001[Music] good evening welcome to the franklin township board of education regular meeting today is thursday november 18th can i get a roll call mr toth yes miss desai mr grippo president mr jackson here miss maris mr patosnik miss singh dr smith president miss stanley you have a quorum oh i'm sorry president lacour here and for the record artemin and pat let us know that they would not be in attendance at today's meeting can you read the open public meetings act please yes in accordance with the open public meetings act public law 1975 c-231 sunshine law copies of this public meeting notice were sent to the courier news the home news tribune the star ledger the franklin reporter tap into franklin township franklin township clerk manager district schools offices and associations pto presidents and posted on
002the district website thank you can i get a motion to adjourn to confidential session please move by mike seconded by bill in favor opposed we are adjourning to confidential session for the purpose of discussing confidential matters which include principal interviews a special education settlement a workers compensation settlement minutes of the confidential session will be made public when the reason for confidentiality no longer exists so we're adjourned confidential good evening and welcome back to the franklin township board of education today is thursday november 18 2021 we were in confidential session for the purpose of discussing confidential matters including principal interviews a special education settlement and a workers compensation settlement minutes of the confidential session will be made public when the reason for confidentiality no longer exists ed would you lead us in the pledge of allegiance
003please sure 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 lori would you read the mission statement please yes franklin township public schools embraces its diversity fosters excellent educational innovation and empowers all students to achieve their highest potential thank you can i get a motion to adopt the agenda nancy i'm going to make that motion i would like to add a denim a to the personnel report no no it's out of battery most of them are uh i was going to add a denim a to the personnel report and then what i would like uh to do here seeing all the young men in the audience uh and folks uh appear to uh
004want to have some comment uh move uh public comment on non-agenda items up after our student representative report but for three minutes only so there's a motion to add a demae and add a public comment portion three minutes only per speaker and then go into our student representative report can i get a second please ed i'll second that second what i said i'll second it oh second by ed all in favor opposed okay welcome naffy davis hello my name is mafi davis i am one of the student government board of education liaison for the school year here's what's going on in franklin high school the fhs sister in training for life members will be collecting brand new toys for our 12th annual toys for tots toy drive all donated toys will be accepted until december
00517 2021 only new unused toys are accepted the spanish club french club and jcl are collecting food to help our community during the holiday season please donate foods such as canned goods pasta rice and other non-perishable items to give to the franklin food bank collection boxes are located in the sweden suite b106 c106 main office room b-123 and room b-116 the student government is hosting a non-perishable food drive for the manual cancer foundation see mr friedman for donation and details franklin franklin fbla is hosting a book drive from november 15th until december 17th please bring in your gently used children's teens and young adult books and novels and drop them off at any class suites or the library all the books will be donated to the under underserved children in new jersey aidan awareness club
006would like to invite all of their all to the annual diwali celebration this friday november 19th evening at 5 30 p.m to 8 30 p.m in the africa cafeteria the tickets are currently being sold 15 per person the tickets include a full course dinner dance performances a fashion show and dj dance music for tickets and details please see ms sharma the fha's guidance department is holding starts tonight on the fhs thursday november 18th at 6 pm thank you and have a good evening thank you and you're free to leave if if you want but thank you very much for your report i move we open public comment on any topic limited to three minutes move by ed seconded by second nishida all in favor opposed okay public comment on any topic is now open if
007you can come to the microphone and state your name if you're over 18s hit your address and there's a three-minute limit for speakers all right my name is benjamin guy i live in a somerset 35 patent drive i'm here to make a comment because of a committee issue um one and the reason why i say it's a community issue is because i don't want to get into politics of what what's going on but i want to make sure that i'm just raising awareness um right now we had a resignation that was actually at the uh high school which is the uh most of the people in this room might be aware as the football coach that actually resigned we've been going through this cycle with the actual athletic department for the last maybe 10 15
008years we're trying to get community engagement and get buy-in from the residents to actually support athletics as a whole one of the main staples for this community has always been football here right we've been going through a downturn as far as what we've actually been doing for retaining talent and retaining people in this community to actually support one of the main pillars that we're uh that i'm really advocating for to actually be a part of this um as a as a citizen of this community is i would like like a chance for our middle school coach to actually have a fair shot to actually get the uh representation here he's done a great job with being raised up in this community he's doing a great job with raising these community kids that are here and
009he's been doing a great job with the middle school itself now the reason why i'm making this public all together and i'm making a specific statement is because i don't want to get into the politics of it i really want the board to make the decision about this and to make it fast not even go out to a public bid about it make a fast decision about this and the reason why is because it's about the touch the feel of the culture that needs to be done in this community there's a big revamp that needs to be done as far as what we need to do as far as franklin township as a whole we need a soul back in this community and the person that can bring back the soul is blair wilson and
010we need to really really consider this it's not about politics it's not about culture it's about people and this person is a person of the people and we really need to put it put it out there to actually really really consider to actually hire this guy he's been here he's done everything that you guys have asked him to do and more and again and then again the board needs to make a heavy consideration to hire this guy in that's my time for now thank you hi good evening my name is tiffany montgomery i live at 27 roberts road here in somerset i'm just going to piggyback off of what he just said i'm here to advocate for coach blair he is a wonderful gentleman of the community he cares about our boys and that's the
011most important thing this the most important thing that coach blair shows is that he cares for our boys he wants them to win on and off the field and he has shown that years and years and years he's displayed that to our community he's displayed that to our boys he does so much for these boys and that's what it's about we're here because it's our children we need our children to have that role model and he is a significant awesome role model to our boys he shows them that it's more than just football because it is we love football and we want to win but we also need our boys to win off the field and he does that he makes them come to school on game days in khakis and polo shirts he makes
012sure that they are out there in the community doing community service he makes sure that these boys are doing what they need to do again not just on the field but off the field so all i'm asking is that you please consider coach blair to be the football coach for our boys at the high school thank you thank you good evening my name is paul matia i'm also a resident here in franklin township also alumni from franklin high school i am here along with many other people i'm sure to ask for certain things for this open position at the football head football coach at franklin high school first off i'm hoping and we want complete transparency and involvement in the process the administration needs to promote the process openly and proactively providing the information for
013the community to know what is happening and how we can be involved in the process franklin is a football community this head coach position is not a position for the school it's a position for the community it's a position for all of us as parents and residents we believe in football this town is built on football we've locked with success on and off the field in football our kids leave the school because they don't have anything to play for there's two things with a program you can play for a winning program or you can play for a coach a winning program is not going to happen overnight nobody you bring in here is going to put the x's the wins and losses up there in one year but what we can do and the opportunity
014we do have is to give these kids someone to play for and that can happen immediately there are candidate there is a candidate in this process now that is community driven we need coaches that coach 24 7. after the whistle blows you got to continue coaching and that goes that comes with staying late with the kids working harder with them seeing them on the streets making sure they're getting home they need a ride they do this they're with the wrong people stop talk to them you can only have that with someone who's part of the community a resident of franklin township we've tried it with many other coaches that live out of the area the first thing they do whistle blows practice game time whatever it is they gotta go they got an hour ride
015they gotta travel they got other other responsibilities what we need is someone who's here and dedicated to the kids these kids need mentorship off the field [Music] to build this program immediately we have a unique opportunity better than anybody else because we have a candidate who could step right in and continue what he's doing and has been doing over the years for our high school program and the kids and bring the kids back who left they will come back and keep the kids who did stay thank you [Applause] oh sure sure should i wait for you to come back right i can go good evening my name is chris druzlecki i live at 63 cherrywood drive here in somerset i might be able to bring a different perspective obviously i'm here along with all these
016individuals i've coached football in franklin township for the last 10 years i started coaching on the pop warner level in 2011 and for the last five years i've coached alongside coach blair who everyone's here in support of i don't want to talk to you tonight about football i want to talk to you tonight about what we do for the young men that we coach we have a saying on our team for the last five years that we teach 75 percent life and 25 football if you haven't been if you've been in town for some time you've seen a rising crime you've seen a rising gang you've seen a rise in young men involved in things that they shouldn't be and us as coaches have been there at ten o'clock at night 1 o'clock in the
017morning fielding calls picking kids up driving them home and being at sometimes a pseudo-father figure that they don't have there's a saying in football that the the team that feels the best players wins and i'm not sure if you're all aware that over the last 10 years there's been 15 players that should have played football in franklin township that are now currently playing major division one college football 13 of them should have played on one team together they went to school goes north as saint peter's prep as far south as as matter day what we're asking and what i'm here for is not only to support coach blair as a coach but he's a better human and i'll leave you at this my fiance and i we fostered one of my players in our home
018at the beginning of 2019. he was a young man that came from a lot of trauma he was living in a shelter in somerville and we brought him into our home and myself and nicole were having troubles with him we didn't know how to handle some of the situations that he had but at 11 o'clock at night i picked up the phone and the guy that came to my door to help me was blair wilson that has nothing to do with football and everything to do with character and that's why i should be the next football coach at franklin high school thank you thank you [Applause] hello my name is leanna nicole g quinto flores i live at 1580 ammo road i am a 37 year resident of franklin township and alumni of franklin high
019school and a parent of one of the young men on coach blair's soccer team so while public speaking is not my favorite thing to do it is definitely something that's worth putting myself out there for tonight in front of all of you i think that the skills both as everyone here has said on and off the field over the last one year that i've seen coach player involved with my son have been incredible lots of things you really can't teach a coach to teach as a community member of the franklin township soccer league both on the executive board and as a coach for the past 17 seasons i can tell you i've never seen a fellow coach as involved interested and invested as this one so i just want to also point out my son
020is a highly talented 8th grader and we are right now in the decision making process of where to send him one of the major decision making factors for us is what happens with this new coaching system and whether or not we start seeing some change within the football team structure and administration structure that's all i have to say thank you thank you [Applause] good evening my name is george metal i live at three renoir way here in somerset um a little birdie told me that this is the most um people you've had at one of these meetings in quite some time and obviously they're here to all show their support for coach blair i'd like to say that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result
021and i think there's value in bringing a coach that not only grew up in this area but also is entrenched in the lives of all of these young men and it's important for us to be a voice for him in his absence here today obviously to let you know he wants this job and he wants it bad he wants it bad so i implore you guys to please take a look at his resume his application and please give it some strong consideration thank you very much thank you [Applause] seeing no one else for public comment i move we close this portion of public comment motion to close public comment by ed seconded by second by laurie on favor all right opposed public comment is now closed um john would you like to speak to this
022explain the process i knew you would do that well yeah first off i think i speak on behalf of the board when i say thanks for coming it's it's always wonderful to hear from the community what i'm i'm trying to summarize what i heard and i think what i heard is a thirst for transparency in the process involvement in the process identifying a community driven leader to be the next football coach and and a host of other things that i've jotted down that i certainly can summarize for dr solomon and for mr margulin as the board knows the process will begin at the high school and ultimately the recommendation comes from the high school to the board and like all of our other coaches like all of our other staff members teachers principals it starts
023at the school level but i think it's fair since folks spent the time and since folks came out and i would think the board would like me probably to go over to high school tomorrow summarize these comments on behalf of the community to dr solomon who will lead the process and make sure the voices are heard i certainly can do that i i would think that would be fair and i will take care of that first thing tomorrow thank you very much i was actually going to say that i'm sure that dr solomon and mr morgan will be watching this so um they can actually hear at the support of the community as well so now we're going to move on to sure i guess you know when you guys came up here and and
024you know spoke what you did it kind of brought me back to my youth and i want everybody in this room to know that winning is everything but not games it's life and i think many of us on this board realize that and understand and we thank you for those comments thank you does anyone else have anything they'd like to add no dad walter i just want to say first and foremost thanks for coming out it's good to see folks coming out at a board meeting we meet every thursday so please feel free to come back um but it's it's it's awesome to see a community come out in support of one of our own you guys came out you came out strong and you really are showing your support for blair so um my
025my prayer is that you know everything works out and but what you guys continue to do is continue to support him as he continues to support our kids and our community thank you [Applause] thank you and and as everyone said we we don't usually have as many people show up at a board of ed meetings so it's actually really nice that you all came out and it's nice for the reason that you came out um i don't know if you guys want to stay for the rest of the meeting it'll be wonderful if you did and like walter said we meet third thursday of every month so and no action on this will be taken today this as dr valley said this will conversation what will happen tomorrow with dr solomon and mr marvel and
026dr valley i would love to encourage everybody to stay at least to honor our students who earned a silver award for sustainable new jersey at the middle school level so what's that our staff right so if we can maybe at least stay and honor our green team that'd be awesome that would be so you're more than welcome to stay and we actually hope that you do um and now we are on to our sustainable jerseys school team recognition principal tori heard oh sorry bud well while we still have this crowd i just want you to know that we are very proud i'm a proud principal that works with blair coach blair and when i say he does an amazing job with our young men i can't wait to see his face at two o'clock because
027any issues i have with any football players that's an immediate meeting and it's immediate resolution so i want to say thank you for coming out because he's done a great job with our boys at franklin middle school and i'm very proud of everything that he's done for us with us and right beside us so thank you coach blair phones will get you in trouble every time you know you try to put everything on the phone so what are we doing digital because we've won a couple of awards in the last three weeks and i am so proud of our staff our students and our community at large because this is a collective reward can we have mr porter come up please mr springsteen for the first award because you guys did the work i want
028you to take the war [Applause] so this group our our goal is to make sure that we prepare students we're preparing students for the 21st century and the silver certification is also it's about curriculum it's about digital citizenship it's about responsibilities about going into the community and doing what's best for the community and preparing our students for their next journey and this is what part of the team did i mean it's creating curriculum it's making sure that we have digital uh citizenship when we infuse technology into everything that we do and they just did a wonderful job so i want to say on behalf of the board of ed dr rivalli and his cabinet we thank you so much for all that you do so thank you so much our next award we were just
029winning all week that's coach blair would be um so proud our next award was a work of love with our students being out and not being in school and us being hybrid working together and doing something for the social emotional mindset of our students one of our teachers came up with this great idea to create a call the warrior garden and someone saw miss martinez come on up she was a she was very critical for this this award and they decided what better way than having the students create a garden a place for them to go to settle down when they get upset they painted rocks if you get an opportunity please come to the middle school to check out our garden because it's a beautiful soothing environment for our students that can go out
030there when they're upset and they immediately calm down they immediately calm down and they've made it a safe space for our students and not only that the vegetables that we get the vegetables and fruit that we get over the summer is just unbelievable so come on over to the middle school check in wear your mask and we love to show you what's what's in our garden and we also have a book stand there as well where students can get books so thank you again to our wonderful team we call it the warrior farm and on behalf of franklin middle school i said thank you for all your work is anyone else here from our warrior team linda is linda here oh come on linda this is miss yoga she does our yoga in the garden
031so when you guys get a chance come on over linda's doing yoga in the garden linda is along with miss martinez they were they were in thy garden all summer all summer tilling the uh till in the land i know nothing about gardening but they told me tilling the land and they're watering it every week and we saw the fruits of their labor and it's it's a place that our students go and enjoy themselves and i thank you from the bottom of our heart our students thank you so thank you very much [Applause] which is thank you very much and and thank you to um the warrior farm team in sustainable new jersey it's great that you guys got recognized by this organization and ed i know that you are the one that kind of
032turned us on to sustainable jersey at a school board's meeting a long time ago you want to talk about it well i just want to thank everybody that's involved uh sustainable jersey and the work that they're doing to teach young people about how to protect our natural resources it's awesome and then you know also feed us so i think it's fantastic and the digital program is important as well so congratulations to principal hurd and the whole team thank you does anyone else have any other comments they want to make no nope okay now we are on to our superintendence report yes and i would just want to take this opportunity to personally congratulate mrs hurd and the fms at hsc green team i think the one thing that it needs to be understood is that
033and and you can check my facts on the website only 32 schools and you know there are 600 plus districts only multiply that by the number of schools you can imagine and only 32 schools thus far have achieved silver status so this is no easy feat and it's certainly something that they should be very proud of i know we're very proud of them and they continue their work as as explained um they also were one of the very few districts to get a grant so um miss clark you have to check my fax but i believe if if i recall correctly it's 32 schools and only 32 schools who have achieved silver status and fms at hsc is one of them we have several other schools in the district now who have been motivated by
034that and several other schools have developed their own green teams and several other schools have now started the process of working through what is needed to achieve sustainable new jersey status as well so very proud of all of our principals all of our green teams and the work that they're doing i only have two other items i want to keep it relatively short tonight holiday travel as the holiday season approaches i just want to remind everyone the district does have pandemic travel protocols in place for those who plan to travel in fact tonight the board is acknowledging an amended version of travel protocols that provide direction to our school community in accordance with the latest cdc guidance travel protocols and all other pandemic response protocols can be found on the website all you need to
035do is click open the covid related protocol tab on the left hand side of the district's main page and you'll see things like testing protocol quarantine protocols travel protocols so forth and so on so you can stay as up to date with with with the ever-changing landscape of the kovid 19 protocol world um and i also want to say uh thank you and congratulations to the mighty force of folks that we had out yesterday at the hamilton street campus who worked a pop-up clinic in age 5 to 11 pop-up clinic led by none other than our school nurses and our favorite person over there with her laptop open miss mary clark we hosted an age five to eleven clinic and we had over 300 children with their parents that showed up to be vaccinated somerset
036county is who did the vaccinations the somerset county health department we partnered with them they were wonderful through the process our school nurses again are second to none miss clark you did a wonderful job with your team organizing it dr sofield um so thanks for providing that opportunity for our students those 300 plus students will now come back on december 8th and receive a second shot from the somerset county health department and then post break we'll see if we have the opportunity and the need is there will host perhaps another pop-up as well i do also want to mention that for ages 12 and above we partner with the township and provide the facility while the township provides the testing and somerset county provides vaccinations so on sunday on sunday at the hamilton street campus
037and that campus is just perfect for doing these kinds of events which is why we always select that campus from 11 a.m to 3 p.m the township will host a testing slash vaccination pop-up clinic for those anybody can be tested but those ages 12 and above can be vaccinated they will not have vaccination for the age group 11 5 to 11. we did that on wednesday and obviously that's different dosage so they won't the county won't be bringing that on sunday can't bring that on sunday but they are on sunday through the township gonna do a testing vex clinic uh for ages 12 and above if if there's a need there so that's it for me again thanks to all those involved in yesterday's pop-up clinic it went well well organized and kudos to all
038thank you can you please all join me in a moment of silence for the passing of jody marcou whose daughter is alyssa marco a teacher at hillcrest thank you my report's kind of short too this being thanksgiving or just about thanksgiving and bill and i are fortunate enough to be warriors for life so the warrior for life foundation is presenting i love franklin week so if you go to their website you can find out all of the ways that you can support franklin and support warrior for life and on giving tuesday which is november 30th you can donate if you graduated you can donate your um the year that you graduated so if you graduated in 2000 it would be 20 dollars to donate so all that money goes to support our students so please
039check that out and it's also a good time to bring up the franklin food bank as as as you brought up tori the um it's a really good time and this month to support the food bank but hunger happens all year so it's a good time to support all of those organizations and i want to wish everybody a very happy thanksgiving coming out of last year i think we have a lot to be thankful for and i think sometimes we forget what we have to be thankful for and if you know somebody that needs some help there are resources that you can that you can apply and now we are on to comments from the public and this would be on agenda items only this is kind of weird that we're doing it backwards and
040this would be five minutes per speaker can i get a motion dope and public comment so moved moved by mike seconded by nishida all in favor aye opposed okay public comment on any item is now open i'm sorry on agenda items is now open and ms clark has some okay all right so does anybody have anything on agenda items please come to the podium and state your name and address boy nothing clears a room faster than a board of ed meeting can i get a motion to close public comment on agenda items move by mike seconded by second walter all in favor always okay public comment on agenda items is now closed lori can you read the um curriculum report please yes the curriculum and instruction committee met monday november 8th via zoom at 6
04115 pm in attendance for myself as chair ms arderman singh mr walter jackson and miss nancy lacourt also dr daniel longren and dr ravalli under new business the committee approved participation in a rutgers university study called the socioeconomic benefits of a novel pilates intervention for the new jersey public school students participation in the study is cost free to the district submission of the district's preschool plan for the 2022-23 school year this plan will enable the district to continue to enhance its delivery of preschool services to eligible students in franklin township the committee also discussed progress on the franklin township public school district equity plan the discussion enabled committee members to review progress being made on the various initiatives outlined in the district's plan the meeting concluded at approximately 7 pm thank you i can't get
042to my committee reports from yeshida did we have communications the communications and public engagement committee met on november 8 2021 present for myself as chair ardeman singh miss laurie maris nancy lacroix and mary clark this was a special meeting of the communications committee for the purpose of discussing the district and school websites the committee discussed concerns raised by the ptso president's council with regard to search engine navigation and content of the website the committee discussed the possibility of securing a new website template providing additional training to district web curators and obtaining additional feedback from the larger district community the committee will revisit these items when it meets at its next scheduled meeting thank you bill can you read safety this month there's no safety okay i just i can't get to any of my reports
043i don't know what we have a report on thank you um walter would you read personnel please okay one second the personnel committee met on number 10 myself dr michael smith nancy lacour dr john ravalli ron bonanno and jackie schneider did your mic just go out sorry the personnel negotiation committee will review and or discuss the following items personnel report november 10 2021 number five personnel committee reviewed and discussed the personnel report for november 10 2021 appointments include teachers prayer professionals assistant school business administrator controllers and food service workers additional stipend appointments include winner coaches fine visual and performing arts positions extended day learning title 1 saturday detention administrator and assessments workers compensation settlement the personnel committee reviewed the settlement offered included in the agenda employment contracts for mr brian bonanno and miss mary clark
044the personnel committee reviewed the individual employment contracts for mr bonanno and ms clark based revised job description and title changes we did the good of order dr reval reviewed the committee the interview and recommendation process for the high school football coach thank you can you do policy as well yes policy committee met on november 8th in attendance were myself as chair nishita desai lori marris dr john ravalli nancy lacour and mary clark the committee reviewed and discussed the recent change to the testing protocol a doctor's note is no longer required for students to return to in-person learning after quarantine provided that they are able to show proof of negative pcr tests the committee reviewed and discussed revisions to the following policies and agreed to move them forward for full board consideration at today's meeting policy
0452422 health and physical education the name of this policy was changed and new requirements of the new jersey student learning standards were added policy surrogate parents and foster parents the name of this policy was changed in other language revised to reflect changes in terminology foster parent will be replaced by resource family parent policy 5116 education of homeless children language was added to acknowledge a yearly report which must be submitted to the office of homelessness prevention which accounts for students enrolled in the district as a result of being homeless policy 8420 emergency and crisis situations languages upgraded to updated to align with status regarding fire and school security drills and then regulation 8420 8420.1 fire and fire drills was also reviewed and language from status added to directly align with district responsibilities regarding fire safety as
046mandated by law the revision to this regulation will come before the board of education at their december meeting respectively submitted thank you um mike would you do finance please sure the finance committee met on tuesday november 16th of this year at 6 pm present were president of the court myself as chair mr grippo dr ravalli mr toth mr ellis mr bonanno and miss mcmillan we went over the district financials where the committee reviewed the bills list for the current period and the board secretary's report the transfer report the bank reconciliation and the void check report for the prior period dr ravalli and mr toth reviewed the sr-3 budget the plan will be posted to the website for the public to view we also discussed our charter school payments activa academy received 16 898 cjcp received
0471 million forty thousand seven hundred and forty four dollars i love this because they're all in in double zeros um at this time uh greater brunswick thirty seven uh thirty seven thousand and seventy four dollars thomas edison received five hundred and fifty two thousand one hundred and twenty eight dollars the barack obama school received three thousand eight hundred ninety six dollars total monthly tuition uh for these charter schools was one million six hundred and fifty thousand seven hundred and seventy dollars total tuition uh to date for the year is nine million four hundred and forty seven thousand three hundred and twenty dollars uh that also uh includes some transportation uh cost uh for those schools that's 242 000 for this period 354.16 and then total for the year total payments to uh the charter schools
048is nine million six hundred and eighty nine thousand six hundred and seventy four dollars and sixteen cents uh our meeting ended at 6 30 pm and that's all thank you thank you ed would you do the facilities committee please uh the facilities can be met on tuesday so no try that again tuesday november 16th at 6 30 p.m in attendance was uh president lacour mr grippo dr smith dr ravalli jonathan toth ryan bonanno sharifah mcmillan and ryan ellis the capital projects were the first item on the agenda and included the pjm hvac the hvac unit has been installed and the electric is complete the only remaining work is on the exterior duct work which will be completed by thanksgiving just next week the severe secure vestibule project is also underway triform finished the above ceiling
049drop soffit at mcafee road school steel was installed this week at the pine grove manor school and the sidewalk is scheduled to be poured this week all the schools will begin to receive glass deliveries next week and the installation will begin thereafter at the board administrative complex the contracts for asbestos abatement are being awarded at tonight's meeting later on the agenda the franklin high school dugouts the committee directed ryan ellis to prepare bid specifications for the acquisition of modular dugouts for the varsity football team a baseball team and the softball teams and those are like movable that's what they're modular and then the land sale contracts have been executed by both the franklin township board of education and the franklin township library board the only remaining items for the new jersey department of education to
050approve is for the disposal of land and the amendment to the boe a long-range facilities plan the meeting started at 6 30 and ended at 8 10 pm thank you did you want to talk about the um solar how that's going since that's what you do for a living yeah so i mean maybe mr tilth can add a little bit more but one of the things that was i think a really smart engagement that the board decided i guess it was just a little over a year ago now the facilities committee invested in solar on the claremont school originally the roof was built as a green well the whole building was built as a green leed certified building to the gold standard and it didn't include solar but it was very energy efficient it used
051half the water half the electricity of our other schools which was awesome but money being the way it is and not knowing how the budgets are going to go we weren't sure we'd have the funds for solar and while a lot of our schools we've looked at doing something called a planned purchase agreement where we work with an outside vendor to provide the solar and we buy it back at a discounted rate we don't have to put any capital into that the board bought the solar array at claremont school so not only are we saving free energy we get something called a solar renewable renewable energy credit or in this case they're a transition all renewable energy credit and i think in the first month now that we've gotten ours would have received sixteen thousand
052dollars back in rebates in addition to the free energy and that's going to be every single month for 20 plus years of dividends from using taxpayer money money to make that investment and we estimate that in about three or four years we'll have paid off the array and then the rest will be as they say gravy and it'll help relief taxpayers from having to pay those bills so i just want to commend the board on that and that was the newest bit of information and it's very exciting to see that come to fruition i know it was not as easy as some of the other arrangements we've had but taking that risk you can start to see the math and it's on our side and it's on the side of taxpayers too so i really
053appreciate everybody going forward with that thank you thank you and now we are on to new business guess i'm up new business new business i would like to make a motion to move r1 m1 a1 through a10 b1 through b9 c1 through c6 p1 through p3 and again that's with the addendum a for the personnel report okay the motion is to move r1 m1 a1 through 810 b1 through b9 c1 through c6 p1 through p3 and including adenoma a second seconded by bill okay anybody have any comments discussion laurie nishida bill any comments or discussion on any of that you said no okay sorry i can't hear that's okay no ed mike no okay mr toath how about a roll call oh wow really yeah mr grippo yes mr jackson yes yes yes thank you
054miss maris yes mr bertoznik yes it wasn't me before sorry miss miss singh oh sorry uh dr smith yes president of the court yes motion cares thank you you might want to ask mr jackson again yes he's got the good mic okay he has him all right i would like to welcome our new principal of conor lee rhodes school mr david harass would you like to come up and say something greetings my name is david eros and i am uh delighted to be filling the shoes as the new principal of connerly road school i have been an educator here in franklin township since wow 1998 and even did my student teaching here when i was at rutgers there was a high school teacher who came to speak to my introduction to teaching class and he
055spoke so passionately about franklin township that i said i have to be wherever that man is my first vice principal uh was dr donna silver burnett and my mentor when i got my principal certificate was dr donna silver burnett and so being able to serve her school carry on the strong tradition at connerly road school and serve the students the families the staff and faculty is just an honor thank you board of education thank you very much and congratulations and now can i get a motion to open public comment on any item right no just just sorry just from the emails that i didn't know before sorry about that i'll happily move that open public comment just for emails second okay motion by ed seconded by mike all in favor aye opposed [Music] mary go
056ahead okay the first comment is from naisha reynaz of 1003 green hill manor drive franklin park i am reaching out to nominate coach blair franklin middle school coach for the high school coach position he is the epitome of a coach because of his passion for the game but more importantly for his actual love for the boys that are on his team he has had such an influence on my son that my son actually calls coach blair when he does has done something wrong for guidance and when he has something positive to share as well the bond that he has with him amazes me because i can see that is making a tremendous difference in how my son views himself the idea of not only teaching the sport but also teaching these young men to become
057gentlemen is what is driving my push for you to consider this nomination unfortunately i am not able to attend the meeting for this evening but i hope this item makes the agenda and he is considered for the open position thank you for your time in advance kindest regards we have one other and this one is from wendy gardner my name is wendy gardner of 12 timberland drive i am the proud parent of two children in the franklin township public schools district i also served as a pto board member of fps and claremont elementary school now that my kids are in sgs and fms i volunteer in other ways to support my children and the school i have a few questions regarding curriculum slash budget one why are we teaching our children equity and project 1619
058is this a part of critical race theory if so why such a diverse community which we should be teaching them to separate into race groups two the educational present presentation by dr d logren in october 2021 why was there such a drop in test scores i ready diagnostics and a failing graduation rate of 89 percent three what is being done to improve test performance and increase our embarrassing graduation rate four during the school year 2020 2021 my daughter informed me that because of the shortened day and off every friday the math department failed to teach over four chapters of math for her algebra 2 class because of this she is struggling in pre-calculus she's also informed me that her math teacher is also frustrated because her teachers and students have to play catch-up in order
059to move forward what particular tools will the board provide to help these students succeed note she is already participating in office hours and five why are we paying head coaches and assistant coaches from four thousand dollars to twelve thousand dollars for their respective season when was the last time fhs has won states in fall sports thank you wendy gardner that is all the public comments that were submitted via email thank you very much mary okay would you like to comment on i move we closed the email portion well they only have one email person so favor opposed mary's email comments are now closed john would you like to comment uh sure i mean i think we handled the coach comments earlier i certainly will include that in the summary as far as the other questions
060um you know why are we teaching equity is that critical race theory so forth and so on uh you know let me be clear we're not teaching critical race theory instead our equity plan strives to what our equity plan strives to do is is really improve what we consider the technical core which is the student-to-teacher relationship a student's sense of belonging in school and the student-to-content relationship i'm sure if you take the time to carefully review our equity plan of action which is board approved that's online that will be apparent as you look at the goals and the action steps that are included in that plan as far as i ready diagnostics and and dr lagren's presentation from last month you know as mentioned by dr lagren last month you know much of the data
061collected the last two years in the absence of state testing really needs to be consumed with caution and you know dr lagren said that on several occasions and that really is due to the unusual circumstances brought about by the pandemic um you know at one that well actually all of last year we didn't have kids in school two years ago and all of last year at the secondary level 60 of our students were learning from home while 40 percent of our kids were learning from school and for a portion of the year that 40 percent were really in a hybrid format or or in an alternating week format so as explained by dr lagren um what our data did reveal is that the kind of growth we've been experiencing in previous years we did not
062experience and i mean unfortunately to be expected with that said we described a host of interventions now that we have our students back and our teachers back and students working with teachers we described a host of interventions they were presented in dan's plan that'll be funded as a good deal of them by esser funds um and you know those are designed to promote the kind of growth that we had been experiencing pre-pandemic um so you know that really leads to question three what's being done to improve test performance i think uh was that question and well you know quote unquote embarrassing graduation rate well the graduation rate is a cohort graduation rate which is not the number of kids that graduate in any one given year but it is a a rate and i think
063it's important to state this it's a rate that is calculated over four years and that changed several years ago in new jersey and one of the challenges in in in recent years with a pandemic is the movement of students you know because what it does is take a snapshot in time when students enter the high school and then it follows that student for the next four years now if a student moves then the expectation is that you know the student registers somewhere else and that's coded one way by us another way by someone else um so you know we've appealed a lot of these as well so we anticipate that rate will go up a bit but it's fairly consistent to where it's been in all honesty and do we want it to be better
064absolutely and are we working hard to improve that sure and some of the things that i mentioned in the response to number one our equity plan will address that right um having students feel like they belong in the school that they go to having students connect better with their teachers having students connect better with the content that's going to improve those kind that kind of data it's going to have a direct reflection on it which is why that equity plan is so important um you know and with that said all the other interventions that dr logren described and we do have a a plan as well online and you know i know i reference online a lot but that's really where there is a lot of information and we just recently updated the arp sr3
065plan that's how we're utilizing arp sr3 money and kudos to dr logren the office of curriculum instruction the directors the supervisors the administrators the parents who responded to the surveys that we put out there the teachers who responded to the surveys that we put out there because and the data and and you know with all of that put together i think we have developed a pretty sound plan on how to leverage the uh the arp money that we're fortunate to be taking into the district that will provide a lot of the support that is needed for our students as we move forward to gain ground you know due to this horrific conditions that we've been under the last two years so i encourage you and i think that handles number three i think that also
066handles number four you know listen yes we had shortened days and yes we needed those fridays to help prepare our staff to be able to teach in a whole brand new way in a whole brand new way um and you know we weren't alone in that quest right we were very consistent across somerset county and for that fact across the state in in in working with each other to develop programs that were they traditional no um and were they uh um but we were maximizing i guess a better way to say we're maximizing what we had and what was dealt to us at the time so yeah unfortunately we know we did lose time and we know we had to prioritize standards and trim content and do the kinds of things that we had to
067do the last 20 months and now we've got to make that time up it's unfortunate but we have to and the good news is that that plan if you take the time to look at it that arps or 3 plan you'll see that there are a lot of really good things included funded by the federal money and the state money that we've been awarded that will allow us to again catch up on some of that time that we miss so and for question five i mean why are we paying head coaches i think that's what it was an assistant coaches mary um well coaching salaries are negotiated it's it's part of the contractual agreement between the board and the ftea and it's you know detailed in the payment of schedules and once that goes into
068effect then it's a contractual obligation so whatever it is for that position is what that person makes no more no less and uh if the season's cancelled or you know like had to happen during the pandemic well then that money's not utilized or if it's cancelled during the year for whatever reason then it's a prorated amount so you know all all those kinds of salaries club salaries in addition are are are all part of a larger schedule that's part of a negotiated agreement and the personnel office simply follows that schedule of salary and that's it thank you um regarding all the salaries everything is posted actually it's part of our budget every dime that is spent within the district is posted on the district website so you can find anyone's salary and with respect to
069the um to our equity plan it's excellent and the um the equity committee meets monthly um and then they have subcommittees that meet as well so that that's comprised of teachers staff supervisors parents students we have on our teams and representatives from the board so it's a pretty um robust committee does anyone have anything for the good of the order bill i'll start with you i go first okay so i've been quiet tonight got a few things first of all um the value of coaches um in coach blair's case i think back over the years of the wonderful coaches we've had in franklin township from back with len rivers and carl wade and matt perry and malcolm bernard and the effect that coaches have on kids is so profound so i wish the very best
070for the future of franklin football teams through all the grades especially pop warner middle school right up the character building that coaches provide is incredible david congratulations when i came to frank well when i came to franklin somewhere in the middle about 20 years ago my first school i was principal of was connolly so i know the footsteps i know the bricks and you're going to have a great time there and best wishes congratulations tori that's great work with the green team and um hennessy she mentioned you with the garden if you have extra produce contact me for the food bank in franklin we have a pantry that is people are starting to come come january that that the walk-in section will be open and it's so great to see people come for fresh produce
071so if you have a garden that's that's just great um and the last thing is a couple meetings ago uh ed patassock put a a thought in my head about electric buses i heard president biden talking about it and um and i know jonathan toth is doing a study on it this year just a couple of things i'd like jonathan to think about is the the size of the lot when we had our own buses for years in franklin township was great to have a bus driving community we don't have that now but maybe with electric buses that could come back it's a possibility we have to look at the size of a lot the cost of maintenance comparison of food fuel to electric driver training the elect the longevity of the buses shared services
072with municipality and county available grants that could help pay for this and the number of buses needed i know it's a big task jonathan but it'd be great to see what the results of your study are so that's it have a blessed thanksgiving everyone and thank you for all you do thank you very much bill uh nishita do you have anything for the good of the order lori i wanted to congratulate mr harass godspeed and also to mrs hearn nice work congratulations and i wanted to especially thank the voters for franklin township for reelecting me to the board it's a very humbling experience to um be elected again and it means a great deal to me to be able to be part of this fabulous district and to be able to have the privilege to
073help in implementing some of the wonderful programs that we have got gotten started so thank you very much from the bottom of my heart [Applause] thank you i actually meant to say thank you lori and congratulations and congratulations to dennis hopkins and sami shaban who will be joining both dennis and sammy will be joining us in january and ed will be leaving us to join the franklin township council as the first ward representative so congratulations to you ed as well [Applause] speaking of ed do you have anything you'd like to say yeah congratulations in order uh principal hurd again thank you for all the work that you're doing uh sustainable jersey is a rigorous program as the superintendent mentioned it's awesome um and the nice thing about education is you know we can foster skills
074and students that we don't even have our own and um you know i remember directing the musicals and i had some talent in some areas but like when i was choreographing dance that was not my strength and they always went so much further than i could and similarly you mentioned you weren't really a gardener but yet your school has a garden and it's taking off because you're facilitating that and it just it's what we do in this space and it's just amazing so uh congratulations and also mr harass now not acting principal anymore uh principal congratulations to you and um um i just wish everyone a happy thanksgiving it's a it was really moving to have everyone here tonight and really to be back in person in so many different places and what a great
075community we have and i'm hopeful you get time with your families again it you know and and really get to break bread and appreciate each other thank you walter do you have anything oh yes happy holidays uh safe happy wholesome thanksgiving to all um we all truly have something to be thankful for so if you have an opportunity this thanksgiving season try to be a blessing to someone who's less fortunate um david congratulations i know you'll do great we're excited about what you will be drinking continuing to bring to franklin and i would like to congratulate principal torrey hurd as well as crystal cross last month i believe they were inducted into the basketball hall of fame at king university so congratulations on that accomplishment that's it [Applause] mike congrats congrats i have a seed
076problem if you need seeds happy thanksgiving and i just want to say have a very blessed thanksgiving and with that we are adjourned [Music] you