001June 23rd, 2026 is now called to order. In accordance with the requirements of the Open Public Meeting Act, NJSA 104-6, adequate notice given the time, date, location, and to the extent known, the agenda of this meeting was sent to the Hundred County Democrat, Star Ledger, and Courier News on January 7th, 2026, and published on January 12th, 2026. In addition, notice of this meeting has been posted at North Hunter High School and Vorhees High School, provided to the municipal clerks of Bethlehem Township, California Burrow, Town of Clinton, Clinton Township, Franklin Township, Glengardner Burrow, Hampton Bur, Highbridge, Lebanon Burough, Lebanon Township, Tuksbury Township, and Union Township, as well as other interested parties and posted on the legal notices section of the district website. Fire exits are located in the direction indicated. If alerted to fire, please move
002in a calm and orderly fashion to the nearest smoke-free exit. Restrooms are located through the doors behind this desk and to the right as indicated. At this time, please silence all cell phones. Roll call. >> Mr. Chapman >> here. >> Mr. Hanley >> here. >> Miss H >> here. >> Mr. Lorie >> here. >> Mr. Matthews >> here. >> Miss Kappa >> here. >> Mr. Morgan >> here. >> Miss Reyes >> here. Mr. Spant >> here, >> Miss >> here, and >> here. All right, we have the flag salute. >> I aliance 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. >> All right. Uh, tonight is our only meeting for this month. I know this
003past year we've moved to a um a work session and an action session. This month we were combining our meetings. So tonight will be actionoriented and discussion oriented. Um so we will begin with a call for a motion and second to approve agenda items 41 and 42. Can I get these are our minutes from the May meetings. Can I get that motion? Uh Rich, thank you. And Tariff with the second. Thank you. Uh any questions or clarifications? Okay. Uh all in favor? >> I opposed or abstensions? >> I abstain from 4.1. >> Any others? Okay. Um that brings us to our board goal setting for the 202627 school year. Tonight we're joined by Kathy Poria, our field representative from school boards association, uh who's going to facilitate and sort of walk us through that process.
004You have uh folders um at your seat uh with that information and our compiled um goals uh self assessment uh from the recent uh board self-ealuation as well. So uh Kathy, we have your presentation linked also. Um, so the the floor is yours. >> Well, happy summer. Happy to see you all again. So, goal set, you're getting a head start in your goal setting, which is great. Uh, I did want to start with the board self-evaluation because that we're just going to talk about. I don't really have a lot about that in the presentation, but in your folder, I did put the entire board self-evaluation. I would really encourage you to read through it and read through the comments. It's 24 pages long, so I'm not expecting that you do that during the course of
005this meeting. And then you also have a chart that tells you how you did compared to last year. And it looks like compared to last year, you consider yourself to have improved in all areas, which is very good. And I did I enjoyed reading through your evaluation. I really did. Like I told you at our last meeting, I read through the comments, look for comments that might be evaluative of staff, but you really made comments that were overall, I think, constructive and insightful. And that's the nice thing about these evaluations because sometimes you have meetings and some people talk more than others, and some people's comfort level with speaking in public is more than others. But when you do these self- valuations, it's anonymous, and you're giving comments about what you thought of how your
006board did throughout the year. So you really I I'm typically pretty impressed with what I read in board self-evaluations because I find that a lot of board members, they're very insightful and they have a pretty good grasp on what's going on with their board and in their district. So if you look at the average scores at the end of each section, we consider a three or above to be a board that's functioning really well. And if you have areas that are below three, that might be an area that you want to think about for a board goal. Um, there were some common themes in here and pretty typical of what I find in districts like community engagement. Community engagement tends to be a struggle in a lot of districts. Um, on boarding like new members,
007if you have turnover with your board, like on boarding. So, there were some common themes there you can look um through. And then when we get to the goal setting, there is a section in the self-evaluation for progress towards your board goals. It's on page 21. And for the most part, all of you thought that, well, not all of you, but the vast majority of you thought that there was satisfactory progress made towards your goals. So, you may want to look at your board goals from this year and see what you can build on for next year or see if you want to carry them over into the next year to achieve them if there's still things that you want to do. Um, like one of the things was shift to a committee of the
008whole model, which you've obviously done. So, maybe there's something else you want to do besides that, but for the most part, you seem to do well with making progress towards your goals. And like I said, I found the comments to be pretty constructive. Um, I did put in your folder there's a sheet here. So, when you're reading through the self-evaluation, it's just about processing the board self-evaluation and it's for your own self-reflection and then maybe you can talk about it if you have another board meeting or another committee of the whole meeting to talk about it with each other, but it's what was the most interesting observation contained in the composite evaluation? What particular strength did the evaluation point out about your team? What is the most critical concern that the evaluation noted? Is there
009one particular area in the evaluation that you think should become a priority for board development this year? So, that's for you to do. I don't typically like to come out to these meetings and put everyone on the spot and say, "Tell me your thoughts about all of this right now." So, you can feel free to take the the whole evaluation home and go through and think about it, share your thoughts with Brendan or any of your other members. So, do you have any questions for me about the self-evaluation before we move on? Yeah. >> Um, well, I guess Mike, I feel like the onboarding topic feels like it's a perennial topic because you have new people every year. >> Yeah. >> And I guess um I know new members have to go through sort of
010their mandatory training. Um I know this year we tried to pull some resources together with like a in a Google notebook where Rich put resources where you could ask questions. I'm curious about what have what are some examples that you've seen other boards do that has sort of hit that onboarding perennial need? >> Boards tend to do different things. The I know it's easy to put like a folder of information together in a Google Drive. U but I remember when I was on a board feedback I got about that was yeah it's great if you have like hours to read through like an exhausting amount of information which not everybody does. Um, but it's still information that's important for them to have. I've seen other districts like large districts where they'll have their new board
011members in December come in and spend a couple hours in their talking with their BA talking with the superintendent. Sometimes the board president and vice president comes in. I've gone out to some of those and done board-on boarding in a small group with a new board member. So, boards I I think that's actually a great thing if you can do that. uh bring your board members in to your board office and introduce them to your administration, your board president, vice president and just >> because I know that has happened I think typically with the superintendent, not necessarily with president and vice president. >> Yeah. >> And I and I will say and I think this was some of the feedback that we saw too. What was interesting was >> by switching to the committee of
012the whole had a very naturally educating effect. Yeah. >> of this board where normally we would be divided into committees and you wouldn't have you wouldn't be participating in the discussions on a variety of topics. Um but again that was I think more a byproduct of the the committee as a whole. >> That's good too. And I've I've gone out and done um a board had me come out and do the whole board's role in finance and the budget presentation at their little small group meeting which I thought was great because new board members they're coming on in January and they're like right in the middle of budget season and all of a sudden they're having to approve the budget and understand school budget and what their role in that is. So I thought that
013was a good idea. uh I've gone out and just sat with them and talked about these are your roles and responsibilities and you know board basics so you can structure it how you want to with what you think you think is important for new board members that are coming onto your board to know um you have a unique board you're all from different towns and you're different towns one town may have different priorities than another township so you're you're a unique board I I think we might have touched on this, but I think something that would be good on the onboarding thing is quite honestly talking about this >> that in six months you're going to have to review the board >> and you're going to have to do the superintendent review. So like so
014in your first couple months you know what you should be looking for because it's it's easy to come in kind of blind and then be like oh we're doing this in the oh man go back did we talk about this three months ago? So I think that >> and that's actually yeah that's a a good point because I don't even know if at that point you were even briefed on what the goals were to say like all right let me pay attention as well >> right >> yeah that can be overwhelming because I remember when I was a new board member I was like I'm supposed to evaluate the superintendent I joined my board I didn't know I >> didn't know what I was getting myself into and all of a sudden I'm like here
015evaluate the superintendent And so it is can be intimidating for a new board member. So that that's a good thing to have some training. And you're going to need to do the board self- evaluation. You'll need to do your CSA evaluation. Terra, >> this year we coupled the three Rs with our January county board. And I thought that was helpful because pretty much we had a huge turnout from all new board members. They did the three Rs and then our session was with BA roundt which was great because we were moving into the budget. So they got, you know, three Rs and then the budget. So we'll try and make sure we plan this year to provide those learning tools for new board members in the county. >> Yeah, we're doing three Rs again. And
016when we have it at the county meetings, we tell current board members like bring your newly elected members. Even if they got elected over your best friend on the board or your favorite board member, reach out to your newly elected board members and invite them to three Rs and go with them. That's a really great thing. We also do candidate briefings. So if you have a person that's running that hasn't ever been on a board before, we do candidate briefings. There's one in North Jersey, one in Central, and one in South Jersey. So I actually have the dates for those not off the top of my head, but I do have the dates for when um I'll be doing central with some of my colleagues. So that's a good thing, too. And that really goes
017through the candidate briefing. go through some of the three Rs things, the roles and responsibilities, the basics, a little bit of campaigning things, but mostly like the role of a board member, what you can do, what you can't do. >> And then the other question I had was one of the goals from last year was to have the July retreat um for district and board goals. We did not have that retreat. And I guess like what would that retreat look like? like typically how do boards structure that and and and um do that around whether it's around goal setting in some way. >> Well, it can be about whatever is a priority for your board at that time. Um boards, you know, we can do it on any number of topics. It can be a
018shorter two-hour retreat. I've done four-hour retreats on a Saturday morning. You do them at a time when it's convenient for all of you and when you know your summer schedules allow for it. It is a public meeting. It tends to be a little less structured and more casual. And it's nice because you can get to know your board members and talk to them a little bit. Usually boards will do a breakfast or a lunch. We do I'm not a huge icebreaker person, but I do have an icebreaker that I use for retreats that's simple and that I like that seems to go over well. So, we do like an icebreaker and then we do we can do activities, but honestly, a lot of times I find that I plan activities and all, you know, all
019of these things and then everybody just winds up getting so engaged in conversation that we don't even get to the activities. But I've done them on like student achievement, what's the board's role? Um, if you have like a really good functioning board, I've done one on like highly effective board, like what are the traits of a highly effective board? We have an eight characteristics of highly effective boards. That's a good one. But they could be on fi like finance. They can be on anything that you want them to be really. >> And that's typically a separate standalone meeting. >> Yeah. Usually it's it's it's a retreat meeting, but it is advertised. You know, it's advertised as a public meeting. We don't tend to get a lot of public outs to the retreat meetings, but you
020still invite your public. They can come watch. They have you have public comment, but it is a little more casually structured. it's facilitated, but it's a nice time where your board members can talk to each other just as people and get to know each other a bit. Same with your administration. >> Okay. So, >> Kathy, one of the questions I had was centered around the superintendent evaluation. So, the timing of that, do they do it to try to get it in for the end of the the school year? Is that why it's kind of positioned where it is now and not later in the calendar year? is we're working off the school year, boards are working off the calendar year. Do you have new board members coming in and they're not really well positioned to
021kind of maybe make some um some I don't know effective comments or maybe they are I don't know but um >> is that is it is that the the logic behind it? So like when I did it last year I found myself punting on a lot of stuff because I didn't know >> and I think a lot of members feel the same. So I don't I was just curious of the timing of it. I you know it's I don't know the logic behind it but it's state statute that it's due July 1st. It's state law. You have to have it in by July 1st. There's not really a lot of control we have over that. But it is and it does align with also statute is you have to evaluate based on district goals. That's
022part of it. It's part of the statute. So it does you know it aligns in the sense that you're evaluating your superintendent at the end of the school year when they've um worked on their district goals throughout that year. But yeah, that's that's all statute and not really something that we really have control over. It's the state. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Sorry for frontloading all the questions. >> That's what I'm here for. >> I always You are a very engaged board and I like coming out here because of that. All right. Any other questions on board self-evaluation? All right. So, just go ahead and read through it. Let me know if you have any thoughts on it and uh you can use it for your goals. So, we'll get to goal setting. All right. Why
023would your board set goals? Because well-defined goals enable equitable policy development, moving closer to achievement of the district vision and mission, establishment of identified priorities, planning for implementation of programs and professional development. periodic evaluation, recalibrating and adjusting if needed, which is very important. And really, it's effective communication between your board and your administrative, your administrative staff, and accountability, which I can't really stress enough how this all ties together with your role in accountability and appraisal. Your board and your administration set district goals collaboratively together. You approve those goals and then you use those. you hold your administr your superintendent accountable for the completion of those goals through the CSA evaluation. So in that sense it all ties together. Um goal development everybody owns the district goals. Um usually they come um out of your ideas
024from your superintendent because your superintendent is your educational leader. But everybody owns the district goals. They're collaboratively set by the board uh and the superintendent. And if you remember back our ethics or any roles and responsibilities trainings, the board is the what and then the administration is the how. So the board approves the goals, the superintendent implements those and is responsible for implementing those goals. Board goals are set by the board. you don't hold your administration or your superintendent accountable for the completion of board goals. They're for yourself and your own functioning and things that are priorities for all of you to help further your own board governance. Um what I also think though is a good thing to have as a board goal and this came from my old uh field service rep when
025I was a board member was a board setting goal will where you'll provide support and that might have been part of yours as well. You'll provide support and resources to the superintendent for the completion of the district goals. So that way you all have buy in even to the into the district goals. And those are just some, you know, areas the district goals can focus on and areas the board goals focus on. This is our cycle of goal setting. So you're June, you're like ahead of the game. You're good setting your goals over the summer once you have your board goals set. So, you won't really approve anything tonight. Tonight's more for discussion, but prove your goals. Usually July or August, your superintendent will make action plans for those goals and then should share uh
026those with the board. And then you'll evaluate how they're going throughout the course of the year. And we've talked about this before, but a good idea is usually for your superintendent to give an update a few times a year on the status of the district goals, and then at the same time, your board president can give an update on the status of the board goals. That way they don't get lost in the shuffle. You have new board members coming on, your board changes over. You're just uh keeping going with the updates on those goals. This is just our stairstep model of responsibility that one of my colleagues make. It really starts with your strategic planning goals. When you have a strategic plan, which you do, it's easy to set goals because you'll be pulling goals
027out of that strategic plan. Um so you have strategic planning goals, district goals, board of education goals, administrators goals, department goals, building goals, and that uh is a stair step to increasing success for your students, which of course is the most important thing. Everything you do in a school, every goal you set, every budget you approve, you should be asking how does this improve outcomes for students? And goal setting is really a hallmark of effective school boards. They define clear goals for student achievement in classroom instruction based on a vision of high expectation and shared beliefs and values about what's possible for all students. So when you're thinking about student success and goals that help support student success, you'll be asking what have you accomplished? What needs additional focus? What are our priorities that reflect
028your values? What are you doing to address learning gaps? And what did we do well to advance student achievement? And for that, you want to look at your data. And I did put two resources in your folder about how boards ask for and discuss data. I think that came up a couple times in your board self-evaluation. And that's really something I feel boards struggle with is asking the right questions about data. What can I ask about data in a way that, you know, isn't offensive to my administration or doesn't make it seem like, you know, we're trying to, you know, accuse the administration of not being good enough or something or, you know, people start debating over the merits of test scores. You are in a high school and you have a lot of different
029data you can use. You can use your, you know, climate surveys that probably go out once a year that gives you a lot of data. There's all sorts of of data you can use. And of course, you know, your New Jersey um school performance reports, your achievement data. You want to look at all of that. Um you can even have data about participation in extracurricular activities and um student and community engagement. So I always encourage boards to use data. Look at your data. Nobody thinks a student is the sum of a test score. Like we all know that students are much more than that. But you do really get useful information from your achievement data and all the data that you have presented to you throughout the year. And when you're setting goals, you also
030want to ask what you've learned about all of these things. school culture and climate, staff recruiting, equitable access to curricul curriculum and extracurricular options, parent commitment to the education of their children, student mental health needs, critical need for ongoing communication and transparency, funding, that's huge obviously on resources to support your programs and learning experiences. And I would also, one of my colleagues made this little graphic, but I would add to here of course your your student achievement data and your academic success of your students. This is just talking about what you should focus on. So student learning, obviously making sure you have a quality educational program that meets the needs of all of your students. uh that your data identifies um areas for where you want to improve um to provide needed support to improve
031um your overall student success. And then when you have these goals set, of course, you want to start thinking early on about how your budget is going to align and support all of these things. And of course, you're a high school, so you're setting your kids up for the future and their future jobs and thinking about what skills they need when they graduate for the future, which is very um you know, everchanging, especially right now. And this of course is a list of what things students need to be successful now. And of course I would add, you know, we have um digitally literate, but I would add AI to that now as well, you know, and how is AI going to change things? These are all things you need to think about for your students.
032So again, you tie everything together, your vision, your mission statement, your strategic plan, make sure they're all aligned into your setting of your district goals. Always review your vision, your mission statement at every meeting. Review your board goals, your strategic planning goals. We even say keep if you have your, it's probably online on your computer, but you have if you have your strategic plan, keep it with you at your board meetings in case you need to reference it. So the vision focuses on tomorrow. It provides your destination. It answers the question, what do we want uh to become? And then the mission focuses on today and what you actually do and guides you to your destination and answers the question what will we do to achieve our vision. Oh, and just like an example of
033this, when you're thinking of goals, sometimes you want to think like broad and big picture. Like we tell boards, think big picture. Think big picture. Like have a vision. Like years and years ago, one of my board members said, "Well, can we set a goal of increasing enrollment in our district?" And we're like, when we set a goal, it's good idea. We want to increase enrollment, of course, but we want to set a goal that the superintendent has control over. You don't necessarily have control over who's moving in and out of your district and who you know the number of children that are in your district. But maybe there are some smaller things to do that you know would make families and make children families with young children want to move into our district like
034you know having strong academic achievement having strong extracurriculars you know what could you do the branding was big years ago back then. So focusing on maybe some smaller things like if you have a big picture things, what are some smaller things you could do today that might lead you in that direction that are realistic and achievable for your superintendent? This is your mission statement. It's very beautiful. Every student empowered for tomorrow. Since the North Hunter and Vorhees Regional High School District empowers all students through innovative and personalized learning to achieve their full potential, embrace lifelong learning and contribute responsibly to a changing world. And of course, these are just the phases of goal setting. Reflect, refine, and commit. Look back before looking forward. So you want to look at how you did last year with
035your goals last year. Where are you with your budget? And then what is the community seeking from your district as well? And then you want to review your strategic planning goals. I have these here. I'm sure you know them. These are your strategic planning goals from 2025 to 2030. So, of course, you're going to align your district goals to that. These were your district goals for this past year. review the progress made toward the previous year's district goals and then determine if any need to be carried over to the upcoming year or expanded. I have them on the next page. And these were I won't read through them all because I'm sure you know them, but these were your district goals. You have them here for 2025 and 2026. And then you want to focus
036and prioritize and narrow the focus to your most critical district needs uh and what will affect uh student impact what will impact your students the most and help lead them to success. And again, you want to, like I said before, you want to you can have wishless thinking like that's okay, but when you're setting the goals, thinking of what is feasible and what's the most impactful. All right. And these I'm going to turn it over to Dr. Burgess for a minute so he can talk about um some district goal proposals. What I do when I'm doing these presentation, goal setting presentation is I do reach out to the superintendent because he is he's you know superintendent typically are non- voting board members. So he's your member of your board and he's also your educational leader
037in the district. So I always reach out and say what are your ideas for goals to help all of you so you're not just coming into this um without any without any ideas. So go ahead. >> Yeah. So without, you know, going through each one of these individually, I think you can all read these over on your own, but these are the draft district goals that, um, my administrative team and myself worked on together. Um, we felt it was important to expand on some of our goals. For instance, the instructional goal of developing, um, you know, um, and hands-on frameworks that we developed this year to make sure that gets fully integrated into our curriculum. Um, one of the feedbacks, one of the pieces of feedback that I received was that, um, the board wanted
038more specific goals. So I did try to put in there you know, percentages um make sure it's very um I I actually made it the smart goal, you know, model to make sure it was um measurable and achievable and um so if you look through all of these, you know, the first one is on instruction and programming and it's um you know, integrating a future ready learning framework that we developed over the course of this year in a pilot into all of our courses and then some um timelines of how we're going to do that. The second one was uh for personnel uh which was to increase um instructional collaboration through a peer-to-peer best practices exchange. This came right out of our strategic plan and I thought this was a lot more measurable than just
039you know last year it was um improve you know school climate personnel um which I I think we you know made a lot of progress towards but it was hard to measure um and so I think this will be a lot easier to measure because we'll have a specific program that will implement. Um I believe one of our emerging leader projects is going to focus on this as well. Also, I think this will be um led from the grassroots side, which will um actually be even better because it'll be our own staff collaborating with this and with our and the third one was around fiscal management. You know, we've talked about transportation costs being one of the biggest costs of our district and so we are going to implement a waiver program. That's we're voting
040on that later tonight. Um and so this goal would basically revolve around that and the cost savings that we'll see as a result of that. And so um that was the fiscal management and then the governance um was to um develop that the strategic planning dashboard that we talked about to make sure we are um communicating with the public in real time as we're making progress. Um and um I'll talk a little bit about strategic planning later. I was going to do a full presentation tonight but with the amount of things on the agenda Brendon and I spoke and we're going to do that in July when we have a little more time. Um but I think you know what we're going to try to do is make sure this is um transparent to the
041public on an ongoing basis so that it's not just even on a monthly basis from the board but anytime somebody has a time to look for it they can look and see where we're at. >> Great. >> So those are the proposed goals. Again I'm welcome all feedback because again these are supposed to be developed collaboratively with all of us but I think it's great to have a starting point instead. >> Brandon, are you okay with some questions from the board? They have any any questions from the board? Um, but I was also going to say, um, as you were speaking, there was a a couple of things resonating, I think, with what you said, what some of our feedback was and what, uh, Dr. Burgess just started to go over. Um, and one of
042those trends, I know you said if if it was under three, you know, it's potentially an area here. And one of those is the vision, vision, mission, and goals. And I know from our board feedback and I believe even some of our superintendent feedback, there's sort there is this desire to increasingly shift the conversation to the to an academic conversation and um what the learning is looking like and and what is happening with that learning. So that um seems to be something that the board wants to engage in more conversation around that versus u more strictly operational kinds of things. So I'm hearing some resonance um among that. Um another question that and also another one was in communicating our governance to the community. Um so uh that was a point that you brought up
043that seems to be a point in our own self-reflection um and potentially through the exploration of a dashboard addressing that as well. So there might be some natural um alignment there. Also, one question I had for you when you were talking about all of the student performance metrics before everything from climate and culture to the levels of achievement. Does school boards have any sort of I don't want to use the word report card but something that sort of lists all of those attributes because I think one of the challenges of being on a board is you are always going to be presented with the state um assessment performance data because that's required. Um, and then the office of curriculum will always report out on things like AP scores, SAT, but beyond that, boards often are
044looking for more data and information. And to your point, it's not that the data and information is not there. It's there, but it's not necessarily brought together in a way that paints a bigger picture for the board. And I guess I was wondering if school boards has any sort of profile or because all of those things that you mentioned before, I could envision the administration being able to pull that data together for us periodically that would give the board a much more comprehensive view of student performance. But I don't know if that kind of tool or exists. >> Does I mean the closest thing I can think of would maybe be the NJDOE school performance reports because they do incorporate attendance data which actually is really important too. If you look at attendance data, it's
045pretty highly correlated with um academic achievement. But they do they did incorporate some different things with extracurriculars. I think they have participation in the arts now in their discipline. Um, I don't think they have climate in there, so that might be something you have to get from your district. That's a good idea. >> But it sounds like a potential marrying >> of the two that the the school report card has other elements on it that are of value and then we internally would have additional data to >> Oh, yeah. If you're not looking at your NJ DOE school performance reports, go on and look at them and they're all on. They usually the only issue with those is that it's they come out in April and they came out late this year. I think they
046they just recently came out, but they're for the previous school year. So, you're looking a year behind, but it's still good information and you can look at trends, but there's a lot of information in there as well. >> Thank you. you know and obviously you know administration's always a huge resource group. >> Other other questions, comments, clarifications, thoughts, right? >> Uh just the the goal integrate the future ready learning framework into 100% of secondary curricula. Can you just give like a few sentence like the future ready learning framework? How how would you just briefly describe that? I know we often hear about like the steering committee and all that like what what is what is that? What is the goal of that? >> So, I'm going to do a very superintendent thing and I'm going
047to ask my curriculum director um to explain that better because I don't want to misexplain it and I think you know Rich does a lot of work on this. Um we communicate a lot about it but I think he's immersed in this and he'll be a better. So really what we want to do is to see how we can embed those AI tools into the curriculum uh and and not just um you know how students can use them and to learn the literacy about them and just learning all different kinds of things to use them more effectively and how they are used and how they're developed. So each class would have a different focus on those different tools though. >> Okay. So strictly tied to to the AI, you know, the venue application of >>
048the two main areas that we're focusing on is AI powered instruction and then the authentic learning. So those are the two areas that really came out of as a result of the strategic plan. >> Okay. >> So again, the authentic learning to me is project based learning. You know, something that's going to give meaning to the students for this content or data or, you know, whatever we're trying to get, you know, them to understand. Um AI is you know in our face though non-stop so it has to be a part of it and I think teaching them to learn these tools the proper way and how they're going to survive in the world with these tools is pretty paramount >> rich uh like for the for the lay person if you were to talk about
049um traditional assessment versus more authentic assessment. Traditional assessment looks like what and more authentic assessment looks like what? >> So it's really trying to look at writing in a case of writing for a larger audience. So, for example, you know, instead of just writing something that only your teacher sees, you want something that would be for the community. Um, so really just trying to embed things within the community to make it more authentic, make it more real, something that you would do outside of the school as well. And that's one of the things that I was looking at um how to capture a report on authentic assessments um including work-based learning AP capstones. But one of the things and I'm not sure how we could do it is looking at post-secary outcomes including the trades,
050apprenticeships and non-ol paths. So I don't know if we're looking at that but that's something that I would think that we would be interested in to see how we're doing here and how it transcends when they go out into the world our students. So I don't know how we could capture that and monitor it but I'm open to hearing thoughts >> and I think that was part of year three plan the way you know a lot of things came out of the strategic plan so just dividing it up among the five years so I think that was looking at the third focusing on I think we're starting it in year two but really focusing on it in year three. Great. Thanks. >> Just >> do does the district feel that it's doing what it should
051do with regard to technology readiness? >> You know, you're you're you're mentioning AI, which I think is great. Um, I'm asking, do do you think we're where where we should be with regard to technology? >> Yeah, I mean, we've had a digital digital literacy curriculum that's embedded throughout all of our subject areas for five or six years. I mean, and we do look at that every year to just make sure that we are, I mean, AI is again one of those things that's sort of embedded in that digital literacy component. Um, I mean, we're always open to suggestions, you know, improvements, but I think, you know, we do try to evaluate that every year because it's so it changes so fast. >> Yeah. >> What do you mean by that, Mara? Well, so anecdotally from
052personal experience with a child who graduated in 2022, who was a super strong student with 10 AP classes that were all high scores, went off to college, and was, he said, very surprised that all of his peers had better technology skills than him. >> And um it was probably one thing that his parents at home didn't lean into and do with him because we don't like it. It was there. It was provided, but if anybody was going to really educate him about next level use of technology, it it it really wasn't going to be mom or dad. >> Do you have a sense of what those skill like when saying not having those skills like the specifics of what those skills might be or >> felt across the board? >> Okay. and is now caught
053up and took almost remedial classes to catch up and I sort of just scratched my head. That is one kid and I I I hate to inject that. I mean, don't change it because it's one kid's story, but it surprised me. >> Well, I guess I was just trying to get at if you're talking about um being adept with applications or if you're talking about information literacy. Um >> I would say more adept with applications. >> So So technology is a very broad term. Do you mean like uh how to run a laser or do you mean programming computer science? What do you mean by the word technology? >> Um I would say probably applications using the computer to put together presentations. So the suite of tools that are typically in an office or a
054Google workspace, spreadsheets, presentations, Excel, again PowerPoint, >> those kinds of tools. >> Um, >> and I mean computer technology. >> Yes. Not operating a laser. >> That's aspiration nuclear reactor or you know technology operating a refinery. You mean computer system technology? >> Yeah, the suites. >> Yeah, that was sort of my followup. Was it not knowing basics of coding where you know and you could go I remember going to college and meeting uh computer science and they knew yeah I knew a lot but as a liberal arts major I didn't but that was I was just kind of kind of zeroing in on what we on what we meant by that. So >> and some basic things like presentation skills and things like that and knowing the products to be able to do that I
055you know can look into >> and well >> I hate to put that in motion by just one person but since we're talking about AI I just thought I would mention technology as well and and we do have adept leadership in the area of technology I see that so I just putting it out there >> uh Andrea you had it >> um so this is a I think a question maybe it was adjust it'll be addressed in the strategic plan but do we offer our kids kind of sort of more comprehensive I don't want to say career coaching but options coaching. I know that there's a lot of, you know, after-school activities. You can go to a presentation about, you know, different options after school, how to pay for college, you know, recruiting from the
056military, but those are kind of after school things that you typically go with a parent. But does anyone sit down and can kind of lay out, you know, here's all these different options. There's college, there's trade school, there's going out and getting just a job, you know, and just kind of walking through the paths like that. Do we offer those types of career? >> I see Mike nodding over there. Yeah, that that is that is part of the uh counseling curriculum. We go out to the classes and do those. We also uh do career awareness events uh the career fairs and things like that. Um we also have them do some uh assessments to help them understand better what their skill bases are, what their interests are. Um and we talk, you know, especially with
057the juniors and seniors about the different options. Um we go out and and talk about the college process, but we also talk about the career process at the same time and it's also part of our financial literacy curriculum and our senior health also is part of that curriculum. And are those um Mike are those like inventories and interest pathways being initially explored during grades nine and 10 on a lighter level before it >> yes >> gets a little more focused towards towards college. on the I think Terry you said it's you I we're sort of talking about having in year three kind of a almost a survey of where our graduates wind up and being able to look at that data and saying oh you know 50% went on to twoyear fouryear others went on
058to trade schools like that's what we're driving towards having that kind of like postgrad report or survey of where people are planning do we know that data >> so I we know the data from exit surveys I don't know Do we have that data um post-graduate as far as students um whether or not they're staying in four-year colleges, graduating? >> Not that data anymore. >> We used to have a different um um system that we used for that. Um and we switched because of a lot of different variables, but I think that was something that we lost from that. Um we know what students are going to a four-year college, >> but I'm also interested in what students who aren't going to a four-year college are doing and >> what they're doing. >> Yeah. What
059are they doing right after? What are their plans? You know, >> we know that data from an exit interview. >> Okay. Right. What we don't know is after they leave here if they follow through. >> Right. Right. And that I mean that's fair. That's >> I don't know what matrix what kind of tool we could use to gather that because that would be voluntary. >> There are some postsecondary um tools out there that we could use. Um I don't know what the return rates aren't that you know sometimes somebody in their 19 or 20 you know. >> Yeah. But sort of >> do we see the exit surveys like kind of the aggregated data for or does that shared with the community? I'm just wondering you have the data with these exit surveys. who gets
060to see that and does that inform any decision making or does that say look we're seeing a lot of our students are not going to sort of a four-year um college they're doing other things and should that you know change how some of our opportunities we're offering to or things that we're talking about earlier just I'm wondering if that data would be useful in informing some of our future ready and career readiness and some of the coaching our counseling we do along the way >> yeah we can look at using that data more than we do. >> So I think I sorry I think you said something along the lines but then my attention for a second >> and I don't think um as part of that exiting process do we actually get an email
061contact on our students in other words the ones who are leaving like here's my personal email or here's my anticipated school email >> to give us access to we we do get that or >> we do ask for for the last I think three years we've asked for their personal email because they lose access to their school. Yeah, for sure. >> What? Six months, something like that. Um, so we do ask for a personal email along with some other questions. We we actually expanded our survey this year to ask some more specific questions about counseling department and overall academic programs and things like that. >> But it sounds like we have actually an avenue to those former students to at least reach out to in the future to see if >> Yeah. Yeah. Um it
062is something that we could put out there how interest how accurate the information we get back or how much information >> I don't know that is something we can do though. >> Okay. >> Uh other other questions other topics other clarifications or thoughts. >> Well did you ask? Well, just a thought on a retreat. Like if we were to decide to do that, what timing and how just reach out to you to see if we could set >> reach out to me. I do have some retreats booked over the summer. So, if you want to do it, let me know pretty soon. So, but I do have some dates in July and August that we could do a retreat. And like I said, you could do them if you wanted to do them on a
063Saturday morning, you could do them on a Saturday morning. The summer retreats tend to be like just on a week night, a couple hours usually, but it depends on what you want to do. And then you get credit for board certification for that as well. It's actually doing a retreat is actually one of the requirements and then you get your training credits also. But no, I I find they're really good. I think it it helps bring the board together a little bit and you can really have some more in-depth conversations about like data and other governance topics that you want to talk about. Um, so for these goals, if you have questions about the goals or feedback, share it with your superintendent. And then the next step for the district goals would be for these
064to go officially on a board agenda for formal board approval. And I do this again majority rules like with everything else with the board. But my philosophy when I was a board president, I really like the goals to be unanimous. I did never want to bring goals forward that wasn't unanimous with my whole board. And I did have some times where I had board members that had some major concerns over goals, whether it was board or district goals, and reach out and we always we talk through and work through it. So, I would work through the goals until you have full board support. That would be my recommendation. You don't have to do that because, like I said, it's majority rules like all your other board decisions, but it's it's nice when you have unanimous
065support for your goals. Thank you very much. >> All right. So, next we have some Oh, yes. These are just next Sorry, these are just next steps. You're not rid of me yet. Um, some next steps for, you know, developing the action plans. Your administration will implement them. Um, establish dates for progress reports. Uh, smart goals. You've probably heard this term. They should be specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and timebased. you when you put your goals out and you have a plan for them, you want your board members, even your newer board members, like you were saying, Rich, to be able to look at those goals and be able to clearly tell for the evaluation if they were achieved or not. So, smart goals are the way to do that. This is an example of action
066plans. You have it in your folder. Again, communicate all of your goals, all things we've talked about. Board goals. Again, we've talked about board goals are how you can be more effective as a board and enhance your governance skills. They could be based on board professional development, address any challenges that you have. Um, again, you want to review your board goals from last year, which these I pulled from your website actually, and I know there was some discussion about whether you had formally approved these or not, but these were your um goals from last year, and you may want to look at these and build on them for next year. These are some examples of board goals like complete the superintendent evaluation which actually some boards is a struggle for some boards. So it could
067be anything from making sure your CSA evaluation is completed on time, reviewing your bylaws, developing a schedule for revising the policy manual, anything you need to do as a board. And this I just I didn't come in with suggestions for board goals because those are for all of you to decide. So, I don't want to put you on the spot tonight, but if you have suggestions, um certainly Brendan, are you okay with taking some suggestions from your board members for board goals if anybody has any? But again, look to those um goals from last year and see if you can build on them and look through your you might need some time to look through your self-evaluation as well. So, any comments on board goals? Right. Okay. So, and again, next step, same thing. Uh,
068develop an action plan for your board goals. There's an action plan template in your folder. You don't have to use those for your district or board goals. We just give them as an example because it kind of has it clearly laid out. And this is a template for your action plans for board goals. All right. Any questions? All right. Thank you. >> Thank you for all you do. Really was a pleasure reading through your evaluation. And you know what? One of my colleagues says a board that says something like a board that always agrees is probably a board that isn't looking closely enough at the data. It's okay to not agree all the time. Challenging each other is how you improve and you always want to have an eye towards improving your board and your
069school district and supporting your administration. So, thank you. Have a wonderful summer. I hope to see you over the summer at a retreat. Reach out to me and we'll plan something. And I hope to see >> Oh, thank you. Yes, I have a have a senior that just graduated. So, I am very very thankful right now for everybody that helps support and uh has a hand in public education. It was a great experience. Thank you so much. >> All right. Um, next on our agendas, we have a uh presentation on our district athletic program uh presented by our respected um athletic directors. So, welcome. So, while they're setting up, I just want to mention to the board that, you know, uh we talk a lot about um academics and curricular um offerings throughout the course
070of the year. Rich Bone does a lot of presentations and I thought as a board the whole be a good idea to try to diversify a little bit and talk about some of the other things that um happen in our district and athletics is a pretty huge part of our district. So um Courtney Burgoid is in her first year as athletic director at North and Brian Bowman is I don't want to guess how many years as athletic director 10. All right 10 but Brian's been here since high school so Mr. authorities so he can answer a lot of questions and u so I asked them just put together something so you would understand what what the program and offerings were so that's what this is about >> so good evening everyone uh pleasure to be
071here so we're just going to we have some data up here we're just going to throw at you I think you have a copy of it so >> perfect thank you guys uh just north at a glance uh for our athletic programs just to put some numbers up here just so you can see what we're offering and what we have going on um right down the driveway here. Uh so for our student athlete participation um each fall, winter, and spring per NJSIA, we take a look at how many student athletes are actually playing sports. Um so we range from 300 to 385. Um our fall being our biggest and this I'm sorry, our winter being our biggest. And this all ranges from the amount of sports that we're offering during that season. Um, so for
072the fall 385, for the winter 381, and for the spring 302. Our total sports offerings is 35 at North including our uh two co-ops, which we'll get into in a little bit. And then we have 866 students registered in Aspen to participate in athletics out of our 1435 students. So this means that 60% of our student body participates in athletics. So, it's a good amount of students that we have that are actually playing sports and getting on the field. And this does not include our multisport athletes. So, we do have a lot of students who are playing in the fall, winter, and spring. Um, multiple sports. Uh, we have a lot, we just did our uh senior awards night, a lot of four-year varsity letter winners. We have a lot of three sport uh varsity
073uh letter winners as well as some four sport ones as well. Um, we also have a big unified sports offering. Um so at North we have fall soccer, winter basketball, winter bowling, and then we do participate in Special Olympics. So it's really awesome to see our um unified sports athletes and our peers come together. Um we have a great coaching staff for that. We have a lot of kids who come out. Uh North actually had so many peers that wanted to be a part of our unified program that we actually had to turn some kids away and only make it available for our upper classmen. So, it's a good problem to have over there that we have that many people who or that many students who want to participate in unified. Um, for our coaching
074staff, uh, we have 38 coaches in the fall, 35 in the winter, and 25 in the spring. And this number I thought was really interesting. We have 59 total volunteers uh, throughout the year. So whether that is across multiple sports or um so our teachers in the building or our community members who want to come and volunteer their time to our sport offerings, it's really great to see um these adults come and mentor our kids. Uh so it's nice to have those extra hands on deck as well. >> So four. >> Okay. uh some s obviously our numbers are smaller in terms of total number of students because we're about you know 400 500 students less than North Hunter but um we had 586 individual athletes um out of the 935 uh students we had
075in the building. So again that's over also just like north that's over 60%. Um, and out of that 586, I I think it was um you can go on Aspen and you click a button, you could you see how many athletes they are, but it kind of counts all the signups at once. And then I figured out a way to get the 586, but uh total signups I think was, you know, close to 800 in terms of how many sports they're doing. So, we have a lot of two sport athletes and some three sport athletes, even though that's that's not as popular as it used to be. A lot of specialization. uh 36 sports including the two co-ops we had with North Hunter this year which was gymnastics and ice hockey. Um oh there it
076is. Total signups was 10003 total signups. Um unified sports we have unified soccer uh unified basketball unified flag football. Um the flag football we made a switch from unified track to flag football two years ago was very was a great switch very popular among the kids. Our unified program in general is outstanding. uh and what they've done at Warheis High School. I don't think I even need to tell the the group everything they've accomplished, but uh they uh participate in NJSA tournaments. Uh both soccer and basketball did. Flag football didn't qualify uh this year. Uh coaching staffs, we have 34 head coaches, 51 assistants. Uh so it's 85 total paid positions. 60 individuals cover those 85 positions. We have a couple three sport coaches and several two sport coaches. And uh volunteers this year, we
077had 11, which is a little light for us this year, but u we have I think we have quite a few more coming this following year. Moving on, the co-ops. So, this was something that we, you know, people always talked about being around here for a long time. Always like, "Oh, can you imagine if you guys combined and everything?" I mean, yeah, it'd be great at first, but then, you know, you'll have less people. But, um, the co-op for NGSA is designed so that schools can, um, to give to give kids a chance to participate, not to create a super team. Uh we started this with ice hockey uh just because that sport itself is kind of a niche sport and this was our third year of ice hockey and as I'm sure many of
078you are aware we made it all the way to the state finals for the co-op uh group which was outstanding. They are a fantastic group. U you know and and as far as the split north of Warhees, I think it's about 8020, maybe 8515, a little bit more north heavy. >> So we did that for a year worked out so well we came up with the logo and everything. Um gymnastics, you know, when Courtney's predecessor, Alexa, she said, "Hey, uh do you have any kids that want to do gymnastics?" Because the numbers were down. Their numbers were down and we had three last year on the team. It's not a very big team. This year we had one. So, that's another opening. Um, and this year, >> yeah, this year, um, we are going to
079combine swimming. Um, so we're going to have a co-op with our boys and girls swim teams. Um, the number at Vorhees was a little bit lower. We saw a little bit of a decline at North. Um, so for the best interest of the team to give swimming the best opportunity, we thought combining would be great. Um, I actually denied Vorhees at first. Um, but then realized that this was the best possible way for our kids to not have to do a co-ed swim team, which co-ed is a little bit, I think, unfair where >> we did that this year. >> Yes. And it didn't work out. And I didn't want them to have to go through that again. Nor did I want nor to ever be in that situation and not have someone kind of
080combined with us um to give the opportunity. Go ahead. >> Just to explain what co-ed is, it's not co-ed. You compete as a boys team, >> right? And we only had I think on a good day five boys. So all our girls in there to compete because their their numbers were like what they they would have trouble having their own team too. So for all them to compete they had to compete as a boys team and our girls even though we got some very competitive girls really that's just it was ugly for them. It was not fair. >> It was not designed well. Um so this upcoming winter uh will be our first year that we have a uh co-op in swimming. Um, so we are planning and coming together with our coaches, um, and
081figuring out what's the best way to go about this. Luckily, with ice hockey and gymnastics, we have a little bit of, you know, experience with that. Um, so we're very hopeful that this is going to work out for the best. It's going to allow us for longer pool time at RVCC. It's going to allow for transportation to be a little bit easier for swimming. Um, and it's going to allow us to, you know, give them the best opportunity to compete. And even though this is the third time we're doing this in four years, it's not something we're going to be looking to, you know, actively do, but every situation was unique in terms of there was a need for. >> Sure. >> So, excellent. >> Okay. >> So, yeah, this year we had some great
082uh team achievements across the board. Um, so starting in the fall, our field hockey state sectional champion state group finalists. Um, we did lose in the the state finals, but to be able to make it that far and compete is an achievement in itself. Same thing with ice hockey. Playing at the credential center was absolutely fantastic to see that that program go forward. Uh wrestling, we were the county champ champions and the state sectional champions. Not talking about the individual achievements as well. Um we definitely had a 100 win um wrestler. We had a girl who played sixth in states. Um so it's it's been really great individually as well as for our teams. Um, girls swimming, we were the county champions for the first time, so that was exciting. Um, boys cross country, boys
083track, girls track, and girls cross country across the board. Um, they are bringing hardware home all the time. If you go in that garage in the stadium, it is filled with it. Um, our boys just competed at the uh, nationals as well. They're doing fantastic. So, um, crossport, track, and cross country is taking it. Um we had county champions for baseball and then just recently we had our softball state sectional champions uh since the first time since 2019 that we've won that. So that's exciting and then we did lose in the state finals but to be there at Satan Hall to play and compete was a fantastic opportunity for our teams. Um so with that too uh we do this really fun thing both schools do it um with our NCAA signing days. So we
084do it in the fall, winter and the spring. Um the spring is the big signing day where we allow everyone whether you are clubs, inter murals, um D1, two or three, if you're signing, you can come out. So we had about 26 students uh who came out that day. Um and then we had four in the fall and then four in the winter. Those are only D1 and D2 commitments in the fall and the winter. Then we put these little graphics on social media. The kids really like them. Um, but to see the support from teammates, from coaches, from uh club coaches come out. We invite everyone out to take pictures. They kind of fake their their national letter of intent that they sign. We have Christmas City Studio come out and take pictures. Um,
085our booster clubs gives us some refreshments. Uh, so it is really a great time to come out and really see where these athletes are going. We announce all of them and praise all the hard work that they put on here that's going to get them to the next level. So, it's a really good day there. >> Uh, on the Vorhees end, uh, great year. Um, boys soccer, they got over the hump. They got their first 101 Sussex championship, which is, uh, you know, beating Hunter Central is always the big bad wolf in that sport. Was a huge deal. Football, we got the Bill Can. So, sorry to half of you, but it's a big deal. So, >> all right. >> Um, girls cross country had an outstanding year. They won the sections and they ended
086up being group two champions. Uh, boys track, won a sectional championship, second in three years, but only the third in 50 years, which is something else. Uh, fall sports was just girls tennis got sectional finals. Fall sports was it was just a great we didn't have a ton of championships, but it was I'm looking around like, wow, every team had a winning record just and and was in a contention for a championship as far as, you know, the that was obviously the best of the three seasons. And we were in five of our teams reached the county semis. And for a school that size, uh, 101 in, it's not just 100 county, it's 101 more in Sussex County. It's 20 schools, um, with some school, you know, you know, a solid private school, Pope John
087and Central and Philipsburg. So to get that far for us, uh, was very good year. Individually, I actually this slide for individuals and I had to do this because this senior class was just uh, yes, Mr. Hamley. Yes. Uh, very special and your son was one of those special athletes. Uh but they did things that there's so many kids that are making it on the banners, you know, uh you I'm not going to go through everyone, but a thousand point score, 100 match winner, uh career goals, um for lacrosse, um you know, a couple all-American cheerleaders. Um just tons of great stuff there. So, and we did have a coach, Coach Barbar, our soccer coach, was a Lehigh Valley live boys, uh soccer coach of the year. So, um fantastic stuff, all kinds of record.
088It was just a pleasure to watch them work through and it's just four years. It was fantastic. And of course, signing day was one of our larger signing day experiences because of the fantastic senior class. And uh we do it I I kind of took the we've been I think this was our ninth signing day. I heard that North did it a long time ago. So it's something that I've always tried to keep up and it's again parents just like you said parents, teammates, people coming out and supporting and it's uh it's a lot of fun. Makes special moment for the kids. >> Skyland Conference. Um that is that is our uh that's our our main league. We're also part of the 101 in Sussex, but that's just for county tournaments. Skyland Conference, that's where
089we get our base schedule for most of our sports. A couple of our sports go outside of that, like football. We're in a much larger conference so that we have, you know, more parody in who we play. But, um, I've been a pleasure to be part of the Skyland Conference as an athlete, as a coach, and as an athletic director. Um, it's a it's a very solid group. Um, we realign every single year at this point. I'm on the alignment committee myself and part we take into account we take into account school size. We take into account how the team has been doing um over a number of years in their respective division. It's a it's actually a pretty complicated spreadsheet that I have the the luxury of of using put all that data in
090and seeing what it spits out at the end. Then me as committee we vote on it. So, you know, if there's a certain support that we don't agree, we're aligned with both Portland and I have the option to say we disagree. We think that North Hunter should be in this division and not this division and so on and so forth. That goes to appeal committee and they make their decision based on that. Um, one thing, you know, being part of it, oh, which just I know this is about sportsmanship and I'm talk about today, but being a part of it, um, it's nice to know that, you know, we're taking into, you know, you could just be a big school and really be in trouble in one sport. Now, we don't necessarily have that problem,
091but we have the ability to get relief. Um, I'll let you talk about the leadership angle. >> Sure. Um so for the fall, winter and spring seasons um the conference comes together and they host these uh leadership summits. So they are conferences and we host them at North um where everybody in the conference brings over one repres student representative from each sport for that season um and they take a bus over and we have this this summit. We bring everyone together. Um North I have the coaches choose. I'm sure you have your coaches choose and you come on over. Then we have a main presentation, a keynote speaker. Like in our last one in the spring, we had uh D1 mindset, which is a mental health focus group come out and speak about, you know,
092what it takes to be an athlete, how to mentally prepare, all of those good things. Um, and then we do these breakout sessions. And the breakout sessions are located in the theater by sport. Um, and they're moderated by coaches of the conference. But what's nice about this is that each individual athlete is now able to sit with one representative from each school in the conference and they're able to talk about how you get your team to buy in. What's the culture like at your school? How are you a leader? Why did your coach choose you? All of these things. So, we've created these great connections between athletes. And what's nice for us is that now when they're playing against each other on the field, they know each other and they're talking to each other in
093a good way. Like all positive stuff. Um, and then the coach moderator will talk about, you know, what it means to have a successful season. What does that look like? What what it means to hold your teammates accountable in a way that's productive and positive. Um, so there's some really really great things that happen during these summits. They're a lot of fun. Um, the kids get pizza afterwards and then they get some time just to kind of mingle between schools and we've had nothing but great feedback um from this. We do plan to host it again uh next year. North is kind of the central hub where everyone can come to us. Um, and it they spend almost three hours together. Uh, and it's all based around that season sports and what they can do
094to be a leader. Uh, so we really praise the athletes that are chosen by their coaches for this because they've done something throughout the year that made their coach say, "Hey, you're a leader. I want you to represent our school to the conference." So, it is the cream of the crop kids there. And several of our coaches have actually led those break because they always ask for, you know, co to nominate a coach to rep, you know, to lead the individual session for baseball for football. And several of ours have just because we have, you know, between the two schools, we have some coaches that have done a great job and are very experienced and respected. >> Yep. >> Um, so with that, we do have some mental health initiatives as well. We still are
095keep um are going with the mind at the athlete presentations by Dr. Jared Spencer. Um we have these in the fall, winter and spring for our athletes uh for that season again where they are able and this is the whole team not just one representative here where they're able to come down and learn about different topics. this year uh we talked about focus, we talked about preparation uh for different competitions. Um and then we were able to t get some tools that they can use in order to be the most successful at their sport. Uh so whether Dr. Spencer was talking about sleep was talking about how to balance and time management. So there's a lot of different topics there that they go over and it's interactive and we've even given um him some feedback
096on more topics uh that we can cover. So, it's not the same presentation over and over again. Um, so the athletes really do like this. They like the interactive part of it. He puts them through little exercises with each other where they have to close their eyes, breathe a certain way. Um, he shows them videos, a lot of Tik Toks on there that the kids are really into. Um, but it gives them some opportunities to learn different coping mechanisms all when it comes to athletics. And honestly, things that as somebody who competed a long time ago weren't even >> Oh, yeah. >> Not you wouldn't even this was not even on >> right >> in anybody's mind. It's just some really uh different stuff. And I I talked to him about uh you know, I
097had a chance I always have a chance to catch up with him. I've known after doing this for 10 years now. He's been coming a long time. um just talked to him because he keep also he works as the Michigan wrestling team's um sports psychologist and I asked him like you know you I'm a fan of wrestling of course but on that level what's it like and he's telling me how today's athlete at that at that level is so different the way that they're handled their psyche is handled than it was you know 10 15 20 years ago. So, it's some it's definitely a very interesting way and some kids really do pick up on a lot of the stuff that he puts out. >> He was just mentioning real quick, we were talking about,
098you know, technology just before he said at Michigan they wear those whoop bands and they have to actually print out the night before sleep, show it to their coach, and then their coach decides if they're practicing or not that day. So, it's just like a whole other level of competitiveness that they're able to to utilize. So him just kind of giving us those little tidbits of like how they're incorporating, you know, the most advanced not only tech but different ways that they're mentally preparing to compete at the highest level has been super interesting. So >> the training staff, uh, we each have two trainers. >> Yep. >> Um, we actually just Keith Skinner just retired this year after 29 years of service. um amazing uh great man that didn't gave so much to the school
099and we just um there'll be a next person filling it we hired will be on next month's agenda. Um so student athlete care, injury evaluation, treatment, rehabilitation, return to play programs, concussion management. We um do impact testing. So every athlete h does a baseline test going into their first year the freshman year. It's good for two years. So, typically a force a four-year athlete will go have one before the freshman year and before their junior year. What that does is if they do get a concussion um and that's they can't part of the return to play process is for them to take the impact test again and it has to match that baseline test because now we know what they were we know what they were at before they had a concussion and then this
100helps us get get them back on the field. um event coverage. Uh they cover they're there all the time. They're there actually a little more than we are. >> Yeah. >> Uh they cover all our all of our home events. Um >> some away too uh in states with us. >> Yes. Um and for hockey, we actually do have some assistant coverage for that. Yep. >> And they collaborate with our school doctors closely. um our our school doctor actually and our trainer who just retired are incredibly close from the relationship that they they've had developed over the years. Um and making phone calls with families. That's all part of the gig, you know, and uh we do a pretty good job of making sure that I know we do in our end and your end,
101but making sure there's constant communication and that we're covering all our bases because that is a priority. And sometimes it gets contentious because there's parents who want their kids right back. He's like, "My doctor said they're fine." Well, do you have a note? And that's that's a question we have we ask a lot like you have a note because uh we make sure we do everything by the book. So >> absolutely. Okay. >> Uh so when it comes to academics um there are some standards that we hold all of our student athletes uh accountable for. Um we definitely emphasize the student part of being a student athlete and they must meet all of the NJSIA eligibility standards. Um, so whether transferring between schools, transferring into our district from out of district, um, there's actually a
102portal. We hear about this a lot in college, but there is a New Jersey portal that we would have to put these kids into and they would have to be approved. If they're not approved, then they are sitting in order to be eligible to play. Not only that, is that they have to have a certain amount of credits. They have to be passing. If they are failing two or more classes, um, they are not eligible to play. So, if we find halfway through the marking period, that they're failing two or more, we do give them a little bit of a grace period, we give them one week, both schools are on the same page with that, um, to get their grades up and to show us that they are no longer failing. If they are
103still failing after that, they are not playing. And we do not care if there is a state final the next day. If you are failing, you are not playing. And that's a standard that we set. Um, so we make sure that that every student is passing and eligible to play before they step onto that field or court. At the end of the marking period, um, if students are failing, they will not be eligible to play until halfway through the next marking period. So, there is a good stretch there where they will be sitting on the bench because their grades aren't there. Now, all of our practices and games do not start until after 3:10. So that 2:30 to 3:10 time span, students are encouraged, deeply encouraged to go and get help with tutoring, to go
104and get ahead on their homework if they know they have a long bus ride, to reach out to their teachers and let them know and keep them in the loop of how their athletic competitions are going. Um, and the support that we've gotten from the teachers has been absolutely outstanding. Um, when we had our state softball games early for all the proms that we accommodated this year, our teachers were nothing but supportive and worked with our our students and able to get them on track, especially around finals time, too. Uh, which we knew was going to be, you know, a little iffy, but everyone said, "Hey, we'll we'll work with the students." Um, our students know the deal when it comes to that, that they are student first and it is their responsibility to make
105sure that they're passing their classes or they won't be able to play. And I could say our policy about the two Fs and midmarketing period for doing this for a number of years. It works because there's a I call it the naughty list when it comes out. And you know we do do the grace period because sometimes it catch a skill by surprise and it could also catch a teacher by surprise if there's a big project that you know we don't want to just say this is it. Um so that the grace period lets everybody get up to date. I can tell you I know it works because the end of the marking period I've only had to make the phone call three I want to say safely five or less times in I think
106the nine years that we've been doing this um to say they can't participate in a game because they finished with two Fs at the end of a marking period. So it's a good wakeup call. The halfway point is a very good wakeup call and it is working keeping our kids as above board as they can. We do have a lot of uh students who run into the athletic office with their Chromebook and like can I show you my Aspen that I'm passing now like yes. >> So question of that so you said there's a So could can a student go from failing to not failing within a week's time frame? Is that >> they could go in like that? >> If they have a 62 and they just did a major project and the teacher
107didn't grade it and that's where the grace period comes in. So that'll you know if we just take a kid off and the teacher didn't have something graded then we're going to have parents call and say well the teacher didn't grade it in time. So that's what it's absolutely positive. It actually happens quite a bit, you know, because they're close and it's it's because they're not doing their homework or they're, >> you know, failed the test and need to make >> not doing an MBA. >> Yeah. Yes. There you go. >> Uh so on the the other side of this um we actually do award um five total scholar athletes. Two for the Skyland Conference. So we had two from north, two from Vorhees, two for 101 Sussex, and then one um from each school
108for NJSIA overall. So we were able to um honor these student athletes for having high GPA, being great students and great athletes altogether. Um so they had gotten a nice award from each of those um organizations. Um, even the NJSIA one was a monetary award where if they went uh I think they received $500 um as and were recognized by by the state for that. So um there is a lot of incentive here to be a really good student athlete um at either school. Okay. So, um, our booster clubs are a huge supporter of athletics and a lot of things that we can't do it without, you know, their support and a lot of our, uh, community friends and community organizations are also great great supporters of our athletics. Um, they do a corporate banner
109program, which you see around the football field. Um, so those are organizations that want to come out and help support. We just got St. Luke's um, to to be a part of this and get a banner on there as well. Um, Lana Brennan's our booster club president and she is fantastic and wants nothing but the best for our athletes and that is what we want out of a booster club. Um, all of the representatives uh for the booster clubs at North uh we have these little umbrella representatives and they are constantly putting on events or making sure that our athletes have subs on long bus rides and all of these different banquetss and things like that. Uh so it is great to have that type of support for for our students. Um with that at
110the end of the year our um awards uh banquet we actually had over $11,000 in scholarships given by the booster club um the hall of fame and some other organizations as well. Um that wasn't total for athletics but that was just from that little organization. So, um, all of our booster club members were eligible for these different scholarships. And then we were able to kind of praise these kids for not only being good students, good athletes, but also being good participants in all of the events that we hold. Um, at North, one of the biggest things, um, and Lana does a fantastic job at it, is making sure that when it comes to fundraising opportunities that these, um, teams are not going head-to-head. uh they make sure and they're very strict about this that if
111somebody's doing a dine to donate, there's not another dine to donate at the same night, making our athletes pick and choose what to go to and what to support. And it allows for fairness across the board of all equal opportunity for all of our teams to, you know, raise funds. Same things when it comes to car washes and clothing drives and team stores. Um, so it's really great that at the time some teams might be frustrated by it, but it's it makes it so fair and so equal that not everybody's running to everything and competing in that. So, right. >> Um, and the community service, um, I know here at North at Boris 2, a lot of our teams are doing community service projects. It's something that's gotten more popular over the years. And, um,
112it's it's actually something in our evaluation about, you know, one of the things that we, you know, is there any type of community service initiative? And our booster clubs are always good about working hand in hand with our coaches to make to get that off the ground. The picture there was a military service or salute to service game that our boys basketball team did. And uh our booster club is there to help it. They got them the shirts and the the special jerseys for the game. And uh it was a very nice shout out to anybody who's served in our military and also police officers, firemen, everybody. So it was a was a great thing. >> Okay. Okay. Um so when it comes to facilities on both the campuses um we are constantly making sure
113that it is safe that is up todate. Um and we're always looking for ways to improve um when it comes to different areas of campus. Um so this year our baseball and softball teams were able to get new fences. I know you got some tennis court renovations going on. >> The last couple years we got the tennis courts. >> Perfect. Um we had some enhancements um supported by our booster club and community donations like our throwing circle. um you see on the agenda tonight a hurdle donation. So without those um little bit of help as well it's really great that we are able to have those organizations who want to give back to us. Um there we're always looking for continued improvements and we want to make sure that our game day operations are organized
114especially when it comes to things like football games where we know we are having a large crowd of people especially like our milk can game. Brian and I work together to make sure that night of the year. Yeah, we have all our police, you know, ambulance, every all those little parts. Uh it's a lot of moving parts, but to come together and make sure that everyone can enjoy the game, but enjoy the game safely as well. Okay. Um so, our current priority right now is to look at transportation costs um and take a look at competitive bidding for this. Well, it's transportation has been a struggle for athletics for both of us. I mean, there's been a couple times where we've shared buses or I said, "Hey, I can change a game so you can
115have a bus." Um, and it's it's not fair to our student athletes that we kind of have to pick and choose who who goes where with transportation. So, it it's been a bit of a struggle um to get our teams out and and on the road here. >> So, we just the lack of drivers um is what we've been told. um that sometimes we have you know five different g away games and we get a call from ESC saying I can cover one. So now if on us it's like how do I choose who gets to go to what event? >> All the drivers who take our kids home after school then have to do right >> middle school elementary school runs, >> right? >> So there's only a couple left over and this year
116particularly in the spring um we got word about call out They called out sick today. Two two guys called out sick, three people called out sick, and that just left us in a position where we say, "Okay, we got one bus for three away events. So, what are we going to do?" So, uh, we'd ask teams to travel release. >> Um, you know, parents can take them, seniors drive, fill out the forms, so we're covered. But, um, it's not an ideal situation. >> Yeah. Sometimes we didn't find out till about 2:00 for a 3:00 bus. Um, so it was >> very, very frustrating for families. So to be to be to get the bus what we'd have to do sometimes and >> it it kind of depended on the situation and for me I knew
117like all right what's my you know >> depending on the sport do I have a base of parents that can drive do I have kids that can drive u but if it's a sport that would struggle with that the solution was okay the game is a half hour away um if we get them out of school early we can drive them there and then the bus come back in time to make the run for the high school but that means that that student is missing at least one classes. In a lot of cases, it was two. >> Um, the other thing was we could go late. We could say, "All right, wait till the elementary school runs are done, we'll get you a bus at 4:00, but now I have to call, we have to
118call that other AD and say, "Hey, would you mind pushing the game back about an hour and a half depending on how far away it is, which means sometimes you're if it's a double header game, you're cutting the JV game. Sometimes they're saying they can't do it. Sometime we're going to move to a different day." So, uh, it's a struggle. >> Yeah, >> it's a struggle. Um, you guys must talk to other ads around the state. Is everybody in this? >> Um, >> yes and no. >> Particularly bad. >> Um, I know just off the top of my head like Hackett Town struggled uh this year. They they canceled unified on us multiple times because they couldn't get, you know, busing to us. So that's something that they, you know, uh, had sometimes. But I
119feel like we were doing more of the calling to the other schools than other schools were calling us. The schools that have their own buses, >> have their own fleet, >> right, >> don't have the problem. The ones that have that outsource it usually have a little more of a problem, >> right? >> I mean, that's, >> you know, it depends on the culture they have there with what they've done with busing over the years. >> Yeah. And we've we've had to get creative um with leaving times and um transportation again with the travel releases as well. Like you said, combining buses on sometimes that we had to like if our golf was going to the same course for a county tournament, we're like, "All right, let's take the same bus at least." Um, so
120it it's been a little tricky to kind of navigate that and I I parents were frustrated on it um because we've had to either move game times or bus times or they had to do the travel release and I don't really blame them for it. It's it we were very very stuck um when it came to transport. >> To see credit too, there were some times where I said look this one I need the bus this day. It's a state game. I can't call up another school and say, "Hey, can you house our kids for an hour and a half in your school?" Because then you think about, "Oh my god, >> I I wouldn't want another group of kids in my school if we had some sort of, you know, >> lockdown or something
121like that." So, there's times where I I I said, "Hey, look, we need something. I don't care what you got to do if we have to outsource it to even companies that we don't." And they've they did when we asked them to do that, they would, but it's not something you can do, you know, like track track out of coach Bus, you know, because that's all they could do. it was the sectionals and they needed to get there and that's all that was available and they did that but you can't do that for just a game you know a softball game versus a nonent >> so the ESC to their credit they did a good job of helping us out when we really really needed it but um >> they weren't always able to answer
122the bill >> yep um with that too we always make sure like our GMAX testing on our our turf is up to date our track um all of our equipment um so we're constantly evaluating we have um our helmets sent out for uh lacrosse and softball and baseball for Red Delt so they can make sure that they're in compliance for concussion. Same thing with our football helmets. Um so we're we're always evaluating the equipment that we have and then making changes um were needed there. Um and then we are in the process and we're have looking at our uh facility scheduling and rental system um with Arbiter and our school and there's a little bit of a migration going on but I think we we've got it figured out now um of how that's going
123to work. our our facilities calendar is staying the same because the company that bought our school which was the old company they're keeping the facility the facilities calendar is the calendar that people sign up like if if an outside organization wants to use >> that is staying the same um the athletic schedule is different um which I just started plugging things in for the summer and >> there's going to be some growing pains and some adjustments but we'll make it work and then we'll see if this new company that just we're angry because we all love the scheduling system we used to have and this company bought and said, "No, we're going to use ours instead." I tell people it's like they bought Coca-Cola and now they're serving us, you know, we can't get Coca-Cola
124anymore, right? >> Um but uh we're going to get through. We're going to see uh how much we like it this year. And then a number of schools around us that we work with, especially in the Sky Conference, are going to another scheduling system. And uh they're going to test that out. they'll let us know how it goes and we'll see what we have this year and we might be making a we could possibly be making a change next year. >> Um so for continual growth of both of our departments uh we have these end of the season surveys. Uh so Juliana sends them out. Um one goes to the parents and one goes to the students. Um and the topics that are covered within these surveys, they're all anonymous. Um but they cover coaches
125uh skills knowledge of the coach and the sport uh the athletic department in general uh facilities um trainers in the health office and then there is a section for comments um as well feedback. Um, so after every season we get these, we take a look through them, we pick through them and see, okay, what what are we seeing as common areas of either frustration or um praises as well because not not all the feedback is bad um in different areas that we can improve. Um so whether it's about scheduling or about communication or about facilities and transportation which are always a big one on there. Um we can take a look and say okay what can we do so that next season this is better next year this is better. Um and then the student
126feedback is always interesting as well. very different than the parents one, but that one is much more positive I feel like um as well where the kids are praising their coaches um and saying that they had a a great time and they love their you know I love when a senior puts in there that they're so sad their four years is over at North that they loved being a part of their team. So it's good it's good to get that and see kind of where we stand because the perception that we have of our department might be different um in the eyes of the parents and the eyes of the students so we can make changes as needed. Yeah, I've had uh after seeing the surveys for a number of years now, um I've seen
127the comment before, I don't know if anybody actually reads these things. They they lead off the you know, in the in the part where they could write their own, you know, I don't know if anybody's reading these things or I've had a parent ask me this year like do do you even do you look at the what do you do with the surveys? And they said simply like, you know, they're talking points. you know, if you see a if you see more than a healthy number of parents feedback and saying, you know, this is what we thought, well, that's perception that's going on right now. >> And, you know, one of the things we tell our head coaches is that, you know, you're not just coaching the sport, you're handling a program, you're handling a
128community of people, and if this perception is out there, you know, why is it out there? Is it accurate? And if it is accurate, how can we change it? Um, and I I just had a conversation with the coach about that. So, um, you know, that they are positive. I mean, I think blood pressure goes up a little bit every time I get the email and say, "Here they are." Cuz you're like, "Okay, what are we going to say?" Yep. >> But, um, you know, for the most part, uh, and honestly, I I I almost wish more of our parents would actually express things because most of the parents I most of the parents who are totally fine with everything don't fill it out. You know, a couple do and then the couple that really
129want to fill it out will fill it out and have something to say. But, um, uh, it's it's a good tool. It gives you a good barometer on how things are going. >> What's the response rate that you get back typically? >> Is it half? >> I don't think it's half. >> It's less than half. It definitely >> I'd say a third would be >> third. >> Yeah, >> a third. >> And that's including student athletes and parents. >> I would say that the parents would be a third. I think the student athletes would be closer to 25%. >> Yeah. Yeah. Um it's it's not like it gives you some talking points but in terms of if you if you ask me I have a feeling that for like if you give me one program
130I couldn't tell you based on the survey that I know most people are happy because not most people are filling out the survey. It's just basically a feeling I have. Um I can tell you I would say that most people are happy probably if I didn't get any negative feedback about a coach. That means that a couple people are disgruntled and just dealing with it and everybody else is good to go. Is are the surveys uh general or are they specific to the sport? >> General. >> It's the same questions for each sport. >> Yeah. >> Is your child happy? Well, it's different. Well, the kids question and the the parents question is obviously a little bit different. Some are the same, but um is your child happy with the program? Does your child feel
131like they're getting the skills necessary to further develop? Does your child feel like they're getting um bigger picture lessons, things like that? Um, does your child >> suggest no questions with an area for comments? >> It's it's very What is it? What's the >> So, it's like a >> uh strongly strongly agree. Yeah, it's a scale. >> Disagree. Strong disagree. Right. >> Some Yes. No. Um, on there. But, uh, a lot of the common topics that we're seeing over and over again um is subvarsity games, which some of that is out of our control. If a school doesn't have a JV or freshman team, sometimes the parents don't know that. Um and that's the feedback that we give our coaches to communicate that. So they want more subvarsity games um for teams um at different
132levels. Transportation big one. Um and then communication about transportation is has been the three hot topics I I would say. So um some things are out of our control but some things aren't. Uh if we're not doing a good job, you know, communicating with parents on busing changes and schedule changes, if it rains that we're delayed, you know, that's something that we can control. Um, and that's where we evaluate our coaches, have those conversations, and make sure that, you know, we're doing our part to, you know, it to fix this. Um, because if if we just let it go and let it continue like that, it's only going to get worse. So, that's where we stop. >> So, I'm not sure if you guys are aware, maybe guys comment, but the board is going to
133approve tonight uh an incentivized program for uh students not to take the bus. Uh maybe with the with the goal here is to free up transportation which maybe in turn, excuse me, will trickle down to sports. If we're able to free up buses for students not to take to school, I might be able to affect you guys. Anything that >> make a bus available in place? >> Sure. >> Do you have any idea if the return rate on the suras is typical? Is that like other ads seeing typical return rates or has anybody sort of struck upon a formula where they get better returns that you you would have more confidence in? >> I would say that that we've had especially this year you would know more than me in years prior um we've had
134more ads reach out to us for our surveys and how we do it. >> Most don't do it if you're Yeah. So they >> you send out surveys the parents. I've gotten that before. Yeah, we do. Um, and they've actually asked us for a sample of it. So, I get that more than >> comments about the surveys to be honest. >> Right. >> All right. So, looking ahead, um, some of our goals, we definitely want to expand participation opportunities. Um, we want to get more enrollment um, are programs that don't have a freshman team or low numbers in a freshman team. We are that's always our our number one goal to to make sure that when we have those eighth graders coming in that they are participating and not only in sports too but in
135anything extracurricular. So uh we want students to be involved in school. It just makes for a better culture, a better student body there. Okay. Um definitely working with our feeder programs. Uh North has fantastic feeder programs through Junior Lions and the track club and um wrestling club. These are just great great programs that are bringing athletes into our school through our doors. Um we have a bunch of camps going on right now and just seeing all of like the the little guys and girls on the wrestling mat this morning was like the best thing. Um so that is what we want kids to play sports. We want kids to be involved. So that's always our main goal. Um I'm sure you guys have heard uh that girls fly football was adopted by the NJSIA. So,
136we are starting to um kind of take a look uh if we were to maybe be interested in that, what that would look like for North Vorhees. Um maybe possibly an inter mural program um this year to see if we have any girls who would be interested in that uh for the future. So, that's exciting. Uh we definitely want to continue our facility improvements um and make sure that we have, you know, safe facilities um accessibility and enhance the experience for not only our athletes but the spectators as well. uh definitely expand on more opportunities for leadership development. You know, through our summits, we we're always taking a look how the leadership summit could be better, who could we bring in to talk? Um even given Dr. Spencer feedback. Um we did a survey for
137that too uh to the kids after his last session to say, "Hey, what are some topics like for next year that that we could talk about?" Um just like our, you know, signing days. How can we make them better? you know, every single year. Uh we'll take a look at some uh safety and wellness initiatives as well. Um emergency preparedness is a big thing. Um as you guys know with the fall what we had going on, we want to make sure nothing like that ever happens again. So we want to be prepared and make sure that we do some things for injury prevention as well. Anything that we can control, we want to there. And then of course increase our community engagement. We want to make sure our families are coming out to games. Um,
138not just football and wrestling games and north, but we want even the smaller programs. We want more families out. We want to celebrate our accomplishments and we want to get the word out to the community of all the great things that North is doing. Um, I will say that somebody, I don't know who it is, um, but they always in our office me the newspaper with our kids articles in it. um and I love it and I have them hanging up um in the athletic department that they're able to still have printed newspaper articles of everything that we we've done on there. So that it's great. I again I don't know who it is but keep doing it. I love it. Um so it's just really awesome to see how much of the community is
139behind athletics here. And that's one, you know, main reason why I love being here, why I love being, you know, the AD at North. It's it's awesome to see. Same. No, it's No, we have, you know, there's challenges out there that, you know, we've dealt with throughout the years. I mean, you know, revolving door coaches is tough. Y >> um, you know, it's not, you don't have coaches lasting as long as they used to. You know, used to have in positions for 15 years and there'd be somebody who when they're ready to go, there was somebody in there who had 10 years experience, ready to take over. And I just had to explain that to a parent recently, too. like, you know, I I I know it's it's it's tough sometimes to find people. Um,
140but I got to say I I'm just so proud of, you know, the job we do at Vorhees in terms of, you know, and I and I know they do it at North here, too. I know plenty I know Courtney, I know plenty of the coaches. Uh, just, you know, the life lessons and the bigger picture things that we get across. And part of that, it's not just through the community service. It's just part of saying, "All right, you know, you know, we lost. You know, we didn't have a great practice, you know, and we, you know, we gave up 10 runs today. What are we going to learn from that?" You know, and it's just things like that. And our coaches do a great job. um even the ones that have not been doing
141it for that long a time to do a great job of saying you know this is something that this is a skill you're gonna need in life not just to succeed here because that that's what you know I'd be I'd be lying to you if I say that athletics didn't have a big part of me being up here in front of you right now because that's what helped me become the person I am that you know my my coaches were so instrumental in my success and you know just athletics in general from young age to now and you know looking ahead that's that's one of the things that I I want to keep doing is you know, keep those life lessons going. >> And I will say, just to finish up, even though North and
142Vorhees are two very different schools, um, athletically very different, um, I think I work with Brian more than some of my own co-workers at North. Um, there are certain things that we feel like with one district that we should be on the same page on. And I'll ask him like, "Hey, how do you do it over there?" He asked me, "How do we do it at North?" Um, and a lot of times we find that common ground. So, we want to make sure that students in our entire district are getting at least close, equal, fair opportunities across the board. Um, so like when it came to academic eligibility, like his grace period email, he's like, "This is what I use. This is what you know, if you want, this is what you'd be doing." So,
143we're we're all on the same page when it comes to that. And I think that makes our whole district a little bit more cohesive. Um, when it comes not everything, but some of those those big topics >> and that's been a developing process over over >> Yep. the length of my term here uh in terms of us being more on the same page and doing things more the same way too, >> which is good. We're not there's some things we have to do different, but we try to stay on the same page more. >> Absolutely. But thank you guys for for having us. We appreciate questions. >> Yeah. Sorry to take you back, >> but I didn't know if we were going to do this until the end. Um I I interpreted a a comment
144that one of you made is kind of a little bit apologetic about having the co-op programs. I can't speak for the rest of the board, but I'm completely supportive of that idea. I think it's a fantastic idea. Nothing to apologize or be concerned about in my opinion. >> Yeah, I I don't know. Maybe it's being around it's such it was >> the topic itself. It's just like, oh wait, you're going to combine, you know, >> with with the school the two schools and you know, every time North plays Warhees in something, it's really one of the biggest concepts. I mean, there's some that we don't because there is a disparity there, but you know, in a lot of sports, it's such a big concept like, oh, we're going to join the same team now. And
145yeah, I I do agree like for the swimming program, it was it was I think it was a no-brainer this year. >> Take a thoughtful approach to it. >> Well, you get to that conclusion. I don't think you have to >> be apologetic at all. >> No. And I just what I want to say is it's not something that we're not we're just going to just hey, let's look what's the next one you want to do. >> Right. It's Yeah, it's got to make it has to make sense. Milk can has to go somewhere. >> That's true. >> And I think you're hearing a little bit of that, Brian, just because uh >> we never want to be um viewed as trying to combine schools to be a super team, right? To be that competitive.
146It's not about being that competitive. It's about what's good for our students. >> Exactly. >> But I Yeah. And I think Brian, I second your point. I wanted to commend you for basically looking for solutions to give kids opportunities, whether it's through those cooperative opportunities or even the transportation efforts that you're making. It's a common problem that you're exploring and actually I want to thank you the most for having precisely the same percentage of kids participating so that it didn't become a competitive point but it's in as we're talking about data points it's a good data point for us to have also because I agree with you that participation in the broader community does pay dividends on an academic level as well and you illustrated that >> and then I'm sorry I got a question
147I don't I'm not trying to second guess an approach that you've taken. I just want to hear your like how you came to the conclusion that it can be like where to draw the the line in academic eligibility. So I might have made a decision that said if you're failing a course you're you're a student athlete you should be you know that's that's unacceptable. You need to but you've drawn a line somewhere a little bit different. It's It's in the policy. >> Policy. >> It's the board policy. >> So, we drew the >> line was drawn. >> The line was drawn. Yes. >> Thank you. >> I I wish I had the statistics on this too because a lot of times those students that are failing two classes when they come back to us, it's
148not like they're only passing one. Most of the time now they're passing all of them. >> Yeah. And that's >> so they're able to get them both up. I don't have the numbers but I wish I did. >> The only decision we made on it and it's a decision I made from really the beginning. It was the grace period >> and honestly what part of it was one I got I got that list I think the second time I got that list it was the wrestling regional tournament and I had a senior wrestling that night and I that and I didn't have enough data. I didn't have a chance. I already got the I got it at 3:00 in the afternoon. You know me. Well, you don't know me but I'm honest. I'm like I
149get what am I supposed to do? But that's where the grace period is. like I need to know for sure that kid's failing too before I pull him off what would be his final >> wrestling match and you know and then of course if that's because a teacher didn't grade something >> that's you know you try and protect everybody in that that's the only call that we made on everything else is just the policy so >> discussion for us to have that >> thank you very much >> where would you guys say that the athletic department is financially is it is it healthy is Do you have does the program have all the resources it needs or are you seeing the programs having more of an over reliance on boosters or parents uh fundraising etc.
150>> I think in terms of equipment uniforms and I'm I'm speaking for you but >> sure >> we get what we need you know we get we get I never have to say no we can't we can't buy those footballs we have to buy those footballs. >> Agreed. you know, um I think we do a good job of saying, "All right, let's, you know, let's pump the brakes on this." But I tell like, you know, for instance, uh I'm really big, you know, our colors are cardinal and gold. They're not black and gold, okay? They're not black. I said, "If you want your black jerseys, your booster clubs by them. I'm going to get you a Cardinal jersey. I'm going to get you a gold jersey. And if you want the special jersey, like in
151that picture with the military, the booster clubs do that, >> right? um what I the things that you know if we had a wish list I mean the things that we would want the number one thing I'm I'm not speaking for you but a second turf field it's all the stuff that's way out there it's not like in terms of our budget our budget is our budget but yes >> um the things that would make it from a very good athletic facility to something of the next level would be that extra stuff >> I would just say yeah facilities wise facility upgrades but like >> in terms of what we need to take care of each team we have what we need. Absolutely. >> Absolutely. And we're in the same boat when it comes to
152uniforms, too. I was just having this conversation with Dr. Pachelo about making sure we have green and gold in everything that we're not, you know, a black and gray school. So, we obviously if you look at us, we represent that as well. Um, so, but like I had uh one team that wanted to do, you know, pink jerseys for October for breast cancer. I'm like that's great, but you know that's something where boosters could help that and then the girls can put their names on the back and keep them you know and that's where those fundraising efforts go go for >> and the booster clubs do a great job of raising the money. So >> absolutely >> thank you. >> Okay. >> Thanks. >> Uh all right, that brings us to the chief school administrator's
153report. >> All right. Um, G, can you put up our um, bee spotlight for me because I'm going to start there because one of our um, recipients is here and I don't want her to have to wait. All right. So, we did have an opportunity um I think everyone knows we did our um B we've been we started a program in um March for BE spotlight um highlighting um a um an employee at each school. Our student board reps and our strategic planning advisory committee um between a combination of the two of them picked the people. So, we did one more one more in June. We were able to get our um our student reps together on the last day of school. They actually came in on that last day of school. They said just
154for this. So um so North is uh someone named Chrissa Styiano and Chrissa is here with us in the back. So let me do my thing first and then I'll have you stand up and wave. Um but Chrissa um is a valued member of our counseling department. Um this year Chrisa was a long-term sub for the entire school year and transitioned into the role seamlessly. Uh Chrisa was familiar with the building and staff as she had worked as a clinician in the building on behalf of Ruters Behavioral Health in the past. And so you would think that Chrissa had been in the building for over a decade based on her interactions with other staff members. Smiles and greetings are passed along to all staff and students both in the hallways and her office. Her energy
155and commitment knows no bounds. Chrissa is a dedicated school counselor, clinician, and coach. And whatever Chris can do to help support the department or school, she is willing to do. Whether it's coaching, helping cover IEP meetings for department members or going on campus visits on behalf of the North Hunter Education Foundation, Chrissa is the first to volunteer. So Chris's professionalism, positive attitude, and kindred spirit. Uh we'll be missed at North next year since she was here um as a temporary um fill in. Uh we're hoping that if there are other opportunities to come, we'll be able to bring Chissa back and um you know, keep her around. I know she lives in the community as the board knows WHO YOU ARE. YOU KNOW, SHE'S one of those people that in a very short short amount
156of time has made a very large impact and um and that was why um everybody was 100% behind choosing her for the June BOE spotlight. So, thank you. Um for Vorty's, uh the person that they chose was uh Carolyn Bowman. Um Carolyn Bowman um is a truly exceptional member of our special education team. Um she spent the last 13 years servicing our school district in several different roles. Uh 13 years in special education is a remarkable milestone but it is the profound impact of her leadership that we honor tonight. Over more than a decade more Mrs. Bowman has worn many hats leaving a lasting mark on Boyise High School. She was initially hired as a special education teacher then served as our district behaviorist for a few years and then returned to the classroom and
157currently works in our special class programs for students with autism spectrum disorders. Outside of the classroom, Mrs. Bowman was a founding member of the unified programs at Vorty's and served in an advisory role the year they won their first unified champion banner award. Additionally, she provided additional support to her students who participated on the soccer, basketball, and track teams. As a special education department's lead teacher, she has guided our team with incredible organization and clarity, ensuring our programs run seamlessly. During her time in the district, she has not only served as a special education teacher, but as I mentioned, as a district behaviors, and her expertise in both of these fields have been an invaluable asset. She steps into complex situations with a calm, analytical, and deeply skilled approach, creating positive environments where students can
158truly thrive. For these qualities, she was nominated as voice high school teacher of the year in 2021. And furthermore, as a mentor, she has selflessly poured her time and knowledge over to the next generation of educators, helping new teachers find their footing and grow into confidential confident professionals. Beyond her titles and credentials, it is her core character that defines her impact. Her compassion is evident in every single interaction. Whether she's comforting a worried parent, collaborating with a colleague, or encouraging a student, her meticulous organization keeps us all on track. But it's her unwavering student first mentality that makes her shine. She's a strong advocate for her students and her needs and a collaborative team member. Miss Bowman, Mrs. Bowman looks at every single challenge through the lens of what is best for a student and
159that advoc advoc advocacy has transformed countless lives in our community. So, thank you Mrs. Bowman for 13 years at Boris High School for educating, supporting, and leading um and your tireous advocacy and your enormous heart for our students. So, uh well deserved. I know Caroline in all of these roles, just a great individual. um pleasure to be around and is one of those people that just makes everybody that she interacts with happy and um so we're very fortunate to have two educators um this month that are welld deserved. So thank you to both of them. All right, so Chris, anytime you want to go, so I do want to just take a quick moment um to talk about graduation. Um number one, we are blessed with beautiful weather. um that doesn't always happen, but we
160we we had that opportunity this year. And I just want to give a thank you to all the people that make this happen. Uh from our student activities directors who are really instrumental in making sure that everything runs as smoothly as it did. Um to our custodial staff who set things up and you know, I know have measuring sticks that they only use once a year to make sure that the chairs are exactly the same, you know, um distance apart. Um the the amount of effort that goes into making sure that these graduations go off without a hitch is huge from again those um from everybody, our teachers that attended graduations that you know showed their support for our students to the board members that were able to be there. Um it was just two
161great celebrations and um so thank you to everybody for making that happen. Uh there was a couple things that happened before graduation that I just want to mention. Um, North Hunter High School seniors participated in a special presentation led by the Somerset County Prosecutor's Office called Think Fast Interactive. Um, it was an engaging presentation that empowered our seniors to make safe, smart decisions as they prepare for their exciting journey ahead. Um, Rory also hosted their arrive alive program, the impaired driving awareness program for juniors and seniors and students and even a few staff members had the opportunity to experience a simulation vehicle which demonstrates the effects of impaired driving in a safe controlled environment. And the program park sparks a lot of meaningful conversations you know around um driving decisions and decisions you know based
162on when you're leaving here and going to college and you know some of the things you're going to experience at the leaf high school. The North Ireland Diversity Club hosted another amazing cultural celebrations day. Uh this is just a great day. The entire gym is filled with um tables and students, staff, everybody collaborates and celebrates all different cultures. They they make food from the cultures. They do dances. They have music. They have all different kinds of things going on at gym. you can walk around and find somebody from you know Argentina to Poland to um you know all different places around the entire world and it's just a great opportunity for our students to celebrate different cultures um in our in our environment. So they also North also hosted their blood drive on May 26th
163and boys had theirs on the 27th and they had great turnouts. I wasn't able to get numbers because um they were gone by the time the I got those numbers, but we usually have very impressive turnouts at our blood drives and we're very thankful but for our community for coming out and also our student body for supporting those. I also want to share that Evan Pla was the recipient of the Trenton section American Chemical Society scholarship. Um and it was an especially meaningful um presentation because Carol Wilham who was a retired McLaren teacher who is a part of that um society now um was able to present him with the award. So we got to see one of our retirees come back and present the award. Uh Vor did host their relay for life. If
164you remember Sam, our board rep um was instrumental in running that and Sam um ran a great event. Um the um they had a goal of raising $20,000 and they exceeded it by raising $21,396.97. Uh Borhees voice track had a great year. They were north two group two sectional champions as I think Ryan mentioned in their presentation. Uh we also had some staff and students uh at a uh have some big wins at the Foxy Awards which is a um at Monontlair University every year. Uh it's for um theater and it was the 2025 production that they honored this year that they gave the awards out for for Monomia and North Arnon. So Mary Hopa and Caleb Dagnel won the Foxy Award for outstanding achievement in scenic design for a musical. And then in addition,
165North Arnan alumni and current students received nominations in seven other categories and two Nort students Sophia Emory Reed and Chorus Sarillo had the chance to perform on stage at the opening number at Foxy as well. Uh, Bores also has once again made history as the first and still the only school in New Jersey to earn a third National Banner Unified Champion Schools designation, the highest honor that is awarded through Special Olympics Unified Champion Schools programming. Um, this achievement does reflect the school's long-standing commitment to inclusion. Um, and you know, very proud of you. They do a great job with that unified program. They get a lot of recognition for it. And um, North Iron softball, I think, as you heard, came in. Um they were sectional champs and made it to the last game of
166the year for their group. Uh they did not come out victorious in that but it was a great experience for all the girls and one of them a junior um Alex Zoo um was named player of the year by the career news and she also ended the season with 16 home runs which w which broke not only the North single season school record but also the Skyland Conference single season school record. So um congratulations to Alex for that. So that is my um basic for any questions on any of that. So uh I do want to do our HIV reports real quick. So at the last meeting we had one um HIP incident reported that was unfounded. Um and at this month we have actually one unfounded as well. So, I'm reporting one to you
167right now that you will affirm in July and then I think I need a motion for the one. >> So, can I get a call for a motion and second to affirm the determinations on the HIB incidents reported at the May 26, 2026 board meeting? Can I get that motion? Dan, can I get a second? Andrew, thank you. Uh, all in favor? I opposed or abstensions? None. Okay. >> And then there's monthly school reports there if any questions. And I did want to mention, we had it on the agenda for me to do a strategic planning progress report. Um, but with the amount of things that we had on the agenda tonight, you and I discussed it, I'll be presenting that to you in July. Um, we have some great data and I think you'll
168be very happy with our progress. So, I know I am. So, >> any other clarifying >> what what was the final conclusion on the new approach to attendance this year? >> Oh, the approach to attendance. Actually, you know what? I did not get those last stats. Okay. So, um, let me, uh, in June, what I'll do is I'll get a full year of data >> for you at that point and then I'll have everything for you. I mean, in July, um, and, um, I'll present that with the strategic planning. Um, as you know, every month that we're reporting, I mean, we saw great results. I don't know the actual final result, though. >> But I'll get that for you for July. >> Andrew, >> one other thing on the uh, school report, depending where you
169look in the change, sorry, the uh, new withdrawals, if you look at the withdrawals and the period, it's showing uh two from Bory's 9th grade, 11th grade or nth grade and 12th grade. But then if you look at the detail down bottom, it's showing that there were four in the period. >> I think we are on the same page because I saw that and I asked Mike about it this morning. Um and he said it was because they were eighth graders that um transferred to a public school, but they weren't actually registered in our system yet, but we still have to report them as transfers. Got it. So that's why it was done there. >> And Brian, did you have a question? No. Oh, okay. Uh all right. Thank you. Anything else? Anything else for
170me, Dr. Burch? >> I can make a comment because I I know one of those eighth graders >> and this is a positive comment. the the the parent that eighth grader said wanted to commend the the board and it's not really the board it's the administration in that in the process of onboarding eighth graders to 9th graders because what happens is the parent is moving because of a job they enrolled in North thinking you know in the process then went to this new uh school in Massachusetts and said in comparison it was like a nightmare and just just that you guys did a fantastic job in that whole process of on boarding the eighth graders into the ninth graders. So just >> so kudos. >> There was um actually there was one thing I asked
171Mike that to send me and I I did get it and I didn't get a chance to put it on my report but um we are running two more programs for rising freshmen at both schools. Um they were advertised and um we have a great sign up so far. Um the spots are filling quickly. We have 105 students signed up at North and 88 at boardities. So number-wise, that's great. And that's students that are coming in and getting really an individual tour and a and a a program um introduction to the school almost on an individual basis. It'll be small small groups, but >> and that's new this year. >> That is new this year. That's great. >> So something like that did exist years ago when I was here. There's something called Freshman Discovery.
172>> Freshman Discovery. Yeah. Which was a three-day program. It usually happened in August. Um, and again, this was something, you know, was it 15 years ago, maybe 12 years ago, something like that. It was a budgetary thing. This board had a conversation about how can we save money. Um, freshman discovery was something that cost quite a bit of money because the um, hourly rate that um, people earned to do it and it ended up being shortened to a one day program and that's what we have on that Wednesday now. But it's it I think the team building stuff they did with Freshman Discovery was um, you know, really important. Um, something we talked about bringing back all the time. I think this is an attempt to try to do something close to that but maybe
173not as >> Yeah, it's definitely I remember it being extremely valuable just familiarizing yourself with meeting kids from other schools before the first day of school. Just having that >> connection right off the bat >> and especially with our footprint, you know, you have students coming from a graduating class of maybe 12 >> and some of them from a graduating a class of 200. >> All right. Um for my report, just a few quick items. The deadline to submit nominating petitions for school board vacancies to the county clerk is July 27th, 2026 at 4 p.m. Uh we have two upcoming board meetings at the district office at 7 p.m. at July 21st and July 28th. So our work session and regular meeting session. Uh also you've probably gotten some communication to see if you're interested
174in attending the uh school board's workshop in October 19th to 22nd. So, if you have that interest or have questions, um, don't hesitate to reach out. I also just want to make a point of, uh, reminding the community that there is going to be a referendum question, um, in November regarding Bloomsberry joining the DIS, uh, the, um, regional district. Just trying to keep that present in folks minds. And I know we had a conversation about more direct outreach and communication on that once the school year begins. Okay. Um, >> quick question, Dan. >> Do we know is there any interest for the workshop from the board? >> I know I had indicated I'm not sure if anybody else, but I guess and I don't >> Nicole Nicole. >> Okay. >> Did I Did I respond
175to you because I'm would like to go. >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> Because I think because I Tara and I went I remember going with Tara and >> Shel. Chel and it it was just great being outside the board, you know, we didn't really know each other at the time. So, and then going to all those events and everything was really helpful. So, >> it is a great experience. >> All right. Uh that brings us to the uh public comment. During this portion of the meeting, the public is invited to address the board of education with comments. You're requested to sign the register provided and to state your name, municipality of residence, group affiliation if applicable, and direct your comments to the school board president. While all comments will be considered by the board of
176education, and a response may be forthcoming if and when appropriate, individual school board members may not respond to the speakers at the time of their appearance. The public comment period will be a maximum of 30 minutes in length unless there are unusual circumstances. You'll be allocated three minutes to speak and no one will be permitted to speak more than once on the same topic until all others who wish to speak on that topic have been heard. Please keep your comments respectful and non-defamy and maintain the level of decorum appropriate for a public meeting where students may be present and in the audience. So I welcome anyone who would like to make a public comment at this time. >> Is the register right here? >> Should be. Yeah, it should be right there. >> Just make
177sure I do that first. I am a resident of Lebanon Township. My name is Robin Shire and I have been a 48y year taxpayer. My group affiliation at this time for the last 25 years 26 years I've been a part of the North Hunter and Athletic Hall of Fame. So that is I think I've directed it. Well, what I did was I went ahead and made copies so that I could hand them out to you and you would have it firsthand and you wouldn't have to print out. I know you can't respond, but you'll be able to follow along and I think it will help everyone. So, I'm going to ask the president, can I do that? >> Give them to me and then I'll take care of that. So, my math skills are not
178all that good. I was not a math teacher. So, timewise, keep me to the three. You'll notice on the cover letter when everyone gets it, there is a background and community support. And this is in regards to honoring our Dave the Rave by naming the main gym um after him. So, one of the things that I wanted to take you through the fall of 75, I walked into North Hunter. I had a hand typed resume. I had run it off on a mimograph machine and I was going to go to all the local high schools and I guess today we call it a cold call. So I walk in, Isabelle Brown was the uh secretary, the uh principal was Carl Morrison, Ken Hall was the superintendent, and um various other different people. I walk up
179to Isabelle's desk and she says, "Oh, hi. How can I help you?" And I said, "Oh, you know, I'm looking for a job." And she goes, "Oh, really?" And I said, "Yes." I said, "Here's my information." At the same time, I get a tap on my shoulder and I turn and it's Dave Robins smiling at me and I go, "Ah." And I turn back and and she and Isabelle goes, "Dave, take her up to the boy's gym, introduce her around. She's a fizzed and health teacher." So, all within 60 seconds, I am on my way up the hallway to the boys gym. I walk into the gym and there is a big meeting going on and Dave points to everyone that was sitting on the bleachers. I walked into a true legend meeting. In attendance
180was Norm Peterson, Fritz Halfacaker, Stan Jim Van Arsdale, Bob Hope, Don S. I don't know if any of you know these names, but they are names of the past. Uh, the ladies in attendance were Gene Lascowski, Patty King, Bonnie Carter. Some of the other gentlemen were uh Bob McGibney, Parker Sner, Rich Moore, and I just stood there like, uh, hi. And Dave was wonderful. He did his usual. He danced around me a little bit and he's, you know, and he's waving to them and they're waving back. Jim Smith was head of the U. Fizzed department at the time and he comes over to me and he says, "Ah, here have a seat." So I sat down, listened to the rest of the meeting. Um, at that point I had been asked a lot of questions.
181I had just finished up my master's program at the University of Kentucky and I had done a graduate study program in Monkeys, Kentucky. Interesting place uh in regards to education. So I talked at length about that. The meeting ended and Jim Smith said to me, "Can you show up tomorrow morning?" And I said, "I can do that." So, as you know, I owe a lot to Dave Robbins in regards to getting my start at North Hunter High School. I taught at North for 38 years, and it was truly an honor, truly a lifeenhancing, life-changing situation. And Dave happened to be when things were happening in my life, he was first there. Um he knew um I met my husband at Northunderan and he was in the fitness lab the same time I met my husband
182for the first time and there's many firsts. Tom Hank brought him to my classroom. Um, and Dave gave me a beautiful bouquet of flowers when I was named North Hunter Teacher of the Year. Dave would come first over to me when I brought my children to games and he would make them smile and laugh. So, I owe a lot. Oh, excuse me. In regards um to Dave enhancing my life. If you read on the cover, you'll see a lot of information from the community and the background. Dave the Ray was a 1963 Northund graduate and iconic supporter of district athletics for more than 60 years. He was inducted into the inaugural Northunder and Athletic Hall of Fame class in 2002 as a contributor, earned over 88 Special Olympic medals, and was inducted into the New
183Jersey Special Olympics Hall of Fame in 2023. He his story received national attention, as you probably are all aware, this past March, the CBS News On the Road with Steve Hartman. Following his death, the North Hunter Athletic Hall of Fame committee received over 1,000 inquiries urging naming um the main gym after Dave Robbins. The request enjoys broad grassroots community support. So, what I'm asking of you, and I know you can't answer to this now, but I would like you to take the time to excuse me, read through the resolution, and I need help in knowing because what I want to make sure we do is that going forward, due process occurs. If a petition is something that is absolutely needed, we can do that. And I'm sure all the people that have reached out to
184us will be more than willing to sign a petition. Um, you have to know that Dave, he alone, one person has made a significant contribution to the well-being of our high school, our community, and our county at large. He certainly had a way of unifying all of us, especially in these times. Never to be forgotten. So, with that, I'm just asking that you take the time, take the consideration, and we'll move forward with getting the gym named after Dave. Thank you. >> Good evening, Joic. That's >> tactic. I am pretty entrenched in North Hun's athletics. I cannot remember a day of not coming to North Hunter athletics. I remember when the football field was on the other side and I went to church with Dr. Singley. So, and I was in high school when she
185showed up there 1975 the football champs of the year. Um, I was an athlete here at North Hunter. I was a coach at Vory's for a while. I raised four kids, all who went on to play college sports. And I now have grandchildren that come to all their games and they hopefully at some point will be at North Hunter. Oh, and I also was a sports writer for a long time for the Hundred Review. So, I just want to say for the ones of you who maybe I mean I know you see Dave, but do you really know Dave? Do you really know who Dave was? He was the community. He was the person that we all followed. I'm going to get choked up. It was hard. I did better at the funeral, didn't I?
186My son wrote his college paper on his community. What a fabulous place it was to grow up because of people like Dave. And I think it's beyond beyond what we can even do. I mean, I'm here all the time again still. I'm at all kinds. But I'm not Dave. Dave made everybody everybody. My husband went, don't tell anybody, to Central, but he's like he loves Dave. Dave Dave was at our daughter's wedding. Dave was, you know, Dave is just everybody everybody loves Dave. And I at um his funeral when we were ready to go, a man that I didn't know but was friends with the family said to me, "So what do you think now happens?" I said, "What do what do you mean?" He said, "Well, if we don't have Dave, how does our
187community go on?" I think we grab that green and gold cape, we move on, and we name that. Thank you. Takes a while to write my name. >> Oh, and I was the booster club president forever, right? Forever. >> Yes. >> Hi, I'm Tony De and 45 years ago, I was sitting right where you guys are sitting tonight. I said, I want to commend you on the time you guys give to make the school system a better than the best it can be made. I know Dave for almost all his life. And I can tell you the love that your students gave that man, he didn't even know he was mentally handicapped. They just love that guy to bits. And I'm going to make a promise to you. When you pass this, no one will
188ever walk up to you and say you made a mistake. Thank you. I may end up having to borrow someone's readers as I ran out. Left them at home. Good evening. There we go. Hang on a second. I apologize. There we go. My name is Don Dorenzo. I'm a special education advocate and educator with over two decades of experience working with students, families, and school districts. I'm here tonight on behalf of two parents and taxpayers in this district who have authorized me to speak. I'm not here to discuss the merits of a a pending legal matter. I'm here because I'm deeply concerned by what appears to be a pattern of obstruction and because this board has a responsibility to know what is being done in its name. This family did what we tell parents to
189do. They raised concerns. They provided documentation. They asked questions. They followed the chain of command. They appealed to every administrator that's available to them. And when they asked who authorized an observation restriction that was placed on their independent evaluator, they did not get an answer. When they asked for the board policy that was authorizing those restrictions, they did not get an answer. When they submitted a lawful public records request for documents reflecting the expenditures of public funds, they did not receive those records within the statutory deadline. They were forced to escalate at every single step. And when they wrote directly to the board president to raise these concerns, they still have not received a response. That should concern every member of this board. I want to draw the board's attention to something specific. This board
190adopted, ironically, we're talking about board goals tonight. Goal three for 2526 school year was a commitment to enhance the transparency of financial operations to the community. This family submitted a lawful OPRA request for legal billing records reflecting expenditures of public funds. That request went unanswered for more than three weeks despite a statutory 7-day deadline. So, I ask the board, is that consistent with its own stated commitment to financial transparency? The family has now been forced to file a complaint with the government records council. The next stop is Superior Court, where they can get their legal fees back. Here's what the bill's list shows. Since January of 2026, the month this family first formally requested a behavioral assessment for their daughter, the district has paid at least $11,844.60 in special education legal fees to outside litigation
191council, specifically Shanken Price. The district has spent nearly six times the amount it offered to settle this matter, continuing to fight it. In this situation, there's no winner except one. The child is losing by not having the proper support in place that she needs to access her education. The district is losing by spending far more to defend against a request than it would have been to simply provide the proper assessment to begin with. The only party that benefits from this continuing is legal counsel that continues to build the district while the child continues to go without. Every dollar spent in litigation is a dollar that does not go to students. Superintendent Bergox was quoted in tap into as saying this district has sharpened its pencils when it comes to financial fiscal responsibility. Excuse me. The
192board has a goal three commitment for financial transparency. Sorry. This board should ask its administration to reconcile those commitments with what the bill's list shows. This family has a daughter with legally recognized disabilities and an action I'm sorry, an active section 504 plan in this district. A team of physicians and psychologists at CHOP, it's not, you know, the doctor's walk-in clinic. This is CHOP in Philadelphia, has asked for the district's cooperation, the family retained an attorney only after the district filed for due process and declined to resolve the matter on reasonable terms. The parents independent evaluator was restricted to one hour of observation and was categorically prohibited from interviewing any school staff in the building where the district's own board policy 6171.6 requires that evaluators be permitted to observe students in educational settings. The restrictions
193imposed on the evaluator prevented her from completing a comprehensive functional behavioral analysis consistent with professional standards. The issue before you tonight is bigger than one student. It is whether families can obtain clear answers from the district that serves them. It is whether board adopted policies are being followed or whether administrators are creating restrictions that directly contradict those policies. It is whether this district has the proper adviserss in place to help it make fiscally responsible decisions that also balance meeting the rights and needs of students or whether those adviserss are only concerned with their own bottom line. I've seen far too many troubling situations in my years as an advocate. This case rises to the level where the line between disagreement and deliberate obstruction is worth examining. The Office for Civil Rights will make that determination
194based on facts. But this board should grapple with that question as a governing body charged with upholding the rights of every child in the district. This family did not come looking for a fight. They came looking for help for their daughter. The cost of doing right by this child would have been a fraction of what has already been spent doing wrong by her. I thank you for your time. Is there any additional public comment? All right. Thank you. And um for those of you uh with the communications on Dave, thank you for those communications and thank you for the direction for where those conversations might go next. Um now we move to our annual authorizations. Um if you recall this is something that we basically do twice a year um in terms of uh appointing
195all the various uh services um and supportive organizations to the various functions of the school. Um, I guess what I don't know, uh, well, I guess first I need to call for a motion and a second to to approve the agenda items 101 through 14. Can I get a motion to open the floor? Dan, thank you. Second, Brian, thank you. I didn't know if um if folks had questions on individual ones. I believe when we did this in January when we encountered it for the first time, we may have sort of just briefly run down what some of these things were, but I know um because there is a there is a lot here. Um I don't know if there's specific questions now that this is the second time we're renewing them as a board
196um on any specific ones and and am I wrong? These this is the twice a year. >> These are some of these are repetitive and a lot of these are fiscal driven. That's why you're seeing them in June because they have a July start and will go through the fiscal school year. Um, and I'll call out a few that I know there's been some questions on um electronic fund transfers. There is a polic policy dictating how we handle EFTs and who is designated who's the first and who is the second approver. There's always more than one eye on every transaction. So, just as we have several um signatures on every check, we have several eyes on every EFT if we should have them, which we have very few. Specifically, again, a June resolution for school's
197health insurance fund membership. We are renewing that. And year end capital transfer, that one is specific. Again, we have to have that resolution by the end of June by statutory requirement. So, if the board does intend to put any money into capital reserve through the audit that we're going to be going through over the summer, it has to pass the resolution before the end of June, and it's a not to exceed amount. We do not expect to be putting $6 million in capital. We do expect to be putting something up to that amount that will come out through the audit. We don't have our surplus numbers yet until we actually go through the audit. We receive our extraordinary aid numbers hopefully within the next month. And if it's positive, great. if it's not um you
198know we'll we'll deal with that but hopefully it's better and we can get closer to a higher number in the capital reserve for the end of this this school year. I hope that clarified a little bit but I'm happy to answer any questions that are specific to any of the resolutions. >> Any specific resolution questions? Brian, >> it's agenda item 10.11. So, I guess it's resolution 13. Um, and it's just the language. Uh, so so this is I I general understand what's what this is about, but it says the list is intends to renew, award, or permit to expire from that list. >> Are these all people we're keeping on the list or they're all people we're letting go off the list? >> This is a confusing resolution and I don't disagree with that. um
199but dictated by that chapter 47 that is referencing. These are contracts that we have awarded for this school year that we're in right now, which is 2526. So, this is just letting you approve what we've already entered into for this year that we're about to end. We are not re renewing every vendor that's on this list. We may not be using them at all. Um, but most of these I would say most of them would probably would be at some level, but there is a statutory requirement to approve the contracts that you've entered into for the current year by the end of June. I know there was confusion on this last year and I think it was pulled. This is anything over the bid threshold that you had a contract with in the current fiscal
200year. >> So the the board will if in the future we enter into a new contract, we'll hear about it at that time. >> Correct. >> Okay. >> Thank you. And then when you say the current year is that um >> the current year I see as the year that we are still operating in 2526 at the end of June then we're entering into the next fiscal year. So in most cases, these are for contracts almost looking backwards at this point and service misleading because I run the report today and you know we could have a few more invoices that come through in the next two weeks but this is how the legislation dictates and we're following the statuto requirement. >> But I'm sorry just for clarification then these monies are already paid or already
201agreed to have been paid. >> Yes. And and it's some of them have already been paid partially potentially like these aren't all getting written before the 30th of June, right? >> Or are >> these are all of the expenditures with these vendors up to the day that we >> cumulatively report? Correct. It may change very slightly. >> Might have been paid but mostly it's been is what we paid out already as well. Is what this is? Is this a list of what we paid out to these contractors >> for these vendors up to the point that the report was run? Correct. >> Okay. Okay. Right. Not do but just >> right >> not do money just spent money. >> Okay. Okay. >> Other questions or clarifications? Sophia >> uh for 10.4 you had mentioned about
202the EFT um transfer the funds designation. The assistant BA would also be um a signature >> right and then in addition we have an administrator. So we have myself, the assistant VA, and the coordinator of HR benefits because they typically initiate a payroll transaction and then either myself or the assistant VA can review that and process that. >> Perfect. Just that was just for clarity. And then in uh 10.2 um I'm sorry 10.10 um with the architect project that is um the firm that we have now. Correct. in place. Correct. Okay. And for the attorney legal services, general counsel and special counsel that is for what we currently went for RFP. And this is the final decision on who we are. Are we voting on the decision of who's going to be general counsel, special
203counsel? >> This is a bit redundant. You'll see their names on this annual resolution, but you're also going to see them in our FFT section under is the appointment of the schoolboard attorney and 133 is the architect, the auditor, and the general liability broker. All of those were the ones that we had gone out for RFP for. And then we're just having the board do a separate resolution stating that we went out for RFP. This was the date that we did it. This is how many respondents we have, and this is who we're selecting. So, you're going to see twice. You're going to see it in FFT and in the annual appointment. >> Okay? So, the annual appointment is for master list of of everything for the the next fiscal year. >> Okay. >> Which
204is why we like to time the RFPs so that that can coincide with >> the appointments if they're changing. >> Okay. >> Any additional questions or clarifications? Okay. Uh all in favor? >> Opposed? Abstain. All right. Curriculum, Instruction, and Technology. I have a call for a motion and second to approve agenda items 111 through 114. Can I get that motion, >> Tara? And second, >> Brian. Um, okay. Uh, I don't know who's speaking to the curriculum articulation update. Um, is >> So, I I can start off. >> Okay. >> I can jump in. >> Jump in as you need to. one um 10 or 11 which is a resolution similar to what you saw last month um in regards to the curriculum consortium that we're entering in with our sending districts um in the vein
205of um shared services. This is particularly to a point our district as a lead agency for something called title 2 which is federal money. Um right now our district gets a certain amount of money and each one of our sending districts gets a certain amount of money and it's based on student population and some of those are very small amounts and some of those are we're the largest of all of them. Um what we decided as part of this curriculum consortial union to do is to pull all that money together um so that we can then have the superintendent articulation group vote on what professional development projects um will be funded from this. So we're acting as the lead agency with that. And so basically what this resolution does is allows us to take the
206federal money that would have been put in accounts for them, have it be put in our larger account for the ones that are participating in this, and then we will run professional development that will benefit us and ours districts throughout the course of the year. Instead of somebody having a very limited amount they can't do much with and someone else having more than they need to do with, it's pulling those resources. And again, just a perfect example of the shared service and this is a small way that we're starting off in doing that with this federal funding. >> So they would attend all the districts that are participating would attend one event. >> Yeah. So it might not that event >> it might not be everybody. So there might be three districts that um need
207a reading a training on a certain reading program. Oh, >> okay. >> Right. And but what would happen is um if they wanted to schedule that for October when we meet in September the superintendent's articulation ESC um who's sort of going to sort of run this you know from a managerial perspective is going to say hey so and so said you're going to run this reading program these other two districts are interested as well we're going to have six teachers all together if anyone else wants to join you can and then ask the group do you approve this and we vote as a group to say yes we approve this funds on this program and then it's for the benefit of multiple districts And that was actually one of the topics that came up at
208the round table discussion. The way that districts could pull >> lesser amounts of resources for something with a bigger impact. >> Steve, >> were there any sending districts that are not participating? >> You know, I think there were a couple that haven't passed the resolution yet, but I think there was um intent to participate with all of them. There's a couple that had interim superintendent that are waiting for the new superintendents to come in and things of that nature. So >> yes, but with a caveat that it's up to some new superintendents that are coming in >> to make that decision. >> Andrew, did you have a question? >> Oh, I thought okay. >> And then um the home instruction is um typical that's what we have provided for the end of the school year
209or out of district placements I think is um typical for the upcoming school year. Um and then the emergency virtual instruction plan. And I don't know, Rich, if you want to mention that, but this is a requirement by the state since co >> Yeah, it is. It's um we've never had to actually use this or we've never been able to use it. You know that we're required to have 180 school days. Snow days do not, you know, if we don't have school because of snow. This would allow us to if there is a state of there's a lot of this if there's a state of emergency by the state and we are out of school for more than three consecutive days starting on the fourth day we could go to this plan and have it
210count as a school day. Now as you all know if there's a state of emergency here that means that people are without power. So, it would be very unlikely that we could actually use it, but this is something that we're required to have on uh file with the counting office so that we could use it to count as a school day if need be. >> Question on the home instruction. >> Yeah. >> Um historically they've all been 10 hours, 5 hours, 5 hours, 10 hours. In this one, there are double their twohour. I thought there was a minimum of five. >> Well, there is a minimum five, but it depends on how many days they were on home instruction. So, I think with the end of the school year ending, there were probably students that
211were only eligible for so many hours because they didn't have that full week. >> Andrew, >> and we don't do any home instruction for like an extended school year over the summer. that is that a situation that would ever occur or >> Yeah, I don't think we ever utilize home instruction for extended school year because I think that >> very specific >> students that are attending extended school year that the inerson um the experience is really vital to what we're delivering there. >> Rich? No. Okay. Any other questions or clarifications? >> Just looking at the out of district there um there's there's the tuition uh column and then there's the aid colum. So even if we were we had an opportunity to bring some of those students back, would we still be paying that aid?
212>> We would, but the cost might not be what you're seeing there because we pay them what we pay professional. Um so obviously if it was for celebrate the children, it's probably pretty close to that number, but it is not close to that number for prep. >> This is over like a little over $2 million. Yeah. I didn't realize that. >> Yeah. And and these are good numbers right now. Um historically, you know, these are very good numbers of what we have because they're programs that we run in house. So >> that didn't hit me. This is our known right now. >> Correct. >> Next academic year out of district placement. >> That is correct. I I think that is a certain >> it is and we're proud of that and and proud of it
213for the fiscal impact but also because we're able to provide those services to students in our district and have them have a high school experience. So >> Yeah. I I I do appreciate that you always bring that aspect up that it's the students >> best interest first then it's >> I mean in the end this might get me fired but it's not about the money. It's about what's good for the kids. Um, but the money is always a nice, you know, very close second. If we can save money and do what's good for kids, it's a win-win. >> Any other questions or clarifications? >> All in favor? >> I oppose. Extensions. >> All right, that brings us to policy and school security. Uh, to open it. Uh, can I get a call for a motion
214and a second to approve agenda items 121 and 122? Can I get a motion, Dan? Second, Andrew. Thank you. Uh questions, clarifications. Obviously, we have second reads on here for the policies that we looked at initially last month. Um we have the job description for the assistant superintendent as well. >> Just clarification. I know we talked about this last meeting. Um the uh 1212 is the student vehicles. >> We talked about motorcycles last meeting. >> Yes. The word motorcycle does not exist in this at all. >> No, I think we're what we're um using is vehicle would be any kind of vehicle because vehicles really can you know think about mopeds >> which makes sense except it's a whole section that says automobiles. >> So I just want to make sure that we're covering bases
215but if it works looking at it again or not um as someone who rode a motorcycle. >> Sure. >> Yeah. May I suggest we just note it as something adopt the >> back into St. Can we make sure that the language there >> and right now we can um we can track that and we can make sure you know even though our policy might say automobile we're going to use the automobile synonymous with you know a vehicle >> and yeah I think when we go back to Strauss that would be a good point is to just use the word vehicle instead of automobile >> because that does cover everything there >> vehicle yeah >> I'll make that >> or motorized >> well there's a whole section there for motorized There's nontorized stuff and skateboards. I
216mean, >> it gets weird in today's day and age. >> Yeah. I mean, you know, rollerblades was a thing at one point, right? Skateboards are a thing at one point. And now there's the one there was the one wheels for a little while that students were riding. Um, >> heelies, right, was a thing for a while. remember sneakers that had the, you know, wheels on the back and you could run in it. >> Steve's get nostalgic, but >> the bicycle car lot as well because I remember my senior my daughter's senior, your daughter's probably there at the same time. There was an issue with bikes going to the high school because there was like kind of senior prank >> and then there was kind of a ch pivot on policy but my kids literally rode
217their bikes to school and didn't end up fighting us a little bit. So >> make sure we're but it all up. >> Absolutely. And again we're going to have an opportunity to do that with language going back to Strauss as well consistent. I guess I'm also wondering maybe with the transition to Strauss coming up, do we have is it in our interest to have the policy ad hoc committee um just have some sort of transitional meeting? I don't know if there's details for us to be just apprised of or ensuring that little details like that are I I I don't know what's next. I was hoping we could schedule an ADOC policy committee meeting for July at some point, but I want to get um some progress from Strauss on where they're at with that.
218I'm hoping they're going to accelerate their conversion process. I didn't have anything new to report as of tonight, but again, they this was like three weeks ago that they got, you know, the authorization to move ahead. So, I too >> ideally we're in Strauss by the start of the next academic year. That's I'm I'm hoping I would like to see August 1st. If it's >> September 1st, we're only a week or so into our academic year and we're still okay. I think y >> um the and again the reason I want these these two particular policies passed tonight even with the school board language is so that we can do the transportation window process. We can do the parking. We need to start those things now. Otherwise, I would say let's just wait and incorporate
219it all into strauss time. >> Any other questions or clarifications? Okay. All in favor? >> Oh, I have a question. I'm so sorry. I apologize. Um, um, 12.2 y >> job description for assistant superintendent. >> Yes. Um in regards to prof professional development, I noticed that it was um overrode written and um that's a really important key performance responsibility under the instructional leadership and operation. So is there any reason why we would omit that or >> Yeah, Rich Brown is in charge of that right now. Um so we you didn't want to assign the same duty to two different positions. Um the assistant superintendent is going to be a you know second in charge in the district. I mean the thing that sort of captures all of that is perform other related duties as may
220be assigned by the superintendent requested by the board. Um Rich Brown does a great job of doing that right now. Obviously the superintendent would assist me in overseeing that as well. >> Okay. And in regards to security, >> um is there a specific requirement that is needed for the because that's added in there um security for um under assistant superintendent. >> Yeah. So we added that in there because and I added in that in there specifically because of the um school safety specialist that we had as a district position >> that we um are not filling. Um, and then but those responsibilities are being put on an assistant principal at each building, but I want the assistant superintendent to be able to make sure that both buildings are consistently applying the same um policies, procedures.
221>> So, it's more of the structural and facility. That's what it that's what it entails. What's security? >> Yeah. The boots on the ground are going to be actually doing work at each building as a school safety specialist and they'll be assigned as that. And I believe they are in one of the appointments that you already approved. Um, and then the assistant superintendent will just be in charge of overseeing all of those programs and policies. >> Overseeing like managing it. >> Yeah. >> Cynthia, what was the striketh through you were referring to with the professional development? >> It's it's one of the titles, >> one of the job descriptions for the assistance and performance responsibility. Number six, >> development, not professional development, >> good staff development. And again, some of this stuff was so when
222we do these job descriptions, we look at what we had um what they currently do because sometimes they're, you know, eight, nine years old and uh and then we look at school boards and they have model job descriptions and we try to take language from all three of those sources and combine them. >> That's where I got the NJS um VA. That's where I got that information from. So that's why I was asking. >> You were talking specifically about the performance responsibilities. Um I could >> yeah I I think so. Yeah. Okay. Because I realize it's mentioned in two places. The knowledge of for qualifications is there but then the job performance >> is where the strength is. Okay. Well and not that it need be stricken out. It's just you're you're not directly administering
223it per second >> because it is part of the responsibility even from NJSBA. So I was just curious. >> Okay. >> I wanted clarification. Uh, any other questions or clarifications? Okay. All in favor? >> I I oppose abstensions. >> I'm going to vote no on 12.1.3. Just the part of it u the charging of the kids for parking just just doesn't feel right to me. Uh, and I'm going to vote no on 12.2. All right. Um, >> in regards to the charging, are we able to speak a little bit? >> Well, we just passed it, but I mean, if you want to just comment. >> I just think in regards to the charging, um, so the seniors will be charged, right? And they will have an incentive to have that waved, right? >> To wave
224the bus and then get it back, right? So, um, a lot of the seniors if they're going to enroll in that and they want to park so forth, it'll be, um, washed away, so to say, right? Um, I just think, this is just me thinking out loud, um, if we would have even just said no parking fee for seniors, the presentation may have been that much more um, you know, a a nicer presentation for the seniors and kind of like a perk for them. Um, not charging them right off the bat anyway. And then it seems even like more of an incentive for those who don't have, you know, parking privileges right now, but can get, you know, waved that fee and incentivized. I I just feel I I agree to what you're saying, Lordy.
225You know, it's just it it would have been I think a better way of presenting it. And just in my opinion, I feel it would be a better way of presenting it and keeping it that way rather than feeling like, well, seniors weren't didn't pay for parking now, but now they're going to start paying for parking. If if we didn't if we we didn't even put that on there for for this um resolution, it would really almost be the same and it wouldn't really appear that way like we're charging them. I don't Does that make sense? I possibly I guess it it will be interesting to see at the end of the year like financially where that shakes out um and whether or not that's a a point to revisit. >> Well, because it's going
226to be washed away regardless. No, I to the point that in other words, the with the design of the the program itself, it's a little bit of an experiment to understand that to see if there's enough of an offset where we can reduce a bus route and then whether or not the gains of that could open a conversation to the fees themselves. But you would have a year of data and sort of know where it landed in terms of what it meant, what students paid, what the district saved, what what which if any routes were able to be reduced. >> Do we have any data from not charging the student? Now >> we've never not charged. >> It would have gone into >> because this year students students got this year they were charged. >>
227So we've never had a year without charge. Yeah. I mean, I'm gonna I'm gonna have to change my notion because I was thinking a different way in regards to not charging the student seniors. >> You you want to change your vote on >> on that particular for the 12 um 13. >> Okay. You want to change that from a yes to a >> Okay. >> All right. >> And then one other question I had, sorry, should have brought this up before. It says, uh, number one, uh, register car, submit application and documents, read and sign a random drug test. Does that mean everyone at some point throughout the school year that has a parking is subjected to a random >> You're just in the pool. >> You're in the pool. >> No, no, no. Anyone
228that is has a parking permit >> is in the pool to be potentially randomly drug tested. >> So that means it's possible that somebody can be picked more than once and somebody get picked never. >> Correct. It's random. >> Yeah. And I think it's it's parking that gets you into that extracurricular involvement. >> Yeah. >> Any extracurricular >> and I've seen it happen firsthand. Me I might too. Yeah. Yeah, we we get that sometimes three times in a year. >> The randomness of it. >> It's random. >> Unfortunately, it doesn't look random sometimes. >> Exactly. >> They should be playing the lottery. >> Perhaps >> I was told. >> Are there any exclusions with the random um testing for students that may be um challenged and maybe understanding? Like what if a student that is
229um randomly selected has certain challenges and maybe doesn't understand the concept of being randomly having to take um a breathalyzer or drug test or anything like that. Do we have a procedure in place? I guess I'm asking. >> Well, the parents sign them up for it. So the parents if they didn't understand, we would work with them and explain to them what the >> So it's the parent who signs up >> the parent signing the student up for it. So, are there like when it comes to um maybe a student that has an IEP or certain like that, certain things like that or maybe have special needs, um are they all put into that same pool as well? >> They are. Yeah. If they're part of >> Yeah. one of my children that had an
230IEP was randomly tested um in her. >> Was there is there a special I guess is there something special in place because I'm sure it could be pretty scary for you know someone >> I mean any student that it would be scary for aware of that because of their IEP requirements and goals. Um and obviously our child study team would be involved in that process with the parents. Right. >> I was just curious. >> Yes. >> You know, we're we're doing >> Yeah. We make sure we don't traumatize students through testing. >> Of course. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Um we're on to finance, facilities, transportation. Can I get a call for a motion and second to approve agenda items 131 through 13 uh 25? Can I get the uh Andrea got the motion, Dan got
231the second. Thank you. Uh questions or clarifications? Um, obviously a number of services here and I don't know if there's items that you want to do a rundown yet. I think that would be helpful. >> The superintendent hiring authority, you see this once a year just because sometimes there was a delay between board meetings in the summertime. We usually give superintendent authorization to do any hiring if there's teachers that we want to get in the classroom as soon as possible for the next fiscal year. Again, as we spoke about before, 132 through 135 are all of the RFPs that we've went out for. School board attorney, architect record, audit services, and general liability brokers. So, in each of those resolutions, you'll see the detail of how many respondents we had um and that we're hiring
232those specific vendors for the next fiscal year's term. So, 26 27 school year. >> Can I Sure. just a the board attorney. I I there was a the a committee >> the subcommittee met um the subcommittee did a series of uh reviews of the submissions. Uh there was an interview process with um each of the firms. Um and then the subcommittee met a final time to sort of discuss um debate uh the options and came to a unanimous conclusion on the appointments that you have here. >> So it was unanimous. Okay. >> Yeah. Great. >> Stephen, >> does this for the legal representation side is do we now only have two firms that represent us then instead of four now after this RFP? >> So yes, we do. We have a we have a general
233and then we have a special. Uh it just so happened that the general this time uh is the same council we had been using for spe special education council. So it was sort of now taking on two responsibilities there. And then the last part that the the committee did discuss was um if there were a different firm that they wanted to engage for um negotiations that negotiations would not be happening until we go through this once more. So the opportunity if if there were the interest in bringing on a firm specifically for negotiations, there would be the opportunity to revisit that this time next year for the negotiations that would follow. Because previously we did have one designated for negotiations, one general, one special ed and one special where now we just have one general
234inclusive of special ed, one special to handle other matters and recognition that if we wanted to revisit uh a a specific appointment for negotiations, we still have the window of time to do that next year. >> And negotiations refers to contract negotiations for employees and teachers and whatnot, right? bargaining units. >> Okay. Okay. >> So, general counsel would be used >> as their >> the majority. Yes. The majority >> special counsel is for you said >> additional special projects need >> special projects things that we would need that general counsel wouldn't be able to handle or um didn't want to handle for various reasons. Could be conflict because they're represent one of the townships. It could be um that they um >> special project meaning like what as an example >> um country club drive
235was one of them. So we were you know um it's a lawsuit that we're involved and it has to do with sewage capacity. >> Um and council at one point said you know we don't have we don't have the expertise for this so use special counsel for that instead. And if I'm not mistaken, >> those are that's an example, but there could be, you know, there's so many different variables. It really comes down to what I um when I talked to our um who will be our new general counsel um Joe at Shank Price. Um you know, basically we when we talked about that, he said, "Me and you will discuss that and you know, we we'll decide together whether or not something should be special counsel or we're going to take it up." >>
236Would we be um notified as to what would be the what would differentiate? Would the board be notified for any of that or >> I mean it depends. I mean the board I would not notify the board in all my communications that I currently do. Um if there was something specific that you wanted to be notified about, you know, if you let me know ahead of time, I can make sure. >> No, I just mean I just mean since you would speak to general counsel, >> the board is authorizing, you know, sort of, you know, my office and the business office to use both of these councils as we see fit. >> Right. Right. >> So that's what this is and that decision will be um based on my discussion with general counsel and then
237you know >> but everything starts with general counsel general counsel. Yeah. >> And then if it's there's an issue then it it goes to special. >> Didn't the um when Bush was our special counsel, weren't they handling the Bloomsberry resolution? >> Yeah. So Steve, just to make sure you understand this, um we've always we always had two councils. We had general counsel and we had special counsel. We've had that for as long as I can remember. Um and then you know last year we went with the four different we specifically carve out like different areas right um and that had some advantages but um in this case we were able to get you know the biggest thing we wanted to make sure we kept was our special education council because we were very happy with
238them and they were part of shank price already so we were able to just go back to what our original model was which was general counsel and special counsel and when Bush um B group was our special counsel um KNA was our general counsel Kangno represented the town of the burough Bloomsberry you know, as a um municipal entity. And so they recuse themselves from all of this and Bush has been handling that. And we're going to continue to let Bush finish that process out as well. We continue to use them, you know, um in current projects that they're in. Um so general and special counsel moving forward be pretty much for new things that current council isn't handling. Stephen, >> just to timeline it because it seems, you know, new board member having it seems
239like we've had like three different special counsels since in a sense or or not special, I'm sorry, general counsels, right? We had uh Phil's firm and then >> we transitioned to Bush, which who was our special lead role >> and then but that was prior to RFP and then now from the RFP. Bush isn't really one of our on retainer firms anymore. They were special counsel before. They're going to finish what they're doing. These are the new ones. Kaggno was previously general >> after Mr. Stern's firm for prior to >> prior to Okay. All right. Just trying to There's been a lot of different legal >> Oh, I Oh, yeah. I know. >> Yeah. Okay. just trying to understand maybe on sharing that transparency more speaking it out for for public information as well just
240seems like there's a lot and then the final question did did the RFPs save us anything or was it just more so to for other reasons like as as far as financially but were these were are these any different better rates than before was it kind of in line with what it was or more expensive at all >> I can't remember relative to Phil where shank price was coming in they're pretty closely. Yeah, general counsel. >> It might be10 to with several of them. I know it felt like it was 10 or $15 an hour. Um I know as a board we difference yes difference per hour. Um uh I think one of the things we've talked about as a board is we've made a conscious effort to just reduce the footprint and presence of
241legal at all of our meetings. um which you know certainly does have an impact. And that was one of the things in speaking with folks was simply their willingness to sort of work with that model and sort of remain on call or even the willingness that if they weren't going to be here during a meeting, but if we needed them to um you know video in in executive on a on a special issue um that willingness was there as well. So that seemed very much in keeping with our own efforts to contain the costs um in as much as we're using counsel. >> Okay. Thank you. >> So general counsel to your to your point and question um it was pretty much aligned and special counsel was that aligned as well or was that more
242or less? >> All of the attorneys were in a a very small per hour window you know difference with each other. Um, I think we had a lot of debate around that hourly rate. Um, because you know, an attorney that charges $190 an hour and it takes an hour to do something and someone that charges $225 an hour and it takes a half an hour to do something. What's the more economical one? Right. And, you know, you could So, it's really a matter of time that you spend on something that's really dictating the amount that you're spending. The >> I just wanted to make sure that Matthew's got his answer. Yeah, >> I know that, you know, I was in the meeting there was a lot of discussion on >> base rate >> doesn't necessarily
243mean it's more expensive because we just don't know how much they're going to build, right? >> Yeah. Sure. Of course. Of course. Right. >> If you look at the rate, >> we ask the question, >> we save money. >> Yeah. The upfront rate. >> We don't know until we're actually we'll never know because we don't know what the other person would >> and it's it's even hard for do that, you know, analyzing um legal costs from year to year. You know, some years you spend more on legal because there are just more issues to deal with hours. It has its es and flows. There's some months that I look at the legal bills and I go, "Wow, what did we do this month?" And you look back and you're like, "Oh, yeah, that was a
244busy month." And there's other months you're like, "Oh, we did really good this month." And, you know, and it's because, you know, something was stalled, right? There wasn't anything that happened that month, but the the book the book ends of that will show the >> annually it averages out. >> Annually, it averages out. Yeah. We look at it every and even again year to year. There are some years where again it's going to be higher than other years and it's not necessarily because of an hourly rate. It's because of the work that was done. >> Of course. >> Thank you. >> Um Katie, I don't recall where we were in your rundown. >> One thing on that Brendon before we proceed just a suggestion. I don't know if it matters, but on the resolution it
245has Shane Price listed as general. Do we want to put general slash special education to include that just to >> That's an So we don't have to. Yeah. >> And that's that's why we had special education carved out because typically you would hire a general counsel to do everything. >> Okay. >> Um but if you didn't want if you want to hire general counsel but carve something out for a specific area, you would name them special education counsel. >> Okay. >> We don't need to do that for this. >> Nice. >> Okay. Katie, I wasn't sure. >> So I'm going to move on to 136 and 137 unless there's any other questions. >> Okay. So 13, six, and seven are our renewal for medical, dental, and prescription benefits. I want to give you just a
246little bit of background on those rates. You're seeing our premium rates on those resolutions. That's not really telling you the story of how much did it go up, right? We budgeted 20%. Where did we land? So the shift renewal, um, everyone else declined to quote us except for the shift. Um, we have our assumptions as to why, but that was 15.4%. So thankfully that is under budget, significantly well under budget. Um, so thankfully that's about $37,000 in savings. So we will have that um as additional funds for health benefits for the year as well as Benard. They originally quoted us 12% increase after we received a competitive quote from the shift at a 7% increase. Bedard sharpened their pencil to 3%. So >> we will now continue with that card at 3%. um they've provided
247excellent coverage for us and when they have any there's also plan impacts when you shift from a card to a shift. So we want to keep it consistent for our employees and make sure everything's comparable coverage. So again that's about $30,000 savings. So that's on our um benefit. So dental is a 0% increase. So again overall we're seeing about $400,000 in savings from what we had originally budgeted for 2627. >> Nice. >> Good news. any of that um uh the lower increase than we anticipated? It was is it partly a factor of um the health of our >> like once they got that data that's how they give you a final >> part of that? Yes. They use the health of your um district. They call it a Colorado. So they they have a certain
248increase for the entire plan which may be let's say 12%. We know everybody has to go at least 12, but there could be 2.5% more or 2.5% less, let's say. Um, so if we have great um employee health, it could be less than that total shift increase or it could be slightly more depending on if you have pe individuals that use the plan heavily. I should say >> that experience rating does factor into that. So rest on how much you use it. So we are on the the lower end but we are pretty close to I think the average ship increase. >> I remember you described or the the the broker described that to us and we brought them in to describe um educate us. I just didn't know when that data gets transferred to
249the ship like you know because you presumably I'm guessing in a year if our if we get a lot more helping a lot less when at some point that's going to >> hit the budget >> it does >> and is that why now it's a little our utilization rate I believe is calendar based for the shift so once they see a calendar year >> then they can start analyzing that in January February and then they can give us our renewal information by again this period of time which is late June. >> Right. >> Unfortunately, it's after we've prepared our budget, but again, it's difficult to get all of these things to align perfectly. So, we typically go off of broker estimate, which is their best guess >> after the ship has kind of given their
250estimate of what they're >> and that broker and you want to if you're going to error and you're going to error, but you'd like to air on a higher number so that you can come in under not. >> Okay. >> Yeah. And when the ship was having those discussions, I do sit on the ship commissioner board. So, We knew it was going to be high double digits. So, everyone estimated at 20% knowing that it could have been the worst case scenario, >> right? >> Thankfully, it wasn't >> good. And so, these wellness programs, I mean, I don't know what I don't how you can >> then you can gauge success, >> actually account for it, but you know, it's moving in the right direction and all those wellness programs are funded through the ship through
251a wellness >> through their encouragement. So, so what would be some factors or that we would get a decline quote? >> I think a few of the things referenced from our broker was, you know, perhaps they have enough clientele already. Perhaps they saw us as just another client that they don't have time to quote. So, I mean, that that's our best guess, but again, without knocking their door down and asking why, >> you're asking why other people didn't bid on. >> Yeah. So seems strange >> because those are separate ETNA plans. >> So the other companies that look at us, they they they know that they have to meet the same program requirements we have. So they have to provide the same coverage. It's not like they could quote us and say, "Well, we're going
252to quote you and it's going to cost you $500,000 less, but you're going to have a $40 deductible instead of $25 deductible." You know, like they they can't do that. So they know that they are constrained to what coverage is equal to or better coverage. >> And it's a lot of work. put that bid out. So they say, "Well, we're not going to be able to beat the price they have." So >> they So they say they knew what the price was in advance that the >> addition they look at our plan design that they do. >> Yes. That's what the broker puts out to the market is our plan design and they say, "Please give us a quote to offer these plans." And then they would get the quote back for how much that
253would cost. >> Right. But they would they know our current cost. >> I've learned a lot about the insurance industry. Things that I >> That's what I'm trying to figure out. Um, this is all actuaries that are putting these numbers together. Um, and so do do we give them the numbers and tell them what we're paying now? >> Do they know what we're paying? >> Right. >> I'm sure they >> it's all it's it's it's all math today and that's what it comes down to is does it mathematically make sense to put the effort into, you know, voting on this when we know that they're >> and it's publication. It's right here. They baked it out. And it's also public knowledge that we moved out of those separate private plans back in 2020 to get
254into a shift vehicle. So would they really spend the time to quote us knowing that we had no intention of most likely leaving the best option that we have right now? So 13.8 is really related to exactly that conversation. you have to sign every three years an indemnity and trust agreement to keep um our our standing with the shift really to be involved in the ship for another three years. Yes, you can leave the ship, it doesn't bind you for the three years, but it doesn't make a commitment. So, we're just committing to the ship for another three years on 13.8. If again next year we find a vehicle that's cheaper, we can absolutely do that as long as we provide them specific notifications. 13.9 is a lot, so I'm going to through that with
255a little bit more detail. There's a specific resolution that I drafted to describe what we're doing here, which is the Honeywell project that I went over in detail at a prior board meeting. >> There was several layers to this grant that we had through New Jersey Clean Energy. There was repairs, there was replacements. It equated to about $6.5 million of total grant funding. Our board contribution was about $1.5 million. Now, at the end of this the projects, so we've installed all the HAC, we've made made all the repairs and now we're coming to the conclusion Honeywell's given us the final change order that you're going to see attached. Says final change order, and there's an attachment. It's about $400,000 less than we originally thought. So, thankfully, we've received all the grant funds. They've given us
256the money. They said, "Great job. You did all the projects." um that money is now ours to put back into capital reserve. So that final change order is really affecting our ability to put the funds back into capital reserve knowing that we originally committed to 1.5 million. Now it's really to the tune of 1.1 million that we contributed against that $6.5 million of grant funding. >> Nice. >> Yeah. >> Not to dwell on this, but this was all um p this was grant grants that Katie um took upon herself to apply for were obviously authorized. Um, and we were able to get about $6 million worth of work for about $600,000 of taxpayer money. >> That's great. >> You know, it's it doesn't get any better than this. >> Um, from a fiscal and grant
257perspective. So, >> Honeywell did a great job. We have allowances built into each of the projects. So, after we went out for the first phase, you'll see there's this is the fourth amendment to this contract. The first one was to go out and solicit Honeywell to be able to do the work for the repair phase. Then we had a replacement phase. Then we wanted to use the rest of the money. So we did a replacement phase too. Now we're doing a DOT credit for the allowances that we did not spend. So you could look at this as all of the projects came in under budget. So all of those underbudget funds now can come back to us and does not need to go back to the grant. It's great. >> It's fabulous. >> It's just
258great. >> Thank you. >> Can we get in with Honeywell again? >> Yeah. I did my best. >> Do it again. >> So again, we had tried over the budget season. I tried my hardest to get council to review all of the contracts for doing solar on the parking lots because we have rooftop solar, right? The only stone left unturned is the solar on the parking lots and I just couldn't get it off the ground in time and then all the funding was gone. So it's so important to have good vendors and I can't stress that enough. You have to have good vendors on your side. because I can't do it alone. >> But that partnership with Honeywell is still there and getting all the time. There'll be other things. >> There'll be other things.
259>> Just remember that crucial rolodex. >> Yep. Yep. They do a fantastic job. And Fred Sanjin and Fred Sanjin also oversaw a lot of those projects. So they were working hand in hand to make sure that our plan designs were exactly how we want them to be in our building. >> Good. >> Did any other local schools get Honeywell grants? >> Not that I know. Do they apply? >> Not that I know. >> Um, go ahead, Stephen. >> Yeah, great job. It all sounds like it was awesome. Then it sounds like it was a lot of work. >> You know, it's not pretty work. You don't see it behind the scenes, but the ventilation in these buildings is >> Well, that's I mean, I heard tons of just like other schools in general, you know,
260complaining about from from people in those schools complaining about no AC and how bad it So it's great that that our school seems to you know seems like this was done before the new board members it's in started before a lot of the new board members are here so we don't really understand the depth of what we've had to do to get it all going to we got the grant funding in 23 and it's been a process super long having air conditioning in a high school is pretty uh like and not everyone really does you know especially with a old building like us is pretty pretty >> and then also the the efficiencies too like now the money you're saving every year by the the system being way more efficient. So, >> and the in
261the >> solar y >> did I hear correctly that with uh in order to tackle the parking lots would require a municipal cooperation? >> It did not. >> Okay. Okay. No. >> And we brought the parking lots up when we were first looking at this. So it's nice to see maybe in the >> future >> we took it off the table because it is more expensive in order to get all of the equipment to get over the vehicles and it's just more construction cost. So sometimes it's a little bit hard to hit that break even point where it's cost efficient >> but >> the efficiencies on the >> when you get enough grant funding sometimes it can be worthwhile because you can then eliminate your electric cost in the long term. So it's really just
262like a cost benefit of does the 15 years 20 years out the >> upfront cost. >> Right. Thank you. So 1310 again this is the wrap up of the ramp up placement right here outside of district office again an allowance that we didn't use it came in under budget so I'm just asking the board to approve the return of that allowance back to capital reserve the only open project now that we have is the HVAC at this building which is going on on track right now we're getting cooling from the units that are installed backfed through the old duct work as they're working on the new duct work. So right now, thankfully with the heat, we're we have air. The ESY program facility usage agreement, that's a zero dollar contract, but we want to have
263something in place to allow Franklin to use our facilities for their ESY program. So that's just to memorialize that agreement. >> I just want to comment on that and and in association with 111, it's just another example of partnering with the bigger district and I think it's great. they were doing um some construction there and they asked if they could use their facility. Jen and Bobby both worked with them to make sure that we you know there were things you know preschool kids would be coming here right making sure that they um these are things you don't think about and um but it was great we ended up coming up with a great plan was just great to talk about the evacuation drills that's annual the transportation management agreement with Hon County services again that's
264just for us to have them over and our transportation department. Again, we don't have a transportation director. We don't have staff. They do all of that for us. We outsource it to them. Again, the ED services rates and their agreement. That is for us to enter into that for next fiscal year for us to use any of those. I'm just pulling up the approved rates. Any of those consultants. Again, sometimes we may need them for an evaluation. if there's something comes up, we can use them for a student um evaluation on a per hour basis. So, we're just approving that for next fiscal year. Again, the same thing for Morris County. Same service rates. 136 is substaffing. We've went out for RFP in the past for ESS Northeast for our substaffing. We contracted out to
265them. So, we are doing a contract addendum just to solidify them providing that service again for next fiscal year. I don't think there's any other changes to that. They're all the same. >> Same with Hamiltonian. We've gone out to RFP for them. We do that every 5 years. This is a contract addended to that RFP process. That was from I believe two years ago we went out for RFP. So this is just a renewal of that contract. Cafeteria milk pricing unfortunately small increases there. Um it's necessary in order to keep the program afloat. If we want to not increase, we would just see less revenue in that line. And I would say we're we're very close. So I would I'm recommending that we increase those meal prices by small small changes. >> The percentages were
266>> it's not really >> very minor >> 5 10 cents and not on everything. >> Yeah on food service this year with the inclusion of some new low-inccome housing. It's definitely changing the makeup of our district and how we're able to subsidize those um free and reduced lunch increases. So those students that we subsidize on the program, we're not in the national school lunch program, so we do not get a subsidy for those kids, we have to make enough money to subsidize them. >> Um so it's something I'm keeping a close eye on, but we're okay at the moment. >> And did we increase last year? I mean, are we just going up a little bit every year or have we were did we hold flat for a few years before this? I'm just >>
267I think they increased very slightly last year, too, but it's only on certain items that they'll actually go around and do an analysis of areas around like quick checks and um wa and make sure like is the sub a comparable price for a sub. >> So, I think they look at it on a paro basis. >> I was I was a little surprised the changes were as small as they are. Actually, >> it's not terrible. >> I was ready to cringe. >> Do you want to talk about Strive? >> Uh, yes. So, NJ Strive is a cooperative. Um, it's actually through NJSA now, which is the Association of School Administrators. They have partnered with them. It started at West Windsor Plainsboro School District. started as a small um recruiting um tool for school districts to
268recruit educators and um we get a job fair out of it every year and we get meetings throughout the year um for HR tactics and how to um recruit staff. So that's basically what that consortium gives us. That's what that is. >> Everything else is pretty standard monthly reports. The district donation Courtney did refer to we're getting some hurdles that are considerable dollar amounts. So I think that's a great donation for us to makeense. Everything else standard if you have any questions happy to answer. >> That's great to see >> questions or clarifications. >> One question um on 134 and five is it common to get one respondent for the audit services and general liability like you see the attorney we had multiple you see architect I think there was 10. Is it common that
269you really don't get any respondents except the one that currently has the role? depends on who's interested in applying for the proposal. Everything goes out in the same manner. It's a matter of who's interested in applying, >> who's looking for business. >> Yeah. >> Any additional questions or clarifications? I I have one thought and suggestion because there were a number of these items that um as it was explained I think we're recognizing some realizing of savings to the district or things like um anticipated health care costs that are already coming in under our projected estimates. I know last year we made an effort to do more to communicate and post things on the website u when we were going through budgetary season. I don't know if there's an appetite or interest in explaining some of
270these things um because I think you know to Stephven's point earlier some of these projects go on for months um or years in the case of the Honeywell and to to be able to articulate that we essentially got $6.5 million worth of facility improvements for less than half a million dollars is is noteworthy. um and other savings there too. Um I think are opportunities to sort of point out the stewardship and the attention to detail on some of these things. I don't know the best way to communicate that but it you know somebody even watching this it's a blip on the radar um until it even dawns on all of us what the impact of some of these things are. So, I I don't know since we've started that habit of posting those presentations in
271the in the run-up to budget season. Um, this might be something where here we are six, you know, a few months out from that. Um, maybe some updates about some additional savings or some new things that we're attempting. Some of it ties into what's going on with the waving of the bus and exploring potential savings there. I just don't know the best way to capture that. But I think it's worth drawing attention to and I don't know if the website is that or if it's something where you put on the district newsletter that goes out to sort to the community to say, you know, here are some areas. I see you shaking your head no on one and yes on the other website for that. I think >> Oh, just from a eyeball standpoint. >>
272I think you got to send get provide the information gets. >> That's a good point. Is that does any of that district newsletter come like directly from the board? Do we have >> there is that was the first thing actually I just wrote that down newsletter and was not going to say it out loud because I was going to talk to Katie about it first but I think maybe even having like a business office section of district news >> brag a little bit and talk about some of the great things we're doing right and how we're trying to save tax. >> Anybody else interested in Katie having a Tik Tok channel? your point. >> I agree with you, Rich. You're probably right. The district newsletter somewhere in that is the way to highlight it. And
273I think in the past, we've even talked about as we try to communicate to the community, be it about strategic planning, be it about financial savings, that is a vehicle that we should be leveraging >> 100%. Absolutely. But the district newsletter goes to >> both buildings, >> but it doesn't go to people who don't have kids in the school. Well, do we >> get out to >> do we push to >> do we work with some of the local >> papers whether it's I don't know if municipalities push out anymore >> yeah there's not many review but >> let me ask this when I was >> I see Clinton Township still does a newsletter where there's a K8 page >> yeah there's like a physical >> um and we used to do something similar when
274I was on CPS there'd be a K8 page >> township. >> I don't know. Do the municipalities have these newsletters. >> So maybe we could do a has a >> piece in each one like >> Well, I I'm almost thinking as part of because we used to have the subcommittee that would focus on district relations and communications. I know we're been talking about, you know, getting word out about the Bloomsberry referendum. if if there's a way to kind of connect with those publications. I don't know if they have an interest in giving us space. I don't know how those deals typically work. If it's usually Yeah, >> you can always submit. There's are still a couple places you can submit press releases to. >> Um there's a couple of online >> newspapers too like tap
275>> in left. Yeah. >> But tell them to watch the rest of the movie, >> right? And I think also social media maybe trying to put it into an infographic, you know, a a simple one image that says how much has been saved that's going to get shared. I think people would share that. So I know the main, you know, audience is school parents, but that's something that's going to be seen a little more widely. >> Yeah. >> Do we have does Juliana have any official district social media presence accounts? >> Yeah, both schools have a Facebook account and an Instagram account. Okay. I think she posts on, you know, simultaneously. >> So to your point, >> yeah, I mean, I think there's definitely an official >> pushes out to those commun that pushes out
276to all the respective communities. >> I have I'm I I know the woman that runs the the Clinton Township newsletter. So I would certainly reach out and live in Township. >> I could share with you just to your point Union Township does that, right? Quarterly newsletter. I actually have a dedicated space in that newsletter. So >> why am I not surprised? Oh lordy lord. >> So I can say this. Um the stuff that goes in there is obviously public information and you do have to be careful with the disclaimer for the board. But >> um it's a good way to get the information out. So you could just reach out to either your local clerk, mayor, council, and I'm sure if they're doing something, >> you know, they'll they'll they'll give you the space because
277there's also uh space for the local board of education. So we have basically two spaces there is dedicated to education to get it out to the community. >> I'll reach out to Dave too because I know you know we've talked about over the course of >> and that might be something that if packaged at the district level and whatever amount of text is required could just be blasted to to all of them. Rich, you had a question. >> I was just thinking is is there any appetite for like a round table with the mayors, you know, to to go through some of these ideas? >> I will at one time. >> I I mean I will say when I was on the board at CPS before we would go into budget season, we had the
278mayors in and we would kind of hit the highlight talking points of what was there. And it was just because you you wanted that other dimension of the community to kind of know um where things stood and just to be able to say that you had a working relationship with them. They're not surprised by what you're doing. uh and they're potentially a a supporter in the cause or at least they're informed in the cause and they understand what you're trying to do. Um I don't know if there's been any history of that here. Um >> I don't think >> it's it's you know this I guess to your point the same way that we reach out in a board round table. Um they're they're it's certainly a communication that you can initiate to see if
279there's interest or uptake in something like that. I don't know. That's an interesting idea. I I would say having done it both ways. When you bring the mayor in and explain the budget, like they understand, you can answer their questions, then they can answer constituent questions. I've also done it when you go to the meeting as sort of a liaison. Um, I'd say the only thing that gets a little squirrely there is that I think sometimes the perception is that you're um reporting to them and they can request things of you in that forum. That gets a little awkward that it's like no no this is I I'm not here because you know for that I'm here to inform. Um, but I think it's definitely worth exploring. >> Even like simple things like making sure
280that the mayors are getting the newsletter that goes out to parents, right? Yeah. >> Oh, from the email block adding them to it. You know, we'll see. >> Mayors, council members. Yeah, amplify that for sure. Uh, Cynthia, you had a question also. Oh, okay. >> I do. Um, so we probably have on our website a a section for our new news newsletters, but would you want to consider making a curated place for the um achievements by the district? And that might be um an a very simple way for anyone to get that information. I mean, I think the idea of using the the the local newspapers is great. I think that that requires a little bit more work, right, >> to to get that out. Um, I also think though that to the extent that
281people who are not sending children to school right now who might be interested in what the school is doing, I think a natural place to go would be our website. >> Yeah. I think whatever we put out on social media, it's easy enough to put that on the website as well. And you know, those things become it's just a the same different ways to get through the same materials, right? >> Yeah. Wherever we announced the um the improvements that we were doing to the facility should be a followup, >> right? >> You know, recognition of what was accomplished. >> What not to drag this out, but one other avenue that might be useful is the county commissioners have their um newsletter that they put out as well. I don't think we get a space in
282that. I know it's kind of a broader scale, so they might not want to do just our district, but it might be a avenue as well. That's >> Myers administrator. >> Any additional questions or comment? A lot of good ideas I would say to explore and to >> amplify communication and and all of those messages. Uh if there are no further questions or clarifications, um all in favor opposed abstensions. >> I'm yes on everything. on 1320. >> Uh Cynthia, >> I abstain from 13.23, 13.24, and 13.25. >> 23 to 25. Yes, >> Rich. >> I'm a no on 13.21. No on 1323. 1324. Abstain 1325. >> I have the abstain on 24 and 25. I have the no on 21. What was the >> 23? >> Is it no or abstain? >> No. >> And
283I'm uh any others? I'm a yes on everything but abstaining on 13.2. All right. community relations and student affairs. I feel like we've talked about community relations a little bit. I didn't know if there was anything else from Richard or Tara in that >> there weren't any other agenda items. I mean, you know, the end of the year stuff that I talked about in your report was pretty much graduations and proms >> and then uh delegates reports. Tara, was there any news there? um just that we have um our first county um will be um October or September 28th and uh it's going to be a superintendent's roundt regarding curriculum and articulation. So it should be exciting and one of the things that we haven't got it confirmed yet but we may be having it
284hosted at the Polytech. Dr. Bonsil is going to get back to us and Polytech might be providing the space and the food for our and that way we can showcase what's going on in the county. But the round table of superintendents um Dr. Burgess has agreed to be part of it and I think we have um two or three others um and it'll be exciting because there's a big movement for the collaborative and you know articulation with curriculum throughout the districts. So um we're looking forward to it and I think it'll be exciting that we can um be hosted down at Polytech. That >> sounds What was that date again? >> Uh September 28th. And how was the other delegates committee meeting? Wasn't the the one in May? The >> SP May was good. Yeah.
285Actually, everything all of the resolutions and I think I'm sorry. >> Yeah. Um everything was uh voted on. Um and then any resolutions that we want to put forward, we'll start calling for those come September. So, and that that won't be the one you'll attend and that's in usually the beginning of November. I'll look at that date for you. So, this sounds like a great idea to have it over here. >> Is there any way that the culinary students could make the food? >> Yeah, that's what we're hoping for. Yeah, that's the idea. Okay. >> So, they'll showcase their what's going on at Polytech and it'll get all of our county school boards. Hopefully, a lot will uh show up to, you know, participate and see what's going on in this part of the county.
286>> Diesel engine changed. >> That's it. That's it. Some welding. Exactly. Some some welding. >> Great. >> Yeah. >> Any other questions or clarifications? All right. Uh, can I get a call for a motion and a second to adopt resolution 062326-2 for an executive session to discuss matters reflected in the attached resolution? The board expects to be in executive session for approximately 45 minutes and upon return to public session, action will be taken. Can I get a motion? Andrea, second, Dan. Thank you. All in favor? Hi. Okay. Oh, wait. Are we >> all right? Can I get a uh call for a motion and second to reconvene public session? Can I get motion? That was fast. >> I'm ready for >> uh Tara with a second. Thank you. Um, can I get a call for
287a motion and a second to approve agenda items 181 through 183 and include hand carries if provided? Can I get a motion? >> So move. >> All right, Brian. >> Seconded. >> All right, Rich beat you to the mo motion. Brian's got the second. Questions and clarifications. >> I need to abstain from 18.2. >> Any other clarifications? All right. All in favor? I >> I >> objections abstensions call. >> Oh, is it roll? >> Yes. >> Oh, I'm sorry. Roll call. >> Okay. Mr. Chapman. >> Yes. >> Mr. Hley. >> Yes. >> Miss H. >> Yes. >> Mr. Morgan. >> Yes. >> Mr. Matthews. >> Yes. >> Mapp. >> Yes. >> Mr. Morgan. >> Yes. >> Mes >> Mr. Spans. >> Yes. >> Stein. >> Yes. >> Mr. McIn. Yes. Old and new business. Can
288I get a call for a motion in a second to adjurnn? Whoa, Andrew was even faster. Followed by Dan. All in favor? >> I opposed. Extensions. All right, that's a wrap. Have a good night. Good night.