion uh i would like a motion to close the nomination that would require a second second i can't do the motion of someone else [Music] okay mr miller move the motion in second you could just do a voice on that all in favor mr slam just brief discussion yes we could have discussion yep great thank you if i may then you may i just want to thank miss phillips for doc nominating dr

016cena and thank dr cena for her service to this board as a vice president and thank ms grasales for her service to this board as president it has been educational and flexible to serve under your leadership and i appreciate that and and look forward um to to the shift with dr senor in leadership so so thank you for stepping up i hope that's an acceptance of the nomination uh because i i know it is is not easy work and it takes a lot of time and i do appreciate the work that you have both done already and the work that dr saner you're about to take on if if i may add a comment i hope the shift is not too much that we remain with shared leadership and that we focus on continue to

017focus on the safety of our kids and our staff and i'm looking forward to um stepping away uh from uh that middle seat so i'm very excited thank you miss phillips for the nomination uh does anyone have anything else to add okay so i would like to um do a voice vote to close nominations all in favor at this time i would like to have a verbal role call uh for the nomin the nomination approving the nomination of dr sanor salas yes miss mendez yes mr miller yes miss nutting yes miss phillips yes mr robles yes mr ruiz yes miss dr sanyor yes with gratitude miss riveros yes motion carries i now give you my [Applause] and seat thank you so thank you very much for your votes of confidence i have extremely big and

018usually quite tall shoes to fill as president i've had the amazing privilege to see the dedication hard work and compassion that ms grasalis brought to her two-year presidency of this board she truly led by example working hard to be the best board member that she could be by attending as many as jsba training sessions as possible and encouraging us as a board to do the same ms grisalis prepared and asked questions at every meeting she led us through a very challenging time when there was massive turnover in the board as our community sought to affect change a transition to a new central administration a new accountability in many areas a pandemic that continues and the beginning stages of a referendum to finally combat the overcrowding that our district has been struggling with for years when

019she became president two years ago i voted for her not because she had served an arbitrary number of years or was supported by the same community organization as i had been but because i believe she was a leader who would bring our board together and challenge us all to do our best over the last two years we have discussed many issues and not always agreed on them but we were both better for having seen the other's perspective agree i hope that you will hold me accountable for doing the same that you will engage me in thoughtful discussions that your votes were a reflection of your expectations that we will all grow together to be better board members i will now accept nominations for vice president dr sander if i may yes i'd like to make

020a motion to nominate carl ruiz for the office of vice president thank you i'd like to also nominate scott miller for the office of vice president thank you may i have a motion to close the nominations i move that we close the nominations at this time second thank you is there discussion yes if i may yes i've seen uh miss ruiz consistently go above and beyond the required tasks as a board member with agenda items she not only reads them but she reviews studies them does research and learns about the agenda item thoroughly then presents a well thought out and very specifically explained questions to us all at the table before voting on those items she has demonstrating a strong knowledge of robert's rules of order which to a pretty new board as we are

021is extremely helpful to have within our shared leadership respect of our no surprises culture so we can all do our own research ahead of time when she poses the many questions and ideas that she always has transparent advocacy to the full board with many ideas comments and questions consistently with the best interest of our children and all school staff in the forefront is what i have seen she has demonstrated in the past four years i have seen her advocate with articles laws studies for programs that meet the current needs of our school community such as breakfast after the bell universal preschool grant in 2018 if you remember the new jersey alliance for immigrant justice welcoming schools policy the njsba gun cultural and mental health services resolution in 19 and most recently in 2020 the njsba

022dream act resolution to my knowledge she is the only board member to at this time that has presented and research resolutions for new policies to the full board in addition to straus esme's recommendations she has been the only board member that i have seen in the past four years who has volunteered to represent us all as our delegate with njsba on saturday long meetings either traveling to trenton or virtually she has been the only board member to educate us on legislative updates that impact our district specifically and finally but not least she has was invited and hosted a panel discussion of school segregation with and by njsba ms reese has demonstrated and consistently implemented shared leadership as a board member by regularly contributing to the creation of our agenda mentorship of other board members knowledge

023of board business individually and her votes for what she analyzes as the best policy for our school community a deep understanding of the needs of our school community as she advocates for them to be met with equity in all aspects while implementing consistent transparent practices in her board work for these reasons i support miss reeves for a shared leadership role as a vice president on this board would anyone else like to speak ms nutting thank you mr dr sander um i would say for both the candidates up i respect both of you it's a hard decision we can't go wrong with either choice so with that said i i just want to say thank you for both of you putting your appreciating the fact that you put your hat out there to do this um

024i this is my fourth or fifth or possibly seventh draft my first version was over five minutes long so you're welcome and it was so long because ms ruiz has so many skills that make her uniquely qualified to support me this board and our community serving as vp requires a significant additional investment in time as vp i served on three committees participated in agenda planning sessions made doodle polls communicated with board members who reached out with questions or suggestions and helped craft responses to numerous community emails i have complete confidence that ms ruiz is capable and willing to perform these roles i support ms ruiz in the role of vice president because she is an njsba certified board member she has invested her time into the weekend-long njsba leadership training as well as many many

025other training opportunities as i think about how ms grasales and i embrace shared leadership and work together more like co-presidents i feel compelled to advocate for ms ruiz for the four years that i have served on the board ms ruiz has always been available to me to talk through issues about how to best advocate for our students as a member of multiple other boards she is truly a master of how to be an effective board member and has been a mentor to me and many of you and has proven invaluable as i have grown personally as a board member one of my expectations is that the vice president will help me to mentor new and less experienced board members which i know ms ruiz will gladly do as she has been doing it for her

026entire tenure on our board i have on occasion over the last four years called ms ruiz with some constructive criticism let's be honest sometimes ms ruiz tries to swat a fly with a sledgehammer and she has always listened to me and tried to see my perspective occasionally we agreed to disagree but every time we were both the richer for our conversation many of you have had these conversations with her as well one more point we must consider as a board member and a teacher i cannot participate in negotiations with our unions our board needs a vice president that has extensive experience with negotiations especially those negotiations in progress as this is one area will i will have to be completely uninvolved in ms ruiz has served on our negotiations team for the past four years

027and has by others account proven invaluable and is capable of complete discretion our board needs this continuity moving forward ms ruiz has helped and debated all of us she has served on every committee often volunteering to take the minutes even if she's not the chair whether the board needs to draft a resolution deliver gift baskets to our schools for teacher appreciation or to stick around after the end of the meeting to help clean up ms ruiz is always willing to serve additionally as ms grasales has said she has researched and advocated for some of our board's biggest accomplishments of the last five years i was still sitting as a member of the public when ms ruiz started recommending breakfast after the bell and are expanding our pre-k program i know that ms ruiz is committed

028to championing our students has the necessary skills and is willing to do the extra work and i can absolutely count on her to hold me accountable and challenge me to be the best president i can be and to grow with all of us over the next 12 months may i have a motion to close the discussion and vote i second okay um mr once you have a motion to say all in favor thank you it's my first night on the job okay voice voice okay um voice vote on closing the discussion all in favor aye aye aye aye thank you um could i have him uh we are going we're gonna vote yeah right the way it works now under board policy you already have the two nominations so the board policy says we vote

029that will now vote in the order in which the members were nominated so the board will vote first for ms mendez the board will vote first for ms ruiz and then um depending on the result of that vote will determine whether you go to the second vote thank you mr crew mr slam could we please have a roll call vote on the um motion for carol ruiz as vice president mr sales yes miss mendes yes mr miller no miss netting yes phillips no mr robles no mr louise yes doctor say nor yes mr riveros yes motion carries thank you mr slam congratulations ruiz [Applause] the public will move to the public participation on agenda items only the board recognizes the value of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the

030public 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 limited to items on this agenda shall be entertained for approximately 30 minutes upon the discretion of the presiding officer since this is a ver virtual meeting occurring during the coven 19 shutdown public comment that is not true okay so i'm just going to skip ahead sorry uh please understand that the public 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

031the 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 at your own risk any public comments that are directed at a particular individual or individuals could subject to legal liability for defamation if you would like please come up to the podium please state your name and address and you have three minutes good evening john coniglio 24 taylor town road monville first i would like to congratulate mr miller ms mendez miss nutting and mr robles for their void appointments this evening and also um dr saner and mrs ruiz on your new appointments as well thank you

032for offering your time to assist the student staff and our dover community as you do secondly at the last meeting i had asked about clarification on the petty cash fund each year for as long as i have been working in dover at this reorganization meeting each school building has been provided a 300 fund to spend throughout the year on small items that are used for educational purposes in the classroom i understand that you're not required to answer questions from the public comment portion but if you could please address this tonight and clarify it i would appreciate it it is on tonight's agenda it seems as if the only location that is receiving the petty cash for the 22-23 school year is in the belmont building please clarify if the fund is being eliminated in the

033schools please thank you are there any other public comments hi my name is blackwell street dover new jersey i want to congratulate all the winners of the the new seats that you're ben and scott and tia and kim welcome and of course my friend daniela welcome on board um you have a big responsibility in taking care of our students so thank you for taking this seriously um on the comment for on the agenda there are the dates for uh 2022. i hadn't missed a town meeting today uh because of the fact that i came here um i would like to attend both meetings in the future and i think the community would welcome that you work together with the town to make sure that we don't have conflicting dates it would help us i would

034appreciate that um i didn't have time to look at the agenda to be honest um but those were the two main things welcome everybody and um [Music] i could breathe a little easier because i know she's an advocate for the transgender community for the lgbtq community and as you know i'm advocating for my for my own family for my child so i now have somebody to reach out to and i hope that what i said in the past happens with training i'm suggesting training for the board on how to work with the lgbtq students i am asking for training for the for the parents for the students for the staff throughout the dover schools and for the hib committee to welcome parents to have an input on what is going on and how to better

035solve our students thank you are there any other public comments could i please have a motion to close public comment it's almost second thank you all in favor aye aye aye any opposed any opposed okay um dr mclaughlin was there anything you would like to address at this time no we don't have any reports this evening uh since it's the reorganization meeting but i would like to highlight that a message was sent out to our community earlier this afternoon indicating that due to the present levels of covet transmission in our district we will have a temporary uh period of remote instruction between the 6th and the 26th of this month so there is a detailed explanation on the website that the parents and community can access under the news and announcements section and then the

036only other item that i'll just bring to everyone's attention just to complicate things further the weather forecaster has indicated that by there might be bad weather for tomorrow which we already have a early dismissal so it will make things interesting if we have to make any other decisions but hopefully if we all think positive thoughts uh that won't happen i'm not sure about that but i'll do it anyway okay um could i have a motion for item uh number seven appointments so move that would be a through q is there a second second um is there any discussion yes i would like to see if we are open to changing some of the regular meetings um i know that uh ms ruiz had mentioned that she researched that there's two conflicts right um i think

037at some point wondering if we could change those or if we are willing to change our meeting to a different tuesday of the month so there's never a conflict because i i think it's harder for the town to change their meetings than it is for us um they've i think they've been in that schedule for a long time so wondering if we would be open to doing anything like that um for our community thank you mr salas dr sander if i may yes please so the dover board of aldermen meetings are on the second and fourth tuesday on the of the month and they have been as mr salas stated that way for a long time the dover board of education meetings are on the third tuesday of the month so generally there is not

038a conflict there is a conflict on july 19 which is the third tuesday of the month so it's a regular meeting um but the town has a meeting that same date and i of course don't speak for this board or that board but it's my understanding that they meet on july 19th because of of end-of-year budget issues which i may imagine is also one of the reasons we need to meet in july but you know the administration can speak to that so that would be the only meeting that we would need to change if we can change it is july 19. of course board members don't only attend one meeting a month this regular session we also have committee meetings so board members generally meet on one of those other tuesdays so board members often

039may not be able to attend a board of aldermen meeting because they're required to be at a board of education committee meeting so perhaps not for this year but it may be something for us to think about to change meetings maybe to wednesdays so that there is never a risk of conflict as long as the board of aldermen keep their meetings on their tuesdays and our reorganization meeting is not a proposed date on here understandably right because that's a that'll be a different board but the board of aldermen does schedule the reorganization meeting the previous year if there is nothing impeding us from doing the same we could ensure that next year there isn't a conflict on the date of reorganization except that you want to at least i'll speak for myself i want to

040hit the ground running so i'd love that reorganization is on the first tuesday as opposed to the second or third so we can get moving and i imagine that the board of aldermen probably has the same thought they they want to get started right away so it may be that reorg always conflicts dr mclachlan would you like to weigh in uh i think as long as we keep it within the third week of the month i think for a business point of view for the district it's it's good timing we have the opportunity in those first weeks to discuss items in committee thoroughly review them and then present them to the board so i don't know that um the day of the week is significant to the administration whether it was a tuesday or wednesday

041um [Music] but uh there is also you know a knowledge within the community that those are the nights that we meet so it might be good to to keep it for that for that reason uh and we certainly could make an adjustment in july i'm not advocating for this in any way i do want to point out that some boards don't meet in the summer so that's that's also another option even if it were just for the month of july that the board might want to consider do they want to bypass that meeting i don't think we have the fiscal significance for july that the town has thank you mr miller just another thing to consider is that there are other town committee meetings that other people are on that are typically on wednesdays as

042well as other committee meetings that try to avoid tuesdays because of the town meetings in the board meeting so if we could only had to change one meeting date that would probably be the best perhaps we could change the july meeting date and that could be something that we work on throughout this year coming up with an alternative to our current schedule just to see if we can better accommodate the public's need does that so uh could i have a motion to change the july meeting date i i just suggested maybe somebody wants maybe you want to just have a discussion about what it should be okay the first tuesday in july is july 5th right after the holiday the second tuesday is july and as i mentioned there's already a board of aldermen meeting

043presumably that day because they meet the second and the fourth um but they switched to the 19th that month we could do that they have their proposed dates on their agenda so if we just take a moment to look at that we might be able to um figure out what day is available in july whether it's the 12th or the miseries are you currently looking at that or would you like um no but i can everybody right now google see who gets their facts so i have the agenda for their reorganization meeting scrolling can we do uh sorry dr center can we do uh look at different dates and do like a google poll or something that we've done in the past to try to narrow down a date i'm proposing to thursday the 20th

044or the 21st that would be okay so when you're proposing which one wednesday the 20th or thursday the 24th and you you want to propose that we do a doodle poll between those two so consider that as a date instead of the 19th okay i i just um suggest it's actually there's a there's good reason for you to can't i'm sorry i can't hear you sorry i suggest that there's good reason that you uh actually set the schedule tonight and the reason for that is under the open public meetings act it it avoids the necessity for notices and it's so it's it's actually important to set the schedule for the year now sometimes you might have to change one during the year and you can do that but there's actually uh there's a reason that

045it would make sense to just to pick a date tonight publish the schedule and then you have your schedule set for the year then if you need to change one later or if even if you decided you didn't need to have two meetings in the summer which as dr mclaughlin said many boards meet only once or not at all in the summer but i think it would be beneficial to to come up with a date now dr sander if i may yes please i uh move that we meet on july 12th not july 19 2022 to respect that there may be other obligations on different days of the week but tuesdays we may already be holding uh separate both board members and the administration and the members of the public thank you ms ruiz is

046there a second and i would just add that there's only one july 19 meeting for the board of aldermen so that july 12th date will not conflict with the board of aldermen meeting thank you second thank you if i dr zainer can i amend that motion absolutely is there um i am end that we add to this motion and add january reorganization meeting to the schedule yes um can anybody have a calendar up i didn't know there was so much googling involved in being president um does anyone have a calendar up to see what that first tuesday is yeah while you're getting yes while you're getting the calendars up you've already kind of alluded to it i just wanted to point out that the board of education is required to have its organization meeting during

047the first week of january so the date you pick has to be during that period okay and dr cena i would just add that the board of aldermen re-org meeting is january 3rd 2023 so that would be my amendment that we do as well on january 3rd because we could not do it just from what john said we need to do it that first week so so we have a motion on the table to change the july 19th to july 12th and we have a motion to set our 2023 reorganization meeting to also be on january 3rd 2023. is it the same as the town rio i think they wanted to go to both is there if i make make a suggestion it's probably good to do the one first because otherwise we've got two

048competing functions to amend thank you mr crew so why why don't we you've already got a motion to amend the pending motion to change the july date to july 12th okay mr kroot may uh can we do a voice vote or do we need to do a roll call for that you could do a voicemail okay could i have a all in favor of changing the july 19th meeting to july 12th uh all opposed okay motion carries um could i have another emotion the motion on the table is to have our reorganization meeting on january 3rd is is there a second yes is there a second second okay a discussion mr miller so i thought we wanted to have a reorg meeting in a different night than the town so that people could go to

049both of them i thought that was the whole point of changing the dates correct and my my emotion um dr it would be to remain on january 3rd because that's typically we need to have it that week um and uh typically i'm only available on tuesdays so that's the reason why i would make it only for me okay thank you miss grasales ms nutting dr sander from may how about i make a motion that we actually amend that and have it on that monday which would be january 2nd miss netting i don't believe we can amend the amendment ms ruiz i believe that we have to vote on this amendment and if it does not pass you could make an an alternative amendment she can also make a new motion and you can right now

050motion to die and i point something out and i it's not about this motion but the pending motion that that monday we're not open the school district okay okay so the school is not open on the second doctor if i may yes please um i think that we just went through all this trouble to look at the calendar and change our july meeting date to then go and schedule our reorgan 2023 on the same day that's kind of like counterproductive so i think we need to strongly consider uh changing that date in 2023 okay ms mendez do you have a motion that you would like to propose we have to finish this motion out there okay so any more discussion i'm sorry right the current motion is is to to set the organization meeting date

051for 2023 on tuesday january 3rd mr miller what i just said was that we didn't want it like we didn't want on the same day so why don't we make it the wednesday so it doesn't conflict with the town meeting okay so we are going to and is there any more discussion ms ruiz i just want to make sure i heard dr um mr crew correctly the doctor would be accurate he does have a juris doctor of my professors in law school right that we must have our reorganization meeting the first week of january so our options then are monday january 2nd which is not an option because the school is closed our option is tuesday january 3rd which falls on the same night as the board of aldermen's meeting that they presumably are voting

052on tonight or will vote on and the fourth the fifth and the sixth wednesday thursday friday i just would have a question for discussion that i imagine some of us can answer are there committee meetings that first week and if there aren't for the board of aldermen or the board of education then that certainly would leave wednesday and thursday open um but that would also sounds like at least one of our board members would not be available for for that reorg so just discussion just for us to think about anyone okay then uh at this moment we have one amendment on the table so um i think we should do a roll call vote for this mr slam if you wouldn't mind a roll call vote the motion on the table is to um set

053our 2023 reorganization meeting as july 3rd 2023. january 3rd january 3rd sorry january 3rd 2023. sorry just shuffling some pages miss grasales yes miss mendes no mr miller well i'm going to say yes only because i didn't realize that she wouldn't be able that mr salas wouldn't be able to make it and we should make every attempt to have every board member there for the reorganization miss nutting yes miss phillips no no no mr robles no ruiz i wanted to say yes but miss philip snow was so awesome now i want to say no um i abstain i i honestly i i think we've made a lot of progress from a lot of conflicting meetings to just one dr sanor yes miss viveros yes motion carries thank you okay so back to the original i'm

054lost back to the original motion for item seven appointments a through q we have a motion and a second is there any more discussion i guess the only question that i would have is is there anything different from the appointments that we had from last year they all look the same but i'm not sure dr mclaughlin can you address that please there are some uh changes slight changes in item q in regard to our liaisons for example i believe the recreation i don't i don't think i was the destiny to the recreation committee um not that it's a very active um post but it is one that we do appoint every year so that's a difference i i don't believe that there's a recreation commission any longer well that'll make that job very easy but

055i do i do um i i guess i would be the liaison whenever the recreation department makes a quotient you just cross out commission and you're good okay okay um mr slam i believe we're ready for a roll call vote on item seven oh sorry dr sander more discussion if i may sure um so item seven is now amended to include under d july 12 instead of july 19 and january 3rd 2023 as our reorganization meeting which as we know still conflicts with the town's board of ed board of aldermen reorganization meeting our meeting time for a public session is 6 30. i believe their meeting time for reorganization is 6 p.m so maybe for just to try to accommodate the public as much as possible just for reorg we could meet at 7pm so

056that people could go could start at the board of aldermen and and come to the board of ed afterwards if they are looking to witness the swearing in which is i think what some members of the public are are most excited about ms ruiz i like that idea but our administration starts work very early in the morning so i would counter that with perhaps five o'clock is that possible we are used to having committee meetings starting at 5 p.m so could we entertain the idea of 5 p.m and switch it around they would start here and then move on to town hall mr miller and then miss vavares i think that's too early people are not really out of work at that time 5 30 i'll entertain you the discussion or emotion doctor senator if

057i may yes i move to amend the motion to approve appointments section 7 d to a meeting start time of 5 30 for the january 3rd 2023 reorganization meeting i second that okay any discussion on the amendment okay that's the executive i'm sorry that's the executive session we're doing there is no executive session at the reorganization meeting so our regular reorganization session with uh i'm sorry our regular reorganization meeting would start at 5 30. so first versus 6 30. 5 30. right 5 30 i think he's sorry if i may i think i hear mr robles saying versus 6 30. that's what i said yeah yes so yes 5 30 instead of 6 30. just for that one meeting and we're doing this to try to accommodate for whoever wants to go to the other

058meeting to try to be here and go over there is that what we're doing yes that is my understanding i mean i think it would have been easier to move the meeting than try to adjust the hours but i understand the rationale thank you for clarifying okay so we have a motion on the table do we have a set we do have a second we do have a second if there's no more discussion mr slam could i have a roll call vote on changing the time of our reorganization meeting on january 3rd 2023 to 5 30 p.m yes sorry miss gracalis yes miss mendez abstain mr miller yes miss nutting yes miss phillips yes mr robles no mr ruiz yes dr sanor yes mr veros yes motion carries okay um that brings us to um

059appointments by the president um with the boards we still have to handle the main big overall motion and i have one other item sorry to prolong this uh but item q just has a typo i'd like to point out it's not for the 21 22 school year it's for the 22 23 school year thank you if no one objects you could just make that correction any objection okay for real this time now we're voting on i need some way to keep track of this okay so we are voting on item seven appointments a through q with the already agreed upon amendments which i will not list again okay mr slam could we have a roll call vote please mr solis yes miss mendez yes mr miller yes miss netting yes miss phillips yes mr robles

060yes mr ruiz yes i i just if i may just take a moment you can if there is a part of it that anyone doesn't agree with like the amendment you can vote no on section d yes on the rest so i'm voting yes on all of them thank you dr sanor yes miss riveros yes motion carries thank you okay moving on to item seven appointments by the president with the board's agreement i would like to table items eight and nine appointments and committee assignments and invite you all to send me as we've done in the past your preferences in regards to appointments such as the njsba delegate assembly and alternate morris county school board association ed services as well as committee preferences in the past it's been past precedent to try to accommodate everybody's

061preferences in committee while also maintaining continuity from previous committees so that the important work being done in each committee is there's some institutional knowledge there as well as a preference for schools that you would be responsible for representing the board at mr dr mclaughlin dr cena the only request i would make is if we could um agree to the negotiations committee this evening only because that committee may need to meet before our next board meeting dr mclachlan would it be acceptable if the um if everyone emailed me their preferences by friday and i would give you the list of members by monday uh that that's fine this loan it doesn't have to be board approved um mr cruz i'm reading your policy right now uh dr saner sanerfemi ms ruiz it's my understanding that the

062appointments of committees are at the pleasure of the president so the board would not need to approve dr senor's appointment onto the negotiations committee um and if the board president was making a motion to table those items listed then i would second that yeah the the ms ruiz is correct your policy does provide unless you were creating an ad hoc committee which is different the the board the policy does provide for the president to make the uh appointments to the committee and actually if if no one if no one disagrees because items eight and nine have not been moved yet as long as everyone's uh consents to it you can just i think you could just table those for the next agenda i don't think you have to go through a formal motion okay uh

063we already have a motion and a second on the table should we just do a voice vote both fine okay um could i have a voice vote all in favor of tabling uh items eight and nine um until the next meeting on january 18th i believe all in favor aye aye any opposed okay thank you please send me an email by friday evening um regarding those three appointments uh new jersey delegate assembly morris county school boards at services we need both a representative and an alternate as well as your committees please send me at least two if you want to you know send three so that we can take that into consideration i think that would be wonderful okay moving on to uh communication i apologize i was not ready for this tonight give me

064just a moment um okay since our last meeting uh we have received two emails uh to the whole board uh on 12 31 2021 we received a email from rosanna baez about her concerns about safety amid the covid surge and a student's return to school and we received a comment on january 2nd 2022 from melissa marazzo regarding concerns about safety amid the coveted surge and the return to school are there any other whole board communications that i am unaware of or forgot dr cena may i yes miss gracalis there was one more by miss maria chacon which she actually spoke in the public comments section as well asking for the calendar changes okay thank you very much are there any other communications okay under old business you had in your board packet both virtually and

065digitally the code of conduct for the board of education is there any question or discussion about this we adopted this a couple years ago i read over it today it i hope that i am living up to these and i hope that you um you know find them to be a good guide for what we should be doing as well comments mr slam i would just like to say if at the end of the meeting everyone could uh after after the everyone has had a chance to uh re-review the code of conduct if everyone could please find me at the front of the table here and i'll have everyone sign a single copy and then i can make a copy of that and email it to everyone so everyone has a copy if i just

066just want to clarify there's two different uh documents in this item the one is the dover board of education code of conduct the other is the code of ethics for school board members which is that which is the document that each board member needs to sign for mr slam and acknowledge that you received dr cena if i may excuse me just to clarify we are signing both is that your intention mr slam yes both documents will be signed okay uh the the actual code of ethics each person would sign individually um and then the code of conduct i i'll have one sheet where everyone will sign and then i'll send that out to everybody thank you ms ruiz do you would you do you still have a comment please yes dr saner we are required

067um to abide by the code of ethics um which is like in blue in front of us and what uh mr crew was referring to we are not required to abide by the dover board of education code of conduct which is the other two page document in front of us um so i don't know whether a motion is necessary to then make this a governing document for us almost like a bylaw or if we wish to just sign it and kind of promise to follow it if it's not required and if the board doesn't fully vote on it then anyone who wishes to not sign it doesn't have to sign it so i would move that we adopt the dover board of education code of conduct as is as we did have time to review

068it um and and follow mr slam's instructions and sign it after the meeting okay is there a second second okay um the motion on the table is that we are adopting the code of conduct for the dover board of education is there any discussion okay um mr slam roll call vote please miss chrysalis yes miss mendes yes mr miller yes miss nutting yes miss phillips yes mr robles yes mr ruiz yes dr sator yes miss riveros yes motion carries thank you okay uh we've moved into code of ethics um and we'll move on to local department of health excuse me dr saner yes sir we have in the past read their ethics and each of us are taking a i don't know if that's something that we want to do this time around thank you

069for the reminder yes why why don't we do that if we could maybe start and let's start at one end ms ruiz would you start with a and we'll just move around the table new jersey statute annotated 18a colon 12-24.1 code of ethics for school board members a school board member shall abide by the following code of ethics for school board members a i will uphold and enforce all laws rules and regulations of the state board of education and court orders pertaining to schools desired changes shall be brought about only through legal and ethical procedures i will make decisions in terms of the educational welfare of children and will seek to develop and maintain public schools that meet the individual needs of all children regardless of their ability race creed sex or social standing c

070i will confine my board action to policy making planning and appraisal and i will help to frame policies and plans only after the board has consulted those who will be affected by them i will i thought you were going to read mr slam go ahead yes i will carry out my responsibility not to administer the schools but together with my fellow board members to see that they are well run with the annotation that i'm not a board member but you still abide by it i will recognize the authority rests with the board of education and will make no personal promises nor take any private action that may compromise the board i will refuse to surrender my independent judgment to special interests or partisan political groups or to use the schools for personal gain or for

071the gain of friends i will hold confidence of all matters pertaining to the school which i disclose would needless injure individuals or the schools are in the matters i would provide accurate information and con concert of my fellow board members interpreted to the staff and the aspirations of the community for its school h i will vote to appoint the best qualified personnel available after consideration of the recommendation of the chief administrative officer i will support and protect school personnel and proper performance of their duties i will refer all complaints to the chief administrative officer and will act on the complaints at public meetings only after failure of an administrative solution thank you all okay moving on um local department of health so i believe um crisis has been uh averted uh at this point the

072there is temporary local health coverage through the county uh department of health and also through the rockweed township department of health i've also been notified by mr bennett that there is an individual being appointed i don't know if that's occurring this evening at the town's meeting but in very short order there will be a a local individual and also i think there was a vote tonight on a temporary health officer until that individual could start so it's probably not appropriate for me to bring up who those are uh since those haven't been appointed yet but the crisis as you may know was with the change in the health department we weren't sure we were going to have local health department guidance and at this time we we certainly do thank you for that update any

073comments or questions about that okay ms mendes would you like to address hybrid public comment please yes thank you dr saner given the spike in the pandemic and the proposed referendum it's necessary for our board to include the public viewing from home in the public comment currently we only receive public comment from those who come to the in-person meeting i propose that the district administration develop a system in which people can participate via phone zoom and or submit a written public comment electronically from home for example we could allow email comments no later than tuesday morning at 10 am i move that the board tasked the administration with this and have it ready for the february regular session thank you uh as ms mendez uh made a motion is there a second second thank you

074discussion mr miller i'm not clear on what we're asking the administration to do is it email have them send emails to ask questions and we read the emails during i believe ms mendez it correct me from i believe that she's tasking the administration to come up with a plan and they they will determine what is feasible or not feasible so it may be everything or a subset okay that's good i'm good with that can we consider and i don't know dr mclaughlin if you would know what other boards have you seen with experience for the boards with personal people participating that are not in the actual meetings not not that i'm aware of i know that there were systems that were put in place when meetings were virtual and some some districts do have a

075virtual i know mine hill for example tonight has a virtual meeting uh so i know that there had to be adaptations for virtual meetings i i personally don't know i'm not saying that there aren't but i personally don't know of any uh boards that are currently uh meeting in person and having a hybrid comment period um and i maybe mr crew has a better vision of that since he's you know all over the state i also wanted to ask mr croot does this in any way blur the distinction between correspondence which we refer to at the on the board agenda versus public comment i i think that um well let me just address the first issue first i the meetings that i go to um all the boards were accepting you know virtual comments during

076remote meetings because you had to essentially um after the uh boards went back into public uh you know meeting in person um most of them reverted to going back to what they had done before which was have public comment in person as well um i i one of my boards was still accepting because there was logistical issues because everybody was in person having zoom comments apparently presented you know more logistical problems and things but that one board did continue to receive email comments um during a you know up to a certain point of time or you know they i forget the exact details but they did continue to receive email comments for a period of time but actually just a few weeks ago switched to now going to the having all the comments be made

077in public in person but so i did but i did see at least one board that continued to receive email comments um after they return to in-person meetings as far as what they would do the correspondence i think it would be treated differently typically when you have the email comments you set them up to be received at a during a certain time like maybe after 2 p.m on a certain day and before 7 pm or whatever and but have them mentioned in the say in the comments section that it's a public comment and also have the person state their name and address most of the boards were very particular just as if somebody in person has to state their name and address if they got a comment that didn't have the name and address they

078wouldn't read it so i don't think it's necessarily inconsistent with the correspondence section because you could receive correspondence at any time if you set up a public comment email system for instance i think it just would have to be specific that you do it on a certain day listed as public comment and and deal with it that way so it is possible ms ruiz thank you dr saner i just want to read our dover public schools vision statement it's one sentence uniting students staff families and communities to learn grow and succeed in an ever-changing world we agreed on this vision statement before the pandemic and our world has changed so one i want to make sure that the decision we make is in line with that vision and two it's our job to make the

079decision in the best interest of our students and school community and it's in the interest of our students and schools community for administration to prioritize and use their time wisely so while i fully support ms mendez's proposal to provide an opportunity for some hybrid public comment session given the tools that mr crew shared of perhaps having a specific public comment at doverpublicschools.org email and a limited time frame i do think it's important for us to know what challenges may exist for our administration between now and february is that a reasonable time frame is there a staff person that can or a board member that can monitor that email there's logistics that i think we have to think about and either step up and volunteer to take um to take on or or task the board

080president and vice president to take that on or hear from the administration as to [Music] who might best fit that role thank you dr mclaughlin i don't you don't have to be on the spot if you don't want to but if you have any thoughts i just uh so reflecting on how that worked when we were all virtual um we did put together a sheet which um i think sometimes was evolving as as the meeting went on so i think we learned some things from that i i do think it was um and it isn't ray so i won't embarrass him by saying this but i do think it was a little burdensome for the uh board secretary at the time to do that in the midst of the meeting um not saying that these

081things couldn't be overcome but the other reflection i would have is that public comment is a since it's a board function i wouldn't ever want to give the image of it being administratively controlled uh because i think that could be a perception that that happens obviously we wouldn't seek to do that but perception is also important if i may dr zainer yes um if i i think we have a motion in a second right yes if i can make a motion to amend that we extend the period to maybe not february but the next meeting and if administration can figure out a best way of doing it i can certainly volunteer to be the person to monitor the public comments and make sure that we are reading them and especially i could you know do

082english and spanish if needed um dr mclaughlin would that be acceptable if we uh made would that be a better time frame if we extended the deadline for dr made a motion to amend the motion on the table second so we need a second and a vote on that before we discuss thank you thank you miss vivero okay now that you have a motion in a second you could you could discuss the event proposal thank you dr mclachlan if you have any thoughts about the proposed i don't know why there are so many amendments tonight thank you for practicing trial by fire thank you dr mclaughlin uh well i certainly think we could work within that time frame especially since it's involving a uh a volunteer board member thank you so that that i think

083whoever is doing that needs to be part of the process and you agree with the february timeline or with the next one that i'm proposing [Music] you for march for march we could certainly do it for march can i just a clarifying question are we being tasked with looking into this or are we being tasked with having it done by march because those are two different things can i refer back to ms mendez i don't want to put i don't want to interpret what you said i think that my idea was for the administration to look into it and figure out which is the best way for us to kind of implement it so so does that mean an implementation then or is that just us discus bringing it back to the board and saying

084here's all our choices what are your thoughts correct okay yeah ms ruiz dr saner i just want to make uh make sure that we all understand what the motion is and what we are voting on what i heard and please correct me uh motion maker and amendment maker is that by the next meeting which it's january 18. no that would happen no february it was by february thank you so by by february 15th we would have options you can make your own email you can do this you can do that and then we would vote on it on february 15 and implement it march 15th so the public would not be able to participate in a hybrid manner until march 15 by which time i prayed to god it wouldn't even be necessary but we

085thought this would last two weeks so i i agree we need to plan ahead um is is that right now the motion as we all understand it that's that was the original motion as you understood it but there currently is an amendment pending which would push i think push the whole thing back one meeting i think correct that i i was under the impression that we had to implement it by february so my amendment was to push the implementation until march but if it's only ideas on february then i retract my amendment and who if everyone is who seconded the amendment that was ms are you okay with retracting that amendment with this new understanding okay so there is no amendment we are we are voting on the original proposal um unless with the clarifications

086unless there's any more discussion mr robles yeah just to understand so the the information that we're trying to gather in terms of public comments is solely the responsibility of the board of education not the administration to to sort of gather that information i know we did it because of the pandemic and there was a channel that we we needed to use because of that moment but is it the responsibility of us or is it the responsibility of the administration i i think it will to some extent the administration will have to be involved in the in the receiving of the you know the comments but i think the idea is that the reading of the comments and the actual handling of it during the board of the way i understood it the the handling of

087it during the board of education meeting may involve a board member reading the comments as opposed to the board secretary trying to do it well i'm not sure i think that would be part of what we bring back in january because my point was that if public comment is coming to is could be perceived to be filtered through the administration to the board member who's reading it that might not be the best i still volunteer though if i made dr senor yes i feel like it is our main responsibility with the assistance of administration when it comes to public comment but i think it's more of on us as board members to ensure that we are hearing and and and almost filtering it down to them rather than them to us yeah i think just

088the the reason why i'm asking is because understanding the point that dr mclachlan broke i think is a very valid point not to be going through a filter as it might be perceived even though it's not um then i would say that the responsibility solely lies on the administration setting it up and letting it run through the board and not them having to even touch it ideally obviously they have to do something with it fine but otherwise grasales or whoever else to just receive everything and handle everything and channel it through the board and not have to really involve them to alleviate one less thing that they have to really monitor or look at but i understand the the concept that that's being brought up so i just want to make that point thank you

089um any other discussion before we vote uh okay so the motion on the table is for the administration in conjunction with ms grasalis to propose options for collecting additional public comment via other means and they will present this to us in february with the idea that we would implement it in march if possible is that everyone's understanding okay mr slam could we have a roll call vote please mr sales yes miss mendes yes mr miller yes miss nutting yes miss phillips yes mr robles yes i actually just thought of a question and i'm sorry i didn't bring it up before so i don't know if i wait till the vote and then just ask the question we're in the middle of it once you're in the middle of voting you really should not have any

090further discussion yes mr ruiz yes dr sanor yes ms riveros yes motion carries thank you okay um i have no other new business dr santa did i miss something mr miller i just have one thing that based on this discussion are we going to be virtual for our next meeting or are we in person excellent question i'm well let me point one piece out that may help the board in terms of that discussion so as you know we are for it until january 26th all remote for students but our staff is reporting to work and i'll just say i think if we're asking our staff to be here in the district i don't know that it what what type of um message it would send for the board to be remote but that's that's just

091my input no i'm good with that i just wanted to know for sure um any more discussion about that i don't think we need to vote on it we are playing right that that is the norm for us to be present in uh at our january regular meeting okay is there any other new business dr saner ms ruiz i did send an item um this morning which is probably why it's not on on the agenda i apologize um i i just want to name the courage of a member of our school community and and name it out loud um because it's already in the newspaper so it's it's public knowledge uh nicholas suarez is a dover high school alumnus and a former dover tigers soccer player and in the first hours of the new year

092he ran back into his sorry i got very emotional you know you all know this he ran back into his burning home to ensure that his cousin a current dover high school student got out safely that is very heroic and i think that all of us also understand how dangerous that was for everyone so just like we have fire drills or at least i do in my place of business and we do here in our school district and all our schools it can be life-saving for families to have a fire safety plan in their homes i also want to name the work of our district's community liaison ms madeline aragon she does not do that work alone we have other community liaisons in the registrar's office but the community liaison team has been supporting our

093student and his family and their neighbors who are impacted by this fire this tragedy and it's it's work that we we hope the community liaison never has to do but we know it's work that needs to be done so i'm truly grateful that the position exists and that miss aragon stepped up to to support this family and our community always steps up right we know with both funds and and donations that we always help each other it's one of the reasons i love our community so much so thinking about all this and our commitment as board members to present community forums with a minority of board members hosting or presenting these forums and the commitment of our district administrators to present community forums all to encompass our school community focus right it's not just a

094building you go for class this is a school community i hope that we can discuss if our first community forum as a board or one of the community forums that the administration hosts would be a joint community forum with the fire department to one address safety that's paramount i know that many of our families are new immigrants and i can speak for myself as a new immigrant family it was more often that my mother took the batteries out of the um out of the fire alarm because she was frying platanos than it was that god forbid we actually needed to run out of the house because of a fire um and and i imagine my mother was not the only one so this is something that we do need to talk about with our community

095and and ensure that everyone understands fire safety a little bit better and also to introduce to any of our students who may not already be familiar with the fire department the great opportunity to make that a career the great opportunity to volunteer clearly nicholas suarez was courageous enough to run into a burning building um what a great volunteer firefighter or career firefighter he may make so um so that that is my point of discussion for us to consider if the district isn't already in conversations with the fire department for a community forum soon then maybe it's something the board can take on thank you so i did have the opportunity today to speak with uh captain sperry uh it's it's really follow-up discussion that that we began earlier this year captain sperry is very uh

096committed to restarting fire prevention education he indicated that at one time it was a fairly vibrant program in the schools and he reached out earlier this year he's been in dialogue with at least two of our principles about setting up those forums um and actually would have been already in some of the schools if the fire department was also impacted by covet and one of the uh concerns he had was bringing some of that with them into the building so it did get delayed a bit but he is uh he is committed to that program we discussed uh community education community provision of smoke alarms for people who may want want them and the fire department has them to distribute so he is definitely very much on board with that i did not bring up

097the idea of a community forum wasn't wasn't a topic that we talked about but i can say after speaking with him that i'm sure he would not have no problem with that thank you okay any more discussion on that any more new business that i'm not aware of okay thank you at this time i would like to 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 assure ensure fair and orderly expression of such comment each statement shall be held to a time period of three minutes public comments limited they are not limited to items on the agenda public comments about anything shall be entertained for approximately 30 minutes please understand that the public comment portions of our

098agenda 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 at your own risk any public comments that are directed at a particular individual or individuals could subject you to legal liability for defamation are there any public comments if there are please step up to the podium

099state your name and address and you will have three minutes all right good evening again john conniglio 24 taylor town road montville i would like to start by addressing a concern in all of our dover schools tonight when our female staff members are out on maternity leave can we please do a better job of being proactive and making certain that there is a permanent long-term replacement in the classroom in order to provide the best transition for our students women who are out on maternity leave often notify the district months in advance of their absence which gives us plenty of time to hire maternity leave replacement instead of having a merry-go-round of substitutes secondly a few meetings ago the thought of a district-wide climate survey had been discussed there was also a discussion about it costing

100an exorbitant amount of money the ultimate goal here is to listen to our staff and garner that feedback to improve our district appropriately i don't think that spending large sums of money is necessary in this endeavor google forms could even be an option i will gladly offer my assistance in any way possible in the development and distribution of the survey i just feel that if we are being honest with ourselves and we want to make dover a place that retains great staff members we need to hear from our staff sooner rather than later thank you for your time thank you are there any other public comments seeing no more public comments i'm going to close the public comment section section would anyone mr dr mclaughlin like to address any of the public comments just uh

101the earlier i know in the first public comment there was a question regarding petty cash so petty cash does continue to exist as a vehicle in the district for people who are approved for expenditures that decision was made last year reviewed with the policy committee to have one petty cash distribution which is not unusual many districts have that versus the management of petty cash throughout the district so we increase the amount uh we have it located in the business office under the direction of the business administrator but it's open for all buildings the location of where the petty cash is really is is just who is managing it versus having several accounts so that's that's what went into the petty cash um the decision it's still available as a an item as mr slam can

102attest to things like petty cash are usually the things that draw the attention of the auditor because they're often not managed in the way the best fashion possible having it under the business administrator really helps us do that okay thank you dr saner if i may yes ms grasalis and mr slam did you are you next i was just going to add absolutely so mr slam and then miss grasales uh though i just wanted to add that there will be uh additional guidance coming out on petty cash which will be going to the school principles so that way everyone's clear on the process for accessing it and then the back of documentation that we'll be looking for mr slam may you please repeat again they have you can't hear i just wanted to add that

103there will be information coming out guidance that will go into the school principles that will provide information on what we'll be looking for and what the process will be in order to access the petty cash what sort of backup we'll need and things of that nature thank you miss grasales i just wanted to take a few seconds to thank um all board members to thank all the administrators um and especially the community for your patience while we get our new footing with our amendments and all our voting and i know it was a lot tonight compared to what we've had in the past but i have to say that we did a good job in trying to be as clear as possible so i just wanted to thank you everyone for your patience ms ruiz

104thank you dr saner climate study is one of my favorite topics so i just want to make sure that we're clear on it we had a long discussion that i personally found confusing so i just want to make sure that we start off the year responding to a climate study clearly so every board member knows where we are and the public knows where we are my understanding is that we do have a climate study finally wonderful coming not started just this minute that that climate study will use a tool that i'm sure mr igliano can clarify which tool it may be that that climate study will be administered by the new york university schools transformation program that it will initially be administered at a certain grade levels not district-wide with the intent that we will

105keep moving forward to a district-wide um a district-wide climate study and that this board has agreed to invest in a climate study administrator because while google forms certainly um is a helpful tool it is not a tool available to all not not every parent for example in our community may be able to access it and and manage it and it's it's also not a um objective tool if we don't have someone to administer it is dr mclaughlin going to administer it and with all due respect to our superintendent are we then going to trust him right is this information that we so desperately need and want going to be filtered through the superintendent who will be subject of some of these questions i think we need to be very clear and honest about that so

106that's why we're investing in an administrator instead of using a available and easy tool like a google form thank you and and if there's any correction on that please yeah let me just clarify so nyu is not administering the the tool we purchased the tool um that was part of the delay and john i'll take you up on your offer to partner with you um to get the survey out there and started a committee needs to come together of staff to choose the questions as well as parents a google form will be coming out for them to sign up to become of a parent steering committee that will also look at the questions for families so we need to create the survey with committees then it will go out the follow-up that's happening next year

107are the small focus groups that's with nyu at the end of when when we're done administering the survey from the dashboard nyu will analyze that survey and present that ms cyrigliano could uh if is there i'm sorry i do not remember is there a tentative timeline for these focus um they're not focus groups the steering committees to be established and start their work uh january february okay so soon yeah awesome anything else miss viveros miss sergiano you said next year do you mean 2023 i mean 22-23 for the focus groups that was the piece that was kind of divided the focus group follow-ups so just to clarify in the remainder of the 21-22 school year we will have the survey part occurring and then at the starting presumably around september 2022 through the 2023 school

108year we will dive into those focus groups correct thank you ms ruiz thank you dr saner mr igliano's correction on the tool reminded me of a correction i failed to make during old business so i just wanted at the last session i believe i i wanted to or i made a motion to task the administration to look into the sda's designation formerly known as abbott district and i stated that our district did not seek that designation and mr miller corrected that and explained that the district did seek the admin the designation and and then the courts did not include us um so so i didn't say it at that time mr miller's correct about that um and i did some more research and received information from from the public as well um like old daily

109record reports the courts decided that designation and um awarded the money mostly if not completely to urban school districts that meant the eligibility keeping out not just over because we at that time were not considered an urban school district i believe that we may be now but but other districts so as the administration continues to explore that it would be beneficial to look at other districts that were left out and that could be a coalition of the left outs to now try to seek some more funding is is that a motion or just a comment just a clarification thank you yeah if i may actually i miss i would like to discuss that with you it sounds good because i have started i have started to look into that issue obviously with the holidays oh

110that's right i forgot it was kicked over yeah and we um you know i'm hoping to report on it uh at least initially uh perhaps at the next meeting at your service mr crew thank you mr croot and ms ruiz is there anything else if not i would entertain a motion to adjourn so moved i heard mr miller is there a second second miss nutting all in favor aye any opposed no thank you all have a wonderful night let's just remember to give ourselves and to clean up yes we have two we have three tasks please uh sign mr slam's paper please help clean up the table clause and other materials and also please turn in your signed code of ethics thank you for the reminder