001uh if everyone could take their seats please yeah thank you thank you uh we're back from executive session i assume we're on camera and streaming thank you very much i will go to board correspondence and project graduation funding i think everyone received a uh letter um i don't know if that's going to be discussed in uh operations or not at all uh so it already was discussed in operation right but when you do your presentation so i would you agree that it would be appropriate to leave that discussion for that time period yes excellent that's what i was hoping to hear so now it's uh dr jewett's time for superintendent's comments thank you um i do just want to speak to the resolutions for revisions to this year's and next year's calendar that are on
002the agenda if you recall earlier this year we had approved a revision to the current year's calendar to accommodate the new federal and state holiday of juneteenth so we are ending the school year a day earlier so in order to do the same thing next year uh the the beginning of school next year for that first week we had teachers reporting tuesday wednesday students reporting thursday friday so i met with the whrea leadership to ask them if they wanted the additional day that week to be a student day or a teacher day i told them that i would go with their preference if i was able to and making the calendar modification and so they met with their executive board and came back to me that they would like an additional pd day that week
003so you'll see on the calendar revision that we now have three teacher pd days prior to students returning and one of the teacher p days and pd days in october is going to become a regular school day and then the other uh just minor modification on both this year's calendar and next year's calendar is in regard to the fact that we are we had mentioned uh back in the fall through the ed committee report that we are not having formal final exams in the traditional sense anymore um and so we've actually taken that weighting out of the grade and so each marking period is worth 25 of the grade so we're adjusting that last week of school schedule a little bit because instruction will actually continue up until the day before graduation so in order
004to make that schedule work we are just changing uh one more full day for students to a half day for students or an early dismissal to accommodate the the scheduling teachers are able to give assessments during those days if they want to when we're actually arranging a schedule so that a student wouldn't have any more than two assessments on a given day but those can only count towards the fourth marking period grade so we have made that adjustment so that's why you'll see both calendars on there for approval tonight with those minor revisions so i just wanted to explain that and i'm going to save the rest of my comments for the honorees that we will be speaking of in a little bit so thank you and welcome to our student rep it's very nice
005to have you thank you very much dr jewett uh for my comments for those of you who don't know this will be my last board meeting i've been on the high school board now this will be my ninth year after seven years on the k-8 board and it's a bittersweet time for me i very much enjoyed serving the community and appreciate over the years the community engagement that i've seen i also appreciate the collaboration of our students parents faculty administration in many of our endeavors including our strategic plan and this has been a great honor to serve our community for such a long period of time finally i'd like to thank my fellow board members it's really been a privilege to serve alongside of you all of you are very professional engaged and really care
006deeply about the school and our students for that i'm grateful and i know that our board is in great hands going forward so i thank you very much all of you for your lengthy service and with that i will pass it on to mr sties for his business administrative comments thank you mr president i just have two things first thing is we did have a an evacuation emergency evacuation drill a semi-annual drill it was done here at the high school in the south building lot about 40 routes and it went well supervised and this time i can actually say her name janice ortiz my former transportation person had a tough name to say i'm i i purposely heart now i did not sorry beth will kill me if i say that so yeah no but
007it went very well and uh my other thing is i i do um want to speak out a term but i do want to thank dr schubilski and barry hunsinger for the amazing support of the district and for your commitment you guys are just phenomenal our student comments um mr bernberg would you mind passing the microphone thanks student achievements the math team defeated brooksville broadway heights in round two of the erie challenge the team will advance to round three against the developing virtue secondary school to girls division the team had a perfect record after two rounds of the new jersey math league the team is number one the country and state we have six students with perfect scores the team excuse me the joy prescott humanitarian award for student leadership and education for keene university
008is present presented annually to a student leader committed to human rights and the pursuit of social justice from the council on global education oh thank you sorry about that i know it's old-fashioned but figured it might be easier to read at least i came prepared you did the joy prescott humanitarian award for student leadership and education from keene university is presented annually to a student leader committed to human rights and the pursuit of social justice from the council on global education and citizenship from keene university congratulations to senior reagan miller the 2021 award recipient reagan do you want to stand up [Applause] glow club's food drive was an incredible success the club made a donation to the food pantry on november 23 with 820 pounds of food the script and q club put on four
009outstanding performances on the pulitzer prize winning comedy you can't take it with you the performances not only provide excellent entertainment to parents families faculty and students but also imparted a wonderful story about pursuing your passion instead of spending time concerned with material wealth congratulations to mr lynch and the entire cast and crew in honor of national diabetes month the future health professionals club invited endocrinologist dr mina murthy to come and speak with our students dr murthy is an endocrinology diabetes and metabolism specialist in new brunswick and has over 42 years of experience in her medical field athletics update our winter athletics program is fully underway and basketball wrestling and fencing teams prepare for their first scrimmage this week our ice hockey bowling competition cheer and swim teams have had a great start to their seasons
010ice hockey 2-0 this team is enjoying a successful competitive start to their season as coach desco leads his team in his fifth season as head coach swimming 1-0 coach hawk coach telinski and their teams are ramping up for an exciting season after this year's virtual only meets the season's opener at phillipsburg was a win for the warriors congratulations to duke to junior lucas standridge who broke wachong hill's 500 free record with a time of 5 minutes 6 seconds 28 bowling 1-0 opening season has taken home the top three spot in a tournament the team also won their first match coaches krueger and rico rito are opening for a competitive and successful season the competitive cheers team led by coach martio continues to hone their skills as they compete in a number of competitions the winter
011cheer team with coach spina at the helm is training hard as they prepare to lead us into cheering on our warrior basketball and wrestling teams this season thank you very much any questions you're welcome to leave if you would like thank you so much uh we've got uh two sets of uh recognitions that uh dr jewett will uh uh present to us and then a little bit out of order of our agenda we'll then move to our first public commentary uh if you would like to start with recognition great thank you so much so um as sad as i am to see our staff leave it is nice that we get to celebrate them that we get the opportunity to do so and we do have a couple of mid-year retirements so we are going
012to celebrate those this evening and we have one of them whom is with us this evening so what i'm going to do first is i'm going to read the two resolutions for the two um who were unable to join us this evening and then i'm going to ask uh kathy chwanmo to come up so while i read her her resolution and because i know brenda's going to want to take pictures of you so i will start off with glenn graham he is one of our school counselors this proclamation regarding glenn graham shall be read at the public meeting of the wachong hills regional high school board of education on december 7 2021 whereas glenn graham was first employed by watson hills regional high school in 2006 after working as a student assistance counselor in voorhees
013and prior to that beginning his educational career as a teacher of biology in phillipsburg and whereas he has utilized his professional counseling skills in providing guidance and support to students and families on matters related to social and emotional wellness during his tenure at wachong hills and whereas he has successfully presented to incoming freshman students on the transition to high school and evening programs for parents and the community on topics related to the college application process and whereas he consistently works behind the scenes to support students and families through individual conferences and meetings on matters related to academic advisement and post-secondary preparedness and whereas he has remained a colleague and a friend to the whrhs staff and has decided to retire now therefore be it resolved that the watching hills regional board of education extends its
014heartfelt gratitude for glenn graham's 15 years of service and devotion to our school and wishes him a healthy and happy retirement to pursue his passions travel and whatever adventures lie ahead next i'm going to move on to kathy van armen who is a member of our child study team i just realized it's all three of our very important student support services personnel that are uh that i'm reading retirees uh retirement resolutions for this evening so um you have all served a crucial role for our students um throughout your careers and i think it has been highlighted even more so in the past year and a half this proclamation regarding kathy van armen to be read at the public meeting of the watching hills regional high school board of education on december 7 whereas kathy van
015armen has decided to retire after being a member of our special services department at watchung hills regional high school for 17 years serving students with disabilities here and in previous school districts for a total of 21 years and whereas she started her career working as a provider of wraparound behavioral services for students and families in an intermediate unit in pennsylvania which inspired her to apply to graduate programs and whereas she has spent the last 20 years as an exceptional school psychologist whose talent and commitment have enabled her to work with some of the students facing greatest their greatest challenges and whereas she has served not only as an outstanding role model for all of our students but also as an active member of the watchon hills community and whereas she has served her profession and
016the community by her unwavering commitment to show consistency humor flexibility and perseverance for students of all levels now therefore be it resolved that the wachong hills regional high school board of education extends its heartfelt gratitude for kathy van armen's 17 years of service and devotion to our school and wishes her a healthy and happy retirement to pursue her passions travel and whatever adventures lie ahead now i'm going to go up to the podium and if kathy if you wouldn't mind joining me so i can present you with yours this proclamation regarding catherine chonmo to be read at the public meeting of the wachong hills regional high school board of education on december 7 whereas catherine chuanmo has decided to retire after being a member of the child study team at wachong hills regional high school
017for 14 years serving students with disabilities here and in previous school districts for a total of 19 and a half years and whereas she started her career as an elementary school art teacher in fairhaven new jersey for four years where she imbued her students with a love of the arts and whereas she has spent the last 15 years as an exceptional learning disabilities teacher consultant whose talent and commitment have enabled her to support families with students facing academic challenges and whereas she has served not only as an outstanding role model for all of our students but also as an active member of the wachong hills community and whereas she has served her profession and the community by her unwavering commitment to enable students to feel good about themselves not only as learners but as contributing
018members in society now therefore be it resolved that the watching hills regional high school board of education extends its heartfelt gratitude for katherine chuanmo's 14 years of service and devotion to our school and wishes her a healthy and happy retirement to pursue her passions travel and whatever adventures lie ahead [Applause] and kathy i just want to say that i will always remember you as one of the first people that i met here who was so friendly and warm and offered your support in any way that i could need and the special services suite is not far from my office so i generally get to see you almost on a daily basis because you are always heading somewhere to see a student or a teacher walking through our halls so i really appreciate all that you
019have done to support not only our students but our staff and you've been a tremendous member of our community and we're going to miss you very much [Applause] i just want to say thank you i've had a really wonderful career here and it's been a wonderful community to work in very supportive administration fantastic teachers to work with and absolutely wonderful students and and families so i thank you for the opportunity and i've really had a very fulfilling career here [Applause] so just in in uh appreciation and in our typical uh celebratory manner we've got a little bit of uh cake or cupcakes i guess uh that we'll share with everyone for a few minutes and then we'll move on to uh first opportunity for public commentary before we go back to our normally scheduled agenda
020every time i get out that you pull me back it's really good actually wow we're gonna get started again uh thank you again for uh your support of our uh retiring staff members we're going to go a little bit out of order and move into our first public comment period to allow students who have attended to speak and be able to get home earlier than ordinarily the first public comment period is limited to agenda items for the meeting the second public comment period will be at the end of the meeting and open to any topic all comments are limited to five minutes you would remember to state your first and last name and the town that you're from when you speak and now's the time to come up to the microphone my name is ryan
021curran i live in watrung and i'm a junior e pluribus unum it is a latin phrase proposed by ben franklin thomas jefferson and john adams to be the motto for the great seal of the united states e pluribus unum means out of many one it is important that this is emblazoned on every quarter it was a reminder that this nation was to be unified despite our different faiths and backgrounds our founding fathers believed in unity but they also believed in religious plurality meaning every individual would have the rights freedom and safety to worship their own faith so important was this to the founding fathers that it formed the first amendment to the constitution the united states laws would not be based on the protestant majority nor would it favor them yet somehow 244 years later
022at watching hills regional high school it is the only it is only the religious majority who have rights equity and inclusion it is one thing when the board was unaware of the inequities in the school calendar we can chalk up the inactions to i didn't know but now you do know and you are willfully excluding us and denying us equitable access the attributes of a warrior are many including courage and strength tonight many watching warriors are here to stand for justice equity and inclusion grant eid and diwali at school holidays we are here and we will keep coming to remind you that we may be different we are one e pluribus unum thank you hi my name is nora curran and i'm a freshman from greenbrook once again board of ed i come here to
023speak to you about the addition of muslim and hindu holidays to the school calendar i'm here because i don't think the board realizes how their decisions reflect on the students whom they whom they represent on multiple occasions when encountering a student from another school they've had the same response oh you go to watchung hills isn't that the racist school the level of ignorance shown at this school has come to be the thing it is best known for throughout the state students from all over the state know watchung hills only as the racist school and nothing else instead of watching hills being known for our students many great achievements we are known for our ignorance if these encounters have taught me anything it is that watchung hills has a lot of catching up to do as
024a school notoriously known for racism our main concern should be inclusion and respect for minorities which is what we are exactly here what we are here today to ask of you the simple rearrangement of a few school days would go unnoticed if not celebrated among students watching hills should be prioritizing fixing our image as we have already fallen behind thank you uh my name is danny curran i live in washington hills and i'm a seventh grade student um dear bored fulfill your goals in the past few days on the occasion of thanksgiving i headed to my tetos or grandma's home it meant the welcome arrival of endless of an endless train of food turkey stuffing pies stuffed grape leaves mashed potatoes lamb cranberry pear sauce and the list goes on and on food is my
025tata's love language and i'm happy to to be the recipient my grandpa denny is always waiting for me too he has a treasure of adventure and fishing stories to share with us keeps us supplied with her fresh out of the oven date pistachio and walnut cookies while we listen eating the tasty snacks eases the fact that my cousins and i are squished together on the couch so we can all fit and i can barely breathe i call it the cousin cuddle memories of thanksgiving reminds me of the upcoming aid and diwali holidays over the past several months my peers and i through the wachon hills muslim hindu and jewish coalition have been petitioning the board of ed to grant naid and diwali as school holidays for students we made the case that without the ability
026to celebrate our families our families felt socially isolated we presented the stresses and anxiety we feel in missing school for our holidays we discuss the benefit to the entire community to having these holidays that are celebrated by over 3 billion people worldwide as a school holiday we've even done the math adding these school holidays only results in one that's right one add a day per year to the calendar for the next three years the board has diversity equity and inclusion goals however the board does not see the students petitioning them as worthy of inclusion or inequity perhaps i am telling the wrong story board of ed members this is the other part she needs me to come for her holidays how do i know this because her arms search for me to give me a
027big bear hug that are sweet sweet like marshmallows my grandpa danny needs me to visit too so i can carry his tackle box when we go fishing my hilarious and brilliant aunt needs someone to laugh at her jokes my best friend and cousin salaam needs someone to accompany him on our bike rides around the neighborhood my older cousins need someone to pick on let's face it it's not the easiest being the youngest the pandemic and the isolation that followed just heightened the love for my family and close friends if there's anything that the that this pandemic taught us and is still teaching us is that social interactions matter and it's hard when they're taken away from you celebrations and parties bring us together as a community it's what helps us meet new faces and see
028the ones that we love and it absolutely breaks my heart when i can do that that can create a ripple effect that can hurt the overall well-being of a community maybe you heard me wrong that having a day off is just about me or maybe you haven't heard us at all it's not just about the watching hill students our families and friends are counting on us too we contribute to this community as teachers plumbers emts doctors engineers and more it's about their mental health and their well-being too please watch on board of ed adding these holidays will help our community be happier and more vibrant and i made a poem like dr seuss's grandchild's small heart grew three sizes that day we hope the board will be convinced in some way to add those school
029holidays and bring joy upon our faces we will celebrate with our families and go to the best places many nearby towns have done it and so can you you have the power to be inclusive so we are not blue so we stand before you today to ask you to fulfill your equity presentation and allow us all a celebration with our families and our nation run run i must maiteta is at the door arms out and waiting please board of ed do the right thing and grant aidan diwali holidays without hesitating thank you hello i'm a junior from greenbrook rohan nagpal last board of education meeting i want to say i was surprised of this decision you guys made but i really was not how could i be none of you guys can relate to me
030or the rest of us so how can i blame you but then i realized actually you all can relate to me most of us here celebrate holidays specific to our religion and hopefully hold our holidays to a strong level of importance let's use christmas as an example if any of you here celebrate christmas i'm sure you enjoy waking up in the morning with your family and opening presents eating a nice lunch or dinner and spending time with relatives when i wake up on diwali my first priority isn't my family it's not my relatives and how they're going to come over tonight and we're going to celebrate it's my academics and falling behind academically in prior years all i was thinking about was the math test i had third period or the essay i have to
031write after school luckily you guys came up with a solution for this no tests and quizzes on religious holidays most people would think this is good but in reality it's not what's the point in that what does this tell me you're not as important as us but sure we'll give you some leeway does it mean my religion isn't as important as you is your religion does it mean i'm not as important as you to be honest with you all it's quite disappointing the fact that i have to come to every meeting and try and prove to you that i am equal to you is disappointing thank you a few nights ago i had the ple the privilege of hearing kizer khan speak his name like to many americans was one that was not familiar to
032me he rose to national prominence a few years ago when the story of his son captain humayun khan was told on the national stage it is worth retelling as it was told then if you want to see the best of america you need look no further than army captain humayun khan as a small child he moved with his family to america settling in maryland he graduated from the university of virginia with the hopes of one day becoming a lawyer like his father but first he felt a duty to serve his country so he enlisted in the army one day while serving in a military base in iraq a suspicious vehicle would approach the gates of his base captain humayun khan told his unit to step back while he went forward to investigate it would be
033ten steps before the car exploded captain humayun khan saved the lives of his entire unit by sacrificing his own we still wonder what made him take those ten steps khizr khan his father had said maybe that's the point where all the values all the service to country all the things he learned in this country kicked in it was those values that made him take those ten steps he was posthumously awarded the bronze star and purple heart for his courage he is the best of america captain khan is a muslim american and he died at the young age of 27. captain khan's story is so powerful what can we learn from his story a young man who was seeking to serve his country not because he had to but because he wanted to he acted without
034prejudice for he felt this was his america too he saw a generous america here at wachong hills however the students are told after months of petitioning by the board that we are sorry the pie is not big enough to share because we've arbitrarily decided so the students who are asking for inclusion and equity will one day no longer be students at wachong hills what values are we imparting to them as minorities but also to those in the majority is it that you only get equitable access if you are in the majority that is what you are saying by denying them equity denying them inclusion you are saying that you are not part of the fabric of this community one day these students who sit here before you might hold the scalpel of a surgeon the
035keyboard of a coder or the drafting pen of an engineer what world do you want them to create one that is petty driven by self-interest and fear or one that imagines possibilities of a selfless generous world and what would you say board of ed if fourteen-year-old humayun khan was standing before you asking for a day one day to celebrate his holiday a child who 13 years later would be willing to sacrifice his life for his brigade what would you say to him you're bored honor captain humayun's sacrifice and the sacrifice of so many others honor your promise of equity and inclusion and grant the students eid diwali eid and diwali off thank you [Applause] would anybody else like to come forward for this first opportunity saying none we'll close the first opportunity for public comment
036and we'll move back into our regular agenda on recognition if there are folks who would like to stay you're welcome to stay if you'd like to leave this is a good time to leave uh reagan thank you i didn't mean to put you on the spot but since your name was in the student report i figured congratulations of course you're welcome okay so before i read these two resolutions um i just want to say a few words about barry and greg so you are actually the last two standing on the board that hired me um so how dramatically we fall exactly um and you know you have both been i think i'm sure you know the board members will echo these sentiments as they speak about you but you both have been tremendously supportive um
037you have both been tremendous mentors to me as i grew into this role when i came onto the board and when i look at what we've been able to accomplish as a district throughout the nine years here it's absolutely 100 because of the support of the board um and you were you know really the part of the beginning of our first strategic plan you know i peter and bob came on right after um i had come on and so it's actually nice that there are layers to the board so that it's not that you know the whole board changes at once but we have you know a nice transition of people who you know folks who've been here and as they leave there's you know folks then who've been here for almost just as long
038um and and so it's nice to to build upon the leadership um that you guys established but i personally um i really want to thank you because you have been tremendously supportive um and by that i don't mean that you know we've always agreed on everything and you've agreed with everything i i've put forward you've challenged me to really think about doing you know about the decisions that i've made and the decisions i've brought to you and to always do what's best for students and the one thing that i tell people when they ask about the board is that our board is a hundred percent um about doing what's right for students and that in every decision you make um regardless of what town you're from of what your you know personal expertise or interest
039might be that that is what you always stand by with every decision and and you know the two of you certainly embody that and we've been able to really accomplish a lot as a district and move the needle because of that we have a lot of work to do still um and i but i think we've gotten better at finding what our areas of of weakness are in our areas in need of intention and being less um afraid to you know be transparent about them and and um speak publicly about them so that we can address them and so i really appreciate that because i think the board has made it uh has really made it okay to do that um because you know we want to really look at we want to celebrate our
040strengths but we also want to be able to identify what our areas of growth are and i think you know you've helped me do that for myself personally in my own professional areas as well so so thank you for that you are going to be tremendously missed on the board these are really going to be giant shoes to fill um so i i you know it's it's we're going to certainly feel your absence um but i think you've left a mark an indelible mark on the district and the board so thank you for that so i'll read your resolutions and then i'm sure everyone else has uh things that they would like to say as well so unless you want to get out early this proclamation regarding barry huntsinger shall be read at the public
041meeting of the watching hills regional high school board of education on december 7 2021 whereas barry hunsinger has served the watching hills regional high school district as an outstanding board member for nine years and whereas he has served on many committees during his tenure sharing his expertise and insights in the areas of co-curricular technology education and operations and served with distinction as the chair of the technology committee he has also served on the alternative finance strategic plan and regionalization ad hoc committees and whereas he has worked tirelessly for our students with his every decision oriented toward giving students the best possible academic athletic and co-curricular experience he constantly looked towards the future to foster creativity growth and success for our students and whereas he has continuously supported the hiring of outstanding administrators teachers guidance counselors
042and support staff he was instrumental in passing three referendums improving our infrastructure and student environment and has been a part of many developments at whrhs from the creation of the music tech lab renovation of the culinary arts room the addition of smart boards and one-to-one chromebooks and the newly renovated learning commons now therefore be it resolved that the wachong hills regional high school board of education extends a heartfelt thank you to barry hunsinger for his years of devoted service to our school district and wishes him the very best and continued success in his future endeavors [Applause] so i never planned on running for the board it wasn't one of my goals in life and then i got a phone call from sandy fechner and sandy said that her and fran had been talking and they
043thought that her and dr stromson thought that uh i would be a good addition to the board so yeah i don't know i thought about it i said okay so i did and oddly enough nobody ran against me that i know of so very you're very intimidating so when i got on the board about what a month and a half two months later fran announced her retirement i was like wow that's odd and then i was put on the committee to help select our new superintendent so if you wonder how he got liz that's one of those things well no we had a committee but you know i i have to say you you shined uh you outshined all the other candidates with your vision you what your knowledge of watching hills was and your
044vision for watch on kills and of course your resume was like spot on so that's how we land up here and you know because i'm such a techno nerd that's when i said you know why are we doing this why are we doing that and so we've had great boards i mean i think this might be one of the best we've had uh because we're all in that boat rowing in the exact same direction and so we have a great superintendent we have a great ba whose default answers always no and we have a director of hr that's phenomenal and who can step up and be the superintendent when we needed her to be and i think all of you as board members bring so much knowledge and experience to this board that i only
045see things getting better and better and better i mean you know we have what three lawyers now we have a doctor i mean so it just goes on and on someone who's a music specialist so i think this this board is going to move forward really well and this school is going to continue to go well right up [Applause] ready for the next one all right this proclamation regarding gregory schabilski shall be read at the public meeting of the watching hills regional high school board of education on december 7 2021 whereas gregory schabilski has served the watching hills regional high school district as an outstanding board member for nine years since his appointment in 2013 he has served as the board president for two years and vice president for four years and whereas he has
046served on many committees during his tenure sharing his expertise and insights in the areas of operations curriculum buildings and grounds and negotiations and served with distinction as the chair of the operations and negotiations committees through the committees he shared his extensive knowledge expertise and insights to foster creativity growth and success for our students whereas he has worked tirelessly for our students with his every decision oriented toward giving students the best possible academic athletic and co-curricular experience he proudly worked towards student enrichment in the arts world language science and many other programs and whereas he has continuously supported the hiring of outstanding administrators teachers guidance counselors and support staff he was instrumental in passing three referendums improving our infrastructure and student environment and has been a part of many developments at whrhs from the creation of
047the music tech lab renovation of the culinary arts room the addition of smart boards and one-to-one chromebooks and the newly renovated learning commons now therefore be it resolved that the wachong hills regional high school board of education extends a heartfelt thank you to gregory schabilski for his years of devoted service to our school district and wishes him the very best and continued success in his future endeavors [Applause] i think barry said it all and i think the most important thing is that we all have worked together it's really been a privilege to work with all of you who are i think very devoted uh not to self-interest but to the best outcome for our students in our community i'm very appreciative for it i think uh our schools are in the best of hands with
048all of you uh at the helm hopefully you can mentor our uh in coming to board members to continue to row in the same direction and follow suit and i think our jobs are made a whole lot easier by our administration liz tim beth overseeing a large group of administrators and faculty who really make it a pleasure to serve so i'm very appreciative for myself personally i will miss this group of people uh you've really been a big part of my life over the past nearly decade uh but it's time to move on and let some new people learn the ropes and uh carry on so thank you very much for your support over the years [Applause] so i'd like to just thank you we were having and the um from both of you and
049all the board um was tremendous so nobody you know nobody gave me so it was it was that was that's what i think was very significant because it could have went so many different ways [Laughter] you could talk to me next year when i retire so barry i just want to say as a fellow former watch online i looked you were so approachable when i joined the board three years ago and uh friendly and i will miss your technical expertise and technology and i always liked how you um approached every time we talked about approving something technology-wise you always questioned it and challenged it and i really felt like you were the guy who knew that stuff so i will miss that um and greg i think you exemplify um when we talk about um
050giving of your own time for anybody who thinks they can't do it because they're too busy this man is a surgeon he's he's raised six children um and all of whom are very accomplished and all you do being on the board for how much 16 years total between the two and and president for like half the time nobody should ever say they don't have time to give when this man gives the time uh and has the kind of life he has so i will i will miss both of you very much just don't sleep yeah i don't think greg actually sleeps well i'll pile on um you know certainly you know barry it's been a pleasure working with you uh particularly in yeah alternative financing which was a lot of fun and uh operations where
051you know your technological expertise you know really shined and really helped us uh as a district as we move forward and in addition to that um your passionate support for our extracurricular programs and your visible support of our athletic programs and you know the football program and being out there and cheering the kids on and you know helping um you know our coaches in with guidance as they are on boarding and making transitions in here i think that that has been uh been phenomenal you've certainly represented your community well but you've represented all of our community as well in that service um and and greg i had the benefit of having you as a board member when my kids were in the warren district the first time i met greg was at a middle school
052band concert where as board member he was there also as a father but i remember him at the end of the concert going up and congratulating my son for some strange reason and it's just he introduced himself and he said hey you did a great job and so i then went and introduced myself to greg and i just thought it was so neat that a board member would take the time to congratulate a student you know at a middle school concert i just that that told me a lot about who you were um and certainly as i became interested in being on the board and then serving on the board you provided great mentorship um over the years and you know i can't i could go on and on and i won't but i i
053will just say that i'm very grateful to you for your service to our community for the 16 years for your service to this board and i'm certainly grateful for all the time and counseling you took in in mentoring me into my position here and for that i'm forever grateful to you so thank you don't don't feel like you have to no i'm just gonna say because i haven't worked with you directly on any committee but it was a pleasure to serve with both of you and thank you for your service uh again i'm at a slight disadvantage as a relative newbie to the district as well as to the board and not having the opportunity having the kovitz situation create the remote board meetings for the first several months my slight disadvantage but i certainly
054want to second the emotion that i'm hearing from all the fellow board members because i certainly feel that as well when asked why i joined the board it was for my passion for students and the betterment of the students because to this day i believe that students are not first i believe that they are not you know that there's others that come before students and it's our job to make sure students are first with that said being on the board gave me the opportunity to be with some of the best and the brightest minds and the people who are most passionate about what i feel are the goals and what should be the goals leaders lead we are a bunch of leaders and the two you exemplify leadership and that's very important guidance steerage and
055again i've been on other boards and there's a lot of murky water that has to that you have to navigate through and it's our job to do that we are elected officials it is our responsibility to maintain uh an even keel let's say and to maintain the goals and i think the two of you exemplify that and others as well and i'm gonna write i'm taking notes so next year whoever retires i'm gonna probably say the same thing um so uh as most of you know in sunset but you may not realize the person you sit next to is very important because that's the person you get the kibitz with and there's always the sidebar and there's the side comments i was noticing peter and bob with a few comments because it's just natural because
056you need someone to just say things so so barry and i would have you know you know some dialogue and it's just excellent so i appreciate that barry uh greg i definitely want to thank you publicly again i had a personal issue greg was there he helped me with that personal issue with my family and so i certainly appreciate your time and things are working out great um and the other thing is for me working with people is one thing but becoming friends with people that's another thing and my goal always is that the people i work with even though you're going to be moving on i make it an effort to maintain that relationship in that friendship because in my mind it shouldn't just end just because the board in our board business ends
057uh the two of you are also great people not just board members and that should not be forgotten and i take great pleasure in that and calling you my friend uh so again thank you and i ditto all the comments you know the service and you know the public should appreciate that because again like susan says you know we give of our time that's all we have we're all busy we have regular lives and uh you know you know i hate to use the word that we sacrifice because it isn't you know it's a pleasure because we don't want to do it we wouldn't do it you know we're not paid but we want to do and we feel it's the right thing to give back to the community so i appreciate that so that's
058all i really have to say and so i thank both to you and uh i'm sure you both will probably miss it and just like peter came back on a year later you may both run again and we may see you again so and i would welcome that so but both of you good luck with uh whatever you choose to do on uh your uh tuesday nights thank you so briefly barry i feel that we share a certain kinship having grown up in the area together the wachong lake and the legend of watchung hating from sears but your love of the community i said we share that affinity um your love of the community really has shown through with your board service so thank you very much and greg so much thanks for the support
059last year with open the school close to school half a day full day your leadership and your knowledge and skills in managing those situations as well as the waiting room on zoom and all of that is greatly appreciated so thank you both very much time to move on to committee reporting anymore greg just before committee reports yes there's a habit we used to have at the k-28 board which you remember which we would actually vote for these resolutions for retirees it's something we've never done on this board i would like to if i may move the approval of the five resolutions that were read tonight and i it's a voice vote i think that's all we need yeah let's move on to our education committee report so the education committee met on december 1st on
060the agenda for tonight are some policies mandated policies 54 60.02 and 24.25 these are on agenda for first reading so i'm not going to go through them belabor the points just to remind everyone that these are peter's favorite types of policies and that they are mandatory mandated policies that we need to put in place uh regarding the calendar i'm not going to rehash what dr jewett discussed regarding the calendar however part of our discussion really focused on the homework zone or homework free zone days and really spending some time understanding all of the various holidays uh impacts and how the schedule would work out so that not only is the day itself homework free but that the students are not coming back the next day after the holiday into you know an onslaught of tests
061and quizzes and other things so looking at what are those homework-free zones around the holidays is something that the the mr librera as well as the administration and supervisors are working on and i think that uh as i understand it we'll have a more uh full a fuller report uh regarding uh their look at this in uh january um the uh we also got an update from mrs phelan regarding the arp funding the use of the american rescue plan funding for our you know largely around our empower program this is the program that we put in place to help identify students that may be falling behind and then have extra support services available to for them as well as to provide support for folks that would walk in you know as well so it wasn't
062just for those that have been identified but other students that may have have been identified as or other students who have self-identified as needing some extra help that this this program is in place for them as well um we also discussed the hour of code that there will be two days in december for students to take advantage of the hour of code it's open to all students who are interested and is offered during the free period lunch or after school it provides an environment to introduce some of our students to the concepts of computer programming uh additionally uh mr librera updated the committee that our partnership with us2 cares for our diversity equity and inclusion program is coming to an end i believe that the last program with them was last friday um if i'm
063not mistaken we still have we have this week i think right okay so it's it's wrapping up right now um and that he they're looking at what the next steps will be and we'll provide the committee with an update once those next steps are finalized so that is that completes a report i'd offer committee members any additional comment or elaborate on things maybe i would like good job and any questions from other board members yeah dr jewett or maybe uh talking about the esser program the empower could you just remind us how many students and teachers uh got involved at the beginning and has it expanded and how many are being served now and do we expect to continue the so the empower program we have a couple of support programs that we had talked
064about at the last meeting this one is the um it's a it's almost an alternative high school program for students during certain periods of the day so we have one full-time teacher that we hired for this program who's actually dual certified in english and special education who left a job where they were an english teacher because they were so attracted to serving this program and and the students most in need and then we also have one of our math teachers pushing into the program as well um and we have students in there for the most part for credit recovery um rather than you know so if they we had students who struggled quite a bit during the very non-traditional turbulent schedule over the past year and a half of of not being here being here
065sometimes um and so we've had this need in years that aren't following a pandemic where we've had a you know a hybrid instructional model as well as some students who have been 100 virtual but the esser art funds gave us the um the funds to be able to start a program like this and we had talked to the board where we actually have it in uh the srr grant did we end up putting it in there for three years tim or two we yeah we tried to so we put two years in um so we're guaranteed that we'll be able to run it out of that money for the next two years and then the plan would be if it's successful we will probably talk to the board about getting it into the general operating
066budget i believe there are 28 students that we've identified that are in the program um and let's see if i can find this information and it's in um various subject areas we're using an online provider edge annuity but knowing that if a student already you know struggled in a course telling them to just okay you know make up for it online that's we certainly know that these students need more support than that however as we didn't have teachers certified in every subject area that we could use to oversee this program we identify thought that having an english certified teacher obviously you know that that being one of the most crucial subjects um to oversee the program uh so that they can actually teach the english course of course part of it and then they can
067support the students doing the other courses via ingenuity but then for math we also have a certified math teacher that is supporting the students for math so in terms of just finding other questions you asked okay so we have 15 angel individual students who make up the 28 seats that are filled because some of the students might be in it for more than one section throughout the day and we also have a supplemental section for ell as well as general support for students you know study skills and assistance with homework and those types of things that's separate from the after school tutoring that we have set up the after school support in the learning commons that we have teachers here every day and that is open we do have certain students who we've reached out
068to that we want them to come and have encouraged them to come and identify them um that it would be appropriate for them but it is open to any student who wants to come and get additional support and so far both programs are going very very well um and and actually what i'm going to share with the ed committee and with the board um the our director of counseling jason sabino had recently met with daniel scanlon who is the teacher the main teacher over seeing the empower program and some of the stories of these students and um are very compelling in terms of the gains that they've already made and so mr sabino actually asked me if i'd like him to share those with me to share with the board and so he's going to
069do that so i'll be able to to give you some follow-up from the students on their feedback on on how it's making a difference for some of these students just the fact that they're actually coming to school um is a huge uh accomplishment and uh and achievement you know from from the past so that's the first step is actually getting them here and then making sure that they can get the support they need in these classes to hopefully graduate on time is then you know the next step thank you for that little detail i appreciate it the other question i had the u.s two cares program i take it they've been helping us put on some sort of yeah and i'll actually let ms schneiderman speak about the current uh pd kind of the last
070piece of our contract with them that we're finishing out that goes in pd we it was supposed that it was supposed to be finished we had set up this contract with them pre pre-covered pandemic and and all and the change to the schedule so that so this was actually supposed to initially be completed at the end of last year but because of obviously everything going on we had bumped some of the things to um to adjust the timeline a bit so i'll let mr schneiderman expand on that so and just before you do that so with this ending we'll be looking either at them or for someone else to provide similar sort of service right um it's aligned with a strategic plan with one of the goals so that there's an action team to to
071address that going forward um so we are wrapping up right now with programs that are aligned with students and faculty so the students and of course their families are invited to the evening webinars faculty members are attending the evening webinar as well and then they have a follow-up session because it's creating leadership within the district so then a squared consulting works with the faculty to be able to repeat those webinar presentations and continue the work with the students so that's the point we're at now with with them and that would wrap up the contract any other questions for bob or the committee thank you we'll move on to personnel personnel met on december 1st and we preview the sea items which are on the agenda um and then we went over policies which as bob
072said are basically mandated policies that we're having changes made because of certain types of statutory changes that have been made in the laws so they're not really substantive changes they're rewarding changes um and they're on for first reading tonight that's it as the operations committee met on december 2nd uh initially we went over a budget update from mr sties we uh our architects have a good history with us of providing us with estimates of various projects that go out to bid and and uh they've been quite good at predicting things however whether it's supply chain problems or the amount of work that's being done at schools now uh the bids are bids are coming in at higher than expected prices so we got two two recent bids one for the the gym floor what's up
073three four excuse me that floor came in uh a little maybe fifty thousand dollars higher the other thing a little bit more concerning i think is the uh the esip uh hvac and electric program came in uh substantially over the estimate so we may have to look at uh exactly what we're going to be able to include in that more on that to come no decisions tonight on anything we also had a discussion about the rfp process for for the various professional services that we engage that includes architects the auditors legal counsel bond council and as well as health insurance and we're looking also at doing property and casualty insurance brokers it's been a while since since we've done some of these so we're going to be the operations committee is recommending that we go
074ahead and do an rfp process for the auditors it's not that we necessarily expect it to be any change but it is good board practice to make them come in and give us their proposals every few years and it's been a while so we're going to try and do the auditors uh in the next few months and then sort of at the end of this coming year do the uh casualty and property insurance brokers uh which hasn't been done well i don't know that we've ever actually done that in the past but we want to we too spoke about policy updates that are just thrilling and i got a double dose of it because i also sit on the somerset county ed services board and adopted some of these same policies there and voted against
075them there too at least we know you're consistent but uh these have to do with with some of the uh federal regulations that that now require that boards have policies having to do with how they spend federal money that they get and all this esser money and some of the others is federal money so we now fall within that ambit uh then the most significant part of the meeting was the discussion of project graduation and the uh correspondence that we not all only received but was also in our packet tonight uh you know we we had previously had a brief discussion about project graduation uh tim gave one of his knee jerk no he doesn't want to do that to going forward with another pro not with this project graduation but the one after that
076uh and and uh we got that correspondence was from the pto president talk talking about the program and she also as you can see in in the material gave us a sort of a frequently asked questions about project graduation project graduation got started around the time maybe a year or two before my daughter graduated way back in 2007 here and was viewed by parents then as a great way to have the kids out doing something other than running from town to town partying on graduation night and the operations committee had a discussion uh we think that that that goal can still be served uh tim did reach out to both our council and to our insurance broker there are a few things that we can do adopting things that might make it slightly less likely
077that we would be sued if something terrible were to happen on a project graduation night uh and the operations committee is recommending that we do those things but that we keep track going forward you know we got to figure that over the last four or five years there's still about 75 percent participation in project graduation we going forward we want to keep track of that from year to year to see if it does trend up or down one way or the other but generally the members of the operations committee support continuing to support graduate graduation questions we do project graduation is not our job event right all right no you're right you are right i did not have my microphone on and i happen to know that the people on youtube would not have been
078able to hear me because i watched part of the last meeting on youtube and could not hear what anybody was saying my condolences for you watching that music that's right so again so all right so pg is not our event so that's where this all came up is you know how do we make sure that it's clear that it's not our event because they're no longer our students we don't oversee it we have no control over it because they've already graduated and we don't run the event we don't want to get the event we just make a donation uh mike to the parents who run it as a separate event not a watch on hills do we run the proms yes those are our events they are they're our staff our staff's involved we're overseeing
079them we supervise them the the attorneys and our attorney and insurance broker just suggested to obviously distance ourselves in other words it's not our event make it clear that it's not our event and also make try to get get them to have their own the project grad folks have their own insurance policies if they don't and our insurance broker can facilitate that perhaps give them a cheaper rate and make it easier for them to do that but that was one of the suggestions they made and you know again just just making sure we're separate from that event it's not it's not the board's event it's project graduate just to clarify peter you mentioned that we contribute something to it what's the level of contribution for about the last seven or eight years seventeen thousand dollars
080out of basically parking fees that we collect from students which is not all of the parking fees but it's a large portion of them is the amount that we've contributed year after year to project graduation right and theoretically we collect them from seniors okay we're the ones the only reason why i asked that question because i understand the concern about liability my concern about it not being our event one of these things says that it's about 50 000 a year for this pg if we were to donate 50 000 we'd be hard-pressed to say it's not our event because we're funding the entire thing so now that i'm hearing 17 000. and i don't know what the right number is is whether or not that number needs some sort of threshold to say hey even
081though you don't control the event you're funding the event it's something that maybe we need to think about or talk about more and figure something just a concern i don't know the answer it's just a concern i think i think that's right i mean there is the other part of the funding is directly by um the project graduation as far as i recall from being involved in it before so they have like i know i have to go to a paint and sit next month i've been i've been uh ordered to drink by donation no i i don't yeah i don't disagree yeah if the budget's 60 000 and we're contributing 50 000 then it can be perceived as you know not well a we endorse it because we think it's a good idea because
082it's a safe sound good environment for the children for the students but we're funding it it's a large part that's the only reason i bring it up yeah and i think michael that that was the reason him got and we asked for recommendations from both from board council and from the insurance uh broker and you know as we lawyers know anybody can be sued for anything but the especially our board council has recommended steps we take to lessen the likelihood that we'd be held liable any other questions or comments i thought in the operations committee minutes you talked about the policy 8550 the one about the school lunch money the school lunch balances that kind of hit a nerve with me if you read the whole policy it's absolutely heartbreaking that any of those uh
083ramifications for kids anywhere take place when their lunch balance hits zero and they try to buy a lunch so i just wanted to clarify what our our policy is that if a lunch balance goes below five dollars negative five dollars then their sort of kids are cut off from charging lunches that's the impression i had from the operation that is that's been our practice okay so that's like a practice not a policy because a policy you said the politic that doesn't exactly follow with what the policy is the policy said that they get one meal and then i guess they're cut off but it also goes on to say if they get fi if they accumulate five meals below if they if they can't if they somehow have an outstanding balance equal to five meals
084then the principal gets involved and checks to see if maybe they would qualify for a free or reduced lunch program yeah that's the policy but i mean in practice we were involved with that well before that okay that's what that's why i'm asking you yeah no i mean that's mandated language from the legislature but i mean when when we see an issue we do immediately and make sure the parent is aware of the resources they have that we well can be provided that's why i'm asking the question because we did talk about this um earlier in the year when we were considering the free lunch program and we had said that we would make sure that everybody who might qualify for a free or reduced lunch would be made aware of it and i just
085wanted to ask the question is that happening i thought if if we're implementing a new policy that might be a good time to have a plan to make sure that people are aware of what they may be entitled to yeah our folks have done a real nice job with that i mean i think our numbers are out okay matter of fact they're up so we we've qualified for that based on that which is it's a medicare program but it is partially based on um okay so that this is the first time since i've been here that happened wow yeah so our numbers have definitely gone up and i do um there's been some communication i i do know our director of guidance is very proactive uh in assisting students uh i much appreciate what he's
086doing okay it makes my life easier no that's great to know i have a question not related to the meals but it triggered a thought do we still have yearbooks yes okay i imagine there are families that can't afford yearbooks do we have some sort of program in place that we subsidize or we pay for yearbooks does that exist at all is that a thought pretty much our board as any of these things yearbooks trips trips when they're particularly if they're on the free and reduced lunch or if they have other circumstances we we do um subsidize okay and i think the booster closer memory serves they've always done that as well any other questions full circle the bob uh regionalization thank you dr chavelski so the regionalization ad hoc committee met last week in
087your folder you will see a draft of the project narrative for our application um we've we reviewed the application during the meeting and started to draft uh the summary narrative that is uh in your box as well as review some of the other steps we need to go through in order for us to meet a january 15th application deadline which we are targeting for we also had some questions for mark magyar as far as the timing of the legislation being finalized he assured us that the governor or that the legislation would be passed through the legislature by the 20th it does not need to go back to the governor because the governor provided a conditional veto and if the assembly and legislature meet the conditions then it becomes law so we're just waiting for it
088to have the final passage which they expect uh on or before the 20th in addition the uh the department of uh community affairs is aware of our application and expecting you know our application to come through as a single entity uh uh application uh and so there's no issues with us being a single entity applicant um which there's been some discussion whether or not that was possible but that has been clarified for us once and for all and then the only outstanding issue is looking at uh the assigning of consultants um and whether that's a process that we will be running ourselves or whether that's a process that we will be running in conjunction with rutgers university who may or may not be a centralized entity to handle uh all of the consultants for all
089of the various um regionalization feasibility studies that will go on just real quickly on the narrative the objectives of the study are going to be to review the impact of combined school district would have on curriculum instruction and scheduling for all students the impact on special education the impact on co-curricular and extracurricular activities for all students to not determine the demographic impact a regionalized district would have on student population which is a requirement of the legislation to analyze the debts each district of each district and determine the potential impact on k-12 regionalization would have on taxpayers for each of the participating municipality in addition to other economic benefits the potential impact on transportation uh the impact on collective bargaining agreements in each districts including recommendations on how to best combine guides in a manner that
090is equitable to the majority of members including the impact of shared staffing the impact on health insurance and to outline the use of existing district assets in a regionalized district meaning cross utilization of existing resources amongst the communities those are the current goals that we have in place they're going to be flushed out a little bit more dr jewett is going to be speaking with these sending district superintendents about what our objectives are and solicit their feedback even though they're not necessarily participating we still want to work with them in a cooperative manner and get their feedback you know to this process so at this point in time it is full steam ahead i will also uh add to this that mr size has been in conversations with nick brown down who is the business
091administrator down in pinelands who has recently gone through this process and released their their feasibility study he has been very cooperative in working with mr sties has sent him lots of information and has had several conversations with them so they're helping guide us in this application process but uh you know i think that we're in in good standing as we work our way toward that january 15 deadline to submit the application is there any changes that can be made to it i i know that adjustments can be made you know it's kind of the framework for you know the work itself but i think any adjustments we would just have to go through the process of making sure dca is aware of it and that they approve of those adjustments any other questions comments yes
092uh bob i apologize for missing the meeting but reading through the narrative one question i had was because it's written in terms of combining all five districts into one district is does this preclude having the consultants reports look at various other combinations no not at all i mean i think the all of our language you know ultimately is going to be up to and including regionalization and as part of that they're going to look at what could the impact be of shared services what could the impact be of partial regionalization where you would have two districts that would combine into you know a k-12 and the others would have sending or three or four or any variation of those themes as well as the idea of where might there be you know some positive impact
093around shared services whether that's special education whether it's transportation some of these other areas that we've often talked about so um that is certainly supposed to be clear and if it's not clear you know we would certainly take your advice and guidance to make sure that it is other questions or comments uh thanks everyone for your hard work on the committees and uh looking into uh next year i i look forward to seeing regionalization come to fruition one of the feasibility study now i understand it doesn't change my state uh we'll move on to uh board discussion uh i thank everybody for our frank discussion last week at our retreat where we're tweaking our board goals a little bit and uh prioritizing um mental well-being uh of our uh i think it's everyone that we're
094just students oh we said it's a student uh so that'll change in our next iteration of uh uh board goals that you'll see in next year's agenda and uh just related on that specific point i want to call everyone's attention to the fact that the surgeon general released a report today that warns of youth mental health crisis that is coming it was a very unusual uh report that he released today making you know basically you know codifying a lot of the things that we've been seeing and feeling and thinking about the the crisis that was already there before the pandemic that the pandemic just kind of ignited uh in a much more significant way so i think it just kind of reinforces our sensitivity to those issues here in our district and the timeliness of
095that goal absolutely thanks uh and and bob already uh peaked under the uh packaging and checked his email and this board self-evaluation that was uh suggested by gwen at our board retreat you may notice in your email that i sent you a parting gift as a gesture in new jersey school boards association uh your login you can be you can easily find the self-evaluation i gave you a link for the instructions as well and uh i'll pass it on to whoever's elected as the next president to work with gwen to collate that and and discuss it at whatever point in time you feel necessary did you give us a deadline that's going to be up to the next board president no i i think it's two weeks after we get greg's self-evaluation ow well maybe
096i'll do mine tonight after all i don't sleep you don't have to do your training on december 31st anymore so you can do that the goals by the way the first two are the same they're one of the attachments to the agenda the third one i wrote down as the whrhs board of education will support student mental health and well-being i think that's what was suggested at the end of the last meeting so um hopefully that captures i think what the board had discussed peter i would love to hear your voice mr president i'd like to move resolutions a1 through a6 would anybody like to pull anything for separate discussion or vote um i mentioned uh to uh dr jewett to tim that for a3 2422 had a provision that had to do with just
097sixth to eighth grade yes so i what i said to susan is we can approve it for first read and then move because that's not a material deletion no i'm glad you're bringing that up i'm glad you caught that because i try to catch the el the things that only apply to elementary or middle school and pull them out but i missed that one so as long as everyone's comfortable with it we'll you can approve it a first read and then we'll remove it for a second read i think nothing else roll call though yes mr burnberg mr fallon no on a3 and a4 yes on everything else mr hunzinger mr morrison yes yes otter yes doctor yes mr president i'd like to move resolutions a 7 and a 8. have a second second please
098ms brown yes mr burnberg mr fallon yes mr hunzinger mr morrison yes silver yes and doctor yes on this rare occasion when we have a b item mr president i'd like to move resolutions b one yes mr president i'd like to move resolutions c1 through c12 second anybody like to pull anything for separate discussion or vote mr morrison yes silver yeah otter yes doctor yes president i'd like to move resolutions d1 through d3 second anybody like to pull one of these for a separate discussion vote seeing none role called votes please ms brown yes mr mr fallon yes mr hunsinger yes morrison yes dober potter yes yes thank you this will be the second opportunity for public commentary and seeing no public they will close the second opportunity for public commentary any other business huh
099gosh i don't know how to tie break i was looking oh i'm sorry go no peter go ahead oh my god we'll we'll go in order of i just want to recognize pearl harbor that you know 80th anniversary and thank all those who served before us to make the united states as great as it is that's all thank you thank you and i i just want to say uh i disagree going forward with changing our agenda uh it also is against robert's rules of order to change our agenda without having a vote of two-thirds of the board to change the agenda i think it was a mistake to do it tonight it's done but going forward i think that's something the board should keep in mind and have a discussion if you're going to consider
100changing the agenda again so noted i'm not sure that your statement is accurate i'd have to look at that but nonetheless i took a prerogative and if you didn't like it take it up with the next president no i know i appreciate it uh just a a a reminder that the somerset county school boards association meeting is this thursday uh in person and or remote if you're in person it's at the vo tech uh where they serve dinner if it's remo and dinner starts at six if it's remote you can dial in at seven uh register at school boards association uh website the topic for this particular meeting is communicating in challenging times so it should be an interesting uh discussion on um some of the communication challenges that school boards are having you know
101around our state i guess it's good that it's a goal for us then huh any other other business second thanks everyone have a wonderful holidays everyone yeah i know