001to order i'm going to ask everyone to please our viewers tonight to please mute themselves we're just getting a little feedback okay thank you so much due to the covet 19 health emergency and in order for the board of education to conduct its business this board meeting is being held via video conference and streamed on youtube on the district website at www.ebnet.org in addition members of the public may provide comment at this meeting through zoom by entering the url meeting id and password you will see before you on the screen there it is upon joining the meeting your participation will be muted to ensure that there is no disruption to the business being conducted by the board of education will the secretary please call the role mr carangelo here mrs chu here mr sismar here
002mrs guass here mr holland mrs lax here mrs reese here mr winston here president becker we have a quorum please rise to salute the flag i pledge allegiance and to the republic for which it stands with liberty and justice for tomorrow public meeting law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting their interests is discussed in accordance with provisions of the sac the east brunswick board of education has caused notice of this meeting to be posted at the board of education office written notice was also provided to the sentinel the newark star ledger the home news and tribune and the municipal clerk of east brunswick all board of education meetings with the exception of executive session
003discussions are videotaped for later broadcast individuals who speak at the board's public meeting should be aware of these videotaping rules good evening we're going to start off tonight as we always do with our superintendent report dr valesky thank you president becker and good evening everyone as we plan for our return to hybrid instruction on monday february 8th each school continues to take precautions to prevent the spread of viruses and other germs by cleaning and sanitizing daily beyond recommended standards additionally it is imperative that we all adhere to the centers for disease control and prevention establish safeguards accounting for all students who are returning in our restart of hybrid instruction our instructional space model is built on maintaining six feet of distancing and wearing masks except during the consumption of food or drink in very limited
004controlled and spatially separate situations at this moment we have accounted for every child occupying a space and the distancing required for everyone's optimum safety if you have any questions about the learning model you have selected please contact my office at 732-613-6705 i will continue to keep the community updated tuesdays and fridays and we'll share covet guideline changes as we are notified of them parents and guardians please help us prepare for next week by reintroducing your young children to their mask if they have not worn it in a while proper fit and wearing it both over the mouth and nose will protect your child as well as all of those around them for this restart in return to hybrid instruction the new jersey department of health guidelines for recommended quarantines have changed quarantines for this restart
005could range anywhere from a few individuals in a classroom to an entire building each case will be analyzed on its own circumstances and on our ability to verify contacts through tracing conducted by our school nurses in consultation with the middlesex department of health and our ability to safely continue face-to-face hybrid instruction i want to be completely candid if we encounter any circumstances that present unsafe conditions for students or staff i will not hesitate to close a school groups of schools or even the entire district again that being said though our collective efforts can help us sustain our restart to hybrid instruction and i'm confident of that ultimately we have a shared responsibility to keep ourselves and each other safe our school their success will be dependent on our individual commitment to be transparent about positive
006covet 19 test results as well as all contacts in the event of an exposure to someone with a positive case of cobit 19. and i thank you all in in anticipation of our successful return appreciate what i know will be a successful return and a cooperative effort by everyone in the community thank you dr valeski so we're going to start off the evening with uh some budget manager reports bernie would you like to uh introduce what we're going to see tonight please yep absolutely so i will begin uh with a um a brief overview in terms of the development process various aspects to our development process beginning at the school level how we do the individual school budgets is based on the projected enrollment um we look at historical data to ascertain what the per
007pupil costs would be and the purpose of the school budgets is to support the day-to-day school needs the school budgets do not budget for staffing or a new program those are those are budgeted through other areas in general outside of the school budgets our budgeting process is on a modified zero-based budgeting basis and what that means is that we do not provide uh fixed allocations uh to the various budget managers uh each year there may be new components to a budget that could be one-time expenditures one-time initiatives and so while that may be approved in one year we deduct that out of their uh budget for the following year and so it reduces the amount of funds available and any new initiatives new funding priorities are requested that is not to say that there are
008things that are fixed and not reviewed every aspect of the budget is reviewed and we begin the process uh actually in september is when uh budget managers begin to construct their budgets and then we proceed from there into october and november and having discussions at the individual budget manager and central office level and now we have advanced to presenting budgets at the board finance committee having conversations there and in turn uh those advance further at the board level as we are doing this evening zero-based budgeting in certain areas for example with special education tuition we don't know what those numbers are or they actually change significantly from year to year so we start from a zero base um what are the actual enrollments for out of district tuition and um what we anticipate those to
009be for the following year based on students that we know are aging out so we start from nothing and work our way to what that actual budget needs to be so that's just a brief of the overview on the development process um we'll move forward now and the first discussion tonight is with the academics department we have dr bolli to speak to that hi good evening thank you i'm pleased to share some highlights from our proposed budget for the next school year so the proposed budget for the department of academics supports the work of each of the content areas listed here this proposed budget also supports the work of the assistant director of alternate programs the profes director professional learning evaluation and assessment as well as the director of curriculum and student achievement the resource
010allocations in this proposed budget reflect the mission of the department of academics meeting the needs of all learners with a lens on equity to that end this proposed budget considers our students who may be in need of additional support through home instruction or our flex program embracing an rti model this proposed budget also provides for tiered supports and intervention for students who may be struggling academically this work will be more important than ever as we endeavor to assess and remediate any learning gaps due to covet school closure meeting the needs of our english language learners continues to be a high priority as well this proposed budget provides funds to translate all parent communications and increases support for our students who are learning the english language we understand the importance of providing high quality professional learning
011opportunities for all staff this proposed budget supports pd for every category of staff member in our east brunswick public schools we strive to keep every member of our team at their best professionally and in compliance with maintaining current certifications required to perform the duties of their position the department of academics strives to support our 21st century learners in cultivating the skills they will need to lead productive lives to that end we offer a wide range of interesting and exciting choices in our schools some highlights that this proposed budget dr bowley um we've lost your audio bernie uh can you text doctor i'll take care of texting dr boley see if she can take her screen off that might help victor did you say that you wanted the screen taken off and returned to the galley
012view i'm going to no ma'am i'm going to i'm going to ask dr bully to take her screen off okay just use audio just waiting for a response from her dr boley is joining us again she had lost her connection she's now back online i'm so sorry i apologize can you hear me now we can't okay great super so um yes i was talking about supporting our 21st century learners in cultivating the skills they will need to lead productive lives to that end we offer a wide range of interesting and exciting choices in our schools in this budget some of the highlights that we support here in this budget include resources to engage our students in rich mathematical thought discussion and problem solving opportunities media centers as the hub of research in our schools to
013strengthen both critical thinking and research skills for all of our students new reading units and other instructional resources to offer interesting culturally relevant books for all of our students and to help promote interdisciplinary connections across grade bands and disciplines transportation and fees to support the fairview trip for our sixth graders as well as science instructional resources materials and safety equipment all of which promote phenomenon based inquiry in our classrooms also additional sewing machines to expand our fashion program series into marketing design fashion construction and retail helping to bridge our engineering design and marketing classes the department of academics is committed to providing world-class arts education in all of our schools this budget supports varied opportunities including artists in residence to visit our schools choreographers for our theater productions creation of an instrument refresh cycle cutting
014edge software for our music tech and digital music classes supports our marching band and the expansion of our elementary band program and purchases a new outdoor kiln at the high school to support the firing portion of the high school ceramics curriculum this slide shows a visual breakdown of this proposed budget for the department of academics before i conclude i'd like to sincerely thank dr velesky and this board of education for both your leadership and your unwavering support thank you mrs becker at this time would be um appropriate for the board to put forth any questions you took the words right out of my mouth um can we return to uh or do you want to leave this up or can we return to the galley view bernie so i can see everyone here absolutely okay
015does anybody have any questions for dr bolling i do actually dr bully thank you for that very uh comprehensive um i was just curious i don't think people are even aware that um you know we we celebrate the incredible diversity in this town and we're we're thrilled about it um the amount of languages spoken in our schools is 70 80 different languages so there were a few charges for translation services for various pieces of the curriculum i don't think that um people are aware of um that we that we provide this is this for this is this primarily for parents um the translation services so that they will be able to parents who don't have english as the first language that's right we translate um just about all parent communications in multiple languages based on
016the population the target audience for the communication um we also tr have a need to translate um international transcripts when students are moving into the district uh to get a sense of what courses they have taken prior and where we should be placing them hey thank you um i also had another question about fairview um the question is fairview uh i am i'm kind of thinking that it might be hard this year because of the constraints of the pandemic still what are your i mean i know you don't have a crystal ball but um please remind me what we did last year did we do anything any programming in place of the actual trip itself um the actual uh site was not open we're not sure what to anticipate this spring but um we do
017understand the importance of this experience for our students and we are brainstorming with both the leadership in the science department and the building administration of any kind of alternate experience for the children that's that's what i was going to say if we were providing some kind of an alternate programming um for them uh that would just be special for the sixth graders and bring out certain aspects of the program good to hear love to hear updates about that as we get closer of if we're not able to use the site what what you are planning that would be great we'll do anybody have any questions barbara i just wanted to say thank you for the expansion to fourth grade band that's fabulous for the elementary students um because uh at this time we had only
018had the uh um you know the instrumental like violin viola the strings but now there are a lot of kids who are interested in band and they can start it earlier so that's fabulous so thank you we have mr hong and mrs i'm sorry i was just saying mr hong and mr winston had their hands up okay lee boo then jeff no jeff is just waving hello goodbye okay leewoo dr bullitt thank you very much for the wonderful uh uh brief i have two questions for you to clarify first you you mentioned the uh the budget for the response to the intervention and second you mentioned that uh the budget for defensive driving courses so would you please add uh elaborate more about these two items and how what's your plan to uh come to
019to apply this uh or uh just two issues such as how you going to teach the different driving courses or how what are you going to do with the response to the intervention certainly they will the the rti model that we are employing um is is comprehensive um we are looking to continue our partnership with teachers college to really strengthen that core literacy instruction for all students as a basis of our tier one support and some of the other items you can see in the budget including the orton gillingham training the wilson materials are also part of our rti plan providing a tier two intervention for our students um the flex program is in the budget as well and uh that could be uh considered a tier three intervention for some students who may need
020that um and regarding i i didn't hear the second part of your question a graphing course is that what you know defensive driving club courses in terms of driving oh defensive driving yes that was a professional development opportunity provided for our bus drivers they need to keep current in their field as well and stay on the cutting edge of knowledge so that they are totally equipped and professionally ready to to provide the best services to our students so that that was something that was um offered for them okay thank you thank you and jeff just to clarify you don't have a question okay okay anyone else thank you so much dr bully very good presentation thank you and bernie next yes so next we have our information technology budget and mr nicola tronica our chief
021information officer will be discussing that well good evening everybody i want to start by showing my appreciation towards this board and dr velesky for understanding the importance of technology in our environment you know the ability to do things the right way and not cut corners has allowed us to do some amazing things without compromising reliability or security uh and i would also be remiss if i did not acknowledge the efforts of the amazing dedicated and talented team of people in the technology department that helped to make these visions a reality so the information technology budget supports and maintains technology all across the district to give you kind of a bird's-eye perspective of what it encompasses we have approximately four thousand uh windows laptops that are used in our one-to-one uh that's both for students and
022faculty we have about seven thousand uh chromebooks that are used for one to one we have about three thousand pcs and macs that are used throughout our buildings and 760 or so access points that basically give us end-to-end wireless coverage in all of our buildings some of the rooms can support up to 500 people at a time although over the past year they have not been put to the test every one of our classrooms has some kind of display technology and most of the classrooms have interactive technology such as a smart board or an interactive flat panel we have two complete data centers that give us complete redundancy for communications and all of our major systems and we have about 10 000 managed user accounts and we also have the ability to see exactly when
023and where each account is accessing any of our systems so this gives us tremendous insight into cyber security threats such as hacked accounts it also allows us to be proactive in protecting our faculty and students against these threats and it helps troubleshoot when people are having troubles accessing things which is really great during remote learning almost all of our applications and systems are accessible from anywhere with an internet connection and we like to follow the philosophy of leading edge not bleeding edge we try to do our due diligence to work with our curriculum department make sure that we're being innovative while still minimizing risks to the district next slide so some of our enterprise systems include our student information system our transportation system our finance and human resource systems email and endpoint management which makes
024it possible to manage those uh you know thousands of computers that are mobile in the field right now we have our dedicated internet service which currently provides us speeds of three gigabytes a second uh with the ability at the flip of a switch to increase to 10 gigabytes we're able to monitor our internet bandwidth both in real time as well as historically this way we can kind of ensure that we have the speed to support what we need right now for instruction uh without spending more than we have to one of our new additions this year is a system that allows us to measure our employees skills in spotting cyber security threats and phishing emails and provides us the ability to allow them specialized training in those targeted areas we also have some print and
025fax management systems which have been allowing us to dramatically cut paper consumption by integrating multi-purpose copiers with our email system and online data repositories so we can greatly reduce the need for printing both of these systems also give us extensions extensive reporting which gives us the ability to target areas that could be improved next slide the budget also covers software services and licensing for instruction so adaptive learning systems like discovery education career in college readiness support for special education next slide curriculum and lesson planning of course our learning management system which we use at churchill in the high school which has made the transition to remote learning this past year is so much easier we have the ability systems for staff evaluation and professional development and one of our newer implementations is a data analytics
026dashboard that allows us to create and monitor key performance indicators these indicators allow us to kind of see at an early stage students that might need extra support and they also allow us to make more informed decisions next slide so here you have a visual representation that summarizes the budget categories as you can see the largest spending category is for computer equipment peripherals and network infrastructure we have a dedicated budget for these types of assets to allow us to stay with in a reasonable age limits of these pieces of equipment the second largest bucket is what we spend for our enterprise systems that support the entire district and this is followed by systems and resources that are directly uh related to instruction and then next we have systems that are focused kind of in those
027specialized areas and now if anybody has any questions i would be more than happy to answer them and hopefully you're all still awake we are um bernie could you please oh great um any questions and then susanna then jeff so nick thank you very much for your job and for your budget is it technology community chair person i have more contact with you personally than maybe than other board members i know how hard you and your team work during this difficult time i want to thank you personally and i read your budget you asked a equipment repair uh budget eight thousand dollars now you are telling me that you we have more than fourteen thousand device including the the chromebooks pcs all those things i just curious how this 8 000 knowledge you do to
028repair equipment anything and it will be very expensive now i just curious how this 8 000 dollars can help you that is a very good question uh so we do this in a few different ways first of all our devices that have insurance we get reimbursements from the insurance company the technicians that we have on staff are very capable and they do most of the repairs in-house so we basically buy replacement parts in bulk and we do the repairs ourselves um if a device isn't covered by the insurance and it's you know let's say malicious damage the families will typically pay for the parts um but i have to tell you all in all we don't have a huge amount of um you know a damage to the devices when you consider how many devices
029we have i would say we have much less than uh an eight or seven percent damage rate it's very low and you budget a lot of money for the kronos and the business plus would you please uh talk a little bit about those two projects so you know business plus is one of our largest applications it takes care of uh our hr system it takes care of all our finance our budgeting invoicing purchase orders um and it really reaches you know every corner of the district uh kronos is you know the system that we've been working towards implementing which has had some challenges just because of the complexity of you know the nature of what we do when you consider that people have different positions they have different rates of pay it's it's kind of
030been a challenge to get everything fine-tuned to work perfectly for our environment however the new team that we have over there has been really great and i'm looking forward to explaining that a little bit in more detail in our next upcoming technology committee meeting which we're working towards scheduling thank you very much nick thank you okay so susannah then jeff um thanks no i i it came up at the finance committee meeting when we went through the budget and just you know the readiness and the preparations and the foresight of the technology preparations really you know got us into a good position for what we faced a year ago so um and and not only that not just in terms of preparedness from a hardware uh and software perspective but also from a personnel perspective
031and just hearing about you know i know when we were start starting to roll out one to one i was very worried about you know the cost of repairs and you know how big of an issue that was going to be it's like you don't even hear about it it's you know as you mentioned it's it's a low it's a it's a it's not a big problem and and your staff is positioned to actually do the repairs which i i find just really impressive so just a big shout out and thanks to to you and your entire staff uh for for all the hard work uh over the past year talk about you know going from a department that's kind of in the background you know it's one of these quiet departments that you make
032everything work and you make everything work to becoming the center of attention and you know when the systems go down it's like you know uh but i i haven't seen too many ah moments right it's been really just amazingly smooth you know a few bumps along the way but uh just i think just an amazing job overall so i just want to say thank you well thank you susannah as i mentioned before we are so lucky uh most of the people in the technology department have been there 15 plus tiers and they are so dedicated to the students the faculty and the community i'm very lucky that we've had them to support uh the community chef uh yeah nick i i'm not going to repeat everything that mr just said other than the fact that
033i completely agree with all of that you know being on the finance committee um also you presented your budget uh the other night is a preview uh to what you have going on and i have to tell you it was it i had a i had a lot of trepidation knowing that this budget was coming and i and i expected something completely different um i expected to report back to our stakeholders that uh the same thing that one might say and raising taxes i thought it was going to be an absolute frightening scenario and the ability that you've kept these costs in line you told a story the other night how you were able to secure uh what were they video cards uh from from the manufacturer to keep a stockpile and make these repairs
034in almost real time i you know being involved with kids in this district i got to tell you i haven't heard of any uh real issues and you put a number out the other night that i think you should really wave the flag on did you say the other night only about well what was it you told a story the other night about repairs of of a ridiculously low fraction if you can remind me i think you said 25 or 30 machines it was in the neighborhood of probably 25 to 50 yeah 25 to 50 uh occurrences that were not covered by another source where the district kind of had to pay the costs out of pocket you know our students have been very kind of protective about their equipment and they've taken very good
035care of it that's amazing out of how many machines so let's just say 50 out of how many we have you know somewhere in the neighborhood of what does it dr bully maybe 9 000 students and you know probably 85 to 90 percent of our students have taken advantage of our one-to-one program it's unbelievable well uh i think we're gonna have to fight to keep you here because i can't imagine any corporation would be just dying to get you so uh quiet jeff let's let's um i'm i'm happy you're here you've done yeah i know you've just done an awesome job and it's so nice to stay running so well so lean uh really delivering to uh to the taxpayers to the students to the teachers absolutely i can't say enough i i came out
036of my meeting with you the other night so excited and i'm really glad you had a chance to tell really what's going on behind that curtain because you are just doing awesome awesome work so thank you thank you jeff me and my team absolutely love what we do and thank you for giving me the chance to be such a big nerd i i appreciate that and nick you would be miserable in a big corporation where you you you love working in a school district i was in a big corporation before and i can't tell you how much more i love this it really is a family uh you know good this meeting is being recorded right perfect okay um i have a question but uh was there somebody else's hand who was up that i
037didn't see okay so nick um i want to echo everything that um jeff and susannah said uh your what you have done is enabled us to be able to be as successful as we have been in our remote and hybrid remote programs you and your entire team are to be commended so i have a question about professional development outside of the professional development for our staff outside of the formal professional development days and workshops our staff is more dependent on technology than ever before to deliver the curriculum to their students what kind of support do we have in place for them every single day so one of the things that's great and it was expanded this past year you know we have our instructional coaches now at hammerschool churchill and the high school and they
038are so important to the success of the teachers especially right now with remote instruction um we have a good working relationship with them so we can kind of see where we need to you know give a little more pd or um you know see how we can work one-on-one with those coaches so that they can kind of turn key over that training to their to their teams um and we've just tried to really go out with the principals and the faculty uh you know nicole tibbetts and myself we visited almost every school to see what their challenges were this past year to try to find solutions for the teachers and you know we try to do as best we can with what we're given and on on a daily basis we have um support that
039teachers can reach out to as uh if glitches come up or questions about if there's something they want to do with their class uh remotely and they're not able to figure out how to do it we have that kind of uh hotline or whatever you want to call it a support desk available we have our help desk line which is available to all faculty students and parents and we also have two different help desk cues we have ones that you know are for staff and students and then we also have our parent support at ebnet.org which is for parents uh people that don't have an e-network email address that was my next question have you know questions and sometimes it's a little challenging trying to figure out exactly you know where that problem lies but
040um you know we know how frustrating it could be for a parent that has a child at home and they're trying to get online and they can't connect to the class and you know we try to be as supportive as possible thank you that's exactly what i was going to ask that the challenges our parents are facing as well and um you answered that so thank you mrs becker could i can i make make a statement of course i just wanted to say because we have dr bolli and mr electronica here giving their presentations tonight but they they are two critical uh departments so they lead two critical departments with as as nick said a lot of talented people in both those departments that were forward-thinking enough uh well before the pandemic to position us
041in in a situation that we were not reactive at all we were proactive uh even in terms of um as we started this school year many in the community may not remember this but there were there were embargoes that were in place uh for shipment of products and so nick and his team had been proactive in getting orders out and we got materials and devices relatively quickly after the start of the school year where other districts were struggling to do that so i'm really appreciative of all the efforts they put into not only supporting our students our staff and our families during the pandemic because this has become a very very new environment for so many people even though after this much time it's beginning to seem routine in some ways but this this was
042years in the planning to prepare for this and we didn't even know this was coming so to that i'm sincerely appreciative of both them and the board for supporting all the ideas that we put forth to you that uh cost money uh in years prior to this to prepare for this thank you dr velesky any other board members thank you again nick excellent job great job thank you so to bring this to a close just a note on our key budget dates coming up met february 18th march 4th and march 18th are the next budget presentations before the board the governor's budget address is slated for february 23rd that is of course subject to change and the reason that is key is because uh within two days of that budget address that is when state
043aid data is released so we are anticipating that information uh by around february 25th bernie what is your personal ball or network rumors smell telling you about um any buzz about state aid this year um i think uh right now as i've said at finance committee hard to have a crystal ball but i think uh at what we can what we should hope for is uh no reduction is what we should hope for um and the best situation would be that we actually saw an increase but i i i'm not holding my breath on that and uh you know we're trying to be conservative in in our budgeting right now um and uh be prepared for whatever options or whatever issues uh face us um so uh key dates uh for the board uh tentative
044budget adoption will take place march 18th it's legally required and we're um within the time frame that it must occur uh the public hearing on the budget will be in may that's may 7th and then a final adoption of the budget may 13th so we've got some time before we need to get to the end game um and just one thing just to emphasize is that coming up with the tentative budget the key there is tentative it's not the final budget uh there's room to be able to make modifications if we think they're necessary uh between then and the public hearing and that's all i've got on budget thank you any final questions board members before i move on to the good of the calls for the public okay the good of the cause of
045the public members of the public may provide comments at this meeting through zoom by entering the url meeting id and password you see before you on the screen in order to be recognized use the chat feature select the zoom meeting host then enter and send your name to the host you will be recognized to speak when your name is called and individuals will be invited to speak in the order in which we've received your request the board of education recognizes the value of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to express themselves on school matters of community interests to protect the privacy of all students and staff concerns regarding individual students and staff members should generally be addressed by first meeting with the appropriate administrative staff all participants
046will be limited to three minutes each is there anyone wishing to address the board tonight well yes we have uh first in the queue is dana's and vicki good evening everyone so first mr latronica i want to thank you very much for all you do for our students and staff and i really want to thank you for the amazing accolades that you gave to your team because you truly are a dynamic team so thank you for that that was very like heartwarming tonight oh thank you dana you know they're my family so i love them and you truly that is the case yes so thank you and you do an amazing job um i want to thank dr velesky tonight for engaging in critical conversations with the east brunswick education association in regards to return
047to in-person instruction we value your commitment to continue maintaining safety protocols we also value your willingness to ensure our students are engaged in the best possible instruction for our students as president of the eba i look forward to continuing a productive progressive conversation as we bring our students back to hybrid learning because you know what we have been exceptionally successful and we will continue to be a model for the state because of our collaboration partnerships are essential and we value your open dialogue and in closing our staff has done an exceptional job throughout this pandemic in every single case and i am so incredibly proud of them and i'm also thankful for them and for the support that we receive so thank you thank you dana okay next we have melissa lennon okay hello melissa
048hello thank you for your time i spoke at the last meeting and there were some comments that were made after the fact that i'd like to start by addressing first off barbara my condolences to you and your family on the passing of your father unfortunately i've also lost family members and friends during this pandemic and it's been a very sad time for many people you commented on our teachers and i couldn't agree with you more i have nothing but wonderful things to say about all of the teachers staff administration and mrs payet at frost elementary school i'd also like to acknowledge that my son is very excited to go back to school next week to see his friends and his teacher in fact more than 50 percent of the children in his class have opted
049for in-person schooling so what we're seeing is the majority of parents agree that in-person schooling is in the best interest of their child and what we all know is research research has also shown that students in a virtual setting unfortunately comparable to in person that they're falling behind academically and also unfortunately it's mentally and emotionally they're struggling from online learning and the lack of socialization so while i appreciate the progress and i am excited and more importantly my son is excited to go back to school what what i and i know other parents are looking to see is for this administration to quickly move to a five day a week in schooling option especially for elementary schools the local private schools have been offering this option since september other local public schools have been offering
050this option successfully since october over and this is exactly the option that i and i know other parents are looking for and i have no doubt that our district is capable of having the same success and i don't think any parent should feel that they need to pull their child out of our public school to to get a quality education and unfortunately that's what's happening and it's happening to the extent that now there are waiting lists for these private schools and regardless of how anyone feels if you see parents removing their children from public schools and putting them into private schools it's not a sign of success on every level so i think my frustration and i can tell you the frustration of other parents is we don't feel that you've been listening to what
051we're telling you and we're watching our children struggling academically and parents know firsthand what is in the best interest of their child and what is and what's not working so what i'm hoping is that you listen to what i other parents and students are telling you and we make the changes that are needed to help our children and we open the schools thank you for your time thank you i'm sorry we have no one else in the queue okay seeing no one else i close the public portion and we move on to tonight's agenda okay starting with can i please have a motion for item one on the board of education agenda second by laurie is there any discussion all those in favor opposed abstain motion carries next item is we have one item on
052our community programs agenda can i please have a motion for that move by lee wu second by jeff again um anyone who is watching could you please make sure you're on mute we're getting a little feedback thank you so much again okay move by leigh wu second by jeff is there any discussion all those in favor i have a question vicki sure that's any discussion sure go ahead oh um is this something new do we have this originally the first time around with the remote learning centers for staff or was it the request no we we have uh had the remote learning centers in place um what we've done is uh really carved out a per diem rate because prior to this we did not have it on a per diem basis we did have
053a request uh that was coming in for uh the per diem basis and so to the extent that we can accommodate it uh we will we will be permitting that although i knew we had them i was referring to the fact that it was staff which is a great idea you know what i got offered that uh but it was on on a larger commitment basis so now they have the ability if they have child care issues last minute you know within 24 hours they can yeah we need we'll need one business day nervous yes yep it's a great idea okay any other discussion all those in favor opposed abstain motion carries moving on to our financial services agenda can i please have a motion for items one through three oh by laurie second by
054mark two mark angelo is there any discussion uh jeff and she's then susanna i'd like to have number one removed and voted separately for discussion so we'll need uh then um it sounds like you're making a motion to separate that i am i'm sorry bernie you're absolutely right i'm making a motion to have number one uh removed for uh both separate and discussion so you want a table uh no that's that's different table uh you wanna uh you wanna have a conversation have that separate discussion not clumped with the one through three bernie yep understood so we have a motion um uh mrs becker will need a second on the separation okay can i please have a second on the separation mark sismar second by mark is there any discussion all those in favor opposed
055abstain okay motion most marc angelo i'm sorry what were you raising your hand and we're going to abstain okay um so for now we're um looking for emotion on items two and three yes so we're going to continue now on items two and three okay can i please have a motion for items two and three now move by laurie second by barbara is there any discussion will the secretary please call the world mr carangelo yes mrs chu yes mr sismar yes mrs gwas yes mr han yes this is lax yes this is reese yes mr winston yes president becker yes motion carries and now bernie we are uh we're now um on the item number one so we have that separated out um so let's uh you'll need a motion on that and then right
056got it okay item number one contract carer insurance arena uh can i please have a motion still move guy move by jeff second by laurie is there any discussion yes uh i'm i'm a little concerned about this for a couple of reasons uh first and foremost uh we we've discussed uh in this board uh potential outcomes for graduation and alternatives accordingly uh last year we were in the graduation separate parts on the field and of course that was during the most uncertain and peak times uh and we really weren't really uh didn't really quite know what was going to happen uh we've we've talked about a variety of ways that we would approach this uh and i've heard suggestions even to the point of putting all students if if it made sense uh on the
057field at once or of course the alternative being splitting up amongst groups that we've done last year and of course all of that is dependent on the same numbers that dr volesky uh has been paying close attention to in terms of school in terms of bringing the kids back to school this particular item number one for the cure is a non-refundable deposit on on going into that arena where i would say the likelihood based on the same statistics and numbers that dr velesky is measuring in bringing people back into the classroom it is highly unlikely that that will happen uh at the levels of bringing all of those students plus the parents into the arena i think it's foolish money to be spent at this time uh so my question would be this instead of
058throwing the baby out with the bath water does that insurance need to be secured now time to make that decision as we gather more data if it does have to be uh secured now reasons why uh to which i really wouldn't quite get i i think it would be foolish for this board based on uh some of the questions that remain in terms of aid and budgeting within this district to spend even fifteen thousand dollars in what would be likely a very poor bet mr winston if i if i could and then bernie if you wouldn't mind on the financial part of this the graduation is is something we plan for in every budget whether it's at your arena with transportation for our students to get there or whether it's on the field but i
059think the reason for the um item on the agenda is we want to reserve our option for the cure arena we believe that if if there in fact is a state of emergency and there is a pandemic this does become a refundable deposit on the cure arena right mr julian yes and so this was really to hold our place jeff as an option um and then we had um we just had i don't want to speak for the you know for mrs lacks in calendar uh but we had a we had a meeting last night about um you know talking about the cure arena and how important that is to graduation now i don't know if this is going to allow us to do it as you suggested uh but i think it was just
060here as an option for us to consider i do not know tonight how much more time we have to exercise this and not in and um jeopardize our place at the cure arena i just don't know that yet but fair enough yes no that's great and i appreciate that answer so then i would uh i would opt for the second part of your response on that uh i'd be more comfortable voting on this knowing that uh today is the day that we must and at this point based on what you just said i don't think we have that information i don't think we necessarily know that we are in a deadline so therefore i feel it's in the best interest of all that this gets tabled until that gets answered mr julian i just wanted
061to defer to you do you have any information that i don't have about the the timing on the cure arena contract no i i don't have that information not at hand okay um it was susannah then i saw marco angelo and now just laurie so uh susannah jeff addressed um my questions so uh we can move on to lori i actually use marco angelo first well i'm new to the calendar committee last night we had the meeting and i don't know exactly the date but if we don't secure this i think soon they can't hold the date or they can't hold it so other schools want this and jeff um you did a great job with this thank you for opening our eyes to to that question i appreciate you doing that because that was
062a great thought process man thank you but uh i know lori has probably a better answer than i um thanks mark um well no what i was tuning into which could say i had the same concern is the non-refundable aspect to the thought of making fifteen thousand dollars disappear but as dr volusky juliana said um because covet is i mean not an act of nature but the pandemic is um something that gives us the ability to get the deposit back if we're not able to use it due to the pandemic then i feel more comfortable going forward i understand yeah because i go the same way why why take and um throw away money but um [Music] uh thank you lori i i i will get the information the boards requested if you want to
063if you want to defer on this and pull this from action tonight will that hurt us if we wait until the next meeting i honestly i honestly do not know tonight i will know tomorrow and i can communicate with the board you know well we do have um a special meeting monday night would we be able to if the deadline was such that all of a sudden we found out that we had to make a decision before the next schedule board meeting that we could make it monday night without the full information uh no we we we're going to be limited on time we've got to provide um at least uh 24 48 hours notice on what the agenda will be for the special meeting and that would be presuming that we have that information
064tomorrow um so um it would be tight it would be really tight but it's a possibility it's possible we can't add it on the agenda on monday if we don't have the information uh tomorrow we will not be able to add it on to the agenda for monday um so dr vanella uh just texted me he's been instrumental in contacting the cure arena he says we'll be fine until the next board meeting oh thank you so much dr vanilla so i appreciate that so thank you doc susanna yes i do have a follow-up question on um the force major clause so um i get that we can invoke forced major if if the state let's say declared you know state of emergency and no gatherings were allowed so we couldn't go there but if um
065that was not the case and if the arena was able to open but we chose not to i presume then we could not invoke force major in that case correct right which is a very good point um because if the state does allow indoor gatherings that large but we as a district felt it would not be in the best interest of the safety of our students staff and parents that would put us in a dicey situation correct yeah so dr vanell and his team have been actively working on options for graduation that we haven't fully shared with the board yet so um i i will i will talk with dr vanilla and we will we'll put together something to give the board some more information some more background and that might help provide more clarity
066before the next board meeting and we'll give you that information before the board meetings to have a chance to actually see it before the meeting um dr velesky i don't know if this is a question you can answer without speaking to dr vanella and his team but um had you considered and actually i want to give susannah credit for this idea because she had was talking to me about it earlier had you considered uh just planning on um a graduation on our football field the options dr bill and his team have put in that are putting into consideration right now okay it just uh susanna had said i'll just keep talking to you susanna i just want to give you credit though um uh it would help parents set parents expectations instead of leaving it
067to um not last minute but uh they would know far in advance whether or not it was going to be indoor outdoors so that would be good as you recall the challenge that that we all had for last school year was the distancing regulations and right right absolutely suzanna yes just one other yes thank you what just one other follow-up item uh for for uh dr vanilla perhaps to see if it's possible is um see if there's the option to negotiate a better um deposit and refund given the state of of of you know school districts booking this stuff i know from past calendar committee it is very hard you have to book more than a year in advance in order to secure the desired date so it's not that you can't get the date
068you you can't get a date you you will get a date that you don't want you know so maybe like two weeks after you know your last day of school but um i'm just wondering if if there is um an opportunity to negotiate something different than the standard deposit um requirements so let's just throw that on the table let's face it i i don't know how many uh graduation ceremonies they do a day but i know that they as you just mentioned suzanna they are book solid so we are not the only high school in the state facing this and having this very discussion um uh somebody just raised their hand yeah yeah no i all these comments are great and and i think if i understood it correctly dr velasquez that there seems to
069be some form of an exploratory committee uh with dr vanilla and pr and i would imagine others uh to a large degree so i guess my gut feeling is because we're putting the card a little bit before the horse not that far but i would like to hear what all of the options are on the table talking about fees ability and in fact there may be more opportunity to save i hear i do know that there's already insurance on the high school field so that would be one expense never exposed along with of course using one facility which is a large expense that we wouldn't be exposed to in budget so i'd like to see the the results of the exploratory before we're making decisions on something conclusive such as booking and paying insurance so
070that's what i hope the board supports at this point yeah and i i will i dr vanella is you know i'm i'm sure um ready to to uh kick that off i mean he's been working on this for uh some time with his high school team already uh in preparation for options so we'll prepare that for you and um you know and i i believe it would be appropriate to invite dr vanilla into that discussion when we have it with the board too because he has first-hand information uh leewoo so sorry i i forgot you had your hand up earlier yeah that's okay so uh it's a beginning i have similar concerns but after i read the first majority class there so that's easy in my mind so i want i just want to uh
071why not we have our other attorney to explain it how that class is going to protect us if the the best thing happened and we'll get our deposit back so matt would you please uh explain how it it's going to work to protect those so i i don't have the actual contract in front of me but i'll tell you generally what a force major clause is a force major is some intervening act that neither party has control over that renders the contract not not capable of being performed so for example if you were going to have a wedding on monday evening and you had the blizzard that we just had with three feet of snow that would be a force major that was something that was out of either party's control when they entered into
072and contemplated the contract what complicates this somewhat is that we're aware of the pandemic and the one thing that we we have very little control over is what the governor does in terms of if levels rise does he put greater restrictions et cetera so i think what we can do is look at the contract and see if we can a bolster the false force measure clause so that if there's some type of level where you can't have the students and their parents attend this graduation it would be a cancellation with full refund of the of the monies um you know but it's it's difficult to predict as we're sitting right now in february the fourth we don't know what the numbers are going to be in june of 2021 hopefully a lot better uh but
073i think i could look at the contract once we get go through this i can give some possible language changes that would better protect the board and give us a stronger ability to get out of this contract if it does not look like what you're into what basically what you're looking to do is have a graduation where the children and their families can attend and if it turns out they can only be children you're going to want to get out of that and that's something that we can look at and put in building the contract cure arena might not agree to it but at least something we can explore for you yes the agenda says should the current pandemic impede the safety the safe use of the facility it would be considered an act of
074god so mr jacoby so please help us to you know reveal that the first major class will provide us some uh safety uh mr hong as as you know if governor murphy declares that indoor gatherings come you know june are limited to no more than 25 people that would be an act of god um based on the pandemic that would then trigger this but i think we can we i can put something i'll review it and make my recommendations to best protect the board thank you yeah good discussion so bernie um we'll need a motion motion to table move by jeff second by barbara is there any discussion all those in favor aye motion carries this item will be tabled thank you jeff okay moving on to our human resources agenda there's one item on
075the agenda can i please have a motion for it by laurie second by jeff is there any discussion this is wrong full vote will the secretary please call the role mr carangelo yes this is true yes mr sismar yes mrs yes mr hong yes this is lex yes this is rhys yes mr winston yes president becker yes motion carries before i ask for a motion to combine items one two three on the student services agenda i want to ask if there's anything anyone would like separated out yes i'd like god number two separated okay okay then um can i have a motion for items one and three only glory second by mark this is any discussion sorry which mark seconded mark carangelo sorry mark two number two um any discussion on items one and three
076this is a roll call vote with the secretary please call the role mr carangelo yes this is true yes mr sismar yes this is gloss yes yes this this is rhys yes winston yes president becker yes motion carries can i have a motion for item two contract ultra athletic center second by barbara is there any discussion jeff yes discussion uh fire shooting clarity i know this seems to come up every year um and tell me exactly why again um we need to bring this offside i know it's for the safety and the floors i i think that's what has been discussed in the past in terms of the gymnastic is is this really a necessary expense at this time an action that we need to take um you know is it that much of a
077game changer i mean right now i do know that the cheer squad who are great are now cheering to the camera um i i noticed a lot of what they've done has been modified to some degree than what i've been seeing over the last years which i understand because i would imagine they can't get into these athletic centers or at least they're just beginning to get into them is this really something we need to be doing right now i think we need to ask ourselves again i go back to the very premise we had before tight budget i don't know what's going we're uh you know hanging on with baited breath of what the state's going to do in a couple of weeks i i just i i believe in it i love it i
078think we do need the gym rental for you know for this type of thing but is it really appropriate now is this something necessary let me explain it to you yes it's a terrific i'm sorry go ahead go ahead though it's a terrific question uh mr winston um what happens is we can't we do not have a nine panel floor the nine panel floor is what we go there for that's what they compete with so when they go to a competition normally it would be on a nine panel floor so we prepare them for the competitions with this nine panel tour now this year they won't be traveling to a competition um they will actually do a performance and it will be a virtual submission so they'll still be on the nine panel floor but
079it'll be virtually submitted instead of them going to the competition so they're still competing and it still makes a big difference uh when it comes to their preparation uh and especially you know this year when they're submitting something they want to be doing that on the nine panel floor and i guess it raises the same question that was raised last year is there anything we could be doing i i understood last year we were exploring the possibility of bringing the this equipment in-house on some type of portable basis uh it was brought up the prior year uh have we moved anywhere on that or is this just you know really an annual conversation but ultimately we rent out the center at this time it is an annual conversation the nine panel floor is extremely expensive
080and hard to put away so we would have to leave that floor out and we use those gyms for many other different activities which would ruin the floor if we were using him for the uh all the activities that we have so at this point with the space we have and what we you know what the resources we have um you know this does become now they usually uh have this year they'll have about 10 practices off-site that's what we're looking at how long is the practice i believe they're about an hour each okay so it's inconsequential so we're looking at we're really looking at under a thousand dollars an ultimate expense correct range um we have recently approved off-site venues for several other teams haven't we yes um bowling i think we just said
081swim um what jeff while you raise a good point um i feel that we need to be consistent and that if we are going to spend the money for off-site facilities for other teams uh at this time that we do it for all the teams we've been doing it for i think that i'm going to echo something you had said when there had been a discussion about um whether or not we should be spending money on artists and residents and you made a very eloquent speech that i really paid attention to about um how now more than ever it was so important for the kids to have the exposure to the arts and that's their niche um they need it now more than ever and i i bring it up because it really made an
082impression on me and i i feel the same way with this i feel that it's a passion for the members of each of these teams and that we should continue to be consistent and do the support that we can well you met you said my dad i just wanted to respond and i appreciate it and i do feel that way about the about the arts and bringing those folks in i think the bowling i i think bowling's important uh by the uh in the very respect that we don't have a bowling alley i i think uh swimming it's important for the fact that we don't have a swimming pool uh we certainly have ample space for certain things understandably i understand i understand the gymnastics aspect of the com of the competition so it's not
083for those reasons i would say the only reason i will support this is by merit of the fact that we're talking about an 800 budget when lou just gave me the hard line when i just see 80 an hour for how many hours you know what are we talking about but i i am going to remain fiscally conservative right now until we have more definitive uh i more definitive idea of what funding is going to look like uh because i would hate to approve it and then go back for a budget modification that would eliminate this and many of the other things that we're talking about in budget negotiation so with that i withdraw any objection but it is not for this not for the reason that it's of its necessity uh by the fact
084that the costs are in line um and and i can i'll stay on that thank you i'm sorry go ahead i'm sorry lori's had her hand up for a while victor well i just had a question which was going to be about um this but now it's about all the other sports there lori we're losing you you're breaking up laurie you're bringing me home hold on hold on hold on i'm turning off my camera is that better yes you're much better can you hear me yes okay sorry because you can't i get it um no my my question was just about um sanitization and cleanliness protocols when we're going off site because i know our people in-house i just want to make sure uh um when we go off site through all these different uh
085sports do we have any control over the cleanliness and the sanitization and and the social distancing and whatever needs to be done keep the kids safe how does that work for us we absolutely we absolutely have can you hear me laura um okay so for instance in this particular uh place that we're talking about for the cheerleading team they have temperature checks before practice hand sanitizers in the gymnasium shoes get sanitized um only one school is allowed in the gym at a time the spleen the spring floor that we need gets sanitized between each team uh obviously if the girls have to be together or some you know to do something then they're going to be together those are girls only and when they can be separated they will i know for instance at the
086uh the bowling alley for for example they're only using certain lanes and they're trying to keep everybody separated so um each each venue has uh their you know their sanity sanitizing and their uh preparation that they go through and we make sure that they're uh appropriate in each one we're overseeing that though that's my question we make sure that they have them and our coaches at each venue make sure that they're being followed making sure that they're being followed that's that's my only concern as they said because when we're in the house i feel comfortable i just wanted to make sure okay thank you was there some other um somebody else had their hand up heather um i just wanted to jump in with my thoughts here were um jeff and i actually share some
087very strong thoughts about women's sports and about mental health that we've both spoken about at different times throughout this past year and during the pandemic and i feel um an enormous drive to make sure that women's sports are taken care of as well as all of our other sports and i was um really impressed during the summer i had the opportunity to be at the high school several times to see our cheerleading squads outside dragging every bit of their equipment to the baseball field every morning and it is not a small amount of equipment that they were using just for the summer workouts and they brought it all out themselves every morning and all back in and i was unaware even knowing people that cheer and knowing parents that are involved i was unaware of
088just how many cheerleaders we have to compete and it is a huge and award-winning program so i'm happy we have the opportunity to support them as we do some of our much you know substantially large men's teams but the other part is i don't think we can put i mean price is always important but for 80 an hour and for what being able to participate in these things still means to our students in any way as far as mental health goes jeff and i have both talked about being concerned about what we're doing for the well-being of the students i think it's important to continue absolutely heather um that's that's the um what i was saying um not quite as articulate as you just uh put it earlier that for consistency's sake for the sake
089of the emotional social well-being of the kids to be able to provide these outlets for their passions for um the extracurriculars normalcy if you will is is just crucial right now so um and for the the men to all sports anyone else did i see anyone else so um we are taking a vote on this now bernie yes yes okay all those in favor aye opposed obscene motion carries good discussion everyone okay moving on to transportation services there is one item on the agenda can i please have a motion second by jeff is there any discussion all those in favor i had a question yes susannah yeah i just had a question about the effective date of october 6 2020. i was just wondering if that's a typo good catch nice nicest man i do
090not believe that's a typo but um if it's not um i i do not believe it's a typo if it turns out that it is we'll bring it back for adjustment then i guess the question is um why are we approving something that happened in october i don't have the answer to that right off the top so i'll have to get back to doing that as well okay we did have a motion and second is there any other discussion how do we vote but if we don't understand if it's very from the beginning of the year lori you're breaking up again lord lord turn up your camera please thanks i was asking how we vote on something if we don't understand it if we don't know if it's something that's retro without knowing that's exactly
091what i was going to say lori um bernie does this have to be voted on tonight um you can table it we'll move it till next okay can i please have a motion yes i think absolutely can i please have a motion table move by mark angelo second by leewoo is there any discussion all those in favor aye aye thank abstain motion carries good catches and all those years in the calendar committee sharpen your sense of date girl going okay that brings us up to committee reports information items and for the good of the cause for the board um we don't have our student rep tonight so are there any committee reports information so for the good of the cause for the board from the board uh also the finance committee meeting is on on
092the agenda but i i think we've heard about that this evening uh everything that i would have said has been said and i appreciate bernie and his team jeff in uh and and letting everybody know and saving me uh that effort so thank you okay uh anybody else leewoo and then barbara so last night i attended the middlesex county school board association meeting so i'm surprised it's almost 60 board members there there is a lot discussing about the legal issues about government vaccine and school district and potential liability to the school district and jonathan bush from the bush law group gave very good representation uh he i believe he represented quite a few a school district and he just gave us a very good opinions but just suggesting because he is now trying to sell
093his war service to to the board member but we had very good discussion such as who are the vaccine issues teacher student some people don't want it should we have mandatorily for them to do it there's all kind of discussions very good very good meeting thank you okay barbara i just wanted to uh say thank you and a shout out to the east brunswick technology education community service eb tech students they did a nice uh online meeting for parents who wanted help with canvas and google classroom and that was me so i was one of the parents on that session and it was really helpful and it's amazing how much the students know and they were super patient with us parents with us parents who are a little bit slower than them and getting uh
094up on pairing uh the canvas how you compare for the students and keep an eye on different things that come up so you get a notification from time to time so and especially for you parents of younger kids that they were there too because uh let's say they're in hammershow let's say they're starting with the canvas and that it would help them as well so thank you to to our high school students laurie um as i mentioned in the calendar committee oh wait i'm going to turn up my camera can you hear me yes okay sorry um as mentioned the calendar committee met last night i just wanted to say um please bear with us to parents to staff i know in the past we have done the calendar um in a greater amount of
095time before with everything going on it's been a little challenging so thank you for your patience and hopefully we will have the calendar done um relatively soon for everybody okay and i think there was someone else susanna um i mentioned it at the last um meeting but just to remind everybody february's black history month and february 9th the east brunswick human relations council 7 30 p.m facebook live um there will be a a celebration event and again our students will be included among those featured uh during the program so it's going to be a great program and hope you'll be able to tune in absolutely anyone else see none we do have a need for closed session whereas the board of education must discuss matters which are not appropriate for discussion in a public meeting
096board of education intends to discuss matters as follows those items listed in tonight's agenda the land closed session is estimated to be one hour after which the public meeting of the board shall reconvene and action will not be taken can i please have a motion to go into closed session mobility whoa that was like an everybody muba liwu second by barbara is there any discussion all those in paper abstain motion carries want to remind the board members please log out of this meeting and log into the closed session to those of you who joined us tonight thank you stay safe and be well have a good evening you