001foreign ER pursuant to the open public public meetings ACT public notice of this meeting has been given by the board secretary in the following manner posting written notice of the official bulletin board at the Voorhees Township Public Schools administrative building on July 6 2022 sending written notice to The Courier Post on July 6 2022 filing written notice with the clerk of Voorhees Township on July 6 2022 and posting on the Voorhees Township website on July 6 2022 please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance [Music] foreign [Music] let's cut over here Dr Levy here Mr schmoose here Mrs stubler here this is Watson here so good evening everyone um I'm happy to have all of you here but I am incredibly excited this is the my favorite part of this job um I'm so happy to
002have um Mr Mike Farrell here today um he is getting the 25-year service award um we have two individuals who are not here today but we love them all the same Mrs Doreen Brannon and Mrs Miss Lois Hensel um but I wanted to say a couple of quick words about Mr Mike Farrell um Mr Farrell has worked in the district for 25 years traveling between Crescent Osage and Voorhees middle middle school he is the band instructor for grades fourth through eighth he has worked with the New Jersey elementary honors band and all South band and has performed in over 80 different musical Productions as a percussionist he holds a bachelor degree in music education music performance and a master's degree in technology in addition Mr Farrell has been the CER summer camp director for 15
003years thank you Mr Farrell for your dedication to the Voorhees Community I cannot say enough um and and provide enough gratitude on behalf of the entire board for the wonderful 25 years of service that you have committed to this community we thank you all the students continue to learn from you and we are so incredibly lucky to have you in this community don't have me come up thank you so much foreign I also want to recognize Mrs Doreen Brannon she's a teacher at E.T Hamilton school um Mrs Brandon was hired in 1996 and began teaching second grade at Crescent school she then went on to E.T Hamilton school to teach third grade after teaching third grade for three years she began teaching fifth grade at E.T Hamilton where she is currently teaching today Mrs Brannon
004has also participated in various District committees Miss Lois Hensel is the secretary at Osage Elementary School Miss Hensel has worked at ostage for 25 years she has worked under three building principles Ms Hensel has been a partner with the Osage parent group and was the chair to many fundraising activities for the school her children attended the Voorhees schools and her daughter is currently a teacher at E.T Hamilton our sincere appreciation and thank you to Mrs Brandon and Miss Hensel for their wonderful service I'm sorry they couldn't be with us today but we um again are incredibly grateful foreign okay we have several items under information um fire drills and safety drills are shown on the attachment I'm sorry I skipped one I went too fast um can I get a motion to approve the minutes
005from the September 28 2022 meeting I'll move back I'll second wait did I miss something else I'm opening up the online voting I have um I have all votes of yes with one abstention from Miss Galliano motion carries there are several items under information items fire drills and safety drills as so as shown on the attachments the bus have actually evacuation drills as shown on the attachments the Hib report enrollment as of October 15 2022 and the suspensions we have two um Oprah requests that came in last month um both of which have been closed out board secretary report okay thank you uh the first item under the board secretary's report is really just a reminder that the November that the upcoming election is November 8th um for checking results you have to go to
006the County Board of Elections the school district really doesn't have any part in it but we just wanted to put that out as a reminder and to say check the County Board of Elections for results that night thereafter the next item is the budget calendar this time of year we put together a budget calendar uh it lays out the budget process and the key dates and the key meetings that we have throughout the process up until when we approve it and then what happens after that so that's something that we do each year and then the third item is our preschool expansion Aid update Pia update um we opened the full day kindergarten on October 3rd it was a very exciting day and we had our ribbon cutting ceremonial ribbon cutting on October 11th there's
007two items on the agenda addressing Pia and one even though we just got approved and started this program for 2223 we already have to submit the annual preschool plan for 23-24 and that's due on November 15th so we had to turn it around real fast and finish that one we're projecting about 190 students next year we currently have six classrooms so that would mean adding eight more we're going to have a meet a lunch and learn meeting with our provide with potential providers on October 28th right now we have one provider but we would really need to increase that to additional ones in order to offer this to 190 students there's another item 20.12 which is the preschool classroom size waiver for 22.23. initially we were going to uh the requirements for class square footage
008is 9.50 if it's under that you have to do waivers and so the minimum it could be a 700 but we had we had picked one classroom and we changed it because of was no toilet room in that one so we picked two other ones and they are 878 872 so we have to file a waiver for that just because it's under the 950 there's still plenty of room the state came out and looked at those rooms and was satisfied with how it looked so everything is fine there we just need to have this board approved and then we will have to do it again for the 23-24 year once we know what providers we're going with and the size of their classrooms but again you don't need a waiver of the classroom is 950
009square feet which would include the toilet room and a closet but if it's under that you just explain why it's still okay and that it's under the 950. um so that is all I have thank you thank you superintendent report thank you very much good evening to the Voorhees Township community members and stakeholders as we Embrace The Fall season and observe the change and transformation that fills the air as these change colors and fall to the ground we are reminded that transformation is occurring as with the fall it's important to recognize that trans is important to recognize transfer transformation in the form of leadership transformational leadership is to empower and encourage a team to realize overall success in the Voorhees Township Public Schools we are promoting and supporting the importance of working together as a
010team in this transformative time in education we're working together as a team through some of the following actions we have now developed teacher leaders who will provide training and coaching for our staff we're working with vendors to provide training and coaching for our staff we have key communicating meetings three times a year we have PFA meetings three times a year um I meet with the Voorhees Township Education Association monthly and I meet with the Voorhees Township administrators Association quarterly there are four superintendents forums we're having targeted committees made up of Staff members Our World Language committee is almost ready to begin their work for a world language program for next year uh there are currently 13 parent workshops available for our parents and I'm in the process now of meeting with the Voorhees Middle School
011student council members I'll meet with them once a month to hear their voice and also I will be meeting with fourth and fifth grade students that principal select from their school so I can hear their voice so all those things I just mentioned involve teachers administrators parents working together as a team so that we can move the district forward at this time I'd like to respond to questions that were presented at the September board meeting one of the questions asked was what are our current stem opportunities in the district each librarian provides maker spaces a Makerspace is a collaborative workspace for making learning exploring and sharing that uses high-tech to low-tech tools students can engage in a variety of activity activities such as Legos Raspberry Pi craft type tasks Etc students are exposed during Library
012class also students can come during their lunch or recess to work on activities of Interest classroom teachers can also check out materials stem is integrated into each content area and you can find that on our Atlas program which lists all of our curriculum guides coding is a focus at the elementary level the technology special Specialists work with hormone teachers as they participate in the hour of code coding is a related art at our Middle School all middle school students must participate in at least one STEM related activity each year for class each year we have three STEM related arts classes gaming coding and stem so although coding is a specific class each stem class does have coding in its plan and many of our students participate in Steam tank challenge the New Jersey school boards
013and we always have many finalists so of course we will continue to always integrate coding and stem into our curriculum but we believe that we have a strong curriculum in the area of coding and yeah that's about advocates for Youth and this is an organization where we use them and for lesson plans for our health lessons and those lesson plans were modified so we found that resource online other districts are using advocates for youth as well we modified their lesson plan so that we only focus on the core State Health standard so we did not use their lesson plan completely we modified them to only focus on what the Core State Standards required us to focus on according to their website advocates for youth envisions a society in which all young people are valued respected
014and treated with dignity sexuality is accepted as a healthy part of being human and youth sexual development is normalized and embraced there was another question regarding an advisory committee and the question reference policy number 9140 which is a Citizens advisory committee I did read policy 9140 both ends and the regulations both indicate that board members can establish an advisory committee of any type if they believe there is a need to do so and or the superintendent advises them of the need for a committee I believe that the question related to a curriculum advisory committee so at this time um there is no specific reference in policy 9140 that relates to curriculum how are we addressing learning laws was another question asked we had professional development on small group instruction for our teachers we have again
015lead teachers reading Specialists who will be providing targeted professional development for our teachers we're using the atlas program which is going to ensure consistency across the district and how teachers teach the curriculum we're using outside vendors to train our elementary teachers on the writing process and our Middle School teachers on small group instruction struggling students are provided with one hour instruction before school in our elementary schools struggling sixth grade students receive an hour of instruction prior to the start of the school day for two years we provide an intensive summer school program and we will do the same this year reading and math Labs have been created for struggling student at the middle school and if there's an increased inclusion for students eligible for special education services uh and that's the focus of our child
016study team for increased inclusion so those are how we are addressing learning learning laws at this time how are we providing assistance to teachers in regard to lesson planning and support for the implementation of all aspects of the curriculum so all districts were required to update our Curriculum by September 2022 and we have done that and I want to commend Dr Young on doing such a fabulous job in her team uh Dr Young and her team worked the entire summer to ensure our curriculum guides were aligned to the standards and for the most part very few changes were necessary the major changes occurred of course in our health and PE curriculum teachers were trained on the atlas program all curriculum guides and resources are available in Atlas and gives the teachers very detailed information as
017to how to teach the standards Dr Young has had a very engaging and informative POC meetings um or Monday and I'm sorry Tuesday and Wednesday and I attended both of them and she did a fabulous job each grade level K to five met up is meeting a half a day with Dr Young while she goes over some very key areas of the teachers had asked for additional support that's differentiate instruction small group instruction lesson planning the atlas program World Language and our move this world program so Dr Young is covering all those Topics in about two and a half hours with each of our grade level teachers I again I attended the workshops and it was very informative the teachers were very engaged and a couple of uh things I heard throughout the Workshops can
018we do this every month because what one teacher asked one teacher said I feel better now another teacher said I understand now so again I want to commend Dr Young for very informative pocs she has two more tomorrow and then she would have covered all K5 uh teachers I also want to take the time to thank our principals and our teachers and our buildings for helping to cover classes while those teachers were at the plcs that's part of the teamwork that I'm referring to in order for those teachers to get training principals had to cover classes and other teachers had to cover classes I just want to take an opportunity to thank everyone for their team spirit to make sure those teachers were able to come and get some much needed professional development uh World
019Language I just want to let you know that our committee is I believe almost there ready to start their work so we did um hear the concerns of parents about World Language and we're putting a committee together to look at some options for next year there was a couple questions about school safety the district works with the Voorhees Police Department to ensure that we are using best practices for school safety our district plan is approved by the New Jersey Department of Education every year for anybody who wants to know more about our safety program there will be a virtual parent workshop on October 27th at 6 pm and I will be co-presenting that workshop with members of the Voorhees Township Police Department so if you'd like to know any more about school safety please attend
020that parent Workshop all of our parent workshops are listed on the website with the link so during the workshop parents will engage in a conversation about school safety policies and procedures preventive resources for students families and school Personnel type of communication channels we use and also before emergency drills that we are required to do every year so please attend that Workshop it would be very very informative um we had a parent who addressed the district regarding policy number 9130 uh this parent uh presented six books that she uh felt should not be in our Middle School library um we probably met as a committee um and made up of myself Dr Young and some other staff members to review those six books um and we made um one book is on the agenda tonight to
021be removed from the Middle School library and the reason that book is being removed it is because it is a sixth grade reading level but it's a 9 to 12 interest level so we are removing the book because it has interest level of 9th and 12th grade all other books are remaining uh in the library there were some slight changes we made uh one book went from permission only required for sixth graders to permission required from 6th 7th and eighth grade or eighth grade the remaining books remained as well as is as far as our parameters are concerned but I think that parent for bringing these books to our attention and this is what we do as a district we Implement our policy when we get any questions or concerns there will be a parent
022virtual Workshop um held on November the 15th this one is in person so we have 12 virtual workshops but this particular Workshop will be in person the workshop was scheduled as a response to the request of our parents who wanted to engage in a workshop that talked about the language of our LGBT community understanding what specific terms when I hear a term what does that term mean so parents wanted to get more information about that so in response to our parents who asked for this Workshop it is scheduled for November 15th at seven o'clock in the Middle School theater we had to cap the number at 100 because we wanted to be an interactive Workshop however if we get more than 100 parents who are expressing interest we will have another workshop and the title
023of the workshop is the power of language understanding the differences between sex assigned at Birth gender identity sexuality and expression so again as our parents request things we definitely try to make sure that we give parents what they need um on this agenda tonight preschool instructional coach we're excited um to have the board vote on this person uh this person has extensive knowledge in the preschool curriculum and has worked with coaching and supporting teachers in the past at last the last board meeting there was a commendation for our principals for attending our board meetings and the Voorhees Township Public Schools district has a great group of principals who work extremely hard to support the overall operation of not only their schools but the entire district and to respect the amount of time that they devote
024to their schools I have advised principles that they are only asked to attend the June August and the reorganization board meetings for all other meetings they have been asked to have one principal attend and TurnKey the information so I'd like to at this time welcome Miss darling as our principal representative tonight um you there is an amazing group of principals here and they work very hard probably more nicely you can imagine they're working very late and we want to make sure we respect their time as well and our Board of Education sound system has been ordered it was ordered on October 6th at this time we don't have an approximate delivery date yet but it has been ordered there's still some supply chain issues but hopefully um if we will get it soon um but
025it has been ordered okay you're very welcome um at this time I'd like to conclude my report by having Ms Stone come up and she's going to do the annual report on student safety data system we have to do this annual I have a very brief PowerPoint presentation to to share um basically it just has some data um our student safety data system is something that the state requires for reporting purposes um it's the old violence and vandalism electronic problems and vandalism report and it's now called the student data system we report each school reports any instruments that are two-time story a square records in December and then another report at the end of June um and what I'm going to share with you is our data from last school year so the 21 22
026school year just the total of all of our incidents and in what categories is really small so I know you're gonna have a hard time I just posted some basic um examples of things that could be reported and this is a really touchy kind of subject because when you see things like weapon and weapon use and weapon possession or weapon sale and distribution so I wanted to kind of talk about that because if you see a school that had an incident where we reported a weapon we are a k to eight District not that things can't happen but a weapon could be something as simple as a threat made with safety centers but the curve so but we do report and it is considered a weapon that the students were to say something like operated
027Pokey with these scissors that we do take serious and we do still report it um but violence is one category of vandalism is another substances weapons and then harassment intimidation and holy examples of violence could be simple um simple altercations physical altercation among students that's going to categorize as a violent incident vandalism is destruction of school property um kids do tend to walk down the hall and they might bump into something purposely um or if they're pushed another student and they knock something over or something um vandalism substances any type of substance abuse [Music] again it's hard to see what the data is but I'm going to go through violence we had one incident reported at ET Hamilton for the school year we had five at Crescent one at Osage one at Signal Hill and
028eight at the middle school and for our incidents of violence more physical altercations in office um vandalism we had one at Osage and one at the middle school zero at Hamilton zero across and zeros and again that's destruction of smooth property um substance is zero across the board of middle school was reported um we did have one weapon at Signal Hill uh again very minor reported Elementary School I'm gonna stab you with these scissors type of an activity event intimate that happens um and then it does also record our confirmed cases of harassment intimidation bullying and our allegations so requested we had one that was confirmed Osage we had one confirmed Signal Hill 2 and warriors Middle School we had then we had alleged meaning that we did an investigation and it was not found
029to rise to the level of harassment to the National bullying um there were zero at Hamilton one of Crescent two at Osage one at Signal Hill and 15 at Morris Middle School so that is the data that was sent to the state of New Jersey through our ssds frequency um this part does open for public comment so does anyone have any questions regarding this specific data thank you thank you if I could have Dr Levy provide a policy committee update good evening everyone thank you Mrs Watson uh earlier this evening we uh reviewed two policies for second reading they are on the agenda for this evening the first was 9 700 special interest groups and the second was 24.25 emergency virtual remote instruction program we also reviewed one policy for a first read which will
030be on the agenda next meeting that's 5512 harassment intimidation or bullying that policy has revived language to match our state template updated reporting guidelines and specified training intervention for students who are involved in three hibs in one school year that concludes my report thank you so much audience participation anyone wishing to address the board please attach the back table and write your name and address on the login sheet if you are attending via Zoom please use the raise your hand feature to be acknowledged while the board is limited in its ability to respond to the public on matters involving Personnel litigation negotiations and attorney client privilege the board will now hear comments from the public relating to items on the agenda for the board meeting comments are limited to three minutes the board will not
031take action this evening you will be notified at some later time by letter electronic mail telephone or in the context of a later board meeting of any action the board does take I'm assuming everybody wants to go see the Phillies all right comments from the board yeah I just want to thank Dr Hackett our team for hosting a terrific ribbon cutting of the Early Childhood uh Center October 11th it was uh very well put together it's a beautiful place I encourage anybody who happens to be in the area of Crescent to stop by and take a look at it's really really impressive thank you um I have a comment yes doctor I'd like to thank Dr Hackett for installing this new practice of responding to the issues that come up at the previous board meeting
032uh I appreciated hearing all those even from a board perspective I get to see some of these things implemented uh and some of them I don't ever see or know really know the answers to so I appreciate that transparency thank you any other word formers okay transportation can I have a motion to approve all of the items under transportation I'll second voting is open thank you I won't come up Mr smoose can I just ask you how you would like to vote what would be your answer yes okay can I get a motion to approve all of the items under policy thirteen one to thirteen three thank you online voting is open yes okay yes okay okay that's fine the motion unanimously passes I'm closing online voting thank you personalities are superintendent recommended items for
033our approval under uh section 14 can I get a motion to approve all the items under personnel a second online voting is open all right thank you the motion unanimously passes I'm closing the voting thank you there are no items under deferred action new business uh can I get a motion to approve all of the items under new business some of the second online voting is open motion unanimously passes closing voting our next meeting is at the administration building at 7 pm on November 16th again again I want to reiterate the election will be held on November 8th audience participation anyone wishing to address the board please approach the back table and write your name and address on the login sheet if you are attending via Zoom please use the raise their hand feature to
034be acknowledged while the board is limited in its ability to respond to the public on matters involving Personnel litigation negotiations and attorney client privilege the board will now hear comments from the public comments are limited to three minutes the board will not take action this evening you will be notified at some later time by a letter electronic mail telephone or in the context of a later board meeting of any action the board does take foreign your son just had an opportunity to talk to a lot of members of our community and I do have a list of things you know positive negatives some concerns but one thing that resonated a lot more often than I expected under concerns about learning loss there is concern that we don't have enough classroom needs using a small group
035differentiated instruction there seems to be a lot of concern that students that are completed the tasks will not have anything to do after they're done or tasks and some people mentioned that other towns you know just seem to have a lot more classroom needs and I think that the big overwhelming concern really is the learning loss and I found that to be very important and it's okay I will email the rest of the feedback that I've received award so thank you very much for your time thank you foreign hi Terry Dell I just want to ask you um I I believe last meeting we brought up some concerns about putting some of the holiday listings on the calendar from the school calendar we mentioned that I guess we did stuff in mind we didn't hear
036about you know what we discussed about them from last time so I was just coming that up again to find out it's part of the answer yeah yeah a lot of diversity to finding out uh because we used to have that calendar why you know we had all the kids understand why we have all today it's not listed so just kind of curious if we can add that background to a school calendar sure sure um so last meeting I did um talk about Diwali and then um the calendar issue came up at the 90-day um forum and it was about putting the dates at the reason why we're off and when we meet with the calendar committee um which is around January that work is something I'll bring up um what to put the dates
037as to why we're off right right yeah this is whether it's a uh you know in service days that's that's basically what I just want to point out okay again yeah I did mention at the last meeting that we did have a meeting with someone from the Indian Community and we're doing our research and right now we found that in our area only Cherry Hill as in eastern does not so we're still doing research right now okay okay yeah but tons foreign opportunities available in the Philippine schools that was really informative and you know hearing about a lot of these for the first time so I'm really glad to hear about them and I hope that we can continue to build on these programs to bring even more um based opportunities for our students one
038idea to bring more steam-based opportunities to Voorhees that I wanted to propose for the sport to consider has to do with the CBR over the past few months I've had lots of conversations with families across Georgia and one theme that has come up often dissatisfaction with the current CER programs offered by the Florida school district around the playground working parents lament that it's and I quote babysitting glorified babysitting these are the things that have I've heard multiple times and that parents have a lot of guilt over having to send their kids and actually spend way too much time on their iPads or watching movies and not enough time being meaningfully engaged the kids say it's boring this is not a criticism of our teachers Staffing the current program but I think it's an opportunity for
039us to look at it and think about um I grew up in New York City and I was elected kid um believe it or not I really enjoyed this I enjoyed live to me there were arts and crafts opportunities we played Sports there was always something fun going on and there were some days where I attended after school clubs one or two days a week before going to lunch we run by my elementary school one was Art based another was theater um and I have such vivid memories of being such a positive experience neighboring districts already offer after school programs like what I had had um growing up and I pour this award to consider exploration of bringing after school programming support like traditional CER Aftercare these clubs would have limited spots available and BC
040base for families to help cover the expensive Staffing materials and other related costs Club options can include things like coding chess painting crafting computer Sports debate less TV time less mindless scrolling on a device and more time for students to explore their interests be exposed to new learning opportunities and be meaningfully engaged during hours when parents and Guardians may still be working I look forward to discussing this idea and opportunity with further further foreign students are we seeing maybe programs that are going through each other like I just want to know I guess how that works any information thank you thank you foreign I'm now raising four kids in the district with my husband I'm just I have very common tonight that night about something I could just talk about the amended uh impending diversity
041District I just want to throw my support toward the audit I think it could be a good way to identify some factors that are leading to the lower test scores that we're staying amongst children the minority sub groups it could also be a way to further tailor the curriculum to include more age-appropriate learning opportunity learning opportunities excuse me regarding different cultures ethnicities historical facts genders sexuality preferences abilities it could also identify and address some ways to augment our already wonderful teaching management in the district with qualified certified professionals with various diverse backgrounds along those same lines I'm also involved with the boarding's cultural diversity committees and I look forward to meeting with Dr Hackett and to hopefully get involved with the district and and work together on some important and fun the eei and community
042outreach industry thank you thank you Lou Morgan's can you hear me now yes hi um I really appreciate the time to uh discuss current events with the recent CDC comments today and likely vote for tomorrow um in that context fear it's paved the way for Governors to shut down businesses and schools it's also paved the way to justify remote learning and mask mandates without any science or statistically driven guidance today the CDC they voted 15-0 to give liability protection to Big Pharma and themselves the vote had nothing to do with high efficacy rates or safety rates it had everything to do with covering big Pharma the CDC the FDA and anyone else who was pushing these vaccines on children so what if Murphy and the New Jersey Department of Health push a vaccine mandate for
043K-12 attendance I'm concerned that an mRNA injection mandate would pose an even bigger public education disaster than the learning setbacks that were caused by the shutdowns remote learning and mass mandates and for this reason now more than ever we need board leaders who think for themselves who won't just rubber stamp every mandate handed down by Trenton who will always prioritize what's best for Voorhees and now more than ever we need leaders willing to promote educational Excellence parents rights and keeping politics out of public education we need leaders who are accountable transparent honest respectful of the constituents and in particular of the parents I greatly appreciate you giving me time I think we're going to hear a lot more about what these CDC recommendations mean and I hope we don't have to go through more of
044the same thanks so much for your time thank you hi can you hear me yes okay uh my name is Cara Thornton my pronouns are she and her um says you can see it's pretty easy to say the pronouns um I firstly wanted to ask um I wanted to know which book was removed from the library and specifically why um secondly on that removing books or requiring parental permission is a slippery slope into censorship why does one single loud parent have a say in what is appropriate or not I do not need any parent deciding what my child is able to if a book is going to be requested to be removed or made difficult to check out perhaps that person should actually read them before making sweeping generalizations about literature they don't understand having
045well-read children is the pathway forward to having adults who can think critically which clearly is lacking in these parents trying to ban books along the same lines my 13 year old social studies teacher he's in eighth grade said he cannot speak about current events to them because of parents who are complaining current events are just that current events and are an integral part of our children's education to have teachers cowed by certain parents to the detriment of my child's education frankly I'm sick of it please reinforce to our teachers that they are doing the teaching and a handful of parents do not run the schools let the teachers do their job please push back on these parents who are causing harm thank you foreign s can you hear me yes hi um I just one
046quick comment as to the books that Dr Hackett had mentioned that have been removed or I guess one was removed and the other ones are remaining can you please release those titles to the parents in the school so they know that there might be a controversial book that is being able to be accessed by their child and they may not want their child to be exposed to that book whether or not they're you know regardless there should be some Choice here I think that books that contain certain language and certain topics uh that are controversial should not be made or I don't mean the parents should know what their child can access thank you I'm going to ask Dr Hackett to address the question since several parents have brought it up and we have the
047information readily available okay so there were six books as I mentioned earlier um the parent did get an email with a decision based on all six books um the first book being jazzed my life as a transgender team the committee determined that there will be no changes to the parameters of this book the current parameters are parent permission is required for grade six and it's available to all seventh and eighth grade that was in place prior to their parents um complaints and uh the committee determined that there would be no changes made to that current parameters of that book the second one book was called The Bluest Eye this book is only available to teachers um so it was in the library so I guess it appeared on some list but it was on it's
048only available for teachers students never um read this book or they do check out this book the third book is called sold s-o-l-d and the committee determined that parent permission would be needed for this book six to eight it does speak about human trafficking and there are some some language in there that we believe that the parents should just know um that the child is reading this book so um the requirement before the committee met was that only sixth grade parents would have to have permission but we decided that all parents um would get the permission would be needed for any child who read this book the fourth book was 13 Reasons Why and there was a current practice of the librarian informing the guidance Council when this book was checked out and the committee
049determined that that practice would continue the fifth book with The Perks of Being a Wallflower um this is the book that's on the agenda for removal again the book is at a reading level grade six but an interest level Grade 9 to 12. and that is the only reason the book is being removed because it's a 9 to 12 interest level the sixth book is poet X and the committee determined that there will be no changes made to the current parameters of this book which was it's only available to 8th grade students thank you thank you nickname my name is Denise Vogel I have two children I want to thank everybody here sitting up here for your volunteer time and for doing what you do thank you so much um I just wanted to say
050um I wanted to commend the coaches um at BMF um especially field hockey coaches but I know that the other coaches are working hard my girl has learned so much because of them and they are giving more time after school especially they have their own families um and I'm just really proud of our staff at BMS I've been my kids went to Signal Hill and it's been a wonderful uh just experience all throughout for my children I'm also a mortgage kid um and also I wanted to just put it in there to continue with these family nights even though we had this board meeting tonight and I'm happy to come because I you know I like to be informed but I love the family of nights it's I don't have that many left a couple
051of years from now because they're going Eastern but I really love the idea I think it's it has brought a lot of families together and um I just would love to see that continue so please but maybe I know the calendars are crazy uh thank you thank you duly noted any other comments comments from the board I have a question yes on the topic of the books is that similarly similar to um I guess school districts surrounding our area do they have similar books and those titles all pulled from though is it you know is it so I'm not sure with a parent who brought the titles to my attention where that parent received those particular six titles um but once we determined those six titles were in our library um according to the policy
052a committee has to be formed I think it was about seven of us Dr Young about seven of us on the committee and who's like who makes up that committee uh doctor you might have helped me out Dr Young's Dr Young myself the principal of the middle school I'm just curious like is it teachers and teachers okay teachers and administrators okay thank you I just was curious if it's similar to surrounding districts I'm not sure if if those books were brought to us around the districts thank you I actually have a question about the book Banning is a removal rather as well um I I've been a parent in this district for a long time and I've actually known transparency around the process for how books are audited whether it's an annual thing uh whether
053a parent can come in and simply say I don't like this book and here's why it strikes me that with this particular book um this was one person's complaint and then it was brought to a committee but that book how long has that book been there without any issue okay um so there's an extensive process that the librarian uses um she goes through various um vendors online to determine the reading level of books the interest level of books um so she does an extensive process for all the books there's over a thousand books in the library uh this particular book had only been checked out I Believe by one or two students over the last five or six years so it's been in the library for a few years but only one or two students
054checked it out but again in the middle school we want the interest levels of the books to be six through eight and this book's interest level was beyond um eighth grade and that is the only reason why it was removed any other comments from the board moving to finance can I get a motion to approve all the items under Finance so the second online voting is open foreign there will be no executive session tonight and can I get a motion to adjourn the meeting I was going to say nobody nobody wants to leave second okay all in favor hi thank you thank you