Dunellen Board of Education Meeting - 12/17/2024

001e e e okay calling this meeting to order so in accordance with the open public meetings njsa 10 4-6 um adequate notification of this meeting has been provided by advertising in The Courier News and posting notice in the Board of Education administration building and district schools and filing notice with the borough clerk I hereby call to order the regular public meeting Tuesday December 17th 2024 in the Lincoln Middle School cafetorium 400 the nellan Avenue at 706 p.m this meeting is broadcast live for details please check www. thelan schools.org moving on to item two on our agenda uh executive session the denan board of AG education will now adjourn into executive session to discuss items that fall within specific exceptions to the open public meetings act C njsa 10 4-12 B the confidential matters discussed by

002the board during this executive session include items related to individual privacy collective bargaining agreements pending or an anticipated litigation and Personnel any discussion that does not need to remain confidential uh will be made public as soon as it is practical m minutes of the executive session will not be disclosed until the need for confidentiality no longer exists all individuals who may be discussed in executive session have been Ade adequately notified action will take place after the conclusion of the executive session may please have a motion to move into executive session at this time motion to move to Executive all those in favor I opposed okay we'll be back in about uh 25 minutes or so e e e okay we are back hello everyone so uh moving on to item number three on the agenda

003uh the Pledge of Allegiance the flag is over here oh I'm sorry sorry one sorry uh before we start we are back we need to motion to return we have a motion to return back to public please move to go back to public second all those in favor I I opposed okay now we do the Pledge of Allegiance 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 will you all please remain standing for a moment of reflection and respect for our troops serving throughout the world our troops who have served and our troops who have made the ultimate sacrifice in the name of our United States of America thank you okay moving on

004to item number four uh roll call Mr Mr Pepe could you please call the role Mr Anderson present Mrs Condit present Mr Dugen here Dr Jen Drano present Mrs Howard present Mr saoi present Miss Shimp present Mrs Shep present Mr Walker here jazar mclin president Douglas guaro press everybody is here awesome Full House nicely done all right moving on to item number five approval of minutes uh looking for a motion to approve the minutes from the November 19th 2024 board meeting move to approved minutes second open for questions or comments last call okay Mr Pepe can you please called the rooll Mr Anderson yes Mrs Condit yes Mr Dugen yes Dr gendrano yes Mrs Howard yes Mr saoi yes Miss schimp yes Mrs Shep yes and Mr Walker yes motion passes fantastic moving on to

005item number six uh student recognition I'll turn this over to Mr Ross excellent thank you Dr gendrano and good evening everyone it's so wonderful to see you here parents and students and some of our amazing staff members as well thank you for coming um so we have for about two years been uh starting all of our board meetings with a recognition of students of the month and this is a wonderful time and opportunity for the board um which is the public representatives of uh the town of dellan to really connect with the students who have been making a positive difference in the school so we're very very pleased that you're here uh and what we're going to do is we're going to have our administrators come up one by one they are going to announce

006the uh recipients for each school and students you're going to come up and you're going to stand in the front then we're going to just take a little pause and then uh parents you can feel free to stand up and come over and grab a nice uh photo of everyone and then we'll move on to the next group all right so we're going to start uh let's start at the top so Mr Lynch and denell in high school [Applause] good evening ladies and gentlemen thanks for coming I will excuse my dress today I'm not usually dressed down but today was twin day today at the high school and my counterpart Mr Tobin he and I dress the same today so we twin together so it would be more effective if he was here next to

007me but you get the idea uh so we're very happy to announce our students of the month uh when I when I call your name just come on up we have the certificate for you and then we'll take a picture at the end uh our first student of the month ninth grade student Justin Cardis [Applause] Suarez Justin has done a great job adjusting to high school he's an all honor student has done very well with his grades uh he also was a starter on the soccer team and did a great job this season with uh the boys team so we're very happy to have him here at the high school congratulations Justin stay here our 10th grade student of the month Sophia Reno she unfortunately not [Applause] here I will say Sophia is one of

008those students that has really made a huge jump this year uh as we were talking to the teachers about the student of the month this year uh student of the month she was one that really came off as uh made such huge strides this year and we're really proud of the work that she has done and the teachers really pushed hard for her to be named this month so we're very happy to present Sophia Reno for uh month of December our 11th grade student of the month Queen [Applause] Emil Queen also has done a fantastic job here at the high school uh her first two years and this year in talking to her counselor she wanted to start looking into taking some college courses and so this past fall she uh did that so in

009addition to all of the high school work she did she also took a college course and is looking to do the same thing come in the springtime uh which not a lot of students do but she's looking to continue to push herself and Achieve and so congratulations Queen and our 12th grade student of the month is Quan [Applause] Tran Quan is not here this evening mwan is one of those individuals who has a ton of talent he is great at playing the piano he's an incredibly bright student he just liked to keep it hidden from students from other people for for a long period of time this year he's really come along he's done an amazing job uh getting straight A so far this year and he's really one of those that we now look

010forward to where he's choosing to go to college next year so our 12th grade student of month is Quan Tran [Applause] all right thank you very much Mr Lynch and and now from Lincoln Middle School we have the assistant principal Miss Lauren [Applause] Coffield good evening okay um our first student of the month is our sixth grader Angelina swam if you could come [Applause] up Angelina is pleasant and respectful to her peers her teachers and all School staff she may come into contact with she works tirelessly to consistently maintain High grades providing her with an excellent start to her career here at LMS she's conscientious about her work she produces and puts thoughtfulness and effort into each of her assignments in class her teachers also all Echo that she is willing to help classmates and

011actively participate in class congratulations Angelina we're very proud of you our seventh grade student of the month is Stacy aerio palar if you could come up Stacy's teachers have expressed she is an absolute pleasure to have in class Stacy is a conscientious and motivated learner who works tirelessly in all of her classes she always comes to class prepar to listen learn and participate in classroom activities Stacy has consistently been a positive role model for her peers as she is always willing to work with others and help them she is kind and courteous toward her classmates and most recently today she was the leader in the classroom door decorating competition congratulations [Applause] Stacy and last we have our eighth grade student sersa Rodriguez if you could come up ca ca achieved high honoral for her outstanding

012academic performance during the first marking period her teachers describe her as a pleasure to have in class noting her active participation in discussions and her exceptional creativity she is a strong passion for art which she consistently incorporates into her work s is not only dedicated to her studies but also demonstrates kindness and respect toward her teachers and Pierce s's positive attitude and hardworking nature makes her truly deserving of this December student of the month award congratulations [Applause] here and parents feel free to uh come up and grab a photo [Applause] all right and last but certainly not least we have uh assistant principal from Faber Elementary Felicia Moody [Applause] hello everybody there it is sorry hello everyone uh we're GNA start with our prek student of the month Emma Molina Novoa Emma's from Miss kean's

013class and she is a happy girl that loves school she loves interacting and playing with her classmates she loves to be a big help Emma works very hard every day and always has a smile on her face congratulations Emma [Applause] next up is our kindergarten student of the month Margo gergus come on up [Applause] Margo Margot always comes to school eager to learn she gets excited to learn new things and her smile lights up the room Margot always treats her classmates with respect and gets along with everyone her passion for learning new things makes the classroom a brighter place congratulations Margo our first grade student of the month is Bella sardinas y Bella is very respectful to her friends and teachers she always tries her best even if she faces challenges she includes everyone to

014play with her she is a great friend to have congratulations Bella our second grade student of the month is Allison Cordova Allison is extremely kind and gentle student she always follows directions and does her best work she is a good friend to her classmates and often helps them make good choices inside and outside of the classroom she is polite and grateful for all that is given to her congratulations [Applause] Allison uh we have two for our third grade our first is Braden Mendes I don't think brayden's here Bren was chosen cuz he always shows up to school with a smile on his face and ready to learn he puts forth his best effort in everything he does and tries his best even when things are hard he is a great friend to others in school

015and always congratulates his friends when something good happens our next third grade is Alexa figuro Lopez I don't think I saw her either no Alexa is a hardworking student who's always thoughtful and kind she can always be counted on for positive attitude student determination she comes to school ready to learn and is always excited she looks out for her classmates and lends a helping hand when someone is struggling I look forward to all the great things that she has in her future congratulations Alexa our fourth grade student of the month is Gian [Applause] Hughes Giana is an exceptionally outstanding student she is organized and responsible and has never missed a homework assignment while maintaining a test average of 100% despite her achievements she remains humble and is quick to encourage and praise her classmates while

016she may be quiet she chooses her words thoughtfully and speaks with eloquence often leaving her teacher speechless with her answers and insight this young scholar has a bright future of amazing achievements ahead of her in the meantime you she's the one you would want on your trivia team congratulations Giana our fifth grade student of the month is Camila vetta Camila is a student who works more diligently carefully and precisely than any other student despite not being a native English speaker she works hard to comprehend and participate in class to make sure she is learning the material that she needs to know she is kind and helpful to the rest of the class and is polite to all the adults she interacts with she's greatly deserving of this reward congratulations Camila [Applause] and our special area

017student of the month is Emma Vela the special Area Teachers are proud to recognize Emma as a December student of the month she is a hardworking student who's always willing to help others she is a good egg Emma is always willing to assist and is kind to everyone and helps to make learning fun Emma is a pleasure to work with and teach the the special Area Teachers are honored to have her as a December student of the month congratulations [Applause] Emma e [Applause] all right so our typical move at this point would be to take a brief pause um but we do have another special recognition that we want to just take care of um and I think it's it would be wonderful if all of you would would remain as we honor um our

018exiting board member uh Mr Michael [Applause] dougen so we have a uh a resolution for board me member recognition which is uh on the agenda and Dr Jano if you would do the honors absolutely it is my honor and uh for those for those following along this is item number eight on the agenda uh be it resolved upon the recommendation of the superintendent the dellan Board of Education recognizes and thanks Michael dougen for his service to the dellan board of education and the dellan school Community whereas Michael dougen has always been mindful of the interests of the dellan Board of Education and has worked tirelessly to advance the quality of our schools and whereas my Michael Dugen has faithfully and with honor integrity and great distinction served the dellan Board of Education as a board

019member for the last four years resolved that the dellan Board of Education formally acknowledges and extends its profound appreciation to Michael dougen for his service and dedication to the dellan Board of Education [Applause] so I'll I'll just say a few words about Mr dougen uh and I know that some of our board members may as well uh I've been in the district since 2022 and um when I first met our board members um Mr dougen introduced himself uh he is a principal in Edison Township Public Schools and he wears uh what I would consider to be the corniest ties of any educator that I've ever seen um I think the day that I first met him he had I don't know what it was but it was cartoon characters or you know crayons or something

020like that he's an elementary principal um and as an elementary principal he really just loves um being with that population of students uh being the person who makes a difference in the lives of of young children as they're learning um and it was very clear to me early on that he really is a leader um in education the the more that I've had the opportunity to know Mr dougen I I've I've learned a couple things about him the first is that he really loves this community um our board members uh do not get paid for their service they spend a tremendous amount of time and energy um serving the community and and acting as representatives and uh Mr Dugen is really is a fixture in the town he's a fixture in the community um and

021he really he serves in a way uh that really shows an incredible humility um and an understanding that his job is not to be the person in the Limelight here his job is to help the community get the best outcomes that they can for the students of dellan um he is an incredibly gracious person um he has written me all sorts of notes of thanks and of recognition and just of sort of uh you know I see you kind of things that for me has been really touching I have many of them saved and will keep them for many many years um there's an authentic authenticity to Mr Dugen that is pretty unparalleled um he just is who he is he presents himself um he presents his true self really in every conversation um and

022as a leader on the board and as a colleague I think uh I can say that he really has been someone who has helped support board members in uh understanding their role um understanding their place in the community and understanding how important it is to serve the the community of dellan so as superintendent it's been an honor uh to be able to to serve under you um I really appreciate your work and um I wish you the best in the rest of your career and obviously in your time in the community um and obviously as you recover from the various ailments that you've been working your way through um but I know the future is bright and I know that your students um and your family are very lucky to have you so thank [Applause]

023you so I'll invite other board members to uh to jump in as well but let me just say a few uh words so um I I uh first met Mike for the first time during a um during the pandemic actually uh on a virtual call as you were interviewing for board seat that had become open after board member had resigned and you you didn't wait man you just jumped right in and got right to work it was pretty awesome on the board you've been uh key and outspoken member of the board and a chair of the education committee and you've brought brought up so many key issues asked so many great questions and made many great points in so many of our discussions as a testament to your commitment and engagement and we are so

024glad you did from my vantage point Mike we are better as a board better as a school district and better as a community because of your many contributions and I so grateful that you were a part of this personally I learned a great deal from you Mike as an educator as a colleague and and as a friend and I will greatly miss our talk and your guidance thank you sir for your service to the community and thank you my friend for the opportunity to shoot the breeze with you I wish you best [Applause] wishes good oh yeah please please Mike we've known each other long time 2009 we had uh we're oldest we're both in kindergarten together it's been a long time I appreciate your integrity and your character I'd like to share a little

025snippet from my personal life but only the two of us know up until right now go back in early 2000s 2 10 or 11 or so I was looking for a direction and Mike helped me get a job which pointed me in the right direction in the career which I am in right now that was that that's something that a person with character does Mike Ed me nothing he did not need to do that for me but he did so character and integrity Mr dougen thank you [Applause] anyone else Mike I'm going to jump in and say that I think something if if you don't know Mike he is one of the most welcoming people that you could ever meet and that's the first impression I had of you when I started on the board

026your ability to just go up to someone and say Hi how are you is not like the normal Hi how are you I feel like there's there's this authenticity right that um you really welcome everybody and you've really just been such a calm presence and it not to say that you're quiet but but there's this calm demeanor about Mike that is just so refreshing and so nice to be around and we'll certainly be really missed I met Mike uh when he was in service to the community um volunteering his time again uh we were coaching together and he said don't worry Jay I got your back and then he promptly went on vacation said I don't know what I'm doing um but you know he's he's been a good friend um we've been uh Partners

027since before the board uh he's helped me coach on several occasions uh baseball um well as soccer uh he didn't have a horse in a race this last season and he even offered if I was going to coach this is how much he loves the city or the town the burrow I should say that he offered his time just to help me coach in case I needed it um as far as the bar board goes he's uh offered me guidance when I have had things weighing Heavenly heavily on my mind and which way I was going to go and he's provided Clarity uh through conversation and I'm going to miss you and I appreciate [Applause] you good good to go all right thank you very much um and parents students uh staff members that are

028here thank you all for being here as well we're going to take about a 5 minute recess right now so if you'd like to head out we certainly understand if you want to stay for the meeting you're certainly more than welcome to do so but I know it's uh it could be a late night so have a wonderful evening of e e e so we'll jump through presence remarks yeah okay okay we're back in so uh we will uh jump to I know we covered uh item six and item eight so just to take a step back item seven president's remarks I'll be brief so uh good evening Welcome to our meeting uh so this is um our last scheduled meeting for 2024 and next time that we're going to be meeting will be at

029our reorganization meeting which will be on Tuesday January 7th uh 2024 right here in the LMS cafetorium uh that's the meeting where we set the stage for the year you know um and and uh kick ourselves off on the right foot uh for for the for 2025 so uh same time 7 o'clock uh Tuesday the January 7th right here um please join us and we're going to be as we'll be swearing in uh new board members who were recently elected um award so I would like to underscore how proud We Are of our students we just recognized and celebrated congratulations again to them on the Great accomplishments since we spoke last there have been quite a number of things that have happened I'll just kind of quickly go through them we've had the and most

030of these have had the um uh privilege to be able to attend and participate in uh the the DHS fall sports awards the tcj honors Wind Ensemble um where we had students of gwend Drew brow jenie satoi Kaden pommo Trevor fro and Jackson gendrano participate uh to represent dellan we had the dellan National Honor Society um and dellan National Art honors excuse me Society inductions we had the favor Winter band and choir concert the LMS DHS Winter band concert um and uh tomorrow we have the uh DHS choir concert so there's a lot happening uh in December guess so A Great Big kudos to all our teachers the staff administrators parents friends to everyone who helped make these events tremendously successful thank you thank you thank you so um staying healthy as the weather changes

031and the temperature drops as we're seeing fluctuate it's important to underscore that healthy kids means healthy schools means a healthier community so bottom line take Common Sense precautions uh to minimize the spread of infectious diseases that can really impact our school year uh the winter when a lot of these infections spreads is just around the corner so we need to be prepared um December has a number of of celebrations that happen um just to call out a few a universal human rights month that's December um the beginning of December was International Day for the abolition of slavery uh December 3rd International Day of persons with disabilities December 18th International migrants Day and December 20th international human solidarity day and all this I I mentioned to underscore the importance of diversity equity and inclusion in the

032fabric of our daily lives and that impact the impact that that has on our community open honest and Equitable communication uh that's respectful positive supportive fair and most of all kind goes a long way in strengthening uh a community so um I will keep it uh short there because I know we have a bunch of things to talk about this evening thank everyone for your time for listening and I'll give it back to you to Mr Ross for the superintendent report great thank you Dr gendrano so we will begin the superintendent Report with actually the student report um so we'll do the student report first and then we'll do the presentation okay nice hat by the way um all right so our uh student Representatives um will uh provide the report for December all right

033good even evening this is the student report for sorry excuse my voice um out of scrimmage today it's a very intense scrimmage um but here is our report for December for DHS last week we had a freshman Focus day for all ninth graders as students got an opportunity to listen to several speakers from various career Fields the speakers that talked to the Freshman included officers Mysterio and hire from the middle sex County Sheriff's Office along with their dogs Valkyrie Jess in Zena discussing careers in law enforcement Miss Phyllis piano DHS choir teacher but also an instructor for equin therapy Caroline bitler and airline pilot John Osborne a forensic document examiner spirit week is in full swing this week at DHS with the holiday break approaching the spirit days for the week are as follows Monday

034is ugly sweater day Tuesday is twin day Wednesday is white lie t-shirt day Thursday is teacher student swap day and Friday is comfy cozy day this week the senior class has been selling bids for the mistletoe dance that will be held on January 3rd at the middle sex Elks class has chosen a new year's theme for the event tomorrow Wednesday December 18th concludes the sale of bids the students have also commence in the voting process for misto king and queen on Wednesday December 18th the LMS DHS winter choir concert will be held at the DHS auditorium at 700 p.m. the National Honor Society is sponsoring event on Tuesday December 19th there's a student ambassador from Yale University coming to speak with the students about Yale admissions Aid Etc the chapter is also considering their oh

035sorry continuing their tutoring program um this month has also marked the official start of winter sports our boys basketball uh varsity team just ended their preseason with a 1 and two record they had a nice one against Calvary Christian in a scrimmage yesterday at home the boys will open up their season with an away game at 5:30 :30 against Highland Park this Friday December 20th on December 26th the boys will play their first game of the Clum Santi Christmas tournament against Highland Park for girls basketball the varsity girls basketball team has had an amazing start to the season they've played two scrimmages so far against Keyport and Woodbridge and have emerged Victorious from both the time of this report being given the girls will have just finished their scrimmage that was scheduled for 430 to

036day against sville the game was hard fought but unfortunately destroyers fell short of a win with the final score being 3230 the lady destroy started off their season officially Friday December 20th with an away game against Henry Hudson at 4 p.m. on December 26th the girls will play their first match of the Clum Santi Christmas tournament against Highland Park at 3 p.m. uh and for wrestling as of right now we have two destroyers wrestling under a conjoint program with middle sex and we wish them the best of luck during their season well good evening I'm sorry good evening to everyone for dellan high school I have some informations first I I like to start with the overall feeling feeling of DHS so this last month has been positive students seem to have adapted to the

037school schedule and are working on their classes a lot of students are feeling motivated as they are able to work in groups and learn working with their friends challenging classes such as APS seems to be going great and mus clubs are meeting on a weekly basis fresh have done another hot chocolate sell person and personally I love their initiative and how they are calculating and thinking on what others will want to purchase in this case hot chocolate is a great idea since they since we are getting a cold weather lately and as a students walk into the building they love to get a they love to be able to get a cup of hot chocolate sophomores are doing a great job as well as they are helding a ornament cell where they are selling considerable

038V variety of ornaments for the Christmas trees they are also going to hold the big sell this Friday right before break I think that the sophomores are going to accomplish a lot this school year as they are locked in Jers have shown a comeback after some time without starting any fund Racers they made a big sell and a D to donate they have a big sell and have a d to donate coming up also they are doing the candy grams throughout this week where individuals can send their significant others a back of sweet candies and show their appreciation towards them junior year is the most most important year in high school to fundies and I think that even after a delayed start the Juniors have been able to get back on track and are going

039to make some Pro some good profit effort is the key last week on December 12th the seniors held their annual cookie walk which was a great success the seniors make $458 the night of the band concert which I think is great for dunan performing at Arts I have that dunan High School performed a van concert last Thursday that the show was a was great and everyone did a great job by performing great music the most interesting part was that the selection of the songs which was challenging as some as some songs contain significant messages last Monday we held a food advisory meeting the food ADV advisory members included staff parents and students thank you for participating and sharing your opinion on our school lunches for middle school I have some information as well starting as

040on Tuesday December 3rd they held their first honoral ceremony for the first marking period it was a great turnout and thank you to all families who attended the event they are also holding uh spirit week which are Monday hot day Tuesday teacher student swap Wednesday ugly sweater Thursday sweet suit day and Friday Hol holiday color day I think that Spirit weeks are great for schools since there is this kind of interaction between teachers and students and also they the students are able to also feel welcome in school and have that kind of environment more like and then I think it gives the opportunity for students students to connect more in school with their classmates as well um on the academic Concepts we have that the Middle School classes science classes have are working on Earth

041Science Life Science and physical science which I think that is like really interesting since they are already going into more technical Concepts and they are going to be learning a lot of stuff that is going to be useful for them and then that will complete my report thank you awesome thank you so much to both of you it was excellent um all right so next in our superintendence report we have a presentation um and one of the things that has been really important to me as we've moved forward with new positions new roles or new structures is to have folks who are in these positions share out with the board and members of the public the work that they've been doing to really understand um kind of not just the Mandate of the position but

042also the person who's in the role and then the types of connections that they've made and so I'm very very excited to have uh miss beatric gimenez here and Miss gimenez serves as the district Community parent involvement specialist which is a new role this year uh that was added um during the budget season last year Miss Jimenez has uh experience in this role uh prior to joining dellan she was in pambo public schools and since she has come to uh denell and she's she's brought that kind of big school big District experience um and really had a wonderful impact here uh in dellan so very pleased to have her here and uh we're excited to hear your presentation [Applause] okay IE start good evening everyone I just want to say that I'm super exced excited

043about being part of the dellan school district um my commitment as the district cpis um is to provide support um to the families to the students and to the teachers um and also to support the the school and Home Connection um I consider myself a dedicated resources resource ensuring that families um receive the support that they need and the assistance that they also need okay just a little overview about everything that I've um been doing um I am trying to improve the communication so by facilitating like clear and consistent um communication between the staff um and the parents um translating information also explaining school policies and just addressing all concerns that families have um secondly um cultural understanding bridging um The Gap culturally um by understanding families their their family Dynamics um their traditions and

044helping to um communicate with them accordingly um and also access to resources um giving the families um resources in the community outside the community um also um to benefit their child's well-being and also to their academic progress um empowering um um parents um with the knowledge and tools that they need in order to be an active participant in their child's education um including things like explaining to them their the grading systems um attending conferences and also advocating for their child's needs um also increasing engagement um encouraging parents to attend all School functions um night events um and also volunteering and being part of the school Community um which is very very important for their child success also um navigating through the the school systems um which can be sometimes difficult for parents at times um

045so things like registration um things like scheduling meetings with um their case manager with their counselor or with teachers um and understanding the schedule Education Services that we provide um the impact that parent involvement has on families um higher attendance so statistics show that children that have involved parents um usually um tend to have a higher attendance rate um they also have improved academic um performance um increasing parent involvement equals higher grades and better academic outcomes um also um enhancing the social emotional development by supporting families um by giving them social um emotional support whether it be outside sources or in in in-house sources um also it impacts the child's behavior in you know in their school in their class some of the next steps that I would um like to take is um increasing

046increasing the percentage of um parents attending um school events by 20% within a g a given time frame um achieving 25% increase in like parent satisfaction with the way we communicate um the communication channels that we currently have and implementing different ones um I currently think the best thing that um I'm able to do with parents is text um that's a great plus um being able to have that app on my phone and being able to text them when they can't pick up the phone and talk to me um is very big um being able to pick up the phone at 5:00 in the evening because I have the app and the phone the phone call is coming through instead of them leaving message um they'll you know I'll be on the other end um

047also establishing Partnerships with three um new community organizations I have been able to connect with the library different um Community organizations like the library um like also different businesses um so it's been um great um but I would like to have a stronger Bond and also add more um Community organizations um to provide supports for the families and part of my future planning um building the cultural competency I think it's very important um that as a as staff um I would like to conduct workshops right that educate staff on cultural sensitivity and the different diverse family dynamics that we have um also translating more um school information into different you know languages um incorporating culturally um relevant activities into um and events into the school calendar um strengthening family engagement um by hosting family events

048also also by workshops and focused on like academic support uh parent support and also College like Readiness um SEC the third one and and lastly is Community Partnerships um I think um establishing strong relationships with local businesses and community centers um nonprofit organizations um will provide valuable resources um to families also um coordinating joint initiatives um working with them um I've worked with the rec center where they give me their calendar I provide all the information that they have to my families when I have one-on ones with them um I give them the calendars for the library things like that that will make them become more involved in the community and also in um school activities um and Def and develop a referral Network um to connect families um knowing that they have me as

049a resource and I also have resources to give them um thank you for your time um like I said I am very happy to be here I'm very happy to work with the den Allan families um I've seen um I've worked with a lot of families and been able to help them um whether it be with resources whether it be within school um that they don't know how to navigate um and I hope to you know be an asset um to um the dellan school district and I I am thankful for being here thank you [Applause] so thank you Miss himz um and what I would say first uh is just offer board members the opportunity to ask any questions that you might have uh regarding any of the things that uh Miss Jimenez spoke

050about or the work that she's doing or anything like that uh yes I have a question yes Mr s u it's a great role and I'm really looking forward to what you can do on there and it's exciting and I think being coming from like Perth Amboy to a community like ours your impact is going to be much more felt uh part of that is understanding the changing dynamics of our community which you're you're starting to do right now and I look forward to seeing what information you'll get back to us what do you see the growths and tracking like here's here's an example um how do you think the kids that are going through the students that are going through our school system will they be staying in the community or are they going

051to be or families going to be cycling in and out uh the reason being is as denell and changes we'd also like to help influence you know longevity in the environment and also provide um or understanding what their career paths would look like how do we get them better prepared for those career paths what do do they look like what kind of jobs and what areas would that be so these are questions that you don't have to answer today but looking for feedback from you and seeing what you discover and the relationships that you build to to look at how we build our community through through your role uh for a longer period and what it looks like from I can tell you from what I've seen from these last couple months um the families

052that I've um engaged with there are families that love the community um love the small time Vibes they come from um bigger um cities and they're here to stay um and want to be involved I think um sometimes the language barriers um but other than that I think um they want to become involved um and they plan to stay here um and I think they they like what they see they like um how the students feel I've had Parents um who dis enrolled and came back in two weeks because the student said they didn't feel comfortable in the other District because this is smaller and they felt more you know at home here so that's what I've observed from and also with the students um how do you see it fitting in with like understanding

053Civics and how how our government works regardless if it's a big size or a small size I think the students with their families can have more of an impact in a smaller Community if they understand Civics I think it's very important especially for for students at the high school level you're talking about right yes um I I think involv Ving parents into what the students what we plan to you know provide the students is very important giving that giving them that education also um is good so they can support at home as well thank you Other Board member questions I know you're just getting started so it may be a an early on question but in terms of the families that you have been working with are there any themes that you've seen in terms

054of where we could be potentially falling short is not the right word but um like where there's a a kind of a theme of a need or resource that that collectively is is being seen from your work with them so far I think um me being in this role um I think parents are very happy to have me in this role um because now they know who they can go to with any questions um and if I don't have the answer finding the answer for them um whether it be outside resources whether it be inside um and helping them learn how to navigate um in the school system um so so far I think um parents are embracing um and also um no I don't I don't see any they haven't said anything as as

055far as them anything negative or anything that they they feel would be more but um if I definitely if if I do hear something I will you know try to um see how we can you know help thank you other board members yeah I did have one uh so uh I was very impressed with the the slide it was I can't remember the three bullet points three community outreach groups uh 25% increasing inreasing yes and then 20% for increasing parent um attending um 20% and 25% um increasing the the parent um Channel communication channels gotcha gotcha I I think it's great having having targets because then it's very clear what what what it is you're focusing on just double checking how how how are you going to measure that I was curious how you're measuring

056that as far um as numbers um right now we take attendance whenever we have parent events okay um and then also you know comparing it to in in a Time time frame um we could do 6 months and and see what you know how it improves um with every event I mean it's always from what I've observed already um and what I've dealt with it's usually you know timing It's usually the time you make the workshops it's usually you know um winter is usually Harder Than You Know spring um and then as far as the channels um I can take a survey as far as what um do they feel like the communication has improved um and being able to navigate okay cool I I love goals and targets and yeah Other Board member questions

057or comments all right thank you very much thank you thank you everyone um and I'll just add a couple things on to what Miss Jimenez was talking about um so you know sort of very specific things that we've been working on that that she's been able to assist parents with really relate to um the things that we're sort of not expert in um so you know we we come to this role of school administration or as a teacher as you know as Educators and we're not necessarily experts in community services right or those types of things um much in the same way that our district security coordinator is an expert in security which is not something that that we typically have you know deep expertise in so I would say that there's a there's been

058a lot of work with um the understanding the School District um and understanding understanding what what American public schools are like um and that will that relates to things like completing the um the the free and reduced lunch form for example right free and reduced meals form we have I think we were at about 55% economic disadvantage this year and that number has increased we know that there's an Under reporting of probably 10 to 15 percentage points uh people just not completing the forms but obviously the goal of a position like the cpis is to try to find those families reach out to them and explain if you fill this form out right then you actually have access to services that you wouldn't have otherwise um and there are benefits that come from that and

059also there's really no downside there's no liability there's no reporting for you know other you know anything that might be sort of a negative driver so that's been really tremendous um I think uh you know know that uh Miss moris is here and I know that Miss Jimenez has worked well with the PTO um and I think for a lot of us it's really about not only the just the person who's really the person to go to that direct contact who can spend time during the day having a conversation but it's also about addressing our blind spots so we we have policies and procedures that uh some of which you know pre-existed me some of which I may have put into place for my Administration and we may not be able to see sort of

060the externalities of those things right there might be harms there might be barriers there might be costs associated with those things that we we might not be aware of with the prior experience that Miss himz brings to us to us in the district she's seen how you know another District operates right so she's got that perspective but then she also has the sort of Common Sense feeling of of this real connection with parents and that just very open plain conversation about how do I I get vaccinations completed for free or how do I get you know U drug testing done for free or mental health counseling for free or what are the community services that can provide those things or if there's a family in need or there's a student in need how can I

061get resources for meals or those types of things um so I think it's been really tremendous the the sort of Genesis of this position was about additional supports for multilingual Learners and their families and we had sort of the option of adding another teaching position um or adding direct support for families and we basically decided that it was the families that needed the support the teachers needed someone to be able to support the families the administrators needed someone to support the families and so that's the way that the role was originated and um I'm very thankful that we found Miss Jimenez and we're we're very happy to have her on board so thank you yeah and if you feel like you have to go tonight feel free to to take off at any at any

062time but appreciate you being here tonight all right so um a couple of General items for superintendent report um the uh sort of the big news of the last couple of weeks has been the preschool facilities Grant um this was announced publicly on December 4th and dellan is one of 25 districts in the state who's receiving funding for Universal preschool facilities expansion um in middlex County there are four schools it's us Carteret Highland Park and Piscataway and so we will be receiving uh just under $3.5 million from the state to complete a project that's budgeted for slightly over $6 million um the remainder of the funds which is $25 million or so will be withdrawn from our capital reserve account uh and that means that this project has no effect on taxpayers um it has

063nothing to do with a referendum or a second question um this is a project that we are fully able to pay for through the funds and and through the savings that we've recruited so uh it's very very exciting work and basically the Expansion Project is to replace the area where my office and the business office is on the second floor of Faber uh with uh classroom space so it's going to be eight full-size classrooms small group instruction um a stairwell and some other uh some other amenities as well all of the classrooms will be 950 ft each classroom will have a uh a restroom uh in the classroom they'll all be brand new construction so they'll have all of those things as well um and we do have to then make some changes the stairwell

064is going to go in the location of the current um Faber staff uh room so that has to be relocated and we've had some conversations about that as well obviously our administrative offices have to be relocated and so we're looking offsite um we certainly don't want to take any other spaces from Faber there's there are no spaces to take so we're looking off site for a location for the admin offices where we'll be able to um still have close access to the schools but have space for the work that we need to do so the next step in this process is the approval of the architect's proposal for architectural and Engineering Services this is in the operations committee uh agenda action items for tonight it's item H the cost of this process is uh slightly

065over $500,000 um and that is included in the uh $6 million uh cost for the total project so that's not an additional half million um the preliminary schedule is also in the proposal essentially the design process will is is ongoing should finish about mid January there's a construction documents which take about two minutes two months to develop and then there's a final doe submission that happens during that time which is slated for about mid-February then there's a bid process which has a statutory amount of time that it has to be open for um we'll probably go a little longer just to try to recruit as many different uh contractors as possible uh and then we have the uh board meeting and award of the bid that process uh is slated to happen in late April

066and so we don't have the board meeting SCH schedule right now for the 25 uh calendar year because that happens at the reorg meeting but we're obviously sensitive to the needs of the construction project in terms of developing the the calendar as well then the construction phases really uh construction is is in two phases the first is going to basically be from the day after school ends um until the day that school starts uh and that's going to be the demolition of the second floor of the board offices and then what they're going to do is they're going to to create a metal uh they're going to basically create a a a a full Second Story uh which is a concrete slab on metal decking and what that allows for is construction of a second

067story that doesn't that's not disruptive of the first story so um it will it will basically you know ensure that work can be done on the second floor without it um significantly impeding the the classrooms below and then the phase two is going to basically take the majority of the school year next year um and that's the installation of the walls and the roof and the windows all the interior pieces the bathrooms um Etc and so uh our goal is uh really to to relocate the administrative offices by about miday or late May to the offsite location which has yet to be uh finalized and then allow the contractors and and folks to get in there and start the work that they need to do um to ensure that we're ready to go in the

06826 27 school year so very exciting um it's always great when the state is interested in um supporting expansion of districts that that are in need $3.5 million is a really significant amazing amount of money uh it's about 58% of the total cost of the project which is wonderful um and we're very excited so that's really kind of the the big the big item um there are a couple other items to discuss as well a regular preschool expans ion for uh for next year uh we presented on that last month that presentation is online on the website um the final decision was to um was made to add four classrooms at Big Hugs which is going to be uh at a location in Greenbrook which is uh not more than a mile or two from

069this location um that's going to take us up to 11 classrooms and the 11 classrooms will serve 165 students in total um and that actually puts us over the 90% Universal threshold so uh we had about five years we have five years to to reach that this is essentially doing it in year two two and a half um so we're very excited about that we've got a lot of interest already for preschool for the 205 26 school year um and so we're we're very excited to be able to to continue to offer that that service what happens after that we we sort of have to figure out because obviously that's going to be when after after next school year we'll have the new facility then we'll have to bring some classrooms back and all the

070rest of it but um at least for next year we'll be using both A+ Academy and big hugs as um as outside providers and then the four classrooms at Faber some uh updates on the grants that we've been working with um the expanding access to climate change Grant which we uh were awarded last year uh we just learned that we're going to be receiving an additional $155,000 in funds which is amazing we have the aquapon and the Hydroponics setup and the The Gardens and all the uh instruction that's been going with that and now we have some more funding that the state uh was able to allocate to us in order to expand that programming so that's wonderful we have the NJ dooe computer science uh education grant so three of our teachers have started

071their work uh to obtain a Masters of Science in teaching and learning computer science through uh New Jersey Center for teaching and learning uh our after school programs and clubs at Faber middle school and at the high school have um been uh sent out information has been sent out or will be shared soon so we have some cool uh after school programs and clubs that are going to be happening and then we also have parent engagement events that are going to be scheduled as part of that Grant the teacher climate and culture Grant which you'll recall was a $125,000 grant that we earned last year um we had our our second meeting on the 21st of November and we have uh decided to move forward on some purchases related to um Curriculum lesson planning and

072data and assessment these are some AI tools uh and some curriculum management tools which we um we think will um help sort of lighten the load for daily planning and curriculum work and those sorts of things we have a lot of other items that are pending um just some conversations um and obviously we have a representative of the DEA who's serving on the committee we have great teacher representation on the committee and administrative as well so we've got some really good things uh moving with that and then lastly the high impact tutoring Grant which we also earned last year um we received an additional $6,000 for programming and we have very narrow programming that's going to be offered at Faber um that's going to begin in January for students who need uh tiered supports so

073um all really cool things and as you know new grants come out we'll we'll look to um you know uh continue to to to see what other services and and options we can provide in the district um an update on uh our midyear testing one of the big drivers for the expansion of our um ESL programming uh over the last couple of years um ESL is now called enl uh English as a new language um so one of the big drivers was to be able to understand when students were ready to exit the program because we' provided them with appropriate supports so we had midyear testing that was just completed at each of the three schools and we actually had 35 students um who were uh in in the program uh tested out that's 16

074students at Faber 10 at the middle school and nine students at at the high school so it's really fantastic and those those students will still get um some support services but it means that they do not have to be pulled out of their regular classes they can be in a much more fully integrated uh classroom environment so we're definitely making really good uh movement with that um we have some work with stutter um which is our organizational Excellence uh part partner uh portrait of a graduate work there's going to be information that will go out in January and this is the sort of defining the district type of work that's going to be about four or five months worth of work with a big stakeholder group um so information about that will go out in

075January and then um lastly just uh reiterating everyone's been talking about the parent events but um last week the two band concerts which were both held at the DHS Auditorium were phenomenal um Miss anastasy did a really excellent job Mr guer as well um at the the Faber event and that was the first time that we held it at the high school previously it had been held at Faber um but with the new Auditorium we wanted to try to find a space that all the parents could be at at once um instead of sort of cycling through uh halfway and the kids got to be on the big stage and all the rest and so that was a that was wonderful um and uh on Thursday was of last week was the high school middle

076school uh bands concert and that was the middle school concert band The High School concert band and the jazz band and uh Douglas mentioned this um the the three bands were were great and really uh Mr sutera has created this this really magical program um the kids totally overperform the expectations I mean they they just they really were wonderful um the jazz band is is killer um and the two concert bands are really excellent the one thing that I said to Mr sua after the show and one of the things that is really interesting to me as a musician and as a school leader is that there the musical selection choice for their concert was uh it was it was a very mature selection of songs it it was uh not sort of traditional you

077know Christmas fair or winter fair or holiday Fair it was a song about uh mental health um that that that was preceded by a reading about the the song and the origins of it um there was a song about uh indigenous peoples and uh the challenges of of native cultures and sort of the loss of Native culture and again the way the structure of the concert is uh a student from the band got up and gave a speech about the song that they were about to play so as an audience member you had this this context for the music that you were hearing um and they just did such an incredible job so I really uh you know the next time that they're around obviously in the spring I encourage everyone to to attend a

078concert it it's it's uh truly amazing stuff they're doing an in uh in school concert on Friday as well so the kids will get to see it if they hadn't had the opportunity to do so then um yesterday there was a an evening event which was uh put together by Sandy Hoy who's the director of accountability she and uh Abby Franklin and uh Jessica McCarthy um who serve as sort of the middle school and the high school kind ofal leads um presented to parents about the results of surveys related to uh the four competencies you can see on the wall over there the four competencies self-awareness self-management social awareness and social management and so students are taking quarterly surveys and the results will be shared out with parents as well um and so they presented

079on that and then obviously the choir concert is tomorrow night at 7.m so that's my report I'll finish with a brief uh update with of enrollment the district uh total uh enrollment is uh 1,363 students so we're still a little under where we ended the year in June of 2024 um but uh we did uh pick up five new students from the November report the enrollment report is in the board agenda if anyone is interested in looking at it including our private provider prek students we're at 1405 and so obviously we'll see that continue to tick up as we add uh preschool classrooms and that is my report thank you okay thank you Mr Ross So moving on to item number 10 uh public comments so uh the board invites public comment um on agenda

080items only from members of our community in accordance with board policy 0167 public comment sections are intended to provide an opportunity for members of the public to express themselves on school matters of community interest the board and administration will be taking notes during public comment but will not provide substantive responses to questions or concerns raised by individual speakers if necessary the superintendent May provide a brief response after the entire public comment period is completed the board appreciates and welcomes feedback from the community but is not at Liberty to engage in a back and forth dialogue with members of the public during this portion of the meeting prior to making your public comment please state your name and municipality uh please note that all statements must be directed to the presiding officer please come to the

081microphone at this time if you'd like to make a comment on agenda items [Music] only you have to use the microphone it's coming yeah and could you please uh state your name and address please you my name is Rebecca and I'm at 417 4th Street denell New Jersey okay and uh now my question was for um Mr Ross about what he talked about with the new uh expansion of fav and the relocation of the administrative offices I was just wondering who's paying for the relocation of the administrative offices and any type of uh work that's going to go into that okay any other questions or no no not any agenda item this right now thank you okay thank you okay any other uh any other questions or comments last call okay did you want to

082say something okay yeah hi uh so just I mean the thank you for your question first of all thank you for being here uh the move for the administration offices is going to be uh taken as part of the general operating budget um so we don't see a significant impact to the operations um we're certainly not looking for something that will add significant cost overhead in order for us to uh accomplish this project thank you okay any other questions comments okay so moving along to uh item number 11 education disc uh discussion items at this time I will turn over uh turn the floor over to our education committee chair Mr dougen One Last Time thank you Dr present at the meeting was uh Miss Howard Miss Shimp Dr gendrano Miss drapkin and Mr Ross

083the education committee met on December 9th and discussed a number of items including a wide range of updates from M drapkin regarding professional development curricular initiatives summer programming and Grant funded initiatives the presentation being given by beatric Jimenez at tonight's meeting information regarding the draft District calendar for the 2526 school year a preschool expansion efforts and plans for next year a student survey from the University of Michigan which is on tonight's agenda for approval and a variety of confidential matters that is all thank you Mr dougen moving on to item number 12 uh education uh at this time looking for the approval of items 12 a through f as a block approve 12 a through f second open for questions or comments last call okay Mr Pepe can you please call the rooll Mr Anderson

084yes Mrs Condit yes Mr Dugen yes Dr gendrano yes Mrs Howard yes Mr satoi yes Miss schimp yes Mrs Shep yes but I believe I need to abstain from B you can you don't need to legally but you can okay and Mr Walker yes motion passes wonderful moving on to item number 13 uh personnel and uh 13A the Personnel committee report and uh that's me as the chair uh so the um Personnel committee um uh met on December 9th uh present in the discussion were uh myself Mr Anderson Mr Shep and Mr Ross and we discussed a number of items including Staffing for the current school year new clubs being considered for approval the shared services agreement with the buau regarding the hiring of an uh SRO which is on tonight's agenda for approval um

085items related to the work of the new District security coordinator and the number of confidential items moving on to item number 14 looking for a motion to approve uh 14a through p as as a block move to approve a through p as a block second open for questions or comments last call okay Mr Pepe can you please call the rooll Mr Anderson yes Mrs Condit yes Mr dougen yes Dr gendrano yes Mrs Howard yes Mr saoi yes Miss Shimp yes Mrs Shep yes Mr Walker yes motion passes fantastic moving on to item number 15 uh operations uh and the committee report for the operations committee I'll turn the floor over to Mr Walker the committee chair thank you Dr Jano the operations committee met on December 11th 2024 7 p.m. I was president along with

086Mr saoi Mr gendrano Mr Pepe Mr Ross uh discussed at the meeting were facilities work ongoing throughout the district information about the district's Universal prek facilities expansion Grant a new pet insurance plan will be available to staff members the plan for district to cover transaction fees for family lunch accounts the upcoming reorganization meeting on January 7th a number of agreements that are on tonight's agenda for approval and a variety of confidential matters that's all thank you thank you Mr Walker so moving uh to looking to excuse me uh looking for a motion to approve um items 16 a through p as a block move to approve items 16a through p as a block second open for questions comments can I hear more about the pet insurance thing sure we had a um an employee inquire

087about pet insurance and so I reached out to our broker and got some information about possible plans and um it's kind of a no-brainer because there's no cost to the district it's just something we basically connect the employee with so if employees want to uh sign up for the pet insurance pet insurance that's right and I ironically since uh since that conversation and the initiation of us looking into that uh my pet actually has had a little issue and we're kind of considering taking this on myself so I'm kind of happy about that but yeah no it's it's a thing and there's um a lot of options out there we picked one that we thought was um financially reasonable and provided a wide range of options for our staff so if they choose they can

088purchase you spend um anywhere from 15 to30 $40 a month and it covers things like your annual shots and trips any medications if you have procedures for your pets so yep interesting um I'd like like to um point out a couple of things in the Ops uh section that I think are noteworthy obviously item H is the uh approval of the proposal from Lan uh regarding the prek facilities project so all the information you can find there uh item I is the Shifting the cost of transaction fees associated with the funding of school lunch accounts and this is paid out of food services funds so the district over the last number of years has accured um a surplus in the school lunch accounts uh in the food service accounts and one of the things that

089we've come to sort of understand about the um the purchasing of uh or rather the deposit of funds into the lunch accounts is that every time a parent makes a deposit using a certain means credit card or um is it a also um there is a fee that's associated with it and the district is in compliance with the law because there's a way to do that by cash and there's no additional fee but obviously we know that most people are not using cash these days and of course there's a relationship between uh the the impact to families who can only afford small um contributions to the lunch at a time and how uh how much of an effect that that fee actually uh really feels and so what we've been able to do is essentially

090take our the Surplus and our lunch balance and from this point forward shift that so that parents will not be paying the additional fee when they contribute to the lunch accounts um through the use of a credit card or through uh a and we'll do that basically as long as we can um and I think that's that's going to have a really significant impact positive impact for families and obviously we'll try to make that sustainable so that that can continue for for many years so very exciting stuff um and then I just want to uh thank the the burough for their partnership uh items M and N are two items that are shared services agreements with the um the burough uh of dellan the first is a anou with uh the dellan police department that

091is related to the to access to the live streaming um uh Hardware the and software that we have so the district has a robust camera system which is used for Safety and Security and this uh mou allows the police department access to the camera system in certain Emergen situations which are described in the agreement and that will help us for you know if uh the police department needs to respond to emergency situations or other kinds of things so that's a very uh good agreement to have in place and then the second is a shared services agreement for the school resource office and essentially this is a um successor agreement to the SRO agreement that had been agreed to previously uh the agreement sort of lapsed um and obviously with Sergeant Chin's retirement last year um

092we haven't had someone who's been able to step into the position from the police department but this agreement puts a tentative start date of July 1st 2025 in place and uh resets the relationship with the buau so that we have very clear parameters and expectations uh this was a a really good positive um dialogue between the district and the burough we're very pleased to have the burrow as a as a partner in this process the police department is still looking to fill some positions and so that means that at the moment we we won't immediately have an SRO who will be able to to serve in the district um but once they are uh more fully staffed then we'll have a full-time officer uh full-time SRO and that will be be a compliment to our

093district security coordinator position and also the district security uh uh guard or official uh that we added um recently uh the the new position so um so yeah so just thank you again to the burough obviously uh mayor sento has been great in these conversations and chief Smith as well so uh just wanted to highlight those as well so any other questions comments last call okay Mr Pepe can you please call the role Mr Anderson yes Mrs conduit yes Mr dougen yes Dr gendrano yes Mrs Howard yes Mr satoi yes Miss Shimp yes Mrs Shep yes Mr Walker yes motion passes all right wonderful moving on to item number uh 17 right item number 17 uh topics for the board as a whole so here we have um looking for a motion uh to approve

094the second reading and Adoption of the board bylaw zero conduct of board meeting move to approve item 17 second open for questions comments and just as a reminder this is one that we had talked about in in committee um and it doesn't really uh it just kind of gives us uh the you know the pieces that we have within uh within the well anyway you you've read it it was it was in the agenda but it's something that we've already already reviewed so any questions comments okay Mr Pepe can you please call the role Mr Anderson yes Mrs condet yes Mr dougen yes Dr gendrano yes Mrs Howard yes Mr saoi yes Miss Shimp yes Miss M Shep yes Mr Walker yes motion passes wonderful moving on to item 18 old business are there any

095other topics from previous meetings that you'd like to bring up I'll just uh note board members uh during the reorg meeting um we will be looking at the 2025 Board calendar so if you could take a look at the draft calendar that is in the um committee agendas it would be really helpful to have a sense of that as we come in for January 7th so thank you any other old business okay moving on to new business the district calendar um Mr Ross all right so we have two um options presented as drafts for the district calendar they're very similar um basically have uh you know we've moved since the 20 3 24 school year to um inservice days in August students starting on the Tuesday after Labor Day um this calendar continues with that

096structure um we had some conversation about the number of inservice days that should exist before the first day of school um and that really is the primary difference between these two calendars one of the calendars I'm not sure which order they're in in the attachment has two inservice days Wednesday and Thursday which would be in line with what we've done for the last two years um and then the other one has three in service days prior to the beginning of the year we're always trying to balance um the amount of professional development time that we have in the calendar before school and then during school in order to to strike some sort of good balance it's a hard balance to to strike um but uh but essentially those are that's the primary difference and then

097there's a couple drivers that occur from that um in these draft calendars um we have October 1st is a full Professional Day in both calendars this is really meant to provide a break for staff members to ensure that they're um that they have time to kind of process everything that's happened in the four first four weeks of school so that professional development day is October 1st and then we would have a day off on uh Columbus Day and this again goes with my sort of General structure of trying to not uh have school off on days for religious holidays because there are very there's a lot of days that could be used as religious holidays and um in a way I think it's uh better if we try to just avoid them all um so

098Columbus Day indigenous people's day October 13th would be a day off from school and then November that first week um we will have school those 3 days um because there's not a significant election and it's my understanding that we're working towards uh removing uh polling from this location uh and sending that back to the U the fire department uh now that it's uh the fire building now that it's open again so we we would have school those days um December would have a professional development day um we can uh in some conversations with the association we talk talked about um potentially adding some half professional development days throughout the calendar um in a month like January where there might not be one but otherwise spring break is early next year um Good Friday is April

0993rd and so Str spring break is structured as March 30th through April 3rd um professional development days in in April and then the Friday before Memorial Day with a closing date of either the 16th or the 17th of June which is a Tuesday or a Wednesday so uh if you have comments or thoughts about this right now happy to uh to take them on otherwise we have our meeting on January 7th We could decide to adopt a calendar at that point or we could wait until the 2nd January meeting obviously that date's not yet determined but I would not really want it to go farther than that just so that we can provide um administrators and uh staff members and families with as much notice as possible also I'll just say that the next couple

100of years are are very tricky in terms of the placement of um winter break because this year um you know the 23rd is the Monday and then next year it's the 22nd and then the following year is the 21st which means that Christmas moves from Wednesday to Thursday to Friday which means that that's also the same structure that happens with New Year's Day um so my own children's District they actually have school next Monday they have a half day you have a half day also oh you do too yeah and and and part of that is because you have so many days off earlier in the year that you you would go until July if you didn't um but as much as it would be nice to have sort of two weeks off for winter

101break um you know that does obviously put a that affects the later parts of the calendar and you know the time for spring testing and all of that so um this calendar has a full day on Monday half day on Tuesday um and then the 26 27 calendar would be full day Monday full day Tuesday and half day Wednesday um prior to prior to that so again yeah feel free to send me any feedback that you that you'd like and then we'll we can talk about this again in January okay questions guys just general for Rich the enclosures I had a hard time finding the calendar enclosure is there a specific order because enclosure it's that um 19 is like near the front of all the enclosures versus at the rear I'm just I'm just

102being nitpicky so no no we'll take a look at it it might just have it's possible it's possible that that we moved the item the item may have been in the superintendent report and then I made the decision to move it to new business and we may not have moved the enclosure as well so if that's what happened that's probably what it was so that would be my fault but yeah we we we always try to all the enclosures are in order otherwise and there's a direct link um that should take you there um that Dave does a wonderful job with but but that's that may be what happened if that enclosure was at the beginning thank you I'm just being that yeah no no no I appreciate it and we'll we'll make that change

103we can adjust the agenda so that it's in the proper location um on the website okay any other comments okay um so moving on to item 20 uh president's remarks I will just take a minute to um say a brief brief few words um before we move on to the next section so as as we reflect on 2024 I think it's fair to say that it's been a heck of a year and we have accomplished a great many things we've had a good bit of change and I'm excited by all the possibilities that those changes bring especially the ones that move our district further forward I can't wait to see what happens uh or I can't wait to see what next year brings so board members any last remarks before we begin winding down 2024

104Mr Dougan I just wanted to um say what a pleasure it's been serving on the board these past four years um I think we're really fortunate we have supportive parents uh we have wonderful hardworking dedicated teachers we have a supportive administrators and for me being part of this board all of you are just some of the smartest uh kindest thoughtful people that I've worked with um you always put students first and if that's your compass you know you're always going to do good work um I also like to thank you Dr Jano and Mr Ross for your leadership because um I've worked in a lot of places uh for a very long time now and it's exciting to work with strong leadership um it could be a bit taxing if that's not the case so

105I'd like to thank you both for really wonderful four years and to your leadership and again to all my board members you are all just wonderful and it was always a pleasure really coming here and collaborating with all of you and I really admire how everyone kind of feels free to express themselves honestly L and openly uh and they trust one another um and it's important that we have opposing or differing points of view because it gets us really to a better place of understanding and in a world in a time when that seems to be lacking just a smidge um it's pretty fun to come here and work with all of you it's refreshing and thank you for all you do thank you Mr Dugan board members any other any other any other thoughts

106okay well then I'm going to wish everyone a happy healthy and peaceful holiday we'll see you in 2025 not that we're done yet just uh just uh F the remarks part of it we still have a few few things to to finish up before uh before we call it a night so moving on to item number 21 pres uh public comments uh any issue any topic so the board invites public comment on any issue topic uh from members of our community in accordance with board policy 0167 public comment sections are intended to provide an opportunity for members of the public to express themselves on school matters of community interest the board and administration will be taking notes during public comment but will not provide substance of responses to questions or concerns raised by individual speakers

107if necessary the superintendent May provide a brief response after the entire public comment period is completed the board appreciates and welcomes feedback from the community but is not at Liberty to engage in a back and forth dialogue with members of the public during this portion of the meeting prior to making your public comment please state your name and municipality uh please note that all statements must be directed to the presiding officer please come to the microphone at this time if you'd like to make comments on any issue or any topic and it's okay you don't have to say your name and address again okay unless you want to but okay uh so I just wanted to share with you that there's a hole in in equity in the regular Mathematics Curriculum offerings for 12th grade

108I'm requesting that the district provide regular offerings of basic skills or remedial math class for 12th grade open to any student to enroll and and stay in especially students scoring low and very low on math in state tests and educational evaluations these tests illustrate areas of weakness which should be worked on and strengthened by the school gifted students are provided with mathematics options regularly many options for them mathematically challenged students should have the same opportunity to have classes which are appropriate for them last year my request for an appropriate math class for my son was denied and I was told that BSI 12 would not be offered I had to get a lawyer in order to get him put in BSI 11 which is ridiculous I shouldn't have to be spending money to get my

109son into a class because he's struggling in math and needs help because of the and and beyond that I had to go through due process in order to to do this um because of this the large number um because of the large number of students who did not pass the njtpa this year the school ultimately offered BSI 12 um but as the math teacher indicates as soon as he passes he's out well he's got BSI 11 in his IEP because I fought for him to get that so he will hopefully stay in if I can keep it in his IEP though it's a struggle with the district continuously wan to deny my um my son uh the basic the basic academics that he needs math and English are very important the district's lawyer um reiterated

110in our EP meeting this this year that the only reason he's in there is because of his I and because of parent request again State scores and educational testing show him scoring low and very low and uh illustrating weaknesses uh in math uh my son also indicated to me of course this is secondhand information he said that there was another kid in his class who wanted to stay in BSI math and he was ejected because he passed finally passed an NJ GPA my son has failed it three times including uh the time when he took it in the summer which was optional um this the district has a regular practice of denying appropriate programming and denying disability um especially by by special services and the district's attorney um through continued denial special services department has

111a non-collaborative approach to parental involvement the school wants parental invol involvement but only if they agree with what the district plans so okay I hear this all the time we want uh parent involvement but that's only if I agree with the school um this year after being initially invited to my son's IEP me meeting my son turned 18 this year I was invited to the meeting but when the case manager called me to say that hey special education teacher she's going to be out I said okay let's postpone until she will be there oh no she'll not be back I'm like well the email to the kids said that kind of indicated she would and she was they said oh no she won't be back we can't postpone the meeting I said I want to

112postpone it they said okay we'll talk to our lawyer and we'll figure it out she said she'd get back to me she never did two minutes before the meeting I'm calling the principal's office because I'm trying to get in touch with special services what's going on are you having the meeting what's what's going on they refused to extend the Google meet invite to me I had to call the principal's office to get it which is ridiculous finally got it they were going to have the meeting without me and just not tell me even though they told me that they would let me know what was going to happen there's a continued denial of his disability and and and his um in lack of recognition of some challenges um yeah I just wanted to share this

113with you especially your lawyer you should uh be in one of these meeting with that tiger Vore you guys got because uh she's pretty Fierce and all she wants is deny deny deny as well as the uh your new school psychologist and that's really what I have to say it's been a frustrate frustrating Journey these last six through TW six years dealing with the district and and trying to get the appropriate services for my son that's it thank you thank you any other uh any other public comments last call okay so moving on to item number 22 uh executive session so the dellan Board of Education will now adjourn into executive session to discuss items that fall within specific exceptions to the open public meetings act C njsa 10 4-12 B confidential matters discussed by

114the board during this executive session include items related uh to individual privacy collective bargaining agreements uh pending or anticipated litigation um and Personnel uh any discussion that does not need to remain confidential will be made public as soon as it is practical minutes of the executive session will not be disclosed until the need for confidentiality no longer exists all individuals who may be discussed in an executive session have been adequately notified action will not take place after the conclusion of the executive session may have a motion uh to uh after the executive session we'll uh probably be adjourning from there so um uh yeah so this will probably be it so U what's that okay okay um we have a motion please to uh move into executive session move to go to exec seconded all

115those in favor I opposed okay so uh we will see you guys at rorg on January 7th uh 700 p.m. right here and Mr Pepe will be leading it I get the big