Cedar Grove Board of Education Meeting 09-15-20

001i call the meeting order and will everybody please rise for the pledge of allegiance numerous flags okay i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all the new jersey open public's meeting law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meeting of public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon in accordance with the provisions of this act the cedar grove board of education has caused notice of this meeting to be advertised by having the date time and place thereof posted on bulletin boards in the district published and were transmitted to the verona cedar grove times and star

002ledger newspapers tap into online news filed with the township clerk and posted on the district's website roll call mrs de chara here miss miga here mr splendoria present mr schoener present mrs dye here so good evening everyone um so there's going to be two parts to the meeting where there are comments that the that the public can make so i'm going to read one statement this is for items that are on the agenda which people have already signed up for and then there's going to be a part later on where it's items on or off the agenda which people have signed up for as well so before i open that portion we've now come to the portion of our meeting where we allow members of the public to address the board in this section we

003allow public comments on resolutions only our board regulations a lot 20 minutes for these communications each person should be limited to three minutes and we ask you to try to stay within this requirement speakers may speak more than once only after all others wishing to speak on a topic have been heard all statements will be directed to me as the presiding officer and no one may address board members individually please be reminded that if your statement is too lengthy abusive obscene or defamatory you may be interrupted warned or your participation may be terminated please also be reminded that if any person does not observe reasonable decorum is disorderly or disrupts the meeting you will be asked to leave the meeting please remember to state your name municipality of residence and the group affiliation if applicable

004and each and every time you address the board so i'm going to set a timer for the three minutes so just bear with me a second and then i have two um people wishing to speak so i'm just going to go in order of the page here so just bear with me there is wipes to wipe the mic down okay so when i call your name after i get the time business right um you're going to come up to the microphone there is um there's a wipe so we ask that when you're done you just kind of wipe it down and then that'll be fair there's a garbage right there um and then that's good okay so give me one second well he knows why am i the one speaking and also doing the clock

005and doing everything that's all i want to know all right okay okay so the meeting is open to the public for comment on items on the agenda and the first person i have here for items on the agenda is um romney beckett and i apologize if i am not saying your name correctly so please come up bikit right okay well i tried i'm sorry it doesn't matter i'm not sure if i sign on the right sheet or the wrong one okay on and off the agenda so i i wanted to talk about the policies i'm not sure if that's a time or not if it's not the time i could are you talking about the policies that are on the agenda or are you talking about policies in general or on the agenda i'm going

006to defer to mr grosso as reference number s13 uh motion to approve the second reading of the following policy remote learning option for families um i just want to talk about like back to school in person versus virgil uh if that's that's the right time if not i could go back and sit and come back is that's okay okay okay go ahead thank you um you know i'm i'm here representing my own children as a parent you know i'm sorry you have to do your name and address first sorry romani beckett cedar grove uh 23 rutledge play cedar grove new jersey thank you okay i'm here as a parent i'm not biased i'm not taking any sides i'm just concerned for the safety and as well as for the education level that my children as

007well as everybody here you know children is learning we noticed the technique you know we were under the impression that we're gonna go hyper plan it was approved everything was fine um and then a day or two prior to the start back to school everything got thrown out it's 100 virtual due to limited staff and such um you know i got approached by couple people i read couple social media comment and post um you know the board of ed was not the readiness of the school was not into place um safety mask hand sanitizer and what have you that's one item that i want to you know ask for the bed if you can respond to that um second item was the teacher were not allowed to leave after lunch to go back home and

008log in after they have the lunch from home third you know maybe it's irrelevant but um some comment was made by uh a union teacher union official i'm gonna try not to point finger at anyone so i'm just gonna speak in general um in response to opinions on on social media that was really kind of irresponsible if you will like um if when you stop calling me names or whatever then we'll go back to school then it becomes safe um just highlight a few i'm i'm trying to take a balanced approach here and i'm trying to you know address all facts all relevant fact for the best interest of our children i care as well about our teacher because they're part of our community as well so i'm trying here you know to be as

009positive and as balanced as possibly can all families are struggling i'm working from home i'm an accountant my kids are on all three of them which are a different level of education so struggle is don't walk into here don't do this don't do that it becomes you know what can be done to help as a parent um you know that you know we are willing and able to to try you know to lend a hand if it's needed be i'll volunteer i'll put my name in the hat if if it needed so those are my common and i would love your response thank you mr gosser do you want to address that thank you very much let me explain the first question that you had pertaining to uh having any ppe available or having any

010type of sanitizing equipment that was available during that time on august 27th we made the announcement that we would uh go from a hybrid version to a full virtual version that decision was made based on personnel issues it was not based on had not having the appropriate ppe nor was it made upon anything other than the fact that we were looking to cover the teachers that needed to have accommodations made um so the government made a an option for employees to either take a family leave or to have accommodations we um in our in our response to accommodate the staff we were unable to then have uh substitutes that would be available to facilitate within the classroom although the staff could have taught from home the children would have still been coming to the schoolhouse

011and with that there would have needed to be an adult in in the building in that particular classroom who was a substitute or a certified teacher unfortunately we are not unique we are under the same struggles that surrounding towns are as well as people throughout the state which we are looking for people to cover certified people to cover those classrooms so therefore we made a decision with the safety of the staff and the safety of the students in mind to go into a full virtual option when we made that decision i gave a date of october 19th as a date to return to a hybrid version through that time we also looked to come up with solutions to bring kids into school before that date i made an announcement the other day that stated that

012we would be able to bring our pre-k through grade 4 population back to the building through our human resource department looking at different options and finding coverages that is how we are able to bring our pre-k through fourth grade students back to the classroom utilizing a hybrid version that doesn't mean that every child in a classroom goes it would go on the cohort a cohort b to respond to the the the question about having teachers return uh to school after their lunch or to go home after their lunch the decision was made to have teachers stay in the building during the full school day the students would be able to go home to go have lunch and part of that reason was because lunch is a [Music] is a significant time where we would have

013to have a student take off their mask they would have to um involve themselves in the activity of eating and drinking and when the staff brought that up at one of our initial meetings of their their feeling of being uncomfortable in a position such as that especially at an elementary level where their staff's normal duties would be to help this child unwrap their sandwich or help to clean up with them or help to put a straw into a juice box um there was there was feelings that they had shared and there was a compromise in that position where it was understandable so therefore we made a decision to have the students go to um go to lunch at home including transition time and transportation time for them to get home with an afternoon session so

014that looks very different from an elementary and a middle and a high school version the decision to have the teachers stay in the building during that time was based on a couple of different pieces uh the first one is is that our our internet service and um our broadband our bandwidth rather uh many of us in this room probably we do not subscribe to the highest bandwidth that we could possibly subscribe to we do what's best for our family and based on the needs of our household that's the same thing that happens for our staff so what we what we decided was that we would be able to provide a stronger bandwidth for our staff that does not necessarily mean that we would not have drops and we wouldn't have freezes because that would happen

015with any um organization but the other decision that we made was was that there's travel time for some of our staff members we do have staff members that live here in town but we also have staff members that live at a further distance so part of the decision was made that um to not uh to to to prohibit the interruption of instruction during that time um what we did was we felt it was best for a continuation of that happening in this building there's another piece to that as well is that very often i talk about this often and i will continue to talk about it because a lot of my decisions are made based on my own children i have five of my children and to uh work within a household where there's a

016lot of different things happening in that household there are there are room for interruptions and disruption and there is an expectation from our students and also from our families of a particular type of delivery of instruction uh and there is another piece of this as well is that if we needed to um if we needed to get in touch with a staff member or collaborate with the staff member we can do that while they are in the building if there's a question from a staff member we can do that while we're in the building doing that remotely makes it difficult and we're looking for continuity so that was part of um that that was the reason why we looked at having um our staff stay in and the and the the other response that i

017would like to give you is based on um i guess you shared that there were responses from staff on social media i will share this each of our individual staff members are individuals and they will respond to particular situations in an individual manner we certainly do have policy uh on how a staff member would represent themselves and the district on social media platforms um but very often um this is a very emotional time and we're seeing uh the emotions are are are at the forefront i cannot comment on individual staff members commenting on social media i am not them they are commenting on their own although i will share this i have always shared that when we are when we are in public and when we are even in our private life we are still

018employees of the cedar grove board of education and we should take that into consideration whenever we make our comments uh in public or in uh on social media and that is something that is is an expectation of the district and it is a good practice in general of how we handle ourselves it doesn't say that we censor or we we do not allow somebody to comment the way they feel so fit um but just to keep in the back of our minds that we are individual people but we're also employees of the district as well you also shared about the struggle and how you would be able to help as a father of five children ages 6 to 16. i'm struggling myself my wife is struggling we both work i will share that my my

019children have various needs and we are trying to figure this out ourselves this is not the ideal situation and we know this well all of us up here on this stage know this as well this is a very fluid situation and when a situation is fluid like this we have to look at all the different parameters in which we can work within and how we can work together as a whole this is not a time for separation this is a time of coming together and we may not agree with everything and we may feel that our opinions um are very different from others and the reality here is the reason why we're all sitting here in this room right now and why we sit here on the stage is because we are here for our

020children and i always will say this phrase as children are first and decisions are made with children and first being first in mind so i wish i could sit here and tell you some tips on how to help you out and i would love for you to tell me some tips dude how to help me help me out as well but um i think it is it is truly we hear a lot of how are you doing i'm taking it day by day it truly is a day by day situation in in development developments unravel uh quite rapidly um i think the biggest piece is that we stay in communication with that you would stay in communication with your school that you stay in communication with your child you ask a lot of questions and

021sometimes those answers are not what we're looking for but at the moment in time that is those are the factual pieces of information um but uh i like i said i think it's something that we have to collaborate together with rather than being divided i have follow up but out of respect for everyone i'll just stand down thank you so much for all your effort thank you um before i call the next person i just want to remind everybody that um while you're in the auditorium you really do have to keep your mask on or you're going to be asked to leave so if everybody could just put their mask back on i would greatly appreciate it um the next person i noticed that your name is actually on both lists so i'm just not

022sure which one you wanted to um or which part of the meeting you want to speak on it's um and i'm sorry it's michael a i think it's palamara is this did you want to speak at this portion of the meeting or or both it's palomara okay confused like the gentleman before i wasn't sure no that's totally fine my name is michael palomara i'm at 285 ridge road and i'm commenting on policies s13 okay okay so we're we're planning to reopen school and there is some risk there okay on march 29th of this year my mother died of covet 19. okay i contracted it as well at the same time right i was lucky i survived okay i quarantined myself in the house obviously my wife is there and my two sons now i was

023successfully able to quarantine myself to make sure that my family didn't get it we got the antibody test mine came out positive right which is a good thing because now i have you know added protection they came up negative that they didn't contract right so opening the schools is theoretically possible right the execution has to be close to perfect okay it can be done right but there is a risk i can't quite understand how anyone with a cancer diabetes heart disease lung disease can return because we don't have a vaccine yet and they have no protection at all the only question that i could have is what is the contingency plans if we detect spread in the school so one of the things that we worked on while we were preparing a plan was that

024we we are educators we are not medical professionals so we lean on the medical professionals to help guide us through this um through this process so we have collaborated with our district doctor and we've collaborated with our local and county health departments as to execute what would happen if a staff member or if a student posed a positive um a positive reading for covet and it's one of the things that we've added into our plan which is located on our return to school website was in conjunction with the new jersey health department the process and procedure and and it depends upon how many people were if it was a single person within a classroom if it was two or more people within a classroom or are they or is are is there a multiple classroom

025positivity rate if that happens we go into a mode where we will contact our local health department they will guide us on what to do as our next steps so i will share and i would definitely encourage you to take a look at a portion in that plant because it is it's tabbed out it'll bring you right to that portion is that if there is a if there is a um positivity uh case in one classroom we would contact that health department and more than likely we would we would have to shut down the one that one classroom it wouldn't be the entire building if i had a classroom that had a positivity a positive case and then i look into another classroom there's a positive case there could be a possibility where we would

026have to close down the school but that is all dependent upon the advice and recommendations that come from the local and county health departments i will assure you this this is not a decision that we will make in isolation this is a decision that we have to make based on our medical professionals in the field and then from that point on they begin the contact tracing process they work with the state health department and then they work with the local township and county where that person may have had me was diagnosed with a positive um with a positive case so let's say there was a staff member who lived in [Music] let's say ringwood um because they're not in essex county we would have to work through the state health department database uh if there's

027somebody in essex county that information comes back to us a lot quicker than if we had to rely upon the state health department i will tell you that we will be cautious and uh but we will be factual and uh we will again base our decisions on the medical professionals that will help guide us thank you very much okay i'm going to close that portion of the meeting oh i'm sorry okay even if it relates to the come on up michael fuchi 29 meadow proclaim cedar grove new jersey um thank you for the thorough answers so far that you've given i appreciate it very thoughtful answers and it sounds like you guys have really thought this through so far so the first thing do you guys have any plan for what the children are going

028to do after school when they go back so do you mean that when we go back to a hybrid uh a hybrid schedule what happens in the afternoon yes yes so prior to us transitioning from a hybrid to a virtual plan on our return to school website we had sample schedules and at the elementary level uh there is a that that afternoon looks very different than what the middle school and what the high school would look like uh we're looking at smaller groups we're looking at some independent uh collaborative learning even though it's virtual you can still do that um but it is it is very um it's fluid and it's based on the needs of the class during that day and the curriculum that and the delivery of the instruction that's happening at that

029time my question is for after school care oh after school care i'm sorry yeah yeah so once the kids are done with school for that particular time period that again i guess we're not doing full days right now what is the plan for after care when you're done with school i'm sorry yeah no it's okay again i feel like i said no that's okay uh so as of right now we're not offering before or after care programming and the reason why we're not doing that is because of the possibility of students that could be that could possibly cross cross-contaminate pathogens that are not in each other's classes at the elementary level right now the students that will be in that classroom will primarily be in that classroom all day long they will not mix within

030a gym class they will not mix within a lunch time period and we do not want them mixing within an aftercare program okay and is there a date that you guys have projected to return to full day full schedule for the students i don't have a date for you with that because um we are [Music] right now we're at the mercy of our state we are looking at at the the contagion rate we are looking at how how we will progress into the uh fall and winter months so there's a lot there's a lot that depends upon how we act as a community not just cedar grove but as a state community and how the progression of of the of the pathogen moves forward we take uh we are in constant communication with our county

031office as well as the state department of education once the governor is able to give us a little bit more insight of where if he will release uh some of the um conditions then we'll move forward but as of right now this is uh looking at a hybrid plan is where we're moving we're moving towards okay and then further again my child is in elementary school she's seven years old she went from march of last year on hybrid learning at six years old to now second grade seven years old um again as you guys know and i'm sure everybody else in here who has had kids at that age those are the foundation years of learning the basic fundamentals that's going to take them through the rest of their life you're asking kids at that

032age to get on the computer log in stay focused do work type in chats and again it's nothing against the teachers because they're trying to do whatever they can as well but to expect children at that age to get on a computer and do all these things the frustration to see your child cry because they can't do it and the fact that we're not going back to school so they can learn in person have social interactions with their friends these are the things that's going to develop them as they get older and again i it sounds like you guys have the right focus but how do we push that forward to get them back into school on a full schedule and again there's other districts that are back full schedule so to say that we're

033at the mercy of the state isn't really factual because like i said you go to a town right next door to us in essex fells and they voted the town voted the the families voted go back to school full-time why why can't we do the same thing here let's vote let's say do we want your kids to go back to school full-time or not and why can't we do that so i i appreciate you saying that i i want to just clarify some of that information so when we talk about districts like essex fells they have a much smaller enrollment population in their district so therefore when we look at our population of students which is coming around 15 1 590 students total in our give or take a little bit maybe a little bit

034more we have a capacity issue which does determine based upon what the governor and based upon what the cdc states as what we can do within the classroom such as the six feet as you can tell how we're all sitting in this room right now based on these chairs the six foot difference front back and side to side we cannot we cannot have a classroom full of 20 plus students in the classroom because we would not be following those social distancing guidelines so those are the reasons and rationale as to why when i spoke before why when the governor speaks to um his recommendations and the cdc speaks to their recommendations that is what we're following i will share this with you you are 100 right everyone everybody in this room right now knows including

035the staff the board and families know that this is not this is not the most prudent way of educating our children we know that but what we're doing is which we are working within the confines of this virus and working within the confines of the regulations and the protocols and procedures to keep ourselves safe so we can get back so we can get our children back to a safe um environment and and our staff back to a safe environment but i do hear your frustration i know that i hear you i'm with you on that five kids yeah absolutely um but i i do i think we all want nothing more to get you know to return our students to the to the schoolhouse and our staff wants nothing more to return our kids to

036the schoolhouse to go back to whatever that new normal is going to be and and you talk about the social and emotional component as well as the academic those are all intertwined together um and you're right i i think you know as time moves on we will see what these what this is what this moment in time will yield to our children and what it will yield to us but at this moment in time we have to we have to follow these protocols and these rules as difficult as that is to swallow at times all right i understand thank you very much thank you i appreciate it thank you okay i'm going to close that portion of the meeting oh yes sure now if people didn't sign can we just allow them to oh oh

037i'm going to get to you then absolutely there's a second part in the meeting for items that are on or off the agenda so move forward with the agenda and then i think everybody on the second sheet wants to talk about the same thing so absolutely you'll have your opportunity don't worry all right right right right so so the second part of the the the public where they can speak is items on or off the agenda so you have the option later on if it's on the agenda you can talk about it and it's if it's not on the agenda well i'm going to move on to committee reports so welcome back everybody and i welcome back to school the new normal excuse me the second portion of the meeting is for items on or

038off the agenda i've closed this part of the meeting but when we get to the second part of the meeting you are free to talk about items please don't interrupt you're free to talk about items that are on or off the agenda so anybody can talk about anything that they want in the second part of of the meeting that's absolutely fine because we had a sign up sheet when we when you entered and that was how the meeting was going to be run is that if you put your name on the sign up sheet that you were going to be able to talk at that period of time okay welcome back everybody how's everybody doing this evening pretty good fantastic i know we probably don't have many committee reports because school just started but one

039thing i wanted to mention um in the spirit of positivity is the uh the cedar grove waves and i wanted to thank mr schoener especially but obviously all the the staff and the students and and the town that came together and helped with the installation um he did an amazing job and uh and every year we are so completely grateful so thank you well thank you very much thank you thank you thank you it just just a side note that it really is a community effort it really is it's it's that's how it functions that's how it works and it really is about the students that's the major component of it and um the great thing is is in the past when we are in school um every student actually gets a seminar on 9

04011 that day so you get a 20 minute seminar on 9 11 the events that took place that day and then you out go outside and actually help put some flags in the ground and so um thank you very much i really appreciate it thank you absolutely all right so we at this point we're going to move on to our board presentations and i think so the board is going to move down to the chairs there and i think our first presentation is going to be on hiv grades which is given by mr chris kinney so mr can you just kind of bear with us while we move okay [Music] chef uh all right good good evening everyone uh my name is christopher kennedy director of special services i'm also the district's anti-bullying coordinator uh

041every year we are charged as a district to report on what are known as the district harassment intimidation and bullying grades that are given from the state you'll notice that the year says 1890 because they are backtracked to that particular year because when you submit to the state for the prior year which is the 1920 you're actually doing the prior year before that and then they certify it you report it in the well we actually had it given to us in june so we weren't able to get it to the public until this particular meeting so how are the grades determined each school has a school safety team which is comprised of the school administrators certain staff are abs anti-bullying specialists and myself and the anti-bullying specialists are the guidance counselors they're required to complete

042a self-assessment which is graded on a rubric as you can see they give their sell themselves a score zero to three based on 26 criterion reference questions uh each question is worth zero to three points you add up the scores and you get our self-assessment scores or we submit that electronically to the state then we have the scores that are compared to my report that i get to the state which is given by annually electronically as well and then at the end the state comes back and gives us our scores that they have now certified so that's what these scores are start off with the high school you'll see that collectively comparatively i did a 17-18 to 2018-19 scenario at the bottom for brevity purposes if you'd like to discuss this i'm more than willing

043to sit down and discuss this with you point by point step by step but i know you all want to get to the mic and say what you got to say the bottom line is the high school uh did stay the same with 69 out of 78 points and i must say that you know some districts they could say they're perfect on their hiv scores but we do take this seriously and we grade ourselves pretty hard and pretty strict when it comes to our our self-assessment we're not going to give ourselves a three if we did not meet all of the criteria to give ourselves a three and as you read some of these questions about if you're going to give yourself a three did you do this and this and as well as this

044so there's almost three parts to each particular question sometimes that if you don't have that evidence to give yourself three you're not going to give yourself that three and that's what we don't do the middle school consistently high score they do a lot of great programming there 77 for two years ago compared with the three years ago 78 north end around the range of the same as they were and south end has increased a little bit so some of the things that we consistently do is try to give you some improvement initiatives we are doing whole school awareness programs projects cultural awareness panther praise peer leadership work you know you'll hear from mr pearson to talk about our inclusiveness uh curriculum that we're now all and uh go throughout the district with we have use

045of safe schools online training that the staff goes through every single year on hiv cyber bullying and reporting the use of the new hiv reporting system the forms that we use are in conjunction with strauss sma which is our policy maker and we now are using what's called my k-12 hiv hiv reporting software which will give us a better idea of definitive trends if there are any that are going on in particular schools so and again this is a mandated state uh district report that we have to give every year so i will be back next september giving you the the 1920 hiv rate thank you very much for having me [Music] and he is going to give a presentation on the lgbtq curriculum good evening my name is bart pearson i am the ela

046supervisor for the district uh before i begin this one say mr schoener city grove waves great job thank you thank you it means a lot to me every year yeah i know simultaneously makes me proud and breaks my heart but very beautiful and i appreciate the work that you and everyone else does for it um tonight i'm here to talk about the cedar grove lgbtq inclusive curriculum plan on january 31st 2019 governor phil murphy signed legislation that requires boards of education to include instruction and to adopt instructional materials that actively portray the political economic and social contributions of lgbtq individuals as well as individuals with disabilities instruction will be included within appropriate places in the curriculum across all relevant subjects in grades 6 to 12 as part of the district's implementation of the news of

047the new jersey student learning standards with the passing of the lgbtq inclusive bill new jersey became the second state of the nation to pass a curriculum mandate that requires lgbtq inclusive topics to be taught in their classrooms it's important to note that curriculum mandates from the state are not unusual in new jersey the lgbtq inclusive curriculum mandate will work in association with two other state mandates both of which are currently being implemented with throughout the district in different courses one being the new jersey commission of holocaust education and the second being the amazon commission these curricular mandates work both individually as well as collaboratively to ensure that our students with diversity are exposed to diverse educational opportunities across the board in today's world an lgbtq inclusive curriculum is necessary in addition to our instruction it's

048necessary because we live in a diverse society and education should reflect promote and facilitate this lgbtq inclusive education is also instrumental in changing discriminatory attitudes and stereotypes and an lgbtq inclusive education benefits students by promoting acceptance and respect and teaching them more about the diverse people and families in the world and more importantly as educators i think it's important that we know that our lgbt students and our students with disabilities deserve to see themselves reflected in the instruction and in our classrooms overall by providing our students an lgbtq inclusive curriculum education it serves to create a more positive learning environment and healthy self-awareness of lgbt students and for students with disabilities while also raising the rest of our students awareness to these particular issues this leads us to the district's lgbtq inclusive curriculum plan we

049started our district plan with the grades 12 6-12 studies and english teachers we identified the extent to which lgbtq related content is present within the content of their current curriculum as well as how this content aligns with the new jersey learning standards this is an ongoing process which will effectively lead to infusing these topics into purposeful instruction we will then branch the lgbt inclusive content to other content areas throughout the year my partner math supervisor ms janine barboza is currently preparing her departments to begin planning lessons as well mrs barboza also plans to address what she's done at one of the next board meetings she's watching she's listening now so hi um implementation of these topics leads to a question how often will lgbtq inclusive topics be taught in our classes much like other state

050curriculum mandates infusion of lbgtq inclusive topics works best when they directly connect with the content found within our approved curriculum and when these topics effectively and appropriately enhance the established course content to be most effective there should be a direct connection between the instructional content and the lgbtq inclusive topic some lgbtq topics can easily be infused within our present curriculum for example the society's teacher is teaching a lesson on trench warfare as used on the western front during world war one the teacher can address the lgbtq inclusive mandate by emphasizing the topic of world war one soldiers who were disabled as a result of fighting in those trenches under dangerous conditions there are numerous primary source documents on this topic this would be an appropriate usage of the mandate since the lgbtq inclusive topic is

051directly connected to the course's instructional content however in some cases this curriculum need to be revised in order to accommodate the lgbt exclusive mandate the object then being not to take anything away but simply to enhance this is the same process we have used in the past for effective implementation of the new jersey commission of the holocaust education mandate and the alistar commission mandates this year the district will be providing staff with the appropriate training needed to effectively implement the lgbtq inclusive mandate professional development will focus on topics such as a range of lgbtq inclusive topics lgbt inclusive cultural competencies and overall teaching of tolerance however the question that is most asked is what will lgbt inclusive instructions look like in our classrooms let me give you examples of what we can expect to see

052of how we can infuse these topics naturally into a curriculum into a course content as opposed to just breaking off and just teaching a lesson on it first example teaching a u.s high school u.s history class you're in the middle of the curricular unit titled civil war and reconstruction as you discuss the impact the civil war had on the union and the confederate soldiers you focus your discussion on the positive and negative aspects faced by civil war soldiers who obtained a disability as a result of the war zoos are then asked to read an excerpt from the book the red badge courage by stephen crane examine an online web exhibition titled life and limb the toll of civil war and view statistics that highlight the high percentage of soldiers who lost limbs as a result

053of the war students would then use these resources to write a short text-based response to a concept stephen crane explores in this excerpt that a high percentage of soldiers looked at battle related wounds as a desirable and even valuable acquisition this lesson example is effective since it addresses a specific aspect of the lgbtq inclusive mandate between individuals with disabilities and their contributions to the civil war in american history for that matter as well as the social aspects of having a disability this lesson also demonstrates how an lgbtq inclusive topic can be organically infused into the established curricular content that's already taught in the class second example is to give both sides of the idea we're teaching a curricular unit called reading and analyzing literature information in the seventh grade english class students are reading the

054novel the outsiders by essie him and some of you have seen the movie as a result students review the first four chapters of novel they are assigned to complete a close reading of a passage that focuses on how the character dary due to circumstance has no choice but to act as both a mother and father figure to his younger brother ponyboy after the death of his parents students then discuss the gender roles behaviors traditionally associated with mothers and fathers within a household these are then divided into collaborative groups each assigned one novel chapter and our challenge to identify and discuss examples of dairy assuming the role and behaviors that could be attributed to being a mother or being a father to his younger brother each collaborative group will present their findings to the class explaining

055scenes from the chapter where darry is shown were in long hours to financially provide for his brother where darry's up early cooking breakfast for his younger brother and making sure he's clean and that he gets to school however darry takes pride for always making sure that their house is clean the emphasis here is that darry is a greaser and a gang member and a young man of like 22 i think in the novel itself the lesson closes with a class discussion comparing how gender roles have developed in the 1950s novel set present day this example lessons effective in addressing the aspect of the lgbtq inclusive mandate which in this case are gender roles and gender expression this also demonstrates lgbtq inclusion topics can be organically infused into the established curricular content which in this case

056is reasoning and analyzing literature these are just two examples of how we can infuse them into our current course curriculum but there are so many other ways to summarize the district lgbtq inclusive curriculum plan focused on instruction that addresses lgbtq inclusive topics and issues that accurately portray the political economic and social contributions of lesbian gay bisexual transgender individuals as well as individuals with disabilities these topics and issues can be fused into the established curricular content of each course and this curriculum may be needed revised to accommodate this mandate and teachers will receive training on implementing the mandate within their classes this is truly just the beginning of our plan not only will the teachers continue to infuse their lessons with lgbtq inclusive topics we also continue to infuse their instruction with topics associated with the

057homicide commission and the new jersey commission of holocaust education they're meant to work in conjunction with each other in many ways this means city grow schools will continue to promote acceptance and respect through instruction that focuses on diverse people and families ultimately will serve prepare our students be effective members of the larger global society and that is pretty much what we have at this point i believe all received a copy of the plan and that's that's our beginning and we're hoping to take it into uh another realm by the end of the year so thanks very much [Applause] [Music] wait a moment because that's [Music] you like that scream right where it was right basically [Music] so i wanted to give an update on a few items because it is the beginning of school and

058i wanted to share with you about our opening and then i would like to talk to you a little bit about the transition from virtual to hybrid we've talked a little bit about that already this evening but then i'd like to also talk to you about the update on the principal search so i would like to begin with um thanking the staff and the families for their incredible feat of of of starting a school year the way that we have started we have never done anything like this before in our lives although it has been done in in the country back when the swine flu had taken place that was in the early 2000s in the middle of the country in the rural rural um united states um this is something that is happening across

059the country and it is not an easy task and i have visited all the schools and i've watched what is going on and i've watched the interaction with the staff and their students and the creativity that they are bringing to the table and i applaud them for that i also applaud the families i applaud the mothers the fathers the aunts the uncles the grandmas the grandpas and the the caregivers of students this is not something that you could have ever imagined that you signed up for as caregivers and it has it is complete it is a frustrating time based on the fact that you are trying to care for your children provide for your children and then help navigate your children through the beginning of school through a computer and that is not an easy

060task that's not an easy task for us as adults so i applaud you as well because as i stated before with the gentleman who came up to the microphone this is a time to come together and it's a time to collaborate and to work together that is the only way that we will be successful because we talked a little bit about keeping kids first and this is truly how we do that it's uncomfortable it is uh sometimes it's it's it's frustrating i can't think of another word other than the fact that it's it's uh messy sometimes but it is fluid and i just wanted to thank you all for your hard work um along with the staff so thank you um i wanted to give an update we had a i sent out a communication

061right before i was actually on labor day um about uh the middle school staff going um not only were they virtual uh scheduled for the classrooms but they were virtual from their homes uh we had a suspected case um with an employee who was very present in the building around multiple staff members uh what we did was we contacted the uh the district doctor and the health department i was on the phone with him all day long on labor day so i appreciate the local monkey health department and our our district doctor um we took precautions uh to provide the safety of the staff this was based on the information and factual information that we were provided and the contact tracing that we were provided in the process that we were undergoing during a holiday

062weekend so um but it we are happy to say that that particular individual came back with a negative uh response and our staff members were able to get back into the building starting this monday we were also aware that technology is our main uh resource for providing instruction for our stu our children uh the in the reliability of our technology uh varies based on the broadband and the um bandwidth in our our family's homes as well as our traffic on our on our side i know that google was um inundated with uh traffic uh these past two weeks i do want to commend our technology department led by jim walsh uh he was been on the phone constantly with google i know there's a lot of frustration with students getting into class into meets and

063uh a waiting room um some waiting room confusion for our staff and for our families but um i feel that based on the communication that mr walsh has had with google uh that we will be back we are back on track uh i know that we one of the things that we're looking at doing is establishing continuity on our platform which is google which is something we subscribe to so instead of having multiple platforms out there and being good at it we like to be great at the platform that we provide our instruction to for our students which is google i know that our elementary students did go back to seesaw uh this uh this i believe at the end of last week that was based on the needs of staff for interaction and collaboration

064with our students so you will see that happen as well we did see a significant drop in issues from last week to this week last week was our first four days on navigating through this but those issues did significantly drop from uh last week when we talk about the transition from virtual to hybrid i shared a little bit about our process and what will be taking place um you know throughout the course of uh between now and october 19th but the elementary children will be going back on september 29th uh they will be following all the protocols and procedures that were outlined in our return to school plan uh that well that is a fluid document so i do ask you to please visit it continuously as we will be providing more updated information as

065needed i also want to share that the all virtual option that we provided to our families here in cedar grove prior to the beginning and the opening of school that was open for several weeks it was closed towards the beginning of school and is it is open again so if families feel that they would want to participate in the all virtual option they are they are completely able to do that they can there are two spots on our return to school website there's a banner on top and there's a section right below the update section where you would take you would request that um option and then we would accommodate you with that i also want to share with you some information about our high school principals search mr mangilli is has uh resigned and

066he will be moving on to his his position over in mountain lakes uh and we do wish him well but in the meantime we're looking for our next leader of our flagship school here at in cedar grove we received around a little over 60 applications from people from all over the state and even out of state to be the leader of cedar grove high school after narrowing down the qualifications that uh the the families and students and staff uh when once they took the survey information we narrowed that information down based on the needs assessment and we were able to start phase one in that phase one was a screening um was a screening that took place last week with with around 10 candidates that were qualified based on what the needs came back with

067on the survey and also our certifications and also experience needs that was narrowed down to three candidates that will go into phase two phase two will be taking place tomorrow that is with a school specific advisory panel those members include staff students student high school of high school representatives parents caregivers and administrators and we look to diversify that and we look to do to just to diversify excuse me our panel based on the individuals that took the uh survey uh from that point we look to narrow down that pool even smaller and that will then go to the district advisory panel that panel will include supervisors of curriculum director of special education our athletic director our high school administrative assistant and a board member from that point on we look to make a a selection

068that will then go to phase four which will have a conversation with her board and we look to approve uh our next uh principle of cedar grove high school by the 29th of september this is a rapid process i do want to share with you that we are taking this process seriously and i do want to make everybody aware that if we do not find a proper qualified candidate for this position we will reopen that search we do not want to rush this but we do want to get a person into this position where they can then lead our students and our staff forward especially during this particular time i also want to share with you all um just a moment and i know we we've talked about this already tonight but it deserves multiple

069times talking about this dave schoener uh has spent uh a good amount of time and and i want to share this with you this is his own personal time weeks he's been doing this for six years i'd like to share that prior to me coming here to cedar grove my my one son who plays uh football would um play over on on the field here and one of the biggest things that we would do as a family is we would drive through the front of the high school and we would look at that display and my son talks about it religiously every year or we're going to go look at the flags over in cedar grove and now being part of this it is something i'm so proud of i'm so proud to be working

070with dave um and the commitment that you have have instilled upon making this a reality and one of the things i do want to say as well is that during the time that we had this the past couple days last week listening to you talk to the reporters about the evolution of this and the stories behind it that was a true education for me and a great learning experience and i think what is beautiful about this is that it's not only something that you brought to this table dave but it's something that lives within our children in this community and how they participate in this and how they keep the memory of the lives lost that day alive but also those who gave their lives to to allow others to live and i i'm so

071proud to sit here with you and to serve with you and i'm proud of our community and i'm proud of our kids so i do i thank you for that dave thank you um and that is a i don't know if it's a brief but it's a little bit of an update for the beginning of school thank you very much all right moving on microphone sorry about that moving on uh from the office of the business administrator and board secretary under minutes can i have a motion for b1 through b3 so moved second b1 is a motion to approve the public and executive minutes of august 18 2020 b2 is a motion to approve the budgetary transfers for the month of august and b3 is a motion to approve the board secretary's certification to the

072cedar grove board of education pursuant to the code that no line item account has encumbrances and expenditures which in total exceed the line item appropriations in violation of the code any discussion no roll call please mrs dejarra yes mrs miga yes mrs pandoria aye mr schoener aye mr dye yes under business can i have a motion for b4 through bear with me there's a lot through b14 so moved second second b4 is a motion to approve the subscription busing contract with the parents of the student number listed in the amount listed for the 2021 school year b5 is a motion to approve the following parent transportation contract for the 2021 school year for the student listed b6 is a motion to accept the generous donation from the memorial middle school fsa and the amount listed

073to be used towards the purchase of dry erase lap boards for all students b7 is a motion to prove zenith construction service payment up payment application number four in the amount listed b8 is a motion to approve any interest received from the 2019 bond sale for the referendum approved on october 2nd 2018 to be transferred to the debt service fund b9 is a motion to approve the settlement agreement between the cgboe and the parents of the student number listed b10 is a motion to approve the special education tuition contract in the amount listed b11 is a motion to approve the following parent transportation contract for the 2021 school year b12 is a motion to approve the following parent transportation contract for the 2021 school year b13 is a motion to approve the student transportation services

074for the fall athletic season and b14 is a motion to retroactively approve the location agreement with calabria films and the cedar grove board of education for a film shoot at the cedar grove high school on sunday september 13th any discussion no no no no roll call please mrs dechara yes mrs miga yes mr splendoria aye mr schoener aye mrs dye yes under personnel can i have a motion for s1 through s12 so moved second s1 is a motion to retroactively appoint the following staff in accordance with the state emergent hiring start date procedures s2 is a motion to approve jimmy destefano high school virtual coordinator s3 is a motion to retroactively approve the extra class stipend from september 8th to september 30th 2020 at the amount listed s4 is a motion to rescind s20 on

075the august 18 2020 agenda and approve the extra class stipend from september 8th to the 18th 2020. s5 is a motion to retroactively approve the extra class stipend from september 8th to the 18th 2020. s6 is a motion to retroactively approve the resignation of kelly savia north end paraprofessional s7 is a motion to authorize attendance at the following events s 8 is a motion to approve the following salary degree advances for the 2021 school year 9 is a motion to approve the following leaves of absence s 10 is a motion to approve the following school nurses to provide nurse screenings for board meetings when needed starting on september 15 through june 30th at a rate listed s11 is a motion to approve the following south end and north end staff to provide temperature checks for

076staff and students starting at 8am on september 29th through june 30th 2021 and s12 is a motion to accept the resignation of robin pelling submitted on september 15 2020 any discussion no no roll call please mrs d chara yes mrs miga yes mrs fundoria hi mr schoener aye mrs dye yes under policies and i just want to clarify we don't have to review any of these we're just approving them as a board for this evening we're not reading through any of them we're just approving them i'm asking you mr uh for s14 i have a little summary okay okay so why don't we why don't you do this summary for s14 before we go any further okay so thank you policy s14 um is for the restart and recovery plan for full-time remote instruction on

077august 13th executive order 175 was signed which permits school districts to provide full-time remote instruction if a district is or becomes unable to satisfy the health and safety requirements of the new jersey department of education road back plan this new policy has been developed to incorporate the provisions of this executive order this policy is mandated thank you can i have a motion under policies can i have a motion for s13 and s14 so moved second s13 is a motion to approve the second reading of the following policy and s14 is a motion to approve the first reading of the following policy that mr dorita just read any discussion no no roll call please mrs dechara yes miss amiga yes mr pandoria aye mr schoener aye mrs dye yes under curriculum can i have a motion

078for s15 and s16 so moved up second anyone uh s15 is a motion to approve the cedar grove lgbtq inclusive direct district curriculum plan and sixteen is a motion to approve the following teachers to write district curriculum any discussion no no roll call please mrs dicara yes mrs miga yes mr pandoria aye mr schoener aye mr dye yes under contracts can i have a motion for s17 so moved second uh rule i'm sorry s17 is a motion to approve the following contracts for special education students as recommended by the director of special services for the 2021 school year any discussion no no no no roll call please mrs dichara yes mrs miga yes mrs pandoria hi mr schoener aye mrs dye yes so before i open the meeting to for comments on items on or

079off the agenda i just want to read a little summary here the board of education recognizes the value of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to express themselves on school matters of community interest in this section we allow public comments on all school related matters our regulations allot 40 minutes for these communications again each person shall be limited to three minutes and we ask you to try to stay within this requirement speakers may speak more than once only after all others wishing to speak on a topic have been heard as i stated earlier all statements will be directed to me as the presiding officer and no one may address board members individually please be reminded that if your statement is too lengthy abusive obscene or defamatory you

080will be interrupted warned or your participation may be terminated please also be reminded that if any person does not observe reasonable decorum is disorderly or disrupts the meeting you will be asked to leave the meeting please remember to state your name municipality of residence and group affiliation if applicable each and every time you address the board the meeting is open to the public for comment on items on or off the agenda and i'd like to start with our mayor who has nice who was nice enough to join us this evening mayor carrie peterson who would like to come up and make a statement and while she's coming up i just wanted to welcome our deputy mayor mr peter chinella who's also in attendance good evening mrs dye do i need to state my address yes

081please 41 bordick road cedar grove um um here this evening alongside with uh deputy mayor tanella just in support of our board of education we know and we want you to recognize i mean we recognize how hard that you all work everybody has families you have jobs and you all have children in the school system and this is personal for all of us and i know that this is a difficult time and we just want you to know how much we support you and we thank you for your for your hard work and for your dedication i also wanted to formally welcome superintendent grosso thank you for being here and joining us at this unprecedented time um i think we all want what's best for our children and for their education in the safest manner

082that we could possibly roll out and i just again want to thank you all and let you know that we stand with you in solidarity and support from the town council to our board of education so that's all thank you thank you very much we really appreciate that and i just want to mention that um you know the board the current board and the town council we have a great working relationship with between the two bodies and i know years ago when i first moved into this town that wasn't necessarily the case and i think both entities have worked really hard to forge a a good friendship and uh and it really has worked out for the best in the community um and so i look to continue that and i think we're due a

083joint meeting i'm just saying and i think you guys are due to host i'm just saying that too so moving on so but thank you very much mayor peterson we appreciate that okay so there was a sign in sheet when everybody came in so i'm just going to go in order of of the sign-in sheet and i'm going to apologize in advance if i don't pronounce your name correctly again you come up to the microphone you state your name and your address um you'll be timed and then we're done if you could just kind of wipe down everything for the next person we'd greatly appreciate it okay um mike mifucci he's i didn't know if you want to speak again so i just figured i didn't want to okay you're good okay all righty um

084patty d'angelo good evening i'm going to read something i wrote because if i talk i'll be very emotional so i'm just going to stay with what i wrote when is it safe we have her sorry when is it safe we had heard over and over when is it safe that is when the teachers will go back to teach in person what does safe mean according to mr cannella safe means few to zero cases this is the answer provided by us by the head of the cedar grove teachers union is this logic is this based on science or statistics did a health care provider an individual educated in public health provide him with this logic or is this based on fear with no scientific evidence as a foundation for such a statement cedar grove high school

085is a school that has a thousand person capacity on any average day we are about fifty percent now with hybrid schedule we are at twenty five percent mms in both elementary schools are newly renovated there is proper ventilation and we have met the criteria set forth by the state to open our board of ed spent tireless hours developing a safe plan we applaud them thank you unfortunately too many teachers do not feel safe they fear for their lives these actions tied the hands of our board of education and forced a full remote learning environment our lives the lives of the teachers that want to teach in person and our children's lives are molded by these people and their unsustained fear mr canelo stated all other schools around us were going remote so why don't we

086do as others do because we as a parent population would like to proceed based on science and logic not because everyone else is doing it isn't that the message we work so hard to teach all of our children covet has stabilized statewide in cedar grove we have been stable for months with few to no cases daily i encourage everyone to visit the cdc sites and look at the science another site as of september 8 2020 john hopkins last latest overall report for new jersey reports a total of 334 cases in new jersey to put this in perspective on on april 3rd there were 4 229 cases let's evolve as the virus has we applaud the teachers who have given them their all given this their all we know you are there we are thankful it

087is unfortunate for cedar grove students that we have teachers that are not guided by fact but by fear-mongering when is it safe few to no cases this is just not about the kids not getting their first day missing the simple things this is about long-term impact that this is going to have on them not having physical learning and socialization go is going to impact them for years to come not only what is immediately in front of them we hand off our children to teachers from september to june trusting them to not only teach but help mold our children into responsible humans what is this teaching them in march and april they learn what a pandemic is and how to act responsibly the state needed to shut down a hospital capacity because the hospital capacity was

088full we have come a long way hospitals are not in crisis anymore rates have significant decreased we are stable why is every other facet in the state opening and responding to the numbers except schools there will be cases there will most likely be a spike which is always expected in flu season that doesn't mean we shut everything down it means we use caution we such as mass hand washing and decreased capacity for social distinction when is it safe for you to know cases education is the most valuable weapon for success we can give our children and for nothing more than fear and lack of willingness of a few a generation will suffer and one day that generation will be making decisions and running the world think about that is that safe [Applause] thank you for

089your comment uh next i have dinner fernandez you're good okay uh next i have uh dawn dora thank you good evening my name is dawn door i live at 56 union street and cedar grove so i wrote a couple questions down here because i too will get emotional so um one of the things i want to start by saying is first of all i am a parent i have three children but i'm also an educator and an administrator so i have done this job for the last uh six months to open our school i work in a neighboring district and our students are in five days we are fully returned shortened days so it can be done and i believe the way to do that is for everybody to work together collaboratively i believe that

090our decisions and our success was based on trust collaboration trust between the board trust between the administration the staff the families the communities and i feel in the last several weeks that that trust has broken down in cedar grove and that's that worries me so how do we recover from that so i put that out there just to have in your mindset that everyone takes some time to think about that how we can recover from that and we can rebuild the trust that i do feel has been broken and fallen apart in the last couple of weeks so that's just a statement i want to wait my first question is are we definitely opening october 19th that's my first question is that a definite are we set is everything in uh in place to open

091in the hybrid model on the 19th and if we are what is different on october 19th then was uh in place on september 8th i believe was the first day you want me to put all my questions out there okay so that was my first question um the other thing i was talking uh i wanted to ask about is was the delay did we do we considered um working in collaboration with the staff in regards to maybe it doesn't need to be across the board everybody works from home everybody works in the school has there been some thought that in some situation it is beneficial for a staff member to be home maybe things like that and maybe you have done all that is which was why i'm asking but if not maybe that communication

092and collaboration with the staff will kind of bridge the gap that has definitely been wedged during these last couple of weeks so i would like some feedback on that the other thing i wanted to ask about is the is there been any discussion on a standard recovery i know a gentleman spoke earlier about his seven-year-old daughter and the things that she's missing and half of the world is missing right now is there any discussion any plans for our curriculum directors to work on standard recovery and how we can bring our students back up this to speed without losing more ground and then the last thing i wanted to ask about was when we do go back hybrid the live streaming and what um if you can talk a little bit about your thoughts about that

093because i saw you you strass asked me as your policy maker and they actually don't recommend the live streaming from the classroom into the homes it's a violation of students potentially can be a violation of students privacy so maybe you could talk a little bit about that that really is something that's very challenging for teachers to have to live stream to their students sitting directly in front of them as well as the students that are sitting at home thank you thank you sorry for all of those questions no that's okay they're good questions um so the first thing is uh you talked about october 19th and what is different uh about october 19th compared to the beginning of september 3rd so october 19th is a projected date that we will get all of our students

094back onto a hybrid schedule we projected that for all of our students we were able to move forward and get our students our elementary students back by october 29th so we are working in in segmented sections to provide uh coverage for our staff along with accommodations that would provide us to get back to that date it is a fluid date like every other date in every other district that has provided a date um i am will not lie to you and say that we will be back there ultimately on the 19th things can change uh we are right now it's a day-to-day situation where our entire community or our directives can change as well so that is our projected date and that is something that we are working towards if we are not able to

095accomplish it by that date i will communicate that with the community and talk about what the next steps will be but as of right now we're moving forward and we're very pleased and happy with the fact that we're able to get our our uh elementary cohort back prior to that that actual deadline um when we talk about um would a staff member be able to work from home uh that would be part of our accommodations that a staff member may need that is definitely definitely something that is not off of the table i shared with you the gentleman that came up to the to the microphone the rationale as to why our staff is working within our buildings but um that is again it's an option um and i agree i think that you know

096when you talk about trying to get everybody back back together and back on track every district is different when the other gentleman talked about essex fells that's a um that's a much smaller district when we look at our k-8 districts compared to our k-12 districts when we look at roseland which is a k-6 district those are all things that we take into consideration so sometimes you know when we look at comparatives out there we also have to look at those different pieces of the puzzle that is something that we continually will look at um but we also look at when you talk about the standard recovery um every district is going every district across this country is going to have to look at this and i i feel that this is something that we have

097to look at now um it's you'll often hear me use a phrase of being proactive rather than reactive this is a time to be proactive i think you know we as educators always look towards the end result and have an end point um unfortunately this is one time in our careers that we don't know what that end point is going to be and you're right and as well as the other gentleman that came up out to the mic about how this generation of students there will be consequences for what we are doing right now and that will be across the country um we don't know what those consequences will be we don't we don't necessarily know what those outcomes will be but what we do have to do and i agree with you on this

098that we do have to come together and work together as a community and as a as a collective body to support our children there will be there will be holes and that is not something that is unique to cedar grove that will be throughout the state and throughout this country but we will be working with our curricular um our curricular team um and we will also i think part of this is reaching out to outside outside districts uh collaborating together sharing best practices partnering with each other are you sure that you're you're in a um surrounding district it's a great opportunity for us to partner together um because what is happening here is not unique we're all going to be in the same position and when you talk about the the high the live streaming

099during the hybrid um we are definitely aware of the fact that strauss esme that is not part of their plan although those plans are our guidelines and templates for for what we would adopt as a um as a board uh the one thing that we took into consideration with synchronous learning for our students and when we looked at the fact that we took cohort a and cohort b and just to give some insight to this our classrooms have a particular capacity we are very fortunate that we have some newer buildings although they may not feel new but they're uh i've come from a district where i worked in a building that was built in and classroom sizes are very different from then compared to what they were building the 50s to the 80s to the

10090s so therefore capacity in the classroom is a big determining factor of how we would move forward uh so when we look at that we look we look at capacity between 11 and 12 uh students in at one time so if we had a cohort a having live instruction and cohort b having um asynchronous instruction whether it be through a video or whether it be through independent learning um that is part of that that kind of works with your question prior which is the standard recovery how can we kind of reduce the amount of strain that we could cause on our education system and the delivery for our students and that is done through live streaming it is an extremely difficult task it's something that we haven't done before even colleges don't necessarily do this

101um the closest that i ever got to it as an educator was when i taught a class where we were doing um a partnership um lessons with surrounding towns in other states when i was doing a dissection of a heart or dissection of an eyeball that is for a period we're looking at doing this throughout the course of the day so when we look at a staff we have to be flexible we have to be intuitive to our students and we have to work our way through that which will evolve what we start off with today will look very very different from than several weeks from now i used a great analogy of kindergarten our kindergarten students don't come in as kindergarteners these are pre-k students or students who have never been to pre-k so

102the expectations of our students during that time are very different than what they look like in october very different than what it looks like in the january jump in the very well it looks like very different from march that's because we have because that's because the kindergarten teachers evolve with the students and they and they're able to pick up on the um the supports that are needed one of the documents that came out it was march march of 20 this i think was march 20 something to march 30th i forget what it was maybe it was march 20th actually of 2020. uh it came out from the department of education united the united states department of education which talked about ferpa laws in utilizing live streaming uh we utilize we have to think back to

103what we did march through june we utilized that and we were in our own homes but one of the things that we learned from that i think i think this needs to be a learning lesson is the fact that how we deliver that instruction how we are just in general for even for our students with iep needs uh how do we protect their rights how do we do that within the classroom in general how do we do that when we're communicating with other staff members how do we do that when we're communicating with families uh those things don't go away but uh that that um there's a great power point online that talks about that and the allowances that the united states government has allowed through ferpa uh it does talk about higher education but

104it also talks about and gives some great examples for our um our secondary education as well as our primary education uh so that's something that we you know when we created our guidebook for our staff to talk about these are things that you can do these are things you can't do and some of this is just basic practices when we're when a teacher is in a classroom talking about talking to a student or supporting a student they're not sharing what that student's modifications or accommodations are or even a student who is a general education student some some basic private needs that is not something that is done on a daily basis nor it shouldn't be done but that is the same expectation that we would have for staff during the time when we were doing

105hybrid uh versions uh our our administrators do have access to all of our classrooms uh so they are able to maneuver in and out and we look for feedback from our families and our students if there is a if they feel there is a violation that has taken place we will investigate it and we will address those needs on an individual basis well my opinion i feel like it puts the teachers on display and it puts it puts the students on display i i don't i don't personally agree with it i think it is an opportunity to um to just break people's uh privacy things that are beyond their control and unfortunately in a small town that becomes a big issue so i would appreciate if if the board reassesses that as well as on

106the policy about the middle school and the high school changing classes i find it challenging how you're going to contain a potential outbreak if students are moving about and switching from class to class throughout the day and each class being different uh students in there i'm not so sure how we would be able to contain that and believe it or not i'm all for the kids going back i want my kids back in school they need to be there because it's detrimental for them to be home so my only request is that you reconsider that and maybe some changes to the overall plan thank you thank you uh next on the list is angela um oh gosh sorry uh vanquin oh sorry can i pull this down yes absolutely my name is angel ventola i

107live at six lafayette drive in cedar grove earlier you mentioned we were at the mercy of the state personally i feel we're at the mercy of the teachers for our children now we found out 48 hours 72 hours prior to school opening that school wasn't opening how are we preparing ourselves if this is to happen again on october 15th or 16th if we have more teachers who do call out on medical leaves and are we filling the spots of these teachers with substitutes how far along have we come to fill the spots that need to be filled i have one child who is eight years old in a private school and i have a child who is in seventh grade my child that's eight years old is so happy back to his normalcy he comes

108in house happy my daughter feels like she's working a full-time job sitting behind a computer it really is not fair to these kids my heart breaks for the kids breaks for the parents and also breaks for the teachers because there aren't many teachers who really want to be back in the classrooms with the kids obviously we all want what's best for the children and the teachers because we do not want to see anyone getting sick but i think we have to really secure ourselves to make sure that something like this does not happen again at the last minute so i was just wondering where do we stand with that so i'm not going to lie to you that could happen again it very well could happen um what we are doing is we are trying

109to establish a pool of certified individuals that can help guide us through the accommodations that certain teachers are asking for and and when we look at those accommodations um those accommodations are real um and they're reasonable um if they're not reasonable that's something then that we would have a different conversation with and those would be personal personnel issues but right now we were very pleased with the fact that we were able to bring back the elementary elementary level um we are working towards this and the unique piece of this is is that the same pool of people that are substitutes that we're pulling from um those are the same pool of people that surrounding districts are pulling from as well so we're all maneuvering through that we've also reached out to services uh and these

110are services that do provide substitute substitutes as well you'll see places like robinsville which are much larger districts that have had much larger issues and we look at places like elizabeth that have had much larger issues but everybody is in that same position and we're all pulling from the same pool of people uh so we are securing that i will share with you that our human resource department is working diligently and and and trying to find people that would be willing to come in and substitute and i will share this with everybody uh that if you are interested in doing that and participating in health and collaborating with us to be a substitute or you know of somebody who can be a substitute uh you need 60 credits and you need to have a criminal

111background check um based on the requirements from the state of new jersey and we will be able to partner with you to help cover uh the teachers that do have those accommodations um but i won't i will never lie to you i'll be very transparent with the fact that that may happen but we are working very hard and diligently towards a resolution to get the kids back into school and that doesn't necessarily mean that we would have more people coming out with accommodations those this is this is the reality and these are the confines which we are working within um but like i said i didn't necessarily think we would be able to i would be able to make that announcement uh earlier this week that we were going to get our elementary school kids

112back and we did so i'm very optimistic uh i feel that you know as we've gotten back into school you know talking with the staff and seeing what's been going on i feel that you know we are we are in partnership with each other and that is my expectation and my my hope and goals that we will will come together and we will we will do what's best for our kids but during the summer months weren't we discussing this with the teachers to find out what their concerns are of going back to school like wasn't this ever brought up it absolutely was brought up but why would they do that so quickly to school opening mr grossman maybe you could mention the survey that was sent out to teachers so we um we sent a

113survey out to the families we sent the survey out to the staff and the majority of our um of our staff they wanted to come back i cannot speak for the individual teachers i i won't do that either based on the fact that they are individuals and have individual needs and these are individual medical needs that they have um but i will tell you that each of the each of the individual teachers that come to the table with a request we will take that request we will evaluate that request and we also uh will evaluate we have evaluated that with our district doctor and sat down and went through what is a reasonable accommodation that would not put our district at risk okay i just hope that there's not more teachers that come forward saying

114that they have medical issues at the last minute because it really is not fair to the children thank you thank you very much next i have abby oh boy garadeli abby with any last name because i maybe not have pronounced that correctly all right well maybe abby left moving on i have daniella barrow okay next i have joe mata hello good evening joe mata 24 linwood road cedar grove um i have some stuff written down here i'm trying to read uh questions really four items uh i understand the challenges related to this global pandemic and uh i like everybody else wants wanting everything to get back to normal and schools and full-time attendance i have a kindergartner and a first grader in south end and a few points that i want to talk about regarding

115the format of the way the classes have been going first one is the format of the class seems to be following a traditional format in an untraditional setting i'd like to for the board to consider instead of having the kids sign in and sign out of all their virtual classrooms can we have the teachers just rotate through the different classrooms so that the students especially the younger kids sign in and they're in that same uh space for a longer period of time than having to constantly every 20 minutes sign in and sign out this would help reduce a lot of class time that is wasted in the initial with the initial technology issues like muting and unmuting the teachers asking for the students to mute themselves unmute themselves kids having problems with that especially on

116the lower grades a lot of times there's feedback on the line just those general tech issues if the kids were in the same spot at least the same room and the teachers rotated through it would help reduce that because once the class does get flowing the tech issues are better the first week was a mess but the second week this week has been has been better so that's item one the second one is the format of the lessons needs to improve uh i think giving the lesson for the day or for the period up front and in the morning and using worksheets projects in the afternoon instead of having the kids being you know doing a lesson and having the kids do a project and being online coloring at their desks it's really difficult for

117the children to keep their attention and they lose interest very quickly i know my child sometimes just colors something in or does a project sloppily quickly just to get done so he can go walk around the house so i think if in that morning session if it can be more concentrated on instruction and then and then perhaps set aside time in the afternoon for them to get that reinforcement with doing the worksheet it'll also help parents like myself and my wife who both work so that we know that in the afternoon there's a little bit more relaxed time we can still be online with the teachers and doing the projects but i think it would be uh just work better by the time lunch comes in the afternoon it's really hard to get the kids

118back into focusing on anything um on the computer screen uh the third item is if we're going to be in this remote environment and we need more class work my kindergartner is done and i realize that there's different levels but perhaps we can have like a minimum amount of work that the students have to do and have extra work for uh the kids who maybe finish quickly and that way we can as parents say oh look you have five more worksheets to do instead of just uh i know sometimes my kids finish really quick and then while the teacher is going through additional lessons they're just waiting around they're rolling their eyes they're they're just not engaged so if we can have more extracurricular or whatever you want to call it classwork i think that

119would help the flow and the balance with all the students being on different levels and the fourth item is i and i work in the it field i appreciate the amount of work that it must have been to get uh all these devices out but the tablets for the kindergarteners was a dropped ball the teachers didn't even know that the kids had tablets and not chromebooks until it's like the second day of school and now we are wasting class time having to install apps on the tablet um when i think if the it team can just send out instructions for these the parents i think everybody here has a mobile phone and we can handle the tablets but just send out instructions on what apps we need to install and what the logins are so

120we can do that at night when the kids are in bed so that the class time is focused on okay kids get your tablets out open this app and then we move forward um so that's a another item and that's all i have thank you did you want to comment on any of that i just i just wanted to comment on i appreciate all of your uh your feedback this is really important and this is what i talk about how we can improve and make adjustments so i thank you for that um and and i will share that back with our uh administrators at the elementary level you know as far as the tablets go um i will share this uh the tablets the tablets actually were not necessarily part of our plan to begin

121with we had anticipated providing all of our our k through uh 12 students with a chromebook unfortunately once we were getting closer to the opening of our date like a lot of other districts um we were we were shared that our um or or inventory was being withheld in customs so therefore we went and wanted to provide we still wanted to provide our students with a device because although um when we took it when we provided that survey to families they shared that around 86 to 90 percent of families said they were able to provide a device for their students their child at home uh we wanted to provide them with a an option and and give them a one-to-one initiative for the district uh so therefore we um look to provide them with a

122uh a tablet which was the um after researching multiple companies everybody was in the same position and uh there was a delay on a delivery uh with with an actual date of the end of this month for uh a delivery chromebook for the chromebooks yes uh then we we we approached the situation with uh providing students with a tablet and uh what was appropriate was uh for our pre-k through k students with a tablet and after um we were able to acquire those uh we also got a little scared because they were saying that those two were going to be um delayed but we were able to get uh our uh our tablets um on time um which was uh several days before school started um so i you know i i will share that

123you know in your frustration with um and apologize for any type of frustration this has caused you or anybody else or any of the other families within the the pre-k through k families uh in our in our cohorts um uh it was to get we wanted to get that into the hands of our children uh tablets when we when we sat back after we were distributing them we actually looked at the fact that we did some research through um the association of american pediatrics um there's actually a study out there when we look at our pre-k in our case students letter recognition uh is not a skill that is that is that a kindergartner or even a preschool child uh would would enter the uh beginning of the year with uh some do and some

124are very very well versed at it and some are not um so we looked at the tablets where um there was a study done between uh believe it or not one-year-olds to uh three-year-olds and how they utilize this device and we see it all the time you know um how this is um uh is very familiar to our younger children and the ability to point and swipe up down side to side um but also the ability to go and provide them with some sort of communication through our google meet platform um this is something that is uh evolving here in our district uh and having feedback such as what you have provided for us will help us and enable us of how we can kind of move forward and this is something that we will

125take into consideration as we do move forward throughout the coming years and how um now we are truly a one to one district which is a very unique we were um we were forced into this situation but this is a positive because it does provide each of our students here in this district a device that they will be able to utilize both at home in school i think it's great that we're able to do that and provide every all the students of devices but i think one one big gripe is if the tablets and i understand if you got them last minute shipping issues with everybody else but then just send send the parents home instructions on what they have to do and not waste class time because today i used i spent a half

126an hour installing an app with everybody else on the phone on the on the thing when we should have been doing some type of lesson yeah and number two you said that the additional chromebooks were stuck in custom so would we be getting those at some point and can swap out the tablet for the chromebook because i think the tablets are a little small to see what the kids need to see on especially having to interact and the we have to install the google pages or google presentation app on it as well so some of the work that the kids get is dragging and dropping items and it just is it works on a computer with a mouse but it doesn't work because you have to click an icon and drag it across a powerpoint

127presentation or a google slides presentation and the interface just isn't as good as it is on a chromebook or laptop right my kids are using old laptops that i had around the house right and you make a good point because uh google slides is not it's not a it's not a programming um um platform so a lot of a lot of what um if we're looking at dragging and dropping within a google slide or even a powerpoint presentation that's not necessarily um the right platform to do that with and that is the reason why we went and um we enabled the the option of using seesaw because you can do those types of things in there so we're learning through this process we're learning we're growing with this as well as far as providing the

128the um the chromebooks uh this is we're having ongoing conversations with our um our tech department and we'll be making some some decisions as we move forward um and just based off of feedback as you've presented here tonight and one last question is there any issues with the teachers rotating that you can see um rotating through the rooms as opposed to the kids going in out of the rooms all the time i took notes on what you shared with me and i'll definitely definitely be bringing this back to our team thank you thank you next i have bonnie fayela hi bonnie fayela 16 pine drive um i have three children at north end school i just first wanted to thank and applaud the teachers there i do think they're doing a great job there's been

129a lot thrown at them in a very short time and i think you know as the weeks go on they're changing and adapting and i do applaud them second i just have a question regarding the hybrid model once we go back i know each teacher essentially will have three groups they'll have the in-person group the group that's at home cohort b and then virtual so my concern is having the children now all virtual you know it's hard enough for the teacher to engage them when they're on with them so my concern is especially in the lower grades having children just sitting really watching in a lecture style and not really being able to check in or see if they're um understanding what's being taught because you have a group in front of you and then

130you also have the group who chooses you know fully virtual so my concern is you know is that sustainable it's a lot on the teacher it's almost to me it's almost unrealistic um and then my concern is for the students too that their frustration may heighten because of you know this format so i think you nailed it with your comment about adapting and adjusting right i think you know and i appreciate you sharing that that positive feedback about our staff and um because it is a difficult task it's something that we've never done before and as i shared before we're growing with each day uh and we're finding what works and what doesn't work um i think you bring up a really good point with the three cohorts of kids the ones that are they're

131actually in the building the ones that are at home on their off week and the ones that are totally virtual i think what we have to really look at and take into consideration is that we are not delivering instruction the way that we normally would within the four walls of a classroom uh when we look at when we when we bring this device into the mix and we're looking at those little squares on that screen and then we are asking um our students and our staff to operate within the confines of that we cannot function the way that we would when all of our students are sitting in the classroom so that goes to your comment about adapting and adjusting and that means adapting of how we deliver the the the lesson initially when we

132model that lesson it also allows us to adapt and adjust on how we work with our in-person students and when we're working with our in-person students what our what are our virtual students doing are they working independently are they working collaboratively with each other um is there an opportunity to bring everybody back together again is there a an opportunity for check-ins is there an opportunity to work in small groups um there are there's a lot of those opportunities um so we through the course of that time when we go back into that hybrid version this is the adaption that our staff will have to take and find what's going to work specifically for the classrooms because it's like every year every year we get a new um cohort of kids and there are specific needs

133to each one of the each one of those classrooms a classroom filled with children and we have to adapt and adjust and how we deliver that instruction how do we support them so it's an opportunity for our staff to become creative it's an opportunity for our staff to work to explore some new opportunities that we can do on this device but the biggest the biggest um piece of the puzzle that i could share here is that we cannot teach the way that we always have taught and i think we've learned that from business and we've learned that from other organizations globally that their companies are going through the same issue and we can't perform our our our our day-to-day functioning and business the same way that we would do that normally within our offices or

134glo or internationally so that's the same concept applies for our classrooms we cannot continue to teach our students at least while we're working right now in this format the same way that we taught september of last year okay just one last question whatever would you also consider once we start this model if it isn't working possibly doing something where you know you have an am and a pm group so that they're both coming every day and maybe a shortened day so that you can clean in between you know maybe specials that are virtual um just that so that their both groups are in person each day so i would i will always explore everything i think it's it's worth exploring i will just share some of the constraints that we work within for a student

135um we also have to work with contractual obligations for our staff and what what their contractual uh duties are and what their time periods are so um those are some pieces that we have to respect within in it's a negotiated contract so we have to work within that as well um we also have to work within what is a truthful day for a student according to the state of new jersey that's four hours of instruction and that doesn't necessarily uh share what that instruction is but they have they would have to be attending school and attendance would have to be taken for the four hours um i'm i'm always often open and our team is always open to more options we have gone through several options of what would work best but again it goes

136back to the capacity and it goes back to how do we juggle that time with the students in in the building providing a contractual lunch for our staff and contractual preps and um in an assortment of other um negotiated items that that were due to them based on on that contract so um i'm not using that as an excuse i'm just using it as fact because we do have to work within the confines of that right now i get it and thank you i appreciate everything thank you thank you next i have mark peterson thank you mark peterson 41 boardic road i would just like to take this opportunity to thank the board in the administration for your tyler's efforts over the past six months i think it goes completely unrecognized the amount of time

137and energy that get has been put in to even trying to figure out how to go back to school so i would like to thank you for that um tonight mr garcia welcome aboard welcome to the circus [Laughter] um just a little bit beyond i just like to really speak to the community um as the board knows as the council knows in the township of cedar grove this is a packed house for a meeting what you see tonight this isn't covid's distancing this is a packed house if you do not pay attention to what goes on in your community and educate yourself about local government and local school boards when we come to time times when it comes to times of crisis that is not the time to pack the house you need to understand

138budgeting you need to understand collective bargaining you need to understand when these things are going on when there's not a time of crisis because in a time of crisis all of these things become into play and then hands are tied and that's exactly what's happening here we need to pay attention all the time thank you very much appreciate that [Applause] okay next up i have um oh boy uh quang hameen and i'm just gonna apologize 23 brunswick road cedar grove i wrote my question so first off i'd like to thank the board and the teachers for everything that you guys are doing uh you know a lot of hard work has gone in and you know the parents in the community really does appreciate it um i've just seen it even in the last two

139weeks with you know i have three kids in the district and just in north end the amount of work the teachers have put in you know to get ready and make sure that you know this can be successful um you know goes a long way and we really do appreciate it um the questions i have i have two questions one uh my question is you know what is the basis for having elementary return earlier and is it based on a vote or what is the process i would think it's riskier for younger kids to keep a mask on for hours and follow social distancing rules so that's question one uh the second question that i have is is related to you know those parents that choose to keep it virtual and if you know do

140we have the proper technology set up for them and i've heard you know how unsuccessful has been in other districts for the teachers to teach in a hybrid class as well as be teaching for the virtual kids and how kids are getting left behind so i want to hear from you like you mentioned adopting what are some of those plans to adopt so that the virtual kids are not being left behind so when we talk about bringing the elementary students back um it was it's based on the um numbers of teachers that we were able to accommodate um i will share this as well um and again i'll bring up my children um there is a i will say there is an ease of transition for a high school student compared to a kindergartner in

141this platform um or a first grader or a second grader i often will share with with with you about decisions that we make and that i make it is based on what i would want for my children and i i have been watching my son um who john who is in first grade and how he is faring against my uh fourth fifth eighth and junior in high school um and it is quite different um i watch my older children be able to navigate and organize themselves in a different way then i watch my younger son john in first grade be able to do that and the the stress and the pressure that is placed on him and also the um like everybody else um my wife and i having to go to work um having

142my 16 and my almost 14 year old help guide him while they are also learning themselves so as you can imagine i'm i feel the frustration that everybody in this room feels having to navigate through this but with that decision of bringing the elementary kids back early it's based on two pieces number one is that um not that all children grades pre-k through 12 they all need to get back into the buildings um but i look at i look at our um our vulnerable uh groups of children and they are our younger children obviously um but it also comes down to primarily of how we were able to accommodate the teachers and provide the coverage that we needed to provide within the classroom to facilitate the lessons during that time and it was um it

143was an easier task at the elementary level than it is currently at the middle in the high school level and that is based on just on sheer numbers um so those that is the reason why we were able to do this as quickly as we were um i i feel very confident in the fact that after the first week we were able to make that announcement and do that i did not expect that i have to be quite honest with you i did not think based on the conversations that we're having since i made the announcement on august 27th um uh that we were all going virtual and just based on my feedback from other entities that would be able to provide us with coverage how difficult they were having a time so i'm very

144grateful um to michelle spalewski and teresa lombardi who have been working tires tirelessly to get people into our district to help cover that when we talk about the virtual students when we look at how how will children when you you know when you share your words of how will children be left behind i think that is time will definitely tell with that based on um the progression of how we deliver the instruction i think when we look at when when families make a decision that they are in it's a decision that i respect each family has their own particular needs i often i talked about um uh i guess it was a last board meeting we talked about fear and how fear does fuel decisions that we make um i respect that um but these

145are decisions that are made and uh we work with we are working as an educational institution within the confines of that so how will we be able to provide students virtually options compared to a hybrid option well they're two different options we cannot compare either we can't compare them to each other because the hybrid option is allowing face time for four days a week every other week compared to an old virtual where you will not get that you're getting it through a screen so uh that contact time will look very different that uh intuition of that teacher knowing that student within the classroom will look very different compared to the virtual student but what we are doing what we are are moving forward with is the synchronous learning um to provide to our virtual students

146so they don't fall behind the way that we can anticipate um this could pos this could possibly how this could possibly have the impact on students based on the fact of how we've had to adjust and adapt to to this um we will be working with our curriculum team we'll be working with our teachers our staff our administrators to really start to assess uh the progress of our students it comes down to assessments it's the same concept that we use when we're in school full-time all the time is that we we will consistently assess our students to see where they are and what kind of supports we can offer those supports are going to look very different because we are we will do those a lot of these supports will be done remotely compared to

147sitting next to each other or compared to sitting together and guiding children doing guided reading or taking a running record and then be able to establish that that can be done through this device it can be done it's just going to look a little bit different and it's going to be an adjustment period for our staff and for students to get used to that so it is a it is a process and it is progress of how we will be moving forward i will share this is that you know when we started school the first day of the first day compared to where we are now i will will say that we we have moved we have moved to different benchmarks and i'm proud of the the teachers and i'm proud of the staff and

148i'm proud of the administrators for for consistently reevaluating what we're doing and how can we adjust and adapt to that and that will be that will continually happen throughout the course of this year depending upon how long we move forward with this the other piece of this is is that we have to look back when we get back into the classroom fully when god willingness is over and we can get back to whatever that normal will look like we're going to have to then rely again on assessments but not our normal assessments we're going to have to really look at where are children and then we're going to re we hear the word differentiate a lot that is truly what we're going to have to do we're truly going to have to then differentiate our

149learning we'll really have to look at small groups we're going to have to look at taking you know um records of students that we can then what can drive our instruction as educational leaders um all those pieces of that puzzle which we've always done but we will now have to adjust those um protocols and we all have to adjust those practices to now help guide those students so it is a continual reevaluation process of how we are going to help aid and support our students and how we're going to support our staff as well to do this thank you thank you thank you and last we have and i'm going to mess up his name again and i've already said his name earlier today um michael palomara if you wanted to speak it you're good

150okay i just wanted to make sure okay and is there anybody else wishing to speak that didn't have their name on the list if so you can come forward state your name address wipe down the microphone you know hello my name is leo stringer i'm at four hive uterus and i know that all options are being considered and i'm wondering if something to think about any of this there's certain classes like music and arts that require hands-on that don't work very well virtually and we looked into maybe moving those to the last period so we can do those in person for the teachers and the students that are parents that are willing to do it i think there's a lot of teachers that would do that and students that would do that in person as

151a voluntary basis if you if you like and continue part of the class in virtual there's something to think about if you did at the late last class then wherever they are virtual or not they can all go to class because we're spending we say a lot did a lot of activity on sports a lot of pushing into sports but music and arts are always left behind so it's like i know we have we're doing a quick look it looks like a twenty thousand dollars for buses going to caldwell in west orange which is kind of interesting because then you have to bring the kids to the school and then get on a bus to go to caldwell so it's interesting so it's um so i'm thinking if they did the last period they can

152work maybe work that in here's the thought thank you it's nice to meet you nice to meet you um i uh i have to share with you i'm a massive supporter of the arts uh that was a huge part of my life prior to me getting into education so i definitely appreciate the fact that for your appreciation of the arts i would definitely you know through my tenure here in cedar grove i would love to uh even enhance our our offerings and our arts programs to our students um these are things that a lot of i love the fact that you're sharing a lot of feedback from everybody here tonight um this is something we can definitely look into uh sometimes it's difficult to do that based on the fact of scheduling um based on

153and sometimes that scheduling of those um special classes such as our music those are um times where we look at how we support our other teachers um when they wouldn't be necessarily with our students but i will definitely take that into consideration i appreciate that right so i'm just looking at it now at the par possibility that we may stay hybrid or virtual and even if we end up with a situation situation like we had september september 8th where we get a sick out again or whatever that there still may be some teachers willing to teach in person and we shouldn't have to shut down the whole school if we have enough for maybe a few classes i appreciate that thank you thank you thank you nick is all for yorkshire drive i'll make it

154quick because everybody wants to get the hell out of here something that didn't come up yet is the pre-k uh you know i have a kid in pre-k i'm paying tuition i'd like to keep her in pre-k but i just wish that the board would maybe re-evaluate or look at it again just to make sure that uh you know if we keep going through this smaller hybrid maybe there could be some kind of adjustment because you know they really a pre-school kid gets nothing out of it they kill a couple pictures and you know it's costing sixty six thousand dollars for it okay thank you i appreciate you saying that i i you know i i have to say this um pre-k in kindergarten when we talk about a mix between academics and creative play

155um it's very difficult to do that through this uh so i i do want to um just share that you know mr kinney is uh is excellent with looking at and reevaluating uh you know programming he's been working extremely hard along with you know mr david myself and how it can bring a a different kind of experience through a computer for a pre-k student which is um is very difficult and it's very frustrating for us on our end and i can only imagine how it feels for you as a parent uh on your end but we will continue to evaluate that and your feedback is well noted and i you know i appreciate that the only class where you know we're actually paying for the kid to be watched you know that's part of the

156plan when you're paying the money you think that the kid's going to get daycare along with an education i understand that thank you thank you is there anybody else wishing to speak okay i'm going to close that portion of the meeting um a couple things i just wanted to say is uh is i wanted to thank mr grosso and the administration for working so hard to get the um the elementary schools back i mean as everybody knows it's the it's the youngest ones who really you know need to to be in those buildings i mean i have two high schoolers and and they need to be in the buildings too but at least they can navigate the computer and they can and they can handle that but so i'm very happy that we're able to

157bring the elementary schools back and i remain very hopeful that we'll be able to bring everyone back in october because everyone needs to to be back secondly i appreciate everybody coming this evening as mr peterson said this is a packed house for a normal board of ed meetings so we appreciate people taking the time to come out and um one other thing i wanted to bring up is that these are really difficult times and it's not easy and we all have to be patient all of us and the one thing is i know we're all looking for answers and and what i just want to say is if you're looking for an answer go to the source and that source is is mr grosso and as you can see he's very approachable he's very accessible

158and he'll answer all your questions so if you have a question ask him and you'll get the answer so that's just what i wanted to mention announcement of future meetings uh september 29th we'll be back here in two weeks uh here 6 30 exact 7 30 regular meeting uh and i just wanted to say also it's great to be back i know we've been meeting in person but it's actually really nice to actually have people in the audience um to talk to so thank you for coming we appreciate that and then our next meeting will be october 13th same place same time um can i have a uh motion tutorial hold on can i just absolutely thank i wanted to thank everybody for coming and i wanted to wish art the best ba in the

159world oh my gosh an extremely happy birthday that he's spending his actual birthday with us so i just didn't want that to go unnoticed thank you no i absolutely appreciate that because who would you rather spend your birthday with than the board of education so anybody else wishing to make a comment before i cut you all off i'm sorry i think the great thing is it's great to be back and even in the situation like this we're in the high school because it can accommodate as many people as possible everyone can come and attend and we can all socially distance and do proper protocol it is good to be back and to be able to have that interaction that face-to-face interaction in a proper way absolutely all right well now can i have a motion

160to adjourn so moved second roll call please mrs dechara yes this is amiga yes this is fondoria aye mr schoener aye mr dye yes the meeting is over everybody have a good night and stay safe thank you you