Board Meeting 04/24/25

001Testing one, two. Test one, two, two, two, two. There you go. Call this meeting to order at 6:07 p.m. The New Jersey Open Public Meetings Law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to advance notice of and to attend the meeting of the public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon. In accordance with the provisions of the act, the East Rutherford Board of Education has caused notice of this meeting by having the date, time, and place thereof provided to the record and South Bergenite newspapers to have published and posted in the vestibule of the Burough Hall in the public library. Copies of agendas are available 48 hours prior to said meetings in the uh in the board of education office and are posted on the East Rutherford

002School website, www.erbo. e rb.net. Uh please stand for the flag salute and remain standing for a moment of silence in honor of the members of our police department, fire department, first responders, and our armed forces. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. You may be seated. Roll call. Miss Caruso here. Miss Collie here. Miss Meta here. Sanders here. Miss Shmley here. Mr. Banka is absent. Miss Laruso here. Uh fire exits front of the room and out to your left. Uh committee reports uh school business administrators report. Mr. Verach. Thank you, Madam President. Uh before I begin, uh I would be remiss not to say something. Uh unfortunately over the

003spring break uh the East Rutherford uh Board of Education uh mainly a custodian uh passed away during the break. Um Guy Mule, I knew him from Little Ferry, so we had a connection back there and we had the opportunity to work together again. Um what I could say about Guy was his smile. He just had this incredible smile. was always positive, always wanted to help people and um my heart just goes out to his family and his friends. He really truly was an amazing person. I I did get to know him, my time in Little Ferry and my time here. So, uh just, you know, just to let his family know that, you know, they are in our thoughts and that he will be uh surely missed not just for what he brought to our

004district, but what he did bring to his family and friends. Thank you, Madam President. Okay, thank you everyone. Appreciate that. Uh, tonight we will uh have the presentation of the 2025 2026 school uh budget presentation with myself and Mr. Jen Caspro. SP2 is the adoption of the maximum travel expenditures for 2025 2026. Uh since the last time we met the work session, there are six new finance items. F1 is the approval of the bills list for April 2025. Uh Miss Caruso, thank you very much for coming in. Appreciate that greatly. Uh F8 is the approval of the financial reports for March 2025. F9 is the approval of the transfers report for March 2025. So the board will approve February and March. So, we're all caught up. F10 is the approval to amend F5.2 as approved

005at the November 14th, 2024 board meeting for extraordinary services for the 2425 school year. The reason for this is that the not to exceed amount was going to go over by not less than $1,000. So, we needed to go ahead and to change that from $35,200 to $36,000. That's the reason why we are amending that F11 approval of the 2425 statement of assurance submission for lead drink and water. This is done every 3 years uh as required by the state uh that the information has been sent in and has been posted on our website. And F12 is the approval of early registration. Can't believe it. The New Jersey the NJSBA workshop 2025 in October. And just to let the board members know, we do have our accommodations. So, we're good to go with our accommodations.

006We'll go with that. Any discussion? I have a quick question in regard to the lead testing. There was two that exceeded. What do we do in that case? They were completely shut down. They were not used. They were retested and we passed. And we passed. Okay. Thank you. Whenever that happens, Miss Meta, uh even when I was in my prior discu, we immediately shut it down. It is not to be used. One was in the kitchen. So, just to let you know, everybody know one was in the kitchen. They stopped using it immediately and one was a water fountain that wasn't even being used in the classroom. So it wasn't even being used at all but they when they come in they test everything. So immediately that was shut down but Mr. Batishani reassured me

007that that drinking fountain in the classroom does not get used at all. So but it was shut down. Okay. It was retested and we're good to go. Thank you. You're welcome. Any other discussion? Okay. Thank you, Mr. Verra. You're welcome, Madam President. Um, should we let should we let Miss Barley go that way? Since you All right, we're gonna have Miss Balli on behalf of the Thank you. schools. Okay. for FA school. Uh the students and staff celebrated Autism Awareness Day by wearing blue on April 2nd. The basketball and cheer team had their pizza party celebration on April 11th for a great season. Thank you to Miss Ravitini, Mr. Chipkin, Miss Orana, and Mr. Cauley for all your help and your support throughout this season. FA school teachers will be attending the NJSLA trusting. We

008we attended the NJSLA testing uh training. Also, um we're excited today to invite our guests. They had a lot of fun and my teachers are exhausted and it was a great day to get a lot of work done. and also they're all preparing for the busy NJSLA assessment coming up. Um, and Lincoln School wind classes have been working hard to close the gap as we approach the back end of the school year. Students have been hard at work practicing key skills that will lead to successful spring. Our fifth graders continued their LE program in collaboration with the ERPD. Officers have been continuing their weekly lessons to support a safe and drug-free community. Cafe 101 has been a huge hit to date. And this month, as our CBI students continue to develop valuable life and workplace

009skills, the NES chapter is partnering with T EM to join forces I believe I believe that's NJS, not ne uh to join forces with Nyaka schools in Uganda for promote civics and global competencies. In the coming weeks, our students are looking forward to streaming into their classrooms to learn more about their culture, their schooling, and ways we can support one another. Report cards for working period 3 went out on April 11th. Uh parents are encouraged to talk to their children about their progress. McKenzie, which I cut in half. Spirit weeks, Wildcat Fridays, the Golden Ticket program, and our monthly ROAR assemblies continue to energize our students and staff. Special shout out to everyone who participated in our staff undercover spirit week. What a blast. We celebrated ReadAcross America with deemed spirit days and welcome community

010members and parents for readalongs throughout March. Thank you for helping us spread the love of reading. We were honored to host the National Honor Society students from Beckton, FA, and Lincoln schools who joined us for readalouds, engaging activities. Thank you for your time and Wildcat Pride. The kindergarten concert was on April 2nd and it was a huge hit. Bravo to our talented performers. And thanks to our amazing PTA ERPD, we enjoyed the Lead VU assembly on April 10th. The fun and educational event focused on respect, resilience, communication, tolerance, and mindfulness. Great lessons for both staff and students. And so you have it before you. Thank you. All right. Superintendence report. Thank you, Madam President. So, as Mr. Barra had mentioned, we're going to be discussing the 2526 school budget um as well as the New

011Jersey performance report that we received that was just recently released from embargo um so that we can share that with the public. Um it will be posted on our district website after we review it with the board tonight um so the parents can view it as well. um S1 which is the approval of the fire emergency drill which we didn't have at our last meeting which we now have. The board will be looking at that for passing of that resolution as well as the approval of uh HIV monthly reports. We have seven um not all of them are bullying but we do have seven reports to res to discuss with the board this evening just so you know what that is all about. Okay. And then also we have under personnel we had our personnel

012actions which we had last month but we do have something that's new. sorry last week um is P2 which is the approval of travel expenditures. Uh going over my report we have student enrollment McKenzie school 383 has not budged stayed the same. FA school 236 stayed the same. Lincoln school 173 also stayed the same. Total number 792. All of our fire drills uh were done for the month of April thanks to my building principles. um underneath uh long range facility plans. Mr. Barachi and I along with Mr. Abatisani is looking forward to the summer um and looking to implement a lot of the different facilities plans that we have coming up in the near future. Um underneath, let's see, underneath um special education, very brief report. Uh just grab it there real quick. Okay, CST

013members, uh we're reminded that the extended school year for the 2025 has been scheduled at Miss McKenzie School and will run from July 7th to July 31st. We're looking for Paris to step up if they would like to come and work. um please make sure that um they are resending their email to Dr. King Dobson so that we can schedule them accordingly. Um invitations for students that are eligible for the extended school year will be sent out tomorrow which is Friday, April 25th. Parentmies that are still left in the district is May 8th a virtual session titled mental health is health uh which will be offered to all parents. On May 21st, a virtual session titled Protecting Tiny Teeth, uh, which is really interesting. Uh, we we saw a preview of it. I It was

014great. It was really nice. Will be presented to preschool parents, uh, which is another way of, uh, keeping up with our hygiene at such a young age for our youngest Wildcats. Um underneath curriculum instruction and updates. Um so uh the assistant superintendent curriculum instruction student services working with middle school world language teachers to discuss professional development for the 2526 school year. Uh which is also included to meet with the math coaches to develop instructional framework for the 2526 school year as well as meeting with the science coach as well for PD for the 2526 school year. And that ends my report other than the data report. Any discussion? No. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Jean Casper. Yeah. I say we do the presentation and then move on with the rest of the agenda. How does that

015look at home? How does that look? It's kind of a delay. So, I want to be sure we don't saw it and people can't see it. Okay. So, we started our budget process way back uh when we worked Mr. Vari and I I want to personally thank Mr. Vari for the hard work that he did uh along with the administrative team in preparing the 2526 school year budget. Um, I will say publicly that the board uh was very good with trying to get us to making sure that we were fiscally sound to our taxpayers out there as well as providing programs for our students, our Wildcats here in um, East Rutherford. Uh, we did have our preliminary budget which was presented to the board which all of you have seen. Um, nothing has changed since

016then. Um and it was recently approved by the county superintendent on April 11th uh 2025 and that's why we are having our budget hearing today on April 2024. Mr. Raj my turn uh before we begin I I want to publicly thank the finance committee Mr. Banker Mr. Caruso Mr. Sanders for all your hard work, your support, the dialogue going back and forth. And I would be uh remiss not to thank all of the board members for uh their support throughout this process. It's not easy. It's not an easy process. Thankfully, we're not one of those districts that have to make these massive cuts. So thankfully, and I will I will say publicly thank you to the board for supporting myself and Mr. Jan Caspro with this cuz like I said it's not an easy decision

017to go above the tax levy. So thank you. So the district tax levy increase for the general fund is 3.25%. I just want to remind everyone uh here and at home that that last year well the current year it was 4.9%. So instead of 4.9 we're at 3.25 because we went 1 and a4% above the 2% threshold. Uh that was an increase of over $600,000 which will go a long way not just in the short term but also in future budgets down the line. The district tax levy increase for debt service. This is for the referendum uh increase by $473,745. The district did utilize we were um fortunate enough to have an enrollment adjustment. So to offset um to help balance the budget, I should say, we utilize $232,25 of enrollment adjustment. We did not

018go into the health waiver. We did not use bank cap. Thankfully, we did not have to go that far into all of our uh adjustments and waivers. Uh good thing we didn't we did get an increase in state aid uh of 17.8% which equals $69,917. That's separate from preschool education aid cuz state aid is considered fund 10. Preschool education aid is considered fund 20. We did receive a substantial increase of 44.5% which equates to 264,732. Uh a slight decrease in uh debt service aid from the state of $182. maintenance reserve. Uh we did utilize $184,885,000. This was slightly above than the current budget by by about $20,000 to help balance the budget. uh capital reserve we did take we did withdraw uh 1.1 million and the reason why is for the roof replacement at McKenzie

019here at the board office the exterior door replacement project at fast and the media center change in use at McKenzie so that's where all that money is and I I just want to remind also the board that two of those projects are rod grants so what we should get back from the state is about $275 $5,000 out of $686,000. So, we will be getting some of the money back from those two uh roof projects. Use of surplus. I have to thank our auditors. They really have guided us along this whole process. Uh this is $700,000. The goal um for everyone on the board is to slowly chip away at the use of surplus. So that's the goal having the conversation with the auditors is little by little chip away at maybe try to do $25,000

020less or $50,000 less. Little by little to chip away at the use of surplus and it's to maintain the long range financial stability and the health of the district. But the auditors are are very happy. They're happy with our reserves. They are happy with how we are using the surplus to help uh bring forth this bud this uh budget. uh continuation of instructional coaches in the areas of mathematics, language arts, science, social studies, and world languages with grant and local funds, hiring additional district staff to meet the district's expansion needs. And finally, district continues to increase student capacity and rigor while decreasing the placement of special education students in out of district private schools. Next one. Go to you on that one. So as we build the 2526 school budget, we look at our current

021goals uh which we have which is building and supporting positive culture, accountability for our students and staff, curriculum, instruction, program and assessment as well as diversity and equity. So from that next during the summer the board members will get an email from me regarding the 2526 budget sorry 2526 school year and the goals and usually what we do is our goals are anywhere from 3 to five years and we try to continue with them because it takes time for us to develop those goals as we go and we meet the needs of our of our students. So this is something that we're looking at for the next school year. So you'll see all the board members you'll see um most likely the end of July you'll get an email with something similar to this where

022you'll get some you'll give us some input on what you would like to see as a board and then from there I take those goals your board goals put it into district goals then the district goals become building level goals and then it goes all the way down to our students which would be SGOs's right our performance so that's something that we continue starts with our board and goes all the way down Mr. you Mr. Jin Caspro. So this is our breakdown of our 2526 budget by fund. We have bund 10. Our general fund is 22 22,684,312. I just want to go back to 2425. This is our total operating budget is 22,615,493. It's only an increase of 3/10en of a percent. So again, thank you to the administration. really thank you to the board

023for supporting us because of all of our efforts because we are mindful uh you know not to to be very mindful of how the monies are spent. We are very very mindful. The local tax levy is 19,180,116. Special revenue fund in the amount of 1,342,298. debt service we budgeted 2,213,758 of that from the local tax levy that is to help pay down the referendum is 1,448,995. So now when you look at the total base budget you're talking you're including fund 10 20 we don't have 30 but 40 is 26,240,368 as compared to the current budget of 26,110,000 it's only an increase of 510 of half a percent. So I'm very proud to present that to the board and for your support. Okay, next is the annual tax levy increase. This is where we show fund

02410 and fund 40. Fund 10, uh this is where the board will uh vote on going above the 2% cap. And the reason why we were able to do that is because of the enrollment adjustment uh by going up by 1.25%. So from the current budget to next year's budget is an increase of over $600,000. uh the debt service fund there. It's a difference of $473,745. Next, and this is uh your 10-year history of the tax levy increases, very similar to what you've seen in the past. Obviously, last year it was 2015. I took that off. Uh as you can see, times are changing. Uh unfortunately, districts are facing very tough decisions right now. when it comes to the tax levy they are. So again, publicly I want to thank the board for their support,

025for their communication back and forth, and really if it wasn't for the board, we wouldn't be able to do what we do. Tax impact as a homeowner myself, this is this is what I want to see. The most important screen. This is one of the most important screens. So the actually the average assessed home value did increase. Last year, I believe it was 461,000. this year is 509,000. That's the average assessed home value. The increase for the year is $93 per year or $7.75 per month or 26 per day on an average assessed home of $59,000. That's what it will cost. It's less than what it was last year. I think last year was over was maybe 110 120 something like that. Yeah. So the so the increase is a lot less uh this year

026than it was last year. The next is a revenue comparison from 2425. As you see your tax levy tuition. I want to point that out. That's when before P school education um came in we were actually collecting tuition. We could no longer collect tuition. So that's why you see that zero. I don't want you to be alarmed but that's the reason why. Uh another thing is slight increase in rents and royalties. Uh miscellaneous we increased it. That's really interesting accounts. One of our accounts is actually earning very good uh interest. Again I want to thank the board for supporting me in the decision to try to uh move the funds that we have to to gain uh more interest. Semi unfortunately they changed the formula right Miss Collie you know this came out as a

027surprise to a lot of us they did change the formula and the so this is what we'll expect for next year we did not expect this much of a decrease but uh we were able to pull it off as well as extraordinary aid instead you what the auditors want to see is that we don't depend on extraordinary aid And I was able to, and some people think thought I was nuts, to bring it down $125,000, but I was committed to bring it down as much as possible. The goal, ladies and gentlemen of the board, is to get extraordinary aid to zero because whatever we get from the state is like a bonus. So that's what it is. So, uh, most recently, we only received we received about 104 105,000 extraordinary aid. The goal is to

028get that to zero if not by next year in in two years. Uh state aid went up. Uh let's see. Uh withdrawal from capital reserve. Those are the capital projects that I talked about. Maintenance reserve went up slightly to help balance the budget. Budgeted fund balance. Uh our goal myself and Mr. Jen Caspro is to little by little start chopping that down the budgeted fund balance. So that will be the goal. And as you can see, the total operating budget from the current year to next year um is only an increase of 3/10en of a percent. Uh our special revenue fund has gone up. Uh let's see. And then you have your debt service, the tax le this is to pay off the referendum that has gone up just for next year. And let's see.

029And pretty much everything else has been flatfunded. And then when you look at the total budget, when you bringing in fund 10, 20, and 40, the budget only went up half a percent. So I'm I'm very proud to present this to the board, to the public, and and again, I can't thank the board enough for their support. Where's the pie chart? There we go. All right. So, it's okay. Revenue. Where does it come from? Guess where it comes from, ladies and gentlemen? 73% of it comes from the tax levy. And then the other 27% comes from debt service aid, miscellaneous, the tax levy, that's for the referendum, special revenue fund, budgeted fund balance. You have your look at the withdrawal from maintenance and capital that's almost 5%. State aid is at 4.7. And then we

030have miscellaneous. So that is our revenue breakdown. And next is our appropriations. Well, how how are we going to where where will the money be going? Pretty much how will the money be spent? And you're going to see the pie chart how salaries and benefits take up a large chunk. But as you can see, regular program instruction all the way you see special education, you see bilingual instruction. a lot of reason for the change. The increase is is really is salaries. Salaries go up. So that that's the reason for that change. Uh let's see. Support services went down. That's because, you know, pea helped us out. We were able to move some positions from the general fund over to preschool. Uh what else do I want to point out? Employee benefits. Yeah, there it is.

03110% increase. So that was budgeted. uh almost $366,000. Uh capital outlay, we were able to break it down by almost $376,000, which is good. Charter schools, uh we have three students, so I I budgeted for them. Let's see. Special revenue fund increased and the debt service fund decreased slightly. And then the next one is who where does it all go? Well, you're looking at about 68.5%. That's more than 23 of the budget is already spoken for in terms of salaries and employee benefits. And then the other third goes everywhere else. So, it's not a lot of money to disseminate when you have salaries and employee benefits. We're This is not unique to us. This is every school district. And you see how it's broken down. Operations and maintenance, instruction, support services, tuition, administration, uh student,

032that's student transportation, capital outlay, special revenue, and debt service fund. So that's where the money will be is is being allocated to. So like like I said, you're talking about over 23 of our money is earmarked between salaries and benefits for full-time and part-time. And um board members, any questions? Got one discussion. Yeah. Yeah. On that extraordinary aid. Yes. Great job reducing that by 71%. Um is there a negative impact on anything with doing that? No. The auditors actually recommend that you you not rely on that money because what happens if let's say we were to budget 150,000 and we don't receive all that money now we're at a we're at a deficit. Got it. So the goal is to get it to zero. So whatever we receive an extraordinary aid it's like a bonus.

033Perfect. So I was and you could ask Mr. Jen Casper. I was I was persistent. I wanted to get it down. I wanted to get it down. I wanted to get it down. So I got it down to 50,000 which was 125 grand. That's all. And our orders are really good. Like they actually sit down. It's almost like they school you as you're going through and they look at the pros and cons of the of the budget, what we can do, what's a what's not a good practice. Uh and we try to stay away from them. I I have to say since I've been here, um our auding firm that the board has hired is they're very good. They're very good. They're knowledgeable. They're pleasant to work with. They they help teach us through things

034and new laws that are out there, purchasing laws. And I'm really really It's really a good company that we have. And we actually did run this by the auditors when we were looking at the revenues and they were they were very pleased with they were so happy. They they were very pleased. So just wanted to have a you know another set of eyes on it. They said no we you're doing a great job and continue to do the work. Great work. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you. Anybody else? No. Um, can I open up to the I'll um I will open to the public for questions or comments, but only on the finance on the budget only. Guess I could do that. Why not? It's not a room full. It's not a Okay, scratch that.

035Okay, I'll open to the public on agenda items only. You will have five minutes. Anybody wishing to speak will be given the opportunity to do so. State your name, address for the record. None. Okay, seeing none, I close to public comment on agenda items. Budget and agenda item. Yes. Okay. So are we. So then we vote on you SP12. No people want to go home. Okay, Mr. J. Thank you, Madam President. So, uh, first to the board, my apologies to getting this out so late. Um we had um an embargoed period of time which we weren't able to share it. Um but we did get information. I was also waiting on Dr. King Dobson u for her input on it as well um in her absence. So we were just able to get this out.

036Um I sent it out late probably the board members got like at 10:30 night like what is this text me email coming at 10:30 tonight but tried to get it out as quickly as I possibly could uh for you to review. This is just basically going through the steps. Uh we're we are required to report out to the board. um about our school performance and this would be the 23 24 school year. So not the current school year that we're in. Um and what we're looking at is we're looking at each of the individual schools. We look at the district first overall all the demographic areas and then we look at McKenzie Lincoln and then FA. Only thing is when we're looking at McKenzie school, you got to keep in mind there's nothing to compare

037it to. There's no growth that we're looking at. We just either met the target or we didn't meet the target. where in the other schools we can we can look at growth. Um, one of the things um that we pride ourselves in I I will tell you and I've shared this with the administrative team and among the teachers as well. Um, we just have a really dynamite school district. We we really do. Um, from the board all the way down to, you know, down to our custodial team, our bus drivers, our aids, we we all pull it together. And this was so evident in our QAC review. Um, we hear it at our CQAC review. We've heard it at the county level where, you know, they're constantly selling us ala accolades of just how wonderful

038our district is doing. Um, and why we were able to pass QAC is because the level of growth, not just meaning the target, like how much growth you have in any given area. Um, and that's something that, you know, we when I say we, I mean the administrative team, and I know and I know the board as well, uh, with the support that you've given us over the years. So 10 years ago when I first came on, uh it's totally a different district than what we have now. Um the teachers are like just incredible. Um they had cried out for a lot of professional development which we were able to provide the teachers. Um our student body is totally different. They're able to take different types of assessments. Um and how to take the assessments

039is really really important. Understanding what to how to answer a test, right? How to answer it, how to approach a question. um that are now our tests, our regular everyday tests pretty much mirror our state assessment because we really want the children to to start getting used to that type of testing so that when they're in the moment they're like, "Oh my goodness, they don't panic and they're able to get through it, right? So trying to build that build that up and that stamina in our students." So we are a very diverse school district with different student body, right? That that's a broader demographic and our demographic is changing all throughout the state of New Jersey. So our job as educators and administrators and boards of education is to move with the punches, right? And

040just move with the time. So our student teacher ratio remains the same. Um and we're really ensuring the intention of you know across McKenzie school, Lincoln school and th school. And we've always heard that you know East Rutherford is a transient district. We have families that come in and come out and come in and come out. That's what makes East Rutherford so unique, you know, and it makes it, you know, a place to work, a place to educate your children. Uh, which is really, really nice. We do have um special populations, so we look at not only of our demographic areas, but we're also looking at students with disabilities. We're looking at English language learners and then our targeted groups um that we look at. So, the teacher's focus is this not on just passing

041content. It's really understanding who our children are, educating the whole child. So, that's the one of the hardest jobs our teachers have. Um, but I will tell you from at least the moment that I've been superintendent, the teachers have been been very receptive. They've been very receptive to change. Sometimes it's hard. Change is hard for everyone. Change is hard for me. Change is hard for our administrative team. You know, it's it's just the way it is. But because of the unique um dynamic that we have as educators, it really reaps the benefits of showing this in our students, our students and how well they're doing. So again, we're focusing on academic growth, which is balanced in our social emotional learning, and we're looking at meeting the target, which is set by the state, right? As

042well as growth. So to focus on growth is what we're really looking at. So I'm going to take us through these are indicators. Um if I were to show you all of the individual detail, the the individual um data, I would probably bore you to death. But I do have that. So if any of the board members want to see that, please come to my office. I will show you the thick packet of individual data that we have and I'm more than willing to share that with anybody. So basically right now is what we're looking to do and this is another reason why we pass Qstack. So we're trying to meet the target. So when we look at growth it's anything above 60 60% to 99%. That's where we want to be in growth and

043that's where East Rutherford is is being looked at and shared among my colleagues at least um at at roundts that we have. So you can see where we exceeded um the standard in um in ma in language arts literacy and in mathematics. So that's showing district-wide all the demographic areas, right? All of those areas we have exceeded it, which is really nice to see the blue. We always want to be in the blue. That's that's our goal, right? Um then we look at target. Did we meet the state target? Now what our goal is and the board parents at home may say, "Oh, we're green. This is great state. It's not good enough. We want to be at the 80 percentile. That's where we want 80% to 100%. That's our goal. So when we look

044at this, remember what I said to the board over the last year. It's a 3 to 5 year projection. So we're trying to do it within three years. That's what we're looking at. The teachers have been working a lot, right? The administrative team working a lot. Our paras are working. Our parents are working. So it's it takes an army. It really takes an army. So this is where we are districtwide as meeting the state. Right? Moving right along. Let's look at Mackenzie School. Okay. So when we look at McKenzie School, don't get nervous, right? Don't get nervous when you see this. Okay? We're not nervous. We have we have a game plan as we're moving forward. So let's look at mathematics right now. Mathematics were at 46.6% when we met the state. We're all not

045happy. When we say we, I can say that administrative team, the teachers, right? We want more than that. We want the blue. But we are working hard on trying to get this to the 80 percentile. Um remember now in math sometimes the math dips not be just because of computation because it's language in the math. Right? So we're looking at like long like um problem solving, you know, all of the the language part of it that we're we're we're really working hard with. We're looking as a school district to pull children more into small group instruction to be able to give that one-on-one attention to our students that need it. I've also not boring our students that are advanced and and and can can go beyond go beyond. So what do we do with this?

046So just oops just to give you some data points here. So math performance okay in mathematics is 46.6% of the students are at or above the state standards slightly exceeding the state max minimum of 40.2. too. So, even though we're above it, we're still not happy, right? We we want we want more, but still we're below the aspirational goal of the 80%. And this is this is I pretty feel comfortable saying this across the Southern Bergen County that when I speak to my superintendent colleagues, we're all in the same boat on this. So, we're trying to really work hard on this. Um so, again, we're trying to strengthen numeracy, right? That's that's what we're looking to do. ELA concerns. only 42% um of the McKenzie school students met or exceeds expectations in English language arts

047and which places us below the state of 52.1%. Right? So this is something that we have in there. We're we're being very transparent and this is what the board always holds us accountable for. Be transparent. Right? This is what we're working with. We're working with the population of students that need assistance. We are providing that assistance as we go through. Now, one of the biggest things as we start tracking this is we look at I've said this at parent teacher conferences, I've said this at back to school nights, it's important that our students are in school because when we look at chronic absenteeism rates, right, and we look at and we share it across the curriculum, right, and we across the demographics when students are out there, there's there's regression, right? So, we try to

048do that. Now, we understand parents keep their children home, they're sick. No, of course, we don't want your children here sick, right? and then that's not we want them to be at their optimal state, right? Making sure that they're healthy, being able to have the stamina to get through a school day. That's what we're looking for. So, what's the the strategic focus? So, when we look at ELA and the proficiency gap, we're looking at targeted intervention. We're looking at those skills, right? comprehension, inferencing skills, word attack skills, vocabulary, pulling those students that are struggling a little bit more instead of once or twice a a week, three to five times a week in small group instruction. And the teachers are great with this. They're working really hard, but again, we do have some obstacles, right?

049We're trying to work, we're making sure that that homeschool connection is there. So, whatever our teachers are working hard with our students in the classroom, parents are picking up from where the teachers left off and then send those children back to us the next day. so that there's you know continuity within instruction right it just doesn't stop at the end of the school day and then pick up again the next morning it it's continuum so I do want to publicly thank our parents um we have a great set of parents here across across the district who will reach out to our teachers who will reach out to our building principles and say well how can I help my child how can I do this how can I do that um especially at parent teacher conferences

050the information that I'm getting back from my building principles saying you know we're getting some good feedback um if there is some feedback where we need some improvement it's shared shared with the teacher, the teacher shares it with the building principal, principles share it with uh Dr. King Dobson and I and then we start looking at ways that we could adjust our instruction um and the types of assessment that we're using um with our children. Um moving right along over at Lincoln school, Lincoln school 75 really like close to that 80% 60 we're over. over and and this is exceeds so we're exceeding in growth 60 to 99 at Lincoln school and 67 um% which where we are over in mathematics. So what we're looking at and and parents have, you know, reached out and

051had shared and I think some of the board members had shared this with us as well is like, well, when we're tracking data, are we tracking student data or are we are we tracking instruction? Right? Because what we try to do is we try to focus on where our third grade students are, then next year they're fourth grade, and the next year they're fifth grade. So, we're trying to attract that and we're trying to figure out like so when they're going from third grade at McKenzie school and maybe they're just under meeting the target, but yet when they get to Lincoln school, they're excelling. Like, what is it? Like, what is it? Is it the curriculum? Is it the content? Is it the framework of the assessment? So, these are the healthy discussions that we

052have amongst the administrative team trickling down to our teachers because our teachers, I mean, they're front line. They're on the front line. So if they're going to know, anybody's going to know, they're going to know, right? So, and they'll be able to trickle back up to us so that we can provide them with professional development um and and keep moving forward. So again, Lincoln School did quite well in growth and met targets. Okay, so they met target again 66.4 49%. Excellent, right? Are we happy? No. Ask my teachers. No, they're not. We want 80%. We want 80 or better. And we're striving every single day to do that. So at Lincoln School, here are some of the highlights. So again, it's consistent improvement in mathematics, raising proficiency over the past year. Remember, this is year

053two. We're going to go next year's year three, and then we reconfigure again. So it's every threeear cycle as we go through because there are curriculum changes, right? There's there's different standards that are assessed. We're looking at we're looking at how it's placed on an assessment, what's assessed. Um, and we do have a seat at the table uh at our curriculum consortium meetings that we have. Uh, one of the things too that I I I pride myself in is that I'm able to sit at the governance relations committee which is at the state level. So, we get to hear it right from the governor's office first. So, that if I hear something, it's coming out. I'm going to share that with all of you as a board. Um, ELA scores are on par with state

054averages and targeted reading in uh initiatives grow uh driving growth. So, we're constantly seeing that growth movement. Um, attendance rates at Lincoln School have improved. And again, that's why I said there's a direct correlation to chronic absenteeism and test scores, right? And not only just state assessment, like we don't wait for the state assessment. Our teachers are seeing it if even on our day-to-day assessments where if a child's not in, right? Or if they're not really working at home on the content, they're not really passing, right? So, we're trying to work with them, work with parents to getting them to understand that how important it is to make sure that your children um number one are healthy, of course, and of course coming to school. uh and our community engagement which we're we're constantly doing

055with parentmies. I would love and I say this publicly please parents come to our parentmies they are really really good my staff really works hard um along with our PTA I know PTA is in our in our in our audience today uh this evening you know which a really nice um marriage nice marriage for lack of better words right uh on how we can help raise our test scores foul school so again this is growth growth look we're in the blue we are in the blue and and again I'm going to say this and I'll say it again over the last 10 years, this is not the same district. Our test scores are moving, okay? Slow and steady, right? Slow and steady. But, you know, we've had that. We've changed tests. Remember, we changed the

056format of tests. Then we had COVID. We were coming out, right? Before CO, we were a trajectory moving up and then all of a sudden co CO hit and we plummeted. Now, we're back up again. So, anybody who's been with me for 10 years, we know it's been up and down, up and down. We're trying to maintain that that that slow steady increase as we go through with not overwhelming our students because our students get very overwhelmed, right? So, we try not to focus on the test scores, but we try to focus our students on you did a really good job. And I just had this conversation with one of my principles today, Mr. Valardi. And it's important for students to know and see this because think about it. If you're playing baseball, right, and

057you're getting up to bat, you want to know what your batting average is, right? you want to know how many more times do I have to go to the batting cages, right? To to to work hard. So, I think data is important as long as it's introduced to our students gingerely, right? Saying it's okay, you're okay. We're here. We're going to move further. We're going to keep working hard as long as it's like, no, our scores are low. You got no, you can't do that, right? So, it's important to become that that the students are part of the process. Part of the process and then again met the target 72.1%. How close are we in ELA? Right? Really, really close. And we had some struggles at the middle school, right? Mrs. Barley and her team

058have worked really, really hard, you know, trying to work in content areas, especially in language arts literacy and mathematics and in some of the other areas like Spanish and and in and and and um science and history or social studies. We're also looking at the piece of how math correlates with science and how language correlates with social studies. So, it's it's one big big machine. So here are some of the highlights. So a foul school was showing growth especially particularly in ELA the median growth percentile of 66% indicating there is progress faster than the academic steer appears of the state. So those are some of the things that we do and we have these conversations among superintendents as well when we round tables. We're always talking um about just where our students are and how

059we can help each other as superintendent to move our students numbers up to a higher level. growth um also exceeds the state standard at 62 showing consistent instructional effectiveness. The growth score suggests that overall proficiency might vary but the rate of improvement and that's something that we had shared that I had shared with you. Uh the focus moving forward is building and maintaining growth constantly seeing growth because with growth you will see the set uh the the target being met. If we we don't ever want to see no growth, that is a huge huge red flag because as long as our students are growing, we're good. We're going and and and it's something that, you know, uh like I said, the county office sees us doing and and again gives us a pat on the

060back. So, kudos to my teachers, administrative team. Thank you board for assisting us with this. Um okay, so the district has improved uh in student attendance, maintaining a uh did I did this already? Hold on one second. Yep, that's a repeat. That's all I have. Any question? I have a question. Do you and I think I know the answer to this. So for the growth on the the charts, so for fourth grade, that's showing growth from third to fourth. It's tracking the same student. We're track we're tracking and we and if you remember Jillian if you remember um in October when we do the that actually has the trends so we're able to track them because we just have to be careful because data is great but if you're not using data correctly you're going

061to get a number that's not good and then we're going to be doing the wrong thing. Right? So what we try to do is we look at the individual grade level to see how our teachers are instructing and what we can do as administration to provide heavy duty professional development to make them feel comfortable. But then again we track our students just to see how they're how they're doing in language arts literacy and mathematics. So yes absolutely and then my other question is regarding the ELA. So I know I think this is this year the first year of that new phonics program. Yes. What grades are currently utilizing that? It's It's uh kindergarten. No, first grade, second grade, third grade at the elementary. Not Not third. Not third. I'm sorry. Yeah. No, absolutely. Yes, it's

062not third grade. Another great program that we used like way back when. So, it does like, you know, the phonics first does feed into that. Okay. Um and now being almost a full year into phonics first again thank you um it really is a great program I do think that um the students have growth and I've seen like the tangible positive impact on their okay and what we were trying to do is because we had the words their way which is intense and then we just felt that the phonics program wasn't up to par where it needs to be to to to marry those two personally myself I've seen a huge difference just from one child to another with the new program but I just um but we won't see the effects of that. I

063was just wondering they say about three years and three years is a long time. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But I just didn't know where that fell. Right. And on this uh when we're looking at year over year because I know we're doing step by step to get to 80 percentile which does feel like a mile away. Um it might be good to show where where we've come from. Yeah. So maybe there's we look at next years we can see you know what the previous five years were and the growth that we've done incrementally to get there and I think it's good for the minister for the staff to understand where their schools stacking up year over year. Absolutely. Absolutely. And that's part were you with us Mr. Sanders in September October? No you so no. So

064that part of it so I agree with you. So we do we we will do that with our individual test scores from the year before here. We we there it's a little different. It's the way it's it's set, but I could show you the actual individual pieces for each of the building. But yes, I agree with you 100% because this way at least our teachers know and our administrators know, hey, well, this is where we came from. Here's the increase. Well, why is it such a little increase from this year? What happened? Like, you know, absolutely. 100%. 100%. It's easier to forecast it that way. Yeah. On that note, as well, are we comparing us to the previous years in terms of how successful we've been with growth and assessments? Because in comparison to the

065previous years, while we're doing a tremendous job in keeping in the blue and exceeding standards overall, it there is a big discrepancy between the 2022 to 2023 reports to this year. I do have one thing a big decrease talking to Mr. Vach. One thing I would say though just in looking at that is if there was a big jump from 2021 to 2022, you might not expect as big of a jump. I didn't look. So I'm just saying like no that that's but I will tell you to answer your question. It's an excellent question. So the the thing is let me just pull it up so you can just see it one more time. View slideshow. So for this part here for foul school and and Lincoln school it's been a consistent growth growing up.

066McKenzie school has been a slight dip slight dip from last year to this year but because like one of our teachers just said we changed the phonics program. So next year's comparison uh Miss Man to your point is going to be like right on the mark because we'll be able to see now one year with the new Fox program into a second year and to track those students to see if the growth is there. So yes, I agree with you 100%. 100%. Yep. I think one other thing to consider and and track or look at, you know, I I think there's some um uh with the with the prek coming in and kind of having that under our house that we should see some behavior development and things that are going to impact testing because

067we we know we're we're we're grooming, you know, we're building them from ground up, right? So, I would be curious to see what McKenzie does just because of that as as a year or two goes by. Absolutely. And and we I think we had mentioned it we mentioned this in an administrative core meeting we said like now that we have these children earlier right we're able to intervene very quickly so if there's something with reading that we have to pick up on or mathematics or where the confusion is you know where we'll able to pick up on it right oh absolutely 100%. And that's that's agreed upon the total administrative team and I know our teachers would say the exact same thing. Absolutely. I just have one other question about the chronic absenteeism. So, I

068think last year it's definitely progressively going down, but it was still at like 11%. Is there are you noticing a decrease already this year from last year? And is there any like steps that we're putting in place to help that? It's been steady. It's been steady, but I do know that each of the building principles have an attendance committee that they work on at the teacher level and then trying to give them incentives for children to come to school and to do these things. But sometimes it's hard. You know, we try to tell the parents to get them to come to school. It's hard. We we we we try to but then again because we do not that I'm blaming anything but we do have a transitional this in and out kind of thing. So

069we do look at that if if students are out for a longer period of time we do take them off of enrollment and then we if they and then we have the parents reregister them because everything affects numbers. It's just it's sad but it's like all about numbers and it shouldn't be about numbers should be about our children right but unfortunately we're held accountable to numbers. So yes, we do and we do meet and the and the building principles will notify me if they see any dramatic change, notify us and then we convene as an administrative team. Yep. Anybody else? No. Yes. Thinking about it. Maybe the wheels are turning. No. Okay. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Jean Caspro. My pleasure. Okay. So, we're going to do SP1 in SP2. Okay. Uh so I need a

070motion to adopt uh SP1, the adoption of the 2025 2026 school budget and SP2 adoption of maximum travel expenditures for the 2025 2026 school year. So move second doesn't matter. Okay, Irene second it. Okay, so we'll do the roll call for Okay. Okay, Miss Caruso, yes. Miss Collie, yes. Miss Mena, yes. Mr. Sanders, yes. Miss Shmley, yes. Mr. Banker, yes. And Miss Laruso, yes. Now we'll do SP2. Hey, Miss Caruso, yes. Miss Collie, yes. Miss Mena, yes. Mr. Sanders, yes. Miss Chmley, yes. Banka, yes. Miss Laruso, yes. Both motions pass 70. Um, okay. So, moving on with our agenda. Correspondence to members of the board. We had a letter from the ACLU on 4925 and I have a walk-on. Um later this afternoon, we received an email from the ERA. Um adoption of prior board

071meeting minutes. Upon the recommendation of the superintendent, the board hereby approves the following meeting minutes. Uh March 13, 2025 work session meeting minutes. March 13, 2025 work executive session meeting minutes. March 18th, 2025 public session meeting minutes. So moved. Second. I don't know which one we're doing. Second. Any discussion? Roll call. Miss Caruso, yes. Miss Collie, yes. Miss Mena, yes. Mr. Sanders, yes to March 13th and abstain to March 18th. Thank you. Okay. Shmley, yes. Mr. Banker, yes. And Mr. Louso, yes. Uh, superintendent resolutions. Upon the recommendation of the superintendent, the board hereby approves motions S1 through S3. S1 approval of fire and emergency drill report. S2 appro approval of enrollment report. And S3 approval of harassment, intimidation, and bullying monthly report. Oh, anything dis any discussion? Yes. So if you look up on the

072screen, there was a lastm minute change. So if you look if you're looking at your hard copy, it's going to be different. So just to recognize for the board, it's two alleged at one verified, Lincoln school zero, two verified, and McKenzie 3 zero verified. So that's the change different than what's in here. It was a last minute change that we couldn't get out. They're all going to be discussed tonight. I have them all here, but just so the numbers are slightly off. That's all. And this is just approval of the report itself, not the individual. Correct. Correct. Correct. I just want to make sure that you know what you're reason. Yep. Okay. Any discussions? No. Roll call. Miss Caruso? Yes. Miss Collie? Yes. Miss Mana? Yes. Mr. Sanders? Yes. Miss Shley? Yes. Mr. Banker? Yes.

073Laruso? Yes. All right. Curriculum committee. Miss Shamley. Thank you, Madame President. Uh, upon the recommendation of the superintendent, the board hereby approves motion C1. C1, approval of student field trips and transportation requests for the 2024 2025 school year. Second. Any discussion? Roll call. Miss Caruso? Yes. Molly? Yes. Miss Mena? Yes. Mr. Sanders? Yes, Miss Shamley. Sorry. Yes, Mr. Banker. Yes. And Miss Laruso. Yes. Thank you, Miss Shley. Concludes my report. Uh, personnel committee, Miss Caruso. Thank you, M. Madam President. Upon the recommendation of the superintendent, the board hereby approves P1 personnel actions and P2 approval of travel expenditures. Second discussion roll call. Miss Caruso? Yes. Miss Collie? Yes. Miss Mena. Mr. Sanders? Yes. Miss Shmley? Yes. Mr. Banker? Yes. and Mr. Louso. Yes. And that ends my report, Madame President. Thank you. Okay. Uh, physical

074facilities committee, Mr. Sanders. Thank you, Madam President. Upon the recommendation of the superintendent, the board hereby approves PF1 through PF2. PF1 approval of monthly facility calendar May 2025. PF2, approval of district use of facility applications. Second. Any discussion? Roll call. Miss Caruso? Yes. Miss Collie? Yes. Miss Mena. Mr. Sanders? Yep. Miss Shmley? Yes. Mr. Banker? Yes. And Miss Larusa? Yes. That concludes my report. Thank you, Mr. Sanders. Okay. Community relations, Miss Collie. Thank you, Madam President. Upon the recommendation of the superintendent, the board hereby approves motion CR1 and CR2. CR1, Administrative Professionals Week acknowledgement. CR2, Teacher Appreciation Week acknowledgement. And I'm assuming we vote on this first and then I will read them, the acknowledgements. Yes. Want me to read them now? Can read them first? Sure. Okay. Be it resolved uh upon the recommendation

075of the superintendent in schools, the East Rutherford Board of Education approves the following resolution honoring administrative assistant, secretarial, clerical, and bookkeeping personnel and proclaim proclaiming the week of April 21st, 2025 as administrative professionals week. Whereas the East Rutherford Board of Education, administrative assistant, secretarial, clerical, and bookkeeping staff members have successfully served the East Rutherford public schools, its administration, faculty, and student body in the daily performance of their duties. And whereas the East Rutherford Board of Education, administrative assistant, secretarial, clerical, and bookkeeping staff members have faithfully and unselfishly carried out their duties in an exemplary manner to the benefit of our students and the community. And whereas the East Rutherford Board of Education wishes to formally recognize and honor every administrative assistant, secretarial, clerical, and bookkeeping staff member for their personal dedication. Now, therefore, be it

076resolved that the week of April 21st, 2025 is hereby proclaimed administrative professionals week for the purpose of providing public recognition and appreciation for the contributions that the administrative assistant, secretarial, clerical, and bookkeeping staff members to the East Rutherford School District in the performance of their duties. [Music] and CR2 teacher appreciation week. Be it resolved that the East Rotherford Board of Education approved the following resolution pro proclaiming the week of May 5th, 2025 as teacher appreciation week. Whereas America's greatest strength has always been an educated citizenry and whereas that educated citizenry is the directly is directly attributable to our system of free and universal public education that provides an educational opportunity for all students. And whereas the foundation upon which that system of public schooling rests in the classroom teacher. And whereas the classroom teacher is

077challenged daily to reach out to every student regardless of ability, interest in learning, social or economic background, physical, mental, or emotional handicap, race, religion, creed, or ethnic origin to provide assistance and guidance necessary for full intellectual development. And whereas the classroom teacher is key to the intellectual and occupational preparation of our individual citizens who collectively determine the quality of life in America and in our communities. And whereas the work of the classroom teacher immeasurably affects the future lives of all students. And whereas the classroom teacher deserve the deepest respect and admiration of citizens of our communities. Now therefore be it resolved that the East Rutherford Board of Education hereby proclaims teacher appreciation week on May 5th, 2025 for the purpose of providing public recognition and appreciation for the dedication and contributions of the classroom teacher

078not only to our communities as a whole but to each of us individually as citizens. Any discussion? Um, just wanted to say thank you to administration and faculty. It's great to see. Is there is there a color for Cincoa that we should support the teachers with? [Laughter] I don't know. We should I'd wear it. But thank you. You're welcome. Sorry. Discussion. [Laughter] Okay. Yes. Um I would like to, you know, personally thank um all our administrative professionals and all of our teachers. Their hard work does not go unnoticed. Um so I'd like to personally thank each and every staff member for all their hard work. Roll call. Miss Caruso, yes. Miss Collie, yes. Miss Mena, yes. Mr. Sanders, yes. Miss Shmley, yes. Mr. Banker, yes. Mr. Russo, yes. And that concludes my report. Thank you,

079Miss Collie. Uh, technology committee, I know there's no new business. Is there anything to report this month? Thank you, Madam President. information security program plan. The district continues to proactively evaluate all appropriate district technologies to ensure the safety and security of our data and information systems. Planning of scheduled maintenance and improvements for the 2425 school year is ongoing, including meetings with our consultant to schedule scans and testing. Protocols are continuing to be updated to best meet the security needs of the district, and scans are nearing completion. AI and programming initial conversations are ongoing as to the scope in which the district may look to embrace the tools so commonly found in today's landscape. As the conversations deepen, stakeholders will be engaged to provide valuable insights and feedbacks in terms of the expectations as we navigate

080this dynamic landscape. Budgeting for the 2526 school year is nearing completion. Initial meetings were held to discuss all anticipated purchases, renewals, and so on to support district infrastructure, programming, and technology needs. As we progress through the budget cycle, the technology team continues to ensure that the technology and support needs for all district and staff are considered when evaluating items and services for purchase. The 2425 school year sees a continuation of the annual technology fee to help support technology programs within the district. All students throughout the district will need the fee to be satisfied alongside their acceptable use and damage agreements in order to use and take possession of district owned technology. The district has added Pay School central as a payment servicing provider for these fees and parents are encouraged to create accounts for all

081district financials if they have not done so already. Fees will continue in future school years to best support the growing technology needs of the district. The district continues to use Genesis to share and collect data from families through the forms portal to allow for efficient and paperless communications. Forms are updated annually to account for new information. The addition of parent square has has been a welcomed one and we look to better communicate with all community members. If you have not already done so, we encourage you to download the app for even more features. The district continues to evaluate varying technology platforms to help support productivity, efficiency, and instruction within the district. And lastly, the district continues to evaluate policies and procedures related to appropriate technologies to help support productivity, efficiency, and instruction. And that concludes

082my report, Madam President. Thank you. Any discussion? Okay. Thank you, Miss Mena. Uh, finance committee. Uh, Mr. Banka. Thank you, Madam President. Upon the recommendation of the superintendent, the board hereby approves motions F1 through F12. F1, approval of bills list, April 2025. F2, approval of March 2025 payroll. F3, approval of semi initiative corrective action plan for 2025 2026. F4, approval of professional services maximum amounts for the 2025 2026 school year. F5, appointment of the public employer trust agreement for East Rutherford vision plan for the 2025 2026 school year. F6, approval of financial reports for February 2025. F7, approval of transfers report for February 2025. F8, approval of financial reports for March 2025. F9, approval of transfer report for March 2025. F10, approval to amend F5.2 two as approved as November 14, 2024 board meeting for

083extraordinary services for the 2024 2025 school year. F11, approval of 2024 2025 statement of insurance submission for lead drinking water. F12 approval for of early registration for NJSBA workshop 2025. Second. Any discussion? Roll call. Miss Caruso? Yes. Miss Collie? Yes. Miss Mena? Yes. Mr. Sanders? Yes. Mr. Shmley? Yes. Mr. Banker? Yes. And Miss Laruso? Yes. That concludes my report. Madam, thank you. Um, any old business? Any new business? Uh so at this time I will reopen to public comment. Opening public comments on any um non-aggenda items. State your name, address for the record. Address the board president. Each person wishing to speak will have five minutes each. Anyone wishing to speak will be given the opportunity to do so. Hello, Kevin Lion here speaking on behalf of our East Rutherford PTA. Um, I just wanted

084to bring you up to date on all of the exciting activities that the PTA is up to. As my daughter recently reminded us or me, uh we have less than eight weeks left in this school year. So, it's coming to a close and there are a lot of we spend a lot of the beginning of the year earning money for PTA. We spend a lot of the end of the year spending money for the PTA. Our responsibility is to spend the money that our community graciously donates through all of our causes. So, we do have a few fundraising programs still going on. Our spring spiritware ended on April 8th, but spiritware is always available on our website. Uh our shoe collection continues. That will continue now through the month of May. Uh we have 40

085bags of 25 pairs of shoes each. We need about 90 to make our goal. Uh we'll have upcoming events in May for more collection uh events. And uh we've removed I believe two of them. I think we're going to get all three of those collection bins from the school. We feel we've exhausted the parents in asking them to send their kids in with shoes. Uh but we'll be putting them in public places like the uh local library or local businesses that have agreed to help collect on our behalf. Um our biggest fundraiser of the year is coming up on May 9th. That is our Tricky Tray. We started it last year. It was a huge success. We're looking forward to it being a similar success this year. We've had a lot of prizes donated by

086local businesses, our community members, uh town services, including our fire and police departments, and also our schools and teachers. I believe we have a prize for uh lunch with the principal and you know ride in a firet truck or all kinds of things like that. So there's going to be a lot of prizes. Um and tickets are on sale. They can be found at the PTA website. We keep posting on our Facebook page and also on the ERBOE website in the virtual backpack section under the PTA uh logo. You will find the flyer with the link for the um tickets for that. Tickets are on sale again for the May 9th Tricky Try. Oh my goodness, all of the activities that we're doing. We had the uh last month I reported about the McKenzie School

087pot of gold St. Patrick's Day coin challenge. Miss Alkalit Alkalites class raised the most money. They chose to have a cookie decorating party and Steph's baking boutique in town here was kind enough to provide those cookies this week. So either yesterday, today or tomorrow, they'll hopefully be decorating their cookies. um McKenzie School also because Miss Gomez the school counselor had recommended a character education assembly called lead you. Um it focused on respect, resilience, communications, tolerance and mindfulness and it was a great lesson for both the teachers and the students. We co-sponsored that with our police department and I believe Mr. Barrow had posted some pictures on the X feed, the Twitter ERSD feed. So if you want to check that out, there are some pictures out there. um upcoming events with Mrs. uh Derovich had

088recommended a grit on the- go assembly with a company called Grit Ninja. Uh that's co-sponsored between our PTA and our Lincoln and FA schools. It will be hosted on June 11th for grades four through seven. I think grade 8 has a field trip that day, so they won't be able to attend. Um and it's basically physical education lessons and a ninja style obstacle course that they will set up. Um and then we also do our annual Holly Rock Entertainment. It's a game show, quiz show kind of format for the um third grade through 8th grade. That's after the NJSLA kind of as a okay, you got through it. Here's your, you know, here's a little fun day for you. And we do that May 23rd, which is the Friday of uh Memorial Day weekend when

089they have a half day. Uh third through fifth grade will have an earlier session, one session, and then they'll do another session for our sixth to 8th grade later that morning. Um, and then we're also planning all of our endofear moving up uh ceremonies and parties. So, the eighth grade will have their formal at the fiesta held in June. I believe it's June 12th, but I don't know the exact date. I I think that's when it was. And the PTA school reps are working with our principles and administration to set up celebrations for both our third graders and our fifth graders who will move to the new schools next year. Um, we've been coordinating with the art teachers, Mrs. Masher and Mrs. Spear, for our field day t-shirt design contest. This is where the students

090get to design the emblem or the logo that will be on their t-shirt for for field day. Uh entries will be submitted by the end of this week. Uh and we'll go through them and select the winners. Those winners will get a a small ribbon or trophy and a cake and cone gift card as a thank you for their design. And we will this year do a separate t-shirt design for each school. So, the FAA winner will do the FA t-shirts, the Lincoln winner will have all the Lincoln t-shirts, and the Mackenzie winner will do all the Mckenzie shirts. Uh, and then for field day, we provide not only that custom t-shirt, but I believe we also do water bottles as well as other items for the kids. And I believe for the middle school,

091we do or FA Lincoln, we do an ice cream or Kona ice truck for that day. Uh, we just announced the Beckton scholarship. So students at Beckton High School who are graduating this year can apply for the East Rutherford PTA scholarship. Uh it is on our ER erbo website directly on the PTA page. Uh it's also available from the school guidance department. Um and it's for any graduating senior who has spent at least three years in the East Rutherford School District from pre or K to 8 uh grade. And applications are due May 9th and the scholarship will be awarded at the June 7th Beckton scholarship uh ceremony. and our eighth grade committee has their spring hangout and dance. It's the second to last dance before the formal uh this Friday, April 25th. So, we're

092asking for volunteers who would like to attend or would like to help with uh that activity as chaperoons. And I know you mentioned uh Mrs. Collie about the uh administrative professionals and the teachers, but I also want to point out that this week also, April 21st to 26 is volunteer appreciation week. And of course, PTA thanks all of our parents and teachers and staff who volunteer for all of our activities and join us. PTA from national, New Jersey level, state level, and local level is run by volunteers. We truly appreciate all our volunteers in addition to our administrative professionals and our teachers and staff. Thank you. Any anyone else? Um, I just wanted to say I'm I'm at Mackenzie's school and I really wanted to um say to Mr. Varra and the board and anyone

093who is listening that we were really affected by Mr. Guy's passing. We I want um I want his family to know that we were really we are missing him and exactly what you said, his smile. He he would go running for anyone or anything and he really um kept our school nice. So please pass that along. I couldn't um have heard that said something. So thank you. Yeah. I will close to public public comments. Um, at this time, we'll adjourn to what? Can I just ask one quick thing? I'm sorry. Um, it just it brought it up when Mr. Lamb was speaking. Can we check the date of the eighth grade graduation because I think it's the same day as our board meeting now. I believe I think they were I went to put it

094in the calendar and I thought they were both the same day, but I could have put it in wrong. So, I just wanted to check it before we get too close. It is, but I some reason there was an email that Yeah, I thought that there was an email that went out about band that I think said the 12th was the eighth grade eighth grade graduation. That's why I just wanted to make sure. could have been the date was incorrect in the email. So yes, I just wanted to give you the advanced notice to check it so that we have two months out at least so we have time to You did. It's okay though. I'm just How much stuff is like on the June agenda that could we just do it? the May the

095May is the most important because that's all the contracts as to teachers you know all the placements and May is much more important than Yeah. I just wonder if we need to go before the end if we do we can move it to Tuesday and do the third week of Yeah. Are you I can't come on a 10th, but if everyone else is here, it's not a big deal. Right now, I mean, so like I mean, do we need to do we want right that would be an actual board meeting saying don't have the work session. No, just keep the only do the 26 like Yeah. Yeah. No, I'm just asking if we I don't care either way. Anybody said I think we'd rather all have one meeting, I think, than two if we had

096to go, but I don't want to speak for everybody. When But when the 12th is the work session or the public is the work session. So when is the regular one? When's the 26th? Was it was conflicting with something else? We had changed it. It was changed and it just conflicted everything. Okay. Don't worry, man. Okay. 26 is fine. 26th. I'm not I'm not I'm not here that week cuz my daughter's Oh, that week. We can Okay. Well, then that poses another question. If we move it, make it happen if the board's okay with it. I up to you guys. I would if we're only doing one meeting because if board members have questions and whatnot, I would prefer you to be sitting here. Um, so the 10th is not past that. We don't have

097a lot of content in our agenda. say, are we going to have enough for the 10th? Yeah, there's not much. And just keep on meeting. Just do one meeting on the 10th. Just do it on the 10th. That's fine. 10th's good. One meeting on the 10th. One meeting. It's six days before the last day of school anyway. Last day of school. Remember, we're into the valuation stuff that That's a Yeah, because so then you know we can do the 10th and the 10. It wasn't you. I thought about it the other day, but it just reminded me while it I'm not sure yet. So let me So we can do the 10th as a work session and then the 26th as our public. We'll just make sure we have any hardcore questions. Yes. In That's

098smart. That's smart. Before you know. Yep. Before then and then that way it's evaluation time then at least we have the two meetings to do the evaluation. Uh 10th is a Tuesday. Yes. I don't think I have anything. So the 10th becomes a work session. Yes. So the 10th will be our work session and the 26th will be our public session. Six o'clock. 6 o'clock board work [Music] session then the 26. Okay. Primary is it? Yeah. Primary day on June 10th. Everybody just go out and vote early. Monday the 23rd the 26th or the 24th or the 23rd or the 23rd and we keep one session. make an earlier debt. So is that what you saying miss? Yeah. Keep move the 26th, the 23rd or 24th. Okay. And that way we can whatever the 23rd

099or the 24th and then Mr. Ger come we can do one session as opposed to doing the two. Okay. Everybody the 23rd or 24th? 24th is a the Tuesday. I can't do the 24th, but I can do the 23rd. 23rd is she said she can't do Monday. I can't do the 23rd, but I'm good for either one of those dates. So, okay. So, who can't be here on the 23rd? Just Ireina, right? You can't do the 24. So either way, Monday or Tuesday. I can do the 25th. He's not here. Oh. Oh, okay. You're just trying to work around. Okay. So, I think we're good on either one of those dates. We only We're missing one person. So, yeah. You pick. [Laughter] Well, pick a date out of a hat. It's fine. One session. Yes.

100Okay. I can check it. Beckton's June meeting is on the 25th so it doesn't conflict. Not to throw a wrench, doesn't that a wrench? Because we recently got our our leadership date, but we didn't know before this, but May 15th, which is a Wednesday, Sharon and me are not here because we're at the leadership conference in May in Atlantic City. 15 161 17 unless you just have the one in May or just have it without me or Sharon. As long as there's a quorum, you could still have a meeting. 14th. No, the 14th, 15th, 16th. We're not here. Oh, is the 21st? May 21st. May is the lunch. No good. What was you say? The 13th. Did you say the 13th? The 12th. Not. Neither am I. 12th. The 12th. The 12th. It's tough because

101you're getting sports. Yeah, but the 15th is Tom. You could they could still have the board meeting without me. As long as you're have a quorum, right? And you're here and the board president. I mean, as long as I'm It's only a work session, right? On the minutes. I mean, I don't want to stop the board. Hold up the board. We're down. We probably could but It's the work session. So nothing's being voted on, right? All right. So the most important one is the 22nd because we're not voting on anything on the work session for May anyway for staff. So I mean plenty of time to figure this out. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. I would just Okay. 15th. Yep. So, yeah, let's not go. It's not changing. Yeah. So, June No, the 12 26 and we're

102doing the 23rd. Mhm. Right. Okay. Monday. Yes. This way. I'll have um I'll have sunshine. But do we still want to have the work session on the 10th? So like if we're going into evaluations, it's primary day. Oh, primary day. Okay. So then we really have to have that evaluation like submitted because then I think it's a lot. Yeah. So that's the only concern. one board meeting in June on Monday the 23rd at 6. Yes. Monday the 25th. Yep. Yes. Oh, we're replacing the 12. It will be a work session. The 26th is being moved to the 23rd public session. I'll make it happen. We'll figure it. Don't worry. We're good. We'll be here. Don't worry. I got I got the We'll make it happen. Okay. Thanks. Exactly. All right. So, at this time, I

103think I'm going to adjourn to executive session. Um, there's going to be no action, right? No action taken when we return. Correct. No action. Okay. um resolved that in accordance with section 8 of the open public meetings act chapter 231. The board has the authority to adjourn to close session to discuss matters pertaining to legal personnel negotiations, attorney client privilege andor student matters. said matters will be made available upon the determination by the board that the disclosure of the minutes will not detrimentally affect any right or interest of the board. The board expects to return to the business portion of this meeting in approximately um we have what did I hit negotiate? H HIV negotiations negotiations. It'll be relatively quick. I got some information on some litigation. A quick update on the ERA. Have that

104contract signed tonight. Um those will be very quick. Okay. But I think we're probably still looking at an hour and a half. I was going in an hour and a half, too. But those you got two personnel matters. So to discuss. I mean, you want to say an hour or we go? So, I I'm going with the hour and a half. Yeah. So, I don't make the call. You guys I'm gonna say an hour and a half to two hours. Well, pick a You don't want to cut You don't want to come out early. Yeah. And close the meeting. Right. So, I We'll go with an hour and a half. Yeah. And Okay. I don't know if we're going to make What? You want to go? No. No. Go. No, go ahead. Sorry. Say it.

105Want to say an hour? Yeah. Say an hour and then we'll Okay, we'll return. Okay, we'll return in 60 minutes. Motion. Second. Second. Favor. I Anybody oppose? Okay. All right. 740. We're going to remain in executive session for another 30 minutes. A motion to return to the regular order of business. Second, all in favor. All in. Okay. So, motion to adjurnn. But before we do that, the next meeting will be held on Thursday, May 15th at 6 PM. Okay. Motion to adjurnn. Second. All in favor? I. Any opposed? Meeting adjourned. Is that you were taking those