001e e e check one two check one two sure check one two e e e hold e e e I call this meeting to order at 6:03 p.m. the New Jersey open public meetings law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice and to attend the meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting their interests is discussed or acted upon in accordance with the provisions of the act the East retherford Board of education has caused notice of this meeting by having the date time and place thereof provided to the record and South Bergen night newspapers to have published and posted in the vestibule of the burrow Hall and Public Library copies of agendas are available 48 hours prior to S meetings in the board of education office and are
002posted on the East retherford School website www. erboe.net please stand for the flag salute and remain standing for a moment moment of silence for our Police Department fire department First Responders and 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 KY here miss Mena here Mr Sanders is absence this evening Miss shamley here Mr Banker here and miss laruso here uh fire exits up front and out to your left um at this time I will call up Mr tanel and the Junior Honor Society for their reports we are back with our March 2025 National Junior Honor Society school report
003iuse chowy will'll read for fa and Lincoln and Daniel Mayu will read for McKenzie so for f uh there is all F students ELA teachers Mr tanel miss petrius miss beay Mr Cavo and missell have been incorporating the importance of reading into their daily lessons to celebrate read Across America week and month thank you to all of our Ela team for sharing your love of reading with our students all our school teachers have been focusing on designing lessons within their curriculum in regard to women's history months the njhs 8th grades 8th graders and Mr Tel will visit McKenzie school on March 26th to read to our youngest Wildcats the njhs members will also be facilitating activities in the classrooms thank you Mr tanal for putting this event together F school students attended a mental health
004and wellness assembly on March 6th thank you for Miss Muse to coordinating this event the annual 8th grade erpd and erfd basketball game is scheduled for March 19th at 7 p.m. in beckton regionals gymnasium come out for a great night let's cheer on let's cheer on our walk cats congratulations to M ma year and their students who will have their artwork displayed on the 2025 youth art month exhibit at Maywood Avenue school on March 20th we are all very proud of you all all of our F School teachers have been working with their students during enrichment and core Foundation to prepare them for the upcoming njsla assignment students have been working on skill-based tasks and Sample njsa assessments keep up the great work and now I'm going to read for Lincoln School our CBI program
005has started a faculty coffee cart to promote functional skills across a number of domains staff are loving to see these students operate their own refreshment stand the NS chapter is partnering with Team to join forces with naaka schools in Uganda to promote Civics and Global competencies more to follow as we highlight that Pro program in coming months World Seal day was March 3rd and we saw special programming positive a affirmations and students reading poems during morning announcements promoting self-worth and positive PE relationships read Across America week culminated with our drop everything and read hour and later this month the NS will be traveling to McKenzie school for some reader louds with our younger students March is women's history month and activities have been embedded across the curriculum students have been researching important women in history
006and presenting to their peers in a number of formats Lincoln School is in the midst of a one school one book with all students reeving their own copy of the world according to hum Frey each day students and their families are encouraged to read along with us and follow-up activities in the classroom are designed to promote literacy in school and at home students will test their luck in reciting as many digits a pie on Monday uh March 10th for the annual Pi Day Challenge where on March 14th as many as five staff members will be getting pied in the face to celebrate on March 6th berens promised to our fourth and fifth graders on an appropriate social media use for kids with a parent workshops following that same night more Community Learning opportunities Around the
007Bend please check the parent Academy website for updates interns are live as of March 12th with report cards for the marking period 3 coming in mid April future happenings Spring Showcase will take place on Wednesday May 28th with the theme being discover Americana more to come as we near the date McKenzie school is excited to announce that prek registration will begin on March 1st and end on March 31st for all Eastford residents all necessary information will be posted on our website and has been sent to All District parents all current prek students that are 3 years old must register during this time frame the administration team and the prek team presented to pre parents during a parent Academy on Tuesday February 11th at 6 p.m. the topic was thriving together positive parent parenting techniques for
008early literacy thank you to all that participated our next Parent Academy is scheduled for Wednesday March 19th at 6:30 p.m. via Zoom building blocks of communication effective strategies for supporting early speech and language development in preschoolers McKenzie school is excited to announce that our pre-ap program begins on March 1st to March 31st all the information and process is on our website and was sent to all parents via Genesis blast parents Square communication website social media accounts within the District kindergarten registration information has been promoted and started please see our school website for registration information McKenzie school celebrated uh McKenzie school celebrated MacKenzie School will have Wildcat Fridays for the rest of the month where staff and students will be wearing School Spirit Gear Mackenzie School welcome guest readers during the month of March to celebrate
009the love of reading and to engage the school Community McKenzie school welcomes guest readers during the month of March please reach out to your child's teacher to schedule a time also please see our Twitter handle on the school website to see all the amazing activities that went on during the weekend month celebration of read Across America be began March 3rd kindergarten concert is Wednesday April 2nd at 9:30 a.m. kindergarten parents par are invited to enjoy doors will open at approximately 9:15 a.m. to allow for facility set up additional notification going out to the specifics the the tomorrow to parents beckon National Honor Society fa and Lincoln National Honor all visited during the month of March to conduct a read aloud and do a literacy craft with MacKenzie School students during the month of R Across
010America go wild cats celebrated women's history month within each classroom and throughout the school for the month of March McKenzie school Illustrated their school spirit by wearing green on St Patrick's Day Wildcat of the month recognition and Roar assembly to highlight positive student behavior and citizenship all right so one more piece of our report uh just so that we can throw that out there um I recently went to a global development conference and while at that conference I got to talk to various administrators and other Educators throughout the state and I'm very proud to announce that we have secured a partnership with the nayaka and katumba primary school and nyaka Vocational Secondary School in Uganda and I'm going to be overseeing that for the district and what we're going to do is we're going to
011start up at the middle school and work our way down into Mr arties building and then I'm going to expand it across the district to have different humanitarian events and video conferences with the students out in Uganda um I've been collaborating with some of the Educators there and they're very excited to welcome the east Rutherford students into their Community virtually and their students are excited to see what's happening here up in East Rutherford as well so you can all state tuned for some updates on that I'm very excited to put that into place and have our Honor Society students oversee that and I'm also very grateful for our Honor Society students attending each month and delivering the report I know it's greatly appreciated thank you right thank you for those exciting updates okay School business
012administrator report uh Mr verrai thank you Madame President good evening everyone so I want to start off with F3 which is the adoption of the preliminary budget for the 2025 2026 school year I just want to go through a few things before that I do want to once again thank the the finance committee Mr Banker Miss Caruso and Mr Sanders for all their hard work the constructive dialogue we had and as well as the support of all the board members so thank you very much for your support uh throughout this whole process so now for the local tax levy for 2526 will be1 19,1 180,00 $116 the total revenue from from local sources will be 19,44 616 for fund 20 which is our total revenue from State sources which is our transportation Aid extraordinary Aid
013special a special education Aid and security Aid uh what his budget is 1,285 194 those two amounts give us our total operation budget of 22,6 184,185 349 total revenue from federal sources 1,200 28,6 67 and then we also have the total local repayment of debt which is 2, 21375 so when you add those three amounts to the total operating budget the total budget is 26,1 12673 that's a total of all revenues and all sources local state and federal uh f8 approval of the bills list for bills list number two for March 2025 uh thank you Mr Banker once again for coming in and reviewing that and F9 we just received this this morning a contract with learnwell it's not it's not the same contract it is a second contract uh we would just inform today
014uh of this of this information and thank you Madame President uh for your dialogue today so instead of as a walk-on we put it on as F9 so it's not the same one it's two separate um students that's all I'll I'll say and that's all I have M any discussion nope okay thank you Mr verace uh superintendence report uh Dr King Dobson okay so uh superintendent report approve I'm sorry excuse me I'm sorry uh superintendent report approval of fire and emergency drill report approval okay so superintendent Jin CASRO asked me to report out for him uh student enrollment to date McKenzie school 383 students an increase of one F School 236 students and incre um decrease in two students who transferred out link School uh enrollment count is 173 students with one student transferring out
015uh and this gives us the total enrollment of 792 students all fire drills were conducted uh so we are in compliance where that is concerned regarding um Hib um we have three upcoming for the next um board meeting which uh superintendent Jen CASRO will report on and um I believe he will also go over his long range facilities plan at that time as well uh superintendent Jan CASRO also asked me to report out on special education um business update uh we have a total of 129 students we lost two students um total of 118 in District and we have a total of seven out of District students so we hold steady in that regard in terms of updates um I'm just going to go over a few items we received a few uh broadcasts from
016the state of New Jersey one has to one had to do with um the use of um Ida funds to fund C uh Community Based instruction so as you know we have Community Based instruction for students um grades uh k through eight and um now we are allowed to use those funds to um provide CBI the broadcast was very clear that parent are not expected to pay for any CBI um cost out of pocket so that came down to us they also sent a release regarding um guidance for speech and language services and another for transportation considerations when we're considering transportation services as a related service for our special education students door-to-door transportation services what are some considerations that we need to put forth before we make that determination um in our recent uh child
017study team meeting we talked about the upcoming um school year 25 26 school year and what is the possibility of our self-contained um classroom configurations those are just preliminary conversations to be continued went over some procedural updates and um very quickly parent acmis as uh you heard in the reports we have been having uh various uh parent acmis and um we did have preschool Mr valard had one for cell phones with parents and there was also uh one during the school day as well um on March 11th we had Bergen promise presented on um wraparound services and it was a really great presentation I will ask Mr valard if he can post the video so that parents could go back and watch to see what resources are available to them and services that are you
018know available to them for free at a free cost in their homes uh March 19 you heard preschool we have building blocks of communication coming up March 27th um in conjunction with span will be offering basic rights in special education um that will that notification will go out shortly for parents a lot has been going out so try not to overwhelm everyone uh parent square is great um but you have to restraint yourself otherwise everybody will get overwhelmed um March 8th uh we're also having another session titled mental health is health and that will be going out as well March 21st we'll be having one for another one for preschoolers titled uh protecting tiny teeth so that should be a a an interesting um one um very quickly for curriculum updates um worked with building
019principls to um facilitate March 6 PD across the buildings and um met with World Language teachers to talk about the framework for PD for the 25 26 school year uh met with after school coordinators and need to have a follow-up meeting with them I know they had one today with Colleen so we'll we'll need to talk about that um schedule meeting with math math coaches to talk about 2526 framework and same for the science coaches as well and I think that ends that that's it any discussion no okay um thank you for your report um at this time I will open to the public opening public comments on agenda or non-agenda item state your name address for the record address the board president each person wishing to speak we'll have five minutes each anyone wishing
020to speak will be given the opportunity to do so uh good evening Kevin lion uh 77 Clinton Place I'm here on behalf of the East Rutherford PT a uh just to give you an update on all the events that we've done I haven't been here I think in a couple months so it's quite a bit um so we have a current 191 members of our PTA we've done several fundraising programs including hotle D and donate in January BJ's Brew House D and donate in February uh Five Below did a shop and donate for us for a week in February we have a current ongoing spirit wear sale so get your spirit wear online uh you save 20 % uh sitewide and that goes on until April 1st and that's Wildcat wear so it's appropriate for
021anyone in town um we have an ongoing shoe collection so we've been collecting um new and gently used shoes um we need 90 bags of 25 pairs each we're about 20 pairs 20 bags of 25 pairs each collected so far we'll have an event this Saturday at the uh DPW at 300 hackin sack Street uh for people to drive through to drop off shoes and we're continuing to collect through the schools as well as at the YMCA uh until the I believe the end of April um I said April but I think it's the end of April last week or past two weeks we had a McKenzie School St Patrick's Day pot of gold challenge where we asked our students to bring in uh spare change from home and our children raised just over $2,000
022for the PTA and uh Miss I'm going to I apologize if I mispronounced the name but miss aled's class raised the most and they'll be given a cookie decorating party based on the class's decision to have a cookie decorating party and we'll partner with uh Steph's baking Boutique in town to provide that for that classroom uh we have we just finished uh collecting the order forms for our gertude Hawk candy sale it's a sale we haven't done in several years we were overwhelmed by the response I believe we have over $177,000 worth of orders uh so that will bring in a nice I forget the exact percentage but it'll bring in a nice amount for our PTA uh we will be putting in a space request because the day of the delivery we'll need to
023put the items somewhere sort them and distribute them to the families that uh submitted the orders and then those families will be responsible to get them to their family and friends that ordered um so I believe we'll know by the end of this week what date the order will be delivered it should be sometime the week of April 7th um School assemblies uh PTA is happy to sponsor several of our school assemblies uh M Gomez at McKenzie school had come up with a program called character education assembly and we're partnering with the East we for Police Department to provide that to the McKenzie students uh Lincoln School is looking into a assembly for the grit ninja assembly uh with Mrs d d deric uh and we're hoping to also partner with the East other PTA
024as part of their lead program uh graduation for that assembly and then we also do an annual Holly Rock entertainment game show uh for the f and Lincoln schools and that happens right after the um standardized exams so that the kids get a little break after they go through that process um we have two social events coming up this weekend McKenzie's kids night kids night out or Kids Day Out is this Saturday afternoon and Lincoln School kids night out is this Friday evening it's a great opportunity for the students in that school to get together with their friends have a little dance we usually have a DJ photo booth uh Pizza drinks and snacks and such uh parents do have to come with their children or each child has to have at least one responsible
025adult with them during the entire event it's not a drop off event uh this year we did not charge for that event because we've been doing so well with our fundraising we said we're just going to give this as a gift to our town uh to our students in our schools so that is happening this coming weekend um we also donated $150 toward the friends of East Rutherford they're having an Easter egg hunt on April 12th uh so they needed some money for their what they call Redemption prizes which I assume are the prizes that the kids get after they collect up all the eggs or what they find inside the plastic eggs I'm not exactly sure what they're using them for but they asked and we said yes we have money for that so
026we we gave um we also have the Tricky Tray coming up in uh May May 9th Friday that will be at the uh community center on breand Avenue I believe tickets for that will be on sale in early a begin go to go on sale in early April uh but that's always that last year we did that and it was a huge event for us and we're looking forward to it being another great event for us this year uh several local companies have already donated and we're still soliciting donations from local companies and people to uh donate to that cause um in the P last year when we did it we asked each grade level to give a certain theme of a of a donation if parents wanted to donate families wanted to donate uh
027this year we're putting together an Amazon gift list registry with items from very low dollar amounts to higher dollar amounts so families want to give information should be out later this month if families want to donate to the Tricky Tray as for prizes for the Tricky Tray um and then finally we are coordinating with the uh art and fed teachers uh for our Field Day events which will come up in May and June uh for the art teachers we ask them to coordinate with the students and we have the students design a wildcat themed Field Day themed logo that becomes the t-shirt that will'll make we'll print on the t-shirt for the students to wear for field day um One Design from each school will be selected and used on the t-shirt and then with
028the fiz head teachers we're looking to them to provide any additional activities that PTA can provide any supplies they may need or any assistance they may need from our membership for that day to have extra parents on hand uh for the event and I believe that is all I have unless unless anyone else has any questions or discussion but it's been quite quite a busy season and we're happy to be you know providing all of this to our town and our students so thank you thank you thank you anyone else okay then I will close to the hearing of the citizens uh correspondence to the board none um adoption of Prior board meeting minutes upon the recommendation of the superintendent the board hereby approves the following meeting minutes February 13 2025 work session meeting minutes
029February 13th 2025 work executive session meeting minutes February 20th 2025 public session meeting minutes February 20th 2025 public executive session meeting minutes second any discussion roll call Miss Caruso yes Miss colie yes Miss Mena yes Mr Sanders is absent Miss shamley yes Mr B I'm drawing a blank I was not at one of those meetings 220 February 20th I think it was so no on that and uh refuse on that and yes on the other okay Anda yes thank you superintendent resolutions upon the recommendation of the superintendent the board hereby approves motions S1 through S4 S1 approval of fire and emergency drill report S2 approval of enrollment report S3 approval of harassment intimidation and bullying monthly report S4 resolution of confirming the superintendent's decision relating to an alleged harassment intimidation and bullying incident report dated
030December 19th second she's moving doesn't she move in motions all right so mov any discussion roll call Miss Caruso yes Miss KY yes Miss Mena yes M Sanders is abson Miss shamley yes thank you Mr Banker yes and miss miss laruso yes now I move this curriculum committee Miss shamley thank you Madam president upon the recommendation of the superintendent the board hereby approves motions C1 and C2 C1 approval of student field trips and transportation requests for the 2024 2025 school year and C2 approval uh approved submission of comprehensive Equity plan 2025 to 2026 statement of of assurance with the three-year c as before you second any discussion roll call Miss Caruso Miss kie yes Miss Mena yes Mr Sanders is absent Miss shley yes Mr B yes and Miss larusa yes hold on give me
031one second uh Personnel committee Miss Caruso thank you Madame President upon the recommendation of the superintendent the board hereby approves motions P1 through P6 P1 approve the Kelly education substitute list P2 Personnel actions P3 approval of travel expenditures P4 acceptance of resignation notification for Sylvia Alfaro with regret P5 acceptance of resignation notification for Jennifer Holland with regret and P6 acceptance of retirement for lilan spear with much regret be my son had Mrs spear many many years ago and she will she'll be truly truly missed any discussion sorry I jumped g m any discussion no okay thank you Miss shamley roll call I'm like it's me sorry Miss Caruso yes having a night Miss kie yes Miss Mena yes Mr Sanders is not presentent miss shamley yes Mr B yes and Miss laruso yes and that
032ends my report Madame President thank you Miss kuso you're just having a night tonight uh let's see physical facilities Mr bka okay on the recommendation uh thank you madam pred by the way upon the recommendation of the superintendent the board hereby approves motion pf1 through pf3 pf1 approval of monthly facilities calendar April 2025 pf2 approval of East ruford manual for school bus AIDS pf3 approval of District use of facility applications second any discussion roll call Miss Caruso yes Miss kie yes Miss Mena s is absent Miss shamley yes Mr B yes and Miss laruso yes uh thank you Mr B uh technology committee Miss Mana thank you Madame President don't have any resolutions but we do have an update for techn techology the information security program plan the district continues to proactively evaluate all appropriate
033District Technologies to ensure the safety and security of our data and information systems planning of scheduled maintenance improvements for the 2425 school year is ongoing including meeting 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 feedback in terms of the expectations as we navigate this Dynamic landscape budgeting for the 2526 school year is ongoing initial meetings were held to discuss all anticipated purchases renewals and so on to support District infrastructure programming and Technology needs as we progress
034through the budget cycle the the technology team continues to ensure that technology and support needs for all students and staff are considered when evaluating items and services for purchase the 2425 school year sees the 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 district financials if they have not already done so 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
035annually to account for new information 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 the appropriate Technologies to help support productivity efficiency and instruction within the district and that concludes my report Madam president thank you any discussion no okay thank you Miss Mena I was so excited for Miss Mena's technology report I skipped over community relations just having a night here miss colie thank you madam president upon the recommendation of the superintendent the board hereby approves motion cr1 through cr3 CR 1 approval of sunshine notice for public budget hearing for the 2025 2026 school year CR2 approved the revised school calendar for the 2425 school year and cr3 approv the school calendar for the
0362025 2026 school year second any discussion roll claw Miss Caruso yes Miss colie yes Miss Mena yes Mr s is absent Miss shimley yes Mr bka yes and Miss laruso yes and that concludes my report thank you Miss coli uh finance committee Mr banka thank you Madame President on the recommendation the superintendent the board hereby approves motions F1 through f8 F1 approval of bills list number one March 2025 oh I don't have that one sorry do I have to read reread this okay okay we'll try that again upon the recommendation of the superintendent the board hereby approves motions F1 through F9 F1 approval of bills list number one March 2025 F2 approval of February 2025 payroll F3 adoption of preliminary budget for the 2025 2026 school year F4 approval of service agreement with Boza yoga
037LLC for 2024 2025 school year F5 approval of contracted services with the South Bergen jointure commission for the 2025 2026 school year F6 approval of agreement with learnwell for 2024 2025 school year F7 approval a joint Transportation agreement with South Bergen jointure commission for the 2025 2026 school year fa8 approval of bills list number two March 2025 an F9 approval agreement with learnwell for the 2024 2025 school year and uh one just a quick comment um just want to thank uh the administration uh Mr verrai the the finance committee on on this budget it was uh very difficult and we thought we were going to have to cut some programming but we were able to keep everything and with a reasonable increase uh not what we wanted but best for this District as as we
038all see it thank you second any discussion roll call Miss Caruso yes Miss yes Miss Mena yes Mr sand zapson Miss shimley yes Mr B yes and Miss laruso yes thank you Mr bka um we have a walk-on resolution for negotiations Miss Caruso thank you Madame President before I read the resolution I just want to thank Mrs KY and Mr bka and also Mr coin for all the hours that they put in to uh for us to reach this agreement with the east Rutherford Education Association so with much delight resolution authorizing and approving a memorandum of agreement and successor contract between the east Rutherford Board of Education and the east Rutherford Education Association whereas the east Rutherford Board of Education and the east Rutherford Education Association negotiations committees have engaged in negotiations for a successor
039contract to the one that expired on June the 30th 2024 and whereas the parties negotiation teams have reached a settlement with respect to those negotiations the terms and conditions of which have been set forth in a memorandum of agreement dated March the 6 2025 a copy of which is on file in the superintendent's office and whereas the draft successor contract act with the duration of July 1st 2024 to June 30th 2027 is on file in the superintendent office and whereas the Moa and contract among other terms provide for a three-year contract with annual salary increases of 3.125% for teachers and Par professionals and 3.2 for secretaries All In inclusive of increment now therefore be it resolved by the board that the affers said recite recital are incorporated herein as though fully set forth at length
040the memorandum of agreement dated March the 6 2025 is authorized and approved the successor contract between the board and the era is hereby authorized and approved with such CH changes as the board negotiations committee councel and the superintendent deem necessary to effectuate the purposes of this resolution second any discussion roll call Miss Caruso yes Miss Callie yes Miss Mana yes Mr Sanders is absent Miss shamley yes Mr Banker yes Miss laruso yes motion passes 60 thank you madam president any old business any new business okay um once again I'll open to public comments on any non-agenda 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 hold it no [Laughter] hi
041everyone my name is May Regal and I reside at five McKenzie um my children are students at McKenzie school um so I just like to address a situation that occurred recently within my son's thirdd grade classroom at McKenzie um so these concerns stem from repeated incidents that have occurred um involving another student whose disruptive and inappropriate behavior such as hitting cursing um just overall General misconduct um and this has been persistent since first grade so my child shared a classroom with this student in first grade they weren't together in second grade and now they're together in third grade um so there have been ongoing issues so my son previously shared um this classroom in first grade with this student and Mr Barrow was aware of the situation I've spoken to miss espacito um we've had
042numerous discussions about this the issues just continue to escalate so I appreciate the school's effort they're trying to mitigate the situation I understand that there are interventions that are in place to separate my child from this other specific student um so recently there have been other concerns I've also reached out to Mr jeene CASRO and he mentioned to me that he debrief debriefed Miss laruso um so throughout the school year I have been in regular communication with Mr Barrow regarding incidents involving my son and the student um so the staggered classroom separation has taken place um they were separated during transitional periods so different interventions that have put in place to help alleviate the situation um but it also raises concern about the adequacy of the school's response to this ongoing Behavior it hasn't stopped
043so just less than two weeks ago I received the phone call from Mr Barrow stating some alarming news um and it involved this student saying to my child that I am going to come your come to your house I'm going to rip your mother's heart out and I'm going to kill her he said that to my son and he also said that to another child in his classroom this took place in the cafeteria so it's not a structured setting it's in the cafeteria where they're probably lining up next to each other um so he said this he was provoked because of a game that the kids were playing um so it was very alarming for a child child in third grade 8 or 9 years old to say something like this um so I understand
044things can happen and things can arise but this was a threat that was made my child came home I spoke to him about the situation he also mentioned that the child said that he's going to kill him and his friend that was standing in line um so I reached out to Mr Barrow I explained to him what my child told me um I spoke to my child I said stay away from the student for now and um he went to school the next day I spoke to him I said everything okay he said yes the student came to school okay after making a threat this child was in school the very next day um so just quick information about myself I'm a special education teacher I've been teaching for about 13 years now when there
045is a crisis team that has to assess the situation it's proper protocol if a child makes a threat the student is not in school the next day whether the child is Harless or not I understand that this child could be harmless but I don't know this child I don't know what weapons are at home I don't know the home life I don't know the structure of that environment my child went to school the next day and this child went to school as well how do I know my child told me he saw him in class other children that live around us also said that he was in class with them so that's how I was able to tell that this child went to school the next day um so I spoken to several School administrators
046from Bergen County and pay County of people that I know and they shared the same exact information that any other school district would have followed which is a suspension and a psych ofal that this child should have gone out with the proper clearance to come back and return to school so after the threat was made the child came to school the child then didn't return the following day and was out of school for a few days so I'm assuming the child was suspended okay my concern is this child was in school the very next day the situation took place whether there's an investigation that's taking place or not the child should not return to school um my husband and I reached out to Mr Barrow we had a meeting with him in person uh two
047days right after the incident we explained to him how alarming this is after that um Mr barel shared as much as he can I understand he can't be very transparent which I get but what was alarming to us is the fact that he was allowed to school allowed back in school that next day I think that is the part that really gets to me I'm just a little nervous that this child was not out of school coming to school after making a threat opens up doors to many other things whether you're an adult and you make a threat or whether you're a third grader and you make a threat so I just hope that this is not just a learning curve and I urge the board to review this matter closely um when I did
048address my email I did address it to Mr Jan CASRO and board members as well um so I hope you all have some knowledge of what occurred um and I just want to make sure that we can ensure that the proper protocols take place when a threat is made it should not matter matter whether a child is harmless or not a threat is a threat um and I just want to make sure that for example if this was my child and my child God forbid makes a threat he doesn't belong in that classroom setting yes if you could just wrap it up that's five minutes past five minutes yeah but if you can just wrap up that would be fine okay that's fine I'm wrapping up sure um so again I know many stories from
049other parents that have shared not a lot of parents come to board meetings as we all know and they're also not very vocal and they don't speak up or defend their child when need be um but just because parents are not going to the school and expressing their concerns doesn't mean that parents don't talk among themselves and that we don't know about prior history from this one specific student yes the student has not been in school for the last few days yes other things have been heard and said about this child I just want to make sure that our special services and our department of special education understands when a behavior is involved and it's recurring ongoing and it's not really being controlled in that specific setting that as professionals we just choose a better
050setting to fit that child's needs thank you thank you for your comment and your concerns anybody else okay and I will close to the hearing of the citizens um we have no executive session tonight yay so at this time I need a motion to adjourn and just note the next Board of Education meeting will be held on Thursday April 10th 2025 at 6: PM that is our work session meeting so moved second all in favor I I any opposed meeting adjourned